Action movie starring former WWE wrestler Dave Bautista as a disgraced ex-cop trying to get to the bottom of a murder he is the prime suspect for. Ray (Bautista)'s career has followed an unusual trajectory. Both an ex-cop and now, having been released from prison, an ex-con, Ray struggles to find work and finally takes a job as a bouncer for a strip club called The House of the Rising Sun. When the son of the club's owner, Vinnie (Lyle Kanouse), is found murdered, Ray's boss, Tony (Dominic Purcell), suggests that Ray use his policing skills to track down the killer. However, the police themselves are on the case and already have a killer firmly in mind: Ray.

As Nola is about to leave Pandorient to enjoy a well-deserved rest in her own world, she is terrified to discover that the door back to the Hexaworld is locked! Has the music box’s key fallen out of its lock? Has someone stolen it? Either way, Nola, Anton, Igor and Andrea are determined to make a one-of-a-kind magic potion to solve the problem. Unfortunately, they are missing a vital ingredient... Can they find the feathers from an endangered silken eagle to complete the potion and send Nola safely home? Find out in the fifth volume of this enchanting graphic novel series that will leave fantasy fans spellbound.

After Siloé and her half-brothers unexpectedly entered the Hexaworld, Nola learned a lot about her mother and the history of Pandorient. But the unanswered questions multiply when she discovers a strange key at home. What could it possibly open? To find out, Nola returns to Pandorient, only to learn of a disturbing disappearance. Are Nola, Igor and Andrea ready for an investigation that could turn life in Pandorient upside down? Will the secrets behind the strange key open a door to adventure or disaster? Find out in the fourth volume of this enchanting graphic novel series that will leave fantasy fans spellbound.

Having recently discovered the world of Pandorient, Nola can’t resist the temptation to go back. When she does, she finds the streets packed for a grand celebration, and it’s not easy for Nola to blend in. Luckily, Anton the great Merlinian is there to give her camouflage powder. But there’s no time for festivities! Nola, Igor and Andrea have mysteries to solve... like revealing the secret of Cyprian, Anton’s son. On top of that, will they be able to thwart the terrible plot brewing in the shadows? Find out in the second volume of this enchanting graphic novel series that will leave fantasy fans spellbound.

When she gets home from school, Nola senses a strange presence. What’s happening? Has someone from Pandorient crossed into her Hexaworld? With help from Igor and Andrea, the mysterious trespasser is unmasked. What a reckless breach! Anton and Mathilda were very clear: no one should pass through the gates of Pandorient and into the Hexaworld! So when a group of Pandorientians appears in Nola’s room on a quest to find Pandoccident, she and her friends fear the worst. Are both worlds now in danger? Find out in the third volume of this enchanting graphic novel series that will leave fantasy fans spellbound.

When Nola turns eight, her father gives her a wonderful present: a music box that belonged to her late mother. As the young girl studies her new gift, she is shocked to find someone living inside it! That’s when Nola shrinks down and enters the music box too. There she discovers the magical world of Pandorient and a pair of siblings named Andrea and Igor. But time is short: Andrea and Igor’s mother, Mathilda, has fallen seriously ill. What’s wrong with her? Could she have been poisoned? Find out in the first volume of this enchanting graphic novel series that will leave fantasy fans spellbound.

An all-new Step 3 Step into Reading leveled Reader that is based on Nickelodeon's Rugrats! Susie, Chuckie, and Tommy are ready for a fun day at a sci-fi convention with their dads. But when they think they find a famous space villain, they end up having an out-of-this-world adventure. Both girls and boys, 5 to 7 years old, who are fans Nickelodeon's animated series will love this hilarious Step 3 Step into Reading leveled reader. Step 3 Readers feature engaging characters in easy-to-follow plots about popular topics. For children who are ready to read on their own.

