American Hero: The True Story Of Tommy Hitchcock--sports Star, War Hero, And Champion Of The War-winning P-51 Mustang

Download American Hero: The True Story Of Tommy Hitchcock--sports Star, War Hero, And Champion Of The War-winning P-51 Mustang

This is the true story of Tommy Hitchcock, a war hero, the world’s greatest polo player, businessman, husband of a Mellon, and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s idol after whom he fashioned two of his most famous fictional characters.

Born in 1900 to a wealthy Long Island family of fox hunters and polo players, he joined the French Lafayette Flying Corps at age 17 when the U.S. Air Force said he was too young for combat flying in World War I. He shot down two German planes before being shot down himself. At age 18, he was captured and was put on a German prisoner train from which he leapt to freedom and then snuck across enemy lines for 50 miles to safety in Switzerland. He returned home a hero, played polo at Harvard, and began his legendary career as a 10 goal player for almost 15 years, a feat never equaled in the U.S. He led American teams in international tournaments all over the world and played with some of the greatest players in the game, including his friends Winston Guest, Averill Harriman, and John Hay Whitney. He married Margaret Mellon, the beautiful daughter of William Larimer Mellon who was Chairman of Gulf Oil and a member of the Pittsburgh banking family, with whom he had four children.

F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald knew the Hitchcocks from living across the water from one another at Great Neck and Sands Point. Fitzgerald biographers have noted that he was in awe of Hitchcock, the wealthy WASP sportsman with the charmed life, and he modeled Tom Buchanan in The Great Gatsby after Tommy as well as the Tommy Barban character in Tender is the Night.

Hitchcock became a partner in the Lehman Brothers brokerage firm on Wall Street and commuted to work from Sands Point in a seaplane. When World War II broke out, he lobbied to become a fighter pilot, but the Pentagon told him he was too old. He finagled his way into a role teaching pilots how to fly in England and he championed the B-51 Mustang airplane when the allies were losing the air war to Germany’s Luftwaffe. Tragically, he died in a test flight in 1944 aboard a newly revamped Mustang while flying a nose dive over a field in rural England. His death was front page news all over the world.

Born A Crime: Stories From A South African Childhood

Download Born A Crime: Stories From A South African Childhood

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The compelling, inspiring, and comically sublime story of one man’s coming-of-age, set during the twilight of apartheid and the tumultuous days of freedom that followed NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Michiko Kakutani, New York Times • Newsday • Esquire • NPR • Booklist Trevor Noah’s unlikely path from apartheid South Africa to the desk of The Daily Show began with a criminal act: his birth. Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents’ indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle. Born a Crime is the story of a mischievous young boy who grows into a restless young man as he struggles to find himself in a world where he was never supposed to exist. It is also the story of that young man’s relationship with his fearless, rebellious, and fervently religious mother—his teammate, a woman determined to save her son from the cycle of poverty, violence, and abuse that would ultimately threaten her own life. The stories collected here are by turns hilarious, dramatic, and deeply affecting. Whether subsisting on caterpillars for dinner during hard times, being thrown from a moving car during an attempted kidnapping, or just trying to survive the life-and-death pitfalls of dating in high school, Trevor illuminates his curious world with an incisive wit and unflinching honesty. His stories weave together to form a moving and searingly funny portrait of a boy making his way through a damaged world in a dangerous time, armed only with a keen sense of humor and a mother’s unconventional, unconditional love. Praise for Born a Crime “[A] compelling new memoir . . . By turns alarming, sad and funny, [Trevor Noah’s] book provides a harrowing look, through the prism of Mr. Noah’s family, at life in South Africa under apartheid. . . . Born a Crime is not just an unnerving account of growing up in South Africa under apartheid, but a love letter to the author’s remarkable mother.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times “[An] unforgettable memoir.” — Parade “What makes Born a Crime such a soul-nourishing pleasure, even with all its darker edges and perilous turns, is reading Noah recount in brisk, warmly conversational prose how he learned to negotiate his way through the bullying and ostracism. . . . What also helped was having a mother like Patricia Nombuyiselo Noah. . . . Consider Born a Crime another such gift to her—and an enormous gift to the rest of us.” —USA Today “[Noah] thrives with the help of his astonishingly fearless mother. . . . Their fierce bond makes this story soar.” —People “[Noah’s] electrifying memoir sparkles with funny stories . . . and his candid and compassionate essays deepen our perception of the complexities of race, gender, and class.” — Booklist (starred review) “A gritty memoir . . . studded with insight and provocative social criticism . . . with flashes of brilliant storytelling and acute observations.” — Kirkus Reviews

Krazy: George Herriman, A Life In Black And White

Download Krazy: George Herriman, A Life In Black And White

In the tradition of Schulz and Peanuts, an epic and revelatory biography of Krazy Kat creator George Herriman that explores the turbulent time and place from which he emerged—and the deep secret he explored through his art.

The creator of the greatest comic strip in history finally gets his due—in an eye-opening biography that lays bare the truth about his art, his heritage, and his life on America’s color line. A native of nineteenth-century New Orleans, George Herriman came of age as an illustrator, journalist, and cartoonist in the boomtown of Los Angeles and the wild metropolis of New York. Appearing in the biggest newspapers of the early twentieth century—including those owned by William Randolph Hearst—Herriman’s Krazy Kat cartoons quickly propelled him to fame. Although fitfully popular with readers of the period, his work has been widely credited with elevating cartoons from daily amusements to anarchic art.

Herriman used his work to explore the human condition, creating a modernist fantasia that was inspired by the landscapes he discovered in his travels—from chaotic urban life to the Beckett-like desert vistas of the Southwest. Yet underlying his own life—and often emerging from the contours of his very public art—was a very private secret: known as "the Greek" for his swarthy complexion and curly hair, Herriman was actually African American, born to a prominent Creole family that hid its racial identity in the dangerous days of Reconstruction.

Drawing on exhaustive original research into Herriman’s family history, interviews with surviving friends and family, and deep analysis of the artist’s work and surviving written records, Michael Tisserand brings this little-understood figure to vivid life, paying homage to a visionary artist who helped shape modern culture.

The Last Punisher: A Seal Team Three Sniper's True Account Of The Battle Of Ramadi

Download The Last Punisher: A Seal Team Three Sniper's True Account Of The Battle Of Ramadi

“One of the very best books to come out of the war in Iraq,” (Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, bestselling author of On Killing), The Last Punisher is a gripping and intimate on-the-ground memoir from a Navy SEAL who was part of SEAL Team THREE with American Sniper Chris Kyle. Experience his deployment, from his first mission to his first kill to his eventual successful return to the United States to play himself in the Oscar-nominated film directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Bradley Cooper.

The Last Punisher is a “thoughtful, funny, and raw…always compelling” (Bing West, New York Times bestselling author of No True Glory) first-person account of the Iraq War. With wry humor and moving testimony, Kevin Lacz tells the bold story of his tour in Iraq with SEAL Team THREE, the warrior elite of the Navy. This legendary unit, known as “The Punishers,” included Chris Kyle (American Sniper), Mike Monsoor, Ryan Job, and Marc Lee. These brave men were instrumental in securing the key locations in the pivotal 2006 Battle of Ramadi.

