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Dante For Beginners
by Joe LeeDante For Beginners takes the reader on a magical trip through Heaven and Hell. Well, this isn't exactly true. After an introduction to Dante Alighieri and his background, the reader meets a sweet lass named Beatrice, the love of his life and the subject of many of his poems. Then the reader explores other samples of Dante's works, such as the great feast, the Convivio. The reader is ultimately led through Dante's most famous and challenging masterpiece, the Commedia, also known as the Divine Comedy, with a canto by canto description of the entire text from Heaven to Hell. Characters, ideas and situations are described as they happen without the need to search through end notes or footnotes to understand the text. Dante For Beginners is a vacation through great Italian literature with history's greatest guide, Dante Alighieri.
Jane Austen For Beginners
by Joe Lee Robert DrydenJane Austen's novels are a solid part of the literary canon and have never been out print. They have been made into many modern movies and are common household names; however, they are largely misunderstood by the general public. On the surface, Austen's novels all involve characters from provincial communities in rural England who seem to be removed from greater social movements, war, industry, colonization, and imperialism. This could not be further from the truth. Jane Austen For Beginners explores Austen's true intention of her novels: to address money, the marriage market, class movement, and a radical upheaval appearing the social fabric of English and British societies.
Save Me! A Young Woman's Journey through Schizophrenia to Health
by Judy LeeThe author describes growing up with an alcoholic mother and plunging into the drug culture during her years as a college student. After several LSD trips she found herself losing touch with reality, and was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. With the help of a "reality therapist" and her deep Christian faith she finally managed to rebuild her life.
Biting the Hand: Growing Up Asian in Black and White America
by Julia LeeJulia Lee is angry. And she has questions.What does it mean to be Asian in America? What does it look like to be an ally or an accomplice? How can we shatter the structures of white supremacy that fuel racial stratification?When Julia was fifteen, her hometown went up in smoke during the 1992 Los Angeles riots. The daughter of Korean immigrant store owners in a predominantly Black neighborhood, Julia was taught to be grateful for the privilege afforded to her. However, the acquittal of four white police officers in the beating of Rodney King, following the murder of Latasha Harlins by a Korean shopkeeper, forced Julia to question her racial identity and complicity. She was neither Black nor white. So who was she?This question would follow Julia for years to come, resurfacing as she traded in her tumultuous childhood for the white upper echelon of elite academia. It was only when she began a PhD in English that she found answers—not through studying Victorian literature, as Julia had planned, but rather in the brilliant prose of writers like James Baldwin and Toni Morrison. Their works gave Julia the vocabulary and, more important, the permission to critically examine her own tortured position as an Asian American, setting off a powerful journey of racial reckoning, atonement, and self-discovery.With prose by turns scathing and heart-wrenching, Julia lays bare the complex disorientation and shame that stem from this country’s imposed racial hierarchy. And she argues that Asian Americans must work toward lasting social change alongside Black and brown communities in order to combat the scarcity culture of white supremacy through abundance and joy. In this passionate, no-holds-barred memoir, Julia interrogates her own experiences of marginality and resistance, and ultimately asks what may be the biggest question of all—what can we do?
Torn: Rescuing the Gospel from the Gays-vs.-Christians Debate
by Justin LeeAn evangelical Christian examines the impact of sexuality, the LGBTQ+ movement, and the future of the church in this thoughtful, deeply researched guide to navigating and mending the social and political division in our families and churches. As a teenager and young man, Justin Lee felt deeply torn. Nicknamed "God Boy" by his peers, he knew that he was called to a life in the evangelical Christian ministry. But Lee harbored a secret: He also knew that he was gay. In this groundbreaking book, Lee recalls the events--his coming out to his parents, his experiences with the "ex-gay" movement, and his in-depth study of the Bible--that led him, eventually, to self-acceptance. But more than just a memoir, TORN provides insightful, practical guidance for all committed Christians who wonder how to relate to gay friends or family members--or who struggle with their own sexuality. Convinced that "in a culture that sees gays and Christians as enemies, gay Christians are in a unique position to bring peace," Lee demonstrates that people of faith on both sides of the debate can respect, learn from, and love one another.
