Book picks similar to
Fireflies by David Morrell
non-fiction
favorites
calibre
health
Obama Zombies: How the Liberal Machine Brainwashed My Generation
Jason Mattera - 2010
For an entire year, otherwise clear-thinking members of the most affluent, over-educated, information-drenched generation in American history fell prey to the most expensive, hi-tech, laser-focused marketing assault in presidential campaign history. Twitter messages were machine-gunned to cell phones at mach speed. Facebook and MySpace groups spread across the Internet like digital fire. YouTube videos featuring celebrities ricocheted across the globe and into college students’ in-boxes with devastating regularity. All the while, the mega-money-raising engine whirred like a slot machine stuck on jackpot. The result: an unthinking mass of young voters marched forward to elect the most radical and untested president in U.S. history. Recognized as one of the country’s top young conservative activists by Human Events, Jason Mattera created an internet sensation with ambush video interviews that exposed clueless young liberals and cunning Democratic officials. Now he reveals the jaw-dropping lengths Barack Obama and his allies in Hollywood, Washington, and Academia went to in order to transform a legion of iPod-listening, MTV-watching followers into a winning coalition that threatens to become a long-lasting political realignment. Obama Zombies uncovers the true, behind-the-scenes story of the methods and tactics the Obama campaign unleashed on youth culture. Through personal interviews and meticulous original research, Mattera explains why conservatism’s future rests upon jolting the young masses from their slumber, yanking out their earphones, and sparking a countercultural conservative battle against the rise of the ignorant Left. The lesson from 2008 is crystal clear: When true conservatives run away, Obama zombies come out to play.
The Son and Heir: A Memoir
Alexander Münninghoff - 2014
This shameful memento came to symbolize not only his father’s tragically misguided allegiance but also a shattered marriage and ultimately the unconscionable separation of a mother and son.In this revelatory memoir, the author confronts his parents’ complex past as he reconstructs the fortunes and disillusions of an entire family upheaved during the changes of twentieth-century Europe. The Münninghoffs were driven by greed, rebellion, and rage. An embattled dynasty, they were torn between the right and the wrong side of history. Their saga haunted Alexander’s life for the next seventy years.Only in reconciling with them can this man find the courage to move forward as son and heir to the startling legacy of a flawed yet grand tradition.
The Pacific
Hugh Ambrose - 2009
From the debacle in Bataan, to the miracle at Midway and the relentless vortex of Guadalcanal, their solemn oaths to their country later led one to the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot and the others to the coral strongholds of Peleliu, the black terraces of Iwo Jima and the killing fields of Okinawa, until at last the survivors enjoyed a triumphant, yet uneasy, return home. In The Pacific, Hugh Ambrose focuses on the real-life stories of the five men who put their lives on the line for our country. To deepen the story revealed in the miniseries and go beyond it, the book dares to chart a great ocean of enmity known as The Pacific and the brave men who fought. Some considered war a profession, others enlisted as citizen soldiers. Each man served in a different part of the war, but their respective duties required every ounce of their courage and their strength to defeat an enemy who preferred suicide to surrender. The medals for valor which were pinned on three of them came at a shocking price-a price paid in full by all.
Doomstalker
Glen Cook - 1985
An innocent pup of the Degnan Packstead, Marika thought it was just a tale to frighten the young. Then the Grauken-possessed, cannibalistic nomads swept down from the far north -- and the winter of death began.Marika's pack now has to fight for its life -- even if it means calling upon the treacherous witchlike Silth who can slay by mind alone. But young Marika has powers, too... enormous, untamed mental energies. Can Marika be a weapon against their foes? Or will she become something far greater than the Silth, something fearfully whispered of only in legends... Doomstalker.
A Sorrow Beyond Dreams
Peter Handke - 1972
Throughout her life, which spanned the Nazi era, the war, and the postwar consumer economy, she struggled to maintain appearances, only to arrive at a terrible recognition: "I'm not human any more." Not long after, she killed herself with an overdose of sleeping pills.In A Sorrow Beyond Dreams her son sits down to record what he knows, or thinks he knows, about his mother's life and death before, in his words, "the dull speechlessness—the extreme speechlessness" of grief takes hold forever. And yet the experience of speechlessness, as it marks both suffering and love, lies at the heart of Handke's brief but unforgettable elegy. This austere, scrupulous, and deeply moving book is one of the finest achievements of a great contemporary writer.
