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Our Last Best Chance
By King Abdullah II of Jordan. 2011
A call for peace by the most dynamic leader of the Arab world At a time of unprecedented…
upheaval in the Middle East King Abdullah II of Jordan is almost unique in enjoying widespread popular support He is the ultimate modern-day monarch as comfortable at a business conference as he is at a meeting of the Arab League In this prescient memoir-cum-manifesto he makes an urgent plea to push for a solution to the Arab-Israeli crisis He writes with disarming frankness about his own upbringing and warns of the brewing resentment in the region A call to arms by the most dynamic young ruler in the Arab world Our Last Best Chance helps explain the volatile underpinnings of the new Arab awakeningA Doll's House
By Henrik Ibsen, Thornton Wilder. 1997
"In [Wilder's] A Doll's House . . . the relationship of dialogue to action is very special, like nothing that…
had been heard on stage before."--David Hammond, PlayMakers Repertory CompanyNot staged since its Broadway premiere starring Ruth Gordon in 1937, the first-ever publication of this adaptation of Henrik Ibsen's classic drama is revitalized through the shrewd lens of American drama master, Thornton Wilder. With his famous, clarifying dialogue, Wilder uproots this classic from Norway and funnels it through an American lens. The marriage of Ibsen's famed naturalistic style melds with Wilder's knack for emotional nuance to create a rich, demonstrative edition of the revered standard A Doll's House.Henrik Ibsen has often been referred to as the father of realistic drama. The Norwegian playwright is best known for his major works Brand, Peer Gynt, Emperor and Galilean, A Doll's House, Ghosts, An Enemy of the People, The Wild Duck, Hedda Gabler, and The Master Builder.Thornton Wilder was an accomplished novelist and playwright in the twentieth century. Two of his four major plays garnered Pulitzer Prizes, Our Town (1938) and The Skin of Our Teeth (1943). His play The Matchmaker was later adapted into the record-breaking musical Hello, Dolly! The Bridge of San Luis Rey, one of his seven novels, won the Pulitzer Prize in 1928, and his next-to-last novel, The Eighth Day received the National Book Award (1968). Our Town continues to be the most produced American play in the world.The Little Red Guard
By Wenguang Huang. 2012
A Washington Post Best of 2012 pick Delightful a book…
that brings a corner of modern China alive --The Wall Street Journal When Wenguang Huang was nine years old his grandmother became obsessed with her own death Fearing cremation she extracted from her family the promise to bury her after she died This was in Xian a city in central China in the 1970s when a national ban on all traditional Chinese practices including burials was strictly enforced But Huang s grandmother was persistent and two years later his father built her a coffin He also appointed his older son Wenguang as coffin keeper a distinction that meant among other things sleeping next to the coffin at night Over the next fifteen years the whole family was consumed with planning Grandma s burial a regular source of friction and contention with the constant risk of being caught by the authorities Many years after her death the family s memories of her coffin still loom large Huang now living and working in America has come to realize how much the concern over the coffin has affected his upbringing and shaped the lives of everyone in the family Lyrical and poignant funny and heartrending The Little Red Guard is the powerful tale of an ordinary family finding their way through turbulence and transitionHey Mom: Stories for My Mother, But You Can Read Them Too
By Louie Anderson. 2018
With wry wit and poignant humor, Louie Anderson, New York Times bestselling author and Emmy Award–winning comedian currently starring in…
Zach Galifianakis’s Baskets, shares his journey of turning life’s challenges into joy, as well as plenty of wisdom he’s still discovering from his late mother. Louie Anderson has channeled his beloved mom in his stand-up routine for decades, but she died before seeing him reach his greatest heights, culminating in his breakout TV role as Christine Baskets, the mesmerizing character inspired by his mom, Ora Zella Anderson. This book is Louie’s way of catching her up on his triumphs, disappointments, and continuing challenges. There is heartache, but also great hope. There are also—given Louie’s inimitable voice—laugh-out-loud stories and observations on life’s absurdities, the kind only he could make. “I started out writing these letters to my mom, but a few friends said I should write a book. I said okay because next to ‘we’ll see,’ ‘okay’ is as non-committal as you can get. But somehow I stuck with it. I hope you like it. I hope that after you read it, you’ll write or call your own mom—and dad, sister, brother, cousin, nephew. Or have lunch with them. Or breakfast. It doesn’t have to be lunch. But do it now. Don’t wait like I did.” —LouiePerfect Is Boring: 10 Things My Crazy, Fierce Mama Taught Me About Beauty, Booty, and Being a Boss
By Tyra Banks, Carolyn London. 2018
P Supermodel and super CEO of our time Tyra Banks and her mother Carolyn show readers why when you kick…
