Adjusting Sights


Haim Sabato - 1999
    A month later, Haim returns alone, on his first leave home. Struggling to come to terms with his experiences he wonders what happened to Dov during those fateful days.

Moments of Reprieve


Primo Levi - 1981
    Levi was a master storyteller but he did not write fairytales. These stories are an elegy to the human figures who stood out against the tragic background of Auschwitz, 'the ones in whom I had recognized the will and capacity to react, and hence a rudiment of virtue'. Each centres on an individual who - whether it be through a juggling trick, a slice of apple or a letter - discovers one of the 'bizarre, marginal moments of reprieve'.The English edition includes just one section of the three originally published in Italian under the title 'Lilít', tales from the other two sections have been published in 'A Tranquil Star'.

Humorous History: An Illustrated Collection of Wit & Irony from the Past


A.G. Mogan - 2017
    For it is but the record of the public and official acts of human beings. It is our object, therefore, to humanize our history and deal with people past and present; people who ate and possibly drank; people who were born, flourished, and died. And if we cannot laugh at ourselves, then we are condemned to repeat the very same deeds of the past.

The Glory Game


Frank Gifford - 2008
    When his New York Giants played the Baltimore Colts for the league championship that year, it became the single most memorable contest in the history of professional football. Broadcast to an audience of millions, it was the first title game ever to go into sudden-death overtime. Its drama, excitement, and controversy riveted the nation and helped propel football to the forefront of the American sports landscape.Now, to mark the fiftieth anniversary of "The Greatest Game Ever Played," New York Giants Hall of Famer and longtime television analyst Frank Gifford provides an inside-the-helmet account that will take its place in the annals of sports literature. Drawing on the poignant and humorous memories of every living player from the game -- including fellow Hall of Famers Sam Huff, Andy Robustelli, Art Donovan, Lenny Moore, and Raymond Berry -- as well as the author's own experiences and reflections, The Glory Game captures a magnificent moment in American sports history. It is the story of two very different cities and teams, filled with the joy, the disappointment, and the eternal pride of a day that will forever symbolize all that is great about sports.Told with gripping immediacy, The Glory Game is an indelible portrait of the NFL's most transcendent hours -- a winter version of The Boys of Summer, told by one of football's true legends.

Chasing the Last Laugh: Mark Twain's Raucous and Redemptive Round-the-World Comedy Tour


Richard Zacks - 2016
    “There are two times in a man’s life when he should not speculate,” he wrote. “When he can’t afford it and when he can.” The publishing company Twain owned was failing; his investment in a typesetting device was bleeding red ink. After losing hundreds of thousands of dollars back when a beer cost a nickel, he found himself neck-deep in debt. His heiress wife, Livy, took the setback hard. “I have a perfect horror and heart-sickness over it,” she wrote. “I cannot get away from the feeling that business failure means disgrace.”     But Twain vowed to Livy he would pay back every penny. And so, just when the fifty-nine-year-old, bushy-browed icon imagined that he would be settling into literary lionhood, telling jokes at gilded dinners, he forced himself to mount the “platform” again, embarking on a round-the-world stand-up comedy tour. No author had ever done that. He cherry-picked his best stories—such as stealing his first watermelon and buying a bucking bronco—and spun them into a ninety-minute performance.     Twain trekked across the American West and onward by ship to the faraway lands of Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania, India, Ceylon, and South Africa. He rode an elephant twice and visited the Taj Mahal. He saw Zulus dancing and helped sort diamonds at the Kimberley mines. (He failed to slip away with a sparkly souvenir.) He played shuffleboard on cruise ships and battled captains for the right to smoke in peace. He complained that his wife and daughter made him shave and change his shirt every day.     The great American writer fought off numerous illnesses and travel nuisances to circle the globe and earn a huge payday and a tidal wave of applause. Word of his success, however, traveled slowly enough that one American newspaper reported that he had died penniless in London. That’s when he famously quipped: “The report of my death was an exaggeration.”     Throughout his quest, Twain was aided by cutthroat Standard Oil tycoon H.H. Rogers, with whom he had struck a deep friendship, and he was hindered by his own lawyer (and future secretary of state) Bainbridge Colby, whom he deemed “head idiot of this century.”     In Chasing the Last Laugh, author Richard Zacks, drawing extensively on unpublished material in notebooks and letters from Berkeley’s ongoing Mark Twain Project, chronicles a poignant chapter in the author’s life—one that began in foolishness and bad choices but culminated in humor, hard-won wisdom, and ultimate triumph.

The Anglo Files: A Field Guide to the English


Sarah Lyall - 2008
    She’s since returned to the United States, but this distillation of incisive—and irreverent—insights, now updated with a new preface, is just as illuminating today. And perhaps even more so, in the wake of Brexit and the attendant national identity crisis.While there may be no easy answer to the question of how, exactly, to understand the English, The Anglo Files—part anthropological field study, part memoir—helps point the way.

One for the Books


Joe Queenan - 2012
    In the years since then he has dedicated himself to an assortment of idiosyncratic reading challenges: spending a year reading only short books, spending a year reading books he always suspected he would hate, spending a year reading books he picked with his eyes closed.In One for the Books, Queenan tries to come to terms with his own eccentric reading style. How many more books will he have time to read in his lifetime? Why does he refuse to read books hailed by reviewers as “astonishing”? Why does he refuse to lend out books? Will he ever buy an e-book? Why does he habitually read thirty to forty books simultaneously? Why are there so many people to whom the above questions do not even matter? And what do they read? Acerbically funny yet passionate and oddly affectionate, One for the Books is a reading experience that true book lovers will find unforgettable.

