I behave badly to set myself apart. To test myself. To push myself. To prove something. To shock someone. ... I behave badly because I can. That s how Ellen Sussman describes her mischievous endeavors. In this anthology of personal essays, she s invited twenty-five other bad girl writers to share their stories. Ann Hood lies; Mary Roach confesses. Erica Jong, the original bad girl, challenges her own claim to that fame. Caroline Leavitt marries and cheats. These pages bristle with danger. The writers dig deep bad behavior lies in their souls. And what they bring to the surface reveals telling truths about our psyches and our society.

"My Hand on the Tiller" is an account of the author's sailing experiences over his lifetime. Gordon Findlay is a classic boat enthusiast and has sailed on many different sailing vessels, from the smallest dinghies to the largest square riggers. He has owned a variety of different boats over the years and some of these are described in the text. Gordon also describes some of his favourite places on the West Coast of Scotland, as well as his experiences in Tall Ships and at Classic Yacht Festivals in different parts of Europe This book is for sailing enthusiasts with a particular interest in traditional boats and Scottish waters. There are many photographs and a large appendix with details of yachts and tall ships as well as a comprehensive glossary and a list of useful websites.

On his 18th birthday, Ryan Knighton was diagnosed with Retinitis Pigmentosa (RP), a congenital, progressive disease marked by night-blindness, tunnel vision and, eventually, total blindness. In this penetrating, nervy memoir, which ricochets between meditation and black comedy, Knighton tells the story of his fifteen-year descent into blindness while incidentally revealing the world of the sighted in all its phenomenal peculiarity. Knighton learns to drive while unseeing; has his first significant relationship--with a deaf woman; navigates the punk rock scene and men's washrooms; learns to use a cane; and tries to pass for seeing while teaching English to children in Korea. Stumbling literally and emotionally into darkness, into love, into couch-shopping at Ikea, into adulthood, and into truce if not acceptance of his identity as a blind man, his writerly self uses his disability to provide a window onto the human condition. His experience of blindness offers unexpected insights into sight and the other senses, culture, identity, language, our fears and fantasies. Cockeyed is not a conventional confessional. Knighton is powerful and irreverent in words and thought and impatient with the preciousness we've come to expect from books on disability. Readers will find it hard to put down this wild ride around their everyday world with a wicked, smart, blind guide at the wheel.

What do 'Abu Sindi', 'Timothy Sean McCormack', 'Saro', and 'Commander Avo' all have in common? They were all aliases for Monte Melkonian. But who was Monte Melkonian? In his native California he was once a kid in cut-off jeans, playing baseball and eating snow cones. Europe denounced him as an international terrorist. His adopted homeland of Armenia decorated him as a national hero who led a force of 4000 men to victory in the Armenian enclave of Mountainous Karabagh in Azerbaijan. Why Armenia? Why adopt the cause of a remote corner of the Caucasus whose peoples had scattered throughout the world after the early twentieth century Ottoman genocides? Markar Melkonian spent seven years unravelling the mystery of his brother's road: a journey which began in his ancestors' town in Turkey and leading to a blood-splattered square in Tehran, the Kurdish mountains, the bomb-pocked streets of Beirut, and finally, to the windswept heights of Mountainous Karabagh. Monte's life embodied the agony and the follies bedevelling the end of the Cold War and the unravelling of the Soviet Union. Yet, who really was this man? A terrorist or a hero? "My Brother's Road" is not just the story of a long journey and a short life, it is an attempt to understand what happens when one man decides that terrible actions speak louder than words.

'In Court and Other Stories' brings together stories written over a span of many years. Some draw on feelings of exile and homesickness in America, some on friendships with others from South Africa, some on events during visits back. On the surface some deal only with Americans. All probe dislocation and imposed identity. South African born author, Rose Moss, emigrated to the USA in 1964. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts and teaches Creative Writing at Harvard.

