1472 results for "Biography"

Undaunted: surviving Jonestown, summoning courage, and fighting back

Speier, Jackie
An inspiring and powerful memoir of surviving the Jonestown massacre and becoming a fearless voice against injustice and inequality by California congresswoman Jackie Speier. Jackie Speier was twenty-eight when she joined Congressman Leo Ryan's delegation to rescue defectors from cult leader Jim Jones's Peoples Temple in Jonestown, Guyana. Ryan was killed on the airstrip tarmac. Jackie was shot five times at point-blank range. While recovering from what would become one of the most harrowing tragedies in recent history, Jackie had to choose: Would she become a victim or a fighter? The choice to survive against unfathomable odds empowered her with a resolve to become a vocal proponent for human rights. From the formative nightmare that radically molded her perspective and instincts to the devastating personal and professional challenges that would follow, Undaunted reveals the perseverance of a determined force in American politics. Deeply rooted in Jackie's experiences as a widow, a mother, a congresswoman, and a fighter, hers is a story of true resilience, one that will inspire other women to draw strength from adversity in order to do what is right--no matter the challenges ahead.
Little A 2018 198 pages

Shores beyond shores: from Holocaust to hope : my true story

Butter, Irene H.,Bidwell, John,Holloway, Kris
As Irene's Pappi fights to save his family during the Holocaust, Irene's childhood is lost. Play is restricted. Family and friends disappear. Finally, with the Dutch police at their door comes the reality that Irene's father has not moved his family far enough from Hitler's Germany. By January 1945, the family is struggling to survive a death camp. Irene tends her ailing parents, cares for starving kids, and even helps bring clothes to her Amsterdam neighbor Anne Frank, before her family is offered a singular chance for freedom...providing the Nazi doctor says they are healthy enough. After two weeks of heart-lifting miracles and heart-breaking tragedies, Irene arrives in the Algerian desert to journey into redemption and womanhood, without her parents or brother. Irene's first person memoir, Shores Beyond Shores, is an account of how the heart keeps its common humanity in the most inhumane and turbulent of times. Irene's hard-earned lessons are a timeless inspiration. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Following publication of an article on the Holocaust on April 13, 2018, Irene wrote a letter to the Editor which was published April 17, 2018 in The New York Times: Holocaust Survivors 'Have Voices That Matter' April 17, 2018 Re "Getting Facts Wrong on the Holocaust" (news article, April 13): More than four decades passed before I could break the silence about my traumatic experiences during the Holocaust. It is a formidable challenge for survivors to speak and for others to listen. The number of survivors is dwindling; they are getting quite old and their memories are fading. Yet it is ever more important that the signs of authoritarian regimes and how they evolved are brought into the consciousness of youths and adults, as warning signals of what must be prevented from happening again. Survivors, when able, have the responsibility to bear witness and provide evidence so that the six million Jews who were murdered are not forgotten, so that perpetrators are not pardoned for their crimes, and so that deniers don't have a leg to stand on. While the voices of the victims have been silenced forever, we the survivors have voices that matter. After four decades of not speaking, I realized that silence was no longer an option. I told my stories to my children and grandchildren as well as to many students in many schools over a 30-year period. Schools and other organizations should take advantage of every opportunity to engage survivors to tell their stories. IRENE BUTTER, ANN ARBOR, MICH. The writer survived two concentration camps, Westerbork and Bergen-Belsen. She recently published her memoir, "Shores Beyond Shores: From Holocaust to Hope."
White River Press 2018 273 pages

