The mysterious true story of Connie Converse—a mid-century New York City songwriter, singer, and composer whose haunting music never found broad recognition—and one writer’s quest to understand her life This is the mesmerizing story of an enigmatic life. When musician and New Yorker contributor Howard Fishman first heard Connie Converse’s voice on a recording, he was convinced she could not be real. Her recordings were too good not to know, and too out of place for the 1950s to make sense—a singer who seemed to bridge the gap between traditional Americana (country, blues, folk, jazz, and gospel), the Great American Songbook, and the singer-songwriter movement that exploded a decade later with Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell. And then there was the bizarre legend about Connie Converse that had become the prevailing narrative of her life: that in 1974, at the age of fifty, she simply drove off one day and was never heard from again. Could this have been true? Who was Connie Converse, really? Supported by a dozen years of research, travel to everywhere she lived, and hundreds of extensive interviews, Fishman approaches Converse’s story as both a fan and a journalist, and expertly weaves a narrative of her life and music, and of how it has come to speak to him as both an artist and a person. Ultimately, he places her in the canon as a significant outsider artist, a missing link between a now old-fashioned kind of American music and the reflective, complex, arresting music that transformed the 1960s and music forever. But this is also a story of deeply secretive New England traditions, of a woman who fiercely strove for independence and success when the odds were against her; a story that includes suicide, mental illness, statistics, siblings, oil paintings, acoustic guitars, cross-country road trips, 1950s Greenwich Village, an America marching into the Cold War, questions about sexuality, and visionary, forward thinking about race, class, and conflict. It’s a story and subject that is by turn hopeful, inspiring, melancholy, and chilling.

The story of a woman, broken and defeated, who found that dreams really do come true.

This is the book that helps you help yourself. By working through straightforward question-and-answer sections, you will effect change and make real progress in your life. 1000 Questions covers confidence and self-esteem, personal values, time, stress, anxiety and relaxation, dealing with the past, depression, loss and grief, happiness, joy and creativity, relatioships and communication.

This is a unique book of questions that raises our awareness and points us toward life-enriching change.

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Night Gardener, Peter Nimble and His Fantastic Eyes is the utterly beguiling tale of a ten-year-old blind orphan who has been schooled in a life of thievery. One fateful afternoon, he steals a box from a mysterious traveling haberdasher—a box that contains three pairs of magical eyes. When he tries the first pair, he is instantly transported to a hidden island where he is presented with a special quest: to travel to the dangerous Vanished Kingdom and rescue a people in need. Along with his loyal sidekick—a knight who has been turned into an unfortunate combination of horse and cat—and the magic eyes, he embarks on an unforgettable, swashbuckling adventure to discover his true destiny. Be sure to read the companion book, Sophie Quire and the Last Storyguard. Praise for Peter Nimble and His Fantastic Eyes “Auxier has a juggler’s dexterity with prose that makes this fantastical tale quicken the senses.” –Kirkus Reviews

Discusses subjects ranging from needle sizes and yarn weights to curling edges, chart reading, tight ribbing, and dropped stitches, in a question-and-answer format.

What would you do if you thought you were being bugged? How would you defend yourself? How would you even know about it? If you've pondered these questions, and especially if you haven't, you need to read this book. It was written to tell you, the average Joe, everything there is to know about tiny hidden transmitters that can broadcast your personal and business conversations to spies, government agents . . . even the next-door neighbors. Find out how these devices work, how effective they are, how to find them and deal with them and how to use this technology in your own self-defense if necessary. Includes scores of ideas and resources for protecting the privacy of landline, cellular and cordless telephones, as well as pagers, fax machines and computers, plus phone phreaking terms and tricks and, as one reviewer put it, true tales of the Biz that "will spook you . . . and a few that will make you laugh."