Secret Agents

Author: Madeline Drexler
Publisher: Joseph Henry Press
ISBN: 0309076382
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 327

Book Description
So you think modern medicine has the whole virus game figured out? Think again. And it's not even a question of "if" we'll be hit by some new and deadly diseaseâ€"it's "when." The war on germs is being fought on many frontsâ€"from the skirmishes with disease-carrying mosquitoes that cross oceans hidden away in airline wheel wells to the high-profile battle against terrorists wielding deadly bioweapons. Today's bold headlines would have us believe that the biggest threat comes from bioterrorism. But don't underestimate Mother Nature, perhaps the most savage bioterrorist of all. Assisted by the increasing ease with which peopleâ€"and the germs they carryâ€"move across international borders, she's an effective force to be reckoned with, a key player on this battlefield. As author Madeline Drexler makes clear, we'd do best not to ignore her. Human beings and the pathogens that attack them are crossing paths more and more frequently, particularly as modern life grows increasingly complex. Whatever the infectious agent may be, whether it's pandemic flu, foodborne illness, a debilitating disease carried far and wide by biting insects, or some new microbial horror we have yet to detect, keen surveillance and rapid response are really the only weapons in our arsenal. Secret Agents looks at today's new and emerging infectionsâ€"those that have increased in attack rate or geographic range, or threaten to do soâ€"and tells the stories of scientists racing to catch up with invisible adversaries superior in both speed and guile. Each chapter focuses on a different threat: foodborne pathogens, antibiotic resistance, animals and insectborne diseases, pandemic influenza, infectious causes of chronic disease, and bioterrorism, including the latest information on the public health threats posed by anthrax and diseases such as smallpox. Based in part on material collected from the Forum on Emerging Infections hosted by the Institute of Medicine in Washington, D.C., Secret Agents is ultimately as engaging as it is disturbing. Drexler's thorough survey of the field of infectious disease, supplemented by extensive interviews with today's top researchers, yields a compelling portrait of a world engaged in a clandestine war. Emerging infections are among the many secret ties that bind the world into an organic whole. We know that infectious disease is an inescapable part of life, but we need to begin thinking globally and acting locally if we are to avoid the menace of a catastrophic outbreak of some new plague. Secret Agents sounds a clear and compelling call to take up arms against the organic predators among us.

Pandemic, Inc.

Author: J. David McSwane
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1982177764
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 336

Book Description
“This startling, vital book deserves our attention.” —San Francisco Chronicle For readers of War Dogs and Bad Blood, an explosive look inside the rush to profit from the COVID-19 pandemic, from the award-winning ProPublica reporter who saw it firsthand. The United States federal government has spent over $10 billion on medical protective wear and emergency supplies, yet as COVID-19 swept the nation, life-saving equipment such as masks, gloves, and ventilators was nearly impossible to find. In this brilliant nonfiction thriller, award-winning investigative reporter J. David McSwane takes us behind the scenes to reveal how traders, contractors, and healthcare companies used one of the darkest moments in American history to fill their pockets. Determined to uncover how this was possible, he spent over a year on private jets and in secret warehouses, traveling from California to Chicago to Washington DC, to interview both the most treacherous of profiteers and the victims of their crimes. Pandemic, Inc. is the story of the fraudster who signed a multi-million-dollar contract with the government to provide lifesaving PPE, and yet never came up with a single mask. The Navy admiral at the helm of the national hunt for additional medical resources. The Department of Health whistleblower who championed masks early on and was silenced by the government and conservative media. And the politician who callously slashed federal emergency funding and gutted the federal PPE stockpile. Winner of the Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting, McSwane connects the dots between backdoor deals and the spoils systems to provide the definitive account of how this pandemic was so catastrophically mishandled. Shocking and revelatory, Pandemic, Inc. exposes a system that is both deeply rigged, and singularly American.

