| The house of being / Natasha Trethewey. |
 "In a shotgun house in Gulfport, Mississippi, at the crossroads of Highway 49, the legendary highway of the Blues, and Jefferson Street, Natasha Trethewey learned to read and write. Before the land was a crossroads, however, it was a pasture: a farming settlement where, after the Civil War, a group of formerly enslaved women, men, and children made a new home. In this intimate and searching meditation, Trethewey revisits the geography of her childhood to trace the origins of her writing life, born of the need to create new metaphors to inhabit "so that my story would not be determined for me." She recalls the markers of history and culture that dotted the horizons of her youth: the Confederate flags proudly flown throughout Mississippi; her gradual understanding of her own identity as the child of a Black mother and a white father; and her grandmother's collages lining the hallway, offering glimpses of the world as it could be. With the clarity of a prophet and the grace of a poet, Trethewey offers up a vision of writing as reclamation: of our own lives and the stories of the vanished, forgotten, and erased."-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Sociopath : a memoir / Patric Gagne, PhD. |
 "Patric Gagne realized she made others uncomfortable before she started kindergarten. Something about her caused people to react in a way she didn't understand. She suspected it was because she didn't feel things the way other kids did. Emotions like fear, guilt, and empathy eluded her. For the most part, she felt nothing. And she didn't like the way that "nothing" felt. She did her best to pretend she was like everyone else, but the constant pressure to conform to a society she knew rejected anyone like her was unbearable. So Patric stole. She lied. She was occasionally violent. She became an expert lock-picker and home-invader. All with the goal of replacing the nothingness with...something. In college, Patric finally confirmed what she'd long suspected. She was a sociopath. But even though it was the very first personality disorder identified--well over 200 years ago--sociopathy had been neglected by mental health professionals for decades. She was told there was no treatment, no hope for a normal life. She found herself haunted by sociopaths in pop culture, madmen and evil villains who are considered monsters. Her future looked grim. But when Patric reconnects with an old flame, she gets a glimpse of a future beyond her diagnosis. If she's capable of love, it must mean that she isn't a monster. With the help of her sweetheart (and some curious characters she meets along the way) she embarks on a mission to prove that the millions of Americans who share her diagnosis aren't all monsters either"--Dust jacket. |
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| Ian Fleming: the complete man / Nicholas Shakespeare. |
 "Ian Fleming's greatest creation, James Bond, has had an enormous and ongoing impact on our culture. What Bond represents about ideas of masculinity, the British national psyche and global politics has shifted over time, as has the interpretation of the life of his author. But Fleming himself was more mysterious and subtle than anything he wrote. Ian's childhood with his gifted brother Peter and his extraordinary mother set the pattern for his ambition to be 'the complete man', and he would strive for the means to achieve this 'completeness' all his life. Only a writer for his last twelve years, his dramatic personal life and impressive career in Naval Intelligence put him at the heart of critical moments in world history, while also providing rich inspiration for his fiction. Exceptionally well connected, and widely travelled, from the United States and Soviet Russia to his beloved Jamaica, Ian had access to the most powerful political figures at a time of profound change." -- Provided by publisher. |
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| Fi : a memoir / Alexandra Fuller. |
 "From the award-winning New York Times-bestselling author, Alexandra Fuller, comes a career defining memoir about grieving the sudden loss of her twenty-one-year-old child. "Fair to say, I was in a ribald state the summer before my fiftieth birthday." And so begins Alexandra Fuller's open, vivid new memoir, Fi. It's midsummer in Wyoming and Alexandra is barely hanging on. Grieving her father and pining for her home country of Zimbabwe, reeling from a midlife breakup, freshly sober and piecing her way uncertainly through a volatile new relationship with a younger woman, Alexandra vows to get herself back on even keel. And then-suddenly and incomprehensibly-her son Fi, at twenty-one years old, dies in his sleep. No stranger to loss-young siblings, a parent, a home country-Alexandra is nonetheless leveled. At the same time, she is painfully aware that she cannot succumb and abandon her two surviving daughters as her mother before her had done. From a sheep wagon deep in the mountains of Wyoming to a grief sanctuary in New Mexico to a silent meditation retreat in Alberta, Canada, Alexandra journeys up and down the spine of the Rocky Mountains in an attempt to find how to grieve herself whole. There is no answer, and there are countless answers-in poetry, in rituals and routines, in nature and in the indigenous wisdom she absorbed as a child in Zimbabwe. By turns disarming, devastating and unexpectedly, blessedly funny, Alexandra recounts the wild medicine of painstakingly grieving a child in a culture that has no instructions for it"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Somehow : thoughts on love / Anne Lamott. |
 ""Love is our only hope," Anne Lamott writes in this perceptive new book. "It is not always the easiest choice, but it is always the right one, the noble path, the way home to safety, no matter how bleak the future looks." In Somehow: Thoughts on Love, Lamott explores the transformative power that love has in our lives: how it surprises us, forces us to confront uncomfortable truths, reminds us of our humanity, and guides us forward. "Love just won't be pinned down," she says. "It is in our very atmosphere" and lies at the heart of who we are. We are, Lamott says, creatures of love. In each chapter of Somehow, Lamott refracts all the colors of the spectrum. She explores the unexpected love for a partner later in life. The bruised (and bruising) love for a child who disappoints, even frightens. The sustaining love among a group of sinners, for a community in transition, in the wider world. The lessons she underscores are that love enlightens as it educates, comforts as it energizes, sustains as it surprises. Somehow is Anne Lamott's twentieth book, and in it she draws from her own life and experience to delineate the intimate and elemental ways that love buttresses us in the face of despair as it galvanizes us to believe that tomorrow will be better than today. Full of the compassion and humanity that have made Lamott beloved by millions of readers, Somehow is classic Anne Lamott: funny, warm, and wise"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| The rulebreaker : the life and times of Barbara Walters / Susan Page. |
 The definitive biography of the most successful female broadcaster of all time--Barbara Walters--a woman whose personal demons fueled an ambition that broke all the rules and finally gave women a permanent place on the air, written by bestselling author Susan Page. Barbara Walters was a force from the time TV was exploding on the American scene in the 1960s to its waning dominance in a new world of competition from streaming services and social media half a century later. She was not just a groundbreaker for women (Oprah announced when she was seventeen that she wanted to be Barbara Walters), but also expanded the big TV interview and then dominated the genre. By the end of her career, she had interviewed more of the famous and infamous, from presidents to movie stars to criminals to despots, than any other journalist in history. Then at sixty-seven, past the age many female broadcasters found themselves involuntarily retired, she pioneered a new form of talk TV called The View. She is on the short list of those who have left the biggest imprints on television news and on our culture, male or female. So, who was the woman behind the legacy?In The Rulebreaker, Susan Page conducts 150 interviews and extensive archival research to discover that Walters was driven to keep herself and her family afloat after her mercurial and famous impresario father attempted suicide. But she never lost the fear of an impending catastrophe, which is what led her to ask for things no woman had ever asked for before, to ignore the rules of misogynistic culture, to outcompete her most ferocious competitors, and to protect her complicated marriages and love life from scrutiny. Page breaks news on every front--from the daring things Walters did to become the woman who reinvented the TV interview to the secrets she kept until her death. This is the eye-opening account of the woman who knew she had to break all the rules so she could break all the rules about what viewers deserved to know. |
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| The queen mother : the untold story of Elizabeth Bowes Lyon, who became Queen Elizabeth the queen mother / Lady Colin Campbell. |
 Campbell shows us that the untold life of Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, is far more interesting and moving than the official version that has been peddled since 1923. Elizabeth's life has been filled with controversy-- beginning with the mysterious circumstances of her birth, the roles she played in her daughters' marriages, and her relationship with Princess Diana. |
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| Barbara Comyns : a savage innocence / Avril Horner. |
