And even more than that, it's the awe-inspiring life story of Kailen Combs Taylor. Kailen lived with a perpetual sense of wonder, maintaining immutable joy and resilient hope in the midst of some of life's most barbaric trials. Narrated with heartrending candor, this harrowing love story will make you laugh, cry, and frantically turn the page, often all at once. And long after you finish the book and fall back into the hectic fray of life, you may find Kailen's message still resonates in your heart: that life can be a fairytale, even when it's a tragedy. "Bryan has written a book which proves that even in the face of impossible odds, love never fails." -Christina Rasmussen, Author of Second Firsts: Live, Laugh, and Love Again

    Little did Julie know how momentous this meeting was set to be. Twenty years earlier, when Julie was just 16, she had become pregnant. Worried how her parents would react, Julie had kept her pregnancy a secret right up until the day she gave birth. Ten days later, she'd been forced to make the hardest decision of her life: to give her baby up for adoption. As the years passed, Julie often wondered what had happened to her daughter. Now, through the most extra-ordinary of coincidences, Julie was about to find out. A temporary secretary called Sara had just started working in the agents' office. Sara had recently discovered that she had been adopted, and had just got hold of her birth certificate. According to the certificate, her mother's name was Julie Wassmer.

    Mukerjee was one of the first Indian followers of Maharaj-ji Westerners met in the late 60s and early 70s when they came seeking this Neem Karoli Baba that Ram Dass wrote about. Dada was fluent in English. He?d been a professor of economics at Allahabad University, editor of a prestigious economics journal, and a political activist. It was the women in his family who were interested in religion and spiritual matters until Maharaj-ji moved into Dada?s home. Dada gave up all his worldly activities then to follow Maharaj-ji. Westerners learned surrender from their acquaintance with Dada, that is did not enslave but frees. They saw there was no space between when Maharaj-ji spoke and Dada acted. His level of service to his Baba while hard for Westerners to understand was beautiful in its simplicity and acceptance of the moment.After Maharaj-ji?s death Westerners began gathering at Dada?s house, eager to hear his stories about Maharaj-ji. They couldn?t get enough and would keep Dada up late talking about his Baba. Now we have this delightful book containing Dada?s stories of the great Indian saint Neem Karoli Baba. Readers will find themselves captivated by Dada?s remembrances, informed, and challenged. Dada opens wide for us a window into Indian spiritual culture as you begin to understand what it is that happens when Guru calls and the devotee replies ?yes.? ? Paperback, 224 pages. Published by the Hanuman Foundation, 1990. The story of one of Neem Karoli Baba?s Indian devotees about his time living in Maharaj-ji?s shadow. Rich with numerous photos of Neem Karoli Baba and Mukerjee and Indian ashram life. Mukerjee often served as Neem Karoli Baba?s translator and writes in a manner easily understood by Westerners, as he leads readers into an understanding of Indian spiritual values.

    It is a yarn still told in a hundred bars in tucked away ports where seafarers drink and wait out stormy weather. The story takes the reader on a smuggling voyage from the Atlantic down the Red Sea to Kenya, to Thailand and back across the Indian Ocean to Spain then the Netherlands. No notoriety, no articles in magazines, no calling for help when things get bad. Medical emergencies at sea, sharks, pirates, monsoon storms, and the Guardia Civil, notwithstanding… backing off was not an option. After 12 years of sailing and smuggling in the N. Atlantic and the Caribbean, Ranen, an old school pre electronic navigation sailor who smuggles to pay the bills for a lifestyle of dangerous freedom, heads for the Indian Ocean aboard his sleek deep ocean sailing boat, Sara. He left with a solid plan to sail new oceans, and do business in a new arena with different cultures. What happens when he gets there sends him on a path that was nothing he imagined, but such is the world of sailing and smuggling. Although Ranen has written this story in first person, It is also told from the perspective of the courageous young “Kenya Cowgirl” who became his crew and lover, all told through her journal entries from that voyage. In the days when “5/11” Beverly Johnson and Lynn Hill were winning the respect of the “rock star” climbers in Yosemite, Ranen was throwing a young Arianna Bell into the maelstrom of long distance non-stop sailing/smuggling. This is her story as well. Surprising twists of fate, cat and mouse with the law and other bad guys, as well as up close accounts of at life at sea in challenging conditions. Like living in a Dylan song.