Minute by minute, Lacz relays the edge-of-your-seat details of his team’s missions in Ramadi, offering a firsthand glimpse into the heated combat, extreme conditions, and harrowing experiences they faced every day. Through it all, Lacz and his teammates formed unbreakable bonds and never lost sight of the cause: protecting America with their fight.

“A rare glimpse into the mind of a Navy SEAL,” (Clint Emerson, New York Times bestselling author of 100 Deadly Skills) Kevin Lacz brings you onto the battlefield and relays the tough realities of war. At the same time, Lacz shares how these experiences made him a better man and how proud he is of his contributions to one of this country’s most difficult military campaigns.

The Last Punisher is the story of a SEAL and an “honest-to-God American hero” (Mike Huckabee, #1 bestselling author) who was never afraid to answer the call.

I Will Hold: The Story Of Usmc Legend Clifton B. Cates, From Belleau Wood To Victory In The Great War

Download I Will Hold: The Story Of Usmc Legend Clifton B. Cates, From Belleau Wood To Victory In The Great War

Winner of the Marine Corps Heritage Foundation 2017 Colonel Joseph Alexander Award for Biography

The incredible true story of Clifton B. “Lucky” Cates, whose service in World War I and beyond made him a legend in the annals of the Marine Corps.

Cates knew that he and his small band of marines were in a desperate spot. Before handing the note over to a runner, he added three words that would resound through Marine Corps history:

I WILL HOLD

From the moment he first joined the Marine Reserves of the American Expeditionary Force in World War I, Clifton B. Cates was determined to make his mark as a leader. Little did he know what he would truly accomplish in his legendary career.

Not as well-known as his contemporaries such as Alvin C. York, his fame would not come from a single act of heroism but from his consistent and courageous demeanor throughout the war and beyond.

In the bloody second half of 1918 with the 6th Marine Regiment, he was awarded the Navy Cross, the Distinguished Service Cross, the Purple Heart, the Silver Star, was recognized by the French government with the Legion of Honor and the Croix de Guerre, and earned the nickname “Lucky.”

I Will Hold is the inspiring, brutally vivid, and incredible true life story of a Marine Corps legend whose grit and unstoppable spirit on the battlefield matched his personal drive and sage wisdom off of it.

The Doc And The Duchess : The Life And Legacy Of George H. A. Clowes

Download The Doc And The Duchess : The Life And Legacy Of George H. A. Clowes

George Henry Alexander Clowes was a pivotal figure in the development of the insulin program at the Eli Lilly Company. Through his leadership, scientists and clinicians at Lilly and the University of Toronto created a unique, international team to develop and purify insulin and take the production of this life-saving agent to an industrial scale. This biography, written by his grandson, presents his scientific achievements, and also takes note of his social and philanthropic contributions, which he shared with his wife, Edith. It tells the story of Clowes from his childhood in late Victorian England to his death at Woods Hole on Cape Cod in 1958. Educated in England and Germany, Clowes came to America to join a startup laboratory in Buffalo, where he conducted basic research on cancer and applied research on other disease-related problems. Assuming the position of head of research at Lilly, Clowes was at the center of one of the great discoveries that changed the course of medical history and offered new life to millions of individuals with diabetes and other metabolic disorders. Clowes was also instrumental in the development of other commercial pharmaceutical advances. Devoted to a number of philanthropic causes, Clowes and Edith contributed greatly to the cultural life of his adopted country, a contribution that continues to this day.

General Henry Baxter, 7th Michigan Volunteer Infantry : A Biography

Download General Henry Baxter, 7th Michigan Volunteer Infantry : A Biography

Few 19th-century Americans were as adventurous as Henry Baxter. Best known for his Civil War exploits–from leading the 7th Michigan Volunteer Infantry across the Rappahannock River at Fredericksburg in the first daylight amphibious assault in American history, to his defense of the Union line on day one of Gettysburg–he accomplished these despite having no prewar military training. His heroism and leadership propelled him from officer of volunteers to major general in the Army of the Potomac.

A New York emigrant from a prominent family, Baxter was involved in developing Michigan's political, business and educational foundations. He excelled at enterprise, leading a group of adventurers to California during the Gold Rush, co-founding what would become the Republican Party and eventually becoming President Grant's diplomat to Honduras during one of the most dynamic periods of Central American history.

The Promise Of Canada: 150 Years--people And Ideas That Have Shaped Our Country

Download The Promise Of Canada: 150 Years--people And Ideas That Have Shaped Our Country

What does it mean to be a Canadian? What great ideas have changed our country? An award-winning writer casts her eye over 150 years of Canadian history.

“Our country owes its success not to some imagined tribal singularity but to the fact that, although its thirty-five million citizens do not look, speak or pray alike, we have learned to share this land and for the most part live in neighbourly sympathy.” —Charlotte Gray, from the Preface of The Promise of Canada

On the eve of Canada’s sesquicentennial celebrations comes a richly rewarding new book from acclaimed historian Charlotte Gray about what it means to be Canadian. Readers already know Gray as an award-winning biographer, a writer who has brilliantly captured significant individuals and dramatic moments in our history. Now, in The Promise of Canada, she weaves together masterful portraits of nine influential Canadians, creating a unique history of the country over the past 150 years.

What do these people—from George-Étienne Cartier and Emily Carr to Tommy Douglas, Margaret Atwood, and Elijah Harper—have in common? Each, according to Charlotte Gray, has left an indelible mark on our country. Deliberately avoiding a “top down” approach to our history, Gray has chosen people whose ideas have caught her imagination, ideas that over time have become part of our collective conversation. She also highlights many other Canadians, past and present, who have added to the ongoing debate over how we see ourselves, arguing that Canada has constantly reimagined itself in every generation since 1867.

Beautifully illustrated with evocative black and white images and colourful artistic visions of our country, The Promise of Canada is a fresh take on our history that offers fascinating insights into how we have matured and yet how—150 years after Confederation and beyond—we are still a people in progress. Charlotte Gray makes history come alive as she opens doors into our past, our present and our future, inspiring and challenging readers to envision the Canada they want to live in.

Edmund Burke : Appraisals And Applications

Download Edmund Burke : Appraisals And Applications

The eighteenth century remains contemporary more than 200 years later because the fundamental questions raised then about politics in both the American and French Revolutions still speak to us. The writings of Edmund Burke on these and other political events of his time are today acknowledged as the basis of modern conservative thought. This volume brings together an outstanding collection of interpretative essays on Burke, and serves as a basic introduction to this seminal thinker.

A member of the British Parliament from 1766 to 1794, Edmund Burke had sympathized with the American War of Independence and argued for reform of British policy toward Ireland and India, but he surprised many of his friends by his early, vehement opposition to the French Revolution. This volume brings together assessments of these and other statements by Burke by contemporaries such as Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William Hazlitt, along with essays by Irving Babbitt and Russell Kirk, who established his significance for twentieth-century conservatism.

