Alone in the Fortress of the Bears: 70 Days Surviving Wilderness Alaska: Foraging, Fishing, Hunting


Bruce Buck Nelson - 2015
    He would return in September. For the next ten weeks my survival would depend on foraging, hunting and fishing on an island I would share with 1,600 brown bears. This is my story of hunger and solitude, salmon fishing and stormy seas, torrential rains and mountain sunsets, giant halibut and deer hunting, campfires and killer whales. Illustrated with nearly fifty photos and a map.

At Home in the Pays d'Oc: A tale of accidental expatriates (The Pays d'Oc series Book 1)


Patricia Feinberg Stoner - 2017
    Patricia and her husband Patrick are spending the summer in their holiday home in the Languedoc village of Morbignan la Crèbe. One hot Friday afternoon Patrick walks in with the little dog, thinking she is a stray. They have no intention of keeping her. ‘Just for tonight,’ says Patrick. ‘We will take her to the animal shelter tomorrow.’ It never happens. They spend the weekend getting to know and love the little creature, who looks at them appealingly with big brown eyes, and wags her absurd stump of a tail every time they speak to her. On the Monday her owner turns up, alerted by the Mairie. They could have handed her over. Instead Patricia finds herself saying: ‘We like your dog, Monsieur. May we keep her?’ It is the start of what will be four years as Morbignanglais, as they settle into life as permanent residents of the village. “At Home in the Pays d’Oc” is about their lives in Morbignan, the neighbours who soon become friends, the parties and the vendanges and the battles with French bureaucracy. It is the story of some of their bizarre and sometimes hilarious encounters: the Velcro bird, the builder in carpet slippers, the neighbour who cuts the phone wires, the clock that clacks, the elusive carpenter who really did have to go to a funeral.

Eight Months in Provence: A Junior Year Abroad 30 Years Late


Diane Covington-Carter - 2016
    For thirty years, Diane Covington-Carter dreamed of living in France and immersing herself in the country and language that spoke to her heart and soul. At age fifty, she set off to fulfill that yearning. Journey along with her as she discovers missing pieces of her own personal puzzle that could only emerge in French. Most of all, Covington-Carter learned that a long cherished dream can become even more powerful from the waiting.

The Importance of Being Ernie:


Barry Livingston - 2011
    . ."—Barry LivingstonA true Hollywood survivor, Barry Livingston is one of the few child stars who turned early success into a lifelong career. As "Ernie" on the 1960s sit-com My Three Sons—which also featured his real-life brother Stanley as "Chip"—Barry become instantly recognizable for his horn-rimmed glasses and goofy charm. Five deCAes later, after working on TV shows like Mad Men and Desperate Housewives, and in feature films like Zodiac and The Social Network, Barry Livingston is one actor who knows The Importance of Being Ernie. . .In this fascinating and funny memoir, Barry reveals his most unforgettable anecdotes: Working on set with Fred McMurray, Ozzie and Harriet, Lucille Ball and Dick Van Dyke. Riding a limousine with Elvis Presley. Trying to upstage Ron "Opie" Howard. Even shooting a Superbowl beer commercial with Brad Pitt. At first, Barry's lazy eye and horn-rimmed glasses nearly derailed his career, getting him kicked off his first major film starring Paul Newman. Eventually, his "nerdy" look became his biggest asset, landing Barry a recurring role on Ozzie & Harriet and a regular part on My Three Sons. Fifty years later, Barry is still going strong—from the stage and small screen to to featured film roles opposite Adam Sandler and Robert Downey, Jr.. Like most Hollywood actors, Barry experienced some incredible highs and lows along the way, but he never gave up. "I've been around half a century," he affirms. "And I'm not going away." This is how one child star beat the odds and survived the dark side of the Hollywood dream factory—with charm, wit, determination. . .and big horn-rimmed glasses. This is The Importance of Being Ernie.Barry Livingston has been a professional actor on stage and screen for more than fifty years. Best known for his role as "Ernie" on the long-running TV program, My Three Sons, Livingston continues to appear regularly in feature films and television shows. He is married with two children, and lives in Los Angeles. Praise For The Importance Of Being Ernie "This wryly told saga of a child star who miraculously avoided the crash-and-burn fate of so many of the once-famous. . . an engaging tale of the unusual life of a humorous, modest, and observant man. Barry Livingston delivers a frank and funny tale of TV, movies, and family life." —Brent Maddock, co-author of Tremors and Short Circuit"For a child star, he's almost normal. This poor kid had to sit on William Frawley's lap we're lucky he's not on a roof with a rifle. . .. Barry is one of those rare child stars who grew up to become an accomplished adult actor. Having logged fifty years in show business, working with everyone from Lucille Ball and Jack Benny to Brad Pitt and Robert Downey, Jr., he's got a great story to tell." —Paul Jackson, Producer Charmed and Sliders."I have known Barry Livingston since he was nine years old. He always made me laugh. Now he's kept me awake reading his wonderful autobiography. There's a lot of talent in those size eight shoes." —Gene Reynolds, director of TV's M.A.S.H.and Promised Land

