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A Giant Cow-Tipping By Savages
Modern mergers and acquisitions, or M&A as it's more commonly known, is a new phenomenon. The buying and selling, the breaking up and combining of companies--the essence of M&A--has been a part of commerce throughout history, but only in our era has M&A itself become a business. In 2007, it was a $4.4 trillion global enterprise. And yet, it remains largely unexplored. Discrete stories have been pulled from the annals of M&A, both true and fictionalized, that have become touchstones for wealth and excess. Who can forget Gordon Gekko and his "Greed is Good" speech? But while there have been a few iconic characters and tales to emerge, no one has told the rich history of M&A, until now. John Weir Close provides a look into that world and the people who created it. "A Giant Cow-Tipping by Savages" reads like "Dallas" meets "Wall Street," told through an intriguing narrative that not only brings to light in gritty detail all of the back room drama of such powerful players as Carl Icahn, Joe Flom, Marty Lipton, and Bruce Wasserstein, but also reveals how the new generation, including activist whirlwind Bill Ackman and iconoclastic new Delaware judge Leo Strine, will dominate the next tsunamic, and imminent, M&A boom.
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Finding Zero
The story of how we got our numbers-told through one mathematician's journey to find zero. The invention of numerals is perhaps the greatest abstraction the human mind has ever created. Virtually everything in our lives is digital, numerical or quantified. The story of how and where we got these numerals, which we so depend on, has for thousands of years been shrouded in mystery. Finding Zero is an adventure filled saga of Amir Aczel's lifelong obsession-to find the original sources of our numerals. Aczel has doggedly crisscrossed the ancient world, scouring dusty, moldy texts, cross examining so-called scholars who offered wildly differing sets of facts and ultimately penetrating deep into a Cambodian jungle to find a definitive proof. Here, he takes the reader along for the ride. The history begins with the early Babylonian cuneiform numbers, followed by the later Greek and Roman letter numerals. Then Aczel asks the key question-where do the numbers we use today, the so-called Hindu - Arabic numerals, come from? It is this search that leads him to explore uncharted territory, to go on a grand quest into India, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and ultimately into the wilds of Cambodia. There he is blown away to find the earliest zero-the keystone of our entire system of numbers-on a crumbling, vine-covered wall of a seventh-century temple adorned with eaten-away erotic sculptures. While on this odyssey, Aczel meets a host of fascinating characters-academics in search of truth, jungle trekkers looking for adventure, surprisingly honest politicians, shameless smugglers and treacherous archaeological thieves-who finally reveal where our numbers come from.
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Unbound- 2000 Years Of Indian Women's Writing
Profound, exhilarating, haunting, angry and meditative, Unbound is a collection that will shatter stereotypes about women's writing in India. Unbound is a collection of some of the most significant writing by Indian women over the past two thousand years. Divided into eleven sections, it encompasses writing on various aspects of life-spirituality, love, marriage, children, food, work, social and individual identity, battles, myths and fables, travel and death. While many of the pieces are commentaries on the struggle that women undergo to overcome obstacles - social and political - all of them showcase the remarkable creative ability of their creators. The term women's writing has often been used to limit and stereotype the work of women writers. But it also has a larger and more constructive meaning and that is the sense in which it has been used to inform and describe the context of the book. As Annie Zaidi explains in her introduction - women bring to their writing the truth of their bodies and an enquiry into the different ways in which gender inequity shapes human experience. Selected from hundreds of novels, memoirs, essays, short story collections and volumes of poetry that were either written in English or that have been translated into English, the pieces in this collection include the most distinctive and powerful voices from every era. There are verses from the Therigatha, written by Buddhist nuns (Circa 300 BCE) and writing by poet-saints like Andal, Avvaiyar, Lal Ded, Mirabai, modern classics by writers like Ajeet Cour, Amrita Pritam, Arundhati Roy, Attia Hosian, Bama, Bulbul Sharma, Irawati Karve, Ismat Chughtai, Kamala Das, Krishna Sobti, Mahasweta Devi, Manju Kapur, Mannu Bhandari, Mrinal Pande, Nayantara Sahgal, Pinki Virani, Qurratulain Hyder, Rashid Jahan, Romila Thapar, Sarojini Naidu, Saudamini Devi, Shivani and powerful new voices from our time like Arundhathi Subramaniam, Nilanjana Roy, Nivedita Menon.
