Emo Nemo

Mily

Sarah

Shaidrian Rios

Jimmy Beans

miCCwatreSSop

Julie Wynne - videos

Kapuster

Nicky Tallon

Harini Sen

Vastralaya

Evan Shively (Perseus271)

Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Why do drug dealers still live with their moms? How much do parents really matter? What kind of impact did Roe v. Wade have on violent crime? Freakonomics will literally redefine the way we view the modern world.These may not sound like typical questions for an economist to ask. But Steven D. Levitt is not a typical economist. He is a much heralded scholar who studies the stuff and riddles of everyday life -- from cheating and crime to sports and child rearing -- and whose conclusions regularly turn the conventional wisdom on its head. He usually begins with a mountain of data and a simple, unasked question. Some of these questions concern life-and-death issues; others have an admittedly freakish quality. Thus the new field of study contained in this book: freakonomics.Through forceful storytelling and wry insight, Levitt and co-author Stephen J. Dubner show that economics is, at root, the study of incentives -- how people get what they want, or need, especially when other people want or need the same thing. In Freakonomics, they set out to explore the hidden side of ... well, everything. The inner workings of a crack gang. The truth about real-estate agents. The myths of campaign finance. The telltale marks of a cheating schoolteacher. The secrets of the Ku Klux Klan.What unites all these stories is a belief that the modern world, despite a surfeit of obfuscation, complication, and downright deceit, is not impenetrable, is not unknowable, and -- if the right questions are asked -- is even more intriguing than we think. All it takes is a new way of looking. Steven Levitt, through devilishly clever and clear-eyed thinking, shows how to see through all the clutter.Freakonomics establishes this unconventional premise: If morality represents how we would like the world to work, then economics represents how it actually does work. It is true that readers of this book will be armed with enough riddles and stories to last a thousand cocktail parties. But Freakonomics can provide more than that. It will literally redefine the way we view the modern world.(front flap)

This edition features George Orwell's best known novels – 1984 and Animal Farm – with an introduction by Christopher Hitchens. In 1984, London is a grim city where Big Brother is always watching you and the Thought Police can practically read your mind.  Winston Smith joins a secret revolutionary organization called The Brotherhood, dedicated to the destruction of the Party. Together with his beloved Julia, he hazards his life in a deadly match against the powers that be.Animal Farm is Orwell's classic satire of the Russian Revolution -- an account of the bold struggle, initiated by the animals, that transforms Mr. Jones's Manor Farm into Animal Farm--a wholly democratic society built on the credo that All Animals Are Created Equal. But are they?

At the dawn of the next world war, a plane crashes on an uncharted island, stranding a group of schoolboys. At first, with no adult supervision, their freedom is something to celebrate; this far from civilization the boys can do anything they want. Anything. They attempt to forge their own society, failing, however, in the face of terror, sin and evil. And as order collapses, as strange howls echo in the night, as terror begins its reign, the hope of adventure seems as far from reality as the hope of being rescued. Labeled a parable, an allegory, a myth, a morality tale, a parody, a political treatise, even a vision of the apocalypse, Lord of the Flies is perhaps our most memorable novel about “the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart.”

