Service Alert
Website maintenance April 24 10pm ET
On Wednesday April 24 at 10pm ET the CELA website will be unavailable for about 15 minutes for planned maintenance.
On Wednesday April 24 at 10pm ET the CELA website will be unavailable for about 15 minutes for planned maintenance.
Showing 1 - 20 of 33363 items
By Thomas Schueman, Zainullah Zaki. 2022
Band of Brothers meets Argo in this dramatic and heartfelt dual memoir of the war in Afghanistan told by two men from opposite…
worlds. Always Faithful entwines the stories of Marine Major Tom Schueman, and his friend and Afghan interpreter, Zainullah “Zak” Zaki, as they describe their parallel lives, converging paths, and unbreakable bond in the face of overwhelming danger, culminating in Zak and his family’s harrowing escape from Kabul. In August of 2021, just days shy of the 20th anniversary of 9/11, America ended its longest war. The speed of the Afghanistan’s fall was so stunning that thousands of Afghan citizens who had helped American forces over the course of two decades—and had been promised visas in return—were suddenly stranded, in extreme, imminent danger. As the world watched the shocking scenes of desperation at the Kabul airport in the final two weeks of August, Maj. Tom Schueman fought—both behind the scenes and through a social media campaign—to get his friend and former Afghan interpreter, Zak, out of Afghanistan before he and his family were discovered by the Taliban. When Zak and his family finally took off from the airport mere days before the US left the country, the years-long effort to get Zak to America culminated in two simple words on Instagram: “Wheels up.”Now in Always Faithful, Tom and Zak tell the full story of the divergent paths that led them to Afghanistan, the dangerous road they walked together in service to America, and how their commitment to each other ended up saving them both. Brilliantly told in Tom’s and Zak’s alternating first person voices, Always Faithful tracks the parallel lives of these two men who each spent their childhoods in fear, peril, and poverty, and turned to war in attempt to build a meaningful future. On an inevitable course towards each other, their lives dovetail in Afghanistan’s deadly Helmand Valley, where they formed a brotherhood that transcends even the most overwhelming of odds, eventually culminating in Zak’s harrowing, eleventh-hour rescue.The end result is an intensely personal and uniquely ground-level account of Tom and Zak’s experience, Always Faithful gives readers a 360-degree view of the war. At once provocative and heart pounding, their stories together form a microcosm of the complicated and lasting effects of America’s longest war. Through their eyes and their experiences, they challenge readers to explore the legacy of the war for American and Afghan citizens alike, as we all collectively seek to understand whether twenty years of war was worth the price.By James M. Scott. 2022
"Riveting.…This book is required reading for anyone with even a passing interest in World War II and the Pacific Theater."…
—Bob Carden, Boston Globe Seven minutes past midnight on March 10, 1945, nearly 300 American B-29s thundered into the skies over Tokyo. Their payloads of incendiaries ignited a firestorm that reached up to 2,800 degrees, liquefying asphalt and vaporizing thousands; sixteen square miles of the city were flattened and more than 100,000 men, women, and children were killed. Black Snow is the story of this devastating operation, orchestrated by Major General Curtis LeMay, who famously remarked: “If we lose the war, we’ll be tried as war criminals.” James M. Scott reconstructs in granular detail that horrific night, and describes the development of the B-29, the capture of the Marianas for use as airfields, and the change in strategy from high-altitude daylight “precision” bombing to low-altitude nighttime incendiary bombing. Most importantly, the raid represented a significant moral shift for America, marking the first time commanders deliberately targeted civilians which helped pave the way for the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki five months later. Drawing on first-person interviews with American pilots and bombardiers and Japanese survivors, air force archives, and oral histories never before published in English, Scott delivers a harrowing and gripping account, and his most important and compelling work to date.By Esmeralda Santiago. 1993
One of "The Best Memoirs of a Generation" (Oprah's Book Club): a young woman's journey from the mango groves and…
barrios of Puerto Rico to Brooklyn, and eventually on to Harvard In a childhood full of tropical beauty and domestic strife, poverty and tenderness, Esmeralda Santiago learned the proper way to eat a guava, the sound of tree frogs, the taste of morcilla, and the formula for ushering a dead baby's soul to heaven. But when her mother, Mami, a force of nature, takes off to New York with her seven, soon to be eleven children, Esmeralda, the oldest, must learn new rules, a new language, and eventually a new identity. In the first of her three acclaimed memoirs, Esmeralda brilliantly recreates her tremendous journey from the idyllic landscape and tumultuous family life of her earliest years, to translating for her mother at the welfare office, and to high honors at Harvard.By Josh Kilmer-Purcell. 2006
