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Water For Elephants
''Water for Elephants'' is the third novel by the Canadian–American author Sara Gruen. The book was published in 2006 by Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill. The historical fiction novel is a 20th century circus drama. Gruen wrote the book as part of the National Novel Writing Month. Plot The story is told through a series of memories by Jacob Jankowski, a man living in a nursing home who can't remember if he's 90 or 93-years-old. In the nursing home, Jacob's life lacks excitement. He gets visited every Sunday by one of his five children and has good rapport with a kind nurse named Rosemary, but for the most part, Jacob's a tired old man whose life is highly regimented and scheduled. This all changes, however, when the circus parks right outside of the nursing home window, igniting Jacob's memories of his time working with the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth. As his memories begin, Jacob is a 23-year-old Polish American preparing for his final exams as a Cornel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sara Gruen
Sara Gruen (born 1969 in Vancouver) is an author with dual Canadian and U.S. citizenship. Her books often deal with animals and she supports numerous charitable organizations that support animals and wildlife. She is a 2007 recipient of an Alex Award. Early life and education Gruen was born in Vancouver, British Columbia. She recounts being left to survive on her own at age 15 as a street urchin. She grew up in London, Ontario, and attended Carleton University in Ottawa to get a degree in English literature. She continued to live in Ottawa for 10 years after graduation. Career Gruen moved to the United States from Ottawa in 1999 for a technical writing job. When she was laid off two years later, she decided to try writing fiction. Gruen is an animal lover; both her first novel, ''Riding Lessons'', and her second novel, ''Flying Changes'', involve horses. Gruen's third book, the 1930s circus drama ''Water for Elephants'', was initially turned down by her publisher at the time, Av ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Great Depression
The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagion began around September and led to the Wall Street stock market crash of October 24 (Black Thursday). It was the longest, deepest, and most widespread depression of the 20th century. Between 1929 and 1932, worldwide gross domestic product (GDP) fell by an estimated 15%. By comparison, worldwide GDP fell by less than 1% from 2008 to 2009 during the Great Recession. Some economies started to recover by the mid-1930s. However, in many countries, the negative effects of the Great Depression lasted until the beginning of World War II. Devastating effects were seen in both rich and poor countries with falling personal income, prices, tax revenues, and profits. International trade fell by more than 50%, unemployment in the U.S. rose to 23% and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid digital subscribers. It also is a producer of popular podcasts such as '' The Daily''. Founded in 1851 by Henry Jarvis Raymond and George Jones, it was initially published by Raymond, Jones & Company. The ''Times'' has won 132 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any newspaper, and has long been regarded as a national " newspaper of record". For print it is ranked 18th in the world by circulation and 3rd in the U.S. The paper is owned by the New York Times Company, which is publicly traded. It has been governed by the Sulzberger family since 1896, through a dual-class share structure after its shares became publicly traded. A. G. Sulzberger, the paper's publisher and the company's chairman, is the fifth generation of the family to head the pa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New York Times Best Seller List
''The New York Times'' Best Seller list is widely considered the preeminent list of best-selling books in the United States. John Bear, ''The #1 New York Times Best Seller: intriguing facts about the 484 books that have been #1 New York Times bestsellers since the first list, 50 years ago'', Berkeley: Ten Speed Press, 1992. Since October 12, 1931, ''The New York Times Book Review'' has published the list weekly. In the 21st century, it has evolved into multiple lists, grouped by genre and format, including fiction and non-fiction, hardcover, paperback and electronic. The list is based on a proprietary method that uses sales figures, other data and internal guidelines that are unpublished—how the ''Times'' compiles the list is a trade secret. In 1983 (as part of a legal argument), the ''Times'' stated that the list is not mathematically objective but rather editorial content. In 2017, a ''Times'' representative said that the goal is that the lists reflect authentic best selle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alex Awards
The Alex Awards annually recognize "ten books written for adults that have special appeal to young adults ages 12 through 18". Essentially, the award is a listing by the American Library Association parallel to its annual Best Books for Young Adults, a longer list of recommended books that have been promoted in the YA category. Since 2002, the Alex Awards have been administered by the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), a division of the American Library Association (ALA). YALSA also names several other "Top Tens" annually. The awards, named after Baltimore librarian Margaret Alexander Edwards, who was known as "Alex," are sponsored by the Margaret Alexander Edwards Trust and ''Booklist ''Booklist'' is a publication of the American Library Association that provides critical reviews of books and audiovisual materials for all ages. ''Booklist''s primary audience consists of libraries, educators, and booksellers. The magazine is av ...'' magazine. The list of book ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quill Award
The Quill Award was an American literary award that ran for three years in 2005-2007. It was a "consumer-driven award created to inspire reading while promoting literacy." The Quills Foundation, the organization behind the Quill Award, was supported by a number of notable media corporations, including Reed Business Information, then parent of ''Publishers Weekly'', and NBC Universal Television Stations, along with Parade Magazine, Borders, Barnes & Noble and the American Booksellers Association. Reed Business Information announced plans to dissolve the awards program in February 2008 and distribute the remaining Foundation funds to non-profit organizations First Book and Literacy Partners. Reed declined to give reasons for the suspension,Reed drops Quills awards sponsorship , CNN, February 26, 2008. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Book Of Genesis