Say everything

Skye, Ione
In 1987, sixteen-year-old Ione Skye landed the breakout role of Diane Court, the dream girl who inspires John Cusack's iconic boombox serenade in the hit Cameron Crowe film, Say Anything. While Skye seemed perfectly typecast as an aloof valedictorian, she was anything but. Deserted by her dad, the folk singer legend Donovan, Skye was a ninth-grade dropout who sought solace and validation in the eyes of audiences and dreamy costars like Keanu Reeves, River Phoenix, Matthew Perry, John Cusack, and Robert Downey Jr. But like her sixties It Girl mum, Skye's greatest weakness was musicians. On the heels of a toxic relationship with the Red Hot Chili Peppers' Anthony Kiedis, which began when she was just sixteen and he was twenty-four, the actress leapt into wedded bliss with her first great love, Beastie Boy Adam Horovitz. But marriage was not the magical hall pass to adulthood Skye had imagined. Awakening to her bisexuality and desperately insecure, she risked her fairytale marriage for a string of affairs with gorgeous nineties "bad girls." The dream marriage imploded, and Skye's trust in herself and her future along with it. Set against a backdrop of rock royalty compounds, supermodel cliques, and classic late-century films like River's Edge, Gas Food Lodging, and Wayne's World, Say Everything is a wild ride of Hollywood thrills as well as a lyrical reflection on ambition, intimacy, and a messy, sexy, unconventional life.
HarperCollinsPublishers 2025-03-13 304 pages

Artists in times of war

Zinn, Howard
"Political power," says Howard Zinn, "is controlled by the corporate elite, and the arts are the locale for a kind of guerilla warfare in the sense that guerillas look for apertures and opportunities where they can have an effect." In Artists in Times of War, Zinn looks at the possibilities to create such apertures through art, film, activism, publishing and through our everyday lives. In this collection of four essays, the author of A People's History of the United States writes about why "To criticize the government is the highest act of patriotism." Filled with quotes and examples from the likes of Bob Dylan, Mark Twain, e. e. cummings, Thomas Paine, Joseph Heller, and Emma Goldman, Zinn's essays discuss America's rich cultural counternarratives to war, so needed in these days of unchallenged U.S. militarism.
Seven Stories Press 2003 112 pages

The art and politics of science

Varmus, Harold
A Nobel Prize–winning cancer biologist, leader of major scientific institutions, and scientific adviser to President Obama reflects on his remarkable career. A PhD candidate in English literature at Harvard University, Harold Varmus discovered he was drawn instead to medicine and eventually found himself at the forefront of cancer research at the University of California, San Francisco. In this “timely memoir of a remarkable career” ( American Scientist ), Varmus considers a life’s work that thus far includes not only the groundbreaking research that won him a Nobel Prize but also six years as the director of the National Institutes of Health; his current position as the president of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center; and his important, continuing work as scientific adviser to President Obama. From this truly unique perspective, Varmus shares his experiences from the trenches of politicized battlegrounds ranging from budget fights to stem cell research, global health to science publishing.
W. W. Norton 2010-04-27 315 pages

House of Glass: the story and secrets of a twentieth-century Jewish family

Freeman, Hadley
"Hadley Freeman knew her grandmother Sara had lived in France, just as Hitler started to gain power in Europe, but rarely did anyone in her family talk about it. Until long after her grandmother's death, she found a shoebox tucked in a closet. In it was: a photograph of her grandmother with a mysterious stranger; a cryptic telegram from the Red Cross; and a drawing signed by Picasso. This discovery sent Freeman on a decade-long journey, as she tried to uncover the significance of these keepsakes. Her search took her from the Picasso archives in Paris to a secret room in a farmhouse in the Auvergne, from Long Island to Auschwitz. Here, Freeman pieces together the puzzle of her family's past. Sarah had three brothers: Jacques, Henri, and Alex. Their lives in France during the war--at times typical, at times remarkable--illustrates the broad range of experiences of Eastern European Jews. Jacques was one of the first to be arrested and sentenced to the concentration camps, where he died. He was on the same train as Irene Nemirovsky, the author of Suite Francaise. Henri hid in his apartment, and survived. He invented a microfilming machine that the resistance used to protect French secrets. Alex, a successful haute couture designer before the war, served in the French Legion. When he was arrested in 1943 and sent to Auschwitz, he pulled up the floorboards of the train, escaped, and was hidden by communists in the French countryside. He went on to become an influential gallerist, and a close friend of Picasso; the boy who began life in a ghetto ended his days living in the most expensive street in Paris. Sarah left for America. Freeman assumed her grandmother must have been thrilled to escape, but the truth was she was miserable-she'd been tricked by her brothers into leaving in the first place. This is a thrilling family saga, with extraordinary twists, vivid characters, and famous cameos. It describes the Jewish and immigrant experience, discussing issues like assimilation, identity and home-issues still relevant today"--
Simon & Schuster Paperbacks 2021-03-23 323 pages

