Books published by Harper Perennial

The remarkable story of two women named Nazanin-one a Canadian at the height of her career, the other a teenager on death row in Iran-and how one email changed their lives forever Nazanin Afshin-Jam was on top of the world. In 2006, she had just signed her first record deal and, after placing as first runner-up for Miss World, was a sought-after fashion model and icon within the Iranian dissident community. But one afternoon, she received an email that would change the course of her life. The subject of that email-a Kurdish girl named Nazanin Fatehi-was facing execution in Iran, as punishment for stabbing a man who had tried to rape her. Afshin-Jam quickly came to Fatehi's defence, striding into the world of international diplomacy and confronting the dark side of the country of her birth, with its honour killings, violence against women and state-sanctioned executions of children. While Fatehi languished in prison, experiencing conditions so deplorable she attempted to end her own life, Afshin-Jam worked desperately on the campaign to save her. The Tale of Two Nazanins weaves together the lives of two women-one leading a life of opportunity, the other living in abject poverty-and a fight for justice that, if only for a moment, brought the Iranian regime to its knees. An inspiring story about the bonds of sisterhood, this extraordinary book speaks to the power of every individual to foster positive change in the world.

Eighty-year-old George Castor promised he would never let his best friend Ralph die alone at the Silver Gardens Nursing Home--but Ralph passed on while George was away fishing. Distraught, guilt-stricken and seeking redemption, George buys a broken-down mansion in Looking glass, Oregon, paints it fire-engine red, and begins searching for other old folks to share it with him. Because George has made a new promise that will alter the course of the rest of his life. And, with the help of a miraculous old woman named Grace, he assembles a ragtag bunch of aging strangers, determined to make their last days on earth--and his own--an adventure.

Stories define our reality as human beings. The stories you tell— as an individual, a business, an organization—will shape yours.LEARN TO MOVE MARKETSWhether you have a product to sell, a fundraising goal to reach, a political agenda to push—any change you’d like to make—crafting the right message, telling the right story, is how you effect the change you seek. In this book, you’ll find the laws that govern the creation of impactful messaging. A framework, consumable in a single sitting, to act as a guiding light for the messages you’ll create. Craft high-impact messages and you can shape culture, drive sales, incite movements—mold the world around you. Fail, and instead craft bland, apathetic messages, and you’ll find yourself yet another voice, lost in the crowd. While there is no singular template for crafting a high impact message, there are laws that govern what works. If you’re ready to spark your movement, sit down, dig in.LET’S GO. BUSINESS/MARKETING-GENERAL THE 12

Why does life speed up as we get older? Why does the clock in your head sometimes move at a different speed from the one on the wall? Time rules our lives, but how much do we understand it? And is it possible to retrain our brains and improve our relationship with it?Drawing on the latest research from the fields of psychology, neuroscience, and biology, and using original research on the way memory shapes our understanding of time, the acclaimed writer and BBC broadcaster Claudia Hammond delves into the mysteries of time perception. Along the way, she introduces us to an extraordinary array of characters willing to go to great lengths in the interests of research, including the French speleologist Michel Siffre, who spends two months in an ice cave in complete darkness. Time Warped offers insight into how to manage our time more efficiently, speed time up and slow it down at will, plan for the future with more accuracy, and, ultimately, use the warping of time to our own advantage.

Chicago deejay Daphne "Dee Dee" Dupree is sassy and successful--but a series of catastrophic relationships has left her gun-shy. Now with her own life and the lives of those closest to her seemingly coming apart at the seams, she's going to have to leave the safe cocoon of her broadcasting booth to face her world, her secrets, and a new promise of mature love fearlessly and head-on.

