A Place in the Country


Laura Shaine Cunningham - 2000
    Now she tells us what became of that little girl--and her lifelong quest to find the perfect country home.

Just Don't Call Me Ma'am: How I Ditched the South, Forgot My Manners, and Managed to Survive My Twenties with (Most of) My Dignity Still Intact


Anna Mitchael - 2010
    In fact, she may even be a lot like you. In her fast-moving world, she might be called on as a friend, coworker, daughter, girlfriend, confidante, brat, cynic, or domestic-goddess-in-training. She's willing to juggle pretty much anything that gets thrown her way, but the one label she simply won't embrace is ma'am.Like so many bright-eyed college graduates before her, Mitchael begins her twenties armed with the conviction that the world is hers for the taking. And she discovers that it is, mostly—only no one told her just how often she’d have to pick herself up off the floor along the way.Written for every woman who’s experienced the ups and downs of trying to figure out who you’re really meant to be, Just Don’t Call Me Ma’am is a story of one woman and the choices that add up to be her twentysomething life—and of how sometimes you have to remember where you came from before you can figure out where you’re going.

Elsewhere


Richard Russo - 2012
    This is where the author grew up, the only son of an aspirant mother and a charming, feckless father who were born into this close-knit community. But by the time of his childhood in the 1950s, prosperity was inexorably being replaced by poverty and illness (often tannery-related), with everyone barely scraping by under a very low horizon.A world elsewhere was the dream his mother instilled in Rick, and strived for herself, and their subsequent adventures and tribulations in achieving that goal—beautifully recounted here—were to prove lifelong, as would Gloversville's fearsome grasp on them both. Fraught with the timeless dynamic of going home again, encompassing hopes and fears and the relentless tides of familial and individual complications, this story is arresting, comic, heartbreaking, and truly beautiful, an immediate classic.

All Made Up


Janice Galloway - 2011
    In the second volume of her memoirs, the prize-winning author Janice Galloway reveals how the child introduced in This Is Not About Me evolved during her teenage years.

The Pursuit of Motherhood


Jessica Hepburn - 2014
     It is currently estimated that one in five couples have difficulty conceiving. Hepburn’s book which describes her long and, at times, heartbreaking journey to have a child has been called a cross between Bridget Jones Diary and Eat Pray Love for the infertile generation. 'After reading dozens of fertility books over the years, I’ve realised how hard it is to get a memoir about treatment right and to tell your own story in a way that other people will actually want to read, but Jessica Hepburn has managed it brilliantly in her book The Pursuit of Motherhood... Whether you’re at the start of your journey or in the middle of treatment, I think you’ll find something for you in Jessica’s book.' Kate Brian, Author of The Complete Guide to IVF and The Complete Guide to Female Fertility ‪www.fertilitymatters.org.uk 'I started the book a few hours ago and have just finished it… I couldn’t stop reading. I love it. The honesty wrapped in engaging writing with a liberal dose of humour is awesome. I want everyone to read it so people can really understand what the journey is like.' Russell Davis, Fertility Coach, Author and Speaker www.thefertilemind.net 'A much needed, honest, moving and compassionate book. At times laugh-out-loud funny, at times incredibly touching, I know it will be of such help to many people.' Anya Sizer, Author of Fertile Thinking www.thefertilitycoach.co.uk 'I have just read The Pursuit of Motherhood in under 24 hours, I could not put it down. It felt like having a long intimate conversation with the author or having stumbled across her diary and once you join her on the rollercoaster ride of trying, and failing, to start a family, you are desperate to see if there is a happy ending. This book is heartbreaking, informative, inspiring and funny! An excellent read for anyone experiencing infertility or for anyone who wants to understand a little of what it is like.' Mindful Muma-To-Be mindfulmumatobe.blogspot.co.uk

The Sum of My Parts


James Sanford - 2011
    At first I tried to deny my condition (trying to treat a tumor with hot baths and ice packs). Eventually, I decided I would learn as much about my illness as possible while trying to keep my emotions on hold.What followed was an experience that finally forced me to deal with issues about my body that I had tried to ignore for decades. Along the way I dealt with a physician who gave me ridiculous advice and acquaintances who asked unbelievable questions. But I was also fortunate to be surrounded by people who supported me and doctors who helped me through the process.

