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Showing 1 - 20 of 23140 items
By Myrna Kostash. 2022
In Ghosts in a Photograph, award-winning nonfiction writer Myrna Kostash delves into the lives of her grandparents, all of whom…
moved from Galicia, now present-day Ukraine, to Alberta at the turn of the twentieth century. Discovering a packet of family mementos, Kostash begins questioning what she knows about her extended families’ pasts and whose narrative is allowed to prevail in Canada.This memoir, however, is not just a personal story, but a public one of immigration, partisan allegiance, and the stark differences in how two sets of families survive in a new country: one as homesteaders, the other as working-class Edmontonians. Working within the gaps in history—including the unsolved murder in Ukraine of her great uncle—Kostash uses her remarkable acumen as a writer and researcher to craft a probable narrative to interrogate the idea of straightforward and singular-voiced pasts and the stories we tell ourselves about where we come from.Rich in detail and propelled by vital curiosity, Ghosts in a Photograph is a determined, compelling, and multifaceted family chronicle.By Amy Tan. 2024
A gorgeous, witty account of birding, nature, and the beauty around us that hides in plain sight, written and illustrated…
by the best-selling author of The Joy Luck Club • With a foreword by David Allen Sibley&“Unexpected and spectacular&” —Ann Patchett, best-selling author of These Precious Days"The drawings and essays in this book do a lot more than just describe the birds. They carry a sense of discovery through observation and drawing, suggest the layers of patterns in the natural world, and emphasize a deep personal connection between the watcher and the watched. The birds that inhabit Amy Tan&’s backyard seem a lot like the characters in her novels.&” —David Allen Sibley, from the foreword Tracking the natural beauty that surrounds us, The Backyard Bird Chronicles maps the passage of time through daily entries, thoughtful questions, and beautiful original sketches. With boundless charm and wit, author Amy Tan charts her foray into birding and the natural wonders of the world.In 2016, Amy Tan grew overwhelmed by the state of the world: Hatred and misinformation became a daily presence on social media, and the country felt more divisive than ever. In search of peace, Tan turned toward the natural world just beyond her window and, specifically, the birds visiting her yard. But what began as an attempt to find solace turned into something far greater—an opportunity to savor quiet moments during a volatile time, connect to nature in a meaningful way, and imagine the intricate lives of the birds she admired.By Tarek El-Ariss. 2008
In this evocative, insightful memoir, a leading voice in Middle Eastern Studies revisits his childhood in war-torn Lebanon and his…
family&’s fascinating history, coming to terms with trauma and desire.Water on Fire tells a story of immigration that starts in a Beirut devastated by the Lebanese Civil War (1975–90), continues with experiences of displacement in Europe and Africa, moves to northeastern American towns battered by lake-effect snow and economic woes, and ends in New York City on 9/11. A story of loss, but also of evolution, it models a kind of resilience inflected with humor, daring, and irreverence.Alternating between his perspective as a child and as an adult, Tarek El-Ariss explores how we live with trauma, poignantly illustrating the profound impact of war on our perception of the world, our fears and longings. His memoir is at once historical and universal, intellectual and introspective, the outcome of a long and painful process of excavation that reveals internal turmoil and the predicament of conflict and separation. A contemporary &“interpretation of dreams&” dealing with monsters, invisible creatures, skin outbreaks, and the sea, it is a book about objects and elements, like water and fire, and about how encountering these elements triggers associations, connecting present and past, time and space.By Boria Majumdar. 2024
A social media trial can break you. There were 100,000 tweets of abuse for days on end, all premised on…
a set of untruths pushed by someone hugely powerful because he had played for the national team. Against the entitled, I never stood a chance. The online trial forced me and the family to draw on every last bit of inner strength, and yet left permanent scars. Having served the ban, I wanted closure in the form of this book. But no one knows better that there will never be a full stop. I will not get back the two years of opportunities that I lost, or the days and evenings when I was almost a stranger to my daughter. For two years, my wife and I never had a quiet dinner where we could just relax. There was not one evening when we didn&’t discuss the issue and the book. Which outsider can quantify the impact it had on the mental health of my family? On my wife, my mother, my sister and my daughter? I became cynical about a number of things, and it will be tough to change that. Writing this book and putting the truth out there has drained and exhausted me. The truth is that the falsehoods piled up against me, ratified by all-knowing social media trolls, changed my life and that of my family. There is no going back to what we were. This was our Long Covid.By Sylvia Brownrigg. 2024
Sylvia Brownrigg's &“wise, intimate, and deliciously entertaining memoir" (Carol Edgarian) reconstructs a poignant story of fathers lost and foundWhen Sylvia…
