It Ain't Me Babe
Bob Dylan has always been something of a mystery. He has worn a variety of masks that have delighted, puzzled, amused and angered his many audiences. Andrea Cossu offers a strikingly fresh explanation of Dylan and the transformations he has made throughout his career. Cossu's descriptions of key Dylan performances explain how he forged authenticity through performance, and how the various attempts to make 'Bob Dylan' have often involved the interaction between the artist, his public image and his many audiences. It Ain't Me Babe offers a striking vision of how Dylan built his image and learned to live with its burden, painting a unique and coherent new portrait of the artist.
It Ain't Me, Babe
Salome knows only one way to live - under Prophet David's rule. Trapped in a commune and bound by her strict faith, Salome knows nothing of the world outside - until a horrific event sets her free. Styx 'River' Nash was born and bred to wear a Hades Hangmen cut. Haunted by a crushing speech impediment, Styx never lets anyone get too close, that is, until a young woman is found injured on his lot.
Mondo Scripto
I Wonder as I Wander
Louisville native John Jacob Niles (1892–1980) is considered to be one of our nation’s most influential musicians. As a composer and balladeer, Niles drew inspiration from the deep well of traditional Appalachian and African American folk songs. At the age of sixteen Niles wrote one of his most enduring tunes, “Go ’Way from My Window,” basing it on a song fragment from a black farm worker. This iconic song has been performed by folk artists ever since and may even have inspired the opening line of Bob Dylan’s “It Ain’t Me Babe.” In I Wonder as I Wander: The Life of John Jacob Niles, the first full-length biography of Niles, Ron Pen offers a rich portrait of the musician’s character and career. Using Niles’s own accounts from his journals, notebooks, and unpublished autobiography, Pen tracks his rise from farm boy to songwriter and folk collector extraordinaire. Niles was especially interested in documenting the voices of his fellow World War I soldiers, the people of Appalachia, and the spirituals of African Americans. In the 1920s he collaborated with noted photographer Doris Ulmann during trips to Appalachia, where he transcribed, adapted, and arranged traditional songs and ballads such as “Pretty Polly” and “Black Is the Color of My True Love’s Hair.” Niles’s preservation and presentation of American folk songs earned him the title of “Dean of American Balladeers,” and his theatrical use of the dulcimer is credited with contributing to the popularity of that instrument today. Niles’s dedication to the folk music tradition lives on in generations of folk revival artists such as Jean Ritchie, Joan Baez, and Oscar Brand. I Wonder as I Wander explores the origins and influences of the American folk music resurgence of the 1950s and 1960s, and finally tells the story of a man at the forefront of that movement.
The Accidental Demon Slayer
A New York Times bestselling, breakout novel! My name is Lizzie Brown, and demon slayer wasn't my first career choice. It didn’t even crack the list. I had a good thing going as a preschool teacher until my long-lost Granny blew into my life riding a Harley and raving about a demon on my toilet. Why did she have to be right? He was from the seventh layer of hell, and I killed his ass faster than you can say flush. Now Grandma insists I’m a demon slayer, destined to ride with her geriatric gang of biker witches. Do I even own a leather jacket? Crazier still, this new job comes with my own personal protector: Dimitri Kallinikos, a devastatingly hot shape-shifting griffin with beautiful eyes and a not-so-secret plan to seduce me. I could get on board with that. But I can’t get too involved because Dimitri needs me to take care of some hellish personal business for him, and I’m not about to let a guy I barely know take me anywhere near the underworld. At least not on the first date. But there’s a bigger danger brewing than either of us can imagine—and if I can’t stop the rise of Hell on Earth, no one can. “Fabulously Fun” —The Chicago Tribune