 The extraordinary twentieth-century writer Barbara Comyns led a life as captivating as the narratives she spun. This pioneering biography reveals the journey of a woman who experienced hardship and single-motherhood before the age of thirty but went on to publish a sequence of novels that are unique in the English language. Comyns turned her hand to many jobs in order to survive, from artist's model to restoring pianos. Hundreds of unpublished letters reveal an occasionally desperate but resourceful and witty woman whose complicated life ranged from enduring poverty when young to mixing with spivs, spies and high society. While working as a housekeeper in her mid-thirties, Comyns began transforming the bleak episodes of her life into compelling fictions streaked with surrealism and deadpan humour. The Vet's Daughter (1959), championed by Graham Greene, brought her fame, although her use of the gothic and macabre divided readers and reviewers. This biography not only excavates Comyns's life but also reclaims her fiction, providing a timely reassessment of her literary contribution. It sheds new light on a remarkable author who deftly captured the complexities of human life. |
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| Did I ever tell you? : a memoir / Genevieve Kingston. |
 Genevieve (Gwen) Kingston's mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer when Gwen was just three years old. Defying the odds, she lived another eight years, during which time she filled a chest with gifts and letters to Gwen and her brother, Jamie, for every major milestone and birthday through age thirty. The day Gwen got her driver's license. The day she graduated from high school. Gwen is now in her thirties and, when Did I Ever Tell You? begins, three unopened boxes remain: engagement, marriage, and first baby. Two decades after her passing, Gwen's mother's extraordinary efforts created a lifelong conversation beyond the grave. |
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| Character matters : and other life lessons from George Herbert Walker Bush / Jean Becker. |
 "As America heads into what promises to be a tumultuous 2024 presidential election year, Character Matters will be a good reminder of the importance of character when defining true leadership. Colleagues, friends, and family will share their often very personal stories of what they learned from watching and listening to President Bush, including former United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice; Secretary of State James A. Baker; stand-up comedian Dana Carvey; "Queen of Country" star Reba McEntire; American columnist for The New York Times Maureen Dowd; American novelist Brad Meltzer; presidential biographer Jon Meacham; former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom John Major; former Prime Minister of Canada Brian Mulroney; Secretary of Defense Robert Gates; the Oak Ridge Boys and best-selling author Christopher Buckley; and of course his grandchildren. Character Matters will illustrate how George Bush never stopped showing us the way to lead by example"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| The making of a leader : the formative years of George C. Marshall / Josiah Bunting III. |
 "A portrait of one of the greatest leaders of modern history, George Catlett Marshall, and a distillation of the essential lessons his formation offers to the leaders of today and tomorrow. George Marshall was a soldier-statesman who guided the Allies to victory during World War II and set Europe on the postwar path to recovery with the plan that bears his name, receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 1953. But how did he become such an effective leader? By eschewing the years and accomplishments for which Marshall is most often remembered and focusing instead on the decisive moments that led up to them, Making a Leader provides the most detailed look yet at the mettle of Marshall's character, guiding us from his arrival as a cadet at the Virginia Military Institute and his Fort Leavenworth days--where he "learned how to learn"--to his instructive time as John J. Pershing's aide-de-camp and his critical experiences during World War I. Josiah Bunting III, a lifelong educator and former superintendent of Marshall's alma mater, highlights the importance of Marshall's activity between the wars, when he led "the single most influential period of military education" at Fort Benning, eventually culminating in his appointment as Army chief of staff in 1939. In this penetrating portrait, told with the command and fluency of one who knows the story by heart, Bunting cuts through the legend of Marshall to the man--his frustrations, passions, loves, and brilliance--revealing a humble commander who knew not only how to lead himself but how to see the leader in others"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Wild life : finding my purpose in an untamed world / Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant. |
 Growing up in the diverse and bustling California Bay Area, renowned wildlife ecologist Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant always felt worlds away from the white male adventurers she watched explore the wilderness on TV. She dreamed of a future where she could spend sleepless nights under the crowded canopies of the Amazon and the starry skies of the savanna. But as Rae set off on her own expeditions in the wild, she saw nature's delicate balance in a new light. Wild Life follows Rae on her adventures and explorations in some of the world's most remote locales. Hers is a story about a nearly twenty-year career in the wild--carving a niche as one of very few Black female scientists--and the challenges she had to overcome, expectations she had to leave behind, and the many lessons she learned along the way. An incredible journey spanning the Great Plains of North America to the rainforests of Madagascar, Wild Life sheds light on our pivotal relationship and responsibility to the natural world and the relatives--both human and otherwise--that we share it with. |
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| Reminiscences of a student's life / Jane Ellen Harrison ; with a foreword by Daniel Mendelsohn. |
 First published by Virginia and Leonard Woolf in 1925, Jane Ellen Harrison's Reminiscences are the irreverent memoirs of a student who declared Victorian education "ingeniously useless," who blazed a trail for female scholars, and who changed the way we see the ancient world. Growing up in the Yorkshire countryside, Harrison showed an early aptitude for languages: by the age of seventeen, with the help of a governess, she had learned Greek, Latin, German, and some Hebrew. ("Unfortunately, having no guide, we began with the Psalms, which are hard nuts to crack.") She went on to become the most influential Classicist of her generation. Drawing on the insights of Nietzsche, Bergson, and Freud, and on archaeological research, she helped to revolutionize the study of Greek myth. "The great Mother," she wrote, "is prior to male divinities." Unconventional in her private life ("By what miracle I escaped marriage I do not know, for all my life I fell in love"), she spent her later years with the poet and novelist Hope Mirrlees, thirty-seven years her junior. Harrison's zest for life is everywhere in these pages. Sprightly, amused, and amusing, her Reminiscences form an unforgettable sketch of a woman ahead of her time. -- Provided by publisher. |
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| Waiting for the monsoon / Rod Nordland. |
 In 2019, a Pulitzer Prize-winning war correspondent who reported in over 150 countries, many in violent upheaval, was diagnosed with a fatal brain tumor, which gave him the strength to face more personal conflicts, in this unforgettable final dispatch that reveals how facing the unknown can change our relationship to the world around us. |
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| Caravans and wedding bands : memories of a Romany life / Eva Petulengro with Claire Petulengro. |
 As traditional Romany ways were disappearing day by day, Eva clung on tightly to her heritage, refusing to say goodbye to the only world she had ever known. In this wonderful book, she provides fascinating glimpses into the lives of her family and their past, telling tales of their whirlwind romances and travelling adventures. She also describes becoming a famous clairvoyant, with celebrity clients lining up to have their palms read, and talks about many of the colourful characters she meets along the way. But it was the Swinging Sixties and an innocent Romany girl could easily find herself in some strange situations ... |
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| Somehow : thoughts on love / Anne Lamott. |
| ""Love is our only hope," Anne Lamott writes in this perceptive new book. "It is not always the easiest choice, but it is always the right one, the noble path, the way home to safety, no matter how bleak the future looks." In Somehow: Thoughts on Love, Lamott explores the transformative power that love has in our lives: how it surprises us, forces us to confront uncomfortable truths, reminds us of our humanity, and guides us forward. "Love just won't be pinned down," she says. "It is in our very atmosphere" and lies at the heart of who we are. We are, Lamott says, creatures of love. In each chapter of Somehow, Lamott refracts all the colors of the spectrum. She explores the unexpected love for a partner later in life. The bruised (and bruising) love for a child who disappoints, even frightens. The sustaining love among a group of sinners, for a community in transition, in the wider world. The lessons she underscores are that love enlightens as it educates, comforts as it energizes, sustains as it surprises. Somehow is Anne Lamott's twentieth book, and in it she draws from her own life and experience to delineate the intimate and elemental ways that love buttresses us in the face of despair as it galvanizes us to believe that tomorrow will be better than today. Full of the compassion and humanity that have made Lamott beloved by millions of readers, Somehow is classic Anne Lamott: funny, warm, and wise"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| The Minotaur at Calle Lanza / Zito Madu. |
