Book picks similar to
Wind In My Wings by Fran Taylor


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Kerry O'Brien, A Memoir


Kerry O'Brien - 2018
    He has witnessed life changing events, interviewed the great and good, and explained the intricacies of the world to millions of Australians as we sat in the comfort and safety of our lounge rooms. Whether strolling the history-laden corridors of the White House unhindered while waiting to interview Barack Obama, or talking with Nelson Mandela on his first day in the presidential residence in Pretoria in a room filled with the blood-soaked ghosts of apartheid, or receiving a haughty rebuke from an indignantly regal Margaret Thatcher, or exploring ideas with some of the great artists, philosophers and scientists of our time, Kerry O'Brien has sought to unearth the truth behind the news. In Australia, he has watched thirteen prime ministers come and go and has called the powerful to account without fear or favour. In this intimate ground-breaking account told with wit and insight O'Brien reflects on the big events, the lessons learned and lessons ignored, along with the foibles and strengths of public figures who construct our world. The end result is a memoir like no other - an engrossing study of a private life lived in the public eye and wrapped in nearly three-quarters of a century of social and political history.

The House of Lies


Renee McBryde - 2017
    But waiting for her was a secret so awful that it would rock her to the core.Renee's mother was a teenage runaway who found herself pregnant and alone when Renee's father was jailed for killing two men. When Renee discovered the truth, she knew her life would never be the same again. She was a murderer's daughter - but that made her determined to escape the past.This is her sometimes shocking, often moving, inspirational true story of terrible secrets and tragic lies, and a life of abuse, suffering and survival.

Center of Attention: A True Crime Memoir


Jami D. Brown Martin - 2020
    The photo looks completely out of place on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list where it’s been since December, 8, 2007. For eight of those years, Jason appeared directly beside Osama Bin Laden. Bin Laden is long gone, but Jason is still wanted for armed robbery and murder.For years, his sister, Jami D. Brown Martin has watched the true crime programs and read the amateur investigative blogs devoted to Jason, his crime, and the efforts to apprehend him knowing the story wasn’t as simple, nor was it just Jason’s. To be the sister, brother, or relative of one of the world’s most wanted men is to live every day with the horrible truth and many consequences of his brutal act.CENTER OF ATTENTION is the story of a former Mormon missionary turned murderer. It is also a riveting look behind the facade of the genetically blessed, seemingly prominent and pious Brown family of Laguna Beach, California. It is a tale of the family patriarch, John Brown, who disappeared without a trace ten years before his son. More important, it is the gripping and ultimately hopeful story of the sister of one of the world’s most wanted fugitives and her journey to accept that despite being a product of the same crazy environment as her brother, her life and path are her own.

Sold in Secret: A mother’s desperate search to find the men who trafficked and killed her daughter


Karen Downes - 2018
    Because I would never, ever know peace again.' Charlene Downes was 14 when she went missing in Blackpool's seedy underbelly. Once a happy-go-lucky schoolgirl, she had become a truant - hanging out with the wrong crowd by the takeaway shops and pier. But Charlene's mum, Karen, always knew her typical teenage daughter would come home.Until one day she didn't.Karen has been searching for 15 years, campaigning for the truth of what happened to her daughter. To this day, Karen and her family have no body, no convictions and no answers. Arrests were made and a murder trial took place, but no one has ever been brought to justice.On the 15th anniversary of Charlene's disappearance, Karen shares this heartbreaking account of every parent's worst nightmare.

The Marco Chronicles: To Rome, without love


Elizabeth Geoghegan - 2014
    Handsome, charming Roman men; perfectly made cappuccino and risotto; breathtakingly beautiful antiquities and that incomparable Italian light—none of these are perhaps quite as idyllic as they might seem to the casual traveler. With a jaded eye but an always vulnerable heart, Geoghegan gives us the anti-Eat, Pray, Love, a tale every bit as atmospheric but way funnier than the runaway best-seller. This is what life in Italy really looks like when you're a 30-something woman running from grief and trying to find her way back to love. Elizabeth Geoghegan writes in English, dreams in Italian, and wishes she could remember how to speak French. She earned an MFA in fiction writing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and an MA in creative writing from the University of Colorado at Boulder. She is currently completing a story collection, The Book of Boys, and at work on a novel called The Year of the Cock, a black comedy set in Southeast Asia. She lives in Rome, Italy, on a dead-end street between a convent and a jail. This is a short e-book published by Shebooks--high quality fiction, memoir, and journalism for women, by women. For more information, visit http://shebooks.net.