Unconditional: Rescuing the Gospel from the Gays-vs-Christians Debate
by Justin Lee'Gay.The word seemed to hold the weight of eternity within its single syllable.As strange as it may seem, in all the years I had struggled with my sexuality, the idea that I could be 'gay' had simply never crossed my mind. I was a Christian! That was my whole life! And Christians weren't gay.'This could be the most important book you read this year.It's a memoir.An exploration of what is, and what could be.Most of all, it's a clarion call to the church - to rediscover the love that Jesus called us to. Unconditionally.'So many gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people give up on Christianity because they cannot reconcile who they are with what they were brought up to believe that the Bible teaches about sexuality. Here is a wonderfully told story of a brave young homosexual man who has struggled to hold onto his faith while still affirming himself as gay. This is a must-read.' Tony Campolo
Groundswell
by Katie Lee"If you liked Eat, Pray, Love, then read Groundswell." —US Weekly (Essential Summer Read selection) A "compulsively readable novel charting the highs and lows of love" (Jen Lancaster) about a young woman recovering from divorce who finds healing—and romance—through surfing.A butterfly flaps its wings in New York City...and a groundswell forms in Mexico. Sometimes the biggest ripples come from the smallest events. Like the day that novice PA Emma Guthrie walks into world-famous movie star Garrett Walker&’s trailer. When she walks out, she&’s on her way to becoming Mrs. Emma Walker, trading her jeans and flip-flops for closets full of Chanel and the start of a successful screenwriting career. But when an incriminating text message throws her marriage into question, Emma flees New York City for a sleepy coastal town in Mexico. Here, she meets gorgeous, California-born Ben, who teaches her about the healing powers of surfing, shows her the joys of the simple life, and opens her up to the possibility of love. An irresistible insider&’s glimpse into a glittering world, Katie Lee&’s debut novel is a captivating story about how losing everything you thought you wanted can be the first step to finding what you need.
Delayed Rays of a Star: A Novel
by Amanda Lee KoeNamed a most anticipated book of the summer by ELLE, USA Today, Thrillist, Kirkus, and LitHubA dazzling debut novel following the lives of three groundbreaking women--Marlene Dietrich, Anna May Wong, and Leni Riefenstahl--cinema legends who lit up the twentieth centuryAt a chance encounter at a Berlin soirée in 1928, the photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt captures three very different women together in one frame: up-and-coming German actress Marlene Dietrich, who would wend her way into Hollywood as one of its lasting icons; Anna May Wong, the world's first Chinese American star, playing for bit parts while dreaming of breaking away from her father's modest laundry; and Leni Riefenstahl, whose work as a director would first make her famous--then, infamous. From this curious point of intersection, Delayed Rays of a Star lets loose the trajectories of these women's lives. From Weimar Berlin to LA's Chinatown, from a seaside resort in East Germany to a luxury apartment on the Champs-Élysées, the different settings they inhabit are as richly textured as the roles they play: siren, muse, predator, or lover, each one a carefully calibrated performance. And in the orbit of each star live secondary players--a Chinese immigrant housemaid, a German soldier on leave from North Africa, a pompous Hollywood director--whose voices and viewpoints reveal the legacy each woman left in her own time, as well as in ours. Amanda Lee Koe's playful, wry prose guides the reader dexterously around murky questions of ego, persona, complicity, desire, and difference. Intimate and raw, Delayed Rays of a Star is a visceral depiction of womanhood--its particular hungers, its calculations, and its eventual betrayals--and announces a bold new literary voice.
Blame It on the Rain: How the Weather has Changed History
by Laura LeeAn amazing, enlightening, and endlessly entertaining look at how weather has shaped our world.Throughout history, great leaders have fallen, the outcomes of mighty battles have been determined, and the tides of earth-shattering events have been turned by a powerful, inscrutable force of nature: the weather. In Blame It on the Rain, author Laura Lee explores the amazing and sometimes bizarre ways in which weather has influenced our history and helped to bring about sweeping cultural change. She also delights us with a plethora of fascinating weather-related facts (Did you know that more Britons die of sunburn every year than Australians?), while offering readers a hilarious overview of humankind's many absurd attempts to control the elements.If a weather-produced blight hadn't severely damaged French vineyards, there might never have been a California wine industry. . . .What weather phenomenon was responsible for the sound of the Stradivarius?If there had been a late autumn in Russia, Hitler could have won World War II. . . .Did weather play a part in Truman's victory over Dewey?Eye-opening, edifying, and totally unexpected, Blame It on the Rain is a fascinating appreciation of the destiny-altering vagaries of mother nature—and it's even more fun than watching the Weather Channel!
