With astonishing power Period Piece brings us into the real presence of the late Victorian past.

    The Wood family is much like its close, Catholic, immigrant neighbors, all dependent on a father’s wages from the Oxford Paper Company. Until the sudden death of Dad, when Mum and the four closely connected Wood girls are set adrift. Funny and to-the-bone moving, When We Were the Kennedys is the story of how this family saves itself, at first by depending on Father Bob, Mum’s youngest brother, a charismatic Catholic priest who feels his new responsibilities deeply. And then, as the nation is shocked by the loss of its handsome Catholic president, the televised grace of Jackie Kennedy—she too a Catholic widow with young children—galvanizes Mum to set off on an unprecedented family road trip to Washington, D.C., to do some rescuing of her own. An indelible story of how family and nation, each shocked by the unimaginable, exchange one identity for another.

    Douglas Thayer was such a boy. In this poignant, often humorous memoir, he depicts his Utah Valley boyhood during the Great Depression and World War II.Known in some circles as a Mormon Hemingway, Thayer has created a richly detailed work that shares cultural DNA with Frank McCourt's Angela's Ashes, Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and William Golding's Lord of the Flies. His narrative at once prosaic and poetic, Thayer captures nostalgia for a simpler time, along with boyhood's universal yearnings, pleasures, and mysteries.

    He was 45: a literary legend, a national treasure, married with ten children. This meeting sparked a love affair that lasted over a decade, destroying Dickens's marriage and ending with Nelly's near-disappearance from the public record. In this remarkable work of biography, Claire Tomalin rescues Nelly from obscurity, not only returning the neglected actress to her rightful place in history, but also giving us a compelling and truthful account of the great Victorian novelist. Through Dickens's diaries, correspondence, address books, and photographs, Tomalin is able to reconstruct the relationship between Charles and Nelly, bringing it to vivid life. The result is a riveting literary detective story—and a portrait of a singular woman.

    Three years later he was in Naples, where he painted The Seven Acts of Mercy. A year later he died at the age of thirty-eight under mysterious circumstances. Exploring Caravaggio's singular masterwork, in The Guardian of Mercy Terence Ward offers an incredible narrative journey into the heart of his artistry and his metamorphosis from fugitive to visionary.Ward's guide in this journey is a contemporary artist whose own life was transformed by the painting, a simple man named Angelo who shows him where it still hangs in a small church in Naples and whose story helps him see its many layers. As Ward unfolds the structure of the painting, he explains each of the seven mercies and its influence on Caravaggio's troubled existence. Caravaggio encountered the whole range of Naples's vertical social layers, from the lowest ranks of poverty to lofty gilded aristocratic circles, and Ward reveals the old city behind today's metropolis. Fusing elements of history, biography, memoir, travelogue, and journalism, his narrative maps the movement from estrangement to grace, as we witness Caravaggio's bruised life gradually redeemed by art.

    Best known as one of the world's greatest painters, he sketched the foundations for inventions that would not come to fruition for centuries. Born a bastard in a hillside village in northern Italy, Leonardo became the protégé of princes, popes, and kings. He mastered so many branches of science that scholars still debate whether he was greater as an anatomist, botanist, cartographer, engineer, geographer, or naturalist. Nevertheless, he died unhappy, believing he had failed to work the miracles of which he had dreamed. Here, from New York Times bestselling author Anna Abraham, is his extraordinary story.

    BAGGAGE will touch readers at many levels; it is as edgy and fearless as Janet Street-Porter herself.

    When "Don't Dream It's Over" and "Something So Strong" exploded in the US charts, worldwide success looked inevitable. Critics compared them musically to the Beatles and fans adored them for their warmth and humour on stage. Four brilliant albums later, their roller-coaster ride of achievements and disappointments came to an end on the steps of the Sydney Opera House, in front of one of the largest audiences in Australian history. The dream was over, the band broken up, their enormous promise only partly fulfilled. In this definitive account, New Zealand journalist Chris Bourke has written the true story of Crowded House. With unparalleled access to all band members, their families, friends, musical collaborators, managers, and record company personanel, he has captured their essence. It is a unique tale of musical chemistry, family bonds and the personal costs of pursuing an artistic vision. From the manic energy of the recording studio to the machinations of the record industry, this riveting account is a book for every Crowded House fan.

    Keema Waterfield's INSIDE PASSAGE, about Alaska's underbelly and hardscrabble life; the author grew up chasing music with her 20-year-old mother on the Alaskan folk festival circuit, two small siblings in tow; adrift with a revolving cast of musicians, drunks, stepdads, and one man with a gun, she yearned for a place to call home, to Rose Alexandre-Leach at Green Writers Press, with Ferne Johansson editing, in an exclusive submission, for publication in spring 2020.

    Behind-the-scenes touring and recording stories are featured, as well as humorous and engaging anecdotes about Matt's relationship with Coldplay as they travel the globe and become one of the biggest bands in the world.

    The colorful characters she meets while delivering babies all over London--from the plucky, warm-hearted nuns with whom she lives to the woman with twenty-four children who can't speak English to the prostitutes and dockers of the city's seedier side--illuminate a fascinating time in history. Beautifully written and utterly moving, The Midwife will touch the hearts of anyone who is, and everyone who has, a mother.

    A bright, witty assessment of football in the 1950s.

    With a career that began in the late 1950s, Joan kept mementos over the course of her entire working life, and Joan Rivers Confidential is a compilation of never-before-seen personal archives. Assembled by her daughter Melissa with Scott Currie, the book contains scripts and monologues, letters from famous friends, exchanges with fans, rare photographs, as well as classic and never-before-heard jokes—many simply scribbled on everything from hotel stationery to airplane boarding passes. Touching on subjects from her 50 years in show business (The Tonight Show, Las Vegas, Elizabeth Taylor, Heidi Abromowitz, the red carpet, and Fashion Police), this is a revelatory and humor-filled insider look at the popular, multitalented comedian.

    He Was A BonannoRosalie Profaci was a Mafia princess. Salvatore "Bill" Bonanno, oldest son of Mafia Don Joe Bonanno, the real-life model for The Godfather, was organized crime's crown prince. And Bill, deeply involved in his father's "business" of mob schemes thought pretty Rosalie knew what it meant to be a "Mafia wife." But the convent-raised, deeply devout Rosalie, whose innocence was protected by her doting father, had no idea... Their Marriage United Two Mafia Dynasties...Mafia Marriage is Rosalie Bonanno's intimate account of life inside the secretive world of the Mafia. Naming names and providing shocking details, she writes about the wild spending sprees, the mysterious absences of her husband, the other women in his-their running from the law, the abductions, and shootings. Above all, Rosalie reveals the passion that kept her virtually a prisoner to love...and her heartbreaking journey of discovering the truth and trying to break free.

    Using vignettes and illustrations from family, education, religion, the military, and politics, Black presents a determined and unyielding faith in his Creator. His confidence in God's control of his life led not only to amazing achievement but also to abiding peace when things didn't work out as planned. From the Hood to the Hill describes the obstacles and unlikely paths that led Barry Black to become: a two-star Navy admiral; the only African-American to ever serve as U.S. Navy Chief of Chaplains; and the first person of color in the nation's history to serve as Chaplain of the U.S. Senate. Inside each chapter, he offers the lessons he has learned.