She has hit rock bottom and here, for the first time, Kerry shares how bad it's really been.But this incredible story of survival charts Kerry's rise out of the mire of addiction, depression and bankruptcy. She has brought her life and health back from the brink of total collapse and has become a happy single parent and working mother of four.

    As of May 2009, Johnny Sexton was the little-known backup fly-half for Leinster, the chronically underachieving Irish province. But when Felipe Contepomi went down with an injury early in the Heineken Cup semi-final against a dominant Munster team, Sexton came on, nailed a penalty with his first touch of the game, and helped Leinster to a crushing victory. Four years, three Heineken Cups later and one British and Irish Lions tour victory later, Sexton is by some distance the leading fly-half in the northern hemisphere. When the 2013 Lions squad was selected, there was almost universal agreement that Sexton was the most important single player heading to Australia. And over the course of the Lions' first victorious Test series in sixteen years, Sexton was the man pulling the strings. His try in the third test was the decisive blow, and his joyous celebrations after scoring were echoed in homes across Britain and Ireland. Becoming a Lion is an intimate portrait of life at the highest levels of the professional game - at Leinster, with Ireland, and on tour with the Lions.

    The happiness of his family and school life was snatched from Jamie when his father was sentenced to ten years in prison for his involvement in the killing of Jack "The Hat" McVitie. The subsequent years saw Jamie without the father he adored and the whole family was put under enormous strain. At 14, Jamie decided that his passion was for acting and, having been encouraged by Barbara Windsor, he discovered yet another new environment at the Italia Conti Stage School. Jamie thrived in the acting world and was soon enjoying success on both stage and screen. By the time of his dad's release from prison, Jamie had carved a "straight" career for himself--but after years apart, there was plenty of lost time to make up for. Soon, he was dividing his time between acting and assisting with Freddie's "business." Whether on the streets or on the stage, there was never a dull moment; Jamie was living life at 100 miles an hour and loving it. Before long, though, life took a surprising turn when a drug deal his father was heavily involved in went tragically wrong and he was forced to go on the run to America with his dad, which marked the start of a whole new adventure.

    Accepted as a RAF navigator in 1940, he was posted to 103 Squadron at Elsham Wolds in the winter of 1942. There he crewed up with a pilot from Western Australia and a British crew to fly a Lancaster bomber. In No Moon Tonight he gives a profound insight into the inner lives of the men of Bomber Command and their hopes and fears in the face of mounting losses. He depicts the appalling human cost of the air war in an account which has been favorably compared to other enduring memoirs of the 1st World War, namely Sassoon's Memoirs of an Infantry Officer and Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front. A memorable first hand account of the air war over Germany.

    

    He was a boxing champion as a boy. He became a dad as a teenager. He has been a barman in a brothel and spent his first years in London working as a carer to some of the capital's most at-risk kids.In this, the first major biography of the star, Neil Simpson reveals the extraordinary highs and the terrible lows of Paul's life. He explains: how Lily Savage was born as a way to make more money - and help Paul take his mind off the horrors he saw every day as a social worker; how tough it was for the 'blonde bombsite from Birkenhead' to break into the entertainment mainstream; and, why Paul decided to risk everything by throwing off Lily's wig and carving out a new career as himself.The depression, the private grief and the near fatal heart attacks that struck as Paul re-invented himself as the funniest and most successful chat show host in the country. Frequently hilarious and sometimes heart-wrenchingly sad, Paul O'Grady has always lived his life on a rollercoaster of emotions. Today he is a proud grandfather, a multimillionaire and a man loved by millions of devoted fans. This is his incredible story.

