No Human Involved

Readers around the world have fallen for Kelley Armstrong’s intoxicating, sensual and wicked tales of the paranormal, in which demons and witches, werewolves and vampires collide – often hilariously, sometimes violently – with everyday life. In Armstrong’s first six novels, Elena, Paige and Eve have had their way with us. Now get ready for Jaime Vegas, the luscious, lovelorn and haunted necromancer. . . Jaime, who knows a thing or two about showbiz, is on a television shoot in Los Angeles when weird things start to happen. As a woman whose special talent is raising the dead, her threshold for weirdness is pretty high: she’s used to not only seeing dead people but hearing them speak to her in very emphatic terms. But for the first time in her life – as invisible hands brush her skin, unintelligible fragments of words are whispered into her ears, and beings move just at the corner of her eye–she knows what humans mean when they talk about being haunted. She is determined to get to the bottom of these manifestations, but as she sets out to solve the mystery she has no idea how scary her investigation will get, or to what depths ordinary humans will sink in their attempts to gain supernatural powers. As she digs into the dark underside of Los Angeles, she’ll need as much Otherworld help as she can get in order to survive, calling on her personal angel, Eve, and Hope, the well-meaning chaos demon. Jeremy, the alpha werewolf, is also by her side offering protection. And, Jaime hopes, maybe a little more than that. “As I knelt on the cobblestones to begin the ritual, I opened not some ancient leather pouch, but a Gucci make-up bag. . . . I know little about the geography and theology of the afterlife, but I do know that the worst spirits are kept secured, and my risk of “accidentally” tapping into a hell dimension is next to nil. Even if I do bring back some depraved killer’s spirit, what can it do to me? When you deprive someone of the ability to act in the living world, he’s pretty darned helpless. In death, even the worst killer plummets from lethal to merely annoying. Yet whatever had been trying to contact me apparently could cross that barrier, could act in the living world. . .at least on me. I added an extra helping of vervain to the censer.” —from No Humans Involved

A strung-out waif-cum-ace auto mechanic, Munch Mancini is trying to get clean and get her act together. But temptation and problems keep pushing her closer to the edge. Like the murder of her abusive father, "Flower George." The cops have her pegged for the crime, and now she's got to stay out of sight of a certain cop named Mace St. John. At first it's easy because Mace isn't looking that hard. But when his prime suspect becomes linked to the gruesome murders of several not-so-innocent women, the wearily homicide detective goes into overdrive. If Mace wants to solve these murders, he'll have to find Munch. And if Munch wants a new life, she's got to find a way to cut a deal. But as they will both discover, there's a precarious line between trust and betrayal-- and the temptation to cross it may be too strong to resist.

When Shanna Edward’s weird new neighbor moves in next door, things begin to go haywire, including her discovering her friend’s grisly, bloody head decorating a fireplace mantel. Meeting Dr. Stevens, San Diego’s acting medical examiner and chief forensic pathologist at the crime scene, the two begin piecing together the puzzle of fifty-three murders marked NHI (no human involved) on crime reports. The serial killer stalks prostitutes and runaways, believing he’s purifying the human race of an infestation, a sickly disease of street trash. Before he’s through, at least fifty-three women will be dead. Unlike previous serial killers, he finds creative new ways to murder, mutilate, and dump the bodies, aided and abetted by the indifference of the chauvinistic SDPD. Shanna, an ex-cop, and the ME open a Pandora’s box of intrigue as their investigations lead them to believe that San Diego’s killer is in reality Washington’s Green River Killer or his protégé. So many twists and turns in the investigation will keep a reader holding her breath for the next surprise revelation.

The first in the mystery series featuring a former addict-turned-auto mechanic is “[a] gritty, gripping novel . . . surprisingly optimistic and funny” (Orange County Register). After some tough times, Miranda “Munch” Mancini just wants to make an honest living. But her hopes for a new beginning are dashed when her abusive father turns up murdered. Staying clean is one thing, but staying off Det. Mace St. John’s radar may prove impossible—especially when he starts viewing her as a suspect not only in this case but also in multiple murders. Her only hope is to cut a deal with the detective, putting her own life on the line to catch a killer. But trust doesn’t come easily for ex-junkies, or for cops. The impulse to betray this precarious alliance may be too strong for either to resist—and may get both of them killed—in this suspenseful mystery that “has grit and authentic street life to spare” (Publishers Weekly). “Seranella drops us right down into the middle of a dark and perplexing world and makes us feel—along with her hero—just how hard it is to get out.” —T. Jefferson Parker “Smart plotting, taut suspense and a highly original heroine.” —Desert Sun “Scenes pulse with such startling immediacy—she’s definitely worth another round.” —Kirkus Reviews

Cites successful examples of community-based policing.