    And yet, when she finally does have something like that life, as a wife and mother in 1980s London, she is the one blaring music from her room, necking vodka and valium and making an almighty mess of her home and family.Cleaning other people’s houses, eventually, is the only option left. At 50 years old, post rehab, living alone in a Hackney bedsit, Michele finds herself finishing her working life as she had begun, “in a dumb job that you do when you can’t really do anything else...”This is a remarkable, powerful, and often unbearably funny memoir in which cleaning and getting clean intertwine as a strange and magical form of redemption. Michele Kirsch is a Nora Ephron for the modern age.

    After appearing for 10 years on the hit BBC show, Ola is now moving on and reveals all about her past in this book.

    They were already used to a simple life, having spent the last three years living on their boat in France for the summer seasons, and returning to the UK and their caravan for the winters. This tiny cabin would now be their new home for the winter months, taking them a step further along the road to self-sufficiency. They had no electricity, no kitchen, no bathroom or bedroom and the loo was a bucket in a shed, but the property came with five acres of field and woodland.From now on their lives would be simple, pared back to the basics, but they found that an off-grid lifestyle was by no means an uncomfortable experience. Responsibilities didn’t disappear but they changed, becoming less onerous. There was more time to think, and to appreciate the natural world around them. Living in such rural isolation, each day brought something new to marvel at: deer browsing in the field at dusk, salamanders on the doorstep, owls calling by night.If their own world felt increasingly magical, the outside world was far from it. They had moved to a foreign country at an historic time, living through a pandemic and adapting to the day-to-day implications of Brexit.A Simple Life doesn’t just follow Mary-Jane and Michael as they settle into their new lives, it also raises questions about what really matters to people. What makes us happy? How does it feel to have few possessions? Will life become unbearable without a flushing toilet?Thought-provoking and amusing, this book opens a window onto a different way of living. Mary-Jane shares a wealth of information and, if you have ever found yourself longing for a simpler life, this might tempt you to take those first tentative steps on the journey.

    Over the next 2 years, I was attacked by a few wild animals, experienced unexplained phenomenon, had a massive learning curve and truly experienced the Australian outback. If you are after a story that was written to appeal to the masses and that mainstream publishers love, then this probably isn't for you. If you are after a lighthearted read that provides the raw truth about life out bush and my experience of it, then click away. I hope you enjoy. Note - mature themes.

    He has left behind nearly a million words of text, but his life is still a mystery. This book is an engaging introduction to a subject that students will certainly encounter many times throughout their education—and their lives. Lucid language and dramatic illustrations re-create the Bard's world of kings and queens, fairies and potions, and bloody beheadings. It imparts an amazing amount of vivid, interesting material about place, period and background of Shakespeare. This sweeping account is a biography, a history, and a retelling of some of Shakespeare’s most famous plays—all in one approachable volume. Salient Features: • Shakespeare's Early Life • Life as Playwright and Actor • Theatre Companies • Style of Presentation • Last Years of Life • England of Shakespeare's Days • Drama in Shakespeare's Days • Shakespeare's Greatness as a Poet • Shakespeare's Influence • Works of Shakespeare in detail • Principal Facts of Shakespeare's Life

    She's barely out of the car when she's called to assist the midwife with a bride who's gone into labour in the middle of her own wedding reception. And so her adventures begin...As a health visitor Nurse Sarah is as green as grass but she puts her best foot into wellies and braves the mad dogs, killer ganders and muddy tracks of the farming community. Despite set-backs young Sarah is determined to help the mums she meets, from struggling young mothers in unmodernised farmhouses, to doyennes of the county dinner party set who slave over stuffed olive hors-d'oeuvres.Village life in 1970s isn't always quite the Good Life Sarah's been expecting; her attempts at self-sufficiency and cider making lead to drunk badgers and spirited house parties - but will it be the clergyman, the vet or the young doctor that win Sarah's heart. During her first year in Kent, Nurse Sarah Hill get stuck in - reuniting families and helping mums in the midst of community full of ancient feuds, funny little ways and just a bit of magic.

    Parrish Times tracks his amazing journey over the last four decades, through a rollercoaster ride of emotions in surely the most dangerous and exhilarating sporting arena there is.In the 1970s Steve was competing for the world motorcycle championship with legendary team mate Barry Sheene on a Suzuki. After retiring in 1986, Steve managed a successful Yamaha factory team to three British Superbike Championship titles and started a truck-racing career, becoming the most successful truck racer ever. He also proved to be a natural commentator, first for BBC radio, then transferring to television with Sky, ITV and Eurosport. Against this backdrop are Steve's notorious pranks: posing as a medical doctor to allow John Hopkins to fly from Japan to the Australian GP; impersonating Barry Sheene in a qualifying session; owning a fire engine, a hearse, and an ambulance - parking it on double yellow lines with the doors open in visits to his local bank.It's a funny, hell-raising account of life - and death - in the fast lane that will keep readers enthralled to the end. Barry Sheene's final words to his best friend sum it up: 'Neither of us will die wondering.'

