"Anne Schroeder's personal essays ... tell a woman's story of coming of age during the Baby Boomer generation and growing into greater wholeness. All the ages of womanhood are covered: girlhood, young adulthood, middle age up into the author's fifties as she shifts focus to caring for the two older matriarchs in her life. Schroeder uses the Greek goddess of love, beauty, and sexual rapture as a metaphor for loving life in all its forms."--Review from...

"California is at a crossroads. For decades a global leader, inspiring the hopes and dreams of millions, the state has recently faced double-digit unemployment, multi-billion dollar budget deficits and the loss of trillions in home values. This atlas brings together the latest research and statistics in a graphic form that gives shape and meaning to these numbers. It shows a new California in the making, as it maps the economic, social, and political...

A true story about a teacher in a racially divided school who gives her students what they've always needed, a voice. Erin Gruwell comes to a southern California high school bubbling over with naive optimism. She quickly discovers that her unruly classroom is not easily won over by her good intentions. After a few floundering attempts to connect with her students, Gruwell gives them the assignment of keeping journals about their own lives. This assignment...

"As Californians battle over Prop. 8's hotly contested ban on same-sex marriage, ACLU veterans Elinson (coauthor of The Development Debacle) and Yogi (co-editor of Highway 99) offer crucial perspective on the history of minority rights in a state long considered a political trendsetter. Beginning in the mid-19th century--amid the expulsion of Chinese communities from hundreds of California towns and state-sponsored genocidal campaigns against indigenous...