Transcendent Luxury

Lewis Thompson (1909–1949) was primarily a poet, a man of letters influenced by Eastern spiritualism and the poets Rimbaud and Rilke. As Richard Lannoy, the editor of Fathomless Heart, writes, Thompson, who rejected traditional literature after experiencing a spiritual crisis as a teenager, wrote “solely as a form of spiritual exercise the most sparse and urgent communication conceivable.” Later in life he wandered alone in India for many years. This book is the culmination of his life and writing. Fathomless Heart is Thompson’s view on how to live a spiritual and truthful life—how to awaken to full consciousness. Meant to be sampled for insights into topics that matter most to the reader, the book is divided into sections on universal subjects such as Truthfulness, Ignorance, Sexuality, Beauty, and Idleness. Novelist Somerset Maugham met Thompson at an Indian ashram and incorporated him into the character of Larry, the hero of the novel The Razor’s Edge, which popularized the archetypal westerner pursuing spirituality in the East. In reality, Thompson directed his unique powers of concentration toward exploration of mental awareness rather than on the accumulation of knowledge about exotic spiritual techniques—an awareness that manifests throughout this useful and inspiring book.

Seventeen-year-old Lessie Morrison has endured her fair share of car accidents, falls, and house fires, but not in the ways one would think. She is gifted with the unique-and unwanted-ability to leave her body behind as her spirit assists a departing soul to The Other Side if they're dying alone. As if high school isn't hard enough for an unpopular teen. The passing of her only mentor, her grandmother, who happened to share her ability, leaves Lessie with nobody to answer her endless questions as she navigates life with her strange ability. Especially the questions that arise when she's faced with a rather serious situation of being called to a reluctant soul: can she bring someone back to their body, and defy death? As it would turn out, she can. But coming back from the dead comes with a cost-not only a broken body, but broken dreams. Lessie is faced with the question: was bringing someone back to life their second chance, or did she meddle in cosmic forces she should have known better than to touch?

Called by many France's foremost philosopher, Gilles Deleuze is one of the leading thinkers in the Western World. His acclaimed works and celebrated collaborations with Félix Guattari have established him as a seminal figure in the fields of literary criticism and philosophy. The long-awaited publication of What Is Philosophy? in English marks the culmination of Deleuze's career. Deleuze and Guattari differentiate between philosophy, science, and the arts, seeing as means of confronting chaos, and challenge the common view that philosophy is an extension of logic. The authors also discuss the similarities and distinctions between creative and philosophical writing. Fresh anecdotes from the history of philosophy illuminate the book, along with engaging discussions of composers, painters, writers, and architects. A milestone in Deleuze's collaboration with Guattari, What Is Philosophy? brings a new perspective to Deleuze's studies of cinema, painting, and music, while setting a brilliant capstone upon his work.