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Lust, Men, and Meth: A Gay Man's Guide to Sex and Recovery
Lust, Men, and Meth: A Gay Man's Guide to Sex and Recovery provides insight for gay men struggling with the issues of sex and recovery, and for the professionals who work with them. The reader is equipped not only with essential information on the problems of drugs and sexuality, but also with solutions in the form of tools and resources that will support him along his path. The book is unique in its blend of therapeutic perspectives of addiction and sex therapy, from which Dr. Fawcett has integrated the most useful concepts and tools. Additionally, detailed case studies will assist clinicians who, in Dr. Fawcett's many trainings for professionals, have asked for material on substance use, identity, and sexuality in gay-identified men. These insights and tools will be helpful not only in the early stages of sobriety, but for an individual's continuing personal evolution of recovery as well.
The book is divided into three parts to help guide the reader through this multifaceted topic. The first part, "The Perfect Storm," examines how, through the release of dopamine and other neurotransmitters, methamphetamine has phenomenal power to change one's mood and entice the user to ingest ever-increasing amounts of the drug. The role of excitement, risk, and even boredom are explored, along with the vulnerabilities of some gay men who find themselves feeling unattractive, left out, or disconnected and utilize meth to soothe these feelings. Finally, this part of the book explores the unfortunate intersection of meth, the gay community, and the rise of dangerous health concerns such as HIV/AIDS.
The second part, "Exploring the Sexual Universe," provides a sex therapist's perspective on sexual desire and how eroticism develops in the brain, an elaborate world of sexual templates, scripts, and themes that methamphetamine penetrates and distorts. This section also highlights exciting discoveries of neurobiology and the direct impact of the brain's plasticity on the profound problem of the fusion of meth and sex. Dopamine is the central player in the drama of both the feelings produced by drug use and the consequent hijacking of sexual desire. New discoveries about the brain's ability to change and adapt in response to compulsive behaviors shed light both on the harmful consequences of drug use and clues about recovery.
The final part, "Restoring Your Life," explores the process of recovery from this drug in detail, with chapters on specific skills derived from thousands of hours working with clients, managing of feelings, and rethinking perspectives on sex. The reader will find that, with increased distance from the drug, such powerful emotions as vulnerability, anxiety, or shame, which once were buried by meth use, now provide direction to promote emotional transformations that ultimately enrich both the sexual and emotional life. Finally, the reader is guided in rebuilding relationships with himself, his loved ones, and the community as he continues in recovery.
Gay men and their helping professionals will find the information in these pages illuminating and motivating as they create lives of recovery from addiction as well as fulfilling and joyous sexual expression.
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Promise of Blood
"Just plain awesome" -- Brandon Sanderson Civil unrest cripples the citizens of Adro in the aftermath of the revolution that obliterated the monarchy. Now, Field Marshal Tamas and his lieutenants must confront the true cost of freedom in book one of the Powder Mage Trilogy. It's a bloody business overthrowing a king. . . Field Marshal Tamas' coup against his king sent corrupt aristocrats to the guillotine and brought bread to the starving. But it also provoked war with the Nine Nations, internal attacks by royalist fanatics, and the greedy to scramble for money and power by Tamas's supposed allies: the Church, workers unions, and mercenary forces. It's up to a few. . . Stretched to his limit, Tamas is relying heavily on his few remaining powder mages, including the embittered Taniel, a brilliant marksman who also happens to be his estranged son, and Adamat, a retired police inspector whose loyalty is being tested by blackmail. But when gods are involved. . . Now, as attacks batter them from within and without, the credulous are whispering about omens of death and destruction. Just old peasant legends about the gods waking to walk the earth. No modern educated man believes that sort of thing. But they should. . . Winner of the David Gemmell Morningstar Award for Best Debut Fantasy. -
The Queen's Price
Enter the dark and sensual realms of the Black Jewels in this sweeping story in the New York Times bestselling fantasy saga of three young women who must navigate life within the powerful SaDiablo family--and come to terms with Witch, the Queen who is still the heart and will of that family.
