The music and mayhem behind the seminal sounds of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Models, The Go-Betweens, Hunters & Collectors, Cold Chisel, The Saints, The Cruel Sea and so many more 'The most obsessive, single-minded character I've ever seen, outside of the mirror' -Nick Cave 'I first met Nick Cave ... at Richmond Recorders in January. I appeared shoeless, red-eyed and late. As usual. The grand piano was overflowing with bits of metal, microphone stands, anything that wasn't nailed down. "That should sound interesting," I said. It was the start of a great love affair.' Maverick music producer-engineer Tony Cohen defined Australia's punk and rock sounds in the late '70s, '80s and '90s. His long and celebrated career took him from the studios of Melbourne and Sydney to West Berlin and London's Abbey Road, working with innumerable bands up until his death in 2017. In candid reflections, Tony shares details of his decades-long relationship with Nick Cave (The Boys Next Door, The Birthday Party, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds) and provides behind-the-scenes access to recordings by Billy Thorpe and the Aztecs, Cat Stevens, Jim Keays, Lobby Loyde, The Ferrets, Split Enz, Laughing Clowns, Models, Magazine, The Reels, The Go-Betweens, Hunters & Collectors, Cold Chisel, Beasts of Bourbon, The Saints, X, Michael Hutchence, The Cruel Sea, TISM, Paul Kelly and so many more. Half Deaf, Completely Mad is a hilarious, tragic and triumphant memoir that reveals a chaotic genius who lived hard and LOUD.

The dramatic rescue of Tony Bullimore in January 1997 was the exhilarating climax to one of the most remarkable survival stories of modern times. When Bullimore's yacht Exide Challenger capsized in the icy vastness of the Southern Ocean, he had been at sea for two months, competing in the Vendée Globe around-the-world race. Sheltering in a tiny air pocket in the upturned hull, some 2,500 kilometers from the southwest coast of Australia, he now prepared for his loneliest challenge. Saved takes us deep into the trauma of Tony Bullimore¹s ordeal as he unfolds the events of his own past against the dramatic events that, hour by hour for nearly five days, were speeding him ever closer to his fate. Gripping and inspiring, Saved is the story of a true survivor.

In the swamps of Asmat in West New Guinea, Tobias Schneebaum--traveler, writer, painter, explorer--finds the way of life that suits him best. Secret Places reels readers into a world of storytellers and sorcerers, cannibals and carvers, a place where Schneebaum discovers his soulmates and his own soul. Looking back at a life of wild adventure, Schneebaum seeks in Secret Places to intertwine the varied strands of his experience, pondering the parallel universes of his experience as a gay Jewish New Yorker and his years among the Asmat. The result illuminates both worlds--as when he juxtaposes the Asmat celebration of the spirits of the dead with a New York City plagued by AIDS and its own sad spirits.

If you want to know where the brothers Paul and George Soros got their business skills, look no further than this little adventure story told by their father. In simple, understated style, Tivadar Soros tells how he and his companions broke out of their Siberian prisoner-of-war camp at the time of the Russian Revolution and traveled on foot through inhospitable mountains to freedom. And this was just preparation for the equally horrendous conditions that Tivadar and his family endured in World War II. -- "As a schoolboy, I used to join my father in the swimming pool after school, and after swimming he would regale me with an installment of his adventures. In this way they became an important part of my childhood." (George Soros) -- "I and my brother consider it to be our good fortune to grow up observing how our father lived and dealt with the problems of the world." (Paul Soros)

A collection of works, both fictional and non-fictional, gathered together here for the first time --

An award-winning actor on screen and stage ( The Defiant Ones , The African Queen , The Sound of Music , My Fair Lady , Fiddler on the Roof ), an activist for civil rights and progressive causes worldwide, and a singer whose voice has won him great applause, Theodore Bikel here tells his own compelling life story. Born in Austria, raised in Palestine, educated in England, and with a stellar career in the United States and around the world, Bikel offers a personal history parallel to momentous events of the twentieth century. In an eloquent, fiercely committed voice, he writes of the Third Reich, the birth of the State of Israel, the McCarthy witch hunts of the 1950s, and the tumultuous 1960s in America. In a new postscript to this paperback edition, he looks at recent events in the Middle East and takes both sides to task for their excesses.

