Last Act

Award-winning author Brad Parks delivers a tense novel of thrills, twists, and deceit that grabs you and won’t let go until the final, satisfying page. Tommy Jump is an out-of-work stage actor approached by the FBI with the role of a lifetime: Go undercover at a federal prison, impersonate a convicted felon, and befriend a fellow inmate, a disgraced banker named Mitchell Dupree, who knows the location of documents that can be used to bring down a ruthless drug cartel . . . if only he’d tell the FBI where they are. The women in Tommy’s life, his fiancée and mother, tell him he’s crazy to even consider taking the part. The cartel has quickly risen to become the largest supplier of crystal meth in America. And it hasn’t done it by playing nice. Still, Tommy’s acting career has stalled, and the FBI is offering a minimum of $150,000 for a six-month gig—whether he gets the documents or not. Using a false name and backstory, Tommy enters the low-security prison and begins the process of befriending Dupree. But Tommy soon realizes he’s underestimated the enormity of his task and the terrifying reach of the cartel. The FBI aren't the only ones looking for the documents, and if Tommy doesn’t play his role to perfection, it just may be his last act.

Between the morning of Wednesday, November 4, and the morning of Thursday, November 5, 1981, a fateful drama unfolded that changed Canada forever. In one last attempt to renew the constitution with the consent of the provinces, Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau met behind closed doors in Ottawa with the ten premiers. It was the culmination of more than five decades of constitutional wrangling, and has been called the most important conference since the Fathers of Confederation got together in Quebec City in 1864. Faced with the threat of Quebec independence, the ambitions of Western Canada, and the provinces’ demands for more power, Trudeau was embattled. But he was fiercely determined to make Canadians fully independent and to entrench a Charter of Rights and Freedoms. What happened that day still reverberates. It severed the last important link to Canada’s colonial past. It guaranteed individual liberty and minority rights in the future. It weakened the grip of the elites and gave ownership of the constitution to Canadians. But it came at a price. Quebec alone refused to sign the final deal. René Lévesque, its separatist premier, claimed he had been betrayed by his allies in the Gang of Eight. The legend of the "Night of the Long Knives" took hold, precipitating a series of events that came close to destroying the country. Thirty years later, author Ron Graham delivers a gripping account of the fractious debates and secret negotiations. He uses newly uncovered documents and the candid recollections of many of the key participants to create a vivid record of that momentous twenty-four hours. Authoritative and engaging, The Last Act is a remarkable combination of scholarly research and historical narrative.

Here is a new Clay Sanskrit Library edition and translation of Bhava-bhuti's Rama's Last Act. The play is counted among the greatest Sanskrit dramas. Rama's Last Act at once dramatizes Valmiki's troubling Ramayana and revises its most intractable episode, the hero's rejection of his beloved wife. Human agency in the face of destiny, the power of love, and the capacity of art to make sense of such mysteries are the themes explored in this singular literary achievement of the Indian stage. Bhava-bhuti transfigured epic models that are history for traditional readers. He may have been, the first not only to produce a reworking intended for theatrical performance, but more important, to attempt to tackle the most critical problem of the story, the abandonment of Sita, the moral valence of the act, and the precise degree of Rama's personal responsibility. Bhava-bhuti's dominant concern is the reflexive appreciation of dramatic art itself and the place of art in making sense of lived experience, His literary practice of self-awareness perhaps constitutes the supreme achievement of Rama's Last Act.

A Richard and Judy Book club selection. In the summer of 1990, Cathy's brother Matty was knocked down by a car on the way home from a night out. It was two weeks before his GCSE results, which turned out to be the best in his school. Sitting by his unconscious body in hospital, holding his hand and watching his heartbeat on the monitors, Cathy and her parents willed him to survive. They did not know then that there are many and various fates worse than death. This is the story of what happened to Cathy and her brother, and the unimaginable decision that she and her parents had to make eight years after the night that changed everything. It's a story for anyone who has ever watched someone suffer or lost someone they loved or lived through a painful time that left them forever changed. Told with boundless warmth and affection, The Last Act of Love by Cathy Rentzenbrink is a heartbreaking yet uplifting testament to a family's survival and the price we pay for love.

His name in American politics is more cited than any other president. Both the Republican and Democratic parties are radically different today, mainly as a result of Ronald Reagan and the force of his ideas. No twentieth century president shaped the American political landscape so profoundly. Craig Shirley’s Last Act is the important final chapter in the life of Reagan that no one has thus far covered. It’s the kind of book that widens our understanding of American history and of the presidency and the men who occupied it. To tell Reagan’s story, Craig has secured the complete, exclusive, and enthusiastic support of the Reagan Foundation and Library and spent considerable time there reviewing sealed files and confidential information. Cast in a grand and compelling narrative style, Last Act contains interesting and heretofore untold anecdotes about Reagan, Mrs. Reagan, their pleasure at retirement, the onslaught of the awful Alzheimer’s and how he and Mrs. Reagan dealt with the diagnosis, the slow demise, the extensive plans for a state funeral, the outpouring from the nation, which stunned the political establishment, the Reagan legacy, and how his shadow looms more and more over the Republican Party, Washington, the culture of America, and the world.

When tragically widowed opera singer, Anne Paget, is told by a doctor that she has only a few months to live she is devastated. Instead of withering quietly into her fate she decides to take a risk and a final challenge, accepting a surprise offer to perform in an opera to be staged in a hidden principality in the Alps, to celebrate an international peace conference. But as she rises quickly from an understudy to a star, she realises that her life is not only threatened by her illness but also by mysterious intrigues and dangerous crosscurrents that underline the high society of Lissenberg. There is sabotage and murder and Anne soon realises that nothing is as it seems, and that she cannot trust any of the men that offer her protection. In Last Act, first published in 1979, Jane Aiken Hodge combines all the elements of a thrilling romance – her heroine is enchanting, the setting glittering, and the men are handsome but dangerous...

How do we align our end-of-life choices with our values? In a world experiencing a climate crisis and a culture that avoids discussions about death and dying, environmentalist and educator Mallory McDuff takes readers on a journey to discover new, sustainable practices around death and dying.