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Being Nixon: A Man Divided
By Evan Thomas. 2015
Evan Thomas delivers the best single-volume biography of Richard Nixon to date, a radical, unique portrait of a complicated figure…
who was both determinedly optimistic and tragically flawed. The New York Times bestselling author of Ike's Bluff and Sea of Thunder, Thomas brings new life to one of American history's most infamous, paradoxical, and enigmatic politicians, dispensing with myths to achieve an intimate and evenhanded look at the actual man. What drove a painfully shy outcast in elite Washington society--a man so self-conscious he refused to make eye contact during meetings--to pursue power and public office? How did a president so attuned to the American political id that he won reelection in a historic landslide lack the self-awareness to recognize the gaping character flaws that would drive him from office and forever taint his legacy? In Being Nixon, Evan Thomas peels away the layers of the complex, confounding figure who became America's thirty-seventh president. The son of devout Quakers, Richard Nixon (not unlike his rival John F. Kennedy) grew up in the shadow of an older, favored brother and thrived on conflict and opposition. Through high school and college, in the navy and in politics, he was constantly leading crusades and fighting off enemies real and imagined. As maudlin as he was Machiavellian, Nixon possessed the plainspoken eloquence to reduce American television audiences to tears with his career-saving "Checkers" speech; meanwhile, his darker half hatched schemes designed to take down his political foes, earning him the notorious nickname "Tricky Dick." Drawing on a wide range of historical accounts, Thomas reveals the contradictions of a leader whose vision and foresight led him to achieve détente with the Soviet Union and reestablish relations with communist China, but whose underhanded political tactics tainted his reputation long before the Watergate scandal. One of the principal architects of the modern Republican Party and its "silent majority" of disaffected whites and conservative ex-Dixiecrats, Nixon was also deemed a liberal in some quarters for his efforts to desegregate Southern schools, create the Environmental Protection Agency, and end the draft. A deeply insightful character study as well as a brilliant political biography, Being Nixon offers a surprising look at a man capable of great bravery and extraordinary deviousness--a balanced portrait of a president too often reduced to caricature.Steven Gerrard: My Liverpool Story
By Steven Gerrard. 2012
Steven Gerrard is a genuine Liverpool legend.Captain at the age of 23.Two FA Cups.Three League Cups.One UEFA Cup.And that Champions…
League win.Gerrard embodies the spirit and passion of Liverpool football club like no other in the modern era.From the raw but talented youngster who made the jump from the Melwood training ground and took to the famous Anfield turf at 18, to the talismanic skipper who has led his beloved club through thick and thin, this stunningly illustrated book, complete with exclusive new photographs, is the story of his fifteen momentous seasons at Liverpool FC.Along with a foreword from Kenny Dalglish, this is Steven Gerrard's Liverpool story in his own words.It's in the Blood
By Lawrence Dallaglio. 2007
As a Premiership, World Cup and Grand Slam winner, no one better embodies the charisma and the colour of English…
rugbys greatest era than Lawrence Dallaglio. He has some story to tell, not just of the formidable exploits on the field, but an extraordinary life off it. His only sister, Francesca, was the youngest to perish in the Marchioness disaster and her death at 19 remains the great sadness of his life. In addition to this and his much-talked about England exploits, he also led his club Wasps to the summit of European rugby, winning two Heineken Cups and three consecutive English Premiership titles. Full of drama, controversy and great sadness, Lawrence Dallaglios story the last of the great World Cup heroes is the one every rugby fan has been waiting to read.The Olympics: Behind the Scenes at the Olympics
By Nick Hunter. 2011
From the winning bid to the Olympic village and stadiums, this book looks beyond the sports and into all aspects,…
such as the costs involved, the media and where events will take place around the country.Usain Bolt: Inspirational Lives
By Simon Hart. 2012
The series focuses on the people who inspire children today. Each book looks at the background, life and achievements of…
a personality, their impact on popular culture as well as detailing the everyday facets of their job and how they have gained such success.The Olympics: Olympic Champions
By Nick Hunter. 2011
The Nixon Defense: What He Knew and When He Knew It
By John W Dean. 2006
Based on Nixon's overlooked recordings, New York Times bestselling author John W. Dean connects the dots between what we've come…
to believe about Watergate and what actually happened Watergate forever changed American politics, and in light of the revelations about the NSA's widespread surveillance program, the scandal has taken on new significance. Yet remarkably, four decades after Nixon was forced to resign, no one has told the full story of his involvement in Watergate. In The Nixon Defense, former White House Counsel John W. Dean, one of the last major surviving figures of Watergate, draws on his own transcripts of almost a thousand conversations, a wealth of Nixon's secretly recorded information, and more than 150,000 pages of documents in the National Archives and the Nixon Library to provide the definitive answer to the question: What did PresidentNixon know and when did he know it? Through narrative and contemporaneous dialogue, Dean connects dots that have never been connected, including revealing how and why the Watergate break-in occurred, what was on the mysterious 18 1/2 minute gap in Nixon's recorded conversations, and more. In what will stand as the most authoritative account of one of America's worst political scandals, The Nixon Defense shows how the disastrous mistakes of Watergate could have been avoided and offers a cautionary tale for our own time.From the Trade Paperback edition.Cleopatra: Cleopatra (Phoenix Press Ser.)
