Youtube milton friedman free to choose6/12/2023 ![]() So how could anyone, I wondered, think Sowell was not worth paying attention to?īut the editor’s response to me expressed a sentiment I found in plenty of others who shared my political views. ![]() To his fans, he is one of “ the most luminous minds this country has produced.” Milton Friedman said he was as close to a genius as a human could be. Steven Pinker has called Sowell “among the most brilliant thinkers in the world today-deep, original, creative, fearless, intimidatingly erudite.” Amy Chua of Yale Law school calls Sowell “one of the most important thinkers of our time.” The Wall Street Journal has called him an “ American sage.” His bestselling Basic Economics has gone through five editions and been published in half a dozen languages. He has written nearly 50 books, many of which have thousands of glowing reviews on Amazon. Millions of people watch videos of Thomas Sowell on YouTube. ![]() I thought then, and I think now, that this attitude was crazy. The editor said he liked my writing, but didn’t understand my choice of subject. “Sowell? Who pays attention to him?” The editor thought Thomas Sowell was simply not worth paying attention to. ![]() Back before starting Current Affairs, when I was a freelancer, I once pitched an editor on a long review of the works of conservative economist Thomas Sowell. ![]()
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Vampire mountain6/12/2023 ![]() ![]() It wouldn't be fair to drag him away from the Cirque Du Freak. I would have loved to jump at his offer, but Evra had his own life to lead. "From what I know, that journey's no joke," he warned in the deep voice that had hit him a few years ago. There were benefits to being a half-vampire - I was stronger and faster than any human, and would live longer - but I would have given them all up if it meant looking my real age and being able to lead an ordinary life.Įven though Evra and me weren't as close as we'd once been, he was still my friend, and was worried about me heading off for Vampire Mountain. In reality I was only a couple of years younger than Evra, but I looked like a kid, and it was hard for him to treat me like an equal. We were still good friends and shared a tent, but he was a young man now, more interested in people - especially women! - his own age. Evra and me used to be best buddies, but not anymore. Crepsley blooded me, I only looked about a year older. So, although eight years had gone by since Mr. As a half-vampire, I aged at one-fifth the normal rate. ![]() ![]() Evra had grown these last six years, gotten taller and broader and older-looking. Or wait, he used to be a snake-boy - now he was a snake-man. "I doubt if sun-shy vampires would make their base in the Caribbean!" He laughed sarcastically.Įvra Von was a snake-boy, with scales instead of skin. ![]() Sufficient Grace by Jessica Greyson6/12/2023 ![]() ![]() “Well, I would buy a copy,” Grandma Letha piped up. I want to read that book, because I know that you have many wonderful stories to share.” ![]() “You need to write a book about your family and the title needs to be There Was Always Laughter in Our House. “Oh? What is that?” I asked, expecting an interesting fiction idea from this man who had fun stories to tell about his growing-up years, his time in Korea, or raising his children. “I know what your next book needs to be and what it should be called.” When I finally paused, Grandpa Leroy looked down at me with a smile. I sat on the floor telling them about my latest book projects and other little happenings in my life. It was a pleasant day in January 2015 and we had come to pick up my sister Grace, who had been helping them clean their house. ![]() So, this feisty elderly couple had adopted us and we had adopted them. Relations with my own grandparents had been strained, and my siblings and I felt the loss. We had moved from my childhood home into a new area almost two hours away from my best friend. ![]() This is an excerpt from There Was Always Laughter in Our House:Īlthough he’s not a blood relation, he and his spunky wife adopted us kids as their grandchildren when I was about eight years old. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() The question however is in what way? Does Kawajiri’s body of work exude a subtle critique of life and society in his storytelling? Does he ooze oodles and oodles of character development for us to swallow up? Is his selected soundtrack akin to Joe Hisaishi’s work with Studio Ghibli? Well, to answer all of that: No, no and HELL NO!! Kawajiri’s not about any of that stuff AT ALL (at least to me). As this blogger gathers y’all around his comical campfire, let’s sit down and, more importantly, break it down about why we all love Yoshiaki Kawajiri!ġ) Madhouse’s Visual Appeal: Kawajiri’s work with Madhouse is nothing short of fantastic. Overall, there’s a whole lot to love about Yoshiaki Kawajiri and his contributions to anime at large, from his founding of Madhouse with other Mushi Pro veterans like Rintaro to the creation of acclaimed anime hits like the ubiquitous Ninja Scroll and Lensman. He seems to like the color blue in lots of his earlier work. He apparently likes hard-boiled science fiction. ![]() He was (and continues to be) a storyboard artist and a damn fine animator to say the least. ![]() Yann martel novel6/12/2023 ![]() ![]() Although he was flattered, Scliar told the New York Times that Martel “used that idea without consulting me or even informing me.” Martel later recognized Scliar in his Author’s Note, thanking himįor providing the “spark of life” for his novel. Borrowing the same premise caused some tension with Scliar after ![]() Martel has also admitted that he was inspired by the premise of Brazilian author Moacyr Scliar’s novella Max and the Cats (1981), about a boy stranded on a lifeboat with a jaguar. Searching for a “capital ‘S’” story, he was inspired by the abundance of animals and religion he encountered. In an interview with PBS, Martel shared that “the idea of a religious boy in a lifeboat with a wild animal struck me as a perfect metaphor for the human condition.” While on a trip in India, (Edinburgh’s Canongate published the first UK edition in 2002). ![]() It was rejected by at least five London-based publishing houses before the Canadian publisher Knopf took a chance on it ![]() Border Bride by Arnette Lamb6/11/2023 ![]() ![]() Power seeped into Duncan’s bones, and the pounding of hooves deafened him to all sound save the siren of impending danger. Before him lay a quest fit for the bards. His blood coursed with the song of excitement.