Cool Air

"Cool Air" follows a writer living in a New York City boarding house who becomes intrigued by his mysterious upstairs neighbor, Dr. Muñoz. The doctor, obsessed with maintaining an unnaturally cold environment in his apartment, reveals an eerie secret tied to his unusual condition. As the narrator delves deeper into the doctor's life, he uncovers unsettling truths about science, life, and mortality.

“[A] history of air conditioning, chronicling the numerous gimmicks, failed attempts, con jobs, and eventual successes . . . a surprisingly interesting journey.” —San Francisco Book Review The air conditioner is often hailed as one of the modern world’s greatest inventions—yet nearly as often blamed for global disaster. It has changed everything from architecture to people’s food habits; saved countless lives, and caused countless deaths. First appearing in 1902, when Willis Carrier, an engineer barely out of college, developed the “Apparatus for Treating Air,” everyone assumed it would instantly change the world. But the story of air conditioning and its rise to ubiquity is far from simple. In Cool, Salvatore Basile tracks two fascinating stories: the struggle to perfect an effective cooling device, and the effort to convince people that they actually needed such a thing. With a cast of characters ranging from Leonardo da Vinci to Richard Nixon and Felix the Cat, Cool showcases the myriad reactions to air conditioning as it was developed and introduced to the world. Here is a unique perspective on a common convenience: how we came to rely on it today, and how it might change radically tomorrow.

A gentleman in New York begins renting an apartment one floor below an aged doctor, who insists on keeping his quarters very chilly. As the two become friends, the old doctor's health begins to deteriorate in a particularly Lovecraftian fashion.

Losing Our Cool exposes the surprising ways in which air conditioning changes human experience: giving a boost to global warming that it is designed to help humans endure; enabling an otherwise impossible commuter economy; and altering human migration patterns. Stan Cox argues that by reintroducing traditional cooling methods and putting newer technologies into practice - and by moving beyond industrial definitions of comfort - people can keep themselves comfortable and keep the planet comfortable too.

The year 2002 marked the 100th anniversary of the first installation of air-conditioning. During the past century, it has become a staple of American life; 83% of US homes are now air-conditioned. In this engaging social history, Marsha Ackermann explores how the idea of “cooling” became firmly embedded in the social perceptions and expectations of Americans, transforming our definition of comfort and the way we live, work, and play.

This “ambitious [and] delightful” (The New York Times) work of literary nonfiction interweaves the science and history of the powerful refrigerant (and dangerous greenhouse gas) Freon with a haunting meditation on how to live meaningfully and morally in a rapidly heating world. In After Cooling, Eric Dean Wilson braids together air-conditioning history, climate science, road trips, and philosophy to tell the story of the birth, life, and afterlife of Freon, the refrigerant that ripped a hole larger than the continental United States in the ozone layer. As he traces the refrigerant’s life span from its invention in the 1920s—when it was hailed as a miracle of scientific progress—to efforts in the 1980s to ban the chemical (and the resulting political backlash), Wilson finds himself on a journey through the American heartland, trailing a man who buys up old tanks of Freon stockpiled in attics and basements to destroy what remains of the chemical before it can do further harm. Wilson is at heart an essayist, looking far and wide to tease out what particular forces in American culture—in capitalism, in systemic racism, in our values—combined to lead us into the Freon crisis and then out. “Meticulously researched and engagingly written” (Amitav Ghosh), this “knockout debut” (New York Journal of Books) offers a rare glimpse of environmental hope, suggesting that maybe the vast and terrifying problem of global warming is not beyond our grasp to face.

The rise of right-wing broadcasting during the Cold War has been mostly forgotten today. But in the 1950s and ’60s you could turn on your radio any time of the day and listen to diatribes against communism, civil rights, the United Nations, fluoridation, federal income tax, Social Security, or JFK, as well as hosannas praising Barry Goldwater and Jesus Christ. Half a century before the rise of Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck, these broadcasters bucked the FCC’s public interest mandate and created an alternate universe of right-wing political coverage, anticommunist sermons, and pro-business bluster. A lively look back at this formative era, What’s Fair on the Air? charts the rise and fall of four of the most prominent right-wing broadcasters: H. L. Hunt, Dan Smoot, Carl McIntire, and Billy James Hargis. By the 1970s, all four had been hamstrung by the Internal Revenue Service, the FCC’s Fairness Doctrine, and the rise of a more effective conservative movement. But before losing their battle for the airwaves, Heather Hendershot reveals, they purveyed ideological notions that would eventually triumph, creating a potent brew of religion, politics, and dedication to free-market economics that paved the way for the rise of Ronald Reagan, the Moral Majority, Fox News, and the Tea Party.

Jon Lindsey's controversial debut, BODY HIGH, squirts across the sunburned landscape of Southern California, taking readers on a debauched, high-speed journey of misplaced lust, mistaken fathers, lost semen, and the kidnapping of a sperm bank daughter, who may hold the key to redemption or, perhaps, the realization of its impossibility. // "Jon Lindsey is the new gleefully heartbreaking voice of California's broken world... [Body High] unfolds in rioting prose that bursts into crazed poetry around every curve..."-GARIELLE LUTZ, author of Worsted

A doll is more than what she seems, a monster lives within a child's walls, a murder solved, another remembered, an experiment in death, and the tale of a demonic, forgotten statue. These are just a few of the freighting stories contained inside. I invite you in to experience the hauntingly horrifying, the terrifyingly true and the unsettlingly unique texts within...