By Michael Grant. 2000
Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt, was also a scholar, murderer, lover of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony and one of the…
most remarkable women in history.The distinguished historian and classicist Michael Grant confirms that her reputation as a temptress was well-founded. However, by unravelling the sources behind the tangle of myth, gossip and invention he shows that the popular image of a wayward woman opting for a life of sensuous luxury and neglecting her affairs of state is far from the truth.A brilliant linguist and the first of her Greek-speaking dynasty who learned Egyptian, she was reputed to be the author of treatises on agriculture, make-up and alchemy. Her love affairs were carefully calculated to further her plans to restore her empire to its former greatness and she was a ruthless foe to all who stood in her way.But dead on her golden couch in the palace at Alexandria her life seemed to have ended in failure; her dreams of empire shattered; her lover Mark Antony a suicide himself and she a prisoner of her conqueror Octavian.An unforgettable portrait of an extraordinary queen and her stormy life.Born to Fight: The bestselling story of UFC champion Mark Hunt, the real life Rocky
By Mark Hunt, Ben Mckelvey. 2015
A powerful story of sadness, hope, pride, honour and triumph from the real-life Rocky!Raw, confronting and honest, UFC champion Mark…
Hunt's inspiring autobiography shows it is possible to defy the odds and carve a better life. Born into a Mormon Samoan family, Hunt details his harrowing early life, his troubled teen years, and his angry youth with no apparent future.After being plucked from an Auckland street fight and dropped into his first kickboxing bout, Mark went on to achieve unprecedented success in Australian and New Zealand combat sports. In an ongoing career that has spanned the globe, Mark Hunt has been in some of the UFC, Pride and K-1's most memorable battles. But in some ways those fights pale in comparison to that which he has overcome out of the ring and cage.As fearless with his opinions as he is in the Octagon, Mark pulls no punches in revealing the highs and lows of his extraordinary life.Unbroken
By Laura Hillenbrand. 2010
On a May afternoon in 1943, an Army Air Forces bomber crashed into the Pacific Ocean and disappeared, leaving only…
a spray of debris and a slick of oil, gasoline, and blood. Then, on the ocean surface, a face appeared. It was that of a young lieutenant, the plane's bombardier, who was struggling to a life raft and pulling himself aboard. So began one of the most extraordinary odysseys of the Second World War.The lieutenant's name was Louis Zamperini. In boyhood, he'd been a cunning and incorrigible delinquent, breaking into houses, brawling, and fleeing his home to ride the rails. As a teenager, he had channeled his defiance into running, discovering a prodigious talent that had carried him to the Berlin Olympics and within sight of the four-minute mile. But when war had come, the athlete had become an airman, embarking on a journey that led to his doomed flight, a tiny raft, and a drift into the unknown. Ahead of Zamperini lay thousands of miles of open ocean, leaping sharks, a foundering raft, thirst and starvation, enemy aircraft, and, beyond, a trial even greater. Driven to the limits of endurance, Zamperini would answer desperation with ingenuity; suffering with hope, resolve, and humor; brutality with rebellion. His fate, whether triumph or tragedy, would be suspended on the fraying wire of his will. In her long-awaited new book, Laura Hillenbrand writes with the same rich and vivid narrative voice she displayed in Seabiscuit. Telling an unforgettable story of a man's journey into extremity, Unbroken is a testament to the resilience of the human mind, body, and spirit. BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from Laura Hillenbrand's Seabiscuit.No Picnic on Mount Kenya: The Story Of Three P. O. W's Escape To Adventure
By Felice Benuzzi. 2016
In the shadow of Mount Kenya, surrounded by the forests and creatures of the savannah, life drags interminably for the…
inmates of POW Camp 354. Confined to an endless cycle of boredom and frustration, one prisoner realizes he can bear it no longer.When the clouds covering Mount Kenya part one morning to reveal its towering peaks for the first time, Felice Benuzzi is transfixed. The tedium of camp life is broken by the beginnings of a sudden idea--an outrageous, dangerous, brilliant idea.Not many people would break out of a POW camp and trek for days across perilous terrain before climbing the north face of Mount Kenya with improvised equipment, meager rations, and a picture of the mountain on a tin of beef as their most accurate guide. Fewer still would break back into the camp on their return.This is the remarkable story of three such men--a powerful testament to the human spirit of rebellion and adventure--reissued in a deluxe edition featuring Benuzzi's own watercolor paintings of the expedition and a final chapter that has never before appeared in English.Fidel & Religion: Conversations with Frei Betto on Marxism & Liberation Theology
By Fidel Castro, Frei Betto, Armando Hart. 2006