White Picket Monsters: A Story of Strength and Survival


Bev Moore Davis - 2021
    

A Little Me


Amy Roloff - 2019
    Finally allowing herself to be vulnerable enough to open up to others, she learned that it’s worth risking possible rejection for a chance at genuine relationships.Ultimately, it was Amy’s faith, as well as the support and encouragement of her community of loving family and good friends, that saw her through the dark times and allowed her to realize her greatest dreams and beyond. Amy’s memoir is an inspiring and at times heart-wrenching account of resilience and the strength of the human spirit to overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles.

Gerda's Story: Memoirs of a Holocaust Survivor


Gerda Nothmann Luner - 2019
    Told through the eyes of a young girl, the book shares Gerda’s memories of Hitler’s rise to power and passionately describes the cruel toll that history can have on those who experience it. The book is much more than Gerda’s story. Through letters she received from her parents, who made the heartbreaking decision to send their two daughters to live with foster families in the relative safety of Holland, we learn how a mother and father try to raise a child from far away in times of great distress. Letters from them to Gerda’s foster parents, and desperate notes to an American family they hoped would act as sponsors, reveal their growing despair. The story is both deeply personal and universal as people wrestle with terrible choices to save their children and protect their families. These issues remain as relevant today as they were during the Holocaust. In 1939, while trying to arrange an escape from Germany, her parents sent 12-year-old Gerda and her younger sister to live with separate families in Holland, which was still safe for Jews. What was intended as a temporary move became permanent and Gerda never saw her parents again. Ultimately, she was the only member of her immediate family to survive and also had to bear the loss of the foster family she had come to love as her own. Gerda describes in searing detail her experiences in six concentration camps, her protection as a worker for the Philips Corporation, and her arrival in the U.S. in 1948 as an 18-year-old Holocaust survivor literally alone in the world. The memoir is a testament to the loving family Gerda built in America. Her husband added translations of the letters from her parents, grandparents and sister. After her oldest child and first grandchild were born, Gerda added notes to them. This group effort illustrates the special generational pull of trauma endured by Holocaust survivors.

Who Ate All The Pies? The Life and Times of Mick Quinn


Mick Quinn - 2003
    They said Mick had a sixth sense for great accuracy in his playing days - he could find a party from any range. Quinn says he only put £50 on each horse race - but liked to stay in the bookies for twenty races a day!Sentenced in 1987 to three weeks in prison for twice driving whilst banned, Mick's been accused of punching Peter Schmeichel on the football pitch and John Fashanu off it. On retirement, though, Quinn switched to horse racing, the Sport of Kings, but controversy led the blue bloods of racing to hang the scouse oik out to dry and he was suspended from training for two and a half years.Who Ate All The Pies? is the funniest and most honest football book you'll read for a long, long time.

A Life Stolen: My Father's Journey Through Alzheimer's


Vanessa Luther - 2014
    It’s an inside look into the day-to-day challenges facing not only the patient, but also the caregivers. For many years, her father exhibited signs of dementia, eventually becoming too significant to ignore. Everything culminated during an incident one night, after which her father was taken away, never to return to his home again. The disease changed him every day until he was a stranger. Then, it stole his life. Through the initial days at home to hospital stays, living in a memory care unit, rehab stints and eventually hospice care, this book reveals many of the struggles encountered while facing Alzheimer’s in a world not quite ready for it. It is based on actual events depicted exactly as they happened while travelling the heartbreaking and harrowing road through this horrific illness. Its purpose is to give guidance and insight to others caring for loved ones with this terrible affliction, whether it is in providing helpful information, feelings of support or simply words of encouragement. Most importantly, the hope is that it will make the road for others an easier one to travel. May the many tears in this journey be the fortitude that helps others deal with the adversity from this overwhelming disease.

Faith Among Shadows


Malcolm Leal - 2009
    While on special assignment with the Cuban Special Forces, Malcolm receives a blow from a sniper rifle that almost ends his life. It is in this moment of darkness that Malcolm calls upon this God in faith, thus beginning his miraculous journey in search of truth, and his eventual discovery of and conversion to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The Luck of The Jews: An Incredible Story of Loss, Love, and Survival in the Holocaust