A friend of the British writer portrays Orwell's personality and examines the influence of personal experience on Orwell's novels

Drugs. Sex. Revolutionary violence. From its first pages, Susan Stern's memoir With the Weathermen provides a candid, first-hand look at the radical politics and the social and cultural environment of the New Left during the late 1960s. The Weathermen--a U.S.-based, revolutionary splinter group of Students for a Democratic Society--advocated the overthrow of the government and capitalism, and toward that end, carried out a campaign of bombings, jailbreaks, and riots throughout the United States. In With the Weathermen Stern traces her involvement with this group, and her transformation from a shy, married graduate student into a go-go dancing, street-fighting "macho mama." In vivid and emotional language, she describes the attractions and difficulties of joining a collective radical group and in maintaining a position within it. Stern's memoir offers a rich description of the raw and rough social dynamics of this community, from its strict demands to "smash monogamy," to its sometimes enforced orgies, and to the demeaning character assassination that was led by the group's top members. She provides a distinctly personal and female perspective on the destructive social functionality and frequently contradictory attitudes toward gender roles and women's rights within the New Left. Laura Browder's masterful introduction situates Stern's memoir in its historical context, examines the circumstances of its writing and publication, and describes the book's somewhat controversial reception by the public and critics alike.

Looks at the life and career of Sally Ride, who in 1983 became the first American woman to travel in space.

American Rabbi provides a comprehensive and insightful assessment of Rabbi Jacob Agus' standing as a notable Jewish thinker. The volume brings together original writings by a range of distinguished contributors to consider the main aspects of Agus' life and work in detail and to flesh out the broad and repercussive themes of his corpus. Taken as a whole, they present a broad and substantial picture of a remarkable American Rabbi and scholar, illuminating Agus' committment to Jewish people everywhere, his profound and unwavering spirituality, his continual reminders of the very real dangers of pseudo-messianism and misplaced romantic zeal, and his willingness to take politically and religiously unpopular stands. Formulated as a companion volume to The Essential Agus, which presents selections of Agus' own writings, the contributors' analyses are based on specific selections of Agus' work which appear in The Essential Agus . Though each volume stands on its own, they are closely interconnected and readers will benefit from consulting both works.

In the heavily forested foothills of the Andes Mountains in Ecuador, a Shuar healer named Alejandro Tsakimp leads many lives. He is a peasant who sells cattle and lumber, a member of the Shuar Federation, a son and a brother, a husband and a father, a student and a worker, and, finally, a troubled shaman. Being a healer has long been both a burden and a resource, for the power to cure is also the power to kill, and shamans like Tsakimp are frequently in danger from accusations of witchcraft. But the situation of the Shuar today is especially perilous, and Tsakimp must constantly negotiate relations of power not only with rival shamans and his patients, but with the better-educated and richer officials of the Shuar Federation and his own siblings as well. In his own words, Alejandro Tsakimp tells of his lives and relationships, the practice of shamanism, and the many challenges and triumphs he has encountered since childhood. He was born at the time when Shuar were first confronting the impact of Ecuadorian colonialism, which had triggered devastating intertribal conflict over the production and trade of shrunken heads and intratribal feuding fueled by accusations of witchcraft. Tsakimp was first exposed to healing practices when he was cured in the womb by a shaman. Later he actively pursued this knowledge in the hopes of curing his father, another shaman, who was ill from witchcraft. His father's death in 1990 created conflict among his heirs, who were the first generation of Shuar to inherit property. Tsakimp's family fiercely competed for the property and eventually accused one another of witchcraft and parricide. Anthropologist Steven Rubenstein, who began working with Tsakimp in 1989, has skillfully edited Tsakimp's stories and provides essential background information. Ruben-stein argues that although these stories reveal tensions between individual and collective autonomy on the colonial frontier, they also resist simplistic dichotomies such as state versus indigene and modern versus traditional. Alejandro Tsakimp provides a revealing look at the relationship between anthropologist and shaman and an insightful glimpse into the complicated lives of South American Indians today.