 Venice, 2020. As a pandemic rages across the globe, Zito Madu finds himself in a nearly deserted city, its walls and basilicas humming with strange magic. As he wanders a haunted landscape, we see him twist further into his own past: his family's difficult immigration from Nigeria to Detroit, his troubled relationship with his father, the sporadic joys of daily life and solitude, his experiences with migration, poverty, foreignness, racism, and his own rage and regret. But as it is with all labyrinths, after finding its center, will he come away unscathed, or will he transform into the gripping, fantastical monstrousness that's out to consume him whole? With nods to Italo Calvino and Jorge Luis Borges, this surrealist debut memoir takes us into the labyrinth of memory and the monsters lurking there. -- Back cover. |
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| The making of a leader : the formative years of George C. Marshall / Josiah Bunting III. |
| "A portrait of one of the greatest leaders of modern history, George Catlett Marshall, and a distillation of the essential lessons his formation offers to the leaders of today and tomorrow. George Marshall was a soldier-statesman who guided the Allies to victory during World War II and set Europe on the postwar path to recovery with the plan that bears his name, receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 1953. But how did he become such an effective leader? By eschewing the years and accomplishments for which Marshall is most often remembered and focusing instead on the decisive moments that led up to them, Making a Leader provides the most detailed look yet at the mettle of Marshall's character, guiding us from his arrival as a cadet at the Virginia Military Institute and his Fort Leavenworth days--where he "learned how to learn"--to his instructive time as John J. Pershing's aide-de-camp and his critical experiences during World War I. Josiah Bunting III, a lifelong educator and former superintendent of Marshall's alma mater, highlights the importance of Marshall's activity between the wars, when he led "the single most influential period of military education" at Fort Benning, eventually culminating in his appointment as Army chief of staff in 1939. In this penetrating portrait, told with the command and fluency of one who knows the story by heart, Bunting cuts through the legend of Marshall to the man--his frustrations, passions, loves, and brilliance--revealing a humble commander who knew not only how to lead himself but how to see the leader in others"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Wild life : finding my purpose in an untamed world / Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant. |
| Growing up in the diverse and bustling California Bay Area, renowned wildlife ecologist Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant always felt worlds away from the white male adventurers she watched explore the wilderness on TV. She dreamed of a future where she could spend sleepless nights under the crowded canopies of the Amazon and the starry skies of the savanna. But as Rae set off on her own expeditions in the wild, she saw nature's delicate balance in a new light. Wild Life follows Rae on her adventures and explorations in some of the world's most remote locales. Hers is a story about a nearly twenty-year career in the wild--carving a niche as one of very few Black female scientists--and the challenges she had to overcome, expectations she had to leave behind, and the many lessons she learned along the way. An incredible journey spanning the Great Plains of North America to the rainforests of Madagascar, Wild Life sheds light on our pivotal relationship and responsibility to the natural world and the relatives--both human and otherwise--that we share it with. |
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| Candy Darling : dreamer, icon, superstar / Cynthia Carr. |
 "From acclaimed biographer Cynthia Carr, the first full portrait of queer icon and Warhol superstar Candy Darling"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| We loved it all : a memory of life / Lydia Millet. |
 "A personal evocation of the glory of nature, our vexed position in the animal kingdom, and the difficulty of adoring what we destroy. Acclaimed novelist Lydia Millet's first work of nonfiction, We Loved It All, is a genre-defying tour de force that makes an impassioned argument for people to see their emotional and spiritual lives as infinitely dependent on the lives of nonhuman beings. Drawing on a quarter-century of experience as an advocate for endangered species at the Center for Biological Diversity, Millet offers intimate portraits of what she calls "the others"-the extraordinary animals with whom we still share the world, along with those already lost. Humans, too, fill this book, as Millet touches on the lives of her world-traveling parents, fascinating partners and friends, and colorful relatives, from diplomats to nut farmers-all figures in the complex tapestry each of us weaves with the surrounding world. Written in the tradition of Annie Dillard or Robert Macfarlane, We Loved It All is an incantatory work that will appeal to anyone concerned about the future of life on earth-including our own"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Rebel Rising : a memoir / Rebel Wilson. |
 For decades, Rebel Wilson had single-mindedly focused on her career, making a name for herself through her iconic roles in Pitch Perfect, Bridesmaids, and Isn't It Romantic. Now, she's ready to chronicle the emotional and physical lessons she learned, as well as her most embarrassing experiences. A malaria-induced hallucination? An all-style martial arts fighting tournament? Junior handling at dog shows? And this was all BEFORE she moved to Hollywood! Rebel Rising follows Rebel Wilson's incredible journey of "making it," constantly questioning, "Am I good enough? Will I ever find love? Will I ever change and become healthy?" Rebel writes for the first time about the most personal and important moments in her life--from fertility issues, weight gain and loss, sexuality, overcoming shyness, rejections, and, well... okay there's at least one story thrown in about Brad Pitt! It's all here. This memoir shows us how to love ourselves while making us laugh uncontrollably. -- Provided by publisher. |
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| Becky Lynch : The Man : not your average average girl / Rebecca Quin. |
 "This compelling and deeply personal memoir from WWE superstar Rebecca Quin-a.k.a. The Man, a.k.a. Becky Lynch-delves into her earliest wrestling days, her scrappy beginnings, and her meteoric rise to fame. By age seven, Rebecca Quin, now known in the ring as Becky Lynch, was already defying what the world expected of her. Raised in Dublin, Ireland in a devoutly Catholic family, Rebecca constantly invented new ways to make her mother worry-roughhousing with the neighborhood kids, hosting secret parties while her parents were away, enrolling in a warehouse wrestling school, nearly breaking her neck and almost kneecapping a WWE star before her own wrestling career even began-and she was always in search of a thrilling escape from the ordinary. Rebecca's deep love of wrestling as a child set her on an unlikely path. With few female wrestlers to look to for guidance, Rebecca pursued a wrestling career hoping to change the culture and move away from the antiquated disrespect so often directed at the elite female athletes that grace the ring. Even as a teenager, she knew that she would stop at nothing to earn a space among the greatest wrestlers of our time, and to pave a new path for female fighters. Culled from decades of journal entries, Rebecca's memoir offers a raw, personal, and honest depiction of the complex woman behind the character Rebecca Quin plays on TV"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Ian Fleming: the complete man / Nicholas Shakespeare. |
| "Ian Fleming's greatest creation, James Bond, has had an enormous and ongoing impact on our culture. What Bond represents about ideas of masculinity, the British national psyche and global politics has shifted over time, as has the interpretation of the life of his author. But Fleming himself was more mysterious and subtle than anything he wrote. Ian's childhood with his gifted brother Peter and his extraordinary mother set the pattern for his ambition to be 'the complete man', and he would strive for the means to achieve this 'completeness' all his life. Only a writer for his last twelve years, his dramatic personal life and impressive career in Naval Intelligence put him at the heart of critical moments in world history, while also providing rich inspiration for his fiction. Exceptionally well connected, and widely travelled, from the United States and Soviet Russia to his beloved Jamaica, Ian had access to the most powerful political figures at a time of profound change." -- Provided by publisher. |
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| We loved it all : a memory of life / Lydia Millet. |
| "A personal evocation of the glory of nature, our vexed position in the animal kingdom, and the difficulty of adoring what we destroy. Acclaimed novelist Lydia Millet's first work of nonfiction, We Loved It All, is a genre-defying tour de force that makes an impassioned argument for people to see their emotional and spiritual lives as infinitely dependent on the lives of nonhuman beings. Drawing on a quarter-century of experience as an advocate for endangered species at the Center for Biological Diversity, Millet offers intimate portraits of what she calls "the others"-the extraordinary animals with whom we still share the world, along with those already lost. Humans, too, fill this book, as Millet touches on the lives of her world-traveling parents, fascinating partners and friends, and colorful relatives, from diplomats to nut farmers-all figures in the complex tapestry each of us weaves with the surrounding world. Written in the tradition of Annie Dillard or Robert Macfarlane, We Loved It All is an incantatory work that will appeal to anyone concerned about the future of life on earth-including our own"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Rebel Rising : a memoir / Rebel Wilson. |
