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The Grandmother's Tale
by Alison WeirThe Grandmother's Tale by historian Alison Weir is an e-short and companion piece to Anne Boleyn: A King's Obsession, the second spellbinding novel in the Six Tudor Queens series.I see her from time to time, and I wish I didn't, but I don't say that. Nor do I tell my guests of my awful gift, or of how I kept seeing a sword over her head . . . Thomas once called me a witch. But witches practise their craft willingly. My visions come unbidden, and I have never been able to control them.As Anne Boleyn's grandmother mourns the death of her granddaughter, she also mourns the loss of Hever as she once knew it - filled with the joy and happiness of her family. With Anne's ghost still walking the halls, Margaret remembers her life in this grand house and the mysteries and rumours that line its walls. But with everything changed for ever, how long will Hever remain her home?Features the first chapter of Anne Boleyn: A King's Obsession and Jane Seymour: The Haunted Queen.SIX TUDOR QUEENS. SIX NOVELS. SIX YEARS.
Grandpa Stops a War: A Paul Robeson Story
by Susan Robeson"It takes a man of peace to stop a war." The true story of Paul Robeson's visit to the front lines of the Spanish Civil War is a tale of courage and activism told by his granddaughter, Susan Robeson. Grandpa Paul was a world-famous actor and singer with a deep and rumbling voice, a man of peace and principle who worried about the safety of children and families living in countries at war. He wanted to use his voice to promote social justice all over the world. Though people warned Grandpa Paul that it was too dangerous, he traveled with his friend Captain Fernando to the battlefields of the Spanish Civil War to sing to the soldiers. And then something amazing happened...With gorgeous illustrations from fine artist Rod Brown, Grandpa Stops a War celebrates Paul Robeson's global activism and towering achievements, and shows readers the power of music in times of discord and war.An author's note helps readers learn more about the author's personal experience growing up in the Robeson family, and gives parents, teachers, and librarians more in-depth material to expand the reader's understanding of the war and Robeson as a champion of civil rights, global freedom, and world peace.
Grania
by Morgan LlywelynHistorical fiction about Grace O'Malley, an Irish chieftain in the late 1500's.
Granny D
by Doris Haddock Dennis BurkeIn February 2000, ninety-year-old Doris “Granny D” Haddock became a national heroine when she completed her 3,200-mile, fourteen-month walk from Los Angeles to Washington, D. C. , to bring attention to the issue of campaign finance reform. Granny Drecalls and celebrates an exuberant life of love, ac-tivism, and adventure—from one-woman feminist plays in the thirties, to stopping nuclear testing near an Eskimo fishing village in 1963, to her current crusade. Threaded throughout is the spirit of her beloved hometown in New Hampshire—Thornton Wilder’s inspiration for Grover’s Corners in Our Town—a quintessentially American center of New England pluck, Yankee ingenuity, and can-do attitude. Told in Doris’s vivid and unforgettable voice,Granny Dwill move and delight readers with its clarion message that one person can indeed make a difference.