perfection to the curb and showcase your unique beauty ain t nobody gonna stop you P In Perfect Is Boring Tyra Banks and her mother Carolyn get raw real and cray-in-a-good-way as they share what they ve learned on Tyra s journey from insecure preteen to supermodel and entrepreneurial powerhouse P Though she ll be the first to tell you she is not her daughter s best friend cause she ain t that kinda mama there s no doubt that Carolyn s signature mix of pep talks and tough love got Tyra to where she is today and here they pay it forward to empower readers with a reminder that perfect really isn t all that P Whether they re writing about watching Tyra s most imperfect moment go viral Does Be Quiet Tiffany ring any bells no-holds-barred sex talks or how they ve overcome everything from fashion industry discrimination to media fat-shaming and a misguided attempt at a music career they never lose their sense of humor or we-got-your-back-spirit P Full of smart wise and often hilarious lessons for mothers daughters fathers and sons everywhere including Take Responsibility for Yourself Lip Gloss Pizza Sauce Boss and Fix It or Flaunt It Perfect Is Boring is a must-read for anyone who needs a kick in the booty a pat on the back or a good reason to laugh-out-loudDimestore: A Writer's Life
By Lee Smith. 2016
“A memoir that shines with a bright spirit, a generous heart and an entertaining knack for celebrating absurdity.”—The New York…
Times Book Review“This is Smith at her finest.”—Library Journal, starred review Set deep in the mountains of Virginia, the Grundy of Lee Smith’s youth was a place of coal miners, tent revivals, mountain music, drive-in theaters, and her daddy’s dimestore. When she was sent off to college to gain some “culture,” she understood that perhaps the richest culture she would ever know was the one she was leaving. Lee Smith’s fiction has always lived and breathed with the rhythms and people of the Appalachian South. But never before has she written her own story. Dimestore’s fifteen essays are crushingly honest, wise and perceptive, and superbly entertaining. Together, they create an inspiring story of the birth of a writer and a poignant look at a way of life that has all but vanished.How I Shed My Skin: Unlearning the Racist Lessons of a Southern Childhood
By Jim Grimsley. 2015
More than sixty years ago, the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that America’s schools could no…
longer be segregated by race. Critically acclaimed novelist Jim Grimsley was eleven years old in 1966 when federally mandated integration of schools went into effect in the state and the school in his small eastern North Carolina town was first integrated. Until then, blacks and whites didn’t sit next to one another in a public space or eat in the same restaurants, and they certainly didn’t go to school together. Going to one of the private schools that almost immediately sprang up was not an option for Jim: his family was too poor to pay tuition, and while they shared the community’s dismay over the mixing of the races, they had no choice but to be on the front lines of his school’s desegregation. What he did not realize until he began to meet these new students was just how deeply ingrained his own prejudices were and how those prejudices had developed in him despite the fact that prior to starting sixth grade, he had actually never known any black people. Now, more than forty years later, Grimsley looks back at that school and those times--remembering his own first real encounters with black children and their culture. The result is a narrative both true and deeply moving. Jim takes readers into those classrooms and onto the playing fields as, ever so tentatively, alliances were forged and friendships established. And looking back from today’s perspective, he examines how far we have really come.The Late Starters Orchestra
By Ari L. Goldman. 2015
In a cluttered room in an abandoned coat factory in lower Manhattan, a group of musicians comes together each week…
to make music. Some are old, some are young, all have come late to music or come back to it after a long absence. This is the Late Starters Orchestra--the bona fide amateur string orchestra where Ari Goldman pursues his lifelong dream of playing the cello. Goldman hadn’t seriously picked up his cello in twenty-five years, but the Late Starters (its motto, If you think you can play, you can) seemed just the right orchestra for this music lover whose busy life had always gotten in the way of its pursuit.In The Late Starters Orchestra, Goldman takes us along to LSO rehearsals and lets us sit in on his son’s Suzuki lessons, where we find out that children do indeed learn differently from adults. He explores history’s greatest cellists and also attempts to understand what motivates his fellow late starters, amateurs all, whose quest is for joy, not greatness. And when Goldman commits to playing at his upcoming birthday party we wonder with him whether he’ll be good enough to perform in public. To the rescue comes the ghost of Goldman’s first cello teacher, the wise and eccentric Mr. J, who continues to inspire and guide him--about music and more--through this well-tuned journey. With enchanting illustrations by Eric Hanson, The Late Starters Orchestra is about teachers and students, fathers and sons, courage and creativity, individual perseverance and the power of community. And Ari Goldman has a message for anyone who has ever had a dream deferred: it’s never too late to find happiness on one’s own terms.A Wedding in Haiti
By Julia Alvarez. 2012
In a story that travels beyond borders and between families, acclaimed Dominican novelist and poet Julia Alvarez reflects on the…
joys and burdens of love—for her parents, for her husband, and for a young Haitian boy known as Piti. In this intimate true account of a promise kept, Alvarez takes us on a journey into experiences that challenge our way of thinking about history and how it can be reimagined when people from two countries—traditional enemies and strangers—become friends.The Seven Good Years
By Etgar Keret. 2015
