Lawrence Wright

A clear-sighted revelation, a deep penetration into the world of Scientology by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the now-classic study of al-Qaeda's 9/11 attack, the Looming Tower. Based on more than two hundred personal interviews with both current and former Scientologists--both famous and less well known--and years of archival research, Lawrence Wright uses his extraordinary investigative skills to uncover for us the inner workings of the Church of Scientology: its origins in the imagination of science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard; its struggles to find acceptance as a legitimate (and legally acknowledged) religion; its vast, secret campaign to infiltrate the U.S. government; and its dramatic efforts to grow and prevail after the death of Hubbard.At the book's center, two men whom Wright brings vividly to life, showing how they have made Scientology what it is today: The darkly brilliant L. Ron Hubbard--whose restless, expansive mind invented a new religion tailor-made to prosper in the spiritually troubled post-World War II era. And his successor, David Miscavige--tough and driven, with the unenviable task of preserving the church in the face of ongoing scandals and continual legal assaults.We learn about Scientology's esoteric cosmology; about the auditing process that determines an inductee's state of being; about the Bridge to Total Freedom, through which members gain eternal life. We see the ways in which the church pursues celebrities, such as Tom Cruise and John Travolta, and how young idealists who joined the Sea Org, the church's clergy, whose members often enter as children, signing up with a billion-year contract and working with little pay in poor conditions. We meet men and women "disconnected" from friends and family by the church's policy of shunning critical voices. And we discover, through many firsthand stories, the violence that has long permeated the inner sanctum of the church.In Going Clear, Wright examines what fundamentally makes a religion a religion, and whether Scientology is, in fact, deserving of the constitutional protections achieved in its victory over the IRS. Employing all his exceptional journalistic skills of observations, understanding, and synthesis, and his ability to shape a story into a compelling narrative, Lawrence Wright has given us an evenhanded yet keenly incisive book that goes far beyond an immediate exposé and uncovers the very essence of what makes Scientology the institution it is.

In this medical thriller Dr. Henry Parsons, an unlikely but appealing hero, races to find the origins and cure of a mysterious new killer virus as it brings the world to its knees.At an internment camp in Indonesia, forty-seven people are pronounced dead with acute hemorrhagic fever. When Henry Parsons--microbiologist, epidemiologist--travels there on behalf of the World Health Organization to investigate, what he finds will soon have staggering repercussions across the globe: an infected man is on his way to join the millions of worshippers in the annual Hajj to Mecca. Now, Henry joins forces with a Saudi prince and doctor in an attempt to quarantine the entire host of pilgrims in the holy city... A Russian émigré, a woman who has risen to deputy director of U.S. Homeland Security, scrambles to mount a response to what may be an act of biowarfare... already-fraying global relations begin to snap, one by one, in the face of a pandemic... Henry's wife Jill and their children face diminishing odds of survival in Atlanta... and the disease slashes across the United States, dismantling institutions--scientific, religious, governmental--and decimating the population.

ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW’ S 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEARA gripping day-by-day account of the 1978 Camp David conference, when President Jimmy Carter persuaded Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian president Anwar Sadat to sign the first peace treaty in the modern Middle East, one which endures to this day.With his hallmark insight into the forces at play in the Middle East and his acclaimed journalistic skill, Lawrence Wright takes us through each of the thirteen days of the Camp David conference, illuminating the issues that have made the problems of the region so intractable, as well as exploring the scriptural narratives that continue to frame the conflict. In addition to his in-depth accounts of the lives of the three leaders, Wright draws vivid portraits of other fiery personalities who were present at Camp David––including Moshe Dayan, Osama el-Baz, and Zbigniew Brzezinski––as they work furiously behind the scenes. Wright also explores the significant role played by Rosalynn Carter.What emerges is a riveting view of the making of this unexpected and so far unprecedented peace. Wright exhibits the full extent of Carter’s persistence in pushing an agreement forward, the extraordinary way in which the participants at the conference—many of them lifelong enemies—attained it, and the profound difficulties inherent in the process and its outcome, not the least of which has been the still unsettled struggle between the Israelis and the Palestinians.In Thirteen Days in September , Wright gives us a resonant work of history and reportage that provides both a timely revisiting of this important diplomatic triumph and an inside look at how peace is made.

