Book picks similar to
Goodbye Bafana: Nelson Mandela - My Prisoner, My Friend by James Gregory
non-fiction
biography
south-africa
africa
Can't Forgive: My 20-Year Battle with O.J. Simpson
Kim Goldman - 2014
Don’t ask her to forgive and forget.When Kim was just 22, her older brother, Ron Goldman, was brutally killed by O.J. Simpson. Ron and Kim were very close, and her devastation was compounded by the shocking not guilty verdict that allowed a smirking Simpson to leave as a free man.It wasn’t Kim’s first trauma. Her parents divorced when she was young, and she and Ron were raised by their father. Her mother kidnapped her, telling her that her father didn’t love her any more. When she was 14, she was almost blinded from severe battery acid burns on her face during an automobile accident, requiring three reconstructive surgeries.But none of these early traumas compared to the loss of her brother, the painful knowledge that his killer was free, and fact that she could not even grieve privately—her grief was made painfully public. Counseled by friends, strangers, and even Oprah to “find closure,” Kim chose a different route. She chose to fight.Repeatedly, Kim and her family pursued Simpson by every legal means. Foiled over and over again, they ultimately achieved a small measure of justice.Kim’s story is one of tragedy, but also of humanity and, often, comedy. Living life as one of America’s most famous “victims” isn’t always easy, especially as a single mother in the dating market. She often had bizarre first date experiences, with one man even breaking down into tears and inconsolable with grief after realizing who she was.Ultimately Kim’s story is that of an ordinary person thrown into extraordinary circumstances at a very young age, and who had the courage—despite the discouragement of so many—to ignore the conventional wisdom and never give up her fight for justice.
A Frog in the Fjord: One Year in Norway
Lorelou Desjardins - 2021
She suddenly gets a job offer in Oslo and decides to move to Norway despite her limited knowledge of the country and its customs. Her friends think she has lost her mind. "Do you know what Norwegians do to have fun? They go on skiing trips in the middle of the night!". During one year she will try to understand Norwegians, learn their language and adopt their traditions. She will try adapting to Norwegian working culture from Norwegian meeting habits at work to the famous Julebord or Christmas party. From Easter holidays at the cabin, to 17th of May celebrations with bunad, and adapting to making things koselig and eating traditional Norwegian food like sheep heads from Voss (smalahove), Lorelou sails through this journey with candour, trying to make Norwegian friends, dating a Scandinavian and cycling all over the country to discover this wonderful land. She falls slowly in love with this country nothing destined her to love. A Frog in the Fjord was a national bestseller in Norway in 2017 and is now available in English, edited for an international audience.
Only When I Step On It: One Man's Inspiring Journey to Hike The Appalachian Trail Alone
Peter Conti - 2021
An Heiress of Holocaust: How my family survived the holocaust and the lasting effects on my life
Sarah Segal - 2020
Remembering Diana: A Life in Photographs
National Geographic Society - 2017
Page after page of inside photos from the legendary National Geographic archives document the royal's most memorable moments in the spotlight; a luminous, personal remembrance by Diana friend and biographer Tina Brown adds context and nuance to a poignant life twenty years after her tragic death. Float down memory lane through more than 100 remarkable images of Diana, from her days as a schoolgirl to her engagement to Prince Charles, the birth of Princes William and Harry, and her life in the media as an outspoken advocate for the poor, the sick, and the downtrodden. This elegant book features reflections from those who knew her best, recollections from dignitaries and celebrities like Nelson Mandela and Elton John, and personal insight through the princess's own words. This richly illustrated book is a beautiful ode to one of the world's most beloved women.
Marley and Me: Life and Love With the World's Worst Dog
John Grogan - 2005
They were young and in love, with a perfect little house and not a care in the world. Then they brought home Marley, a wiggly yellow furball of a puppy. Life would never be the same.Marley quickly grew into a barreling, ninety-seven-pound streamroller of a Labrador retriever, a dog like no other. He crashed through screen doors, gouged through drywall, flung drool on guests, stole women's undergarments, and ate nearly everything he could get his mouth around, including couches and fine jewelry. Obedience school did no good—Marley was expelled. Neither did the tranquilizers the veterinarian prescribed for him with the admonishment, "Don't hesitate to use these."And yet Marley's heart was pure. Just as he joyfully refused any limits on his behavior, his love and loyalty were boundless, too. Marley shared the couple's joy at their first pregnancy, and their heartbreak over the miscarriage. He was there when babies finally arrived and when the screams of a seventeen-year-old stabbing victim pierced the night. Marley shut down a public beach and managed to land a role in a feature-length movie, always winning hearts as he made a mess of things. Through it all, he remained steadfast, a model of devotion, even when his family was at its wit's end. Unconditional love, they would learn, comes in many forms.
Little Ice Cream Boy
Jacques Pauw - 2009
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.