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The Risk Factor
Our most revered business icons of the last few decades are the bold risktakers, such as Richard Branson, Elon Musk, and Steve Jobs. Yet in today's stock market-driven economy, companies are playing it safe, with too many leaders focused on short-term gains, rather than value creation. The result is a static business culture that generates forgettable results--even as the world demands big solutions. So how do we get back in the risk-taking game? In "The Risk Factor," Deborah Perry Piscione takes the most comprehensive look at this crucial, undervalued leadership behavior, and outlines how companies must support risk-taking across the enterprise. Exploring the heroes of risk, including entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and technologists, and the role risk-taking and failure tolerance play in their success, she makes a compelling case not only for big, flashy mergers or acquisitions, but also for unorthodox choices in everything from leadership to corporate social responsibility. Drawing on case studies from a wide range of now-famous giants (Netflix, Salesforce) and successful start-ups (Tesla, NetApp), she distills lessons for both new entrepreneurs and established companies whose longtime risk aversion has cost them more than they realize.
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Dead Companies Walking
Hedge fund manager Scott Fearon explains why failure in business is not only common, but necessary-and how spotting it early can pay off. Unlike most investors, who live in fear of failure, Scott Fearon actively seeks it out. He has earned millions of dollars over the past thirty years shorting the stocks of businesses he believed were on their way to bankruptcy. In Dead Companies Walking, Fearon describes his foolproof formula for spotting these doomed businesses and how they can be-extremely profitable investments. In his experience, corporate managers routinely commit six common mistakes that can derail even the most promising companies-they learn from only the recent past, they rely too heavily on a formula for success, they misunderstand their target customers, they fall victim to the magical storytelling of a mania, they fail to adapt to tectonic shifts in their industry and they are physically or emotionally removed from their companies operations. Fearon has personally interviewed thousands of executives who were headed, unknowingly, for bankruptcy-from the Texas oil barons of the 80s to the tech wunderkinds of the late 90s to the flush real estate developers of the mid - 2000s. Here, he explores recent examples like J. C. Penney, Herbalife and Blockbuster Entertainment to help investors better predict the next booms and busts-and come out on top.
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30 Women In Power- Their Voices, Their Stories
30 Women in Power carries the inimitable voices of Indian women who have been pioneers and led large organizations in banking, law, the media, advertising, government services, health care, consulting, the fast-moving consumer goods sector and the not-for-profit space. In these narratives told up, close and personal thirty of Indias greatest women achievers speak of the guiding principles that have held them in good stead, the role models who have anchored them, the childhood influences that have shaped their values and the interests outside the world of work that have revitalized them. Coming from all walks of life, these empowered woman discuss their many successes and their dreams for the future. Yet, they also venture to disclose the setbacks that have preceded hard-won conquests, the barriers, psychological or otherwise, that may have held them back at certain points and the compromises theyve had to make to reach the top. Through these honest and contemplative revelations, thirty women in power answer those questions that confront all working women from how best to balance the personal and the professional, to how to dismantle gender biases. Equally, the essayists consider seminal issues that concern every committed professional, man or woman - What are the qualities that define a leader? Where does one find a mentor? What are the ingredients in the recipe for success? Edited by business leader extraordinaire Naina Lal Kidwai, this topical and relevant book is a must-read, not only for the lessons it provides, but also for the intimate accounts it offers of lives powerfully lived.
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The Moral Arc
Bestselling author Michael Shermer's exploration of science and morality that demonstrates how the scientific way of thinking has made people and society as a whole, more moral. From Galileo and Newton to Thomas Hobbes and Martin Luther King, Jr., thinkers throughout history have consciously employed scientific techniques to better understand the non-physical world. The Age of Reason and the Enlightenment led theorists to apply scientific reasoning to the non-scientific disciplines of politics, economics and moral philosophy. Instead of relying on the woodcuts of dissected bodies in old medical texts, physicians opened bodies themselves to see what was there, instead of divining truth through the authority of an ancient holy book or philosophical treatise, people began to explore the book of nature for themselves through travel and exploration, instead of the supernatural belief in the divine right of kings, people employed a natural belief in the right of democracy. In this provocative and compelling book, Shermer will explain how abstract reasoning, rationality, empiricism, skepticism-scientific ways of thinking-have profoundly changed the way we perceive morality and indeed, move us ever closer to a more just world.