From Antiquity to the COVID-19 Pandemic

Author: Nuno Pires de Carvalho
Publisher: Kluwer Law International B.V.
ISBN: 9403528516
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 561

Book Description
The COVID-19 pandemic has magnified the tensions inherent in the interface of proprietary medicines and the strong reaction of society at large in respect of pharmaceutical inventors and rights holders. As this comprehensive collection of sources shows, these tensions have persisted since ancient times. The sources—along with headnotes and a deeply informed preamble—clearly illustrate how society has constructed intellectual property in association with medicines to adapt it to the needs of entrepreneurship and free trade, and, at the same time, accommodating it to the imperatives of public health. Revealing two major lines of tension—trademarks versus generic designations and patents versus trade secrets—the texts deal with such aspects of the special intellectual property of medicines and access to health as the following: the question of whether inventions that are crucially important to save lives should be left in private hands to be exploited with a view on profitability; prohibiting the use of trademarks to designate certain medicines; loss of distinctiveness of some well-known pharmaceutical trademarks; sanitary authorities as a sort of a parallel trademark and patent office; the requirement of higher distinctiveness for pharmaceutical trademarks—the so-called duty of greater care; use of secrecy to secure private interests in pharmaceutical inventions; granting prizes and awards to inventors instead of acknowledging private proprietary rights in pharmaceuticals; and the protection of inventions in times of epidemics. The sources are structured in two chapters (business identifiers—trademarks, geographical indications, shop signs—and appropriation of knowledge—patents, trade secrets) to permit an easy understanding of the enchainment of important moments that have contributed to give intellectual property for medicines its special configuration. The selection of sources (more than 200) underlines the struggle of creative entrepreneurs in the pharmaceutical field to obtain a living from their trade and all the contradictions to which it gives rise, as well as approaches that governments have adopted to deal with its tensions. Practitioners in intellectual property law and healthcare law, magistrates, medical professionals, and academics will have a better sense of how the imperatives of public health have designed and continue designing norms and principles of intellectual property especially adapted to the social goals it serves.

Pandemic

Author: Sonia Shah
Publisher: Sarah Crichton Books
ISBN: 0374708746
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 289

Book Description
Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize | A New York Times Editor's Choice “[A] grounded, bracingly intelligent study” —Nature Prizewinning science journalist Sonia Shah presents a startling examination of the pandemics that have ravaged humanity—and shows us how history can prepare us to confront the most serious acute global health emergency of our time. Over the past fifty years, more than three hundred infectious diseases have either emerged or reemerged, appearing in places where they’ve never before been seen. Years before the sudden arrival of COVID-19, ninety percent of epidemiologists predicted that one of them would cause a deadly pandemic sometime in the next two generations. It might be Ebola, avian flu, a drug-resistant superbug, or something completely new, like the novel virus the world is confronting today. While it was impossible to predict the emergence of SARS-CoV-2—and it remains impossible to predict which pathogen will cause the next global outbreak—by unraveling the stories of pandemics past we can begin to better understand our own future, and to prepare for what it holds in store. In Pandemic: Tracking Contagions, from Cholera to Ebola and Beyond, Sonia Shah interweaves history, original reportage, and personal narrative to explore the origins of epidemics, drawing parallels between cholera—one of history’s most deadly and disruptive pandemic-causing pathogens—and the new diseases that stalk humankind today. She tracks each stage of cholera’s dramatic journey, from its emergence in the South Asian hinterlands as a harmless microbe to its rapid dispersal across the nineteenth-century world, all the way to its latest beachhead in Haiti. Along the way she reports on the pathogens now following in cholera’s footsteps, from the MRSA bacterium that besieges her own family to the never-before-seen killers coming out of China’s wet markets, the surgical wards of New Delhi, and the suburban backyards of the East Coast. Delving into the convoluted science, strange politics, and checkered history of one of the world’s deadliest diseases, Pandemic is a work of epidemiological history like no other, with urgent lessons for our own time. “Shah proves a disquieting Virgil, guiding us through the hells ruled by [infectious diseases] . . . the power of Shah's account lies in her ability to track simultaneously the multiple dimensions of the public-health crises we are facing.” —The Chicago Tribune

COVID-19 ON TRIAL

Author: Rui Alexandre Gabirro
Publisher: Hospitallers Order of the Good News
ISBN:
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 211

