FREE/BARGAIN — Non-Fiction

[svenlind]

Originally Posted by issybird

In a "limited time deal", the Penguin History of the World is 99¢ at Kindle, down from $15.99. Not discountable at Kobo.

https://www.amazon.com/Penguin-Histo...dp/B00ADNPDEM/

Got it. A true deal.

[salty-horse]

The Edge of Space-Time by Chanda Prescod-Weinstein is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

**NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A fresh, charming, socially conscious tour of the mysteries of space-time, from the award-winning author of The Disordered Cosmos

“With this extraordinary book, Prescod-Weinstein cements her status as one of the most accomplished and important science writers of our time” —Ed Yong, author of An Immense World**

In her highly acclaimed debut, distinguished cosmologist and particle physicist Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein shared with her audience an abiding sense of wonder at the cosmos, while imagining a world without the entrenched injustice that plagues her field. Now, in The Edge of Space-Time, she embraces that cosmic wonder, taking readers on a mind-altering journey to the boundaries of the universe, inviting us to spend time at the edge of what we know about space-time and about ourselves.

Guided by her conviction that for humanity to go forward we must know our cosmic past, and drawing on poetry and popular culture—from Langston Hughes, Queen Latifah, and Lewis Carroll, to Big K.R.I.T., Sun Ra, and Star Trek—Prescod-Weinstein renders accessible some of the most abstract concepts of theoretical physics to tell fascinating stories about the history and fundamental nature of our universe. Here we meet the quantum cat that is both dead and alive, learn the difference between dark matter and dark energy, explore the inner workings of black holes, and investigate the possibility of a unified theory of quantum gravity, following our guide out to the far reaches of the cosmic event horizon and down to the tiniest (and queerest) neutrino. Along the way, she calls on us to resist colonial approaches to space exploration and instead imagine a better path forward in our pursuit of humanity’s undeniable connection with the stars.

Through Prescod-Weinstein’s clear-eyed and unique perspective, and informed by her deep knowledge of postcolonial history and Black feminist thought, The Edge of Space-Time argues that physics is an essential way for everyone to look at the universe and presents a compelling case that “the edge” is a powerful vantage point from which to see the big picture.

[Martinoptic]

University of Chicago Press September free book of the month is Brown In The Windy City
This is the first history to examine the migration and settlement of Mexicans and Puerto Ricans in postwar Chicago. Lilia Fernández reveals how the two populations arrived in Chicago in the midst of tremendous social and economic change and, in spite of declining industrial employment and massive urban renewal projects, managed to carve out a geographic and racial place in one of America’s great cities.

[salty-horse]

Monsters by Claire Dederer is £1 in the UK (Kobo, Amazon)

Pablo Picasso beat his partners. Richard Wagner was deeply antisemitic. David Bowie slept with an underage fan. But many of us still love Guernica and the Ring cycle and Ziggy Stardust.

And what are we to do with that love? How are we, as fans, to reckon with the biographical choices of the artists whose work sustains us?

Wildly smart and insightful, Monsters is an exhilarating attempt to understand our relationship with art and the artist in the twenty-first century.

[salty-horse]

Get Ahead of Being Dead by Evie King is £1 in the UK (Kobo, Amazon)

Welcome mortal, to your little book of death homework. A practical, compassionate and laugh out loud guide to preparing for the end.

An informative, practical and yet highly entertaining read from former comedian and council funeral officer Evie King, who walks you through everything you need to sort your death out, so others don't have to.

Have you ever sat down and thought about what happens after you die? And have you told anyone what you want when you're gone? Probably not. Sort your death out, so you can get on and enjoy the rest of your life.

As well as recounting real-death stories, Evie takes you through a series of lessons and exercises spanning all things death preparation, including advice on how to:
· Think about what you really want to happen at your funeral
· Express your wishes to avoid post-death pandemonium
· Clear your clutter so that those you love don't have to
· Ensure the admin of your life can be packed down quickly and efficiently
· Plan your post-death online life.

Get Ahead of Being Dead is a gift to your future (dead) self. By taking control and preparing for death, you can prepare to live ... and do both better as a result.

[bookmarked]

Originally Posted by bookmarked

Sync: How Order Emerges from Chaos In the Universe, Nature, and Daily Life by Steven H. Strogatz is on sale for $2.99.

On sale again, for $1.99 this time, but only for another 7.5 hours. Not on sale at Kobo.

At the heart of the universe is a steady, insistent beat, the sound of cycles in sync. Along the tidal rivers of Malaysia, thousands of fireflies congregate and flash in unison; the moon spins in perfect resonance with its orbit around the earth; our hearts depend on the synchronous firing of ten thousand pacemaker cells. While the forces that synchronize the flashing of fireflies may seem to have nothing to do with our heart cells, there is in fact a deep connection.

Synchrony is a science in its infancy, and Strogatz is a pioneer in this new frontier in which mathematicians and physicists attempt to pinpoint just how spontaneous order emerges from chaos. From underground caves in Texas where a French scientist spent six months alone tracking his sleep-wake cycle, to the home of a Dutch physicist who in 1665 discovered two of his pendulum clocks swinging in perfect time, this fascinating book spans disciplines, continents, and centuries. Engagingly written for readers of books such as Chaos and The Elegant Universe, Sync is a tour-de-force of nonfiction writing.

From Publishers Weekly
Strogatz is a Cornell mathematician and pioneer of the science of synchrony, which brings mathematics, physics and biology to bear on the mystery of how spontaneous order occurs at every level of the cosmos, from the nucleus on up. In this eminently accessible and entertaining book, Strogatz explores the mysterious synchrony achieved by fireflies that flash in unison by the thousands, and the question of what makes our own body clocks synchronize with night and day and even with one another. He explores the sync of inanimate objects, inadvertently discovered by Christiaan Huygens in 1665 when he observed that his two pendulum clocks would swing in unison when they were within a certain distance of each other. A case of spontaneous synchrony occurred on the 2000 opening of the Millennium footbridge in London when hundreds of pedestrians caused the bridge to undulate erratically as they unconsciously adjusted their pace to the bridge's swaying-it was closed two days later. Strogatz explores synchrony in chaos systems, at the quantum level, in small-world networks as exemplified by the parlor game "six degrees of Kevin Bacon" and in human behavior involving fads, mobs and the herd mentality of stock traders. The author traces how the isolated and often accidental discoveries of researchers are beginning to gel into the science of synchrony, and he amply illustrates how the laws of mathematics underlie the universe's uncanny capacity for spontaneous order.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.