Luther Albright is a devoted father and a designer of dams, a self-controlled man who believes he can engineer happiness for his family by sheltering them from his own emotions.But when an earthquake shakes his Sacramento home, the world Luther has constructed with such care begins to tilt: his son's behavior becomes increasingly bizarre and threatening, his loving wife seems to grow distant, the house he built with his own hands shows its first signs of decay, and a dam of his design comes under investigation for structural flaws exposed by the tremors. Nightmarish connections begin to whisper at Luther from the most innocent of places as debut novelist MacKenzie Bezos tightens her net of psychological suspense around the reader with bravura skill. This is a harrowing portrait of an ordinary man who finds himself tested and strives not to be found wanting.

?Laurie Colwin was the best kind of master: human and humorous, full of wisdom and love.? ?Emma Straub, New York Times bestselling author of All Adults HereIn these fourteen tales, Laurie Colwin explores love and marriage, friendship and loyalty, and obligation and desire with the compassion and wit that earned her the devotion of legions of readers. When Passion and Affect was first published in 1974, Colwin was anointed as a young writer to watch. Now, a new generation has the opportunity to encounter some of the most charmingly complicated and beautifully drawn characters in modern fiction: a music critic whose orderly life is threatened by her flirtation with a married cartographer; an ornithologist perplexed by human mating rituals despite his expertise in the natural world; and two young men, best friends and cousins, whose relationship is disrupted by the sudden arrival of Misty Berkowitz in their lives.Passion and Affect is a dazzling must-have collection from "a wise, big hearted writer. A deft and funny one, too." (Washington Post)

Nominated for a National Book Award, this fresh and stunning collection of stories takes the reader deep into the heart of the most alarming and joyful human relationships.

Joyner's Dream is the sweeping story of a family and its dubious legacy: an abiding love of music coupled with a persistent knack for thieving. Beginning in England in the 1780s, continuing in Halifax at the time of the Great Explosion, and ending in Toronto in the present, eight larcenous generations from all walks of life-craftsmen and highwaymen, aristocrats and servants, lawyers and B-movie actors-are connected by music, a secret family journal and one long-lived violin. When the branches of the family are reunited and lingering secrets are revealed, we have come full circle in a hugely satisfying and surprising tale. This multi-generational story-told in a spellbinding series of historical voices-abounds in such rich social detail and sharply rendered characters, it affords the deep reading pleasures to be found in the novels of Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy. Enjoy the accompanying album, Joyner's Dream: The Kingsfold Suite, with all-original music by Sylvia Tyson. Available at zunior.com.

At the age of forty-one, Trevor Greene, a journalist and a reservist in the Canadian Forces, was deployed to Afghanistan, leaving behind his fiance, Debbie, and his young daughter, Grace. On March 4, 2006, while meeting with village elders in a remote village in Kandahar Province, Trevor removed his helmet, confident that a centuries-old pact would protect him from harm. Without warning, a teenage boy under the influence of the Taliban walked up to him and landed a rusty axe in his skull, nearly splitting his brain in two. Initially, Debbie was told that Trevor would not survive.When he did, she was told that he would never be able to communicate or move on his own. But after years of rehabilitation, setbacks and crises, Trevor not only learned how to talk and move again, but in July 2010, he stood up at his wedding, Debbie at his side and Grace carrying their rings down the aisle as their flower girl.March Forth is a remarkable story of love told in two voices: first in Trevor's, up until the attack; then in Debbie's, as she works tirelessly to rehabilitate her fiance. Together, Trevor and Debbie have written the next chapter in their remarkable story.

Bound on a lecturing trip around the world, Mark Twain turns his keen satiric eye to foreign lands in Following the Equator. The first of two volumes, this vivid record of a sea voyage on the Pacific Ocean displays Twain's instinctive eye for the unusual, his wide-ranging curiosity, and his delight in embellishing the facts. The personalities of the ship's crew and passengers, the poetry of Australian place-names, and the success of women's suffrage in New Zealand, among other topics, are the focus of his wry humor and redoubtable powers of observation. Following the Equator is an ecocative and highly unique American portrait of nineteenth-century travel and customs.

