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Getting Life: An Innocent Man’s 25-Year Journey from Prison to Peace
by Michael Morton“A devastating and infuriating book, more astonishing than any legal thriller by John Grisham” (The New York Times) about a young father who spent twenty-five years in prison for a crime he did not commit…and his eventual exoneration and return to life as a free man.On August 13, 1986, just one day after his thirty-second birthday, Michael Morton went to work at his usual time. By the end of the day, his wife Christine had been savagely bludgeoned to death in the couple’s bed—and the Williamson County Sherriff’s office in Texas wasted no time in pinning her murder on Michael, despite an absolute lack of physical evidence. Michael was swiftly sentenced to life in prison for a crime he had not committed. He mourned his wife from a prison cell. He lost all contact with their son. Life, as he knew it, was over. Drawing on his recollections, court transcripts, and more than 1,000 pages of personal journals he wrote in prison, Michael recounts the hidden police reports about an unidentified van parked near his house that were never pursued; the bandana with the killer’s DNA on it, that was never introduced in court; the call from a neighboring county reporting the attempted use of his wife’s credit card, which was never followed up on; and ultimately, how he battled his way through the darkness to become a free man once again. “Even for readers who may feel practically jaded about stories of injustice in Texas—even those who followed this case closely in the press—could do themselves a favor by picking up Michael Morton’s new memoir…It is extremely well-written [and] insightful” (The Austin Chronicle). Getting Life is an extraordinary story of unfathomable tragedy, grave injustice, and the strength and courage it takes to find forgiveness.
Open Heart, Open Mind
by Clara HughesFrom one of Canada's most decorated Olympians comes a raw but life-affirming story of one woman's struggle with depression.In a world where winning meant everything, her biggest competitor was herself. In 2006, when Clara Hughes stepped onto the Olympic podium in Torino, Italy, she became the first and only athlete ever to win multiple medals in both Summer and Winter Games. Four years later, she was proud to carry the Canadian flag at the head of the Canadian team as they participated in the opening ceremony of the Vancouver Olympic Winter Games. But there's another story behind her celebrated career as an athlete, behind her signature billboard smile. While most professional athletes devote their entire lives to training, Clara spent her teenage years using drugs and drinking to escape the stifling home life her alcoholic father had created in Elmwood, Winnipeg. She was headed nowhere fast when, at sixteen, she watched transfixed in her living room as gold medal speed skater Gaétan Boucher effortlessly raced in the 1988 Calgary Olympics. Dreaming of one day competing herself, Clara channeled her anger, frustration and raw ambition into the endurance sports of speed skating and cycling. By 2010, she had become a six-time Olympic medalist. But after more than a decade in the gruelling world of professional sports that stripped away her confidence and bruised her body, Clara began to realize that her physical extremes, her emotional setbacks, and her partying habits were masking a severe depression. After winning bronze in the last speed skating race of her career, she decided to retire from that sport, determined to repair herself. She has emerged as one of our most committed humanitarians, advocating for a variety of social causes both in Canada and around the world. In 2010, she became national spokesperson for Bell Canada's Let's Talk campaign in support of mental health awareness, using her Olympic standing to share the positive message of the power of forgiveness. Told with honesty and passion, Open Heart, Open Mind is Clara's personal journey through physical and mental pain to a life where love and understanding can thrive. This revelatory and inspiring story will touch the hearts of all Canadians.
The Undertaker's Daughter: A Memoir
by Kate Mayfield“The Undertaker’s Daughter is a wonderfully quirky, gem of a book beautifully written by Kate Mayfield.…Her compelling, complicated family and cast of characters stay with you long after you close the book” (Monica Holloway, author of Cowboy & Wills and Driving With Dead People).How does one live in a house of the dead? Kate Mayfield explores what it meant to be the daughter of a small-town undertaker in this fascinating memoir evocative of Six Feet Under and The Help, with a hint of Mary Roach’s Stiff. After Kate Mayfield was born, she was taken directly to a funeral home. Her father was an undertaker, and for thirteen years the family resided in a place nearly synonymous with death, where the living and the dead entered their house like a vapor. In a memoir that reads like a Harper Lee novel, Mayfield draws the reader into a world of haunting Southern mystique. In the turbulent 1960s, Kate’s father set up shop in sleepy Jubilee, Kentucky, a segregated, god-fearing community where no one kept secrets—except the ones they were buried with. By opening a funeral home, Frank Mayfield also opened the door to family feuds, fetishes, murder, suicide, and all manner of accidents. Kate saw it all—she also witnessed the quiet ruin of her father, who hid alcoholism and infidelity behind a cool and charismatic façade. As Kate grows from trusting child to rebellious teen, the enforced sobriety of the funeral home begins to chafe, and she longs for the day she can escape the confines of Jubilee and her place as the undertaker’s daughter. “Mayfield fashions a poignant send-off to Jubilee in this thoughtfully rendered work” (Publishers Weekly).
