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.

    In the rain.In this compelling memoir, comedian and actor Alan Davies recalls his boyhood with vivid insight and devastating humour. Shifting between his 1970s upbringing and his life today, Davies moves poignantly from innocence to experience to the clarity of hindsight, always with a keen sense of the absurd.From sibling dynamics, to his voiceless, misunderstood progression through school, sexuality and humiliating 'accidents', Davies inhabits his younger mind with spectacular accuracy, sharply evoking an era when Green Shield Stamps, Bob-a-Job week and Whizzer & Chips loomed large, a bus fare was 2p - and children had little power in the face of adult motivation. Here, there are often exquisitely tender recollections of the mother he lost at six years old, of a bereaved family struggling to find its way, and the kicks and confusion of adolescence.

    His behaviour, seemingly overnight, changed from indifferent to violently abusive and, for the next seven years, Tracy was sexually and physically abused by her father, his friends and her own brother. All of the men were in the British Armed Forces. Tracy's father compounded the abuse by sending her to baby-sit for his paedophile friends - whilst their own children slept in other rooms, these men would find excuses to leave later or return earlier than their wives in order to abuse her, with her own father's blessing. When she sought help and safety the doors were closed as the authorities closed ranks. In this shocking and compelling book, Tracy Black pieces together the jigsaw of a story that has haunted her for the past forty years. She reveals the horrific betrayal of trust perpetrated by men who were considered upstanding citizens and heroes. Tracy's tale reminds us all of the terrible ways in which paedophiles work and the secrets too many children are forced to carry alone. It is only now that she can tell her full story of recovery.

    Most significantly, I found forgiveness. I might even call it redemption.On July 4, 1990, eighteen-year-old Stacey Lannert shot and killed her father, who had been sexually abusing her since she was eight. Missouri state law, a disbelieving prosecutor, and Stacey’s own fragile psyche conspired against her: She was found guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced to life without parole.Redemption is Stacey’s candid memoir of her harrowing childhood and the pain and protective love of her sister that led her to that horrifying night. It is also an extraordinary portrait of what happened after she found herself in prison and how she grew determined to live positively, even triumphantly, despite her circumstances. Ultimately, and most profoundly, she learned the healing power of forgiveness. After spending as many years in prison as she had out of it, on January 10, 2009, outgoing Missouri governor Matt Blunt commuted Stacey’s life sentence. Six days later she walked out of the gates a free woman.Redemption is the story of how Stacey learned to be free while living behind bars. It is a coming-of-age story set in a parallel universe of a maximum-security prison. And, it is a story of sisterhood, courage, and justice finally served.

    She survived the stunning traumas of a lost childhood, but survival may not be a way of life. Now the secrets, lies and loneliness that once imprisoned her are brought into sharp focus, where an adult Jenny can make her peace at last. But one more mystery demands her attention: the quiet troubled soul of Bryan, who, lacking the inner strength of the survivor, chooses a sad and sorrowful destiny. And Jenny must dig deep to find the one bond that held them through the years, and the one reason any of us have for enduring: love.

    Two loving parents, a backdrop of 1960’s Britain; life had provided for her, at least with the riches of modesty.Keri herself however, would often confound teachers with her erratic behaviour, which was at best sullen and withdrawn; at worst violently disruptive. When challenged, she would only exacerbate her growing reputation as a fantasist; weaving terrible tales about the “abuse” she was suffering at the hands of her very creators.But it was the much-celebrated age of innocence; the childhood of our modern culture. Big brother had not yet been born and Nanny was only looking out for her dearest, as opposed to the entire State. Who would take the word of child on such matters? After all, she was just a bad egg… wasn’t she?Well, no. She wasn’t. She was indeed, for over a decade, the victim of an abuse so staggering that merely to read about it is enough to freeze even the thickest of blood. “Keri” is the story of what happens when truth is imprisoned in a little glass jar and buried deep within the Earth, condemned to a sentence of eternal silence. For truth may be repressed, but never supressed. It will always find light eventually. And, in this gut-wrenching account of her early life, author Kat Ward takes the reader through every shade of darkness, whilst never allowing the candle of hope to fully extinguish, so as that truth may indeed find its rightful freedom.

    But that was not my life.Journalist, celebrity, television presenter, author, ambassador for beyondblue and patron of its work on post-natal depression, Member of the Order of Australia, risk-taker, social commentator, charity worker, public speaker, passionate mother and wife, Jessica Rowe is all of these things, and more. And in this extraordinary memoir, Jessica reveals herself as a woman who thought it would be easy to have it all, to do it all. But what was supposed to be her beautiful life derailed in the very public collapse of her television career accompanied by astonishingly hurtful public trolling, her long struggle to conceive, her fears and what she believed to be failings as a mother and in her professional life, and the diagnosis of post-natal depression.Thankfully, with proper medical help, and that of her beloved husband and family, Jessica ultimately rediscovers her 'sparkle'.Deeply honest, funny, gut-wrenching and touching this book will be treasured by women who don't feel they fit the mould of the perfect woman; women who understand that in life, 'having it all' may develop a different meaning; and women suffering from post-natal depression, who will be encouraged that it's okay to ask for help.

