From the hugely popular star of TVUs "Judge Mathis, " comes the inspirational story of a young man who rose from delinquent to Detroit District Court Judge to national television personality. Color photos.

From the author of his truly candid memoir, Inner City Miracle, comes the fast-paced thriller about a judge who is caught up in a gritty case involving a brutal murder that no one else seems to care about. Detroit was once considered the murder capital of the nation, and as fresh-to-the-bench Judge Mathis discovers, it may be living up to its name. In one of the city’s most horrific crimes ever, a black female has been discovered decapitated in an alleyway, with her head located several blocks away. The police are stumped until the arrest of a drug dealer promises to reveal vital information about the case. The only problem? The drug dealer won’t talk to anyone but Judge Mathis. The dealer demands privileges and assurances of safety from Mathis, who refuses to bend his moral code and give in to the conditions, setting the investigation back to square one. But Mathis isn’t about to give up and finds himself unable to stop thinking about the case. So he sets out on the streets, using his savvy and connections to uncover the motives and means that led to the woman’s death.

Author Dr. Gloria Bonilla-Santiago, a Puerto Rican child of migrant farm workers, defied family, tradition, and expectations to reach the highest ranks of academia and overcome monumental obstacles to create LEAP Academy, one of the nations best charter schools. In The Miracle on Cooper Street, Bonilla-Santiago shares the challenges and obstacles, potential resources, and support of fellow professionals that moved LEAP Academy from a small charter school in 1997 to its top position today. She describes and analyzes the establishment and accomplishments of LEAP Academy in one of Americas poorest and most violent cities, Camden, New Jersey. Bonilla-Santiago also shares the story of her personal and professional struggles as a Latina from an impoverished and working-class background, surviving and fighting for respect in an academic world that many times did not value racial or ethnic diversity. Those experiences forged a dream of transforming a poor urban community through education. The Miracle on Cooper Street narrates an inspiring account that shows how one determined individual can make a profound difference in the lives of at-risk children and their communities. It presents a working model for charter schools, while at the same time admitting that LEAP is a work in progress. Most of all, it describes an inspiring institution that has seen many young people break the cycle of poverty, graduate from high school, succeed in college, and go on to live productive lives.

The remarkable story of David Kennedy's crusade to combat America's plague of gang- and drug-related violence - with methods that have been astonishingly effective across the country. 'If you want to read a book on urban gangs and find out why they exist and why they kill each other, read this ... this is a sociology book, but it's like immersing yourself in The Wire ... When Kennedy says something, you believe him' Scotsman Gang- and drug-related inner-city violence, with its attendant epidemic of incarceration, is the defining crime problem in our country. In some neighborhoods in America, one out of every two hundred young black men is shot to death every year, and few initiatives of government and law enforcement have made much difference. But when David Kennedy, a self-taught and then-unknown criminologist, engineered the "Boston Miracle" in the mid-1990s, he pointed the way toward what few had imagined: a solution. Don't Shoot tells the story of Kennedy's long journey. Riding with beat cops, hanging with gang members, and stoop-sitting with grandmothers, Kennedy found that all parties misunderstood each other, caught in a spiral of racialized anger and distrust. He envisioned an approach in which everyone-gang members, cops, and community members-comes together in what is essentially a huge intervention. Offenders are told that the violence must stop, that even the cops want them to stay alive and out of prison, and that even their families support swift law enforcement if the violence continues. In city after city, the same miracle has followed: violence plummets, drug markets dry up, and the relationship between the police and the community is reset. This is a landmark book, chronicling a paradigm shift in how we address one of America's most shameful social problems. A riveting, page-turning read, it combines the street vérité of The Wire, the social science of Gang Leader for a Day, and the moral urgency and personal journey of Fist Stick Knife Gun. But unlike anybody else, Kennedy shows that there could be an end in sight.

