Book picks similar to
Just Off For A Walk by Stephen Reynolds
travel
non-fiction
hiking
england
The Forgotten Child: The powerful true story of a boy abandoned as a baby and left to die
Richard Gallear - 2019
A baby boy, a few hours old, is left by his mother, wrapped in nothing but two sheets of newspaper and hidden amongst the undergrowth by a canal bank. An hour later, a late-shift postman is walking wearily home when he hears a faint cry. He finds the newspaper parcel and discovers the newborn, white-cold and whimpering, inside.After being rushed to hospital and against all odds, the baby survives. He’s baptised by the hospital chaplain as Richard.Everything feels as though it’s looking up; Richard is put into local authority care and regains his health. However, after nearly five blissful years in a rural care home filled with loving friends, it soon unfolds that his turbulent start in life is only the beginning…Based on a devastating true story, this inspirational memoir follows Richard’s traumatic birth, abusive childhood, and search for the truth.
Fingers in the Sparkle Jar: A Memoir
Chris Packham - 2016
But when he stole a young kestrel from its nest, he was about to embark on a friendship that would teach him what it meant to love, and that would change him forever. In his rich, lyrical and emotionally exposing memoir, Chris brings to life his childhood in the 70s, from his bedroom bursting with fox skulls, birds' eggs and sweaty jam jars, to his feral adventures. But pervading his story is the search for freedom, meaning and acceptance in a world that didn’t understand him.Beautifully wrought, this coming-of-age memoir will be unlike any you’ve ever read.
The Year of Living Danishly: My Twelve Months Unearthing the Secrets of the World's Happiest Country
Helen Russell - 2015
When Helen Russell is forced to move to rural Jutland, can she discover the secrets of their happiness? Or will the long, dark winters and pickled herring take their toll?A Year of Living Danishly looks at where the Danes get it right, where they get it wrong, and how we might just benefit from living a little more Danishly ourselves.
Endurance: A Year in Space, A Lifetime of Discovery
Scott Kelly - 2017
"A stunning memoir from the astronaut who spent a record-breaking year aboard the International Space Station – a candid account of his remarkable voyage, the journeys that preceded it, and his colorful formative years." Inside book cover comments.
Adventureman - Anyone Can Be a Superhero
Jamie McDonald - 2017
And he does it all dressed as the superhero, the Flash.Though his journey was both mentally and physically exhausting, it was the astounding acts of kindness and hospitality he encountered along the way that kept him going. Whether they gave him a bed for the night, food for the journey, a donation to his charity or companionship and encouragement during the long days of running, Jamie soon came to realise that every person who helped him towards his goal was a superhero too.
Sully: My Search for What Really Matters
Chesley B. Sullenberger - 2009
‘Sully’ Sullenberger—the pilot who miraculously landed a crippled US Airways Flight 1549 in New York’s Hudson River, saving the lives of all 155 passengers and crew.On January 15, 2009, the world witnessed a remarkable emergency landing when Captain "Sully" Sullenberger skillfully glided US Airways Flight 1549 onto the Hudson River, saving the lives of all 155 passengers and crew. His cool actions not only averted tragedy but made him a hero and an inspiration worldwide. His story is now a major motion picture from director / producer Clint Eastwood and stars Tom Hanks, Laura Linney and Aaron Eckhart.Sully's story is one of dedication, hope, and preparedness, revealing the important lessons he learned through his life, in his military service, and in his work as an airline pilot. It reminds us all that, even in these days of conflict, tragedy and uncertainty, there are values still worth fighting for—that life's challenges can be met if we're ready for them.
