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Showing 1 - 20 of 57 items
By Gladys Knight. 1997
Knight recalls the ups and downs of her life. She describes her struggle to become well known, first along with…
the Pips and later as a solo performer, and discusses her family, her various addictions, her failed marriages, and her feelings of isolation within the world of show businessBy Robert Lacey. 1994
The author examines the image of a beautiful fairy-tale princess who did not live happily ever after. Lacey chronicles the…
story of Grace Kelly's abbreviated life through her American phase, depicting the actress with a cool, classy facade and a tawdry private life. When the Hollywood star married her European prince, the location of her fantasy life changed, but reality began to destroy the portrait. BestsellerBy Todd Gold, T. Gold, Ann-Margret. 1994
Nominated twice for an Academy Award, Ann-Margret has sung, danced, and acted in movies, on television, and on stage including…
(at the age of fifty) a performance with the Rockettes. After a brief romance with Elvis Presley, Ann-Margret married actor Roger Smith. She discusses how they remained together despite her battle with alcohol, a serious accident, and negative press about their relationship. BestsellerBy Louie Anderson. 1989
Stand-up comic Louie Anderson's letters to his deceased father are an effort to exorcize the demons of a childhood spent…
with an alcoholic father. For Anderson, a member of Adult Children of Alcoholics, his letters were a journey of self-discovery in which he came to understand that his own addiction to food stemmed from his father's addiction to alcohol. Some strong languageBy Barbara Leaming. 1989
Leaming shows Hayworth as a constant victim. She focuses on the sexual abuse Hayworth suffered as a child at the…
hands of her father, who used her as a replacement for her alcoholic mother, and Hayworth's attempts to make herself into the person her husbands and lovers expected. Hayworth had several destructive marriages and spent her last years as an Alzheimer's patientBy Bob Hope, B. Hope, Shavelson, Melville Shavelson. 1990
For almost half a century, Bob Hope has been entertaining American troops--from World War II Europe to the Persian Gulf.…
This is his story of the fun, the laughs, the heartaches, and the dangers of entertaining the troops in Europe, Japan, Korea, Moscow, Vietnam, the Middle East, and elsewhereBy Celia Hawkesworth, Velibor Colic. 1997
The life of the painter Amedeo Modigliani (1884-1920) was chaotic and tragically brief. Consisting of a series of vignettes, mostly…
set in the painter's studio and peopled by his lover Jeanne Hébuterne (who ended her own life the day after Modigliani's death), the prostitutes who were his occasional models and several Bohemian visitors, the novel spans the last months of Modigliani's life, evoking the strange workings of the painter's troubled and often drug-fuelled mind and its expression in his paintings, ultimately succeeding in conveying something of the intense artistic life of Paris in the first decades of the twentieth century.By Charles Margerison. 2011
There are many forms of escape, and many reasons for needing to do it. In psychological terms, it's the 'fight…
or flight' response. Some, like Harry Houdini, turned escape into a death defying form of entertainment, but for others, escape was the only way of fleeing a miscarriage of justice or the brutality of a concentration camp. Henri Charrière attempted to escape from a penal colony in French Guiana nine times and was finally successful in 1941. Find out what happened! Mary Bryant was one of the first successful escapees from the fledgling Australian penal colony. Discover her amazing story. Hear about Rudolph Vrba's incredible escape from the Auschwitz concentration camp and his subsequent attempts to alert authorities about the atrocities there. Who can forget Bram van der Stok, the most decorated aviator in Dutch history, and one of only three men to escape from the German POW camp Stalag Luft III in "the Great Escape" of 1943. Discover more about the lives of these and others in this unique collection of eStories from the Amazing People Club. Each story comes to life through BioViews® which are short biographical narratives, similar to interviews. These inspirational stories provide a new way of learning about amazing people who made major contributions and changed our world.By Cheryl Della Pietra. 2015
"Long after the last drink is poured and the final gunshot fired, Cheryl Della Pietra's novel inspired by her time…