| For decades, Rebel Wilson had single-mindedly focused on her career, making a name for herself through her iconic roles in Pitch Perfect, Bridesmaids, and Isn't It Romantic. Now, she's ready to chronicle the emotional and physical lessons she learned, as well as her most embarrassing experiences. A malaria-induced hallucination? An all-style martial arts fighting tournament? Junior handling at dog shows? And this was all BEFORE she moved to Hollywood! Rebel Rising follows Rebel Wilson's incredible journey of "making it," constantly questioning, "Am I good enough? Will I ever find love? Will I ever change and become healthy?" Rebel writes for the first time about the most personal and important moments in her life--from fertility issues, weight gain and loss, sexuality, overcoming shyness, rejections, and, well... okay there's at least one story thrown in about Brad Pitt! It's all here. This memoir shows us how to love ourselves while making us laugh uncontrollably. -- Provided by publisher. |
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| Rotten evidence : reading and writing in an Egyptian prison / Ahmed Naji ; translated by Katharine Halls. |
 "In February 2016, Ahmed Naji was sentenced to two years in prison for "violating public modesty," after an excerpt of his novel Using Life reportedly caused a reader to experience heart palpitations. Naji ultimately served ten months of that sentence, in a group cell block in Cairo's Tora Prison. Rotten Evidence is a chronicle of those months. Through Naji's writing, the world of Egyptian prison comes into vivid focus, with its cigarette-based economy, home-made chess sets, and well-groomed fixers. Naji's storytelling is lively and uncompromising, filled with rare insights into both the mundane and grand questions he confronts. How does one secure a steady supply of fresh vegetables without refrigeration? How does one write and revise a novel in a single notebook? Fight boredom? Build a clothes hanger? Negotiate with the chief of intelligence? And, most crucially, how does one make sense of a senseless oppression: finding oneself in prison for the act of writing fiction. Genuine and defiant, this book stands as a testament to the power of the creative mind, in the face of authoritarian censorship."--Front flap of cover. |
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| No bullet got me yet : the relentless faith of Father Kapaun / John Stansifer. |
 "Father Emil Kapaun, a humble priest, went far beyond the call of duty during World War II and the Korean War. Often found with the combat medics on the front lines, unarmed, ministering to the wounded, and known for his intense devotion to the soldiers whom he called "my boys," Kapaun became the most decorated chaplain in US military history, awarded a Medal of Honor, the Distinguished Service Cross and the Legion of Merit. But Father Kapaun's leadership, bravery and selflessness don't end there. When the story of human history is over, evil, death, darkness--they don't get the final word. It was Father Kapaun's love for God that gave him the courage to lay down his life for his friends and for his country"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Lessons for survival : mothering against "the apocalypse" / Emily Raboteau. |
 "A powerfully moving meditation on race, climate, environmental justice--and what it takes to find shelter"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Cloistered : my years as a nun / Catherine Coldstream. |
 "An astonishing memoir of twelve years as a contemplative nun in a silent monastery. Cloistered takes the reader deep into the hidden world of a traditional Carmelite monastery as it approaches the third Millennium and tells the story of an intense personal journey into and out of an enclosed life of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Finding an apparently perfect world at Akenside Priory, in Northumberland, Catherine trusts herself to a group of twenty silent women, believing she is trusting herself to God. As the beauty and mystery of an ancient way of life enfold her, she surrenders herself wholly to its power, quite unaware of the complexity and dangers that lie ahead. Cut off from the wider world for decades, the community has managed to evade accountability to any authority beyond itself. When Sister Catherine realises that a mesmerising cult of the personality, with the distortions it entails, has replaced the ancient ideal of religious obedience, she is faced with a dilemma. Will she submit to this, or will she be forced to speak out? An exploration of the limits of trust, Cloistered shows us how far youthful idealism can take us along the road of self-surrender, and of how much harm is done when institutional flaws go unacknowledged. Catherine's honest account of her time in the monastery - and her dramatic flight from it - is both a love song to a lost community and an exploration of what is most compelling, yet most potentially destructive when closed human groups become laws unto themselves"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Not your China doll : the wild and shimmering life of Anna May Wong / Katie Gee Salisbury. |
 "Set against the glittering backdrop of Los Angeles during the gin-soaked Jazz Age and the rise of Hollywood, this debut book celebrates Anna May Wong, the first Asian American movie star, to bring an unsung heroine to light and reclaim her place in cinema history"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Life : my story through history / Pope Francis with Fabio Marchese Ragona ; translated from the Italian by Aubrey Botsford. |
 "Turning the pages of the precious book that is life, Pope Francis leads us along a path made of emotions, joys, and agonies: a window on the past that will allow us to better understand our present"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| The manicurist's daughter : a memoir / Susan Lieu. |
 "An emotionally raw memoir about the crumbling of the American Dream and a daughter of refugees who searches for answers after her mother dies during plastic surgery. Susan Lieu has long been searching for answers. About her family's past and about her own future. Refugees from the Vietnam War, Susan's family escaped to California in the 1980s after five failed attempts. Upon arrival, Susan's mother was their savvy, charismatic North Star, setting up two successful nail salons and orchestrating every success-until Susan was eleven. That year, her mother died from a botched tummy tuck. After the funeral, no one was ever allowed to talk about her or what happened. For the next twenty years, Susan navigated a series of cascading questions alone-why did the most perfect person in her life want to change her body? Why would no one tell her about her mother's life in Vietnam? And how did this surgeon, who preyed on Vietnamese immigrants, go on operating after her mother's death? Sifting through depositions, tracking down the surgeon's family, and enlisting the help of spirit channelers, Susan uncovers the painful truth of her mother, herself, and the impossible ideal of beauty. The Manicurist's Daughter is much more than a memoir about grief, trauma, and body image. It is a story of fierce determination, strength in shared culture, and finding your place in the world"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| In true face : a woman's life in the CIA, unmasked / Jonna Mendez With Wyndham Wood. |
 "Jonna Hiestand Mendez began her CIA career as a "contract wife," a second-class citizen who was hired as a convenience to her husband, a young officer stationed in Switzerland. She needed his permission to open a bank account or shut off the gas to her apartment, and she performed menial duties for the CIA. Despite battling sexism at all levels of the agency, Mendez's talent for espionage was clear, and she soon took on bigger and more significant roles. She lived under cover and served tours of duty all over the globe, as well as at CIA Headquarters. She confronted dangerous situations that called on her spy training: coming face to face with a rogue Jihadi who had brought down an American plane, and helping steal a top-secret encryption machine from a Soviet embassy, among other high stakes situations. She became an international spy and ultimately Chief of Disguise at CIA's Office of Technical Service--a kind of female American version of James Bond's famous "Q." In this breakthrough memoir, Mendez recounts not only the drama of her international spy career but the grit and good fortune it took for her to navigate the CIA's misogynistic world. She was undermined, harassed, and threatened, and saw colleagues experience worse. While maintaining a patriotic mission and working to advance her own career, she was a firsthand witness to the cost of this gendered culture, both to the women who worked there, and to the interests of the agency and the nation it serves. In True Face is both clear-eyed and dramatic: the story of an incredible spy career, and what it took to achieve it"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| The many lives of Mama Love : memoir of lying, stealing, writing, and healing / Lara Love Hardin. |
 "New York Times bestselling author Lara Love Hardin recounts her slide from soccer mom to opioid addict to jailhouse shot-caller and her unlikely comeback as a highly successful ghostwriter in this harrowing, hilarious, no-holds-barred memoir"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| One way back : a memoir / Christine Blasey Ford. |
 On September 27, 2018, Christine Blasey Ford testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee which was considering the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the United States Supreme Court. She described an alleged sexual assault by the Supreme Court nominee that took place at a high school party in the 1980s. Her words and courage on that day provided some of the most credible and unforgettable testimony our country has ever witnessed. In One Way Back, Ford recounts the months she spent trying to get information into the right hands without exposing herself and her family to dangerous backlash. Drawing parallels to her life as a surfer, she explains the process of paddling out into unknown waters despite the risks and fears, knowing there is only one way back to shore. The book reveals riveting new details about the leadup to her testimony and its overwhelming aftermath and describes how she continues to navigate her way out of the storm. This is the real story behind the headlines and the soundbites, a complex, page-turning memoir of a scientist, a surfer, a mother, a patriot and an unlikely whistleblower. Ford's experience shows that when one person steps forward to speak truth to power, she adds to a collective whole, causing "a ripple that might one day become a wave." |