Facing the Music
by Jennifer KnappJennifer Knapp's meteoric rise in the Christian music industry ended abruptly when she walked away and came out publicly as a lesbian. This is her story--of coming to Christ, of building a career, of admitting who she is, and of how her faith remained strong through it all.At the top of her career in the Christian music industry, Jennifer Knapp quit. A few years later, she publicly revealed she is gay. A media frenzy ensued, and many of her former fans were angry with what they saw as turning her back on God. But through it all, she held on to the truth that had guided her from the beginning. In this memoir, she finally tells her story: of her troubled childhood, the love of music that pulled her through, her dramatic conversion to Christianity, her rise to stardom, her abrupt departure from Christian Contemporary Music, her years of trying to come to terms with her sexual orientation, and her return to music and Nashville in 2010, when she came out publicly for the first time. She also talks about the importance of her faith, and despite the many who claim she can no longer call herself a believer, she maintains that she is both gay and a Christian. Now an advocate for LGBT issues in the church, Jennifer has witnessed heartbreaking struggles as churches wrestle with issues of homosexuality and faith. This engrossing, inspiring memoir will help people understand her story and to believe in their own stories, whatever they may be.
Life by the Cup
by Zhena MuzykaThe founder of Zhena's Gypsy Tea Company tells her extraordinary story of struggle, hope, and audacity, inspiring you to overcome setbacks--no matter how daunting--and pursue your dreams.As a twenty-four-year-old single mom, Zhena Muzyka had a young son in need of life-saving surgery and only six dollars in her wallet. But she also had three other powerful motivators: hope, a love of tea, and a dream to share beautiful, aromatic, organic teas with the world. By combining her knowledge of aromatherapy and her gypsy grandmother's teachings, Zhena started selling custom tea blends from a cart on California street corners--and with a lot of ingenuity and grit, her business took off. Now, thirteen years later, her son is healthy and Zhena's Gypsy Tea is a thriving, purpose-driven, fair-trade, multimillion-dollar brand. Life by the Cup is the inspiring story of Zhena's journey to a meaningful life as founder of a company that benefits health, protects the environment, and supports humanitarian efforts. Zhena's message is that no matter where you are, you can change your circumstances and live your dreams. Each chapter illuminates an inspirational life lesson through stories and wisdom passed down through generations--and also shares one of her signature tea blends as well as mouthwatering tea-based dessert recipes. Zhena's gentle insight will motivate you no matter where you are in life. Her message: Be audacious in your dreams, commit to your values, and see your passion transformed into possibility.
Finding the Next Steve Jobs
by Gene Stone Nolan BushnellIn Silicon Valley legend Nolan Bushnells first book, he explains how to find and hire employees who have the potential to be the next Steve Jobs. Nolan Bushnell founded the groundbreaking gaming company Atari in 1972, and two years later employed Steve Jobs, as well as many other creatives over the course of his five decades in business. Here Bushnell explains how to find, hire, and nurture the people who could turn your company into the next Atari or the next Apple. Bushnells advice is constantly counter-intuitive, surprising, and atypical. When looking for employees, ignore credentials. Hire the obnoxious (in limited numbers). Demand a list of favorite books. Ask unanswerable questions. Comb through tweets. Just because youve hired creatives doesnt mean youll keep them. Once you have them, isolate them. Celebrate their failures. Encourage ADHD. Ply them with toys. Encourage them to make decisions by throwing dice. Invent haphazard holidays. Let them sleep. The business world is changing faster than ever, and every day your company faces new complications and difficulties. The only way to resolve these issues is to have a staff of wildly creative people who live as much in the future as the present, who thrive on being different, and whose ideas will guarantee that your company will prosper when other companies fail. Bio: About the Authors Nolan Bushnell is the founder of video game company Atari, Chuck E. Cheese-the first restaurant to integrate gaming into its entertainment model-as well as twenty-five other companies. Bushnell has been inducted into the Video Game Hall of Fame and the Consumer Electronics Association Hall of Fame, received the BAFTA Fellowship, and was named one of Newsweeks "50 Men Who Changed America. " Hes a frequent subject of media coverage and was prominently featured in Walter Isaacsons best selling book, Steve Jobs. Gene Stone, a former book, magazine, and newspaper editor for such companies as the Los Angeles Times, Esquire, Harcourt Brace, and Simon & Schuster, has ghostwritten thirty books (many of which were New York Times bestsellers) for a wide range of people in many different fields. Stone has also written numerous titles under his own name, including The Secrets of People Who Never Get Sick, which has been translated into more than twenty languages; the New York Times bestseller Forks Over Knives; and The Watch, the definitive book on the wristwatch. Editorial Reviews: "The man who helped give a generation the game of Pong now gives a new generation a series of pongs for their careers. Nolan Bushnells book is a spirited and insightful road map for anyone trying to navigate the new world of work. " -- Daniel H. Pink, author of To Sell Is Human and Drive "Nolan is a genius, and a generous one, too. Like most geniuses who share their secrets, his secrets are simple, and available to anyone with the guts to listen. " -- Seth Godin, Author, The Icarus Deception
Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates
by Mike Stangle Dave StangleTwo reckless but lovable all-American bros make a strong case for maturing slowly through their outrageous yet enlightening misadventures across this great country of ours.My brother and I are looking for wedding dates for our cousin's wedding. We've been told by the bride that bringing dates is "mandatory" so we "won't harass all of my friends all night" and "stay under control." Rather than ask some fringe women in our lives to go and face the inevitable 'does this mean he wants to take it to the next level?!' questions, we'd rather bring complete strangers and just figure it out... We're both in our 20s, single, dashingly tall, Anglo-Saxon, respectfully athletic, love to party, completely house trained...love our mother, have seen Love Actually several times...raw, emotional, sensitive, but still bad boys....You should be attractive or our aunts will judge you, but not TOO attractive or one of our uncles might grope you. Dave and Mike Stangle thought nothing of it when they boozily decided to turn to the "activity partners" section of Craigslist to solicit dates to their cousin's wedding. The hilarious, out-of-this-world ad that they came up with--featuring a picture of the two brothers as centaurs--immediately went viral, eventually landing these Wayfarers-wearing, moped-riding, completely reckless but ultimately loveable bros in the annals of the "Internet famous." In Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates, the Stangle brothers bring their trademark, off-color humor to everything from their most embarrassing adolescent experiences (like getting beat up by a girl on their front lawn...in front of their dad), to the most outrageous predicaments (like tripping on mushrooms with their bulldog, Frank), to proper sexting etiquette, and finally to breaking up a midget bar fight (you have to shoo them away). With the incredible comedic chemistry of Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson in Wedding Crashers and the uncensored honesty of Tucker Max, Mike and Dave insist there's nothing wrong with just seeing where life takes you.ing wrong with just seeing where life takes them.
Normally, This Would be Cause for Concern: Tales of Calamity and Unrelenting Awkwardness
by Danielle FishelA warm and witty memoir by Danielle Fishel, the beloved star of the '90s sitcom Boy Meets World and the eagerly anticipated spin-off, Girl Meets World.Best known for playing Topanga Lawrence on Boy Meets World, Danielle Fishel was many a tween's first crush and the quintessential girl-next-door for seven years as she joined 10 million viewers in their living rooms every Friday from 1993 to 2000. The real Danielle is just as entertaining and down-to-earth as the character she portrayed on her hit show. But even life for a successful actress can be messy, from disastrous auditions to dating mishaps and awkward red carpet moments. Normally, This Would Be Cause for Concern is a fun romp through Danielle's own imperfections and mild neuroses. It's a book for anyone who, like Danielle, has ever tripped and fallen down a flight of stairs in a room full of people, had a romantic moment with their significant other that was ruined by horrendous gas, or taken a Halloween photo without realizing there was a huge chunk of chocolate-covered strawberry in their teeth. Here is the real, imperfect Danielle, who knows that a good sense of humor and a positive attitude makes life so much more enjoyable. Even when you've just face-planted in front of Ben Affleck.
Watch Me: A Memoir
by Anjelica HustonFollowing her "extraordinary" (Vanity Fair), "evocative" (The New York Times), "magically beautiful" (The Boston Globe), "gorgeously written" (O, The Oprah Magazine) coming-of-age memoir, Academy Award-winning actress Anjelica Huston writes about her relationship with Jack Nicholson, her rise to stardom, her work with the greatest directors in Hollywood, her love affair with her husband, and much more.Anjelica Huston was twenty-nine years old and trying to create a place for herself as an actress in Hollywood when the director Tony Richardson said to her: "'Poor little you. So much talent and so little to show for it. You're never going to do anything with your life.' Tony had a singsong voice, like one of his own parrots, but there was no mistaking the edge. 'Perhaps you're right,' I answered. Inside I was thinking, Watch me." In A Story Lately Told, Anjelica Huston described her enchanted childhood in Ireland and her glamorous but troubled late teens in London. That memoir of her early years ended when Anjelica stepped into Hollywood. In Watch Me, Huston tells the story of falling in love with Jack Nicholson and her adventurous, turbulent, high-profile, spirited seventeen-year relationship with him and his intoxicating circle of friends. She writes about learning the art and craft of acting, about her Academy Award-winning portrayal of Maerose Prizzi in Prizzi's Honor, about her roles as Morticia Addams in the Addams Family films, Etheline Tenenbaum in The Royal Tenenbaums and Lilly Dillon in The Grifters, and about her collaborations with many great directors, including Woody Allen, Wes Anderson, Bob Rafelson, Francis Ford Coppola, and Stephen Frears. She movingly and beautifully writes about the death of her father, the legendary director John Huston, and her marriage to sculptor Robert Graham. She is candid, mischievous, warm, passionate, funny, and a superb storyteller.