Burned Alive
Souad - 2003
In her village, as in so many others, sex before marriage was considered a grave dishonour to one's family and was punishable by death. This was her crime. Her brother-in-law was given the task of arranging her punishment. One morning while Souad was washing the family's clothes, he crept up on her, poured petrol over her and set her alight.In the eyes of their community he was a hero. An execution for a 'crime of honour' was a respectable duty unlikely to bring about condemnation from others. It certainly would not have provoked calls for his prosecution. More than five thousand cases of such honour killings are reported around the world each year and many more take place that we hear nothing about.Miraculously, Souad survived rescued by the women of her village, who put out the flames and took her to a local hospital. Horrifically burned, and abandoned by her family and community, it was only the intervention of a European aid worker that enabled Souad to receive the care and sanctuary she so desperately needed and to start her life again. She has now decided to tell her story and uncover the barbarity of honour killings, a practice which continues to this day.Burned Alive is a shocking testimony, a true story of almost unbelievable cruelty. It speaks of amazing courage and fortitude and of one woman's determination to survive. It is also a call to break the taboo of silence that surrounds this most brutal of practices and which ignores the plight of so many other women who are also victims of traditional violence.
The Phish Book
Phish - 1998
The first and only authorized book about the band, The Phish Book is an extraordinary verbal and visual chronicle of a year in the life of Phish, featuring extensive interviews with the four band members--Trey Anastasio, Jon Fishman, Mike Gordon, and Page McConnell--conducted by writer Richard Gehr, who also serves as guide to the history, mythology, musical context, and unique audience-band relationship in which the Vermont quartet flourishes. While it contains many of the trappings of other lavish rock monuments--including more than two hundred pieces of previously unpublished art and photography from the band's private archive--The Phish Book elevates the form by means of an innovative roundtable-style discussion format. Richard Gehr and Phish use the events of 1997 as a jumping-off point from which the band members free-associate about themselves, their music, and the dedicated and colorful community that springs up wherever they perform. Beginning with the backstage scene at Boston's Fleet Center on New Year's Eve, 1996, The Phish Book explores the band's earliest days in Burlington, Vermont; their musical influences, which include James Brown, Frank Zappa, and the Grateful Dead; their legendary Halloween shows; the two European and two American tours the group undertook in 1997; the stories behind their 1996 studio album, Billy Breathes, and the following year's live Slip Stitch and Pass; life onstage and off; the sixty-thousand-fan Maine campout and art project known as the Great Went; and the experimental recording and performing techniques that informed the band's most recent studio album, The Story of the Ghost. More than a retrospective journal of the group's evolution, The Phish Book is a glorious snapshot of a band much bigger than its parts and at the height of its collective power.
Shell Shocked: My Life with the Turtles, Flo & Eddie, and Frank Zappa, Etc.
Howard Kaylan - 2013
If Howard Kaylan had sung only one song, the Turtles' 1967 No. 1 smash hit "Happy Together," his place in rock-and-roll history would still be secure. But that recording, named in 1999 by BMI as one of the top 50 songs of the 20th century, with over five million radio plays, is only the tip of a rather eye-opening iceberg. For nearly five decades, Howard Kaylan has been a player in the rock-and-roll revolution. In addition to his years with the Turtles, Kaylan was a core member of Frank Zappa's Mothers of Invention and the dynamic duo Flo and Eddie, and part of glam rock history with Marc Bolan and T. Rex. He's also given street cred and harmonies to everyone from John Lennon, Bruce Springsteen and Alice Cooper to the Ramones and Duran Duran, to name just a few. Howard Kaylan's life has been a dangerous ride that he is only too happy to report on, naming names and shedding shocking tales of sex, drugs, and creative excess. Shell Shocked will stand alone as not only one of the best-told music-biz memoirs, but one with a truly candid and unmatchable story of rock-and-roll insanity and success from a man who glories in it all.
Unmasked: The True Story of the World's Most Prolific, Cinematic Killer
Michael Aloisi - 2011
To fans, this name is synonymous with horror, an icon on the level of Bela Legosi, Boris Karloff and Vincent Price. Kane has appeared as a stunt man and actor in more than two hundred television shows and movies in a career spanning over thirty years. His role as Jason Voorhees in four consecutive films of the Friday the 13th series came to define the character feared by millions of fans the world over. The man behind the hockey mask would seal his fate as horror royalty years later by starring as the monster Victor Crowley in the Hatchet series. Unmasked documents the unlikely true story of a boy who was taunted and beaten relentlessly by bullies throughout his childhood. Kane only escaped his tormentors when he moved to a tiny island in the South Pacific where he lived for all of his teen years. After living shirtless in a jungle for a while, he headed back to America where he fell in love with doing stunts... only to have his love burn him, literally. For the first time ever, Kane tells the true story of the horrific burn injury that nearly killed him at the start of his career. The entire heart wrenching, inspirational story of his recovery, the emotional and physical damage it caused and his fight to break back into the industry that almost killed him... and triumphant rise to become a film legend are told in Kane's own powerful voice. Take a peek inside the head of the man behind the mask. Be inspired by his triumphant comeback and laugh at his onset hijinks as you unmask the world's most prolific, cinematic killer.
