Miss Prudence Whitsby becomes involved in crime detection when she attends a Cape Cod house party

The definitive biography of Alan Shepard, America’s first man in space, with a new Foreword by Chris Kraft “One of the finest books ever written about the space program.”—Homer Hickan, author of Rocket Boys “A wonderful and gripping biography . . . meticulously reported in the best tradition of David Halberstam.”—Buzz Bissinger, New York Times bestselling author of Friday Night Lights Alan Shepard was the brashest, cockiest, and most flamboyant of America’s original Mercury Seven, but he was also regarded as the best. Intense, colorful, and dramatic, he was among the most private of America’s public figures and, until his death in 1998, he guarded the story of his life zealously. Light This Candle, based on Neal Thompson’s exclusive access to private papers and interviews with Shepard’s family and closest friends—including John Glenn, Wally Schirra, and Gordon Cooper—offers a riveting, action-packed account of Shepard’s life.

A memoir about the loss of a friend through a vehicular accident and the healing power of love.

At the age of 56, Rob A. Gentile had a massive heart attack followed by a profound near-death experience. On his journey to a heart transplant, he was close to death again and entered the Ethereal a second time. He found himself inside a shapeless, formless vacuum of unending and infinite vastness. He was everywhere at once, scattered across a timeless expanse and connected to the wisdom of the universe-all of it without words. He saw and simultaneously became part of a gigantic interactive web of twinkling lights covering the Earth and stretching into infinity. Curiously, some parts of the web were brighter, some dim, and some completely dark. He later came to believe that this web represents a network that binds us all and is built upon quarks-the smallest elements of matter, and which are made of light. While in the Ethereal, he understood that each quark of light symbolized a life. He realized that if he hurt himself, he hurt everything connected to him, but if he loved, the light would spread. Rob also saw his daughter with special needs, perfect, whole, and radiant. The most important message he received was of unity, oneness, and our real identity. In Quarks of Light, Rob shares his journey and provides a roadmap for overcoming adversity, staying in spirit, and connecting to the Universal language of love and light.

For centuries, arsenic's image as a poison has been inextricably tied to images of foul play. In King of Poisons, John Parascandola examines the surprising history of this deadly element. From Gustave Flaubert to Dorothy Sayers, arsenic has long held a place in the literary realm as an instrument of murder and suicide. It was delightfully used as a source of comedy in the famous play Arsenic and Old Lace. But as Parascandola shows, arsenic has had a number of surprising real-world applications. It was frequently found in such common items as wallpaper, paint, cosmetics, and even candy, and its use in medical treatments was widespread. American ambassador Clare Boothe Luce suffered from exposure to arsenical paint in her study, and Napoleon's death has long been speculated to be the result of accidental or intentional poisoning. But arsenic poisoning is still a public menace. In the neighborhood surrounding American University in Washington, D.C., the army has undertaken a massive cleanup of artillery shells and bottles containing chemical warfare agents such as arsenical lewisite after a number of workmen and residents became ill. Arsenic contamination of the water supply in Bangladesh and in West Bengal, India, is a major public health problem today as well. From murder to crime fiction, from industrial toxin to chemical warfare, arsenic remains a powerful force in modern life.

For bereaved parents the development of a continuing bond with the child who has died is a key element in their grieving and in how they manage the future. Using her experience of working in a children's hospital as a counsellor with bereaved parents, Catherine Seigal looks at how continuing bonds are formed, what facilitates and sustains them and what can undermine them. She reflects on what she learned about the counsellor's role supporting parents in extremely distressing situations. Using the words and experiences of bereaved parents, and drawing on current theories of continuing bonds, the book is relevant to both professionals and parents. It covers important subjects such as the benefits of a therapeutic group for bereaved parents, the challenges for parents when another child is born, the important role of siblings in keeping the bonds alive and how it is for parents whose child dies before birth or in early infancy. The book uses theory lightly but relevantly and places it into the heart of the lived experience. It offers anyone working with bereaved parents insight into the many and varied ways grief is experienced and expressed and what can be helpful and unhelpful. And it offers bereaved parents the opportunity to share other parents' experiences, to understand a little more about their own feelings and to know they are not alone, providing an original and valuable guide to continuing love after death.