Read Jeff Alexander's posts on the Penguin Blog. A couch potato’s book of wisdom— 100% commercial free! Some say that entire generations of Americans are being raised by the television…like that’s a bad thing. Not so, says author Jeff Alexander, long-time television writer, advocate of education by television, and recapper for the popular website Television Without Pity. Here, he offers the ultimate in life lessons as seen on TV. Topics include: • Saved by the Bell: School on TV • Somebody Save Me: Super Powers and Magic Spells • Tell Me Why I Love You Like I Do: Relationships on TV • Making A Living: The Workplace • And more With a smart, snarky style, Alexander guides readers through important lessons gleaned from years of TV reviewing (now in convenient book form!), freeing up a whole new generation to learn other things, like how to cure cancer or solve world hunger…or anything more useful than watching TV (Author’s note: Just joking… there is no such thing).

A TV Guide to Life: How I Learned Everything I Needed to Know From Watching Television

Alexander, Jeff

Reference

Penguin Publishing Group

Muskegon is a derivation of a Native American word meaning "river with marshes." Jeff Alexander examines the creation, uses of, devastation, and restoration of Michigan's historic and beautiful Muskegon River. Four of the five Great Lakes touch Michigan's shores; the state's shoreline spans more than 4,500 miles, not to mention more than 11,000 inland lakes and a multitude of rivers. The Muskegon River, the state's second longest river, runs 227 miles and has the most diverse features of any of Michigan’s many rivers. The Muskegon rises from the center of the state, widens, and moves westward, passing through the Pere Marquette and AuSable State Forests. The river ultimately flows toward Lake Michigan, where it opens into Muskegon Lake, a 12 square-mile, broad harbor located between the Muskegon River and Lake Michigan. Formed several thousand years ago, when the glaciers that created the Great Lakes receded, and later inhabited by Ottawa and Potawatomi Indians, the Muskegon River was used by French fur trappers in the 1600s. Rich in white pine, the area was developed during the turn-of-the-century lumber boom, and at one time Muskegon Lake boasted more than 47 sawmills. The Muskegon was ravaged following settlement by Europeans, when rivers and streams were used to transport logs to the newly developing cities. Dams on rivers and larger streams provided power for sawmills and grain milling, and later provided energy for generating electricity as technology advanced. There is now an ambitious effort to restore and protect this mighty river's natural features in the face of encroaching urbanization and land development that threatens to turn this majestic waterway into a mirror image of the Grand River, Michigan's longest river and one of its most polluted.

The Muskegon: The Majesty and Tragedy of Michigan's Rarest River

History

Americas

Michigan State University Press

The St. Lawrence Seaway was considered one of the world's greatest engineering achievements when it opened in 1959. The $1 billion project-a series of locks, canals, and dams that tamed the ferocious St. Lawrence River-opened the Great Lakes to the global shipping industry. Linking ports on lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario to shipping hubs on the world's seven seas increased global trade in the Great Lakes region. But it came at an extraordinarily high price. Foreign species that immigrated into the lakes in ocean freighters' ballast water tanks unleashed a biological shift that reconfigured the world's largest freshwater ecosystems. Pandora's Locks is the story of politicians and engineers who, driven by hubris and handicapped by ignorance, demanded that the Seaway be built at any cost. It is the tragic tale of government agencies that could have prevented ocean freighters from laying waste to the Great Lakes ecosystems, but failed to act until it was too late. Blending science with compelling personal accounts, this book is the first comprehensive account of how inviting transoceanic freighters into North America's freshwater seas transformed these wondrous lakes.

Pandora's Locks: The Opening of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Seaway

The St. Lawrence Seaway was considered one of the world's greatest engineering achievements when it opened in 1959. The $1 billion project-a series of locks, canals, and dams that tamed the ferocious St. Lawrence River-opened the Great Lakes to the global shipping industry. Linking ports on lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario to shipping hubs on the world's seven seas increased global trade in the Great Lakes region. But it came at an extraordinarily high price. Foreign species that immigrated into the lakes in ocean freighters' ballast water tanks unleashed a biological shift that reconfigured the world's largest freshwater ecosystems. Pandora's Locks is the story of politicians and engineers who, driven by hubris and handicapped by ignorance, demanded that the Seaway be built at any cost. It is the tragic tale of government agencies that could have prevented ocean freighters from laying waste to the Great Lakes ecosystems, but failed to act until it was too late. Blending science with compelling personal accounts, this book is the first comprehensive account of how inviting transoceanic freighters into North America's freshwater seas transformed these wondrous lakes.

The Muskegon River, unnatural wonder

Muskegon Chronicle

The big little book of fake DVD commentaries, wherein well-known pundits make impassioned remarks about classic science fiction films. It's a gas!

Speak, Commentary

Literature & Fiction

BISSELL, TOM

Literary

McSweeney's

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Alexander, Jeff. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Alexander, Jeff

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Alexander, Jeff. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

A TV Guide to Life: How I Learned Everything I Needed to Know From Watching Television

The Muskegon: The Majesty and Tragedy of Michigan's Rarest River

Pandora's Locks: The Opening of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Seaway

Pandora's Locks: The Opening of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Seaway

The Muskegon River, unnatural wonder

Speak, Commentary