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By Angel Au-Yeung, David Jeans. 2023
A Financial Times best business book of 2023In 1998, at the age of 24, Tony Hsieh sold his first company…
to Microsoft for $265 million.In 2009, at the age of 35, he sold his e-commerce company, Zappos, to Amazon for $1.2 billion.In 2020, at the age of 46, he died.Tony Hsieh revolutionized both the tech world and corporate culture. He was a business visionary. He was also a man in search of happiness. So why did it all go so wrong?Tony Hsieh’s first successful venture was in middle school, selling personalized buttons. At Harvard, he made a profit compiling and selling study guides. From there, he went on to build the billion-dollar online shoe empire of Zappos.The secret to his success? Making his employees happy.At its peak, Zappos’s employee-friendly culture was so famous across the tech industry that it inspired copycats and earned a cult following. Then Hsieh moved the Zappos headquarters to Las Vegas, where he personally funded a nine-figure campaign to revitalize the city’s historic downtown area. But as Hsieh fell deeper into his struggles with mental health and drug addiction, the people making up his inner circle began changing from friends to enablers.Drawing on hundreds of interviews with a wide range of people whose lives Hsieh touched, journalists Angel Au-Yeung and David Jeans craft a rich portrait of a man who was plagued by his eternal search for happiness and ultimately succumbed to his own demons.By Candice Bergen. 2015
In this New York Times bestseller, acclaimed actress Candice Bergen “shows how to do a memoir right...The self-possessed, witty, and…
down-to-earth voice that made Bergen’s first memoir a hit when it was published in 1984 has only been deepened by life’s surprises” (The New York Times Book Review).“Candice Bergen is unflinchingly honest” (The Washington Post), and in A Fine Romance she describes her first marriage at age thirty-four to famous French director Louis Malle; her overpowering love for her daughter, Chloe; the unleashing of her inner comic with Murphy Brown; her trauma over Malle’s death; her joy at finding new love; and her pride at watching Chloe blossom. In her decidedly nontraditional marriage to the insatiably curious Louis, Bergen takes readers on world travels to the sets where each made films. Pregnant with Chloe at age thirty-nine, this mature primigravida also recounts a journey through motherhood that includes plundering the Warner Bros. costume closets for Halloween getups and never leaving her ever-expanding menagerie out of the fun. She offers priceless, behind-the-scenes looks at Murphy Brown, from caterwauling with Aretha Franklin to the surreal experience of becoming headline news when Dan Quayle took exception to her character becoming a single mother. Bergen tackles familiar rites of passage with moving honesty: the rigors of caring for a spouse in his final illness, getting older, and falling in love again after she was tricked into a blind date. By the time the last page is turned, “we’re all likely to be wishing Bergen herself—funny, insightful, self-deprecating, flawed (and not especially concerned about that), and slugging her way through her older years with bemused determination—was living next door” (USA TODAY).By Cat Marnell. 2017
From the New York Times bestselling author and former beauty editor Cat Marnell, a &“vivid, maddening, heartbreaking, very funny, chaotic&”…
(The New York Times) memoir of prescription drug addiction and self-sabotage, set in the glamorous world of fashion magazines and downtown nightclubs.At twenty-six, Cat Marnell was an associate beauty editor at Lucky, one of the top fashion magazines in America—and that&’s all most people knew about her. But she hid a secret life. She was a prescription drug addict. She was also a &“doctor shopper&” who manipulated Upper East Side psychiatrists for pills, pills, and more pills; a lonely bulimic who spent hundreds of dollars a week on binge foods; a promiscuous party girl who danced barefoot on banquets; a weepy and hallucination-prone insomniac who would take anything—anything—to sleep. This is a tale of self-loathing, self-sabotage, and yes, self-tanner. It begins at a posh New England prep school—and with a prescription for the Attention Deficit Disorder medication Ritalin. It continues to New York, where we follow Marnell&’s amphetamine-fueled rise from intern to editor through the beauty departments of NYLON, Teen Vogue, Glamour, and Lucky. We see her fight between ambition and addiction and how, inevitably, her disease threatens everything she worked so hard to achieve. From the Condé Nast building to seedy nightclubs, from doctors&’ offices and mental hospitals, Marnell &“treads a knife edge between glamorizing her own despair and rendering it with savage honesty.…with the skill of a pulp novelist&” (The New York Times Book Review) what it is like to live in the wild, chaotic, often sinister world of a young female addict who can&’t say no. Combining &“all the intoxicating intrigue of a thriller and yet all the sobering pathos of a gifted writer&’s true-life journey to recover her former health, happiness, ambitions, and identity&” (Harper&’s Bazaar), How to Murder Your Life is mesmerizing, revelatory, and necessary.By Arman Azadi. 2024
