The first volume of Roberta Sykes' three-volume autobiography, chronicling her childhood and teenage years in Townsville in the 1940s and 1950s, to the birth of her son, the result of a gang rape when she was 17.

    

    Today it details Appalachia's difficult past, and at the same time, presents an accurate historical backdrop for a contemporary understanding of the Appalachian region.

    In this real-life "lost world," hundreds of animal and plant species, most famously the lemurs, have evolved here and only here, while other creatures extinct elsewhere for tens of millions of years now vie with modern man for survival. It's a land of striking geography, from soaring mountains to vast canyon lands, from tropical rain forests to spiny desert. And its people are a conundrum unto themselves, their origins obscure, their language complex and distinct, and their beliefs fascinating. In The Eighth Continent, Peter Tyson will guide you into this, the planet's most exotic frontier, so you can see for yourself why it's been called "the naturalist's promised land."Part scientific exploration, part adventure saga, part cultural and historical narrative, The Eighth Continent follows Tyson's journeys with four scientific experts as they explore the fourth-largest island in the world:A herpetologist with a pied piper call to reptiles who has discovered and collected more Malagasy species than any other biologist-and continues to discover more every yearA paleoecologist searching an enormous cavern complex for clues as to why the island's megafauna-Galipagos-sized tortoises, lemurs as big as apes, ten-foot-tall birds, and pygmy hippos, among others-all died out less than two millennia agoAn archeologist trying to answer the most basic and puzzling question about the Malagasy people: Where did they come from?A primatologist who studies elusive jungle lemurs even as she strives to prevent the island's total ecological destructionFor if Madagascar is one of the most fascinating environments on the planet, it is also one of the most endangered. As the Malagasy hack a subsistence from the island's dwindling forests, they also threaten its diverse habitats and its rich biological diversity. It is not an easy situation to resolve, nor is it easy to answer the burning question at its heart: Can Madagascar be saved? In The Eighth Continent, Peter Tyson navigates this tortuous path as he delves into the island's storied interior as well as its misty past.

    The denial of her diagnosis and the eventual acceptance of her medication and disease. She takes us from her innocence as a child to her adult criminal lifestyle, which led to a subsequent 70 month federal prison sentence for Securities Fraud. A tale so unbelievable and elements so disturbing, you would swear you were reading fiction.

    Except she’s not. Blissfully unaware of her children’s shock at having to deal with the changes in their mum, Suzie has had a wake-up call and intends to live life to the full, with or without their approval. Then her youngest daughter, Sharon, is faced with some major issues of her own and the one person she would have turned to – her mother – is no longer there for her. An emotional story about family, second chances and what happens when, in the blink of an eye, life changes forever …

    

    Jack Kennedy, the American hero, and Marilyn Monroe, the love goddess: Their affair has been whispered about for 30 years. Now, at last, the story we have only been able to imagine is brought to vibrant, stunning life--a passionate, tragic romance lived out against a background of deadly intrigue.

    As the nation faced yet another Sandy Hook story of tragedy, one woman rewrote the ending. Yet the story doesn't start with those first steps Michael Hill took into that Atlanta elementary school. It starts with Antoinette Tuff, a woman who faced her own pain, hurt, and rejection, yet held onto grace, faith, and hope. A hope that anchored her in the most high stakes of moments, a grace that allowed her to empathize with a hurting young man, and a faith that gave her the courage to love him back from the brink. This is more than just the amazing account of tragedy averted. It's the evidence of what we can do when we allow ourselves to be used by God. And it's a story of how God uses "all "of our life experiences--the good and the bad--to prepare us for our own moment of divine purpose.

    "Kroeger's biography of Nellie Bly moves at almost as fast a pace as did Bly's remarkable life".--Mindy Spatt, San Francisco Chronicle. Photos & illustrations.

    David Lamb's journey--on a sleek 21-speed touring bicycle--carried him 3,145 miles, from his home near the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., all the way to the pier in Santa Monica, California.  The result is a highly personal account of coming to grips with middle age in the tradition of Howell Raines Fly Fishing Through the Midlife Crisis.Lamb did no training for his cross-country feat, failed to curb his addiction to either cigarettes or junk food, and along the way encountered an America all but invisible to those unfortunate travelers held hostage by the interstate.  The journey took him three months, and Over the Hills is the magnificent result: a literary travelogue, funny and celebratory, a story about people met and physical challenges overcome.

    

    This is a gripping and poignant memoir recounting one boy's experiences of deprivation and poverty growing up in a rural farming village during the Great Depression. The short stories are written by John Gallant and illustrated by his son Seth, better know to many as the New Yorker illustrator and award-winning D+Q cartoonist behind the books It's a Good Life, If You Don't Weaken and the sumptuous Vernacular Drawings. Written with a concise honesty and clarity, the stories reveal the sad reality of a boy growing up in brutal social and economic conditions.

    In 1960, however, she had reached the limits of that provincial--and irredeemably sexist--society and set off for America. True North--the testament of an extraordinary woman living in an extraordinary time--te lls the profound story of the challenges that confronted Conway, as she sought to establish her public self.

    It is a delightful journey backward - in the grandest of company - into a voluptuous, genteel world that has vanished forever.