Dakota Christmas
Joseph Bottum - 2011
By turns sweet and comic, sentimental and serious, Joseph Bottum's "Dakota Christmas" is an instant Christmas classic. In this beautifully written account of the mad joys and wild emotions of Christmas for children, Bottum captures the universal spirit of the season even while he recounts his memories with a sharp particularity that brings them alive for readers."Her hair was the same thin shade of gray as the weather-beaten pickets of the fence around her frozen garden," he writes of one chance Christmas encounter. "She had a way with horses, and she was alone on Christmas Eve. There is little in my life I regret as much as that I would not stay for just one cookie, just one cup of tea.""Joseph Bottum is one of America’s most gifted writers, with a perfect ear and a matchless style," the essayist Andrew Ferguson notes of "Dakota Christmas." And "to watch him deck the halls with his customary humor and generosity of spirit is glad tidings indeed--guaranteed to make your Yuletide bright.""Families have always loved brief Christmas classics that could be read aloud by the fire," adds Michael Novak. "Joseph Bottum's 'Dakota Christmas' is such a classic."
Round Ireland with a Fridge
Tony Hawks - 1997
Joined by his trusty traveling companion-cum-domestic appliance, he made his way from Dublin to Donegal, from Sligo through Mayo, Galway, Clare, Kerry, Cork, Wexford, Wicklow--and back again to Dublin. In their month of madness, Tony and his fridge met a real prince, a bogus king, and the fridge got christened. They surfed together, entered a bachelor festival, and one of them had sex without the other knowing. And unexpectedly, the fridge itself became a momentary focus for the people of Ireland.An international bestseller, Round Ireland with a Fridge is a classic travel adventure in the tradition of Bill Bryson with a dash of Dave Barry.
Married to Laughter: A Love Story Featuring Anne Meara
Jerry Stiller - 2000
But, as his memoir, "Married to Laughter," reveals, Jerry Stiller has had a lifelong love affair with entertainment. Growing up during the Depression in Brooklyn and on Manhattan's Lower East Side, Jerry Stiller discovered the power of comedy when, as a child, he saw Eddie Cantor transform an audience. Jerry's father often took him to vaudeville performances, where Jerry decided that he, too, wanted to make people laugh. He studied drama at Syracuse University, where a charismatic professor inspired Jerry to believe that he could achieve his dream and become a successful actor. After Syracuse, Jerry returned to New York to begin a life in the theater.Jerry soon met Anne Meara. Even before he fell in love with her, he knew she was a remarkable person. At first they encouraged each other in their separate performances, but eventually they began doing a comedy act in the coffeehouses of New York's Greenwich Village. They created a brilliantly successful act with two characters who were exaggerated versions of themselves. Before long, they were regulars on "The Ed Sullivan Show," the most popular television program of the day. Stiller and Meara was a smash hit.But Jerry's first love has always been the theater, and he writes with fondness and charm about his nearly fifty years in show business -- from summer stock to the early days of Joe Papp's pioneering Shakespeare in the Park, from his Broadway performance in "Hurlyburly" to his roles in such films as "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, The Ritz,Seize the Day," and "Hairspray." He describes the genesis of the hugely successful Blue Nun radio commercials that he and Anne recorded, the first of many award-winning advertisements they would make together.Jerry takes us inside his life offstage, describing with great candor his personal and professional neuroses, including some unusual experiences in therapy. He recounts hilarious stories about the Stiller family and tells wonderful tales about such friends and colleagues as Walter Matthau, Colleen Dewhurst, Mike Nichols, F. Murray Abraham, and Henny Youngman.But most of all, he describes life with Anne, showing us his admiration for her as a performer and describing how she gave him the insight into acting that he'd long sought."Married to Laughter" is a great love story about two people who found their place in show business without ever losing sight of each other.
