One woman’s journey to the bottom of the bottle—and back. In this tragicomic memoir about alcoholism as spiritual thirst, Heather King—writer, lawyer, and National Public Radio commentator—describes her descent into the depths of addiction. Spanning a decades-long downward spiral, King’s harrowing story takes us from a small-town New England childhood to hitchhiking across the country to a cockroach-ridden “artist’s” loft in Boston. Waitressing at ever-shabbier restaurants, deriving what sustenance she could from books, she became a morning regular at a wet-brain-drunks’ bar—and that was after graduating from law school. Saved by her family from the abyss, King finally realized that uniquely poetic, sensitive, and profound though she may have been, she was also a big-time mess. Casting her lot with the rest of humanity at last, she learned that suffering leads to redemption, that personal pain leads to compassion for others in pain, and, above all, that a sense of humor really, really helps.

Told from three perspectives, Sarel, who just witnessed the brutal murder of her parents, Nandi, the leader of a pack of dogs who looks out for her pups and Sarel, and Musa, an escaped prisoner with the water song inside him, struggle to survive in a land without water.

It hasn’t rained for a long time in the desert, leaving the animals that live there very thirsty. Follow Fen, a fennec fox, as he makes friends on his journey to find water for himself and his fellow desert dwellers. This illustrated chapter book helps advancing readers understand desert biomes and supports their journey to independent reading. Engage students’ natural curiosity with fun and inspiring real-world stories. Perfect for shared or guided reading, this book builds a foundation for a lifelong love of reading.

In sixteen-year-old Tessendra Rockwood's world, natural resources are at an all-time low. Most of the remaining supplies are funneled into Eden, known as the "powerful city of shining abundance," while citizens of the Badlands eat gelatinous gray porridge and drink reddish iron water. Tess was born an Edenite, but after the death of her scientist mother she decides to combat this inequality by joining a rebel group called Kudzu. Together they uncover a shocking government plot to carry out genocide in the Badlands using artifical intelligence. Unofrtunately, Tess has some complicated ties to the project that test her loyalty. Robots, renewable resources, and romance get tangled together as Tess risks her life to bring justice to Eden.

The beloved Harpers series kicks off with a thrilling tale about an outcast witch, a foreign agent, and the endangered desert tribes of the Anauroch Determined to drive a trade route through Anauroch, the Zhentarim have sent an army to enslave the fierce nomads of the great desert. As tribe after tribe fall to the intruders, only a single woman, Rhua, sees the true danger—but what sheik will heed the advice of an outcast witch? Ruha finds help from an unexpected source. The Harpers, guardians of liberty throughout the Realms, have sent an agent to counter the Zhentarim. If she can help this stranger win the trust of the sheikhs, perhaps he can overcome the tribes’ ancestral rivalries and drive the invaders from the desert. The Parched Sea is the first book in a series of loosely-connected novels about the Harpers.

The result of decades of research, A Green Band in a Parched and Burning Land presents a thorough and detailed understanding of the Sobaipuri O’odham—arguably the most influential and powerful Indigenous group in southern Arizona in the terminal prehistoric and early historic periods, yet one of the least understood and under-studied to have occupied the region. Deni J. Seymour combines historical sources with fresh archaeological data and oral history to reveal an astonishingly different view of, and revise conventional wisdom around, the native history of the region. First and foremost irrigation farmers, the Sobaipuri O’odham permanently occupied verdant strips along all the major rivers in the region—including the headwaters of the San Pedro and various other areas thought to be beyond their domain. Seymour draws on career-spanning fieldwork, conversations with direct descendants (the O’odham residents of Wa:k), and recent breakthroughs in archaeological, ethnographic, and ethnohistorical research to shed light on their unique forms of landscape use, settlement patterns, and way of life. She details the building materials, linear site layout, and other elements of their singular archaeological signature; newly established dating for individual sites, complex building episodes, and occupational sequences; and evidence of cumulative village occupation as well as the habitation of river valleys and other locales long after supposed abandonment. The book also explains the key relationships between site distributions and landscape characteristics. Addressing some of the longest-standing archaeological and historical questions about the Sobaipuri O’odham, A Green Band in a Parched and Burning Land reorients the discussion of their crucial place in the history of the region in constructive new directions.

The modern understanding of climate extremes in the vast Pacific Ocean has been hampered by an incomplete picture of the incidence of such extremes in the past. For the first time in this book is given a largely complete account of extreme events – tropical cyclones (hurricanes) and droughts – culled from a myriad of sources, ranging from whalers’ logs to missionary diaries, as far back in time as written records extend. This book is an essential reference for anyone interested in the nature and recurrence times of climate extremes in the Pacific Ocean. It also provides fascinating insights into the historical impacts of extreme events on often highly vulnerable island populations and livelihoods and, in doing so, underscores their continuing vulnerability as they confront 21st-century climate change.