A sweeping narrative history of the events leading to 9/11, a groundbreaking look at the people and ideas, the terrorist plans and the Western intelligence failures that culminated in the assault on America. Lawrence Wright's remarkable book is based on five years of research and hundreds of interviews that he conducted in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Sudan, England, France, Germany, Spain, and the United States.The Looming Tower achieves an unprecedented level of intimacy and insight by telling the story through the interweaving lives of four men: the two leaders of al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri; the FBI's counterterrorism chief, John O'Neill; and the former head of Saudi intelligence, Prince Turki al-Faisal.As these lives unfold, we see revealed: the crosscurrents of modern Islam that helped to radicalize Zawahiri and bin Laden . . . the birth of al-Qaeda and its unsteady development into an organization capable of the American embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania and the attack on the USS Cole . . . O'Neill's heroic efforts to track al-Qaeda before 9/11, and his tragic death in the World Trade towers . . . Prince Turki's transformation from bin Laden's ally to his enemy . . . the failures of the FBI, CIA, and NSA to share intelligence that might have prevented the 9/11 attacks.The Looming Tower broadens and deepens our knowledge of these signal events by taking us behind the scenes. Here is Sayyid Qutb, founder of the modern Islamist movement, lonely and despairing as he meets Western culture up close in 1940s America; the privileged childhoods of bin Laden and Zawahiri; family life in the al-Qaeda compounds of Sudan and Afghanistan; O'Neill's high-wire act in balancing his all-consuming career with his equally entangling personal life--he was living with three women, each of them unaware of the others' existence--and the nitty-gritty of turf battles among U.S. intelligence agencies.Brilliantly conceived and written, The Looming Tower draws all elements of the story into a galvanizing narrative that adds immeasurably to our understanding of how we arrived at September 11, 2001. The richness of its new information, and the depth of its perceptions, can help us deal more wisely and effectively with the continuing terrorist threat.

With humor and the biting insight of a native, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower explores the history, culture, and politics of Texas, while holding the stereotypes up for rigorous scrutiny.God Save Texas is a journey through the most controversial state in America. It is a red state in the heart of Trumpland that hasn't elected a Democrat to a statewide office in more than twenty years; but it is also a state in which minorities already form a majority (including the largest number of Muslims). The cities are blue and among the most diverse in the nation. Oil is still king but Texas now leads California in technology exports. The Texas economic model of low taxes and minimal regulation has produced extraordinary growth but also striking income disparities. Texas looks a lot like the America that Donald Trump wants to create. And Wright's profound portrait of the state not only reflects our country back as it is, but as it was and as it might be.

