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Books > Language & Literature > Biography & autobiography
J. Michael Wilson (1916-1999), Soldier, Medical Doctor, Priest and
Academic, may be best known for his often ground-breaking
professional achievement, from working with lepers in Ghana to his
seminal work in Pastoral Studies. For all his successful
accomplishments, however, he thought accolades, titles and
qualifications were no more than vain baubles for obituary columns.
Becoming a fully human being was, he believed, best manifested in
community, through art, poetry, prayer and revelling in the wonders
of Nature. Here, finally, is your chance to share a merry dance
through his creative life and works...
Intrigue, high-stakes machinations and adrenaline-fuelled track action
– Growing Wings is the never-before-told inside story of how the grid’s
most fascinating, swagger-rich and win-at-all-costs team competed their
way to total domination and disrupted Formula One’s world order.
With exclusive access to Red Bull's inner sanctum, but maintaining
journalistic independence, leading F1 writer Ben Hunt probes the
operations of a world-beating Formula One team over its eventful
twenty-year history, from the rivalries, turbulence and controversy, to
the game-changing tech and the leadership strategies. He also talks to
the drivers themselves, including Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel, for
a fascinating insight into the mindset of motorsport athletes through
success, risk and challenge.
Endorsed with a foreword by Team Principal Christian Horner, but
maintaining journalistic independence, this thrilling, frank and
unvarnished account of how the paddock’s loudest upstarts achieved team
alchemy with the promotion of a driver called Max Verstappen, shows you
what it looks like to go, learn, go again, tweak, test and ultimately
outplay the competition in a way never before seen in Formula One.
Louis Botha was ’n briljante Boeregeneraal wie se taktiese vernuf en intuïtiewe aanslag vir etlike oorwinnings oor die Britse magte in die Anglo-Boereoorlog gesorg het. Maar dit was sy enigmatiese karakter en vaste oortuiging om te hou by wat hy geglo het reg was, wat hom as ’n leier van die Boerevolk bevestig het.
Richard Steyn gee op meesterlike wyse insae in die lewe van hierdie grootse Suid-Afrikaanse krygsman en staatsman. Hy beskryf verhelderend hoe Botha saam met sy hegte vriend, Jan Smuts, die vier Suid-Afrikaanse kolonies na Uniewording in 1910 gelei het waarna Botha as die eerste eerste minister van die Unie aangewys is.
Gedurende die Eerste Wêreldoorlog was Botha aan die voorpunt van die Suid-Afrikaanse magte se suksesvolle inval van Duits-Suidwes-Afrika. Tog is hy deur talle Afrikaners verkwalik vir sy steun aan Brittanje, en die Afrikaner-rebellie van 1914, waartydens hy teen voormalige makkers moes optree, het sy hart gebreek.
Botha se groothartig en vrygewige omgang met mense – van Vereeniging tot Versailles – het hom bo sy tydgenote laat uitstaan.
My recollection of one of the proudest days of my life. At the
Meardy Farm, I stood next to my mother and my dad Arthur while she
rang France to speak to the Duke of Windsor. The change in my
mothers voice from this miserable woman in her sixties, who would
moan and groan regardless about life, into a young girl blushing at
the sound of his voice. "Hello David, its Rose," she sounded so
gentle. I looked at Arthur and he did not look happy with mum,
hearing her conversation, watching her acting in this way. I stood
waiting nervously, what would I say to this man? A Prince, a King,
and now the Duke of Windsor, but always my father. Then mum passed
me the telephone, I put it against my ear and stammered. "Hello,
it's Roy, Roy Albert." The telephone went silent for a few moments,
then a voice on the end of the line replied, "Hello Roy Albert,
this is Edward ..."