This is a collection of the best, previously published interpretive essays on Burke. It will be of interest to all those interested in the philosophical roots of conservatism, in the history of political thought, in revolution, and in modern political ideologies.

The Life Of D. H. Lawrence

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Complete with fresh perspectives, and drawing on the latest scholarship and biographical sources, The Life of D. H. Lawrence spans the full range of his intellectual interests and creative output to offer new insights into Lawrence’s life, work, and legacy. Addresses his major works, but also lesser-known writings in different genres and his late paintings, in order to reassess the innovative, challenging, and subversive aspects of Lawrence’s personality and writing Incorporates newly-discovered sources, including correspondence, a manuscript written in 1923-4, new evidence for important influences on his major novels and two previously unpublished images of the author Emphasizes Lawrence’s gregarious nature, his desire to collaborate with others, and his adaptability to different social situations Pays particular attention to the many interactions with literary advisors, editors, agents, publishers, and printers that were required for him to work as a professional writer Combines new material with astute commentary to provide a nuanced understanding of one of the most prolific and controversial authors of the twentieth century

A Feminist In The White House: Midge Costanza, The Carter Years, And America's Culture Wars

Download A Feminist In The White House: Midge Costanza, The Carter Years, And America's Culture Wars

A feminist, an outspoken activist, a woman without a college education, Midge Costanza was one of the unlikeliest of White House insiders. Yet in 1977 she became the first female Assistant to the President for Public Liaison under Jimmy Carter, emerging as a prominent focal point of the American culture wars. Tasked with bringing the views of special interest groups to the president, Costanza championed progressive causes even as Americans grew increasingly divided on the very issues for which she fought. In A Feminist in the White House, Doreen Mattingly draws on Costanza's personal papers to shed light on the life of this fascinating and controversial woman. Mattingly chronicles Costanza's dramatic rise and fall as a public figure, from her initial popularity to her ultimate clashes with Carter and his aides. While Costanza challenged Carter to support abortion rights, gay and lesbian rights, and feminist policies, Carter faced increased pressure to appease the interests of emerging Religious Right, which directly opposed Costanza's ideals. Ultimately, marginalized both within the White House and by her fellow feminists, Costanza was pressured to resign in 1978. Through the lens of Constanza's story, readers catch a unique perspective of the rise of debates which have defined the feminist movement and sexual politics to this very day. Mattingly also reveals a wider, but heretofore neglected, narrative of the complex era of gender politics in the late 1970's Washington - a history which continues to resonate in politics today. A Feminist in the White House is a must-read for anyone with an interest in sexual politics, female politicians, and presidential history.

Mad Frank And Sons: Tougher Than The Krays, Frank And His Boys On Gangland, Crime And Doing Time

Download Mad Frank And Sons: Tougher Than The Krays, Frank And His Boys On Gangland, Crime And Doing Time

Drawing on exclusive final interviews with Frank, and with unprecedented access to his closest relatives, Mad Frank and Sons follows his rise from a small kid stealing to put food on the table to a feared and respected West End crime lord and head of a legendary gangland family. It includes the story of Frank's beloved sister, Eva, who was a top-class West End shoplifter, and his sons David and Patrick, who reveal in shocking detail the full extent of the family's network and the influences that shaped them. With sawn-off shotguns as toys, the Kray twins as family friends and a mother who urged them as teenagers to 'get out of bed and rob a bleedin' bank', it is little wonder that the Fraser boys were heavily involved in organized crime by the time they were in their twenties. Packed with new information, and featuring some of the most famous names in the London underworld, this is a fascinating slice of gangland history seen through the eyes of Frank Fraser and his two renegade sons.

Evatt: A Life

Download Evatt: A Life

John Murphy's Evatt: A life is a biography of Australian parliamentarian and jurist HV Evatt. Remembered as the first foreign minister to argue for an independent Australian policy in the 1940s and for his central role in the formation of the UN, Evatt went on to be the leader of the Labor party in the 1950s, the time of the split that resulted in the party being out of power for a generation. Evatt traces the course of Evatt's life and places him in the context of a long period of conservatism in Australia. It treats Evatt's inner, personal life as being just as important as his spectacular, controversial and eventual tragic public career. Murphy looks closely at Evatt's previously unexamined private life and unravels some of the puzzles that have lead Evatt to be considered erratic, even mad. ‘Bert' Evatt remains a polarising figure – still considered by many in Labor as the man who ‘split the party' and by many conservatives as unreliable and dangerous.

Twenty Years With The Jewish Labor Bund : A Memoir Of Interwar Poland

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Bernard Goldstein's memoir describes a hard world of taverns, toughs, thieves, and prostitutes; of slaughterhouse workers, handcart porters, and wagon drivers; and of fist-and gunfights with everyone from anti-Semites and Communists to hostile police, which is to say that it depicts a totally different view of life in prewar Poland than the one usually portrayed. As such, the book offers a corrective view in the form of social history, one that commands attention and demands respect for the vitality and activism of the generation of Polish Jews so brutally annihilated by the barbarism of the Nazis. In Warsaw, a city with over 300,000 Jews (one third of the population), Bernstein was the Jewish Labor Bund's “enforcer,” organizer, and head of their militia — the one who carried out daily, on-the-street organization of unions; the fighting off of Communists, Polish anti-Semitic hooligans, and antagonistic police; marshaling and protecting demonstrations; and even settling family disputes, some of them arising from the new secular, socialist culture being fostered by the Bund. Goldstein's is a portrait of tough Jews willing to do battle — worldly, modern individuals dedicated to their folk culture and the survival of their people. It delivers an unparalleled street-level view of vibrant Jewish life in Poland between the wars: of Jewish masses entering modern life, of Jewish workers fighting for their rights, of optimism, of greater assertiveness and self-confidence, of armed combat, and even of scenes depicting the seamy, semi-criminal elements. It provides a representation of life in Poland before the great catastrophe of World War II, a life of flowering literary activity, secular political journalism, successful political struggle, immersion in modern politics, fights for worker rights and benefits, a strong social-democratic labor movement, creation of a secular school system in Yiddish, and a youth movement that later provided the heroic fighters for the courageous Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

Waiting For First Light: My Ongoing Battle With Ptsd

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Longlisted for the RBC Taylor Prize: In this piercing memoir, Roméo Dallaire, retired general and former senator, the author of the bestsellers Shake Hands with the Devil andThey Fight Like Soldiers, They Die Like Children, and one of the world's leading humanitarians, delves deep into his life since the Rwandan genocide. At the heart of Waiting for First Light is a no-holds-barred self-portrait of a top political and military figure whose nights are invaded by despair, but who at first light faces the day with the renewed desire to make a difference in the world. Roméo Dallaire, traumatized by witnessing genocide on an imponderable scale in Rwanda, reflects in these pages on the nature of PTSD and the impact of that deep wound on his life since 1994, and on how he motivates himself and others to humanitarian work despite his constant struggle. Though he had been a leader in peace and in war at all levels up to deputy commander of the Canadian Army, his PTSD led to his medical dismissal from the Canadian Forces in April 2000, a blow that almost killed him. But he crawled out of the hole he fell into after he had to take off the uniform, and he has been inspiring people to give their all to multiple missions ever since, from ending genocide to eradicating the use of child soldiers to revolutionizing officer training so that our soldiers can better deal with the muddy reality of modern conflict zones and to revolutionizing our thinking about the changing nature of conflict itself. His new book is as compelling and original an account of suffering and endurance as Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking and William Styron's Darkness Visible.

