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Christmas at the Ragdoll Orphanage
By Suzanne Lambert. 2013
Discover a magical true story of the power of love and motherhood . . . 'Filled with warmth and love,…
and is so life-affirming' 5***** reader reviewTwo-week-old Suzanne was left at the door of Nazareth House orphanage - abandoned by the very people who should have given her the love, protection and care she desperately needed. But when Nancy - the orphanage nanny - held Suzanne in her arms and looked into her eyes, she felt a magical bond. It seemed that a guardian angel had brought them both together. Yet their future looked uncertain. Would Nancy ever be allowed to adopt tiny Suzanne? And could their love endure all that the years ahead were to send them? A tear-jerking and unforgettable story about the struggles and joys of parenthood and childhood, and how, for an orphan, having somewhere to call home makes every day feel like Christmas. ____________'A fantastic read' 5***** reader review 'Lovingly portrayed' 5***** reader review'Well written, funny and very moving' 5***** reader reviewCastles in the Air is a beautifully written, autobiographical story of rescuing an ancient mansion. Gwydir Castle was inhabited by…
ravers and rats until Judy Corbett and her husband Peter Welford found and acquired this 500-year-old house mouldering in the foothills of Snowdonia. Despite the toads, strange smells and squatters, they decided to mortgage themselves to the hilt to bring the castle back to life.This is an evocatively written and genuinely moving book and is infused with an extraordinary sense of place. The couple's adventures in a gothic wonderland lead them through plots both supernatural and historical. In a museum storeroom in a Bronx warehouse they find a missing room, in the castle's Solar Tower the ghost of a young woman appears and from the far edges of the woods a silent man called Sven emerges to befriend the couple and their beloved castle.For everyone who has ever wanted to live in a glorious house or escape from the mundanity of life - Castles in the Air is pure magic.Call Me Red: A shepherd’s journey
By Hannah Jackson. 2021
Sunday Times bestsellerLessons to live by, without getting up with the lark Hannah Jackson (aka The Red Shepherdess) grew up…
in the Wirral, and hadn't set foot on a farm until she was 20-years-old. But she'd always loved animals and on a visit to the Lake District, she saw a lamb being born and had a light bulb moment - a burning desire to succeed as a farmer - and never looked back.In Tales of a Shepherdess, Hannah gives us a unique insight into farm life and the values it has taught her that we can use in our everyday lives to change ourselves and our world for the better - from connection, communication and community, to leadership, patience and resilience. Hannah will show us how becoming a lambing and farming contractor in a male-dominated and traditional world taught her grit and determination; how training her loyal sheepdog Fraser taught her to trust; and how sometimes failure can teach us more about ourselves than success. Hannah's journey also teaches us how we should find what sets our hearts on fire and throw everything into it.Hannah's simple and universal wisdom, practical advice, and words of encouragement will inspire you to achieve your goals, follow your dreams and focus on what's really important in life.Bookworm: A Memoir of Childhood Reading
By Lucy Mangan. 2018
A love letter to the joys of childhood reading from Wonderland to Narnia.When Lucy Mangan was little, stories were everything.…
They opened up new worlds and cast light on all the complexities she encountered in this one.She was whisked away to Narnia - and Kirrin Island - and Wonderland. She ventured down rabbit holes and womble burrows into midnight gardens and chocolate factories. She wandered the countryside with Milly-Molly-Mandy, and played by the tracks with the Railway Children. With Charlotte's Web she discovered Death and with Judy Blume it was Boys. No wonder she only left the house for her weekly trip to the library or to spend her pocket money on amassing her own at home.In Bookworm, Lucy revisits her childhood reading with wit, love and gratitude. She relives our best-beloved books, their extraordinary creators, and looks at the thousand subtle ways they shape our lives. She also disinters a few forgotten treasures to inspire the next generation of bookworms and set them on their way.Lucy brings the favourite characters of our collective childhoods back to life - prompting endless re-readings, rediscoveries, and, inevitably, fierce debate - and brilliantly uses them to tell her own story, that of a born, and unrepentant, bookworm.'Passionate, witty, informed, and gloriously opinionated' Jacqueline Wilson author of The Story of Tracy BeakerA Book for Her