Brownrigg received a package addressed to her father that had been lost for over fifty years, she wanted to deliver it to him before it was too late. She did not expect that her father, Nick, would choose not to open it. A few years later, she and her brother finally did.Nick, an absent father, was a would-be writer and back-to-the-lander who lived off the grid in Northern California. Nick&’s own father, Gawen—also absent—had been a wellborn Englishman who wrote a Bloomsbury-like novel about lesbian lovers, before moving to Kenya and ultimately dying a mysterious death at age twenty-seven. Brownrigg was told Gawen had likely died by suicide.Reconstructing Gawen&’s short, colorful life from revelations in the package takes her through glamorous 1930s London and staid Pasadena, toward the last gasp of the British Empire in Kenya, and from there, deep into the California redwoods, where Nick later carved out a rugged path in the wilderness, keeping his English past at bay. Vividly weaving together the lives of her father and grandfather, through memory and imagination, Brownrigg explores issues of sexuality and silences, and childhoods fractured by divorce. In her uncovering of this lost family, she writes movingly of daughterhood and of parenthood, gradually making her own story whole.By Emmett Rensin. 2024
An unflinching, rare account of living with severe mental illness that is also a bold commentary on how we misunderstand…
this often debilitating disease.The Complications is an intimate portrait of what it’s like to live with schizoaffective disorder of the bipolar type as well as a biting, revelatory critique of America’s mental health culture. Emmett Rensin has written and edited articles for major national media outlets, and taught writing and literature at prestigious schools. But he has also lost jobs and friends, been hospitalized and institutionalized, and cycled through a daunting combination of medications. With scorching honesty, he reflects on his messy, fragile attempt to live his life, his periods of grace, and his near misses with disaster and death.Going beyond the usual peans against “stigma” and for “understanding”, Rensin confronts the dysfunction in current mental health narratives, contrasting what he calls mental illness “high culture”—in which we affirm the prevalence of anxiety and encourage regular therapy, insisting that the “mentally ill” aren’t dangerous or even weird—with even progressive society’s inability to contend with people with more severe forms of mental illness: those people we pass on the street talking to themselves, those caught in a loop between hospitals and prisons, or even those who we cannot tolerate in our own schools, offices, and lives, including himself. With raw honesty, Rensin invites us into every aspect of his life, from what it’s like see four different psychiatrists in one year and the nature of psychotic breaks to a harrowing diary that logs exactly what happens when he stops taking his medication and the unexpected kinship he discovers with an incarcerated spree killer with schizophrenia. Going beyond pure memoir, he reflects on the uncertain “science” of diagnosis, the nature of art about and by the insane, political activism, and the history of madness, from the asylum to the academy. A compelling, often devastating, blend of memoir, cultural commentary, and history, The Complications elevates the conversation around mental illness and challenges us to reexamine what we think we know about what is to go insane.By Bakari Sellers. 2024
The New York Times bestselling author of My Vanishing Country examines the modern political landscape and policies that are impacting…
Black families and communities and offers solutions for a better tomorrow. In late May in 2020, while discussing the murder of George Floyd on CNN, Bakari Sellers spoke from the heart sharing devastating insight that touched millions around the world: “It’s just so much pain. You get so tired. We have black children. I have a 15-year-old daughter. I mean, what do I tell her? I’m raising a son. I have no idea what to tell him. It’s just—it’s hard being black in this country when your life is not valued and people are worried about the protesters and the looters. And it’s just people who are frustrated for far too long and not have their voices heard.”In this powerful and persuasive book, Sellers expands on the issues he addressed in his New York Times bestseller My Vanishing Country, examining national politics and policies that deeply impact not only Black people in his home state of South Carolina but the lives of millions of African Americans in communities across the nation. Four years later, Sellers has an answer to the question he raised on CNN, offering much-needed prescriptions to help all Black American lives.Sellers explores inequities in healthcare, education, early childhood education, and policing, drawing on interviews with numerous thought leaders such as pioneering voting rights and poverty activist the Rev. William Barber, and Ben Crump, the civil rights legend who successfully uses the law to achieve justice for people of color in racially charged cases. He also shares his thoughts on conservative media and the forces and dark money behind firebrands such as Tucker Carlson. This thoughtful and practical work is a timely meditation on the state of our world today and how we can all play a part in making it better for tomorrow.By April Simpkins, Cheslie Kryst. 2024