The Queen's price is to stand against what you know is wrong. To stand and fight, no matter the cost to your court or to yourself. Especially to yourself. Zoey, a young Queen-in-training at SaDiablo Hall, is wounded...and vulnerable to taunts and criticism. When an opportunity arises to befriend a stranger seeking sanctuary at the Hall, she puts herself and others in danger by ignoring Daemonar Yaslana's warning to back off. Meanwhile, the witch Jillian's family prepares for her Virgin Night, the rite of passage that assures a woman will retain her power and her Jewels. The trouble is Jillian secretly went through the ceremony already. Now she has to explain the omission of that detail to her powerful and lethal family. And the High Lord of Hell's daughter, Saetien, travels to Scelt to find out about Jaenelle Angelline's sister--and perhaps to discover truths about herself. With some guidance from Witch, these three young women will learn when to yield because it is right--and when to take a stand, even if they must pay the Queen's price. -
LSD and the Mind of the Universe: Diamonds from Heaven
A professor of religious studies meticulously documents his insights from 73 high-dose LSD sessions conducted over the course of 20 years - Chronicles, with unprecedented rigor, the author's systematic journey into a unified field of consciousness that underlies all physical existence - Makes a powerful case for the value of psychedelically induced spiritual experience and discusses the challenge of integrating these experiences into everyday life - Shows how psychedelic experience can take you beyond self-transformation into collective transformation and help birth the future of humanity On November 24, 1979, Christopher M. Bache took the first step on what would become a life-changing journey. Drawing from his training as a philosopher of religion, Bache set out to explore his mind and the mind of the universe as deeply and systematically as possible--with the help of the psychedelic drug LSD. Following protocols established by Stanislav Grof, Bache's 73 high-dose LSD sessions over the course of 20 years drew him into a deepening communion with cosmic consciousness. Journey alongside professor Bache as he touches the living intelligence of our universe--an intelligence that both embraced and crushed him--and demonstrates how direct experience of the divine can change your perspective on core issues in philosophy and religion. Chronicling his 73 sessions, the author reveals the spiral of death and rebirth that took him through the collective unconscious into the creative intelligence of the universe. Making a powerful case for the value of psychedelically induced spiritual experience, Bache shares his immersion in the fierce love and creative intent of the unified field of consciousness that underlies all physical existence. He describes the incalculable value of embracing the pain and suffering he encountered in his sessions and the challenges he faced integrating his experiences into his everyday life. His journey documents a shift from individual consciousness to collective consciousness, from archetypal reality to Divine Oneness and the Diamond Luminosity that lies outside cyclic existence. Pushing the boundaries of theory and practice, the author shows how psychedelic experience can take you beyond self-transformation into collective transformation, beyond the present into the future, revealing spirit and matter in perfect balance. -
Song of the Forever Rains
From the award-winning author of the Dreamland series comes a new dark romantic fantasy about a young woman finding hope in her powers of destruction.
The Thief Kingdom is a place hidden within the world of Aadilor. Many whisper of its existence, but few have found this place, where magic and pleasure abound. There, the mysterious Thief King reigns supreme with the help of the Mousai, a trio of revered and feared sorceresses.
Larkyra Bassette may be the youngest of the Mousai, but when she sings her voice has the power to slay monsters. When it's discovered the Duke of Lachlan is siphoning a poisonous drug from the Thief Kingdom and using it to abuse his tenants, Larkyra is offered her first solo mission to stop the duke. Eager to prove herself, Larkyra accepts by posing as the duke's potential bride. But her plans grow complicated when she finds herself drawn to Lord Darius Mekenna, Lachlan's rightful heir. Soon she suspects Darius has his own motivations for ridding Lachlan of the corrupt duke. Larkyra and Darius must learn to trust each other if there is to be any hope of saving the people of Lachlan--and themselves.
Welcome to the world of Aadilor, where lords and ladies can be murderers and thieves, and the most alluring notes are often the deadliest. Dare to listen?