Arman is just a boy when he is forced to leave his home and embark on the most extraordinary journey.…
Separated from family and friends, he travels across mountains, land and sea to find refuge. After encountering bandits, war and wolves, and surviving a hazardous boat crossing, he arrives at Dover, clinging to the underside of a lorry. Little did he know, his journey had just begun.Unable to speak English, Arman battles loneliness, despair and the reawakening of his traumas in this new strange place. Memories of his family haunt him. The dark clouds almost consume him. And still he persists, step-by-step.What follows is a struggle for self-understanding, and the great strength it takes to overcome the trauma we carry. Running through is the long journey to find peace, and how education is the most powerful tool to seeing one's life through new eyes.This is the unforgettable, heartfelt and transformative story, from a child who deserved to live in safety, not flee in fear. Arman's is a powerful new voice you won't forget and Across Mountains, Land and Sea the perfect book for fans of I Am Malala, Educated and Butterfly.By Beth Nguyen. 2023
Named a Best Memoir of 2023 by Oprah Daily Selected by Time , NPR, and BookPage as a Best Book…
of 2023 "This book...is what memoir writing in the hands of a caring, curious wunderkind can be." —Kiese Laymon, author of Heavy From the award-winning author of Stealing Buddha's Dinner, a powerful memoir of a mother-daughter relationship fractured by war and resettlement. At the end of the Vietnam War, when Beth Nguyen was eight months old, she and her family fled Saigon for America. Only Beth's mother stayed—or was left—behind, and they did not meet again until Beth was nineteen. Over the course of her adult life, she and her mother have spent less than twenty-four hours together. Owner of a Lonely Heart is "a portrait of things left unsaid" ( The New York Times ), a memoir about parenthood, absence, and the condition of being a refugee: the story of Beth's relationship with her mother. Framed by a handful of visits over the course of many years—sometimes brief, sometimes interrupted, some alone with her mother and others with the company of her sister—Beth tells an "unforgettable" ( People ) coming-of-age story that spans her childhood in the Midwest, her first meeting with her mother, and her own experience of parenthoodBy Caleb Kaltenbach. 2015
Sometimes, grace gets messy. Caleb Kaltenbach was raised by LGBT parents, marched in gay pride parades as a youngster, and experienced…
firsthand the hatred and bitterness of some Christians toward his family. But then Caleb surprised everyone, including himself, by becoming a Christian…and a pastor. Very few issues in Christianity are as divisive as the acceptance of the LGBT community in the church. As a pastor and as a person with beloved family members living a gay lifestyle, Caleb had to face this issue with courage and grace. Messy Grace shows us that Jesus&’s command to &“love your neighbor as yourself&” doesn&’t have an exception clause for a gay &“neighbor&”—or for that matter, any other &“neighbor&” we might find it hard to relate to. Jesus was able to love these people and yet still hold on to his beliefs. So can you. Even when it&’s messy. &“Messy Grace is an important contribution to the conversation about sexual identity for churches and leaders. Caleb's story is surprising and unique, and he weaves it together compellingly. He states his views clearly, leaves room for disagreement, and champions love no matter where you are in this conversation.&”—Jud Wilhite, Sr. Pastor, Central Christian ChurchBy Denise Chong. 2024
From the bestselling author of The Concubine&’s Children and The Girl in the Picture, a gripping story of a domestic assault…
