<b>A provocative and wide-ranging conversation between two distinctive women?one American and one French?on the dilemmas, rewards, and demands of womanhood.</b> <br /> <br />Lisa Alther and Françoise Gilot have been friends for more than twenty-five years. Although from different backgrounds (Gilot from cosmopolitan Paris, Alther from small-town Tennessee) and different generations, they found they have a great deal in common as women who managed to support themselves with careers in the arts while simultaneously balancing the obligations of work and parenthood. <br /> <i><br />About Women </i>is their extended conversation in which they talk about everything important to them: their childhoods, the impact of war on their lives and their work, and their views on love, style, self-invention, feminism, and child rearing. They also discuss the creative impulse and the importance of art as they ponder what it means to be a woman.
<b>An utterly stunning novel of love, loss, the insidious nature of secrets, and the transformative power of words. <i>I Saw a Man</i> fulfills the promise of Owen Sheers's acclaimed novel, <i>Resistance</i>.</b> <br /> <br />When journalist Caroline Marshall dies while on assignment in Pakistan, her grief-stricken husband, Michael, leaves their cottage in Wales and returns to London. He quickly develops a friendship with his neighbors, Josh and Samantha Nelson, and their two young daughters. Michael?s becoming close with the family marks the beginning of a long healing process. <br /> <br />But Michael's period of recovery comes to an abrupt end when a terrible accident brings the burden of a shattering secret into his life. How will Michael bear the agonizing weight of guilt as he navigates persistent doubts on the path to attempted redemption? The answer, revealed poignantly in Sheers' masterly prose <i>,</i> is eloquent, resonant, and completely unforgettable.
The author of the runaway bestseller <i>How the Irish Saved Civilization</i> has done it again. In <i>The Gifts of the Jews</i> Thomas Cahill takes us on another enchanting journey into history, once again recreating a time when the actions of a small band of people had repercussions that are still felt today. <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /> <i>The Gifts of the Jews</i> reveals the critical change that made western civilization possible. Within the matrix of ancient religions and philosophies, life was seen as part of an endless cycle of birth and death; time was like a wheel, spinning ceaselessly. Yet somehow, the ancient Jews began to see time differently. For them, time had a beginning and an end; it was a narrative, whose triumphant conclusion would come in the future. From this insight came a new conception of men and women as individuals with unique destinies--a conception that would inform the Declaration of Independence--and our hopeful belief in progress and the sense that tomorrow can be better than today. As Thomas Cahill narrates this momentous shift, he also explains the real significance of such Biblical figures as Abraham and Sarah, Moses and the Pharaoh, Joshua, Isaiah, and Jeremiah. <br /> <br /> <br /> <br />Full of compelling stories, insights and humor, <i>The Gifts of the Jews</i> is an irresistible exploration of history as fascinating and fun as <i>How the Irish Saved Civilization.</i>