Tinderbox tells the exclusive, explosive, uninhibited true story of HBO and how it burst onto the American scene and screen to detonate a revolution and transform our relationship with television forever. The Sopranos, Game of Thrones, Sex and the City, The Wire, Succession...HBO has long been the home of epic shows, as well as the source for brilliant new movies, news-making documentaries, and controversial sports journalism. By thinking big, trashing tired formulas, and killing off cliches long past their primes, HBO shook off the shackles of convention and led the way to a bolder world of content, opening the door to all that was new, original, and worthy of our attention. In Tinderbox, award-winning journalist James Andrew Miller uncovers a bottomless trove of secrets and surprises, revealing new conflicts, insights, and analysis. As he did to great acclaim with SNL in Live from New York; with ESPN in Those Guys Have All the Fun; and with talent agency CAA in Powerhouse, Miller continues his record of extraordinary access to the most important voices, this time speaking with talents ranging from Abrams (J. J.) to Zendaya, as well as every single living president of HBO—and hundreds of other major players. Over the course of more than 750 interviews with key sources, Miller reveals how fraught HBO’s journey has been, capturing the drama and the comedy off-camera and inside boardrooms as HBO created and mobilized a daring new content universe, and, in doing so, reshaped storytelling and upended our entertainment lives forever.

Buried for decades, the Up Stairs Lounge tragedy has only recently emerged as a catalyzing event of the gay liberation movement. In revelatory detail, Robert W. Fieseler chronicles the tragic event that claimed the lives of thirty-one men and one woman on June 24, 1973, at a New Orleans bar, the largest mass murder of gays until 2016. Relying on unprecedented access to survivors and archives, Fieseler creates an indelible portrait of a closeted, blue- collar gay world that flourished before an arsonist ignited an inferno that destroyed an entire community. The aftermath was no less traumatic—families ashamed to claim loved ones, the Catholic Church refusing proper burial rights, the city impervious to the survivors’ needs—revealing a world of toxic prejudice that thrived well past Stonewall. Yet the impassioned activism that followed proved essential to the emergence of a fledgling gay movement. Tinderbox restores honor to a forgotten generation of civil-rights martyrs.

In this groundbreaking narrative, longtime Washington Post reporter Craig Timberg and award-winning AIDS researcher Daniel Halperin tell the surprising story of how Western colonial powers unwittingly sparked the AIDS epidemic and then fanned its rise. Drawing on remarkable new science, Tinderbox overturns the conventional wisdom on the origins of this deadly pandemic and the best ways to fight it today. Recent genetic studies have traced the birth of HIV to the forbidding equatorial forests of Cameroon, where chimpanzees carried the virus for millennia without causing a major outbreak in humans. During the Scramble for Africa, colonial companies blazed new routes through the jungle in search of rubber and other riches, sending African porters into remote regions rarely traveled before. It was here that humans first contracted the strain of HIV that would eventually cause 99 percent of AIDS deaths around the world. Western powers were key actors in turning a localized outbreak into a sprawling epidemic as bustling new trade routes, modern colonial cities, and the rise of prostitution sped the virus across Africa. Christian missionaries campaigned to suppress polygamy, but left in its place fractured sexual cultures that proved uncommonly vulnerable to HIV. Equally devastating was the gradual loss of the African ritual of male circumcision, which recent studies have shown offers significant protection against infection. Timberg and Halperin argue that the same Western hubris that marked the colonial era has hamstrung the effort to fight HIV. From the United Nations AIDS program to the Bush administration's historic relief campaign, global health officials have favored well-meaning Western approaches--abstinence campaigns, condom promotion, HIV testing--that have proven ineffective in slowing the epidemic in Africa. Meanwhile they have overlooked homegrown African initiatives aimed squarely at the behaviors spreading the virus. In a riveting narrative that stretches from colonial Leopoldville to 1980s San Francisco to South Africa today, Tinderbox reveals how human hands unleashed this epidemic and can now overcome it, if only we learn the lessons of the past.

Megan Dunn had lost the plot—in her life and in her art. Her attempt to write a fictional tribute to Fahrenheit 451 wasn’t going well. Her employer, the bookseller Borders, was going bust. Her marriage was failing. Her prospects were narrowing. The world wasn’t quite against her – but it wasn’t with her either. Riffing on Ray Bradbury’s classic novel about the end of reading, Tinderbox is one of the most interesting books in decades about literary culture and its place in the world. More than that, it’s about how every one of us fits into that bigger picture – and the struggle to make sense of life in the twenty-first century. Ironically enough for a book about failures in art, Tinderbox itself is a fantastic achievement: a wonderfully crafted and beautifully written work of non-fiction that is by turns brilliantly funny and achingly sad. Tinderbox is one of the most successful books about failure you will ever read. Praise for Tinderbox: ‘Megan Dunn’s writing is utterly modern, sharp, unsentimental and beautiful; she tells a gripping story laced with humour and pathos. She is a writer to watch.’ - Michèle Roberts ‘Megan Dunn possesses a rare combination of assets – a highly original voice, great subject matter, enormous insight and serious literary ambition. Plus, she’s funny. Her work leaps off the page and makes the reader want more.’ - Kate Pullinger “It’s already one of my favourite New Zealand books.” – Hera Lindsay Bird, The Spinoff “Megan Dunn is a comic genius.” – Susanna Andrew, Metro “A wonderful, restless, formally daring first book” – James Cook, Review 31 Praise for Things I Learned at Art School: “It is, quite simply, a work of brilliance. It is an intelligent, sharp, and incisive body of work.” – Lana Lopesi, Metro “Dunn has an extraordinary facility with tone, an ability to be consistently funny while telling sad stories.” – David McCooey, Sydney Review of Books. “A rich, rewarding, funny and poignant memoir.” – Sally Blundell, Academy of New Zealand Literature “Dunn takes the reader on a digressive, funny and unflinching journey through late-20th-century New Zealand.” – Paula Morris, New Zealand Listener “As Megan Dunn makes clear in her wise, witty and wonderful memoir, the seeds of a creative life will bloom in the most unexpected of places.” – Jennifer Higgie, author of The Other Side

Enjoy a delightful excursion into the wonderful world of make-believe, where fairy-tales and old favorite stories come vividly to life. Narration by expert storytellers, music, exciting sound effects, and dramatic dialogue will inspire. This classic tale is sure to become a favorite pass-time, treating children to a magical fantasy of entertaining enjoyment along with life lessons to which they can relate.

"Myra is a Manhattan psychotherapist. A quick study and an excellent judge of character, she thinks she knows what she's getting when she hires a nanny--it's her job, after all, to analyze people. Her phobia-addled son has just moved back in with his wife and child, and the new nanny, Eva, seems like a perfect addition: she cleans like a demon and irons like a dream, and she forms an immediate bond with Myra's grandson. But as Eva, a Peruvian immigrant, reveals more of herself, what seemed a felicitous arrangement turns ominous"--Dust jacket flap.

Bedtime Story Book A long time ago lived as soldier. He was a young and charming man. One day, he was returning to his home from a war thankful to be alive.

"The Story of a Tinder-box, penned by Charles Meymott Tidy, delves into the fascinating history and significance of a seemingly ordinary object. Tidy's narrative skillfully weaves together historical anecdotes and insights, transforming the tinder-box into a symbol of innovation and societal progress. This book serves as a captivating exploration of the ordinary artifacts that shape our lives and collective memory."