William and Harry: Behind the Palace Walls
Katie Nicholl - 2010
Then just fifteen and twelve years old, William and Harry have since grown into extraordinary young men. Today they are modern princes poised to shape the Royal Family in their own image, and determined to carry the legacy of their beloved mother, Diana, into the twenty-first century.The royal brothers have been the subjects of intense scrutiny since birth, but until now, no journalist has delved as successfully into their lives as Katie Nicholl. Through her unprecedented network of sources, some of whom have agreed to speak for the very first time, Nicholl provides fascinating insight into the lives of William and Harry, following them from childhood to present day, chronicling the difficult period after their mother's tragic death, their college years, their love lives, their careers as front-line soldiers, and William's struggles with his destiny as the future king.Now, as William gets set to assume a more prominent role in the monarchy, and a royal wedding between he and Kate Middleton seems probable, Nicholl has spoken to a wealth of contacts close to the couple who reveal how their love affair really started at the University of Saint Andrews, the hurdles the pair overcame, and the challenges they still face. She recounts the story of Harry's time at Eton, his relationship with Chelsy Davy, and the three months he spent on the front line in Afghanistan. She analyzes William and Harry's complex relationship with their father, and the woman who will one day become Queen Camilla.A constantly surprising and compulsively readable book, William and Harry sheds an astonishing light on the two most famous brothers in the world.
The Saint of Dragons
Jason Hightman - 2004
Instead, they've moved undercover — and into human society. Now one lonely schoolboy is about to learn where the dragons have gone...Educated at boarding schools, Simon St. George has never met his parents. When a ragged-looking man shows up claiming to be his father, Simon is skeptical, and when the man kidnaps him, he's indignant to say the least.Then the man claims to be a descendant of England's Saint George and a career dragon fighter. Why should Simon believe any of this nonsense? But what if the man is telling the truth? What if the dragons know he's out there?Rich with the dragon lore of legend, the saint of dragons continues and enlarges on the tale of the centuries-old conflict between dragons and humans that rages even today.
The Rainbow Comes and Goes: A Mother and Son on Life, Love, and Loss
Anderson Cooper - 2016
After she suffers a brief but serious illness at the age of ninety-one, they resolve to change their relationship by beginning a year-long conversation unlike any they had ever had before. The result is a correspondence of surprising honesty and depth in which they discuss their lives, the things that matter to them, and what they still want to learn about each other.Both a son’s love letter to his mother and an unconventional mom’s life lessons for her grown son, The Rainbow Comes and Goes offers a rare window into their close relationship and fascinating life stories, including their tragedies and triumphs. In these often humorous and moving exchanges, they share their most private thoughts and the hard-earned truths they’ve learned along the way. In their words their distinctive personalities shine through—Anderson’s journalistic outlook on the world is a sharp contrast to his mother’s idealism and unwavering optimism.An appealing memoir with inspirational advice, The Rainbow Comes and Goes is a beautiful and affectionate celebration of the universal bond between a parent and a child, and a thoughtful reflection on life, reminding us of the precious insight that remains to be shared, no matter our age.
All That Remains: A Life in Death
Sue Black - 2018
As Professor of Anatomy and Forensic Anthropology, she focuses on mortal remains in her lab, at burial sites, at scenes of violence, murder and criminal dismemberment, and when investigating mass fatalities due to war, accident or natural disaster. In All that Remains she reveals the many faces of death she has come to know, using key cases to explore how forensic science has developed, and what her work has taught her. Do we expect a book about death to be sad? Macabre? Sue’s book is neither. There is tragedy, but there is also humour in stories as gripping as the best crime novel. Our own death will remain a great unknown. But as an expert witness from the final frontier, Sue Black is the wisest, most reassuring, most compelling of guides.
The Tenth Island: Finding Joy, Beauty, and Unexpected Love in the Azores
Diana Marcum - 2018
A long-buried personal sadness is enfolding her—and her career is stalled—when she stumbles upon an unusual group of immigrants living in rural California. She follows them on their annual return to the remote Azorean islands in the Atlantic Ocean, where bulls run down village streets, volcanoes are active, and the people celebrate festas to ease their saudade, a longing so deep that the Portuguese word for it can’t be fully translated.Years later, California is in a terrible drought, the wildfires seem to never end, and Diana finds herself still dreaming of those islands and the chuva—a rain so soft you don’t notice when it begins or ends.With her troublesome Labrador retriever, Murphy, in tow, Diana returns to the islands of her dreams only to discover that there are still things she longs for—and one of them may be a most unexpected love.
