Les Genies du chocolat, refered to as "the bible" is the most comprehensive work on the highest quality chocolate in the world today. Crafted with great sensitivity with meticulous editing, this pioneering masterpiece unravels an undiscovered territory of French gastronomy.
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Choc Lit is an award-winning publisher of women's fiction - romance, historical and crime fiction. We hold world rights for all our titles.
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Sexual politics in revolutionary England recounts a dramatic transformation in English sexual polemic that unfolded during the kingdom's mid-seventeenth-century civil wars. In early Stuart England, explicit sexual language was largely confined to manuscript and oral forms by the combined regulatory pressures of ecclesiastical press licensing and powerful cultural notions of civility and decorum. During the early 1640s, however, graphic sex-talk exploded into polemical print for the first time in English history. Over the next two decades, sexual politics evolved into a vital component of public discourse, as contemporaries utilized sexual satire to reframe the English Revolution as a battle between licentious Stuart tyrants and their lecherous puritan enemies. By the time that Charles II regained the throne in 1660, this book argues, sex was already a routine element of English political culture.
The secret life of romantic comedy offers a new approach to one of the most popular and resilient genres in the history of Hollywood. Steering away from the rigidity and ideological determinism of traditional accounts of the genre, this book advocates a more flexible theory, which allows the student to explore the presence of the genre in unexpected places, extending the concept to encompass films that are not usually considered romantic comedies. Combining theory with detailed analyses of a selection of films, including To Be or Not to Be (1942), Rear Window (1954), Kiss Me Stupid (1964), Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989) and Before Sunset (2004), the book aims to provide a practical framework for the exploration of a key area of contemporary experience - intimate matters - through one of its most powerful filmic representations: the genre of romantic comedy. Original and entertaining, The secret life of romantic comedy is perfect for students and academics of film and film genre.
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Gender-based violence (GBV) in travel and tourism is embedded within wider social structures of gender inequalities and discrimination. Even though it is pertinent to study GBV in all its forms, this book focuses on the multiple and interconnected manifestations of violence that women/girls encounter in tourism consumption and production (physical, sexual, emotional or socio-economic), while seeking to open the debate on violence against sexual minorities (LGBT) and discussing men/boys as victims and perpetrators of GBV. By engaging in a critical exploration of the theoretical landscape of GBV and case studies on GBV and sexual harassment, the book adopts a multidisciplinary perspective drawing on feminist, intersectional and post-colonial frameworks, bringing together contributions from academics and practitioners across the globe.
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Catherine Deneuve is indisputably one of the world's most celebrated actresses, both in her native France and throughout the world. Her career has spanned five decades during which she has worked with the most significant of French auteurs, as well as forging partnerships with international directors such as Bunuel and Polanski. The Deneuve star persona has attained such iconic status that it can now symbolise the very essence of French womanhood and civic identity. In this wide-ranging and authoritative collection of essays by a selection of international film academics and writers, the Deneuve persona is scrutinised and illuminated. Beyond the glamorous iconographic status of Yves Saint Laurent's muse, and the epitome of sexual inviolability, Deneuve's status as actress is foregrounded. The book will be essential reading for students and lecturers in star studies.
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Tensions in the struggle for sexual minority rights in Europe, newly available in paperback, is the first queer and poststructuralist reading of political rights concepts in the specific European transnational context. In the last thirty years Europe has seen the rise of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender movements fighting nationally and transnationally for participation rights in society. In addition academic theorists have increasingly paid attention to the epistemological and ontological roles gender and sexuality play in modern politics. However, in the political process of arguing for rights the centrality of those roles is mostly hidden from view in official institutional and movement discourses. This book investigates the conceptual themes of lesbian, gay and transgender rights and lobby politics in Europe and their open and hidden relations to binary and hierarchical orders of dominance. It contributes to an understanding of the conditions upon which politics of inclusion, participation, social justice and equality rest and why struggles for sexual minority rights have been so difficult and slow. It illuminates how the paradigms of political discourse constitute, consolidate and contest the meaning and cultural significance of gender and sexuality on modern, democratic, capitalist European societies. ;
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Desert Passions unfolds tales of wild, dramatic transformations that may occur to people in Sinai due to a mixture ofcravings, sexual arousal, spontaneity, love, rapture, hopes and dreams—conflicting forces that are often at odds with our current lifestyles. New motivations appear, behavioral patterns might shift or completely change, sex and romance easily flourish, often unrestrained by former inhibitions. This explains why seekers trying to find their way in this puzzled, crazy world travel to the Sinai Desert where secret passions, hidden sexual fantasies, and lust that have been long subdued suddenly emerge and rule. Since ancient times, the Sinai Desert has been a place for spiritual and mental metamorphosis, initiating its powerful impact on anyone who wanders there. When Western ideas and habits first met traditional, tribal Bedouins after the Six-Day War in 1967, it created a unique cultural divergence. Many Westerners, too, have been deeply influenced by the raw nature revealed to them. Robert Bettelheim was born in Vienna, but after his parents fled the Nazi Anschluss of Austria to China, he grew up in Shanghai Ghetto under Japanese rule during WWII. Bettelheim later served in the IDF as a paratrooper, and soon became an ardent scuba diver on the enchanting shores of the Sinai Desert. A musicology graduate and teacher, the author lives with his wife in Kibbutz Zikim, which is not infrequently under shell fire. He has six grandchildren. An English-language eBook edition was published in Summer 2018. 326 Pages, 15X22.5 cm.