Twelve Years a Slave: Plus Five American Slave Narratives (illustrated)
by Solomon Northup Introduction by Dolen Perkins-ValdezQuality hardcover edition of this compelling and influential memoirs, an inside account of life as a slave in rural Louisiana, written by a Northern free man who was kidnapped in Washington, D. C. , and sold into brutal slavery. Features additional interesting and rare images relating to Solomon Northup, such as the actual "manifest of slaves" from the ship that brought him in chains to New Orleans. Proper formatting, unlike any new hardcover edition available today, features legible font, complete text, and modern presentation. Note that other new hardbacks are about half the pages as they make font tiny while still using non-standard paragraph structure. This edition is the only one usable and realistic for new readers, school uses, library collections, and gifting. Soon to be a feature motion picture filmed in New Orleans, rural Louisiana and environs, this historic, gripping, and well-written account is presented by Quid Pro Books (New Orleans) using all the original illustrations from the 1854 edition (plus the added rare images noted above). A book of this importance and interest deserves a complete, library-ready, and professional presentation.
The Agitators: Three Friends Who Fought for Abolition and Women's Rights
by Dorothy WickendenAn LA Times Best Book of the Year, Christopher Award Winner, and Chautauqua Prize Finalist! &“Engrossing... examines the major events of the mid 19th century through the lives of three key figures in the abolitionist and women&’s rights movements.&” —Smithsonian From the executive editor of The New Yorker, a riveting, provocative, and revelatory history told through the story of three women—Harriet Tubman, Frances Seward, and Martha Wright—in the years before, during and after the Civil War.In the 1850s, Harriet Tubman, strategically brilliant and uncannily prescient, rescued some seventy enslaved people from Maryland&’s Eastern Shore and shepherded them north along the underground railroad. One of her regular stops was Auburn, New York, where she entrusted passengers to Martha Coffin Wright, a Quaker mother of seven, and Frances A. Seward, the wife of William H. Seward, who served over the years as governor, senator, and secretary of state under Abraham Lincoln. During the Civil War, Tubman worked for the Union Army in South Carolina as a nurse and spy, and took part in a spectacular river raid in which she helped to liberate 750 slaves from several rice plantations. Wright, a &“dangerous woman&” in the eyes of her neighbors, worked side by side with Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony to organize women&’s rights and anti-slavery conventions across New York State, braving hecklers and mobs when she spoke. Frances Seward, the most conventional of the three friends, hid her radicalism in public, while privately acting as a political adviser to her husband, pressing him to persuade President Lincoln to move immediately on emancipation. The Agitators opens in the 1820s, when Tubman is enslaved and Wright and Seward are young homemakers bound by law and tradition, and ends after the war. Many of the most prominent figures of the era—Lincoln, William H. Seward, Frederick Douglass, Daniel Webster, Charles Sumner, John Brown, William Lloyd Garrison—are seen through the discerning eyes of the protagonists. So are the most explosive political debates: about the civil rights of African Americans and women, about the enlistment of Black troops, and about opposing interpretations of the Constitution. Through richly detailed letters from the time and exhaustive research, Wickenden traces the second American revolution these women fought to bring about, the toll it took on their families, and its lasting effects on the country. Riveting and profoundly relevant to our own time, The Agitators brings a vibrant, original voice to this transformative period in our history.
Henry Kissinger The Complete Memoirs E-book Boxed Set
by Henry KissingerThis e-book box set includes the complete memoirs of Henry Kissinger, detailing his life and work.White House Years: One of the most important books to come out of the Nixon Administration, White House Years covers Henry Kissinger's first four years (1969-1973) as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs.Years of Upheaval: This second volume of Henry Kissinger's monumental memoirs covers his years as President Richard Nixon's Secretary of State (1972-1974), including the ending of the Vietnam War, the 1973 Middle East War and oil embargo, Watergate, and Nixon's resignation. Years of Upheaval opens with Dr. Kissinger being appointed Secretary of State.Years of Renewal: This third and final volume of memoirs completes a major work of contemporary history. The third & final volume begins with the resignation of Nixon and takes the reader through the years of Ford's administration, in which Kissinger continued to play a decisive role. Years of Renewal is the triumphant conclusion of a major achievement and a book that will stand the test of time as a historical document of the first rank.
