SHORTLISTED FOR THE BARBELLION PRIZE 2021 'A manifesto for recalibrating' DAILY MAIL 'I can't think of many books where the reader feels so passionately on the side of the narrator' GUARDIAN 'A profound redefinition of the very idea of vitality' FINANCIAL TIMES Josie George lives in a tiny terraced house in the urban West Midlands with her son. Since her early childhood, she has lived with the fluctuating and confusing challenge of disabling chronic illness. But Josie's world is surprising, intricate, dynamic. She has learned what to look for: the routines of her friends at the community centre; the neighbourhood birds in flight; the slow changes in the morning light, in her small garden, in her growing son, in herself. In January 2018, Josie sets out to tell the story of her still life, over the course of a year. As the seasons shift, and the tides of her body draw in and out, Josie begins to unfurl her history. And against a world which values progress and productivity above all else, Josie sets out a quietly radical alternative: to value and treasure life for life itself, with all its great and small miracles. 'Full of kindness, A Still Life will make you a better person' CLARE MACKINTOSH 'A Still Life is joy-lit: vivid, lovestruck, hopeful and wise' MELISSA HARRISON 'Josie George is the kind of writer I strive to be ... A tough, tender, beautiful book about existing in a body in the world' ELLA RISBRIDGER 'Could not be more timely ... An immensely talented writer' LINDA GRANT

In this inspirational and unflinchingly honest memoir, acclaimed author Reyna Grande describes her childhood torn between the United States and Mexico, and shines a light on the experiences, fears, and hopes of those who choose to make the harrowing journey across the border. Reyna Grande vividly brings to life her tumultuous early years in this "compelling...unvarnished, resonant" (BookPage) story of a childhood spent torn between two parents and two countries. As her parents make the dangerous trek across the Mexican border to "El Otro Lado" (The Other Side) in pursuit of the American dream, Reyna and her siblings are forced into the already overburdened household of their stern grandmother. When their mother at last returns, Reyna prepares for her own journey to "El Otro Lado" to live with the man who has haunted her imagination for years, her long-absent father. Funny, heartbreaking, and lyrical, The Distance Between Us poignantly captures the confusion and contradictions of childhood, reminding us that the joys and sorrows we experience are imprinted on the heart forever, calling out to us of those places we first called home. Also available in Spanish as La distancia entre nosotros.

Audrey Blignault is een van die heel bekendste skrywers in Afrikaans. Vir ongeveer 50 jaar het daar gereeld nuwe boeke uit haar pen verskyn. In 'n Blywende vreugde kan lesers vir die eerste keer haar persoonlike briewe aan vriende, familie en mede-skrywers lees. Sy skryf onder andere aan dr. Elize Botha, M.E.R., Hennie Aucamp, Ernst van Heerden en W.A. de Klerk oor dinge wat haar na aan die hart lê. Die briewe wissel van liriese aanhalings uit die poësie tot selfspot en skaterlag-stoute rympies en grappe. Wanneer geliefdes deur die dood weggeneem word, ontroer haar openhartige ontboeseming. Die omslag van die boek is 'n foto van een van die skrywer se geliefde kledingstukke. En hoe gepas, want dink jy aan Audrey Blignault, dink jy rooi - en spesifiek aan die oulap se rooi wat mooi maak.

'An intimate portrait ... Critical, generous and heartfelt' Ahdaf Soueif, Guardian 'An intriguing account of an alluring but evasive character' Daily Telegraph Drawing on extensive archival sources and hundreds of interviews, Timothy Brennan's Places of Mind is the first comprehensive biography of Said, one of the most controversial and celebrated intellectuals of the 20th century. In Brennan's masterful work, Said, the pioneer of post-colonial studies, a tireless champion for his native Palestine, and an erudite literary critic, emerges as a self-doubting, tender, and eloquent advocate of literature's dramatic effects on politics and civic life. Places of Mind charts the intertwined routes of Said's intellectual development, revealing him as a study in opposites: a cajoler and strategist, a New York intellectual with a foot in Beirut, an orchestra impresario in Weimar and Ramallah, a raconteur on national television, a Palestinian negotiator at the State Department, and an actor in films in which he played himself. Brennan traces the Arab influences of Said's thinking along with his tutelage under Lebanese statesmen, off-beat modernist auteurs, and New York literati, as Said grew into a scholar whose influential writings changed the face of university life forever. With both intimidating brilliance and charm, Said turned these resources into a groundbreaking counter-tradition of radical humanism, set against the backdrop of techno-scientific dominance and religious war. With unparalleled clarity, Said gave the humanities a new authority in the age of Reaganism that continues today. Drawing on the testimonies of family, friends, students, and antagonists alike, and aided by FBI files, unpublished writing, and Said's drafts of novels and personal letters, Places of Mind captures Said's intellectual breadth and influence in an unprecedented, intimate, and compelling portrait of one of the great minds of the twentieth century.