A tragic legacy: how a good vs. evil mentality destroyed the Bush presidency

Greenwald, Glenn
The first true character study of a lost president and his disastrous legacy In this fascinating, timely book, Glenn Greenwald examines the Bush presidency and its long-term effect on the nation, charting the rise and steep fall of the current administration, dissecting the rhetoric, and revealing the faulty ideals upon which George W. Bush built his policies. Enlightening and eye-opening, this is a powerful look at the man whose incapability and cowboy logic have left America at risk.
Three Rivers Press 2008-04-08 321 pages

Still alive: a wild life of rediscovery

Galante, Forrest
"Forrest Galante, host of Extinct or Alive and the world's #1 rare species expert, takes readers along with him through the deepest wilderness and most remote and dangerous parts of the world to find all the animals we thought were extinct. In the course of his travels, Galante has been attacked by lions, stung by jellyfish, bitten by snakes and had run-ins with pissed off hippos. Still Alive offers a travelogue of Galante's most harrowing adventures, introducing readers to some of the most unique rare species he's encountered--while also adding the unpredictable drama and human element of traveling to some of the world's most isolated locations. Part memoir, part biological adventure, Still Alive is a calling card for conservation, highlighting not just Galante's toughness as he finds animals thought to be lost, but also the resiliency of the animals themselves, as they keep their species alive in spite of the odds"--
Hachette Books 2021 238 pages

In search of memory: the emergence of a new science of mind

Kandel, Eric R.
Nobelist Eric Kandel's account of how his personal quest to understand memory intersected with the emergence of a new science. In Search of Memory relates the astonishing story of how four different and distinct disciplinesbehaviorist psychology, cognitive psychology, neuroscience, and molecular biologyconverged into a powerful new science of mind. Through its profound insights into thought, perception, action, recollection, and mental illness, this new science is revolutionizing our understanding of learning and memory while simultaneously showing great promise for more effective healing. The narrative follows Eric R. Kandel through the last five decades, focusing on Vienna, where he became fascinated with memory. With intrepid scientific ardor, Kandel was captivated first by history and psychoanalysis, then by neurobiology, and finally by the biological processes of memory. His resulting, multifaceted perspective was the foundation for his path-breaking research that will continue to dominate modern thoughtnot only in science but in culture at large. 50 illustrations.
W. W. Norton & Company 2006 510 pages

Motherland: a memoir of love, loathing, and longing

Altman, Elissa
"Elissa and Rita have forever struggled to find their place in each other's worlds. Rita, an overreaching, makeup-addicted, narcissistic Manhattan singer couldn't be more different from Elissa, her gay, taciturn New England writer daughter. Stuck in an outrageous maelstrom of codependency, mother and daughter cannot seem to extricate themselves from the center of each other's lives. Motherland is their universal story: a kaleidoscopic journey built on the ferocity of mother-daughter love, moral obligation, and the possibility and promise of healing. Having survived a harrowing childhood at the hands of her mother, Elissa is finally settled in Connecticut with her wife of almost twenty years. After much time, therapy, and wine, Elissa is at last in a healthy place, orbiting around her mother, but keeping far enough away from her to preserve the independent, quiet life she has built for herself. All of this is suddenly at risk when Rita, whose days are spent traversing the streets of Manhattan from Bergdorf's to Bloomingdale's and back again, suffers an incapacitating fall that leaves her fully dependent on her only child. Forced to confront her mother's desperate need for beauty, her view of the world through a medley of men, her lost days in the spotlight, addiction, and the money that has mysteriously disappeared in the name of maintaining her youth, Elissa must navigate the waters of their shared history, obligation, the problems of caregiving and age, and the frenetic, co-dependent love that has defined their obsessive relationship. Motherland asks the universal mother-daughter question: How much love is too much love?"--
Ballantine Books 2019 249 pages

