Now in Review: The Master Your Metabolism Cookbook

The Master Your Metabolism Cookbook
by Jillian Michaels
Crown, 2010

Through the Master Your Metabolism plan, Jillian has taught readers how to balance their hormones naturally so their bodies become energetic, thriving, fat-burning machines.

Now Jillian makes it even easier for you by bringing the Master program right into your kitchen. With more than 125 recipes specifically designed for the Master Diet and including health tips tailored to enhance your nutrition and weight loss, The Master Your Metabolism Cookbook will help make living a long, healthy life easier—and tastier.

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Very Blueberry: Preserving

Very Blueberry
by Jennifer Trainer Thompson
Celestial Arts, 2005

To enjoy berries year-round, simply place them, unwashed, in a single layer on a baking sheet and freeze them. Remove the pan from the freezer, place the berries in sealed plastic bags, and return them to the freezer for up to six months.

Never wash berries -- fresh, dried, or frozen -- until you're about to serve them or use them to brighten muffins or pancakes, enliven rice and salad, or add color to desserts. Swirled into your pancake batter in January, they will remind you of that hot August afternoon you picked the perfect blue ball and popped it into your mouth while it was still warm from the sun.

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Now in Review: Fixing the Sky

Fixing the Sky
The Checkered History of Weather and Climate Control
by James Rodger Fleming
Columbia University Press, 2010

For more than a century, scientists, soldiers, and charlatans have tried to manipulate weather and climate, and like them, today's climate engineers wildly exaggerate what is possible. Scarcely considering the political, military, and ethical implications of managing the world's climate, these individuals hatch schemes with potential consequences that far outweigh anything their predecessors might have faced.

Showing what can happen when fixing the sky becomes a dangerous experiment in pseudoscience, James Rodger Fleming traces the tragicomic history of the rainmakers, rain fakers, weather warriors, and climate engineers who have been both full of ideas and full of themselves.

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Out There

The Abundant Community

The Abundant Community
Awakening the Power of Families and Neighborhoods
by John McKnight and Peter Block
Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2010

Depersonalization and the corporate centralization of wealth, power and influence has obviously had a deleterious affect on families and neighborhoods throughout America in recent years, creating deep insecurities, inequities and social maladies that have lowered the quality of life and enlarged prison populations.

This book is all about correcting this trend with basic, localized and personal actions that lead to greater cooperation, stronger communities and a sustainable economy.

Educators and social policy scholars John McKnight and Peter Block offer practical suggestions for nurturing voluntary systems, reconnecting with our neighbors and creating an environment of abundance rather than scarcity.

"The culture of community is initiated by people who value each other's gifts and are seriously related to each other," they explain. "It takes time, because serious relationships are based upon trust, and trust grows from with experience of being together in ways that make a difference in our lives."

The process begins with mutual respect, appreciating the abilities of our neighbors, buying and employing locally while also welcoming newcomers and including them in the community, creating associations and supporting one another.

"We take seriously the idealistic notion that our future is dependent on each of us and if one of us is not free, or valued, or participating in a full life, then those are not possible for any of us."

Refreshingly utopian and optimistic, this book gives voice to ideals that have been too long suppressed. Hopefully, it will help strengthen efforts to restore community and neighborhood to their rightful importance in American society.

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