as Hunter S. Thompson's assistant will linger in your mind. This debut novel is raucous, page-turning, head-spinning, and side-splitting as it depicts a boss and mentor who is both devil and angel, and a young heroine who finds herself tested in the chaos that surrounds him. An intense story, Della Pietra's tale about writing, firearms, psychotropics, and the pros and cons of hot tubs will suck you in and take you on ride. Gonzo Girl is a ticket you want to buy." --Piper Kerman, author of Orange Is the New BlackAlley Russo is a recent college grad desperately trying to make it in the grueling world of New York publishing, but like so many who have come before her, she has no connections and has settled for an unpaid magazine internship while slinging drinks on Bleecker Street just to make ends meet. That's when she hears the infamous Walker Reade is looking for an assistant to replace the eight others who have recently quit. Hungry for a chance to get her manuscript onto the desk of an experienced editor, Alley jumps at the opportunity to help Reade finish his latest novel. After surviving an absurd three-day "trial period" involving a .44 magnum, purple-pyramid acid, violent verbal outbursts, brushes with fame and the law, a bevy of peacocks, and a whole lot of cocaine, Alley is invited to stay at the compound where Reade works. For months Alley attempts to coax the novel out of Walker page-by-page, all while battling his endless procrastination, vampiric schedule, Herculean substance abuse, mounting debt, and casual gunplay. But as the job begins to take a toll on her psyche, Alley realizes she's alone in the Colorado Rockies at the mercy of a drug-addicted literary icon who may never produce another novel--and her fate may already be sealed. A smart, rollicking ride told with heart, Gonzo Girl is a loving fictional portrait of a larger-than-life literary icon.By Shani Boianjiu. 2012
Una revelación literaria: una joven autora con una audaz y provocadora novela sobre la vida de las chicas soldado en…
el Ejército Israelí. La premiada autora israelí Shani Boianjiu desvela una realidad desconocida, al tiempo que capta la energía sexual y la efervescente angustia de la adolescencia. Lea, Avishag y Yael son amigas de la escuela en un pequeño pueblo al norte de Israel. Durante las clases sueñan despiertas con los chicos que les gustan. Cuando cumplen los dieciocho años, son reclutadas por el Ejército y su vida cambia de forma inesperada. Yael se acuesta con un chico al que entrena como tirador. Avishag hace guardias y observa a los refugiados que se abalanzan sobre la alambrada. Lea, destinada en un puesto de control, imagina las historias que se ocultan tras los rostros familiares que pasan ante ella día tras día. Las tres viven al filo de la muerte, en la intensidad de ese instante eterno antes de queel peligro estalle. Ganadora del premio «5 Under 35» de la National Book Foundation (nominada por Nicole Krauss), finalista del premio Sami Rohr y del Women#s Prize for Fiction y traducida a 23 idiomas. Reseñas:«Una primera novela tensa como un thriller, romántica y psicológicamente audaz... Boianjiu escribe sobre la atrocidad y el absurdo de una guerra sin fin.»More «Irreverente, conmovedora. Una autora con un inusual talento literario para transportarnos hasta un sitio absolutamente remoto... Un libro provocador e inquietante.»The Jewish Journal «Memorable... Un retrato feroz y hermoso del daño causado por la guerra.»The Washington Post «Único y desgarrador. Leerlo es sentir como si te partieran el corazón en dos.»Etgar Keret «La gente como nosotros no tiene miedo describe en profundidad y con agudeza el efecto desorientador que el miedo produce en las mentes jóvenes.»The Observer «Un debut impresionante sobre la transición a la madurez de tres adolescentes que experimentan lo absurdo de la vida y el amor en el abismo de la violencia.»Vogue «La vida en el Ejército inicia la metamorfosis de niña a mujer. La descripción que Boianjiu realiza de la mente de estas jóvenes es fascinante... La prosa se lee como una pesadilla o un sueño, pero es en esta indecisión febril donde reside su poder.»The Economist «Con su mezcla de brutal hilaridad y emocionante angustia, esta es una primera novela brillante.»The Boston Globe «Las reflexiones de la novela sobre el amor y la pérdida, el deseo y la desesperación, son pura poesía... En esta novela, conviven lo cómico y lo grotesco, al igual que en el Israel de hoy en día.»Los Angeles Review of Books «Shani Boianjiu ha hallado el modo de exponer los efectos de la guerra y la doctrina nacional en la vida de los jóvenes israelíes... Incluso cuando escribe sobre la muerte, Boianjiu está mucho más llena de vida que cualquier otro escritor joven con el que me haya topado en mucho tiempo.»Nicole Krauss «Shani Boianjiu nos ofrece una visión reveladora sobre la juventud de un país marcado por el terrorismo y las fronteras hostiles... La gente como nosotros no tiene miedo marca la llegada de una escritora brillante.»Wall Street JournalBy Sharon Rudahl. 2021