Michael Benanav - 2014
    He was twenty-three, from Czechoslovakia; she was twenty, from Romania. Both had lost nearly everything in the war – yet in their chance encounter at sea, they found a new beginning. Three days later, on a train rattling across the Turkish countryside en route to Palestine, with no common language between them, they were married…and spent the rest of their lives together. Isadora had emerged from the brutal, frozen ghettos of Transnistria – known as the ‘Forgotten Cemetery’ of the Holocaust. Joshua had escaped from the Hungarian Army’s slave labor corps as his unit was being marched toward a train to Auschwitz. That either survived is incredible; that, of all possible fates, the war would toss them onto the same deck of the same boat at the same time is simply unbelievable – except that it happened. Here, their grandson, prize-winning author Michael Benanav, traces the improbable twists and turns that pulled Joshua and Isadora through the horrors of the Holocaust. As their families were destroyed and their own lives nearly lost, each element of their experiences – including a photograph of a Hungarian general; a mismatched pair of galoshes; a Romanian Orthodox priest; an SS officer’s wife; and maybe, on one occasion, an angel – proved crucial to getting them out of the war and onto that boat. Benanav vividly recounts the devastating events and astonishing coincidences that brought his grandparents together – while reckoning with the unsettling knowledge that without the Holocaust, his family would not exist. This is an extraordinary true story, rooted in the terrible tragedies and sudden strokes of serendipity that together are The Luck of the Jews. Praise for The Luck of The Jews (First published by Lyons Press as Joshua & Isadora: A True Tale of Loss & Love in the Holocaust): “Movingly written, Michael Benanav’s search for his grandparents’ tragic memories and experiences brings the reader closer to an ineffable truth that must not be forgotten.” – Elie Wiesel, Nobel Prize Winner, author of Night “A harrowing wartime saga [and] an intriguing record of Holocaust survival written with passion and authority.”–Publishers Weekly “A tale of suffering, romance and redemption in Israel… What stands out about this story is its ability to bring Southeastern Europe and Bessarabia, a southern Yiddish-speaking region in today’s Moldova, into focus. The narrative is highly imagistic, often relying on crisp depictions of Jews moving through the landscape to power a story of loss.” –The Jewish Daily Forward “Important and gripping.” –Hindustan Times About the Author Michael Benanav is a freelance writer and photojournalist whose work appears in The New York Times, The Christian Science Monitor, Geographical Magazine, Lonely Planet guidebooks, and other publications. His first book, Men Of Salt: Crossing the Sahara on the Caravan of White Gold, was nominated by Barnes & Noble for their Discover Great New Writers award and was named a Best Book for Young Adults by the American Library Association

Seve: The Autobiography


Severiano Ballesteros - 2007
    And then there's Seve.Severiano Ballesteros was perhaps the most naturally gifted golfer ever to have walked a fairway. From the moment his brother Manuel gave him his first club he was unstoppable. A few weeks before his seventeenth birthday he turned pro. Five years later he won the Open. A genius had arrived.For the best part of two decades Seve dominated the golfing landscape. He played shots others could only dream of. With 94 wins as a professional (including 5 majors) he was a phenomenon, an athlete who transcended his sport.But Seve stood for more than simple excellence. Almost single-handedly, Seve gave European golf credibility; almost single-handedly, he made the Ryder Cup one of the greatest contests in world sport. And when, as captain, he finally lifted the trophy on home soil in 1997, a whole continent rejoiced. His pride and passion have inspired millions, and we have taken him to our hearts. Here, for the first time, Seve tells his own story. From his humble beginnings right up to the present day, here at last is the man behind the magic in his own words. Seve is utterly entertaining, blazingly charismatic and unique.Severiano "Seve" Ballesteros Sota was a Spanish professional golfer and a leading sports figure. He won more than 90 international tournaments in an illustrious career. He first caught the attention of the sporting world in 1976, when at the age of 19 he finished second at The Open. He played a leading role in the re-emergence of European golf, helping the European Ryder Cup team to five wins both as a player and captain. He won the World Match Play Championship a record-tying five times. He is generally regarded as the greatest Continental European golfer of all time and won a record 50 times on the European Tour.Ballesteros died of brain cancer on 7 May 2011, aged 54.

Whatever It Took: An American Paratrooper's Extraordinary Memoir of Escape, Survival, and Heroism in the Last Days of World War II


Henry Langrehr - 2020
    

The Last Gangster: My Final Confession


Charlie Richardson - 2013
    Boss of the Richardson Gang and rival of the Krays, to cross him would result in brutal repercussions. Famously arrested on the day England won the World Cup in 1966, his trial heard he allegedly used iron bars, bolt cutters and electric shocks on his enemies.The Last Gangster is Richardson’s frank account of his largely untold life story, finished just before his death in September 2012. He shares the truth behind the rumours and tells of his feuds with the Krays for supremacy, undercover missions involving politicians, many lost years banged up in prison and reveals shocking secrets about royalty, phone hacking, bent coppers and the infamous black box.Straight up, shocking and downright gripping, this is the ultimate exposé on this legendary gangster and his extraordinary life.

Hiding in the Open: A Holocaust Memoir


Sabina S. Zimering - 2001
    They missed the liquidation of their ghetto by mere hours, hiding in a shed all night listening to the screams of their fellow Jews. Then went into Germany and took up work in a hotel housing Gestapo officers. Many close escapes and daring moments make this book chilling.