that shocked the world, of the exercise of power and political influence, and of the Bangladeshi woman whose irrepressible spirit found light in sudden darkness.From the outside, Rumana seemed an unlikely victim of domestic abuse: married to a man of her own choosing and progressing in her career as a professor of international relations at Dhaka University. But in 2011, on return from graduate studies at the University of British Columbia, her husband attacked and blinded her in front of their young daughter. As Rumana's horrifying story garnered international headlines, and connections brought her to Vancouver in an attempt—ultimately futile—to restore her sight, her plight underscored the fact that there are no typical victims of intimate-partner violence. Denise Chong goes behind the headlines to reveal the devolution of a love story into a tale of tyranny behind closed doors, and the pursuit of justice that proved all the more elusive during the rise of social media. Out of Darkness tells a globe-spanning narrative of loyalty, perseverance and a woman&’s determination to face the future and rebuild a life with meaning.An influential pastor, podcaster, and thought leader believes it's not only possible to predict life's hardest moments, but also to…
alter outcomes, overcome challenges, and defeat your fiercest adversaries.Founding Pastor of one of North America's most influential churches, Carey Nieuwhof wants to help you avoid and overcome life's seven hardest and most crippling challenges: cynicism, compromise, disconnectedness, irrelevance, pride, burnout, and emptiness. These are challenges that few of us expect but that we all experience at some point. If you have yet to confront these obstacles, Carey provides clear tools and guidelines for anticipation and avoidance. On the other hand, if you already feel stuck in a painful experience or are wrestling with one of these challenges, he provides the steps you need to find a way out and a way forward into a more powerful and vibrant future.By Shiraz Maher. 2016
No topic has captured the public imagination of late quite so dramatically as the specter of global jihadism. While much…
has been said about the way jihadists behave, their ideology remains poorly understood. As the Levant has imploded and millenarian radicals claim to have revived a Caliphate based on the teachings of the Prophet Mohammed, the need for a nuanced and accurate understanding of jihadist beliefs has never been greater. Shiraz Maher charts the intellectual underpinnings of salafi-jihadism from its origins in the mountains of the Hindu Kush to the jihadist insurgencies of the 1990s and the 9/11 wars. What emerges is the story of a pragmatic but resilient warrior doctrine that often struggles - as so many utopian ideologies do - to consolidate the idealism of theory with the reality of practice.By Richard T. Hughes, James L. Gorman. 2024
A balanced, well-documented history of the Churches of Christ in America The Churches of Christ is a denomination defined…
by not being a denomination. These communities intended to restore a primitive Christianity, undivided by historical quarrels. Despite this ideal, the Churches of Christ in America have a surprisingly complex history dating back to the nineteenth century. James L. Gorman&’s fresh edition of Richard T. Hughes&’s classic work, Reviving the Ancient Faith, illuminates the movement started by Barton Stone and Alexander Campbell. The authors trace the movement&’s sociological transformation into a denomination from the 1830s into the twentieth century. Four developments forged this new identity: the premillennialist controversy, the divide over institutions, the racial segregation of congregations and schools, and the fight over liberalism in the 1960s. New to the third edition, the final chapters bring the history of Churches of Christ from the 1960s up to 2022, analyzing the growing diversity of the movement amid intradenominational &“culture wars.&” Reviving the Ancient Faith, 3rd edition, challenges readers to learn the historical basis of Church of Christ identity and beliefs. Students of the history of the Church of Christ and American religion will derive from its pages a more holistic and informed understanding of the tradition.By Air Commodore John Mitchell, Sean Feast. 2010
An RAF pilot who flew around the world with Winston Churchill during World War II tells his story. An…