By Bridget Christie. 2015
Bridget Christie is a stand-up comedian, idiot and feminist. On the 30th of April 2012, a man farted in the…
Women’s Studies Section of a bookshop and it changed her life forever. A Book For Her details Christie’s twelve years of anonymous toil in the bowels of stand-up comedy and the sudden epiphany that made her, unbelievably, one of the most critically acclaimed British stand-up comedians this decade, drawing together the threads that link a smelly smell in the women’s studies section to the global feminist struggle. Find out how nice Peter Stringfellow’s fish tastes, how yoghurt advertising perpetuates rape myths, and how Emily Bronte used a special ladies’ pen to write Wuthering Heights.If you’re interested in comedy and feminism, then this is definitely the book for you. If you hate both then I’d probably give it a miss. “Christie is adept at turning on a sixpence between being comical, or serious, or both at once, and at pricking her own earnestness.” Telegraph‘Christie piles derision and tomfoolery upon everyday sexism, while never pretending that jokes alone will solve the problem.’ GuardianThe Bonfire Of Berlin
By Helga Schneider. 1995
Abandoned by her mother, who left to pursue a career as a camp guard at Auschwitz-Birkenau, loathed by her step-mother,…
cooped up in a cellar, starved, parched, lonely amidst the fetid crush of her neighbours, Helga Schneider endured the horrors of wartime Berlin. The Bonfire of Berlin is a searing account of her survival. The grinding misery of hunger, combined with the terror of air-raids, the absence of fresh water and the constant threat of death and disease served not to unite the tenants and neighbours of her apartment block but rather to intensify the minor irritations of communal life into flashpoints of rage and violence. And with Russian victory the survivors could not look forward a return to peacetime but rather to pillage and rape. It was only gradually that Schneider's life returned to some kind of normality, as her beloved father returned from the front, carrying his own scars of the war. This shocking book evokes the reality of life in a wartime city in all its brutality and deprivation, while retaining a kernel of hope that while life remains not all is lost.Elle a osé réussir (in English, She Dared to Succeed), delves into the life of a woman who, for more…
than 30 years, broke multiple glass ceilings in the Canadian media and political worlds. Well-known in the broadcasting industry, she was propelled to the political forefront following her appointment to the Senate of Canada (1995) and her election as President of the Liberal Party of Canada (2006). She had to overcome many challenges throughout her career: sexism, prejudice against single mothers and career women, wage disparities, and harassment in the workplace. Above all, she experienced the opprobrium reserved for Senate members—all of whom were exonerated—targeted as part of the Senate expenses scandal (2012-2016). In this book, she bears witness to the human cost of this chapter of Canadian history. This biography, with a foreword by the Hon. John Manley, is the fruit of impressive research by the author, who not only interviewed Madame Charette-Poulin at length, but also conducted 67 interviews, including with prominent Canadians such as Right Honourable Jean Chrétien and Brian Mulroney, the Honourable Sheila Copps, Sharon Carstairs, Mike Duffy, Hugh Segal, Céline Hervieux-Payette, Vivienne Poy, Linda Frum, Sheila Fraser, as well as judges Robert Desmarais, and Robert Del Frate. She dared to succeed... despite it all.Also available in English (She Dared To Succeed)Available in hardcover, trade paperback, and accessible PDF et ePUB formats.Real Life
By Melissa Kite. 2012
Does an exciting weekend for you mean scrubbing all the grouting in your bathroom with a toothbrush? Have you ever…
