Books
More Work or More Free Time: The Crucial Political Issue that No One Is Talking About : Charles Siegel
Do you know that American work hours went down steadily from 1840 until the Great Depression but have not gone down at all since then? Do you know that European work hours have continued to go down and that Dutch workers have the right to choose part-time work, so they can work as much as they want rather than having to work full time?
No one is talking about these facts, but this book shows that they are crucial to building a future that is environmentally sustainable and that works for people.
Americans believe we need rapid economic growth to create jobs and avoid unemployment, but that is because we do not have the choice of working shorter hours. Because the Dutch can choose part-time work, they can avoid unemployment by creating the amount of work people actually want.
We have reached the point where economic growth no longer brings significant benefits. International comparisons show that higher-income no longer improves a nation’s happiness, health, or educational achievement significantly after it reaches about two-thirds of the current American level. And postwar America’s push to promote automobile use to stimulate the economy actually made our cities less livable.
American and Dutch employees produce about the same amount per hour, but the average American employee works 25% more than the average Dutch employee. The available measures of well-being show that all the extra work doesn’t do us any good.
In the course of this century, most nations of the world could emerge from poverty and have a comfortable middle-class standard of living if we can avoid ecological crisis. But that is a big “if.”
To create a sustainable economy with a high quality of life, it is essential for the world to follow the Dutch model of lower inequality, shorter work hours and slower growth rather than the current American model of high inequality, long work hours and rapid growth.
But no mainstream politician is talking about the crucial issue of work time.
The ABCs of Global Warming by Charles Siegel is also on Whizbuzz Books.
Vuel: Perception is Everything : Kregt Cadizan
Three friends met for margaritas one evening. Ranger had graduated from business school. Suzann had become a code writing manager. Alecia had completed a management systems degree.
They all remembered leaving the Cactus Bar that night and walking across the parking lot. They are all sure that was their last memory of Earth.
Their next memory was of walking out of a spaceship onto the meadows of Vul. They will not forget the first time they looked up to see a planet filling the sky.
Ranger walked out of that spaceship with the first group of Humans, then watched as other groups were loaded into vehicles and taken away. Alecia and Suzann were difficult to distinguish from other girls, but he thought he recognized them by their movements. He wasn’t sure of anything, really, except that there was another planet filling the sky, and this place was definitely not Earth.
Alecia and Suzann are taken to a mountain village and trained to be the charismatic vuelessas that guide vuel. Suzann will initially reject the training and learn hard lessons about vuel.
Ranger fares no better as he is abducted from Vul and sent to the twin planet, Govul, where work crews do not survive for long.
The Vuelans of Vul believe that Earth Humans are primitive beings, brought from a faraway land where they lived in the wild, and must be taught the Vuelan lengua as well as basic cleanliness.
These stories are received on Earth telepathically from each character. Occasionally, their stories converge.
Soft erotic occurrences are part of Vuel, you may not want to return to Earth.
In Vuel, perception is everything.
The first book of the “Vuel” series.
Vuel: Gang Fighters and Vuel: Vuelessa of Centium by Kregt Cadizan are also on Whizbuzz Books.
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The Danger of Safety : Jules Coventry
After fighting bravely in World War 2 the nation is tired but the Cold War is at its terrifying peak.
The government is pursuing a nuclear deterrent at breakneck speed and pinning its faith in that to prevent another conflict. They push the project too hard and there is a catastrophic reactor fire. This must never be public knowledge so a cover-up starts that must last for years and keep the scores of people who know what happened silent.
Those charged with the cover-up go too far; they have instilled fear but now they have to cover up their own actions. One man knows way too much and is suspected of having hard evidence. How far will they go to keep him silent and protect their careers?
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50 States : Richard R Becker
An Idaho farmer who aches for absolution after a tragedy is given one more chance at redemption. Two runaways cross paths in a Tennessee bus station with only one ticket between them. A family sees looters racing toward their home as they escape an Oregon wildfire. A young couple takes a reckless turn off a state highway in Utah and find themselves in a nightmarish government biohazard area.
These and 46 more shorts make up an anthology that will surprise readers with each new thought-provoking story as they skip across different genres, moods, and states of mind. Together, they provide a character-driven collection of short stories that captures the human condition across the American landscape over the last 60 years — the kind and the cruel, the heroic and criminal — in unpredictable and exciting ways.
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The Vow: A Love Story and the Holocaust : Michael Ruskin
As the son and last surviving member of his family, my book is based on the lives of my late parents, David and Dora Ruskin, who were Holocaust Survivors in Lithuania from 1941-1945. Beginning from the couples’ early childhood in the 1930s, the book depicts their special bond amidst the death and destruction of the Holocaust; and their lives after liberation and coming to America.
Being forced into a Lithuanian ghetto early in their marriage, they were separated and then deported into separate concentration camps where they went through unimaginable brutality and abuse at the hands of the German SS under horrific living conditions.