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The Method: How the Twentieth Century Learned to ACT
National Book Critics Circle Award Winner, Nonfiction
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF 2022 BY THE NEW YORKER, TIME MAGAZINE, SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE, VOX, SALON, LIT HUB, AND VANITY FAIR "Entertaining and illuminating."--The New Yorker * "Compulsively readable."--New York Times * "Delicious, humane, probing."--Vulture * "The best and most important book about acting I've ever read."--Nathan Lane The critically acclaimed cultural history of Method acting-an ebullient account of creative discovery and the birth of classic Hollywood. On stage and screen, we know a great performance when we see it. But how do actors draw from their bodies and minds to turn their selves into art? What is the craft of being an authentic fake? More than a century ago, amid tsarist Russia's crushing repression, one of the most talented actors ever, Konstantin Stanislavski, asked these very questions, reached deep into himself, and emerged with an answer. How his "system" remade itself into the Method and forever transformed American theater and film is an unlikely saga that has never before been fully told. Now, critic and theater director Isaac Butler chronicles the history of the Method in a narrative that transports readers from Moscow to New York to Los Angeles, from The Seagull to A Streetcar Named Desire to Raging Bull. He traces how a cohort of American mavericks--including Stella Adler, Lee Strasberg, and the storied Group Theatre--refashioned Stanislavski's ideas for a Depression-plagued nation that had yet to find its place as an artistic powerhouse. The Group's feuds and rivalries would, in turn, shape generations of actors who enabled Hollywood to become the global dream-factory it is today. Some of these performers the Method would uplift; others, it would destroy. Long after its midcentury heyday, the Method lives on as one of the most influential--and misunderstood--ideas in American culture. Studded with marquee names--from Marlon Brando, Marilyn Monroe, and Elia Kazan, to James Baldwin, Ellen Burstyn, and Dustin Hoffman--The Method is a spirited history of ideas and a must-read for any fan of Broadway or American film. -
Sold outThe Crane Wife: A Memoir in Essays
A memoir in essays that expands on the viral sensation "The Crane Wife" with a frank and funny look at love, intimacy, and self in the twenty-first century. From friends and lovers to blood family and chosen family, this "elegant masterpiece" (Roxane Gay, New York Times bestselling author of Hunger) asks what more expansive definitions of love might offer us all. A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: TIME, THE GUARDIAN, GARDEN & GUN "Hauser builds their life's inventory out of deconstructed personal narratives, resulting in a reading experience that's rich like a complicated dessert--not for wolfing down but for savoring in small bites." --The New York Times "Clever, heartfelt, and wrenching."
--Time
"Brilliant."
--Oprah Daily
Ten days after calling off their wedding, CJ Hauser went on an expedition to Texas to study the whooping crane. After a week wading through the gulf, they realized they'd almost signed up to live someone else's life. What if you released yourself from traditional narratives of happiness? What if you looked for ways to leave room for the unexpected? In Hauser's case, this meant dissecting pop culture touchstone, from The Philadelphia Story to The X Files, to learn how not to lose yourself in a relationship. They attended a robot convention, contemplated grief at John Belushi's gravesite, and officiated a wedding. Most importantly, they mapped the difference between the stories we're asked to hold versus those we choose to carry. Told with the late-night barstool directness of your wisest, most bighearted friend, The Crane Wife is a book for everyone whose path doesn't look the way they thought it would; for everyone learning to find joy in the not-knowing and to build a new sort of life story, a new sort of family, a new sort of home to live in.Sold out -
Transgender Marxism