    Always afraid he was about to die, he climbed into the cockpit anyway ... and lived to tell you about it. How would you feel if you were a new guy in the sky ... attacked by four Messerschmitts? Let me tell you, no matter how much you prepare, no matter how much you read, how much you train, no matter how much you think of yourself as a 'Hot Shot Pilot,' you are never ready for life and death combat! How did it feel to say a 'last goodbye' to your bride believing you would never see her again, as you left to fight WWII? Author's Facebook page at: facebook.com/P38Flyer/ As reviewed by A. L. Hanks, Lieutenant Colonel, USAF (Ret) who said it perfectly: In "Brave and Funny Memories of WWII" Lyndon Shubert, to our great benefit, tells us his story, an engaging tale of his WWII experience as a fighter pilot in WWII. A member of the "greatest generation" he recounts his days (and nights) flying P-38 fighters in the wartime skies of Europe. The tale is told in a relaxed, conversational style, honest and personal. The reader will appreciate the authenticity and the easy humor. He tells us a story that is at once delightfully humorous and deadly serious. He shares that unfettered sense of flying a powerful aircraft free in the vast expanse of the sky. The special sense that pilots have when they "can reach out and touch the face of God". Shubert relates the feelings of men in combat, that gripping apprehension in your gut when you know you're going to die, your senses at full maximum intensity, and then that striking after mission fear when you look back and realize that you cheated death once again. Shubert was indeed a special fellow. We are indebted to him for his service and his book. He captures a special piece of the American character and our history that is essential to pass on to our children and grandchildren. Lt Shubert was exceptional, a USAF officer and a fighter pilot who fought the war and earned the Distinguished Flying Cross. The author reminds us once again why fighter pilots are special. Why they are ubiquitously viewed as swaggering "raconteurs", with big egos and big watches who can sometimes be insufferable. But his tale also captures the reality of one-on-one aerial combat, loser goes home.... to God.

    Miraculously, his daughter was unharmed, but his wife faced a series of life-threatening injuries, including the same one that famously left Christopher Reeve paralyzed. Following the accident, Segal began sending regular email updates to their circle of friends and family—a list that continued to grow as others heard of the event and were moved by the many emotional and spiritual issues it raised. Segal's compelling memoir is an intimate and honest chronicle built around these email updates, and is a profound example of how people show up for one another in times of crisis.Alternatingly harrowing, humorous, heartbreaking, and hopeful, this is an uplifting tribute to love, determination, and how the compassion of community holds the power to heal, serving as an inspiring testament to the resilience of the human spirit when faced with pain and adversity.

    Prostitute. Gangster’s Wife. Survivor. Tara grew up in squalor on the island of Alderney. When she was only four, she was sexually abused by one of her mother’s many lovers, a horror that continued for five long years. As a teenager, desperate to escape the toxic environment at home, she fled to London – but was swiftly drawn into working as a prostitute. She became involved with some of London’s most notorious gangsters – even marrying one – but when she realised the danger she was inflicting on her children, she knew she had to find a way to get out. This is the inspiring story of one woman’s will to survive, and to fight for a better life.

    It will effectively reveal and dispel any wrong-thinking surrounding this idea upon which all else stands. The purpose? To unburden you from all notions of ‘self’, allowing you to directly discover the raw, non-dual truth of Being.This isn't the first work that tackles this subject. But others have left it at “we can’t really know whether there’s anything beyond our experience”, while I go all the way and say that we can know – and in this book I’ll show you exactly how and why this idea of an objective, physical universe of time and space beyond our perceptions is nothing but a figment of our imagination.But it’s a book unlike all others on the contemporary non-dual awakening scene. You won’t find any ‘pointers’ in it. What you’ll find is stone cold logic hacking away at the very foundation of existence itself. And in its wake; when the dust finally settles; you’ll recognize that, not only were the words of the sages true all along, but they've gone from being a remote possibility to being the light and guiding principle of your life. What words?"Consciousness is all."