Motherland: a memoir of love, loathing, and longing

Altman, Elissa
"Elissa and Rita have forever struggled to find their place in each other's worlds. Rita, an overreaching, makeup-addicted, narcissistic Manhattan singer couldn't be more different from Elissa, her gay, taciturn New England writer daughter. Stuck in an outrageous maelstrom of codependency, mother and daughter cannot seem to extricate themselves from the center of each other's lives. Motherland is their universal story: a kaleidoscopic journey built on the ferocity of mother-daughter love, moral obligation, and the possibility and promise of healing. Having survived a harrowing childhood at the hands of her mother, Elissa is finally settled in Connecticut with her wife of almost twenty years. After much time, therapy, and wine, Elissa is at last in a healthy place, orbiting around her mother, but keeping far enough away from her to preserve the independent, quiet life she has built for herself. All of this is suddenly at risk when Rita, whose days are spent traversing the streets of Manhattan from Bergdorf's to Bloomingdale's and back again, suffers an incapacitating fall that leaves her fully dependent on her only child. Forced to confront her mother's desperate need for beauty, her view of the world through a medley of men, her lost days in the spotlight, addiction, and the money that has mysteriously disappeared in the name of maintaining her youth, Elissa must navigate the waters of their shared history, obligation, the problems of caregiving and age, and the frenetic, co-dependent love that has defined their obsessive relationship. Motherland asks the universal mother-daughter question: How much love is too much love?"--
Ballantine Books 2019 249 pages

Love and math: the heart of hidden reality

Frenkel, Edward
"Love and Math tells the two intertwined stories of mathematics and the adventure of one man in learning it. The result is a story about how he became one of the twenty-first century's leading mathematicians, working on one of the biggest ideas to come out of mathematics in the last 50 years: the Langlands Program. As Frenkel proves, a mathematical formula can be as elegant and beautiful as a painting, a poem, or a piece of music. And the process of creating new mathematics is just that, an artistic pursuit--a deeply personal experience, which requires passion, dedication, and love. In Love and Math, Frenkel shows readers the aesthetic--and the truly powerful--side of mathematics, and enables appreciation of the field even from those who have long been terrified by it."--Provided by publisher.
Basic Books, a member of the Perseus Books Group 2014-09-09 292 pages

The ballerina of Auschwitz

Eger, Edith Eva,Schwall, Esmé
"Edie is a talented dancer and skilled gymnast with hopes of making the Olympics. Between her rigorous training and her struggle to find her place in a family where she's considered the daughter "with brains but no looks," Edie's too busy to dwell on the state of the world. But life in Hungary in 1943 is dangerous for a Jewish girl. Just as Edie falls in love for the first time, Europe collapses into war, and Edie's family is forced onto a train bound for the Auschwitz concentration camp. Even in that darkest of moments, Edie's beloved, Eric, kindles hope. "I'll never forget your eyes," he tells her through the slats of the cattle car. Auschwitz is horrifying beyond belief, yet through starvation and unthinkable terrors, dreams of Eric sustain Edie. Against all odds, Edie and her sister Magda survive, thanks to their sisterhood and sheer grit. In this young adult edition of her bestselling, award-winning memoir The Choice, renowned psychologist and Holocaust survivor Dr. Edith Eger gives readers a gift of hope and strength"--
Atheneum Books for Young Readers 2024-10 182 pages