Bøker av Rob Fisher

Set against the lush jungles and rice fields of South East Asia, and a dreamscape of half sunken boats in the back woods of Northern California, this is the story of three people. It is the story of Anna who possesses an extraordinary emotional depth and healing ability from which she is hiding; Pushpa, her daughter, left in Burma with a cruel and violent ex husband, she is the mistress of a bitterness that can fill oceans; and Michael, a New York environmental lawyer who has lost his soul in the bland absences and the grey wintertime slush of empty material success. Born in a poor family in rural Southeast Asia, Anna grew up relentlessly drawn to the mysteries of life and to following a deep calling that leads her from violence and turmoil to serendipity and grace. As the result of birth, training and heart wrenching trauma, Anna has an unwanted ability to weep for the suffering of the people whom she encounters. Wherever she goes, and despite her protestations, she is recognized as a modern day saint: one who teaches with tears instead of words, with kindness instead of concepts and humility instead of arrogance. Her escape from a brutal marriage sends her off into the world with limited resources and ill health requiring her to engage with people in ways she had never dreamed. Men and woman are drawn to her capacity to penetrate their aloneness with her feelings, and her deep connection with her own sexuality. For Anna, however, the veneration, the fame and the material acquisitions stand in sharp contrast to a deep sense of shame about her own failure to save her daughter from her conscienceless ex-husband. Eating away at her soul, this finally sends her into running and then hiding in the back woods of California, living in a rapidly deteriorating house that appears to be weeping. Michael has become everything he was supposed to be, but feels a deep loss and a gnawing sense that he has betrayed himself. Seeing an online news story about a proposed upscale housing project in the untouched redwood forests of Northern California, he is inexorably drawn to the forest grove of his childhood, now threatened by development. He leaves his external success behind as he follows what is vitally important to him inside. In the course of pitting himself against the developers, he encounters Anna, an extraordinary woman, haggard and darkly beautiful, camped on the side of a dreamlike river in the woods. This passionate confluence of their lives inspires all of them to try to correct what is has gone awry in their lives. Together they set out on a journey to rescue Anna's deeply wounded daughter from the thinly veiled cruelty and exploitation of her ex-husband living in Burma. It challenges Michael to leave the safety of the known world to follow what is most important to him, Anna to admit and accept the extraordinary person she is, and Pushpa to find what lives deeper in her than her anger and cynicism. In a high-risk mission of rescue, the characters are challenged to meet sexuality with sacredness, violence with forgiveness, and fame with humility.

"Adventure Guides Handbook: Optimal Physical Fitness" is a comprehensive guide to physical training, preparation and nutrition for individuals working in the outdoor adventure industry or people joining a guided tour in the outdoors. The book covers topics such as assessing fitness levels, developing cardiovascular endurance, improving muscular strength and endurance, enhancing flexibility and mobility, boosting balance and stability, optimal nutrition, injury prevention and recovery, mental fitness and mindfulness, and specific physical training for various adventure activities.The book includes various tables with exercise plans, meal plans, and active recovery methods, as well as recommendations for books, websites and apps that can be useful for adventure guides. Additionally, the book provides practical tips for staying motivated and celebrating progress.Overall, "Optimal Physical Fitness for Adventure Guides" is a valuable resource for anyone looking to improve their physical fitness and performance in outdoor adventure activities.

Do witches and witchcraft represent our understanding of how women who threaten the patriarchy are demonised?If to be born female is to be born deviant, how deviant is a body transformed to be female?There are few explorations of whether power exercised by women is as robust as that exercised by men, and therefore whether it is more open to abusive use. This fascinating anthology examines these questions through the lens of literary critique, history, criminology, and psychology to explore another representation of women - in relation to how they abuse power, or how they react when they are the victims of that abuse.With themes ranging from the personal consideration of female bodies, to the supernatural hidden realm, to the public condemnation of women who fall foul of either the law or of a male-dominated world, this collection of interdisciplinary essays provides an in-depth look at the fate of women who abuse or are abused by power.

Monsters show us our deepest fears and anxieties, our discomfort with difference, and our simultaneous repulsion with and fascination for the other. Understanding that the concept of the monster can be a political tool used to dehumanize opponents and a psychological tool that can help us reconsider our beliefs, Interdisciplinary Essays on Monsters and the Monstrous analyses and explores the enduring influence and imagery of monsters and the monstrous on human societies.Introducing the innovative practice of "e;imagining monsters"e; as a way to rethink the key organizing principles in our society that we have traditionally taken for granted, the authors explore not only what monsters are but, most importantly, what monsters reveal about us. This cutting-edge collection of chapters challenges us to contradict worldviews, such as the binary of gender, that have organized our thinking for millennia. Showcasing discussions loaded with ontological, ideological, socio-political, and aesthetic implications, the monstrous is rendered uncannily familiar as our own public and domestic socio-political and psycho-emotional realities are subjected to scrutiny.Launching a critical question: when faced with an existential threat, what can we do? The authors show us how the study of monsters and monstrosity is perfectly positioned to answer. Tackling this question from a unique interdisciplinary scope, the research presented in the chapters are interesting reading for a variety of researchers interested in monsters and the monstrous from across sub-disciplines.

The ebook edition of this title is Open Access, thanks to Knowledge Unlatched funding, and freely available to read online. Gender Violence, the Law, and Society analyses and explores the historical and cultural roots of issues of gender-based and sexual violence in Japan, India and South Africa.