Along the way, Lori explores the small things, both meanness and goodness in relationships, to discover what Austen herself knew: the worth of an ordinary life.

    The political and socio-economic developments that have influenced the growth of modern India have been dealt with in independent chapters.

    She avoided the scales, she wore a uniform of baggy black clothes, refused to make connections between her weight and health issues and told herself that she was fat and happy. She was certainly fat. But the happy part was an Oscar-worthy performance. In private she lived with a growing sense of fear and misery that her weight would probably kill her before she made it to seventy. Interwoven with the science, social history and psychology of weight management, Fat Cow, Fat Chance is a refreshingly honest account of what it's like to be fat when society dictates that skinny is the norm. It asks why we overeat and why, when the weight is finally lost through dieting, do we simply pile the pounds back on again? How do we help young people become comfortable with the way they look? What are the consequences of the obesity epidemic for an already overstretched NHS? And, whilst fat shaming is so often called out, why is it that shouting 'fat cow' at a woman in the street hasn't been included in the list of hate crimes?Fusing politics, science and personal pain, this is a powerful exploration of our battle with obesity._______________'Agony and confusion, humour and hope. A beautiful book.' SUSIE ORBACH, author of Fat is a Feminist Issue

    Chronicles of a Cruise Ship Crew Member goes below the waterline to explore the cramped, dirty, and dimly lit crew areas on a revealing tour of the ship's underworld. Go where no passenger has gone before and learn what the crew eats, where they sleep, how they party, and finally understand why all of the officers on a cruise ship are Italian.Climb aboard an adventure on the high seas and witness the wonderful side of ship life where crew members have whirlwind escapades while traveling the world aboard a massive sailing city.Drawing from his experiences working as a musician aboard cruise ships for more than five years, Joshua tells the laugh-out-loud funny and also beautifully poignant story of what cruise ship crew members experience from the minute they first step onto a ship to the day they walk down that gangway for the last time.

    This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.

    This Irish-American couple told of their decision to emigrate in reverse, to settle in Christine's great-grandmother's cottage in the west of Ireland, in "O Come Ye Back to Ireland." They chronicled their further adventures, and the adoption of their daughter, Deirdre, in "When Summer's in the Meadow." Now they take us with them on their travels by foot, bicycle, car and boat through the island they have come to know and love in search of that "Irish feeling, " the feeling which first called them back to Ireland.

    Activist author Marissa LaRocca's revelatory tale includes her struggle with her secrets, including sexuality, and how she emerged as an outspoken advocate for gay rights and women’s health issues.Anorexia and bulimia health crisis: Many young women and girls struggle with the body image issues that engender eating disorders with elaborate rituals around food, binging, purging, and hiding it all while trying to maintain a face of normalcy to the world. Anorexia and bulimia have become major national health crises with skyrocketing statistics indicating that between 3 and 5% of the population suffer anorexia nervosa alone. Sadly, many never attain the sense of being “normal” and deal with a lifetime of body image and self-esteem issues.Coming of age story of a woman battling for self-esteem: This intimate account of courage and the search for truth and meaning will have you rooting for Marissa LaRocca as she unravels the emotional layers of her own battle with food, body image, and sexuality. Readers of this riveting memoir, Starving in Search of Me, will relate to the coming-of-age story of a young woman confronting some of life’s major issues while living, for a time, in two closets: one to hide her eating disorder and one to hide her sexuality and very identity. What You'll Learn Inside This Book: Identify the root causes, symptoms, and triggers associated with an eating disorder Acknowledge the "life issues" that are being masked by "food issues" or another addiction Disempower compulsive behaviors like binging, purging, and obsessing about calories and exercise Heal your relationship with food through healing your relationship with yourself Escape the victim role, become empowered, and take responsibility for your own happiness Connect with your life’s purpose and authentic self, transforming your weaknesses into strengths Free your mind through tuning in to the body and witnessing emotions Improve your body image and self-esteem by aligning your lifestyle with your true values, desires, and what is realistic Effectively communicate your needs with confidence Establish guilt-free lifestyle boundaries to reduce anxiety and maximize vitality Enhance peace of mind by developing a reliable support system Eliminate the need to be perfect by practicing forgiveness and compassion toward yourself

    Even his metal tools melted. Friends loaned him a tent, but after just a month it began to break down—which Warren vowed not to do. Instead, he decided to follow a childhood dream and live in a tipi. Excitement stirred in his chest, and so began a two-year adventure of struggle, contemplation, and achievement that brought him even closer to the land that he called home. More than just the story of one man, Two Winters in a Tipi gives the history and use of the native structure, providing valuable advice, through Warren’s trial and error, about the confrontations that march toward a tipi dweller. It shows, without thumping the drum of environmental doom, how you can go back to the land for two days or two years. The wild plants that Natives harvested for food and medicine still grow nearby. The foods still nourish; the medicines still heal. As Warren beautifully reveals, the wild places of the past still exist in our everyday lives, and living that wilderness is still a possibility. It’s as close as the river running through your city, the woods in your neighborhood, or even the edges of your own backyard.

