Book picks similar to
The golden evenings of summer by Will Stanton
fiction
american-novels
boyhood
comedy
Mr Starlight
Laurie Graham - 2005
We Follow The Ups And Downs Of Mr Starlight's Career As He Heads To The Bright Lights Of America, As Seen Through The Eyes Of Cled, His Brother.
How to Build a Girl
Caitlin Moran - 2014
Johanna Morrigan, fourteen, has shamed herself so badly on local TV that she decides that there’s no point in being Johanna anymore and reinvents herself as Dolly Wilde—fast-talking, hard-drinking Gothic hero and full-time Lady Sex Adventurer. She will save her poverty-stricken Bohemian family by becoming a writer—like Jo in Little Women, or the Bröntes—but without the dying young bit.By sixteen, she’s smoking cigarettes, getting drunk and working for a music paper. She’s writing pornographic letters to rock-stars, having all the kinds of sex with all kinds of men, and eviscerating bands in reviews of 600 words or less.But what happens when Johanna realizes she’s built Dolly with a fatal flaw? Is a box full of records, a wall full of posters, and a head full of paperbacks, enough to build a girl after all?Imagine The Bell Jar written by Rizzo from Grease. How to Build a Girl is a funny, poignant, and heartbreakingly evocative story of self-discovery and invention, as only Caitlin Moran could tell it.
Number Two: More Short Tales from a Very Tall Man
Jay Onrait - 2015
. .— explored the squalid world of medical marijuana; — made a mess of himself on the road to Pittsburgh; — got upstaged on live TV by comedy legend Martin Short; — rode a Street Dragon through the laneways of Sochi; — shared a drink with Jay-Z and was then asked to leave;And much, much more!
Gabe Owens
C.J. Petit - 2018
What made it difficult for Gabe was that the station manager may have been shot by his wife, a woman he’d proposed to years earlier.
The Twin Flame Game
Adam Eccles - 2018
A group of passionate people, convinced their twin soul is somewhere roaming on the Earth and they must find and be with that person.It’s an unexploited vein of gold for a womaniser like Keith.He uses his cunning and jet-set lifestyle to the aid the task of bedding as many women as possible in a hilarious search for his one true love and soul mate. Pausing to help some lost souls along the way.But will he find her? And if he does, can he hold on to her?Your twin flame will be your mirror image, the yang to your yin. Be careful what you wish for. Your life and plans just might get turned upside-down.When the fires of passion have flickered out with a whimper, try kindling a new flame. Journey through the modern dating minefields and see if you can make it out in one piece.
Valley of the Shadow
Franklin Allen Leib - 1991
William Stuart, a compassionate platoon leader from the 7th ANGLICO (Air and Naval Gunfire Liaison Company) survived his unit's last battle but continued to mourn his losses. Douglas Moser, master of the .50 caliber machine gun, was one of those missing in action. Moser, a "gentle giant" of a man, had been Stuart's closest companion. In Valley of the Shadows, Stuart learns that the Red Cross has delivered a letter to Moser's mother informing her that he is a prisoner of war in Laos. "Tell Mr. Stuart," the letter closes. Stuart has his mission. Moser languishes in the POW camp, tormented daily by Nan, the disfigured, soul-dead camp commandant. Meanwhile, Stuart's mission takes him to the mountains of Moser's boyhood home in Georgia and on to the Foreign Legion archives in France as he searches for clues to the exact location of the camp. Along the way, Stuart recruits an old friend from their days together in Da Nang. Fellow navy officer Philip Hooper will bring along his elite team of SEALS (Sea, Air, Land) to form Moser's rescue party. Bureaucratic inertia in Washington and the rising anti-war movement conspire to stall the rescue interminably. Failure of a major operation to liberate the "Hanoi Hilton" adds to the forces arrayed against Moser's rescue. Finally, it is only through the direct intervention of the president that Stuart's mission is a go. But doubts remain: Has Stuart really found the "Valley of the Shadow" mentioned in Moser's letter? Is Moser still alive? And, most importantly, can Stuart, Hooper, and the SEALS really pull it off? Valley of the Shadow is dramatic, vivid, authentic - and surprising. "Old-fashioned heroism in a saga of Vietnam . . ." - Newsday
Trail of the Gunman
R. Cameron Cooke - 2017
Cameron Cooke... Elijah Jones is a man with a violent past ... Setting out for the Arizona Territory, Jones seeks to escape his past and live a quieter, gentler life in the vast wilderness of the Mogollon Rim. But men who once made their living with the gun cannot simply walk away. In an untamed land teeming with Apaches and desperadoes, Jones finds himself unwittingly embroiled in a territorial war pitting him against new foes - and old ones... Through showdowns on dusty streets to savage gunfights in the wild, Jones is dogged by the demons of his former life, and realizes he must face them if he ever hopes to leave the trail of the gunman far behind...
