Book picks similar to
The Story of Alexander Graham Bell: Inventor of the Telephone by Margaret Davidson
biographical
chapter-books
e-books
in-the-past
Becoming the Natural: My Life In and Out of the Cage
Randy Couture - 1900
Randy Couture wins fights with the seemingly effortless ease with which lesser mortals eat or breathe. He's the only athlete to have held championship titles in both the heavyweight and light heavyweight divisions of the UFC, and he's the only six-time title earner in UFC history.In "Becoming the Natural," Couture tells his story for the first time, beginning with a childhood spent in search of an elusive father figure, followed by the pure adrenaline rush that accompanied his first wrestling bout in grade school. In 1997, at the age of thirty-three, Couture made his UFC debut, defeating two opponents in the heavyweight class and then scoring a TKO victory against Brazilian phenom Vitor Belfort to earn the nickname "The Natural." He won his first heavyweight title that same year. At the age of forty, he defeated five-time defending champion Tito Ortiz for the undisputed light heavyweight title. Couture retired in 2006, only to reemerge the following year and seize the heavyweight championship title once again."Becoming the Natural" is the remarkable story of one of the world's most gifted and dedicated athletes -- a born fighter whose skill and showmanship have helped to lift mixed martial arts out of the shadows and into the mainstream.
The Early History of the Airplane
Orville Wright - 1922
You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
You Deserve a Drink: Boozy Misadventures and Tales of Debauchery
Mamrie Hart - 2015
With over a million subscribers to her cult-hit video series “You Deserve a Drink,” Hart has been entertaining viewers with a combination of tasty libations and raunchy puns since 2011. Hart also co-wrote/co-starred in Dirty Thirty and Camp Takota with Grace Helbig and Hannah Hart.Finally, Hart has compiled her best drinking stories—and worst hangovers—into one hilarious volume. From the spring break where she and her girlfriends avoided tan lines by staying at an all-male gay nudist resort, to the bachelorette party where she accidentally hired a sixty-year-old meth head to teach the group pole dancing (not to mention the time she lit herself on fire during a Flaming Lips concert), Hart accompanies each story with an original cocktail recipe, ensuring that You Deserve a Drink is as educational as it is entertaining.
Steve McQueen: The Salvation of an American Icon
Greg Laurie - 2017
This iconic muscle car was the vehicle McQueen drove in his most raucous and enduring film, Bullitt. In the 1960s, McQueen was, according to box office receipts, the biggest movie star of his generation and one of the coolest men to ever walk the planet. Greg Laurie was a teen at the time and an ardent fan of “The King of Cool,” first mesmerized by McQueen in 1963’s The Great Escape. Like millions of cinema fans, Greg developed a lifelong fascination with the actor. Now he has a chance to tell McQueen’s story. McQueen was a complex, contradictory man who lived the same way he drove his motorcycles and cars: fearlessly, ruthlessly and at top speed. After a lifetime of fast cars, women and drugs, McQueen took a surprising detour. In this book, Laurie thoughtfully interviews members of Steve McQueen’s family, friends, co-stars, associates, widow and pastor to tell of the dramatic life-change for the actor in the spring of 1979 – six months before McQueen was diagnosed with terminal cancer. What were the critical steps that led McQueen to make such a life-altering decision? Perhaps more importantly, why is that part of his story so rarely told? This book answers these questions. Greg Laurie will follow the seeds of Christianity that were sown throughout McQueen’s improbable life where a Light finally shone into the darkness of his troubled life. These seeds miraculously germinated, allowing McQueen to see that redemption through Jesus Christ is a lasting truth more glittering and real than any magic of the entertainment industry.