Book Description
COVID-19 ON TRIAL Critical Analyses of a “Pandemic” Introduction 1 Chapter 1 The Nuremberg Code..................................................................3 Nuremberg 2.0.............................................................................4 WMA Declaration of Helsinki....................................................6 Informed Consent........................................................................6 The Vaccine Programme Has Been Rolled out in Breach of the Legal Requirements for Clinicians to obtain the Free and Informed Consent of Those Being Vaccinated................................................7 Three Major Questions................................................................8 UNESCO Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights.............................................................................................10 BILD Asks all Children for their Forgiveness!.........................11 Wire Fraud.................................................................................13 CDC Study Finds 78% of People Hospitalized for Covid were Overweight or Obese.....................................................................13 Yellow Card Scheme Shows.....................................................14 Chapter 2 Single Source of Truth...............................................................16 Everything Is Prohibited............................................................16 COVILAND..............................................................................17 The First Social Media Virus.....................................................17 COVID-19 Has Caused 6.9 Million Deaths Globally, More Than Double what Official Reports Show..........................19 Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, University of Washington....................................................................................22 France & Germany Falsified ICU Bed Occupancy Figures to Justify Sanitary Restrictions..........................................................26 World Average Annual Number of Deaths................................27 The PCR Test Farce...................................................................28 I Discovered That There Was No Evidence That There Was A Virus...............................................................................................29 Eric Clapton after COVID Vaccination: “I Should Never Have Gone Near the Needle”..................................................................34 India Mucormycosis..................................................................35 The Epidemiology of Mucormycosis in India...........................37 Malnutrition and Pollution India's Biggest Health Hazard.......38 Trained Dogs can Detect Odour of COVID-19.........................39 Virus or Fecal Samples..............................................................39 The Virus Transmission Farce...................................................42 Medical Trade Propaganda........................................................42 Christian Drosten - The Real Face of the Coronavirus Farce...43 Corona-Explainer-In-Chief.......................................................43 German Government Advisory Board on Global Health..........45 The Virus Farce.........................................................................47 Clear Line on Nails A Symptoms of Covid-19.........................48 Sneezing is A “Classic” Symptoms of Covid-19......................48 Professor Timothy Spector........................................................49 The Emerging Field of Epigenetics...........................................50 Future of Jobs............................................................................51 We Tried to Infect Covid-19 into Bats, it Doesn't Grow Well in Bats................................................................................................52 The Variants of Concern and Emerging Mutations Farce.........52 Joint Biosecurity Centre............................................................53 Triple Mutant Variant................................................................54 Lying to Everybody...................................................................55 The Covid-19 Vaccine Farce.....................................................55 Spike Protein is a Toxin.............................................................56 Ingredients (as reported in the prescribing information) included in mRNA COVID-19 Vaccines.......................................60 SM-102 in Cloroform................................................................60 Safety Data Sheet......................................................................61 Vaccine Deaths..........................................................................63 Covid19 Vaccine Reports in USA.............................................64 Covid-19 Vaccine is a “Gene Therapy”....................................65 Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency..........................67 DARPA Awards Moderna Therapeutics a Grant for up to $25 Million to Develop Messenger RNA Therapeutics.................68 Australia Drugs Regulator Never Seen the Study Data............69 UK Drugs Regulator We Didn't Read the Clinical Trial...........69 They Don't Understand What They Are Doing.........................70 We Have Essentially Been Taken Over by the Medical Trade Taliban............................................................................................71 Chapter 3 Follow the Money......................................................................73 The UK Government Business Plan..........................................74 Government Wants to Sell Your Medical Records....................74 Britain’s Status as a Scientific Superpower...............................75 The Plan is Predicated...............................................................76 The Bill Gates Business Plan....................................................77 CEPI - A New Organization Will Help Accelerate the Development of Vaccines..............................................................81 A Global Treaty on Pandemic Preparedness / Zoonotic Research Hubs................................................................82 UK Government Funds 8 Vaccine Passport Schemes...............83 Covid-19 Vaccine Passport........................................................83 Accelerate Genomic Medicine..................................................84 Chris Whitty..............................................................................84 Genomics...................................................................................85 Health Data................................................................................85 Applying Behavioural Science and Social Sciences in Health.............................................................................................85 Bill Gates and George Soros Buy Covid Test Company...........87 The Global South Market: Latin America, Asia, Africa, and Oceania..........................................................................................87 Mologic.....................................................................................87 A Very Terrorised Country.........................................................89 We Have Been Fed a Diet of Fear and Scaremongering...........91 How Does Lack of Oxygen Affect the Brain?..........................91 “Long Covid” a Disability Eligible for Accommodation under Civil Rights Law............................................................................92 