felt the urge to kidnap the cable guy and tie him to the bed like Kathy Bates in Misery because you are terrified the TV will stop working once he's gone? Do you ponder marrying the Albanian builder who has just fitted alcove shelving because he's brought you more happiness in three days than your useless ex-boyfriend brought you in three years? Are you engaged in endless rows with call centre staff called Keeley who hang up on you because you are 'shouting and hysterical'? Are you convinced the entire world is engaged in a conspiracy to drive you insane, especially the automated phone system that generates ten text messages whenever you try to book a minicab?Do you write to-do lists that need paginating, and include items such as 're-mortgage house, get pregnant, climb Kilimanjaro'?Welcome to Melissa Kite's life. If you answered yes to three or more of these questions, clearly you too are a desperate single woman trying to survive in the modern world. If not, congratulations: you will have a good laugh reading this book.The Biscuit Girls
By Hunter Davies. 2015
Ivy, Dulcie, Barbara, Ann, Dorothy and Jean all had different reasons for applying to work at Carr’s biscuits, but once…
they had put on their overalls and walked through the factory gates they discovered a community full of life, laughter and friendship. To those who didn’t know, the biscuit factory that towered over Carlisle might look like just another slice of the industrial North, a noisy and chaotic place with workers trooping in and out at all hours. For the biscuit girls it was a place where they worked hard, but also where they gossiped, got into scrapes and made lifelong friends. Outside the factory walls there might be difficult husbands or demanding kids, and sometimes even heartbreak and tragedy, but they knew there would always be an escape from their troubles at Carr's. Some, like Barbara, only applied because she needed the extra cash, until things got a bit easier at home. Her supervisor cross examined her about who would be looking after the kids while she was at work, but let her have the job. Like many of the women who joined up ‘temporary’ Barbara went on to stay at Carrs for 32 years.Beginning in the 1940s, these heartwarming and vividly-remembered stories have all been told by the women themselves to Hunter Davies.Between the Covers: Jilly Cooper on sex, socialising and survival
By Jilly Cooper Obe. 2020
'No one else can make me laugh and cry quite like Jilly Cooper.' Gill Sims'Jilly Cooper's non-fiction is just as…
entertaining as her novels.' Pandora Sykes____________________'One truth I have learnt, as middle age enmeshes me like Virginia creeper, is that I shall never change-because my capacity for self-improvement is absolutely nil.'Jilly Cooper's observations from her days as a much-loved newspaper columnist cover everything to do with sex, socialising and survival - from marriage, friendship and the minutiae of family life, to the tedium of going to visit people for the weekend, the stress of hosting dinner parties and the descent of middle age. Entertaining and full of heart, this classic collection of journalism from the legendary author explores the highs and lows of everyday life with wit, wisdom and warmth.Praise for Jilly Cooper:'Joyful and mischievous' Jojo Moyes'Fun, sexy and unputdownable' Marian Keyes'Flawlessly entertaining' Helen FieldingAll Sorts of Lives: Katherine Mansfield and the art of risking everything
By Claire Harman. 2023
** The Sunday Times Best Literary Book of 2023**** A Waterstones Best Book of 2023**'All Sorts of Lives is a…
beautiful, fastidiously researched and fascinating exploration of Mansfield's life and work' A.L. KENNEDYRestless outsider, masher-up of form and convention, Katherine Mansfield’s career was short but dazzling. She was the only writer Virginia Woolf admitted being jealous of, yet by the 1950s was so undervalued that Elizabeth Bowen was moved to ask, 'Where is she – our missing contemporary?'In this inventive and intimate study, Claire Harman takes a fresh look at Mansfield’s life and achievements, through the form she did so much to revolutionise: the short story. Exploring ten pivotal works, we watch how Mansfield’s desire to grow as a writer pushed her art into unknown territory, and how illness sharpened her extraordinary vitality: ‘Would you not like to try all sorts of lives – one is so very small.’‘What a gift to the biographer, this life of adventure and sickness and sex and celebrity… Brilliant’ Sunday Times‘A searching, incisive and compulsive book. A lesson in how to read and connect and understand’ Sunjeev SahotaAirhead: The Imperfect Art of Making News
