A. J. Downing (1815-1852) wrote the first American treatise on landscape gardening. As editor of the Horticulturist and the country's leading practitioner and author, he promoted a national style of landscape gardening that broke away from European precedents and standards. Like other writers and artists, Downing responded to the intensifying demand in the nineteenth century for a recognizably American cultural expression. To Live in the New World examines in detail Downing's growing conviction that landscape gardening must be adapted to the American people and the nation's indigenous landscapes. Despite significant changes in its three editions, Downing's ATreatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening remained true to the original intent: to guide country gentlemen—with enough money, time, and taste—in the creation of ideal homes and pleasure grounds. While most historians and critics have focused on Downing's more formally written treatise, Judith Major gives equal emphasis to Downing's spirited monthly editorials in the Horticulturist. In the journal, Downing "spoke American" and encouraged his countrymen and women to practice economy, to use America's rich natural resources wisely yet artfully, to be content with a little cottage and a few fine native trees. Although the book is not a biography, the people, events, and experiences that shaped Downing's thinking on landscape gardening are central to the story. Significantly, Downing spent his life in the spectacular natural setting of the Hudson River valley. Through his professional practice, travels, reading, and extensive correspondence, he gradually became aware of the individual and collective needs that he served. Landscape gardening, Downing came to feel, had to respect not only a client's desires and means, but also the nation's republican values of moderation, simplicity, and civic responsibility. Major takes a fresh look at the influence on Downing's theory and practice of British writers such as Archibald Alison, Uvedale Price, Humphry Repton, John Claudius Loudon, and John Ruskin, and analyzes for the first time his debt to the French academician A. C. Quatremère de Quincy's Essay on Imitation.

While most historians and critics have focused on the treatise, Judith Major gives equal emphasis to Downing's spirited monthly editorials in the Horticulturist. In the journal, Downing "spoke American" and encouraged his countrymen and women to practice economy, to use America's rich natural resources wisely yet artfully, to be content with a little cottage and a few fine native trees.

Brief Candles (1930), Aldous Huxley's fifth collection of short fiction, consists of the following four short stories: "Chawdron" "The Rest Cure" "The Claxtons" "After the Fireworks" Brief Candles takes its title from a line in William Shakespeare's Macbeth, from Macbeth's famous soliloquy: "Out, out, brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."

A scientist makes a powerful case that preservation of the integrity of the biosphere is a necessity and an inviolable human right. A century of industrial development is the briefest of moments in the half billion years of the earth's evolution. And yet our current era has brought greater changes to the earth than any period in human history. The biosphere, the globe's life-giving envelope of air and climate, has been changed irreparably. In A World to Live In, the distinguished ecologist George Woodwell shows that the biosphere is now a global human protectorate and that its integrity of structure and function are tied closely to the human future. The earth is a living system, Woodwell explains, and its stability is threatened by human disruption. Industry dumps its waste globally and makes a profit from it, invading the global commons; corporate interests overpower weak or nonexistent governmental protection to plunder the planet. The fossil fuels industry offers the most dramatic example of environmental destruction, disseminating the heat-trapping gases that are now warming the earth and changing the climate forever. The assumption that we can continue to use fossil fuels and “adapt” to climate disruption, Woodwell argues, is a ticket to catastrophe. But Woodwell points the way toward a solution. We must respect the full range of life on earth—not species alone, but their natural communities of plant and animal life that have built, and still maintain, the biosphere. We must recognize that the earth's living systems are our heritage and that the preservation of the integrity of a finite biosphere is a necessity and an inviolable human right.

In this dramatic short story -- a prequel to the award-winning Chaos Walking Trilogy -- author Patrick Ness gives us the story of Viola's journey to the New World. Whether you're new to Chaos Walking or an established fan, this prequel serves as a fascinating introduction to the series that Publishers Weekly called one of the most important works of young adult science fiction in recent years.

A history of the relationship between Great Britain and the United States ranges from the establishment of the first English colony in the New World to the present day, examining both nations in terms of what connected them and what drove them apart.

Author of Oprah’s Book Club Pick—The Way of Integrity: Finding the Path to Your True Self “The best known life coach in America” (Psychology Today) and bestselling author of Finding Your Own North Star provides a new transformational program for creating an unconventional life path to a sustainable way of life. Martha Beck’s program has been practiced by Oprah and featured on Super Soul Sunday! Finding Your Way in a Wild New World reveals a remarkable path to the most important discovery you can make: the knowledge of what you should be doing with your one wild and precious life. It’s the thing that so fulfills you that, if you knew what it was, you’d run straight toward it through brambles and fire. Life coach and bestselling author of Finding Your Own North Star Martha Beck guides you to find out how you got to where you are now and what you should do next, with clear instructions on tapping into the deep, wordless knowledge you carry in your body and soul. You probably have sensed that you have a higher calling and a quiet power that could change the world—you lack only the tools. With her sparkling prose, Beck draws from ancient wisdom and modern science to help you consciously tap into that power and develop those tools for transformation. You’ll also find your inner identity and your external “tribe” of like-minded people, experience the spark of inspiration, and take action to make a lasting impact on the world. Compassionate and inspirational, Finding Your Way in a Wild New World is a revolutionary journey of self-discovery that leads to miraculous change.