"A terrific collection of essays - I couldn't put it down"--Kathi Weeks, author, The Problem with Work "A vibrant and much needed collection - not just for trans people - but the left in general"--Shon Faye, author, The Transgender Issue The first collection of its kind, Transgender Marxism is a provocative and groundbreaking union of transgender studies and Marxist theory. Exploring trans lives and movements, the authors delve into the experience of surviving as transgender under capitalism. They explore the pressures, oppression and state persecution faced by trans people living in capitalist societies, their tenuous positions in the workplace and the home, and give a powerful response to right-wing scaremongering against "gender ideology'." Chapters include: *Trans Work: Employment Trajectories, Labour Discipline and Gender Freedom by Michelle O'Brien
*Judith Butler's Scientific Revolution: Foundations for a Transsexual Marxism by Rosa Lee
*How Do Gender Transitions Happen? By Jules Joanne Gleeson
*A Queer Marxist Transfeminism: Queer and Trans Social Reproduction by Nat Raha
*The Bridge between Gender and Organizing by Farah Thompson
*Transgender and Disabled Bodies - Between Pain and the Imaginary by Zoe Belinsky
*Seizing the Means: Towards a Trans Epistemology by Nathaniel Dickson
*"Why Are We Like This?" The Primacy of Transsexuality by Xandra Metcalfe
*Cosmos Against Nature in the Class Struggle of Proletarian Trans Women by Anja Heisler Weiser Flower
*Afterword: One Utopia, One Dystopia by Jordy Rosenberg Reflecting on the relations between gender and labor, these essays reveal the structure of antagonisms faced by gender non-conforming people within society. Looking at the history of transgender movements, Marxist interventions into developmental theory, psychoanalysis and workplace ethnography, the authors conclude that for trans liberation, capitalism must be abolished. -
You're That Bitch: & Other Cute Lessons about Being Unapologetically Yourself
"This book is hilarious and that bitch made me laugh out loud."--Chelsea Handler
A chaotically joyous collection of essays from one of the original influencers and the internet's sweetheart, Bretman "The Baddest" Rock.
Hilarious and earnest, this collection of essays, and never-before-seen photos goes far beyond what we know of Bretman Rock from social media. Who is Bretman Rock Sacayanan behind the screen and how did he become the original superstar influencer and today's beloved best friend of the internet?
You're That Bitch welcomes you into Bretman Rock's world--from how his childhood in the Philippines, his family, Filipino culture, and being a first-generation immigrant helped shape him into who he is today. Peek into how Bretman became a social media sensation at the precocious age of 14, balancing living a glamorous jet-setting lifestyle on weekends while still serving lunch at his school's cafeteria, running as a varsity track-star, and making honor roll during the week. With his signature honesty, this is an unfiltered and unprecedented look at what it means to be one of the first digital celebrities and that bitch---from dealing with cancel culture, drama and heartbreak, to what it means to love yourself and your community.
From the funniest and undeniably cutest person on the internet, this is a book for the weirdos and for the bad bitches . . . this book is for you!
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Sailor Moon Eternal Edition 6
The guardians in sailor suits return in this definitive edition of the everlasting masterpiece! Features all-new cover illustrations by creator Naoko Takeuchi, a glittering holographic coating, an extra-large size, premium paper, French flaps, and a newly-revised translation! Ages 13 and up. Teenager Usagi is not the best athlete, she's never gotten good grades, and, well, she's a bit of a crybaby. But when she meets a talking cat, she begins a journey that will teach her she has a well of great strength just beneath the surface and the heart to inspire and stand up for her friends as Sailor Moon! Experience the Sailor Moon manga as never before in these extra-long editions (about 300 pages each). -
The Holiday Trap
For fans of Alexandria Bellefleur and Casey McQuiston comes a charming, hilarious, and heartwarming LGBTQIA+ romcom about two separate couples finding love over the holidays from acclaimed author Roan Parrish!
FROM A COZY NEW ENGLAND HAVEN TO THE HEART OF NEW ORLEANS COMES ONE HOLIDAY THAT'LL CHANGE THEIR LIVES
Greta Russakoff loves her tight-knit family and tiny Maine hometown, but they can't seem to understand what it's like to be a lesbian living in such a small world. When an act of familial meddling goes way too far, she realizes just how desperately she needs space to figure out who she is.
Truman Belvedere's heart is crushed when he learns that his boyfriend has a secret life including a husband and daughter. Reeling, all he wants is a place to lick his wounds far, far away from Louisiana.