A brilliant, life-affirming, and hilarious memoir from a "genius" (The New York Times) and master storyteller.The seven years between the…
birth of Etgar Keret's son and the death of his father were good years, though still full of reasons to worry. Lev is born in the midst of a terrorist attack. Etgar's father gets cancer. The threat of constant war looms over their home and permeates daily life.What emerges from this dark reality is a series of sublimely absurd ruminations on everything from Etgar's three-year-old son's impending military service to the terrorist mind-set behind Angry Birds. There's Lev's insistence that he is a cat, releasing him from any human responsibilities or rules. Etgar's siblings, all very different people who have chosen radically divergent paths in life, come together after his father's shivah to experience the grief and love that tie a family together forever. This wise, witty memoir--Etgar's first nonfiction book published in America, and told in his inimitable style--is full of wonder and life and love, poignant insights, and irrepressible humor.From the Hardcover edition.Life Is Not an Accident
By Jay Williams. 2016
Like millions of kids before him, Jay Williams used to pretend he was making the game-winning shot while playing basketball…
in his Plainfield, New Jersey, backyard. Unlike almost all of those other kids, he kept right on making shots until he became an NCAA champion and two-time national player of the year at Duke and the number-two overall NBA draft pick in 2002.But after just one season with the Chicago Bulls, a team starved for a new messiah since Michael Jordan's retirement, Williams destroyed his career when he suffered a horrific motorcycle accident. In an instant, the man with as fast a first step as any point guard in history could no longer do anything for himself, including walk.In Life Is Not an Accident Jay Williams shares his story--both heartbreaking and uplifting--of being a young man trying to wrest control of his life from his overinvolved parents, from the pleasures and perils of fame and money, and from the near-fatal mistake that threatened to define him.After a decade spent recovering from his injuries--the rehabilitations, the comeback attempts, the professional forays into the seedy underside of sports agenting--Williams recounts with a rare honesty his hard-fought path to college basketball stardom and the painful lessons he's learned while reconstructing his fractured adulthood.Life Is Not an Accident is also Williams's tribute to the many angels who helped him survive, including his mother, his first love, and his legendary Duke basketball coach, Mike Krzyzewski. Now in his thirties and an ESPN college basketball analyst, Jay Williams is happy with the man he has become--and convinced that the crash that almost killed him at 21 was no accident, but a tragedy that taught him how to live.Advance Praise For Life Is Not An Accident"A lot of athletes have been to the mountaintop and back to the bottom in the course of their careers, and their stories end there. But not Jay's. He was determined to build a life beyond basketball no matter how many hard picks he'd have to fight through. This book shows how he did it--one brave step at a time."--Charles Barkley, TNT basketball analyst and NBA legend"From a freakish motorcycle accident that derailed his destiny to overcoming the residue from it that left a severe mental and emotional stain, Jay's story is about strength, resilience, and redemption. Life Is Not an Accident is a surprisingly honest and revealing account that will inspire and resonate with all."--Grant Hill, CBS basketball analyst and former NBA All-Pro"Jay Williams has led a fascinating life, much of it in the public eye. But it is the very private side of the man-- through his breathtaking highs and startling lows--that makes this gutsy, intimate, unflinchingly honest memoir impossible to put down."--Mike Greenberg, ESPN's Mike & MikeCan You Tolerate This?: Essays
By Ashleigh Young. 2016
A dazzling - and already prizewinning - collection of essays on youth and aging ambition and disappointment Katherine…
Mansfield tourism and New Zealand punk rock and the limitations of the body Youth and frailty ambition and anxiety the limitations of the body and the challenges of personal transformation these are the undercurrents that animate acclaimed poet Ashleigh Young s first collection of essays In Can You Tolerate This --the title comes from the question chiropractors ask to test a patient s pain threshold--Young ushers us into her early years in the faraway yet familiar landscape of New Zealand fantasizing about Paul McCartney cheering on her older brother s fledging music career and yearning for a larger and more creative life As Young s perspective expands a series of historical portraits--a boy who grew new bone wherever he was injured an early French postman who built a stone fortress by hand a generation of Japanese shut-ins--strike unexpected personal harmonies as an unselfconscious childhood gives way to painful shyness in adolescence As we watch Young fall in and out of love undertake an intense yoga practice that masks an eating disorder and gradually find herself through her writing a highly particular psyche comes into view curious tender and exacting in her observations of herself and the world around her Can You Tolerate This presents a vivid self-portrait of an introspective yet widely curious young woman the colorful isolated community in which she comes of age and the uneasy tensions--between safety and risk love and solitude the catharsis of grief and the ecstasy of creation--that define our livesAmerican Values: Lessons I Learned from My Family (Identification And Value Guide Ser.)