Grant: A Novel
by Max ByrdMax Byrd, the renowned author of Jackson and Jefferson, brings history to life in this stunning novel set in America's Gilded Age. Grant is an unforgettable portrait of a colorful era--and the flawed, iron-willed, mysterious giant at its center. Ulysses S. Grant pursued a tragic war to its very end. But his final battle starts in 1880, when he loses his race to become the first U.S. President to serve three terms, goes bankrupt, and begins a fight against cancer that will prove to be his greatest challenge. Through journalist Nicholas Trist, readers follow Grant's journey--and along the way meet Grant's sworn enemy Henry Adams and Adams's doomed wife, Clover, the old soldiers Sherman and Sheridan, and the always clever, always scheming Mark Twain. Revealed here are not only the penetrating secrets of our eighteenth president, but the intimate power-brokering that led to the end of Grant's career, setting the stage for a new era in American history--one defined by politics, not warfare. "Serious, intricate . . . gripping . . . Byrd is an expert at linking the products of his own imagination with historical facts."--The New York Times Book Review "With the license and gifts of a first-rate novelist, Max Byrd has managed in Grant to reveal the man far better than those who have tried before."--San Francisco Chronicle "A vibrant, stunning story of Grant's last years, but best of all, a gripping tale of 'the reborn nation on the other side of the war.' "--Civil War Book Review "Splendid . . . nothing less than a visit with greatness."--Associated Press "Historical fiction doesn't get any better than this."--Booklist
Grant: The Wartime Letters Of Ulysses S. Grant To His Wife
by Ron Chernow<P>Pulitzer Prize winner Ron Chernow returns with a sweeping and dramatic portrait of one of our most compelling generals and presidents, Ulysses S. Grant. <P>Ulysses S. Grant's life has typically been misunderstood. All too often he is caricatured as a chronic loser and an inept businessman, or as the triumphant but brutal Union general of the Civil War. But these stereotypes don't come close to capturing him, as Chernow shows in his masterful biography, the first to provide a complete understanding of the general and president whose fortunes rose and fell with dizzying speed and frequency. Before the Civil War, Grant was flailing. <P>His business ventures had ended dismally, and despite distinguished service in the Mexican War he ended up resigning from the army in disgrace amid recurring accusations of drunkenness. But in war, Grant began to realize his remarkable potential, soaring through the ranks of the Union army, prevailing at the battle of Shiloh and in the Vicksburg campaign, and ultimately defeating the legendary Confederate general Robert E. Lee. Along the way, Grant endeared himself to President Lincoln and became his most trusted general and the strategic genius of the war effort. Grant’s military fame translated into a two-term presidency, but one plagued by corruption scandals involving his closest staff members. <P>More important, he sought freedom and justice for black Americans, working to crush the Ku Klux Klan and earning the admiration of Frederick Douglass, who called him “the vigilant, firm, impartial, and wise protector of my race.” After his presidency, he was again brought low by a dashing young swindler on Wall Street, only to resuscitate his image by working with Mark Twain to publish his memoirs, which are recognized as a masterpiece of the genre. <P> With lucidity, breadth, and meticulousness, Chernow finds the threads that bind these disparate stories together, shedding new light on the man whom Walt Whitman described as “nothing heroic... and yet the greatest hero.” Chernow’s probing portrait of Grant's lifelong struggle with alcoholism transforms our understanding of the man at the deepest level. This is America's greatest biographer, bringing movingly to life one of our finest but most underappreciated presidents. The definitive biography, <i>Grant</i> is a grand synthesis of painstaking research and literary brilliance that makes sense of all sides of Grant's life, explaining how this simple Midwesterner could at once be so ordinary and so extraordinary. <P><b>A New York Times Bestseller</b>
Grant
by William S. McfeelyIn this stunning biography, William McFeely brings us a thoroughly compelling story of a tangled life.<P><P> Having once said "a military life had no charms to me," U.S. Grant entered West Point to get through the course, secure a detail for a few years as assistant professor of mathematics at the Academy, and afterwards obtain a permanent position as professor at some respectable college. But the course his life took was quite different. Little did he ever dream that he would serve with distinction in the Mexican War, lead the Union to victory in the Civil War, struggle through eight years as President of the United States, and wage bitter personal battles against alcoholism, insolvency, and cancer.<P> Pulitzer Prize Winner
Grant: A Biography (Great Generals Series)
by John MosierGrant: A Biography tells of the extraordinary life and legacy of one of America's most ingenious military mindsA modest and unassuming man, Grant never lost a battle, leading the Union to victory over the Confederacy during the Civil War, ultimately becoming President of the reunited states. Grant revolutionized military warfare by creating new leadership tactics by integrating new technologies in classical military strategy. In this compelling biography, John Mosier reveals the man behind the military legend, showing how Grant's creativity and genius off the battlefield shaped him into one of our nation's greatest military leaders.
