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A Dog's Life
by Martin ClunesIt is a fact generally acknowledged, dear reader, that a man is not a man without a dog . . . `I have always been a pushover when it comes to dogs ? something my own dogs worked out a long time ago. Who else can be relied on to be that excited about seeing you first thing, day in day out??Mary, Tina and Arthur are the four-footed members of the Clunes family ? scrapping, sleeping, leaping, wagging and licking. But there?s too much of the scrapping, and the hierarchy is a complicated structure that has been bent and broken. Martin Clunes set off on a worldwide adventure to film ITV?s A Man and His Dogs and sought to discover where dogs come from and how they evolved into our companions and the working dogs of today. Along the way he also learned about the social structure of a wolf pack, survival skills of dingoes in Australia and wild dogs in Africa, among other things. In the wild, social rules are obeyed or fur flies, but nature has been pretty vicious in Martin?s own back yard as well. The battle to stop the fighting between Tina and Mary has included ventures into therapy, training classes, dog psychiatry, diet and tough love. Through the adventures of this delightful, closely-knit family, with their horses and chickens and dogs, we learn about the soft-hearted actor who is Martin Clunes. Fond, funny and endearing, this book will enchant and fascinate in equal measure.
A Dog's Life
by Martin ClunesIt is a fact generally acknowledged, dear reader, that a man is not a man without a dog . . . ‘I have always been a pushover when it comes to dogs – something my own dogs worked out a long time ago. Who else can be relied on to be that excited about seeing you first thing, day in day out?’Mary, Tina and Arthur are the four-footed members of the Clunes family – scrapping, sleeping, leaping, wagging and licking. But there’s too much of the scrapping, and the hierarchy is a complicated structure that has been bent and broken. Martin Clunes set off on a worldwide adventure to film ITV’s A Man and His Dogs and sought to discover where dogs come from and how they evolved into our companions and the working dogs of today. Along the way he also learned about the social structure of a wolf pack, survival skills of dingoes in Australia and wild dogs in Africa, among other things. In the wild, social rules are obeyed or fur flies, but nature has been pretty vicious in Martin’s own back yard as well. The battle to stop the fighting between Tina and Mary has included ventures into therapy, training classes, dog psychiatry, diet and tough love. Through the adventures of this delightful, closely-knit family, with their horses and chickens and dogs, we learn about the soft-hearted actor who is Martin Clunes. Fond, funny and endearing, this book will enchant and fascinate in equal measure.
A Dog's Life
by Michael HolroydEustace is undisputed patriarch of the Farquhar family. That is, he would be if everyone stopped mumbling, let him get on with his shaving and find his way downstairs. It's not Henry's fault that he snores and that his marriage has collapsed. Or that he failed to get into the cricket team. But he has made up for it and is now a faster motorist than ever he was bowler. He is a good father too and one day, when he wakes up from day-dreaming, his son Kenneth will thank him. It is good that Anne sleeps with a whistle in her mouth - how else could she terrify the burglars? As for Mathilda she would love to like her mother, but prefers going for long walks with the dog. But what will happen to them all if the dog dies? A devastating postscript follows the story. Placing this eccentric family in isolation after two world wars and at the beginning of our aggressive financial culture, it turns comedy into tragedy. This novel brings a very personal addition to the biographer's remarkable career.(P)2014 WF Howes Ltd
A Dominant Character: The Radical Science And Restless Politics Of J. B. S. Haldane
by Samanth SubramanianA biography of J. B. S. Haldane, the brilliant and eccentric British scientist whose innovative predictions inspired Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. J. B. S. Haldane’s life was rich and strange, never short on genius or drama—from his boyhood apprenticeship to his scientist father, who first instilled in him a devotion to the scientific method; to his time in the trenches during the First World War, where he wrote his first scientific paper; to his numerous experiments on himself, including inhaling dangerous levels of carbon dioxide and drinking hydrochloric acid; to his clandestine research for the British Admiralty during the Second World War. He is best remembered as a geneticist who revolutionized our understanding of evolution, but his peers hailed him as a polymath. One student called him “the last man who might know all there was to be known.” He foresaw in vitro fertilization, peak oil, and the hydrogen fuel cell, and his contributions ranged over physiology, genetics, evolutionary biology, mathematics, and biostatistics. He was also a staunch Communist, which led him to Spain during the Civil War and sparked suspicions that he was spying for the Soviets. He wrote copiously on science and politics in newspapers and magazines, and he gave speeches in town halls and on the radio—all of which made him, in his day, as famous in Britain as Einstein. It is the duty of scientists to think politically, Haldane believed, and he sought not simply to tell his readers what to think but to show them how to think. Beautifully written and richly detailed, Samanth Subramanian’s A Dominant Character recounts Haldane’s boisterous life and examines the questions he raised about the intersections of genetics and politics—questions that resonate even more urgently today.