Deployment of Covert Psychologic Interventions....................93 The Modelling Farce.................................................................94 NHS (UK) Sells Patients Medical Records to Companies........95 We Expect this Positive Momentum to Continue.....................96 Pfizer Wants Military Bases & Bank Reserves as Collateral....97 Who owns Pfizer?.....................................................................99 The Vanguard Group.................................................................99 BlackRock...............................................................................100 Behind those Vaccines are Companies, Shareholders, Bankers........................................................................................101 Chapter 4 Algorithmic Medicine.............................................................103 Clinical Trial Service Unit.......................................................105 Chapter 5 COVID-19 Versus Law or The Medical Trade Against the People...........................................................................................109 You Must Not Do Your Own Research When It Comes To Science.........................................................................................109 Infection Fatality Rate Less than 0.20%.................................110 Get Covid And Live Longer....................................................110 Lock-down Farce Alcohol Related Deaths Rise by 20% in England During “Pandemic”........................................................111 That Fear that Didn't Happen, The Models Failed in late March, and They Failed in April, They Failed Basically.........................112 Lockdowns just Have One Consequence, that is Making Poor People a lot Poorer.......................................................................117 From Science Fiction to Science Farce...................................118 Weaponized Viruses................................................................118 Developing Medical Counter Measures for Coronaviruses 2016..............................................................................................119 Secret Pandemic Plan to Deny Care to Elderly 2016..............119 A Scenario to Facilitate Medical Countermeasure Communication 2017...................................................................120 If You Have To: Be Persuaded, Reminded, Pressured, Lied to, Incentivized, Coerced, Bullied, Socially Shamed, Guilt-tripped, Threatened, Punished and Criminalized.....................................121 Chapter 6 The First “Confirmed” Case of Covid-19 “Virus”..................123 The Isolation of the So-Called “Virus” Farce.........................124 Chapter 7 COVID-19 The Rule By Fear..................................................127 The CDC is Certainly Misleading...........................................128 Sweden No Lockdowns Led To Better Mental Health, Healthier Economy And Happier People.....................................................128 The Vaccine Farce...................................................................129 Those With 2 Vaccine Doses “May Still Die”.........................129 Vaccines Save Lives................................................................129 Anyone Who Is Claiming that any of this is Totally Safe is Either Confused or Lying.............................................................130 Last Summer With No Vaccines Magic..................................133 There is no FDA approved Vaccine to Prevent Covid-19.......134 NEJM Editor had Close Ties with the FDA authorisation process when publishing Covid-19 Vaccine Trials......................137 Social Distancing and Face Masks Forever.............................138 Covid-19 is not a Health Pandemic, it is an Ideological Pandemic......................................................................................138 Neil Ferguson..........................................................................138 Covid-19 as a Dangerous and Deadly Disease Needs to Change.........................................................................................139 The Goal of Developing and Delivering a Universal Influenza Vaccine.........................................................................................140 Chapter 8 Universal Basic Income Program............................................141 Wales to Launch Universal Basic Income Scheme.................141 Global Over-Population Is The Real Issue..............................142 But Baby Number 7 on the Way..............................................142 Global Health Emergency.......................................................142 Lockdown Every Two Years...................................................143 Bill Bowtell.............................................................................144 Matt Hancock, Secretary of State for Health..........................145 Chapter 9 States Ban Vaccine Passports..................................................149 World Health Organization (WHO)........................................150 The Vaccine Is Trust First Trust In science.............................151 The Patients Who Die, After and Possibly From a Vaccination...................................................................................151 The Data Support The Failure of the Vaccine.........................152 I Refuse to be Vaccinated........................................................154 Manipulation Without Shame or Dignity................................155 Number of People Died Within 21 Days of Having COVID-19 Vaccine in England Between January and June 2021..................156 Pharmacovigilance Investigation Concerning Janssen Covid-19 Vaccine.........................................................................156 If It Works Perfectly is Going to Take a Decade.....................157 Chapter 10 Every Year People Catch The Flu...........................................160 Is Just Like the Common Flu..................................................161 Flu Season Didn’t Happen Last Year in Canada.....................163 Australia Is Currently Reporting “Historically Low Levels” of Influenza..................................................................................163 Two-in-One Vaccine Booster Shot that Protects Against Both Covid-19 and the Seasonal Flu....................................................164 Australia Deaths Due to Influenza 2017.................................165 Australia Deaths Due to “Covid-19” 2020-2021....................166 Covid Will Eventually Become Like the Common cold.........167 Least We Forget The Medical Trade HIV (AIDS) Virus Pandemic......................................................................................168 Influenza Vaccine A Failed Vaccine........................................171 How to Treat Yourself Coronavirus (COVID-19) at Home, Just Like the Flu...........................................................................172 Chapter 11 The Muddy Foundations, or a Sand Castle Called “Genetic Medicine”.....................................................................................173 Medical Trade so-called “Gene Therapies” + “Viruses” Farce.............................................................................................174 National Institutes of Health (NIH).........................................175 The Final Words......................................................................176 Annex 1. Letter to Sir Simon Stevens, CEO of the NHS England 2. SAGE COVID-19 Register of Participants' Interests - GOV.UK Index 179