RAF Volunteer Reserve officer, John Mitchell was mobilized on the outbreak of war—and just missed going to join a Battle Squadron in France where he would have undoubtedly been killed. Instead, he was posted to No. 58 Squadron flying Whitleys, surviving a tour of operations in 1940–41 that included ditching in the North Sea. Awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, he was sent to the US, becoming involved in the development of the first navigation training simulators with the famous Link Trainer factory. There, he was awarded the US Legion of Merit, signed by Harry S. Truman. Then, returning to the UK in 1942, he was personally selected to join the crew of Winston Churchill&’s private aircraft, one of the early prototype Avro Yorks called Ascalon. For two years he navigated Churchill to conferences around the world—from North Africa to Italy, the Middle East to Moscow, including the famous Teheran and Yalta conferences. He also flew &“General Lyon&” (aka His Majesty George VI) on several occasions. After the war, he enjoyed an eventful career as an air attaché, including an intelligence posting to Moscow, and was senior navigation officer for the long range exercises over the Pole in the converted Lincoln, Aries III. His is an exceptional story, told with wit and verve to military aviation historian Sean Feast, who adds authoritative and informed insights.By Billy Connolly. 2021
In his first full-length autobiography, comedy legend and national treasure Billy Connolly reveals the truth behind his windswept and interesting…
life.Born in a tenement flat in Glasgow in 1942, orphaned by the age of 4, and a survivor of appalling abuse at the hands of his own family, Billy's life is a remarkable story of success against all the odds.Billy found his escape first as an apprentice welder in the shipyards of the River Clyde. Later he became a folk musician - a 'rambling man' - with a genuine talent for playing the banjo. But it was his ability to spin stories, tell jokes and hold an audience in the palm of his hand that truly set him apart.As a young comedian Billy broke all the rules. He was fearless and outspoken - willing to call out hypocrisy wherever he saw it. But his stand-up was full of warmth, humility and silliness too. His startling, hairy 'glam-rock' stage appearance - wearing leotards, scissor suits and banana boots - only added to his appeal.It was an appearance on Michael Parkinson's chat show in 1975 - and one outrageous story in particular - that catapulted Billy from cult hero to national star. TV shows, documentaries, international fame and award-winning Hollywood movies followed. Billy's pitch-perfect stand-up comedy kept coming too - for over 50 years, in fact - until a double diagnosis of cancer and Parkinson's Disease brought his remarkable live performances to an end. Since then he has continued making TV shows, creating extraordinary drawings... and writing.Windswept and Interesting is Billy's story in his own words. It is joyfully funny - stuffed full of hard-earned wisdom as well as countless digressions on fishing, farting and the joys of dancing naked. It is an unforgettable, life-affirming story of a true comedy legend.'I didn't know I was Windswept and Interesting until somebody told me. It was a friend who was startlingly exotic himself. He'd just come back from Kashmir and was all billowy shirt and Indian beads. I had long hair and a beard and was swishing around in electric blue flairs.He said: "Look at you - all windswept and interesting!"I just said: "Exactly!"After that, I simply had to maintain my reputation...'By Katell Berthelot. 2021
How encounters with the Roman Empire compelled the Jews of antiquity to rethink their conceptions of Israel and the TorahThroughout…
their history, Jews have lived under a succession of imperial powers, from Assyria and Babylonia to Persia and the Hellenistic kingdoms. Jews and Their Roman Rivals shows how the Roman Empire posed a unique challenge to Jewish thinkers such as Philo, Josephus, and the Palestinian rabbis, who both resisted and internalized Roman standards and imperial ideology.Katell Berthelot traces how, long before the empire became Christian, Jews came to perceive Israel and Rome as rivals competing for supremacy. Both considered their laws to be the most perfect ever written, and both believed they were a most pious people who had been entrusted with a divine mission to bring order and peace to the world. Berthelot argues that the rabbinic identification of Rome with Esau, Israel's twin brother, reflected this sense of rivalry. She discusses how this challenge transformed ancient Jewish ideas about military power and the use of force, law and jurisdiction, and membership in the people of Israel. Berthelot argues that Jewish thinkers imitated the Romans in some cases and proposed competing models in others.Shedding new light on Jewish thought in antiquity, Jews and Their Roman Rivals reveals how Jewish encounters with pagan Rome gave rise to crucial evolutions in the ways Jews conceptualized the Torah and conversion to Judaism.By Rachel Lloyd. 2011
"Powerfully raw, deeply moving, and utterly authentic. Rachel Lloyd has turned a personal atrocity into triumph and is nothing less…