One Day You'll Thank Me: Essays on Dating, Motherhood, and Everything In Between
Cameran Eubanks Wimberly - 2021
But Cameran has never been your typical Southern belle, and she was always determined to flout expectations.She set out to paint the town red, enjoy her single life, focus on her successful real estate career, maybe join the cast of a hugely popular reality show…and then she met her future husband, Jason. After falling in love and getting married, Cameran faced the same dilemma so many women encounter: whether or not to have kids. Ultimately, her own journey to motherhood was anything but simple.Now, she takes you deeper into her life—from her first foray into reality TV on The Real World to dating in her twenties to the honest truth about her pregnancy and motherhood—to get to know the person behind the camera. Known as the voice of reason on Southern Charm, she’ll share the same honest advice she gives to her castmates and guide y’all through dating, pregnancy, and motherhood. Charming, hilarious, and a hell of a lot fun, One Day You’ll Thank Me is for anyone who has ever wondered if they should or can.
The Tent, the Bucket and Me
Emma Kennedy - 2009
But despite a brave new world of Casio hand-held calculators and digital watches, one thing remained the same: the family holiday. For the Seventies child, summer holidays didn't mean the joy of CentreParcs or the sophistication of a Tuscan villa. They meant being crammed into a car with Grandma and heading to the coast. With just a tent for a home and a bucket for the necessities, we would set off on new adventures each year stoically resolving to enjoy ourselves.For Emma Kennedy, and her mum and dad, disaster always came along for the ride no matter where they went. Whether it was swept away by a force ten gale on the Welsh coast or suffering copious amounts of food poisoning on a brave trip to the south of France, family holidays alwaysleft them battered and bruised.But they never gave up. Emma's memoir, The Tent, the Bucket and Me,is a painfully funny reminder of just what it was like to spend your summer holidays cold, damp but with sand between your toes.
Paris Letters
Janice MacLeod - 2014
Then she decided to make it a challenge. Over the next few months, with a little math and a lot of determination, she saved up enough to buy two years of freedom in Europe.But she had only been in Paris for a few days when she met a handsome butcher (with a striking resemblance to Daniel Craig)—and never went home again.A love story in the vein of Almost French and Lunch in Paris, Paris Letters (February 4) is a joyful romp through the City of Light, and an inspiring look at what can happen when we dare to create the life we want.Realizing that her Parisian love affair would be forever, MacLeod began her own business on Etsy, creating beautifully-illustrated letters from Paris inspired by artists like Percy Kelly and Beatrix Potter. She now paints and writes full-time, bringing beautiful things to subscribers around the world and reviving the lost art of letter-writing.
The Twenty-Ninth Day
Alex Messenger - 2019
The story follows Alex and his five companions as they paddle north through harrowing rapids and stunning terrain. Twenty-nine days into the trip, while out hiking alone, Alex is attacked by a barren-ground grizzly. Left for dead, he wakes to find that his summer adventure has become a struggle to stay alive. Over the next hours and days, Alex and his companions tend his wounds and use their resilience, ingenuity, and dogged perseverance to reach help at a remote village a thousand miles north of the US-Canadian border.The Twenty-Ninth Day is a coming-of-age story like no other, filled with inspiring subarctic landscapes, thrilling riverine paddling, and a trial by fire of the human spirit.
Going Round the Bend
Danny Baker - 2017
easily as funny, as self-deprecating and as wordly-wise as The Moon's a Balloon by David Niven ... it's like Tom and Jerry written by a Cockney Roddy Doyle on Prozac. But funnier' GQ Online on Going Off Alarming
'Rattles along at the same delightful and dizzying pace as its predecessor ... Baker loves a tale told at his own expense and they come thick and fast. He writes like he speaks, with hyperactive garrulity and a rhetorical flourish ... there is something about Baker in full flow that is affirming' Daily Telegraph on Going Off Alarming
Danny Baker is a national treasure with a well-documented - thanks to the recent eight-part BBC TV adaptation - and colourful life. For over a quarter of a century he has amused and entertained audiences on both radio and television. Beginning his career at the age of 15 in a small record shop in the London's West End, Danny went on to become an acclaimed music journalist, and started his radio career on BBC GLR in 1989. With a unique take on life and a lot to say, Danny's latest book is full of his trademark warmth, wit and insight.