From stress and anxiety to real loss, booze was his magic elixir that made it all disappear. But the constant blackout nights brought with them even more trouble. Despite the perpetual cycle of drunken mistakes and continued escalation in drinking, he found new ways to rationalize his self-destructive behavior. Drinking was a part of who he was. And an existence without it seemed inconceivable. He takes you through a life where nights with missing pieces of time were the norm. And how there was a haze that overshadowed everything, even his happiest memories. He shares how far he fell before finally willing to change. And the long road back in recovery that required him to completely shift his perceptive in order to remain sober. He also explains what he discovered about the many reasons he drank so much for so long. And how he was ultimately able to come out better on the other side. This is a memoir about overcoming the grip alcohol can have on us. About learning to live life again after the bottle and facing the world with sober eyes. And finally discovering one’s true self. This is a story that will resonate with anyone who has struggled with addiction. And will give hope to those looking to change their lives for the better.

    Just a few short months later, he found himself confined to a wheelchair. But rather than succumbing to the darkness that threatened to overwhelm him in the days after his diagnosis, he drew on his powerful faith and unwavering belief in life and found a way to light, hope and acceptance.From growing up in Fairview, to serving in the dioceses in Ballymun and later Mount Merrion and Kilmacud, and his charity work while in UCD, Fr Tony takes us on the journey of his life and shows us how, through this devastating illness, he came to know the true meaning and nature of God's love.Sadly, Tony passed away on the 28 August 2019 but his memoir and his message of hope, strength and unwavering faith live on.'Our lives will never be measured in words spoken or success achieved but rather how we live and how our life has affected those around us.' Fr Tony Coote

    Tailhookers who wear the US Navy Wings of Gold are renowned as the most skilled pilots in the Aviation community. This book tells the story of a twenty year-old drafted into military service during the Vietnam War, then applying to enter US Navy pilot training. His historically accurate story begins with highlights of his Navy flight training to his assignment as an A-4 Skyhawk pilot in VA-22 The Fighting Redcocks. The book chronicles facts about the frustrating air war in Vietnam from 1968 to 1970 through Lt. Dellicker's three tours as an Attack pilot and LSO. Intertwined with the war stories and close calls is a love story of two young people who met, became engaged in two weeks, and endured 18 months of war-time separation. Now, after 45 years of marriage this story was written for their kids and grandkids as an accurate historical account of the Vietnam War, True Love, and Faith in God.

    This passion stems from his own story … Before Michael was even one year old, he was diagnosed with an aggressive cancer of the central nervous system – a tumour had taken over half of his tiny body. The chance of Michael surviving was virtually non-existent. He started chemotherapy at 1 year old and by his second birthday, doctors had basically given up all hope. His only hope was taking part in a drug trial program – a program of which Michael was the only participant to survive the treatment. Although he survived, he was left with some permanent scars – only one lung, a damaged heart and a sensitive immune system. Michael Crossland sets an example for all of us. He's a man who has faced (and still faces) extreme challenges in life, but he never gives up. And despite his own obstacles, he always puts others before himself and gives so much to people in need. A true inspiration. A true hero. About the Author: As one of Australia’s most sought after inspirational speakers Michael has defied the odds of a life threatening cancer to build his life of exceptional achievements. He is a regular inspirational speaker for corporations, schools, professional sporting organisations and universities throughout the world. In the last 12 months Michael has presented in front of over 250,000 people around the globe. His journey has been shared on many TV programs including Fox Sports, ABC, ChannelSeven & Nine networks, Full Potential TV, The Get Inspired Project, Inspire Me Today program and countless radio shows throughout America, Fiji and Australia. Along with his award winning program about his life on Australian Stories, Michael has also recently featured in a humanitarian documentary about the countless lives saved through his orphanage and school in Haiti that he is involved with. Diagnosed before his first birthday and spending over ¼ of his life in hospital, doctors told him school and sport were not options. Infection and fatigue were too great a risk, reaching his teenage years would be a miracle. His only wish was to lead a normal life and be able to do all the things that other kids took for granted every day. But he had a dream and the undying determination to achieve the impossible… No matter the size of the obstacles that lay ahead. Now, an accomplished businessman, National Ambassador for Camp Quality, Australian of the Year finalist, Australia Day Ambassador and international hall of fame inductee, Michael inspires people from all walks of life. It is no doubt he has a heart for giving and a skill to engage people from all walks of life. Within the last five years he has gone from being one of the youngest State Development Managers for one of the largest companies in the world, to running five banks then leaving his finance career to follow his dreams in making a global impact and he certainly has done that! Michael’s story “Field of Dreams” was documented on Australian Story, ABC TV television. Through this documentary, his message touched the hearts of a nation, with his story of how he overcame seemingly insurmountable obstacles to achieve success in both his personal and professional life.