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| Devout : a memoir of doubt / Anna Gazmarian. |
 In this revelatory memoir, Anna Gazmarian tells the story of how her evangelical upbringing in North Carolina failed to help her understand the mental health diagnosis she received, and the work she had to do to find proper medical treatment while also maintaining her faith. When Anna is diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 2011, she's faced with a conundrum: while the diagnosis provides clarity about her manic and depressive episodes, she must confront the stigma that her evangelical community attaches to her condition. Over the course of ten years, we follow Anna on her journey to reframe her understanding of mental health to expand the limits of what her religious practice can offer. In Devout: A Memoir of Doubt, Anna shows that the pursuing our emotional health and our spiritual well-being is one single mission and, in both cases, an act of faith. -- Provided by publisher. |
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| Mother island : a daughter claims Puerto Rico / Jamie Figueroa. |
 "A searing and deeply personal memoir that explores the institutions--family, society, country--that defined a Puerto Rican woman and what she unlearned to rediscover herself. Growing up in the Midwest, raised by a Puerto Rican mother who was abandoned by her family, Jamie Figueroa and her sisters were estranged from their culture, consumed by the whiteness that surrounded them. In Mother Island, Figueroa traces her search for identity as shaped by and against a mother who settled into the safety of assimilation. In lyrical, blistering prose, Figueroa recalls a childhood in Ohio in which she was relegated to the background of her mother's string of failed marriages; her own marriage in her early twenties to a man twice her age; how her work as a licensed massage therapist helped her heal her body trauma; and how becoming a mother has reshaped her relationship to her family and herself. Only as an adult in New Mexico was Figueroa able to forge her own path, using writing to recast her origin story. In a journey that takes her to Puerto Rico and back, Figueroa looks to her ancestors to reimagine her relationship to the past and to her mother's native island, reaching beyond her own mother into a greater experience of mothering and claiming herself. In stunning prose that draws from Puerto Rican folklore and mythology, a literary lineage of women writers of color, and narratives of identity, Figueroa presents a cultural coming-of-age story. Candid and raw, Mother Island gets to the heart of the question: Who do we become when we are no longer trying to be someone else?"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Radiant : the life and line of Keith Haring / Brad Gooch. |
 "A stunning life of the iconic American artist, Keith Haring, by the acclaimed biographer Brad Gooch. In the 1980s, the subways of New York City were covered with art. In the stations, black matte sheets were pasted over outdated ads, and unsigned chalk drawings often popped up on these blank spaces. These temporary chalk drawings numbered in the thousands and became synonymous with a city as diverse as it was at war with itself, ravaged by poverty and oppression but alive with art and creative energy. And every single one of these drawings was done by Keith Haring. Keith Haring was one of the most emblematic artists of the 1980s, a figure described by his contemporaries as "a prophet in his life, his person, and his work." Part of an iconic cultural crowd that included Andy Warhol, Madonna, and Basquiat, Haring broke down the barriers between high art and popular culture, creating work that was accessible for all and using it as a means to provoke and inspire radical social change. Haring died of AIDS in 1990. To this day, his influence on our culture remains incontrovertible, and his glamorous, tragically short life has a unique aura of mystery and power. Brad Gooch, noted biographer of Flannery O'Connor and Frank O'Hara, was granted access to Haring's extensive archive. He has written a biography that will become the authoritative work on the artist. Based on interviews with those who knew Haring best and drawing from the rich archival history, Brad Gooch sets out to capture the magic of Keith Haring: a visionary and timeless icon"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass / Frederick Douglass. |
 Perhaps the most powerful and influential black American of his time, Frederick Douglass, embodied the tumultuous social changes that transformed the United States during the nineteenth century. In a career of unprecedented breadth, Douglass rose from the oppression of his slave's birth to fame as an abolitionist. |
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| Not your China doll : the wild and shimmering life of Anna May Wong / Katie Gee Salisbury. |
| "Set against the glittering backdrop of Los Angeles during the gin-soaked Jazz Age and the rise of Hollywood, this debut book celebrates Anna May Wong, the first Asian American movie star, to bring an unsung heroine to light and reclaim her place in cinema history"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Fear gone wild : a story of mental illness, suicide, and hope through loss. / Kayla Stoecklein. |
 A pastor's wife's shattering yet ultimately hopeful story of her husband's death by suicide, her journey to understand mental illness, and the light she found in the darkness. On August 25, 2018, Kayla Stoecklein lost her husband, Andrew--mega church pastor of Inland Hills Church in Chino, California--to suicide. In the wake of the tragedy, she embarked on a brave journey to better understand his harrowing battle with mental illness and, ultimately, to overcome the stigma of suicide. Fear Gone Wild is her intimate account of all that led to that tragic day, including her husband's panic attacks and debilitating bouts of anxiety and depression. Despite their deep faith in God and the countless prayers of many believers, Andrew was never healed of his illness. Turning to Scripture for answers, she discovered God uses wilderness experiences to prepare His children--including Jesus--for his greater purpose and to work miracles inside our souls. With a clear-eyed acknowledgment of how misguided and misinformed she was about mental illness, Kayla Stoecklein shares her story in hopes that anyone walking through the wilderness of mental illness will be better equipped for the journey and will learn to put their hope in Jesus through it all. |
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| Fancypants : an autobiographical novel / Robert Freedman. |
 Fancypants is part memoir, part novel. One Jewish boy's attempt at coming of age in a time period (1955-1966) when his whole generation is trying to do the same. Buddy Foreman wants answers: Why don't my parents listen to me when I talk? Why can't I draw on the walls? What's the deal with being Jewish? Buddy gives up on being a good boy, a good son, a good Jew--especially after a calamitous Bar Mitzvah. Goes off to college. Discovers others like himself--outsiders. Buddy meets a girl with a crippled leg and a guitar. Candy's a folksinger. "Do ya wanta go to New York City with me? We'll be young artists together?" she asks. Buddy drives Candy away, knowing even at the time what a fool he is. Digs his hole deeper by rebounding to a pretty college co-ed, a sorority girl, a schicksa. Buddy and Amy decide to get married. Buddy doesn't want to go to Vietnam. Keep putting one foot in front of the other, he tells himself. Something's gotta give. Doesn't it?-- from Amazon.com |
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| An ordinary man : the surprising life and historic presidency of Gerald R. Ford / Richard Norton Smith. |
 For many Americans, President Gerald Ford was the genial accident of history who controversially pardoned his Watergate-tarnished predecessor, presided over the fall of Saigon, and became a punching bag on Saturday Night Live. Yet as Richard Norton Smith reveals in a book full of surprises, Ford was an underrated leader whose tough decisions and personal decency look better with the passage of time. Drawing on hundreds of interviews and thousands of documents, Smith recreates Ford's hardscrabble childhood in Michigan, his early anti-establishment politics and lifelong love affair with the former Betty Bloomer, whose impact on American culture he predicted would outrank his own. As president, Ford guided the nation through its worst Constitutional crisis since the Civil War and broke the back of the most severe economic downturn since the Great Depression--accomplishing both with little fanfare or credit (at least until 2001 when the JFK Library gave him its prestigious Profile in Courage Award in belated recognition of the Nixon pardon). Less coda than curtain raiser, Ford's administration bridged the Republican pragmatism of Eisenhower and Nixon and the more doctrinaire conservatism of Ronald Reagan. His introduction of economic deregulation would transform the American economy, while his embrace of the Helsinki Accords hastened the collapse of the Soviet Union. Illustrated with sixteen pages of black-and-white photos, this definitive biography, a decade in the making, will change history's views of a man whose warning about presidential arrogance ("God help the country") is more relevant than ever. |
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| The manicurist's daughter : a memoir / Susan Lieu. |