Coronavirus Outbreak

Author: Sidney Osler
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 152

Book Description
Prep Yourselves Better With This Detailed Report On Wuhan Coronavirus! At the end of 2019, alarming reports started coming out of Wuhan China, about an unknown virus that was causing pneumonia. As a result, Wuhan was shut down immediately in hopes of containing the virus but it was too late. Soon, reports started coming out from all over the world that people are getting sick due to the same illness. Finally, in January 2020, Chinese researchers identified the virus. It was a new strain of the deadly Coronavirus! Even though the world has come a long way since the epidemics and pandemics of the 20th Century. This virus is proof that we are still exposed to many unknown and advanced diseases. And it is up to us to do something about it. We may not be a scientist or doctor or microbiologist, but there are things that we, the ordinary people, can do to shield ourselves. To do that, we should know everything there is to know about this disease. Only that way will we be able to protect ourselves and our loved ones. That is where this book comes. This book contains all the essential and updated information about Wuhan Coronavirus until now. Equipped with this knowledge, you will know better how to take precautionary measures so that you or your loved ones don't fall victim to the hands of this disease! Here's a sneak peek into what you will learn from this book: How exactly Coronavirus spreads Things you can do to prevent yourself from this disease A detailed report on the cases all over the world Myths and Facts about the disease in the light of scientific evidence How to identify the symptoms of this disease And much, much more! Get this book to educate yourself and your loved ones about Coronavirus and its effects! Scroll up and click on "Buy Now with 1-Click" to get your copy now!

The Sublime Secret

Author: Sal Godinho
Publisher: Archway Publishing
ISBN: 1665712597
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 351

Book Description
In 1919, a young man, Barker, returns to his family farm in historic South Carolina, near a quince plantation. He is searching for the answers to the pain he feels from the loss of his parents in a tragic accident. Inspired by the legendary properties of quince, the forgotten fruit, Barker seeks insight into not only his own misfortune, but also, as it turns out, all gun-inflicted tragedies, from war to children at schools, marring an otherwise peaceful society. Such quest is increased by his captivation of a beautiful heiress, Polly, the owner of the quince farm, who happens to be friends with an elderly man, Gunter, known as the quince prophet. Gunter advocates a way of life designed to preserve the living Earth and eliminate further tragedies. Barker’s exalted love for Polly undergoes radical changes as he, along with her, absorb deeper knowledge. The striking unexpected resolution of Barker’s quest for enlightenment and peace and finding his place in the spirit of the Universe is revealed in the prescient pages of The Sublime Secret.