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Simple Plane Love
A perfect landing is a mirage, the more you chase it, the more it eludes you. Meet Captain Meera Khanna. As a first officer on an Aeroflot Aviation plane, with a luxurious apartment in the beautiful city of Manila, she seems to have it all. Flying to exotic destinations, navigating turbulent flights through typhoons and handling engine failure are all in a days work. Even when a leg injury forces Meera to take time off her busy schedule, she has the perfect solution - an exciting vacation to Subic Bay with her glamorous best friend Diana, aka Dee. And nothing could have been a better idea, what with the unexpected arrival of her childhood friend, the suave Aditya. But when Aditya seems to want more than friendship, it throws Meera off-kilter. Will Meera's perfect life come to an abrupt landing? Or will she find her happily-ever-after? In Simple Plane Love, join Captain Meera on a rollicking adventure, where navigating an aeroplane seems simpler than negotiating the many twists and turns of love.
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Never Kiss Your Best Friend
Go lingerie-shopping with him. Pass out drunk with her on the same bed. Cry on his shoulder when you break up. Bore her with football talk at 3 a. m. Ask him for advice on how to keep your boyfriend 'happy'. Watch a cheesy movie with her and cry freely. Ask him to rate your butt. Dance with her in your boxers. But never, ever kiss your best friend. In this sequel to the bestselling Just Friends, find out what happens when headstrong and impulsive Tanie Brar meets her equally crazy best friend Sumer Singh Dhillon after five long years of separation. Heart-warming and poignant, Never Kiss Your Best Friend redefines the rules of friendship with its story of a boy and a girl who are soul mates in every sense.
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Alibaba's World
A riveting insider account of the rise, culture and influence of Alibaba, the Chinese ecommerce giant that is changing the face of global business. In September 2014, a Chinese company that most Westerners had never heard of held the largest IPO in history - bigger than Google, Facebook and Twitter combined. Alibaba, now the world's largest e-commerce company, mostly escaped Western notice for over ten years, while building a customer base more than twice the size of Amazon's and handling the bulk of e-commerce transactions in China. How did it happen? And what was it like to be along for such a revolutionary ride? In Alibaba's World, author Porter Erisman, one of Alibaba's first Western employees and its head of international marketing from 2000 to 2008, shows how Jack Ma, a Chinese schoolteacher who twice failed his college entrance exams, rose from obscurity to found Alibaba and lead it from struggling startup to the world's most dominant e-commerce player. In this, the first English language account of Alibaba's extraordinary success, Erisman shares stories of weathering the dotcom crash, facing down eBay and Google, negotiating with the unpredictable Chinese government and enduring the misguided advice of foreign experts, all to build the behemoth that's poised to sweep the ecommerce world today. And he analyzes Alibaba's role as a harbinger of the new global business landscape-with its focus on the East rather than the West, emerging markets over developed ones and the nimble entrepreneur over the industry titan. As we face this near future, the story of Alibaba - and its inevitable descendants - is both essential and instructive.
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The Rye Man
Returning to rural Northern Ireland for a fresh start, John Cameron takes on the role of headmaster at his old primary school. But as dark memories are disturbed and his marriage falters, Cameron is left feeling powerless in this fractured community. Driven by unresolved grief and tormented by his waking dreams, he is forced to confront his past as he struggles to prevent history from repeating itself.
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It Shouldn't Happen To A Vet
Lesson number one: When taking a cow’s temperature the old-fashioned way, never let go of the thermometer . . . Now firmly ensconced in the sleepy Yorkshire village of Darrowby, recently qualified vet James Herriot has acclimatised to life with his unpredictable colleagues, brothers Siegfried and Tristan Farnon. But veterinary practice in the 1930s was never going to be easy, and there are challenges on the horizon, from persuading his clients to let him use his ‘modern’ equipment, to becoming an uncle (to a pig called Nugent). Throw in his first encounters with Helen, the beautiful daughter of a local farmer, and this year looks to be as eventful as the last… From the author whose books inspired the BBC series All Creatures Great and Small, It Shouldn’t Happen to a Vet is a book for all those who find laughter and joy in animals, and who know and understand the magic and beauty of Britain’s wild places. 'I grew up reading James Herriot's books and I'm delighted that thirty years on, they are still every bit as charming, heartwarming and laugh-out-loud funny as they were then' Kate Humble He can tell a good story against himself, and his pleasure in the beauty of the countryside in which he works is infectious' Daily Telegraph 'Full of warmth, wisdom and wit' The Field
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I love You But I'm Not In Love With You
How do you fall back in love? This was the underlying problem of one in four couples seeking help from relationship therapist Andrew G. Marshall. They described their problem as - 'I love you but I'm not in love with you'. Noticing how widespread the phenomenon had become, he decided to look more closely. Why were these relationships becoming defined more by companionship than by passion and why was companionship no longer enough? From his research Andrew has devised his own unique programme. By looking at how a couple communicate, argue, share love, take responsibility, give and learn he offers in seven steps a reassuring and empowering map for how two individuals can better understand themselves, strengthen their bond and recover that lost magic.