| "An emotionally raw memoir about the crumbling of the American Dream and a daughter of refugees who searches for answers after her mother dies during plastic surgery. Susan Lieu has long been searching for answers. About her family's past and about her own future. Refugees from the Vietnam War, Susan's family escaped to California in the 1980s after five failed attempts. Upon arrival, Susan's mother was their savvy, charismatic North Star, setting up two successful nail salons and orchestrating every success-until Susan was eleven. That year, her mother died from a botched tummy tuck. After the funeral, no one was ever allowed to talk about her or what happened. For the next twenty years, Susan navigated a series of cascading questions alone-why did the most perfect person in her life want to change her body? Why would no one tell her about her mother's life in Vietnam? And how did this surgeon, who preyed on Vietnamese immigrants, go on operating after her mother's death? Sifting through depositions, tracking down the surgeon's family, and enlisting the help of spirit channelers, Susan uncovers the painful truth of her mother, herself, and the impossible ideal of beauty. The Manicurist's Daughter is much more than a memoir about grief, trauma, and body image. It is a story of fierce determination, strength in shared culture, and finding your place in the world"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Life : my story through history / Pope Francis with Fabio Marchese Ragona ; translated from the Italian by Aubrey Botsford. |
| "Turning the pages of the precious book that is life, Pope Francis leads us along a path made of emotions, joys, and agonies: a window on the past that will allow us to better understand our present"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Where rivers part : a story of my mother's life / Kao Kalia Yang. |
 "In the 1960s when Kalia's mother, Chue, was born, the US was actively recruiting Hmong Laotians to assist with CIA efforts in Laos's Secret War. By the time Chue was a teenager, the US had completely vacated Laos, and the country erupted into genocidal attacks on the Hmong people, who were perceived as traitorous for their involvement. Notably, from 1964-1973, Laos became victim to the heaviest bombardment by the United States against communist Pathet Lao, becoming the most heavily bombed country in history. Fearing vengeful soldiers looking to take their lives, Chue and her family quickly fled their village for the jungle, leaving all that they knew behind. Perpetually on the run, the family was often on the brink of starvation, and death loomed. During this tumultuous period, Chue met her husband, Bee, and unwittingly left her mother behind forever when she escaped to a refugee camp with his family, a mistake she would regret for the rest of her life. There, Chue, Bee, and their daughters lived in a state of constant fear and hunger until they finally made it to America. The determined couple enrolled in high school classes despite being in their late twenties and worked grueling factory jobs to provide for their family, yet most who meet Chue know nothing of her extraordinary resilience and traumatic past. In Where Rivers Part, told from her mother's point of view, Kao Kalia Yang unveils her mother's epic struggle towards safety and the important undocumented history of a time and place most US readers know nothing about, offering insight into America's Secret War in Laos with tenderness and unvarnished clarity. In doing so, she excavates the plight of many refugees, who suffer silently and are often overlooked as one of the essential foundations of this country. For readers of The Wild Swans by Jung Chang, The Spirit Catches You When You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman, and those who flock to stories about survival during wartime, Where Rivers Part is not only a personal account of resilience and survival but also a powerful and transporting look into Laos's Secret War and the lived experiences of the Hmong people"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Story of a poem : a memoir / Matthew Zapruder. |
 Matthew Zapruder had an idea: to write a poem as slowly and intentionally as possible, to preserve its drafts, and record the painstaking, elusively transcendent stuff of its construction. It would be the end cap to a new collection of poetry, and a means to process modern American life in a time of political turmoil, mega fires, and sobriety. What Zapruder didn't anticipate was that this literary project would reveal a deeply personal aspect as well: a way to resolve the unexplored pain and unexpected joys he was confronting in the wake of his son's diagnosis with autism. The result is a remarkable piece of writing, one that explores not just what it means to be a poet and father, but also what it means to be alive on this planet during this turbulent and extraordinary time. By comparing the writing of a poem with his own tangled evolution as a son, husband and father, Zapruder unfolds moments of his own life in the reflection of an increasingly uncanny world. With a wide range of reference points -- from Celan, Li Bai and Frank O'Hara to Whitman, Merwin and Rupi Kaur -- we join Zapruder on a poet's journey; that in some alchemy of literature, becomes a journey of our own. |
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| Cloistered : my years as a nun / Catherine Coldstream. |
| "An astonishing memoir of twelve years as a contemplative nun in a silent monastery. Cloistered takes the reader deep into the hidden world of a traditional Carmelite monastery as it approaches the third Millennium and tells the story of an intense personal journey into and out of an enclosed life of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Finding an apparently perfect world at Akenside Priory, in Northumberland, Catherine trusts herself to a group of twenty silent women, believing she is trusting herself to God. As the beauty and mystery of an ancient way of life enfold her, she surrenders herself wholly to its power, quite unaware of the complexity and dangers that lie ahead. Cut off from the wider world for decades, the community has managed to evade accountability to any authority beyond itself. When Sister Catherine realises that a mesmerising cult of the personality, with the distortions it entails, has replaced the ancient ideal of religious obedience, she is faced with a dilemma. Will she submit to this, or will she be forced to speak out? An exploration of the limits of trust, Cloistered shows us how far youthful idealism can take us along the road of self-surrender, and of how much harm is done when institutional flaws go unacknowledged. Catherine's honest account of her time in the monastery - and her dramatic flight from it - is both a love song to a lost community and an exploration of what is most compelling, yet most potentially destructive when closed human groups become laws unto themselves"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Candy Darling : dreamer, icon, superstar / Cynthia Carr. |
| "From acclaimed biographer Cynthia Carr, the first full portrait of queer icon and Warhol superstar Candy Darling"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| I heard her call my name : a memoir of transition / Lucy Sante. |
 "For a long time, Lucy Sante felt unsure of her place. Born in Belgium, the only child of conservative working-class Catholic parents who transplanted their little family to the United States, she felt at home only when she moved to New York City in the early 1970s and found her people among a band of fellow bohemians. Some would die young, to drugs and AIDS, and some would become jarringly famous. Sante flirted with both fates, on her way to building an estimable career as a writer. But she still felt like her life a performance. She was presenting a façade, even to herself .Sante's memoir braids together two threads of personal narrative: the arc of her life, and her recent step-by-step transition to a place of inner and outer alignment. Sante brings a loving irony to her account of her unsteady first steps; there was much she found she still needed to learn about being a woman after some sixty years cloaked in a man's identity, in a man's world. A marvel of grace and empathy, I Heard Her Call My Name parses with great sensitivity many issues that touch our lives deeply, of gender identity and far beyond."-- Provided by publisher. |
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| The peacemaker : Nixon : the man, president, and my friend / Ben Stein. |
 "Stein presents Nixon as not just a politician and president--in triumph and disgrace, gaining, wielding and losing power--but as a human being, a down-to-earth family man and friend to Ben Stein and his family. Stein presents an argument that Nixon was not only one of the most capable presidents the United States has ever seen, but one who was focused on and manifestly successful in his self-described role as peacemaker in the world. And on the journey of getting to know real Nixon, Stein reveals the real Ben Stein: his parents, upbringing, and comin gof age in the 50's and 60's, his work in the White House, and eventual move to California and evolution as a writer"-- Book jacket. |
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| One way back : a memoir / Christine Blasey Ford. |
| On September 27, 2018, Christine Blasey Ford testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee which was considering the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the United States Supreme Court. She described an alleged sexual assault by the Supreme Court nominee that took place at a high school party in the 1980s. Her words and courage on that day provided some of the most credible and unforgettable testimony our country has ever witnessed. In One Way Back, Ford recounts the months she spent trying to get information into the right hands without exposing herself and her family to dangerous backlash. Drawing parallels to her life as a surfer, she explains the process of paddling out into unknown waters despite the risks and fears, knowing there is only one way back to shore. The book reveals riveting new details about the leadup to her testimony and its overwhelming aftermath and describes how she continues to navigate her way out of the storm. This is the real story behind the headlines and the soundbites, a complex, page-turning memoir of a scientist, a surfer, a mother, a patriot and an unlikely whistleblower. Ford's experience shows that when one person steps forward to speak truth to power, she adds to a collective whole, causing "a ripple that might one day become a wave." |