Chasing the Chinese Dream

Author: William N. Brown
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 9811606544
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 224

Book Description
This open access book explores the historical, cultural and philosophical contexts that have made anti-poverty the core of Chinese society since Liberation in 1949, and why poverty alleviation measures evolved from the simplistic aid of the 1950s to Xi Jinping’s precision poverty alleviation and its goal of eliminating absolute poverty by 2020. The book also addresses the implications of China’s experience for other developing nations tackling not only poverty but such issues as pandemics, rampant urbanization and desertification exacerbated by global warming. The first of three parts draws upon interviews of rural and urban Chinese from diverse backgrounds and local and national leaders. These interviews, conducted in even the remotest areas of the country, offer candid insights into the challenges that have forced China to continually evolve its programs to resolve even the most intractable cases of poverty. The second part explores the historic, cultural and philosophical roots of old China’s meritocratic government and how its ancient Chinese ethics have led to modern Chinese socialism’s stance that “poverty amidst plenty is immoral”. Dr. Huang Chengwei, one of China’s foremost anti-poverty experts, explains the challenges faced at each stage as China’s anti-poverty measures evolved over 70 years to emphasize “enablement” over “aid” and to foster bottom-up initiative and entrepreneurialism, culminating in Xi Jinping’s precision poverty alleviation. The book also addresses why national economic development alone cannot reduce poverty; poverty alleviation programs must be people-centered, with measurable and accountable practices that reach even to household level, which China has done with its “First Secretary” program. The third part explores the potential for adopting China’s practices in other nations, including the potential for replicating China’s successes in developing countries through such measures as the Belt and Road Initiative. This book also addresses prevalent misperceptions about China’s growing global presence and why other developing nations must address historic, systemic causes of poverty and inequity before they can undertake sustainable poverty alleviation measures of their own.

America's Secret Pandemic

Author: William Hoyes
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781935764144
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 304

Book Description
"America's Secret Pandemic" not only describes the medical errorproblem in detail, but also offers a time proven cure utilizing the basicsof the Aviation Safety Model: a safety procedure that requires allhospitals to report all errors to a central authority in a non-punitivemanner. That central authority should then utilize computerized statisticalanalysis of all errors in determining best practices, (operatingprocedures) and then transfer that knowledgeto all other healthcare facilities.The error rate has been, and is, on theincrease. It will continue to do so as baby-boomers come of an age requiring increased potential for hospitalization.The healthcare industry has danced with this secret pandemic, hidden it from view and externalized the expense, for far too long. Only public awareness will cause positive change in bringing our nation's "hospital killing fields under control.The best chance for personal safety while confined to a hospital is to have, "America's Secret Pandemic - Preventable Medical Errors" in plain sight for viewing by physicians, nursing personnel and other healthcare technicians. Their knowledge of your understanding of the error pandemic will promote much greater attention to patient safety and quality of care.

Romantic Comedy

Author: Curtis Sittenfeld
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ISBN: 039959096X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 353

Book Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • REESE’S BOOK CLUB PICK • A comedy writer thinks she’s sworn off love, until a dreamy pop star flips the script on all her assumptions—a “smart, sophisticated, and fun” (Oprah Daily) novel from the author of Eligible, Rodham, and Prep. “Full of dazzling banter and sizzling chemistry.”—People “If you ever wanted a backstage pass to Saturday Night Live, this is the book for you.”—Zibby Owens, Good Morning America A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The Washington Post, NPR, USA Today, BuzzFeed, PopSugar, Harper’s Bazaar, Real Simple, She Reads, New York Post Sally Milz is a sketch writer for The Night Owls, a late-night live comedy show that airs every Saturday. With a couple of heartbreaks under her belt, she’s long abandoned the search for love, settling instead for the occasional hook-up, career success, and a close relationship with her stepfather to round out a satisfying life. But when Sally’s friend and fellow writer Danny Horst begins dating Annabel, a glamorous actress who guest-hosted the show, he joins the not-so-exclusive group of talented but average-looking and even dorky men at the show—and in society at large—who’ve gotten romantically involved with incredibly beautiful and accomplished women. Sally channels her annoyance into a sketch called The Danny Horst Rule, poking fun at this phenomenon while underscoring how unlikely it is that the reverse would ever happen for a woman. Enter Noah Brewster, a pop music sensation with a reputation for dating models, who signed on as both host and musical guest for this week’s show. Dazzled by his charms, Sally hits it off with Noah instantly, and as they collaborate on one sketch after another, she begins to wonder if there might actually be sparks flying. But this isn’t a romantic comedy—it’s real life. And in real life, someone like him would never date someone like her . . . right? With her keen observations and trademark ability to bring complex women to life on the page, Curtis Sittenfeld explores the neurosis-inducing and heart-fluttering wonder of love, while slyly dissecting the social rituals of romance and gender relations in the modern age.