Rock Over The Edge

This collection brings new voices and new perspectives to the study of popular—and particularly rock—music. Focusing on a variety of artists and music forms, Rock Over the Edge asks what happens to rock criticism when rock is no longer a coherent concept. To work toward an answer, contributors investigate previously neglected genres and styles, such as “lo fi,” alternative country, and “rock en español,” while offering a fresh look at such familiar figures as Elvis Presley, the Beatles, and Kurt Cobain. Bridging the disciplines of musicology and cultural studies, the collection has two primary goals: to seek out a language for talking about music culture and to look at the relationship of music to culture in general. The editors’ introduction provides a backward glance at recent rock criticism and also looks to the future of the rapidly expanding discipline of popular music studies. Taking seriously the implications of critical theory for the study of non-literary aesthetic endeavors, the volume also addresses such issues as the affective power of popular music and the psychic construction of fandom. Rock Over the Edge will appeal to scholars and students in popular music studies and American Studies as well as general readers interested in popular music. Contributors. Ian Balfour, Roger Beebe, Michael Coyle, Robert Fink, Denise Fulbrook, Tony Grajeda, Lawrence Grossberg, Trent Hill, Josh Kun, Jason Middleton, Lisa Ann Parks, Ben Saunders, John J. Sheinbaum, Gayle Wald, Warren Zanes

Recounting the adventures of seven decades, Jim Whittaker claims he is a man blessed often by fortune. Yet his is a life of both planned ascents and unplanned falls, in the mountains and in the world of business, and in his personal life. He believes in rising above life's reverses.

Journalist Aaron Smith's new memoir holds up a unique mirror to Australia. What he sees is at once amazing, disturbing and revealing. The Rock explores the failings of our nation's character, its unresolved past and its uncertain future from the vantage point of its most northerly outpost, Thursday Island. Smith was the last editor, fearless journalist and the paperboy of Australia's most northerly newspaper, the Torres News, a small independent regional tabloid that, until it folded in late 2019, was the voice of a predominantly Torres Strait Islander and Aboriginal readership for 63 years across some of the most remote and little understood communities in Australia. The Rock is a story of self-discovery where Smith grapples to understand a national identity marred by its racist underbelly, where he is transplanted from his white-boy privileged suburban life to being a racial and cultural minority, and an outsider. Peppered with his experiences, Smith gradually and sensitively becomes embedded in island life while vividly capturing the endless and often farcical parade of personalities and politicians including Scott Morrison and Tony Abbott. Smith pulls no punches while he reflects on the history of Terra Australis incognita, dissecting what is truly Australia, and its gaping cultural and moral divide. 'A credit to regional journalism, Aaron carried on the fine tradition of the Torres News holding governments to account and telling stories of everyday life in the Straits, never shying away from controversies, lifting all the rocks and even out foxing prime minister Tony Abbott on his visit to Mabo's grave.' — Stefan Armbruster, SBS 'Aaron Smith makes a huge and extremely valuable contribution to journalism in Australia. With insight and committment he brings issues of national and international significance to audiences in Australia and beyond.' — Dr Tess Newton Cain, Griffith Asia Institute 'Aaron's journalism has provided a rare and valuable insight into issues affecting the Torres Strait Islander community. Navigating cultural protocols and geographical challenges, he has given a voice to some of Australia's most marginalised people and shared important stories that would otherwise have gone unheard.' — Ella Archibald-Binge, Sydney Morning Herald

An NPR Best Book of 2021 NYPL 10 Best Books for Adults, 2021 A story collection, in the vein of Carmen Maria Machado, Kelly Link, and Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, spanning worlds and dimensions, using strange and speculative elements to tackle issues ranging from class differences to immigration to first-generation experiences to xenophobia What does it mean to be other? What does it mean to love in a world determined to keep us apart? These questions murmur in the heart of each of Brenda Peynado’s strange and singular stories. Threaded with magic, transcending time and place, these stories explore what it means to cross borders and break down walls, personally and politically. In one story, suburban families perform oblations to cattlelike angels who live on their roofs, believing that their “thoughts and prayers” will protect them from the world’s violence. In another, inhabitants of an unnamed dictatorship slowly lose their own agency as pieces of their bodies go missing and, with them, the essential rights that those appendages serve. “The Great Escape” tells of an old woman who hides away in her apartment, reliving the past among beautiful objects she’s hoarded, refusing all visitors, until she disappears completely. In the title story, children begin to levitate, flying away from their parents and their home country, leading them to eat rocks in order to stay grounded. With elements of science fiction and fantasy, fabulism and magical realism, Brenda Peynado uses her stories to reflect our flawed world, and the incredible, terrifying, and marvelous nature of humanity.

