Apparently, I'm Torture


Book Description

From the author of Apparently, I’m A Bitch comes a new Double Shot rom-com in which a teacher is forced to work on a fundraiser with her ex-co-worker-turned-closest-friend-turned-hated-rival – with risky results. Lilly Fares is not a people-pleasing pushover. At least, not anymore. Right? Cue Trevor Atkins: the head teacher of her nightmares. Thanks to his threats to fire Lilly, she can’t help but fold into old, torturous, habits. To save her dream-job teaching literature, Trevor forces her to take his place in the upcoming Educational Arts Fundraiser, where she runs into long-time frenemy Shawn Jackson. The Great Shawn Jackson, educational thought leader extraordinaire. Cue melodramatic groan. Years ago, Shawn made his feelings about Lilly crystal clear, and judging by the icy cold front he’s been emanating, nothing will change despite their close quarters. But as Lilly struggles to fix her career, and Shawn begins to lend a helping hand, things feel... different. Lilly and Shawn start *gasp* talking. Suddenly, things don’t seem as bad as they once did. Suddenly, Lilly starts enjoying herself. Suddenly, Lilly can’t take her eyes off of Shawn’s sexy, dimpled smile and muscular forearms. But when it comes time to prove she’s the teacher she was meant to be, will Shawn be able to handle her particular brand of torture? Apparently, I’m Torture is a smart, swoony, feel-good romantic comedy based on the awfully vague question: Is everything always what it seems? This spicy friends to enemies to lovers romantic comedy is set in contemporary New York City, and is the second book within the Double Shot Duet, but can be read as a standalone. This full length romance features: · A Happily Ever After · A Swoon-worthy 'I'll sacrifice it all for her' hero · A Nostalgic heroine with anxiety representation · No third act breakup · Teacher x Teacher high stakes workplace conflict · Opposites attract · Found Family · He falls first · Open door, slow burn EARNED spice · Dual first person POV (point of view) · Then vs now timeline · Angst and humor! If you enjoyed Love Theoretically by Ali Hazelwood, Yours Truly by Abby Jimenez, or The True Love Experiment by Christina Lauren, you'll love this book!




Blindfold


Book Description

An award-winning journalist’s extraordinary account of being kidnapped and tortured in Syria by al Qaeda for two years—a revelatory memoir about war, human nature, and endurance that’s “the best of the genre, profound, poetic, and sorrowful” (The Atlantic). In 2012, American journalist Theo Padnos, fluent in Arabic, Russian, German, and French, traveled to a Turkish border town to write and report on the Syrian civil war. One afternoon in October, while walking through an olive grove, he met three young Syrians—who turned out to be al Qaeda operatives—and they captured him and kept him prisoner for nearly two years. On his first day, in the first of many prisons, Padnos was given a blindfold—a grime-stained scrap of fabric—that was his only possession throughout his horrific ordeal. Now, Padnos recounts his time in captivity in Syria, where he was frequently tortured at the hands of the al Qaeda affiliate, Jebhat al Nusra. We learn not only about Padnos’s harrowing experience, but we also get a firsthand account of life in a Syrian village, the nature of Islamic prisons, how captors interrogate someone suspected of being CIA, the ways that Islamic fighters shift identities and drift back and forth through the veil of Western civilization, and much more. No other journalist has lived among terrorists for as long as Theo has—and survived. As a resident of thirteen separate prisons in every part of rebel-occupied Syria, Theo witnessed a society adrift amid a steady stream of bombings, executions, torture, prayer, fasting, and exhibitions, all staged by the terrorists. Living within this tide of violence changed not only his personal identity but also profoundly altered his understanding of how to live. Offering fascinating, unprecedented insight into the state of Syria today, Blindfold is “a triumph of the human spirit” (The New York Times Book Review)—combining the emotional power of a captive’s memoir with a journalist’s account of a culture and a nation in conflict that is as urgent and important as ever.




Hard Measures


Book Description

An explosive memoir about the creation and implementation of the controversial Enhanced Interrogation Techniques by the former Chief Operations Officer for the CIA's Counterterrorism Center.




Torture and Eucharist


Book Description

In this engrossing analysis, Cavanaugh contends that the Eucharist is the Church's response to the use of torture as a social discipline.




Buddha's Brain


Book Description

Jesus, Moses, Mohammed, Gandhi, and the Buddha all had brains built essentially like anyone else's, yet they were able to harness their thoughts and shape their patterns of thinking in ways that changed history. With new breakthroughs in modern neuroscience and the wisdom of thousands of years of contemplative practice, it is possible for us to shape our own thoughts in a similar way for greater happiness, love, compassion, and wisdom. Buddha's Brain joins the forces of modern neuroscience with ancient contemplative teachings to show readers how they can work toward greater emotional well-being, healthier relationships, more effective actions, and deepened religious and spiritual understanding. This book will explain how the core elements of both psychological well-being and religious or spiritual life-virtue, mindfulness, and wisdom--are based in the core functions of the brain: regulating, learning, and valuing. Readers will also learn practical ways to apply this information, as the book offers many exercises they can do to tap the unused potential of the brain and rewire it over time for greater peace and well-being.




