It Really Is That Complicated

Chas Rawlingss It Really Is That Complicated is an often personal, indeed intimate, and sometimes hilarious ride from start to finish through the byways and mazes of mens and womens relationships. He guides through the fits and startssome of the latter false startsthat characterize the dating game, especially with modern-day dating services. He lays out what he calls the horrors of marriage in the degeneration of romance and eroticism into the battle of the sexes in more mundane but often deal-breaking power struggles over control, money, and property. He elaborates on Tolstoys notion that even this supposedly most sanctified of unions is a form of prostitutionwomen dispensing sex in return for material gain and security. At the same time, he asks good old Freuds notorious question My God, what does woman want, since so many of them flee the very rewards they desire along with the generous, often attractive, and accomplished guys who proffer them. He takes us into what in Victorian times was dubbed My Secret Life, the alleyways of escorts who offer up not only sex but also the companionship and even the no-strings intimacy men crave. Well, for a while at leastuntil the courtesan gets conflicted and crazy herself. And, despite all of this mayhem, Dr. Rawlings urges us all, men and women, to take risks and hurl ourselves into the fray, implicitly asserting that it is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved and lived. Good fun, a great read, and edifying to boot! John Munder Ross, PhD Author, The Sadomasochism of Everyday Life Coauthor of Tales of Love, Sex and Danger

A professional matchmaker and certified life coach outlines a straightforward, optimistic guide to finding romance, discussing how to assess one's marriage suitability, relationship etiquette in modern times, and the appropriate use of current technology.

Surveys the online social habits of American teens and analyzes the role technology and social media plays in their lives, examining common misconceptions about such topics as identity, privacy, danger, and bullying.

A work of fierce originality and brilliance, Miriam Toews' novel explores the ties that bind families together and the forces that tear them apart. It is the world according to Nomi Nickel, a heartbreakingly bewildered and wry young woman trapped in a small Mennonite town that seeks to set her on the path to righteousness and smother her at the same time.'Half of our family, the better-looking half, is missing,' Nomi tells us at the beginning of A Complicated Kindness. Left alone with her father Ray, her days are spent piecing together the reasons her mother Trudie and her sister Tash have gone missing, and trying to figure out what she can do to avoid a career at Happy Family Farms, a chicken abattoir on the outskirts of East Village - not the neighbourhood in Manhattan where Nomi most wants to live but the small town in southern Manitoba. East Village is ministered by Hans, Nomi's pious uncle, otherwise known as The Mouth.As Nomi gets to the bottom of the truth behind her mother's and sister's disappearances, she finds herself on a direct collision course with her uncle and the only community she has ever known. In this funny, compassionate and moving novel, Miriam Toews has created a character who will stay in the hearts of readers long after they've put the book down.

In the new knowledge economy, traditional modes of thinking are no longer effective. Compartmentalizing problems and solutions and assuming everything can be solved with the right formula can no longer keep pace with the radical changes occurring daily in the modern business world. It’s Not Complicated offers a paradigm shift for business professionals looking for simplified solutions to complex problems. In his straightforward and highly engaging style, Rick Nason introduces the principles of “complexity thinking” which empower managers to understand, correlate, and explain a diverse range of business phenomena. For example, why some new products go viral while others remain unnoticed, how office cliques develop despite collaborative work policies and spaces, how economic bubbles form, and how an unknown retiree foiled one of the most carefully planned product launches ever with a single letter to the editor of his local newspaper. Rather than consider complicated and complex as interchangeable terms, Rick Nason explains what complexity is, how it arises, and the errors in solving complex situations with complicated thinking. It’s Not Complicated provides managers with fresh, counterintuitive, and actionable models for dealing with challenging business problems.

A steamy and hilarious holiday treat from New York Times Bestseller J. S. Cooper Santa baby, I've really been an awful bad girl...If the city ever decides to put a sign on my front door, it will say, "Good Girl Gone Bad." This year I am definitely on Santa's naughty list and it's not even my own fault. How was I supposed to know that when I asked for a boyfriend for Christmas, that my wish would be granted; with not one, but two suitors vying for my heart?When one problem becomes two...My two suitors are exact opposites. Lucas, the corporate hottie, wants me to spend Christmas Eve at his penthouse and Connor, the bad boy rockstar wants to take me to an isolated cabin on Christmas Day. I've agreed to both invitations. Hey, a girl has to explore her options.The Christmas surprise I didn't see coming...And then everything went wrong. Because who couldn't see this trainwreck coming; asides from me? Both guys wanted to see me on New Year's Eve: each one sliding a naughty note under my door promising copious amounts of spiced eggnog and an even spicier night. The only problem was they'd both invited me to the same party. Turns out they were connected in a way I never saw coming.It's complicated doesn't even begin to express my dilemma. The only thing I know is that at midnight, the fireworks going off aren't just going to be in the sky.

“A novelistic mosaic that simultaneously reads like a thriller and like a strange, dreamlike excursion into the subconscious.” —The New York Times Years ago, when House of Leaves was first being passed around, it was nothing more than a badly bundled heap of paper, parts of which would occasionally surface on the Internet. No one could have anticipated the small but devoted following this terrifying story would soon command. Starting with an odd assortment of marginalized youth -- musicians, tattoo artists, programmers, strippers, environmentalists, and adrenaline junkies -- the book eventually made its way into the hands of older generations, who not only found themselves in those strangely arranged pages but also discovered a way back into the lives of their estranged children. Now this astonishing novel is made available in book form, complete with the original colored words, vertical footnotes, and second and third appendices. The story remains unchanged, focusing on a young family that moves into a small home on Ash Tree Lane where they discover something is terribly wrong: their house is bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. Of course, neither Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Will Navidson nor his companion Karen Green was prepared to face the consequences of that impossibility, until the day their two little children wandered off and their voices eerily began to return another story -- of creature darkness, of an ever-growing abyss behind a closet door, and of that unholy growl which soon enough would tear through their walls and consume all their dreams.

Black Mirror meets What If It’s Us in this gripping, romantic, and wildly surprising novel about two boys lost in space trying to find their way home—while falling in love—from the critically acclaimed author of We Are the Ants. When Noa closes his eyes on Earth and wakes up on a spaceship called Qriosity just as it’s about to explode, he’s pretty sure things can’t get much weirder. Boy is he wrong. Trapped aboard Qriosity are also DJ and Jenny, neither of whom remember how they got onboard the ship. Together, the three face all the dangers of space, along with murder, aliens, a school dance, and one really, really bad day. But none of this can prepare Noa for the biggest challenge—falling in love. And as Noa’s feelings for DJ deepen, he has to contend not just with the challenges of the present, but also with his memories of the past. However, nothing is what it seems on Qriosity, and the truth will upend all of their lives forever. Love is complicated enough without also trying to stay alive.