Jon Ronson

"For the past three years Jon Ronson has traveled the world meeting recipients of famous public shamings, often while their shamings are in full force. These are people like us--people who, say, made a joke on social media that came out badly. Once a transgression is revealed, collective outrage circles with the force of a hurricane, and the next thing they know, they're being torn apart for it, jeered at, demonized, and fired from their jobs. A great...

Ronson investigates the strange things we are willing to believe in, from lifelike robots programmed with the personalities of our loved ones to indigo children to hyper successful spiritual healers. He looks at ordinary lives that take on extraordinary perspectives, for instance a pop singer whose greatest passion is the coming alien invasion, and the scientist designated to greet those aliens when they arrive. Ronson throws himself into the stories....

Reporter Bob Wilton is trying to lose himself in the romance of war after his marriage fails. He gets more than he bargains for when he meets a special forces agent who reveals the existence of a secret, military unit whose goal is to end war as we know it. With unparalleled psychic powers, they can read the enemy's thoughts, pass through solid walls, and even kill a goat by simply staring at it. Now, the founder of the unit has gone missing and the...