Grant
by Jean Edward SmithUlysses S. Grant was the first four-star general in the history of the United States Army and the only president between Andrew Jackson and Woodrow Wilson to serve eight consecutive years in the White House. As general in chief, Grant revolutionized modern warfare. Rather than capture enemy territory or march on Southern cities, he concentrated on engaging and defeating the Confederate armies in the field, and he pursued that strategy relentlessly. As president, he brought stability to the country after years of war and upheaval. He tried to carry out the policies of Abraham Lincoln, the man he admired above all others, and to a considerable degree he succeeded. Yet today, Grant is remembered as a brilliant general but a failed president. In this comprehensive biography, Jean Edward Smith reconciles these conflicting assessments of Grant's life. He argues convincingly that Grant is greatly underrated as a president. Following the turmoil of Andrew Johnson's administration, Grant guided the nation through the post- Civil War era, overseeing Reconstruction of the South and enforcing the freedoms of new African-American citizens. His presidential accomplishments were as considerable as his military victories, says Smith, for the same strength of character that made him successful on the battlefield also characterized his years in the White House. Grant was the most unlikely of military heroes: a great soldier who disliked the army and longed for a civilian career. After graduating from West Point, he served with distinction in the Mexican War. Following the war he grew stale on frontier garrison postings, despaired for his absent wife and children, and began drinking heavily. He resigned from the army in 1854, failed at farming and other business endeavors, and was working as a clerk in the family leathergoods store when the Civil War began. Denied a place in the regular army, he was commissioned a colonel of volunteers and, as victory followed victory, moved steadily up the Union chain of command. Lincoln saw in Grant the general he had been looking for, and in the spring of 1864 the president brought him east to take command of all the Union armies. Smith dispels the myth that Grant was a brutal general who willingly sacrificed his soldiers, pointing out that Grant's casualty ratio was consistently lower than Lee's. At the end of the war, Grant's generous terms to the Confederates at Appomattox foreshadowed his generosity to the South as president. But, as Smith notes, Grant also had his weaknesses. He was too trusting of his friends, some of whom schemed to profit through their association with him. Though Grant himself always acted honorably, his presidential administration was rocked by scandals. "He was the steadfast center about and on which everything else turned," Philip Sheridan wrote, and others who served under Grant felt the same way. It was this aura of stability and integrity that allowed Grant as president to override a growing sectionalism and to navigate such national crises as the Panic of 1873 and the disputed Hayes-Tilden election of 1876. At the end of his life, dying of cancer, Grant composed his memoirs, which are still regarded by historians as perhaps the finest military memoirs ever written. They sold phenomenally well, and Grant the failed businessman left his widow a fortune in royalties from sales of the book. His funeral procession through the streets of Manhattan closed the city, and behind his pallbearers, who included both Confederate and Union generals, marched thousands of veterans from both sides of the war.
Grant Achatz
by Chicago Tribune StaffGrant Achatz's career as a chef has been built around beating the odds--from his humble Midwestern beginnings and rise to stardom in Chicago; his iconoclastic vision of the American dining experience; and his life-threatening battle with cancer that temporarily stripped him of his ability to taste. In all these situations, Achatz defiantly and definitively surmounted innumerable obstacles to become--and remain--one of the world's most recognizable and respected chefs.Grant Achatz: The Remarkable Rise of America's Most Celebrated Young Chef, a collection of articles taken from the Chicago Tribune, is an up-close examination of Achatz's personal history and international impact in the culinary world. Included are rare interviews on Achatz's humble beginnings as a young chef and modest lifestyle, stories from his stint as executive chef of Evanston, Illinois's four-star restaurant Trio, long-unseen restaurant reviews, as well as features on his innovative restaurants Aviary and Next, which play with Achatz's trademark concept of molecular gastronomy and the importance of presentation and memory in fine dining. In the middle of all this success, Achatz was diagnosed with stage-four squamous cell carcinoma, a rare cancer afflicting the tongue that completely eliminated Achatz's sense of taste. Told he would die if he did not have his tongue surgically removed, Achatz tenaciously clung to the belief he would be able to regain the sense most vital to his extraordinary talent. While undergoing experimental treatment to regain his sense of taste, Achatz continued to manage Alinea and even improved it despite his professionally debilitating condition. Miraculously, Achatz made a full recovery and regained his ability to taste while going on to open one of the culinary world's most discussed and praised new restaurants: Next.Grant Achatz tells the story of the man at the forefront of modern culinary trends and the world's top-rated restaurants, as seen through both his own eyes and the journalists who have been covering his fights against the odds from the beginning.