A sharply drawn, page-turning send up of Texas politics—from the Pulitzer Prize winner and best-selling author—about a dark horse candidate who risks his personal life for a career in the Texas House of Representatives.Sonny Lamb is an affable, if floundering, rancher with the unfortunate habit of becoming a punchline in his Texas hometown. Most recently, he bought his own bull at auction, saving it from being sold to a slaughterhouse. But when a fire breaks out at a neighbor’s farm, Sonny makes headlines in another way: Not waiting for help, he bolts to the farm and heroically saves the family’s daughter and her horse, riding the animal out of their burning barn. Within days of the event, he attracts the notice of a mysterious man named L.D. who arrives at his door and asks if he’d like to run as a Republican for his district’s representative seat. Though Sonny has zero experience and doesn’t consider himself political in the least, he decides to throw his hat in the ring . . . and he wins.As Sonny navigates life in politics—from running a campaign to negotiating in the capitol—he must learn the ropes, weighing his own ethics and environmental concerns against the pressures of veteran politicians, savvy lobbyists, and his own party. In tracing Sonny’s attempt to balance his marriage and morality with an increasingly volatile professional life, Lawrence Wright has crafted a hilarious, immensely clever rollercoaster ride about one man’s pursuit of goodness in the Lonestar State.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower, whose best-selling thriller The End of the October all but predicted our current pandemic, comes another momentous account, this time of COVID-19: its origins, its myriad repercussions, and the ongoing fight to contain it Beginning with the absolutely critical first moments of the outbreak in China, and ending with an epilogue on the vaccine rollout and the unprecedented events between the election of Joseph Biden and his inauguration, Lawrence Wright's The Plague Year surges forward with essential information--and fascinating historical parallels--examining the medical, economic, political, and social ramifications of the COVID-19 pandemic.Wright takes us inside the CDC, where the first round of faulty test kits cost America precious time; inside the halls of the White House, where Deputy National Security Advisor Matthew Pottinger's early alarm about the virus was met with great skepticism; into a COVID ward in a Charlottesville hospital, with an idealistic young woman doctor from Little Africa, South Carolina; into the precincts of prediction specialists at Goldman Sachs; and even inside the human body, diving deep into the science of just how the virus and vaccines function, with an eye-opening detour into the history of vaccination and of the modern anti-vaxxer movement.In turns steely eyed, sympathetic, infuriated, comical, and always precise, Wright is a formidable guide, slicing through the dense fog of misinformation to give us a 360-degree portrait of the catastrophe we thought we knew. His full accounting does honor to the medical professionals around the country who've risked their lives to fight the virus, revealing America in all its vulnerability, courage, and potential.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower comes "the most powerful and disturbing true crime narrative to appear since Truman Capote's In Cold Blood" ( TIME )—a case that destroyed a family, engulfed a small town, and captivated an America obsessed by rumors of a satanic underground. In 1988 Ericka and Julie Ingram began making a series of accusations of sexual abuse against their father, Paul Ingram, who was a respected deputy sheriff in Olympia, Washington. At first the accusations were confined to molestations in their childhood, but they grew to include torture and rape as recently as the month before. At a time when reported incidents of "recovered memories" had become widespread, these accusations were not unusual. What captured national attention in this case is that, under questioning, Ingram appeared to remember participating in bizarre satanic rites involving his whole family and other members of the sheriff's department.As Remembering Satan follows the increasingly bizarre accusations and confessions, the claims and counterclaims of police, FBI investigators, and mental health professionals, it gives us what is at once a psychological detective story and a domestic tragedy about what happens when modern science is subsumed by our most archaic fears.

Lawrence Wright at the height of his powers. Centering around the newfound—and forced—relationship between an American/Palestinian FBI agent and a hardline Israeli cop, working together uneasily to solve the murder of the Israeli police chief in Gaza. Moving, thrilling, with extraordinary scope, it does for Palestine and Israel what Gorky Park did years ago for Russia. In the vein of LeCarré and Graham Greene, this is the rare novel that manages to entertain, educate, and deeply move the reader.Tony Malik is a half-Irish, half-Arab New York based FBI agent, specializing in money flowing from drug and arms deals. The novel opens in shocking fashion, with Malik seriously injured by a terrorist-planted bomb. During his lengthy recuperative process, his life changes radically. A long-term relationship ends, and his job is on the verge of being taken away from him. During this period he learns more about his roots and becomes interested in his father's past and family - his father came to America years ago from Palestine. He decides to make a trip to his father's homeland to attend the wedding of his niece, whom he has never met. As a result of his plans, he is given a simple assignment by his boss at the FBI, partly to see how well he can still do his job. That simple assignment becomes extremely complicated.As soon as he arrives in Gaza, the Israeli police chief overseeing the area is murdered. Malik is at first a suspect. Then, due to his superior investigative skills, he is invited into the Israeli investigation, seeking the murderer. At the center of this novel is Malik's relationship with Yossi, the hardline anti-Arab Israeli police officer leading the investigation. They must learn to trust each other because, as they move closer to solving the case, they realize there is no one else they can trust on either side.Extraordinary three dimensional characters populate this Yossi's daughter, studying in Paris, trying to escape the violence that surrounds her in Israel; Malik's niece, whose wedding and life are shattered by the murder; her fiancé, a peacenik whose existence is complicated by the fact that his cousin is high up in the Hamas command; religious leaders on both sides; corrupt Israeli cops; Palestinians thirsting for violence against Israel; Israelis determined to crush the Palestinians. Lawrence Wright brings a wide and complicated tapestry to life, one that culminates on October 7 with the deadly Hamas attack on Israel. But he has written more than just a thriller, or even just an examination of all these complicated lives. He has written a novel that manages to explore and explain much of the devastating history that encompasses the relationship between Israel and Palestine—and shows it to us in a way that poignantly reveals the tragic human scale that is involved.

