Innocence And Gold Dust

2013 Book Award Winner from the International Research Society in Children's Literature 2012 Outstanding Book Award Winner from the Association for Theatre in Higher Education 2012 Winner of the Lois P. Rudnick Book Prize presented by the New England American Studies Association 2012 Runner-Up, John Hope Franklin Publication Prize presented by the American Studies Association 2012 Honorable Mention, Distinguished Book Award presented by the Society for the Study of American Women Writers Part of the American Literatures Initiative Series Beginning in the mid nineteenth century in America, childhood became synonymous with innocence--a reversal of the previously-dominant Calvinist belief that children were depraved, sinful creatures. As the idea of childhood innocence took hold, it became racialized: popular culture constructed white children as innocent and vulnerable while excluding black youth from these qualities. Actors, writers, and visual artists then began pairing white children with African American adults and children, thus transferring the quality of innocence to a variety of racial-political projects--a dynamic that Robin Bernstein calls "racial innocence." This phenomenon informed racial formation from the mid nineteenth century through the early twentieth. Racial Innocence takes up a rich archive including books, toys, theatrical props, and domestic knickknacks which Bernstein analyzes as "scriptive things" that invite or prompt historically-located practices while allowing for resistance and social improvisation. Integrating performance studies with literary and visual analysis, Bernstein offers singular readings of theatrical productions from blackface minstrelsy to Uncle Tom's Cabin to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz; literary works by Joel Chandler Harris, Harriet Wilson, and Frances Hodgson Burnett; material culture including Topsy pincushions, Uncle Tom and Little Eva handkerchiefs, and Raggedy Ann dolls; and visual texts ranging from fine portraiture to advertisements for lard substitute. Throughout, Bernstein shows how "innocence" gradually became the exclusive province of white children--until the Civil Rights Movement succeeded not only in legally desegregating public spaces, but in culturally desegregating the concept of childhood itself. Check out the author's blog for the book here.

The escape from Egypt is the pivotal event in the Old Testament. Through it God gave his people their freedom. For forty tumultuous years God and Moses and a chronically rebellious people suffered and fought and established the foundations of a legal system and a system of ethics that changed the world. The Old Testament reminds us that we must never forget the Exodus, or we will forget who we are. And as we learn about the Exodus, we learn who we are.

"I was eaten, plain and simple. It felt like being burned alive, like every cell in my body was exploding. Then everything stopped—my breathing, my pain, my heart . . ." The Innocent is a passionate lyrical novel and modern myth, at once a coming of age story and a guide to life’s most mysterious and powerful force: Love. Reminiscent of A.S. Byatt’s Possession and Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist, The Innocent tells of a woman’s mythic journey through sorrow and death toward fulfilment and understanding. Alexa Wyndham is a painfully sheltered girl from Brooklyn with a mysterious past. She is an innocent in every sense of the word, her views of the world formed through the lens of the poetry and literary novels she reads. Now on her own in college in Manhattan she finds the big bad city is waiting to devour her. When she goes out with friends on Valentine’s Day, a stunning kiss from a stranger is her introduction to this new and dangerous world. Her would be lover is after her flesh. It contains a most powerful transformative energy, and the supernatural creatures of the city are willing to do anything for a taste of it. Eight-hundred-year-old Lord of New York City Cristien LaRoche thinks he is just doing his job when he rescues Alexa from the clutches of a rabid night creature, but she is much more than just a helpless victim. He has not seen anyone like her in an eternity, and he has been glad of it. Alexa is an Innocent, a nascent daemon on the verge of her change. He will be damned if helps her and damned if he doesn't. Even if he can save her from those who seek her power, he still won’t be able to protect her from his own deadly past. Alexa and Cristien may be the most unexpected couple to ever search for True Love, but they are also fated to be together. They will embark on the road rarely travelled, facing terrible trials and crushing defeats in order to get that most coveted prize. As these two souls struggle to find a way to be together, they will learn about the wisdom of forgiveness, the nature of suffering, the seduction of evil, and the power of unconditional love.

Innocent in Alaska, first published in 1963 recounts the lively adventures of a young woman telephone operator, age 18, who left her family's farm in Nebraska to brave the wilds of Alaska in 1904. She describes life in the small cities of Alaska (especially in Fairbanks and Nome), in the rural areas, and her sometimes hazardous travels by land and sea. Also portrayed are her romances with Jack Bartlett, a handsome yet violent-tempered lawyer, and with Will Burke, whom she would eventually marry. Along the way Margaret Burke would parlay her modest earnings into a small fortune, a fitting testament to this courageous woman.