It's Hard to Fight Naked
Niecy Nash - 2013
Right.Niecy Nash wants you to find love. She invites you to think differently about traditional norms and matters of the heart. She wants you to get the very thing we are created for—great relationships! But you have to want it too. None of this “there are no good men left” nonsense. With an attitude like that, you might as well keep your butt at home because you already believe unhappiness is yours to claim. The universe will send you somebody amazing, but why would it ever send the best for you when you’re not at your best? Time for a tall glass of “act right”!Before you start thinking, “Well, it’s easy for Niecy to dish out advice with her hilarious hit television shows and her hot, sexy husband,” just know that she’s been cheated on, divorced, brokenhearted, and laid up in bed, wailing and gnashing, surrounded by girlfriends telling her that those men didn’t deserve her. None of that was constructive! Each time, she had to be honest with herself before she could make the choice to find love again.In this hilarious, heartfelt book of no-nonsense dating and relationship wisdom, Niecy tells it like it is. What she has to say might not always be popular with your girlfriends. Your perseverance will be tested. But in the end you will find out how to keep yourself happy and your man coming back for more! You’ll also understand your priorities, you’ll know where to look for love, you’ll learn how to keep your relationship thriving, how to fight fair with your partner, and best of all, how hard it is to fight at all if you're naked!You attract what you are, so be what you want to see. Loving and caring for yourself will welcome a man who will do the same.
Ayoade on Ayoade: A Cinematic Odyssey
Richard Ayoade - 2014
It wouldn't. In fact, it's actually pretty insulting that this so-called 'Community' hasn't done more to acknowledge (or even begin to repay) its undoubted debt to me.Richard Ayoade is many things - film director (of Submarine and the forthcoming The Double), comedy actor (The IT Crowd), comedian and TV presenter (Gadget Man). Ayoade on Ayoade captures the director in his own words: pompous, vain, angry and very, very funny.
Becoming Elisabeth Elliot
Ellen Vaughn - 2020
Incredibly, prayerfully, Elisabeth took her toddler daughter, snakebite kit, Bible, and journal . . . and lived in the jungle with the Stone-Age people who killed her husband. Compelled by her friendship and forgiveness, many came to faith in Jesus. This courageous, no-nonsense Christian went on to write dozens of books, host a long-running radio show, and speak at conferences all over the world. She was a pillar of coherent, committed faith; a beloved and sometimes controversial icon. In this authorized biography, Becoming Elisabeth Elliot, bestselling author Ellen Vaughn uses Elisabeth’s private, unpublished journals, and candid interviews with her family and friends, to paint the adventures and misadventures God used to shape one of the most influential women in modern church history. It’s the story of a hilarious, sensual, brilliant, witty, self-deprecating, sensitive, radical, and surprisingly relatable person utterly submitted to doing God’s will, no matter how high the cost. For Elisabeth, the central question was not, “How does this make me feel?” but, simply, “is this true?” If so, then the next question was, “what do I need to do about it to obey God?” “My life is on Thy Altar, Lord—for Thee to consume. Set the fire, Father! Bind me with cords of love to the Altar. Hold me there. Let me remember the Cross.” –Elisabeth Elliot, age 21
Stuart: A Life Backwards
Alexander Masters - 2005
A gripping who-done-it journey back in time, it begins with Masters meeting a drunken Stuart lying on a sidewalk in Cambridge, England, and leads through layers of hell…back through crimes and misdemeanors, prison and homelessness, suicide attempts, violence, drugs, juvenile halls and special schools–to expose the smiling, gregarious thirteen-year-old boy who was Stuart before his long, sprawling, dangerous fall. Shocking, inspiring, and hilarious by turns, Stuart: A Life Backwards is a writer’s quest to give voice to a man who, beneath his forbidding exterior, has a message for us all: that every life–even the most chaotic and disreputable–is a story worthy of being told.From the Hardcover edition.
Bring It! (Shake It Up! Junior Novel)
N.B. Grace - 2012
Rocky and CeCe are psyched to show the world their latest moves at a dance marathon on Shake It Up, Chicago! But when CeCe's younger brother Flynn keeps them up late the night before the marathon, will the girls be too exhausted to participate? The excitement continues when Rocky and CeCe volunteer to choreograph the Little Cutie Queen Pageant!
Now for the Disappointing Part: A Pseudo-Adult’s Decade of Short-Term Jobs, Long-Term Relationships, and Holding Out for Something Better
Steven Barker - 2016
Steven, in contrast, has followed the philosophy of “quit everything until you find something you don’t want to quit,” and has spent over fifteen years as a contract employee, a demographic that has come to make up 2 percent of the nation’s work force. Now for the Disappointing Part is the first collection of essays written for the temp workers of the millennial generation—those who, by choice or circumstance, delay or abandon plans for long-term careers for the variety (and anxiety) of contract work.Funny, insightful, and sometimes shocking, Barker details his life moving from job to job as his contracts expire. He faces abuse as an account manager at Amazon when callers assume he’s in India. He learns about office politics at a nonprofit. And he attends an open call at UPS for holiday help. The chapters explore issues ranging from financial instability to how gender and race play into the workforce to the (often poor) treatment temporary employees receive compared to full-time employees performing the same job. Throughout Barker also reveals his parallel relationships with women, which, like the jobs he works, appear to have predetermined expiration dates.Now for the Disappointing Part is more than the stories of a man who thinks life is too short to spend forty hours a week doing something you hate. It will resonate with a generation of people who are struggling to find work, stability, and happiness, and are afraid of losing all of them.