By Emily Maitlis. 2019
FEATURING EMILY MAITLIS' GROUNDBREAKING INTERVIEW WITH PRINCE ANDREWThe news has never been more prominent - but are we getting the…
full story? Newsnight presenter Emily Maitlis gives us a behind-the-scenes look at some of the biggest news stories and interviews of recent years 'Smart, funny and brilliantly told' Elizabeth Day 'Revelatory, riveting and frequently hilarious' James O'Brien 'Absolutely irresistible' Jeremy Vine ________ In this no holds barred account of life in the seconds before, during and after going on air, Newsnight presenter, leading journalist, and queen of the side eye Emily Maitlis gives us the insider info on what we don't get to see on-screen. Giving us the inside scoop on her interviews with everyone from Emma Thompson to Russell Brand, and Donald Trump to Tony Blair, as well as covering news stories such as President Clinton's affairs, Boris Johnson's race to PM, Grenfell, #MeToo, and that interview with Prince Andrew. Airhead is a brilliant exposé of the moments that never make the news. From News Presenter of the Year and 2020 BAFTA nominee ________ 'Funny and subtly smart' GUARDIAN, BOOKS OF THE YEAR DAILY MAIL BOOKS OF THE YEAR 'Deliciously funny . . . Irresistible' The Times '[Emily] is so absolutely of the moment' Evening StandardWisdom of Wildly Creative Women: Real Stories from Inspirational, Artistic, and Empowered Women
By Angela Lomenzo, James Lomenzo. 2023
Real Stories from Wildly Creative Women“If you need an extra boost of bravery, read this book! If you want to…
simply feel more positive about the world, read this book!” —Sherry Richert Belul, founder of Simply Celebrate and author of Say It Now#1 New Release in Interviews, Photography Criticism & Essays, and PhotojournalismAngela LoMenzo combines stunning photography and powerful real stories documented from interviews with a diverse group of accomplished women that encourages us to dig deep into our own creative lives!Women from all walks of life. Artists, musicians, authors, fashion designers, entrepreneurs, and others from a multitude of creative careers share their experiences with depression, bullying, infertility, cancer, assault, loss of loved ones, drug addiction, and many other issues women often do not have a safe space to talk about. These stories show you just how real life is.Powerful affirmations and true-life stories to empower you. This book is packed with words of wisdom from women who have both overcome adversity and achieved an authentic life honoring their individuality and freedom of personal expression. Their real stories illustrate that it is possible to live the life you have always desired now.Inside, you’ll find:Words of wisdom and beautiful photography of wildly creative womenRaw and authentic interviews featuring stories by women redefining the role of a womanAnd much more!If you're looking for unique gifts for women who have everything or if you like books such as Women, In the Company of Women, Collective Wisdom, or A Room of Her Own, you need to read Wisdom of Wildly Creative Women!The Strong Black Woman: How a Myth Endangers the Physical and Mental Health of Black Women
By Marita Golden. 2021
Major Health Crisis Among Black Women Generated from Systemic Racism “Marita Golden’s The Strong Black Woman busts the myth that Black women…
are fierce and resilient by letting the reader in under the mask that proclaims ‘Black don’t crack.’” ―Karen Arrington, coach, mentor, philanthropist, and author of NAACP Image Award-winning Your Next Level LifeSarton Women’s Book Award#1 New Release in ReferenceMeet Black women who have learned through hard lessons the importance of self-care and how to break through the cultural and family resistance to seeking therapy and professional mental health care.The Strong Black Woman Syndrome. For generations, in response to systemic racism, Black women and African American culture created the persona of the Strong Black Woman, a woman who, motivated by service and sacrifice, handles, manages, and overcomes any problem, any obstacle. The syndrome calls on Black women to be the problem-solvers and chief caretakers for everyone in their lives―never buckling, never feeling vulnerable, and never bothering with their pain.Hidden mental health crisis of anxiety and depression. To be a Black woman in America is to know you cannot protect your