James Madison: A Life From Beginning to End


Henry Freeman - 2016
    As the people who crafted the documents that would win Americans freedom from Great Britain and establish a constitutional republic, they were indeed a special group. One of the most overlooked Founders is James Madison. His life was as extraordinary as the others, but for some reason, he doesn't often find himself in the popularity column. Inside you will read about... ✓ Early Life ✓ Early Political Career ✓ Father of the Constitution ✓ The Federalist Papers ✓ Politician and Statesman ✓ President 1809-1817 ✓ Personal Life ✓ Later Years This ebook will introduce you to James Madison. Besides becoming the 4th president of the United States, he served in government for most of his life. You will meet him as he goes off to college, when he returns home to Montpelier, and when he decides to assist with the greatest achievement of his life, the writing of the U. S. Constitution. James Madison was a man not to be forgotten. This ebook will prove to you why.

The Violet Hour: Great Writers at the End


Katie Roiphe - 2016
      In The Violet Hour, Katie Roiphe takes an unexpected and liberating approach to the most unavoidable of subjects. She investigates the last days of five great thinkers, writers, and artists as they come to terms with the reality of approaching death, or what T. S. Eliot called “the evening hour that strives Homeward, and brings the sailor home from sea.”   Roiphe draws on her own extraordinary research and access to the family, friends, and caretakers of her subjects. Here is Susan Sontag, the consummate public intellectual, who finds her commitment to rational thinking tested during her third bout with cancer. Roiphe takes us to the hospital room where, after receiving the worst possible diagnosis, seventy-six-year-old John Updike begins writing a poem. She vividly re-creates the fortnight of almost suicidal excess that culminated in Dylan Thomas’s fatal collapse on the floor of a Greenwich Village tavern. She gives us a bracing portrait of Sigmund Freud fleeing Nazi-occupied Vienna only to continue in his London exile the compulsive cigar smoking that he knows will hasten his decline. And she shows us how Maurice Sendak’s beloved books for children are infused with his lifelong obsession with death, if you know where to look.  The Violet Hour is a book filled with intimate and surprising revelations. In the final acts of each of these creative geniuses are examples of courage, passion, self-delusion, pointless suffering, and superb devotion. There are also moments of sublime insight and understanding where the mind creates its own comfort. As the author writes, “If it’s nearly impossible to capture the approach of death in words, who would have the most hope of doing it?” By bringing these great writers’ final days to urgent, unsentimental life, Katie Roiphe helps us to look boldly in the face of death and be less afraid.

Bonifacio's Bolo


Ambeth R. Ocampo - 1995
    In Bonifacio's Bolo, Ambeth Ocampo adds even more interesting bits to another scrapbook of history.

Ball Four


Jim Bouton - 1970
    The commissioner, executives, and players were shocked. Sportswriters called author Jim Bouton a traitor and "social leper." Baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn tried to force him to declare the book untrue. Fans, however, loved the book. And serious critics called it an important social document. Today, Jim Bouton is still not invited to Oldtimer's Days at Yankee Stadium. But his landmark book is still being read by people who don't ordinarily follow baseball.

You Can't Say That: Memoirs


Ken Livingstone - 2011
    From his eccentric South London working class childhood to running one of the biggest cities in the world, Ken Livingstone delivers the turbulent true story of his life as one of Britain's foremost politicians.

We Will Rise: A True Story of Tragedy and Resurrection in the American Heartland


Steve Beaven - 2020
    With a charismatic young coach and a freshman phenom, this small Indiana city hoped to see its team shine in the national spotlight. Then, on a foggy night, after just four games, the plane carrying the team and its coach crashed after takeoff, killing everyone on board.The tragedy seemed insurmountable, a devastating blow to the identity of a fading factory town. But, with the support of a city in mourning, ambitious new coach Dick Walters promised to rebuild the cherished institution. Assembling a team of castoffs, walk-ons, and overachievers, Walters restored the legacy of the team and its fans. Against all odds, his young men made history.A tribute to those who were lost, and to those who carried on, We Will Rise is the rich and powerful story of an underdog team and its fans and the spirit of a resilient community.

The Best New True Crime Stories: Small Towns (History, Forensic Psychology, Criminology)


Mitzi Szereto - 2020
    We’ve been told nothing bad happens in small towns. You can leave your doors unlocked, and your windows wide open. We picture peaceful hamlets with a strong sense of community, and everyone knows each other. But what if this wholesome idyllic image doesn’t always square with reality? Small towns might look and feel safe, but statistics show this isn’t really true.Tiny town, big crime. Whether in Truman Capote’s detailed murder of the Clutter family or Ted Bundy’s small-town charm, criminals have always roamed rural America and towns worldwide. Featuring murder stories, criminal case studies, and more, The Best New True Crime Stories: Small Towns contains all-new accounts from writers of true crime, crime journalism, and crime fiction. And these entries are not based on a true story―they are true stories. Edited by acclaimed author and anthologist Mitzi Szereto, the stories in this volume span the globe. Discover how unsolved murders, kidnapping, shooting sprees, violent robbery, and other bad things can and do happen in small towns all over the world.If you enjoyed Mitzi's last book in the series, The Best New True Crime Stories: Serial Killers, and true crime books like In Cold Blood, Murder in the Bayou, and The Innocent Man, then you’ll love The Best New True Crime Stories: Small Towns.