WARNING: Some of my political views are discussed in this VERY LONG review. I don't think there is anything offensive but with politics, you never know. Therefore, in case anything I say upsets anyone, I have included several very CUTE kitten photos by way of apology. 6.0 stars.  On Liberty has secured a spot on my list of “All Time Favorite” books. I have gone through a pretty significant political re-examination over the last several years (maybe a lot of us have). A few years ago, if you were to line up everyone on goodreads according to political beliefs, I would guess that I would be found at the more conservative end of the spectrum. However, recently, I have come to see that I disagree with “LARGE CHUNKS” of both political parties and find myself embracing a more “libertarian” philosophy. Without going into a detailed thesis of my political beliefs, I am going to share a few basic beliefs so that you will understand where I am coming from in relation to the theories that Mill argues in favor of in this book. ...The following is a political advertisement on behalf of S-PAC (Stupid Political Asshats of Congress) …which is sponsored in part by the WTF Association whose motto is, “When you can see it but just can’t believe it….WTF.”\
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 Social Issues:On social issues, I think you can generally sum up my feelings as follows:I believe, with certain exceptions, everyone should be free to do whatever they want so long they are not causing harm to anybody else and this freedom necessarily extends to control over their own body. I know that is pretty simplistic but the nuances would take forever to explain so hopefully I can explain the basic gist. For example, I think people should be able to:(a): Eat whatever you want (does not seem to be a problem for people in the U.S.);(b): Drink what you want (of course, we run into the whole “cause no harm” thing once you get behind the wheel);(c): Smoke cigarettes and cigars if you want…with reasonable restrictions for places where people either have no choice in being (e.g., work, school) or “little” choice (e.g., an airplane or mass transportation). (d): Do drugs if you want… I may not like this one but it would be “hypocritical” of me to distinguish this from the whole “free to live as you want and control your own body” philosophy (however, the “cause no harm” requirement still applies). (e): Love who you want…provided we are talking consenting ADULTS***. For me, this is a no-brainer. Two consenting adults caring for one another...let's move on. ***Point of clarification #1…I said consenting ADULTS. Pedophiles and NAMBLA spokesmen can go ahead and sit back down…or better yet:\
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(f): Abortion….uh, I think I just stumbled upon one of the third rails of politics. However, like the drug issue I think it would be hypocritical of me to argue an exception to the whole “control over your own body” philosophy and therefore, regardless of what one personally believes, I don’t believe you should have the right to impose that belief on someone else and thus a person should be “free to choose.”******Point of Clarificaiton #2... I can hear the “do no harm” contingent screaming on this one and I understand the argument but (for me at least), the other interests don’t overcome the fundamental freedom over one’s own body. Okay, this is getting a little heavy, so I would like to take a short break to look at another cute animal photo:\
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Ahhhhh, that is cute. Okay, I feel better.  Economic Issues: Being consistent and applying the same reasoning as above to economic issues will probably make me sound very conservative, but it is really just a consistent application of the concept of individual freedom. Basically, I think that people should be free to keep what they earn, except for some reasonably allocated portion needed to DEFEND*** the Country and to protect the rights of people to live their lives free from oppression by their neighbor. *** Point of Clarification #3...I said DEFEND the Country. That does NOT mean the equivalent of getting a bunch of your buddies together, grabbing a pile of gold from the money room and storming off next door because you think they MIGHT be the next Mordor. \
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Now I certainly understand that for a lot of people this is just too limited a governmental role and they feel like there are things the government NEEDS to do. I certainly acknowledge that the government does a lot of things that help a lot of people. For me, the problem arises when I step back and start with the basic premise that every dollar the government has must be TAKEN from someone (e.g., through taxes, tariffs, or borrowing from our kids). Now when those “taxes” go to benefit everyone (e.g., defense, police, courts, etc.) then it is simply a matter of figuring out how to fairly allocate the burden among the people. However, when money is taken from one group and given it to another group, suddenly you are in the position of necessarily imposing one group’s values on another. Suddenly it is necessary to “lobby” the government so that your group is the one that comes out on top. Thus, you get the rise of the “special interest” group, the name calling, the buying of influence through “campaign contribution” and everyone fighting for control over the public teat. Basically, you get our current political system which just seems broken to me. Well, I have probably said more about myself than most of you care to know. Hopefully, I haven’t offended anyone even if you don’t agree with anything I have said. Thank you for listening to me ramble and, as a form of appreciation, I offer you another cute kitten picture:\
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...Well, with that VERY LONG introduction, I now come to the book itself. \
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 On Liberty is in many ways a “bible” for libertarian philosophy and encompasses many of the ideas I mentioned above. In the book, Mill takes the position that, with certain limited exceptions, people should be free to think what they want, believe what they want, worship (or not worship) as they want, speak and write freely and conduct their own personal lives without interference from the government. Mill argues that the government’s role should be to create the environment whereby people can be free from the oppression of their neighbor and should not intrude in or exert control over the day to day lives of its citizens. In addition to his strong defense in favor of freedom of the press, freedom of religion and freedom of assembly and debate, Mill also passionately argues that all of the very assumptions that we live by should never be held so sacred as to be excluded from debate. Mill argues that only by examining our beliefs and subjecting them to rigorous debate and evaluation can we achieve true wisdom. I thought that was a wonderful way of saying keep an open mind and always be willing to challenge your assumptions. One final thing I wanted to mention that I found fascinating for a book written in 1859, was Mills position on women’s rights. Mills categorically believed that the right to be free and live your life as you choose applied equally to both women and men. He spoke of the “oppression” of husbands over their wives as being absolutely contrary to the principle of individual freedom. I found him to seriously ahead of time on that subject and it just made me appreciate his positions even more.Overall, I have rarely found myself more in agreement with a book on political theory and am sure I will be reading this again in the future. HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATION!!! 

