Low Level Panic

A funny, unapologetic play about the effects of society's objectification of women.

Two modern feminist classics by a writer who was amongst the extraordinary generation of British female playwrights to emerge in the 1980s. 'McIntyre's first Royal Court play, Low Level Panic, [is] a deft and funny all-female three-hander, set in a bathroom... The play was directed in 1988 by Nancy Meckler with Caroline Quentin, Lorraine Brunning and Alaine Hickmott in the principal roles. The panic of the title is provoked by omnipresent pornography and a sexual assault on one of the characters. But the play's originality and boldness lie in its treatment of the characters' complex relationships with their own sexual fantasies, their bodies and each other. 'In McIntyre's next play, My Heart's a Suitcase, which had its premiere at the Royal Court in 1990, the sense of invasion felt by the two female central characters is dramatised by characters called Pest and Luggage, who burst unpredictably through the walls of the seaside flat in which the play is set. ... McIntyre's theatrical imagination [is] matched by an unsentimental but sympathetic portrayal of women trying to make sense of their place in a threatening and intrusive world. 'Low Level Panic won the Samuel Beckett award, while My Heart's a Suitcase earned McIntyre the Evening Standard's most promising playwright award, with both plays quickly entering the feminist theatre canon.' David Edgar, The Guardian

Explores the history and nature of women in British dramatic comedy

The brain is the most complex organ in our body. Indeed, it is perhaps the most complex structure we have ever encountered in nature. Both structurally and functionally, there are many peculiarities that differentiate the brain from all other organs. The brain is our connection to the world around us and by governing nervous system and higher function, any disturbance induces severe neurological and psychiatric disorders that can have a devastating effect on quality of life. Our understanding of the physiology and biochemistry of the brain has improved dramatically in the last two decades. In particular, the critical role of cations, including magnesium, has become evident, even if incompletely understood at a mechanistic level. The exact role and regulation of magnesium, in particular, remains elusive, largely because intracellular levels are so difficult to routinely quantify. Nonetheless, the importance of magnesium to normal central nervous system activity is self-evident given the complicated homeostatic mechanisms that maintain the concentration of this cation within strict limits essential for normal physiology and metabolism. There is also considerable accumulating evidence to suggest alterations to some brain functions in both normal and pathological conditions may be linked to alterations in local magnesium concentration. This book, containing chapters written by some of the foremost experts in the field of magnesium research, brings together the latest in experimental and clinical magnesium research as it relates to the central nervous system. It offers a complete and updated view of magnesiums involvement in central nervous system function and in so doing, brings together two main pillars of contemporary neuroscience research, namely providing an explanation for the molecular mechanisms involved in brain function, and emphasizing the connections between the molecular changes and behavior. It is the untiring efforts of those magnesium researchers who have dedicated their lives to unraveling the mysteries of magnesiums role in biological systems that has inspired the collation of this volume of work.

The New York Times-bestselling "skeptical environmentalist" argues that panic over climate change is causing more harm than good Hurricanes batter our coasts. Wildfires rage across the American West. Glaciers collapse in the Artic. Politicians, activists, and the media espouse a common message: climate change is destroying the planet, and we must take drastic action immediately to stop it. Children panic about their future, and adults wonder if it is even ethical to bring new life into the world. Enough, argues bestselling author Bjorn Lomborg. Climate change is real, but it's not the apocalyptic threat that we've been told it is. Projections of Earth's imminent demise are based on bad science and even worse economics. In panic, world leaders have committed to wildly expensive but largely ineffective policies that hamper growth and crowd out more pressing investments in human capital, from immunization to education. False Alarm will convince you that everything you think about climate change is wrong -- and points the way toward making the world a vastly better, if slightly warmer, place for us all.

What is gonna happen, when we can't take it anymore? Stumbling down the street drunk at 11.30am Effie is the kind of girl you avoid making eye contact with. You think you know her, but maybe you don't know half of it. Effie's life is a mess of drink, drugs and drama every night, and a hangover worse than death the next day – till one night gives her the chance to be something more. Gary Owen's critically acclaimed and powerful monodrama inspired by the Greek myth opens at the Lyric after a smash-hit season at the Sherman Theatre in Wales and later the National Theatre, winning the Best New Play at the UK Theatre Awards 2015. This edition was published to coincide with the production at the Lyric Hammersmith, London, in September 2022.

From a racing heart and dry mouth to shallow breathing and difficulty concentrating, anxiety can take many forms, but none of them are pleasant. The Panic Button Book is an anxiety first-aid kit, featuring simple exercises that can help alleviate common symptoms of panic, whenever and wherever they strike. The tried-and-tested techniques in this book will help you go from worry to relief, no matter what life throws your way.

From the modern master of noir comes a novel based on the real-life Hollywood fixer Freddy Otash, the malevolent monarch of the 1950s L.A. underground, and his Tinseltown tabloid Confidential magazine. Freddy Otash was the man in the know and the man to know in ‘50s L.A. He was a rogue cop, a sleazoid private eye, a shakedown artist, a pimp—and, most notably, the head strong-arm goon for Confidential magazine. Confidential presaged the idiot internet—and delivered the dirt, the dish, the insidious ink, and the scurrilous skank. It mauled misanthropic movie stars, sex-soiled socialites, and putzo politicians. Mattress Jack Kennedy, James Dean, Montgomery Clift, Burt Lancaster, Liz Taylor, Rock Hudson—Frantic Freddy outed them all. He was the Tattle Tyrant who held Hollywood hostage, and now he’s here to CONFESS. “I’m consumed with candor and wracked with recollection. I’m revitalized and resurgent. My meshugenah march down memory lane begins NOW.” In Freddy’s viciously entertaining voice, Widespread Panic torches 1950s Hollywood to the ground. It’s a blazing revelation of coruscating corruption, pervasive paranoia, and of sin and redemption with nothing in between. Here is James Ellroy in savage quintessence. Freddy Otash confesses—and you are here to read and succumb.