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Books > Fiction > True stories > General
Ed Husain's The Islamist is the shocking inside story of British Islamic fundamentalism, told by a former radical. 'When I was sixteen I became an Islamic fundamentalist. Five years later, after much emotional turmoil, I rejected fundamentalist teachings and returned to normal life and my family. As I recovered my faith and mind, I tried to put my experiences behind me, but as the events of 7/7 unfolded it became clear to me that Islamist groups pose a threat to this country that we - Muslims and non-Muslims alike - do not yet understand.' 'Why are young British Muslims becoming extremists? What are the risks of another home-grown terrorist attack on British soil? By describing my experiences inside these groups and the reasons I joined them, I hope to explain the appeal of extremist thought, how fanatics penetrate Muslim communities and the truth behind their agenda of subverting the West and moderate Islam. Writing candidly about life after extremism, I illustrate the depth of the problem that now grips Muslim hearts and minds and lay bare what politicians and Muslim 'community leaders' do not want you to know.' 'A complete eye-opener' The Times 'Captivating, and terrifyingly honest' Observer 'Persuasive and stimulating' Martin Amis 'Read this articulate and impassioned book' Simon Jenkins, Sunday Times Ed Husain was an Islamist radical for five years in his late teens and early twenties. Having rejected extremism he travelled widely in the Middle East and worked for the British Council in Syria and Saudi Arabia. Husain received wide and various acclaim for The Islamist, which was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize for political writing and the PEN/Ackerley Prize for literary autobiography, amongst others.
The harrowing true story of a high-school senior, her parents, her secret online relationship with a handsome, manipulative stranger, and her well-laid plan to leave home and country to marry a man in Kosovo she thought she loved. The Baldwins were a strong, tight-knit family living in Texas. When their seventeen-year-old daughter, Mackenzie, met Aadam in an online chat room, she fell for his good looks, his charm, and his respectful conversation. He lived in Kosovo, and they began talking regularly. The more attached Mackenzie became to Aadam, the more detached she became from her family. Mackenzie's parents, John and Stephanie Baldwin, had no clue there was a man behind their daughter's sudden change in personality, her surprising interest in Islam, and her withdrawal from friends and family. When Mackenzie's attachment to Aadam increased and they became "engaged," Mackenzie started making plans to fly secretly to Kosovo and marry Aadam. But twenty-five days before Mackenzie was scheduled to leave the country, three friends in whom Mackenzie had confided told Mackenzie's father. Through the help of their pastor, John Baldwin contacted the FBI and asked for help. The FBI did not believe Aadam was involved with ISIS or that he was trying to radicalize her, but they were concerned about Aadam's intentions, as that part of Kosovo was known for sex-trafficking and money scams. With just 72 hours left before Mackenzie's planned departure, three FBI agents confronted her and urged her to stay. Told from the viewpoint of both father and daughter, Almost Gone allows us to walk with this family through Mackenzie's network of lies and deceit and John and Stephanie's escalating bewilderment and alarm. More than a cautionary tale, this is the story of unconditional parental love and unwavering faith, and how God helped a family save their daughter from a relationship that jeopardized not only her happiness, but also her safety.
"Friday Night Lights "meets "Glee"--the incredible and true story
of an extraordinary drama teacher who has changed the lives of
thousands of students and inspired a town.
Four undocumented Mexican American students, two great teachers,
one robot-building contest . . . and a major motion picture
Sunday Times bestselling foster carer Maggie Hartley faces one of the toughest challenges of her career when she is forced to choose between two children in her care. A heartbreaking true story perfect for fans of Cathy Glass, Casey Watson, Angela Hart and Rosie Lewis. ***** THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER At just ten years old, Kirsty has already suffered a lifetime of heartache and suffering. Neglected by her teenage mother and taken into care, Kirsty thought she had found her forever family when she is fostered by Pat and Mike, who she comes to see as her real mum and dad. But when Pat has a heart attack and collapses in front of her, Kirsty's foster family say it's all her fault. They blame her temper tantrums for putting Pat under stress and they don't want Kirsty in their lives anymore. Kirsty is still reeling from this rejection when she comes to live with foster carer Maggie Hartley. She acts out, smashing up Maggie's home and even threatens to hurt the baby boy Maggie has fostered since birth. Social Services must take Kirsty's threat seriously and Maggie is forced to choose between eight-month-old Ryan, who she's grown to love, or angry Kirsty, who will most likely end up in a children's home if Maggie can no longer care for her. Maggie is in an impossible position, one that calls in to question her decision to become a foster carer in the first place... An inspiring and heartwarming read, perfect for fans of Cathy Glass, Casey Watson, Angela Hart and Rosie Lewis.