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Learn To Love Yourself Enough
Are you your own greatest critic? Do you have low self-esteem? Have you ever thought that if people knew the real you, that they would think less of you? Does life feel an uphill struggle because nobody - not even you - is truly on your side? If any of this sounds familiar, it is time to take a fresh look at the most important relationship of all:your relationship with yourself.In this thought-provoking book, marital therapist Andrew G Marshall looks at how to love yourself enough to make better relationships and how to stop zig-zagging between boosting yourself up (often to unsustainable heights) and becoming overly critical. He explains:- Why modern life is making it harder to have a balanced opinion of ourselves.- The types of thinking that sabotage and make life harder.- Why old pains can still cast a shadow today and how to make peace with your past.- How to develop a positive mind-set.- Increasing your self-confidence.(Some of the exercises in this book have appeared in The Single Trap by Andrew G. Marshall, published by Bloomsbury)
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Are You Right for Me?
In the movies, a couple meet and they just know that each has found that one special person. Marriage, children andeternal bliss are just a heart-beat away. Unfortunately in the real world, it is much harder to work out if a relationship has a future or not. Most people do not have these blinding flashes or if they've had them in the past, have been badly let down and no longer trust their own judgement. If this sounds familiar and you're not sure if your relationship is serious or you're just wasting your time, this book is for you. Marital therapist Andrew G Marshall draws on extensive research andtwenty-five years' experience of working with couples to help youunderstand what is going on beneath the surface. He explains:- How to tell if your partner is truly into you.- How to know if you want to spend the rest of your life with this person.- The natural rhythm of relationships and how both jumping in too soon or spending too long on hold can ruin a budding romance.- How to stop listening to other people and listen to your heart.- How to talk productively about your future.
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The Book Of Life
Fall under the spell of Diana and Matthew once more in the stunning climax to their epic tale, following A DISCOVERY OF WITCHES and SHADOW OF NIGHT. A world of witches, daemons and vampires. A manuscript which holds the secrets of their past and the key to their future. Diana and Matthew - the forbidden love at the heart of it. After travelling through time in SHADOW OF NIGHT, the second book in Deborah Harkness's enchant?ing series, historian and witch Diana Bishop and vampire scientist Matthew Clairmont return to the present to face new crises and old enemies. At Matthew's ancestral home in France they reunite with their families - with one heart-breaking exception. But the real threat to their future is yet to be revealed, and when it is, the search for the elusive manuscript Ashmole 782 and its missing pages takes on a terrifying urgency. Using ancient knowl?edge and modern science, from the palaces of Venice and beyond, Diana and Matthew will finally learn what the witches discovered so many centuries ago.
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Moriarty
Sherlock Holmes is dead. Days after Holmes and his arch-enemy Moriarty fall to their doom at the Reichenbach Falls, Pinkerton agent Frederick Chase arrives in Europe from New York. The death of Moriarty has created a poisonous vacuum which has been swiftly filled by a fiendish new criminal mastermind who has risen to take his place. Ably assisted by Inspector Athelney Jones of Scotland Yard, a devoted student of Holmes's methods of investigation and deduction, Frederick Chase must forge a path through the darkest corners of the capital to shine light on this shadowy figure, a man much feared but seldom seen, a man determined to engulf London in a tide of murder and menace. Author of the global bestseller The House of Silk, Anthony Horowitz once more breathes life into the world created by Arthur Conan Doyle. With pitch-perfect characterization and breathtaking pace, Horowitz weaves a relentlessly thrilling tale which teases and delights with the turn of each page. The game is afoot.
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Very Good Lives
In 2008, J. K. Rowling delivered a deeply affecting commencement speech at Harvard University. Now published for the first time in book form, Very Good Lives presents J. K. Rowling's words of wisdom for anyone at a turning point in life. How can we embrace failure? And how can we use our imagination to better both ourselves and others? Drawing from stories of her own post-graduate years, the world famous author addresses some of life's most important questions with acuity and emotional force. J. K. Rowling is the author of the bestselling Harry Potter series of seven books, published between 1997 and 2007, which have sold over 450 million copies worldwide, are distributed in more than 200 territories, have been translated into 73 languages and have been turned into eight blockbuster films. As well as an Order of the British Empire for services to children's literature, J. K. Rowling is the recipient of numerous awards and honorary degrees, including the Prince of Asturias Award for Concord, France's Legion d'honneur and the Hans Christian Andersen Award and she has been a commencement speaker at Harvard University. She supports a wide range of causes and is the founder of Lumos, which works to transform the lives of disadvantaged children.
