Prodigal Sons

Forced into retirement, Evan Smoak gets an urgent request for help from someone he didn't even suspect existed—in Prodigal Son, the next New York Times bestselling Orphan X book from Gregg Hurwitz. As a boy, Evan Smoak was pulled out of a foster home and trained in an off-the-books operation known as the Orphan Program. He was a government assassin, perhaps the best, known to a few insiders as Orphan X. He eventually broke with the Program and adopted a new name—The Nowhere Man—and a new mission, helping the most desperate in their times of trouble. But the highest power in the country has made him a tempting offer—in exchange for an unofficial pardon, he must stop his clandestine activities as The Nowhere Man. Now Evan has to do the one thing he’s least equipped to do—live a normal life. But then he gets a call for help from the one person he never expected. A woman claiming to have given him up for adoption, a woman he never knew—his mother. Her unlikely request: help Andrew Duran—a man whose life has gone off the rails, who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, bringing him to the deadly attention of very powerful figures. Now a brutal brother & sister assassination team are after him and with no one to turn to, and no safe place to hide, Evan is Duran’s only option. But when the hidden cabal catches on to what Evan is doing, everything he’s fought for is on the line—including his own life.

"A herd of independent minds," Harold Roseberg once labelled his fellow intellectuals. They were, and are, as this book shows, a special and fascinating group, including literary critics like Lionel Trilling, Alfred Kazin, Irving Howe, Leslie Fiedler, Philip Rahv, and William Phillips; social scientists like Nathan Glazer; art critics and historians Clement Greenberg, Harold Rrosenberg, and Meyer Schapiro; novelist Saul Bellow; and political journalists Irving Kristol and Norman Podhoretz. Their story winds through nearly all of the crucial intellectual and political events of the last decades, as well as through the major academic institutions of the nation and the editorial boards of such important journals as Partisan Review, Commentary, Dissent, The Public Interest, and The New York Review of Books. So deeply entrenched in our intellectual establishment are these people that it's easy to forget that most grew up onthe edge of American society--poor, Jewish, the children of immigrants. Prodigal Sons retraces their common past, from their New York City ghetto upbringing and education at Columbia and City College through their radicalization in the '30s to their preeminence in the postwar literary and academic world. The book examines their youthful efforts to ignore their Jewish heritage and their later rediscovery of this heritage in the wake of the Holocaust. It shows how they moved toward the liberal center during the Cold War and how the group fragmented in the 1960s, when some turned toward the right, becoming key figures in the Neo-Conservative movement of the 1970s and '80s. As Bloom points out, there is no single typical New York intellectual; nor did they share all their ideas. This book is concerned with how the community came to be formed, and what it thought important, how and why it moved and changed, and why it ultimately came undone. We learn some of the ways in which intellectuals function and justify their own places and a great deal about the political and cultural landscape over which New York intellectuals passed. A fascinating portrait of New York intellectual life over the past half-century ·Based on interviews with many of the leading figures and 10 years of extensive research ·Takes us behind the scenes at Commentary, Partisan Review, The Public Interest and other influential publications

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1968.

In today’s society many young people have lost sight of the value of money and seem to believe that money really does "grow on trees." Part expose and part survival guide, Prodigal Sons and Material Girls addresses the nagging issue faced by many parents today – why do their children have such unrealistic expectations about money? The book is divided into two comprehensive parts. Part I outlines the disturbing facts about America’s possession-crazed youth and the society that has distorted their views. You’ll be introduced to everything from the "three-headed monster"—a high-powered triumvirate of consumer products companies, media conglomerates, and advertising agencies that has tremendous influence over your children—to the distorted view of the American Dream as shaped by principles known as "The Teen Commandments." In learning what you’re up against you can teach financial responsibility from a position of strength. In Part II, Dungan offers creative and convincing examples on how to leverage his highly successful "Share-Save-Spend" approach to money – critical elements for you to help your children break free from the materialism that has become ingrained in our society. Through insightful anecdotes and simple exercises, you will learn how to: Talk to your children about money Understand the difference between financial wants and needs Increase the probability of your children having a prosperous life Raise your children’s marketing IQ Maintain healthy financial boundaries Set a healthy example for your children to follow The "Share–Save–Spend" methodology will help your children establish healthy financial habits and will undoubtedly become their foundation for making a lifetime of responsible financial decisions. Nathan Dungan is an innovative leader in the financial services industry. Over the past 15 years, he has been a top-performing financial advisor outside of Philadelphia, PA and most recently served as Vice President of Marketing for Lutheran Brotherhood (now Thrivent Financial for Lutherans), a $57 billion member-owned financial services company with nearly 3 million members. Dungan is a frequent speaker and workshop leader and has been widely quoted on this subject in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, USA Today and has appeared on CNN and PBS.