The Republic (Greek: Πολιτεία, translit. Politeia; Latin: De Republica) is a Socratic dialogue, authored by Plato around 375 BC, concerning justice (δικαιοσύνη), the order and character of the just city-state, and the just man. It is Plato's best-known work, and has proven to be one of the world's most influential works of philosophy and political theory, both intellectually and historically.In the dialogue, Socrates talks with various Athenians and foreigners about the meaning of justice and whether the just man is happier than the unjust man. They consider the natures of existing regimes and then propose a series of different, hypothetical cities in comparison, culminating in Kallipolis (Καλλίπολις), a utopian city-state ruled by a philosopher-king. They also discuss the theory of forms, the immortality of the soul, and the role of the philosopher and of poetry in society. The dialogue's setting seems to be during the Peloponnesian War.

What would happen if two statistics-minded outsiders were allowed to run a professional baseball team?It's the ultimate in fantasy baseball: You get to pick the roster, set the lineup, and decide on strategies -- with real players, in a real ballpark, playing in real time. That's what Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller got to do when the Sonoma Stompers, an independent minor-league team in California, offered them the chance to run the team's baseball operations according to the most advanced statistics. The Only Rule Is It Has to Work is unlike any other baseball tale you've ever read.We tag along as Lindbergh and Miller apply their number-crunching insights to all aspects of assembling and running a team. We meet colorful figures like general manager Theo Fightmaster and boundary-breakers like the first openly gay professional player and the first Japanese manager in American professional baseball. Even José Canseco makes a cameo appearance.Will sabermetrics bring the Stompers a championship, or will they fall on their face? Will the team have a competitive advantage or is the old folk wisdom really true after all? Will the players be able to maximize their talents and attract the attention of big-league scouts, or will this be a fast track to oblivion?It's a wild ride, as the authors' infectious enthusiasm and feel for the absurd make the Stompers' story one that will speak to numbers geeks and traditionalists alike. And it proves that you don't need a bat or a glove to make a genuine contribution to the game.

Billy Beane, general manager of MLB's Oakland A's and protagonist of Michael Lewis's Moneyball, had a problem: how to win in the Major Leagues with a budget that's smaller than that of nearly every other team. Conventional wisdom long held that big name, highly athletic hitters and young pitchers with rocket arms were the ticket to success. But Beane and his staff, buoyed by massive amounts of carefully interpreted statistical data, believed that wins could be had by more affordable methods such as hitters with high on-base percentage and pitchers who get lots of ground outs. Given this information and a tight budget, Beane defied tradition and his own scouting department to build winning teams of young affordable players and inexpensive castoff veterans.  Lewis was in the room with the A's top management as they spent the summer of 2002 adding and subtracting players and he provides outstanding play-by-play. In the June player draft, Beane acquired nearly every prospect he coveted (few of whom were coveted by other teams) and at the July trading deadline he engaged in a tense battle of nerves to acquire a lefty reliever. Besides being one of the most insider accounts ever written about baseball, Moneyball is populated with fascinating characters. We meet Jeremy Brown, an overweight college catcher who most teams project to be a 15th round draft pick (Beane takes him in the first). Sidearm pitcher Chad Bradford is plucked from the White Sox triple-A club to be a key set-up man and catcher Scott Hatteberg is rebuilt as a first baseman. But the most interesting character is Beane himself. A speedy athletic can't-miss prospect who somehow missed, Beane reinvents himself as a front-office guru, relying on players completely unlike, say, Billy Beane. Lewis, one of the top nonfiction writers of his era (Liar's Poker, The New New Thing), offers highly accessible explanations of baseball stats and his roadmap of Beane's economic approach makes Moneyball an appealing reading experience for business people and sports fans alike. --John Moe

The apprenticeship is over—now the real test has begun.When word that Yelena is a Soulfinder—able to capture and release souls—spreads like wildfire, people grow uneasy. Already Yelena's unusual abilities and past have set her apart. As the Council debates Yelena's fate, she receives a disturbing message: a plot is rising against her homeland, led by a murderous sorcerer she has defeated before...Honor sets Yelena on a path that will test the limits of her skills, and the hope of reuniting with her beloved spurs her onward. Her journey is fraught with allies, enemies, lovers and would-be assassins, each of questionable loyalty. Yelena will have but one chance to prove herself—and save the land she holds dear.

You know your life is complicated when you miss your days as a poison taster...With her greatest enemy dead, and on her way to be united with the family she'd been stolen from long ago, Yelena should be pleased. But although she has gained her freedom, she once again finds herself alone - separated from her lover Valek and suspected as a spy for her reluctance to conform to Sitian ways.Despite the turmoil, she's eager to start her magic training - especially as she's been given one year to harness her power or be put to death. But her plans take a radical turn when she becomes embroiled in a plot to reclaim Ixia's throne for a lost prince - and gets entangled in powerful rivalries with her fellow magicians. If that wasn't bad enough, it appears her brother would love to see her dead. Luckily, Yelena has some old friends to help her with her new enemies.