A behind-the-scenes look at death in New York City. For almost a century, New York City's Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has presided over the dead. Over the years, the OCME has endured everything- political upheavals, ghastly murders, bloody gang wars, the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and non-stop battles for power and influence-and remains the final authority in cases of sudden, unexplained, or violent death. Founded in 1918, the OCME has evolved over decades of technological triumphs and all-too human failure to its modern-day incarnation as the foremost forensics lab in the world, investigating an average caseload of over 15,000 suspicious deaths a year. This is the behind-the-scenes chronicle of public service and private vendettas, of blood in the streets and back-room bloodbaths, and of the criminal cases that made history and headlines.

Dancer and entertainer, the author lived like there was no tomorrow. Anything goes, he told himself. But when he and a fellow dancer were caught dealing in drugs and landed up in the notorious Klong Prem prison, they had to dance to a different tune. There they reached rock bottom, and found – God. Royal pardon is the story of how two men shone the light of Jesus in a place of unimaginable darkness and brutality. It is the story of how God can reach out and grab someone for the work in his Kingdom. It tells how God wipes away all horrors of the past and present that can chain the mind, and how He provides miracles to open prison doors and break all the chains that bind us. After his release from prison in Thailand, William Bosch founded the Royal Pardon Ministry in South Africa. After two years of sharing with parents and school children Bangkok Prison Ministry experiences, and the dangers of drugs and making the wrong choices, he is currently following his dream of working in China and sharing God’s grace and goodness there.

NO FUTURE? 'It will never work.' 'They are just too different.' 'Sleep with a white man? No thanks.' 'Look at the state of him, those clothes ' Just some of the comments directed at Margaret and Bobby Smith during their ten-year marriage. Why? Because Bobby is a white, cider-bellied punk rocker and Margaret a black, Methodist, Nigerian. One Love is a book that shows the reality of inter-racial love. Through the eyes of Mr and Mrs Smith we see how two people can conquer prejudice, intolerance and hate. A hate that comes from both sides. Written from their dual perspective, they honestly debate the issues that affect those who marry out of their culture. The result is a book that challenges previously held views about multiculturalism. Taking their relationship as a starting point, our co-authors also explore wider issues such as: segregation, self-hate, sex and identity. Crucially, the book addresses the unique problems experienced by black women/white men partnerships. A mixture of social comment and personal experience, One Love shows the true level of prejudice that exists in modern day England. It delves into the underbelly of inter-racial relationships and discusses the pain, pleasures and pitfalls of such liaisons. It is a book to make you think differently about the world we live in. It is also a sign of hope.

In The White Masai, Corinne Hofmann told the incredible story of how she fell in love with and married Lketinga, a Masai worrior, and lived with his family in Kenya. Now, in Back From Africa, she describes her return to Switzerland and the difficulties that faced her there, detailing how she built a new life for herself and her daughter and overcame all obstacles wth the same courage and optimism with which she faced the demands of her life in the Kenyan outback. With her previous two books Hofmann has proved herself to be an acute observer and an effective storyteller, and her astonishing and compelling tale speaks for itself.

By Philip Clements

ISBN: 9781847471024
Published: 2007
Pages: 150
Key Themes: Christianity, manic depression, bi-polar disorder

Description

This book is the description of an Anglican priest's experience of manic depression. His illness is powerful and dehabilitating yet, through his faith and with a lot of determination, Philip avoids becoming overwhelmed and manages to live and achieve against all odds and expectations. In this book, Philip Clements adds his own personal testimony, a record which is also an account of aspects of his ministry as an Anglican priest and the effects of the illness on his work. This well-written and uplifting account puts manic depression in a new light and reveals how the church deals with the mentally ill

About the Author

Philip Clements was born in 1938 in Aldershot, Hampshire, he now lives near Sandwich, in Kent. Philip has devoted his life to his faith and following the completion of a degree in theology became an ordained Anglican priest. Now retired, Philip is a writer and broadcaster. He has had four books of poetry published and is currently writing his second novel. He is a regular features on BBC Radio 4 and local BBC radio where he is involved in programming discussing spirituality and mental health. He is Chaplain of St Bart's Hospital in Sandwich and works tirelessly for local churches and charitable organisations.