A Dominant Character: The Science and Politics of J.B.S. Haldane
by Samanth SubramanianJ.B.S. Haldane, scientist extraordinaire—born in Britain yet spiritually bound to India—remains one of the most enigmatic geniuses of the modern era. Here is a man who saw action in two world wars, engaged in the most radical politics of his day, conducted groundbreaking scientific research, and wrote with flair and conviction—yet Haldane&’s universe remains shrouded in mystery. <P><P>Award-winning author Samanth Subramanian’s latest offering undoes this travesty. Besides shedding light on Haldane’s contributions to genetics and evolutionary biology—he was the first to calculate the rate at which mutations occur and accumulate in genes—the book illuminates Haldane&’s inner world—his towering intellect, his radical vision of society, his provocative philosophy, and his attempts a wrestling with the essential moral questions that scientific progress must raise. <P><P>Equally, the book dwells on Haldane’s years in India—his journey to the nation; his affiliation with the Indian Statistical Institute, Calcutta; his attachment to the Genetics and Biometry Laboratory in Bhubaneshwar (where he died). Dronamraju’s description of Haldane as ‘the last man who knew everything’ was, at its simplest, an acknowledgement of his command over multiple subjects. But it was also an astute observation that Haldane’s era was the last time when the realms of scientific knowledge were limited enough for a single person to apprehend in near-entirety. To know everything was to see the forces of the world unified and to conceive of life in its full complexity. A Dominant Character will give readers a taste of that heady sensation.
A Donkey in the Meadow: Tales from a Cornish Flower Farm (Minack Chronicles #6)
by Derek TangyeThe fourth title in the Minack Chronicles tells the story of how Derek and Jeannie acquired two donkeys, Penny and Fred. From the first steps and learning all about donkey foibles, through to picnics in the meadows, this is a further charming instalment in the tales of the Tangye's life at Minack.
A Door in the Ocean: A Memoir
by David McglynnOn a warm September night in 1991, in a quiet neighborhood north of Houston, Texas, David McGlynn's closest friend and teammate on the high school swimming team is found murdered on his living room floor. As the crime goes unsolved and his friends turn to drugs and violence, McGlynn is vulnerable, rootless, searching for answers. He is drawn into the eccentric and often radical world of evangelical Christianity-a journey that leads him to a proselytizing campus fellowship in Southern California, on a mission to Australia, and to Salt Lake City, where a second swimming-related tragedy leaves him doubting the authenticity of his beliefs.In his post-evangelical life, he finds himself exiled from his parents, plunged into financial chaos, and caught off-guard by the prospect of fatherhood. A new job offers hope for a new beginning, until the possibility of losing his newborn son forces him to confront the nature of everything he believes.The memoir's concluding chapter, which appeared in The Best American Sports Writing 2009, celebrates the author's love for swimming, the enduring metaphor for his faith and the setting for many of his life's momentous occasions. Rough Water charts the violent origins of one young man's faith and the struggle to find meaning in the midst of life's painful uncertainties.