īehind him rode a dozen loyal clansmen and one fugitive. His tartan cape snapped like a loose topsail in a raging wind. Duncan threw back his head and inhaled the glorious fragrance of heather. A strong liberated lady trying to negotiate for peace between the warring factions Zorro with a Scots burr.” - Romance Heart to Heart Read more ![]() What makes this book special are the main characters . . . ![]() ![]() Border Lord is stupendous!” - RT Book Reviews “Arnette Lamb has a tremendous gift for writing genuine, warm, humorous, sensual love stories. Relinquishing his birthright as laird of Kildalton for the role of Border Lord could cost him his future, but Duncan knows that if his true identity is discovered by the beautiful Lady Miriam, he will lose the thing he holds most dear-her heart. The kindly, awkward laird of Kildalton Castle becomes a trusted friend, but the dashing and mysterious Border Lord, disguised by midnight’s cloak, becomes much, much more.īehind Duncan Kerr’s disguise is a lifetime of anguish. Lady Miriam MacDonald comes to Scotland seeking peace between the Scots and the English-instead, she gets the admiration of two men. Colorful characters come alive against a backdrop of espionage and intrigue (Sherrilyn Kenyon, #1 New York Times–bestselling author). ![]() George eliot novel adam6/11/2023 ![]() ![]() Reading it now however it’s evident that in focusing so much on the doomed love triangle between Hetty, the carpenter Adam Bede and Captain Arthur Donnithorne, I overlooked many of the key themes of the novel. What I remember mostly is how sorry I felt for poor gullible Hetty Sorrel, a milkmaid who dreamed of love and a life beyond the drudgery of the cowshed and dairy only to be abandoned by the dastardly squire’s son. I first read Adam Bede more than 30 years ago. ![]() But you can see in Adam Bede, the novel she wrote some 14 years earlier, (it was in fact her first full length novel) her first steps towards the themes and approaches that will become prevalent in Middlemarch. To read it is to see Eliot’s creative imagination as its most mature. Yet it’s also a very human novel one that deals with ambition and the loneliness of failure whether in love or theological research or the desire to bring great benefit to mankind. This is a novel stuffed with big ideas, from Darwin’s natural selection to advances in medical sciences, from the Great Reform Act to industrialisation all organised within a central metaphor of “the web” of society. It’s why I love George Eliot’s Middlemarch so much and why I never tire of going back to it. What distinguishes a truly great classic for me is that no-matter how many times I read it, I can still discover something fresh within its pages. ![]() Tales of the city novels6/11/2023 ![]() There are real life people (and events) who feature across the series, with varying levels of disguise. ![]() Across the series (nine books, I still need to buy a copy of The Days of Anna Madrigal, although I have read it!) you’ll laugh and you’ll cry as you cover 40 years in their lives. ![]() It’s fun, it’s incredibly readible – and it’s soapy in the best way aka increasingly ridiculous and far-fetched but you go with it anyway. She moves into a boarding house run by the eccentric Anna Madrigal (she names the marijuana plants she grows in the garden) and soon her life is tangled up with the other residents of the building – Michael Tolliver, known as Mouse Mona, hippy and bi-sexual Brian, a horny lothario and Norman, the mysterious tenant of the shack on the roof. Starting in 1976, we meet Mary-Ann Singleton, who has just moved to the city from Cleveland and starts to discover a whole new world. So this is an iconic series, that started as a newspaper serial, about the lives (and loves) of a group of housemates in San Francisco. Today I’m talking about Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City Series, which I think it pretty perfect reading for the moment – as it’s episodic and starts back in the 1970s. Hello, welcome to another Friday and the latest in my new batch of Series I Love posts. ![]() Dresden book 146/11/2023 ![]() How messed up is that?īeset by his new enemies and hounded by the old, Dresden has only twenty four hours to reconnect with his old allies, prevent a cataclysm and do the impossible - all while the power he bargained to get - but never meant to keep - lays siege to his very soul. ![]() Even as he grapples with the impossible task, Dresden learns of a looming danger to Demonreach, the living island hidden upon Lake Michigan, a place whose true purpose and dark potential have the potential to destroy billions and to land Dresden in the deepest trouble he has ever known - even deeper than being dead. Mab, the mother of wicked faeries, has restored the mostly-dead wizard to health, and dispatches him upon his first mission - to bring death to an immortal. This book introduces us to our main hero of the series, Harry Dresden. This is the first book from the Dresden Files by Jim Butcher. ![]() ![]() ![]() You can't keep a good wizard down - even when he wants to stay that way.įor years, Harry Dresden has been Chicago's only professional wizard, but a bargain made in desperation with the Queen of Air and Darkness has forced him into a new job: professional killer. Dresden Files’ book order intelligently shows the working mechanism of the White Council that governs magical laws, Harry’s investigations that inclined towards the political point of view. ![]() Bill gates how to avoid6/10/2023 ![]() ![]() ![]() It is, however, exactly what he has done, and to explain how this happened, the book opens with some rather long-winded explanations as to how Gates came to the realisation of why we need to act and why we need to act fast. Inspired by its recent release in paperback, environmental blogger Anders Lorenzen takes a look at the modestly titled publication.Īs Bill Gates, the tech entrepreneur turned health advocate, acknowledges in the introduction to his book How to Avoid a Climate Disaster – The Solutions and Breakthroughs We Need, two decades ago, he would never have predicted that he would, one day, write a book about climate change. ![]() More recently, Gates has found a passion for helping to problem-solve the climate crisis, resulting in his book How to Avoid a Climate Disaster – The Solutions and Breakthroughs We Need. Most people will know Bill Gates as the co-founder of Microsoft, and some will be aware of his work on health and development through the Bill and Melinda Gates foundations. ![]() |