A bestseller that offers an intimate insight into Fidel Castro, the man behind the beard! · This historic encounter between…
religion and revolution paved the way for Pope John Paul II's historic visit to Cuba in 1999 and the rule change in the Cuban Communist Party (1992) accepting as members those practicing their religious faith ·High Stakes: The rise of the Waterhouse dynasty
By Paul Kennedy. 2014
Drama, glamour, scandal, success - and very high stakes. The story of Australia's best known horse racing family has it…
all.When it comes to racing, the name most Australians associate with the racetrack is Waterhouse. This is their compelling story.HIGH STAKES takes us from Bill Waterhouse's introduction to the world as a sixteen-year-old, working as a bookmaker for his father in the late thirties - going on to make money both on and off the track - to the headlines caused by his involvement in the notorious Fine Cotton affair in the eighties.It examines his son Robbie's rise as a respected bookie and a knowledgeable judge of horses, to his spectacular fall, as a result of that same Fine Cotton affair, which led to a life ban from involvement in the racing industry. While the ban was lifted in 2001, he keeps a low profile these days. As Kennedy reveals, the same cannot be said of Robbie's wife, Gai, daughter of the legendary horse trainer TJ Smith. In a male-dominated world, she has gone on to rival her father as one of Australia's best trainers, training horses for a star-studded clientele that has ranged from John Singleton to the Queen of England.Yet as HIGH STAKES shows, the scandal aside, the marriage between Gai and Robbie was always going to be problematic. As the Sydney Morning Herald put it: 'It's not that the Smiths and the Waterhouses were necessarily the Capulets and the Montagues but the country's leading trainer and the world's biggest bookmaker were hardly natural kinsfolk either.'Despite an already colourful history, when their son, Tom, stepped into the family business and became one of the best-known and most controversial bookies the country had ever seen, Kennedy describes how the dramas for the Waterhouse dynasty were only just beginning...This is the book for anyone who wants to know the inside story of contemporary Australian horse racing, a world where premiers and millionaires rub shoulders with gangsters and girls with fancy hats. It's a world of passion, action - and very high stakes.Democratic Dynasties
By Kanchan Chandra. 2016
Dynastic politics, usually presumed to be the antithesis of democracy, is a routine aspect of politics in many modern democracies.…
This book introduces a new theoretical perspective on dynasticism in democracies, using original data on twenty-first-century Indian parliaments. It argues that the roots of dynastic politics lie at least in part in modern democratic institutions - states and parties - which give political families a leg-up in the electoral process. It also proposes a rethinking of the view that dynastic politics is a violation of democracy, showing that it can also reinforce some aspects of democracy while violating others. Finally, this book suggests that both reinforcement and violation are the products, not of some property intrinsic to political dynasties, but of the institutional environment from which those dynasties emerge.Love Your Sister
By Samuel Johnson, Connie Johnson. 2014
A searingly honest memoir of family, cancer, love ... and unicycles by the founders of the LOVE YOUR SISTER charity,…
Connie and Samuel Johnson, that will inspire and they hope get people talking about boobs! Born a year apart, Connie and Samuel Johnson have always been close. Faced with the devastating news that they would soon be separated forever, they made a decision.After already surviving cancer twice in her young life, at 33 Connie was diagnosed with breast cancer. But this time it was a whole different ball game. This time she was told she will die, leaving behind her two sons. As a young mum faced with her own death, Connie wanted to make it all less meaningless, and she knew just the way to do it - send her brother, Sam, on a one-wheeled odyssey around Australia.The aims: to break the world record for the longest distance travelled on a unicycle. To raise $1 million for the Garvan Research Foundation. And, most importantly, to remind women to be breast aware and stop others having to say goodbye to those they love.Their message is simple: 'Don't fall into the booby trap.' Samuel has travelled through every state and ridden more than 150,000 kilometres to raise awareness and raise research dollars.But Connie had a secret fourth aim: to fix Samuel. And it worked. Sam cleared his diary, cleaned himself up and tenaciously kept his promise to his dying sister.For them the job isn't over. They are determined to raise more money for research. Connie vows to fight until her dying day and Sam says the fight will go on long after that.These two remarkable Australians share their tale, from childhood through to the finish line and beyond in this truly unique story. Part memoir, part travel diary, part conversation, LOVE YOUR SISTER is an inspiring and unforgettable story that shows just how far one man will go for his sister.So Close: Bravest, Craziest, Uunluckiest Defeats in Aussie Sport
