| Dadland by Keggie CarewAuthor Keggie Carew grew up knowing her father, Tom, as a brilliant, unconventional man who failed to keep his family in the style his first wife expected. Until he began showing symptoms of dementia, Keggie knew nothing of her father's World War II experiences as a Jedburgh -- a skilled guerilla who parachuted behind the lines in Burma and France. After she accompanied him to a Jedburgh reunion, she started piecing together his earlier life, discovering his wartime exploits and the reasons he struggled to achieve normality after the war. |
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| Inferno: A Doctor's Ebola Story by Steven HatchIn November 2013, American Dr. Steven Hatch went to work at a hospital in Monrovia, Liberia; by June 2014 the Ebola virus had killed several of his colleagues. In vivid, compelling detail, Hatch describes his experiences in Liberia, calling his memoir a "horror story." He reviews West Africa's history of colonialism, post-colonial dictatorships, and lagging technology that made the region vulnerable to the epidemic. His compassionate writing evokes empathy for the Africans, who were often reduced to anonymity by Western journalists as they recounted the heroism of volunteer American and European health workers. |
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Border: a journey to the edge of Europe
by Kapka Kassabova
In Border, Kapka Kassabova sets out on a journey to meet the people of this triple border Bulgarians, Turks, Greeks, and the latest wave of refugees fleeing conflict further afield. She discovers a region that has been shaped by the successive forces of history: by its own past migration crises, by communism, by two World wars, by the Ottoman Empire, and older still by the ancient legacy of myths and legends.
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The price of illusion : a memoir
by Joan Juliet Buck
A former editor-in-chief of Paris Vogue presents an account of her four decades spent in the creative heart of London, New York, Los Angeles and Paris, a vocation that enabled her to learn key differences about illusion versus substance and the qualities of genuine happiness.
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| The Home That Was Our Country: A Memoir of Syria by Alia MalekJournalist and civil rights lawyer Alia Malek, born in Baltimore to Syrian refugee parents, always felt a strong connection to her family's history. In 2011, during the Arab Spring, she moved to Damascus to restore her grandmother's house and report on Syrian politics under the Assad family dictatorship. The Home That Was Our Country traces stories of her ancestors back to 1899, depicting an amicably diverse Syria that was ruptured starting in 1970 by Hafez al-Assad's repressive policy of division. |
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Claretta : Mussolini's last lover
by R. J. B Bosworth
Few deaths are as gruesome and infamous as those of Benito Mussolini, Italy's fascist dictator, and Claretta (or Clara) Petacci, his much-younger lover. Shot dead by Italian partisans after attempting to flee the country in 1945, the couple's bodies were then hanged upside down in Milan's main square in ignominious public display. This provocative book is the first to mine Clara's extensive diaries, family correspondence, and other sources to discover how the last in Mussolini's long line of lovers became his intimate and how she came to her violent fate at his side.
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Born both : an intersex life
by Hida Viloria
An intersex activist describes what it was like being raised a girl, but knowing that her genitals, reproductive organs, hormones and chromosomes failed to fit the standard definition of either sex and how she became an advocate for others in similar situations.
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Her: a memoir
by Christa Parravani
This haunting memoir depicts Christa Parravani's struggle to survive the death of her identical twin, Clara, from an accidental heroin overdose at 28.
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When memory comes
by Saul Friedländer
A classic Holocaust memoir by the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian describes his family's 1939 flight from Prague to France, where they lived through the German Occupation before his parents were killed at Auschwitz and the author was forced to convert and train for the Roman Catholic priesthood.
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The afterlife of John F. Kennedy
by Michael J. Hogan
In his new book, Michael J. Hogan, a leading historian of the American presidency, offers a new perspective on John Fitzgerald Kennedy, as seen not from his life and times but from his afterlife in American memory.
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Lion : a long way home
by Saroo Brierley
.Describes how the author was accidentally separated from his family and home in India as a child, how he survived as an orphan in Kolkata, his adoption by an Australian family, and his search for his biological family as an adult.
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Island on the Edge : A Life on Soay
by Anne Cholawo
This book describes her extraordinary transition from a hectic urban lifestyle to one of rural isolation and self-sufficiency, without mains electricity, medical services, shops or any of the other modern amenities we take for granted. Anne describes the history of Soay and its unique wildlife, and as well as telling her own personal story introduces along the way some of the off-beat and colourful characters associated with the island, notably Tex's one-time associate, the celebrated writer and naturalist, Gavin Maxwell.
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Insomniac city : New York, Oliver, and me
by Bill Hayes
The author of Sleep Demons presents a celebration of New York City life and intimate glimpses into his relationship with the late Oliver Sacks, describing how in the aftermath of a partner's death the author moved to the city and unexpectedly fell in love on the eve of Sacks' battle with cancer.
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Focus on: Athletes and Competitors
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Adventurer at Heart : An Autobiography
by Nathan Fa'avae
To win an adventure race can take up to 160 hours of non-stop racing over six days, with virtually no sleep or rest. In this book, world champion adventure racer Nathan Fa'avae, considered by many to be the best in the history of the sport, shares his life story, and provides a unique insight into this remarkable pursuit.
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Richie McCaw 148
by Richie McCaw
This lavish retrospective is something special. It features over 500 photographs, close to 50,000 words and weighs in at around 3 kgs. The book devotes two pages to each of the 148 tests Richie played.
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The Kiwi Pair
by Hamish Bond
Since competing at their first race meeting together in 2009, the powerhouse duo of rowers Hamish Bond and Eric Murray have never been beaten. They are one of New Zealand's most successful sporting partnerships of all time. Affectionately known as the Kiwi Pair.
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Valerie: The Autobiography
by Valerie Adams
In her book the traditionally media-shy Adams will talk about her humble upbringings, her incredibly successful partnership with coach Kirsten Hellier and, for the first time, shed light on the dramatic disintegration of that partnership in 2010. But perhaps most importantly, she will talk about what it's like to achieve at the very highest level ...and to regularly look out from the centre of the sporting dais.
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| Find a Way by Diana NyadDistance swimmer Diana Nyad (who had already swum 28 miles around Manhattan) tried in 1978 to swim between Florida and Cuba, failing on that occasion and (years later) on three more. Her initial attempts at the Cuba-Florida transit were stymied by weather, dehydration, hypothermia, asthma, and jellyfish. In Find a Way, Nyad recounts her life, details her training methods, and explains her strategy for long open-water swims. At age 64, on August 31, 2013, she set out again from Havana, completing the crossing to Key West in 53 hours. |
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