A Drag Queen's Guide to Life: A Drag Queen's Guide To Life
by Bimini Bon BoulashThe perfect gift for Bimini and Drag Race fans!'MAGIC! A fun, fierce, honest origin story of how to drag yourself up out of trouble and become an icon' Katherine Ryan'A triumph for UK queer culture' Travis Alabanza'Eye-opening, intelligent, thoughtful as well as sassy and surprising - a must read' Lorraine Kelly_______________________________________A witty and inspiring guide to transforming your life through lessons from drag, by the UK's favourite drag queen and star of RuPaul's Drag Race UK, Bimini Bon Boulash.From being told she couldn't have dance lessons as a kid in Great Yarmouth to having to conform to the stereotypes of the gay scene in London's East End, people have always been trying to put Bimini Bon Boulash in a box. It was only through discovering the art of drag that she began to fight back against those preconceptions, and understand that she had the power to define herself.In A Drag Queen's Guide to Life, Bimini tells the story of how drag took her from the brink of self-destruction to become a gag-inducing, death-dropping, plant-based superstar. Drawing on her own experience as a nonbinary person in a binary world, as well as inspirational stories from history, politics, pop culture and fashion, she uses all her wit, charm and kindness to show us how to lead the lives we wish we could lead, through the life-changing magic of dragging up._______________________________________'Radical, life-affirming, and utterly important for this time' Riyadh Khalaf'A very important read' Gottmik'She's a superstar' Kathy Burke'You will always be our winner' Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London'A force of nature' James AcasterSunday Times Bestseller, October 2021
A Drake at the Door: Tales from a Cornish Flower Farm (Minack Chronicles #8)
by Derek TangyeThe third title in the Minack Chronicles, which tell the story of how Derek and his wife Jeannie left behind their London home to establish a flower farm on the coast of Cornwall. This book takes a closer look at some of the animals who shared the Tangye's home and surroundings, especially Boris, the Muscovy duck.
A Dreadful Deceit: The Myth of Race from the Colonial Era to Obama's America
by Jacqueline JonesIn 1656, a planter in colonial Maryland tortured and killed one of his slaves, an Angolan man named Antonio who refused to work the fields. Over three centuries later, a Detroit labor organizer named Simon Owens watched as strikebreakers wielding bats and lead pipes beat his fellow autoworkers for protesting their inhumane working conditions. Antonio and Owens had nothing in common but the color of their skin and the economic injustices they battled--yet the former is what defines them in America’s consciousness. In A Dreadful Deceit, award-winning historian Jacqueline Jones traces the lives of these two men and four other African Americans to reveal how the concept of race has obscured the factors that truly divide and unite us. Expansive, visionary, and provocative, A Dreadful Deceit explodes the pernicious fiction that has shaped American history.
A Dream About Lightning Bugs: A Life of Music and Cheap Lessons
by Ben FoldsBen Folds is an internationally celebrated musician, singer-songwriter and former front man of the alternative rock band, Ben Folds Five, beloved for songs such as ‘Brick’, ‘You Don’t Know Me’, ‘Rockin’ the Suburbs’ and ‘The Luckiest’. In A Dream About Lightning Bugs Folds looks back at his life so far in a charming, funny and wise chronicle of his artistic coming of age, infused with the wry observations of a natural storyteller. He opens up about finding his voice as a musician, becoming a rock anti-hero, and hauling a baby grand piano on and off stage for every performance. From growing up in working class North Carolina childhood amid the race and class tensions that shaped his early songwriting to painful life lessons he learned the hard way, he also ruminates on music in the digital age, the absurdity of life on the road, and the challenges of sustaining a multi-decade, multi-faceted career in the music business. A Dream About Lightning Bugs embodies what Folds has been singing about for years: Smile like you’ve got nothing to prove, because it hurts to grow up, and life flies by in seconds
A Dream About Lightning Bugs: A Life of Music and Cheap Lessons
by Ben FoldsFrom the genre-defying icon Ben Folds comes a memoir that is as nuanced, witty, and relatable as his cult-classic songs. <P><P> Ben Folds is a celebrated American singer-songwriter, beloved for songs such as “Brick,” “You Don’t Know Me,” “Rockin’ the Suburbs,” and “The Luckiest,” and is the former frontman of the alternative rock band Ben Folds Five. But Folds will be the first to tell you he’s an unconventional icon, more normcore than hardcore. <P><P>Now, in his first book, Folds looks back at his life so far in a charming and wise chronicle of his artistic coming of age, infused with the wry observations of a natural storyteller. <P><P>In the title chapter, “A Dream About Lightning Bugs,” Folds recalls his earliest childhood dream—and realizes how much it influenced his understanding of what it means to be an artist. In “Measure Twice, Cut Once” he learns to resist the urge to skip steps during the creative process. <P><P>In “Hall Pass” he recounts his 1970s North Carolina working-class childhood, and in “Cheap Lessons” he returns to the painful life lessons he learned the hard way—but that luckily didn’t kill him. <P><P> In his inimitable voice, both relatable and thought-provoking, Folds digs deep into the life experiences that shaped him, imparting hard-earned wisdom about both art and life. Collectively, these stories embody the message Folds has been singing about for years: Smile like you’ve got nothing to prove, because it hurts to grow up, and life flies by in seconds. <P><P><b>A New York Times Bestseller</b>
