Showing results by narrator "Todd Ross" in All Categories

In The Bible’s Cutting Room Floor, acclaimed author and translator Dr. Joel M. Hoffman gives us the stories and other texts that didn’t make it into the Bible even though they offer penetrating insight into the Bible and its teachings. The Book of Genesis tells us about Adam and Eve’s time in the Garden of Eden, but not their saga after they get kicked out or the lessons they have for us about good and evil.

It's 1969 and Palm Springs socialite Maxine Simmons is planning a Thanksgiving feast to rival Nixon's stealthy maneuvers in the White House and Neil Armstrong's walk on the moon. With a catered menu to die for and a dining room that looks like it's been ripped from the glossy pages of a magazine, her entrance to high society is all but assured. Then comes the humiliation of being dumped by her husband of 17 years. Banished to Arizona, the disgraced Maxine languishes in exile. But then she suddenly gets an idea of how she can win it all back.

We like to think we make decisions based on good reasoning–and that our doctors, judges, politicians, economic forecasters and employers do too. In this groundbreaking book, three world-leading behavioural scientists come together to assess the last great fault in our collective decision-making: noise. We all make bad judgements more than we think. Noise shows us what we can do to make better ones.

When a baby is discovered floating in a basket along the quiet canals of Venice, a guild of artisans takes him in and raises him as a son, skilled in each of their trades. Although the boy, Sebastien Trovato, has wrestled with questions of his origins, it isn’t until a woman washes ashore on his lagoon island that answers begin to emerge. In hunting down his story, Sebastien must make a choice that could alter not just his own future, but also that of the beloved floating city.

First, the bad news: an ancient evil—you know, your standard consume-all-life-in-the-galaxy deal—is about to be unleashed. The good news? Squad 312 is standing by to save the day. They've just got to take care of a few small distractions first. Like the clan of gremps who'd like to rearrange their favorite faces. And the cadre of illegit GIA agents with creepy flowers where their eyes used to be, who'll stop at nothing to get their hands on Auri. Then there's Kal's long-lost sister, who's not exactly happy to see her baby brother and has a Syldrathi army at her back.

It may be taboo to say, but some groups in America do better than others. Mormons have recently risen to astonishing business success. Cubans in Miami climbed from poverty to prosperity in a generation. Nigerians earn doctorates at stunningly high rates. Indian and Chinese Americans have much higher incomes than other Americans; Jews may have the highest of all. Why do some groups rise? Drawing on groundbreaking original research and startling statistics, The Triple Package uncovers the secret to their success.

One in ten American adults tried intermittent fasting last year, and they may be on to something. The latest research shows that fasting repairs cellular damage, improves the outcomes for chemotherapy patients, and helps with keeping a healthy weight, leading to a resurgence in recent years. Journalist Steve Hendricks’s The Oldest Cure in the World tells the history of fasting—from the ancient world (Jesus treated an epileptic with fasting) to its rediscovery centuries later.

The year is 2016. Not our 2016. Theirs. Earth is dying, the result of a worldwide nuclear holocaust caused by America’s dictatorial President-for-Life Lewis Henderson, a man who will use any means necessary to maintain power and survive. Enter: The Splitter. A machine capable of splitting off an exact replica of Henderson’s world. A world where the cataclysmic events causing its destruction have yet to occur. That world is ours.

New York Times best-selling author Nancy Krulik has written more than 150 books for young audiences. Even the most reluctant reader will be enthralled by Super Burp!, the tale of a class clown looking for a fresh angle. On his first day at a new school, George Brown tries to leave his goofball reputation behind him. But soon his body is overpowered by magical, loud-as-thunder burps that compel him to do crazy things.

1983: Three students from a small college embark on a week-long road trip to film a documentary on roadside memorials for their American Studies class. The project starts out as a fun adventure with long stretches of empty road and nightly campfires where they begin to open up with one another. But as they venture deeper into the Appalachian backwoods, the atmosphere begins to darken. They notice more and more of the memorials feature a strange, unsettling symbol hinting at a sinister secret.