Choose: A quick death… or slow poison...About to be executed for murder, Yelena is offered an extraordinary reprieve. She'll eat the best meals, have rooms in the palace—and risk assassination by anyone trying to kill the Commander of Ixia.And so Yelena chooses to become a food taster. But the chief of security, leaving nothing to chance, deliberately feeds her Butterfly's Dust—and only by appearing for her daily antidote will she delay an agonizing death from the poison.As Yelena tries to escape her new dilemma, disasters keep mounting. Rebels plot to seize Ixia and Yelena develops magical powers she can't control. Her life is threatened again and choices must be made. But this time the outcomes aren't so clear...

Crows will fight over a dead man's flesh, and kill each other for his eyes.Bloodthirsty, treacherous and cunning, the Lannisters are in power on the Iron Throne in the name of the boy-king Tommen. The war in the Seven Kingdoms has burned itself out, but in its bitter aftermath new conflicts spark to life.The Martells of Dorne and the Starks of Winterfell seek vengeance for their dead. Euron Crow's Eye, as black a pirate as ever raised a sail, returns from the smoking ruins of Valyria to claim the Iron Isles. From the icy north, where Others threaten the Wall, apprentice Maester Samwell Tarly brings a mysterious babe in arms to the Citadel.Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, victory will go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel and the coldest hearts.

In the aftermath of a colossal battle, the future of the Seven Kingdoms hangs in the balance—beset by newly emerging threats from every direction. In the east, Daenerys Targaryen, the last scion of House Targaryen, rules with her three dragons as queen of a city built on dust and death. But Daenerys has thousands of enemies, and many have set out to find her. As they gather, one young man embarks upon his own quest for the queen, with an entirely different goal in mind.Fleeing from Westeros with a price on his head, Tyrion Lannister, too, is making his way to Daenerys. But his newest allies in this quest are not the rag-tag band they seem, and at their heart lies one who could undo Daenerys’s claim to Westeros forever.Meanwhile, to the north lies the mammoth Wall of ice and stone—a structure only as strong as those guarding it. There, Jon Snow, 998th Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch, will face his greatest challenge. For he has powerful foes not only within the Watch but also beyond, in the land of the creatures of ice.From all corners, bitter conflicts reignite, intimate betrayals are perpetrated, and a grand cast of outlaws and priests, soldiers and skinchangers, nobles and slaves, will face seemingly insurmountable obstacles. Some will fail, others will grow in the strength of darkness. But in a time of rising restlessness, the tides of destiny and politics will lead inevitably to the greatest dance of all.

An alternate cover for this isbn can be found here.Here is the third volume in George R.R. Martin's magnificent cycle of novels that includes A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings. Together, this series comprises a genuine masterpiece of modern fantasy, destined to stand as one of the great achievements of imaginative fiction.Of the five contenders for power, one is dead, another in disfavor, and still the wars rage as alliances are made and broken. Joffrey sits on the Iron Throne, the uneasy ruler of the Seven Kingdoms. His most bitter rival, Lord Stannis, stands defeated and disgraced, victim of the sorceress who holds him in her thrall. Young Robb still rules the North from the fortress of Riverrun. Meanwhile, making her way across a blood-drenched continent is the exiled queen, Daenerys, mistress of the only three dragons still left in the world. And as opposing forces manoeuver for the final showdown, an army of barbaric wildlings arrives from the outermost limits of civilization, accompanied by a horde of mythical Others—a supernatural army of the living dead whose animated corpses are unstoppable. As the future of the land hangs in the balance, no one will rest until the Seven Kingdoms have exploded in a veritable storm of swords...

Told with deadpan humour and bitter irony, Kurt Vonnegut's cult tale of global destruction preys on our deepest fears of witnessing Armageddon and, worse still, surviving it ...Dr Felix Hoenikker, one of the founding 'fathers' of the atomic bomb, has left a deadly legacy to the world. For he's the inventor of 'ice-nine', a lethal chemical capable of freezing the entire planet. The search for its whereabouts leads to Hoenikker's three ecentric children, to a crazed dictator in the Caribbean, to madness. Felix Hoenikker's Death Wish comes true when his last, fatal gift to humankind brings about the end, that for all of us, is nigh...

Six months in the life of the world's most dangerous teenager.Youth in Revolt is the journals of Nick Twisp, California's most precocious diarist, whose ongoing struggles to make sense out of high school, deal with his divorced parents, and lose his virginity result in his transformation from an unassuming fourteen-year-old to a modern youth in open revolt. As his family splinters, worlds collide, and the police block all routes out of town, Nick must cope with economic deprivation, homelessness, the gulag of the public schools, a competitive Type-A father, murderous canines (in triplicate), and an inconvenient hair trigger on his erectile response—all while vying ardently for the affections of the beauteous Sheeni Saunders, teenage goddess and ultimate intellectual goad.