A History of Scars: A Memoir
by Laura LeeFrom a writer whose work has been called &“breathtaking and dazzling&” by Roxane Gay, this moving, illuminating, and multifaceted memoir explores, in a series of essays, the emotional scars we carry when dealing with mental and physical illnesses—reminiscent of The Collected Schizophrenias and An Unquiet Mind. In this stunning debut, Laura Lee weaves unforgettable and eye-opening essays on a variety of taboo topics. In &“History of Scars&” and &“Aluminum&’s Erosions,&” Laura dives head-first into heavier themes revolving around intimacy, sexuality, trauma, mental illness, and the passage of time. In &“Poetry of the World,&” Laura shifts and addresses the grief she feels by being geographically distant from her mother whom, after being diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer&’s, is relocated to a nursing home in Korea. Through the vivid imagery of mountain climbing, cooking, studying writing, and growing up Korean American, Lee explores the legacy of trauma on a young queer child of immigrants as she reconciles the disparate pieces of existence that make her whole. By tapping into her own personal, emotional, and psychological struggles in these powerful and relatable essays, Lee encourages all of us to not be afraid to face our own hardships and inner truths.
As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning: A Memoir (The Autobiographical Trilogy #2)
by Laurie LeeThe second volume in Laurie Lee's acclaimed autobiographical trilogy, an unforgettable glimpse of Spain on the eve of its civil war On a bright Sunday morning in June 1934, Laurie Lee left the village home so lovingly portrayed in his bestselling memoir, Cider with Rosie. His plan was to walk the hundred miles from Slad to London, with a detour of an extra hundred miles to see the sea for the first time. He was nineteen years old and brought with him only what he could carry on his back: a tent, a change of clothes, his violin, a tin of biscuits, and some cheese. He spent the first night in a ditch, wide awake and soaking wet.From those unlikely beginnings, Laurie Lee fashioned not just the adventure of a lifetime, but one of the finest travel narratives of the twentieth century. As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning, written more than thirty years after the events it describes, is an elegant and irresistibly charming portrait of life on the road--first in England, where the familiar landscapes and people somehow made Lee feel far from home, and then in Spain, whose utter foreignness afforded a new kind of comfort.In that brief period of peace, a young man was free to go wherever he wanted to in Europe. Lee picked Spain because he knew enough Spanish to ask for a glass of water. What he did not know, and what would become clear only after a year spent tramping across the beautiful and rugged countryside--from the Galician port city of Vigo, over the Sierra de Guadarrama and into Madrid, and along the Costa del Sol--was that the Spanish Republic would soon need idealistic young men like Lee as badly as he needed it.
The Autobiographical Trilogy: Cider with Rosie, As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning, and A Moment of War (The Autobiographical Trilogy #3)
by Laurie LeeA young man’s journey—from the international bestselling account of his idyllic childhood in rural England to “a poetic memoir” of the Spanish Civil War (The Washington Post). In his acclaimed autobiographical trilogy, “one of the great writers of the twentieth century” presents a vivid portrait of coming of age in Europe between the wars (The Independent). Beginning with the international bestselling, lyrical memoir of his childhood in the Cotswolds, Laurie Lee follows up with a fascinating travel narrative of crossing England and Spain on foot, and brings the story to a climax with a gripping chronicle of his part in the Spanish Civil War. Cider with Rosie:International Bestseller Three years old and wrapped in a Union Jack to protect him from the sun, Laurie Lee arrived in the village of Slad in the final summer of the First World War. The cottage his mother had rented had neither running water nor electricity, but it was surrounded by a lovely half-acre garden and big enough for the seven children in her care. In this verdant valley tucked into the rolling hills of the Cotswolds, Lee learned to look at life with a painter’s eye and a poet’s heart—qualities of vision that, decades later, would make him one of England’s most cherished authors. “A remarkable book . . . dazzling.” —The New York Times As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning: At age nineteen, Lee set out to walk the hundred