"Modello" is the true story from beginning to end of how Dr. Roger Mills and staff accomplished the "miracle" in the Modello and Homestead Gardens Housing Projects, applying the Three Principles/Health Realization approach based on a new spiritual psychology. Through extensive interviews with residents as well as Dr. Mills, his staff and other professionals, a very compelling and moving portrait is painted of how two low-income, inner-city housing projects replete with violence, crack, drug gangs, abuse, welfare dependency and hopelessness were completely turned around within two-and-a-half years. This book shows how people who lived in the most difficult circumstances were reached, came to find hope and changed their lives. "In all my years in prevention I have never seen this level of change in people " It is a truly inspirational story. The lives of people on whom society has given up were completely turned around. At the same time it is a sociological study. It shows how a new and different inside-out, spiritual paradigm, which on the surface seems too simple and backwards to possibly work in such overwhelming conditions, can produce incredible results and create changes in people's lives that stand head and shoulders above the traditional outside-in paradigm for prevention, human services, social work, community development and education. It has vast implications for improving humanity's social ills. About the Author: Jack Pransky, Ph.D. is founder/director of the Center for Inside-Out Understanding. He authored the books, "Somebody Should Have Told Us : Simple Truths for Living Well, Parenting from the Heart, Prevention from the Inside-Out; Prevention: The Critical Need" and co-authored "Healthy Thinking/ Feeling/Doing from the Inside-Out" prevention curriculum for middle school students. Pransky has worked in the field of prevention since 1968 in a wide variety of capacities and now provides consultation, training, counseling and coaching from the inside-out, throughout the U.S. and internationally. He is also cofounder/director of the nonprofit consulting organization, Prevention Unlimited, which created the Spirituality of Prevention Conference. In 2001 his book, "Modello" received the Martin Luther King Storyteller's Award for the book best exemplifying King's vision of "the beloved community," and in 2004 Jack won the Vermont Prevention Pioneer's Award. Jack can be contacted through his website at www.healthrealize.com.

The inspiring true story of "one of the country's finest educators" (National Review) and the school he changed forever. Under the leadership of highly unorthodox principal Dr. Ben Chavis, Oakland's American Indian Public Charter School was hailed as an "education miracle" by governor Arnold Schwarzenegger after it was transformed from a failing "nuisance" into one of the best public middle schools in the nation. This is the story of that transformation and of a man who dared to be different. With his rigorous, no-nonsense approach, Dr. Chavis debunks the myth that poor, minority, inner-city schools have little chance at academic excellence. Focusing on back-tobasics ideals, he has created a structured educational model that, combined with the enthusiasm of his students and teachers, delivers astounding results. In Crazy Like a Fox, Dr. Chavis recounts how he did it-in his own words and through the stories of the extraordinary young people he's helped.

WINNER OF THE SIGURD F. OLSON NATURE WRITING AWARD “Blending family memoir and environmental history, Kendra Atleework conveys a fundamental truth: the places in which we live, live on—sometimes painfully—in us. This is a powerful, beautiful, and urgently important book.” —Julie Schumacher, author of Dear Committee Members and The Shakespeare Requirement Kendra Atleework grew up in Swall Meadows, in the Owens Valley of the Eastern Sierra Nevada, where annual rainfall averages five inches and in drought years measures closer to zero. Her parents taught their children to thrive in this beautiful if harsh landscape prone to wildfires, blizzards, and gale-force winds. Above all, the Atleework children were raised on unconditional love and delight in the natural world. But when Kendra’s mother died when Kendra was just sixteen, her once-beloved desert world came to feel empty and hostile, as climate change, drought, and wildfires intensified. The Atleework family fell apart, even as her father tried to keep them together. Kendra escaped to Los Angeles, and then Minneapolis, land of tall trees, full lakes, water everywhere you look. But after years of avoiding her troubled hometown, she felt pulled back. Miracle Country is a moving and unforgettable memoir of flight and return, emptiness and bounty, the realities of a harsh and changing climate, and the true meaning of home. For readers of Cheryl Strayed, Terry Tempest Williams, and Rebecca Solnit, this is a breathtaking debut by a remarkable writer.