Through the eyes of her naive and inexperienced younger self, Byron shares remarkable stories inspired by the people she had the privilege to treat. Gripping, poignant, and full of daring black humor, this book reveals the frightening and challenging induction all mental health staff face and highlights their incredible commitment to their patients. It shares the tales of ordinary people with an amazing resilience to life's challenges.

    Dave Liniger had it all: four successful children, a lifetime filled with adventure, and a company he’d founded, RE/MAX, that became one of the most prominent real estate brands in the world and made him a success beyond his wildest dreams. He had served in the Vietnam War, parachuted out of planes, raced cars, and once even attempted to circumnavigate the world in a balloon. And then overnight his full and varied life almost came to an abrupt end. Doctors discovered he had a horrific staph infection along his spine that left him paralyzed from the neck down and in excruciating pain.My Next Step chronicles how Dave found reserves of strength to fight through his pain. He drew inspiration from his wife, Gail, who had shown incredible grace and courage during her recovery from a tragic airplane crash twenty-nine years earlier. His guiding light was the mantra, “Just 10 steps.” If he could take 10 steps, he could take 20. If he could take 20, he could walk a mile. After three critical surgeries and six grueling months in the hospital, Dave finally returned home. He continues to heal, but is back running the company he loves and getting stronger every day. My Next Step will inspire those facing tragedy to find the courage to accept their situation and do what’s necessary to take the next step toward a meaningful life.

    Jena Morrow has a Savior. He came to give her abundant life.This is not a polished tale of victory but an honest, true story of fragility. Hollow recounts Jena’s daily struggle with anorexia and the God who is able and willing to reach down into the dirt. A central theme of Hollow is the surrender of control to Jesus Christ. His Word is interwoven throughout the story as rebuttals to the lies that besiege those engaged in any addiction.  In addition to her point of view, Jena includes those of her friends, family, and former therapists providing  an undercurrent of hope.Written in an easy conversational voice, Hollow will resonate with those in the midst of a struggle and those who stand beside them.

    Stories of adventure, misadventure, love and loss from the #1 bestselling author of the critically acclaimed memoirs Working Class Boy and Working Class Man. Outrageous, witty, warm and wise, Killing Time shares more than 40 yarns from an epic life - a dazzling collection of tall tales, out-takes and B-sides from one of Australia's finest storytellers.

    From childhood to diagnosis to mental hospitals, everything is included, including the ugly parts of being raised in a time period that did not understand mental illness and instead applied "tough love" to children who acted abnormally.

    So when the all-natural, vegetarian, yoga-practising, marathon-running mother of three young boys was diagnosed with breast cancer, the world stopped making sense.In an increasingly perilous environment, the promise of order amid chaos is so tantalizing.Every busy woman will recognize herself in Gill’s striving—if we just get through our to-do list of achievements and improvements, we can get our lives under control …can’t we? The illusion of perfection is a powerful motivator, propelling so many of us on a breakneck pace toward somewhere other than where we are right now. But as only a brush with death can teach us, Gill learns the folly of believing we are in control.Readers will be inspired to appreciate the ragged imperfection of right now and learn to find glimpses of gratitude in every moment of any day.

    He used the money to fund a gambling addiction that began with a bet of €1 and eventually rose to €10 million, leading to the loss of his job, his family, his home – and winning him a prison sentence.From the heart-stopping moments in a hotel room in Cyprus with his wedding money riding on the Epsom Derby, to the euphoria of winning half a million over a weekend, to the late goals and the horses falling at the last fence, Tony 10 is the story of an ordinary man’s journey from normality to catastrophe. At times, he vowed to get out while he was ahead, only to be taken by another surge of adrenaline, falling deeper and deeper into a compulsion that consumed his life. His disappearance on the morning the fraud was discovered led to a surreal three days on the run in Northern Ireland, and ultimately his arrest, conviction and sentencing to four years in jail.Tony 10 is the mesmerising story of the secret life of a pathological gambler – as well as the most compelling account yet of the damage wrought by the online gambling industry.

    This insider's view of the humorous and bizarre journey of a World Series champion pitcher turned color commentator will delight Pirates and baseball fans alike. Recounting his first years in the Major Leagues and his battle with the baffling condition that would ultimately bear his own name, Steve Blass tells the story of his life on and off the field with a poignant, dazzling wit and shares the life of a baseball player who had the prime of his career cut short.

    With refreshing candor, Maria Ross shares how the relentless pace of her life came to a screeching halt when an undetected brain aneurysm ruptured and nearly killed her. Along her stubborn road back to health, her resulting cognitive and emotional challenges forced her―sometimes kicking and screaming―to reframe her life, her work and her identity. With humor and heart, Ross shares what it was like being blind for six weeks, how a TV crime drama and a brain-games website played key roles in her recovery, and why a handmade necklace helped her regain her sense of self. Ross reveals the keys to her extraordinary comeback and how her perspective is forever changed, mostly for the better. Funny, touching and real, this book not only shares an inspirational story of transformation but enlightens readers about the surprising effects of brain injury... and explores the question, "How do our brains define who we are?"

