Middle Dreams

Long before the pyramids rose from the sands of Egypt or Rome’s legions marched across Europe, a great river civilization stirred beneath the vast skies of East Asia. Along the banks of the Yellow River, where floods carved both destruction and fertility into the earth, humanity planted the seeds of the world’s oldest continuous civilization. This is not merely the story of a nation—it is a saga spanning over five thousand years, a chronicle of emperors and rebels, poets and warriors, philosophers and visionaries, whose dreams shaped not just a people, but the very soul of human endurance.

The highly anticipated follow up to Wish, which has spent six years on the New York Times bestseller list and is beloved by over two million readers. Dream follows a small town girl with big aspirations who discovers that anything is possible with your best friends and an adorable pup by your...

The sequel to the award-winning Where Dragonwoofs Sleep and the Fading Creeps. As Ben, Avery, and Marcus near their last summer break before high school, a feverish sleep beckons them back to the mysterious dream realm of Meridia. The three friends haven’t returned to Meridia since they stopped the Fading from consuming their magical world. But a new triad of villains threatens the land: The Ghastly Three. Ben, Avery, and Marcus must join forces with a kodkod pirate, translucent elves, and even the Sovereign’s former generals if they wish to survive. Traversing the Lost City of ...

The widening wealth gap is all too familiar to many Millennials and GenZers, especially when home ownership and the lack of debt seem like faraway fantasies. And it's no surprise when they only hold about 4.6% of the country's wealth while Boomers held 22% at around the same age. So what happened to the promise of the American Dream? In this entry of his celebrated Hidden History series, Thom Hartmann uncovers the rise of the American middle class through the progressive policies of FDR, through to its downfall with the increasing privatization and economic deregulations of the Reagan era.

Republic of Dreams is a riveting portrait of Iraqi Kurdistan as its people weather Hussein’s genocidal campaign against the Kurds and the US invasion of Iraq -- only to face internal struggles between pro-democracy activists and political elites determined to hang onto power. Throughout the book, the thread of Peshawa’s story immerses listeners in the everyday and extraordinary world of Iraqi Kurds between the late 1980s and 2022, exploring the meaning of home and dislocation in the wake of war and genocide.

*The basis for the documentary Join or Die—now streaming on Netflix!* 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...

Michael Wood has travelled the length and breadth of China, the world's oldest civilization and longest lasting state, to tell a thrilling story of intense drama, fabulous creativity, and deep humanity that stretches back thousands of years.

A spicy small-town, brother’s best friend, sports romance “packed with sizzling tension, heat, and sweet, swoon-worthy moments” (Peyton Corinne, author of TikTok sensation Unsteady) between a college football coach and the one that got away that you’ll want to devour in one sitting. If...

As Reeves shows, the growing separation between the upper middle class and everyone else can be seen in family structure, neighborhoods, attitudes, and lifestyle. Those at the top of the income ladder are becoming more effective at passing on their status to their children, reducing overall social mobility. The result is not just an economic divide but a fracturing of American society along class lines. Upper-middle-class children become upper-middle-class adults.

📚World-famous author Cressida Vance is rich, rude, and really bad at finishing her series. When she crashes into the cozy town of Mariposas to open a Very Serious Bookstore™, tensions rise quickly. But when she bails on a local book club Q&A and turns up dead, the real mystery begins... featuring: 💸 An old-money inheritance 🖋️a scandalous lie 🔍and a whole town full of suspects Murder’s on the menu—and everyone’s reading between the lines. 🍰🔍 Perfect for fans of mysteries with bite, bookish chaos, and small-town snark. Praise for A.R. Winters: "The perfect balance...

In 1948, seven hundred thousand Palestinians were forced out of their homes by the first Arab-Israeli War. More than seventy years later, most of their houses are long gone, but millions of their descendants are still registered as refugees, with many living in refugee camps. This group—unlike countless others that were displaced in the aftermath of World War II and other conflicts—has remained unsettled, demanding to settle in the state of Israel. Their belief in a "right of return" is one of the largest obstacles to successful diplomacy and lasting peace in the region.

2025 Eric Hoffer Book Award First Place Winner! Imagine living in a mine 2,000 feet underground, in the damp and the dark, and filled with rats! Young Bethan is living a peaceful life in a coal mining town in South Wales. But her world crumbles when her father is badly injured after a section of the mine collapses.Setting her dreams aside for the time being, Bethan must help support her family. Defying the laws forbidding it, she goes to work 2,000 feet underground in the dark, damp, and terrifying coal mine. Her only source of comfort comes in the form of Dobbin, the very pit pony who ...

“Extraordinary...beautifully precise...[an] earnestly ambitious debut.” —The New York Times Book Review “A wild, angry, and devastating masterpiece of a book.” —NPR “[A] descendent of the Dickensian ‘social novel’ by way of Jonathan Franzen: epic fiction that lays bare...

Robin Wright first landed in the Middle East on October 6, 1973, the day the fourth Middle East war erupted. She has covered every country and most major crises in the region since then, through to the rise of al Qaeda and the U.S. invasion of Iraq. For all the drama of the past, however, the region's most decisive traumas are unfolding today as the Middle East struggles to deal with trends that have already reshaped the rest of the world.

From the author of Bowling Alone and Our Kids, a “sweeping yet remarkably accessible” (The Wall Street Journal) analysis that “offers superb, often counterintuitive insights” (The New York Times) to demonstrate how we have gone from an individualistic “I” society to a more...

In this urgent book, Julie M. Norman and Maia Carter Hallward provide a comprehensive yet accessible introduction to Gaza's political history. Combining a nuanced narrative with hard-hitting reflections from everyday Gazans, the book tells the dynamic story of how Gaza became an epicenter of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and a pivotal hot-spot in the region.

Prominent CNN host and commentator Lou Dobbs unleashes his manifesto on the vanishing American dream. Abridged CDs - 5 CDs, 6...

Nikki Maxwell’s favorite fairy tales get dork-tastic twists in this eighth installment of the #1 New York Times bestselling Dork Diaries series! After a bump on the head in gym class on April Fool’s Day, Nikki has a wild dream in which she, her BFFs Chloe and Zoey, her crush Brandon, and...

In Privilege Lost, Jessi Streib traces the lives of over 100 youth born into the upper-middle-class. Following them for over 10 years as they transition from teens to young adults, Streib examines who falls from the upper-middle-class, how, and why don't they see it coming. In doing so, she reveals the patterned ways that individuals' resources and identities push them onto mobility paths - and the complicated choices youth make between staying true to themselves and staying in their class position.

From two leading economists comes a groundbreaking new portrait of the hidden fortunes of Main Street business owners—ordinary Americans who built extraordinary wealth and are quietly rewriting the rules of money and power. Most people think the path to great wealth runs through Wall Street or...