Book picks similar to
Archipelago New York by Thomas Halaczinsky
non-fiction
edelweiss-books
artsyfartsybx
natural-history
Stella's Secret: A True Story of Holocaust Survival
Jerry L. Jennings - 2005
But it is Stella’s voice, the amazing way that she tells her story, that makes this Holocaust story so unique, powerful and endearing. The reader listens to Stella’s stunning simplicity of expression, her use of Polish and Yiddish phrases, her humor, her all-so-frequent grammatical errors – and is charmed. It is a story that only Stella Yollin can tell, and it can only be told in Stella’s sweet and incomparable way.
Over the Wire: A POW's Escape Story from the Second World War
Philip H. Newman - 1983
After several failed attempts he got out over the wire and journeyed for weeks as a fugitive from northern France to Marseilles, then across the Pyrenees to Spain and Gibraltar and freedom. He was guided along the way by French civilians, resistance fighters and the organizers of the famous Pat escape line. His straightforward, honest and vivid memoir of his work as a surgeon at Dunkirk, life in the prison camps and his escape attempts gives a fascinating insight into his wartime experience. It records the ingenuity and courage of the individuals, the ordinary men and women, who risked their lives to help him on his way. It is also one of the best accounts we have of what it was like to be on the run in occupied Europe.
Unwelcomed Songs: Collected Lyrics 1980-1992
Henry Rollins - 2002
A must for all Rollins fans.
My Father's Island: A Galapagos Quest (Pelican Press)
Johanna Angermeyer - 1990
Like her father, she came to love the Galapagos and to dream of having a life there. Her experience was filled with the perils and incomparable pleasures of living on the Galapagos.
Around Madagascar on My Kayak
Riaan Manser - 2010
For over two years, he padalled a mammoth 37,000kms through 34 countries; some of which rank as the most dangerous places on Earth. It was a feat that earned him the title Adventurer of the Year 2006 and made his resulting book, Around Africa on my Bicycle, a best-seller.In July 2009 Riaan again set another world first when he became the first person to circumnavigate the world's fourth largest island of Madagascar by kayak; another expedition achieved alone and unaided. This incredible journey, 5000km in eleven months, was considerably more demanding, both physically and mentally. Daily, Riaan had to conquer extreme loneliness while ploughing through treacherous conditions such as cyclones, pounding surf and an unrelenting sun that, combined with up to ten hours in salt water, was literally pickling his body. The perseverance, of course, brought memorable close encounters with Madagascar's marine life - humpback whales breaching metres away from his kayak, giant leatherback turtles gliding alongside him and even having his boat rammed by sharks. Riaan travelled around Madagascar during a period of the country's political turmoil, which gave him unrivalled insight into the exotic island's psyche and even earned him two nights in prison on suspicion of carrying out mercenary activities. Around Madagascar in my Kayak is packed with engaging stories and beautiful photographs and is set to become another best-seller.
The Low Countries: A History
Anthony Bailey - 2016
Here, from British historian and New Yorker senior writer Anthony Bailey is the dramatic story of the Low Countries - Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg - from the early days of nomads and barbarian invaders to the birth of towns and cities to the rise and decline of world prominence and finally to the dark and tragic days of World War II.
Cocaine + Surfing: A Sordid History of Surfing's Greatest Love Affair
Chas Smith - 2018
The 1960–70s image, bolstered by Tom Wolfe and Big Wednesday, was one of mild outlaws―tanned boys refusing to grow up, spending their days drinking beer and smoking joints on the beach in between mindless hours in the water.But in the 1980s, as surf brands morphed into multibillion-dollar companies, the derelict portrait began to harm business. The external surf image became Kelly Slater and Laird Hamilton, beacons of health, vitality, bravery, and clean-living.Internally, though, surfing had moved on from booze and weed to its heart’s true home, its soul’s twin flame: cocaine. The rise of cocaine in American popular culture as the choice of rich, white elites was matched, then quadrupled, within surf culture. The parties got wilder, the nights stretched longer, the stories became more ridiculously unbelievable. And there has been no stopping, no dip in passion.It is a forbidden love, and few, if any, outside the surf world know about this particular rhapsody. Drug use is kept very well-hidden, even from insiders, but evidence of its psychosis rears its head from time to time in the form of overdoses, bar fights, surf contests, murders, and cover-ups.Cocaine + Surfing draws back the curtain on a hopped-up, sometimes-sexy, sometimes-deadly relationship and uses cocaine as the vehicle to expose and explain the utterly absurd surf industry to outsiders.
Pakistan: Courting the Abyss
Tilak Devasher - 2016
He also dwells at length on the Pakistan movement, where the seeds of many current problems were sown the opportunistic use of religion being the most lethal of these. With data-driven precision, Devasher takes apart the flawed prescriptions and responses of successive governments, especially during military rule, to the many critical challenges the country has encountered over the years. These, as much as the particular trajectory of its creation and growth, he contends, have brought Pakistan to an abyss where it risks multi-organ failure unless things change dramatically in the near future.
