Showing results by narrator "Ron Butler" in All Categories

A savvy connoisseur's guide from the editors of the world's most popular cannabis platform. Cannabis is at the very beginning of a craft and educational renaissance. It is emerging from the legislative shadows and a second awakening is occurring: people are proactively seeking information about...

Throughout the 1990s, Prince feuded with his record label, Warner Bros., over his rights as an independent recording artist - and made some of the most brilliant music of his career. During that time, Jim Walsh covered Prince for the St. Paul Pioneer Press and wrote about him passionately, thoughtfully, exhaustively. Here, in real-time, is that coverage: a look back at Prince in the '90s. Walsh's newly unearthed interviews, essays, columns, and reviews make Gold Experience an essential slice of history.

The coauthor of Beowulf’s Children strikes out on his own with this novel of mystic revelation and martial arts. What if the disciplines we know as the martial arts, meditation, and fasting were mere fragments of a greater, more powerful killing art? What if that hidden discipline could produce in a man the power to manipulate matter and energy at will? What if the effect on the mind were so deadly that, uncontrolled, the result would be an inhuman killer?

The inspiring story of a Black doctor who was deeply affected by the violence that plagued his Brooklyn childhood and later dedicated himself to addressing trauma and violence as public health issues Rob Gore first encountered violence when he was beaten and robbed as a 10-year old; it was...

Cletius Tremaine, Professor Emeritus of Archaeology at Miskatonic University, has seen a number of very strange and frightening things. Yet for the most frightening he did not have to travel to the deserts of Africa or the lush jungles of Asia or even the lofty peaks of the Andes. For that he had to go to the lethargic little town of Blankenship, Georgia and the Malatowa Mounds.

Following in the tradition of Richard Wright's Black Boy, Joseph Zobel's semi-autobiographical 1950 novel Black Shack Alley chronicles the coming-of-age of José, a young boy grappling with issues of power and identity in colonial Martinique. As José transitions from childhood to young adulthood and from rural plantations to urban Fort-de-France on a quest for upward mobility, he bears witness to and struggles against the various manifestations of white supremacy, both subtle and overt, that will alter the course of his life.

V. S. Naipaul's legendary command of broad comedy and acute social observation is on abundant display in these classic works of fiction - two novels and a collection of stories - that capture the rhythms of life in the Caribbean and England with impressive subtlety and humor.

When the 2010 earthquake struck Haiti, Raymond Joseph, the former Haitian ambassador to the United States, found himself rushing back to his beloved country. The earthquake ignited a passion in Joseph, inspiring him to run for president against great competition, including two well-known Haitian pop stars, his nephew Wyclef Jean and Michel Martelly. But he couldn't compete in a democratic system corrupt to the core.

Twin sisters Bibike and Ariyike are enjoying a relatively comfortable life in Lagos in 1996. Then their mother loses her job due to political strife, and the family, facing poverty, is drawn into the New Church, an institution led by a charismatic pastor who is not shy about worshipping earthly wealth. Soon Bibike and Ariyike's father wagers the family home on a sure bet that evaporates like smoke.

When seasoned big-game hunter Sanger Rainsford is cast overboard on his way to the Amazon, he washes ashore on the foreboding Ship-Trap Island. There, he encounters General Zaroff, a refined aristocrat with a dark obsession. What follows is a deadly game of wits and endurance, as Rainsford becomes prey in a twisted contest where survival is the only victory. Originally published in 1924, The Most Dangerous Game remains a chilling exploration of morality, violence, and the thin line between hunter and hunted.

On an unnamed Caribbean Island, political tensions provoked by race and poverty are high. Jimmy Ahmed, a young mixed-race man, has been hailed as a revolutionary leader of the people. Roche, imprisoned for activities against South Africa's apartheid regime, and Jane, a feckless English rich girl wanting to feel a part of something bigger, get sucked into the turmoil and world of Ahmed. But does anyone achieve anything by causing unrest? Do any of them really want freedom in a new society or just the old society with themselves at the helm of power?

Rooted in rhythm-and-blues pioneered by black musicians, 1950s rock and roll was racially inclusive and attracted listeners and performers across the color line. In the 1960s, however, rock and roll gave way to rock: a new musical ideal regarded as more serious, more artistic-and the province of white musicians. Decoding the racial discourses that have distorted standard histories of rock music, Jack Hamilton underscores how ideas of "authenticity" have blinded us to rock's inextricably interracial artistic enterprise.

Albert Poland, legendary Broadway and Off-Broadway producer and general manager, presents Stages: A Theater Memoir.

Zero Adedji dreams of joining one of the Saba guilds—groups of intergalactic travelers who explore space, retrieve lost treasures, and hunt down criminals. Instead, he must scrape by as a guide to travelers stranded on his home planet of Anansi 12. Then he meets Wanderblatch, a strange creature with an even stranger object: a golden pyramid that houses a legendary Kobasticker called the Jupiter. When the Jupiter chooses Zero as its next host, he is recruited by a top Saba guild so he can harness his newfound powers.

With this inspiring book of meditations, every day brings a reminder of "the wholeness and beauty of our nature, of the glad spirit that dances in each one of us". Addressing the needs of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, Glad Day speaks to the issues that touch everyone, regardless of sexual orientation: change, fear, self-disclosure, faith in a power greater than ourselves, success and failure, openness to ourselves and others.

Thirteen-year-old Habo has always been different - light eyes, yellow hair, and white skin. Not the good brown skin his family has and not the white skin of tourists. Habo is strange and alone. His father, unable to accept Habo, abandons the family; his mother can scarcely look at him. His brothers are cruel, and the other children never invite him to play. Only his sister, Asu, loves him well. But even Asu can't take the sting away when the family is forced from their small Tanzanian village, and Habo knows he is to blame.

In February 1971, racial tension surrounding school desegregation in Wilmington, North Carolina, culminated in four days of violence and skirmishes between white vigilantes and black residents. The turmoil resulted in two deaths, six injuries, more than $500,000 in damage, and the firebombing of a white-owned store before the National Guard restored uneasy peace. Despite glaring irregularities in the subsequent trial, 10 young persons were convicted of arson and conspiracy and then sentenced to a total of 282 years in prison.

A joyful celebration of the LGBTQ+ community’s development, history, and culture, packed with facts, trivia, timelines, and charts, and featuring 100 full color illustrations. Compiled and designed by queer power couple and illustrators extraordinaire, Ashley Molesso and Chessie Needham...

When young Tybre Faw discovers John Lewis and his heroic march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in the fight for voting rights, Tybre is determined to meet him. Tybre’s two grandmothers take him on the seven-hour drive to Selma, Alabama, where Lewis invites Tybre to join him in the annual memorial walk across the Bridge. And so begins a most amazing friendship!​​​​​​​​​ In rich, poetic language, Andrea Davis Pinkney weaves the true story of a boy with a dream—together with the story of a real-life hero (who himself had a life-altering friendship with Martin Luther King, Jr. when he was young!).

Lincoln Corbain still remembers the "spring-break fling" he shared with Raven Anderson. During the week they spent on Daytona Beach, they shared mind-blowing and unforgettable nights of passion. Four years later, when he sees her again in a bar, he can not help but to approach her. But, Raven...