William The Conqueror By David Bates

Download William The Conqueror By David Bates

Fifteen years in the making, a landmark reinterpretation of the life of a pivotal figure in British and European history In this magisterial addition to the Yale English Monarchs series, David Bates combines biography and a multidisciplinary approach to examine the life of a major figure in British and European history. Using a framework derived from studies of early medieval kingship, he assesses each phase of William’s life to establish why so many trusted William to invade England in 1066 and the consequences of this on the history of the so-called Norman Conquest after the Battle of Hastings and for generations to come. A leading historian of the period, Bates is notable for having worked extensively in the archives of northern France and discovered many eleventh- and twelfth-century charters largely unnoticed by English-language scholars. Taking an innovative approach, he argues for a move away from old perceptions and controversies associated with William’s life and the Norman Conquest. This deeply researched volume is the scholarly biography for our generation.

Zayn 2016

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ZAYN opens up with this collection of thoughts, inspiration, and never-before-seen personal photographs. After five years of massive success with One Direction, ZAYN launched his career as a solo artist with Mind of Mine, becoming one of the most successful artists in the world. Now, for the first time ever, ZAYN is going to tell and show all in this intimate and raw scrapbook of his life. Never-before-released photos give readers insight to ZAYN, no-holds-barred. Gorgeously designed with hundreds of full-color photographs and ZAYN’s notes, drawings, song lyrics, and personal stories, the book captures ZAYN’s most private moments and his candid feelings on fame, success, music, and life. The next chapter of ZAYN’s evolution into global superstar, told by the artist who is living it.

Anna Komnene: The Life And Work Of A Medieval Historian

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Byzantine princess Anna Komnene is known for two things: plotting to murder her brother to usurp the throne, and writing the Alexiad, an epic history of her father Alexios I Komnenos (1081-1118) that is a key historical source for the era of the First Crusade. Anna Komnene: the Life and Work of a Medieval Historian investigates the relationship between Anna's self-presentation in the Alexiad and the story of her bloodthirsty ambition. It begins by asking why women did not write history in Anna's society, what cultural rules Anna broke by doing so, and how Anna tried to respond to those challenges in her writing. Many of the idiosyncrasies and surprises of Anna's Alexiad are driven by her efforts to be perceived as both a good historian and a good woman. These new interpretations of Anna's authorial persona then spark a thorough re-thinking of the standard story which defines Anna's life by the failure of her supposed political ambitions. The second half of this work reviews the medieval sources with fresh eyes and re-establishes Anna's primary identity as an author and intellectual rather than as a failed conspirator.

The Reporter Who Knew Too Much: The Mysterious Death Of What's My Line Tv Star And Media Icon Dorothy Kilgallen

Download The Reporter Who Knew Too Much: The Mysterious Death Of What's My Line Tv Star And Media Icon Dorothy Kilgallen

Was What’s My Line TV Star, media icon, and crack investigative reporter and journalist Dorothy Kilgallen murdered for writing a tell-all book about the JFK assassination? If so, is the main suspect in her death still at large? These questions and more are answered in former CNN, ESPN, and USA Today legal analyst Mark Shaw’s 25th book, The Reporter Who Knew Too Much. Through discovery of never-before-seen videotaped eyewitness interviews with those closest to Kilgallen and secret government documents, Shaw unfolds a “whodunit” murder mystery featuring suspects including Frank Sinatra, J. Edgar Hoover, Mafia Don Carlos Marcello and a "Mystery Man" who may have silenced Kilgallen. All while by presenting through Kilgallen's eyes the most compelling evidence about the JFK assassinations since the House Select Committee on Assassination’s investigation in the 1970s. Called by the New York Post, “the most powerful female voice in America,” and by acclaimed author Mark Lane the “the only serious journalist in America who was concerned with who killed John Kennedy and getting all of the facts about the assassination,” Kilgallen’s official cause of death reported as an overdose of barbiturates combined with alcohol, has always been suspect since no investigation occurred despite the death scene having been staged. Shaw proves Kilgallen, a remarkable woman who broke the "glass ceiling" before the term became fashionable, was denied the justice she deserved, that is until now.

Maximinus Thrax: Strongman Emperor Of Rome

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The first full-length biography of the half-barbarian emperor. Maximinus was a Thracian tribesman “of frightening appearance and colossal size” who could smash stones with his bare hands and pull fully laden wagons unaided. Such feats impressed the emperor Severus who enlisted Maximinus into the imperial bodyguard whereupon he embarked on a distinguished military career. Eventually he achieved senior command in the massive Roman invasion of Persia in 232 AD, and three years later he became emperor himself in a military coup—the first soldier ever to assume the imperial throne. Supposedly more than seven feet tall (it is likely he had a pituitary disorder), Maximinus was surely one of Rome’s most extraordinary emperors. He campaigned across the Rhine and Danube for three years until a rebellion erupted in Africa and the snobbish senate engaged in civil war against him. This is a narrative account of the life and times of the Thracian giant, from his humble origins up to and beyond the civil war of 238 AD. Replete with accounts of treachery, assassination, and civil war, Maximinus Thrax is written for enthusiasts of Roman history and warfare.

The Roman Emperor Aurelian: Restorer Of The World

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The ancient Sibylline prophecies had foretold that the Roman Empire would last for 1000 years. As the time for the expected dissolution approached in the middle of the third century AD, the empire was lapsing into chaos, with seemingly interminable civil wars over the imperial succession. The western empire had seceded under a rebel emperor and the eastern empire was controlled by another usurper. Barbarians took advantage of the anarchy to kill and plunder all over the provinces. Yet within the space of just five years, the general, later emperor Aurelian had expelled all the barbarians from with the Roman frontiers, reunited the entire empire and inaugurated major reforms of the currency, pagan religion and civil administration. His accomplishments have been hailed by classical scholars as those of a ‘superman’, yet Aurelian himself remains little known to a wider audience. His achievements enabled the Roman Empire to survive for another two centuries, ensuring a lasting legacy of Roman civilization for the successor European states. Without Aurelian, the ‘Dark Ages’ would probably have lasted centuries longer. This is a new, revised edition.

Tomas Young's War

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Tomas Young’s War is the tragic yet life affirming story of a paralyzed Iraq War veteran who spent his last ten years battling heroically with his injuries, while courageously speaking against America's wars. Based on hours of interviews with Young and those close to him, the book puts the reader alongside Young as he struggles with life as a paralyzed veteran, suffering frustration and humiliation as he attempts to reenter society and resume as normal an existence as possible. It shows his fight to balance his precarious health with his drive to speak out for veterans care and against the war, and the impact his catastrophic injuries had on his family and his relationships. This emotional and powerful book sheds light on many crucial but often overlooked issues such as veterans’ care, public attitudes toward the disabled, medical marijuana, and the terminally ill. Tomas Young’s War shares everything, as unflinchingly honest as Tomas himself: the depression, the pain, the love, and laughter . . . the life of this man whose world was turned upside down by an Iraqi bullet more than ten years ago. Throughout, it serves as a powerful testament to the true cost of war.