The Book of Genesis (from Greek ; Hebrew: בְּרֵאשִׁית ''Bəreʾšīt'', "In hebeginning") is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Its Hebrew name is the same as its first word, ( "In the beginning"). Genesis is an account of the creation of the world, the early history of humanity, and of Israel's ancestors and the origins of the Jewish people. Tradition credits Moses as the author of Genesis, as well as the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and most of Deuteronomy; however, modern scholars, especially from the 19th century onward, place the books' authorship in the 6th and 5th centuries BC, hundreds of years after Moses is supposed to have lived.Davies (1998), p. 37 Based on scientific interpretation of archaeological, genetic, and linguistic evidence, most scholars consider Genesis to be primarily mythological rather than historical. It is divisible into two parts, the primeval history (chapters 1–11) and the ancestr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jacob
Jacob (; ; ar, يَعْقُوب, Yaʿqūb; gr, Ἰακώβ, Iakṓb), later given the name Israel, is regarded as a patriarch of the Israelites and is an important figure in Abrahamic religions, such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Jacob first appears in the Book of Genesis, where he is described as the son of Isaac and Rebecca, and the grandson of Abraham, Sarah, and Bethuel. According to the biblical account, he was the second-born of Isaac's children, the elder being Jacob's fraternal twin brother, Esau. Jacob is said to have bought Esau's birthright and, with his mother's help, deceived his aging father to bless him instead of Esau. Later in the narrative, following a severe drought in his homeland of Canaan, Jacob and his descendants, with the help of his son Joseph (who had become a confidant of the pharaoh), moved to Egypt where Jacob died at the age of 147. He is supposed to have been buried in the Cave of Machpelah. Jacob had twelve sons through four ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Polish Language
Polish (Polish: ''język polski'', , ''polszczyzna'' or simply ''polski'', ) is a West Slavic language of the Lechitic group written in the Latin script. It is spoken primarily in Poland and serves as the native language of the Poles. In addition to being the official language of Poland, it is also used by the Polish diaspora. There are over 50 million Polish speakers around the world. It ranks as the sixth most-spoken among languages of the European Union. Polish is subdivided into regional dialects and maintains strict T–V distinction pronouns, honorifics, and various forms of formalities when addressing individuals. The traditional 32-letter Polish alphabet has nine additions (''ą'', ''ć'', ''ę'', ''ł'', ''ń'', ''ó'', ''ś'', ''ź'', ''ż'') to the letters of the basic 26-letter Latin alphabet, while removing three (x, q, v). Those three letters are at times included in an extended 35-letter alphabet, although they are not used in native words. The traditional ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jamaican Ginger
Jamaica ginger extract, known in the United States by the slang name Jake, was a late 19th-century patent medicine that provided a convenient way to obtain alcohol during the era of Prohibition in the United States, Prohibition, since it contained approximately 70% to 80% ethanol by weight. In the 1930s, a large number of users of Jamaica ginger were afflicted with a paralysis of the hands and feet that quickly became known as Jamaica ginger paralysis or jake paralysis. Early use and Prohibition Since the 1860s, Jamaica ginger had been widely sold at drug stores and roadside stands in bottles. In small doses, mixed with water, it was used as a remedy for headaches, upper respiratory infections, menstrual disorders, and intestinal gas. Despite its strong ginger flavour, it was popular as an alcoholic beverage in Dry county, dry counties in the United States, where it was a convenient and legal method of obtaining alcohol. It was often mixed with a soft drink to improve the taste ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Christmas Memory
''"A Christmas Memory"'' is a short story by Truman Capote. Originally published in '' Mademoiselle'' magazine in December 1956, it was reprinted in ''The Selected Writings of Truman Capote'' in 1963. It was issued in a stand-alone hardcover edition by Random House in 1966, and it has been published in many editions and anthologies since. The largely autobiographical story, which takes place in the 1930s, describes a period in the lives of the seven-year-old narrator and an elderly woman who is his distant cousin and best friend. The woman was Nanny Faulk, elder sister of the household where Capote’s wayward parents deposited him as a young boy. Nanny, whom everyone called Sook, was thought to be developmentally disabled. But Capote later wrote a friend, ‘’I had an elderly cousin, the woman in my story ‘A Christmas Memory,’ who was a genius.” The evocative narrative focuses on country life, friendship, and the joy of giving during the Christmas season, and it also ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jack Russell Terrier
The Jack Russell Terrier is a small terrier that has its origins in fox hunting in England. It is principally white-bodied and smooth, rough or broken-coated and can be any colour. Small tan and white terriers that technically belong to other breeds are sometimes known erroneously as "Jack Russells". Each breed has different physical characteristics according to the standards of their national breed clubs; size and proportions are often used to tell them apart. Some authorities recognize a similar but separate breed as the Russell Terrier – a shorter-legged, stockier dog, with a range of . However, the ''Fédération Cynologique Internationale'' (FCI) regards the Russell terrier as a sub-type of Jack Russell terrier. Jack Russells are also frequently confused with the Parson Russell Terrier. Technically, the Parson Russell is usually larger and officially limited to a middle range, with a standard size of , whereas the Jack Russell is a broader type, with a size range of . ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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