Grant and Twain: The Story of a Friendship That Changed America
by Mark PerryIn the spring of 1884 Ulysses S. Grant heeded the advice of Mark Twain and finally agreed to write his memoirs. Little did Grant or Twain realize that this seemingly straightforward decision would profoundly alter not only both their lives but the course of American literature. Over the next fifteen months, as the two men became close friends and intimate collaborators, Grant raced against the spread of cancer to compose a triumphant account of his life and times—while Twain struggled to complete and publish his greatest novel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. In this deeply moving and meticulously researched book, veteran writer Mark Perry reconstructs the heady months when Grant and Twain inspired and cajoled each other to create two quintessentially American masterpieces. In a bold and colorful narrative, Perry recounts the early careers of these two giants, traces their quest for fame and elusive fortunes, and then follows the series of events that brought them together as friends. The reason Grant let Twain talk him into writing his memoirs was simple: He was bankrupt and needed the money. Twain promised Grant princely returns in exchange for the right to edit and publish the book—-and though the writer’s own finances were tottering, he kept his word to the general and his family. Mortally ill and battling debts, magazine editors, and a constant crush of reporters, Grant fought bravely to get the story of his life and his Civil War victories down on paper. Twain, meanwhile, staked all his hopes, both financial and literary, on the tale of a ragged boy and a runaway slave that he had been unable to finish for decades. As Perry delves into the story of the men’s deepening friendship and mutual influence, he arrives at the startling discovery of the true model for the character of Huckleberry Finn. With a cast of fascinating characters, including General William T. Sherman, William Dean Howells, William Henry Vanderbilt, and Abraham Lincoln, Perry’s narrative takes in the whole sweep of a glittering, unscrupulous age. A story of friendship and history, inspiration and desperation, genius and ruin, Grant and Twain captures a pivotal moment in the lives of two towering Americans and the age they epitomized.
Grant Fuhr
by Bruce Dowbiggin Grant FuhrThe Hall of Fame story of Grant Fuhr, the first black superstar in the National Hockey League and the last line of defense for the Edmonton Oilers dynasty, told through Fuhr's 10 most important games.Grant Fuhr was the best goalie in the league at a time when hockey was at its most exciting. Wayne Gretzky's Edmonton Oilers were arguably the greatest team in league history, and during the 1980s arguably the most popular team across the United States, even if many had little idea where Edmonton was. They were that good. And so was Fuhr: Gretzky called him the best goaltender in the world.Fuhr broke the colour barrier for NHL goaltenders when he played his first game for the Oilers in 1981, and was an inspiration for later players including future Hall of Famer Jarome Iginla. But in addition to their dynastic run of Stanley Cup championships, the Oilers were also synonymous with the excesses of the decade: Fuhr himself was suspended for substance use, a discredit he had to fight back from--and did, going on to set career records and earning election to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility.
Grant Moves South: Grant Moves South And Grant Takes Command
by Bruce CattonA Pulitzer Prize-winning historian's acclaimed Civil War history of the complex man and controversial Union commander whose battlefield brilliance ensured the downfall of the Confederacy Preeminent Civil War historian Bruce Catton narrows his focus on commander Ulysses S. Grant, whose bold tactics and relentless dedication to the Union ultimately ensured a Northern victory in the nation's bloodiest conflict. While a succession of Union generals--from McClellan to Burnside to Hooker to Meade--were losing battles and sacrificing troops due to ego, egregious errors, and incompetence, an unassuming Federal Army commander was excelling in the Western theater of operations. Though unskilled in military power politics and disregarded by his peers, Colonel Grant, commander of the Twenty-First Illinois Volunteer Infantry, was proving to be an unstoppable force. He won victory after victory at Belmont, Fort Henry, and Fort Donelson, while brilliantly avoiding near-catastrophe and ultimately triumphing at Shiloh. And Grant's bold maneuvers at Vicksburg would cost the Confederacy its invaluable lifeline: the Mississippi River. But destiny and President Lincoln had even loftier plans for Grant, placing nothing less than the future of an entire nation in the capable hands of the North's most valuable military leader. Based in large part on military communiqués, personal eyewitness accounts, and Grant's own writings, Catton's extraordinary history offers readers an insightful look at arguably the most innovative Civil War battlefield strategist, unmatched by even the South's legendary Robert E. Lee.