A Dream About Lightning Bugs: A Life of Music and Cheap Lessons
by Ben FoldsFrom genre-defying icon Ben Folds comes a memoir reflecting on art, life and music that is as nuanced, witty and relatable as his cult classic songs. Ben Folds is an internationally celebrated musician, singer-songwriter and former frontman of the alternative rock band, Ben Folds Five, beloved for songs such as ‘Brick’, ‘You Don’t Know Me’, ‘Rockin’ the Suburbs’ and ‘The Luckiest’. In A Dream About Lightning Bugs, Folds looks back at his life so far in a charming, funny and wise chronicle of his artistic coming of age, infused with the wry observations of a natural storyteller. He opens up about finding his voice as a musician, becoming a rock anti-hero, and hauling a baby grand piano on and off stage for every performance. From growing up in working class North Carolina amid the race and class tensions that shaped his early songwriting, to painful life lessons he learned the hard way, he also ruminates on music in the digital age, the absurdity of life on the road, and the challenges of sustaining a multi-decade, multi-faceted career in the music business. A Dream About Lightning Bugs embodies what Folds has been singing about for years: Smile like you’ve got nothing to prove because it hurts to grow up, and life flies by in seconds. Advanced Praise: ‘I’m gonna learn to read for this’ Josh Groban ‘I read this in one glorious, giant gulp. As a fan and a musician, this is truly a gift ... moments for me to geek out, moments to laugh and cry and many fragments of pure, hard won wisdom and honesty’ Jamie Cullum ‘A Dream About Lightning Bugs reads like its author: intelligent, curious, unapologetically punk, and funny as hell. This intimate look at his life from his own unique perspective is a rare and unforgettable gift that does what Ben Folds always has done for me as an artist and a friend: encourages me to be more myself, with a lot of swear words’ Sara Bareilles ‘A masterfully written memoir, and so much more. Folds imbues this literary work with keen insight and humor to create an elegant and moving tribute to art and life itself.’ Daniel Levitin, author of #1 New York Times bestseller This Is Your Brain on Music and The Organized Mind ‘Besides being super talented, and an incredibly poignant and multifaceted musician, Ben Folds is a fantastic author. I couldn’t put this book down – and not just because I taped it to my hand. Ben takes us into his mind and into his process from the very beginnings of his childhood to where he is today – one of the greatest musicians and writers that has ever graced the art.’ Bob Saget
A Dream Called Home: A Memoir
by Reyna Grande&“Here is a life story so unbelievable, it could only be true.&” —Sandra Cisneros, bestselling author of The House on Mango Street From bestselling author of the remarkable memoir The Distance Between Us comes an inspiring account of one woman&’s quest to find her place in America as a first-generation Latina university student and aspiring writer determined to build a new life for her family one fearless word at a time.As an immigrant in an unfamiliar country, with an indifferent mother and abusive father, Reyna had few resources at her disposal. Taking refuge in words, Reyna&’s love of reading and writing propels her to rise above until she achieves the impossible and is accepted to the University of California, Santa Cruz. Although her acceptance is a triumph, the actual experience of American college life is intimidating and unfamiliar for someone like Reyna, who is now estranged from her family and support system. Again, she finds solace in words, holding fast to her vision of becoming a writer, only to discover she knows nothing about what it takes to make a career out of a dream. Through it all, Reyna is determined to make the impossible possible, going from undocumented immigrant of little means to &“a fierce, smart, shimmering light of a writer&” (Cheryl Strayed, author of Wild); a National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist whose &“power is growing with every book&” (Luis Alberto Urrea, Pultizer Prize finalist); and a proud mother of two beautiful children who will never have to know the pain of poverty and neglect. Told in Reyna&’s exquisite, heartfelt prose, A Dream Called Home demonstrates how, by daring to pursue her dreams, Reyna was able to build the one thing she had always longed for: a home that would endure.