In this series of essays, exvangelical A. J. Sieling takes us on a deeply personal journey out of the darkness of a religion that could never see her. Drawing from the Parable of the Prodigal Son, she shares her story—not as the celebrated youngest son, nor as the begrudging elder brother, but as the sister: invisible, overlooked, and ultimately liberated. Weaving through the pain of being unseen and taken for granted in a community that preached unconditional love, these essays explore resentment, trauma, and the path to healing. With candid reflections, marked by raw honesty and bold choices, Sieling maps out the emotional landscape of leaving behind a world where she was always present but never acknowledged. This book isn't about proving points or winning arguments. It's about tracing feelings back to their roots and finding freedom in the realization that sometimes, invisibility can be a gift—the very thing that allows you to walk away, to heal, and to find happiness, with or without religion.

This is a story of a boy who gets lost in the world, and who reaches out to his brother from the grave, to warn his little brother to hold on to his salvation. There is a God who reaches out to us to remind us that every child is precious in His sight: a God who is waiting for us on the road back home.

In today’s society many young people have lost sight of the value of money and seem to believe that money really does "grow on trees." Part expose and part survival guide, Prodigal Sons and Material Girls addresses the nagging issue faced by many parents today – why do their children have such unrealistic expectations about money? The book is divided into two comprehensive parts. Part I outlines the disturbing facts about America’s possession-crazed youth and the society that has distorted their views. You’ll be introduced to everything from the "three-headed monster"—a high-powered triumvirate of consumer products companies, media conglomerates, and advertising agencies that has tremendous influence over your children—to the distorted view of the American Dream as shaped by principles known as "The Teen Commandments." In learning what you’re up against you can teach financial responsibility from a position of strength. In Part II, Dungan offers creative and convincing examples on how to leverage his highly successful "Share-Save-Spend" approach to money – critical elements for you to help your children break free from the materialism that has become ingrained in our society. Through insightful anecdotes and simple exercises, you will learn how to: Talk to your children about money Understand the difference between financial wants and needs Increase the probability of your children having a prosperous life Raise your children’s marketing IQ Maintain healthy financial boundaries Set a healthy example for your children to follow The "Share–Save–Spend" methodology will help your children establish healthy financial habits and will undoubtedly become their foundation for making a lifetime of responsible financial decisions. Nathan Dungan is an innovative leader in the financial services industry. Over the past 15 years, he has been a top-performing financial advisor outside of Philadelphia, PA and most recently served as Vice President of Marketing for Lutheran Brotherhood (now Thrivent Financial for Lutherans), a $57 billion member-owned financial services company with nearly 3 million members. Dungan is a frequent speaker and workshop leader and has been widely quoted on this subject in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, USA Today and has appeared on CNN and PBS.

The fourth entry in this “compelling, passionate, and gritty” (Daily Mail, UK) series by internationally acclaimed bestselling author Colleen McCullough sends Carmine Delmonico on a heart-pounding ride through the world of toxic substances and brilliant biochemists to pursue a mysterious killer on the loose. When Chubb University biochemist Millie Hunter notices that a deadly neurotoxin is missing from her laboratory refrigerator, she knows the situation is grave: the poison, extracted from a blowfish, shuts down the nervous system, leading to a slow, gruesome, and virtually unstoppable death. The very next night, Millie and her husband, another exceptional biochemist, attend a black tie dinner for an old friend, John Hall. John’s stepmother, an exotic former Yugoslavian model, has assembled some of the most important—and eccentric—people from Chubb University for a lavish dinner. Notably missing is John’s Aunt Emily, who holds an old family grudge. After dinner, the men retire for cigars and whiskey, and John suddenly falls to the floor and dies a horrible death. The cause: a dose of the missing neurotoxin, administered through a tiny puncture wound in his neck. As the bodies pile up and the coroner keeps pointing to the neurotoxin, Captain Carmine Delmonico must find the killer fast. Assisted by his brilliant colleague Delia and his constant wife Desdemona (an excellent cook), Delmonico follows the trail—no matter how close to home it may lead.