Collection: Adult

Issuing a gracious invitation to leisurely moments of escape, The Comfort of Books & Tea: A Gentle Guide to Reading and Teatime pays homage to the cherished pairings of soul-soothing rituals so dear to the hearts of Victoria readers. Brimming with an abundance of storybook settings and recipes for delicious fare inspired by treasured tales, this keepsake volume is sure to set the hearts of bibliophiles and tea aficionados aflutter.

Within the pages of this beautifully curated compendium, the editors of Victoria share reflections on the pleasure of quiet interludes alone, where soothing tonics are sipped, and the thoughts of an esteemed author may be encountered between the pages of a beloved tome. The joy of taking tea and sharing stories amidst the warm camaraderie of others is also explored. Cozy milieus and menus for book clubs and other gatherings abound, as do teatime treats informed by enduring childhood classics such as Anne of Green Gables, Winnie-the-Pooh, and The Complete Tales of Beatrix Potter.

Flights of fancy take readers to the shores of Great Britain, a nation steeped in ardor for both the written word and refined refreshment. From a village brimming with booksellers and a tearoom tucked inside a library, to destinations associated with revered Regency Era author Jane Austen, these armchair journeys promise a multitude of bliss. In addition to literary sojourns, seasonally appropriate tea blends and tastebud-tempting repasts are included to accompany nature's ever-evolving song. Sweet indulgences and bold brews counter the chill of winter, while sun-kissed berries bring a burst of flavor to an alfresco affair perfect for the lazy days of summer. Recommended reading selections for each season lend extra delight.

Finally, lovers of literature may revel in the thrill of peeking into romantic abodes once inhabited by acclaimed novelists such as the Brontë sisters, C. S. Lewis, and Sir Walter Scott. The editors of Victoria hope these small intervals of beauty stir the imagination and provide sweet reprieve for the spirit.

From a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist and a former White House senior advisor, a deeply reported manual about how anyone can defy an authoritarian - based on original interviews with more than 100 dissidents, activists, and theorists across the world.

The United States is only the latest country to face a leader who wields fear as a weapon, punishes political enemies, disappears people off the street, and undermines free and fair elections. Today nearly three out of four people on earth live under authoritarianism, the highest rate since the late 1970s.

But even under repressive conditions, each of us holds the power to help defeat autocrats. Based on their acclaimed The New Yorker essay "So You Want to Be a Dissident?," veteran reporter Julia Angwin and political strategist Ami Fields-Meyer give us a captivating - and profoundly hopeful - guide to courage in an age of fear.

Meet a student from Hong Kong who risked everything for democracy. A mom in a working-class neighborhood of Caracas who broke with the political movement that raised her. Cairo twentysomethings who staged a gutsy stunt to help bring down a dictator. A mild-mannered immigrant fighting to save a landmark U.S. civil rights law. People throughout the United States and across five continents who faced serious risks for dissenting in their workplace, their community, or their country. On Courage is the story of how they did it anyway - and how you can do it, too.

Blending rich, previously untold narratives with history, spirituality, and movement research, Angwin and Fields-Meyer deliver a highly accessible book full of practical lessons - an inspiring resource for anyone, anywhere, who feel the walls of history closing in on them. On Courage is a roadmap to political courage and a powerful case for how taking personal risks can help save the free world.

A landmark book--the first complete publication of Langston Hughes's translations of thirty-three stories by eighteen Mexican and Cuban writers

In late 1934, Langston Hughes, already established as a leading voice of literary Black America, traveled to Mexico City, where he stayed for more than five months and began translating short fiction by prominent Mexican and Cuban writers. These stories, as he wrote to a friend, explore "the revolutions and uprisings, sugar cane, Negroes, Indians, corrupt generals, [and] American imperialists," and are "mostly all left stories, because practically all the writers down here are left these days." But when Hughes proposed publishing the stories as a book, to be titled Troubled Lands, his agent discouraged him from further pursuing the project and it remained unpublished, until now, with only a handful of the translations making their way into contemporary magazines. This volume presents Hughes's translations of these stories together for the first time as he originally envisioned. Edited by Ricardo Wilson, the book also features an introduction and brief biographies of the included writers.

Troubled Lands features thirty-three stories by eighteen writers, including Rafael Felipe Muñoz, Nellie Campobello, Lino Novás Calvo, Luis Felipe Rodríguez, Germán List Arzubide, Pablo de la Torriente-Brau, and Juan de la Cabada. The collection depicts Mexico in the wake of its revolution and Cuba in the years between the brutal regimes of Machado and Batista.

