Payback

Explores debt as a central historical component of religion, literature, and societal structure, while examining the idea of humanity's debt to the natural world.

This revisionist's view of the '80s by a leading conservative economist--who argues that the so-called "decade of greed", spearheaded by the rise of Michael Milken and Drexel Burnham, actually improved corporate America--examines how Michael Milken became a scapegoat in a complicated and convoluted mess made by the government.

Thirteen-year-old Charley Callaghan is coping with some difficult changes. His family has recently moved to Vancouver from Ireland, and his mother has died of cancer. Now he is desperately trying to fit in - in a new school, a new city, a new country - while holding a part-time job and keeping an eye on his little sister, Annie. Charley’s red hair and Irish accent at first make him a target of the class bullies, but he is tough enough - just - to keep them at bay. So it is almost a relief to him when the bullies find a new target, Benny Mason. Charley keeps hoping that Benny will defend himself, but he fails to intervene when the bullying worsens. When Benny commits suicide, Charley is overcome with remorse and guilt. He visits Benny’s single mom, Joanna, but instead of confessing, finds himself trying to make amends by doing chores, running errands and befriending Benny’s little brother. Can Charley find atonement for failing to act? James Heneghan’s trademark narrative drive, vivid characters and strong social message make this a striking study of loss and renewal.

“There has never been a better book about hip-hop…a record-biz portrait that jumps off the page.”—A.V. Club THE INSPIRATION FOR THE VH1 SERIES THE BREAKS The Big Payback takes readers from the first $15 made by a “rapping DJ” in 1970s New York to the multi-million-dollar sales of the Phat Farm and Roc-a-Wear clothing companies in 2004 and 2007. On this four-decade-long journey from the studios where the first rap records were made to the boardrooms where the big deals were inked, The Big Payback tallies the list of who lost and who won. Read the secret histories of the early long-shot successes of Sugar Hill Records and Grandmaster Flash, Run DMC's crossover breakthrough on MTV, the marketing of gangsta rap, and the rise of artist/ entrepreneurs like Jay-Z and Sean “Diddy” Combs. 300 industry giants like Def Jam founders Rick Rubin and Russell Simmons gave their stories to renowned hip-hop journalist Dan Charnas, who provides a compelling, never-before-seen, myth-debunking view into the victories, defeats, corporate clashes, and street battles along the 40-year road to hip-hop's dominance. INCLUDES PHOTOGRAPHS

A former NYPD Detective goes after a corrupt cop, while also trying to takedown a money-laundering accounting firm that he believes is responsible for his brother's death.

We call it justice—the assassination of Osama bin Laden, the incarceration of corrupt politicians or financiers like Rod Blagojevich and Bernard Madoff, and the climactic slaying of cinema-screen villains by superheroes. But could we not also call it revenge? We are told that revenge is uncivilized and immoral, an impulse that individuals and societies should actively repress and replace with the order and codes of courtroom justice. What, if anything, distinguishes punishment at the hands of the government from a victim’s individual desire for retribution? Are vengeance and justice really so very different? No, answers legal scholar and novelist Thane Rosenbaum in Payback: The Case for Revenge—revenge is, in fact, indistinguishable from justice. Revenge, Rosenbaum argues, is not the problem. It is, in fact, a perfectly healthy emotion. Instead, the problem is the inadequacy of lawful outlets through which to express it. He mounts a case for legal systems to punish the guilty commensurate with their crimes as part of a societal moral duty to satisfy the needs of victims to feel avenged. Indeed, the legal system would better serve the public if it gave victims the sense that vengeance was being done on their behalf. Drawing on a wide range of support, from recent studies in behavioral psychology and neuroeconomics, to stories of vengeance and justice denied, to revenge practices from around the world, to the way in which revenge tales have permeated popular culture—including Hamlet, The Godfather, and Braveheart—Rosenbaum demonstrates that vengeance needs to be more openly and honestly discussed and lawfully practiced. Fiercely argued and highly engaging, Payback is a provocative and eye-opening cultural tour of revenge and its rewards—from Shakespeare to The Sopranos. It liberates revenge from its social stigma and proves that vengeance is indeed ours, a perfectly human and acceptable response to moral injury. Rosenbaum deftly persuades us to reconsider a misunderstood subject and, along the way, reinvigorates the debate on the shape of justice in the modern world.

If you're like most people, you bet your career and company on innovation--because you must. Payback: Reaping the Rewards of Innovation offers you a new way to think about and manage innovation that will dramatically improve the odds of success. Authors James Andrew and Harold Sirkin, senior partners in The Boston Consulting Group, describe an approach to managing innovation based on the concept of a cash curve--which tracks investment against time. They ask the questions you need to ask: How much should you invest in a new product or service? How fast should you push it to market? How quickly can you get to optimal value? How much additional investment should you pour into sustaining and building the product or service? Payback offers you practical and economically sound advice on when to pursue cash flow indirectly by first pursuing other benefits, such as brand and knowledge. It also shows you how to reshape the cash curve by using different business models--integrator, orchestrator, and licenser--each of which balances risk and reward differently. The authors then present a short list of decisions and activities that you must make--not delegate--to achieve a high return on innovation. You won't find facile answers in Payback--but you will find valuable insights and practical guidance for mastering one of the most challenging and critical business activities: innovation.

Don’t get mad, get even… Phil Town’s first book, the #1 New York Times bestseller Rule #1, was a guide to stock trading for people who believe they lack the knowledge to trade. But because many people aren’t ready to go from mutual funds directly into trading without understanding investing—for the long term – he created Payback Time. Too often, people see long-term investing as “mutual fund contributing” – otherwise known as “long-term hoping.” But the sad truth is that mutual fund investors are, to a stunning degree, pinning their hopes on an institution that is hopeless. It turns out that only 4% of fund managers consistently beat the S&P 500 index over the long term, which means that 96% of fund investors see a smaller return on their nest egg than a chimpanzee who simply buys stocks in the 500 biggest companies in America and watches what happens. But it’s worse than that. The net effect of hitching your wagon to mutual funds is that over a lifetime they’ll fritter away as much 60% of your nest egg in fees. Once you understand how funds engineer this, you’ll rush to invest on your own. Payback Time’s risk-free approach is called “stockpiling” and it’s how billionaires get rich in bad markets. It’s a set of rules for investing (not trading but investing) in the right businesses at the right time -- rules that will ensure you make the big money.