Enter a mutual friend with a life-altering idea: swap homes for the holidays. For one perfect month, Greta and Truman will have a chance to experience a whole new world...and maybe fall in love with the partner of their dreams. But all holidays must come to an end, and eventually these two transplants will have to decide whether the love (and found family) they each discovered so far from home is worth fighting for.
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Parakeet
EDITORS' CHOICE AT THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
"Miraculous: spry and mordant, with sentences that lull you with their rhythms, then twist suddenly and sting." --Lauren Groff, author of Florida "A twisting, strange delight, Parakeet shimmers a soft and generous light on the darkest of a woman's innermost thoughts." --Kristen Iversen, Refinery29
LONGLISTED FOR THE 2021 CARNEGIE MEDAL and the Joyce Carol Oates Prize
Acclaimed author of 2 A.M. at the Cat's Pajamas Marie-Helene Bertino's Parakeet is a darkly funny and warm-hearted novel about a young woman whose dead grandmother (in the form of a parakeet) warns her not to marry and sends her out to find an estranged loved one. The week of her wedding, The Bride is visited by a bird she recognizes as her dead grandmother because of the cornflower blue line beneath her eyes, her dubious expression, and the way she asks: What is the Internet? Her grandmother is a parakeet. She says not to get married. She says: Go and find your brother. In the days that follow, The Bride's march to the altar becomes a wild and increasingly fragmented, unstable journey that bends toward the surreal and forces her to confront matters long buried. A novel that does justice to the hectic confusion of becoming a woman today, Parakeet asks and begins to answer the essential questions. How do our memories make, cage, and free us? How do we honor our experiences and still become our strongest, truest selves? Who are we responsible for, what do we owe them, and how do we allow them to change? Urgent, strange, warm-hearted, and sly, Parakeet is ribboned with joy, fear, and an inextricable thread of real love. It is a startling, unforgettable, life-embracing exploration of self and connection. A Best Book of 2020 at Lit Hub, Electric Literature, and Refinery29
A Best Book of Summer at Vulture, Refinery29, Yahoo! Life, Alma, Subway Book Review, and Lit Hub
A Best Book of the Month at Entertainment Weekly, Hello Giggles, and PopSugar -
The Boy and the Dog
"An amazing, beautiful book . . . It shows how one dog's dignified presence can bring connection and love to a fractured world." ―Cat Warren, New York Times bestselling author of What the Dog Knows One dog changes the life of everyone who takes him in on his journey to reunite with his first owner in this inspiring novel about the bond between humans and dogs and the life-affirming power of connection. Following a devastating earthquake and tsunami, a young man in Japan finds a stray dog outside a convenience store. The dog's tag says "Tamon," a name evocative of the guardian deity of the north. The man decides to keep Tamon, becoming the first in a series of owners on the dog's five-year journey to find his beloved first owner, Hikaru, a boy who has not spoken since the tsunami. An agent of fate, Tamon is a gift to everyone who welcomes him into their life. At once heartrending and heartwarming, intimate and panoramic, suspenseful and luminous--and deepened in its emotion by the author's mastery of the gritty details and hardscrabble circumstances that define the lives of the various people who take Tamon in on his journey--this bestselling, award-winning novel weaves a feel-good tale of survival, resilience, and love beyond measure. -
This Savage Song
#1 New York Times Bestseller * An Amazon Best Book of the Year
There's no such thing as safe in a city at war, a city overrun with monsters. In this dark urban fantasy from acclaimed author Victoria Schwab, a young woman and a young man must choose whether to become heroes or villains--and friends or enemies--with the future of their home at stake.
The first of two books, This Savage Song is a must-have for fans of Holly Black, Maggie Stiefvater, and Laini Taylor.
Kate Harker and August Flynn are the heirs to a divided city--a city where the violence has begun to breed actual monsters. All Kate wants is to be as ruthless as her father, who lets the monsters roam free and makes the humans pay for his protection. All August wants is to be human, as good-hearted as his own father, to play a bigger role in protecting the innocent--but he's one of the monsters. One who can steal a soul with a simple strain of music.