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The Poets' Wives
Three women, each destined to play the role of a poet's wife: Catherine Blake, the wife of William Blake - a poet, painter and engraver who struggles for recognition in a society that dismisses him as a madman; Nadezhda Mandelstam, wife of Russian poet Osip Mandelstam, whose poetry costs him his life under Stalin's terror; and the wife of a fictional contemporary Irish poet, who looks back on her marriage during the days after her husband's death as she seeks to fulfil his final wish.Set across continents and centuries, and in very different circumstances, these three women confront the contradictions between art and life, contemplate their emotional and physical sacrifices for another's creativity, and struggle with infidelities that involve not only the flesh, but ultimately poetry itself. They find themselves custodians of their husbands' work, work that has been woven with love's intimacies and which has shaped their own lives in the most unexpected of ways. Deeply insightful and beautifully wrought, The Poets' Wives is David Park at his best - a novelist whose work has the power to bring the hidden from the shadows, into a delicate and shimmering light.
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The Disinherited
In the small hours of the morning of 3 June 1914, a woman and her husband were found dead in a sparsely furnished apartment in Paris. It was only when the identity of the couple was revealed in the English press a fortnight later that the full story emerged. The man, Henry Sackville-West, had shot himself minutes after the death of his wife from cancer; but Henry's suicidal despair had been driven equally by the failure of his claim to be the legitimate son of Lord Sackville and heir to Knole. The Disinherited reveals the secrets and lies at the heart of an English dynasty, unravelling the parallel lives of Henri's four illegitimate siblings: in particular his older sister, Victoria, who on becoming Lady Sackville and mistress of Knole, by marriage, consigned her brothers and sisters to lives of poverty and disappointment.
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Zeppelin Nights- London In The First World War
11pm, Tuesday 4 August 1914: with the declaration of war London becomes one of the greatest killing machines in human history. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers pass through the capital on their way to the front; wounded men are brought back to be treated in London's hospitals; and millions of shells are produced in its factories. The war changes London life for ever. Women escape the drudgery of domestic service to work as munitionettes. Full employment puts money into the pockets of the London poor for the first time. Self-appointed moral guardians seize the chance to clamp down on drink, frivolous entertainment and licentious behaviour. As the war drags on, gloom often descends on the capital. And at night London is plunged into darkness for fear of German bombers and Zeppelins that continue to raid the city. Yet despite daily casualty lists, food shortages and enemy bombing, Londoners are determined to get on with their lives and flock to cinemas and theatres, dance halls and shebeens, firmly resolved not to let Germans or puritans spoil their enjoyment. Peopled with patriots and pacifists, clergymen and thieves, bluestockings and prostitutes, Jerry White's magnificent panorama reveals a struggling yet flourishing city.
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Runaway Wife.
Rose Pritchard has fled her home and her abusive husband with little more than the clothes on her back - and her most precious possession her seven year old daughter Maddie. But Rose does have one other thing left - a glimmer of hope that she can build a better life for herself and her daughter whatever it takes.
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Mr. Mojo- A Biography Of Jim Morrison
In Paris pre-lachaise cemetery, Jim Morrison's graffiti-scrawled tombstone is a place of pilgrimage for local devotees, adolescent hedonists and wayward backpackers alike. Found dead in his bathtub aged only 27 having achieved worldwide stardom as lead singer of the doors, Morrison was quickly immortalized amongst the rock and roll deity such as Hendrix and Joplin. In death, however, this debauched 'rock poet' remained more stubbornly enigmatic than ever. Who was the real Jim Morrison? Nihilist, egoist, Shaman-he was a master of self-creation. A mosaic mythology of new-age hippy rhetoric, French poetry and Nietszchean symbolism obscured a man trapped by the mythology that he had so carefully constructed around himself. In this colorful and intimate biography, Dylan Jones strips bare the skin-tight leather suit of Jim Morrison's Lizard King persona and offers a frank and honest appraisal of a much beloved and often-romanticized counter-cultural icon. Mr Mojo is littered with little-known anecdotes from fellow stars, spurned lovers and industry moguls. It is a refreshingly honest portrait of a self-indulgent artist with a penchant for pageantry and public self-destruction.