Showing results by narrator "Tom Zingarelli" in All Categories

In 2014, after a brief orientation course and a few fingerprinting sessions, Nicholson Baker became an on-call substitute teacher in a Maine public school district. He awoke to the dispatcher's five-forty a.m. phone call and headed to one of several nearby schools; when he got there, he did his best to follow lesson plans and help his students get something done. What emerges from Baker's experience is a complex, often touching deconstruction of public schooling in America.

In 1820 the slave ship Antelope was captured off the Florida coast. Though the slave trade was prohibited, slavery was still legal in half of the United States, and it was left to the Supreme Court to determine whether the nearly 300 Africans onboard were considered slaves - and if so, to whom they belonged.

Few losses are as painful as the death of someone close. No valley is as vast as grief, no journey as personal and life changing. Compassionate and wise guides Raymond Mitsch and Lynn Brookside shine a light on the road through grief. They can help you endure the anguish and uncertainty; understand the cycles of grief; sort through the emotions of anger, guilt, fear, and depression; and face the god who allowed you to lose the one you love.

When John Moretz takes a job as a reporter in the Appalachian town of Sycamore Shade, a crime wave erupts that boosts circulation and leaves people uneasy. Then a murder victim is discovered, and Moretz is first on the scene. As more bodies turn up, Moretz comes under police suspicion, but the newspaper's sales are booming due to his coverage of sensational crime.

Private investigator Richard Steele must solve his most difficult case ever - his own murder - while caught between women on both sides of the grave. His lover Lee is tangled up in the mess he left behind, and his dead ex-wife Diana has been waiting on the other side for her chance at revenge. In a race against time, as his spirit slips away, Richard confronts his many, many failings and faces a power beyond his understanding -- love. His only weapon is faith, and he's running out of bullets.

Based on three years of research and more than 300 firsthand interviews with experts, Your Best Health Care Now is your easy-to-follow, real-world guide to making today's health system work for you. You'll learn all the smart moves and timely tips to get better care and save hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars - no matter what your concerns may be. Whether you're trying to book a free checkup, negotiate with a surgeon, or worrying about high insurance deductibles and rising premiums, Your Best Health Care Now has the answers you need.

This book is about the Americans who tried to stop their nation from fighting in one of history's most destructive wars and then were hounded by the government when they refused to back down. In the riveting War Against War, Michael Kazin brings us into the ranks of the largest, most diverse, and most sophisticated peace coalition up to that point in US history. They came from a variety of backgrounds: wealthy and middle and working class, urban and rural, white and black, Christian and Jewish and atheist.

Jonathan Franzen's work raises major questions about the possibilities of contemporary fiction: How does one appeal to a broad mass of mainstream readers on the one hand while persuading connoisseurs, on the other, that one's fiction has is high art? Even more acutely, how did Franzen move from the rage that animates his first two novels to the more generous comic stance of the two later novels, on which his reputation rests?

When a mysterious fire destroys his home and shatters his family, Jacob Wells is pulled into a downward spiral that draws him ever closer to the past he thought was dead and buried. Now his twin brother Joshua is back in town, seeking to settle old scores and claim his half of the Wells birthright. Jacob's wife Renee is struggling with her own past, and her attempts to salvage Jacob are driven by guilt and ambition. As Jacob and Joshua return to the twisted roles they adopted at the hands of cruel, demanding parents, they wage a war of pride, wealth, and passion.

From 1754 to 1755, the slave ship Hare completed a journey from Newport, Rhode Island, to Sierra Leone and back to the United States - a journey that transformed more than 70 Africans into commodities, condemning some to death and the rest to a life of bondage in North America. In this engaging narrative, Sean Kelley painstakingly reconstructs this tumultuous voyage, detailing everything from the identities of the captain and crew to their wild encounters with inclement weather, slave traders, and near-mutiny.

The Good Book collects new pieces by writers from many different faiths and ethnicities, including literary fiction writers (Colm Tóibín, Edwidge Danticat, Tobias Wolff, and Rick Moody); best-selling nonfiction writers (A. J. Jacobs, Ian Frazier, Adam Gopnik, and Thomas Lynch); notable figures in the media (Charles McGrath, Cokie Roberts, and Steven V. Roberts); and social activists (Al Sharpton and Kerry Kennedy).

In Under This Roof, award-winning White House journalist Paul Brandus weaves together stories of the presidents, their families, the events of their time, and an oft-ignored major character, the White House itself. From George Washington to the current occupant, Barack Obama - the story of the White House is the story of America itself, Brandus writes.

2566 AD. Unlike the other Marines on board the troop ship Beowulf, when 18-year-old Arun McEwan is woken from cryo to board an enemy ship, he already knows that he will survive: his destiny to lead the Human Legion has been foretold. But there are other factions who will stop at nothing to bring about their rival dreams for humanity's future. Isolated on a ship rocked by mutiny, betrayal, and murder, Arun must find new allies amongst the most detested of the Navy crew: the freaks.

AD 2568. As Major Arun McEwan readies the newly formed Human Legion to retake his home planet of Tranquility, loyalties are wafer thin, and morale is low. Even his closest friends harbor poisonous secrets. And he needs everyone beside him, because the legion must strike boldly and win allies rapidly if it is to defeat the overwhelming numbers of an enemy led by Arun's old nemesis. What the legion discovers will scar Arun's heart and change the meaning of the word human forever.