Chris Matthews Biographies E-book Boxed Set
by Chris MatthewsThis ebook boxed set collects MSNBC host Chris Matthews's works of biography, from his time in House Speaker Tip O'Neill's office, to the rivalry between Kennedy and Nixon, to the elusive hero who was John F. Kennedy. Tip and the Gipper is a magnificent personal history of a time when two great political opponents served together for the benefit of the country. Chris Matthews was an eyewitness to this story as a top aide to Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill, who waged a principled war of political ideals with President Reagan from 1980 to 1986. Together, the two men forged compromises that shaped America's future and became one of history's most celebrated political pairings. Kennedy and Nixon: John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon each dreamed of becoming the great young leader of their age. First as friends, then as bitter enemies, they were linked by a historic rivalry that changed both them and their country. In this startling dual portrait, Chris Matthews shows how the contest between the charismatic Kennedy and the talented yet haunted Nixon propelled America toward Vietnam and Watergate. Fresh, entertaining, and revealing, Kennedy and Nixon shows how the early fondness between the two men--Kennedy, for example, told a trusted friend that if he didn't receive the Democratic nomination in 1960, he would vote for Nixon--degenerated into distrust and bitterness. Jack Kennedy: What was he like, this man whose own wife called him "that elusive, unforgettable man"? In this New York Times bestselling biography, Chris Matthews answers that question with the verve of a novelist. Matthews's extraordinary biography is based on personal interviews with those closest to JFK, oral histories by top political aide Kenneth O'Donnell and others, documents from his years as a student at Choate, and notes from Jacqueline Kennedy's first interview after Dallas.
The Cynic: The Political Education of Mitch McConnell
by Alec MacgillisFrom a dogged political reporter, an investigation into the political education of Mitch McConnell and an argument that this powerful Senator embodies much of this country's political dysfunction.Based on interviews with more than seventy-five people who have worked alongside Mitch McConnell or otherwise interacted with him over the course of his career, The Cynic, which will be published as an original ebook, is both a comprehensive biography of one of this country's most powerful politicians and a damning diagnosis of this country's eroding political will. Tracing his rise from a pragmatic local official in Kentucky to the leader of the Republican opposition in Washington, the book tracks McConnell's transformation from a moderate Republican who supported abortion rights and public employee unions to the embodiment of partisan obstructionism and conservative orthodoxy on Capitol Hill. Driven less by a shift in ideological conviction than by a desire to win elections and stay in power at all costs, McConnell's transformation exemplifies the "permanent campaign" mindset that has come to dominate American government. From his first race for local office in 1977--when the ad crew working on it nicknamed McConnell "love-me-love-me" for his insecurity and desire to please--to his fraught accommodation of the Tea Party, McConnell's political career is a story of ideological calcification and a vital mirror for understanding this country's own political development and what is wrought when politicians serve not at the behest of country, but at the behest of party and personal aggrandizement.
Winners Dream
by Joanne Gordon Bill McdermottA leadership and career manifesto told through the narrative of one of today's most inspiring, admired, and successful global leaders.In Winners Dream, Bill McDermott--the CEO of the world's largest business software company, SAP--chronicles how relentless optimism, hard work, and disciplined execution embolden people and equip organizations to achieve audacious goals. Growing up in working-class Long Island, a sixteen-year-old Bill traded three hourly wage jobs to buy a small deli, which he ran by instinctively applying ideas that would be the seeds for his future success. After paying for and graduating college, Bill talked his way into a job selling copiers door-to-door for Xerox, where he went on to rank number one in every sales position he held and eventually became the company's youngest-ever corporate officer. Eventually, Bill left Xerox and in 2002 became the unlikely president of SAP's flailing American business unit. There, he injected enthusiasm and accountability into the demoralized culture by scaling his deli, sales, and management strategies. In 2010, Bill was named co-CEO, and in May 2014 became SAP's sole, and first non-European, CEO.Colorful and fast-paced, Bill's anecdotes contain effective takeaways: gutsy career moves; empathetic sales strategies; incentives that yield exceptional team performance; and proof of the competitive advantages of optimism and hard work. At the heart of Bill's story is a blueprint for success and the knowledge that the real dream is the journey, not a preconceived destination.
