Acclaimed, definitive account of the inextricably linked histories of drugs and popular music.

Joe, a 36-year-old advertising copywriter for a slick New York agency, feels disillusioned with his life. He starts dreaming of a mysterious man, seeing him on the street, and hearing his voice. Joe decides to listen to the Man and so he waits on his stoop, day and night, for instructions. A local reporter takes notice, and soon Joe has become a media sensation, the centre of a storm. When the Man tells Joe to "go west," he does, in search of meaning. A surreal journey of a man who is searching for purpose and for happiness, "Waiting for the Man" is about the struggle to find something more in life. The paperback edition includes a bonus BackLit section with a reader's guide, Q&A with the author, and more.

An advertising man searches for meaning in this “fascinating dissection of the media world we live in . . . A thought-provoking road-trip tale” (Chicago Tribune). Longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize In his mid-thirties, Joe works as an advertising copywriter for a slick New York agency. But he feels disillusioned with his life, and finds himself experiencing dreams about a mysterious man, seeing him on the street, hearing his voice. Joe decides to listen. So he waits on his stoop, day and night, for instructions. A local reporter takes notice, and soon Joe has become a media sensation, the center of a storm. When the Man tells Joe to “go west,” he does. What follows is a compelling and visceral story about the struggle to find something more in life, told in two interwoven threads—Joe at the beginning of his journey in Manhattan, and at the end of it as he finds new purpose on a ranch in Montana under the endless sky. “A strangely engrossing, meticulously written allegory of the present moment.” —Douglas Coupland, author of Worst. Person. Ever.

A brief, lyrical novel with a powerful emotional charge, Rules for Old Men Waiting is about three wars of the twentieth century and an ever-deepening marriage. In a house on the Cape “older than the Republic,” Robert MacIver, a historian who long ago played rugby for Scotland, creates a list of rules by which to live out his last days. The most important rule, to “tell a story to its end,” spurs the old Scot on to invent a strange and gripping tale of men in the trenches of the First World War. Drawn from a depth of knowledge and imagination, MacIver conjures the implacable, clear-sighted artist Private Callum; the private’s nemesis Sergeant Braddis, with his pincerlike nails; Lieutenant Simon Dodds, who takes on Braddis; and Private Charlie Alston, who is ensnared in this story of inhumanity and betrayal but brings it to a close. This invented tale of the Great War prompts MacIver’s own memories of his role in World War II and of Vietnam, where his son, David served. Both the stories and the memories alike are lit by the vivid presence of Margaret, his wife. As Hearts and Minds director Peter Davis writes, “Pouncey has wrought an almost inconceivable amount of beauty from pain, loss, and war, and I think he has been able to do this because every page is imbued with the love story at the heart of his astonishing novel.”

A major backlist sleeper! 130,000 sold-to-date! A feminist sci-fi novel. The kin of Ata live only for "the dream". Into their midst comes a desperate man who is first subdued and then led on a spiritual journey that, sooner or later, all of us make.

Waiting for Nothing, first published in 1935, is a sobering, first-hand account of the author's life as a homeless man during the Great Depression of the 1930s. The book, a classic portrayal of the brutality and inhumaness of the time, was written while author Tom Kromer (1906-1969) was working at a Civilian Conservation Corps camp in California, and was his only completed novel. Waiting for Nothing describes Kromer's travels on the rails, his encounters with small-time cooks, prostitutes and homosexuals, and the endless search for enough food to eat and a warm place to sleep. Throughout the book, Kromer describes the plight of a vast army of unemployed workers, left to fend for themselves in a largely uncaring society.

This monumental study provides an innovative and powerful means for understanding institutions by applying problem solving theory to the creation and elaboration of formal organizational rules and procedures. Based on a meticulously researched historical analysis of the U.S. Navy’s officer personnel system from its beginnings to 1941, the book is informed by developments in cognitive psychology, cognitive science, operations research, and management science. It also offers important insights into the development of the American administrative state, highlighting broader societal conflicts over equity, efficiency, and economy. Considering the Navy’s personnel system as an institution, the book shows that changes in that system resulted from a long-term process of institutional design, in which formal rules and procedures are established and elaborated. Institutional design is here understood as a problem-solving process comprising day-to-day efforts of many decision makers to resolve the difficulties that block completion of their tasks. The officer personnel system is treated as a problem of organized complexity, with many components interacting in systematic, intricate ways, its structure usually imperfectly understood by the participants. Consequently, much problem solving entails decomposing the larger problem into smaller, more manageable components, closing open constraints, and balancing competing value premises. The author finds that decision makers are unlikely to generate many alternatives, since searching for existing solutions elsewhere or inventing new ones is an expensive, difficult enterprise. Choice is usually a matter of accepting, rejecting, or modifying a single solution. Because time constraints force decisions before problems are well structured, errors are frequently made, problem components are at best only partially addressed, and the chosen solution may not solve the problem at all and even if it does is likely to generate unanticipated side-effects that worsen other problem components. In its definitive treatment of a critical but hitherto entirely unresearched dimension of the administration of the U.S. Navy, the book provides full details over time concerning the elaboration of officer grades and titles, creation of promotion by selection, sea duty requirements, graded retirement, staff-line conflicts, the establishment of the Reserve, and such unusual subjects as “tombstone promotions.” In the process, it transcends the specifics of the personnel system to give a broad picture of the Navy’s history over the first century and a half of its development.

In a world where sexual expression is the norm and abstinence is unpopular, Waiting For The Ice Cream Man: How I Found True Love Through The Power of A Simple Prayer is author Simisola Okai's personal journey through chastity, courtship, and marriage. With honesty and wit, Simisola uncovers her tale of coming to faith, waiting on God for a spouse, and ultimately finding her fairytale love. Through her story, you will uncover the unshakeable truth that God is the ultimate matchmaker and the author of true romance. Simisola Okai is a TV host, producer, and writer. Prior to her work as a segment host and producer for the award-winning program, Turning Point International, she was the host for a children's television program The Flying House, a production of the Christian Broadcasting Network. A native of Nigeria, Simisola spent the majority of her adolescent years in Australia before immigrating to America to pursue her education. Simisola holds a Master's Degree in Journalism & Communication and resides in Virginia Beach, USA with her husband and two sons.

Living in the small Florida town where his father was killed under suspicious circumstances, Roy Collier grows up the mirror image of his father while the secrets of the past come back to haunt him.

"All the books about me are bullshit except Jeremy's." --Lou Reed