Advice From Strangers

'Hilarious and heartbreaking' Sara Pascoe 'Sheer bloody joy' Philippa Perry Over the course of a year, comedian Rachel Parris asked members of her live audience for advice - and here's what she learned from a bunch of total strangers... She takes those random nuggets of wisdom - 'Be kind', 'Never pass up the opportunity for a wee', 'When it doubt, wing it' - and explores them in ways that are entertaining and serious, hilarious and heart-breaking. Full of life guidance on how to deal with everything from tampons to Tories, from grief to gaslighting, this book might just change your life. Funny, fiercely feminist and full of love, this book is a feast; devour it, then pass it to a friend. 'Original and wise. This is essential reading' Ellie Taylor

In Strangers Tend to Tell Me Things--her follow-up memoir to the NYT bestselling The Mighty Queens of Freeville--America's most popular advice columnist, "Ask Amy," shares her journey of family, second chances, and finding love. By peeling back the curtain of her syndicated advice column, Amy Dickinson reveals much of the inspiration and motivation that has fueled her calling. Through a series of linked essays, this moving narrative picks up where her earlier memoir left off. Exploring central themes of romance, death, parenting, self-care, and spiritual awakening, this touching and heartfelt homage speaks to all who have faced challenges in the wake of life's twists and turns. From finding love in middle-age to her storied experience with stepparenting to overcoming disordered eating to her final moments spent with her late mother, Dickinson's trademark humorous tone delivers punch and wit that will empower, entertain, and heal.

I asked 70 strangers, 'Please give me a piece of life advice.' I used their responses as inspiration to write my next poem. This poetry collection is the result. The youngest stranger I asked was six years old. The oldest stranger was eighty-something. Some were asked in the queue at the supermarket or the post office. One time I asked the waiter at a restaurant. I also asked Joanne, who was trying to sell me car insurance over the phone. My favourite? It's hard to choose. "Don't tie your shoelace in a revolving door" said by a chap called Russell was a corker. "Spend time with the people you love" said Nicole, aged nine, on a particular day when I was feeling alone, really pulled on my heart strings. And then 'Make every day count' said Matt, was a particular fond memory. I met this stranger by chance in a woodland car park. It was a cold winter's day and I had been for a run in the woods. Caked in mud I arrived back at the car park only to find I had somehow locked my car keys in the car. He was an incredibly kind man and he drove me to my house and back to get my spare keys. During the car journey, with conversation flowing, of course I had to ask him for his life advice. When I was younger I was told, 'don't talk to strangers.' Good advice. But on this occasion, I am so glad I did.

A photo book with 1,000 photos of strangers and their advice about making the most of life created by artist and storyteller Imran Nuri. Starting in May of 2022, Imran lived in his Toyota Camry for 12 weeks while driving to all of the lower 48 US states in pursuit of photographing 1,000 strangers on a 50-year-old camera after asking them for a piece of life advice. The journey challenged every aspect of who he was. Talking to strangers was way beyond his comfort zone, he had never lived in a car before, he quit his job, and he used a combination of his entire savings, Patreon, and a personal loan to fund the cost of it all. Sleeping in rest areas, casino parking lots, Walmarts, and occasionally on friends' couches around the country, Imran planned his next destination each morning. His days were spontaneous, which was perfect for the serendipity he was looking for in meeting strangers. The end result is a series of 1,000 black-and-white portraits of people across America, each of whom shared a personal learning in their lives. Readers experience an inevitable pattern of universal keys to living a life well lived. In a time when divisiveness is more prevalent than ever, this series also seeks to show that despite our races, genders, locations, and more, we have more in common with the strangers around us than we think. The photos were made on a medium format film camera, the subjects were told to pose however they felt most comfortable, and just one photo was taken of each stranger.

Tracing the origins of how we think about strangers to the Victorian period, Strangers and the Enchantment of Space in Victorian Fiction, 1830-1865 explores the vital role strangers had in shaping social relations during the cultural transformations of the industrial revolution, transportation technologies, and globalization. While studies of nineteenth-century Britain tend to trace the rise of an aloof cosmopolitanism and distancing narrative strategies, this volume calls attention to the personalizing impulse in nineteenth-century literary form, investigating the deeply personal reflections on individual and national identities. In her book, Dr. Pond leads the reader through homes of the urban poor, wandering the Great Exhibition in the Crystal Palace, loitering in suburban neighborhoods, riding the railway, and touring a country estate. Readers will experience how the ordinary can be enchanting, and how the mundane can be unexpected, discovering a new way of thinking about strangers and their influence on our lives. Through an examination of the short and long fictional forms of Martineau, Dickens, Brontë, Gaskell, and Braddon, this study locates the figure of the stranger as a powerful topos in the story Victorian literature and the ethics of social relations. This book will be ideal for those seeking to understand the dynamics of the stranger in Victorian fiction as a figure for understanding the changing dynamics of social relations in England in the early nineteenth century.

Over the past two decades, violent crime has become one of the most serious domestic problems in the United States. Approximately 13 million people (nearly 5% of the U.S. population) are victims of crime every year, and of that, approximately one and a half million are victims of violent crime. Ensuring quality of life for victims of crime is therefore a major challenge facing policy makers and mental health providers. Helping Victims of Violent Crime grounds victim assistance treatments in a victim-centered and strengths perspective. The book explores victim assistance through systems theory: the holistic notion of examining the client in his/her environment and a key theoretical underpinning of social work practice. The basic assumption of systems theoryis homeostasis. A crime event causes a change in homeostasis and often results in disequilibrium. The victim's focus at this point is to regain equilibrium. Under the systems metatheory, coping, crisis and attribution theories provide a good framework for victim-centered intervention. Stress and coping theories posit that three factors determine the state of balance: perception of the event, available situational support, and coping mechanisms. Crisis theory offers a framework to understand a victim's response to a crime. The basic assumption of crisis theory asserts that when a crisis occurs, people respond with a fairly predictable physical and emotional pattern. The intensity and manifestation of this pattern may vary from individual to individual. Finally, attribution theory asserts that individuals make cognitive appraisals of a stressful situation in both positive and negative ways. These appraisals are based on the individual's assertion that they can understand, predict, and control circumstances and result in the victim's assignment of responsibility for solving or helping with problems that have arisen from the crime event. In summary, these four theories can delineate a definitive model for approach to the victimization process. It is from this theoretical framework that Treating Victims of Violent Crime offers assessments and interventions with a fuller understanding of the victimization recovery process. The book includes analysis of victims of family violence (child abuse, elder abuse, partner violence) as well as stranger violence (sexual assault, homicide, and terrorism).

Knowledge from the very start Bringing a child into the world can be the most momentous event in one's life. Now parents can have the most up–to–date information on what to expect from the nine months of pregnancy and the entire process of childbirth. Written by an experienced OB-GYN and mother, with a very reassuring tone, the latest edition of The Complete Idiot's Guide® to Pregnancy and Childbirth includes: • A new focus on "green" pregnancies and childbirth • The latest information on screenings, guidelines for vaccination, and more • "Daddy Alert" sidebars provided throughout to include the father during pregnancy and childbirth