A Dream Is a Wish Your Heart Makes: My Story
by Patricia Romanowski Annette FunicelloAn autobiography of Annette Funicello.
A Dream So Big: Our Unlikely Journey to End the Tears of Hunger
by Gregg Lewis Steve PeiferA Dream So Big is the story of Steve Peifer, a corporate manager who once oversaw 9,000 computer software consultants, who today helps provide daily lunches for over 20,000 Kenyan school children in thirty-five national public schools, and maintains solar-powered computer labs at twenty rural African schools. Steve and his wife, Nancy, were enjoying a successful management career with one of America’s high tech corporate giants during the dot-com boom of the 1990’s when, in 1997, he and his wife Nancy discovered they were pregnant with their third child. Tragically, doctors said a chromosomal condition left their baby “incompatible with life.” The Peifers only spent 8 days with baby Stephen before he died. Seeking to flee the pain, Steve and Nancy began a pilgrimage that thrust them into a third-world setting where daily life was often defined by tragedy—drought, disease, poverty, hunger, and death. They didn’t arrive in the service of any divine calling, but the truth of their surroundings spoke to their troubled hearts. A short-term, 12-month mission assignment as dorm parents for a Kenyan boarding school turned this ordinary man into the most unlikely internationally recognized hero, and his story will inspire you to pursue similar lives of service.
A Dream Too Big: The Story of an Improbable Journey from Compton to Oxford
by Caylin Louis MooreIn this inspiring and provocative memoir, Caylin Moore tells the against-all-odds story of his rise from cruel poverty in gang-ridden Los Angeles to academic success at Oxford University, with hope as his compass.By all rights, Caylin Louis Moore should be dead, in prison, or stalking the streets of Compton with his fellow gang-members. Instead, he’s a Rhodes Scholar, author, speaker, and role model for every kid deprived of hope in downtrodden communities. A Dream Too Big is the story of Moore’s exodus from one of the most impoverished, gang-infested communities in the United States to the golden, dreaming spires of Oxford, England.After Moore’s mother gathered her three young children and fled an abusive husband of nine years, leaving behind a comfortable middle-class life, Moore found himself in a bewildering and dangerous environment. The family lived in a neighborhood ruled by the Bloods, and Caylin often lay awake at night, terrified by both the sounds of gunfire outside and the scratching of rats and roaches moving in the walls. When Moore’s father was convicted of murder and his mother was sexually assaulted in the hospital while recovering from open-heart surgery, Moore was forced to enter adulthood prematurely. Embracing his mother’s steely faith in God and education, Moore skirted the gangs and the endemic violence of Compton to excel on the football field and in the classroom.Academics and athletics led to college scholarships, which led to a Fulbright and eventually the Rhodes Scholarship. Along the way, Moore cofounded a student organization that brought college athletes into underserved classrooms as inspirational speakers, role models, and mentors. Moore’s eye-opening, inspirational story proves that, contrary to what others told him on his journey, there is no such thing as a dream too big. "A dream too big is a truly special book. Caylin's story is not just inspirational, it is instructional. I have admired him and his journey for a long time; read this book and you'll understand why." --Wes Moore, bestselling author of The Other Wes Moore, CEO of Robin Hood "I loved this story of triumph in praise of a sacrificial single mom and a kid who, against all odds, fought hunger-pains and gangs to make a dream-too-big become a dream-come-true. Through gunshots and the temptations of inner city poverty, Caylin Moore laced up his cleats, outran gangs, and caught the 6:00am bus on an empty stomach. A future world-changer, Caylin has penned an inspiring tale that should be mandatory reading for every student, parent, and anyone else interested in the success of those who will shape and define our future." -- Ron Hall, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Same Kind of Different as Me and Workin' Our Way Home
A Dream of Flight: Alberto Santos-Dumont's Race Around the Eiffel Tower
by Rob Polivka Jef PolivkaDebut nonfiction duo Rob and Jef Polivka offer an illustrated madcap adventure in A Dream of Flight, a dynamic biography of Alberto Santos-Dumont, an inventor who risked everything to reach the skies. And sure enough, his successes and failures brought the world’s people closer together.Ready? Set. Fly! At the turn of the twentieth century, no aviation prize was more coveted in Europe than the Deutsch Prize. To win it, a pilot would have to fly a balloon from Paris’s Aero Club around the Eiffel Tower and back in thirty minutes or less. Who would be the first to succeed?Alberto Santos-Dumont thought he could. His latest design, Airship No. 6, was perfected from the countless lessons he learned during previous crashes. On the morning of October 19, 1901, Santos was making good time in the race when disaster struck—his motor had sputtered to a stop mid-air! Would Santos make it to the finish line in time—let alone survive?