Jonathan Safran Foer spent much of his teenage and college years oscillating between omnivore and vegetarian. But on the brink of fatherhood - facing the prospect of having to make dietary choices on a child's behalf - his casual questioning took on an urgency His quest for answers ultimately required him to visit factory farms in the middle of the night, dissect the emotional ingredients of meals from his childhood, and probe some of his most primal instincts about right and wrong.

Private Matthew Petticrew arrives in France as part of the American Expeditionary Forces, an arrival that a war-weary France desperately hopes will help to end the turmoil. Having faced unthinkable things on the front, he is captivated by the sound of a lullaby, sung by a voice so pure he knows he must have imagined it. But rumors sweep through the trenches like wildfire, dubbing the voice "The Angel of Argonne", a mysterious presence who leaves behind wreaths on unmarked graves and footprints in the war-pocked soil.

Appetite for America is the incredible real-life story of Fred Harvey - told in depth for the first time ever. As a young immigrant, Fred Harvey worked his way up from dishwasher to household name. With the verve and passion of Fred Harvey himself, Stephen Fried tells the story of how this visionary built his business from a single lunch counter into a family empire whose marketing and innovations we still encounter in myriad ways. Inspiring, instructive, and hugely entertaining, Appetite for America is historical biography that is as richly rewarding.

Most of us know that sugar can wreak havoc on adult bodies, but few realize how uniquely harmful it is to the growing livers, hearts, and brains of children. And the damage can begin early in life. In his research on the effects of sugar on kids' present and future health, USC Professor of Pediatrics and Program Director for Diabetes and Obesity at Children's Hospital Los Angeles Michael Goran has found that too much sugar doesn't just cause childhood obesity, it can cause health issues in kids who are not overweight, too.

Henry at Work invites listeners to rethink how we work today by exploring an aspect of Henry David Thoreau that has often been overlooked: Thoreau the worker. John Kaag and Jonathan van Belle overturn the popular misconception of Thoreau as a navel-gazing recluse who was scornful of work and other mundanities. In fact, Thoreau worked hard—surveying land, running his family's pencil-making business, writing, lecturing, and building his cabin at Walden Pond—and thought intensely about work in its many dimensions.

Negotiations are incredibly stressful and can bring out the worst in people. Wouldn’t it be better if there were a principled way to negotiate? Wouldn’t it be even better if there were a way to treat people fairly and get treated fairly in a negotiation? Split the Pie offers a new approach that does both—a field-tested method that reframes how negotiations play out. Barry Nalebuff, a professor at Yale School of Management, helps identify what’s really at stake in a negotiation: the “pie.” The negotiation pie is the additional value created through an agreement to work together.

Mother nature has a lot to teach us, if only we open our eyes. Pigeons and dolphins offer creative strategies for preserving our memories and warding off dementia, while squirrels and pigs harbor secrets for managing chronic pain. In The Book of Animal Secrets, visionary physician and biomedical researcher David B. Agus, MD, explores all these ways—and more—that we can harness the wonders of the animal kingdom in our own, very human lives.

Cassie Simmons, a museum curator, is enthusiastic about solving mysteries from the past, and she has a personal interest in the history of the rumrunners who ferried illegal booze across the Detroit River during Prohibition. So when a cache of whisky labeled Bailey Brothers’ Best is unearthed during a local home renovation, Cassie hopes to find the answers she’s been searching for about the legendary family of bootleggers...

Restoring the empire that had been destroyed 45 years earlier, Emperor Colin finds problems in the genocidal Achuutani and in his children, Sean and Harriet, who have been marooned on a hostile planet.

After helping the Libert’s store in Ractos sell his herbs, Takumi and Leo visit an orphanage run by the duke’s family. But what they find is an institution full of sick children. Takumi quickly gets to work using his cultivation gift to heal them, with surprising consequences.