Ecologists are on a collision course with economists. As long as the economic systems worked when the demands of smaller economies were within the capacities of the world's ecosystems, there was no problem. Centuries are-a-changing, and things will never be the same anymore. Trends, to put it as a cliché, are more than ominous. Some projections have become banalities, but some people are not willing to learn. Forget, change, says Subir Ghosh

Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose! The more things change the more they remain the same. It doesn't matter where you live, how much you earn, what you do. The vacuousness and lack of purpose that can pervade our lives, will do so, irrespective. Neither in excess, nor in deprivation or denial, is there happiness or peace of mind. The first half of the book deals with life in a small, slow town in India, with rigid parents and well-drafted routines while the other half deals with "rule-less' life in suburban US, writes MFM

The sequel of the Pulitzer Prize-Winning Angela's Ashes, 'Tis is the story of Frank McCourt after he came back to America in 1949. He had dreamed since childhood of returning to New York City. When one of his employers in Limerick, Ireland died, he took some of her money from her dead body and bought passage on a ship. On the voyage to New York, he meets a Catholic priest who urges him to speak to some rich Protestants from Kentucky who are also on board so that they will give him a job. However, young Frank is too shy and passes up the chance to work on their horse farm. However, he is introduced to classic literature as Crime and Punishment by Dostoievsky, points out Cynthia Arbuthnot

In October 1, 1993, National Day in China, a couple in their early seventies had dinner at the McDonald's restaurant on Wangfujing Street. They had been invited to celebrate the holiday at McDonald's by their daughter and son-in-law, who spent almost 200 yuan for the dinner, an unimaginably large sum in the view of the elderly couple. The experience of eating in a foreign restaurant struck them as so significant they had their picture taken in front of the Golden Arches and sent it to their hometown newspaper, along with another photo they had had taken on October 1, 1949, in Tiananmen Square--celebrating the first National Day of the People's Republic of China. Excerpts

Part of the Time-Life Series Myth and Mankind, this book tells the story of the Chinese from Prehistoric times to the present Communist regime. China is a diverse land with many different groups of people and many different beliefs. Some people, such as Mao and Confucius, are not associated with the supernatural, but rather with philosophy. Confucius, for example, taught self-discipline and duty. He has had a great influence on Chinese society even up to the present day, says Cynthia Arbuthnot