Are you a late bloomer? Are you caught in a career you don't think you can leave? Do you dream of a better life -- but aren't sure how to make it happen? This book is for you. Written by a self-professed "late bloomer", it explains just what that term means and why people fall into that category. Then it shows you how to envision the future you want and how to prepare yourself for the changes to come. Finally, it introduces the Ten Principles of Unconventional Wisdom -- including "Bite off more than you could chew," "Leap before you look," and "Push your luck" -- advice that will help you see your situation and its possibilities in a whole new light.Filled with practical tips to get you started, worksheets to help identify your goals, and meditations and exercises to keep you on track, this encouraging, upbeat, and fun-filled resource will help you achieve and live the kind of life and career you thought you could only dream of.

You can always count on a crowd outside Heads by Harry, the Yagyuu family's taxidermy shop in Hilo, where the regulars gather every day to drink beer, eat smoked meat, and pontificate into the pau hana hours. But above the shop, where the family lives, life isn't so predictable. Toni Yagyuu, the middle child, has enough on her hands dealing with her budding diva of a little sister. But it is the men in her life that really have her running in circles: a flamboyant older brother who wants to be a hairdresser, a stubborn father who refuses to accept her into the family business, and the Santos brothers--two pig-hunting, ex-high school football players who don't know what to think of their headstrong, outspoken neighbor.

Prankster, warrior, seducer, fool -- Old Man Coyote is the most enduring legend in Native American culture. Crafty and cagey -- often the victim of his own magical intrigues and lusty appetites -- he created the earth and man, scrambled the stars and first brought fire . . . and death. Barry Lopez -- National Book Award-winning author of Arctic Dreams and recipient of the John Burroughs Medal for his bestselling masterwork Of Wolves and Men -- has collected sixty-eight tales from forty-two tribes, and brings to life a timeless myth that abounds with sly wit, erotic adventure, and rueful wisdom.

The sheltered son of a Jewish mobster, Art Bechstein leaps into his first summer as a college graduate as cluelessly as he capered through his school years. But new friends and lovers are eager to guide him through these sultry days of last-ditch youthful alienation and sexual confusion--in a blue-collar city where the mundane can sometimes appear almost magical.

Paris, by custom and design, is a pedestrian's city - each block a revelation, every neighbourhood a new feast for the senses, a place rich with history and romance at every turn. This is your guide par excellence to the true, off-the-beaten-track heart of the City of Lights.

First published in hardcover: New York: Harper, 2009.

Includes interviews, features, and other extras.

An international bestseller and publishing phenomenon, Every House Needs a Balcony?dubbed the ?Israeli Kite Runner? by The Bookseller?is the story of one family, one home, and the surprising arc of one woman's life, from the poverty of her youth, to the glowing love and painful losses of her adult years. If you enjoy the novels of Dalia Sofer (The Septembers of Shiraz), Amos Oz (My Michael, A Tale of Love and Darkness), and A.B. Yehoshua (Mr Mani), you'll find much to love in Rina Frank's beautiful and bittersweet Every House Needs a Balcony.

Originally published in 1987, two years before the Tiananmen Square protests, Zhang Wei's award-winning novel is the story of three generations of the Sui, Zhao, and Li families living in the fictional northern town of Wali during China's troubled postliberation years.Spanning four decades following the creation of the People's Republic in 1949, The Ancient Ship is a bold examination of a society in turmoil, the struggle of oppressed people to control their own fate, and the clash between tradition and modernization. In the course of the narrative, the townspeople of Wali face the moments that have defined China's history during the latter part of the twentieth century: the land reform programs, the famine of 1959-1961, the Great Leap Forward, the Anti-Rightist Campaign, and the Cultural Revolution. Translated into English for the very first time, The Ancient Ship is a revolutionary work of Chinese fiction that speaks to people across the globe.

In poised and elegant prose, Kathryn Harrison weaves a stunning story of women, travel, and flight; of love, revenge, and fear; of the search for home and the need to escape it. Set in alluring Shanghai at the turn of the century, The Binding Chair intertwines the destinies of a Chinese woman determined to forget her past and a Western girl focused on the promises of the future.

