Uncommon Traveler


Book Description

Mary Kingsley spent her childhood in a small house on a lonely lane outside London, England. Her mother was bedridden, her father rarely home, and Mary served as housekeeper, handyman, nursemaid, and servant. Not until she was thirty years old did Mary get her chance to explore the world she’d read about in her father’s library. In 1893, she arrived in West Africa, where she encountered giant Xying insects, crocodiles, hippos, and brutal heat. Mary endured the hardships of the equatorial country—and thrived.




Uncommon Traveler


Book Description

A brief biography of the self-educated 19th century Englishwoman who, after a secluded childhood and youth, traveled alone through unexplored West Africa in 1893 and 1894 and learned much about the area and its inhabitants. Full-color illustrations.




Vagabonding


Book Description

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER • With a new foreword by Tim Ferriss • “Vagabonding easily remains in my top-10 list of life-changing books. Why? Because one incredible trip, especially a long-term trip, can change your life forever. And Vagabonding teaches you how to travel (and think), not just for one trip, but for the rest of your life.”—Tim Ferriss, from the foreword There’s nothing like vagabonding: taking time off from your normal life—from six weeks to four months to two years—to discover and experience the world on your own terms. In this one-of-a-kind handbook, veteran travel writer Rolf Potts explains how anyone armed with an independent spirit can achieve the dream of extended overseas travel. Now completely revised and updated, Vagabonding is an accessible and inspiring guide to • financing your travel time • determining your destination • adjusting to life on the road • working and volunteering overseas • handling travel adversity • re-assimilating back into ordinary life Updated for our ever-changing world, Vagabonding is an indispensable guide for the modern traveler.




Uncommon Type


Book Description

A collection of seventeen wonderful short stories showing that the legendary Tom Hanks is as talented a writer as he is an actor. “Reading Tom Hanks's Uncommon Type is like finding out that Alice Munro is also the greatest actress of our time.” —Ann Patchett, bestselling, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Dutch House A gentle Eastern European immigrant arrives in New York City after his family and his life have been torn apart by his country's civil war. A man who loves to bowl rolls a perfect game--and then another and then another and then many more in a row until he winds up ESPN's newest celebrity, and he must decide if the combination of perfection and celebrity has ruined the thing he loves. An eccentric billionaire and his faithful executive assistant venture into America looking for acquisitions and discover a down and out motel, romance, and a bit of real life. These are just some of the tales Tom Hanks tells in this first collection of his short stories. They are surprising, intelligent, heartwarming, and, for the millions and millions of Tom Hanks fans, an absolute must-have!




Uncommon Carriers


Book Description

McPhee, in prose distinguished by its warm humor, keen insight, and rich sense of human character, looks at the people who drive trucks, captain ships, pilot towboats, drive coal trains, and carry lobsters through the air: people who work in freight transportation.




Uncommon Ground


Book Description

Bestselling author Timothy Keller and legal scholar John Inazu bring together a thrilling range of artists, thinkers, and leaders to provide a guide to faithful living in a pluralistic, fractured world. How can Christians today interact with those around them in a way that shows respect to those whose beliefs are radically different but that also remains faithful to the gospel? Timothy Keller and John Inazu bring together illuminating stories--their own and from others--to answer this vital question. Uncommon Ground gathers an array of perspectives from people thinking deeply and working daily to live with humility, patience, and tolerance in our time. Contributors include: Lecrae Tish Harrison Warren Kristen Deede Johnson Claude Richard Alexander Shirley Hoogstra Sara Groves Rudy Carrasco Trillia Newbell Tom Lin Warren Kinghorn Providing varied and enlightening approaches to reaching faithfully across deep and often painful differences, Uncommon Ground shows us how to live with confidence, joy, and hope in a complex and fragmented age. "Loving engagement with folks with whom we disagree does not come easily for many of us with strong Christian convictions. Tim Keller and John Inazu are not only models for how to do this well, but in this fine book they have gathered wise conversation partners to offer much needed counsel on how to cultivate the spiritual virtues of humility, patience, and tolerance that are necessary for loving our neighbors in our increasingly pluralistic culture." -- Richard Mouw, Professor of Faith and Public Life, Fuller Theological Seminary "For anyone struggling to engage well with others in an era of toxic conflict, this book provides a framework, steeped in humility, that is not only insightful but is readily actionable. I'm grateful for the vulnerability and wisdom offered by each of the twelve leaders who contributed to this book. The task of learning to love well - neighbors and enemies alike - is long and urgent, and it can be costly. And yet, as this book shows us, because it is the work of Jesus, we can pursue this love with great hope." -- Gary A. Haugen, founder and CEO, International Justice Mission




Uncommon Voyage


Book Description

Uncommon Voyage, first published in 1996, documented Laura Shapiro Kramer’s search for alternative treatments for her son Seth’s cerebral palsy in the face of an uncomprehending medical establishment. In this revised and expanded edition, the author redefines the main complementary therapies discussed earlier and explores new solutions she and Seth have discovered.




Mystical Traveler


Book Description

Combining factual research garnered in her trance mediumship with new insights from her spirit guide Francine, Browne presents information about the Mystical Traveler.




Elizabeth Webster and the Court of Uncommon Pleas


Book Description

Welcome to Elizabeth Webster's world, where the common laws of middle school torment her days . . . and the uncommon laws of an even weirder realm govern her nights. Elizabeth Webster is happy to stay under the radar (and under her bangs) until middle school is dead and gone. But when star swimmer Henry Harrison asks Elizabeth to tutor him in math, it's not linear equations Henry really needs help with-it's a flower-scented, poodle-skirt-wearing, head-tossing ghost who's calling out Elizabeth's name. But why Elizabeth? Could it have something to do with her missing lawyer father? Maybe. Probably. If only she could find him. In her search, Elizabeth discovers more than she is looking for: a grandfather she never knew, a startling legacy, and the secret family law firm, Webster & Son, Attorneys for the Damned. Elizabeth and her friends soon land in court, where demons and ghosts take the witness stand and a red-eyed judge with a ratty white wig hands out sentences like sandwiches. Will Elizabeth's father arrive in time to save Henry Harrison-and is Henry the one who really needs saving? Set in the historic streets of Philadelphia, this riveting middle-grade mystery from New York Times bestselling author William Lashner will have readers banging their gavels and calling for more from the incomparable Elizabeth Webster.




A Landscape of Travel


Book Description

While the number of domestic leisure travelers has increased dramatically in reform-era China, the persistent gap between urban and rural living standards attests to ongoing social, economic, and political inequalities. The state has widely touted tourism for its potential to bring wealth and modernity to rural ethnic minority communities, but the policies underlying the development of tourism obscure some complicated realities. In tourism, after all, one person’s leisure is another person’s labor. A Landscape of Travel investigates the contested meanings and unintended consequences of tourism for those people whose lives and livelihoods are most at stake in China’s rural ethnic tourism industry: the residents of village destinations. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in Ping’an (a Zhuang village in Guangxi) and Upper Jidao (a Miao village in Guizhou), Jenny Chio analyzes the myriad challenges and possibilities confronted by villagers who are called upon to do the work of tourism. She addresses the shifting significance of migration and rural mobility, the visual politics of tourist photography, and the effects of touristic desires for “exotic difference” on village social relations. In this way, Chio illuminates the contemporary regimes of labor and leisure and the changing imagination of what it means to be rural, ethnic, and modern in China today.