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| Carson McCullers : a life / Mary V. Dearborn. |
 V. S. Pritchett called her "a genius." Gore Vidal described her as a "beloved novelist of singular brilliance... Of all the Southern writers, she is the most apt to endure..." And Tennessee Williams said, "The only real writer the South ever turned out, was Carson." She was born Lula Carson Smith in Columbus, Georgia. Her dream was to become a concert pianist, though she'd been writing since she was sixteen and the influence of music was evident throughout her work. As a child, she said she'd been "born a man." At twenty, she married Reeves McCullers, a fellow southerner, ex-soldier, and aspiring writer ("He was the best-looking man I had ever seen"). They had a fraught, tumultuous marriage lasting twelve years and ending with his suicide in 1953. Reeves was devoted to her and to her writing, and he envied her talent; she yearned for attention, mostly from women who admired her but rebuffed her sexually. Her first novel--The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter--was published in 1940, when she was twenty-three, and overnight, Carson McCullers became the most widely talked about writer of the time. While McCullers's literary stature continues to endure, her private life has remained enigmatic and largely unexamined. Now, with unprecedented access to the cache of materials that has surfaced in the past decade, Mary Dearborn gives us the first full picture of this brilliant, complex artist who was decades ahead of her time, a writer who understood--and captured--the heart and longing of the outcast. -- Provided by publisher. |
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| The house of hidden meanings : a memoir / RuPaul. |
 From an international drag superstar and pop culture icon comes his most revealing and personal work to date-a deeply intimate memoir of growing up black, poor and queer in a broken home and discovering the power of performance, found family and self-acceptance. |
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| Whiskey tender : a memoir / Deborah Jackson Taffa. |
 "Whiskey Tender is a memoir of family and survival, coming-of-age on and off the reservation, and the frictions between being raised to strive towards the American dream while also coming into an understanding of how the narratives of the Quechan Nation and Laguna Pueblo heritages have been excluded from the central mythologies and structures of America"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| American Negra : a memoir / Natasha S. Alford. |
 "An award-winning journalist, TV political analyst, and creator of TheGrio documentary, Afro-Latinx Revolution: Puerto Rico, recounts her experiences as an African American and Puerto Rican woman, reflecting on her improbable journey from Syracuse to Harvard, hedge fund boardrooms to newsrooms, and beyond in pursuit of America's infinite opportunities. Part inspiring memoir, part cultural analysis, with remarkable self-determination, Natasha S. Alford shows why the movement to recognize Afro-Latin identity illuminates shared struggles across the Black diaspora and often overlooked history"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| I never did like politics : how Fiorello La Guardia became America's mayor, and why he still matters / Terry Golway. |
 "A hugely entertaining celebration of one of America's greatest politicians--a source of inspiration for our equally challenging times....Fiorello La Guardia was one of the twentieth century's most colorful politicians--on the New York and national stage. He was also quintessentially American: the son of Italian immigrants, who rose in society through sheer will and chutzpah. Almost one hundred years later, America is once again grappling with issues that would have been familiar to the Little Flower, as he was affectionately known. It's time to bring back La Guardia, argues historian and journalist Terry Golway, to remind us all what an effective municipal officer (as he preferred to call himself) can achieve....Golway examines La Guardia's extraordinary career through four essential qualities: As a patriot, a dissenter, a leader, and a statesman. He needed them all when he stood against the nativism, religious and racial bigotry, and reactionary economic policies of the 1920s, and again when he faced the realities of Depression-era New York and the rise of fascism at home and abroad in the 1930s. Just before World War II, the Roosevelt administration formally apologized to the Nazis when La Guardia referred to Hitler as a "brown-shirted fanatic." There was nobody quite like Fiorello La Guardia. In this immensely readable book, as entertaining as the man himself, Terry Golway captures the enduring appeal of one of America's greatest leaders"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| I heard her call my name : a memoir of transition / Lucy Sante. |
| "For a long time, Lucy Sante felt unsure of her place. Born in Belgium, the only child of conservative working-class Catholic parents who transplanted their little family to the United States, she felt at home only when she moved to New York City in the early 1970s and found her people among a band of fellow bohemians. Some would die young, to drugs and AIDS, and some would become jarringly famous. Sante flirted with both fates, on her way to building an estimable career as a writer. But she still felt like her life a performance. She was presenting a façade, even to herself .Sante's memoir braids together two threads of personal narrative: the arc of her life, and her recent step-by-step transition to a place of inner and outer alignment. Sante brings a loving irony to her account of her unsteady first steps; there was much she found she still needed to learn about being a woman after some sixty years cloaked in a man's identity, in a man's world. A marvel of grace and empathy, I Heard Her Call My Name parses with great sensitivity many issues that touch our lives deeply, of gender identity and far beyond."-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Splinters : another kind of love story / Leslie Jamison. |
 From the New York times best-selling author of The Recovering and The Empathy Exams comes the riveting story of rebuilding a life after the end of a marriage--an exploration of motherhood, art and new love. |
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| Secrets of the sun : a memoir / Mako Yoshikawa. |
 "A memoir about a daughter trying to understand her father's genius, mental illness, violence, and past. Touches on Japanese culture, immigration, racism, WWII, and the Asian American experience"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Radiant : the life and line of Keith Haring / Brad Gooch. |
| "A stunning life of the iconic American artist, Keith Haring, by the acclaimed biographer Brad Gooch. In the 1980s, the subways of New York City were covered with art. In the stations, black matte sheets were pasted over outdated ads, and unsigned chalk drawings often popped up on these blank spaces. These temporary chalk drawings numbered in the thousands and became synonymous with a city as diverse as it was at war with itself, ravaged by poverty and oppression but alive with art and creative energy. And every single one of these drawings was done by Keith Haring. Keith Haring was one of the most emblematic artists of the 1980s, a figure described by his contemporaries as "a prophet in his life, his person, and his work." Part of an iconic cultural crowd that included Andy Warhol, Madonna, and Basquiat, Haring broke down the barriers between high art and popular culture, creating work that was accessible for all and using it as a means to provoke and inspire radical social change. Haring died of AIDS in 1990. To this day, his influence on our culture remains incontrovertible, and his glamorous, tragically short life has a unique aura of mystery and power. Brad Gooch, noted biographer of Flannery O'Connor and Frank O'Hara, was granted access to Haring's extensive archive. He has written a biography that will become the authoritative work on the artist. Based on interviews with those who knew Haring best and drawing from the rich archival history, Brad Gooch sets out to capture the magic of Keith Haring: a visionary and timeless icon"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| The house of hidden meanings : a memoir / RuPaul. |
| From an international drag superstar and pop culture icon comes his most revealing and personal work to date-a deeply intimate memoir of growing up black, poor and queer in a broken home and discovering the power of performance, found family and self-acceptance. |
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| Carson McCullers : a life / Mary V. Dearborn. |
| V. S. Pritchett called her "a genius." Gore Vidal described her as a "beloved novelist of singular brilliance... Of all the Southern writers, she is the most apt to endure..." And Tennessee Williams said, "The only real writer the South ever turned out, was Carson." She was born Lula Carson Smith in Columbus, Georgia. Her dream was to become a concert pianist, though she'd been writing since she was sixteen and the influence of music was evident throughout her work. As a child, she said she'd been "born a man." At twenty, she married Reeves McCullers, a fellow southerner, ex-soldier, and aspiring writer ("He was the best-looking man I had ever seen"). They had a fraught, tumultuous marriage lasting twelve years and ending with his suicide in 1953. Reeves was devoted to her and to her writing, and he envied her talent; she yearned for attention, mostly from women who admired her but rebuffed her sexually. Her first novel--The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter--was published in 1940, when she was twenty-three, and overnight, Carson McCullers became the most widely talked about writer of the time. While McCullers's literary stature continues to endure, her private life has remained enigmatic and largely unexamined. Now, with unprecedented access to the cache of materials that has surfaced in the past decade, Mary Dearborn gives us the first full picture of this brilliant, complex artist who was decades ahead of her time, a writer who understood--and captured--the heart and longing of the outcast. -- Provided by publisher. |