After David was liberated in May 1945 from the Dachau concentration camp, he began his “mission” to find his beloved wife nearly a year after their separation. Searching through the rugged and treacherous terrain of central Europe, he finally found her, nearly two months into his search.
They eventually immigrated to the United States along with their 3-year son. My intention in writing the book was to keep their legacy alive and to contrast their remarkable journey against the backdrop of one of the darkest periods in human history… the Holocaust.
The book is more than writing about the unimaginable horrors of the Holocaust, it is also a tribute to my parents’ love, faith and courage and their will to survive. Their relationship truly exemplifies the strength of their love and the human spirit, which is in all of us. A poignant message they wanted to leave for humanity but never did. Now, this book will be their “voice.”
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The Mirror’s Touch : Jackie Notter
This 2019’s IPPY Award winner’s new novel is a monster hunter’s tale, wrapped up in a sizzling Romeo and Juliet scenario that doesn’t end tragically.
Sleeping with the enemy has never been more risqué.
Pop Secrets by Jackie Notter is also on Whizbuzz Books.
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All Mine : Davy D
Coal is ingrained deep in Dave Doran’s DNA. Mining is a family matter, his grandfather, great-grandfather and a great-uncle, who was killed in a pit disaster at the age of 18, were miners all their working lives. A childhood spent in the shadow of the local pit wheel, and being brought up in a close-knit mining community, provided him with lifelong values.
All Mine is part memoir, part natural history, part social commentary, told through the medium of poetry: a collection of writing from boyhood to retirement. The poems take us on a journey from the coal fields of West Cumbria, through the complex underbelly of a metropolis, to the bucolic landscapes of Buckinghamshire.
All Mine has been a lifetime in the making, a series of flirtations with writing, art, and a thirty-year career policing the streets of London.
The poetic gaze moves from the Irish Sea to the River Thames, the miner’s strike of 1984 to the pandemic, and a view of the capital through the eyes of a street copper; each poem questions again the things that make a man.
There are many events which shape and fracture an identity. The writing contained in this collection reflects a life of love, loss, bewilderment and belonging. Coal haunts the bones. Ghosts darken walls of black stone, catch upon a common air, shadowing and highlighting those things that lift a life from the pit to the surface. History and chance layer each other like geological eras in this debut collection.
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The Czar of Wilton Drive : RP Andrews
The new boss is in…
In the course of minutes, twenty-one-year-old Jonathan Antonucci, barely out of the closet gay man from suburban New York, finds himself a multi-millionaire. His great uncle Charlie has unexpectedly died of a heart attack, leaving Jon the sole owner of several of the most successful bars in Wilton Manors, Ft. Lauderdale’s gay ghetto.
Flying down to Lauderdale to claim his bequest, Jon encounters Uncle Charlie’s dubious friends and business associates and is immediately drawn into Lauderdale’s scene of unbridled sex and heavy drugs. He also discovers his great uncle’s memoirs which reveal truths not only about Jon’s own past but also what may have really happened to his uncle. In the end, Jon is torn between avenging Uncle Charlie’s death or loving the very man responsible for it.
For the Love of Samuel by R P Andrews is also on Whizbuzz Books.
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Forty Four : Jan Miklaszewicz
Most people don’t touch poetry, because poetry doesn’t touch most people.
In his latest collection, Jan Miklaszewicz seeks to offer an alternative, exchanging unrequited love and silken sunsets for riffs on relationships, the writing process, and pop spirituality.
Featuring eleven bespoke illustrations and a voice that ranges from salty to sweet to sour, Forty Four is more than worth the admission fee.
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The Exceptional Life R-Evolution : Jessica Tietjen
Will you join the Exceptional Life R-Evolution?
What will you say when you look back on your life? Will you think, “I lived an exceptional life?” Or do you find yourself struggling to have exceptional work and life experiences?
Who doesn’t want to live an exceptional life, filled with exceptional work and life experiences? I know I want to be like my 90-year-old grandma who told me, with a smile and tears in her eyes, “I truly feel I lived an exceptional life.” My life’s purpose is to help people live their best life— an exceptional life—and this book is meant to help more people!
After reading this book, you will know how to create these exceptional work and life experiences so you can one day echo my grandma’s words. To do so, we must first understand why evolving our performance is needed to reach our peak performance and climb our personal performance mountain. Next, we need to apply the lessons learned from our experiences, especially during challenging times like those we faced in 2020. Then, we will follow the guide for reaching our peak performance using the four keys: expectations, feedback, development, and accountability. Finally, we will apply these keys to the roles we serve in our workplaces, homes, and communities.
Everyone can live an exceptional life, and the resources in this book will provide you with the guidance necessary to do so successfully. As we learn, grow, and evolve our performance, sharing the success of our experiences along the way, we will ignite the Exceptional Life R-Evolution!
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