He talked to presidents and guerrilla leaders, university professors and witch doctors. He bounced from wars to coups oceans apart, catching midnight flights to little-known countries where supposedly decent people were doing unspeakable things to one another. In the tradition of John Gunther's Inside Africa, The Africans is an extraordinary combination of analysis and adventure. Part travelogue, part contemporary history, it is a portrait of a continent that sometimes seems hell-bent on destroying itself, and of people who are as courageous as they are long-suffering.

    Educated at Eton and Oxford, Thesiger was repulsed by the softness and rigidity of Western life-"the machines, the calling cards, the meticulously aligned streets." In the spirit of T. E. Lawrence, he set out to explore the deserts of Arabia, traveling among peoples who had never seen a European and considered it their duty to kill Christian infidels. His now-classic account is invaluable to understanding the modern Middle East.

    My ancestors traveled the East African desert in search of grazing land for their livestock, and the most precious resource of all—water. When they exhausted the land and the clouds disappeared from the horizon, their accumulated ancestral knowledge told them where to move next to find greener pastures. They loaded their huts and belongings onto their most obedient camels and herded their livestock to a new home.” When Shugri Said Salh was six years old, she was sent to live with her nomadic grandmother in the desert, away from the city of Mogadishu. Leaving behind her house, her parents, her father’s multiple wives, and her many siblings, she would become the last of her family to learn a once-common way of life. The desert held many risks, from drought and hunger to the threat of predators, but it also held beauty, innovation, and centuries of tradition. Shugri grew to love the freedom of roaming with her goats and the feeling of community in learning the courtship rituals, cooking songs, and poems of her people. She was even proud to face the rite of passage that all “respectable” girls undergo in Somalia, a brutal female circumcision. In time, Shugri would return to live with her siblings in the city. Ultimately, the family was forced to flee as refugees in the face of a civil war—first to Kenya, then to Canada, and finally to the United States. There, Shugri would again find herself a nomad in a strange land, learning to navigate everything from escalators to homeless shelters to, ultimately, marriage, parenthood, and nursing school. And she would approach each step of her journey with resilience and a liveliness that is all her own. At once dramatic and witty, The Last Nomad tells a story of tradition, change, and hope.

    Rian Malan is an Afrikaner, scion of a centuries-old clan and relative of the architect of apartheid, who fled South Africa after coming face-to-face with the atrocities and terrors of an undeclared civil war between the races. This book is the searing account of his return after eight years of uneasy exile. Armed with new insight and clarity, Malan explores apartheid's legacy of hatred and suffering, bearing witness to the extensive physical and emotional damage it has caused to generations of South Africans on both sides of the color line. Plumbing the darkest recesses of the white and black South African psyches, Malan ultimately finds his way toward the light of redemption and healing. My Traitor's Heart is an astonishing book -- beautiful, horrifying, profound, and impossible to put down.

    This memoir is a love story about the wonderful, humorous, and sometimes harrowing experiences that await when a woman throws her heart to the wind just to see where it lands. After taking a job at a weekly newspaper in Homer, Alaska, Jill and her partner forge a new life in a town where artists and sport fishermen drive the local economy, grizzly bears roam through back yards, social outings feature death-defying ski trips or kayaking rough seas in freezing rain, and business attire means wearing three sweaters to an unheated office. As Jill adapts to Homer's idiosyncrasies, she finds her own quirky hobby — riding a bike on snow. Despite having little in the way of an athletic background or talent, Jill signs up for a hundred-mile race across frozen wilderness. As the harsh Alaskan winter sets in, she launches a tenacious training routine that takes her far out of her comfort zone. Here, under the Northern Lights, battling exhaustion and extreme cold, Jill discovers the heart of Alaska. And there's no going back.

    They include brands such as Chippy, C2, Maxx, Cloud 9, Payless instant noodles, Great Tast coffee, Cebu Pacific, Robinson's Department stores and malls, and YES! magazine.But Big John didn't always have money. Many years ago he was little John with no money at all.This is the story of how a young boy learned the value of dreaming big, working hard, and never giving up.

    Greenburger risked it all to buy three older loft buildings at 50 West Street near the current 9/11 Memorial. He ultimately dreamed of one day erecting a magnificent skyscraper in their place. But disaster struck in 2008, just as his plans were coming together, and development came to a screeching halt. The global financial crisis had made the land practically worthless and it would be years before he could get back on track, but he refused to give up on his dream.Today, 50 West is a striking 780-foot skyscraper with curved glass windows that has become an iconic feature on the city skyline—but it took much more than a financial investment to get there. It required Greenburger to do what he does best—take huge risks at every turn.During his parallel careers, Francis J. Greenburger has made publishing and real-estate history. Whether risking the reputation of his agency for the super -star authors of tomorrow, such as James Patterson to Dan Brown, or pioneering the New York co-op market by taking “hopeless” properties and turning them into prized homes, he has successfully navigated the worlds of business, politics, and social change to become the quintessential American entrepreneur.A math and business prodigy who started working for his father at the age of 12. After a stop–and-start academic career, he voluntarily left one of the most elite and academically distinguished New York City high schools and started his adult life at 15. Greenburger has made it his life’s work to find value where others never thought to look, and his keen instincts and innovative strategies have taken him from a high-school "dropout" to a well-educated self-made billionaire.Francis has mastered the "risk game." Now, with Rebecca Paley’s gripping prose, he takes us behind the scenes in Risk Game and reveals firsthand how he has become a self-made force in the competitive world of New York real estate—and a champion for nonprofit organizations in the fields of art, education, and, most recently, social and criminal justice.