than a true hero.... Never again will you look at young girls on the street as one of 'those' women—you will only see little girls that are girls just like us." —Demi Moore, actress and activist With the power and verity of First They Killed My Father and A Long Way Gone, Rachel Lloyd’s riveting survivor story is the true tale of her hard-won escape from the commercial sex industry and her bold founding of GEMS, New York City’s Girls Education and Mentoring Service, to help countless other young girls escape "the life." Lloyd’s unflinchingly honest memoir is a powerful and unforgettable story of inhuman abuse, enduring hope, and the promise of redemption.By Brian Welch. 2010
This 40-Day devotional from Brian “Head” Welch, former lead guitarist of Korn and the New York Times bestselling author of…
Save Me From Myself, is an intimate tour through the Bible passages that have meant the most to him on his trying journey from substance abuse to salvation. Save Me From Myself, Welch’s self-effacing story his against addiction and his reawakening to divine love, has made the metal band icon into a hero of Christian rock. Uncompromisingly honest about his demons, and equally fervent about his faith, Head and his impassioned devotional offer a uniquely voiced guiding light perfect for young Christians and rock music fans everywhere.By Peter Wehner. 2019
The New York Times opinion writer, media commentator, outspoken Republican and Christian critic of the Trump presidency offers a spirited…
defense of politics and its virtuous and critical role in maintaining our democracy and what we must do to save it before it is too late. “Any nation that elects Donald Trump to be its president has a remarkably low view of politics.” Frustrated and feeling betrayed, Americans have come to loathe politics with disastrous results, argues Peter Wehner. In this timely manifesto, the veteran of three Republican administrations and man of faith offers a reasoned and persuasive argument for restoring “politics” as a worthy calling to a cynical and disillusioned generation of Americans. Wehner has long been one of the leading conservative critics of Donald Trump and his effect on the Republican Party. In this impassioned book, he makes clear that unless we overcome the despair that has caused citizens to abandon hope in the primary means for improving our world—the political process—we will not only fall victim to despots but hasten the decline of what has truly made America great. Drawing on history and experience, he reminds us of the hard lessons we have learned about how we rule ourselves—why we have checks and balances, why no one is above the law, why we defend the rights of even those we disagree with. Wehner believes we can turn the country around, but only if we abandon our hatred and learn to appreciate and honor the unique and noble American tradition of doing “politics.” If we want the great American experiment to continue and to once again prosper, we must once more take up the responsibility each and every one of us as citizens share.By Antony Flew, Roy Abraham Varghese. 2008
In one of the biggest religion news stories of the new millennium, the Associated Press announced that Professor Antony Flew,…
the world's leading atheist, now believes in God. Flew is a pioneer for modern atheism. His famous paper, Theology and Falsification, was first presented at a meeting of the Oxford Socratic Club chaired by C. S. Lewis and went on to become the most widely reprinted philosophical publication of the last five decades. Flew earned his fame by arguing that one should presuppose atheism until evidence of a God surfaces. He now believes that such evidence exists, and There Is a God chronicles his journey from staunch atheism to believer. For the first time, this book will present a detailed and fascinating account of Flew's riveting decision to revoke his previous beliefs and argue for the existence of God. Ever since Flew's announcement, there has been great debate among atheists and believers alike about what exactly this "conversion" means. There Is a God will finally put this debate to rest. This is a story of a brilliant mind and reasoned thinker, and where his lifelong intellectual pursuit eventually led him: belief in God as designer.By Richard Elliott Friedman. 2001
In this groundbreaking and insightful new commentary, one of the world's leading biblical scholars unveils the unity and continuity of…
