Nuevo California


Book Description

A fabulist comedy-drama of a future city-state made up of Tijuana and San Diego after a great California earthquake. The world greets the first Mexican Pope who leads the region back into recovery. "The year is 2028. A massive earthquake has reconfigured Southern California, wiping out Los Angeles and Orange County. The whole region has to be reconceived. In a controversial move, a new city-state has been proposed, combining San Diego and Tijuana into one cross-cultural community known as Nuevo California. This imaginary world is at the center of a new play premiering at the San Diego Repertory Theater. So the wall is coming down and there's a Mexican-American pope who comes to the region to bless its demolition. What follows is a wild mix of fantasy and reality - chaos and crisis, murder, mystery and a budding bicultural romance - all played out by Mexicans, Anglos, Asians, blacks, Jews, Muslims and Kumi Indians." -Robert Siegel, All Things Considered, N P R News




Ten Poems to Open Your Heart


Book Description

Ten Poems to Open Your Heart is a book devoted to love: to the intimacy of personal love and lovemaking, to a loving compassion for others, and to the love that embraces both this world and the next. This new volume from Roger Housden features a few of the same poets as his extraordinarily moving Ten Poems to Change Your Life, such as Mary Oliver and Pablo Neruda, along with contributions from Sharon Olds, Wislawa Szymborska, Czeslaw Milosz, Denise Levertov, and others. Any one of the ten poems and, indeed, any one of Housden’s reflections on them, can open, gladden, or pierce your heart. Through the voices of these ten inspiring poets, and through illustrations from his own life, Housden expresses the tenderness, beauty, joys, and sorrows of love, the presence of which, more than anything else, gives human existence its meaning. As Housden says in his eloquent introduction, “Great poetry happens when the mind is looking the other way and words fall from the sky to shape a moment that would normally be untranslatable. . . . When the heart opens, we forget ourselves and the world pours in: this world, and also the invisible world of meaning that sustains everything that was and ever shall be.” From the Hardcover edition.




City Lights Stories


Book Description

You are holding a collection of stories, the aim of this collection is to equip and inspire you to make a positive impact in your own community, through relationships and creative initiatives. In this material, you will read about Dave and Will who developed gardens on wasteland in inner city London council estates, encouraging residents to be part of the process of renewal and creativity by growing plants and vegetables. Will hosts community harvest feasts, bringing together local residents to eat their own locally-grown produce. Andy in his 20s, started a lunch club for isolated elderly people, rallying his student friends to help serve homemade meals in a borrowed church hall. Pauline responded to a news bulletin about the lack of housing for refugees and asylum seekers, by setting up homes across North London to provide safe housing. Annie set up regular meals in her church building for homeless people and rough sleepers. Mark started a football club for local lads from an estate in London, most of whom were from extremely difficult backgrounds and not in education or employment. Countless others have weeded gardens for families referred by social services, mentored children in foster care and painted a wall in a refuge. Abroad, Mick and Ruby moved into an inner city slum community in the heart of Manilla for 9 years with their young children. At the heart of City Lights are stories and friendships. Find out more about City Lights. regenerateuk.co.uk