children or guarantee their safety, your value is consistently questioned, and even being “twice as good” is often not good enough. Consequently, Black women disproportionately experience anxiety and depression. Studies now conclusively connect racism and mental health―and physical health.Take care of your emotional health. You deserve to be emotionally healthy for yourself and those you love. More and more young Black women are re-examining the Strong Black Woman syndrome and engaging in self-care practices that change their lives.Hear stories of Black women who:Asked for helpBuilt lives that offer healingLearned to accept healingIf you have read The Unapologetic Guide to Black Mental Health, The Racial Healing Handbook, or Black Fatigue, The Strong Black Woman is your next read.In Search of Fatima: A Palestinian Story
By Ghada Karmi. 2024
"One of the finest, most eloquent and painfully honest memoirs of the Palestinian exile and displacement."–New StatesmanAn intimate memoir of…
the 1948 Nakba, exile and the dispossession of Palestinian landsIn Search of Fatima reflects the author&’s personal experiences of displacement and loss against a backdrop of the major political events which have shaped conflict in the Middle East. Kharmi was born in Jerusalem but her family were forced out in 1948, following the Nakba, when Palestinians were dispossessed of their lands at the hands of the Israeli state.In this moving account of exile, she charts her family's displacement to Jordan, and finally to Golders Green, London, where she initially refused to lay down roots in alien soil. Through this journey, Kharmi charts the personal account of a young woman's search for identity: as a Palestinian far away from home.Speaking for the millions of displaced people worldwide who have lived suspended between their old and new countries, fitting into neither, this is a nuanced exploration of psychological displacement and loss of identity.The Wives: A Memoir
By Simone Gorrindo. 2024
&“A haunting, beautifully written celebration of found sisterhood.&” —Publishers Weekly (starred review) &“A fearless, engaging, and important memoir.&” —Library Journal…
(starred review) &“[A] gorgeously rendered peek behind the curtain of military life.&” —Booklist (starred review) A captivating memoir that tells the story of one woman&’s experience of joining a community of army wives after leaving her New York City job—a profoundly intimate look at marriage, friendship, and the power of human connection.When her new husband joins an elite Army unit, Simone Gorrindo is uprooted from New York City and dropped into Columbus, Georgia. With her husband frequently deployed, Simone is left to find her place in this new world, alone—until she meets the wives. Gorrindo gives us an intimate look into the inner lives of a remarkable group of women and a tender, unflinching portrait of a marriage. A love story, an unforgettable coming-of-age tale, and a bracing tour of the intractable divisions that plague our country today, The Wives offers a rare and powerful gift: a hopeful stitch in the fabric of a torn America.An Uncommon Woman: The Life of Lydia Hamilton Smith (Keystone Books)
By Mark Kelley. 2023
Lydia Hamilton Smith (1813–1884) was a prominent African American businesswoman in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and the longtime housekeeper, life companion, and…
collaborator of the state’s abolitionist congressman Thaddeus Stevens. In his biography of this remarkable woman, Mark Kelley reveals how Smith served the cause of abolition, managed Stevens’s household, acquired property, and crossed racialized social boundaries.Born a free woman near Gettysburg, Smith began working for Stevens in 1844. Her relationship with Stevens fascinated and infuriated many, and it made Smith a highly recognizable figure both locally and nationally. The two walked side by side in Lancaster and in Washington, DC, as they worked to secure the rights of African Americans, sheltered people on the Underground Railroad, managed two households, raised her sons and his nephews, and built a real-estate business. In the last years of Stevens’s life, as his declining health threatened to short-circuit his work, Smith risked her own well-being to keep him alive while he led the drive to end slavery, impeach Andrew Johnson, and push for the ratification of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments.An Uncommon Woman is a vital history that accords Lydia Hamilton Smith the recognition that she deserves. Every American should know Smith’s inspiring story.Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City