By Patrick Mangan. 2013
A tribute to the bravest, craziest, unluckiest, most ridiculous defeats in Australian sporting history.Typically, there?s only one way to win…
? by being the best. But there are countless ways of having victory snatched from your grasp. Remember Pat Rafter?s 2001 Wimbledon final against the enigmatic Goran Ivanisevic. Think of Allan Border and Jeff Thomson?s titanic last-wicket partnership against England in 1982 that nearly won one of the closest-fought Tests ever.Look no further than Australian walker Jane Saville, only a few hundred metres from a gold medal at Sydney 2000 when she was tragically disqualified. And yet, as Adam Scott shows, a devastating defeat can sometimes spur a champion on to glory.From the calamitous to the hilarious, from the poignant to the absurd, sport is about so much more than gold medals, premiership trophies and urns filled with ashes. And in So Close, some of those sportspeople will finally get the recognition they deserve.Goal!: Intimate portraits and interviews with every living FIFA World Cup Final scorer
By Michael Donald. 2017
Beautifully illustrated and officially licensed by FIFA, Goal! is a unique football book that captures the essence of the ultimate…
sporting achievement.This is a fascinating portrait of the men who have lived the dream of every football fan worldwide. Includes: Intimate portraits by award-winning photographer Michael DonaldInterviews with the players, giving fascinating insight into the occassion, from the music they played on the bus to the stadium, to the meal they ate afterwardsProfiles on Pelé, Ronaldo, Zidane, Götze annd many more of the greatsThe book includes the story of what happened in each FIFA World Cup?, what happened to the players afterwards and what they do today. There's also a comprehensive statistics section covering all the facts and figures for each World Cup tournament so readers can relive the matches they saw, and discover the details about the ones they didn't.The Master: The Life and Times of Dally Messenger Australia's First Sporting Superstar
By Sean Fagan, Dally Messenger. 2007
Dally Messenger was an Australian sporting superstar in the early years of the 20th century - a rugby league icon,…
rugby union champion, and the most popular sporting personality of this day.He was courted by all codes in that heady period of the early 1900s, when rugby league and Australian rules were fighting to become the dominant winter sport. He represented Australia in rugby league and rugby union and also represented New Zealand in rugby league. Thousands flocked to the grounds when he was playing, and he his revered as an icon in rugby league to this very day.The Master is a popular and authoritative account of the life and times of a superlative sportsman, a tribute to a rugby league player without peer, and an inspiring story for all those who would marvel at this sporting excellence and outstanding achievements.Eddie: The rise and rise of Eddie McGuire
By Michael Bodey. 2015
The inspiring biography of one of Australia's best-known businessmen, TV stars and footy club presidents.Eddie McGuire charts the incredible rise…
of Edward Joseph McGuire AM from his childhood in the working-class Melbourne suburb of Broadmeadows, through his nightclub days as an ambitious young sports reporter to the heights of television, radio,the AFL and politics.Award-winning author and journalist Michael Bodey explores McGuire's rise to the presidency of the most popular football club in the land, Collingwood; his creation of Channel Nine's 'The Footy Show'; his ascent to become Australian television's 'Eddie Everywhere' before his unlikely appointment as Nine's CEO and 'Five Million Dollar Man'; as well as his political ambitions, including his role opposite Malcolm Turnbull heading the republican campaign.Covering Eddie McGuire's many feuds, his missteps, his successes, the turnaround of his beloved Magpies and his seemingly unstoppable rise, this is the inspiring and unique story of the ultimate working-class boy made good.The Last 100 Days: FDR at War and at Peace
By David B. Woolner. 2017
A revealing portrait of the end of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's life and presidency, shedding new light on how he made…
his momentous final policy decisionsThe first hundred days of FDR's presidency are justly famous, often viewed as a period of political action without equal in American history. Yet as historian David B. Woolner reveals, the last hundred might very well surpass them in drama and consequence.Drawing on new evidence, Woolner shows how FDR called on every ounce of his diminishing energy to pursue what mattered most to him: the establishment of the United Nations, the reinvigoration of the New Deal, and the possibility of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. We see a president shorn of the usual distractions of office, a man whose sense of personal responsibility for the American people bore heavily upon him. As Woolner argues, even in declining health FDR displayed remarkable political talent and foresight as he focused his energies on shaping the peace to come.