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| We are not here to be bystanders : a memoir of love and resistance / Linda Sarsour. |
 As a young Muslim American woman unapologetic in her faith and her activism, Sarsour would discover her innate sense of justice in the aftermath of 9/11. Her experiences as a daughter of Palestinian immigrants provide a moving portrayal of what it means to find one's voice and use it for the good of others. Through decades of fighting for racial, economic, gender, and social justice she became one of the most recognized activists in the nation. Throughout, Sarsour inspires readers to take action as she reaffirms that we are not here to be bystanders. -- adapted from jacket |
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| Churchill's American network: Winston Churchill and the forging of the special relationship. / Cita Stelzer ; foreword by Randolph Churchill. |
 "A revelatory portrait showing how the famed British statesman created a network of American colleagues and friends who helped push our foreign policy in Britain's favor during World War II." publisher's website. |
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| The making of a king : King Charles III and the modern monarchy / Robert Hardman. |
 "No British monarch has had a tougher act to follow. Now, after seventy years of waiting and preparation, King Charles III is not just the head of the most famous family in the world. He is the custodian of a thousand-year-old institution that must redefine its place in the digital age while others insist on rewriting the past. With unrivaled access to the king, the royal family, and the court, leading royal authority Robert Hardman brings us the inside story on the most pivotal and challenging year for the monarchy in living memory. From the death of Elizabeth II through to the ancient spectacle of the Coronation, from the rise of a new Prince and Princess of Wales to the latest truth bombs from the Sussexes, this is the story of the making of a monarch."--Amazon. |
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| Private equity : a memoir / Carrie Sun. |
 "When we meet Carrie Sun, she can't shake the feeling that she's wasting her life. The daughter of Chinese immigrants, Carrie excelled in school, graduated early from MIT, and climbed up the corporate ladder, all in pursuit of the American dream. But at twenty-nine, she's left her analyst job, dropped out of an MBA program, and is trapped in an unhappy engagement. So when she gets the rare opportunity to work at one of the most prestigious hedge funds in the world, she knows she can't say no. Fourteen interviews later, she's in. Carrie is the sole assistant to the firm's billionaire founder. She manages his work life, becoming the right hand to an investor who can move mountains and markets with a single phone call. Eager to impress, she dives headfirst into the firm's culture, which values return on time above all else. A luxury-laden world opens up for her, and Carrie learns that money can solve nearly everything. Playing the game at the highest levels, amid the ultimate winners in our winner-take-all economy, Carrie soon finds her identity swallowed whole by work. With her physical and mental health deteriorating, she begins to rethink what it actually means to waste one's life. A searing examination of our relationship to work, Carrie's story illuminates the struggle for balance in a world of extremes: efficiency and excess, status and aspiration, power and fortune. Private Equity is a universal tale of self-invention from a dazzling new voice, daring to ask what we're willing to sacrifice to climb to the top--and what it might take to break free and leave it all behind"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| My side of the river : a memoir / Elizabeth Camarillo Gutierrez. |
 "Elizabeth Camarillo Gutierrez reveals her experience as the U.S. born daughter of immigrants and what happened when, at fifteen, her parents were forced back to Mexico in this galvanizing yet tender memoir. Born to Mexican immigrants south of the Rillito River in Tucson, Arizona, Elizabeth had the world at her fingertips as she entered her freshman year of high school as the number one student. But suddenly, Elizabeth's own country took away the most important right a child has: a right to have a family. As her parents' visas expired, they were forced to return to Mexico, leaving Elizabeth responsible for her younger brother, as well as her education. Determined to break the cycle of being "a statistic," she knew that even though her parents couldn't stay, there was no way she could let go of the opportunities the U.S. could provide. Armed with only her passport and sheer teenage determination, Elizabeth became what her school would eventually describe as an unaccompanied, homeless youth, one of thousands of underage victims affected by family separation due to broken immigration laws. For fans of Educated by Tara Westover and The Distance Between Us by Reyna Grande, My Side of the River explores separation, generational trauma, and the toll of the American dream. It's also, at its core, a love story between a brother and a sister who, no matter the cost, is determined to make the pursuit of his own dreams easier than it was for her"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Whiskey tender : a memoir / Deborah Jackson Taffa. |
| "Whiskey Tender is a memoir of family and survival, coming-of-age on and off the reservation, and the frictions between being raised to strive towards the American dream while also coming into an understanding of how the narratives of the Quechan Nation and Laguna Pueblo heritages have been excluded from the central mythologies and structures of America"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| Dear mom and dad : a letter about family, memory, and the America we once knew / Patti Davis. |
 "A remarkably poignant writer for our troubled times, Patti Davis writes about love, loss, and the power of redemption in this poetic letter to her long-gone parents"-- Provided by publisher. |
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| What have we here? : portraits of a life / Billy Dee Williams. |
 "Film legend recalls his remarkable life of nearly eight decades-a heralded actor who's played the roles he wanted, unchecked by the racism and typecasting so rife in the mostly all-white industry in which he triumphed. Billy Dee Williams was born in Harlem in 1937 and grew up in a household of love and sophistication. As a young boy, he made his stage debut working with Lotte Lenya in an Ira Gershwin/Kurt Weill production where Williams ended up feeding Lenya her lines. He studied painting, first at the High School of Music and Art, with fellow student Diahann Carroll, and then at the National Academy of Fine Art, before setting out to pursue acting with Herbert Berghoff, Stella Adler, and Sidney Poitier. His first film role was in The Last Angry Man, the great Paul Muni's final film. It was Muni who gave Billy the advice that sent him soaring as an actor, "You can play any character you want to play no matter who you are, no matter the way you look or the color of your skin." And Williams writes, "I wanted to be anyone I wanted to be." On Broadway, he acted in The Cool World in an all-Black cast that included James Earl Jones and Cicely Tyson, and in the original hit Broadway production of A Taste of Honey with Angela Lansbury and a young Joan Plowright. In 1971, he landed the role of a lifetime: co-starring alongside James Caan in Brian's Song, the made-for-television movie that was watched by an audience of more than fifty million people. Williams says it was "the kind of interracial love story America needed." His rich and varied career included working with producer Berry Gordy on the Billie Holiday biopic, Lady Sings the Blues, a star vehicle for Diana Ross, then at the height of her superstardom. He also starred in the 1977 film Scott Joplin and appeared in Tim Burton's Batman and more recently the television series, And Just Like That. He became a true pop culture icon when, as the first Black character in the Star Wars universe, he played Lando Calrissian in George Lucas's The Empire Strikes Back ("What I presented on the screen people didn't expect to see"). It was a role he reprised in the final film of the original trilogy, The Return of the Jedi, and in the recent sequel The Rise of Skywalker. A legendary actor, in his own words, on all that has sustained and carried him through a lifetime of dreams and adventure"--Provided by publisher. |
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| Medgar & Myrlie : Medgar Evers and the love story that awakened America / Joy-Ann Reid. |
 Tracing the extraordinary lives and legacy of two civil rights icons, this gripping account of Medgar and Myrlie Evers is told through their relationship and the work that went into winning basic rights for black Americans, and the repercussions that still resonate today. |
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| Splinters : another kind of love story / Leslie Jamison. |
| From the New York times best-selling author of The Recovering and The Empathy Exams comes the riveting story of rebuilding a life after the end of a marriage--an exploration of motherhood, art and new love. |
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| Kubrick : an odyssey / Robert P. Kolker and Nathan Abrams. |
 This immersive biography of the legendary director of films such as 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Shining and A Clockwork Orange is based on new research and interviews with family members and those who worked with him. |
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