Grant Takes Command: Grant Moves South And Grant Takes Command
by Bruce CattonA thrilling account of the final years of the War Between the States and the great general who led the Union to victory This conclusion of Pulitzer Prize-winning author Bruce Catton's acclaimed Civil War history of General Ulysses S. Grant begins in the summer of 1863. After Grant's bold and decisive triumph over the Confederate Army at Vicksburg--a victory that wrested control of the Mississippi River from Southern hands--President Abraham Lincoln promoted Grant to the head of the Army of the Potomac. The newly named general was virtually unknown to the nation and to the Union's military high command, but he proved himself in the brutal closing year and a half of the War Between the States. Grant's strategic brilliance and unshakeable tenacity crushed the Confederacy in the battles of the Overland Campaign in Virginia and the Siege of Petersburg. In the spring of 1865, Grant finally forced Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox Court House, thus ending the bloodiest conflict on American soil. Although tragedy struck only days later when Lincoln--whom Grant called "incontestably the greatest man I have ever known"--was assassinated, Grant's military triumphs would ensure that the president's principles of unity and freedom would endure. In Grant Takes Command, Catton offers readers an in-depth portrait of an extraordinary warrior and unparalleled military strategist whose brilliant battlefield leadership saved an endangered Union.
Grant Wood: A Life
by R. Tripp EvansA major new biography of America’s most acclaimed, and misunderstood, regionalist painter, Grant Wood who is revealed to have been anything but plain, or simple . . . R. Tripp Evans reveals the true complexity of the man and the image Wood so carefully constructed of himself. Grant Wood called himself a farmer-painter but farming held little interest for him. He appeared to be a self-taught painter with his scenes of farmlands, farm workers, and folklore but he was classically trained, a sophisticated artist who had studied the Old Masters and Flemish art as well as impressionism. He lived a bohemian life and painted in Paris and Munich in the 1920s, fleeing what H. L. Mencken referred to as “the booboisie” of small-town America. We see Wood as an artist haunted and inspired by the images of childhood; by the complex relationship with his father (stern, pious, the “manliest of men”); with his sister and his beloved mother (Wood shared his studio and sleeping quarters with his mother until her death at seventy-seven; he was forty-four). We see Wood’s homosexuality and how his studied masculinity was a ruse that shaped his work. Here is Wood’s life and work explored more deeply and insightfully than ever before. Drawing on letters, the artist’s unfinished autobiography, his sister’s writings, and many never-before-seen documents, Evans’s book is a dimensional portrait of a deeply complicated artist who became a “National Symbol. ” It is as well a portrait of the American art scene at a time when America’s Calvinistic spirit and provincialism saw Europe as decadent and artists were divided between red-blooded patriotic men and “hothouse aesthetes. ” Thomas Hart Benton said of Grant Wood: “When this new America looks back for landmarks to help gauge its forward footsteps, it will find a monument standing up in the midst of the wreckage . . . This monument will be made out of Grant Wood’s works. ”
Grant's Final Victory: Ulysses S. Grant's Heroic Last Year
by Charles Bracelen FloodCivil War General Ulysses S. Grant completed his now-famous memoir as he fought against his final illness, in the hope that profits from the book would support his family after he was swindled by a business partner. This book details the public support surrounding Grant as he rushed to finish the book before his death and describes the roles of family, friends, and physicians, especially Grant's friend and publisher Mark Twain. The book is illustrated with b&w historical photos. Flood is past president of PEN American Center. Annotation ©2011 Book News, Inc. , Portland, OR (booknews. com)
Grant's Last Battle: The Story Behind the Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant (Emerging Civil War Series)
by Chris Mackowski Kristopher D. WhiteThe remarkable story of how one of America’s greatest military heroes became a literary legend. The former general in chief of the Union armies during the Civil War . . . the two-term president of the United States . . . the beloved ambassador of American goodwill around the globe . . . the respected New York financier—Ulysses S. Grant—was dying. The hardscrabble man who regularly smoked twenty cigars a day had developed terminal throat cancer. Thus began Grant’s final battle—a race against his own failing health to complete his personal memoirs in an attempt to secure his family’s financial security. But the project evolved into something far more: an effort to secure the very meaning of the Civil War itself and how it would be remembered. In this maelstrom of woe, Grant refused to surrender. Putting pen to paper, the hero of Appomattox embarked on his final campaign: an effort to write his memoirs before he died. The Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant would cement his place as not only one of America’s greatest heroes but also as one of its most sublime literary voices. Authors Chris Mackowski and Kristopher D. White have recounted Grant’s battlefield exploits as historians at Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park, and Mackowski, as an academic, has studied Grant’s literary career. Their familiarity with the former president as a general and as a writer bring Grant’s Last Battle to life with new insight, told with the engaging prose that has become the hallmark of the Emerging Civil War Series.