The Strange Last Voyage Of Donald Crowhurst

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On Halloween Day, 1968, weekend sailor and lifelong tinkerer Donald Crowhurst set sail aboard an untested trimaran, The Teignmouth Electron, determined to win the first-ever official race to single-handedly circumnavigate the globe. At stake was a generous cash prize that would save his failing business from insolvency and provide an opportunity to very publicly prove the value of the device he had invented (and that his business manufactured): the Navicator, a handheld marine navigation device. The race was sponsored by the Sunday Times, so the victor would get not just money but invaluable media exposure. Even before the race began, things looked uncertain for Crowhurst. The boat he was sailing was of a completely new design, as yet unproven; one observer noted that the boat was very fast but that it couldn't sail close to the wind. And when it was running at full speed it began to vibrate, shaking loose the screws in the self-steering apparatus. Ironically, even Crowhurst's navigational abilities were questioned during a pre-race test sail. Worst of all, there wasn't time to add in all the usual safety features. Undeterred, Crowhurst just beat the October 31 deadline for departure and headed into open water. Soon after the race began, Crowhurst ran into trouble, sailing far more slowly than he had planned. It wasn't long before he realized that he had no chance of winning the race whatsoever, and instead faced a difficult choice: finish the race and risk his life aboard a boat he couldn't control; give up in defeat and send his business into bankruptcy; or take a shortcut and falsify his navigational logs. Fatefully, Crowhurst chose the latter, maintaining from that moment on two logs–one actual and one invented–about his progress. Pieced together by two Times reporters following the discovery of the abandoned Teignmouth Electron (and Crowhurst's navigational logs), Deep Water captures the enigma at the center of Crowhurst's final voyage–a quixotic attempt to save his business, and to provide for his young family, by attempting to become the first person to sail around the world without stopping. It is a mesmerizing journey into uncharted territory, not just of the world's oceans but of the darkest corners of the human mind.

White Sands: Experiences From The Outside World

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From “one of our most original writers” (Kathryn Schulz, New York magazine) comes an expansive and exacting book—firmly grounded but elegant, often hilarious, and always inquisitive—about travel, unexpected awareness, and the questions we ask when we step outside ourselves. Geoff Dyer’s restless search—for what? is unclear, even to him—continues in this series of fascinating adventures and pilgrimages: with a tour guide who may not be a tour guide in the Forbidden City in Beijing; with friends in New Mexico, where D. H. Lawrence famously claimed to have had his “greatest experience from the outside world”; with a hitchhiker picked up on the way from White Sands; with Don Cherry (or a photo of him, at any rate) at the Watts Towers in Los Angeles. Weaving stories about places to which he has recently traveled with images and memories that have persisted since childhood, Dyer tries “to work out what a certain place—a certain way of marking the landscape—means; what it’s trying to tell us; what we go to it for.”

Grant & I

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The Go-Betweens, one of Australia's most talented and influential bands, very nearly wasn't. Grant McLennan didn't want to be in a group, and couldn't even play an instrument. That didn't stop the singer-songwriter duo of Forster/McLennan becoming one of the most acclaimed partnerships in Australian music history. Just as The Go-Betweens always defied categorisation, Grant & I is like no other rock memoir. At its heart is a privileged insight into a prolific artistic collaboration that lasted three decades, and an extraordinary friendship that rode out the band's break-up to remain strong until Grant's premature death in 2006. Unconventional in lineup and look, noted for near misses and near hits, always a beat to one side of the mainstream - the band's unusual beginnings were followed by twists that often confounded its members as well as fans and record companies. The story of The Go-Betweens is also the story of the times, and Grant & I is a wonderfully perceptive look at the music industry and a brilliantly fresh take on the sounds of the era. As distinctive a writer of prose as he is of songs, Robert Forster is wise and witty, intimate and frank, astute and knowledgeable. There could be no better tribute than Grant & I to this partnership and band who remain loved and revered. 9781743485668 24th August 2016 Penguin Random House Retail

Where The Light Gets In: Losing My Mother Only To Find Her Again

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Many know Kimberly Williams-Paisley as the bride in the popular Steve Martin remakes of the Father of the Bride movies, the calculating Peggy Kenter on Nashville, or the wife of country music artist, Brad Paisley. But behind the scenes, Kim was dealing with a tragic secret: her mother, Linda, was suffering from a rare form of dementia that slowly crippled her ability to talk, write and eventually recognize people in her own family. Where the Light Gets In tells the full story of Linda’s illness—called primary progressive aphasia—from her early-onset diagnosis at the age of 62 through the present day. Kim draws a candid picture of the ways her family reacted for better and worse, and how she, her father and two siblings educated themselves, tried to let go of shame and secrecy, made mistakes, and found unexpected humor and grace in the midst of suffering. Ultimately the bonds of family were strengthened, and Kim learned ways to love and accept the woman her mother became. With a moving foreword by actor and advocate Michael J. Fox, Where the Light Gets In is a heartwarming tribute to the often fragile yet unbreakable relationships we have with our mothers.

Bare Bones: I'm Not Lonely If You're Reading This Book

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A touching, funny, heart-wrenching, and triumphant memoir from one of the biggest names in radio, the host of The Bobby Bones Show, one of the most listened-to drive time morning radio shows in the nation. Growing up poor in Mountain Pine, Arkansas, with a young, addicted mom, Bobby Estell fell in love with country music. Abandoned by his father at the age of five, Bobby saw the radio as his way out—a dream that came true in college when he went on air at the Henderson State University campus station broadcasting as Bobby Bones, while simultaneously starting The Bobby Bones Show at 105.9 KLAZ. Bobby’s passions were pop, country music, and comedy, and he blended the three to become a tastemaker in the country music industry, heard by millions daily. Bobby broke the format of standard country radio, mixing country and pop with entertainment news and information, and has interviewed some of the biggest names in the business, including Luke Bryan, Taylor Swift, Blake Shelton, Tim McGraw, Lady Antebellum, and Jason Aldean. Yet despite the glamour, fame, and money, Bobby has never forgotten his roots, the mom and grandmother who raised him, the work ethic he embraced which saved him and encouraged him to explore the world, and the good values that shaped him. In this funny, poignant memoir told in Bobby’s distinctive patter, he takes fans on a tour of his road to radio. Bobby doesn’t shy away from the curves he continues to navigate—including his obsessive-compulsive disorder—on his journey to find the happiness of a healthy family. Funny and tender, raw and honest, Bare Bones is pure Bobby Bones—surprising, entertaining, inspiring, and authentic.