Winner of the 2010 Non-Fiction National Book Award Patti Smith's
definitive memoir: an evocative, honest and moving coming-of-age
story of her extraordinary relationship with the artist Robert
Mapplethorpe 'Sharp, elegiac and finely crafted' Sunday Times
'Terrifically evocative ... The most spellbinding and diverting
portrait of funky-but-chic New York in the late '60s and '70s that
any alumnus has committed to print' New York Times 'Render,
harrowing, often hilarious' Vogue In 1967, a chance meeting between
two young people led to a romance and a lifelong friendship that
would carry each to international success never dreamed of. The
backdrop is Brooklyn, Chelsea Hotel, Max's Kansas City, Scribner's
Bookstore, Coney Island, Warhol's Factory and the whole city
resplendent. Among their friends, literary lights, musicians and
artists such as Harry Smith, Bobby Neuwirth, Allen Ginsberg, Sandy
Daley, Sam Shepherd, William Burroughs, etc. It was a heightened
time politically and culturally; the art and music worlds exploding
and colliding. In the midst of all this two kids made a pact to
always care for one another. Scrappy, romantic, committed to making
art, they prodded and provided each other with faith and confidence
during the hungry years--the days of cous-cous and lettuce soup.
Just Kids begins as a love story and ends as an elegy. Beautifully
written, this is a profound portrait of two young artists, often
hungry, sated only by art and experience. And an unforgettable
portrait of New York, her rich and poor, hustlers and hellions,
those who made it and those whose memory lingers near.
The story of a fifty-year relationship between a Vietnam veteran
and a remote Aboriginal tribe: a miniature epic of human
adaptation, suffering and resilience. The Passion of Private White
describes the meeting of two worlds: the world of the fiercely
driven biologist and anthropologist Neville White, and the world of
the hunter-gatherer clans of remote northern Australia he studied
and lived with. As White tried to understand the world as it was
understood on the other side of the vast cultural divide, he was
also trying to transcend the mental scars he suffered on the
battlefields of Vietnam. The clans had their own injuries to deal
with, as they tried to adapt to modernity, live down their losses
and yet hold onto their ancient lands, customs, laws and language.
Over five decades, White mapped in astonishing detail the culture
and history of the Yolgnu clans at Donydji in north-east Arnhem
Land. But eventually presence meant involvement, and White became
advocate more than anthropologist in the clan's struggle to survive
when everything - from the ambitions of mining companies and a
zombie bureaucracy, to feuds, sorcery and magic, despair and
dysfunction - conspired to destroy them. And the fifty-year
endeavour served another purpose for White and the members of his
old platoon he took there. Working to help the community at Donydji
became a kind of antidote for the psychic wounds of Vietnam. While
for the clans, from the old warriors to the children, their
fanatical benefactor offered a few rays of meaning and hope. There
was no cure in this meeting of two worlds, both suffering their own
form of PTSD, but they helped each other survive. This is a
miniature epic of human adaptation, suffering and resilience, an
astonishing window into both our recent and our deep history, the
coloniser and colonised - indeed into the human condition itself.
THE NO.1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER It has been 30 years since Noel
Fitzpatrick graduated as a veterinary surgeon, and that 22-year-old
from Ballyfin, Ireland, is now one of the leading veterinary
surgeons in the world. The journey to that point has seen Noel
treat thousands of animals - many of whom were thought to be beyond
help - animals that have changed his life, and the lives of those
around them, for the better. If the No.1 Sunday Times bestseller
Listening to the Animals was about Noel's path to becoming The
Supervet, then How Animals Saved My Life is about what it's like to
actually be The Supervet. Noel shares the moving and often funny
stories of the animals he's treated and the unique 'animal people'
he has met along the way. He reflects on the valuable lessons of
Integrity, Care, Love and Hope that they have taught him - lessons
that have sustained him through the unbelievable highs and crushing
lows of a profession where lives are quite literally at stake. As
Noel explores what makes us connect with animals so deeply, we meet
Peanut, the world's first cat with two front bionic limbs;
eight-year-old therapy dachschund Olive; Odin, a gorgeous
five-year-old Dobermann, who would prove to be one of Noel's most
challenging cases - and of course his beloved companions Ricochet,
the Maine Coon, and Keira, the scruffy Border terrier who is always
by his side.
Ivan Petrov was born in 1934 in the industrial town of Chapaevsk.