A Dream of Resistance: The Cinema of Kobayashi Masaki
by Stephen PrinceCelebrated as one of Japan’s greatest filmmakers, Kobayashi Masaki’s scorching depictions of war and militarism marked him as a uniquely defiant voice in post-war Japanese cinema. A pacifist drafted into Japan’s Imperial Army, Kobayashi survived the war with his principles intact and created a body of work that was uncompromising in its critique of the nation’s military heritage. Yet his renowned political critiques were grounded in spiritual perspectives, integrating motifs and beliefs from both Buddhism and Christianity. A Dream of Resistance is the first book in English to explore Kobayashi’s entire career, from the early films he made at Shochiku studio, to internationally-acclaimed masterpieces like The Human Condition, Harakiri, and Samurai Rebellion, and on to his final work for NHK Television. Closely examining how Kobayashi’s upbringing and intellectual history shaped the values of his work, Stephen Prince illuminates the political and religious dimensions of Kobayashi’s films, interpreting them as a prayer for peace in troubled times. Prince draws from a wealth of rare archives, including previously untranslated interviews, material that Kobayashi wrote about his films, and even the young director’s wartime diary. The result is an unprecedented portrait of this singular filmmaker.
A Dress of Violet Taffeta
by Tessa ArlenA sumptuous novel based on the fascinating true story of La Belle Époque icon Lucy, Lady Duff Gordon, who shattered the boundaries of fashion with her magnificently sensual and enchantingly unique designs.Lucy Duff Gordon knows she is talented. She sees color, light, and texture in ways few people can begin to imagine. But is the male dominated world of haute couture, who would use her art for their own gain, ready for her? When she is deserted by her wealthy husband, Lucy is left penniless with an aging mother and her five-year-old daughter to support. Desperate to survive, Lucy turns to her one true talent to make a living. As a little girl, the dresses she made for her dolls were the envy of her group of playmates. Now, she uses her creative designs and her remarkable eye for color to take her place in the fashion world—failure is not an option. Then, on a frigid night in 1912, Lucy&’s life changes once more, when she becomes one of 706 people to survive the sinking of the Titanic. She could never have imagined the effects the disaster would have on her fashion label Lucile, her marriage to her second husband, and her legacy. But no matter what life throws at her, Lucy will live on as a trailblazing and innovative fashion icon, never letting go of what she worked so hard to earn. This is her story.
A Drinkable Feast: A Cocktail Companion to 1920s Paris
by Philip GreeneA history of the Lost Generation in 1920s Paris told through the lens of the cocktails they lovedIn the Prohibition era, American cocktail enthusiasts flocked to the one place that would have them--Paris. In this sweeping look at the City of Light, cocktail historian Philip Greene follows the notable American ex-pats who made themselves at home in Parisian cafes and bars, from Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Gertrude Stein to Picasso, Coco Chanel, Cole Porter, and many more.A Drinkable Feast reveals the history of more than 50 cocktails: who was imbibing them, where they were made popular, and how to make them yourself from the original recipes of nearly a century ago. Filled with anecdotes and photos of the major players of the day, you'll feel as if you were there yourself, walking down the boulevards with the Lost Generation.