    And it takes another kind of person to stand out from all the rest as both a wild man and a rock star. Chris Leben, otherwise known as “The Crippler,” is that kind of person.Leben’s reputation started when he appeared on the inaugural season of The Ultimate Fighter, a reality show and competition where hopeful fighters live together and vie for a UFC contract and a path to greatness. He quickly made a name for himself with his controversial and abrasive behavior. During his subsequent ten-year career in ultimate fighting, Leben became one of the most recognized figures in the sport, enthralling audiences around the world with his wild, head-first style of fighting as he took on some of the world’s best fighters, including Anderson Silva, Yoshihiro Akiyama, and Wanderlei Silva.But Leben’s success in the ring and international fame hid a troubled background. Abandoned by his father at a young age, Leben’s mother worked long hours to raise him and his two siblings, and Leben learned early he had to be tough to fend for himself. For most of his life, Leben struggled with alcohol and narcotics, and he was suspended by the UFC for nine months for testing positive for performance-enhancing drugs. The Crippler is not just an exciting account of his rise to prominence within the UFC; it’s the incredible story of a renowned wild man dealing with his personal demons and learning that the toughest opponent is always yourself.Skyhorse Publishing, along with our Arcade, Good Books, Sports Publishing, and Yucca imprints, is proud to publish a broad range of biographies, autobiographies, and memoirs. Our list includes biographies on well-known historical figures like Benjamin Franklin, Nelson Mandela, and Alexander Graham Bell, as well as villains from history, such as Heinrich Himmler, John Wayne Gacy, and O. J. Simpson. We have also published survivor stories of World War II, memoirs about overcoming adversity, first-hand tales of adventure, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

    Miller discovers that he is also searching for a defining part of himself, formed by his relation to Max Blatt, but whose significance will remain obscure until he finds Max, complete, in his history. With Max, Miller the novelist has written a wonderful work of non-fiction, as fine as the best of his novels. Always a truth-seeker, he has rendered himself vulnerable, unprotected by the liberties permitted to fiction. Max is perhaps his most moving book, a poignant expression of piety, true to his mentor's injunction to write with love.' Raimond Gaita, award-winning author of Romulus, My FatherI began to see that whatever I might write about Max, discover about him, piece together with those old shards of memory, it would be his influence on the friendships of the living that would frame his story in the present.According to your 1939 Gestapo file, you adopted the cover names Landau and Maxim. The name your mother and father gave you was Moses. We knew you as Max. You had worked in secret. From an early age you concealed yourself - like the grey box beetle in the final country of your exile, maturing on its journey out of sight beneath the bark of the tree.You risked death every day. And when at last the struggle became hopeless, you escaped the hell and found a haven in China first, and then Australia, where you became one of those refugees who, in their final place of exile, chose not death but silence and obscurity.Alex Miller followed the faint trail of Max Blatt's early life for five years. Max's story unfolded, slowly at first, from the Melbourne Holocaust Centre's records then to Berlin's Federal Archives. From Berlin, Miller travelled to Max's old home town of Wroclaw in Poland. And finally in Israel with Max's niece, Liat Shoham, and her brother Yossi Blatt, at Liat's home in the moshav Shadmot Dvora in the Lower Galilee, the circle of friendship was closed and the mystery of Max's legendary silence was unmasked.Max is an astonishing and moving tribute to friendship, a meditation on memory itself, and a reminder to the reader that history belongs to humanity.'A wonderful book. It is a story that needs to be heard.' Jay Winter, Charles J. Stille Professor of History, Yale University'It is a beautiful and haunting book…There is something sacred about this story, this delicate act of remembrance…There is a slow, elegant circling in the book's storytelling, as if those precious shards are held up to the light and turned to reveal their facets. But there is a compelling journey of discovery too, not so much into the light as into the darkness, into Max's silence. In Max, the reader becomes engaged in a fascinating, visceral wrestling with facts, the power of the imagination and the character of truth…This book so beautifully evokes the power of places in shaping our consciousness and perception.' - Tom Griffiths. Emeritus Professor, ANU

    We and the 1st Battalion."A Yale graduate who volunteered to serve his country, Larry Gwin was only twenty-three years old when he arrived in Vietnam in 1965. After a brief stint in the Delta, Gwin was reassigned to the 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) in An Khe. There, in the hotly contested Central Highlands, he served almost nine months as executive officer for Alpha Company, 2/7, fighting against crack NVA troops in some of the war's most horrific battles.The bloodiest conflict of all began November 12, 1965, after 2nd Battalion was flown into the Ia Drang Valley west of Pleiku. Acting as point, Alpha Company spearheaded the battalion's march to landing zone Albany for pickup, not knowing they were walking into the killing zone of an NVA ambush that would cost them 10 percent casualties.Gwin spares no one, including himself, in his gut-wrenching account of the agony of war. Through the stench of death and the acrid smell of napalm, he chronicles the Vietnam War in all its nightmarish horror.