Kisses From Nimbus: From SAS to MI6 An Autobiography


P.J. 'Red' Riley - 2017
    His is the story the establishment doesn’t want you to read.br>Captain P. J. “Red” Riley is an ex-SAS soldier who served for eighteen years as an MI6 agent. Riley escaped internment in Chile during the Falklands war during an audacious top-secret attempt to attack the Argentinian mainland. He was imprisoned in the darkness of the Sierra Leonean jungle, and withstood heavy fire in war-torn Beirut and Syria. In 2015, he was arrested for murder but all charges were later dropped. In this searing memoir, Riley reveals the brutal realities of his service, and the truth behind the newspaper headlines featuring some of the most significant events in recent British history. His account provides startling new evidence on the Iraq war, what Tony Blair really knew about Saddam Hussain’s weapons of mass destruction before the allied invasion, and questions the British government’s alleged involvement in the death of Princess Diana. Chaotic, darkly humorous and at times heart-wrenchingly sad, Kisses From Nimbus charts the harrowing real-life experiences of a soldier and spy in the name of Queen and country.

In Sickness and in Health: A Memoir by Joclyn and Jeremy Krevat


Joclyn Krevat - 2018
    Just a few months after their wedding, and a few weeks after running a 10K, a rare autoimmune disease landed Joclyn in the hospital with a failing heart. Enduring four open heart surgeries, rounds of experimental chemotherapy, a punctured lung, a lost voice, a pacemaker, an unsympathetic nurse, bedpans, and legitimately gruesome hospital food, it seemed the bad news would never end. But with the help of a top-notch medical team, supportive and loving friends and family, courage, a will to live, and a desire to just go home, they learned the true value of love, hope and life. Joclyn, an occupational therapist, Jeremy, a public school administrator, live in Sacramento, California with their dog, Ramsay. Their experience received national attention and helped facilitate legislative reform surrounding “surprise medical bills,” out-of-network bills received when a patient has done everything he possibly can to remain in-network.

You've Got This: And Other Things I Wish I Had Known


Louise Redknapp - 2021
    

Tea, Scones, and Malaria


Katlynn Brooke - 2021
    Running wild and free on the veldt. Elephants and giraffe for playmates. What more could a child want? As a builder for the then-Rhodesian government, Dad's job was low-paying and demanding. We were sent to areas where there were few trappings of civilization, such as electricity or potable water. My siblings and I ran barefoot in the bush and swam in crocodile and parasite-infected rivers. We were never clean. We loved it.Our camps were spartan and makeshift, and scorpions, spiders, and snakes regularly invaded our space. There were no schools. I was home-schooled by Mom. Then, at age eight, my parents sent me to a religious boarding school; an institution ripped straight out of the pages of Dickens. It was there I discovered not all adults were kind or empathetic people. In the bush, we were forced to create our own amusements--making our smash hit movie on a riverbank, or writing plays that we produced on a squeaky, portable 8-track tape recorder. We spent sultry nights playing poker in our caravan, reading books, and writing stories. My parents were artists and writers; creative, but not the most practical people. They made mistakes, and in 1963 a whopping blunder bankrupted us and forced our family back into the bush. This memoir will take the reader through my life from birth in 1950 to the abrupt end of my childhood in 1969. Tea, Scones, and Malaria is a story about my family's gypsy-like trek through the African bushveld. It is about loneliness, poverty, dysfunction, and tropical diseases. It is also the laugh-out-loud memoir of a child who finds ways to entertain herself and survive in a world that is the literal definition of wild. How I survived it all, I will never know.

Outback Cop


Neale McShane - 2016
    Neale McShane The Birdsville police posting is one of the most remote in Australia. It can be extremely lonely and incredibly busy at the same time. Nothing might happen for weeks or months, then problems come crawling out of the woodwork.There aren't many who can handle the job for long - unless you're Senior Constable Neale McShane, who has single-handedly taken care of this beat the size of the UK for the past ten years. Recently retired from this 'hardship posting', Neale now has a stock of stories and adventures from his life and colourful times living with his family in Birdsville.In recounting these tales to his good friend and bestselling author Evan McHugh, Neale delights us with yarns that could only come from the furthest corner of our country. Here are stories of desert dangers, dead bodies, droughts and floods, drinkers and dreamers - and, of course the infamous Birdsville Races, when the town's population swells from 50 to 500.So if Birdsville has remained just a little too far off the beaten track for you, sit back and let Birdsville come to you.