A Drinking Life: A Memoir
by Pete HamillRugged prose and a rare attention to telling detail have long distinguished Pete Hamill's unique brand of journalism and his universally well received fiction. Twenty years after his last drink, he examines the years he spent as a full-time member of the drinking culture. The result is A Drinking Life, a stirring and exhilarating memoir float is his most personal writing to date. The eldest son of Irish immigrants, Hamill learned from his Brooklyn upbringing during the Depression and World War II that drinking was an essential part of being a man; he only had to accompany his father up the street to the warm, amber-colored world of Gallagher's bar to see that drinking was what men did. It played a crucial role in mourning the death of relatives or the loss of a job, in celebrations of all kinds, even in religion. In the navy and the world of newspapers, he learned that bonds of friendship, romance, and professional camaraderie were sealed with drink. It was later that he discovered that drink had the power to destroy those very bonds and corrode any writer's most valuable tools: clarity, consciousness, memory. It was almost too late when he left drinking behind forever. Neither sentimental nor self-righteous, this is a seasoned writer's vivid portrait of the first four decades of his life and the slow, steady way that alcohol became an essential part of that life. Along the way, he summons the mood of a time and a place gone forever, with the bittersweet fondness of a lifetime New Yorker. It is his best work yet.
A Drop of Treason: Philip Agee and His Exposure of the CIA
by Jonathan StevensonPhilip Agee’s story is the stuff of a John le Carré novel—perilous and thrilling adventures around the globe. He joined the CIA as a young idealist, becoming an operations officer in hopes of seeing the world and safeguarding his country. He was the consummate intelligence insider, thoroughly entrenched in the shadow world. But in 1975, he became the first such person to publicly betray the CIA—a pariah whose like was not seen again until Edward Snowden. For almost forty years in exile, he was a thorn in the side of his country. The first biography of this contentious, legendary man, Jonathan Stevenson’s A Drop of Treason is a thorough portrait of Agee and his place in the history of American foreign policy and the intelligence community during the Cold War and beyond. Unlike mere whistleblowers, Agee exposed American spies by publicly blowing their covers. And he didn’t stop there—his was a lifelong political struggle that firmly allied him with the social movements of the global left and against the American project itself from the early 1970s on. Stevenson examines Agee’s decision to turn, how he sustained it, and how his actions intersected with world events. Having made profound betrayals and questionable decisions, Agee lived a rollicking, existentially fraught life filled with risk. He traveled the world, enlisted Gabriel García Márquez in his cause, married a ballerina, and fought for what he believed was right. Raised a conservative Jesuit in Tampa, he died a socialist expat in Havana. In A Drop of Treason, Stevenson reveals what made Agee tick—and what made him run.
A Duel of Nations
by David WetzelOn July 19, 1870, Emperor Napoleon III of France declared war against the Prussia of King William I and Prime Minister Otto von Bismarck. A Duel of Nationsdramatically depicts the world in which that war took place. In this, the first book in English to study in totality the diplomatic history of the Franco-Prussian War, David Wetzel draws extensively on private and official records, journalistic accounts, cabinet minutes, and public statements by key players to produce a book that is unmatched in the range and clarity of its analysis, its forceful characterizations, and its vivid language.
A Dutch Homesteader On The Prairies: The Letters of Wilhelm de Gelder 1910-13
by Herman Ganzevoort Willem De GelderThe letters in this volume, found in the original Dutch in the archives of the Netherlands Emigration Service in Holland, form a unique chronicle of one European homesteader in Saskatchewan from 1910 to 1913. They were written by Willem dr Gelder whose experience as a homesteader was typical of that of hundreds of thousands of newcomers to the prairies in the greatest years of western expansion just before the First World War. As a European immigrant he was able to write from a special perspective often ignored in Anglo-Saxon accounts of western development. Minute and perceptive observations of daily life are contained in his letters; together with the recollections of friends and neighbours who spoke well of him, this volume forms the portrait of a singular man who personified the toughness and persistence of the western pioneer. De Gelder was born in the 1880s in Doorn, the son of a well-to-do banker, and received all the benefits of birth in an upper-class home, including a university education. He came to Canada in 1910 and by the 1920s he had become a successful homesteader owning a half-section of land, meeting his bills, and joining in the community life. But in 1922 he rented out his land, went to the Netherlands to see his family, and returning to Canada he disposed of his homestead – and vanished. This book traces the compass of his life in Canada, revealing the doubts and fears which culminated in his disappearance; it highlights the anguish that all immigrants, new and old, suffered when they took the crucial step of beginning a new life.