Grant's Tomb: The Epic Death of Ulysses S. Grant and the Making of an American Pantheon
by Louis L. PiconeThe moving story of Ulysses S. Grant's final battle, and the definitive account of the national memorial honoring him as one of America's most enduring heroes The final resting place of Ulysses S. Grant, the victorious general in the Civil War and the eighteenth president of the United States, is a colossal neoclassical tomb located in the most dynamic city in the country. It is larger than the final resting place of any other president or any other person in America. Since its creation, the popularity and condition of this monument, built to honor the man and what he represented to a grateful nation at the time of his death, a mere twenty years after the end of the Civil War, have reflected not only Grant's legacy in the public mind but also the state of New York City and of the Union.In this fascinating, deeply researched book, presidential historian Louis L. Picone recounts the full story. He begins with Grant's heroic final battle during the last year of his life, to complete his memoirs in order to secure his family's financial future while contending with painful, incurable cancer. Grant accomplished this just days before his death, and his memoirs, published by Mark Twain, became a bestseller. Accompanying his account with numerous period photographs, Picone narrates the national response to Grant's passing and how his tomb came to be: the intense competition to be the resting place for Grant's remains, the origins of the memorial and its design, the struggle to finance and build it over the course of twelve years, and the vicissitudes of its afterlife in the history of the nation up to recent times.
Graphic History: Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad
by Michael Martin Dave Hoover Bill Anderson Donald LemkeTells the story of Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad. Written in graphic-novel format.
Graphic History: The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
by Kay Melchisedech Olson Otha Zackariah Edward Lohse Tom AdamsonNonfiction topics in graphic novel format! History leaps off the page in Capstone's Graphic Library. Eye-popping artwork and easy-to-read text offer an appealing experience for all readers. An additional information section provides key facts and further understanding.
Graphic History: The Adventures of Marco Polo
by Roger Smalley Brian Bascle Blake A. HoenaNonfiction topics in graphic novel format! History leaps off the page in Capstone's Graphic Library. Eye-popping artwork and easy-to-read text offer an appealing experience for all readers. An additional information section provides key facts and further understanding.
The Grasmere and Alfoxden Journals
by Dorothy Wordsworth Pamela WoofDorothy Wordsworth's journals are a unique record of her life with her brother William, at the time when he was at the height of his poetic powers. Invaluable for the insight they give into the daily life of the poet and his friendship with Coleridge, they are also remarkable for their spontaneity and immediacy, and for the vivid descriptions of people, places, and incidents that inspired some of Wordsworth's best-loved poems. The Grasmere Journal was begun at Dove Cottage in May 1800 and kept for three years. Dorothy notes the walks and the weather, the friends, country neighbors and beggars on the roads; she sets down accounts of the garden, of Wordsworth's marriage, their concern for Coleridge, the composition of poetry. The earlier Alfoxden Journal was written during 1797-8, when the Wordsworths lived near Coleridge in Somerset. Not intended for publication, but to "give Wm Pleasure by it," both journals have a quality recognized by Wordsworth when he wrote of Dorothy that "she gave me eyes, she gave me ears."