A spiritual and scientific surf quest. After spending two years in bed with Lyme disease, Steven Kotler had lost everything: his health, his job, his girl, and, he was beginning to suspect, his mind. Kotler, not a religious man, suddenly found himself drawn to the sport of surfing as if it were the cornerstone of a new faith. Why, he wondered, when there was nothing left to believe in, could he begin to believe in something as unlikely as surfing. What was belief anyway? How did it work in the body, the brain, our culture, and human history? Into this mix came a strange story. In 2003, on a surf trip through Mexico, Kotler heard of "the conductor," a mythical surfer who could control the weather. He'd heard this same tale eight years earlier, in Indonesia, but this time something clicked. With the help of everyone from rebel surfers to rocket scientists, Kotler undertakes a three year globetrotting quest for the origins of this legend. The results are a startling mix of big waves and bigger ideas: a surfer's journey into the biological underpinnings of belief itself.

"What did Haydn’s wife use for curling-paper for her hair? What did Schubert do with his old spectacles case? Why was Dvorák given a butcher’s apron when he was a little boy? Why did Tchaikovsky spit on a map of Europe? Why did Fauré find a plate of spinach on his face? And why did Handel waggle his wig?" --Back cover.

It was the stuff dreams were made of. It became the ultimate nightmare. Being the first winner of the X Factor in 2004, Steve Brookstein should have it all. Instead, he tells a story of a man sold down the river by his own record label as they championed the runner-up G4 and forced him into an album of cover songs. This is the story of what really happened from vicious personal attacks by Sharon Osborne and Louis Walsh to threats from Max Clifford about going public. A decade on, and Max Clifford is inside and severely discredited. So, is Andy Coulson, an Editor who ran many of the untrue stories about Steve. He has been dubbed a pub singer, a fake, a flop and bitter as the narrative that begun on the show became adopted by journalists who thought he was fair game, frequently reviewing gigs that they hadn't been too or inventing quotes he hadn't said, and always regulated by a toothless Press Complaints Commission. Ten years on Steve is now able to lift the lid on the show itself and analyse for the first time exactly what Max Clifford said when he rang to say, "Talk to the press and we'll bury you."

Stephen M. Flatow was "just a real estate lawyer in New Jersey," until the events of April 9, 1995 changed his life forever. That day, Flatow learned that his daughter Alisa, a twenty-year-old college student traveling in Israel, had been the victim of a terrorist bus-bombing in Gaza. After he discovered the Iranian government had directly sponsored the suicide bomber, by sponsoring Islamic Jihad, Flatow decided to sue the terror state. It was not to be futile: Flatow, working with an astute Washington lawyer and a forensic researcher, not only won a dramatic verdict against Iran, but collected a huge judgment. Stephen M. Flatow explains how Alisa changed the family's religious life at an early age, eventually making six trips to Israel by the time she was killed. Alisa was an honors student at Brandeis University. This is the story of a brave father's determination to bring his daughter's murderers to justice through the American justice system. Encountering one roadblock after another, Flatow persisted, even challenging the president of the United States in his quest. "I'm still Alisa's father," he told Bill Clinton-as Clinton and his aides tried to thwart Flatow's lawsuit. With the help of Senators Frank Lautenberg and Connie Mack, Flatow's case advanced. In the end, the man who was once "just a real estate lawyer from New Jersey" succeeded in a U.S. District courtroom- against the longest of odds. This book is the story of that lengthy fight for justice

"In Stephen Lang's theatrical adaptation of Larry Smith's book Beyond Glory: Medal of Honor Heroes in Their Own Words, Lang presents the stories of eight veterans from World War II, Korea, and Vietnam, rendering firsthand accounts of the actions which resulted in each of them receiving the nation's highest military award, the Medal of Honor. Beyond glory gathers these men together in the present to look back on the defining moments of their lives and to examine the meaning of courage, duty, and, ultimately, humility"--Page 4 of cover.

Sol Linowitz was a co-negotiator of the Panama Canal treaties, President Carter's representative to the Middle East peace negotiations, President Johnson's ambassador to the Organization of American States, and the chairman of the Xerox Corporation. In the first part of this memoir, Linowitz discusses his years at the Xerox Corporation, the scientific aspects of xerography and his role in founding and developing the company, using the protection of the American patent laws to shelter its growth and the antitrust laws to preserve its independence. In the second part he describes his Washington years covering the Panama Canal negotiations and their ratification, the Camp David accords, and his role as the head of the National Urban Coalition. Combining autobiography and historical reportage, he offers insights into the intricate relationship between Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin and the strange maneuvering of Omar Torrijos. ISBN 0-316-52689-4 : $19.95.