miles from Slad to London, carrying only a change of clothes, his violin, a tent, a tin of biscuits, and some cheese. With a detour of an extra hundred miles to see the sea for the first time, Lee hopped a ferry to Spain because he knew enough Spanish to ask for a glass of water, and wandered the country for a year on foot. In one of the finest travel narratives of the twentieth century, Lee offers an unforgettable portrait of Spain on the eve of its civil war. “The vivid, sensitive, irresistibly readable story of what happened after [Lee] left home.” —The Daily Mail A Moment of War: Returning to a divided Spain in the bitter December of 1937 by crossing the Pyrenees from France, the idealistic young Lee came face to face with the reality of war, in this New York Times Notable Book. The International Brigade he sought to join was far from the gallant fighting force he’d envisioned but instead a collection of misfits without proper leadership or purpose. In a sudden confrontation with the enemy, he was left feeling anything but heroic. Captured more than once as a spy, Lee was lucky to escape with his life. “Written with brilliant economy and belongs to the remarkable literature which the Spanish Civil War inspired.” —The Independent
Cider with Rosie: A Memoir (The Autobiographical Trilogy #1)
by Laurie LeeThis international-bestselling memoir of childhood in post–World War I rural England is one of the most &“remarkable&” portraits of youth in all literature (The New York Times). Three years old and wrapped in a Union Jack to protect him from the sun, Laurie Lee arrived in the village of Slad in the final summer of the First World War. The cottage his mother had rented for three and sixpence a week had neither running water nor electricity, but it was surrounded by a lovely half-acre garden and, most importantly, it was big enough for the seven children in her care. It was here, in a verdant valley tucked into the rolling hills of the Cotswolds, that Laurie Lee learned to look at life with a painter&’s eye and a poet&’s heart—qualities of vision that, decades later, would make him one of England&’s most cherished authors. In this vivid recollection of a magical time and place, water falls from the scullery pump &“sparkling like liquid sky.&” Autumn is more than a season—it is a land eternally aflame, like Moses&’s burning bush. Every midnight, on a forlorn stretch of heath, a phantom carriage reenacts its final, wild ride. And, best of all, the first secret sip of cider, &“juice of those valleys and of that time,&” leads to a boy&’s first kiss, &“so dry and shy, it was like two leaves colliding in air.&” An instant classic when it was first published in 1959, Cider with Rosie is one of the most endearing and evocative portraits of youth in all of literature. The first installment in an autobiographical trilogy that includes As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning and A Moment of War, it is also a heartfelt and lyrical ode to England, and to a way of life that may belong to the past, but will never be forgotten.
The Firstborn: A Reflection on Fatherhood
by Laurie LeeAn intimate and lyrical consideration of what it means to be a fatherThis moment of meeting seemed to be a birth-time for both of us; her first and my second life. Nothing, I knew, would be the same again . . .Full of warmth and candor, this essay composed on the occasion of his daughter's birth is one of Laurie Lee's most delightful and inspiring works. From the moment Jessy is born, "purple and dented like a bruised plum," to the first time his kiss quiets her cries, Lee describes the joys and responsibilities of new fatherhood with a poet's precision and boundless capacity for wonder.
I Can't Stay Long (Penguin Modern Classics Ser.)
by Laurie LeeThe essential Laurie Lee, a collection of occasional writings full of his unique vision and irresistible charm All of the wit and wisdom and poetry that made Laurie Lee one of the most celebrated English writers of the twentieth century can be found in this compilation of &“first loves and obsessions.&” In Part One, Lee revisits his idyllic boyhood in the Cotswolds village made famous by his bestselling autobiography, Cider with Rosie. In Part Two, he turns his attention to an earnest consideration of abstract concepts such as the power of charm, the pleasures of appetite, and the meaning of paradise. And in the final and longest section, the author of the acclaimed Spanish travelogues As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning and A Rose for Winter tells the stories of his many other journeys—from sun-dappled Tuscany to melancholy Warsaw to the enchanting and exotic Sugar Islands of the Caribbean.