“A glittering, bittersweet vision of an outsider who turned himself into the life and soul of the party. Kilmer-Purcell’s cast…
is part freak-show, part soap-opera, but his prose is graced with such insight and wit that the laughter is revelatory, and the tears—and there are tears to be shed along this extraordinary journey—are shed for people in whom everybody will find something of themselves. In a word, wonderful.” — Clive Barker“Absolutely hilarious and heartbreaking and heartfelt.” —Armistead Maupin, author of Tales of the CityThe New York Times bestselling, darkly funny memoir of a young New Yorker's daring dual life—advertising art director by day, glitter-dripping drag queen and nightclub beauty-pageant hopeful by night—was a smash literary debut for Josh Kilmer-Purcell, now known for his popular Planet Green television series The Fabulous Beekman Boys. His story begins here—before the homemade goat milk soaps and hand-gathered honeys, before his memoir of the city mouse’s move to the country, The Bucolic Plague—in I Am Not Myself These Days, with “plenty of dishy anecdotes and moments of tragi-camp delight” (Washington Post).By Ariel Leve. 2009
“Ariel Leve is the love child of David Sedaris and Fran Leibowitz. An original and funny voice…. Insightful and sharp.”…
— Joan Rivers “Ariel Leve is brilliant and funny and the only other person I know without an oven. Buy this book and keep it close.” — Bill Nighy “Funny, smart, delightfully cranky”(AJ Jacobs) Ariel Leve’s Sunday Times Magazine (London) column “Cassandra” moves to book form. It Could Be Worse, You Could Be Me offers a humorously bleak perspective on life’s potential to turn out badly… and Ariel’s innate ability to put the black cloud into the silver lining. This is a book for schadenfreude aficionados; for readers who identify with Cassandra’s slogan, “worrying is my yoga”; and for fans of Seinfeld, Ugly Betty, Sex & the City, Curb Your Enthusiasm, David Sedaris, Woody Allen, and New Yorker cartoons.By Jay Williams. 2016
New York Times BestsellerThis big-hearted memoir by the most promising professional basketball player of his generation details his rise to…
NBA stardom, the terrible accident that ended his career and plunged him into a life-altering depression, and how he ultimately found his way out of the darkness.Ten years ago, Jay Williams was at the beginning of a brilliant professional basketball career. The Chicago Bulls’ top draft pick—and the second pick of the entire draft—he had the great Michael Jordan’s locker. Then he ran his high-performance motorcycle head-on into a light pole, severely damaging himself and ending his career.In this intense, hard-hitting, and deeply profound memoir, Williams talks about the accident that transformed him. Sometimes, the memories are so fresh, he feels like he’ll never escape the past. Most days, he finds a quiet peace as a commentator on ESPN and as an entrepreneur who can only look back in astonishment at his younger self—a kid who had it all, thought he was invincible, and lost everything . . . only to gain new wisdom.Williams also shares behind the scenes details of life as an All-American. He tells it straight about the scandalous recruiting process and his decision to return to Duke and Coach K—a man who taught him about accountability—to finish his education. He also speaks out about corruption—among coaches, administrators, players, and alumni—and about his time in the NBA, introducing us to a dark underworld culture in the pros: the gambling, drugs, and sex in every city, with players on every team.By Wendy Pearlman. 2017
LONG-LISTED FOR THE CARNEGIE MEDALReminiscent of the work of Nobel Prize winner Svetlana Alexievich, an astonishing collection of intimate wartime…
testimonies and poetic fragments from a cross-section of Syrians whose lives have been transformed by revolution, war, and flight.Against the backdrop of the wave of demonstrations known as the Arab Spring, in 2011 hundreds of thousands of Syrians took to the streets demanding freedom, democracy and human rights. The government’s ferocious response, and the refusal of the demonstrators to back down, sparked a brutal civil war that over the past five years has escalated into the worst humanitarian catastrophe of our times. Yet despite all the reporting, the video, and the wrenching photography, the stories of ordinary Syrians remain unheard, while the stories told about them have been distorted by broad brush dread and political expediency. This fierce and poignant collection changes that. Based on interviews with hundreds of displaced Syrians conducted over four years across the Middle East and Europe, We Crossed a Bridge and It Trembled is a breathtaking mosaic of first-hand testimonials from the frontlines. Some of the testimonies are several pages long, eloquent narratives that could stand alone as short stories; others are only a few sentences, poetic and aphoristic. Together, they cohere into an unforgettable chronicle that is not only a testament to the power of storytelling but to the strength of those who face darkness with hope, courage, and moral conviction.By H. R. McMaster. 2020
