This gripping book tells the largely unknown story of longtime Russian dissident Alexander Ogorodnikov -- from Communist youth to religious dissident, in the Gulag and back again. Ogorodnikov's courage has touched people from every walk of life, including world leaders such as Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, and Margaret Thatcher. In the 1970s Ogorodnikov performed a feat without precedent in the Soviet Union: he organized thousands of Protestant, Orthodox, and Catholic Christians in an underground group called the Christian Seminar. When the KGB gave him the option to leave the Soviet Union rather than face the Gulag, he firmly declined because he wanted to change "his" Russia from the inside out. His willingness to sacrifice himself and be imprisoned meant leaving behind his wife and newborn child. Ogorodnikov spent nine years in the Gulag, barely surviving the horrors he encountered there. Despite KGB harassment and persecution after his release, he refused to compromise his convictions and went on to found the first free school in the Soviet Union, the first soup kitchen, and the first private shelter for orphans, among other accomplishments. Today this man continues to carry on his struggle against government detainments and atrocities, often alone. Readers will be amazed and inspired by Koenraad De Wolf's authoritative account of Ogorodnikov's life and work.

In 1665, as Jews abandoned reason for the ecstasy of enthusiasm for self-proclaimed Messiah Sabbetai Zevi, Jacob Sasportas watched in horror. Dweck tells the story of the Sephardic rabbi who challenged Sabbetai Zevi's improbable claims and warned his fellow Jews that their Messiah was not the answer to their prayers..

How often do you hear a doctor saying doctors need to be more accountable, Medicare needs more support and family medicine deserves more respect? Dissident Doctor bristles with refreshingly frank criticisms from inside the health sector, and its author is not just any doctor but a distinguished scientific researcher, veteran medical administrator, Professor Emeritus, recipient of the Order of Canada and lifelong gadfly. In Dissident Doctor, Michael C. Klein intersperses fascinating tales of individual cases with formative elements of his personal life. As the son of American left-wing activists, he grew up singing folk songs about justice and racial equality; as a young doctor his refusal to serve as a military physician during the Vietnam War prompted his immigration to Canada. His early experience working with midwives in Ethiopia—delivering babies using techniques for natural pain relief and without routine episiotomy—were formative, leading him to question many standard but unjustified procedures in Western maternity care. He made many unconventional decisions as a result of his focus on humane medicine, transitioning from a specialization in pediatrics and newborn care to become a family physician, and embracing midwifery before it was approved in Canada. Klein’s determination in the face of great opposition, the strength of his convictions, and his humility and sense of humour drive this powerful story of a life and career dedicated to his patients and his principles.

The first reports seemed absurd. A Russian dissident, formerly an employee of the KGB and its successor, the FSB, had seemingly been poisoned in a London hotel. As Alexander Litvinenko's condition worsened, however, and he was transferred to hospital and placed under armed guard, the story took a sinister turn. On 23 November 2006, Litvinenko died, apparently from polonium-210 radiation poisoning. He himself, in a dramatic statement from his deathbed, accused his former employers at the Kremlin of being responsible for his murder. Who was Alexander Litvinenko? What had happened in Russia since the end of the Cold War to make his life there untenable, and even in severe jeopardy in Britain? How did he really die, and who killed him? In his spokesman and close friend, Alex Goldfarb, and widow Marina, we have two people who know more than anyone about the real Sasha Litvinenko, and about his murder. Their riveting book sheds astonishing light not just on these strange and troubling events but also on the biggest crisis in relations with Russia since the fall of the Berlin Wall.

"I was amazed to find that I had no idea how to unfold my spiritual life in a feminine way. I was surprised, and, in fact, a little terrified, when I found myself in the middle of a feminist spiritual reawakening." ––Sue Monk Kidd For years, Sue Monk Kidd was a conventionally religious woman. Then, in the late 1980s, Kidd experienced an unexpected awakening, and began a journey toward a feminine spirituality. With the exceptional storytelling skills that have helped make her name, author of When the Heart Waits tells her very personal story of the fear, anger, healing, and freedom she experienced on the path toward the wholeness that many women have lost in the church. From a jarring encounter with sexism in a suburban drugstore, to monastery retreats and to rituals in the caves of Crete, she reveals a new level of feminine spiritual consciousness for all women– one that retains a meaningful connection with the "deep song of Christianity," embraces the sacredness of ordinary women's experience, and has the power to transform in the most positive ways every fundamental relationship in a woman's life– her marriage, her career, and her religion. This Plus edition paperback includes a recent interview with the author conducted by the book's editor Michael Maudlin.

From the PEN/Malamud Award-winning author of Lucky Girls comes an intricately woven novel about secrets, love, art, identity, and the shining chaos of every day American life. Yuan Zhao, a celebrated Chinese performance artist and political dissident, has accepted a one-year artist's residency in Los Angeles. He is to be a Visiting Scholar at the St. Anselm's School for Girls, teaching advanced art, and hosted by one of the school's most devoted families: the wealthy if dysfunctional Traverses. The Traverses are too preoccupied with their own problems to pay their foreign guest too much attention, and the dissident is delighted to be left alone—his past links with radical movements give him good reason to avoid careful scrutiny. The trouble starts when he and his American hosts begin to view one another with clearer eyes.