By Jane Wong. 2023
2024 PNBA Award Winner "[Wong] paints her story with flourish."—The New York Times "A love letter to Atlantic City and…
the Asian American working class."— The Los Angeles Times "Blazing, lyrical."—The Boston Globe "Joyful. . . . Wong’s memoir invites those who have been overlooked in America to hold up their verses, accolades and solidarity in a collective rejoinder to their detractors."—The Washington Post An incandescent, exquisitely written memoir about family, food, girlhood, resistance, and growing up in a Chinese American restaurant on the Jersey shore. In the late 1980s on the Jersey shore, Jane Wong watches her mother shake ants from an MSG bin behind the family’s Chinese restaurant. She is a hungry daughter frying crab rangoon for lunch, a child sneaking naps on bags of rice, a playful sister scheming to trap her brother in the freezer before he traps her first. Jane is part of a family staking their claim to the American dream, even as this dream crumbles. Beneath Atlantic City’s promise lies her father’s gambling addiction, an addiction that causes him to disappear for days and ultimately leads to the loss of the restaurant. In her debut memoir, Jane Wong tells a new story about Atlantic City, one that resists a single identity, a single story as she writes about making do with what you have—and what you don’t. What does it mean, she asks, to be both tender and angry? What is strength without vulnerability—and humor? Filled with beauty found in unexpected places, Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City is a resounding love song of the Asian American working class, a portrait of how we become who we are, and a story of lyric wisdom to hold and to share.Black Women Writers of Louisiana: Telling Their Stories
By Ann B. Dobie, Daren Tucker. 2022
Louisiana has been home, by birth or adoption, to numerous literary greats. But among that talent, there's an under-celebrated cohort:…
Black women. Due to lack of education and opportunity, their record is fairly brief, but over the past century they have been responsible for a flowering of literature that portrays the Black experience through poetry, fiction, plays, essays and journalism. The writers profiled here have not gone wholly unrecognized though--far from it. Some have been honored with prestigious awards and have found a readership large enough to put them at the forefront of the national literary scene. Beginning with Alice Ruth Dunbar Nelson--a fiery activist, columnist and storyteller in the late nineteenth century--the work extends to Fatima Shaik, named 2021 Louisiana Writer of the Year. Join Ann B. Dobie on this celebration of Louisiana literary talent.Secuestrada: Una historia de la vida real (Atria Espanol)
By Leszli Kalli. 2007
Para los cuarenta y seis ocupantes del avión Fokker 50 de Avianca, que volaba de Bucaramanga a Bogotá, el 12…
de abril de 1999 se convirtió en una pesadilla. Guerrilleros encapuchados secuestraron el avión y lo hicieron aterrizar en una pista abandonada. Entre los pasajeros viajaba Leszli Kálli, una joven de dieciocho años que soñaba vivir una experiencia facinante en un kibutz en Israel. En los campamentos de la guerrilla, Leszli escribió este diario en el que detalla el drama de estar privada de su libertad, las jornadas a pie por senderos sembrados de trampas y minas quiebrapatas, la solidaridad y los conflictos entre los secuestrados, las relaciones con los guerrilleros, a veces afectadas por discusiones, a veces por atracciones y afectos. La especial sensibilidad y el carácter recio de Leszli quedaron consignados en sus cuadernos, en los dibujos y juegos que se intercalan en sus páginas, en las cartas que escribió a Dios, a sus padres y a sus hermanos. Su amor por los animales la enfrentó a guerrilleros y amigos, y hasta a su padre, quien se horrorizó cuando ella le confesó que tenÍa de mascotas, bajo su camastro, a una serpiente y una tarántula. Este diario tambiên contiene la conmovedora defensa de la libertad que hace Leszli, su reclamo por un paÍs justo y sus alegatos contra procedimientos inhumanos de la guerrilla como el secuestro. Son centenares de páginas escritas con rabia, con lágrimas, con ternura, con la impotencia que siente al estar secuestrada.