By the Time You Read This is the story former Miss USA Cheslie Kryst was about to publish before her…
tragic suicide. Her mother, April, wraps up the narrative by exploring the mental illness and depression that took her daughter&’s life.The text read, &“By the time you get this . . .&” This is the story of Cheslie Kryst, a former Miss USA, in her own words. When the world awoke on the morning of January 30, 2022, many were shocked to learn of the tragic death of former Miss USA Cheslie Kryst. For most people, the news was unfathomable. How could a young woman in the prime of her life—a pageant queen, accomplished attorney, Extra correspondent, and tireless advocate for charity organizations—have been lost to the world so suddenly? By the Time You Read This shares the manuscript Cheslie wrote before her passing, her story in her own words—from the highest highs of passing two bar exams, winning Miss USA, and beginning an exciting career as an entertainment journalist to the lowest lows of heartbreak, betrayal, and persistent depression. When Cheslie&’s mother, April Simpkins, picks up the narrative, she shares for the first time what she experienced in the aftermath of Cheslie&’s suicide. When faced with such a devastating loss, how does a mother find a way to carry on? Whether you are someone who struggles to maintain your mental health, or you love someone who does, this book will share insight into a reality that impacts thousands of families every year—as well as provide hope for those who are left behind. Net proceeds from the book will be used to support the Cheslie C. Kryst Foundation, which is being founded in Cheslie&’s honor.By Caroline Crampton. 2024
Part cultural history, part literary criticism, and part memoir, A Body Made of Glass is a definitive biography of hypochondria.Caroline Crampton’s life was upended at…
the age of seventeen, when she was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a relatively rare blood cancer. After years of invasive treatment, she was finally given the all clear. But being cured of the cancer didn’t mean she felt well. Instead, the fear lingered, and she found herself always on the alert, braced for signs that the illness had reemerged. Now, in A Body Made of Glass, Crampton has drawn from her own experiences with health anxiety to write a revelatory exploration of hypochondria—a condition that, though often suffered silently, is widespread and rising. She deftly weaves together history, memoir, and literary criticism to make sense of this invisible and underexplored sickness. From the earliest medical case of Hippocrates to the literary accounts of sufferers like Virginia Woolf and Marcel Proust to the modern perils of internet self-diagnosis, Crampton unspools this topic to reveal the far-reaching impact of health anxiety on our physical, mental, and emotional health.At its heart, Crampton explains, hypochondria is a yearning for knowledge. It is a never-ending attempt to replace the edgeless terror of uncertainty with the comforting solidity of a definitive explanation. Through intimate personal stories and compelling cultural perspectives, A Body Made of Glass brings this uniquely ephemeral condition into much-needed focus for the first time.Thae Yong-ho was a leading North Korean diplomat to the United Kingdom and Northern Europe—until his dramatic defection to South…
Korea in 2016. In this gripping tell-all, he reveals the inner workings of the North Korean regime and shares the story of his decision to leave.Thae spent nearly three decades working under three generations of the ruling Kim dynasty after entering the foreign service as an idealistic twenty-seven-year-old “red warrior” eager to strive for the “socialist motherland.” During this time, he witnessed the arbitrary and tyrannical rule of the Kim family and the enigmatic “Third Floor,” a powerful group of high-ranking officials. Thae provides up-close portraits of the excesses of the North Korean elite and the depths of the cult of personality around the Kims, describing experiences such as concocting reports of Europeans celebrating the birthdays of Kim Il-sung or Kim Jong-il and escorting Kim Jong-un’s older brother to Eric Clapton concerts in London. He also details the economic and political consequences of North Korea’s pursuit of the bomb and the immiseration of the vast majority of the population.Today a politician in South Korea who advocates unification, Thae offers a powerful plea for the families torn apart by the conflict—including his own, as his brother and sister likely now languish in prison camps. A best-seller in South Korea, Passcode to the Third Floor is an unparalleled look at North Korean politics and diplomacy, giving readers intimate access to the regime’s innermost secrets.By Michel Leiris. 2024
The fourth and final volume of Michel Leiris’s renowned autobiography, now available in English for the first time, translated by…
Richard Sieburth Ex-surrealist and maverick anthropologist Michel Leiris (1901–1990) crafted his multivolume autobiography over the course of thirty-five years, profoundly influencing generations of French writers, from Sartre and Beauvoir to Modiano and Ernaux. In this fourth and final volume, Richard Sieburth completes the project of bringing Leiris’s monumental experiment in self-portraiture into English. With wit and playfulness, Leiris assembled a scrapbook of fragments—journal extracts, travel notes, transcriptions of dreams, poems—to document the vagaries of a life committed to the difficult marriage of poetry and revolutionary politics, which he witnessed firsthand in Mao’s China, Castro’s Cuba, and on the Paris streets in May ’68. Frail Riffs is a jazz improvisation on the twilight of a life, at once a painstaking self-examination and a chronicle of a century. As Leiris wrote, it is "neither a private diary nor a formal work, neither an autobiographical narrative nor a work of the imagination, neither prose nor poetry, but all this at the same time. . . . A perpetual work in progress.&rdquoBy David Grčki, Rafe McGregor. 2024