A Walk Against the Stream is a true story of love set against a background of war in Rhodesia.

Greece, it has been said, is where art became inseparable from life. The country evokes a richly embroidered tapestry of images, from old monuments rife with history to idyllic isles of glass-blue sea and blinding-white stucco dwellings. Greece enchants its visitors with its beauty, tradition, and spirit. In this eloquent collection, women share firsthand experiences of the people, history, and landscapes of Greece. Their essays go beyond ordinary travelogue to capture the ways in which Greece has shaped lives and influenced decisions. In expressing their love for the country, these women share stories as visceral as they are poignant, as entertaining as they are endearing. Whether they are seasoned travelers or armchair adventurers, Greece aficionados or those just beginning to learn about the country, readers of this compelling collection will gain a better understanding of Greece and how experiences abroad can impact their lives.

From the author of the international bestseller "Zlata's Diary" comes a haunting testament to how war's brutality affects the lives of young people, spanning from World War I to the war in Iraq that continues today.

"Blood Brothers" is M.J. Akbar's amazing story of three generations of a Muslim family - based on his own - and how they deal with the fluctuating contours of Hindu-Muslim relations. Telinipara, a small jute mill town some 30 miles north of Kolkata along the Hooghly, is a complex Rubik's Cube of migrant Bihari workers, Hindus and Muslims; Bengalis, poor and 'bhadralok'; and Sahibs who live in the safe, 'foreign' world of Victoria Jute Mill. Into this scattered inhabitation, enters a child on the verge of starvation, Prayaag, who is saved and adopted by a Muslim family, converts to Islam and takes on the name of Rahmatullah. As Rahmatullah knits Telinipara into a community, friendship, love, trust and faith are continually tested by the cancer of riots. Incidents - conversion, circumcision, the arrival of plague or electricity - and a fascinating array of characters - the ultimate Brahmin, Rahmatullah's friend Girija Maharaj, the workers' leader, Bauna Sardar, the storyteller, Talat Mian, the poet-teacher, Syed Ashfaque, the smiling mendicant, Burha Deewana, the sincere Sahib, Simon Hogg, and then the questioning, demanding third generation of the author and his friend Kamala - interlink into a narrative of social history as well as a powerful memoir. "Blood Brothers" is a chronicle of its age, its canvas as enchanting as its narrative, a personal journey through change as tensions build, stretching the bonds of a lifetime to breaking point and demanding, in the end, the greatest sacrifice. Its last chapters, written in a bare-bones, unemotional style, are the most moving as the author searches for hope amid raw wounds with a surgeon's scalpel.

Kaffertjie embraces this volatile time in a brutally honest fashion and without fanfare. A true story that captures the celebration of the human spirit and the sudden blossoming of true love for those who were not meant to be loved. When left to care for an infant child of their domestic worker, this conservative family experienced a sequence of events they never imagined possible. The title captures the confusion of a nation and a small group of every-day individuals caught up in its path of irreversible change. The author's recollection of these dramatic events transcends all cultural and racial boundaries with its cutting representation of a middleclass white family wrapped up in the political tribulations of the apartheid regime, as they are unexpectedly confronted by laws that previously protected them.

A young lad struggles through puberty, then fights hard to uphold a promise made to his father to remain a virgin until marriage which results in many humorous sexual scenarios requiring great self-discipline.

Danvers State gives an insider's view of what really went on at the state run insane asylum. The book provides details about the facility's dark past and the melancholy lives of her inhabitants. It brings to light the harsh treatment of mental illness in decades past.