The first-ever graphic biography of Paul Robeson, Ballad of an American, charts Robeson’s career as a singer, actor, scholar, athlete,…
and activist who achieved global fame. Through his films, concerts, and records, he became a potent symbol representing the promise of a multicultural, multiracial American democracy at a time when, despite his stardom, he was denied personal access to his many audiences. Robeson was a major figure in the rise of anti-colonialism in Africa and elsewhere, and a tireless campaigner for internationalism, peace, and human rights. Later in life, he embraced the civil rights and antiwar movements with the hope that new generations would attain his ideals of a peaceful and abundant world. Ballad of an American features beautifully drawn chapters by artist Sharon Rudahl, a compelling narrative about his life, and an afterword on the lasting impact of Robeson’s work in both the arts and politics. This graphic biography will enable all kinds of readers—especially newer generations who may be unfamiliar with him—to understand his life’s story and everlasting global significance. Ballad of an American: A Graphic Biography of Paul Robeson is published in conjunction with Rutgers University’s centennial commemoration of Robeson’s 1919 graduation from the university. View the blad for Ballad of an American.By James Salter. 2004
A singular life often circles around a singular moment, an occasion when one's life in the world is defined forever…
and the emotional vocabulary set. For the extraordinary writer James Salter, this moment was contained in the fighter planes over Korea where, during his young manhood, he flew more than one hundred missions.James Salter is considered one of America's greatest prose stylists. The Arm of Flesh (later revised and retitled Cassada) and his first novel, The Hunters, are legendary in military circles for their descriptions of flying and aerial combat. A former Air Force pilot who flew F–86 fighters in Korea, Salter writes with matchless insight about the terror and exhilaration of the pilot's life.By Jodi Picoult. 2020
Order Jodi Picoult's stunning new novel about life, death, and missed opportunities. THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER'A writer the…
world should be reading right now.' IndependentWho would you be, if you hadn't turned out to be the person you are now? Dawn is a death doula, and spends her life helping people make the final transition peacefully. But when the plane she's on plummets, she finds herself thinking not of the perfect life she has, but the life she was forced to abandon fifteen years ago - when she left behind a career in Egyptology, and a man she loved. Against the odds, she survives, and the airline offers her a ticket to wherever she needs to get to - but the answer to that question suddenly seems uncertain. As the path of her life forks in two very different directions, Dawn must confront questions she's never truly asked: what does a well-lived life look like? What do we leave behind when we go? And do we make our choices, or do our choices make us?Two possible futures. One impossible choice. ----------------------------------------------------------------'It is hard to exaggerate how well Picoult writes.' Financial Times 'A matchless talent for hitting emotional notes.' Irish Times'A wise, cerebral, propulsive adventure . . . eruditely spans the worlds of Egyptology, university physics and end-of-life care, while never losing sight of its high-stakes human story . . . a captivatingly immersive, multilayered, painstakingly researched and impressively realised exploration of deeply human geographies.' The Sunday Times'This complex, time-shifting romance combines moral hazard with Wuthering Heights echoes and degree-level Egyptology. And there aren't many books you can say that about.' Daily MailBy David Sedaris. 2004
'No one has a turn of phrase like David Sedaris. This series of essays about his life and family is…