Why Torture Doesn’t Work


Book Description

Torture is banned because it is cruel and inhumane. But as Shane O’Mara writes in this account of the human brain under stress, another reason torture should never be condoned is because it does not work the way torturers assume it does. In countless films and TV shows such as Homeland and 24, torture is portrayed as a harsh necessity. If cruelty can extract secrets that will save lives, so be it. CIA officers and others conducted torture using precisely this justification. But does torture accomplish what its defenders say it does? For ethical reasons, there are no scientific studies of torture. But neuroscientists know a lot about how the brain reacts to fear, extreme temperatures, starvation, thirst, sleep deprivation, and immersion in freezing water, all tools of the torturer’s trade. These stressors create problems for memory, mood, and thinking, and sufferers predictably produce information that is deeply unreliable—and, for intelligence purposes, even counterproductive. As O’Mara guides us through the neuroscience of suffering, he reveals the brain to be much more complex than the brute calculations of torturers have allowed, and he points the way to a humane approach to interrogation, founded in the science of brain and behavior. Torture may be effective in forcing confessions, as in Stalin’s Russia. But if we want information that we can depend on to save lives, O’Mara writes, our model should be Napoleon: “It has always been recognized that this way of interrogating men, by putting them to torture, produces nothing worthwhile.”




101 Ways to Torture Your Husband


Book Description

He forgot your birthday. He always leaves his socks on the floor. He’s glued to the tube all weekend for every game. Let’s face it: Even the best of husbands are a real pain in the ass sometimes. And when all the “talks,” counseling sessions and self-help books fail, there’s only one viable recourse: torture. In this hilarious collection of clever tricks and tactics, you will learn how to put your husband in his place when you: Bury the remote in the backyard Have lunch with an ex Pick a fight during the game Book a male masseuse for your next massage Delete his DVR recordings And many more! Risk factors rank damage done as well as how long it’ll take him to get over it. With the creatively wicked methods outlined in this manual, he’ll never misbehave again!




The History Of Torture


Book Description

First published in 2005. Torture, an enduring and seemingly not declining aspect of man's relationship to his fellow man, is an enduring thread through human history. Whether it be practiced by primitive people, the ancient Greeks or the Catholic Church, whether it be ancient China, Japan, 1930's Germany, or Northern Ireland today, torture is alarmingly systematic and consistent in its methods. Impaling, burning, rack or wheel, mutilation, drawing and quartering, burning or hanging alive in chains. A very comprehensive and readable work.




23 Minutes in Hell


Book Description

New York Times Best Seller and Over 1 million copies sold! Over 750 5-Star reviews Wiese’s visit to the devil’s lair lasted just twenty-three minutes, but he returned with vivid details etched in his memory, capturing the attention of national media, including the Christian Broadcasting Network, Daystar Television Network, Trinity Broadcasting Network, the Miracle Channel, Sid Roth’s It’s Supernatural!, Sean Hannity’s America, Charisma News, and many others. Awaken to the realities of hell, the afterlife and the urgency to live for Christ in your short time here on earth.. Bill Wiese experienced something so horrifying it continues to captivate the world. He saw the searing flames of hell, felt total isolation, smelled the putrid and rotting stench, heard deafening screams of agony, and experienced terrorizing demons. Finally the strong hand of God lifted him out of the pit. This expanded anniversary edition includes more than 150 Bible verses referencing hell for further study. Also included is the new section, “Wrestling With the Big Questions” where Bill answers these and many others questions: Why do some people who have a near-death experience see a bright light? Will those who never heard about Jesus go to hell? Is hell eternal, or are those in hell simply annihilated?




Lexicon Urthus, Second Edition


Book Description

Lexicon Urthus is an alphabetical dictionary for the complete Urth Cycle by Gene Wolfe: The Shadow of the Torturer; The Claw of the Conciliator; The Sword of the Lictor; The Citadel of the Autarch; the sequel Urth of the New Sun; the novella Empires of Foliage and Flower; the short stories "The Cat," "The Map," and "The Old Woman Whose Rolling Pin Is the Sun"; and Gene Wolfe's own commentaries in The Castle of the Otter. The first edition was nominated for a World Fantasy Award. This second edition, available for the first time in paperback, includes 300 new entries. When the first edition was published, Science Fiction Age said: "Lexicon Urthus makes a perfect gift for any fan of [Wolfe's] work, and from the way his words sell, it appears that there are many deserving readers out there waiting." Gary K. Wolfe, in Locus, said: "A convenient and well researched glossary of names and terms. . . . It provides enough of a gloss on the novels that it almost evokes Wolfe's distant future all by itself. . . . It can provide both a useful reference and a good deal of fun." Donald Keller said, in the New York Review of Science Fiction: "A fruitful product of obsession, this is a thorough . . . dictionary of the Urth Cycle. . . . Andre-Driussi's research has been exhaustive, and he has discovered many fascinating things . . . [it is] head-spinning to confront a myriad of small and large details, some merely interesting, others jawdropping."