NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY BUZZFEED • ALEX AWARD WINNER • New York Times bestselling author Joe Abercrombie’s thrilling series continues in the follow-up to Half a King, which George R. R. Martin hailed as “a fast-paced tale of betrayal and revenge that grabbed me from page 1 and refused to let go.” “The Shattered Seas trilogy has worked its way into a very exclusive group of my favorite fantasy novels of all time.”—James Dashner, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Maze Runner Sometimes a girl is touched by Mother War. Thorn is such a girl. Desperate to avenge her dead father, she lives to fight. But she has been named a murderer by the very man who trained her to kill. Sometimes a woman becomes a warrior. She finds herself caught up in the schemes of Father Yarvi, Gettland’s deeply cunning minister. Crossing half the world to find allies against the ruthless High King, she learns harsh lessons of blood and deceit. Sometimes a warrior becomes a weapon. Beside her on the journey is Brand, a young warrior who hates to kill, a failure in his eyes and hers, but with one chance at redemption. And weapons are made for one purpose. Will Thorn forever be a pawn in the hands of the powerful, or can she carve her own path? Praise for Half the World “An excellent page-turner . . . full of drama and energy.”—New York Daily News “Another entertaining burst of battle, magic and political machinations from the always reliable Joe Abercrombie . . . a thoroughgoing blast, a violent, beautiful rabbit hole of craft that is well worth disappearing into.”—Shelf Awareness “Compelling . . . [Thorn] makes Katniss Everdeen look like Dorothy Gale.”—Chicago Tribune “Splendid . . . Abercrombie has a knack for building characters with pathos and wit. . . . The fast-paced story draws readers along while setting up what promises to be an explosive final showdown.”—Publishers Weekly “Clever, exciting and unexpected.”—SFF World Praise for Joe Abercrombie’s Half a King “Half a King is my favorite book by Joe Abercrombie so far, and that’s saying something.”—Patrick Rothfuss “As in all Abercrombie’s books, friends turn out to be enemies, enemies turn out to be friends; the line between good and evil is murky indeed; and nothing goes quite as we expect. With eye-popping plot twists and rollicking good action, Half a King is definitely a full adventure.”—Rick Riordan “Enthralling! An up-all-night read.”—Robin Hobb “Polished and sharp, perhaps his most technically proficient novel yet . . . I dare you to read the first chapter and try not to turn the next page.”—Brent Weeks “Half a King can be summed up in a single word: masterpiece. It’s a coming-of-age story. It’s a Viking saga. It’s a revenge tale and family drama and the return of the prodigal son. But most of all, it’s this: a short time alongside people as weak and blundering as we are and, in the midst of it all, as heroic. Far too short a time, as it turns out. What a wonderful book.”—Myke Cole “Half a King is full of all the adventure I’ve come to expect from Abercrombie and a tenderness I never knew he had.”—Sam Sykes

Measurement and Use of Cash by Half the World's Population

#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A passionate call to arms against our era’s most pervasive human rights violation—the oppression of women and girls in the developing world. From the bestselling authors of Tightrope, two of our most fiercely moral voices With Pulitzer Prize winners Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn as our guides, we undertake an odyssey through Africa and Asia to meet the extraordinary women struggling there, among them a Cambodian teenager sold into sex slavery and an Ethiopian woman who suffered devastating injuries in childbirth. Drawing on the breadth of their combined reporting experience, Kristof and WuDunn depict our world with anger, sadness, clarity, and, ultimately, hope. They show how a little help can transform the lives of women and girls abroad. That Cambodian girl eventually escaped from her brothel and, with assistance from an aid group, built a thriving retail business that supports her family. The Ethiopian woman had her injuries repaired and in time became a surgeon. A Zimbabwean mother of five, counseled to return to school, earned her doctorate and became an expert on AIDS. Through these stories, Kristof and WuDunn help us see that the key to economic progress lies in unleashing women’s potential. They make clear how so many people have helped to do just that, and how we can each do our part. Throughout much of the world, the greatest unexploited economic resource is the female half of the population. Countries such as China have prospered precisely because they emancipated women and brought them into the formal economy. Unleashing that process globally is not only the right thing to do; it’s also the best strategy for fighting poverty. Deeply felt, pragmatic, and inspirational, Half the Sky is essential reading for every global citizen.