a joy from start to finish' Adam KayDavid Sedaris plays in the snow with his sisters.He goes on vacation with his family.He gets a job selling drinks.He attends his brother's wedding.He mops his sister's floor.He gives directions to a lost traveller.He eats a hamburger.He has his blood sugar tested.It all sounds so normal, doesn't it?In his new book David Sedaris lifts the corner of ordinary life, revealing the absurdity teeming below its surface. His world is alive with obscure desires and hidden motives - a world where forgiveness is automatic and an argument can be the highest form of love. Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim finds one of the wittiest and most original writers at work today at the peak of his form.By David Sedaris. 1994
In David Sedaris's world, no one is safe and no cow is sacred. A manic cross between Mark Leyner, Fran…
Lebowitz and the National Enquirer, Sedaris's collection of stories and essays is a rollicking tour through the American Zeitgeist: a man who is loved too much flees the heavyweight champion of the world; a teenage suicide tried to incite a lynch mob at her funeral; and in his essays, David Sedaris considers the hazards of rewards of smoking, writing for Giantess magazine, and living with his scrappy brother Paul, aka 'The Rooster'.With a perfect eye and a voice infused with as much empathy as wit, Sedaris writes and reads stories and essays that target the soulful ridiculousness of our behaviour. Barrel Fever is like a blind date with modern life - and anything can happen.By David Quantick. 2021
'Best quiz book ever'HARRY HILL'Quantick is the Captain Beefheart of quizzing'MARK BILLINGHAM'The antidote to every deathly dull pub quiz you've…
ever been to. This is how a quiz book should be written - where having fun is the most important outcome'GARY WIGGLESWORTH, author of The Book Lover's Quiz BookDistinctive, unusual, difficult, but spectacularly entertaining, this quiz book is to other pub quizzes what Trivial Pursuit was to Ludo, what The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy is like to the Rhyl phone directory, and what the Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost is like compared to a kid's scooter. Loads better.David Quantick works regularly with Armando Iannucci, including on the new HBO series, Avenue 5. He won an Emmy as part of the writing team on Veep, a BAFTA for Harry Hill's TV Burp and a Writers' Guild Award for The Thick of It. For over fifteen years, David has also hosted his own very popular quizzes at festivals, events, pubs, clubs, cinemas and in tents: the quizzes range is broad and the questions are tricky. They're not about statistics, there's no sport, the picture rounds are conceptual, and there's sometimes a round called 'Martin Amis Character or Blur Song'. Each quiz is funny and entertaining even if you don't know the answers. The quizzes are informative and opinionated. In some ways, they're like stand-up with questions. This is a book based on David's excellent live quizzes, described by many people as 'quite difficult'.But they are quizzes. Quite difficult quizzes that tax the brain and make it go in directions it didn't know it could. That's not to say the questions are fiendishly scientific and packed with questions about dates and the periodic table. They're about books and music, movies and actors, strange events and interesting quotes. You don't leave a Quantick quiz knowing how many times Spurs have won the League, but you may know how many Shirleys have sung a Bond theme or how George V made the front page of The Times.The effectiveness of David's quizzes is down to their unusual variety and almost stream-of-consciousness leaps and bounds of factual imagination. There's not even much point in cheating, because the answers often require mental agility as well as just knowing where Calais is (it's in France, but it wasn't always, even when it was).David's quiz book includes twenty-five main quizzes, four Christmas quizzes and four specialist quizzes, so thirty-three quizzes in total. Entertaining in its own right, this is also a conceptual yet very practical guide to staging excellent quizzes of your own.By David Quantick. 2021
'Best quiz book ever'HARRY HILL'Quantick is the Captain Beefheart of quizzing'MARK BILLINGHAM'The antidote to every deathly dull pub quiz you've…