The hero-narrator of The Catcher in the Rye is an ancient child of sixteen, a native New Yorker named Holden Caulfield. Through circumstances that tend to preclude adult, secondhand description, he leaves his prep school in Pennsylvania and goes underground in New York City for three days. The boy himself is at once too simple and too complex for us to make any final comment about him or his story. Perhaps the safest thing we can say about Holden is that he was born in the world not just strongly attracted to beauty but, almost, hopelessly impaled on it. There are many voices in this novel: children's voices, adult voices, underground voices-but Holden's voice is the most eloquent of all. Transcending his own vernacular, yet remaining marvelously faithful to it, he issues a perfectly articulated cry of mixed pain and pleasure. However, like most lovers and clowns and poets of the higher orders, he keeps most of the pain to, and for, himself. The pleasure he gives away, or sets aside, with all his heart. It is there for the reader who can handle it to keep. J.D. Salinger's classic novel of teenage angst and rebellion was first published in 1951. The novel was included on Time's 2005 list of the 100 best English-language novels written since 1923. It was named by Modern Library and its readers as one of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century. It has been frequently challenged in the court for its liberal use of profanity and portrayal of sexuality and in the 1950's and 60's it was the novel that every teenage boy wants to read.

Written in his distinctively dazzling manner, Oscar Wilde’s story of a fashionable young man who sells his soul for eternal youth and beauty is the author’s most popular work. The tale of Dorian Gray’s moral disintegration caused a scandal when it ﬁrst appeared in 1890, but though Wilde was attacked for the novel’s corrupting inﬂuence, he responded that there is, in fact, “a terrible moral in Dorian Gray.” Just a few years later, the book and the aesthetic/moral dilemma it presented became issues in the trials occasioned by Wilde’s homosexual liaisons, which resulted in his imprisonment. Of Dorian Gray’s relationship to autobiography, Wilde noted in a letter, “Basil Hallward is what I think I am: Lord Henry what the world thinks me: Dorian what I would like to be—in other ages, perhaps.

