Forget the 10,000 hour rule. What if it is possible to learn the basics of any new skill in 20 hours or less? Take a moment to consider how many things you want to learn to do. What is on your list? What is holding you back from getting started? Are you worried about the time and effort it takes to acquire new skills, time you do not have and effort you cannot spare? Research suggests it takes 10,000 hours to develop a new skill. In this nonstop...

Investigates the poisons Christie employs in fourteen of her mysteries, discussing why the poisons kill, how they interact, obtainability of such poisons, and which cases may have inspired Christie's stories.

"A fresh take on George Orwell as a far more nature-loving figure than is often portrayed, and a dazzlingly rich meditation on roses, gardens, and the value and use of beauty and pleasure in the face of brutality and horror. "In the spring of 1936 a man planted roses." That man was George Orwell, shortly before he went off to fight against fascism in Spain. Today, those rosebushes are still thriving. This is the starting point for Rebecca Solnit's...