By Robert Kennedy. 2018
With rich detail compelling honesty and a storyteller s gift RFK Jr describes his…
life growing up Kennedy in a tumultuous time in history that eerily echoes the issues of nuclear confrontation religion race and inequality that we confront today In this powerful book that combines the best aspects of memoir and political history the third child of Attorney General Robert Kennedy and nephew of JFK takes us on an intimate journey through his life including watershed moments in the history of our nation Stories of his grandparents Joseph and Rose set the stage for their nine remarkable children among them three U S senators Teddy Bobby and Jack one of whom went on to become attorney general and the other the president of the United States We meet Allen Dulles and J Edgar Hoover two men whose agencies posed the principal threats to American democracy and values Their power struggles with the Kennedys underpinned all the defining conflicts of the era We live through the Cuban Missile Crisis when insubordinate spies and belligerent generals in the Pentagon and Moscow brought the world to the cliff edge of nuclear war At Hickory Hill in Virginia where RFK Jr grew up we encounter the celebrities who gathered at the second most famous address in Washington members of what would later become known as America s Camelot Through his father s role as attorney general we get an insider s look as growing tensions over civil rights led to pitched battles in the streets and 16 000 federal troops were called in to enforce desegregation at Ole Miss We see growing pressure to fight wars in Southeast Asia to stop communism We relive the assassination of JFK RFK s run for the presidency that was cut short by his own death and the aftermath of those murders on the Kennedy family These pages come vividly to life with intimate stories of RFK Jr s own experiences not just with historical events and the movers who shaped them but also with his mother and father with his own struggles with addiction and with the ways he eventually made peace with both his Kennedy legacy and his own demons The result is a lyrically written book that is remarkably stirring and relevant providing insight hope and steady wisdom for Americans as they wrestle as never before with questions about America s role in history and the world and what it means to be AmericanPanther Baby: A Life of Rebellion & Reinvention
By Jamal Joseph. 2012
In the 1960s he exhorted students at Columbia University to burn their college to the ground. Today he’s chair of…
their School of the Arts film division. Jamal Joseph’s personal odyssey—from the streets of Harlem to Riker’s Island and Leavenworth to the halls of Columbia—is as gripping as it is inspiring.Eddie Joseph was a high school honor student, slated to graduate early and begin college. But this was the late 1960s in Bronx’s black ghetto, and fifteen-year-old Eddie was introduced to the tenets of the Black Panther Party, which was just gaining a national foothold. By sixteen, his devotion to the cause landed him in prison on the infamous Rikers Island—charged with conspiracy as one of the Panther 21 in one of the most emblematic criminal cases of the sixties. When exonerated, Eddie—now called Jamal—became the youngest spokesperson and leader of the Panthers’ New York chapter.He joined the “revolutionary underground,” later landing back in prison. Sentenced to more than twelve years in Leavenworth, he earned three degrees there and found a new calling. He is now chair of Columbia University’s School of the Arts film division—the very school he exhorted students to burn down during one of his most famous speeches as a Panther.In raw, powerful prose, Jamal Joseph helps us understand what it meant to be a soldier inside the militant Black Panther movement. He recounts a harrowing, sometimes deadly imprisonment as he charts his path to manhood in a book filled with equal parts rage, despair, and hope.Imperfect Harmony: Finding Happiness Singing with Others
By Stacy Horn. 2014
For Stacy Horn, regardless of what is going on in the world or her life, singing in an amateur choir—the…
Choral Society of Grace Church in New York—never fails to take her to a place where hope reigns and everything good is possible. She’s not particularly religious, and her voice is not exceptional (so she says), but like the 32.5 million other chorus members throughout this country, singing makes her happy. Horn brings us along as she sings some of the greatest music humanity has ever produced, delves into the dramatic stories of conductors and composers, unearths the fascinating history of group singing, and explores remarkable discoveries from the new science of singing, including all the unexpected health benefits. Imperfect Harmony is the story of one woman who has found joy and strength in the weekly ritual of singing and in the irresistible power of song.Bloodlands: Europe between Hitler and Stalin
By Timothy Snyder. 2010
The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating
By Elisabeth Tova Bailey. 2010