Have you ever been lied to by a lover? In this straightforward and supportive book, therapist Susan Forward profiles the wide variety of liars, shows you how to deal with the lies -- from the benign to the lethal -- that these men spin, and gives practical strategies to stop them before they ruin your relationship and, ultimately, your life. Once you find out the truth about your lover and his lies, what do you do? Forward offers practical, proven, step-by-step methods for healing the wounds caused by his deception and betrayal. She provides all the communication and behavioral techniques you need to deal with a lover's lies, telling you exactly what to say, when and how to respond to his reactions, and how to present your requirements for staying in the relationship. With understanding and compassion, she helps you decide whether your relationship can be saved and shows you how to move beyond doubt and regret if you feel that it can't. But whether you stay or go, you can learn to love and trust again.
Through intimate portraits of four exonerated prisoners, journalist Alison Flowers explores what happens to innocent people when the state flings open the jailhouse door and tosses them back, empty-handed, into the unknown. These stories reveal serious gaps in the criminal justice system. Flowers depicts the collateral damage of wrongful convictions on families and communities, challenging the deeper problem of mass incarceration in the United States, vividly showing that release from prison is not always a happy ending, or indeed an ending at all.
In the bestselling tradition of Seabiscuit, the extraordinary true
story of the world's most famous racehorse, and the rogue who owned
him.
Anouilh's celebrated play draws from historical events in the Norman conquest of England to create a profound portrait of a man's soul—and a transcendent vision of the human spirit.
'The most eccentric golf book ever' Sports and Leisure Magazine Golf's Strangest Rounds is an absorbing collection of bizarre tales from the lengthy annals of the sport's history. There are stories of tragedy, eccentricity, tactical slipups and ones that defy categorization altogether - meet `Mysterious Montague', for example, of the world's best golfers but a man who refused ever to compete in a tournament. You'll find plenty of golfing greats here - Gene Sarazen, Chip Beck, Greg Norman, Nick Faldo - all of whom have played their parts in irrational finishes, record rounds and famous freak shots. The tales within these pages are bizarre, fascinating, hilarious and, most importantly, true. This brand new edition, redesigned in splendid hardback for 2018, is the perfect gift for any golf fanatic. Word count: 45,000
#1 "NEW YORK TIMES" BESTSELLER
Based upon conversations recorded by a French journalist, this book mixes autobiographical reflections with a critique of the contemporary state of the Middle East. It tells the stories of many individuals working for peace and of his own work, especially with children and students of the school and college he has founded. Fr Elias Chacour, author of the bestselling books Blood Brothers and We Belong to the Land, is the Archbishop of Galilee. Seeing the lack of educational opportunities for Palestinian youth, he created a school open to all local children which opened in the early 1980s. The Mar Elias Educational Institution and now caters for 4,500 students, representing all major religions and ethnicities in Israel. Fr Chacour has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize three times and has received other prestigious peace awards.
Roofless is the new non-fiction book by Stewart Harvey, and is a series of real-life accounts and interviews given by people who have faced the brutal realities of homelessness at some point in their lives. Compiled by the charity First Stop Darlington, the true identities of the protagonists are kept secret, but their stories always make for difficult and bleak reading. Documenting both the successes and failures of people who attempt to make a life for themselves while battling homelessness, Roofless is a disturbing reality check for people who may often turn a blind eye to this ever-increasing issue. "...Harrowing and calling out for change, Roofless serves as a reminder that anyone can be homeless, especially in times of economic uncertainty and welfare cut-backs..."
Imagine a time before the whole world knew The Beatles - you are in 1960s Liverpool, standing in an overcrowded, dark, sweaty cellar, waiting for John, Paul, George and Pete to take to the stage - about to witness the face of popular music, and your own life, changing forever. This is the story of Mike and Bernadette Byrne's amazing and uniquely personal journey. They not only witnessed music history being made but they went on to build The Beatles Story, the most successful Beatle exhibition in the world. With no money of their own, little experience, and hardly any support from the city, they succeeded. Bernadette was a Cavern regular who went on to date George and Paul, while Mike was a fellow Merseybeat musician and acquaintance of The Beatles. Like scenes in a Beatles film yet to be made, Bernie was caught with her hair in rollers by George Harrison, Paul McCartney nearly burned her parents' house down and Mike was backed by a 21-year-old Ringo while playing at Butlins Holiday Camp. From escaping screaming fans in George Harrison's car and organising 14 labourers to carry Ringo's customised Mini up an escalator in a Dallas mall, to secret meetings with senior Beatle bosses in a London crypt, this journey is packed with unseen pictures and many untold stories about The Beatles - and how a Liverpool couple helped Liverpool fall in love with the Beatles again. The book is a large, coffee table size hardcover with full colour interior, full of rare and magnificent images.