When the chance arises to keep an eye on Kate, who's just been kicked out of her sixth boarding school and returned home, August jumps at it. But Kate discovers August's secret, and after a failed assassination attempt the pair must flee for their lives.
In This Savage Song, Victoria Schwab creates a gritty, seething metropolis, one worthy of being compared to Gotham and to the four versions of London in her critically acclaimed fantasy for adults, A Darker Shade of Magic. Her heroes will face monsters intent on destroying them from every side--including the monsters within.
The repackaged paperback includes a map of V-City!
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The Black History Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained
Learn about the most important milestones in Black history in The Black History Book.
Part of the fascinating Big Ideas series, this book tackles tricky topics and themes in a simple and easy to follow format. Learn about Black History in this overview guide to the subject, great for novices looking to find out more and experts wishing to refresh their knowledge alike! The Black History Book brings a fresh and vibrant take on the topic through eye-catching graphics and diagrams to immerse yourself in. This captivating book will broaden your understanding of Black History, with: - Covers the most important milestones in Black and African history
- Packed with facts, charts, timelines and graphs to help explain core concepts
- A visual approach to big subjects with striking illustrations and graphics throughout
- Easy to follow text makes topics accessible for people at any level of understanding The Black History Book is a captivating introduction to the key milestones in Black History,
culture, and society across the globe - from the ancient world to the present, aimed at adults with an interest in the subject and students wanting to gain more of an overview. Explore the rich history of the peoples of Africa and the African diaspora, and the struggles and triumphs of Black communities around the world, all through engaging text and bold graphics. Your Black History Questions, Simply Explained Which were the most powerful African empires? Who were the pioneers of jazz? What sparked the Black Lives Matter movement? If you thought it was difficult to learn about the legacy of African-American history, The Black History Book presents crucial information in an easy to follow layout. Learn about the earliest human migrations to modern Black communities, stories of the early kingdoms of Ancient Egypt and Nubia; the powerful medieval and early modern empires; and the struggle against colonization. This book also explores Black history beyond the African continent, like the Atlantic slave trade and slave resistance settlements; the Harlem Renaissance and Jazz Age; the Windrush migration; civil rights and Black feminist movements.
The Big Ideas Series With millions of copies sold worldwide, The Black History Book is part of the award-winning Big Ideas series from DK. The series uses striking graphics along with engaging writing, making big topics easy to understand.Sold out -
Sold outMaking Love with the Land: Essays
A moving and deeply personal excavation of Indigenous beauty and passion in a suffering world
The novel Jonny Appleseed established Joshua Whitehead as one of the most exciting and important new literary voices on Turtle Island, winning both a Lambda Literary Award and Canada Reads 2021. In Making Love with the Land, his first nonfiction book, Whitehead explores the relationships between body, language, and land through creative essay, memoir, and confession.In prose that is evocative and sensual, unabashedly queer and visceral, raw and autobiographical, Whitehead writes of an Indigenous body in pain, coping with trauma. Deeply rooted within, he reaches across the anguish to create a new form of storytelling he calls "biostory"--beyond genre, and entirely sovereign. Through this narrative perspective, Making Love with the Land recasts mental health struggles and our complex emotional landscapes from a nefarious parasite on his (and our) well-being to kin, even a relation, no matter what difficulties they present to us. Whitehead ruminates on loss and pain without shame or ridicule but rather highlights waypoints for personal transformation. Written in the aftermath of heartbreak, before and during the pandemic, Making Love with the Land illuminates this present moment in which both Indigenous and non-Indigenous people are rediscovering old ways and creating new ones about connection with and responsibility toward each other and the land.
Intellectually audacious and emotionally compelling, Whitehead shares his devotion to the world in which we live and brilliantly--even joyfully--maps his experience on the land that has shaped stories, histories, and bodies from time immemorial.
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