Shit Happens
Eileen Wharton - 2012
She's got problems though when bits of her ex-husband turn up in different places and the slimy DI Savage seems to be bending the evidence to link her to the death. Add the fact that she's being pressured into taking a ‘job’ by hard-nosed Vera Devlin from the estate and having to work in a topless bar to make ends meet and you can see she's up against it. Desperate to extricate herself from the mess she breaks into her old marital home to find the diary of her dead husband, except that his mother has taken up residence and arrives back early from bingo… Set against a backdrop of Northern council estate life, this fast paced, humorous novel exemplifies the problems caused by poverty, piles and unruly children, think Jeremy Kyle meets the Thorn Birds and you won't be far wrong!
He Who Dares
Derek 'Del Boy' Trotter - 2015
One day he would mature into an award-winning man of business*, thriving entrepreneur and glittering member of the jet-set. A force of nature, a man who beat the odds, if only for a bit. This is his story. The story of Derek 'Del Boy' Trotter. Who else could tell the glorious tale of rags to riches to rags to rich(ish) but the man himself? You've heard of The Wolf of Wall Street, now meet the Pug of Peckham.*Trotter's Independent Traders, employee of the year 1982 - 2003
Magnificent Bastards
Rich Hall - 2008
Meet the man who vacuums bewildered prairie dogs out of their burrows; a frustrated werewolf who roams the streets of Soho getting mistaken for Brian Blessed; a smug carbon-neutral eco-couple; a teenage girl who invites 45,000 MySpace friends to a house party; the author of a business book entitled Highly Successful Secrets to Standing on a Corner Holding Up a Golf Sale Sign and a man whose attempts to teach softball to a group of indolent British advertising executives sparks an international crisis.
Preemie: Lessons in Love, Life, and Motherhood
Kasey Mathews - 2012
But what seemed a perfect life was shattered when she went into labor four months early, delivering her one-pound, eleven-ounce daughter, Andie.The first time Kasey was wheeled into the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU), nothing prepared her for what she saw: a tiny, fragile baby in a tangle of tubes and wires. All at once, Kasey was confronted with a new and terrifying reality that would test the limits of love, family, and motherhood.In this riveting, honest, and often humorous memoir,
Preemie
chronicles the journey of one tiny baby’s tenacious struggle to hold on to life and the mother who ultimately grew with her. From hospital waiting rooms to the offices of alternative practitioners, from ski slopes to Symphony Hall, Kasey tries to make meaning of her daughter’s birth and eventually comes to learn that gifts come in all sizes and all forms, and sometimes... right on time.
Dancing on Deansgate
Freda Lightfoot - 2003
But when the Blitz reaches Manchester, she is locked in the cellar by her feckless mother, Lizzie. As bombs rain down from a sky turned blood red with flame, Jess waits for Lizzie to return.But fortunes are fickle, and soon Jess finds herself packed off to live with her tyrant Uncle Bernie, a bullying black marketeer. Though he treats her like a servant, she seeks refuge in the Sally Army and her natural musical talent offers both an escape route and the chance for love.But Uncle Bernie never forgives his niece for refusing to join his illegal schemes and threatens to deprive Jess of her hard-won freedom once and for all.
This is a sweeping saga of hope and resilience perfect for fans of Kitty Neale and Rosie Goodwin.
Praise for Dancing on Deansgate ‘A heart-wrenching story’ 5* Reader review‘It drew me in straight away’ 5* Reader review‘Another gem from a great writer’ 5* Reader review‘A compelling story of separation and hardship, and heartache overcome at last’ 5* Reader review
Collecting Sticks
Joe Decie - 2017
(It's like camping, but much more expensive.) Loosely based on actual events, but sometimes veering unexpectedly into fantasy, the story plays with the challenges nature presents to city folk as they forage for berries, get stuck up a tree, make perilous encounters with stinging wildlife, compete to build the best fire and discover the importance of finding good sticks. Also, it rains. It's about the human desire to get back to nature. Or to return to childhood and hit things with sticks.Funny, moving, beautifully drawn, Collecting Sticks can stand beside Joff Winterhart’s classic graphic novel of family life, Days of the Bagnold Summer.
Lummox: The Evolution of a Man
Mike Magnuson - 2002
When a mysterious phantom enters his life, he sets himself on a quest to discover the true meaning of lummoxness, and what he learns along the way is both shocking and hilarious.Written with honesty and selfeffacing wry humor, Lummox is an exceptional story of manhood at a time of its redefinition, a book that will leave you laughing out loud in recognition and cheering for lummoxes everywhere.