A luminous quartet, five years in the writing, reveals even more fully the breathtaking range of "a storyteller in the grand tradition" (New York Times). Allan Gurganus's voice--by turn bawdy and serene, folkloric and profane--deepens as it soars into this quiet masterwork. Four new fables--rich in event, comedy, experience--surge with the force of history's headlines versus sidestreet human fortitude. Improbable heroes and heroines spiral outward from Gurganus's familiar Carolina terrain. Each fires into a wild and differing direction, all in quest of some fantasy that's practically impossible: --An impoverished immigrant has her portrait painted (or not) by John Singer Sargent. --A young man's devotion to saving eighteenth-century homes—and their odd lingering ghosts—helps him find unlikely ways to renovate his own mortality. --A pillar of the community becomes, over the course of one cartoon matinee, its pariah. --A beloved, transfixingly homely father shows his village and his only son a decency stronger than race, humiliation, or even death itself. These characters' quixotic missions prove mysterious, often even to themselves. Their legacies are not easily deciphered. And yet, their most impractical wishes soon become the heartiest facts about each. They manage to wrest battle-courage from everyday indecision. Out of superstition and convention, they lift certainty. They each find a wealth of consoling truths banked--immortal--in the all-too-human heart. Allan Gurganus's great powers--announced more than a decade ago by Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All--here achieve a yearning exuberance worthy of a new Whitman. These leaps of sexual longing, empathy, and faith become a major new gift from this essential fablemaker.

An invitation to discover and develop your heart powers and tap into heart energy • Features accessible yet profound wisdom about the power of the heart and approaches for tapping into heart energy • Reveals that the heart, often perceived as our most vulnerable and fragile place, is in fact the source of our greatest potential • Supports individual heart-work by offering simple and practical exercises, meditations, and visualizations proven effective through many years of practice The heart is more often associated with vulnerability than hidden powers. We generally feel the need to protect our heart, building high walls after experiences of emotional pain and hurt. This response is unconscious, and since the modern world teaches us to rely on the brain to guide our life and actions, many of us find it hard to connect to the power and skills within our own hearts. Addressing the fears and feelings of insecurity that can arise and prevent us from opening up to the treasures we hold within, Shai Tubali reveals that the heart, often perceived as our most vulnerable and fragile place, is in fact the source of our greatest potential. Providing practical advice, exercises, meditations, and visualizations proven through his own heart-work practice, he shows how to tap into the heart’s energy field and easily activate its seven secret powers: wisdom, vulnerability, forgiveness, ability to love, infinite energy, transformation, and self-acceptance. He explains how our modern education system develops our mind perception only, focusing on the goal of being successful and urging us constantly to be faster and better. Not only does this not bring happiness and fulfilment, but it may even cause stress and illness. Showing how to transition from mind to heart perception, Tubali helps us understand more about our heart’s skills and how to implement its powers by healing inner energetic and emotional blockages. Calling for a change from one-sided mind perception and behavior, Tubali urges us to get in touch with our core and surrender completely to our heart energy, leaving all misconceptions behind and tearing down protective walls to discover our full potential. Unlocking the seven heart powers will lead to a deep sense of peace, balance, and fulfilment and enable you to approach life from a place of trust and love.

Featuring over 1,000 full-color illustrations, this text is a comprehensive guide to cardiac autopsy and surgical pathology of cardiovascular disease. The book is geared to pathology residents and practicing surgical pathologists and focuses on illustrated practical diagnosis, including differential diagnosis.

Providing a complete but succinct overview of the information cardiologists and cardiology trainees need to have at their fingertips, Practical Cardiovascular Medicine, Second Edition is an everyday primary guide to the specialty. Provides cardiologists with a thorough and up-to-date review of cardiology, from pathophysiology to practical, evidence-based management Ably synthesizes pathophysiology fundamentals and evidence-based approaches to prepare a physician for a subspecialty career in cardiology Clinical chapters cover coronary artery disease, heart failure, arrhythmias, valvular disorders, pericardial disorders, congenital heart disease, and peripheral arterial disease Practical chapters address ECG, coronary angiography, catheterization techniques, echocardiography, hemodynamics, and electrophysiological testing Includes over 730 figures, key notes boxes, references for further study, and coverage of clinical trials Review questions help clarify topics and can be used for Board preparation - over 650 questions in all The Second Edition has been comprehensively updated with the newest data and with both the American and European guidelines. More specifically, 20 clinical chapters have been rewritten and extensively revised. Procedural chapters have been enhanced with additional concepts and illustrations, particularly the hemodynamic and catheterization chapters. Clinical questions have been revamped, new questions have been added, including a new, 259-question section at the end of the book. Practical Cardiovascular Medicine, Second Edition is an ideal reference for the resident, fellow, cardiologist, and any professional treating patients with cardiovascular disease.

With great narrative inventiveness and emotional amplitude, Allan Gurganus gives us artistic Manhattan in the wild 1980s, where young artists--refugees from the middle class--hurl themselves into playful work and serious fun. Our guide is Hartley Mims Jr., a Southerner whose native knack for happiness might thwart his literary ambitions. Through his eyes we encounter the composer Robert Christian Gustafson, an Iowa preacher's son whose good looks constitute both a mythic draw and a major limitation, and Angelina "Alabama" Byrnes, a failed deb, five feet tall but bristling with outsized talent. These friends shelter each other, promote each other's work, and compete erotically. When tragedy strikes, this circle grows up fast, somehow finding, at the worst of times, the truest sort of family. Funny and heartbreaking, as eventful as Dickens and as atmospheric as one of Fitzgerald's parties, Plays Well with Others combines a fable's high-noon energy with an elegy's evening grace. Allan Gurganus's celebrated new novel is a lovesong to imperishable friendship, a hymn to a brilliant and now-vanished world.

Downtowns are more than economic engines: they are repositories of knowledge and culture and generators of new ideas, technology, and ventures. They are the heart of the city that drives its future. If we are to have healthy downtowns, we need to understand what downtown is all about; how and why some American downtowns never stopped thriving (such as San Jose and Houston), some have been in decline for half a century (including Detroit and St. Louis), and still others are resurging after temporary decline (many, including Lower Manhattan and Los Angeles). The downtowns that are prospering are those that more easily adapt to changing needs and lifestyles. In The Heart of the City, distinguished urban planner Alexander Garvin shares lessons on how to plan for a mix of housing, businesses, and attractions; enhance the public realm; improve mobility; and successfully manage downtown services. Garvin opens the book with diagnoses of downtowns across the United States, including the people, businesses, institutions, and public agencies implementing changes. In a review of prescriptions and treatments for any downtown, Garvin shares brief accounts—of both successes and failures—of what individuals with very different objectives have done to change their downtowns. The final chapters look at what is possible for downtowns in the future, closing with suggested national, state, and local legislation to create standard downtown business improvement districts to better manage downtowns. This book will help public officials, civic organizations, downtown business property owners, and people who care about cities learn from successful recent actions in downtowns across the country, and expand opportunities facing their downtown. Garvin provides recommendations for continuing actions to help any downtown thrive, ensuring a prosperous and thrilling future for the 21st-century American city.

Ko-i Bastis is a Buddhist chaplain and in her book she helps readers reflect on what forgiveness really means and how it can heal their lives and relationships. She explores the difficult emotions that keep people from forgiving and offers tools to help us overcome them.