Hughes was a noted translator of poetry, but his commitment to translating fiction is less well known. Troubled Lands provides a window into this important dimension of his work and illuminates his deep interest in Mexico and Cuba.

A popular novelist and literary blogger answers those who claim the classics are too difficult, too problematic, and too white--and explains what we gain by reading them

When she was in her early twenties, then-aspiring writer Naomi Kanakia set out to read the Great Books--humankind's most highly regarded literary classics, representing "the best that human beings have thought or said," as determined by the two elderly intellectuals who'd written the guidebook she consulted. After twenty years, she has made her way through about two-thirds of these books, and she's found reading them to be an immensely pleasurable and insightful activity. Plato, Milton, Tolstoy, Proust, all those dead guys--their books have stood the test of time.

But since beginning her journey, Kanakia has found that although reading the Great Books is part of a longstanding tradition of engaging with the thought of previous generations, it is also a highly contingent activity that arose out of a specific time and place, the brainchild of a small group of early twentieth-century popularizers associated with Columbia University and the University of Chicago. And people have always been skeptical about the idea of reading the Great Books, asking if this is truly a realistic or even desirable goal for the ordinary person. A more recent and growing group of Great Books skeptics asks if these works are too problematic, reactionary, and irrelevant to bother reading. Kanakia, a self-described "left-of-center person," grapples with these objections, attempting to restore context for the Great Books even as she sticks up for them. Because books that expose us to fundamental truths about the nature of beauty and reality are worth fighting for.

The epic conclusion of the Archimedes Engine duology by legendary author Peter F. Hamilton. Set in the universe of EXODUS, a new sci-fi action-adventure RPG coming soon from Archetype Entertainment.

For millennia, the Crown Dominion has been at relative peace, with the Celestials in control and the human population little better than serfs. But now the Crown Dominion is facing a crisis of epic proportions--one that could change the balance of power in the Centauri Cluster forever--as an exiled faction that has been waiting for seven thousand years beyond the Helium Sea has returned to claim their vengeance.

For Finn and his human allies, who have ended up at the center of this conflict either through circumstance or manipulation, this is an unprecedented opportunity. If they can band together, they may be able to outwit the Celestials and finally earn their fellow humans a place of independence and power in the Crown Dominion. But first they must locate and master ancient artifacts of immense power that could give them a needed edge in the conflict ahead. And all while ducking the forces that are determined to knock them off the board for good.

"A vampire (don't say that word) novel like no other." --Paul Tremblay, New York Times bestselling author of Horror Movie and A Head Full of Ghosts

"Wonderfully mysterious and gorgeously written...a boldly original take on what it means to be a monster." --Monika Kim, Sunday Times Bestselling Author of The Eyes Are the Best Part

A dark and utterly original literary horror debut, following a priest whose bloodthirsty life has extended far longer than any mere human's--and is upended when a stranger comes to town

Stutley Tillinghast lives a solitary life, ostensibly as the minister of a remote rural parish in Rhode Island. For many decades now, what little human contact he's allowed himself has been brief, frenzied and bloody, and has always ended in a shallow grave in his cellar. There's a name for what he is, but he prefers not to use it: it is simple enough that he has his needs, and that when they become unbearable, he fulfils them. In his long and lonely life, he has met only one other like him--the woman he still yearns for, the one who made him what he is.

Then a girl arrives, searching for him. She has his last name, and bears an uncanny resemblance to that woman, awakening memories Tillinghast had long suppressed; the connection he feels for her is immediate and overwhelming. She's also sick, very sick, with symptoms Tillinghast recognizes all too well...and only he knows how to cure her.

Inspired by the real events of the New England vampire panic of the nineteenth century, TILLINGHAST is a novel to sink your teeth into: at once a gripping, atmospheric horror that turns the classic monster narrative on its head; a literary work of exceptional prose about giving into--or resisting--our impulses; and a remarkably moving father-daughter story that will leave you unexpectedly hopeful--and rooting, despite your every instinct, for the killers.

Everything you need to know about breast health and breast cancer in one place, essential advice you can trust from Mount Sinai's Chief of Breast Surgery, Dr. Elisa Port, and her patients.

Breast cancer is the most common cancer affecting women in the United States. There are 300,000 women diagnosed in the United States each year, and of all cancers women get, one in three will be breast. Everyone has been touched by breast cancer in some way - as the more than 4 million breast cancer survivors in the US can attest. With misinformation flooding us from chat forums to wellness influencers, where can we turn for the truth?

