Comprised of suggestions and ideas for making a relationship special--contributed by men and women of all ages--this book is a collection of moving, honest, often funny, and always real "secrets" for nurturing and enjoying romance.

Rowdy, ecstatic, and sometimes stern, these teaching stories and fables reveal new and very human properties in Rumi's vision. Included here are the notorious "Latin parts" that Reynold Nicholson felt were too unseemly to appear in English in his 1920s translation. For Rumi, anything that human beings do--however compulsive--affords a glimpse into the inner life. Here are more than 40 fables or teaching stories that deal with love, laughter, death, betrayal, and the soul. The stories are exuberant, earthy, and bursting with vitality--much like a painting by Hieronymus Bosch or Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. The characters are guilty, lecherous, tricky, ribald, and finally possessors of opened souls. Barks writes: "These teaching stories are a kind of scrimshaw--intricately carved, busy figures, confused and threatening, and weirdly funny. This is an entertaining collection from one of the greatest spiritual poets of all time, rendered by his most popular translator. "The minute I heard my first love story, I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don't finally meet somewhere. They're in each other all along."--Rumi

Leadership has for too long been treated as a function and not as a relationship. Zina Sutch and Patrick Malone argue that successful leadership must be based on love (altruism and empathy) and laughter (positive emotions and joy). Science tells us that humans are deeply wired for empathy and compassion and that our emotional selves help us make better decisions and motivate others. However, the tactics we use to train leaders bear little reflection of these advancements; we're still creating competent but emotionally distant leaders who “manage human assets” and lead by setting goals, deadlines, and deliverables. Zina Sutch and Patrick Malone hope to flip a light switch and illuminate, above all else, that leadership begins with heart and soul. Too many training programs reduce leadership to an equation, matrix, or acronym. But leadership is a relationship. It's one human helping another. The most successful leaders show they genuinely care about their employees and are, well, fun. It's just like any relationship. In seven succinct chapters, the authors show that people lead best when they tap into their genetically driven human nature to love and nurture, connect and trust. Leading with love and laughter offers powerful dividends: tighter teams, stronger performance, improved morale, greater trust, more creativity, and even better health. While Sutch and Malone cite the science and offer examples, tips, and practices, their larger purpose is to reintroduce the warmth of human interaction and emotion as the foundation of what leadership is all about.

To know the Sweet Potato Queens is to love them, and if you haven't heard about them yet, you will. Since the early 1980s, this group of belles gone bad has been the toast of Jackson, Mississippi, with their glorious annual appearance in the St. Patrick's Day parade. In The Sweet Potato Queens' Book of Love, their royal ringleader, Jill Conner Browne, introduces the Queens to the world with this sly, hilarious manifesto about love, life, men, and the importance of being prepared. Chapters include: • The True Magic Words Guaranteed to Get Any Man to Do Your Bidding • The Five Men You Must Have in Your Life at All Times • Men Who May Need Killing, Quite Frankly • What to Eat When Tragedy Strikes, or Just for Entertainment • The Best Advice Ever Given in the Entire History of the World From tales of the infamous Sweet Potato Queens' Promise to the joys of Chocolate Stuff and Fat Mama's Knock You Naked Margaritas, this irreverent, shamelessly funny book is the gen-u-wine article.

ONE OF THE MOST LOVED NOVELS OF THE DECADE. A long-lost book reappears, mysteriously connecting an old man searching for his son and a girl seeking a cure for her widowed mother's loneliness. Leo Gursky taps his radiator each evening to let his upstairs neighbor know he’s still alive. But it wasn’t always like this: in the Polish village of his youth, he fell in love and wrote a book…Sixty years later and half a world away, fourteen-year-old Alma, who was named after a character in that book, undertakes an adventure to find her namesake and save her family. With virtuosic skill and soaring imaginative power, Nicole Krauss gradually draws these stories together toward a climax of "extraordinary depth and beauty" (Newsday).

“A timely story about what matters most deeply: our quest for love and acceptance….Jyotsna Sreenivasan’s writing speaks straight to the heart.” —Kim Barnes, author of In the Kingdom of Men And Laughter Fell from the Sky, the enthralling first novel from Jyotsna Sreenivasan, is a stirring contemporary love story about two young Indian-Americans trying to find love and their place in the world, while dealing with the confines and pressures of their culture and their families. A remarkable literary journey that carries the reader from the American heartland to the Pacific Northwest and into the teeming heart of India, And Laughter Fell from the Sky is a magnificent debut by a fresh and exciting new voice, immediately placing Sreenivasan alongside Jhumpa Lahiri, popular author of The Namesake, as an expert chronicler of the Indian-American cultural experience.

"An absolutely dazzling entertainment. . . . Arousing on every level—political, erotic, intellectual, and above all, humorous." —Newsweek "The Book of Laughter and Forgetting calls itself a novel, although it is part fairy tale, part literary criticism, part political tract, part musicology, and part autobiography. It can call itself whatever it wants to, because the whole is genius." —New York Times Rich in its stories, characters, and imaginative range, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting is the novel that brought Milan Kundera his first big international success in the late 1970s. Like all his work, it is valuable for far more than its historical implications. In seven wonderfully integrated parts, different aspects of human existence are magnified and reduced, reordered and emphasized, newly examined, analyzed, and experienced.

I've always been textbook people pleaser with third-degree middle child syndrome. Putting everyone else first with a smile on my face was working out pretty well for me when out of nowhere, Archer Bliss - a growly single dad- drops a bomb on my carefully constructed happy life. It seems my boyfriend has been cheating on me with Archer's girlfriend. Even worse? She's my coworker and secret archnemesis. The old me would have forgiven them and wished them the best. But the new me has had enough. So, I do the (ir)rational thing and dump my lunch all over the backstabbing cheaters. Then I plant a kiss right on Archer's very kissable lips right in front of both of them. That's right - I started a war by serving up a dish called revenge, which is best served with lips and lo mein. And now, I've somehow teamed up with this hunky beast of a man to get even with our cheating exes. At least it started that way, but now it's an excuse to spend time together... some of which is horizontal. The catch? He's got three kids who need him, and I'm still trying to figure out who I am. Starting a romance with each of us fresh out of a messy breakup is only asking for trouble. But the new me likes trouble. And Archer Bliss is trouble with a capital T.

Be Intentional and Laugh Together to Enjoy a Happier, More Satisfying Marriage. Life can be a grind, but marriage can be a source of joy and refueling. When you intentionally look for the funny moments of life and enjoy them together, you’ll see that married life doesn’t have to be as hard as we sometimes make it out to be. In A Love That Laughs, you’ll learn that you don’t need to choose between work and play, duty and fun, laughter and responsibility. Use humor to lighten the load of everyday life, reduce stress, and grow closer together. Pastor and comedian Ted Cunningham will help you: Learn comedic skills, such as effectively using the “callback” as a laughter toolInitiate laughter by using two activities at the end of each chapterRate Your Laughter Score (and your spouse’s) by following the ten types of laughter explained in the book (hint: you can get points for a smirk)Tally all of your laughter points for a final laughter score A Love That Laughs may be your favorite marriage book that will help you enjoy your spouse more. It even includes a bonus chapter: “Extra Credit: Ten Fast, East, and Free Ways to Make Your Spouse Laugh.”