A Moment of War: A Memoir (The Autobiographical Trilogy #3)
by Laurie LeeA memoir of the Spanish Civil War with &“the plainness of Orwell but the metaphorical soaring of a poem . . . An extraordinary book&” (The New York Times Book Review).In December 1937 I crossed the Pyrenees from France—two days on foot through the snow. I don&’t know why I chose December; it was just one of a number of idiocies I committed at the time. Such was Laurie Lee&’s entry into the Spanish Civil War. Six months after the Nationalist uprising forced him to leave the country he had grown to love, he returned to offer his life for the Republican cause. It seemed as simple as knocking on a farmhouse door in the middle of the night and declaring himself ready to fight. It would not be the last time he was almost executed for being a spy. In that bitter winter in a divided Spain, Lee&’s youthful idealism came face to face with the reality of war. The International Brigade he sought to join was not a gallant fighting force, but a collection of misfits without proper leadership or purpose. Boredom and bad food and false alarms were as much a part of the experience of war as actual battle. And when the decisive moment finally came—the moment of him or the enemy—it left Lee feeling the very opposite of heroic. The final volume in Laurie Lee&’s acclaimed autobiographical trilogy—preceded by Cider with Rosie and As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning—is a clear-eyed and vital snapshot of a young man, and a proud nation, at a historic crossroads.
A Rose for Winter: Travels in Andalusia
by Laurie LeeA passionate ode to the magic of Spain, composed by one of its most ardent admirersFifteen years after the events described in his acclaimed autobiographies, As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning and A Moment of War, Laurie Lee returned to Spain, the land of his youth and experience. He found a country bowed but not broken, where the heavy gloom of the recent past was shot through with the vibrant rays of tradition: the exquisite ecstasy of the flamenco, the pomp and circumstance of the bullfight, the eternal glory of Christ and church.From the smuggler&’s paradise of Algeciras to the Moorish majesty of Granada, Lee paints the wonders of Spain with a poet&’s brush. To read A Rose for Winter is to be transported to one of the most enchanted places on earth.
Supervivencia Engañosa
by Lc LeeEn un período en el que había pocas opciones para una mujer, el personaje principal, Andrée, encuentra el valor para crecer como persona y la fuerza para sobrevivir como una mujer fuerte. A través de una serie de pruebas que ponen en peligro su vida, el viaje de Andrée comienza cuando es abandonada por su familia; sin otra opción, se convierte en monja y es asignada a una misión en Haití. Pronto tendrá que huir por su vida para sobrevivir a una revolución entre los vodunes y los granjeros franceses. Junto a un sacerdote, René, encuentra refugio en las montañas en un pueblo indígena taíno, y sin la Iglesia para definir su papel, se enamora del sacerdote rebelde. Cuando su presencia pone en peligro a la tribu, escapan de Haití al abordar un barco a Cuba. Es el comienzo de varios engaños intrigantes en la historia, cuando abandonan sus posiciones en la Iglesia y viajan como marido y mujer.
Breaking the Alabaster Jar: Conversations with Li-Young Lee (American Readers Series)
by Li-Young LeeIn the foreword to Li-Young Lee&’s first book, Rose (BOA Editions, 1986), Gerald Stern wrote, &“What characterizes Li-Young Lee&’s poetry is a certain kind of humility, a kind of cunning, a love of plain speech, a search for wisdom and understanding. . . . I think we are in the presence of a true spirit.&” Poetry lovers agree! Rose has gone on to sell more than eighty thousand copies, and Li-Young Lee has become one of the country&’s most beloved poets. Breaking the Alabaster Jar: Conversations with Li-Young Lee is a collection of the best dozen interviews given by Li-Young Lee over the past twenty years. From a twenty-nine-year-old poet prodigy to a seasoned veteran in high demand for readings and appearances across the United States and abroad, these interviews capture Li-Young Lee at various stages of his artistic development. He not only discusses his family&’s flight from political oppression in China and Indonesia, but how that journey affected his poetry and the engaging, often painful, insights being raised a cultural outsider in America afforded him. Other topics include spirituality (primarily Christianity and Buddhism) and a wide range of aesthetic topics such as literary influences, his own writing practices, the role of formal and informal education in becoming a writer, and his current life as a famous and highly sought-after American poet.
