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Artists Of Sedona, 1930—1999 : Gene K. Garrison

Artists Of Sedona, 1930—1999 : Gene K. GarrisonArtists Of Sedona, 1930—1999

Artists of Sedona is a narrative art history book about successful artists who lived, or currently live, in the beautiful small town of Sedona in northern Arizona in Red-Rock Country.

It covers an exciting period from 1930 when a young man named Bob Kittredge and his brother, Dan, roared into the area on a Harley Davidson motorcycle. A tiny Asian ape called a gibbon clung to the back of the driver. A baby coyote was tucked away somewhere. Bob became a sculptor of note.

A dynamic artist from Egypt, Nassan Gobran, set off an explosion of artistic activity. His energy, determination, education and talent changed the direction of the town. An apple-packing barn was became the Sedona Arts Center. All sorts of creative classes were held, painting, sculpture, ceramics, as well as art shows and plays. It truly became the social center of the area.

The Cowboy Artists of America met at a local bar and formed what became a well respected organization. Joe Beeler, Charlie Dye, George Phippen, and John Hampton made it all happen.

All over town you can see monumental and life-size sculptures by Joyce Killebrew, Susan Kliewer, John Waddell, Clyde Ross Morgan,  John M. Soderberg, PhD,  James Muir, Leslie B. DeMille who also does portraits, and Ken Rowe.  Paintings by Joella Jean Mahoney, Stephen Juharos, Jeffrey Lungé, Adele Seronde,  Jan Sitts, Bearcloud, M. L.  Coleman and a couple of movie poster artists who became fine artists—Zoe Mozert and Frank McCarthy who also qualified as a Cowboy Artist of America member. An outstanding artist in another medium is Holy Stedman who makes her magic happen in glass.  Bonnie Burkee is an etcher, photographer, sculptor, and painter. Nancy Robb Dunst is an installation artist.

Gene K. Garrison, a writer with an extensive arts background, has her own ideas about how to write history. She writes in a narrative, insightful style, and uses anecdotes as well as professional credits to introduce readers to the fine artists of Sedona.

She explained it this way: “I don’t want the book to be of interest only to artists. I want to make it so interesting that even people who ignore art will want to turn the pages.” She has done it before in There’s Something About Cave Creek (It’s The People), Widowhood Happens,  From Thunder to Breakfast, and a childrens’  book titled Javelina (Have-uh-WHAT? as well as approximately 560 magazine articles.

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In His Keeping: Taken : Mia Frances

In His Keeping: Taken : Mia FrancesIn His Keeping : Taken

Out of work and on the verge of being homeless, Sylvie Jenkins is desperate. Her desperation leads her to take a job with a reclusive writer living in the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York.

She’s never heard of Connor Hudson, but the man is offering her room, board, and an extremely generous salary. How bad could he be?

Sylvie is shocked to learn that she might not know who Connor Hudson is, but millions of readers do, scarfing up the books he writes under various pseudonyms.

And Connor’s not just a bestselling author. He’s a billionaire entrepreneur whose publishing and media empires span the globe.

Her new employer is a drop-dead gorgeous hunk, but he’s also surly, dominating, and demanding. He’s accustomed to being obeyed and kowtowed to, but he soon discovers that his feisty new assistant refuses to do either.

Sylvie thinks he’s an arrogant, condescending jackass!

Connor is shocked that this little imp isn’t cowed by his wealth, power, or position. That fascinates him. The Dom in him is determined to have her…and her obedience and submission as well.

Naive and nerdy, Sylvie mistakes sex for love. But Connor can’t love her. He’s keeping secrets: dark and dangerous secrets. He says he’s incapable of love.

But as the body count begins to rise, you can’t help but wonder…is he capable of murder?

IN HIS KEEPING Book #1 TAKEN is an erotic romance murder mystery thriller with a cliff-hanger ending. The story continues in Book #2 BANISHED and concludes in Book #3 CLAIMED.

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Show Time : Phil Harvey

Show Time : Phil HarveyFuture viewing audiences have become totally desensitized to violence and entirely dependent on sensation to escape their boring workaday lives—an addiction nurtured by the media with graphic portrayals of war and crime and with so-called reality programming.

Now, TV execs in pursuit of the only things they care about—higher ratings and bigger paychecks—have created the ultimate reality show: Seven people, each bearing the scars of his or her past, are deposited on an island in the middle of Lake Superior. Given some bare necessities and the promise of $400,000 each if they can endure, the three women and four men risk death by starvation or freezing as the Great Lakes winter approaches.

The island is wired for sound, and flying drones provide the video feed, so everything the contestants do and say is broadcast worldwide. Their seven-month ordeal is entirely unscripted, they can’t ask for help or they forfeit the prize, and as far as the network is concerned—the fewer survivors the better.

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Stop The Diet, I Want To Get Off! : Lisa Tillinger Johansen

Stop The Diet, I Want To Get Off! : Lisa Tillinger JohansenStop The Diet, I Want To Get Off!

The Paleo.  The Zone.  The Gluten-free.  Another day, another diet.  We’re caught in a never-ending merry-go-round of weight loss plans, fueled by celebrity endorsers, TV doctors and companies angling for a piece of a $60 billion industry.  But do these diets really work?  And how healthy are they?

