Books about Circling from Amazon.com

In this triumphant return to nonfiction after two critically acclaimed works of fiction, Mary Gordon gives us a rich, bittersweet memoir about her mother, their relationship and her role as daughter

Anna Gagliano Gordon, who died in 2002 at the age of 94, lived a life colored by large forces: immigration, world war, the Great Depression, and physical affliction--she contracted Polio at the age of 3 and experienced the ravages of both alcoholism and dementia. A hard-working single mother--Gordon’s father died when she was still a girl--Anna was the personification of the culture of the mid-century American Catholic working class. Yet, even in the face of these setbacks, she managed hold down a job, to dress smartly and raise her daughter on her own, and though she was never a fan of the arts which so attracted Mary, she worshiped the beauty in life in her own way, with a surprising joie de vivre and a beautiful singing voice.

Gordon writes about Anna in all of her roles: sister, breadwinner, woman of faith and single mother. We discover Anna’s wry and often biting humor, her appreciation of life’s simple pleasures, her courage in breaking out of the narrow confines of her birth. Toward the end of Anna’s life, we watch the author take on all the burdens and blessings of caring for her mother in old age, beginning even then to reclaim from memory the vivid woman who helped her sail forth into her own life.

Bringing her exceptional talent for detail, character, and scene to bear on the life of her mother, Gordon gives us a deeply felt and powerfully moving book..
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In the harsh, forsaken landscape of Western Tibet, a holy mountain rises up, the legendary center of the world. Sacred to Hindus and Buddhists alike, Mount Kailash had been in professor and popular writer Robert Thurman's mind for some time when he finally decided to organize a group and go--across the Chinese border, where he has always been persona non grata. Writer Tad Wise decides to tag along and put the adventures on paper. While recording Thurman's dharma lectures, Wise comes face to face with the magic of the mountain, its myths and its people, and haltingly transforms from cynical skeptic to tear-streaked pilgrim. Wise's writing leans toward the quirky, pushing ordinary sentences to their lapidary limits, and Thurman, as usual, tosses off tantalizing Buddhisms like "mind-body bubble" and "supreme orgasm of bliss-void-indivisible." For a book that's effectively about walking 32 miles over rubble around a remote peak, Circling the Sacred Mountain succeeds in drawing you into a mandala of swirling ideas and experiences, nudging you toward your own realizations. --Brian Bruya.
Price: $8.90 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Who couldn't use a little encouragement from time to time? In this delightful collection of stories and life lessons, you'll discover how you can experience hope, joy, and peace even in life's most trying times. In chapters such as "When the Fountain of Youth Has Rusted" and "I Know I'm Lost, but the Scenery Is Spectacular," you'll find the encouragement you need to shoo away any buzzards and face life's difficulties with the security of knowing that God is in control. By mixing humor with poignant truths and practical methods for finding hope when life gets tough, Stan Toler will have you boldly laughing in the face of difficult circumstances..
Price: $3.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Imagine this:
First graders analyzing texts, critiquing ideas, debating points, and making connections Third graders sharing analogies between slaves' lives in the 1800s and their own.Fifth graders synthesizing elements of foreshadowing before the term is even mentioned.

This is what literature conversations are all about. And this is what Ardith Cole writes about in this book, a comprehensive, inspiring guide to the art and practice of literature conversations.

Cole is committed to literature conversations because she has watched them change lives and perspectives, build confidence and compassion, and produce dramatic consequences, both in and out of the classroom. That's why she wants teachers to understand the importance of teaching children how to talk about their reading. In Knee to Knee, Eye to Eye Cole addresses text, organization, management, assessment, and the tremendous amount of learning that occurs through the powerful, engaging combination of books and talk. Most important, she offers a step-by-step guided comprehension process in which teachers have students:

• observe, analyze, and investigate the workings of a real conversation
• "wonder" with a partner after a read-aloud
• refine content and behaviors in one large literature conversation
• use the process in a small group without the teacher's presence
• read independently for conversation grist that will later drive interactions and assessments.

Because dialogue is critical to this process, the book features plentiful examples to demonstrate the higher levels of thinking and rich discussions that occur as students move into constructing their own knowledge. An appendix includes textual resources to use during read-aloud modeling lessons and sample conversation transcriptions that are handy examples for instruction and assessment.

Create a conversation community in your classroom. Invite your students into this culture of focused talk. Build relationships between and among students. And watch as they develop deep, reflective conversations as reading becomes an adventure in learning.

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Price: $17.55 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Sure, running sounds easy enough. But a good running program involves more than just buying a pair of new sneakers and hitting the pavement From gentle jogs to intense marathons, this guide will help you to choose the right equipment, train safely, and meet your running goals. Written by a veteran marathon runner and trainer, this book teaches you how to:

• Set immediate and long-term running goals
• Prevent injuries
• Avoid plateaus
• Workout at any level
• Regulate your water intake
• Cross-train with weights and alternative methods (like yoga)

You'll also find information on ensuring correct posture, tailoring running to your age, and training for and running a 5K, 10K, half-marathon, and marathon. The Everything Running Book, 2nd Edition has everything you need-from start to finish!.
Price: $9.52 [Notify me when price goes down.]

An inspirational guide for mothers, grandmothers, stepmothers, aunts, or any woman wishing to nurture a girl through her coming of age (while empowering herself!)
This book provides practical guidelines for mentoring a girl into womanhood. It offers creative ceremonies and activities designed to honor a girl s transition and call her to new levels of maturity. At the same time, it presents the adult woman/mentor with powerful tools for enhancing her inner and outer life. The book is motivated by the belief that for a girl to enter womanhood in a meaningful way, it is essential that her mother and other special women in her life cultivate a new way of relating that will gradually help her to become their peer..
Price: $45.15 [Notify me when price goes down.]

After many years of limited commitments to people or places, writer and naturalist John Lane married in his late forties and settled down in his hometown of Spartanburg, in the South Carolina piedmont. He, his wife, and two stepsons built a sustainable home in the woods near Lawson's Fork Creek. Soon after settling in, Lane pinpointed his location on a topographical map. Centering an old, chipped saucer over his home, he traced a circle one mile in radius and set out to explore the area.

What follows from that simple act is a chronicle of Lane's deepening knowledge of the place where he'll likely finish out his life. An accomplished hiker and paddler, Lane discovers, within a mile of his home, a variety of coexistent landscapes--ancient and modern, natural and manmade. There is, of course, the creek with its granite shoals, floodplain, and surrounding woods. The circle also encompasses an eight-thousand-year-old cache of Native American artifacts, graves of a dozen British soldiers killed in 1780, an eighteenth-century ironworks site, remnants of two cotton plantations, a hundred-year-old country club, a sewer plant, and a smattering of mid- to late twentieth-century subdivisions.

Lane's explorations intensify his bonds to family, friends, and colleagues as they sharpen his sense of place. By looking more deeply at what lies close to home, both the ordinary and the remarkable, Lane shows us how whole new worlds can open up..
Price: $15.43 [Notify me when price goes down.]

O'Keeffe's most significant contribution to art history was her unique approach to abstraction This book examines, for the first time an overlooked aspect of O'Keeffe's work, focusing on her distinctive use of circular forms as an abstract motif..
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