When the Nazis take Rome, thousands go into hiding. One priest will risk everything to save them. September 1943: German forces occupy Rome. SS officer Paul Hauptmann rules with terror. An Irish priest, Hugh O'Flaherty, dedicates himself to helping those escaping from the Nazis. His home is Vatican City, a neutral, independent country within Rome where the occupiers hold no sway. He gathers a team to set up an Escape Line. But Hauptmann's net begins closing in and the need for a terrifyingly audacious mission grows critical. By Christmas, it's too late to turn back. Based on a true story, My Father's House is a powerful thriller from a master of historical fiction. It is an unforgettable novel of love, sacrifice and what it means to be human in the most extreme circumstances.
THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER Want to know the truth about what life is like as a mum and step-mum with a chaotic patchwork family? This book is everything I've been through that's made me who I am, plus the lessons I've learned from many mistakes. I hope that it will make you laugh as well as give you strength to keep going when times get tough. After all, we are all in this together... Rachaele, aka Part-Time Working Mummy Hundreds of thousands of fans flock to the Part-Time Working Mummy page for its heartfelt posts, honest accounts of complicated family life and its appeal to 'bring parents together to support each other through all the sh*t that life throws at us!'. This book channels the amazing spirit of the page, with Rachaele sharing behind-the-scenes experiences that have shaped her own views on parenting and life; packed with personal stories and lessons learned, it's about the best, the worst and the ok times in a 'normal' family. As well as tackling subjects like single parenthood, patchwork families, unexpected pregnancy, domestic violence and bullying, the book ultimately spreads a message of kindness amidst the chaos and inspires you to change the world for the better - and, of course, a good laugh to see you through the tough times!
The fire was visible from seventy miles away and the heat generated was so intense that a helicopter could only circle the rig at a perimeter of one mile. On the surface of the sea, a converted fishing trawler inched as close as possible, but the paint on the vessel’s hull blistered and burnt. In the water surrounding the inferno, men’s heads could be seen bobbing like apples as their yellow hard hats melted with the heat. On 6 July 1988 a series of explosions ripped through the Piper Alpha oil platform, 110 miles north-east of Aberdeen in the North Sea. Ablaze with 226 men on board, the searing temperatures caused the platform to collapse in just two hours. Only sixty-one would survive by leaping over 100 feet into the water below. Newly updated for the thirtieth year since the tragedy, Fire in the Night by journalist Stephen McGinty tells in gripping detail the devastating story of that summer evening. Combining interviews with survivors, witness statements and transcripts from the official inquiry into the disaster, this is the moving and vivid tale of what remains the worst offshore oil-rig disaster to date.
In early November 1913, not quite 19 months after the loss of the Titanic in midatlantic, an autumn gale descended on the Great Lakes. "Gales of November" - like the one that sank the Edmund Fitzgerald in the 1970s - are a fact of life for Great Lakes mariners, but this one was anything but ordinary. Meteorologists now believe that a blast of cold polar air met a warm, moist air mass entrained in a low-pressure cell moving up from the Gulf of Mexico through the U.S. heartland, and the result was a violent weather "bomb" and the worst recorded storm in Great Lakes history. The storm lasted four days, with sustained winds as high as 75 miles per hour, freezing temperatures, white-out blizzard conditions, and mountainous seas.;Though the U.S. Department of Agriculture's weather bureau (forerunner of the U.S. Weather Bureau) issued storm warnings on Friday morning, November 7, the warnings contained no hint of anything more than 50-mile-per-hour winds for Friday and Saturday. Most ships were making their final trips of the season; their captains knew that as autumn turned to winter the weather would only get worse, and then the lakes would freeze. Across the Great Lakes, hundreds of ships left port that weekend, heading directly into the jaws of what became a survival storm. On the ocean, with sea room, a well-found ship can often survive by running off before a storm until it blows out. On the Great Lakes there is never sufficient sea room. In the driving snow, ship masters could only guess where the treacherous shores lay. Ships iced up and became topheavy; some turned turtle. By Monday evening 19 ships had sunk, another two dozen were driven ashore, and at least 238 sailors had lost their lives.;The city of Cleveland, buried under 22 inches of snow that drifted up to second-story eaves, and facing shortages of milk, bread, and meat, was confronting the worst natural disaster in its history. White Hurricane recreates the four-day storm with narrative intensity and factual depth. To make sense of this big, sprawling, multifaceted story, author David Brown develops it chronologically and focuses on the most exciting human dramas. One or two ships in each of the four hardest hit lakes - Superior, Huron, Michigan, and Erie - carry the narrative, while other disasters are reported more briefly as they occur.;The featured ships are those that left in the newspaper archives and other original and secondary sources the richest, most exciting, most mysterious, and most humanly moving stories. The destructive impacts ashore - especially the privations in Cleveland - weave another narrative strand. The U.S. Weather Bureau and the U.S. Coast Guard owe their existence in part to the Storm of 1913. Like Isaac's Storm and The Heart of the Sea, White Hurricane is both thrilling narrative and scrupulous history. This is the book that carries The Perfect Storm to the heart of America, and David Brown, a Great Lakes mariner and writer and the author of The Last Log of the Titanic, is the ideal guide.