Youth sports aren't just about fun and games anymore. What should be a pleasurable experience is often marred by poor sportsmanship, trash talking, win-at-all-cost attitudes, and, in the worst cases, violence. But World Cup soccer champion and Olympic gold medalist Brandi Chastain has a solution. In It's Not About the Bra, Chastain draws on lessons learned in her phenomenal career and in her experience as a parent to illuminate "the beautiful game" and provide creative answers to the challenges that face young athletes and their parents.Chastain emphasizes the importance of developing leadership skills, finding (and becoming) role models, and giving back to one's team and community. She offers a blueprint for kids and parents alike on how to play fair, win (and lose) with grace, and, above all, have a good time doing it.

When thirty-three-year-old Mohammed Odeh al-Rehaief made the decision to risk his life and his family to save Private First Class Jessica Lynch -- an American soldier he did not know -- it was more than the everyday reckoning with death that permeates wartime. It was the culmination of a life spent at odds with the repressive regime that held his country.Mohammed's story is a coming of age tale in a society where violence and betrayal were everyday events, where one in five adult males worked for the state's security apparatus, where a president-for-life demanded absolute loyalty and adulation. Yet even as he navigates a culture tarnished by brutality and corruption, Mohammed reveals unexpected sides of Iraq -- scenes of surprising tenderness and stubborn generosity -- and emerges as an unlikely hero whose values transcend ideology: honor, compassion, and an unshakable belief in the sanctity of human life.

From seers to scientists, mystics to meteorologists, there have always been peoplewho claim to know what will happen in the future. The Oracle at Delphi, Pythagoras, Newton and the stock analyst on a business report have all endeavoured to look forward in time. But even with recent technological advances and the help of computers and satellites, are we any better at predicting the future now than we were in the distant past? How can scientists claim to foresee future climate events when even three-day forecasts prove a serious challenge?In Apollo's Arrow, David Orrell looks at the history of prognostication to show how scientists (and charlatans) have tried to forecast the future. He then breaks down the mathematics of what really goes into apredictive model. Orrell has created a compelling, elegantly written history of our future that addresses some of the most important issues of our time.

On January 26, 1976, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau became the first leader of a NATO country to visit Cuba since the crippling 1960 American economic embargo. Accompanied by his wife, Margaret, and baby Michel, Trudeau was greeted in Havana by 250,000 cheering Cubans and a 30-foot poster of himself. "Long live Prime Minister Fidel Castro!" Trudeau would famously shout at the love-in.In this fascinating portrait of an unusual relationship between two enigmatic world leaders, author and historian Robert Wright brings to life three days of Canadian politics played out on the international stage. In a revealing look at both leaders' personalities and political ideologies, Wright shows how these two towering figures-despite their official positions as allies of rival empires-determinedlyrefused to exist merely as handmaidens to the United States and forged a long-lasting relationship.

Barbara Goldsmith's portrait of suffragette Victoria Woodhull and her times was hailed by George Plimpton as "a beautifully written biography of a remarkable woman" and by Gloria Steinem as "more memorable than a dozen histories." A highly readable combination of history and biography, Other Powers interviews the stories of some of the most colorful social, political, and religious figures of America's Victorian era with the courageous and notorious life of Victoria Woodhull--psychic, suffragette, publisher, presidential candidate, and self-confessed practitioner of free love. It is set amid the battle for women's suffrage, the Spiritualist movement that swept across the nation in the age of Radical Reconstruction following the Civil War, and the bitter fight that pitted black men against white women in the struggle for the right to vote. Peter Gay found Other Powers "Irresistible...this is a biography guaranteed to keep the reader reading." And Gloria Steinem called it "A real-life novel of how one charismatic woman...turned women's suffrage, the church, New York City, and much of the country on its ear."