Grass
by Martin King Martin Knight Phil SparrowhawkGrass is the incredible story of Phil Sparrowhawk, a working-class boy with gambling in his blood. Like most punters, he enjoyed an incredible run of luck, but finally rolled the dice once too often.Before he had come of age, Phil had accumulated a small fortune from street trading. He then staked his entire capital on Njinsky in the 1970 Derby - and won. With his now large capital base, he launched a business importing clothes. Enter Howard Marks (aka Mr Nice), who was enthused by Phil's Far East connections and introduced him to the far more lucrative world of the 'movement of beneficial herbs' - or drug smuggling, as it is known to the authorities. Phil struck out on his own and from his new base in Thailand became involved in many large-scale cannabis deals, whilst at the same time developing highly successful legitimate businesses. Read of his encounters with Greenpeace, Mother Teresa, gangsters and leading politicians, Lord Moynihan, religious cults, former pop singers and many other diverse characters as his life became more and more surreal. The winning streak came to an end in 1988 when the US Drug Enforcement Agency closed in. Phil's £30m fortune was promptly confiscated and he spent the next four years in two of Thailand's most notorious jails before being extradited to the US, where he served further time in a series of penitentiaries. Grass details the life of an ordinary young man with a taste for adventure, who ended up on the most extraordinary journey. Sit back, take a deep breath and enjoy.
The Grass Ceiling: On Being a Woman in Sport
by Eimear Ryan'A book which will very soon be acknowledged as a classic of Irish sportswriting' Ciarán MurphyWhat is it like to be female in a male-dominated sporting world? If you play with the boys, more people pay attention - but you get treated like an alien. Playing with other girls or women means you have to accept smaller audiences, diminished status and - for professionals - lower pay.And what if, as is the case for camogie player Eimear Ryan, your sport has a completely different name when women play it? What if you don't feel entirely comfortable in an all-female sporting environment because you're shy, bookish, not really one of the girls?In The Grass Ceiling, acclaimed novelist Eimear Ryan digs deep into the confluence of gender and sport, and all the questions it throws up about identity, status, competition and self-expression. At a time when women's sport is on the rise but still a long way from equality, it is a sharp, nuanced and heartfelt exploration of questions that affect everyone who loves sport.Praise for The Grass Ceiling'A gorgeous memoir about a life lived in sport, specifically a female, Irish rural life. I read it in two sittings.' Malachy Clerkin, Irish Times'A love letter to the GAA and a diatribe against the idea sport is not for women' Kathleen McNamee, Irish Times'Brilliant ... Ryan's bold and deep search into so many of those internalised questions provides a fascinating collage of emotional detail' Christy O'Connor, Irish Examiner 'Lyrical, urgent, wise and bracing' Irish Times
The Grass Flute Zen Master: Sodo Yokoyama
by Arthur BravermanWhat motivated Sodo–san to spend the last twenty years of his life in a “temple under the sky”— a corner of a public park where he taught passersby what it means to be forever young through the funky tunes he played on his grass flute? In The Grass Flute Zen Master: Sodo Yokoyama, we are seeking not only a truer understanding of this well–loved monk, but of zazen, Zen meditation, itself. In his search for insights into Sodo Yokoyama’s life, Arthur Braverman skillfully weaves a tapestry from seemingly disparate threads—the brief taisho period into which Sodo–san was born and where individualism shone; his teachers, both ancient and contemporary practitioners of Zen Bhuddism; the monk’s love of baseball; and the similarities Braverman finds between Sodo–san and Walt Whitman, who both found the universal in nature.Through conversations with Joko Shibata, Yokoyama’s sole disciple, and careful study of his teacher’s poetry, an intriguing tension between the personal and the universal is revealed. The Grass Flute Zen Master is a meditative examination not of just one life, but of many. The lineage of teacher and protégé is traced back through generations, contemporaries are drawn up from unexpected places, and Braverman examines his own long journey in Zen Buddhism; confronting his own expectations and surprising disappointments (the monk lived in a boarding house and later took a cab to his park when he could no longer walk the whole way) and the understanding and acceptance that followed. “When you play the leaf,” Sodo–san once wrote, “you’ll usually be a little out of tune. That’s where its very charm lies . . .”