Registered Dietitian Lisa Tillinger Johansen examines dozens of the most wildly popular diets based on medical facts, not hype. And along the way, she reveals tried-and-true weight loss strategies, relying on her years of hospital experience, weight-loss seminars and community outreach efforts.

With insight and humor, Stop The Diet, I Want To Get Off! shows that the best answer is often not a trendy celebrity-endorsed diet, but easy-to-follow guidelines that are best for our health and our waistlines.

 

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The Last Adventure of Life : Maria Dancing Heart Hoaglund

The Last Adventure of Life : Maria Dancing Heart HoaglundThe Last Adventure of Life: Inspiring Approaches to Living and Dying

This is a collection of inspirational stories, poetry, scripture, prayers, and resources.

These pieces come from all walks of life to help the reader acknowledge the unity and interconnectedness of all. It has been aptly called “a book for healing and prayer.”

People who may especially appreciate this book are:

  • Individuals who are preparing for the mystical and transformational process of death, and their family members and friends
  • Hospice workers and volunteers who deal with death and dying on a regular basis
  • Bereaved persons dealing with a death, or with any major transitions in their lives
  • Those spiritual seekers who are waking up to the fragility of material things and desiring to tune in to their spiritual nature
  • Baby boomers with aging parents who live longer but often are dealing with chronic illnesses that debilitate or handicap them

Because Maria’s work in spiritual and bereavement care with hospice honors the interconnectedness of all things, this book has a universal perspective and appeal.

Anyone interested in the mystical Oneness of All could appreciate it; it is also likely to assist those desiring to go deeper spiritually.

This book includes inspirational stories, poetry, scripture, prayers, and guided meditations. It also has chapters on grief and relaxation/healing tools, and a wealth of reference material. It is a “treasure trove of hope and healing,” reframing the experience of death as a new and exciting chapter in life.

Reviews

I loved reading around in your book, The Last Adventure of Life. It is so chock-full of resources and prayers and stories. I am reading things out of order and am currently really enjoying the chapter on Trust. Beautifully written.
— Suzanna McCarthy, LICSW

It is skillful advice from a revered hospice worker who speaks from the deep experience of a true heart.
— Stephen & Ondrea Levine

This is the most genuine, information-rich, readable, and hopeful treasury of reflections on living and dying I have had the pleasure of reading, written by a seasoned hospice counselor with the melodic name of Maria Dancing Heart, whom I suspect is actually two parts angel and one part spiritual counselor & hospice worker. Like the author’s moniker, the poetry, stories, prayers, meditations, resources, sample teachings, inspirational readings, and support for the “last adventure of life” in these pages dance with love and compassion—and always re-framing the experience of death to one of transformation. …
If there were a master manual for living, this book would be first on the required reading list.
— Julie Clayton, New Consciousness Review

As a seasoned Hospice Social Worker, I have read countless textbooks, nonfiction books, references and novels about death and the dying experience. When I picked up Maria Dancing Heart’s book, The Last Adventure of Life, I knew I was meant to read it. It felt good in my hands. Her warmth and support radiated off every page. The volume of compiled wisdom and information that this special book contains will support and serve anyone who lives with death and dying.
As a professional the book sensitized me. As a human being it expanded my faith and offered me comfort. I said to myself “Wouldn’t it be great to meet this author!” Little did I know, when I was a Guest Speaker at a local seminar some time later, the author would be in the audience! She came up to me afterwards and introduced herself. She was just as compassionate, wise and wonderful as the book led me to believe she was. I don’t know if this is a testimonial for her book or for her, but either way she makes life – and the last adventure of it – better. It is a privilege to know Maria Dancing Heart Hoaglund and to have read her book.  — Kate McGahan, MSW

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The Felix Chronicles : Freshmen : R.T. Lowe

The Felix Chronicles : Freshmen : R.T. LoweThe Felix Chronicles: Freshmen

Reeling from a terrible accident that claimed the lives of his parents, Felix arrives at Portland College hoping only to survive the experience.

In time, however, his reality star roommate shows him there is more to higher education than just classes, shared bathrooms and bad dorm food, and Felix gradually dares to believe he can put his past behind him.

But a fateful storm looms on the horizon: In the nearby woods, two hikers become the latest victims in a series of gruesome murders; a disfigured giant embarks on a vicious cross-country rampage, killing teenagers who fail his ‘test’; and an ancient society of assassins tasked with eradicating the wielders of a mysterious source of power awakens after a long silence.

Only one man—the school’s groundskeeper—knows that the seemingly unrelated events are connected, and that an eighteen-year-old boy stands in the center of the storm.

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The Wine Hunter : Campbell Mattinson

The Wine Hunter : Campbell MattinsonThe Wine Hunter

Australia’s first great winemaker was a Frenchman. As a 24 year old, in 1921, he walked onto a hillside vineyard in the Hunter Valley north-west of Sydney and in a hard, hot climate set about growing and crafting wines that, when finally opened as fifty- and sixty-year-olds, became renowned as Australia’s first great wines.