New York Times BestsellerNow with new text from McMaster addressing the January 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol and recommending how…
citizens across the free world can work together to restore confidence in democratic institutions and processesFrom Lt. General H.R. McMaster, U.S. Army, ret., the former National Security Advisor and author of the bestselling classic Dereliction of Duty, comes a bold and provocative re-examination of the most critical foreign policy and national security challenges that face the United States, and an urgent call to compete to preserve America’s standing and security.Across multiple administrations since the end of the Cold War, American foreign policy has been misconceived, inconsistent, and poorly implemented. As a result, America and the free world have fallen behind rivals in power and influence. Meanwhile threats to security, freedom, and prosperity, such as nuclear proliferation and jihadist terrorism have grown. In BATTLEGROUNDS, H.R. McMaster describes efforts to reassess and fundamentally shift policies while he was National Security Advisor. And he provides a clear pathway forward to improve strategic competence and prevail in complex competitions against our adversaries.Battlegrounds is a groundbreaking reassessment of America’s place in the world, drawing from McMaster’s long engagement with these issues, including 34 years of service in the U.S. Army with multiple tours of duty in battlegrounds overseas and his 13 months as National Security Advisor in the Trump White House. It is also a powerful call for Americans and citizens of the free world to transcend the vitriol of partisan political discourse, better educate themselves about the most significant challenges to national and international security and work together to secure peace and prosperity for future generations.By Rita Coolidge, Michael Walker. 2016
The two-time Grammy Award-winning singer and songwriter bares her heart and soul in this intimate memoir, a story of music,…
stardom, love, family, heritage, and resilience.She inspired songs—Leon Russell wrote “A Song for You” and “Delta Lady” for her, Stephen Stills wrote “Cherokee.” She co-wrote songs—“Superstar” and the piano coda to “Layla,” uncredited. She sang backup for Eric Clapton, Joe Cocker, and Stills, before finding fame as a solo artist with such hits as “We're All Alone” and “(Your Love Has Lifted Me) Higher and Higher.” Following her story from Lafayette, Tennessee to becoming one of the most sought after rock vocalists in LA in the 1970s, Delta Lady chronicles Rita Coolidge’s fascinating journey throughout the ’60s-’70s pop/rock universe.A muse to some of the twentieth century’s most influential rock musicians, she broke hearts, and broke up bands. Her relationship with drummer Jim Gordon took a violent turn during the legendary 1970 Mad Dogs & Englishmen tour; David Crosby maintained that her triangle with Stills and Graham Nash was the last straw for the group. Her volatile six-year marriage to Kris Kristofferson yielded two Grammys, a daughter, and one of the Baby Boom generation’s epic love stories. Throughout it all, her strength, resilience, and inner and outer beauty—along with her strong sense of heritage and devotion to her family—helped her to not only survive, but thrive. Co-written with best-selling author Michael Walker, Delta Lady is a rich, deeply personal memoir that offers a front row seat to an iconic era, and illuminates the life of an artist whose career has helped shape modern American culture.By Pete Hegseth. 2020
A New York Times bestseller.From FOX & Friends Weekend cohost Pete Hegseth comes a collection of inspiring stories from fifteen of America’s…