In a work that beautifully demonstrates the rewards of closely observing nature, Elisabeth Tova Bailey shares an inspiring and intimate…
story of her encounter with a Neohelix albolabris—a common woodland snail. While an illness keeps her bedridden, Bailey watches a wild snail that has taken up residence on her nightstand. As a result, she discovers the solace and sense of wonder that this mysterious creature brings and comes to a greater understanding of her own place in the world. Intrigued by the snail’s molluscan anatomy, cryptic defenses, clear decision making, hydraulic locomotion, and courtship activities, Bailey becomes an astute and amused observer, offering a candid and engaging look into the curious life of this underappreciated small animal. The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating is a remarkable journey of survival and resilience, showing us how a small part of the natural world can illuminate our own human existence, while providing an appreciation of what it means to be fully alive.Better Than New: Lessons I've Learned from Saving Old Homes (and How They Saved Me)
By Nicole Curtis. 2016
A New York Times and USA Today Bestseller For the first time, Nicole Curtis, the star of the megahit HGTV…
and DIY Network show Rehab Addict, reveals her private struggles, her personal victories, and the inspiring lessons we can all learn from them. Nicole Curtis is the tough, soulful, charismatic dynamo who for the past twenty years has worked tirelessly to restore historical houses, often revitalizing neighborhoods in the process. And also, in the process, drawing millions of fans to her television show, Rehab Addict, where they follow each step of the hard work and singular vision that transform the seemingly lost cause of a run-down building into a beautifully restored home. But there is so much more to this self-taught expert and working mom. With hersignature irresistible honesty and energy, Curtis writes about a project that every reader will find compelling: how she rehabbed herself. Better Than New reveals what’s not seen on TV—Curtis’s personal battles and her personal triumphs, her complicated relationships, her life as a single mother, the story of how she got started remodeling houses, and the consuming ins and outs of producing a megahit television show while keeping up with two kids, two rescue dogs, and countless tasks on her home renovation punch lists. Followers of the show will get an inside look at some of her most famous restorations, including the Dollar house, the Minnehaha house, the Campbell Street project, and the Ransom Gillis mansion. Part inspirational memoir and part self-help guide, Better Than New is a journey ineight chapters—each pinned to the story of a house that Curtis has remodeled, each delivering a hard-fought lesson about life—that takes readers to the place we all want to be: home.Greenhorns: 50 Dispatches from the New Farmers' Movement
By Zoe Ida Bradbury, Severine Von Fleming, Paula Manalo. 2012
The Greenhorns are a community of more than 5,000 young farmers and activists committed to producing and advocating for food…
grown with vision and respect for the earth. This book, edited by three of the group’s leading members, comprises 50 original essays by new farmers who write about their experiences in the field from a wide range of angles, both practical and inspirational. Funny and sad, serious and light-hearted, these essays touch on everything from financing and machinery to family, community building, and social change.Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood
By Trevor Noah. 2016
The compelling, inspiring, and comically sublime story of one man's coming-of-age, set during the twilight of apartheid and the tumultuous…
days of freedom that followed Trevor Noah's unlikely path from apartheid South Africa to the desk of The Daily Show began with a criminal act: his birth. Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents' indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa's tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle. Born a Crime is the story of a mischievous young boy who grows into a restless young man as he struggles to find himself in a world where he was never supposed to exist. It is also the story of that young man's relationship with his fearless, rebellious, and fervently religious mother--his teammate, a woman determined to save her son from the cycle of poverty, violence, and abuse that would ultimately threaten her own life. The eighteen personal essays collected here are by turns hilarious, dramatic, and deeply affecting. Whether subsisting on caterpillars for dinner during hard times, being thrown from a moving car during an attempted kidnapping, or just trying to survive the life-and-death pitfalls of dating in high school, Trevor illuminates his curious world with an incisive wit and unflinching honesty. His stories weave together to form a moving and searingly funny portrait of a boy making his way through a damaged world in a dangerous time, armed only with a keen sense of humor and a mother's unconventional, unconditional love. A New York Times Bestseller