Key West: History of an Island of Dreams
Maureen Ogle - 2006
The city’s real story—told by Maureen Ogle in this lively and engaging illustrated account—is as fabulous as fiction. In the two centuries since the city’s pioneer founders battled Indians, pirates, and deadly disease, Key West has stood at the crossroads of American history. In 1861, Union troops seized control of strategically located Key West. In the early 1890s, Key West Cubans helped José Martí launch the Cuban revolution, and a few years later the battleship Maine steamed out of Key West harbor on its last, tragic voyage. At the turn of the century, a technological marvel—the overseas railroad—was built to connect mainland Florida to Key West, and in the 1920s and 1930s, painters, rumrunners, and writers (including Ernest Hemingway and Robert Frost) discovered Key West. During World War II, the federal government and the military war machine permanently altered the island’s landscape, and in the second half of the 20th century, bohemians, hippies, gays, and jet-setters began writing a new chapter in Key West’s social history.
The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World 2017
Bob Sehlinger - 2016
With advice that is direct, prescriptive, and detailed, it takes the guesswork out of travel by unambiguously rating and ranking everything from hotels, restaurants, and attractions to rental car companies.With an Unofficial Guide in hand, and authors Bob Sehlinger and Len Testa as guides, find out what's available in every category, from best to worst, and use step-by-step detailed plans to help make the most of your time at Walt Disney World.
For the Love of Prague: The True Love Story of the Only Free American in Prague During 30 Years of Communism
Gene Deitch - 1997
No reporter, who flew in, contacted a few dissidents, and flew out again, could ever match his experience, insight, or personal adventures. His book, For The Love Of Prague, is part love story, part history, part a record of national lunacy, and part terror. It is all true, with real names, real people, and real incidents. The New York Times, in a two-thirds page illustrated story, hailed it as a spicy, funny memoir!
About the Author:
Gene Deitch is an Oscar-winning animation film director and scenarist. He is a voting member of the Motion Picture Academy of Arts and Scientists. In the early 1950s he was Creative Director of UPA s New York studio, where among his many gold-medal winning films were the famous Bert & Harry Piels beer commercials. His TV commercials were the first ever shown at the New York Museum of Modern Art. In 1956 CBS purchased the Terrytoons animation studio and named Gene Deitch as its Creative Director. Under his supervision and direction, the studio produced 18 CinemaScope cartoons per year for 20th Century-Fox, and won its very first Oscar nomination. He personally created and directed the Tom Terrific series for the CBS nationwide Captain Kangaroo show. Tom Terrific, with Mighty Manfred the Wonder Dog, was the very first animated serial for network television. In 1958 he set up his own studio, Gene Deitch Associates, inc., in New York.
The Shepherd's Bush Murders
Nick Russell-Pavier - 2016
Jack Witney served twenty-five years in prison although he shot no one and was released on appeal, only to be murdered in his Bristol flat a few years later. John Duddy died in Parkhurst after fifteen years. But Harry Roberts, by his own admission the instigator of the crime and the most notorious, was released from prison after forty-eight years in 2015 making national front page news. What could possess an apparently rational and sane man, albeit an habitual criminal, to commit such a callous and ruthless act? What kind of a man is he? How can an ordinary person understand what he did? Should he be forgiven?50 years later, the full story for the first time.
Raising Hell: Backstage Tales from the Lives of Metal Legends
Jon Wiederhorn - 2020
The book contains the crazy, funny and sometimes horrifying anecdotes musicians have told about a lifestyle both invigorating and at times self-destructive. The metal genre has always been populated by colorful individuals who have thwarted convention and lived by their own rules. For many, vice has been virtue, and the opportunity to record albums and tour has been an invitation to push boundaries and open a Pandora ’s Box of wild experiences. Even before they joined bands, the urge for metalheads to rebel and a seemingly contradictory need to belong was ingrained in their DNA. Whether they were oddballs who didn’t fit in or angry kids from troubled backgrounds, metal gave them a sense of identity and became more than a form of music. From the author of the classic collection of Metal music-making tales Louder Than Hell comes a collection that goes behind the music with the lead singers, guitarists, bassists, drummers, stage hands, roadies, groupies, fans, and more. These are the stories of the parties, the tours, the rage, the joy, . . . the Heavy Metal life!
Ghosts in the Forest (Kindle Single)
Corinne Purtill - 2015
They did not know that the war they were fleeing had in fact ended—25 years earlier. Corinne Purtill was one of the first journalists to meet the families upon their incredible return to society. Years later she returned to Cambodia to learn the truth about their time on the run. What she found was a darker and more complicated tale than the one they first shared, a story of terror, isolation, fierce loyalty, appalling choices and murder. The result is a story that examines the unyielding human need for family and connection and the meaning of survival. Corinne Purtill is a journalist who has reported around the world for publications including Quartz, GlobalPost, CNN, Salon and the Cambodia Daily. She lives in California with her family. Cover design by Hannah Perrine Mode