Book picks similar to
International Adventures - Walking Miracle by Art Sanborn
christian
memoir-biography
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biography-autobiography
Fresh Off the Boat
Eddie Huang - 2013
Eddie Huang was raised by a wild family of FOB (“fresh off the boat”) immigrants—his father a cocksure restaurateur with a dark past back in Taiwan, his mother a fierce protector and constant threat. Young Eddie tried his hand at everything mainstream America threw his way, from white Jesus to macaroni and cheese, but finally found his home as leader of a rainbow coalition of lost boys up to no good: skate punks, dealers, hip-hop junkies, and sneaker freaks. This is the story of a Chinese-American kid in a could-be-anywhere cul-de-sac blazing his way through America’s deviant subcultures, trying to find himself, ten thousand miles from his legacy and anchored only by his conflicted love for his family and his passion for food. Funny, moving, and stylistically inventive, Fresh Off the Boat is more than a radical reimagining of the immigrant memoir—it’s the exhilarating story of every American outsider who finds his destiny in the margins.
The Time of My Life
Patrick Swayze - 2007
Known for his versatility, passion and fearlessness, he's become one of our most beloved actors. But in February 2008, Patrick announced he had been diagnosed with stage IV pancreatic cancer. Always a fighter, he refused to let the disease bring him to his knees, and his bravery has inspired both his legion of fans and cancer patients everywhere. Yet this memoir, written with wisdom and heart, recounts much more than his bout with cancer. In vivid detail, Patrick describes his Texas upbringing, his personal struggles, his rise to fame with North and South, his commercial breakthroughs in Dirty Dancing and Ghost, and the soul mate who's stood by his side through it all: his wife, writer and director Lisa Niemi. A behind-the-scenes look at a Hollywood life and a remarkable love, this memoir is both entertainment and inspiration. Patrick and Lisa's marriage is a journey of two lives intertwined and lived as one--throughout their years in Hollywood and at home on their working ranch outside Los Angeles, and culminating in the hope and wisdom they've imparted to all who know them. This book will open the door for families, individuals, and husbands and wives to grow, bond and discover entirely new levels of love and sharing, proving that life shouldn't be lived as a series of endings, but rather as the beginning of greater strength and love.
The Autobiography of George Muller
George Müller - 1899
Join him on his journey from a life of sin and rebellion to his glorious conversion. Share his struggles and triumphs as he establishes orphan homes to care for thousands of English children, depending on God's response to his prayer of faith to supply all things. Mller's unwavering, childlike dependence upon his heavenly Father will inspire you to confidently trust the God of the impossible in every area of your life.
The Good Life
Tony Bennett - 1998
The renowned recording artist shares a half-century of personal memories, from his childhood in Depression-era Queens, to the New York jazz scene of the 1940s, to his successes with a new generation of fans in the 1990s.
Sisters First: Stories from Our Wild and Wonderful Life
Jenna Bush Hager - 2017
As small children, they watched their grandfather become president; just twelve years later they stood by their father's side when he took the same oath. They spent their college years being trailed by the Secret Service and chased by the paparazzi, with every teenage mistake making national headlines. But the tabloids didn't tell the whole story of these two young women forging their own identities under extraordinary circumstances. In this book they take readers on a revealing, thoughtful, and deeply personal tour behind the scenes of their lives, with never-before-told stories about their family, their adventures, their loves and losses, and the special sisterly bond that fulfills them.
Gypsy Boy
Mikey Walsh - 2009
They live in a closeted community, and little is known about their way of life. After centuries of persecution Gypsies are wary of outsiders and if you choose to leave you can never come back.This is something Mikey knows only too well.Growing up, he rarely went to school, and seldom mixed with non-Gypsies. The caravan and camp were his world.But although Mikey inherited a vibrant and loyal culture his family’s legacy was bittersweet with a hidden history of grief and abuse.Eventually Mikey was forced to make an agonising decision – to stay and keep secrets, or escape and find somewhere he could truly belong.
Pretty Mess
Erika Jayne - 2018
Now, in her first-ever memoir, the fan favorite star of Bravo’s The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills bares her heart, mind, and soul. In Pretty Mess, Erika spills on every aspect of her life: from her rise to fame as a daring and fiery pop/dance performer and singer; to her decision to accept a role on reality television; to the ups and downs of family life (including her marriage to famed lawyer Tom Girardi, thirty-three years her senior). There’s much more to Erika Jayne than fans see on The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Pretty Mess is her opportunity to dig deep and tell her many-layered, unique, and inspiring life story. As fun and fearless as its author, this fascinating memoir proves once and for all why Erika Jayne is so beloved: she’s strong, confident, genuine, and here to tell all!
Greenlights
Matthew McConaughey - 2020
Notes about successes and failures, joys and sorrows, things that made me marvel, and things that made me laugh out loud. How to be fair. How to have less stress. How to have fun. How to hurt people less. How to get hurt less. How to be a good man. How to have meaning in life. How to be more me. Recently, I worked up the courage to sit down with those diaries. I found stories I experienced, lessons I learned and forgot, poems, prayers, prescriptions, beliefs about what matters, some great photographs, and a whole bunch of bumper stickers. I found a reliable theme, an approach to living that gave me more satisfaction, at the time, and still: If you know how, and when, to deal with life’s challenges - how to get relative with the inevitable - you can enjoy a state of success I call “catching greenlights.” So I took a one-way ticket to the desert and wrote this book: an album, a record, a story of my life so far. This is fifty years of my sights and seens, felts and figured-outs, cools and shamefuls. Graces, truths, and beauties of brutality. Getting away withs, getting caughts, and getting wets while trying to dance between the raindrops. Hopefully, it’s medicine that tastes good, a couple of aspirin instead of the infirmary, a spaceship to Mars without needing your pilot’s license, going to church without having to be born again, and laughing through the tears. It’s a love letter. To life. It’s also a guide to catching more greenlights - and to realizing that the yellows and reds eventually turn green too. Good luck.