The Breast Advice offers a trustworthy resource as you navigate assessing your risk of breast cancer, navigate screening and prevention, and treatment, dispelling myths and laying out the facts, including the latest innovations from AI to new screening techniques. Bringing in patients' wisdom together with her 25 years of experience as one of New York's most celebrated specialists, Mount Sinai's Chief of Breast Surgery Dr. Elisa Port has created a comprehensive guide to breast cancer risk, diagnosis, and treatment. Addressing:

• Lifestyle factors to prevent breast cancer
• Risk assessment, screening, and testing--including the latest technology
• Diagnosis--choosing a doctor, what to ask, how to manage hard news
• Treatment--from radiation and chemotherapy to surgery and novel therapies
• Top ten pieces of advice from patients who have been through it

An essential resource for everyone with breasts, The Breast Advice will be passed around and relied upon for years to come.

The original Xbox console changed the console industry forever and in the ORIGINAL XBOX: THE CONSOLE AND THE GAMES, the team at XboxEra got the community to rally together for this book, to celebrate twenty years since the original Xbox came to be.

Originally funded by the community and produced exclusively for Kickstarter, this new version has been tweaked to bring this work of passion to more Xbox fans around the world. Featuring exclusive interviews, features and retrospectives on some of the best games to release on the platform, this is one book about the original Xbox that fans won't want to miss.

With 360 Full Colour pages, we've detailed over 790+ games - from Fable to MechAssault, Halo: Combat Evolved to the very first Forza Motorsport, this book is a celebration of the console that started it all.

"All my blessings are the blessings of community." --Octavia Spencer

Octavia drove to Los Angeles at twenty-six in search of a career in film. What she found was her chosen family. In this captivating memoir, the Oscar-winning actor and producer recounts the seeds of the relationships that grew into the story of her life, from her tender teenage connection with Whoopi Goldberg to her sustaining friendships with Sandra Bullock, Melissa McCarthy, Allison Janney, Viola Davis, Jessica Chastain, and the many talented, inspiring women whose love and advice have helped her become the woman she is today. Together, they built the world in which this book is set: a place where women support one another and the voices of history's heroines ring aloud.

Give Them Their Flowers is a love letter to female friendship. It is a call to follow your personal passions, create community, and persevere. This is Octavia's ode to all the women who wake up early to get it done: the mentors, the mothers and the mother figures, the aunties and the godmothers, the creators, the visionaries, and the best friends.

"Men have given me jobs," Octavia says. "Women are the reason the world knows who I am."

"Smart, fast, fun, and wildly original! You won't put it down."--Kitty Kelley, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Jackie Oh! and Oprah: A Biography

From acclaimed publisher Thomas Dunne, Murders and Acquisitions is a gripping story of greed, rivalry, and revenge in the publishing industry. Perfect for fans of Succession.

Entitlement

Greed

Rivalry

Revenge

It's just another day for the wealthy, privileged Maybachs--at least the few who still pay attention to the business.

Werther Maybach Myers was little known outside his primary businesses of media, publishing, and world-class money laundering. But with his death, his family's multibillion-dollar conglomerate--Omnium International--has to change. And his position as the major American stakeholder in the enterprise is now up for grabs.

After five generations, few of the founders' descendants have any interest in the business as long as the money keeps gushing--assuming that even a fight within the family would likely sort itself out. Except sharks are now circling: oligarchs, criminal syndicates, foreign powers.

What happens next will shake the world ...

Caught between wars raging in both Eastern Europe and the Middle East, Greece is an island of relative stability. Popularly considered the cradle of Western civilization, this is a Christian Orthodox state on the edge of the Islamic world. And, after a half-century of integration into NATO and the EU, Greece is now reabsorbing into the Near East, as the West fractures and new Middle Eastern powers rise. The country's importance as a cultural and geopolitical hybrid is growing.

Travelling through the region, Sean Mathews explores at ground level the tectonic shifts reshaping Europe and the Middle East. He meets the last Greek merchants in Cairo, and hears from Istanbul's remaining Greeks about Turkey's break with the West. In Jerusalem, he discovers a budding alliance between Greece and Israel; and in a faded Ottoman port, he encounters football hooligans loyal to a Russian oligarch.

This bold reappraisal of Greece as a Near Eastern nation uncovers its Byzantine and Ottoman past as a key to survival in today's chaotic, shrinking world.