    When a chance encounter with a handsome stranger presented her with an opportunity to move halfway around the world, Lisa left behind cosmopolitan Los Angeles for a new adventure in the ancient Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan—said to be one of the happiest places on earth.Long isolated from industrialization and just beginning to open its doors to the modern world, Bhutan is a deeply spiritual place, devoted to environmental conservation and committed to the happiness of its people—in fact, Bhutan measures its success in Gross National Happiness rather than in GNP. In a country without a single traffic light, its citizens are believed to be among the most content in the world. To Lisa, it seemed to be a place that offered the opposite of her fast-paced life in the United States, where the noisy din of sound-bite news and cell phones dominate our days, and meaningful conversation is a rare commodity; where everyone is plugged in digitally, yet rarely connects with the people around them.Thousands of miles away from everything and everyone she knows, Lisa creates a new community for herself. As she helps to start Bhutan’s first youth-oriented radio station, Kuzoo FM, she must come to terms with her conflicting feelings about the impact of the medium on a country that had been shielded from its effects. Immersing herself in Bhutan’s rapidly changing culture, Lisa realizes that her own perspective on life is changing as well—and that she is discovering the sense of purpose and joy that she has been yearning for.In this smart, heartfelt, and beautifully written book, sure to please fans of transporting travel narratives and personal memoirs alike, Lisa Napoli discovers that the world is a beautiful and complicated place—and comes to appreciate her life for the adventure it is.

    Despite what David Miliband might think

    When graduate student Jenny Worley needed a fast way to earn more money, she found herself at the door of the Lusty Lady Theater in San Francisco, auditioning on a stage surrounded by mirrors, in platform heels, and not much else. So began Jenny’s career as a stripper strutting the peepshow stage as her alter-ego “Polly” alongside women called Octopussy and Amnesia. But this wasn’t your run-of-the-mill strip club—it was a peepshow populated by free-thinking women who talked feminist theory and swapped radical zines like lipstick.As management’s discriminatory practices and the rise of hidden cameras stir up tension among the dancers, Jenny rallies them to demand change. Together, they organize the first strippers’ union in the world and risk it all to take over the club and run it as a co-operative. Refusing to be treated as sex objects or disposable labor, they become instead the rulers of their kingdom. Jenny’s elation over the Lusty Lady’s revolution is tempered by her evolving understanding of the toll dancing has taken on her. When she finally hangs up her heels for good to finish her Ph.D., neither Jenny nor San Francisco are the same—but she and the cadre of wild, beautiful, brave women who run the Lusty Lady come out on top despite it all. A first-hand account as only an insider could tell it, Neon Girls paints a vivid picture of a bygone San Francisco and a fiercely feminist world within the sex industry, asking sharp questions about what keeps women from fighting for their rights, who benefits from capitalizing on desire, and how we can change entrenched systems of power.

    Though it is a diary of an unruly life in an often inhospitable place, it is suffused with Fuller’s endearing ability to find laughter, even when there is little to celebrate. Fuller’s debut is unsentimental and unflinching but always captivating. In wry and sometimes hilarious prose, she stares down disaster and looks back with rage and love at the life of an extraordinary family in an extraordinary time.

    He has kept a blog of his daily working life since 2003 and his award-winning writing is, by turn, moving, cynical, funny, heart-rending, and compassionate. From the tragic to the hilarious, the stories Tom tells give a fascinatingand at times alarming picture of life in inner-city Britain, and the people who are paid to mop up after it.

    Avalon only needed one.From Amazon bestselling author Vanessa Morgan, Avalon is the heartwarming and once-in-a-lifetime love story of a girl and her neurotic Turkish Van cat.With humor, the author details how Avalon made other creatures cringe in distress whenever he was around, how he threw her dates out by means of special techniques, and how he rendered it almost impossible for her to leave the house. Avalon was so incorrigible that even her landlord ordered her to get rid of him. But beneath Avalon's demonic boisterousness, Vanessa recognized her own flaws and insecurities, and she understood that abandoning Avalon would be the worst she could do to him. Thanks to her unswerving loyalty, Avalon transformed into a tender feline, and even landed a major role in a horror movie. In turn, Avalon made it his mission to be there for his human companion.Avalon is a memoir for anyone who has ever been obsessively in love with a pet.

    Prize-winning novelist Cai Emmons praises Sterry by saying she really knows how to tell a story. Sterry grew up in a succession of isolated one-room schools in northern and central Montana, where her mother, a teacher, eked out a living. A must read for anyone who loves Montana and its rich history.

    Realizing that there was something very malevolent about the couple, she left their employment soon after, glad to be rid of them. The story should have ended there, but a month, later she was abducted by the Wests and suffered violent sexual abuse at their hands before being told that she would be killed and buried. Through a combination of luck and quick thinking, depite the trauma of what had happened, Caroline managed to escape to freedom. This is her story of those fateful days and the appalling aftermath.