    

    It was an audio-cassette filled with the voice of her father telling outrageous stories about his hunting expeditions with his famous older brother, Ernest Hemingway. In this mesmerizing book, Hilary transcribes these stories, revealing the bond between two larger-than-life brothers -- and tells of her own quest to make peace with the painful parts of the Hemingway legacy.

    I was also a fraud, a liar and a cheat. Those lists of birds seen, ticked off like Don Juan’s conquests? A tissue of lies. One hundred and thirty species? More like 60. Dotterel, firecrest, smew? Give me a break.So when I revived my dormant mania early this year, I decided to right my childhood wrongs, even though they were born of good intentions. I would go birdwatching again. I would keep track of the birds I saw. I would not lie. To spice things up, and to guard against enthusiasm fatigue, I set myself a target. Six hundred and one bird species have been recorded in Britain. I would aim to see 200 of them in a year. A doddle, surely?Not so fast, man-cub.Half of the 601 are described as ‘rare’. One, the great auk, is extinct. That leaves 300. My friend Andrew is a proper and active birder. In his best year he clocked up 206. I’m neither proper nor active. What chance do I have? Slim to none. But I like a challenge.Why Do Birds Suddenly Disappear? is the story of that challenge. But it’s not just about birds. It’s about family, music, nostalgia; hearing the stories of strangers; the nature of obsession and obsession with nature. It’s about finding adventure in life when you twig it’s shorter than you thought; losing and regaining contact with the sights, sounds and smells of the natural world; the humiliation of being a professional musician who doesn’t recognise the song of a blue tit. It’s about the first time my parents heard me say ‘fuck’.It’s a book for anyone who has ever seen a small brown bird and wondered what it was, or tried to make sense of a world in which we can ask ‘What's that bird?’ and ‘What's for lunch?’ and get the same answer. It’s also a long overdue thank you letter to my parents.

    They are all amazing characters who manage to carry a deep knowledge of their chosen species within a distinctly quirky shell. Other animals making an appearance include otters , house sparrows, robins , owls, bats, badgers, dolphins, toads, dragonflies, moths, foxes and adders.Hugh Warwick, animal enthusiast and hedgehog fanatic, writes a series of affectionate and quirky homages to the animals of the British Isles, composed of fieldwork and interviews with the people who love and conserve them.

    Modeled loosely after a medieval bestiary, these witty, playful, whipsmart essays traverse history, myth, science, and more, bringing each beast vibrantly to life.

    I wasn't always called Bodacious. I must have been called something else in my kitten-hood in the nearby city of Kilkenny, but it's all a bit of a mystery to My Human. As far as she's concerned, I appeared one day and have never left. It's a secret I plan to keep.’Written from the perspective of Bodacious the cat, this is a beautifully written memoir of Bodacious’s life on the farm and everything that entails – early mornings, frosty starts, beautiful sunrises, adventurous rare-breed Zwartbles sheep, hard work, entertaining animals, mouth-watering food, kind people and idyllic country living with its highs and lows.The Shepherd often tells Bodacious her favourite story of how she went out to buy red ribbon to wrap a gift for her friend, but instead came home with a gift for herself: a daring, assertive, ambitious cat looking for a home. But soon The Shepherd realises she needs Bodacious as much as he needs her. As soon as he arrives, Bodacious saunters around the farm like he owns the place and immediately establishes himself as Top Cat. But Bodacious isn’t content to pad round the house and curl up by the Aga, and soon he befriends a farm cat called Oscar who trains him in the ways of the farm. As well as Oscar, Bodacious gets to know all the other animals on the farm — cats Miss Marley and Ovenmitt, the scruffy border collie/fox terrier-cross called Pepper, and The Big Fellow, to name a few.With wonderful characterisation, humour, sharp observation, and a plucky attitude, Bodacious shows us the ropes of Black Sheep Farm. As we soak in the atmosphere of the house, the orchards and the fields, we also learn how this Top Cat Shepherd got his name – by being 'Big, bold, beautiful, bolshie', as his Shepherd always says…

    A book for apprentice falconers wanting to know the basics of becoming a falconer. Shows a step-by-step approach to training your first wild caught hawk.