Stripped Down: A Naked Memoir


Stacey Keith - 2013
    This chronicle of life in the skin trade follows the meteoric rise of Stacey Keith, a girl scarcely out of her teens whose eye-popping assets launch her from wet T-shirt contests to the catwalks of Houston, strip bar capital of the world. Almost overnight, she is discovered by a famous porn star, who Svengalis her onto the pages of Playboy, Penthouse, and dozens of other men’s magazines. While strutting her stuff onstage and across the country, Stacey makes the fateful decision to head to Hollywood. She’s got everything a girl could want: fame, attention, endless piles of cash...but no idea what awaits her. With Internet porn overtaking men’s magazines, everyone from her Mafia-boss road manager to her smarmy talent agent pressures Stacey to do more than just flash her flesh. Uber-boob filmmaker Russ Meyer verbally abuses her; rocker Don Henley tries to use her. Yet through it all, from the warped misogyny of Playboy to the S&M dungeons of the Pacific Palisades, Stacey’s dark, self-deprecating humor will leave you laughing, crying and rooting for her at every step of the way.

To Air is Human: One Man's Quest to Become the World's Greatest Air Guitarist


Björn Türoque - 2006
     The true story of how mildly successful guitarist and New York Times writer Dan Crane relinquished his instrument and became Björn Türoque (pronounced "b-yorn too-RAWK"), the second greatest air guitarist in the nation. This exploration of the international air guitar sub-culture addresses the issue of dedicating oneself to an invisible art in order to achieve the ultimate goal of "airness"-that is, when air guitar transcends the "real" art that it imitates and becomes an art form in and of itself.

Practice Makes Perfect (Edward Vernon's Practice series Book 1)


Edward Vernon - 2014
    It is his first job in general practice; his first brave excursion into the dangerous world where patients walk round in their clothes. Dr Vernon soon finds himself bemused, fascinated and exhausted as he copes with the procession of ailing humanity that streams into his surgery and awaits his visits. A confused old lady, timid vet, puzzled diabetic, lonely housewife, hypochondriac, tipster with an ulcer, nun with dandruff and a persistent young lady with abundant charms and nothing wrong with her. Just published as an e book, exclusive to Amazon, this book was a huge hit in England and America when first published in the 1970s. Edward Vernon is a pen name of a well known British doctor/author.Here's what the critics said about the series:Thoroughly delightful - Fresno BeeHilarious - TitbitsA delightfully funny book that keeps the reader laughing and appeals to one's sense of the ridiculous - Sunday Advocate, Baton RougeFor entertainment, a chapter or two before bedtime is just what the doctor ordered - Sacramento BeeDoes for British GPs what Herriot has done for vets - BooklistHilarious, written with skill and zest - Grimsby Evening TelegraphVery funny - Citizen, GloucesterThoroughly enjoyable, genuinely funny - South Wales EchoWise, funny, sad and heartwarming - Chattanooga TimesGood fun - Homes and GardensMost of his adventures are funny, some hilarious; but he has the good sense to leven the comedy lump with some that are sad, some touching. All are written lightly, easily, entertainingly - Oxford TimesThe funniest of the funny doctor books - Richard GordonJolly good reading - Publishers WeeklyViews the human species he treats with much the same affection, compassion and humour as Herriot brings to the animal world - Cleveland Plain DealerSometimes serious, sometimes hilarious - Lancashire Evening PostTruthful, well observed and consistently readable - Daily TelegraphPerceptive and witty - Surrey AdvertiserWill amuse, amaze and entertain - Yorkshire Postetc etc