Romanov: The Last Tsarist Dynasty

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April, 1945. Hitler’s deep inside his bunker in Berlin and he’s not coming out, except maybe, eventually feet-first. The war is finally ending and now, suddenly, people have started wondering what comes next? But even as Nazi Germany is being torn to pieces and swallowed up by the Allies, Hitler’s henchmen are jockeying with each other over who will be the next Fuhrer. The problem is it can’t be just anybody. It has to be someone Eisenhower won’t just respect, it has to be someone he’ll……like! Himmler, Goering, Speer; each believes he’s the one. But someone else unexpected gets the job. Suddenly the war is over. Suddenly everything is different, but not different in the ways they’d expected. Even though the defeat is total, the surrender, unconditional, nobody, not even the victorious Allies, know what to do next. For a while, at least, the surviving Nazis are free to imagine any rosy, surreal future they wish. Days turn into weeks and a caretaker regime does what all governments naturally do; it grows. Welcome to the Flensburg Reich of Hitler’s successor, Grand Admiral Karl Doenitz! And into this unhinged world sail four brothers, Manni, Franzi, Ziggy and Sebastian, the once-famous Flying Magical Loerber Brothers and the toast of Prewar Berlin. This time, though, they’re not out to entertain. They’re Jews, they’re spies, they’re assassins and they’re out for revenge. (First published in 2008 by Simon & Schuster)

Lady Gaga And The Sociology Of Fame: The Rise Of A Pop Star In An Age Of Celebrity

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This book investigates the stardom of Lady Gaga within a cultural-sociological framework. Resisting a reductionist perspective of fame as a commodity, Mathieu Deflem offers an empirical examination of the social conditions that informed Lady Gaga’s rise to fame. The book delves into topics such as the marketing of Lady Gaga; the legal issues that have dogged her career; the media; her audience; her activism; issues of sex, gender, and sexuality; and Lady Gaga’s unique artistry. By training a spotlight on this singular pop icon, Lady Gaga and the Sociology of Fame invites readers to consider the nature of stardom in an age of celebrity.

Terrence Malick: Rehearsing The Unexpected

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Terrence Malick's debut film, Badlands, announced the arrival of a unique talent. In the 40 years since that debut, Malick has only made five films, but they are distinctive in their beauty. This book is not meant to be a biography of Terrence Malick. The purpose behind the book is to introduce readers to the extraordinary universe of his film-making and to aid them in understanding his work. And to do this through the words of his closest collaborators — cinematographers, set designers, costumers, cameramen, directors, producers, and actors such as Sean Penn, Martin Sheen, Sissy Spacek and Jessica Chastain. As their words flow from one to another, they form a fascinating, kaleidoscopic vision of American film and specifically Malick's artistic world. who make up a film. This book is the fruit of a journey began years ago when Luciano Baracaroli, Carlo Hintermann, Gerardo Panichi and Daniele Villa made a documentary on the work of Terrence Malick, which led to the making of this book as well.

A Companion To The Brontes

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A Companion to the Brontës brings the latest literary research and theory to bear on the life, work, and legacy of the Brontë family. Includes sections on literary and critical contexts, individual texts, historical and cultural contexts, reception studies, and the family’s continuing influence Features in-depth articles written by well-known and emerging scholars from around the world Addresses topics such as the Gothic tradition, film and dramatic adaptation, psychoanalytic approaches, the influence of religion, and political and legal questions of the day – from divorce and female disinheritance, to worker reform Incorporates recent work in Marxist, feminist, post-colonial, and race and gender studies

Raising Wild: Dispatches From A Home In The Wilderness

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Combining natural history, humor, and personal narrative, Raising Wild is an intimate exploration of Nevada’s Great Basin Desert, the wild and extreme land of high desert caliche and juniper, of pronghorn antelope and mountain lions, where wildfires and snowstorms threaten in equal measure. Within this remote, high desert landscape sits the home of Michael Branch, where he, his wife, and their two curious little girls brazenly live among the packrats and ground squirrels, rattlesnakes and scorpions. In Branch’s hands, this exceedingly barren and stark landscape becomes a place teeming with energy, surprise, and an endless web of connections that ultimately includes his family and home. It is in this desert setting where, in building a ladder to the stars, one can find a connection to the past and to the heavens; where his children’s first garden becomes not the quaint blossoming of seed to flower and fruit but a smoke bomb–drenched exhibit of futility in the face of the inhospitable desert environment; where the surprise of fire acts as a reminder all too real of the unknowable that awaits us and for which we can never fully prepare. In this exhilarating, lyrical, and humorous exploration of natural history, Branch reveals a desert wilderness in which our ideas about nature and ourselves are challenged and transformed.

Lucifer's Banker: The Untold Story Of How I Destroyed Swiss Bank Secrecy

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As a private banker working for the largest bank in the world, UBS, Bradley Birkenfeld was an expert in Switzerland's shell-game of offshore companies and secret numbered accounts. He wined and dined ultrawealthy clients whose millions of dollars were hidden away from business partners, spouses, and tax authorities. As his client list grew, Birkenfeld lived a life of money, fast cars, and beautiful women, but when he discovered that UBS was planning to betray him, he blew the whistle to the US Government. The Department of Justice scorned Birkenfeld's unprecedented whistle-blowing and attempted to silence him with a conspiracy charge. Yet Birkenfeld would not be intimidated. He took his secrets to the US Senate, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Internal Revenue Service, where he prevailed. His bombshell revelations helped the US Treasury recover over $15 billion (and counting) in back taxes, fines, and penalties from American tax cheats. But Birkenfeld was shocked to discover that at the same time he was cooperating with the US Government, the Department of Justice was still doggedly pursuing him. He was arrested and served thirty months in federal prison. When he emerged, the Internal Revenue Service gave him a whistle-blower award for $104 million, the largest such reward in history. A page-turning real-life thriller, Lucifer's Banker is a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the secret Swiss high-net worth banking industry and a harrowing account of our government's justice system. Readers will follow Birkenfeld and share his outrage with the incompetence and possible corruption at the Department of Justice, and they will cheer him on as he ''hammers'' one of the most well-known and powerful banks in the world.

The Purple Diaries: Mary Astor And The Most Sensational Hollywood Scandal Of The 1930s

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One of Hollywood’s first scandals was nearly its last. 1936 looked like it would be a great year for the movie industry. With the economy picking up after the Great Depression, Americans everywhere were sitting in the dark watching the stars―and few stars shined as brightly as one of America’s most enduring screen favorites, Mary Astor. But Astor’s story wasn’t a happy one. She was born poor, and at the first sign that she could earn money, her parents grabbed the reins and the checks. Widowed at twenty-four, Mary Astor was looking for stability when she met and wed Dr. Franklyn Thorpe. But the marriage was rocky from the start; both were unfaithful, but they did not divorce until after Mary Astor gave birth to little Marylyn Thorpe. What followed was a custody battle that pushed The Spanish Civil War and Hitler’s 1936 Olympic Games off of the front pages all over America. Astor and Thorpe were both ruthless in their fight to gain custody of their daughter, but Thorpe held a trump card: the diaries that Mary Astor had been keeping for years. In these diaries, Astor detailed her own affairs as well as the myriad dalliances of some of Hollywood’s biggest names. The studio heads, longtime controllers of public perception, were desperate to keep such juicy details from leaking. With the complete support of the Astor family, including unlimited access to the photographs and memorabilia of Mary Astor’s estate, The Purples Diaries is a look at Hollywood’s Golden Age as it has never been seen before, as Egan spins a wildly absorbing yarn about a scandal that threatened to bring down the dream factory known as Hollywood.