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Teenage Intimacies offers a new account of 'sexual revolution' in mid-twentieth century England. Rather than focusing on 'Swinging London', the book reveals the transformations in social life that took place in school playgrounds, local cinemas, and suburban bedrooms. Based on over 300 personal testimonies, Teenage Intimacies traces the everyday experiences of teenage girls, illuminating how romance, sex and intimacy shaped their young lives. The book shows how sex became embedded in ideas about 'growing up' and explores how heterosexuality influenced young women's social lives and vice versa. It offers new explanations of why sexual mores shifted in this period, revealing the pivotal role that young women played in changing sexual values, cultures and practices in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s.
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This book about the Thatcher government and the City of London tells the compelling human story of the people and processes that made Britain's 1980s financial revolution. Fusing insider testimony with new archival discoveries, it examines high stakes and networked solutions, and uncovers new objectives that drove reforms. In so doing it demystifies a major shift in capitalism. This has implications for our understandings of government and capitalism, from the way we think about the origins of subsequent financial crises to today's growing inequalities. Survival Capitalism offers new insights into the last major restructuring of the City, disrupts myths surrounding the logics of the market, and pays attention to people and processes at a time when the City of London again faces major change as Britain seeks to find its place outside the European Union in the wake of Brexit.
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It is a realistic novel with unique characteristics in content and text. The novel describes the different lives of the hero and Brother Liaoliao, his fellow villager and classmate, two young people who came from a small town. The town and the city work as mirror images of each other, as was the case with the two main characters. They share common childhood and juvenile memories, which are the source of life that has been turned into fantasy stories over time. As friends, they went out to college together and lived in the city after graduation. One got promoted, while the other spent time in a mediocre position...
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This volume explores a range of premodern rulers and their depictions in historiography, literature, art and material culture to gain a broader understanding of their sexualities. It considers the methodologies and motivations of premodern writers and rulers when fashioning royal and elite sexualities and offers new analyses of an array of texts and artwork from across Europe and the wider Mediterranean.
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Based on award-winning research, Love and revolution brings classical and contemporary anarchist thought into a mutually beneficial dialogue with a global cross-section of ecological, anti-capitalist, feminist and anti-racist activists - discussing real-life examples of the loving-caring relations that underpin many contemporary struggles. Such a (r)evolutionary love is discovered to be a common embodied experience among the activists contributing to this collective vision, manifested as a radical solidarity, as political direct action, as long-term processes of struggle, and as a deeply relational more-than-human ethics. This book provides an essential resource for all those interested in building a free society grounded in solidarity and care, and offers a timely contribution to contemporary movement discourse.
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In the eyes of many Chinese parents, talking about "sex" with their children always feels ashamed to speak out. In fact, the younger the children, the higher their acceptance, the lower their shame, and the easier it is to grasp the true meaning of "sex and life". So, as parents, in what way should we tell children the origin of life, tell them the correct understanding of sexual organs, and avoid being sexually assaulted? "Growth and Sex for Children" starts with "sex and life", through the form of "picture book + cartoon", it uses scientific and childlike language to tell children a complete and systematic knowledge of sex education. In addition, the series also fully considers the sexual and psychological development of children aged 3-6. It integrates storytelling, fun, and knowledge. It is a growth book for parents and children to read together.
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This novel by Can Xue presents a whole range of characters with strong personality, such as Joe, Maria, Vincent, Lisa, Reagan and Ida. They are full of vitality and are accordingly unsatisfied with their present status. They actively explore unknown field of life and firmly embark on the journey of spiritual exploration. The novel focuses the complicated and intertwining relationship between husbands, wives and lovers to uncover the hidden inner desire of each character. Boiling wild nature and advanced civilization collide with each other before they finally become one unity. For the readers, entering the world of these characters is like entering their own inner world.