greatest heroes—highly decorated Navy SEALs, Army Rangers, marines, Purple Heart recipients, combat pilots, a Medal of Honor recipient, and more—based on FOX Nation’s hit show of the same name.After three Army deployments—earning two Bronze Stars and a Combat Infantryman’s Badge—Pete Hegseth knows what it takes to be a modern warrior. In Modern Warriors he presents candid, unfiltered conversations with fellow modern warriors and digs for real answers to key questions like: What inspired them to serve? What is their legacy? What does sacrifice really mean to them? How do they handle loss? And what can civilians learn from this latest generation of veterans?From the skies over Afghanistan to the seas of the Mediterranean to the treacherous streets of Iraq, these brave men and women take you inside the firefight, sharing the harrowing realities of war. Hegseth uses their experiences to facilitate conversations about the raw truths of combat, including the difficulties of transitioning back home, while also celebrating these soldiers’ contributions to preserving our nation’s most precious gift—freedom.In addition to the oral history, Modern Warriors presents dozens of personal, rarely shared photos from the battlefield and the home front. Together these stories and images provide an unvarnished representation of battlefield leadership, military morale, and the strain of war. This book is the perfect keepsake and gift for anyone who wants to know what it means, and what it truly takes, to be a patriot.By Frank Langella. 2012
Rita Hayworth dancing by candlelight; Elizabeth Taylor tenderly wrapping him in her Pashmina scarf; streaking for Sir Laurence Olivier in…
a drafty English castle; terrifying a dozing Jackie Onassis; carrying an unconscious Montgomery Clift to safety on a dark New York street...Captured forever in a unique memoir, Frank Langella’s myriad encounters with some of the past century’s most famous human beings are profoundly affecting, funny, wicked, sometimes shocking, and utterly irresistible. With sharp wit and a perceptive eye, Mr. Langella takes us with him into the private worlds and privileged lives of movie stars, presidents, royalty, literary lions, the social elite, and the greats of the Broadway stage. We learn something, too, of Mr. Langella’s personal journey from the age of fifteen to the present day. Dropped Names is, like its subjects, riveting and unforgettable.By Elizabeth Willard Thames. 2018
The deeply personal story of why award-winning personal finance blogger Elizabeth Willard Thames abandoned a successful career in the city…
and embraced extreme frugality in order to create a more meaningful, purpose-driven life and retire to a homestead in the woods at age thirty-two with her husband and daughter.In 2014, Elizabeth and Nate Thames were conventional 9-5 young urban professionals. But the couple had a dream to become modern-day homesteaders in rural Vermont. Determined to retire as early as possible in order to start living each day—as opposed to wishing time away working for the weekends—they enacted a plan to save an enormous amount of money: well over seventy percent of their joint take home pay. Dubbing themselves the Frugalwoods, Elizabeth began documenting their unconventional frugality and the resulting wholesale lifestyle transformation on their eponymous blog.In less than three years, Elizabeth and Nate reached their goal. Today, they are financially independent and living out their dream on a sixty-six-acre homestead in the woods of rural Vermont with their young daughter. While frugality makes their lifestyle possible, it’s also what brings them peace and genuine happiness. They don’t stress out about impressing people with their material possessions, buying the latest gadgets, or keeping up with any Joneses. In the process, Elizabeth discovered the self-confidence and liberation that stems from disavowing our culture’s promise that we can buy our way to "the good life." Elizabeth unlocked the freedom of a life no longer beholden to the clarion call to consume ever-more products at ever-higher sums.Meet the Frugalwoods is the intriguing story of how Elizabeth and Nate realized that the mainstream path wasn’t for them, crafted a lifestyle of sustainable frugality, and reached financial independence at age thirty-two. While not everyone wants to live in the woods, or quit their jobs, many of us want to have more control over our time and money and lead more meaningful, simplified lives. Following their advice, you too can live your best life.By Ariel Leve. 2016
“Sometimes, a child is born to a parent who can’t be a parent, and, like a seedling in the shade,…
has to grow toward a distant sun. Ariel Leve’s spare and powerful memoir will remind us that family isn’t everything—kindness and nurturing are.” —Gloria SteinemAriel Leve grew up in Manhattan with an eccentric mother she describes as “a poet, an artist, a selfappointed troublemaker and attention seeker.” Leve learned to become her own parent, taking care of herself and her mother’s needs. There would be uncontrolled, impulsive rages followed with denial, disavowed responsibility, and then extreme outpourings of affection. How does a child learn to feel safe in this topsyturvy world of conditional love?Leve captures the chaos and lasting impact of a child’s life under siege and explores how the coping mechanisms she developed to survive later incapacitated her as an adult. There were material comforts, but no emotional safety, except for summer visits to her father’s home in South East Asia-an escape that was terminated after he attempted to gain custody. Following the death of a loving caretaker, a succession of replacements raised Leve-relationships which resulted in intense attachment and loss. It was not until decades later, when Leve moved to other side of the world, that she could begin to emancipate herself from the past. In a relationship with a man who has children, caring for them yields a clarity of what was missing.In telling her haunting story, Leve seeks to understand the effects of chronic psychological maltreatment on a child’s developing brain, and to discover how to build a life for herself that she never dreamed possible: An unabbreviated life.By Donald Stratton, Ken Gire. 2016