Survival In The Shadows: Seven Jews Hidden In Hitler's Berlin

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The remarkable true story of two German Jewish families that survived against all odds while hiding in the heart of the Nazi capital In January 1943, unable to flee Germany, the four members of the Arndt family went underground to avoid deportation to Auschwitz. Ellen Lewinsky and her mother, Charlotte, joined them; a year later, Bruno Gumpel arrived. Hiding in a small factory near Hitler’s bunker, without identification cards or food-ration stamps, they were dependent on German strangers for survival. When Russian soldiers finally rescued the group in April 1945, the families were near death from starvation. But their will to live triumphed and two months later, four of the survivors—Erich Arndt and Ellen Lewinsky, and Ruth Arndt and Bruno Gumpel—reunited in a double wedding ceremony. Survival in the Shadows chronicles the previously untold story of the largest group of German Jews to have survived hiding in Berlin through the final and most deadly years of the Holocaust. Relayed to Barbara Lovenheim by three survivors from the group, the riveting story is a touching portrayal of the bravery of these seven Jews, and a heartfelt acknowledgment of the fortitude and humanity of the compassionate Germans who kept them alive.

The Illustrated Walden: Thoreau Bicentennial Edition

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To coincide with the bicentennial of Thoreau's birth and TarcherPerigee's publication of Expect Great Things: The Life of Henry David Thoreau, here is a sumptuous rediscovery edition of the first illustrated volume of Thoreau's classic, as originally issued in 1897. In 1897, thirty-five years after Thoreau's death, Houghton Mifflin issued a two-volume "Holiday Edition" of Walden illustrated with thirty remarkable engravings, daguerreotypes, and period photographs. In 1902 the publisher collected the work into a single volume. Now, to mark the bicentennial of Thoreau's birth in 1817, this timeless landmark is reproduced with all of the original illustrations and the complete text of his mystical, practical, magisterial record of a life in the woods.

The Complete History Of Black Sabbath: What Evil Lurks

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Black Sabbath's career spans eleven different line-ups and nineteen studio albums in addition to the twenty-eight solo albums of the original four members. The band began in 1968 as a blues rock band on the cover circuit of Birmingham, England. Clawing their way up from the postwar bombed-out suburbs of Birmingham, the four members - guitarist and main songwriter Tony Iommi, bassist and main lyricist Geezer Butler, singer Ozzy Osbourne, and drummer Bill Ward - would define a new genre of music and make themselves world famous. Joel McIver explores the complete history of Sabbath, from the precursor bands to the release of the holy trinity of heavy metal - "Black Sabbath" (the song) on Black Sabbath (the album) by Black Sabbath (the band) - to the present. With over 150 photos, a gatefold family tree tracing the development of the band, a complete discography, and a foreword by Machine Head frontman Robb Flynn, this is the must-have book for any Sabbath fan. 9781631063688 30th September 2016 1 Retail

Moses: A Human Life (jewish Lives)

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An unprecedented portrait of Moses's inner world and perplexing character, by a distinguished biblical scholar No figure looms larger in Jewish culture than Moses, and few have stories more enigmatic. Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg, acclaimed for her many books on Jewish thought, turns her attention to Moses in this remarkably rich, evocative book. Drawing on a broad range of sources—literary as well as psychoanalytic, a wealth of classical Jewish texts alongside George Eliot, W. G. Sebald, and Werner Herzog—Zornberg offers a vivid and original portrait of the biblical Moses. Moses's vexing personality, his uncertain origins, and his turbulent relations with his own people are acutely explored by Zornberg, who sees this story, told and retold, as crucial not only to the biblical past but also to the future of Jewish history.

The Sick Bag Song

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From the inimitable Nick Cave comes a mesmerizing exploration of love, inspiration, and memory that chronicles his 2014 twenty-two-city American tour with the Bad Seeds. The Sick Bag Song began life scribbled on paper airlinesick bags during Cave’s 2014 tour. It soon grew into a restless full-length contemporary odyssey. Spurred by encounters with modern-day North America, beset by longing and exhaustion, Cave teases out the significant moments, the people, the books, and the music that have influenced him. Drawing inspiration from Leonard Cohen, John Berryman, Patti Smith, Sharon Olds, folk ballads and ancient texts, The Sick Bag Song takes the form of a quest, turning over questions of creativity, loss, death, and romance. Both mythic and grounded in the now, it lies somewhere between The Waste Land and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. It is also a companion piece to the Sundance award-winning feature documentary 20,000 Days on Earth.

Talking As Fast As I Can: From Gilmore Girls To Gilmore Girls

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In this collection of personal essays, the beloved star of Gilmore Girls and Parenthood reveals stories about life, love, and working as a woman in Hollywood—along with behind-the-scenes dispatches from the set of the new Gilmore Girls, where she plays the fast-talking Lorelai Gilmore once again. In Talking as Fast as I Can, Lauren Graham hits pause for a moment and looks back on her life, sharing laugh-out-loud stories about growing up, starting out as an actress, and, years later, sitting in her trailer on the Parenthood set and asking herself, “Did you, um, make it?” She opens up about the challenges of being single in Hollywood (“Strangers were worried about me; that’s how long I was single!”), the time she was asked to audition her butt for a role, and her experience being a judge on Project Runway (“It’s like I had a fashion-induced blackout”). In “What It Was Like, Part One,” Graham sits down for an epic Gilmore Girls marathon and reflects on being cast as the fast-talking Lorelai Gilmore. The essay “What It Was Like, Part Two” reveals how it felt to pick up the role again nine years later, and what doing so has meant to her. Some more things you will learn about Lauren: She once tried to go vegan just to bond with Ellen DeGeneres, she’s aware that meeting guys at awards shows has its pitfalls (“If you’re meeting someone for the first time after three hours of hair, makeup, and styling, you’ve already set the bar too high”), and she’s a card-carrying REI shopper (“My bungee cords now earn points!”). Including photos and excerpts from the diary Graham kept during the filming of the recent Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, this book is like a cozy night in, catching up with your best friend, laughing and swapping stories, and—of course—talking as fast as you can.

Lennon On Lennon: Conversations With John Lennon

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John Lennon was a highly opinionated and controversial figure with a commanding personality and quick wit. And he made a point of living his adventurous life as openly as possible. Whether he was experimenting with LSD, Transcendental Meditation, primal therapy, macrobiotic diets, or recording techniques, the public was on board every step of the way. He spoke candidly about his intense, sometimes tumultuous relationship with Yoko Ono, his split with the Beatles, his squabbles with Paul McCartney, and just about everything else, baring his emotional ups and downs for all to see. By the time he granted his—and this book’s—final interview, only hours before his death, he had become one of the most famous people on the planet and an articulate commentator on politics, human relations, and world peace. Lennon on Lennon is an authoritative, chronologically arranged anthology of some of Lennon’s most illuminating interviews. The majority have not been previously available in print, and several of the most important have not been widely available in any format. Interspersed throughout the book are key quotes from dozens of additional Q&As. Together, this material paints a revealing picture of the artist in his own words while offering a window into the cultural atmosphere of the sixties and seventies.

