Priveleged Lives

DIVDIVIn this classic thriller, bestselling author Edward Stewart weaves a complex tale of sex, money, and murder/divDIV In a private suite at a New York hospital, Beatrice “Babe” Vanderwalk Devens awakens from a seven-year coma. The socialite and fashion designer is stunned to learn that her husband, Scottie, was brought to trial twice—and acquitted—for her attempted murder./divDIV Across town, the naked, mutilated body of a young man wearing a black leather bondage mask is found in an empty apartment in the Beaux Arts Tower, high atop the Museum of Modern Art. Seven miles away, off-duty NYPD lieutenant Vince Cardozo is relaxing on a Brooklyn beach with his twelve-year-old daughter when he gets the call./divDIV Cardozo’s investigation into the savage murder of the Beaux Arts John Doe takes him into the exclusive lairs of Manhattan’s elite. Babe Devens is part of that world. When Cardozo uncovers a shocking connection between the two cases, it could topple more than just high society./divDIV A Book-of-the-Month-Club featured selection./divDIV/div/div

At once glamorous and mysterious, the WASP lifestyle has influenced countless trends in the worlds of fashion, home design, and pop culture. Today, one no longer has to be a WASP to embrace its casual-yet-elegant attitude and sense of style. With lively text and over one hundred images from world-renowned photographers, A Privileged Life: Celebrating WASP Style is the first book of its kind to unveil this rarefied way of life, one that many emulate though few truly understand. From the eclectic and well-decorated home of Sister Parish to the popular pink-and-green color combination of preppy chic to iconic photographs of the style makers who embody the WASP spirit like Grace Kelly, Truman Capote, or Jacqueline Kennedy, this book celebrates our timeless fascination with America's leisure class.

Recent Yale graduate Megan Smith comes to Manhattan with big plans for a career in journalism and even bigger student loan debt: $75,000. When she flails at her trashy tabloid job, she's given an escape hatch: tutor seventeen-year-old identical twins Rose and Sage Baker--yes, the infamous Baker heiresses of Palm Beach, Florida, best known for their massive fortunes and their penchant for drunkenly flashing the paparazzi -- and get their SAT scores up enough to get into Duke. Impossible job -- yes. But if she succeeds, her student debts are history. Unfortunately for Megan, the Baker twins aren't about to curtail their busy social schedules for basic algebra. And they certainly aren't thrilled to have to sit down for a study session with dowdy Megan. Megan quickly discovers that if she's going to get her money, she'll have to learn her Pucci from her Prada. And if she can look the part, maybe, just maybe, she can teach the girls something along the way.

Male and white privilege are on the decline, yet elite privilege has gone from strength to strength. The privileges enjoyed by the rich and powerful are not only unfair but cause widespread harm, from the everyday slights and humiliations visited on those lower down the scale to the distortions in the labour market when elites use their networks to secure plum jobs, not least in new domains such as professional sports. In this book, Clive Hamilton and Myra Hamilton show that elite privilege is not a mere by-product of wealth but an organising principle for society as a whole. They explore the practices and processes that sustain, legitimise and reproduce elite privilege and show how we are all implicated in the system, both facilitating it and tolerating its harmful effects. Building on their original fieldwork and a wide range of other sources, the authors paint a vivid picture of the micropolitics of elite privilege, highlighting in particular the vital role played by exclusive private schools. Ranging across topics as diverse as ‘glamour suburbs’, philanthropy, Rhodes scholarships and super-yachts, The Privileged Few delves beneath attempts at concealment to expose how the elites keep getting away with it.

A JEWEL OF A NOVEL BY NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER CLAIRE MESSUD. When the Armstrong family moves from New York at the dawn of the 1970s, Australia feels, to Alice Armstrong, like the end of the earth. Residing in a grand manor on the glittering Sydney Harbour, her family finds their life has turned upside down. As she navigates this strange new world, Alice must find a way to weave an existence from its shimmering mirage. Lies and self-deception are at the heart of this keenly observed story. This is a sharp, biting and playful tale with a cast of unscrupulous characters adrift in a dream life of their own making. Written with the characteristic delicacy of touch, humour and emotional insight that make Claire Messud one of our greatest writers. '[Messud is] among our greatest contemporary writers.' -- The New Yorker 'A perfect frolic of a book, puffed on breezes of beauty and wit: it waltzes you through a little fear, a little darkness, and tips you out, refreshed and laughing, into the sun.' -- Helen Garner 'Witty, arch and acutely observed, A Dream Life expertly captures the excruciating insecurities of class in our supposedly classless society.' -- Geraldine Brooks 'A novelist of unnerving talent.' -- The New York Times

A Gentle Invitation into the Challenging Topic of Privilege The notion that some might have it better than others, for no good reason, offends our sensibilities. Yet, until we talk about privilege, we’ll never fully understand it or find our way forward. Amy Julia Becker welcomes us into her life, from the charm of her privileged southern childhood to her adult experience in the northeast, and the denials she has faced as the mother of a child with special needs. She shows how a life behind a white picket fence can restrict even as it protects, and how it can prevent us from loving our neighbors well. White Picket Fences invites us to respond to privilege with generosity, humility, and hope. It opens us to questions we are afraid to ask, so that we can walk further from fear and closer to love, in all its fragile and mysterious possibilities.

What are the obstacles in the way of effectively solving the environmental crises of our time? What can we do to overcome them? These may be two of the most important questions heading into the 21st century. Organized human societies have the ability to completely change the world. While we have excelled at building, destroying and rebuilding, we h

In Prayers for a Privileged People, this much-published author sculpts—as carefully as if with chisel—prayers on behalf of those who are people of privilege and entitlement—the haves—at an urgent moment in our society. The privileged face, on the one hand, the seduction of denial or, on the other, the temptation of despair. These prayers of wisdom and prophetic power remind us that when things go wrong , when we are afraid , and when we feel prodded by those who lack voice, there is a conversation we can have—a conversation situated amid the promises and commands of God.