Meet the inspirational dogs who went from being rescued to becoming rescuer, in these incredible true stories. You'll read all about... Toby, the golden retriever who performed the Heimlich manoeuvre to save his owner's life Liam, the Lhaso Apso-Poodle mix who helped his owner battle an eating disorder Hercules, the St Bernard who saved his owners from burglars on the first day he moved in Alfie, the terrier who gave a bullied girl a new lease of life ... as well as many other canine heroes who came to their owner's aid - whether it was saving them from physical threats, or helping them to recover from mental illness, PTSD and bereavement. These remarkable dogs all repaid the love and appreciation that their owners displayed in rescuing them. Let these uplifting stories warm your heart, and show you that adopted dogs truly are man's best friend.
A scared little boy who just wants his mummy back. A grieving father struggling to cope. And a loving foster carer determined to help them heal. A heartbreaking true story perfect for fans of Cathy Glass, Casey Watson, Angela Hart and Rosie Lewis. ***** A TRUE STORY BY THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR MAGGIE HARTLEY Quiet and polite, obsessively neat, clean and tidy, eight-year-old Tom is unlike any child Maggie has ever fostered before. Tom has been taken into care following concerns that his dad is struggling to cope after the death of Tom's mum. At first, Maggie doesn't know what to make of this shy, nervous little boy who never cries and is terrified of getting dirty. But as Tom's cleaning rituals start to get more extreme, Maggie fears that there's something more sinister going on beneath the surface. When she meets Tom's dad Mark, a stern ex-soldier and strict disciplinarian, it's clear that Tom's life at home without his mummy has been a constant battlefield. Can Maggie help Mark to raise a son and not a soldier? Or will little Tom lose his daddy too? An uplifting and ultimately redemptive story by Sunday Times bestselling foster carer Maggie Hartley. Perfect for fans of Cathy Glass, Casey Watson, Angela Hart and Rosie Lewis.
Daniel A. Kelin II preserves the qualities of oral storytelling in fifty stories recorded from eighteen storytellers on eight islands and atolls. This lively collection includes something for everyone: origin stories, tales of mejenkwaad and other demons, tricksters, disobedient children, wronged husbands, foolish suitors, and reunited families - all relaying the importance of traditional Marshallese values and customs. Profiles of the storytellers, a glossary, and a pronunciation guide enrich the collection.
Adventurers cross deserts and row oceans, appearing to live the dream. Yet they also must pay the bills and carve out time to get away. Are you trying to make a career doing what you love, daring to go freelance in a creative industry, growing a tribe or curious about an unconventional career? What is it like to build a life from living adventurously? Whether you are adventurous, creative, or just curious, Ask An Adventurer answers your questions from behind the scenes, rather than the usual questions adventurers hear: there are no kit lists, practical expedition planning advice or daring deeds in these pages. Instead, Alastair tackles questions asked by readers on social media such as: How do you make a living? How do you make time for adventure? How do you stay motivated and focused? How do you deal with post-adventure blues? How do you deal with the dilemma of flying and travel? How has social media changed the way you tell stories? How do you become an adventurer? How much does an adventurer earn? How do you decide what you will or won't do for money? How do you find sponsors? How do you get your work done? How can we make the world of adventure better? How do you get a book published? How do you get paid to give talks? How do you become a better speaker? How do you deal with emails? How do you start a podcast? How do you launch an email newsletter? And more...
**THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER** **SHORTLISTED FOR THE COSTA BIOGRAPHY AWARD** 'A modern masterpiece' Guardian Uncovering the mystery of her mother's disappearance as a child: Laura Cumming, prize-winning author and art critic, takes a closer look at her family story. Autumn 1929 - a young girl is kidnapped from a beach. Five agonising days go by before she is discovered safe and well in a nearby village. The child remembers nothing of these events and at home, nobody ever speaks of them again. Decades later, Laura Cumming delves into the mystery surrounding her mother's disappearance. Examining everything from old family photos to letters, tickets and recipes, she uncovers a series of secrets and lies perpetuated not just by her family but by the whole community and in doing so unlocks a mystery almost a century old. 'A moving, many-sided human story of great depth and tenderness, and a revelation of how art enriches life' Sunday Times Shortlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction Shortlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize Longlisted for the RSL Ondaatje Prize |
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