    This entirely new diary is composed in a similar style to the Country Diary, with Edith Holden's thoughts, anecdotes, and writings interspersed with poetry, mottoes, and her exquisite watercolor paintings of flowers, plants, birds, butterflies and landscape scenes.

    And although we want it to last forever, we know that nothing ever does. In the early 1990's David Hartwig, a Texas cowboy with dreams of rodeo stardom, struggled to support his family and, in doing so, discovered a dog with talents he himself could never realize.Together with David, Skidboot shot to international fame, despite tumultuous events that nearly sent this rural family to the brink. Skidboot is a true story of loyalty, sacrifice, discipline, love, and companionship. Skidboot--there will never be another.

    New technologies have revealed secrets locked in prehistoric bones that no one could have previously predicted. We can now work out the color of dinosaurs, the force of their bite, their top speeds, and even how they cared for their young.Remarkable new fossil discoveries—giant sauropod dinosaur skeletons in Patagonia, dinosaurs with feathers in China, and a tiny dinosaur tail in Burmese amber—remain the lifeblood of modern paleobiology. Thanks to advances in technologies and methods, however, there has been a recent revolution in the scope of new information gleaned from such fossil finds.In Dinosaurs Rediscovered, leading paleontologist Michael J. Benton gathers together all the latest paleontological evidence, tracing the transformation of dinosaur study from its roots in antiquated natural history to an indisputably scientific field. Among other things, the book explores how dinosaur remains are found and excavated, and especially how paleontologists read the details of dinosaurs’ lives from their fossils—their colors, their growth, and even whether we will ever be able to bring them back to life. Benton’s account shows that, though extinct, dinosaurs are still very much a part of our world.

    In these pages you’ll also meet Maya and Zuni, two orphaned baby hummingbirds who hatched from eggs the size of navy beans, and who are little more than air bubbles fringed with feathers. Their lives hang precariously in the balance—but with human help, they may one day conquer the sky. Snowball is a cockatoo whose dance video went viral on YouTube and who’s now teaching schoolchildren how to dance. You’ll meet Harris’s hawks named Fire and Smoke. And you’ll come to know and love a host of other avian characters who will change your mind forever about who birds really are. Each of these birds shows a different and utterly surprising aspect of what makes a bird a bird—and these are the lessons of Birdology: that birds are far stranger, more wondrous, and at the same time more like us than we might have dared to imagine. In Birdology, beloved author of The Good Good Pig Sy Montgomery explores the essence of the otherworldly creatures we see every day. By way of her adventures with seven birds—wild, tame, exotic, and common—she weaves new scientific insights and narrative to reveal seven kernels of bird wisdom. The first lesson of Birdology is that, no matter how common they are, Birds Are Individuals, as each of Montgomery’s distinctive Ladies clearly shows. In the leech-infested rain forest of Queensland, you’ll come face to face with a cassowary—a 150-pound, man-tall, flightless bird with a helmet of bone on its head and a slashing razor-like toenail with which it (occasionally) eviscerates people—proof that Birds Are Dinosaurs. You’ll learn from hawks that Birds Are Fierce; from pigeons, how Birds Find Their Way Home; from parrots, what it means that Birds Can Talk; and from 50,000 crows who moved into a small city’s downtown, that Birds Are Everywhere. They are the winged aliens who surround us. Birdology explains just how very "other" birds are: Their hearts look like those of crocodiles. They are covered with modified scales, which are called feathers. Their bones are hollow. Their bodies are permeated with extensive air sacs. They have no hands. They give birth to eggs. Yet despite birds’ and humans’ disparate evolutionary paths, we share emotional and intellectual abilities that allow us to communicate and even form deep bonds. When we begin to comprehend who birds really are, we deepen our capacity to approach, understand, and love these otherworldly creatures. And this, ultimately, is the priceless lesson of Birdology: it communicates a heartfelt fascination and awe for birds and restores our connection to these complex, mysterious fellow creatures.