The Removers: A Memoir
by Andrew Meredith“A darkly funny memoir about family reckonings” (O, The Oprah Magazine)—the story of a young man who, by handling the dead, makes peace with the living.Andrew Meredith’s father, a literature professor at La Salle University, was fired after unspecified allegations of sexual misconduct. It’s a transgression that resulted in such long-lasting familial despair that Andrew cannot forgive him. In the wake of the scandal, he frantically treads water, stuck in a kind of suspended adolescence—falling in and out of school, moving blindly from one half-hearted relationship to the next. When Andrew is forced to move back home to his childhood neighborhood in Northeast Philadelphia and take a job alongside his father as a “remover,” the name for those unseen, unsung men whose charge it is to take away the dead from their last rooms, he begins to see his father not through the lens of a wronged and resentful child, but through that of a sympathetic, imperfect man. Called “artful” and “compelling” by Thomas Lynch in The Wall Street Journal, Meredith’s poetic voice is as unforgettable as his story, and “he tucks his bittersweet childhood memories between tales of removals as carefully as the death certificates he slips between the bodies he picks up and the stretcher-like contraption that transports each body to the waiting vehicle” (Minneapolis Star-Tribune). “Potent” (Publishers Weekly), and “ultimately rewarding” (The Boston Globe), The Removers is a searing, coming-of-age memoir with “lyrical language and strong sense of place” (The Philadelphia Inquirer).
Foreign Correspondent
by H.D.S. GreenwayDavid Greenway, a journalist's journalist in the tradition of Michael Herr, David Halberstam, and Dexter Filkins. In this vivid memoir, he tells us what it's like to report a war up close.Reporter David Greenway was at the White House the day Kennedy was assassinated. He was in the jungles of Vietnam in that war's most dangerous days, and left Saigon by helicopter from the American embassy as the city was falling. He was with Sean Flynn when Flynn decided to get an entire New Guinea village high on hash, and with him hours before he disappeared in Cambodia. He escorted John le Carre around South East Asia as he researched The Honourable Schoolboy. He was wounded in Vietnam and awarded a Bronze Star for rescuing a Marine. He was with Sidney Schanberg and Dith Pran in Phnom Penh before the city descended into the killing fields of the Khmer Rouge. Greenway covered Sadat in Jerusalem, civil war and bombing in Lebanon, ethnic cleansing and genocide the Balkans, the Gulf Wars (both), and reported from Afghanistan and Iraq as they collapsed into civil war. This is a great adventure story--the life of a war correspondent on the front lines for five decades, eye-witness to come of the most violent and heroic scenes in recent history.
All Due Respect ... The Sopranos Changes Everything
by Alan Sepinwall"The Sopranos is the one [show] that made the world realize something special was happening on television. It rewrote the rules and made TV a better, happier place for thinking viewers, even as it was telling the story of a bunch of stubborn, ignorant, miserable excuses for human beings" (From All Due Respect…The Sopranos Changes Everything). In this chapter from the critically acclaimed book The Revolution Was Televised, Alan Sepinwall explores why The Sopranos was critical to ushering in a new golden age in television. Drawing on a new interview with creator David Chase, Sepinwall weaves fascinating behind-the-scenes details about the show with his trademark incisive criticism—including his theory on the controversial series finale.
Unfriending My Ex
by Kim StolzAn incisive, hilarious, and brutally honest memoir about life online and about how our obsessive connectivity is making us more disconnected--from former reality show contestant, MTV VJ, restauranteur, and go-to voice for millenials.Social media and technology have fundamentally altered the way we do business, couple and break up, develop friendships, and construct our identities and our notions of aspiration and fame. We make decisions about where we'll go based on whether it's Instagrammable. We don't have friends, we have followers. For an entire generation, an experience not captured on social media might as well not have happened at all. As someone whose identity has been forged by reality TV (as a contestant on America's Next Top Model) and social media and mobile technology, Kim Stolz is deeply obsessed with the subject. She has a hard time putting her phone down. And yet she remembers what life was like before technology-induced ADD, before life had become a string of late-night texts, Snapchats, endless selfies, that sinking feeling you get when you realize you've hit reply all by mistake. It's hard to imagine now, but there was once a time before we wasted a full hour emptily clicking through a semi-stranger's vacation pictures on Facebook, a time before every ex, every meaningless fling was a mere click away. Unfriending My Ex (And Other Things I'll Never Do) is the first book to document the hilarity of the social media revolution from the inside; it chronicles a life filtered through our obsessive relationship with technology. The book is as eye-opening as it is entertaining as it proceeds through the various ways in which social media and mobile technology have generated empathy deficits and left us all with the attention spans of fruit flies...and the sad fact that in spite all of this, we find it impossible to switch our devices off. Smart, hilarious, and completely relatable, Unfriending My Ex (And Other Things I'll Never Do) captures our crazy moment, shining a bright light on the trials and tribulations of life online.