His father was shot by Stalin as an 'enemy of the people', and Ivan
was brought up by his mother and violent stepfather - both
alcoholics, along with most of the rest of the town. By his early
20s, Ivan had also succumbed to the lure of the bottle. 'Smashed in
the USSR' is his eye-opening, frequently eye-watering story.
In her spare, stark style, Annie Ernaux documents the desires and
indignities of a human heart ensnared in an all-consuming passion.
Blurring the line between fact and fiction, she attempts to plot
the emotional and physical course of her two-year relationship with
a married man where every word, event, and person either provides a
connection with her beloved or is subject to her cold indifference.
With courage and exactitude, Ernaux seeks the truth behind an
existence lived, for a time, entirely for someone else.
For anyone who has ever felt like they don't belong, Sigh, Gone
shares an irreverent, funny, and moving tale of displacement and
assimilation woven together with poignant themes from beloved works
of classic literature. In 1975, during the fall of Saigon, Phuc
Tran immigrates to America along with his family. By sheer chance
they land in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, a small town where the Trans
struggle to assimilate into their new life. In this coming-of-age
memoir told through the themes of great books such as The
Metamorphosis, The Scarlet Letter, The Iliad, and more, Tran
navigates the push and pull of finding and accepting himself
despite the challenges of immigration, feelings of isolation, and
teenage rebellion, all while attempting to meet the rigid
expectations set by his immigrant parents. Appealing to fans of
coming-of-age memoirs such as Fresh Off the Boat, Running with
Scissors, or tales of assimilation like Viet Thanh Nguyen's The
Displaced and The Refugees, Sigh, Gone explores one man's
bewildering experiences of abuse, racism, and tragedy and reveals
redemption and connection in books and punk rock. Against the
hairspray-and-synthesizer backdrop of the '80s, he finds solace and
kinship in the wisdom of classic literature, and in the subculture
of punk rock, he finds affirmation and echoes of his disaffection.
In his journey for self-discovery Tran ultimately finds refuge and
inspiration in the art that shapes--and ultimately saves--him.
Meet Jess, aka Touretteshero. Jess has Tourettes Syndrome. Welcome
to Biscuit Land is a witty yet stirring first-hand account of
dealing with the daily difficulties of Tourettes - a neurological
disorder characterized by physical and verbal tics. Jess Thom
shares a year of her life, detailing the entire spectrum of her
experiences. From arm and leg tics that can occasionally be
life-threatening to uncontrollable verbal outburst - she says the
word 'biscuit' an average of 16 times per minute - Jess manages
with the support of a close network of friends and family, as well
as encountering strangers who can be unpredictably helpful and
harmful. At once funny and shocking, tender and moving, this memoir
provides a courageous and optimistic voice in the face of the major
challenges, leaving readers with an inspiring message of
resilience.
Read by Dave Grohl. Features excerpts from five never-before-heard
demos performed by Dave Grohl and an original story exclusive to
The Storyteller audiobook. So, I've written a book. Having
entertained the idea for years, and even offered a few questionable
opportunities ('It's a piece of cake! Just do four hours of
interviews, find someone else to write it, put your face on the
cover, and voila!'), I have decided to tell these stories just as I
have always done, in my own voice. The joy that I have felt from
chronicling these tales is not unlike listening back to a song that
I've recorded and can't wait to share with the world, or reading a
primitive journal entry from a stained notebook, or even hearing my
voice bounce between the Kiss posters on my wall as a child. This
certainly doesn't mean that I'm quitting my day job, but it does
give me a place to shed a little light on what it's like to be a
kid from Springfield, Virginia, walking through life while living
out the crazy dreams I had as young musician. From hitting the road
with Scream at 18 years old, to my time in Nirvana and the Foo
Fighters, jamming with Iggy Pop or playing at the Academy Awards or
dancing with AC/DC and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, drumming
for Tom Petty or meeting Sir Paul McCartney at Royal Albert Hall,
bedtime stories with Joan Jett or a chance meeting with Little
Richard, to flying halfway around the world for one epic night with
my daughters...the list goes on. I look forward to focusing the
lens through which I see these memories a little sharper for you
with much excitement.
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