Half Moon Scar

Allison Green's Half Moon Scar is an edgy novel about three childhood friends who reunite as adults to discover and heal each other's wounds, both physical and emotional. Amy is a thirtysomething lesbian who escaped her small, Midwestern hometown of Willow Bay, Wisconsin, to pursue an academic career and establish a life with her lover. After years away from Willow Bay, she returns to visit the people she's left behind--only to discover that her old friends Gina and Gavin have learned to dissociate from their pasts in extreme ways that rival her own. Amy's tendency toward self-mutilation parallels both Gavin's anorexia and Gina's moody detachment from life, and Amy soon begins to fear for Gavin's life while becoming more and more bewildered by Gina's behavior. As past and present collide and the visit extends far beyond its intended length, as the reunion forces all three to examine the shame and guilt they experienced as gay adolescents. Amy finds that she must reconcile the tense relationship with her family and her long-standing attraction to Gina, as well as her past romantic experimentation with Gavin. Together, Amy, Gina, and Gavin examine the scars--both emotional and physical, visible and invisible--that pervade their still-unresolved lives.

For centuries scholars have pondered and speculated over the uses of the chipped stone implements uncovered at archaeological sites. Recently a number of researchers have attempted to determine prehistoric tool function through experimentation and through observation of the few remaining human groups who still retain this knowledge. Learning how stone tools were made and used in the past can tell us a great deal about ancient economic systems, exchange networks, and the social and political structure of prehistoric societies. Suzanne M. Lewenstein used the artifacts from Cerros, an important Late Preclassic (200 BC–AD 200) Mayan site in northern Belize, to study stone tool function. Through a comprehensive program of experimentation with stone tool replicas, she was able not only to infer the tasks performed by individual tool specimens but also to recognize a wide variety of past activities for which stone tools were used. Unlike previous works that focused on hunter-gatherer groups, Stone Tool Use at Cerros is the first comprehensive experimental study of tool use in an agricultural society. The lithic data are used in an economic interpretation of a lowland Mayan community within a hierarchically complex society. Apart from its significance to Mayan studies, this innovative work offers the beginnings of a reference collection of identifiable tool functions that may be documented for sedentary, complex society. It will be of major interest to all archaeologists and anthropologists, as well as those interested in economic specialization and artisanry in complex societies.

In this collection of unique patient narratives, adolescents who survived kidney, heart, and liver transplants explore through poetry issues significant to all ages: body changes, independence, identity, and mortality. Background narratives provide context and analyses of their poems that are ultimately healing as they voice hope amid uncertainty.

NIGHT OF A THOUSAND DREAMS is a personal journey through the difficulties and mysteries of life. It is the endeavor of one Soul to understand the shadows and light that we all live. The stories, dreams, and challenges presented in this manuscript attempt to simplify many abstract and ancient concepts. The beauty of truth is that it is simple...not complex. The chapter Essence of Gold speaks to the nuggets of gold (truths) which are often twisted so tightly by conventional religion that their sacred intent and meaning is lost. Storytelling is an art that weaves the light of truths into the common stories of humanities struggles. These stories serve as an inspiration for me to keep moving forward on my journey. They reveal the spectrum of human emotions. This collection of spiritual stories is my attempt as a storyteller to inspire others to share their unique perspectives and truths.

Bounty hunter Iron Eyes is heading south to Mexico in search of outlaws Bodine and Walters, but is himself being hunted down by his erstwhile sweetheart Squirrel Sally. Then Iron Eyes learns that Sally has been kidnapped by landowner Don Jose Fernandez, and rushes to her aid. But Sally, Iron Eyes and the outlaws are all just pawns in a much larger game, with an enemy more deadly than they can imagine, and Iron Eyes has to use all his courage and skill to survive.

This volume introduces a methodology, based on a systematic, in-depth study of prehension and hafting traces on experimental stone artifacts. The author proposes a number of distinctive macro- and microscopic wear traits for identifying handheld tools.