With the Pulitzer Prize–winning The Looming Tower, Lawrence Wright became generally acknowledged as one of our major journalists writing on terrorism in the Middle East. Here, in ten powerful pieces first published in The New Yorker, he recalls the path that terror in the Middle East has taken, from the rise of al-Qaeda in the 1990s to the recent beheadings of reporters and aid workers by ISIS.The Terror Years draws on several articles he wrote while researching The Looming Tow er , as well as many that he’s written since, following where and how al-Qaeda and its core cultlike beliefs have morphed and spread. They include a portrait of the “man behind bin Laden,” Ayman al-Zawahiri, and the tumultuous Egypt he helped spawn; an indelible impression of Saudi Arabia, a kingdom of silence under the control of the religious police; the Syrian film industry, at the time compliant at the edges but already exuding a feeling of the barely masked fury that erupted into civil war; the 2006–11 Israeli-Palestinian conflict in Gaza, a study in the disparate value of human lives. Other chapters examine al-Qaeda as it forms a master plan for its future, experiences a rebellion from within the organization, and spins off a growing web of worldwide terror. The American response is covered in profiles of two FBI agents and the head of the intelligence community. The book ends with a devastating piece about the capture and slaying by ISIS of four American journalists and aid workers, and our government’s failed response. On the fifteenth anniversary of 9/11, The Terror Years is at once a unifying recollection of the roots of contemporary Middle Eastern terrorism, a study of how it has grown and metastasized, and, in the scary and moving epilogue, a cautionary tale of where terrorism might take us yet.

The author chronicles his experiences as a member of the baby-boom generation, beginning with life in Dallas during the 1960s, and offers insights into the events of three decades

A New York Times Notable Book for 1998Critical acclaim for Lawrence Wright'sA Rhone-Poulenc Science Prize Finalist""This is a book about far more than twins: it is about what twins can tell us about ourselves.""--The New York Times""With plenty of amazing stories about the similarities and differences of twins, Wright respectfully shows, too, how their special circumstance in life challenges our notions of individuality. A truly fascinating but sometimes spooky (Mengele's experiments with twins at Auschwitz figure among Wright's examples) study.""--American Library Association""Like so much of Wright's work, this book is a pleasure to read. Because he writes so well, without pushing a particular point of view, he soon has you pondering questions you have tended to comfortably ignore.""--Austin American-Statesman""Informative and entertaining . . . a provocative subject well considered by a talented journalist.""--Kirkus Reviews

Provides a fictional account of the events that took place in Panama in the late 1980s that led to the capture of Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower comes a fascinating book about religion in America, about the passions, triumphs, and failures of the life of faith, revealing stories of grace and despair, sexual scandal and attempted murder. • "Insightful...vivid...beautifully rendered stories." — Chicago TribuneLawrence Wright's Saints and Sinners are Jimmy Swaggart, who preached a hellfire gospel with rock 'n' roll abandon before he was caught with a, prostitute in a seedy motel; Anton LaVey, the kitsch-loving, gleefully fraudulent founder of the First Church of Satan; Madalyn Murray O'Hair, whose litigious atheism sometimes resembled a brand of faith; Matthew Fox, the Dominican priest who has aroused the fury of the Vatican for dismissing the doctrine of original sin and denouncing the church as a dysfunctional family; Walker Railey, the rising star of Dallas's Methodist church, who, at the pinnacle of his success, was suspected of attempting to murder his wife; and Will Campbell, the eccentric liberal Southern Baptist preacher whose challenges to established ways of thinking have made him a legend in his own time.