I Can Only Imagine: A Memoir
Bart Millard - 2018
But few know about the pain, redemption, and healing that inspired it. Now Bart Millard, award-winning recording artist and lead singer of MercyMe, shares how his dad’s transformation from abusive father to man of God sparked a divine moment in music history. Go behind the scenes of Bart’s life—and the movie based on it—to discover how God repaired a broken family, prepared Bart for ministry through music, and wrote the words on his heart that would change his life forever. I Can Only Imagine is a front-row seat to witnessing God’s presence throughout Bart’s life. Whether falling in love with his childhood sweetheart or mourning his father’s death, founding MercyMe or flailing in the midst of its success, Bart continues to place his trust in God’s plans—plans that continue to surprise and surpass what Bart could have ever imagined.
Dead Men Tell Tales: The Memoir of a Police Surgeon
B. Umadathan - 2021
Umadathan.Popularly known as the 'Sherlock Holmes of Kerala', Dr Umadathan revisits some of his strangest and most interesting cases, like the Chacko murder masterminded by Sukumara Kurup; the sensational Polakkulam case; and the baffling Panoor Soman case.Chilling, shocking and, at times, downright bizarre, Dead Men Tell Tales is unputdownable.
Love, Ellen: A Mother/Daughter Journey
Betty DeGeneres - 1999
Twenty years ago, during a walk on a Mississippi beach, Ellen DeGeneres spoke those simple, powerful words to her mother. That emotional moment eventually brought mother and daughter closer than ever, but it was not without a struggle. In Love, Ellen, Betty DeGeneres tells her story: the complicated path to acceptance and the deepening of her friendship with her daughter, the media's scrutiny of their family life, and the painful and often inspiring stories she's heard on the road as the first nongay spokesperson for the Human Rights Campaign's National Coming Out Project.Insightful, universally touching, and uncommonly wise, Love, Ellen is a story of friendship between mother and daughter and a lesson in understanding for all parents and their children.
Mozart in the Jungle: Sex, Drugs, and Classical Music
Blair Tindall - 2005
In a book that inspired the Amazon Original series starring Gael Garcia Bernal and Malcolm McDowell, oboist Blair Tindall recounts her decades-long professional career as a classical musician--from the recitals and Broadway orchestra performances to the secret life of musicians who survive hand to mouth in the backbiting New York classical music scene, where musicians trade sexual favors for plum jobs and assignments in orchestras across the city. Tindall and her fellow journeymen musicians often play drunk, high, or hopelessly hungover, live in decrepit apartments, and perform in hazardous conditions-- working-class musicians who schlep across the city between low-paying gigs, without health-care benefits or retirement plans, a stark contrast to the rarefied experiences of overpaid classical musician superstars. An incisive, no-holds-barred account, Mozart in the Jungle is the first true, behind-the-scenes look at what goes on backstage and in the Broadway pit.
Lost in Tokyo: A Year of Sex, Sushi, and Suicide in the Real Japan
Garett Wilson - 2018
until he started a new job and a new life at a high school in downtown Tokyo. Here he discovered the real Japan, not the version sold to tourists, and realized that it was far more thrilling, heartbreaking, and beautiful than anything he had ever experienced. Over the course of one year in Tokyo, Garett navigates the perilous waters of 21st-century Japan, where love and laughter are as common as violence and tragedy. From love hotels to sumo, yakuza gangs to hostess bars, and a Shinto wedding to a KFC Christmas, discover what Tokyo is really like for its 38 million inhabitants. A travel book, a tale of sex and romance, and a love letter to a maddening, wonderful place, Lost in Tokyo provides a new perspective on living, working and playing in the world's most vibrant city.