the Torah for the modern reader. Richard Elliott Friedman, the bestselling author of Who Wrote the Bible?, integrates the most recent discoveries in biblical archaeology and research with the fruits of years of experience studying and teaching the Bible to illuminate the straightforward meaning of the text -- "to shed new light on the Torah and, more important, to open windows through which it sheds its light on us."While other commentaries are generally collections of comments by a number of scholars, this is a unified commentary on the Torah by a single scholar, the most unified by a Jewish scholar in centuries. It includes the original Hebrew text, a new translation, and an authoritative, accessibly written interpretation and analysis of each passage that remains focused on the meaning of the Torah as a whole, showing how its separate books are united into one cohesive, all-encompassing sacred literary masterpiece. This landmark work is destined to take its place as a classic in the libraries of lay readers and scholars alike, as we seek to understand the significance of the scriptural texts for our lives today, and for years to come.By Shannon Molloy. 2020
Optioned for a major film and adapted to the stage, Fourteen is this generation&’s Holding the Man – a moving coming-of-age…
memoir about a young man&’s search for identity and acceptance in the most unforgiving and hostile of places: high school. This is a story about my fourteenth year of life as a gay kid at an all-boys rugby-mad Catholic school in regional Queensland. It was a year in which I started to discover who I was, and deeply hated what was revealed. It was a year in which I had my first crush and first devastating heartbreak. It was a year of torment, bullying and betrayal – not just at the hands of my peers, but by adults who were meant to protect me. And it was a year that almost ended tragically. I found solace in writing and my budding journalism; in a close-knit group of friends, all growing up too quickly together; and in the fierce protection of family and a mother&’s unconditional love. These were moments of light and hilarity that kept me going. As much as Fourteen is a chronicle of the enormous struggle and adversity I endured, and the shocking consequences of it all, it&’s also a tale of survival. Because I did survive.Longlisted for the 2021 ABIA Biography Book of the Year &‘Teenagers should read this book, parents should read this book. Human beings, above all, should read this book.&’ Rick Morton, bestselling author of One Hundred Years of Dirt &‘I love this book … a beautifully written account of a young man struggling with his sexuality, overcoming shocking abuse and finding his way to pride.&’ Peter FitzSimons, bestselling author &‘Shannon is unflinching in recounting the horror, but he is also funny, empathetic and, above all, full of courage.&’ Bridie Jabour, author of The Way Things Should Be &‘A slice of life as experienced quite recently in the &“lucky country&”.&’ The Hon Michael Kirby, AC CMG &‘Shannon's bitter struggle is painfully recognisable and happening in playgrounds around the world. But he not only triumphs, he relives his past using his best weapon: beautiful words.&’ Australian Women&’s Weekly &‘A stunning memoir about heartbreak and acceptance … a unique, hilarious and bittersweet insight into the heart of a boy, the courage of survival, and the fierce love of a mother.&’ Frances Whiting, Courier Mail &‘Australia hasn&’t changed all that much from what Shannon describes in Fourteen. Marriage equality isn&’t the end; there is still such a long way to go, and books like this are an important part of that journey.&’ FIVE STARS. Good Reading &‘Intensely raw and incredibly moving.&’ OUTinPerth 'A book in which many will undoubtably see themselves and take solace' The AgeBy Jennifer Craig. 2011
'What is your name?' she asks, staring at me.'Jennifer Ross.''Jennifer Ross, Sister. Well, Nurse Ross, you are dressed in the…
uniform of a nurse from the Leeds General Infirmary. Such a uniform is not worn with a cardigan. Take it off at once.''Yes Sister.' I can feel my face turn red.A trainee nurse in the 1950s had a lot to bear. In Jennifer Craig's enchanting memoir, we meet these warm-hearted yet naïve young girls as they get to grips with strict discipline, long hours and bodily fluids. But we also see the camaraderie that develops in evening study sessions, sneaked trips to the cinema and mischievous escapades with the young trainee doctors. The harsh conditions prove too much for some girls, but the opportunity to help her patients in their time of need is too much of a pull for Jenny. As she commits to her vocation and knuckles down to her exams, she is determined that when she reaches the heights of Ward Sister herself she will not become the frightening matron that struck fear into her student heart ...Rich in period detail, and told with a good dose of Yorkshire humour, Yes Sister, No Sister is a life-affirming true story of a life long past.