Down the Rabbit Hole: Curious Adventures and Cautionary Tales of a Former Playboy Bunny
Holly Madison - 2015
A former girlfriend of Hugh Hefner describes how her years inside the Playboy Mansion went from a fairytale of A-list celebrity parties to an oppressive regime of strict rules, scheduled sex, and a total loss of identity, so much so that she even contemplated suicide.
Melissa Explains It All: Tales from My Abnormally Normal Life
Melissa Joan Hart - 2013
She cast a spell on millions more viewers as Sabrina, the Teenage Witch. Now, in Melissa Explains It All, Melissa tells the frank and funny behind-the-scenes stories from her extraordinary past and her refreshingly normal present.Melissa has been entertaining audiences most of her life; when there were no girls named Melissa on her favorite show, the forceful four year old decided she'd get on television her way. From that moment on, Melissa has shown a singular determination and focus-whether it's for booking three national commercials so her dad would build her a tree house or for nailing the audition for Clarissa.From her first commercial to her current starring role in ABC Family's hit Melissa and Joey, Hart never let fame go to her head. She always had one foot in Hollywood and one foot in reality-and still does. Melissa makes us laugh along with her as she talks about:--guest appearances in shows like Saturday Night Live and The Equalizer --auditioning for Punky Brewster and Clarissa--her early Broadway days--wacky parties she's thrown and attended-- the actors who influenced her and whom she befriended, worked with and competed against --her experiences both on and off-set-with Sabrina's Salem the Cat and Elvis the Alligator on Clarissa --how she met the love of her life at the Kentucky DerbyMelissa Joan Hart explains all that she's learned along the way-what's kept her grounded, normal and working when others have not been so fortunate-and that she's the approachable, hilarious girl-next-door her fans have always thought she'd be.
Brando Unzipped: A Revisionist and Very Private Look at America's Greatest Actor
Darwin Porter - 2005
Brando Unzipped is the definitive gossip guide to the late, great actor's life New York Daily News. Lurid, raunchy, perceptive, and certainly worth reading, it's one of the best show-biz biographies of the year. London's Sunday Times. Brando Unzipped received an Honorable Mention from Foreword Magazine in its Book of the Year competition, and it won a Silver Ippy award for Best Biography from the Independent Publisher's Association."
Hopeful
Omid Djalili - 2014
He was raised in a beautiful, chaotic, cramped, colorful, and legally dubious guesthouse where his parents fed and watered Iranian nationals flocking to the UK for medical treatment on the NHS. Over 20 years, almost 2000 "cousins" passed through the Djalili's doors, and the young Omid played translator to each. Although these years taught him a lot about the rich tapestry of life, this parenting by committee led to a slightly checkered school career which saw Omid taking his A levels a record six times, and eventually fake his own university entrance papers. Desperate to be free of his cramped living quarters he escapes to the University of Ulster, where he lives a life of wonderful solitude. Full of the warmth and intelligence that makes Omid such a successful comedian and sought-after actor, this memoir takes us on an incredible and laugh-out-loud funny journey through an unusually British life.
My Mother Was Nuts
Penny Marshall - 2012
What they don’t know is her trailblazing career was a happy accident. In this funny and intimate memoir, Penny takes us from the stage of The Jackie Gleason Show in 1955 to Hollywood’s star-studded sets, offering up some hilarious detours along the way.My Mother Was Nuts is an intimate backstage pass to Penny’s personal life, her breakout role on The Odd Couple, her exploits with Cindy Williams and John Belushi, and her travels across Europe with Art Garfunkel on the back of a motorcycle. We see Penny get married. And divorced. And married again (the second time to Rob Reiner). We meet a young Carrie Fisher, whose close friendship with Penny has spanned decades. And we see Penny at work with Tom Hanks, Mark Wahlberg, Whoopi Goldberg, Robert De Niro, and Whitney Houston.Throughout it all, from her childhood spent tap dancing in the Bronx, to her rise as the star of Laverne & Shirley, Penny lived by simple rules: “try hard, help your friends, don’t get too crazy, and have fun.” With humor and heart, My Mother Was Nuts reveals there’s no one else quite like Penny Marshall.
Reckless Abandon: A Modern-Day Gospel Pioneer's Exploits Among the Most Difficult to Reach Peoples
David Sitton - 2011
Leaving Texas with a Bible, a suitcase (and a surfboard), he took the gospel into cannibalistic areas to people who had never heard the name of Jesus. For thirty-four years God has used him to help train missionaries, spread the gospel and establish dozens of churches in remote regions. Through this book, experience the amazing things God did as David recklessly abandoned his will to the will of God.
Sounds Like Me: My Life (So Far) in Song
Sara Bareilles - 2015
In this candid book of essays, Sara pulls back the curtain to expose her songwriting process, revealing all the struggle and joy inherent in creating great work while staying true to yourself.Showcasing her stripped down and confessional writing style, Sara's entertaining and inspirational book tells the inside stories behind her most popular songs and offers insights into finding balance between making art for herself and commercial music for her listeners.