The Winged Seed: A Remembrance (American Readers Series)
by Li-Young Lee"It has true spiritual importance for contemporary American literature."-Edward HirschUpon its initial publication, acclaimed poet Li-Young Lee's memoir The Winged Seed: A Remembrance (1995), received an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation. In lyrical prose, Lee's extraordinary story begins in the 1950s when his parents fled China's political turmoil for Indonesia. Along with many other Chinese members of the population, his family was persecuted under President Sukarno. Falsely accused and charged for crimes against the state, his father spent a year and a half in jail as a political prisoner, half of that time in a leper colony. While his entire family was being transported to a prison colony, they escaped and fled to Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, and back to Hong Kong where his father rose to prominence as an evangelical preacher. Eventually, the family sought asylum in the United States in 1962. When the author was six, they emigrated to a small town in western Pennsylvania where his father became a Presbyterian minister. This reissued edition contains a new foreword by the author and never-before-seen photos of the family from different stages of their journey.Li-Young Lee is the author of four critically acclaimed books of poetry that have garnered such awards as the Delmore Schwartz Memorial Award from New York University; the 1990 Lamont Poetry Selection; the Writer's Award from the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation; and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, The Lannan Foundation, and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.
The Winged Seed
by Li-Young Lee"It has true spiritual importance for contemporary American literature."-Edward HirschUpon its initial publication, acclaimed poet Li-Young Lee's memoir The Winged Seed: A Remembrance (1995), received an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation. In lyrical prose, Lee's extraordinary story begins in the 1950s when his parents fled China's political turmoil for Indonesia. Along with many other Chinese members of the population, his family was persecuted under President Sukarno. Falsely accused and charged for crimes against the state, his father spent a year and a half in jail as a political prisoner, half of that time in a leper colony. While his entire family was being transported to a prison colony, they escaped and fled to Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, and back to Hong Kong where his father rose to prominence as an evangelical preacher. Eventually, the family sought asylum in the United States in 1962. When the author was six, they emigrated to a small town in western Pennsylvania where his father became a Presbyterian minister. This reissued edition contains a new foreword by the author and never-before-seen photos of the family from different stages of their journey.Li-Young Lee is the author of four critically acclaimed books of poetry that have garnered such awards as the Delmore Schwartz Memorial Award from New York University; the 1990 Lamont Poetry Selection; the Writer's Award from the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation; and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, The Lannan Foundation, and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.
Bygone Badass Broads: 52 Forgotten Women Who Changed the World
by Mackenzi Lee“You’ll meet suffragettes who did jujitsu, women warriors who wore lipstick into battle and queens who put women in their rightful places—positions of power.” —Ms.Based on Mackenzi Lee’s popular weekly Twitter series of the same name, Bygone Badass Broads features fifty-two remarkable and forgotten trailblazing women from all over the world. With tales of heroism and cunning, in-depth bios and witty storytelling, Bygone Badass Broads gives new life to these historic female pioneers. Starting in the fifth century BC and continuing to the present, the book takes a closer look at bold and inspiring women who dared to step outside the traditional gender roles of their time. Coupled with riveting illustrations and Lee’s humorous and conversational storytelling style, this book is an outright celebration of the badass women who paved the way for the rest of us.“The author of the first novel, warriors and rulers, scientists and war heroes. History abounds with tales of trailblazing women long forgotten—especially those who were nonwhite, non-Western, or not straight. Take a look at a dozen of the women in Bygone Badass Broads so you can begin to see what you missed in history class.” —The Boston Globe “Shar[es] the stories of fifty-two women in history who changed the game forever—even though you’ve probably never heard of them . . . If you’re looking for some inspiration this , you Women’s History Month just got it—fifty-two times over.” —Bustle“Lee admirably fulfills her stated goal of promoting lesser-known subjects who are awesome, accompanied by brightly colored, full-page artwork.” —School Library Journal
The Education of a Very Young Madam
by Ma-Ling Lee Christa BourgFull of juicy details about what really goes on behind the bedroom door, The Education of a Very Young Madam is a provocative exposé of the newest developments in the world's oldest profession. A stripper at age fifteen, involved with majorleague gang members before she was twenty, and a madam raking in over $20,000 a day only a few years later, Ma-Ling Lee has a tale to tell about life. The Education of a Very Young Madam is the compulsively readable, fast-paced story of how Ma-Ling Lee went from living in a comfortable Connecticut suburb to founding a lucrative but illegal "escort service." Korean born and adopted by an American family, Ma-Ling began her career in the sex business at the age of thirteen. "Taken in" by strippers, pimps, and prostitutes, she soon became an expert at negotiating the hard-and-fast ways of life on the streets. Ma-Ling's natural knack for marketing and managing a business led her to open her first brothel at the age of sixteen. After the police shut her down, she knew it was time to take advantage of the opportunities afforded by the anonymity of the Internet. She bought her first Internet mailing list, set up an offshore server, and targeted a huge middleclass clientele. And business thrived. In her own frank and candid voice, Ma-Ling describes the difficulties -- and the economic advantages -- of running an illegal business. From clients' outrageous and often hilarious fetishes to the hardships of living off the grid to the heartbreak of watching friends get destroyed by drug addiction, Ma-Ling refuses to shy away from the truth of what the prostitution business has become. The madam explains how technology has not only revolutionized the sex industry but also regulated business by ensuring quality, safety, and efficiency. The business has never been better.