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Colonial governments, institutions and companies recognised that in many ways the effective operation of the Empire depended upon sexual arrangements. For example, nuclear families serving agricultural colonization, and prostitutes working for single men who powered armies and plantations, mines and bureaucracies. For this reason they devised elaborate systems of sexual governance, such as attending to marriage and the family. However, they also devoted disproportionate energy to marking and policing the sexual margins. In Sex, Politics and Empire, Richard Phillips investigates controversies surrounding prostitution, homosexuality and the age of consent in the British Empire, and revolutionises our notions about the importance of sex as a nexus of imperial power relations. ;
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Colonial governments, institutions and companies recognised that in many ways the effective operation of the Empire depended upon sexual arrangements. For example, nuclear families serving agricultural colonization, and prostitutes working for single men who powered armies and plantations, mines and bureaucracies. For this reason they devised elaborate systems of sexual governance, such as attending to marriage and the family. However, they also devoted disproportionate energy to marking and policing the sexual margins. In Sex, Politics and Empire, Richard Phillips investigates controversies surrounding prostitution, homosexuality and the age of consent in the British Empire, and revolutionises our notions about the importance of sex as a nexus of imperial power relations.
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Exile, its pain and possibility, is the starting point of this book. Women's experience of exile was often different from that of men, yet it has not received the important attention it deserves. Women in exile in early modern Europe and the Americas addresses that lacuna through a wide-ranging geographical, chronological, social and cultural approach. Whether powerful, well-to-do or impoverished, exiled by force or choice, every woman faced the question of how to reconstruct her life in a new place. These essays focus on women's agency despite the pressures created by political, economic and social dislocation. Collectively, they demonstrate how these women from different countries, continents and status groups not only survived but also in many cases thrived. This analysis of early modern women's experiences not only provides a new vantage point from which to enrich the study of exile but also contributes important new scholarship to the history of women.
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This volume examines the films of Hispanic and Lusophone women filmmakers from the 1930s to the present day. It establishes productive connections between film practices across these geographical areas by identifying common areas of concern on the part of these female filmmakers. Focusing on aesthetic, theoretical and socio-historical analyses, it questions the manifest or latent gender and sexual politics that inform and structure the emerging cinematic productions by women filmmakers in Portugal, Spain, Latin America and the US. With a combination of scholars from the UK, the US, Spain and Latin America, the volume documents and interprets a fascinating corpus of films made by Hispanic and Lusophone women and proposes research strategies and methodologies that can expand our understanding of socio-cultural and psychic constructions of gender and sexual politics. An essential resource to rethink notions of gender identity and subjectivity, it is a unique contribution to Spanish and Latin American Film Studies and Film Studies.
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Winter tourism has seen increased levels of investment in recent times as new ski destinations develop and traditional skiing destinations merge to reduce economic risks by means of spatial distribution. Increasingly environmental issues in many established ski resorts, including certifications and adaptions of the management regime, and new mobility concepts to reduce CO2 emissions caused by the travel behavior of the winter tourists, are growing areas of consideration. This includes the importance of scenic beauty, nature and sustainable development as well as snow reliability and avalanche safety. Finally skiers themselves and their preferences (destination choice), need to be considered as part of demographic change and changing leisure time habits, in particular considering the Chinese market and its impact in the future. The book will explore these trends and discuss the different approaches and adaption strategies that are employed in the European Alpine region, North America, and Eastern Europe.
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Above all else, and despite all the enlightenment of the age, sex in the 21st century seems to be a problem. Abuse, MeToo, human trafficking, circumcision, role-playing, body cult... But if sex is a mere abyss for modern humans, then why not just let it be? We are the first generation that could actually do it without endangering the survival of the species. And voices are getting louder that once again call for abstinence in a supposedly over-sexualised society. Artificial insemination and artificially intelligent technology for the safe removal of instincts should finally pacify what humans cannot control: instinctive nature. Sex is not the epitome of our animal nature. Every attempt to control the animal in us, either by taming it or by freeing it from tamers in a sexual revolution, inevitably misses the point. Bettina Stangneth asks the quite simple question: what is sex? If every culture of prohibition has failed so far, clearer ideas are obviously needed. Even if we prefer to ignore it, attempts to establish a culture through desire instead of the cultivation of desire have been around for a long time. After all, if you don't want to learn to talk positively about sex, you can't talk meaningfully about coercion and violence.
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"Lexicon of Intimate Cities" is the biggest novel of Yuriy Andruhovych so far. A tireless traveler across Ukraine, Europe, and America, the author tells us 111 stories about 111 cities with which he was lucky enough to experience happy and not so happy, but always intimate, in the broadest sense of the word, moments.Arranged in the alphabetical order according to the geographical names of the locations, these diverse texts – from essays and short stories to prose poems together form an autobiographical atlas of the writer's world. In addition, each "lexical" adventure is clearly inscribed in time space coordinates, which allows the reader to follow the author in 111 private-historical leaps from the mid-60s of the last century to the present day.It is hardly worth expecting objective characteristics of Kyiv and Lviv, Moscow and Warsaw, New York and Yenakiyiv from this atlas, this extremely subjective "manual of geopoetics and cosmopolitics". But you can definitely find more artistically important things in it: the atmosphere, mood, images, smells and tastes of favorite cities and places, as they were imprinted in the author's memory. As well as momentary observations and deeper reflections, lyricism and sadness, irony and sarcasm - that is, everything that makes our communication with the world to resemble true intimacy.
