A captivating exploration of beach resort culture—from its roots in fashionable society to its undervalued role in today’s world economy—as the travel industry approaches a climate reckoning With its promise of escape from the strains of everyday life, the beach has a hold on the popular imagination as the ultimate paradise. In The Last Resort, Sarah Stodola dives into the psyche of the beachgoer and gets to the heart of what drives humans to seek out the sand. At the same time, she grapples with the darker realities of resort culture: strangleholds on local economies, reckless construction, erosion of beaches, weighty carbon footprints, and the inevitable overdevelopment and decline that comes with a soaring demand for popular shorelines. The Last Resort weaves Stodola’s firsthand travel notes with her exacting journalism in an enthralling report on the past, present, and future of coastal travel. She takes us from Monte Carlo, where the pursuit of pleasure first became part of the beach resort experience, to a village in Fiji that was changed irrevocably by the opening of a single resort; from the overdevelopment that stripped Acapulco of its reputation for exclusivity to Miami Beach, where extreme measures are underway to prevent the barrier island from vanishing into the ocean. In the twenty-first century, beach travel has become central to our globalized world—its culture, economy, and interconnectedness. But with sea levels likely to rise at least 1.5 to 3 feet by the end of this century, beaches will become increasingly difficult to preserve, and many will disappear altogether. What will our last resort be when water begins to fill the lobbies?

A fascinating exploration into the world of turtles across the globe; Laufer charts the lore, love, and peril to a beloved species. Dreaming in Turtle is a compelling story of a stalwart animal prized from prehistory through to today—an animal threatened by human greed, pragmatism, and rationalization. It stars turtles and shady and heroic human characters both, in settings ranging from luxury redoubts to degraded habitats, during a time when the confluence of easy global trade, limited supply, and inexhaustible demand has accelerated the stress on species. The growth of the middle class in high-population regions like China, where the turtle is particularly valued, feeds this perfect storm into which the turtle finds itself lashed. This is a tale not just of endangered turtles but also one of overall human failings, frailties, and vulnerabilities—all punctuated by optimistic hope for change fueled by dedicated turtle champions.

How an antisemitic legend gave voice to widespread fears surrounding the expansion of private credit in Western capitalism The Promise and Peril of Credit takes an incisive look at pivotal episodes in the West’s centuries-long struggle to define the place of private finance in the social and political order. It does so through the lens of a persistent legend about Jews and money that reflected the anxieties surrounding the rise of impersonal credit markets. By the close of the Middle Ages, new and sophisticated credit instruments made it easier for European merchants to move funds across the globe. Bills of exchange were by far the most arcane of these financial innovations. Intangible and written in a cryptic language, they fueled world trade but also lured naive investors into risky businesses. Francesca Trivellato recounts how the invention of these abstruse credit contracts was falsely attributed to Jews, and how this story gave voice to deep-seated fears about the unseen perils of the new paper economy. She locates the legend’s earliest version in a seventeenth-century handbook on maritime law and traces its legacy all the way to the work of the founders of modern social theory—from Marx to Weber and Sombart. Deftly weaving together economic, legal, social, cultural, and intellectual history, Trivellato vividly describes how Christian writers drew on the story to define and redefine what constituted the proper boundaries of credit in a modern world increasingly dominated by finance.

“THE UNLEASHED POWER OF THE ATOM HAS CHANGED EVERYTHING SAVE OUR MODES OF THINKING, AND WE THUS DRIFT TOWARD UNPARALLELED CATASTROPHE.” —ALBERT EINSTEIN With the revelation of Iran’s secret uranium enrichment facilities, North Korea’s brazen testing of missiles and nuclear weapons, and nuclear-endowed Pakistan’s descent into instability, the urgency of the nuclear proliferation problem has never been greater. Based on his extensive experience in tracking the illicit nuclear trade as one of the world’s foremost proliferation experts, in Peddling Peril David Albright offers a harrowing narrative of the frighteningly large cracks through which nuclear weapons traffi ckers—such as Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan—continue to slip. Six years after the arrest of Khan, the networks he established continue to thrive, with black markets sprouting up across the globe. The dramatic takedown of the leader of the world’s largest and most perilous smuggling network was originally considered a model of savvy detection by intelligence and enforcement agencies, including the CIA and MI6. But, as Albright chronicles, the prosecutions of traffickers that were much anticipated have not come to pass, and Khan himself was released from house arrest in February 2009. Iran, Pakistan, and North Korea all use statesponsored smuggling networks that easily bypass export regulations and avoid detection. Albright illuminates how these networks have learned many ways to trick suppliers across the globe, including many in the United States, into selling them vital parts, and why, despite the fact that, since 2007, several dozen companies have been indicted—with some pleading guilty—for suspicion of participating in illicit trade, very few prosecutions have been achieved. Peddling Peril charts the dealings of several of these companies. Albright also reports on the hopeful story of the German company Leybold’s decision to become an industry watchdog, and shows how this story reveals just how effective corporate monitoring and government cooperation would be if more serious efforts were made. Concluding with a detailed plan for clamping down tightly on the illicit trade, Albright shows the way forward in the vital mission of freeing the world of this terrifying menace.

Are purpose and profit in conflict, or can both be achieved simultaneously with the right mindset and tools? What are the forces that are reshaping the relationship between the two? What can we all do to strengthen the relationship between purpose and profit as entrepreneurs, managers, employees, consumers, and investors? Backed by cutting-edge research, Purpose and Profit provides answers to these fundamental questions that are increasingly defining the business landscape all around the world. Distinguished Harvard Business School Professor George Serafeim takes readers on a research-driven journey to understand: How and why environmental and social issues are becoming increasingly relevant for organizations worldwide; The ways that companies can design and implement strategies that generate greater impact; The six archetypes of value creation enabled by these new trends; The role of investors in driving greater recognition of ESG issues; and How we can all look at the choices we make and careers we pursue in a way that maximizes purpose and profit in our own lives.

Sully Must Get Her Childhood Friend Off the Naughty List Before They're Both Scrooged When Edwina "Sully" Sullivan's life imploded, she left behind her job on the police force and her unfaithful husband to start a new life as the general manager of her hometown theater, the Cliffside Theater Company. For five years, she focused on budgets instead of crime and kept the Cliffside running alongside its mercurial artistic director. But when her childhood friend is suspected of killing his father, no one is looking for another culprit. So, in between keeping A Christmas Carol on budget and Scrooge sober, Sully dusts off her investigative skills to find a murderer. Her two lives collide when her ex-husband arrives on the scene to play lawyer and she's forced to confront her past in order to save her present.

Witty, authoritative, comprehensive and fun, Wake Up and Smell the Profit is the ultimate guide to making more money in your coffee business. In this book you'll find the sharpest insights and the best ideas from two of the UK's top Coffee Business Gurus. Together 'The Coffee Boys' have 40 years' experience in how to make money in the coffee selling business. Whether you operate a single site espresso bar, a Michelin starred restaurant or chain of hotels, there is something in this book for everyone. With 52 motivating tips and suggestions (plus an extra bonus idea for good measure), all you need to do is apply one initiative a week for a year and you could have a much more profitable and easier to manage business within twelve months. With this book you'll be able to: * Make more money and work less * Have happier customers who spend more money * Win more customers without spending a fortune * Enjoy running your business more * Create customers who rave about your business and consequently generate more customers through word of mouth What are you waiting for?