I don’t know what to do with these stars anymore. I give stars to books and then I think, ‘god, you give five stars to everything, people will think you are terribly undiscriminating’ – so then I give four stars or even three stars to some books. Then I look back and it turns out that that I’ve given four stars to Of Human Bondage and honestly, how could I possibly have thought it was a good idea to give that book less than five stars? It is the absurdity of human conventions that has us doing such things.Now, that is what is called a segue, from the Italian ‘seguire’ – to follow. For the last thirty years I have studiously avoided reading this book. I have done that because for the last thirty years I have known exactly what this book is about and there just didn’t seem any point in reading it. In high school friends (one of them even became my ex-wife) told me it was a great book about a man condemned to die because he was an outsider. Later I was told that this book was a story about something much like the Azaria Chamberlain case. A case where someone does not react in a way that is considered to be ‘socially appropriate’ and is therefore condemned.But after 30 years of avoiding reading this book I have finally relented and read it. At first I didn’t think I was going to enjoy it. It didn’t really get off to the raciest of starts and the character's voice – it is told in first person – was a bit dull. He is a man who lives entirely in the present, how terribly Buddhist of him – although, really there doesn’t seem to be all that much to him.My opinion of the book began to change at his mother’s funeral. I particularly liked the man who kept falling behind in the march to the cemetery and would take short cuts. Okay, so it is black humour, but Camus was more or less French – so black humour is more or less obligatory.I really hadn’t expected this book to be nearly so funny as it turned out. I’d always been told it was a ponderous philosophical text – and so, to be honest, I was expecting to be bored out of my skull. I wasn’t in the least bit bored.A constant theme in my life at present is that I read ‘classics’ expecting them to be about something and they end up being about something completely different. And given I’ve called this a ‘constant’ theme then you might think I would be less than surprised when a read a new ‘classic’ and it turns out to be completely different to my expectations. I’m a little more upset about this one than some of the others, as I’ve been told about this one before, repeatedly, and by people I’d have taken as ‘reputable sources’ – although, frankly, how well one should trust one’s ex-wife in such matters is moot.I had gotten the distinct impression from all of my previous discussions about this book that the guy ends up dead. In fact, this is not the case – he ends up at the point in his life where he has no idea if he will be freed or not. The Priest who comes to him at the end is actually quite certain that he will be freed. Let’s face it, he is only guilty of having murdered an Arab, and as we have daily evidence, Westerners can murder Arabs with complete impunity. The main point of the book to me is when he realises he is no longer ‘free’. He needs this explained to him – because life up until then had been about ‘getting used to things’ and one can 'get used to just about anything'. But the prison guard helpfully informs him that he is being ‘punished’ and the manifestation of that punishment is the removal of his ‘freedom’. Interestingly, he didn’t notice the difference between his past ‘free’ life and his current ‘unfree’ one. The most interesting part of the book to me was the very end, the conversation with the priest. The religious often make the mistake of thinking that Atheists are one thing – I’ve no idea how they ever came to make this mistake, but make it they do. Given that there are thousands upon thousands of different shades of Christians – from Jesuit Catholics to Anti-Disney Episcopalians – it should be fairly obvious that something like Atheism (without any ‘organised’ church or even system of beliefs) could not be in anyway ‘homogeneous’.I am definitely not the same kind of Atheist as Camus. To Camus there is no truth, the world is essentially absurd and all that exists is the relative truth an individual places on events and ideas. This makes the conversation with the priest fascinatingly interesting. To the priest the prisoner who is facing death is – by necessity – someone who is interested in God. You can play around with ideas like the non-existence of God when it doesn’t seem to matter (life is long and blasphemy can seem fun) – but surely when confronted with the stark truth of the human condition any man would turn away from their disbelief and see the shining light.Not this little black duck. Now, if I was in that cell I would have argued with the priest too – but I would not have argued in the same way that Meursault argues. No, I do not believe in God, but I do believe in truth, and so Camus’ arguments are barred to me.Meursault essentially says, “Look, I’m bored, I’m totally uninterested in the rubbish you are talking – now go away”. Now, this is a reasonable response. What is very interesting is that the priest cannot accept this as an answer. The world is not allowed to have such a person in it – if such a person really did exist then it would be a fundamental challenge to the core beliefs of the priest. So, he has to assume Meursault is either lying to him or is trying to taunt him. But it is much worse – he is absolutely sincere, he is not interested in this ‘truth’.I don’t know that the world is completely meaningless, it is conventional rather than meaningless. That those conventions are arbitrary (decided by the culture we grew up in) doesn’t make them meaningless, it makes them conventional. I don’t think I would like to live in a world where people go up and kill Arabs pretty much at random and with impunity, but then again, we have already established this is precisely the world I do live in. My point is that it would be better if we did adhere to some sort of moral principles and that these should be better principles than ‘he should be killed because he didn’t cry at his mum’s funeral’. Camus is seeking to say that all of our ‘moral principles’ in the end come to be as meaningless as that – we judge on the basis of what we see from the framework of our own limited experience. And look, yes, there is much to this – but this ends up being too easy.The thing I like most about Existentialism, though it isn’t really as evident in this book as it is in the actual philosophy – although this is something that Meursault is supposed to have grown to understand (sorry, just one more sub-clause) even though this wasn’t something I noticed at all while reading the book, was the notion of responsibility. I didn’t think in the end Meursault was all that much more ‘responsible’ for his actions than he had been at the start. But I do think that ‘responsibility’ is a key concept in morality and one that seems increasingly to be ignored.Better by far that we feel responsible for too much in our lives than too little – better by far that we take responsibility for the actions of our governments (say) than to call these governments ‘them’. I’m not advocating believing in The Secret - but that if one must err, better to err on the side of believing you have too much responsibility for how your life has turned out, rather than too little.So, what can I say? I enjoyed this much more than I expected – but I’m still glad I waited before reading it, I really don’t think I would have gotten nearly as much out of it at 15 as I did now.

Humbert Humbert - scholar, aesthete and romantic - has fallen completely and utterly in love with Lolita Haze, his landlady's gum-snapping, silky skinned twelve-year-old daughter. Reluctantly agreeing to marry Mrs Haze just to be close to Lolita, Humbert suffers greatly in the pursuit of romance; but when Lo herself starts looking for attention elsewhere, he will carry her off on a desperate cross-country misadventure, all in the name of Love. Hilarious, flamboyant, heart-breaking and full of ingenious word play, Lolita is an immaculate, unforgettable masterpiece of obsession, delusion and lust.

Goat Simulator is the latest in goat simulation technology, bringing next-gen goat simulation to YOU. You no longer have to fantasize about being a goat, your d...

The Long Dark is a thoughtful, exploration-survival experience that challenges solo players to think for themselves as they explore an expansive frozen wilderne...

You manage the Kestrel and its crew as you explore the galaxy. Strategic, real-time combat involves managing power between essential systems and choosing which...

The communist state of Arstotzka has just ended a 6-year war with neighboring Kolechia and reclaimed its rightful half of the border town, Grestin. Your job as...

