Showing results by publisher "Spoken Word Inc." in All Categories

Reverend Maloney isn't the world's greatest spiritual advisor. He drinks gin out of his coffee cup and has sex dreams about the Holy Ghost. His best friend Eli isn't perfect either, but he's a chess genius, so Maloney sees an opportunity in traveling around the country so Eli can win major chess tournament after chess tournament (while Maloney pockets Eli's winnings).

In her electric fourth collection, Melissa Broder penetrates the itch of existence and explores numberless deaths: the annihilation of self, the bereavement of love, the destruction of fantasy, the transmutation, even, of our ideas of dying. What emerges is an infinite series of false endings - each a trap door containing the possibility for alchemy, rebirth, and renewal. Last Sext confronts both eternal longing and the mystery of mortality, with language hot, primal, and dark.

Before the Bible was a book, it was flesh and blood. Sean Gladding takes us between the lines of Scripture to listen in on the conversations of people wrestling with the Story of God for the first time. Whether sitting around a campfire in Babylon, reclining at a table in Asia Minor or huddled together by candlelight in Rome, we meet people encountering the Story for the first and the hundred-and-first time. With them we hear a tale that is at once familiar and surprising. The Story of God, the Story of Us is an account of Scripture that introduces us to people who remind us of ourselves, because as much as the Bible is a story about God, it's also a story about us—a story, perhaps, we have yet to hear. Read by the author and his wife, Rebecca.

A "Proustian minimalist on the order of Lydia Davis" ( Kirkus Reviews), Sarah Manguso is one of the finest literary artists at work today. To hear her work is to witness acrobatic acts of compression in the service of extraordinary psychological and spiritual insight. 300 Arguments, a foray into the frontier of contemporary nonfiction writing, is at first glance a group of unrelated aphorisms.

Why are most slogans and taglines ineffective? Because they're just words and a mind cannot understand words. A mind can only understand sounds. Why do most Americans remember the battlecry of the French Revolution ("Liberté, égalité, fraternité") when they cannot remember the battlecry of the American Revolution?

The very short stories of Diane Williams have been aptly called "folk tales that hammer like a nail gun," and these 40 new ones are sharper than ever. They are unsettling, yes, frequently revelatory, and, more often than not, downright funny. Not a single moment here is what you might expect. The heart of the drama beats in the language of American short fiction's grand master, whose originality, precision, and power bring the familiar into startling and enchanted relief.

In The Fabric of Autism: Weaving the Threads into a Cogent Theory, Judith Bluestone combines her personal autistic experience with academic research and over 40 years of clinical practice to craft a unique and compelling view of the phenomenon called autism. Bluestone's audiobook is both a significant clinical work and a moving memoir that illuminates the humanity beneath the bewildering facade of autism.

Successful leaders build and maintain productive, mutually-beneficial relationships - inside and outside of their organizations. They purposefully shape workplace culture that retains talent, cultivates innovation and supports the organization's goals. And they achieve excellence in teamwork and organizational execution - the nuts and bolts of collaborative action that actually produces desired results.

To keep doing what you love, you need to maintain your own systems, not just the ones you write code for. Regular exercise and proper nutrition help you learn, remember, concentrate, and be creative - skills critical to doing your job well. Learn how to change your work habits, master exercises that make working at a computer more comfortable, and develop a plan to keep fit, healthy, and sharp for years to come.

True crime, memoir, and ghost story, Mean is the bold and hilarious tale of Myriam Gurba’s coming-of-age as a queer, mixed-race Chicana. Blending radical formal fluidity and caustic humor, Gurba takes on sexual violence, small towns, and race, turning what might be tragic into piercing, revealing comedy. This is a confident, intoxicating, brassy book that takes the cost of sexual assault, racism, misogyny, and homophobia deadly seriously.

Your culture is your number-one competitive advantage. But here's the rub: Inspiring cultures don't happen by accident. You can't buy, borrow, or fake a great culture. You need to be deliberate about building a truly inspiring culture. That's where The Humor Advantage comes in.

Self-awareness - knowing your nature, your abilities, and how you react to people and situations - may well be the greatest life-management skill you can have. The Acorn Principle is a guide to doing a complete "life checkup" that will help you pinpoint your talents and strengths. Nurturing those strengths is the key to the success you've always wanted but didn't know how to attain. The mighty oak sleeps within you...right now.

Many questions and stories circulate about cancer. Are you telling yourself you are a victim of cancer? Are you worried the cancer will come back? Are you stuck in the role of being sick? Christine Egan made a conscious choice to tell a different story. The Healthy Girl's Guide to Breast Cancer is part memoir and part guide revealing the all-too-true story of cancer in this country with a healthy twist.

In Branding Basics for Small Business, marketing expert Maria Ross shares real-life examples and expert interviews to show how organizations of any size can create a winning brand. Small businesses, start-ups, and nonprofits enviously watch the big guys create tribes of loyal followers. How do they do it? What can time- and resource-strapped organizations learn from them? The secret is starting with a strong brand strategy, which goes far beyond a logo.

Joining the Marines in 2002, David Rose signed up to go fight...and to go die. On this grim path, rather than finding a violent death, he would find family, purpose, and a brotherhood amid the misfit world of the war fighter. No Joy sees David recounting madcap tales of Muay Thai bouts in seedy garages, a bizarre stint as a street cop, being on the other side of the badge, becoming a veteran of the psych ward, and more. It's an irreverently told story that doesn't just tell one man's tale, but speaks to the necessary question: What really draws modern young men to war?

If you don't know Melville's letters to Hawthorne, you don't know Melville. These letters are full of passion, humor, doubt, and spiritual yearning, and offer an intimate view of Melville's personality. Lyrical and effusive, they are literary works in themselves. This correspondence has been out of print for decades, and even when it was in print it appeared in scholarly volumes of Melville's complete correspondence, aimed at the academy.

An Unferth story lures you in with a voice that seems amiable and lighthearted, but it swerves in sudden and surprising ways that reveal, in terrifying clarity, the rage, despair, and profound mournfulness that have taken up residence at the heart of the American dream. These stories often take place in an exaggerated or heightened reality, a quality that is reminiscent of the work of Donald Barthelme, Lorrie Moore, and George Saunders, but in Unferth's unforgettable collection she carves out territory that is entirely her own.

The Science Series contains 53 lectures covering four topics: the Physical Sciences, the Realm of Postulates, the Principles of Dichotomy/Duality, and the Two Facets of Our Existence.

The Insight series contains 37 lectures covering the four topics of scientific knowledge, understanding viewpoints, the nature of man, and the mysteries of our universe. This series was written by Matthew M. Radmanesh, PhD, the author of three popular books: Advanced Principles of Success and Prosperity, The Ultimate Keys to Success in Business and Science, and The Gateway to Prosperity.

The Cracking the Code series is composed of 44 lectures, divided into the four topics: our immense universe, understanding waves, cracking the science code, and cracking the financial code. This series is written by Matthew M. Radmanesh, PhD, the author of three popular books: Advanced Principles of Success and Prosperity, The Ultimate Keys to Success in Business and Science, and The Gateway to Prosperity.