He made these wines without electricity, with bare bones equipment – his winery, Mount Pleasant never once turned a profit during his 30 year struggle – and with a broken heart. What he achieved out there on that hillside is one of the miracles of wine. This is Maurice O’Shea’s remarkable story.

REVIEWS
James Halliday, The Weekend Australian: “One of the most remarkable wine books to come my way … It will capture anyone who reads it: this is not a wine geek book but an epic.”

Lisa Perrotti-Brown MW, The Wine Advocate: “Loved The Wine Hunter. A must-read for lovers of Aussie wine.”

Max Allen, The Australian Magazine: “This is the best book on wine to be published in Australia for many, many years”.

Jancis Robinson, jancisrobinson.com: “Campbell Mattinson is arguably Australia’s most literate, and certainly most literary, wine writer. I … admire his monograph on the Hunter Valley pioneer Maurice O’Shea immensely.”

Jeni Port, The Melbourne Age: “Wine Hunter is a breakthrough wine book: an astonishing, cerebral, emotional entanglement of fact and dramatisation, of tender detail and beautiful, expressive words. Has there ever been a wine book written quite this way?”

Paddy Kendlar, Herald-Sun: “I started reading a wine book last weekend and finished it on the Sunday night. Literally couldn’t put it down, except to take a break when the story became somewhat sad … It’s a wonderful story with a perception and sensitivity almost matching that of the subject. The few O’Shea wines that I have tasted – made under the McWilliams Mount Pleasant label – were more than forty years old at the time. They were magnificent. Campbell Mattinson has captured the essence of a great Australian artist. I heartily commend this remarkable book.”

Gary Walsh, Winorama: “I started reading it this morning and finally put the book down late in the afternoon. Finished. It’s really quite brilliant. A captivating, compelling and very moving read written in the unique Mattinson style. A beautiful story first, and a wine book second. I think it has universal appeal.”

Grant Dodd: “This is a genuine call to those of you that love wine and/or love great writing to go out and buy “The Wine Hunter”, by Campbell Mattinson, one of the most inspired pieces of writing in any genre by an Austalian writer for some time. A biopic of sorts on the life of the great but under-appreciated Hunter Valley winemaker Maurice O’Shea, “The Wine Hunter” is a beautifully written, emotive story that somehow infiltrates the ghost of O’Shea and brings his undeniable genius to life. It is a great read, and it deserves to be read.”

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Family Caregiver’s Guide : Harriet Hodgson

Family Caregiver's Guide : Harriet HodgsonFamily Caregiver’s Guide: How to Care for a Loved One at Home

Caring for a loved one at home. What’s really involved? And what does it mean for your family and future? Tens of millions of Americans have had these questions and more as they prepare for this unsettling yet necessary task.

The Family Caregiver’s Guide fills in the gaps, connecting the dots between research and real life. Drawing on the author’s extensive caregiving experience, this book provides strategies to care for your loved one, inside and out, as well as for yourself–including how to use your natural skills in your new role, and which skills you may need to add.

You’ll discover how to set up your home for caregiving, including a safety checklist, equipment suggestions, and words you should know. For those days that are more than a handful, you’ll find positive affirmations, a section on facing and accepting illness, and Smart Steps at the end of each chapter, in case you need guidance in a hurry.

Caregiving has both rewards and challenges. But through it all, you’ll discover what’s most important–that caregiving is love in action.

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How to Grow and Master Your Relationships : Anthony Servadio

How to Grow and Master Your Relationships : Anthony ServadioHow to Grow and Master Your Relationships: 13 Steps for Men

It is no secret that attempting to understand the differences between men and women, especially during modern dating rituals, can be a complex and frustrating process.

But when a man is able to overcome stereotypes and identify the right female companion, he has the potential to forge a loving relationship that can bring years of happiness, fun, romance, and deep-seeded friendship.

In his relationship handbook, Anthony Servadio introduces thirteen fundamental principles that will help young men master their interpersonal relationships with women by learning how to appreciate the nature of women, fully comprehending their behavioral characteristics, and then building a relationship based on love and trust.

Servadio utilizes extensive research and real-life examples to teach single men specifically how to:

  • Develop self-awareness and repair a bruised ego
  • Navigate through the first date and beyond
  • Identify nurturing women seeking committed relationships
  • Avoid different types of traps
  • End an unhealthy relationship with dignity

How to Grow and Master Your Relationships: Thirteen Steps for Men is a practical guide that offers advice, tips, and empowerment strategies that will help men successfully navigate the evolving world of dating and find the woman of their dreams.

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Rampage : Alan Brenham

Rampage : Alan Brenham

Rampage

The stakes soar both professionally and personally for Austin PD Detective Jason Scarsdale as he finds himself in a race against time to hunt down a vicious gang hell-bent on murder.

Realizing that his new partner, the attractive divorcee Tatum Harper, could be trouble in more ways than one, he tries to run her out of Homicide.

Will their partnership destroy his romantic relationship with long-time girlfriend Dani Mueller? Will they both survive the harrowing face-off with the increasingly unhinged gang leader?

 

 

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