This effort constitutes the most comprehensive and authoritative work to date on the history of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, or the World Bank. Author-editors John Lewis, Richard Webb, and Devesh Kapur chronicle the evolution of this institution and offer insights into its successes, failures, and prospects for the future. The result of their intense labors is an invaluable resource for other researchers and a fascinating study in its own right. The work is divided into two volumes. The first is organized thematically and examines the critical events and policy issues in the World Bank's development over the last fifty years. Chapter topics include poverty alleviation, structural adjustment lending, environmental programs, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the International Development Association (IDA), and the evolution of the Bank as an institution. The second volume contains case studies written by experts with experience in the various regions in which the Bank operates. There are chapters on the Bank's activities in Korea, Mexico, Africa, South Asia, and Eastern Europe. Volume 2 also contains essays on the World Bank's relationship with the United States, Japan, and Western Europe, and its partnership with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). By special arrangement, the authors have had wide-ranging access to confidential documents at the World Bank, making this work a unique source of information on the internal workings of this critical institution. They have also drawn on extensive interviews with current and past Bank officials. Moreover, publication could not be more timely, coming as it does when many in the development community and in the U.S. Congress are questioning the Bank's track record and even its reason for existence. The World Bank: Its First Half Century will be of great interest not only to development practitioners but also to students of international relations, development economics, and global finance. During the course of the project, John P. Lewis and Richard Webb were nonresident senior fellows, and Devesh Kapur was a program associate, in the Foreign Policy Studies program at the Brookings Institution.

Globalization and Money explores how men and women, particularly the poor and the unbanked in the global South, use money in ways that empower themselves and their families. Supriya Singh argues that money as a medium of relationships across cultures is a central component of globalization. She deftly weaves theory and individual stories to show how money is emblematic of interconnected markets, the half of the world that is unbanked, and gender disparities. She shows how men’s and women’s banking patterns are tied to their management of money in the household. Migrants send money home to show they care for their families and communities left behind. Yet these remittances are far from symbolic; instead they represent more than three times the total amount of official development assistance. This book illustrates how many of the most exciting changes in harnessing people’s savings; widening credit and insurance; and lowering the cost of technologies, payments and money transfers are taking place in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Singh demonstrates how strategies to help the poor and marginalized have gone global in South–South conversations, making us rethink the contours of globalization and money.

Includes an audio CD of the author reading! For nearly four decades, Juan Felipe Herrera has documented his experience as a Chicano in the United States and Latin America through stunning, memorable poetry that is both personal and universal in its impact, themes, and approach. Often political, never fainthearted, his career has been marked by tremendous virtuosity and a unique sensibility for uncovering the unknown and the unexpected. Through a variety of stages and transformations, Herrera has evolved more than almost any other Chicano poet, always re-inventing himself into a more mature and seasoned voice. Now, in this unprecedented collection, we encounter the trajectory of this highly innovative and original writer, bringing the full scope of his singular vision into view. Beginning with early material from A Certain Man and moving through thirteen of his collections into new, previously unpublished work, this assemblage also includes an audio CD of the author reading twenty-four selected poems aloud. Serious scholars and readers alike will now have available to them a representative set of glimpses into his production as well as his origins and personal development. The ultimate value of bringing together such a collection, however, is that it will allow us to better understand and appreciate the complexity of what this major American poet is all about.

What is gender, and why is it a development issue? How can development projects and programmes take gender-related issues into account? This book explains how and why women are disadvantaged, not only by social and economic structures but also by many current development initiatives.

The world has seen dramatic changes since the publication of the first edition of The Oxford Companion to Politics of the World in 1993. In the post-Cold War world, globalization now offers wealth and opportunities on a broader scale, as well as greater international harmony, but threatens to reinforce the advantage gap between wealthy and poor regions and intensify environmental degradation. Conflict and squalor--expressed in brutal brushfire wars, epidemics, and chronic underdevelopment--vie with equally dramatic accounts of growth and democracy associated with a liberal political order and the global diffusion of trade, investment, and communications.Drawing on the breadth of the first edition, this updated edition reflects the changing world with a reassessment of many of the core themes of the Companion, and new articles on the people, concepts, and events that have shaped the world since 1993. The second edition includes biographies of Kofi Annan, Tony Blair, Bill Clinton, and Gerhard Schroder; articles on events such as the Rwandan Genocide and the war in Kosovo; and coverage of international trade developments such as NAFTA and the World Trade Organization. Eighty-seven of the 672 articles in the Second Edition are completely new; most others are thoroughly revised.This edition also features a substantial new set of articles, a dozen essays on critical issues written by influential figures. Recognizing the importance of including varying viewpoints, the editors have commissioned these essays to provide an informed and often passionate debate on controversial topics. Discussions include Lani Guinier and Glenn Loury on Affirmative Action; Francis Fukuyama and Milton Fisk on the Limits of Liberal Democracy; and Lloyd Axworthy and John Bolton on the United Nations.The contributors discuss nearly every nation in the world, including extensive information on institutions, political parties, leaders, and the sources of political mobilization and conflict. The volume also includes biographies of more than seventy-five political leaders and thinkers who have shaped the contemporary political world. Articles include detailed discussions of critical historical developments and events, concepts, international law, and organizations. The Oxford Companion to Politics of the World, Second Edition is an accessible, timely, thought-provoking, and comprehensive reference that captures the complexity and vitality of contemporary world affairs.