The Vanishing Velázquez: A 19th Century Bookseller's Obsession with a Lost Masterpiece
by Laura CummingFrom one of the world's most expert art critics, the incredible true story--part art history and part mystery--of a Velazquez portrait that went missing and the obsessed nineteenth-century bookseller determined to prove he had found it.When John Snare, a nineteenth-century provincial bookseller, traveled to a liquidation auction, he stumbled on a vivid portrait of King Charles I that defied any explanation. The Charles of the painting was young--too young to be king--and yet also too young to be painted by the Flemish painter to which the work was attributed. Snare had found something incredible--but what? His research brought him to Diego Velazquez, whose long-lost portrait of Prince Charles has eluded art experts for generations. Velazquez (1599-1660) was the official painter of the Madrid court, during the time the Spanish Empire teetered on the edge of collapse. When Prince Charles of England--a man wealthy enough to help turn Spain's fortunes--ventured to the court to propose a marriage with a Spanish princess, he allowed just a few hours to sit for his portrait. Snare believed only Velazquez could have met this challenge. But in making his theory public, Snare was ostracized, victim to aristocrats and critics who accused him of fraud, and forced to choose, like Velazquez himself, between art and family. A thrilling investigation into the complex meaning of authenticity and the unshakable determination that drives both artists and collectors of their work, The Vanishing Velazquez travels from extravagant Spanish courts in the 1700s to the gritty courtrooms and auction houses of nineteenth-century London and New York. But it is above all a tale of mystery and detection, of tragic mishaps and mistaken identities, of class, politics, snobbery, crime, and almost farcical accident. It is a magnificently crafted page-turner, a testimony to how and why great works of art can affect us to the point of obsession.
Primates of Park Avenue: A Memoir
by Wednesday MartinLike an urban Dian Fossey, Wednesday Martin decodes the primate social behaviors of Upper East Side mothers in a brilliantly original and witty memoir about her adventures assimilating into that most secretive and elite tribe.After marrying a man from the Upper East Side and moving to the neighborhood, Wednesday Martin struggled to fit in. Drawing on her background in anthropology and primatology, she tried looking at her new world through that lens, and suddenly things fell into place. She understood the other mothers' snobbiness at school drop-off when she compared them to olive baboons. Her obsessional quest for a Hermes Birkin handbag made sense when she realized other females wielded them to establish dominance in their troop. And so she analyzed tribal migration patterns; display rituals; physical adornment, mutilation, and mating practices; extra-pair copulation; and more. Her conclusions are smart, thought-provoking, and hilariously unexpected. Every city has its Upper East Side, and in Wednesday's memoir, readers everywhere will recognize the strange cultural codes of powerful social hierarchies and the compelling desire to climb them. They will also see that Upper East Side mothers want the same things for their children that all mothers want--safety, happiness, and success--and not even sky-high penthouses and chauffeured SUVs can protect this ecologically released tribe from the universal experiences of anxiety and loss. When Wednesday's life turns upside down, she learns how deep the bonds of female friendship really are. Intelligent, funny, and heartfelt, Primates of Park Avenue lifts a veil on a secret, elite world within a world--the exotic, fascinating, and strangely familiar culture of privileged Manhattan motherhood.
Mary Poppins, She Wrote: The Life of P. L. Travers
by Valerie LawsonTHE ONLY TRUE STORY BEHIND THE CREATOR OF MARY POPPINS The remarkable life of P.L. Travers, the creator of Mary Poppins—perfect for fans of the movie Mary Poppins Returns and the original Disney classic! &“An arresting life…Lawson is superb at excavating the details.&” —Library JournalThe spellbinding stories of Mary Poppins, the quintessentially English and utterly magical nanny, have been loved by generations. She flew into the lives of the unsuspecting Banks family in a children&’s book that was instantly hailed as a classic, then became a household name when Julie Andrews stepped into the title role in Walt Disney&’s hugely successful and equally classic film. But the Mary Poppins in the stories was not the cheery film character. She was tart and sharp, plain and vain. She was a remarkable character. The story of Mary Poppins&’ creator, as this definitive biography reveals, is equally remarkable. The fabulous English nanny was actually conceived by an Australian, Pamela Lyndon Travers, who came to London in 1924 from Queensland as a journalist. She became involved with Theosophy, traveled in the literary circles of W.B. Yeats and T.S. Eliot, and became a disciple of the famed spiritual guru, Gurdjieff. She famously clashed with Walt Disney over the adaptation of the Mary Poppins books into film. Travers, whom Disney accused of vanity for &“thinking you know more about Mary Poppins than I do,&” was as tart and opinionated as Julie Andrews&’s big-screen Mary Poppins was cheery. Yet it was a love of mysticism and magic that shaped Travers&’s life as well as the character of Mary Poppins. The clipped, strict, and ultimately mysterious nanny who emerged from her pen was the creation of someone who remained inscrutable and enigmatic to the end of her ninety-six years. Valerie Lawson&’s illuminating biography provides the first full look whose personal journey is as intriguing as her beloved characters.