[Xbox Live Arcade] Uncertain of his sister's fate, a boy enters LIMBO....

The Stanley Parable HD Remix is an updated version of the Half-Life 2 mod The Stanley Parable. It is a first person exploration game. You will play as Stanley,...

Dear Esther is a first-person ghost story. Rather than traditional game-play the focus here is on exploration, uncovering the mystery of a lonely island, of who...

The eldest daughter of the Greenbriar family returns after a year abroad. She expects her parents and sister to greet her. Instead she finds only a deserted hou...

Based on the award-winning Fables comic book series by Bill Willingham (published by DC Comics' Vertigo imprint), The Wolf Among Us is a dark, often brutally vi...

Los Santos is a vast, sun-soaked metropolis full of self-help gurus, starlets and once-important, formerly-known-as celebrities. The city was once the envy of t...

Twenty years after a pandemic radically transformed known civilization, infected humans run amuck and survivors kill one another for sustenance and weapons - li...

Life is Strange is a hand drawn work of art and every action enacts a butterfly effect - but with the power to rewind time, what would you change? And would it...

Rockstar Games and Team Bondi are crafting a film noir-style detective thriller for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360....

Climb, swim, and backflip your way through a maze of cryptic deathtraps so realistic you can practically smell the decaying flesh. Unload an arsenal of lethal f...

The next chapter in the Elder Scrolls saga arrives from the Bethesda Game Studios. Skyrim reimagines the open-world fantasy epic, bringing to life a complete vi...

Alan Wake is a psychological action thriller, a unique new take in the world of gaming. The game is set in an idyllic all-American small town and its surroundin...

Initially conceived as a floating symbol of American ideals at a time when the United States was emerging as a world power, Columbia is sent to distant shores w...

Going beyond "run and gun corridors," "monster-closet AIs" and static worlds, BioShock creates a living, unique and unpredictable FPS experience. After your pla...

What Remains of Edith Finch is a collection of short stories about a cursed family in Washington State....

Disco Elysium is an open world role playing game. You’re a detective with a unique skill system at your disposal and a whole city block to carve your path acr...

A sexually frustrated suburban father has a mid-life crisis after becoming infatuated with his daughter's best friend.

1999 American drama film directed by Sam Mendes

A television reporter and cameraman follow emergency workers into a dark apartment building and are quickly locked inside with something terrifying.

2007 film by Jaume Balagueró, Paco Plaza

A washed-up superhero actor attempts to revive his fading career by writing, directing, and starring in a Broadway production.

2014 film directed by Alejandro G. Iñárritu

Crazy, Stupid, Love is a 2011 American romantic comedy film directed by Glenn Ficarra and John Requa, written by Dan Fogelman and starring Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling, Julianne Moore, Emma Stone, Marisa Tomei and Kevin Bacon. It follows a recently separated man who seeks to rediscover his manhood and is taught how to pick up women at bars.The film was released in the United States by Warner Bros. Pictures on July 29, 2011, grossing over $142 million against its $50 million budget. Gosling was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy for his performance.Cal Weaver is a middle-aged man whose wife Emily asks for a divorce after she reveals an affair she had with co-worker David Lindhagen. After moving into his own apartment, Cal begins frequenting an upscale bar, talking loudly about his divorce, until he attracts the attention of a young man named Jacob Palmer. Jacob, a womanizer who beds different women each night, was recently rejected by a woman named Hannah. Jacob takes pity on Cal and offers to teach him how to pick up women. After a few awkward attempts to talk to women, Cal seduces Kate at the bar. This experience gives Cal the confidence to approach other women, and Cal begins to emulate Jacob's example successfully.

Two detectives, a rookie and a veteran, hunt a serial killer who uses the seven deadly sins as his motives.

1995 neo-noir crime thriller film by David Fincher

Barely 21 yet, Frank is a skilled forger who has passed as a doctor, lawyer and pilot. FBI agent Carl becomes obsessed with tracking down the con man, who only revels in the pursuit.

A spy organisation recruits a promising street kid into the agency's training program, while a global threat emerges from a twisted tech genius.

A skilled London police officer is transferred to a small town with a dark secret.

Two English comic book geeks traveling across the U.S. encounter an alien outside Area 51.

A man's uneventful life is disrupted by the zombie apocalypse.

In a magically realistic version of Toronto, a young man must defeat his new girlfriend's seven evil exes one by one in order to win her heart.

2010 American-British-Japanese-Canadian film by Edgar Wright

Through a series of freak occurrences, a group of actors shooting a big-budget war movie are forced to become the soldiers they are portraying.