The New York Times bestselling memoir of survival and heroism at Pearl Harbor“An unforgettable story of unfathomable courage.” —Reader’s DigestIn this, the…
first memoir by a USS Arizona sailor, Donald Stratton delivers an inspiring and unforgettable eyewitness account of the Pearl Harbor attack and his remarkable return to the fight. At 8:10 a.m. on December 7, 1941, Seaman First Class Donald Stratton was consumed by an inferno. A million pounds of explosives had detonated beneath his battle station aboard the USS Arizona, barely fifteen minutes into Japan’s surprise attack on American forces at Pearl Harbor. Near death and burned across two thirds of his body, Don, a nineteen-year-old Nebraskan who had been steeled by the Great Depression and Dust Bowl, summoned the will to haul himself hand over hand across a rope tethered to a neighboring vessel. Forty-five feet below, the harbor’s flaming, oil-slick water boiled with enemy bullets; all around him the world tore itself apart. In this extraordinary, never-before-told eyewitness account of the Pearl Harbor attack—the only memoir ever written by a survivor of the USS Arizona—ninety-four-year-old veteran Donald Stratton finally shares his unforgettable personal tale of bravery and survival on December 7, 1941, his harrowing recovery, and his inspiring determination to return to the fight. Don and four other sailors made it safely across the same line that morning, a small miracle on a day that claimed the lives of 1,177 of their Arizona shipmates—approximately half the American fatalaties at Pearl Harbor. Sent to military hospitals for a year, Don refused doctors’ advice to amputate his limbs and battled to relearn how to walk. The U.S. Navy gave him a medical discharge, believing he would never again be fit for service, but Don had unfinished business. In June 1944, he sailed back into the teeth of the Pacific War on a destroyer, destined for combat in the crucial battles of Leyte Gulf, Luzon, and Okinawa, thus earning the distinction of having been present for the opening shots and the final major battle of America’s Second World War.As the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack approaches, Don, a great-grandfather of five and one of six living survivors of the Arizona, offers an unprecedentedly intimate reflection on the tragedy that drew America into the greatest armed conflict in history. All the Gallant Men is a book for the ages, one of the most remarkable—and remarkably inspiring—memoirs of any kind to appear in recent years.*Library JournalBy Adam Nicolson. 2005
“Strikingly original. . . . Nicolson brings to life superbly the horror, devastation, and gore of Trafalgar.” —The EconomistAdam Nicolson…
takes the great naval battle of Trafalgar, fought between the British and Franco-Spanish fleets, and uses it to examine our idea of heroism and the heroic. A story rich with modern resonance, Seize the Fire reveals the economic impact of the battle as a victorious Great Britain emerged as a global commercial empire.In October 1805 Lord Horatio Nelson, the most brilliant sea commander who ever lived, led the British Royal Navy to a devastating victory over the Franco-Spanish fleets at the great battle of Trafalgar. It was the foundation of Britain's nineteenth-century world-dominating empire. Seize the Fire is not only a close and revealing portrait of a legendary hero in his final action but also a vivid account of the brutal realities of battle; it asks the questions: Why did the winners win? What was it about the British, their commanders and their men, their beliefs and their ambitions, that took them to such overwhelming victory?His masterful history is a portrait of a moment, a close and passionately engaged depiction of a frame of mind at a turning point in world history.By Michael Savage. 1985
Radio legend Michael Savage reveals the man behind the microphone, sharing his extraordinary American journey and the adventures that shaped…