Starry Field: A Memoir of Lost History
by Margaret Juhae Lee&“Absorbing...Starry Field reminds us that even knowing where we came from won&’t tell us where we&’re going - but it will help along the way.&” Susan Choi, National Book Award winning author of Trust Exercise A poignant memoir for readers who love Pachinko and The Return by journalist Margaret Juhae Lee, who sets out on a search for her family&’s history lost to the darkness of Korea&’s colonial decades, and contends with the shockwaves of violence that followed them over four generations and across continents. As a young girl growing up in Houston, Margaret Juhae Lee never heard about her grandfather, Lee Chul Ha. His history was lost in early twentieth-century Korea, and guarded by Margaret&’s grandmother, who Chul Ha left widowed in 1936 with two young sons. To his surviving family, Lee Chul Ha was a criminal, and his granddaughter was determined to figure out why. Starry Field: A Memoir of Lost History chronicles Chul Ha&’s untold story. Combining investigative journalism, oral history, and archival research, Margaret reveals the truth about the grandfather she never knew. What she found is that Lee Chul Ha was not a source of shame; he was a student revolutionary imprisoned in 1929 for protesting the Japanese government&’s colonization of Korea. He was a hero—and eventually honored as a Patriot of South Korea almost 60 years after his death.But reclaiming her grandfather&’s legacy, in the end, isn&’t what Margaret finds the most valuable. It is through the series of three long-form interviews with her grandmother that Margaret finally finds a sense of recognition she&’s been missing her entire life. A story of healing old wounds and the reputation of an extraordinary young man, Starry Field bridges the tales of two women, generations and oceans apart, who share the desire to build family in someplace called home. Starry Field weaves together the stories of Margaret&’s family against the backdrop of Korea&’s tumultuous modern history, with a powerful question at its heart. Can we ever separate ourselves from our family&’s past—and if the answer is yes, should we? 20 memorable photographs will be included.
Grief Is Love: Living with Loss
by Marisa Renee LeeA trusted grief expert shares advice on how to navigate the loss of a loved one in this incisive and compassionate guide: &“calm, lucid prose… humanizing exploration of coping with the life-changing tides of loss&” (Kirkus Reviews).In Grief is Love, author Marisa Renee Lee reveals that healing does not mean moving on after losing a loved one—healing means learning to acknowledge and create space for your grief. It is about learning to love the one you lost with the same depth, passion, joy, and commitment you did when they were alive, perhaps even more. She guides you through the pain of grief—whether you&’ve lost the person recently or long ago—and shows you what it looks like to honor your loss on your unique terms, and debunks the idea of a grief stages or timelines. Grief is Love is about making space for the transformation that a significant loss requires. In beautiful, compassionate prose, Lee elegantly offers wisdom about what it means to authentically and defiantly claim space for grief&’s complicated feelings and emotions. And Lee is no stranger to grief herself, she shares her journey after losing her mother, a pregnancy, and, most recently, a cousin to the COVID-19 pandemic. These losses transformed her life and led her to question what grief really is and what healing actually looks like. In this book, she also explores the unique impact of grief on Black people and reveals the key factors that proper healing requires: permission, care, feeling, grace and more. The transformation we each undergo after loss is the indelible imprint of the people we love on our lives, which is the true definition of legacy. At its core, Grief is Love explores what comes after death, and shows us that if we are able to own and honor what we&’ve lost, we can experience a beautiful and joyful life in the midst of grief.