    Everyone else know Gideon Goosen as a monster: a gangster, assassin and murderer, who made a pact with the devil and deserves to live out his days in a solitary cell in Pretoria Central. How is it possible that the son of a decorated, God-fearing security policeman could fall so low? His mother blames it on his friends from the other side of the railway line in Randfontein, others on a leggy prostitute from Nigel who became his obsession. Gideon himself believes everything changed on an autumn morning when the fatal pellets from a pump-action shotgun cut short the life of an anti-apartheid activist in the driveway of his home. Set against the backdrop of the dying days of apartheid, and inspired by a true story and events that really happened, Jacques Pauw's explosive debut novel exposes the raw, seamy underworld of gangsterism and brutality when life was cheap and fear was everywhere.

    She put on her sparkly crash helmet, armed herself with maps and a baffling array of visas, and got on her bike. Destination: Cape Town - and the small matter of tackling the Sahara, war-torn Angola and the Congo Basin along the way - this feisty independent woman's grand trek through the Dark Continent of Africa is the definitive motorcycling adventure.Colourful and hilarious, Red Tape and White Knuckles is an action-packed tale about following your dreams that will have you packing your bags and jetting off into the sunset on your own adventure before you know it.

    The Adventurist is a real book about the real world, an inspirational read that takes you places you might never willingly go.From the Hardcover edition.

    A good idea can inspire one commercial. But a good insight can fuel a thousand ideas, a thousand commercials. An insight gives you an entirely new way of thinking about your business. Consider just a few of the breakthrough insights that Dusenberry's agency, BBDO, has offered their clients over the years: That General Electric's unifying tagline should be ?We bring good things to life.? That Pepsi should be targeting the ?Pepsi Generation.? That Ronald Reagan's 1984 reelection theme should be ?Morning in America.? That Visa should compare itself with American Express, not MasterCard. Talk about moving the needle!Dusenberry argues that these brainstorms don?t come out of thin air, even at a world class organization like BBDO. They are actually the result of a rigorous and disciplined process of insight generation, one that any manager in any type of business can adopt. Dusenberry explains this process?Research, Analysis, Insight, Strategy, and Execution (RAISE)?in plain English. And he offers examples of some of the greatest business insights of our time, from the birth of Federal Express to the positioning of HBO."Moving the Needle" will help businesspeople get to the heart of their toughest problems.

    These were household names with glory-laden careers whose exploits on the pitch will never be forgotten. Yet, despite access to such fabulous raw material, they have mostly produced bloody awful books – predictable, plodding, repetitive, self-important and just plain boring. They may have been better footballers than Howey, but he has written the most entertaining football memoir you are ever likely to read. Not that Lee Howey’s football career is in any way undistinguished. He won the First Division Championship with his beloved Sunderland in 1995 and played in the Premier League against some of the most celebrated names in English football, including Jürgen Klinsmann, Ryan Giggs, Eric Cantona, Gianfranco Zola, Peter Schmeichel, Ian Wright, Alan Shearer and Fabrizio Ravanelli – and not always unsuccessfully. It wasn’t all assaults upon the kneecaps on wet Tuesday nights in Hartlepool (though there is plenty of that too).This honest, thoughtful and hilarious book may not end with an unforgettable game at Wembley, or a 100th England cap. However, it will amuse and delight fans of all teams in its portrait of the game of football before it disappeared up its own backside.

    You'll soon be relating to the sense of humour that moves an ambulance driver to respond to his friend and fellow paramedic's predicament on a hot summer's day, as a powerful smell engulfs the saloon of the vehicle. What would you do? Open the cab windows and the hatch through to the saloon to provide some extra ventilation? Of course not! You switch the heating on, causing the already intolerable pong to become even more unbearable, making for a bangin' mess room tale on your later return! Wonderfully illustrated with cartoons depicting each scene, it's an eye-watering insight into the Lighter Side of working on the Dark Side, straight from the mess rooms of ambulance stations up and down the UK. There's also a heartening reminder of the power of a flamin’ good belly laugh and its analgesic effect even in situations of severe pain. This is a book that laughs in the face of extreme emotion and stress. Outrageous? Perhaps. Distasteful? Probably. Humorous? Absolutely!

    She could not have predicted the journey ahead when she arrived in the heat, sunshine, and vibrant culture of the Dominican Republic. She found love, a ready-made family and - despite being shot in a bungled robbery - a desire to help the Dominican people, many living in abject poverty.She supported her husband as he ran for political office, and with Lindsay by his side they were a formidable team. As the campaign gathered momentum, they learnt the hard way what happens when you oppose those in power. Fighting corruption, double-dealing, and with their lives at risk, they were forced into hiding.Their incredible story is stranger than fiction, and twice as menacing. The dark underbelly of the Dominican Republic is exposed, from the tourist beaches, to the soaring mountains of the interior. Lindsay tells it how it is, but in the telling her deep love for the Dominican Republic, its culture, and its people shines through. What About Your Saucepans? is not only essential reading for anyone moving to the Dominican Republic, it's also a damn good read."Lindsay de Feliz's fight against political corruption, being shot, and almost losing everything is one of the most inspiring expat stories I have ever read." Jamie Morris, Founder, ExpatFocus.com"Despite the incredible setbacks she has faced, Lindsay's love and loyalty for her adopted country radiate through this entertaining chronicle of her eventful life in the DR." Ilana Benady, co-author, Expat FAQs: Moving to and Living in the Dominican Republic (Summertime Publishing 2011)"Lindsay's adventures in the DR will shock and amuse in equal measure, and her vast knowledge of the country makes this a hugely entertaining memoir." Shelley Antscherl, Book reviewer, Dutchnews.nl