ever been to. This is how a quiz book should be written - where having fun is the most important outcome'GARY WIGGLESWORTH, author of The Book Lover's Quiz BookDistinctive, unusual, difficult, but spectacularly entertaining, this quiz book is to other pub quizzes what Trivial Pursuit was to Ludo, what TheHitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy is like to the Rhyl phone directory, and what the Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost is like compared to a kid's scooter. Loads better.David Quantick works regularly with Armando Iannucci, including on the new HBO series, Avenue 5. He won an Emmy as part of the writing team on Veep, a BAFTA for Harry Hill's TV Burp and a Writers' Guild Award for The Thick of It. For over fifteen years, David has also hosted his own very popular quizzes at festivals, events, pubs, clubs, cinemas and in tents: the quizzes range is broad and the questions are tricky. They're not about statistics, there's no sport, the picture rounds are conceptual, and there's sometimes a round called 'Martin Amis Character or Blur Song'. Each quiz is funny and entertaining even if you don't know the answers. The quizzes are informative and opinionated. In some ways, they're like stand-up with questions. This is a book based on David's excellent live quizzes, described by many people as 'quite difficult'.But they are quizzes. Quite difficult quizzes that tax the brain and make it go in directions it didn't know it could. That's not to say the questions are fiendishly scientific and packed with questions about dates and the periodic table. They're about books and music, movies and actors, strange events and interesting quotes. You don't leave a Quantick quiz knowing how many times Spurs have won the League, but you may know how many Shirleys have sung a Bond theme or how George V made the front page of The Times.The effectiveness of David's quizzes is down to their unusual variety and almost stream-of-consciousness leaps and bounds of factual imagination. There's not even much point in cheating, because the answers often require mental agility as well as just knowing where Calais is (it's in France, but it wasn't always, even when it was).David's quiz book includes twenty-five main quizzes, four Christmas quizzes and four specialist quizzes, so thirty-three quizzes in total. Entertaining in its own right, this is also a conceptual yet very practical guide to staging excellent quizzes of your own.By David Sedaris. 2004
No one renders the pathos, chaos, and impossible variety of daily encounters like David Sedaris. On every subject, he is…
bruisingly painful and tenderly affectionate. Sedaris is unique in American writing, and these readings of his own work are highly skilled performances. This new collection will be eagerly anticipated by his ever-growing crowd of devoted fans.In this stand alone novella from New York Times bestselling author Laini Taylor comes the story of a funny and…
fantastical first date. In NIGHT OF CAKE & PUPPETS, Taylor brings to life a night only hinted at in the Daughter of Smoke & Bone trilogy - the magical first date of fan-favorites Zuzana and Mik. Told in alternating perspectives, it's the perfect love story for fans of the series and new readers alike.Petite though she may be, Zuzana is not known for timidity. Her best friend, Karou, calls her 'rabid fairy', her 'voodoo eyes' are said to freeze blood, and even her older brother fears her wrath. But when it comes to the simple matter of talking to Mik, or 'Violin Boy', her courage deserts her. Now, enough is enough. Zuzana is determined to meet him, and she has a fistful of magic and a plan. It's a wonderfully elaborate treasure hunt of a plan that will take Mik all over Prague on a cold winter's night before finally leading him to the treasure: herself!Violin Boy's not going to know what hit him.By Sabine Durrant. 2016
The truth is, we all tell lies... take a deep breath and get ready for the most twisty, tense and…
unsettling book of the summer. 'If, like me, you have been longing for a psycho-thriller of genius since you finished Gone Girl, then the wait is finally over. There are very few books in this world that are impossible to put down. Lie With Me is one of them.' Tony ParsonsIt starts with a lie. The kind we've all told - to a former acquaintance we can't quite place but still, for some reason, feel the need to impress. The story of our life, embellished for the benefit of the happily married lawyer with the kids and the lovely home.And the next thing you know, you're having dinner at their house, and accepting an invitation to join them on holiday - swept up in their perfect life, the kind you always dreamed of...Which turns out to be less than perfect. But by the time you're trapped and sweating in the relentless Greek sun, burning to escape the tension all around you - by the time you start to realise that, however painful the truth might be, it's the lies that cause the real damage...... well, by then, it could just be too late.(P) 2016 Hodder & Stoughton