Blessed: The Breakout Year of Rampaging Roy Slaven


John Doyle - 2021
    Whether it was riding Rooting King to another Melbourne Cup victory, commentating the Olympics or hobnobbing with the country's upper crust, Rampaging Roy Slaven has lived an extraordinary life.But even some of the greatest men come from humble beginnings. Before he shot to fame as Australia's most talented sportsman, he was just another kid in Lithgow, trying to avoid Brother Connell's strap and garner the attention of Susan Morgan from the local Catholic girls school.Blessed follows one year in the life of the boy who would become Rampaging Roy Slaven, a boy who, even at the age of fifteen, knew he was destined for greatness but had to get through high school first.

That'd Be Right


William McInnes - 2008
    Both funny and insightful That'd Be Right is part memoir, part personal history of Australia over the last thirty years. It's a biographical trip told through sport, and families and William's own experiences. He writes: 'As with A Man's Got to Have a Hobby I weave in and around the events that have held such fascination for this country over the last thirty years or so, connecting them all with the progression of a life.' Some of these events would be considered momentous, some small and personal. And all are seen through William's eyes. They range from a day at the Melbourne Cup with his mother where too many champagnes and too few winners were picked; a swimming carnival early in the morning after a gloomy and long federal election the night before; watching truly surreal Grand Final moments in a pub with a group of odd and unknown bar companions. William also writes about a night at the cricket with his son, which shows how things can change and oddly come full circle.

Your Lives in Our Hands: Based on true stories from a retired hospital doctor


Dr. Jay - 2014
    Would you believe the one about the man who got stuck with half a paintbrush in a delicate area? The medical ethics of a woman using the hospital like a babysitting service? The day when two surgeons almost came to blows after a squabble over theatre space? After reading this brilliantly realised medical nonfiction collection of short stories you will no longer doubt the strange and sometimes tragic circumstances doctors face in medical diagnosis and treatment. From humourous stories about misbehaving patients to short biographies to moving medical stories with tragic ends, Dr Jay weaves a tale of over thirty years’ experience and relates some of the most interesting medical diagnosis and treatment of patients from his career. His narrative voice is rich and compelling and each of the patients’ short biographies is treated with the solid medical ethics we have come to expect from our doctors. Forthright and entertaining, this medical nonfiction collection of short stories comes directly from the horse’s mouth and includes humourous stories as well as short biographies that reveal some of the least pleasant aspects of life as a Surgeon.

Hinch Yourself Happy, How To Clean Your House 2 Books Collection Set


Sophie Hinchliffe
    Description:- Hinch Yourself Happy: All The Best Cleaning Tips To Shine Your Sink And Soothe Your Soul Cleaning - aka hinching - doesn't have to be that job you dread, not when Mrs Hinch is here to show you her sparkly ways. At over 2 million followers and counting, she has taken the nation by storm with her infectiously addictive charm, clever tidying tips and passionate belief in cleaning. Mrs Hinch invites you into her home and while inside you'll discover how a spot of cleaning is the perfect way to cleanse the soul. She'll even share the story of Mr and Mrs Hinch and their 'dorgeous' boy, Henry.With the help of her cloth family, Mrs Hinch will help you turn your house into a home. Whether you're a daily duster or looking for a monthly makeover, Hinch Yourself Happy shows you how to create not only a cleaner house, but a calmer you. How To Clean Your House: Easy tips and tricks to keep your home clean and tidy up your life Lynsey Queen of Clean, Instagrammer, businesswoman and busy mum of three, has done all of the work so you don't have to. Featuring her make-at-home cleaning products, easy step-by-step guides and all her recommendations for toxic-free and eco-friendly products, this book is the ultimate guide to keeping on top of your house, and having fun while you do it. Lynsey shares her daily and seasonal routines, motivating and encouraging you along the way with so that you are left with the will, and the skill, to take on even the most seemingly insurmountable tasks and end up with a clean, calm and happy home.

Walking to Maine: A Scoutmaster's Journey on the Appalachian Trail


Glenn Justis - 2019
    When the challenge of hiking the entire 2,190 mile Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine called out to him, he knew he had to show his scouts and others he had the perseverance to accomplish a dream. On a cold January morning, he set off alone from Georgia and started his nearly 5 month adventure to Maine. The challenges and tragedies he faced before and during his hike tested his resolve and changed his life. In Walking to Maine, readers join Glenn on the Appalachian Trail as he battles the mountains and the weather through 14 states seeking to push himself out of his comfort zone and to learn more about himself. He will meet interesting people from all walks of life and discover the goodness that stills exists in the hearts of total strangers. Along the way he will encounter brutal conditions and personal tragedy. Through it all he will follow the same lessons he taught his scouts and keep pushing north towards his goal. He will learn that the trail provides those who hike it everything they need and he will learn to enjoy the simple pleasures that we all take for granted in our daily lives.