Book picks similar to
Goodbye Junie Moon by June Collins
memoir
non-fiction
amazon
fiction
Dreaming in German
Claudia Poser - 2012
When the author's father, who had spent several years as a POW in the US, accepts the opportunity to realize his dream to return to America, the family encounters culture shock: a move from a densely populated urban area to upstate South Carolina. As time passes, the narrator is torn between the desire to return home and her growing adaptation to life in the a new country. She moves to New England, then the Midwest feeling less out of place with each move, but still longing for home. When the Wall falls so suddenly in 1989, she is euphoric - being able to visit family without crossing the dreaded East German border was a childhood fantasy she never expected to realize. But with reunification come questions of inheritance, and the idyll of family unity explodes as the country's borders dissolve. In the end, she finds that for an immigrant there can never be a simple answer to the question: where is home?
Becoming Fearless: My Ongoing Journey of Learning to Trust God
Michelle Aguilar - 2011
They will discover they have a lot to lose as well—whether it’s fear, weight, or insecurities that keep them from living a full life.Becoming Fearless is a story of reconciliation between a mother and a daughter, a testament to the power of forgiveness, and a reminder that the journey is even more important than the destination. It is an encouragement to “feel the fear” in any situation without being paralyzed by it. Will you have faith in God when you’ve lost faith in yourself?
Beautiful on the Mountain: An Inspiring True Story
Jeannie Light - 2014
In 1977, Jeannie Light left her fine plantation home amid heartbreak and came to Graves Mill, a tiny hamlet in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Alone in an utterly new kind of life, Jeannie was determined to find the courage to make a fresh start.To Jeannie’s surprise, she found herself called upon by her new neighbors to open the old, deteriorated country church, a place that had once united the fractured community of mountain folk. With no training, and no small amount of trepidation, she undertook the task. And as she embarked on an unforeseen series of adventures, from heartbreaking to hilarious, Jeannie would learn more than she ever expected about faith, loving your neighbor, and doing the work that God sets in front of you. Because sometimes, God calls us to go where there is no path . . . and leave a trail.
Sinner's Creed
Scott Stapp - 2012
Raised by an abusive stepfather, Scott was always aware of God's presence in his life, but it wasn't until years later, amid a life punctuated by sex, drugs, and rock ’n roll that Scott began to feel a need for God in his life.During CREED’s decade of dominance and in the years following the band's breakup, Scott struggled with drugs and alcohol, which led not only to a divorce, but also to a much-publicized suicide attempt in 2006. Now clean, sober, and in the midst of a highly successful solo career, Scott has finally come full circle-a turnaround he credits to his renewed relationship with Jesus Christ.In Sinner's Creed, Scott shares his story for the first time, from his fundamentalist upbringing, the rise and fall of CREED, and his ongoing battle with addiction, to his recommitment to Christ and the launch of his solo career. The result is a gripping memoir that is proof positive that God is always present in our lives, despite the colossal mess we sometimes make of them.
Kidowed
Jessica Kenley - 2012
As she travels through her hellish journey, you will experience unexpected humor, endless love, and learn how strong one family can be while they walk beside her.
A Voice in the Box: My Life in Radio
Bob Edwards - 2011
The programs’ mix of long-form interviews and news documentaries has won many prestigious awards.For thirty years, Louisville native Edwards was the voice of National Public Radio’s daily newsmagazine programs, co-hosting All Things Considered before launching Morning Edition in 1979. These programs built NPR’s national audience while also bringing Edwards to national prominence. In 2004, however, NPR announced that it would be finding a replacement for Edwards, inciting protests from tens of thousands of his fans and controversy among his listeners and fellow broadcasters. Today, Edwards continues to inform the American public with a voice known for its sincerity, intelligence, and wit.In A Voice in the Box: My Life in Radio, Edwards recounts his career as one of the most important figures in modern broadcasting. He describes his road to success on the radio waves, from his early days knocking on station doors during college and working for American Forces Korea Network to his work at NPR and induction into the National Radio Hall of Fame in 2004. Edwards tells the story of his exit from NPR and the launch of his new radio ventures on the XM Satellite Radio network. Throughout the book, his sharp observations about the people he interviewed and covered and the colleagues with whom he worked offer a window on forty years of American news and on the evolution of public journalism.A Voice in the Box is an insider’s account of the world of American media and a fascinating, personal narrative from one of the most iconic personalities in radio history.
Your Blue Is Not My Blue: A Missing Person Memoir
Aspen Matis - 2020
Both sought to redefine themselves beneath the stars. By the time they made it to the snowy Cascade Range of British Columbia—the trail’s end—Aspen and Justin were in love.Embarking on a new pilgrimage the next summer, they returned to those same mossy mountains where they’d met, and they married. They built a world together, three years of a happy marriage. Until a cold November morning, when, after kissing Aspen goodbye, Justin left to attend the funeral of a close friend.He never came back. As days became weeks, her husband’s inexplicable absence left Aspen unmoored. Shock, grief, fear, and anger battled for control—but nothing prepared her for the disarming truth. A revelation that would lead Aspen to reassess not only her own life but that of the disappeared as well.The result is a brave and inspiring memoir of secrets kept and unearthed, of a vanishing that became a gift: a woman’s empowering reclamation of unmitigated purpose in the surreal wake of mystifying loss.
