'With a brilliantly plotted new crime novel set in small-town Massachusetts, Chuck Hogan, prizewinning author of Prince of Thieves, delivers a page-turning, knockout thriller that demonstrates why he is the unrivaled master of gritty suspense. The crack of a handgun shatters the silence of a warm summer night...A notorious local felon and former child magician vanishes, seemingly without a trace...A corrupt police force applies a stranglehold to a failing town...An ailing old man hatches a last-ditch plan to save the police department he once headed, and the community he still loves...An outsider arrives, bearing a simple recipe for death that could destroy them all...
Launching a three-book series, Wolfe's latest takes place several decades after the close of his acclaimed four-volume the Book of the Long Sun. There, it was revealed that the great artifact called the Whorl, unbeknownst to its millions of inhabitants, was in fact a failing spaceship and that the AI "Gods" that ruled the Whorl wanted its inhabitants to leave and colonize two nearby terrestrial planets, Blue and Green.
Hammond (Going to Bend) shares the story of charismatic mega-vertebrate Hannah, the elephant star of the failing Max L. Biedelman Zoo, in her sweet but slow third novel.
Drugs, Brains, and Behavior - The Science of Addiction
Throughout much of the last century, scientists studying drug abuse labored in the shadows of powerful myths and misconceptions about the nature of addiction. When science began to study addictive behavior in the 1930s, people addicted to drugs were thought to be morally flawed and lacking in willpower. Those views shaped society's responses to drug abuse, treating it as a moral failing rather than a health problem, which led to an emphasis on punitive rather than preventative and therapeutic actions.
From the Introduction:
Schooling is one of the top domestic policy issues of the day, and testing and the effectiveness of teaching, broadly considered, are among the top issues in education. Nearly all states have developed standards and have begun state testing programs in the last several years. The 2002 federal No Child Left Behind act makes testing and accountability policies even more crucial because poorly performing schools may be closed; already many failing schools must allow and pay for their students to attend successful schools.