Artificial intelligence is no longer confined to science fiction. It recommends what we watch, curates what we read, and even drafts what we write. Yet for all its influence, AI remains a mystery to many of us. How does it really work? And what happens when we place more and more of our lives in the hands of machines that "think"?

Physicist and AI researcher Inga Strümke pulls back the curtain on the most transformative technology of our time in this captivating introduction to artificial intelligence. Writing for curious minds from all backgrounds, she traces the history of AI from early chess-playing machines to modern neural networks and language models. Along the way, she explains the principles behind machine learning with a balance of clarity and depth. Strümke explores the promise of AI breakthroughs like AlphaFold, which cracked one of biology's greatest puzzles--and spotlights the risks of biased decision-making, misinformation, and autonomous systems that sometimes fail with deadly consequences. She raises urgent questions about ethics, responsibility, and regulation: Who is accountable when AI systems make mistakes? How do we prevent algorithms from reinforcing prejudice? And how do we ensure that AI serves humanity's highest aspirations rather than its narrowest interests?

Winner of the Brage Prize for Norwegian nonfiction, Machines That Think is an essential guide to artificial intelligence--and a call to shape the future before it shapes us.

A tender and beautifully illustrated story, FISH AND WATER is a new graphic novel from Eisner award-winning graphic novelist Gengoroh Tagame. He asks: What if The Odd Couple were Japanese, living in the middle of COVID, and just might be . . . gay?

From Gengoroh Tagame, the brilliant mind behind My Brother's Husband and Our Colors, comes Fish and Water, which follows the unlikely love story of two "straight" friends. Having met at a mutual friend's wedding, Akira, a business sales administrator, and Koji, a freelance writer, quickly become close buddies. One day, during a visit with a farm client, Akira is offered a case of freshly picked cabbage. Since no one at his office wants it, and he is no cook, Akira decides to see if Koji (who loves to cook) might be interested. Koji accepts and invites Akira to join him. Lonely and in the midst of pandemic-related shutdowns, Akira welcomes the chance and one meal becomes many. Once they get past how to be COVID-cautious, they become quite relaxed with each other, creating an amusing but emotionally perplexing scenario. Eventually, Akira and Koji grapple with deciding if they are just friends, or something more.

Part exceptionally drawn character study, part contemporary comedy of manners, Fish and Water is a delightful love story for the modern era, considering how love and connection can find you in the strangest ways.

In contemporary Paris, a narrator and two companions explore the life and work of Gertrude Stein: a subversive imagining of a truly subversive female artist.

Our narrator has a lot going on. Her friend Eva's cat is missing--also, she wonders, where is Eva's husband. Their other friend Fanny is barely around, and not because of her job in finance; she is tangled up with no less than three lovers. And Gertrude Stein is ruining the narrator's life.

She is trying to write an essay about Stein but it seems impossible. She knows too much and nothing at all about the leading avant-garde thinker of the early twentieth century. There are the facts: Gertrude Stein studied psychology at Harvard and medicine at Johns Hopkins, then quit; curated modern art in her rented apartment that would shake the world; wrote novels, plays, poetry, and libretti that are incoherent and brilliant; felt love at first sight for her daring wife, the subject of The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas.

But so much is out of reach. How do we put ourselves together? What do we lose to become modern? What do we find beyond the limits of language? Only a book like this, only a book by Deborah Levy, "an indelible writer [and] elliptical genius" (Dwight Garner, The New York Times Book Review), could attempt such an investigation. It crashes through genre to form something distinctively, utterly new--an imaginative, entertaining, and scholarly manifestation befitting the genius at its center. This is My Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein.

This groundbreaking book brings the cosmos to life like never before. Featuring more than two hundred stunning color photographs from the world's leading observatories and eighty detailed diagrams, this large-format book offers a mesmerizing journey through the formation, nature, evolution, and classification of galaxies.

Highlights include:
- A look at the universe in three dimensions with Brian May's patented 3-D viewer,
- Accessible science, offering a non-mathematical review of modern cosmology and astronomy
- An exploration of the chaotic beauty of colliding and merging galaxies,
- A reference section on historical galaxy catalogues, plus a comprehensive index.

Authored by renowned astrophysicist Derek Ward-Thompson and the world's most famous astronomer Dr Brian May, with ground-breaking stereos by J-P Metsävainio, Islands of Infinity is a must-have for anyone fascinated by the night sky.

Co-published with London Stereoscopic Company. The University of Arizona Press is pleased to offer this title in North America.