Within these covers are stories about a group of risk-takers and adrenaline junkies who lived a life of stimulating and challenging activity. It is a rollicking adventure account of men who chose awilderness avocation and lifestyle in lieu of comfort and leisure for their relaxation. This is also a travelogue about much of the backcountry of this nation. Their journeys into these wilderness areas lasted over twenty years comprising some seventy expeditions into places like the Everglades, Okefenokee Swamp, Appalachian Trail, Pesidential Range, and the desert of Joshua Tree. Learn about these locations and other backwoods areas, primarily in the mountain states of Colorado, Idaho, New Mexico, Montana, Utah, and Wyoming. Read about these unusual people and the physical trials they put their aging bodies through as they pursued their passion, searching for refuge from their work, and adventure in their lives to help calm their craving for fun and new experiences. Importantly, they wanted to be explorers and to see what was over the horizon. Their interest level had no valley and no summit. It was limitless. They were not purists in the sense of following the conventional standards of "roughing it" in the wilderness. Instead, they did it their way. They were the real thing and enjoyed living on the edge. Not many people do. There is humor, philosophy, lessons on field-craft, and dubious judgment noted in their journeys. These should appeal to all readers with similar inclinations despite age or gender. I am thankful to have been a member of this group, and wish we could do it again. We would try, if we had the stamina.

In The Edge of Extinction, Jules Pretty explores life and change in a dozen environments and cultures across the world, taking us on a series of remarkable journeys through deserts, coasts, mountains, steppes, snowscapes, marshes, and farms to show that there are many different ways to live in cooperation with nature. From these accounts of people living close to the land and close to the edge emerge a larger story about sustainability and the future of the planet. Pretty addresses not only current threats to natural and cultural diversity but also the unsustainability of modern lifestyles typical of industrialized countries. In a very real sense, Pretty discovers, what we manage to preserve now may well save us later.Jules Pretty's travels take him among the Maori people along the coasts of the Pacific, into the mountains of China, and across petroglyph-rich deserts of Australia. He treks with nomads over the continent-wide steppes of Tuva in southern Siberia, walks and boats in the wildlife-rich inland swamps of southern Africa, and experiences the Arctic with ice fishermen in Finland. He explores the coasts and inland marshes of eastern England and Northern Ireland and accompanies Innu people across the taiga’s snowy forests and the lakes of the Labrador interior. Pretty concludes his global journey immersed in the discrete cultures and landscapes embedded within the American landscape: the small farms of the Amish, the swamps of the Cajuns in the deep South, and the deserts of California.The diverse people Pretty meets in The Edge of Extinction display deep pride in their relationships with the land and are only willing to join with the modern world on their own terms. By the examples they set, they offer valuable lessons for anyone seeking to find harmony in a world cracking under the pressures of apparently insatiable consumption patterns of the affluent.

* A different sort of true climbing adventure—this one with terrorists, kidnappings, and AK47s * New afterword by the author * First time in paperback Before dawn on August 12, 2000, four of America’s best young rock climbers—Tommy Caldwell, Beth Rodden, Jason “Singer” Smith, and John Dickey—were asleep in their portaledges high on the Yellow Wall in the Pamir-Alai mountain range of Kyrgyzstan. At daybreak, they would be kidnapped at gunpoint by fanatical militants of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), which operates out of secret bases in Tajikistan and Afghanistan and is linked to Al Qaeda. The kidnappers, themselves barely out of their teens, intended to use their hostages as human shields and for ransom money as they moved across Kyrgyzstan. They hid the climbers by day and marched them by night through freezing, treacherous mountain terrain, with little food, no clean water, and the constant threat of execution. The four climbers -- the oldest of them only 25 -- would see a fellow hostage, a Kyrgyz soldier, executed before their eyes. And in a remarkable life-and-death crucible over six terrifying days, they would be forced to choose between saving their own lives and committing an act none of them thought they ever could. In Over the Edge, the climbers reveal the complete story of their nightmarish ordeal to journalist and climber Greg Child. With riveting details, Child re-creates the entire hour-by-hour drama, from the first ricocheting bullets to the climatic decision that gains them their freedom. Set in a region rife with narcotics and terrorism, this is a compelling story about loyalty and the will to survive. What continues to make it relevant today, 15 years after the events took place, is the geopolitical context -- the incident happened, eerily, on the eve of 9–/11; the fact that at least two of the four climbers continue to be prominent in the sport; and the details incorporated into the story around the media hype and controversy regarding the climbers and their story.

Perfect for fans of George and Ivy Aberdeen's Letter to the World: a heartfelt coming of age story about a nonbinary character navigating a binary world. Twelve-year-old Ana-Marie Jin, the reigning US Juvenile figure skating champion, is not a frilly dress kind of kid. So, when Ana learns that next season's program will be princess themed, doubt forms fast. Still, Ana tries to focus on training and putting together a stellar routine worthy of national success. Once Ana meets Hayden, a transgender boy new to the rink, thoughts about the princess program and gender identity begin to take center stage. And when Hayden mistakes Ana for a boy, Ana doesn't correct him and finds comfort in this boyish identity when he's around. As their friendship develops, Ana realizes that it's tricky juggling two different identities on one slippery sheet of ice. And with a major competition approaching, Ana must decide whether telling everyone the truth is worth risking years of hard work and sacrifice.