Live from New York: An Oral History of Saturday Night Live


Tom Shales - 2002
    But Saturday Night Live, launched in 1975 and still thriving today, would change the face of television. It introduced brash new stars with names like Belushi, Radner, Chase, and Murray; trashed taboos that had inhibited TV for decades; and had such an impact on American life, laughter, and politics that even presidents of the United States had to take notice. Now, Pulitzer Prize-winner Tom Shales and bestselling author James Andrew Miller bring together stars, writers, guest hosts, contributors, and craftsmen for the first-ever oral history of Saturday Night Live, from 1974, when it was just an idea, through 2002, when it has long since become an institution. In their own words, dozens of personalities recall the backstage stories, behind-the-scenes gossip, feuds, foibles, drugs, sex, struggles, and calamities, including personal details never before revealed. Shales and Miller have interviewed a galaxy of stars, including Mike Myers, Chris Rock, Bill Murray, Tom Hanks, Adam Sandler, Chevy Chase, Will Ferrell, Dan Aykroyd, Steve Martin, Jon Lovitz, Jane Curtin, Billy Crystal, Martin Short, Dana Carvey, Tina Fey, Jimmy Fallon, Chris Kattan, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Garrett Morris, Molly Shannon, Damon Wayans, Chris Elliott, Julia Sweeney, Norm Macdonald, and Paul Simon-plus writers like Al Franken, Conan O'Brien, Larry David, Rosie Shuster, Jack Handey, Robert Smigel, Don Novello, and others who got their big breaks as part of the SNL team. The Coneheads, the Blues Brothers, Buck-wheat, Wayne and Garth, Hans and Franz, the Cheerleaders, Todd DiLaMuca and Lisa Loopner, "Cheeseburger cheeseburger," Mango, the Church Lady, Ed Grimley-they're all here. And for every fabulous character on-screen there was an outrageous maverick, misfit, or rebel behind the scenes. Live from New York does what no other book about the show has ever done: It lets the people who were there tell the story in their own words, blunt and loving and uncensored.

An Heiress of Holocaust: How my family survived the holocaust and the lasting effects on my life


Sarah Segal - 2020
    

Chiseled: A Memoir of Identity, Duplicity, and Divine Wine


Danuta Pfeiffer - 2015
    
 This is a story of navigating identities through a remarkable life. Danuta Pfeiffer was an unwed teenage mother escaping to the tundra of Alaska; a journalist who inadvertently became a television evangelist with a ringside seat to a presidential campaign; a wife c aught in a web of deceit and substance abuse. Through it all, she clings to her father’s legacy, sustained by his tales of fortitude and endurance when faced with the horrors of war. Finally, living happily as a winemaker in Oregon, she finds she must once more reinvent herself, when during a sojourn to the Carpathian Mountains of Poland she uncovers long-buried family secrets. Chiseled is the story of one woman brave enough to chip away at a life of lies and finally arrive at a shining core of truth.

House of Happy Endings


Leslie Garis - 2007
    In a large, romantic house in Amherst, Massachusetts, Leslie Garis, her two brothers, and their parents and grandparents aimed to live a life that mirrored the idyllic world the elder Garises created nonstop. But inside The Dell--where Robert Frost often sat in conversation over sherry, and stories appeared to spring from the very air--all was not right. Roger Garis's inability to match his parents' success in his own work as playwright, novelist, and magazine writer led to his conviction that he was a failure as father, husband, and son, and eventually deepened into mental illness characterized by raging mood swings, drug abuse, and bouts of debilitating and destructive depression. "House of Happy Endings "is Leslie Garis's mesmerizing, tender, and harrowing account of coming of age in a wildly imaginative, loving, but fatally wounded family.

To Mormons, With Love


Chrisy Ross - 2011
    Sure, she knew Mormons didn't drink caffeine (cough), and they never swore (double cough), but life with family-centered folks would be cozy and wonderful. She could smell the fresh-baked bread just thinking about it. Join her as she honestly, humorously, and lovingly describes her quest to find someone with a real panty line problem, requests her LDS friends baptize her-after she dies-and considers her dad's suggestion to become a Jack Mormon. Although not a convert, Chrisy develops an understanding and respect for a widely misunderstood religion and has found a comfortable spot in her town, the community and the culture.

May You Live in Interesting Times: A Memoir


Laraine Newman - 2021
    There, along with famous cast members John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, Chevy Chase, Jane Curtain, Garret Morris, and Gilda Radner - Bill Murray was passed over at first and joined in a later season - Laraine was part of the show that changed TV - and comedy - forever. But it isn't all yuks and glamor. Laraine struggled with demons.Arriving in New York City with an attraction to drugs that started as a vice and grew to be an all-consuming addiction even as she sky-rocketed to fame via her memorable characters on SNL.May You Live in Interesting Times is a warm, funny, heartfelt snapshot of 1970s New York City and SNL's unexpected rocket to success, with all the giddy headiness that that entailed.After five seasons, Laraine left SNL, worked in movies and television, while having adventures and relationships in Hollywood that, in her words, “should have gotten me killed.” Now with long term sobriety, she became a parent and reinvented herself as a voice over actor and has a thriving career working on such animated favorites including Finding Nemo, Monsters, Inc., Despicable Me, Inside Out, Shrek, and Minions. ©2020 Laraine Newman (P)2021 Audible Originals, LLC.