Standing at the intersection of criminology and philosophy, this book demonstrates the ways in which mythic movies and television series…
can provide an understanding of actual crimes and social harms.Taking three social problems as its subjects – capitalist political economy, structural injustice, and racism – the book explores the ways in which David Fincher’s Fight Club (1999), HBO’s Game of Thrones (2011–2019), and Jordan Peele’s Us (2019) offer solutions by reconceiving justice in terms of personal and collective transformation, utopian thinking, and the relationship between racism and elitism, respectively. In doing so, the authors set out a theory of understanding the world based on cinematic and televisual works of art and conclude with a template that establishes a methodology for future use.An Epistemology of Criminological Cinema is authoritative and accessible, ideal reading for undergraduate and postgraduate students, criminologists, philosophers, and film, television, and literary critics with an interest in social justice and social harm.By Raphael Schlembach. 2024
The ‘spycops’ scandal has laid bare the existence of secretive police units that sent undercover police officers to infiltrate and…
undermine hundreds of political campaigns and activist groups. This is the first academic analysis of the activists’ experiences and their attempts to find answers and accountability in the Undercover Policing Inquiry. Written from the perspective of the ‘policed’, the author draws on extensive fieldwork and his first-hand experience of police infiltration through his participation in climate campaigns.By Girls Write Now. 2023
A writing companion, inspirational guide to the craft, and anthology featuring interactive multi-genre work from the acclaimed organization on its…
twenty-fifth anniversary.We all have stories to tell, but not everyone gets the mentoring and training or encouragement to become a great storyteller. Founded a quarter century ago, Girls Write Now has empowered young women and gender-expansive youth to harness their creative talents, gaining confidence, skills, and a community supporting them in sharing stories the world needs to hear.This hands-on guide—conceived of and written and edited by the young people of Girls Write Now—draws from the organization’s dynamic curriculum and the writers’ own personal experiences spanning decades. It offers aspiring writers the tools they need to develop their craft—including tips, insight, and advice on the writing and publishing process as well as critical thinking about the future of storytelling.With this handbook, readers everywhere can equip themselves to shape their life stories, and become the writers and leaders they dream of being.By Nicolas Hamilton. 2025
Nicolas Hamilton has been exceeding expectations since day one.Born with a form of cerebral palsy, Nicolas was told that he…
would never walk and would need a wheelchair for the rest of his life. Today he not only walks everywhere but he is the first disabled athlete to ever compete at the top level of British motorsport, The British Touring Car Championship, where he lines up on the grid alongside some of the world's best drivers.Now That I Have Your Attention follows Nicolas's remarkable journey and shares the valuable, tough, and often surprising lessons learned throughout his life.Nicolas's journey has at times been hostile and has forced him to navigate periods of anger and resentment, but by building his mental strength and pushing himself beyond the physical limits of what anyone had ever expected of him, Nicolas has changed his life - and believes you can too.With each of these 7 Lessons, Nicolas's message is simple and universal: with self-discipline and self-compassion you can defy the limitations imposed upon you.By James F. Albrecht, Garth Den Heyer. 2024
This book comprehensively examines five key areas of concern across the field of policing. These critical issues include: police use…
of force, police ethics and integrity, traffic safety, police-community collaboration, and optimizing organizational performance and service delivery. The chapters that follow provide a global, multi-faceted approach to analyze these core professional issues, examine them through sociological and theoretical lenses, and ultimately propose policy recommendations to ensure optimal professionalism and organizational effectiveness. The book focuses on issues, including:• Enhancing public trust and confidence• Effective crime control• Rule of law• Social justice• Best procedures and practices This book is ideal for upper-level undergraduate and graduate-level students, criminal justice and law enforcement practitioners and policy makers, and criminal justice and criminology researchers.By Samina Raja, Marcia Caton Campbell, Alexandra Judelsohn, Branden Born, Alfonso Morales. 2023
This open access book, building on the legacy of food systems scholar and advocate, Jerome Kaufman, examines the potential and…