An up-close account of the experience of inner city New York kids—black and Latino, from ghettos and projects—who spent a summer in an Amish and Mennonite farm community in Central Pennsylvania in the late 1970s, sponsored by the Fresh Air Fund. City Chidren, Country Summer follows these children as they navigate two very different worlds, from Lawrence Wright, author of The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11, winner of the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction.

Within the last several years…the animal-welfare movement has been divided between those who merely hope to protect animals and those who would like to extend to animals the same rights and recognition that have been gained by minorities, women, and homosexuals. For people who believe that animals have rights, or deserve to have them, an ordinance regulating the use of laboratory animals is only a small step toward the establishment of a society in which mankind lives in a different relation to the rest of the animal kingdom.In The Rights of Mice, Lawrence Wright, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower and Going Clear, takes readers inside the war between science and anti-vivisection raging across the city of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and its great educational institutions, Harvard and MIT. As animal rights activists attempt to push through city council an ordinance restricting the use of animals in laboratory testing, leaders in the science and medical communities brace for a fight. The Rights of Mice was originally published in New England Monthly, August 1987. Cover design by Adil Dara.

Mobile gaming on cell phones and portable consoles is a huge business, and many characters have become design icons. However, the physical limitations of these small screens, and the technological challenges of different gaming platforms, mean that designers have had to become experts at creating characters with just a few points of light. Creating art for these devices is a completely different process than used when creating art for highly sophisticated 3D games. The difference between pixel art and art created for 3D games is there are practical considerations that must be addressed as well as aesthetic considerations. This book will cover both subjects as well as examining the evolution of gaming graphics--explaining the significance of the changes we've seen in game artistry and what we can learn from examining successful icons and graphics created in the past. Character Design for Mobile Devices looks at the techniques, the inspiration, the technologies, and the creative challenges behind designing characters with only a few pixels at your disposal.Filled *Practical and inspirational tutorials that enable you to clearly understand the processes involved in creating art for mobile devices*Timely and inspirational information*Features over 400 full-color images to inspire and instruct

Originally published in 1983, this book is about the way we see things – or think we do, which is by no means the same – and about the ways in which we have tried to reproduce that visual concept in diagrams, pictures, photographs, films and television. Whatever the medium, if any degree of realism is intended, some use of perspective is inevitable, and some understanding of it can aid the appreciation of the result. But here the technicalities of perspective geometry are treated as far as possible non-technically, by a common-sense approach. Students, would-be artists or architects, are warned in the Preface that they will travel second-class in the author’s train of thought (the ‘general reader’ coming first), but they may well find the journey worthwhile in that it provides a background to a subsequent, more detailed studies. Lawrence Wright shows that every form of perspective representation has some innate falsity, but that most such forms offer an adequate makeshift; that rules of geometry often need to be bent; that labour-saving dodges and shortcuts exist. As he says, perspective drawing, like politics, is an art of the possible. In reading this book, beginners may find it all simpler than they had supposed, though the established expert may in some interesting respects find just the opposite. The general reader may thereafter find himself seeing things – and representations of them – in a new light.

¿Qué es el miedo y qué efecto ejerce sobre nuestras vidas? ¿Por qué degenera en fobias y ataques de pánico? ¿Cómo curarse de esos trastornos, por otra parte tan corrientes hoy en día? Al mismo tiempo que responden a estas preguntas, los autores de este libro explican cómo es posible salir del círculo vicioso del pánico, es decir, del miedo al miedo. Y llegan a la conclusión de que es necesaria una modalidad de conocimiento más amplia que reconduzca los problemas y los miedos ?hipertrofiados por la ansiedad? a sus dimensiones reales.

The war to end all wars has finally culminated in a showdown of the world's military heavyweights. None of that matters to a young schoolboy from Australia. Until it does.