Now in paperback, a beautifully illustrated account of of Tove Jansson's life and art The definitive biography of one of the most unique and beloved children's authors of the 20th century, the creator of the Moomins. Tove Jansson (1914-2001) led a long, colourful and productive life, impacting significantly the political, social and cultural history of 20th-century Finland. And while millions of children have grown up with Little My, Snufkin, Moomintroll and the many creatures of Moominvalley, the life of Jansson - daughter, friend and companion - is more touching still. This book weaves together the myriad qualities of a painter, author, illustrator, scriptwriter and lyricist from fraught beginnings through fame, war and heartbreak and ultimately to a peaceful end. Dr Tuula Karjalainen is a Finnish art historian and non-fiction writer who has previously worked as a director of the Helsinki Art Museum and the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma in Helsinki. As the author of Tove Jansson's biography, Karjalainen has become an expert not only on Jansson's writing and art but also on her decades of personal correspondence and journals.

With more than two million copies in print, "Manchild in the Promised Land" is one of the most remarkable autobiographies of our time--the definitive account of African-American youth in Harlem of the 1940s and 1950s, and a seminal work of modern literature.
Published during a literary era marked by the ascendance of black writers such as Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, James Baldwin, and Alex Haley, this thinly fictionalized account of Claude Brown's childhood as a hardened, streetwise criminal trying to survive the toughest streets of Harlem has been heralded as the definitive account of everyday life for the first generation of African Americans raised in the Northern ghettos of the 1940s and 1950s.
When the book was first published in 1965, it was praised for its realistic portrayal of Harlem--the children, young people, hardworking parents; the hustlers, drug dealers, prostitutes, and numbers runners; the police; the violence, sex, and humor.
The book continues to resonate generations later, not only because of its fierce and dignified anger, not only because the struggles of urban youth are as deeply felt today as they were in Brown's time, but also because of its inspiring message. Now with an introduction by Nathan McCall, here is the story about the one who "made it," the boy who kept landing on his feet and grew up to become a man.

The first modern study of Hartley Coleridge, showing that he deserves our attention not as the son of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, but as a literary presence in his own right.

Investigating the oeuvre of the Italian humanist Francesco Filelfo (1398-1481), this collection is the first to make extensive use of the critical editions of Filelfo's numerous writings - in particular of his Epistolarium, published in 2016 by Jeroen De Keyser, who also edited this volume. Uncovering a lot of new information not previously mentioned in the literature on Filelfo, twelve specialized scholars draw attention to long-neglected material, shedding new light on Filelfo's intellectual endeavors and his literary journey between Greek and Latin. This illuminating collection offers historians of ideas as well as literary scholars and Neo-Latinists new inroads into Filelfo's vast oeuvre, and through it to the world of Quattrocento humanism. Contributors include: Jean-Louis Charlet, Guy Claessens, Jeroen De Keyser, Tom Deneire, Ide Francois, James Hankins, Noreen Humble, Gary Ianziti, Han Lamers, David Marsh, John Monfasani, and Jan Papy.

In the winter of 2009, Rachel Cusk's marriage of ten years came to an end. Candid and revelatory, Aftermath chronicles the perilous journey as the author redefines herself and creates a new version of family life for her daughters.

A unique chronicle of the hundred-year period when the Jewish people changed the world - and it changed them Marx, Freud, Proust, Einstein, Bernhardt and Kafka. Between the middle of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries a few dozen men and women changed the way we see the world. But many have vanished from our collective memory despite their enduring importance in our daily lives. Without Karl Landsteiner, for instance, there would be no blood transfusions or major surgery. Without Paul Ehrlich no chemotherapy. Without Siegfried Marcus no motor car. Without Rosalind Franklin genetic science would look very different. Without Fritz Haber there would not be enough food to sustain life on earth. These visionaries all have something in common - their Jewish origins and a gift for thinking outside the box. In 1847 the Jewish people made up less than 0.25% of the world's population, and yet they saw what others could not. How?

At age nineteen, Natasha Trethewey had her world turned upside down when her former stepfather shot and killed her mother.

Heartbreakingly clear-eyed and tender, Memorial Drive is a daughter's act of love - and an unflinching excavation of the wounds that never heal. For as Trethewey tells her story, and reclaims her mother's, she lays bare the indelible scars of slavery and racism on the soul of a troubled nation.