The Nine Of Us: Growing Up Kennedy

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In this evocative and affectionate memoir, Ambassador Jean Kennedy Smith, the last surviving child of Joe and Rose Kennedy, offers an intimate and illuminating look at a time long ago when she and her siblings, guided by their parents, laughed and learned a great deal under one roof. Prompted by interesting tidbits in the newspaper, Rose and Joe Kennedy would pose questions to their nine children at the dinner table. "Where could Amelia Earhart have gone?" "How would you address this horrible drought?" "What would you do about the troop movements in Europe?" It was a nightly custom that helped shape the Kennedys into who they would become. Before Joe and Rose’s children emerged as leaders on the world stage, they were a loving circle of brothers and sisters who played football, swam, read, and pursued their interests. They were children inspired by parents who instilled in them a strong work ethic, deep love of country, and intense appreciation for the sacrifices their ancestors made to come to America."No whining in this house!" was their father’s regular refrain. It was his way of reminding them not to complain, to be grateful for what they had, and to give back. In her remarkable memoir, Kennedy Smith—the last surviving sibling—revisits this singular time in their lives. Filled with fascinating anecdotes and vignettes, and illustrated with dozens of family pictures, The Nine of Us vividly depicts this large, close-knit family during a different time in American history. Kennedy Smith offers indelible, elegantly rendered portraits of her larger-than-life siblings and her parents. "They knew how to cure our hurts, bind our wounds, listen to our woes, and help us enjoy life," she writes. "We were lucky children indeed."

T Bone Burnett: A Life In Pursuit

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T Bone Burnett is a unique, astonishingly prolific music producer, singer-songwriter, guitarist, and soundtrack visionary. Renowned as a studio maven with a Midas touch, Burnett is known for lifting artists to their greatest heights, as he did with Raising Sand, the multiple Grammy Award–winning album by Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, as well as acclaimed albums by Los Lobos, the Wallflowers, B. B. King, and Elvis Costello. Burnett virtually invented “Americana” with his hugely successful roots-based soundtrack for the Coen Brothers film, O Brother, Where Art Thou? Outspoken in his contempt for the entertainment industry, Burnett has nevertheless received many of its highest honors, including Grammy Awards and an Academy Award. T Bone Burnett offers the first critical appreciation of Burnett’s wide-ranging contributions to American music, his passionate advocacy for analog sound, and the striking contradictions that define his maverick artistry. Lloyd Sachs highlights all the important aspects of Burnett’s musical pursuits, from his early days as a member of Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue and his collaboration with the playwright Sam Shepard to the music he recently composed for the TV shows Nashville and True Detective and his production of the all-star album Lost on the River: The New Basement Tapes. Sachs also underscores Burnett’s brilliance as a singer-songwriter in his own right. Going well beyond the labels “legendary” or “visionary” that usually accompany his name, T Bone Burnett reveals how this consummate music maker has exerted a powerful influence on American music and culture across four decades.

Exit Right: The People Who Left The Left And Reshaped The American Century

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A provocative, intimate look at the evolution of America’s political soul through the lives of six political figures—from Whittaker Chambers to Christopher Hitchens—who abandoned the left and joined the right. In Exit Right, Daniel Oppenheimer tells the stories of six major political figures whose journeys away from the left reshaped the contours of American politics in the twentieth century. By going deep into the minds of six apostates—Whittaker Chambers, James Burnham, Ronald Reagan, Norman Podhoretz, David Horowitz, and Christopher Hitchens—Oppenheimer offers an unusually intimate history of the American left, and the right’s reaction. Oppenheimer is a brilliant new voice in political history who has woven together the past century’s most important movements into a single book that reveals the roots of American politics. Through the eyes of his six subjects, we see America grow, stumble, and forge ahead—from World War I up through the Great Depression and World War II, from the Red Scare up through the Civil Rights Movement, and from the birth of neoconservatism up through 9/11 and the dawn of the Iraq War. At its core, Exit Right is a book that asks profound questions about why and how we come to believe politically at all—on the left or the right. Each of these six lives challenges us to ask where our own beliefs come from, and what it might take to change them. At a time of sky-high partisanship, Oppenheimer breaks down the boundaries that divide us and investigates the deeper origins of our politics. This is a book that will resonate with readers on the left and the right—as well as those stuck somewhere in the middle.

Charlotte Brontë: A Fiery Heart

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A groundbreaking biography that places an obsessive, unrequited love at the heart of the writer's life story, transforming her from the tragic figure we have previously known into a smoldering Jane Eyre. Famed for her beloved novels, Charlotte Brontë has been known as well for her insular, tragic family life. The genius of this biography is that it delves behind this image to reveal a life in which loss and heartache existed alongside rebellion and fierce ambition. Harman seizes on a crucial moment in the 1840s when Charlotte worked at a girls' school in Brussels and fell hopelessly in love with the husband of the school's headmistress. Her torment spawned her first attempts at writing for publication, and he haunts the pages of every one of her novels—he is Rochester in Jane Eyre, Paul Emanuel in Villette. Another unrequited love—for her publisher—paved the way for Charlotte to enter a marriage that ultimately made her happier than she ever imagined. Drawing on correspondence unavailable to previous biographers, Claire Harman establishes Brontë as the heroine of her own story, one as dramatic and triumphant as one of her own novels.

Not Just An Accountant

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Not just an accountant is an incisive, no-holds-barred account of Indias eleventh comptroller and auditor general and a symbol of the anti-corruption movement, Vinod Rai. Through a narrative, rich in anecdote and inside information, Rai sheds light on the major scams that shook the country. Among the case studies-chosen for the diversity of failures they highlight are - the procedural irregularities in the issuance of licenses for second generation spectrum allotment, the last minute quick-fixes in the conduct of the XIX commonwealth games, the loss of national resources while allocating coal blocks, the flouting of systems and the clear display of crony capitalism in the exploration of hydrocarbon and the tragic tale of civil aviation in India. Through these illustrations, Rai wishes to not only expose government malfeasance, but also probe the mandate of the CAG as a watchdog. Equally, he hopes to push for long-term solutions to corruption and bring home the urgent need for ethics-for the pursuit of excellence, accountability, probity and transparency within governments, the bureaucracy, corporate enterprises and public life.

Master Of Ceremonies

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Joel Grey, the Tony and Academy Award-winning Master of Ceremonies in Cabaret finally tells his remarkable life story. Born Joel David Katz to a wild and wooly Jewish American family in Cleveland, Ohio in 1932, Joel began his life in the theater at the age of 9, starting in children’s theater and then moving to the main stage. He was hooked, and his seven decades long career charts the evolution of American entertainment - from Vaudeville performances with his father, Mickey Katz to the seedy gangster filled nightclubs of the forties, the bright lights of Broadway and dizzying glamour of Hollywood, to juggernaut musicals like Cabaret, Chicago, and Wicked.