Thirty never-before collected essays—many of them profiles—by the Pulitzer Prize–winning and bestselling author of The Looming Tower, Going Clear, and The Plague Year. These brilliant pieces reveal the broad spectrum of Wright’s cultural and political observations over the past thirty five yearsSpanning more than thirty five years of Lawrence Wright’s reporting for The New Yorker, Texas Monthly, Rolling Stone and other magazines, these pieces remind us what a brilliant observer Wright has been of institutions, of political maneuverings, and of people—dangerous, eccentric, or beloved.Some of the essays ORPHANS OF JONESTOWN (1993): A profile of Jim Jones’ two sons. In 1978, when they left Jonestown to play in a basketball tournament, their father ordered the deaths of everyone they knew and loved, leaving them alone in a society uncomprehending of their experience.A RAPIST’S HOMECOMING (1995): The ethical dilemma of a prison therapist, concerned that her patient—about to be released—could attack again.A LIVING DOLL (1988): A very personal column. How the author relates to his 5-year-old daughter through her dolls and stuffed animals.THE LIFE AND DEATH OF RICHARD BRAUTIGAN (1985): An incisive look at the 1960’s and 1970’s literary icon.CAPTURED ON FILM (2006): Dissident filmmakers in Syria.SPACE CADET (1981): How a sanitary engineer combined her expertise and career with her love of space exploration and NASA.THE ELEPHANT IN THE COURTOOM (2022): Should animals have legal rights?And many A profile of the great spitball pitcher, Gaylord Perry; a look at how a Pentecostal Texas cattle farmer and an orthodox rabbi from Jerusalem come together over the End of Days; a 2006 essays detailing an attack in Gaza that mirrors the tragedies occurring today; a profile of Jamaal Khashoggi; one of Jimmy Carter; and a group of essays that deal with Wright’s life as a father.This is an important collection that will demand attention, and a stirring overview of an extraordinary career.

1963. 4th Impression. 281 pages. Pictorial dust jacket over yellow cloth. Black and white illustrations throughout. Binding remains firm. Pages and illustrations have light tanning and foxing throughout. Water staining to page edges throughout, text remains unaffected. Boards have light shelf-wear with corner bumping. Slight crushing to spine ends. Clipped jacket has moderate edgewear with chips, tears, and creasing. Light tanning and water staining to spine and edges. Foxing overall.

アメリカＣＤＣで感染症対策班を率いるヘンリーは、インドネシアの収容キャンプで発生した謎の出血熱の調査に向かう。彼の迅速な対応により、死亡率70％を超えるこのコンゴリウイルスは、封じ込めに成功した、と思われていた……感染者がひとり、 300万の巡礼者が集まるメッカへ向かったと判明するまでは。おりしもサウジアラビアとイランは一触即発の危機にあった――ピュリッツァー賞作家が送る、迫真のテクノスリラー

ヘンリーはメッカ封鎖を試みたものの刻々と死者が増え、感染の封じ込めは不可能だった。やがてコンゴリウイルスは世界中で蔓延し始めた。各地で経済が破綻、紛争が勃発し、アメリカ・ロシア間の緊張も臨界点を超えつつある。帰国の手段を失ったヘンリーはなんとか米海軍潜水艦ジョージアに乗りこむが、艦内でも感染者が発生しており……。そして世界の命運を決める十月が――衝撃のパンデミック・スリラー

Un jumeau est-il toujours identique à son jumeau ? Ont-ils nécessairement la même forme et le même degré d'intelligence ? Comment expliquer qu'ils partagent les mêmes goûts vestimentaires ou les mêmes peurs, quand ils sont élevés séparément ? Le développement de leur personnalité est-il génétiquement prédéterminé ? À travers une foule d'histoires pittoresques, Lawrence Wright fait le point sur les recherches scientifiques les plus avancées en matière de gémellité. Son enquête nous permet ainsi de mieux saisir la part de libre arbitre laissée à chacun d'entre nous et de comprendre les véritables fondements de l'identité individuelle : comment devenons-nous ce que nous sommes ? Sommes-nous libres de décider de ce que nous ferons de notre vie ? Lawrence Wright a reçu le National Magazine Award for Reporting pour cette enquête scientifique. Journaliste au New Yorker, il est aussi l'auteur de plusieurs essais.