2008 American satirical action comedy film directed by Ben Stiller

A process server and his marijuana dealer wind up on the run from hitmen and a corrupt police officer after he witnesses his dealer's boss murder a competitor while trying to serve papers on him.

2008 American stoner action comedy film directed by David Gordon Green

A pair of underachieving cops are sent back to a local high school to blend in and bring down a synthetic drug ring.

Two co-dependent high school seniors are forced to deal with separation anxiety after their plan to stage a booze-soaked party goes awry.

Set on the last day of camp, in the hot summer of 1981, a group of counselors try to complete their unfinished business before the day ends.

A hapless young Viking who aspires to hunt dragons becomes the unlikely friend of a young dragon himself, and learns there may be more to the creatures than he assumed.

2010 animated film directed by Dean DeBlois and Chris Sanders

In a post-apocalyptic wasteland, a woman rebels against a tyrannical ruler in search for her homeland with the aid of a group of female prisoners, a psychotic worshiper, and a drifter named Max.

2015 Australian post-apocalyptic action film directed by George Miller

Zombieland is a 2009 American post-apocalyptic zombie comedy film directed by Ruben Fleischer and written by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick. It stars Woody Harrelson, Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone, Abigail Breslin, and Bill Murray. In the film, Tallahassee (Harrelson), Columbus (Eisenberg), Wichita (Stone), and Little Rock (Breslin) make their way on an extended crosscountry road trip to find a sanctuary free from zombies.

Detective Sherlock Holmes and his stalwart partner Watson engage in a battle of wits and brawn with a nemesis whose plot is a threat to all of England.

American singer, rapper, songwriter and flutist

Pacific is a 1978 album featuring instrumental compositions by Japanese musicians Haruomi Hosono, Shigeru Suzuki and Tatsuro Yamashita. It is the first in the CBS/Sony Sound Image Series.Jen Monroe of Listen to This called the album "a classic," stating "its unabashed tropical nostalgia acts as a jumping off point for flitting between genres (lounge, funk, disco, rhumba, smooth jazz, Latin fusion, synth pop), all delivered in full-color with jaunty, winking songwriting."

A young woman, destined to slay vampires, demons and other infernal creatures, deals with her life fighting evil, with the help of her friends.

1997 American supernatural drama TV series

A suspended lawyer is forced to enroll in a community college with an eccentric staff and student body.

American comedy television series created by Dan Harmon

Maniac is the story of Espen, a man in his thirties who is loved by everyone. Every day is a party and there's no limit to what he experiences. We meet Espen in various situations where everything is amazing and whatever happens, Esp

An intelligent high school student goes on a secret crusade to eliminate criminals from the world after discovering a notebook capable of killing anyone whose name is written into it.

The further adventures in time and space of the alien adventurer known as the Doctor and their companions from planet Earth.

Dancers skilled in everything from ballroom and ballet to salsa, jive, hip-hop and krumping, all compete to be named the best. Dancers must impress the judges with their moves and rigorous routines in order to survive the auditions a

Hip-hop dance groups from around the U.S. compete for money and a chance to land a touring contract.

Aspiring fashion designers compete for a chance to break into the industry in this reality competition. Each week, a designer is eliminated from the competition after exhibiting their work in front of a judges' panel.

Awakened into a world where humanity has been petrified, scientific genius Senku and his brawny friend Taiju use their skills to rebuild civilization.

Two brothers search for a Philosopher's Stone after an attempt to revive their deceased mother goes awry and leaves them in damaged physical forms.

After his hometown is destroyed and his mother is killed, young Eren Yeager vows to cleanse the earth of the giant humanoid Titans that have brought humanity to the brink of extinction.

The satiric adventures of a working-class family in the misfit city of Springfield.

American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening

Contestants must compete against each other for a chance to win $500,000 in a house wired with cameras and microphones, capturing their every move for a TV and Internet audience.

Multiple teams race around the globe for $1,000,000 to 'amazing' locations.

A reality show where a group of contestants are stranded in a remote location with little more than the clothes on their back. The lone survivor of this contest takes home a million dollars.

The comics from season one face off against the comics from season two.

A game show in which globe-trotting contestants solve puzzles and complete tasks in order to win a cash prize -- all while trying to figure out who among them is a player planted to sabotage the game.

Meet a child genius named Sheldon Cooper; (already seen as an adult in The Big Bang Theory (2007)) and his family. Some unique challenges face Sheldon who seems socially impaired.

When a skilled but timid chef is possessed by a sassy spirit, her newfound confidence catches the eye of her longtime crush, a culinary hotshot.

This drama will focus on the extreme fan culture that emerged in the 1990s when idol groups took center stage and K-pop was blossoming.

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