    As an impoverished writer in need of rejuvenation, Miller travelled to Greece at the invitation of his friend, the writer Lawrence Durrell. The text is inspired by the events that occurred. The text is ostensibly a portrait of the Greek writer George Katsimbalis, although some critics have opined that is more of a self-portrait of Miller himself.[1] Miller considered it to be his greatest work.

    Beginning with a dilemma about whether he spends more money on reading or smoking, George Orwell's entertaining and uncompromising essays go on to explore everything from the perils of second-hand bookshops to the dubious profession of being a critic, from freedom of the press to what patriotism really means.

    This is the story of his life: the ups, the downs, from finding fame to losing his father, and his love-affair with music. Raised in Lancashire, as the youngest of nine children with a father who played opera at home, Alfie's story is not typical of opera stars. His dreams of singing were only ever going to be dreams until fate intervened in the form of a stranger: he was training as a car mechanic when a customer overheard him and told him about a London audition which Alfie needed to try out for. He got the part and never looked back. This is the story of how Alfie went from car mechanic to this generation's most popular and well-known opera star. How he became celebrated by Baz Luhrman, Cameron Macintosh and Michael Parkinson as the best tenor we've produced in a generation. This is also the story of snobbery from within the establishment and how Alfie has created serious upset with some of the more traditionally inclined members of the opera scene. It's a story which his legions of fans will love.

    He has entertained, charmed and occasionally spooked us with his books and stories and opened our eyes to the beauty of the everyday and the natural world. He has made us smile when our spirits are low and steadied us when we’ve stumbled. Now, in this brilliantly readable autobiography—his book of books—one of India’s greatest writers shows us the roots of everything he has written. He begins with a dream and a gentle haunting, before taking us to an idyllic childhood in Jamnagar by the Arabian Sea—where he composed his first poem—and New Delhi in the early 1940s—where he found material for his first short story. It was a brief period of happiness that ended with his parents’ separation and the untimely death of his beloved father. A search for companionship and security, undercut by a fierce independence and a tendency for risk-taking, would inform every choice he made for the rest of his life. With effortless intimacy and candour, Bond recalls his boarding school days in Shimla and winter holidays in Dehradun, when he tried to come to terms with a sense of abandonment, made friends, discovered great books and found his true calling. Determined to be a writer, he spent four difficult years in England, from 1951 to 1955 and he writes poignantly of his loneliness there, even as he kept his promise to himself and produced a book—the classic novel of adolescence, The Room on the Roof. It was born of his longing for ‘the atmosphere that was India’—the home he would return to even before the novel was published, taking a gamble that would prove to be the best decision he made. In the final, glorious section of the autobiography, he writes about losing his restlessness and settling down in the hills of Mussoorie, surrounded by generous trees, mist and sunshine, birdsong, elusive big cats, new friends and eccentrics—and a family that grew around him and made him its own. Full of anecdote, warmth and gentle wit; often deeply moving and always with a magnificent sense of time and place—and containing over fifty photographs, some of them never seen before Lone Fox Dancing is a book of understated, enduring magic, like Ruskin Bond himself.

    After studying law at Cambrige and time spent helping to prosecute Japanese war criminals, Yun Ling Teoh seeks solace among the jungle fringed plantations of Northern Malaya where she grew up as a child.

    Jangmi, on the other hand, has had to fend for herself since childhood, most recently by smuggling goods across the border. Then there is Danny, a Chinese-American teenager of North Korean descent whose quirks and precocious intelligence have long marked him as an outcast in his California high school. These three disparate lives converge when each of them escapes to the region where China borders North Korea—Danny to visit his mother, who is working as a missionary there, after a humiliating incident keeps him out of school; Yongju to escape persecution after his father is killed at the hands of the Dear Leader himself; and Jangmi to protect her unborn child. As they struggle to survive in a place where danger seems to close in on all sides, in the form of government informants, husbands, thieves, abductors, and even missionaries, they come to form a kind of adoptive family. But will Yongju, Jangmi and Danny find their way to the better lives they risked everything for? Transporting the reader to one of the most little-known and threatening environments in the world, and exploring how humanity persists even in the most desperate circumstances, How I Became a North Korean is a brilliant and essential first novel by one of our most promising writers.

    When Ron returned to his home in Botswana, Caitlin joined him in Maun, the 'Place of Reeds', and the two began their lives together. Eager to absorb all that Setswana culture had to offer, Caitlin found herself becoming part of Ron's extended family, falling in love with both the country and its people. Eventually, with the birth of their daughter, Caitlin's happiness seemed complete.But the Botswana of the 1990s was changing. AIDS and urbanization had taken their toll, violence was on the increase. When, with her child in her arms, Caitlin was brutally attacked, Ron's family closed ranks and Caitlin found herself ostracized by the very people she had grown to love.Passionate, hilarious, dramatic and heartbreaking in turn, PLACE OF REEDS is a story of the clash of cultures, the inflexibility of belief and traditions. It's a story about women - about Caitlin and her daughter, about Eliah and Madintwa, Ron's formidable mother and grandmother. Most of all, it's a story about one woman's courage, resilience - and ultimately, survival.