    On May 11, 1945, McKinney returned fire on the Japanese attacking his unit, using every available weapon-even his fists-standing alone against wave after wave of dedicated Japanese soldiers. At the end, John McKinney was alive-with over forty Japanese bodies before him. This is the story of an extraordinary man whose courage and fortitude in battle saved many American lives, and whose legacy has been sadly forgotten by all but a few. Here, the proud legacy of John McKinney lives on.

    seasoned with the terror of war. We Escaped plunges the reader into the extraordinary World War II escapades of an ordinary couple and their children as they first escape from Nazi-occupied Holland; and then deal with the war years by leavening danger and stress with the joy and love of everyday family life. It is the song and dance of The Sound of Music seasoned with the terror of guns and blood. The story begins in the Netherlands, a peaceful nation protected by a treaty of neutrality and kinship with Hitler's Germany. The calm is shattered by the cacophony and confusion of battle as, under the guns of panzers, German troops overrun Holland's lines. The ter Weele family's subsequent exodus from their home is told from the points of view of the father, Lieutenant Carl ter Weele, a Dutch reservist called up to defend the Grebbeberg; his wife Margery, an American citizen raised in Boston, who delivers her third child in a hospital not far from the Grebbeberg as war threatens; their oldest son, six-year-old Jan, whose dark eyes and hair lead Nazis to suspect he is Jewish; and their second son, Alex, a blond and fair-skinned imp, who at the age of two charms a German border guard into allowing the family to cross into Switzerland. Within weeks of Germany's conquest of Holland, the family has to flee the dragnet of the Gestapo, which is arresting all Dutch military officers. As far as Carl can see, the only way out is through Germany, and from there it's a tortuous and terrifying journey through Switzerland, Vichy France, Spain, and Portugal, with the Gestapo a threat at every turn.

    "That was perhaps the last race of my career..."'Deep down, Mark Cavendish thought he was finished. After illness, setbacks and clinical depression, the once fastest man in the world had been written off by most. And at the age of 36, even he believed his explosive cycling career would fade out with a whimper. The Manxman hadn't won a single Grand Tour stage in Italy, Spain or France since 2016.But then came his incredible resurrection at the 2021 Tour de France. Included on the Deceuninck Quick-Step team at the very last minute, only after Sam Bennett suffered an injury, Mark set about rewriting history. He claimed back the green jersey he first wore in 2011, and his four stage victories finally saw him matching Belgian legend Eddy Merckx's all-time record of 34 Tour de France stage wins. Cycling greats are never content, and Cav's dogged determination and inner strength had earned him the record that few believed he could ever achieve. This is his own intimate account of that race, right from the saddle of the miracle tour.

    The book describes his zany squadron mates in the C-130 and their travels around the world; then his experiences teaching students to fly high performance jets. He reached his goal and details what it was like to fly the world's most exotic aircraft.

    . . Brilliant. I advise anyone to go and read it' Louise Redknapp_______From X Factor star to Queen of the Jungle, Stacey Solomon has never been far from our screens . . .As a kid, Stacey always dreamed of becoming a star. But at 17, it looked like her dream was shattered when she unexpectedly became pregnant.Always the fighter, new single mum Stacey rallied, found a college with a crèche for her son Zachery and waitressed at night, determined that he should have the opportunities she didn't.And then the X Factor came along, where she stunned Britain with her astonishing voice. She went from hard-up single mum to X Factor favourite, Queen of the Jungle and much-loved TV presenter in just two years.Stacey Solomon's My Story So Far is a fantastic and inspirational read by a modern-day heroine who always looks on the bright side of life._______'Stacey has charmed that nation with her down-to-earth personality and irrepressible spirit' Sunday Mirror'She's hilariously dizzy yet whip-smart. She's a treat' Scotsman'She has a warm smile, an infectious laugh and a heart of gold' Love It

    Alex Ferguson labelled him 'bargain of the century' when he reflected on the £505,000 Manchester United paid to sign him in 1991. Schmeichel became a key figure in the club's successes during the decade ahead, culminating when he captained United in the incredible, last-gasp Treble-clinching win over Bayern Munich in the 1999 Champions League final.A complex character, Schmeichel's story is no mere litany of triumphs. In the book, he recalls how he nearly died at the age of 15. The son of a Danish nurse and Polish musician, his own son Kasper has followed him to the sport's summit, winning the Premier League with Leicester and taking over in Denmark's goal.