A new play about the conflict between a West-Indian woman and her English-born daughters.

American soldiers overseas during World War II were famously said to be “overpaid, oversexed, and over here.” But the assaults, rapes, and other brutal acts didn’t only happen elsewhere, far away from a home front depicted as safe and unscathed by the “good war.” To the contrary, millions of American and Allied troops regularly poured into ports like New York and Los Angeles while on leave. Euphemistically called “friendly invasions,” these crowds of men then forced civilians to contend with the same kinds of crime and sexual assault unfolding in places like Britain, France, and Australia. With unsettling clarity, Aaron Hiltner reveals what American troops really did on the home front. While GIs are imagined to have spent much of the war in Europe or the Pacific, before the run-up to D-Day in the spring of 1944 as many as 75% of soldiers were stationed in US port cities, including more than three million who moved through New York City. In these cities, largely uncontrolled soldiers sought and found alcohol and sex, and the civilians living there—women in particular—were not safe from the violence fomented by these de facto occupying armies. Troops brought their pocketbooks and demand for “dangerous fun” to both red-light districts and city centers, creating a new geography of vice that challenged local police, politicians, and civilians. Military authorities, focused above all else on the war effort, invoked written and unwritten legal codes to grant troops near immunity to civil policing and prosecution. The dangerous reality of life on the home front was well known at the time—even if it has subsequently been buried beneath nostalgia for the “greatest generation.” Drawing on previously unseen military archival records, Hiltner recovers a mostly forgotten chapter of World War II history, demonstrating that the war’s ill effects were felt all over—including by those supposedly safe back home.

THE STORY: In the middle of the night, Eliot Pryne, professor of English Literature--specialty Shakespeare--is packing what he thinks is a suitcase and leaving what he thinks is a hotel. In the early stages of Alzheimer's disease, he is taking leave

University professor Neil Thomas was a committed Darwinist and agnostic-until an investigation of evolutionary theory led him to a startling conclusion: "I had been conned!" As he studied the work of Darwin's defenders, he found himself encountering tactics eerily similar to the methods of political brainwashing he had studied as a scholar. Thomas felt impelled to write a book as a sort of warning call to humanity: "Beware! You have been fooled!" The result is Taking Leave of Darwin, a wide-ranging history of the evolution debate. Thomas uncovers many formidable Darwin opponents that most people know nothing about, ably distills crucial objections raised early and late against Darwinism, and shows that those objections have been explained away but never effectively answered. Thomas's deeply personal conclusion? Intelligent design is not only possible but, indeed, is presently the most reasonable explanation for the origin of life's great diversity of forms.

Rejecting Christian doctrines and metaphysics in favour of the religious consciousness which characterizes human identity, Cupitt "takes leave" of God by abandoning objective theism.

A haunting novel by 'one of the greatest writers of our era' (Hilary Mantel) and 'the Irish novelist everyone should read' (Colm Tóibín). A day, crucial and cathartic, in the life of a young Catholic schoolteacher who has returned to Ireland after a year's sabbatical in London where he married an American divorcee. As a result he now faces certain dismissal by the school authorities. Moving from the earliest memories of both the man and the woman, the novel recreates their breaking of the shackles of guilt and duty into the acceptance of a fulfilling adult love. 'A beautiful, irresistible work of imagination. Sunday Telegraph 'Wise and compelling ... Elegiac and graceful.' David Mitchell 'I have admired, even loved, John McGahern's work since his first novel .' Melvyn Bragg

Leave taking nounthe act of saying goodbye. What if you had just one week left to say goodbye to everything you've ever known? Toby and his mum and dad are leaving their family farm after the death of Toby's younger sister, Leah. Together, they sort through all their belongings and put things aside to sell or throw out. It's a big task, and Toby doesn't want to leave the only place he's called home. As his last day on the farm approaches, Toby has a plan - a plan to say goodbye to all the things and places that mean something special to him and Leah, from the machinery shed to Pa's old truck to the chook house. With the help of his best friend, Trigger the dog, he learns what it means to take your leave.