Updated to include a new chapter about the influence of social media and the Internet—the 20th anniversary edition of Bowling Alone remains a seminal work of social analysis, and its examination of what happened to our sense of community remains more relevant than ever in today’s fractured America. Twenty years, ago, Robert D. Putnam made a seemingly simple observation: once we bowled in leagues, usually after work; but no longer. This seemingly small phenomenon symbolized a significant social change that became the basis of the acclaimed bestseller, Bowling Alone, which The Washington Post called “a very important book” and Putnam, “the de Tocqueville of our generation.” Bowling Alone surveyed in detail Americans’ changing behavior over the decades, showing how we had become increasingly disconnected from family, friends, neighbors, and social structures, whether it’s with the PTA, church, clubs, political parties, or bowling leagues. In the revised edition of his classic work, Putnam shows how our shrinking access to the “social capital” that is the reward of communal activity and community sharing still poses a serious threat to our civic and personal health, and how these consequences have a new resonance for our divided country today. He includes critical new material on the pervasive influence of social media and the internet, which has introduced previously unthinkable opportunities for social connection—as well as unprecedented levels of alienation and isolation. At the time of its publication, Putnam’s then-groundbreaking work showed how social bonds are the most powerful predictor of life satisfaction, and how the loss of social capital is felt in critical ways, acting as a strong predictor of crime rates and other measures of neighborhood quality of life, and affecting our health in other ways. While the ways in which we connect, or become disconnected, have changed over the decades, his central argument remains as powerful and urgent as ever: mending our frayed social capital is key to preserving the very fabric of our society.

On parole for dealing in drugs, lady car mechanic Munch Mancini does a friend a favor, only to be sucked back into the world of crime. Arrested, she buys her freedom by helping police catch the criminals. By the author of No Human Involved.

This landmark missive from one of the greatest activists in history calls for direct, non-violent resistance in the fight against racism, and reflects on the healing power of love.

A propulsive and ambitious novel as electrifying as The Wire, from a writer hailed as the West Coast's Richard Price—a mesmerizing epic of crime and opportunity, race, revenge, and loyalty, set in the chaotic streets of South Central L.A. in the wake of one of the most notorious and incendiary trials of the 1990s At 3:15 p.m. on April 29, 1992, a jury acquitted three white Los Angeles Police Department officers charged with using excessive force to subdue a black man named Rodney King, and failed to reach a verdict on the same charges involving a fourth officer. Less than two hours later, the city exploded in violence that lasted six days. In nearly 121 hours, fifty-three lives were lost. But there were even more deaths unaccounted for: violence that occurred outside of active rioting sites by those who used the chaos to viciously settle old scores. A gritty and cinematic work of fiction, All Involved vividly re-creates this turbulent and terrifying time, set in a sliver of Los Angeles largely ignored by the media during the riots. Ryan Gattis tells seventeen interconnected first-person narratives that paint a portrait of modern America itself—laying bare our history, our prejudices, and our complexities. With characters that capture the voices of gang members, firefighters, graffiti kids, and nurses caught up in these extraordinary circumstances, All Involved is a literary tour de force that catapults this edgy writer into the ranks of such legendary talents as Dennis Lehane and George V. Higgins.

A great many theorists have argued that the defining feature of modernity is that people no longer believe in spirits, myths, or magic. Jason Ā. Josephson-Storm argues that as broad cultural history goes, this narrative is wrong, as attempts to suppress magic have failed more often than they have succeeded. Even the human sciences have been more enchanted than is commonly supposed. But that raises the question: How did a magical, spiritualist, mesmerized Europe ever convince itself that it was disenchanted? Josephson-Storm traces the history of the myth of disenchantment in the births of philosophy, anthropology, sociology, folklore, psychoanalysis, and religious studies. Ironically, the myth of mythless modernity formed at the very time that Britain, France, and Germany were in the midst of occult and spiritualist revivals. Indeed, Josephson-Storm argues, these disciplines’ founding figures were not only aware of, but profoundly enmeshed in, the occult milieu; and it was specifically in response to this burgeoning culture of spirits and magic that they produced notions of a disenchanted world. By providing a novel history of the human sciences and their connection to esotericism, The Myth of Disenchantment dispatches with most widely held accounts of modernity and its break from the premodern past.