A deeply reported, gripping narrative of injustice, exoneration, and the lifelong impact of incarceration, Beyond Innocence is the poignant saga of one remarkable life that sheds vitally important light on the failures of the American justice system at every level In June 1985, a young Black man in Winston-Salem, N.C. named Darryl Hunt was falsely convicted and sentenced to life in prison for the rape and murder of a white copyeditor at the local paper. Many in the community believed him innocent and crusaded for his release even as subsequent trials and appeals reinforced his sentence. Finally, in 2003, the tireless efforts of his attorney combined with an award-winning series of articles by Phoebe Zerwick in the Winston-Salem Journal led to the DNA evidence that exonerated Hunt. Three years later, the acclaimed documentary, The Trials of Darryl Hunt, made him known across the country and brought his story to audiences around the world. But Hunt’s story was far from over. As Zerwick poignantly reveals, it is singularly significant in the annals of the miscarriage of justice and for the legacy Hunt ultimately bequeathed. Part true crime drama, part chronicle of a life cut short by systemic racism, Beyond Innocence powerfully illuminates the sustained catastrophe faced by an innocent person in prison and the civil death nearly everyone who has been incarcerated experiences attempting to restart their lives. Freed after nineteen years behind bars, Darryl Hunt became a national advocate for social justice, and his case inspired lasting reforms, among them a law that allows those on death row to appeal their sentence with evidence of racial bias. He was a beacon of hope for so many—until he could no longer bear the burden of what he had endured and took his own life. Fluidly crafted by a master journalist, Beyond Innocence makes an urgent moral call for an American reckoning with the legacies of racism in the criminal justice system and the human toll of the carceral state.

Educated in Amherst, Massachusetts, Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe (1819-1906) accompanied her physician-husband to California in 1849. The couple first lived in mining camps where Dr. Clappe practiced medicine and then moved to San Francisco, where Mrs. Clappe taught in the public schools for more than twenty years. The Shirley letters (1922) is the book edition of a series of letters written by Mrs. Clappe to her sister in 1851 and 1852. They were first published under the pseudonym of "Dame Shirley" in the Pioneer magazine, 1854-55. In these letters Louise Clappe writes of life in San Francisco and the Feather River mining communities of Rich Bar and Indian Bar. She focuses on the experiences of women and children, the perils of miners' work, crime and punishment, and relations with native Hispanic residents and Native Americans. Bret Harte is said to have based two of his stories on the "Shirley" letters.

In this intense marriage-of-convenience romance from Jackie Ashenden, the Greek is about to rewrite the rules of the virgin’s bargain! The virgin’s request… …is even more outrageous than the billionaire! Stepping into Castor Xenakis’s mansion, Glory Albright is completely out of her depth. Yet if she’s to fund her sister’s urgent medical treatment, she can’t fail. Glory must make a bargain with the gorgeous playboy whose name is synonymous with scandal… After everything cynical Castor has witnessed, there’s almost nothing he’s surprised by. But naive Glory’s offer to sell him her virginity floors him! Of course, her offer is out of the question. Instead, he makes a counterproposal: become his convenient bride! From Harlequin Presents: Escape to exotic locations where passion knows no bounds. Read all The Xenakis Reunion books: Book 1: The Innocent's One-Night Proposal Book 2: The Maid the Greek Married

The struggle for justice is ongoing. In answering the biblical call to act justly and love mercifully, can Christians cross lines of privilege to walk humbly not only with God but with their marginalized neighbors as well? No Innocent Bystanders looks at the role of allies in social justice movements and asks what works, what doesn't, and why. It explains what allies legitimately can accomplish, what they can't, and what kind of humility and clarity is required to tell the difference. This book is a start-up guide for spiritual or religious people who are interested in working for social justice but don't know how or where to begin, drawing on the lessons of history, the framework of Christian ideas, and the insights of contemporary activists. It offers practical guidance on how to meaningfully and mindfully advocate alongside all who struggle for a more just society.

“Imagine Cormac McCarthy's savage lyricism in a Paul Bowles desert landscape and you begin to enter the bleakly beautiful world of this mesmerizing, fable-like novel.”—The Independent Gold Dust is a classic story of the brotherhood between man and beast, the thread of companionship that is all the difference between life and death in the desert. It is a story of the fight to endure in a world of limitless and waterless wastes, and a parable of the struggle to survive in the most dangerous landscape of all: human society. Rejected by his tribe and hunted by the kin of the man he killed, Ukhayyad and his thoroughbred camel flee across the desolate Tuareg deserts of the Libyan Sahara. Between bloody wars against the Italians in the north and famine raging in the south, Ukhayyad rides for the remote rock caves of Jebel Hasawna. There, he says farewell to the mount who has been his companion through thirst, disease, lust, and loneliness. Alone in the desert, haunted by the prophetic cave paintings of ancient hunting scenes and the cries of jinn in the night, Ukhayyad awaits the arrival of his pursuers and their insatiable hunger for blood and gold.