A Child al Confino: A True Story of Escape in War-Time Italy
Eric Lamet - 2010
Five days after Hitler marches Eric and his parents flee for their lives. His mother hides out in Italy, taking her son deeper and deeper into the mountains to avoid capture. This book tells his story.
Dear Life: A Doctor's Story of Love and Loss
Rachel Clarke - 2020
Every day she tries to bring care and comfort to those reaching the end of their lives and to help make dying more bearable. Rachel's training was put to the test in 2017 when her beloved GP father was diagnosed with terminal cancer. She learned that nothing - even the best palliative care - can sugar-coat the pain of losing someone you love. And yet, she argues, in a hospice there is more of what matters in life - more love, more strength, more kindness, more joy, more tenderness, more grace, more compassion - than you could ever imagine. For if there is a difference between people who know they are dying and the rest of us, it is simply this: that the terminally ill know their time is running out, while we live as though we have all the time in the world. Dear Life is a book about the vital importance of human connection, by the doctor we would all want by our sides at a time of crisis. It is a love letter - to a father, to a profession, to life itself.
Blue Nights
Joan Didion - 2011
Richly textured with bits of her own childhood and married life with her husband, John Gregory Dunne, and daughter, Quintana Roo, this book by Joan Didion examines her thoughts, fears, and doubts regarding having children, illness, and growing old. Blue Nights opens on July 26, 2010, as Didion thinks back to Quintana’s wedding in New York seven years before. Today would be her wedding anniversary. This fact triggers vivid snapshots of Quintana’s childhood—in Malibu, in Brentwood, at school in Holmby Hills. Reflecting on her daughter but also on her role as a parent, Didion asks the candid questions any parent might about how she feels she failed either because cues were not taken or perhaps displaced. “How could I have missed what was clearly there to be seen?” Finally, perhaps we all remain unknown to each other. Seamlessly woven in are incidents Didion sees as underscoring her own age, something she finds hard to acknowledge, much less accept. Blue Nights—the long, light evening hours that signal the summer solstice, “the opposite of the dying of the brightness, but also its warning”—like The Year of Magical Thinking before it, is an iconic book of incisive and electric honesty, haunting and profoundly moving.
When Twilight Comes
B.J. Daniels - 2005
Harry Ballantine had been a prisoner of Fernhaven forest and now he found the key to his salvation in Jenna Dante. But would she surrender to him before she left the hidden hamlet?With an angry ex on her tail and rain pouring, the last thing Jenna Dante needed was car trouble and a cranky child. Her only option was to seek refuge in the desolate hotel on the hill in Fernhaven. But the restored walls seemed to hold more than memories. For Jenna they vibrated with life and an all-male seduction she could only see and feel in her mind. But when danger came to call, she would need flesh-and-blood protection - and maybe something more lethal...like transcending love.
Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself: A Road Trip with David Foster Wallace
David Lipsky - 2010
Wallace’s pieces for Harper’s magazine in the ’90s were, according to Lipsky, “like hearing for the first time the brain voice of everybody I knew: Here was how we all talked, experienced, thought. It was like smelling the damp in the air, seeing the first flash from a storm a mile away. You knew something gigantic was coming.”Then Rolling Stone sent Lipsky to join Wallace on the last leg of his book tour for Infinite Jest, the novel that made him internationally famous. They lose to each other at chess. They get iced-in at an airport. They dash to Chicago to catch a make-up flight. They endure a terrible reader’s escort in Minneapolis. Wallace does a reading, a signing, an NPR appearance. Wallace gives in and imbibes titanic amounts of hotel television (what he calls an “orgy of spectation”). They fly back to Illinois, drive home, walk Wallace’s dogs. Amid these everyday events, Wallace tells Lipsky remarkable things—everything he can about his life, how he feels, what he thinks, what terrifies and fascinates and confounds him—in the writing voice Lipsky had come to love. Lipsky took notes, stopped envying him, and came to feel about him—that grateful, awake feeling—the same way he felt about Infinite Jest. Then Lipsky heads to the airport, and Wallace goes to a dance at a Baptist church.A biography in five days, Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself is David Foster Wallace as few experienced this great American writer. Told in his own words, here is Wallace’s own story, and his astonishing, humane, alert way of looking at the world; here are stories of being a young writer—of being young generally—trying to knit together your ideas of who you should be and who other people expect you to be, and of being young in March of 1996. And of what it was like to be with and—as he tells it—what it was like to become David Foster Wallace.