Thin Wire: A Mother's Journey Through Her Daughter's Heroin Addiction
Christine Lewry - 2012
Amber is introduced to drugs and becomes addicted without her mother's knowledge. She meets a dealer who feeds her habit. Whilst living together, they are raided by the police. Bailed to her mother's address with a £200-a-day addiction, Amber doesn't think her family will accept her back when they discover the truth. When she's charged by the police with dealing class A drugs and accepting stolen goods, she fears she'll go to prison. Trying to feed her habit alone, Amber meets a fellow addict who offers to introduce her to prostitution. The prospect terrifies her, but will her mother help her?An unflinching story that looks at drug addiction from two sides. The book's concluding section offers two sets of personal guidelines; one for addicts, the other for parents or partners of addicts, while the in-depth, harrowing real life story vividly illustrates the difficulties of overcoming addiction. In a society where 50% of teenagers experiment with drugs, Amber is every mother's child. She could be yours.
An American Princess: The Many Lives of Allene Tew
Annejet van der Zijl - 2015
At eighteen, she met Tod Hostetter at a local dance, having no idea that the mercurial charmer she would impulsively wed was heir to one of the wealthiest families in America. But when he died twelve years later, Allene packed her bags for New York City. Never once did she look back.From the vantage point of the American upper class, Allene embodied the tumultuous Gilded Age. Over the course of four more marriages, she weathered personal tragedies during World War I and the catastrophic financial reversals of the crash of 1929. From the castles and châteaus of Europe, she witnessed the Russian Revolution and became a princess. And from the hopes of a young girl from Jamestown, New York, Allene Tew would become the epitome of both a pursuer and survivor of the American Dream.
Pushups in the Prayer Room
Norm Schriever - 2012
Throughout his journeys he touches down in more than 20 countries in 6 continents, spanning 70,000 miles total, or the equivalent of almost three times around the equator. There is never a dull moment on this wild and irreverent adventure, whether Norm is evading armed carjackers in a high-speed chase in the barrios of Venezuela, exploring ancient wonders of the world like the pyramids, the Great Wall, and Machu Picchu, almost landing in Bolivian jail for mistakenly being accused of cocaine trafficking, or witnessing the holiest sites on earth in Jerusalem. Along the way, Norm encounters a broad spectrum of human existence and experiences a blossoming of consciousness and spiritual growth that he never anticipated. What started out as a wild, raucous party trip evolves into a man's quest for his life's purpose in the world. Pushups in the Prayer Room: A Year Backpacking around the World is an honest, no-holds-barred account of that year-long odyssey around the globe. Norm's writing, which is enlightening, gritty, filled with self-deprecating humor, yet always authentic, picks you up and carries you along on that crazy journey.
Feast: True Love in and out of the Kitchen
Hannah Howard - 2018
Eighteen years old and eager to learn, she’s invigorated by the manic energy and knife-sharp focus of the crew. By day Hannah explores the Columbia arts scene, struggling to find her place. By night she’s intoxicated by boxes of heady truffles and intrigued by the food industry’s insiders. She’s hungry for knowledge, success, and love, but she’s also ravenous because she hasn’t eaten more than yogurt and coffee in days.Hannah is hiding an eating disorder. The excruciatingly late nights, demanding chefs, bad boyfriends, and destructive obsessions have left a void inside her that she can’t fill. To reconcile her relationships with the food she worships and a body she struggles to accept, Hannah’s going to have to learn to nourish her soul.
Precious Lives
Margaret Forster - 1998
Margaret Forster's father was not a man to answer questions - least of all questions about life and death, so she attempts to answer them for herself. As Forster looks back at Arthur's life and indomitable character, she evokes incidents from her childhood, his working life and stubborn old age, trying to make sense of their largely unspoken relationship, and of his tenacious hold on life, and on his family. Arthur and Marion's lives were ordinary, and apparently unremarkable, but, when faced with death, lives like these become strangely precious.
The Secret Holocaust Diaries: The Untold Story of Nonna Bannister
Nonna Bannister - 2009
Nonna's writings tell the remarkable tale of how a Russian girl, born into a family that had known wealth and privileges, was exposed to the concentration camps and learned the value of human life and the importance of forgiveness.
Inside the Robe: A Judge's Candid Tale of Criminal Justice in America
Katherine Mader - 2021
As Anthony Bourdain invited readers to follow him behind the scenes of the restaurant business in his bestseller, Kitchen Confidential, and Caitlin Doughty’s Smoke Gets in Your Eyes was a revealing peak into the mysteries of what happens after death inside a mortuary, Inside the Robe shines a bright spotlight into the hidden folds of the judging world. Despite the old saw that judges should merely “follow the law,” Inside the Robe lays bare how following the law can produce wildly different results depending upon the background, politics, and life experiences of each judge. Even the floor of the courthouse can mean the difference between prison and freedom.Judge Katherine Mader spent decades as a judge in a criminal court, was the LAPD’s first inspector general, a prosecutor in two murder-for-hire trials, and a defense attorney who successfully argued to spare the life of the Hillside Strangler. From her perch behind the bench, Judge Mader witnesses a parade of drug addicts, gang members, mentally ill defendants, pricey private attorneys ranging from brilliant to incompetent, jaded prosecutors, and starry-eyed true believer public defenders. Never before has the judging profession been laid bare for all to see.
Curbchek
Zach Fortier - 2011
Additionally Curbchek was awarded a Bronze medal in the 2013 Readers Favorite International book awards contest. Curbchek is the story of a damaged cop, Zach Fortier. Fortier worked in the police department for the city where he grew up. One foot in the world of the cops, courts and legal system. The other in the world of gangs, drugs, thugs and street violence. Where the laws and rules are made by the strongest, the schemers and the most brutal. Read about the transformation of Fortier from a green rookie to a damaged paranoid veteran seeing danger in every situation. Follow along as he walks this tight rope. Trying to make difference, breaking the laws he promised to enforce. This is a story of law and order uncensored.