pitfalls of planning for urban agriculture (UA) in the United States, especially in how questions of ethics and equity are addressed. The book is organized into six sections. Written by a team of scholars and practitioners, the book covers a comprehensive array of topics ranging from theory to practice of planning for equitable urban agriculture. Section 1 makes the case for re-imagining agriculture as central to urban landscapes, and unpacks why, how, and when planning should support UA, and more broadly food systems. Section 2, written by early career and seasoned scholars, provides a theoretical foundation for the book. Section 3, written by teams of scholars and community partners, examines how civic agriculture is unfolding across urban landscapes, led largely by community organizations. Section 4, written by planning practitionersand scholars, documents local government planning tied to urban agriculture, focusing especially on how they address questions of equity. Section 5 explores UA as a locus of pedagogy of equity. Section 6 places the UA movement in the US within a global context, and concludes with ideas and challenges for the future. The book concludes with a call for planning as public nurturance – an approach that can be illustrated through urban agriculture. Planning as public nurturance is a value-explicit process that centers an ethics of care, especially protecting the interests of publics that are marginalized. It builds the capacity of marginalized groups to authentically co-design and participate in planning/policy processes. Such a planning approach requires that progress toward equitable outcomes is consistently evaluated through accountability measures. And, finally, such an approach requires attention to structural and institutional inequities. Addressing these four elements is more likelyto create a condition under which urban agriculture may be used as a lever in the planning and development of more just and equitable cities. This is an open access book.This is an open access book.By Madelaine Dickie, Wayne Bergmann. 2024
'I've spent the majority of my life fighting for the rights of Traditional Owners. This has put me in the…
firing line. But I chose this job, I chose this political path. My family did not.' - Wayne BergmannIt's Broome, 2010. Nyikina man Wayne Bergmann has just received a death threat. His wife has watched a friend cross the road to avoid speaking with her. His children are subject to intense schoolyard bullying. Bergmann, a boilermaker by trade, and lawyer, is chief executive of the Kimberley Land Council during the controversial James Price Point gas hub negotiations. It's an event that will tear the Broome community apart. Wayne's story starts on Nyikina country and encompasses backbreaking station work, buried treasure, a Swedish bone thief and traditional magic love songs. His is an electrifying tale of resilience, determination and optimism, which shows what it takes to be an Aboriginal person walking in two cultures in a country where racism runs deep.The memoirs of a brilliant and beloved Founding Father Printer, author, scientist, inventor, statesman, revolutionary—arguably no American life has been more…
remarkable than Benjamin Franklin&’s.Penned between 1771 and 1790 and published after his death, the unfinished Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin is one of the most acclaimed and widely read personal histories ever written. From his youth as a printer&’s assistant working for his brother&’s Boston newspaper through his own publishing, writing, and military careers, his scientific experiments and worldwide travels, his grand triumphs and heartbreaking tragedies, Franklin tells his story with aplomb, bringing to life the flesh-and-blood man behind the American icon.This ebook has been professionally proofread to ensure accuracy and readability on all devices.By Crystal McVea, Alex Tresniowski. 2013
New York Times bestseller! A remarkable and inspirational memoir about one woman's near-death experience, who was dramatically changed by the…
nine minutes she spent in heaven.On December 10, 2009, McVea, a thirty-two-year-old mother of four, went to the hospital for a routine procedure. While undergoing treatment, her face suddenly turned a dark shade of blue, then black. Her mother screamed for help, and a nurse tried to revive her…to no avail. Today, Crystal does not remember what happened in that hospital room during the nine minutes she was unconscious and unable to breathe on her own. She has no memory of the panic and the rushing nurses and the loud cries of &“Code Blue.&” She only remembers drifting off…and waking up in heaven. This unexpected meeting of a self-described sinner and skeptic with her God changed everything. Raised Christian, she had left her faith behind after childhood abuse and the subsequent struggles and suffering of her troubled teens and early adulthood. She longed to believe but felt abandoned, broken, and undeserving. A moving autobiographical testament to the power of divine love and forgiveness, Waking Up in Heaven shares the message of hope, healing, and compassion McVea brought back from her brush with God. This brave, honest account of years lost to shame and guilt will inspire those who&’ve stumbled along their own spiritual journey, with the uplifting reminder that no one is beyond the reach of grace and redemption, and that, in the words of the author, &“God is real. Heaven is real. And God&’s love for us is the realest thing of all.&”