For one hundred and one days Asne Seierstad worked as a reporter in Baghdad. Always in search of a story far less obvious than the American military invasion, Seierstad brings to life the world behind the headlines in this compelling- and heartbreaking-account of her time among the people of Iraq. From the moment she first arrived in Baghdad on a ten-day visa, she was determined to unearth the modern secrets of an ancient place and to find out how the Iraqi people really live. What do people miss most when their world changes overnight? What do they choose to say when they can suddenly say what they like? Seierstad reveals what life is like for everyday people under the constant threat of attack- first from the Iraqi government and later from American bombs. Displaying the novelist's eye and lyrical storytelling that have won her awards around the world, Seierstad here brings to life an unforgettable cast of characters, from foreign press apparatchikUday, to Zahra, a mother of three, to Aliya, the guide and translator who becomes a friend. Putting their trust in a European woman with no obvious agenda, these and other Iraqis speak for themselves, to tell the stories we never see on the evening news.

From the bestselling author of Cats in the Belfry and Cats in May. The behaviour of a Siamese cat is never predictable, as all owners well know. The calm of the Tovey household is once again torn to shreds when Doreen's cat Seeley instantly loathes the new arrival, Shebalu, and she - all five inches of her - loathes him back. And then, even worse, they become firm friends, and team up to create havoc. Seeley decides to leave home, and lodges himself in a forty-foot tree when a neighbour takes up pigeon-shooting. Shebalu follows up by teaching him to dance. The characters of Cats in the Belfry return with a vengeance: Father Adams, Miss Wellington and Annabel the donkey. But Seeley and Shebalu steal the show with their loveable mischief, and their antics will bring tears of laughter.

Something strange occurs to people as soon as they check in to a luxury hotel. Otherwise well mannered, decent folk cast their scruples aside as they spin through the revolving doors. Normal rules of behaviour no longer seem to apply. Everything you read in "Hotel Babylon" is true. Only the names have been changed to protect the guilty. All the anecdotes, the characters, the highs, the lows, the drugs, the scams, the misery and the debauchery are exactly as experienced by Anonymous - someone who has spent his entire career working in some of the most luxurious hotels in London. However, for legal reasons, the stories now take place in the fictional Hotel Babylon. More than a decade is compressed into twenty-four hours. Everything else is as it should be. The rich spend obscene amounts of money, the hotel makes obscene amounts of money and the chambermaids still fight the bellboys over a two-pound coin...

On the streets of Bez Valley Tony grew up hard and he grew up fast. In the cosmopolitan working-class suburbs of Johannesburg, he mixed with, and mixed it with, Jews, Greeks, Italians, Lebanese, blacks, Afrikaners and occasionally Anglo-Saxons. His first rite of passage is to subdue the ruthless Agnee gang, a bunch of Afrikaans school bullies. Learning tactics from his Uncle Mick, a professional wrestler who wears a large Star of David on his back to incite the anti-Jewish crowds of the East Rand, Tony starts on his life-journey of opportunism, petty crime, street-fighting and questionable business practices, driven always by his never-ending quest "to make money lots of it." Wide boy will take the reader directly into the balmy streets of a summer day in 1946 Bez Valley; to the street-brawls of the 1950s' Hillbrow and Yeoville; to the post-war euphoric boom days of Southern Rhodesia, the ensuing bush war, sanctions-busting and, finally, to return full-circle to the sometimes murky otherworld of 'big business' in Johannesburg.

When an enigmatic stranger promises to cure a young Englishman's recurring bouts of asthma it seems too good an opportunity to miss. At the time there was no indication that in the process he would end up being possessed by a 1500 year old Hawaiian Kahuna with a mission. A Kahuna, or priest magician, well versed in the ancient arts of enacting the death spell, sorcery and the native healing rituals of the time. A man, whose life since birth, had been dedicated to the service of the gods, but who had miraculously found the love of a young island woman with whom he shared the secrets of his art. It soon becomes apparent that this powerful kahuna has travelled across time and space from the island of Kaua'i to fulfil a promise. A promise made over the dead body of his beautiful apprentice to somehow let her know of the depth of his unspoken love for her. To finally free his spirit, he is honour bound to make restitution for calling upon the gods to bring swift and violent death to the warriors who killed her, thus violating the code by which he had vowed to live. Helping him fulfil his promise, was to expose the Englishman, and those close to him, to a series of bizarre and magical events that took him close to the edge of madness.