The Price of Illusion: A Memoir
by Joan Juliet BuckFrom Joan Juliet Buck, former editor-in-chief of Vogue Paris and &“one of the most compelling personalities in the world of style&” (New York Times) comes her dazzling, compulsively readable memoir: a fabulous account of four decades spent in the creative heart of London, New York, Los Angeles, and Paris—&“If you loved The Devil Wears Prada, you&’ll adore The Price of Illusion&” (Elle).In a book as rich and dramatic as the life she&’s led, Joan Juliet Buck takes us into the splendid illusions of film, fashion, and fame to reveal, in stunning, sensual prose, the truth behind the artifice. The only child of a volatile movie producer betrayed by his dreams, she became a magazine journalist at nineteen to reflect and record the high life she&’d been brought up in, a choice that led her into a hall of mirrors where she was both magician and dupe. After a career writing for Vogue and Vanity Fair, she was named the first American woman to edit Vogue Paris. The vivid adventures of this thoughtful, incisive writer at the hub of dreams across two continents over fifty years are hilarious and heartbreaking. Including a spectacular cast of carefully observed legends, monsters, and stars (just look at the index!), this is the moving account of a remarkable woman&’s rocky passage through glamour and passion, filial duty and family madness, in search of her true self.
Power Forward
by Reggie LoveEvery path to adulthood is strewn with missteps, epiphanies, and hard-earned lessons. Only Reggie Love's, however, went through the White House by way of Duke University's Cameron Indoor Stadium. Mentored by both Coach Krzyzewski and President Obama, Love shares universal insights learned in unique circumstances, an education in how sports, politics, and life can define who you are, what you believe in, and what it takes to make a difference.Power Forward tells the story of the five years Love worked as a personal assistant to Senator Obama as a candidate for president, and President Obama, and it is a professional coming of age story like no other. What the public knows was well put by Time magazine in 2008: "[Love's] official duties don't come close to capturing Reggie's close bond with Obama, who plays a role that is part boss and part big brother." What the public doesn't know are the innumerable private moments during which that bond was forged and the President mentored a malleable young man. Accountability and serving with pride and honor were learned during unsought moments: from co-coaching grade school girls basketball with the president; lending Obama his tie ahead of a presidential debate; managing a personal life when no hour is truly his own; being tasked with getting the candidate up in the morning on time for long days of campaigning. From his first interview with Senator Obama, to his near-decision not to follow the president-elect to the White House, to eventually bringing LeBron, Melo, D-Wade, and Kobe to play with the President on his forty-ninth birthday, Love drew on Coach K's teachings as he learned to navigate Washington. But it was while owning up to losing (briefly) the President's briefcase, figuring out how to compete effectively in pick-up games in New Hampshire during the primary to secure support and votes, babysitting the children of visiting heads of state, and keeping the President company at every major turning point of his historic first campaign and administration, that Love learned how persistence and passion can lead not only to success, but to a broader concept of responsibility.
Focus: The Secret, Sexy, Sometimes Sordid World of Fashion Photographers
by Michael GrossIn this rollicking account of fashion photography's golden age, the New York Times bestselling author of Model and House of Outrageous Fortune, Michael Gross, brings to life the wild genius, ego, passion, and antics of the men (and a few women) behind the camera.Before Instagram was an art form, fashion photographers and the models they made famous were pop culture royalty. From the postwar covers of Vogue to the triumph of the digital image, the fashion photographer sold not only clothes but ideals of beauty and visions of perfect lives. Even when they succumbed to temptation and excess--and did they ever--the very few photographers who rose to the top were artists, above all. Focus probes the lives, hang-ups, and artistic triumphs of more than a dozen of fashion photography's greatest visionaries: Richard Avedon, Irving Penn, Melvin Sokolsky, Bert Stern, David Bailey, Bill King, Deborah Turbeville, Helmut Newton, Gilles Bensimon, Bruce Weber, Steven Meisel, Corinne Day, Bob and Terry Richardson, and more. From Avedon's haute couture fantasies and telling portraits to Weber's sensual, intimate, and heroic slices of life, and from Bob Richardson's provocations to his son Terry's transgressions, Focus takes readers behind the scenes to reveal the revolutionary creative processes and fraught private passions of these visionary magicians. Tracing the highs and lows of fashion photography from the late 1940s to today, Gross vividly chronicles the fierce rivalries between photographers, fashion editors, and publishers like Condé Nast and Hearst, weaving together candid interviews, never-before-told insider anecdotes and insights born of his three decades of front-row and backstage reporting on modern fashion. An unprecedented look at an eccentric and seductive profession and the men and women who practice it on the treacherous shifting sands of pop and fashion culture, Focus depicts--perhaps most importantly--the rewards and cost, both terribly high, of translating an artist's vision of beauty for an often cold and cruel commercial reality.