The Russian Five: A Story of Espionage, Defection, Bribery and Courage
Keith Gave - 2018
That's when the Wings turned to Keith Gave, the newsman whose clandestine mission to Helsinki, Finland, was the first phase of a of a years-long series of secret meetings from posh hotel rooms to remote forests around Europe to orchestrate their unlawful departures from the Soviet Union.One defection created an international incident and made global headlines. Another player faked cancer, thanks to the Wings' extravagant bribes to Russian doctors, including a big American car. Another player who wasn't quite ready to leave yet felt like he was being kidnapped by an unscrupulous agent. Two others were outcast when they stood up publicly against the Soviet regime, winning their freedom to play in the NHL only after years of struggle.They are the Russian Five: Sergei Fedorov, Viacheslav Fetisov, Vladimir Konstantinov, Vyacheslav Kozlov and Igor Larionov. Their individual stories read like pulse-pounding spy novels. The story that unfolded after they were brought together in Detroit by the masterful coach Scotty Bowman is unforgettable.This story includes details never before revealed, and by the man who was there every step of the way—from the day Detroit drafted its first two Soviets in 1989 until they raised the Stanley Cup in 1997, then took it to Moscow for a victory lap around Red Square and the Kremlin.The Russian Five did more to bridge Russian and American relations than decades of diplomacy and detente between the White House and the Kremlin. This is their story.
So Close to Amazing: Stories of a DIY Life Gone Wrong . . . and Learning to Find the Beauty in Every Imperfection
KariAnne Wood - 2017
It's also a book for anyone who has ever mismatched her shoes or trimmed her own bangs when a professional might have been a better choice or added too much soap to the washer and watched it overflow.(Not that KariAnne Wood has ever done any of these things.)A debut memoir from the beloved Thistlewood Farms blogger, So Close to Amazing is a collection of hilarious and heartfelt reflections on getting it almost right--and how, instead of giving up, we can choose to simply embrace our real selves right where we are. It's a story of transparency and honesty and recognizing that perfection is completely overemphasized and overrated. It's about grace and learning from mistakes and rejoicing in every victory, no matter how small. Because when you find joy in the "you" God created you to be, you'll discover the amazing that was there all along.Contains beautiful DIY project ideas anyone can do, whether you're Pinterest perfect or craft challenged! Homemade signs, centerpieces, recipe walls, and more!
Up in the Air
Betty Riegel - 2013
From humble working-class roots, growing up with a mother who struggled to make ends meet and a father away at war, she had always dreamed of bigger things.After responding to an advert in the local newspaper she secured herself an interview for the Pan Am training programme, and at just 22-years-old was selected from thousands of eager young British women to begin a career that would change the course of her life. Betty said goodbye to everything she knew and boarded a plane to New York, a city full of noise, towering skyscrapers and promise.Under the watchful eye of her 'housemother', Dottie, Betty mastered the art of being the perfect Pan Am stewardess; everything from faultless etiquette, geography and safety to seamless make-up application, how to charm influential passengers and preparing five-course Parisian cuisine at 37,000 feet. But no amount of training could have prepared her for the rollercoaster of life in the air.Up in the Air charts the gruelling yet fabulous life aboard the most iconic airline there has ever been, and how a young woman from Essex opened her eyes to the world and lived her dream.
Fearless: How Leicester City Shook the Premier League, and What it Means for Sport
Jonathan Northcroft - 2016
Out on the pitch a lone brass player sounds the haunting Post Horn Gallop, for 80 years the home players' entrance tune. Spines tingle. Air is gulped into opposition lungs. Game time, time to begin the chase. Burning fox eyes peer down from between the decks of one of the stands. On the stadium's outside wall a royal blue LCD display says #Fearless.Welcome to Leicester City. They were always a club with a difference but in 2015-16 they created a story that in modern football stands unique. Who could believe it: from relegation certainties to champions of England? It was when, on behalf of every small club, dreams were hunted at the King Power, a season where the impossible became merely quarry.5,000-1 shots when the campaign started, Leicester's transformation has been remarkable. This is the most incredible cast of written-offs, grafters, misfits and journeymen, coming together in a special time and place to simultaneously have the season of their lives. Fearless will document Leicester's hunt of their impossible dream. It will tell the greatest football tale of the Premier League era, in loving detail, with the inside track. Now that Leicester have gone all the way and won the title, it is the best story in world sports - for years.Premier League champions. The side who'd been adrift at the bottom 12 months previously, who's started the season as relegation favourites, whose manager was favourite to be the first one sacked once the campaign got underway. A League One side only seven seasons previously. A squad of �500,000 and �1m men. Leicester. Ridiculous. Miraculous. Fearless.