When Otto Frank unwrapped his daughter's diary with trembling hands and began to read the first pages, he discovered a side to Anne that was as much a revelation to him as it would be to the rest of the world. Little did Otto know he was about to create an icon recognised the world over for her bravery, sometimes brutal teenage honesty and determination to see beauty even where its light was most hidden. Nor did he realise that publication would spark a bitter battle that would embroil him in years of legal contest and eventually drive him to a nervous breakdown and a new life in Switzerland. Today, more than seventy-five years after Anne's death, the diary is at the centre of a multi-million-pound industry, with competing foundations, cultural critics and former friends and relatives fighting for the right to control it. In this insightful and wide-ranging account, Karen Bartlett tells the full story of The Diary of Anne Frank, the highly controversial part it played in twentieth-century history, and its fundamental role in shaping our understanding of the Holocaust. At the same time, she sheds new light on the life and character of Otto Frank, the complex, driven and deeply human figure who lived in the shadows of the terrible events that robbed him of his family, while he painstakingly crafted and controlled his daughter's story.

From one of the most important chroniclers of our time, come two extended excerpts from her never-before-seen notebooks - writings that offer an illuminating glimpse into the mind and process of a legendary writer. Joan Didion has always kept notebooks: of overheard dialogue, observations, interviews, drafts of essays and articles Here is one such draft that traces a road trip she took with her husband, John Gregory Dunne, in June 1970, through Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. She interviews prominent local figures, describes motels, diners, a deserted reptile farm, a visit with Walker Percy, a ladies' brunch at the Mississippi Broadcasters' Convention. She writes about the stifling heat, the almost viscous pace of life, the sulfurous light, and the preoccupation with race, class, and heritage she finds in the small towns they pass through. And from a different notebook: the "California Notes" that began as an assignment from Rolling Stone on the Patty Hearst trial of 1976. Though Didion never wrote the piece, watching the trial and being in San Francisco triggered thoughts about the city, its social hierarchy, the Hearsts, and her own upbringing in Sacramento. Here, too, is the beginning of her thinking about the West, its landscape, the western women who were heroic for her, and her own lineage.

As a songwriter, James Weldon Johnson is best known for "Life Every Voice," which he wrote with his brother, J. Rosamond Johnson. However, during the early 1900s he was part of one of the most popular and successful songwriting teams in America. Johnson, along with his brother, Rosamond, and Bob Cole wrote hit songs for musicals during the ragtime era, 1895-1910. Later, he became one of the most prominent African-Americans in the United States before World War II. He was a diplomat, the author of a novel (The Autobiography of a Colored Man), poet ("God's Trombones"), Civil Rights leader (the first black Executive Secretary of the NAACP), an active member of the Harlem Renaissance during the 1920s and a distinguished Professor at Fisk University. Most of James Weldon Johnson's songs have not been heard for over a hundred years because he wrote during the era of sheet music. Now, for the first time, here is a collection of Johnson's lyrics and an extended biographical essay on him as a songwriter. Don Cusic is Professor of Music Business at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee and the author of 25 books. Cusic and Mike Curb produced a double album containing 30 of James Weldon Johnson's songs, recorded by Melinda Doolittle, for Curb Records.

First published in 1970, this is a detailed and balanced biography of one of the most controversial literary figures of the twentieth century. Ezra Pound, an American who left home for Venice and London at the age of twenty-three, was a leading member of the modern movement, a friend and helper of Joyce, Eliot, Yeats, Hemingway, an early supporter of Lawrence and Frost. As a critic of modern society his far-reaching and controversial theories on politics, economics and religion led him to broadcast over Rome Radio during the Second World War, after which he was indicted for treason but declared insane by an American court. He then spent more than twelve years in St Elizabeth 's Hospital for the Criminally Insane in Washington, D.C. In 1958 the changes against him were dropped and he returned to Italy where he had lived between 1924 and 1945.

In his motivational autobiography Glimpses of Greatness, Philip Guy Rochford shares the milestones of his life that mark not only his spiritual journey, but also his very successful professional career as a financier.

Rochford was born in 1933 in Port of Spain, Trinidad-arriving into the world with a clean slate of consciousness. Raised in a strict Catholic household by a single mother, Rochford received his first lessons in applied economics as he and his family dealt with the financial ripples of World War II. With an honest, conversational style, Rochford details his intriguing life story beginning with his school years when he was encouraged to work in a local pharmacy to his education in several countries to the challenges-political, professional, and personal-that he faced on a daily basis as he enjoyed a fruitful career as an economist and chartered secretary, banker, and accountant. By including questions and answer segments at the end of each chapter, Rochford allows for deeper explanations, insight, and elaboration into his life experiences and many professional accomplishments.

