The original The Road Less Travelledspent more than ten years on the bestseller lists and is one of the biggest-selling self-help books of all time. In this wonderfully wise and accessible sequel M. Scott Peck delves more deeply into the issues that confront and challenge all of us in the modern world: blame and forgiveness; sexuality and spirituality; death and the meaning of life; families and relationships; accepting responsibility and growing up. Writing throughout with insight and sensitivity, he draws on his own extensive experience -- both professional and personal -- to challenge false assumptions, suggest a way forward and demonstrate that personal change is always possible, no matter how difficult and complex the journey.

With a unique blend of candour and humour, Down the Road Never Travelled chronicles the arduous journey Brigitte Pellerin and her fellow researchers undertook in their attempts to track a tax dollar through one government spending program. Imagine coming home one evening and announcing to your significant other that the only way to truly understand how government worked was to study it from the ground up - to literally look into the sewer lines, leaking water mains, pothole-ridden roads and collapsing bridges of Canadian cities. This was Pellerin's goal when she embarked on an investigation of the Canada Infrastructure Works Program (CIWP), a government initiative that promised to repair the country's crumbling infrastructure and create jobs for Canadians. The task, Pellerin believed, would be relatively easy: to determine whether the government did what it said it would under this program. How hard could that be? As it turned out, it was nearly impossible.

With a unique blend of candour and humour, Down the Road Never Travelled chronicles the arduous journey Brigitte Pellerin and her fellow researchers undertook in their attempts to track a tax dollar through one government spending program. Imagine coming home one evening and announcing to your significant other that the only way to truly understand how government worked was to study it from the ground up - to literally look into the sewer lines, leaking water mains, pothole-ridden roads and collapsing bridges of Canadian cities. This was Pellerin's goal when she embarked on an investigation of the Canada Infrastructure Works Program (CIWP), a government initiative that promised to repair the country's crumbling infrastructure and create jobs for Canadians. The task, Pellerin believed, would be relatively easy: to determine whether the government did what it said it would under this program. How hard could that be? As it turned out, it was nearly impossible.

A powerful story touched with family trauma, deprivation, and adversity balanced by a life of hard work and philanthropy! On the Road Less Traveled is the inspirational story of Edmund A. Hajim, an American financier and philanthropist who rises from dire childhood circumstances to achieve professional success and personal fulfillment. At age three, Hajim is kidnapped by his father, driven from St. Louis to Los Angeles, and told that his mother is dead. His father soon abandons him in order to seek employment—mostly in vain—leaving his son behind in a string of foster homes and orphanages. This establishes a pattern of neglect and desertion that continues for Hajim’s entire childhood, forever leaving its mark. From one home to another, the lonely boy learns the value of self-reliance and perseverance despite his financial deprivation and the trauma of being an orphan. As time passes, Hajim displays a powerful instinct for survival and a burning drive to excel. A highly motivated student and athlete, he earns an NROTC college scholarship to the University of Rochester; serves in the United States Navy; works as an application research engineer; then attends Harvard Business School, where he finds that the financial industry is his true calling. So begins his rapid ascent in the corporate world, which includes senior executive positions at E. F. Hutton, Lehman Brothers, and fourteen years as CEO of Furman Selz, growing the company more than tenfold. He also creates a happy and abundant family life, though he never forgets what it means to struggle. At age sixty, he is reminded of his painful past when a family secret emerges that brings the story full circle.

From alternatives to the Carnival in Rio and the beaches of Thailand to substitutes for the most visited national parks and over-rated restaurants; The Road Less Travelled will help you find less crowded, sometimes less expensive and often more spectacular and rewarding places to visit. Presenting 1,000 fascinating alternatives to hundreds of well-known tourist destinations and sights, this compact edition of the bestselling guide brings vibrant cities, enchanting sights, breathtaking natural wonders and unforgettable experiences to life. Written by a team of travel experts and with a foreword by Bill Bryson, The Road Less Travelled is divided by theme to help you find what you're looking for - Ancient and Historical Sights, Festivals and Parties, Great Journeys, Architectural Marvels, Natural Wonders, Beaches, Sports and Activities, Art and Culture, and Cities. And it's packed with informative narrative and stunning photography, plus practical advice on where to stay, where to eat, when to go and useful 'need to Know' facts to ensure that you get the most out of your time away. Escape the everyday and embrace the new with The Road Less Travelled.

A cultural “biography” of Robert Frost’s beloved poem, arguably the most popular piece of American literature “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood . . .” One hundred years after its first publication in August 1915, Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken” is so ubiquitous that it’s easy to forget that it is, in fact, a poem. Yet poetry it is, and Frost’s immortal lines remain unbelievably popular. And yet in spite of this devotion, almost everyone gets the poem hopelessly wrong. David Orr’s The Road Not Taken dives directly into the controversy, illuminating the poem’s enduring greatness while revealing its mystifying contradictions. Widely admired as the poetry columnist for the New York Times Book Review, Orr is the perfect guide for lay readers and experts alike. Orr offers a lively look at the poem’s cultural influence, its artistic complexity, and its historical journey from the margins of the First World War all the way to its canonical place today as a true masterpiece of American literature. “The Road Not Taken” seems straightforward: a nameless traveler is faced with a choice: two paths forward, with only one to walk. And everyone remembers the traveler taking “the one less traveled by, / And that has made all the difference.” But for a century readers and critics have fought bitterly over what the poem really says. Is it a paean to triumphant self-assertion, where an individual boldly chooses to live outside conformity? Or a biting commentary on human self-deception, where a person chooses between identical roads and yet later romanticizes the decision as life altering? What Orr artfully reveals is that the poem speaks to both of these impulses, and all the possibilities that lie between them. The poem gives us a portrait of choice without making a decision itself. And in this, “The Road Not Taken” is distinctively American, for the United States is the country of choice in all its ambiguous splendor. Published for the poem’s centennial—along with a new Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition of Frost’s poems, edited and introduced by Orr himself—The Road Not Taken is a treasure for all readers, a triumph of artistic exploration and cultural investigation that sings with its own unforgettably poetic voice. Praise for The Road Not Taken: “The most satisfying part of Orr’s fresh appraisal of ‘The Road Not Taken’ is the reappraisal it can inspire in longtime Frost readers whose readings have frozen solid. The crossroads between the poet and the man is where Frost leaves his poems for us to discover, turning what seems like a fork in the road into a site of limitless potential.” —The Boston Globe

Comedian and actor Stephen Fry's witty and practical guide, now in paperback, gives the aspiring poet or student the tools and confidence to write and understand poetry. Stephen Fry believes that if one can speak and read English, one can write poetry. In The Ode Less Travelled, he invites readers to discover the delights of writing poetry for pleasure and provides the tools and confidence to get started. Through enjoyable exercises, witty insights, and simple step-by-step advice, Fry introduces the concepts of Metre, Rhyme, Form, Diction, and Poetics. Most of us have never been taught to read or write poetry, and so it can seem mysterious and intimidating. But Fry, a wonderfully competent, engaging teacher and a writer of poetry himself, sets out to correct this problem by explaining the various elements of poetry in simple terms, without condescension. Fry's method works, and his enthusiasm is contagious as he explores different forms of poetry: the haiku, the ballad, the villanelle, and the sonnet, among many others. Along the way, he introduces us to poets we've heard of but never read. The Ode Less Travelled is not just the survey course you never took in college, it's a lively celebration of poetry that makes even the most reluctant reader want to pick up a pencil and give it a try.