Despite their inherent seriousness, the law and those who practice it, be it lawyers, judges, politicians, or bureaucrats, are amongst the most popular objects of comedy and humour. Sometimes even the mention of the law, or the mere use of legal vocabulary, can trigger laughter. This is deeply counterintuitive, but true across cultures and historical eras: while the law is there to prevent and remedy injustice, it often ends up becoming the butt of comedy. But laughter and comedy, too, are also infused with seriousness: as universal social phenomena, they are extremely complex objects of study. This book maps out the many intersections of the law and laughter, from classical Greece to the present day. Taking on well-known classical and modern works of literature and visual culture, from Aristophanes to Laurel and Hardy and from Nietzsche to Totò and Fernandel, laughter and comedy bring law back to the complexity of human soul and the unpredictability of life.

This volume contains the papers of the 8th International Workshop on Medical and Service Robots (MESROB) which was held in Craiova, Romania, on June 7-10, 2023. The main topics include: design of medical devices, kinematics and dynamics for medical robotics, exoskeletons and prostheses, anthropomorphic hands, therapeutic robots and rehabilitation, cognitive robots, humanoid and service robots, assistive robots and elderly assistance, surgical robots, human-robot interfaces, haptic devices, medical treatments, medical lasers, and surgical planning and navigation. The contributions, which were selected by means of a rigorous international peer-review process, highlight numerous exciting ideas that will spur novel research directions and foster multidisciplinary collaboration among different specialists, demonstrating that medical and service robotics will drive the technological and societal change in the coming decades.

Though conflict is normal and can never fully be prevented in the international arena, such conflicts should not lead to loss of innocent life. Tourism can offer a bottom-up approach in the mediation process and contribute to the transformation of conflicts by allowing a way to contradict official barriers motivated by religious, political, or ethnic division. Tourism has both the means and the motivation to ensure the long-term success of prevention efforts. Role and Impact of Tourism in Peacebuilding and Conflict Transformation is an essential reference source that provides an approach to peace through tourism by presenting a theoretical framework of tourism dynamics in international relations, as well as a set of peacebuilding case studies that illustrate the role of tourism in violent or critical scenarios of conflict. Featuring research on topics such as cultural diversity, multicultural interaction, and international relations, this book is ideally designed for policymakers, government officials, international relations experts, academicians, students, and researchers.

This book shows that screens don’t just distribute the visible and the invisible, but have always mediated our body's relationships with the physical and anthropological-cultural environment. By combining a series of historical-genealogical reconstructions going back to prehistoric times with the analysis of present and near-future technologies, the authors show that screens have always incorporated not only the hiding/showing functions but also the protecting/exposing ones, as the Covid-19 pandemic retaught us. The intertwining of these functions allows the authors to criticize the mainstream ideas of images as inseparable from screens, of words as opposed to images, and of what they call “Transparency 2.0� ideology, which currently dominates our socio-political life. Moreover, they show how wearable technologies don’t approximate us to a presumed disappearance of screens but seem to draw a circular pathway back to using our bodies as screens. This raises new relational, ethical, and political questions, which this book helps to illuminate.

This book explores the subject of artificial psychology and how the field must adapt human neuro-psychological testing techniques to provide adequate cognitive testing of advanced artificial intelligence systems. It shows how classical testing methods will reveal nothing about the cognitive nature of the systems and whether they are learning, reasoning, and evolving correctly; for these systems, the authors outline how testing techniques similar to/adapted from human psychological testing must be adopted, particularly in understanding how the system reacts to failure or relearning something it has learned incorrectly or inferred incorrectly. The authors provide insights into future architectures/capabilities that artificial cognitive systems will possess and how we can evaluate how well they are functioning. It discusses at length the notion of human/AI communication and collaboration and explores such topics as knowledge development, knowledge modeling and ambiguity management, artificial cognition and self-evolution of learning, artificial brain components and cognitive architecture, and artificial psychological modeling. Explores the concepts of Artificial Psychology and Artificial Neuroscience as applied to advanced artificially cognitive systems; Provides insight into the world of cognitive architectures and biologically-based computing designs which will mimic human brain functionality in artificial intelligent systems of the future; Provides description and design of artificial psychological modeling to provide insight into how advanced artificial intelligent systems are learning and evolving; Explores artificial reasoning and inference architectures and the types of modeling and testing that will be required to "trust" an autonomous artificial intelligent systems.