him.**FEATURING EXCLUSIVE, NEVER-BEFORE-PUBLISHED NEW MATERIAL**For twenty-five years, Michael Savage has captivated listeners on his national radio show The Savage Nation, which reaches a loyal audience of more than ten million each week. In A Savage Life, the usually private man tells his own compelling story in forty-six vignettes that span his childhood to today. These tales of Savage’s journey from poor immigrant’s son in New York City to media star are deeply personal and revealing: he writes of being so poor as a child that he had to wear a dead man’s pants; of the various trials that beset his parents and “silent brother,” Jerome, who was sent to an institution; of his botanical expeditions to Fiji in the 1970’s; and, most of all, of his family, his sustaining force throughout. “A marvelous storyteller.”— THE NEW YORKER“Vivid storytelling.” — WASHINGTON TIMESBy Jillian Keenan. 2016
A provocative, moving, kinky, and often absurdly funny memoir about Shakespeare, love, obsession, and spankingWhen it came to understanding love,…
a teenage Jillian Keenan had nothing to guide her—until a production of The Tempest sent Shakespeare’s language flowing through her blood for the first time. In Sex with Shakespeare, she tells the story of how the Bard’s plays helped her embrace her unusual sexual identity and find a love story of her own.Four hundred years after Shakespeare’s death, Keenan’s smart and passionate memoir brings new life to his work. With fourteen of his plays as a springboard, she explores the many facets of love and sexuality—from desire and communication to fetish and fantasy. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Keenan unmasks Helena as a sexual masochist—like Jillian herself. In Macbeth, she examines criminalized sexual identities and the dark side of “privacy.” The Taming of the Shrew goes inside the secret world of bondage, domination, and sadomasochism, while King Lear exposes the ill-fated king as a possible sexual predator. Moving through the canon, Keenan makes it abundantly clear that literature is a conversation. In Sex with Shakespeare, words are love.As Keenan wanders the world in search of connection, from desert dictatorships to urban islands to disputed territories, Shakespeare goes with her —and provokes complex, surprising, and wildly important conversations about sexuality, consent, and the secrets that simmer beneath our surfaces.By Michael Bar-Zohar, Nissim Mishal. 2015
A riveting follow-up to Michael Bar-Zohar and Nissim Mishal’s account of the most memorable missions of the Mossad, No Mission…
Is Impossible sheds light on some of the most harrowing, nail-biting operations of the Israeli Special Forces.In No Mission Is Impossible, Michael Bar-Zohar and Nissim Mishal depict in electrifying detail major battles, raids in enemy territory, and the death- defying commando missions of the Israeli Special Forces. The stories are often of victories, but sometimes also of immense failures, and they run side by side with the accounts of the lives and accomplishments of some of Israel’s most prominent figures. Captivating and eye-opening, No Mission Is Impossible is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding how these crucial missions shaped Israel, and the world at large.By Terri Cheney. 2008
An attractive, highly successful Beverly Hills entertainment lawyer, Terri Cheney had been battling debilitating bipolar disorder for the better part…
of her life—and concealing a pharmacy’s worth of prescription drugs meant to stabilize her moods and make her "normal." In explosive bursts of prose that mirror the devastating mania and extreme despair of her illness, Cheney describes her roller-coaster existence with shocking honesty, giving brilliant voice to the previously unarticulated madness she endured. Brave, electrifying, poignant, and disturbing, Manic does not simply explain bipolar disorder—it takes us into its grasp and does not let go.By Michael Savage. 1985
A #1 New York Times bestselling author and superstar radio personality, Michael Savage is admired by millions for his tough…
talk and no-punches-pulled common sense about the state of our union and its leaders. In Train Tracks, a more personal side of Savage shines through in this marvelous collection of “American Stories for the Holidays.” Like Glen Beck’s blockbuster, The Christmas Sweater, Michael Savage’s poignant, personal stories of home, family, and the holidays will resonate with readers everywhere.The holidays. It's the time when families gather and reflect on the past year, to remember losses, to toast triumphs, to look forward to new beginnings. In the spirit of the season, beloved author and radio host Michael Savage's Train Tracks reminds us how every member of our family—in fact, each individual we encounter through time—contributes essential gifts to our life story.In the title chapter, set in the early 1950s, Savage remembers the excitement and mystery of riding the train from New York's old Penn Station to rural Pennsylvania at the start of the holiday break. Drawn from Savage's own journey from poor immigrant's son to media stardom, these deeply personal true tales show us that even in today's homogenizing times, we are all charting a unique destiny as we journey through life.Train Tracks is an instant holiday classic by an American original—a very special gift to be read and shared as we gather together.