Rochford combines anecdotes, poetry, and letters with a compelling life story that will surely motivate others to let their brilliance shine through, no matter what their barriers.

Includes an exciting sneak peek extract from Three Sisters - the conclusion to The Tattooist of Auschwitz Trilogy. Available now. The Tattooist of Auschwitz is one of the bestselling books of the 21st Century. Now, in this essential companion, Heather Morris presents an inspiring manual for life, with a series of tales of the remarkable people she has met, the incredible stories they have shared with her, and the lessons they hold for us all. In Stories of Hope, Heather will explore her extraordinary talents as a listener - a skill she employed when she first met Lale Sokolov, the tattooist at Auschwitz-Birkenau and the inspiration for her bestselling novel. It was this ability that led Lale to entrust Heather with his story, which she told in her novel The Tattooist of Auschwitz and the bestselling follow up, Cilka's Journey. Now Heather shares the story behind her inspirational writing journey and the defining experiences of her life, including her profound friendship with Lale, and explores how she learned to really listen to the stories people told her - skills she believes we can all learn. 'Stories are what connect us and remind us that hope is always possible.' Heather Morris An international phenomenon, The Tattooist of Auschwitz has sold over six million copies. Cilka's Journey has sold over a million copies worldwide.

Barbara Hepworth sculpted outdoors and Janet Frame wore earmuffs as she worked to block out noise. Kate Chopin wrote with her six children ‘swarming around her’ whereas the artist Rosa Bonheur filled her bedroom with the sixty birds that inspired her work. Louisa May Alcott wrote so vigorously – skipping sleep and meals – that she had to learn to write with her left hand to give her cramped right hand a break.

From Isak Dinesen subsisting on oysters, champagne and amphetamines, to Isabel Allende's insistence that she begins each new book on 8 January, here are the working routines of over 140 brilliant female painters, composers, sculptors, writers, filmmakers and performers.

Filled with details of the large and small choices these women made, Daily Rituals Women at Work is a source of fascination and inspiration.

Charles Campbell was born in Sheridan, Wyoming in 1923. He studied engineering in Caltech and Purdue and earned a degree in Architecture in Columbia University in 1975. He shares his insights into some of the major developments and issues of the 20th century: the atomic bomb and peacetime control of atomic energy, national concern over the biological effects of atomic radiation, and efforts to penetrate Soviet nuclear development. He was involved in international cooperation on storage and retrieval of scientific information, and biomedical research in Rockefeller University and the New York Heart Association. His quest led to psychiatry, the Gurdjieff Work, Sufism, energetic healing, Shamanism and astrology. He gives vignettes of 35 Nobel Laureates, he earned a degree, he has known and tells about his avocations-architecture, telescope-making, printing, calligraphy and typography, and computers. He became a Dervish in Iran in 1968. After retirement, he opened a bookstore in New York specializing in Islam and the Middle East. In 2006 he graduated from the Fire and Wind Institute of Energetic Science and Heart Centered Healing and is a certified Energetic Healer and Shaman. He lives in Tappan, NY, with his wife, Vivian Davis Campbell, whose memoir, ""Love Hoped For"" was published by iUniverse.

Small wonder that, at nine years old, Monica Holloway develops a fascination with the local funeral home. With a father who drives his Ford pickup with a Kodak movie camera sitting shotgun just in case he sees an accident, and whose home movies feature more footage of disasters than of his children, Monica is primed to become a morbid child.

Yet in spite of her father's bouts of violence and abuse, her mother's selfishness and prim denial, and her siblings' personal battles and betrayals, Monica never succumbs to despair. Instead, she forges her own way, thriving at school and becoming fast friends with Julie Kilner, whose father is the town mortician.

She and Julie prefer the casket showroom, where they take turns lying in their favorite coffins, to the parks and grassy backyards in her hometown of Elk Grove, Ohio. In time, Monica and Julie get a job driving the company hearse to pick up bodies at the airport, yet even Monica's growing independence can't protect her from her parents' irresponsibility, and from the feeling that she simply does not deserve to be safe. Little does she know, as she finally strikes out on her own, that her parents' biggest betrayal has yet to be revealed.

Throughout this remarkable memoir of her dysfunctional, eccentric, and wholly unforgettable family, Monica Holloway's prose shines with humor, clear-eyed grace, and an uncommon sense of resilience. "Driving with Dead People" is an extraordinary real-life tale with a wonderfully observant and resourceful heroine.