    He became one of the ten richest men on the planet and controlled 80 per cent of the global cocaine trade before he was shot dead in 1993.In 1965, a secret mission by Colombian Special Forces, led by an MI6 agent, to recover a cash hoard from a safe house used by a young Pablo Escobar culminates in a shoot-out leaving many dead. Escobar and several of his men escape. Only a baby survives, Roberto Sendoya Escobar. In a bizarre twist of fate, the MI6 agent takes pity on the child, brings him home and later adopts him.Over the years, Pablo Escobar tries, repeatedly, to kidnap his son. The child, unaware of his true identity, is allowed regular meetings with Escobar and it becomes apparent that Roberto’s adopted father and the British government are working covertly with the gangster in an attempt to control the money laundering and drug trades.Many years later in England, as Roberto’s father lies dying in hospital, he hands his son a coded piece of paper which, he says, reveals the secret hiding place of Escobar’s ‘missing millions'. The code is published in this book for the first time.

    What set their climb apart from those before it, and even those afterward, was a disaster of such magnitude that it became know as North America's worst mountaineering tragedy. Prior to July of 1967 only four men had ever perished on Denali, and then, in one fell swoop, Denali--like Melville s, Great White Whale, Moby Dick--indiscriminately took the lives of seven men. The brothers survive one danger after another: a terrible train accident, a near drowning in the McKinley River, an encounter with a large grizzly, a 60 foot plunge into a gaping crevasse, swept away by a massive avalanche, and finally a climactic escape from the terror of 100 mph winds while descending from the summit. Should I Not Return is a one of a kind cliffhanger packed with danger, survival under the worst conditions, and heroism on the Last Frontier s most treasured trophy--the icy slopes of Denali, North America s tallest mountain--Mount McKinley.

    From dramatic, high-risk spacewalks to author Scott Parazynski’s death-defying quest to summit Mount Everest—his body ravaged by a career in space—readers will experience the life of an elite athlete, physician, and explorer.This intimate, compelling account offers a rare portrait of space exploration from the inside. A global nomad raised in the shadow of NASA’s Apollo missions, Parazynski never lost sight of his childhood dream to one day don a spacesuit and float outside the airlock. With deep passion, unbridled creativity, resilience, humility, and self-deprecation, Parazynski chases his dream of the ultimate adventure experience, again and again and again. In an era that transitioned from moon shots to the Space Shuttle, space station, and Mars research, Parazynski flies with John Glenn, tests jet packs, trains in Russia to become a cosmonaut, and flies five missions to outer space (including seven spacewalks) in his seventeen-year NASA career.An unparalleled, visceral opportunity to understand what it’s like to train for—and deploy to—a home in zero gravity, The Sky Below also portrays an astronaut’s engagement with the challenges of his life on Earth, including raising a beautiful autistic daughter and finding true love.

    Before Nic became addicted to crystal meth, he was a charming boy, joyous and funny, a varsity athlete and honor student adored by his two younger siblings. After meth, he was a trembling wraith who lied, stole, and lived on the streets. David Sheff traces the first warning signs: the denial, the three a.m. phone calls—is it Nic? the police? the hospital? His preoccupation with Nic became an addiction in itself. But as a journalist, he instinctively researched every treatment that might save his son. And he refused to give up on Nic.

    After Clint’s first collection of stories, which act as an apology to his wife (with essays taking a humorous yet critical look of his role as a husband), this natural follow up will place the author’s children at the center of the apology and recount funny and relatable tales of Clint’s various parenting fails. Stories will detail incidents of the author half surviving, half ruining birthdays, holidays, vacations and other important milestones in his children’s lives, and touchingly examine the ways he makes up for them.With this book exploring the widely universal theme of parenting, new audiences (as well as Clint’s dedicated following) will see stories as both a mirror of their own lives and a comic relief from it, and eagerly sink their teeth into this truthful and entertaining narrative. Essays include titles like, “I Changed A Friend’s Name in my Phone to Santa and Had Him Text Threats to my Children,” “Pro Tip: Pick Up The Dog Poop BeforeThe Easter Egg Hunt,” “Reasons My Children Cried At Their Own Birthday Parties,” and “I Am A Summer Scrooge.” Clint’s addicting voice, writing about being a parent around Christmas, Halloween, New Years and more, will help anyone who is a mother or father, who works with young children, is member of a large family or has ever taken care of another human being before relate to and connect with these stories.

    In the Dam Square in Amsterdam, long-haired young people wearing vibrant clothes and burning incense could be found meditating, playing music and discussing sexual liberation, the expansion of consciousness and the search for an inner truth. They were a generation refusing to live the robotic and unquestioning life that their parents had known.At this time, Paulo is a young, skinny Brazilian with a goatee and long, flowing hair who wants to become a writer. He sets off on a journey in search of freedom and a deeper meaning for his life: first, with a girlfriend, on the famous “Death Train to Bolivia,” then on to Peru and later hitchhiking through Chile and Argentina.His travels take him further, to the famous square in Amsterdam, where Paulo meets Karla, a Dutch woman also in her 20s. She convinces Paulo to join her on a trip to Nepal, aboard the Magic Bus that travels across Europe and Central Asia to Kathmandu. They embark on a journey in the company of fascinating fellow travelers, each of whom has a story to tell, and each of whom will undergo a transformation, changing their priorities and values, along the way. As they travel together, Paulo and Karla explore their own relationship, an awakening on every level that brings each of them to a choice and a decision that sets the course for their lives thereafter.