In the spring of 2000, stand-up comedian Robert Schimmel was diagnosed with stage III non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, and soon the fire of his white-hot career started to fizzle. But Schimmel never lost his sense of humor, his searing honesty, and most of all, his passion to make people laugh. Indeed, it was his basic need to entertain—even if the only people around him were suffering from cancer and the room he was playing was the Mayo Clinic infusion center—that carried him through his ordeal. Alternately laugh-out-loud funny and deeply moving, Cancer on 5 a Day is a stirring account of how one man's face-off with a deadly disease helped him better understand himself, and ultimately changed his life.

The riveting memoir of Rikki Klieman--an enormously successful defence attorney and television personality--as she discovers the possibilities of love in middle age with Los Angeles' new police commissioner, Bill Bratton. Thirty-five-year-old Rikki was named one of America's top five female trial attorneys by Time magazine for her work in criminal defence, one of the toughest branches of law for a woman to enter. She defended clients ranging from accused drug smugglers to media moguls to well-meaning Christian Scientists Ginger and David Twitchell, whose beliefs were put on trial after the death of their child. She waged a war of nerves with Boston police and the FBI during negotiations for the return of fugitive sixties radical Katherine Ann Power. As Rikki moved from success to success, however, the frenetic lifestyle of a defence attorney began to damage her health and happiness. She suffered from exhaustion, chronic back pain, and two failed marriages, but considered these afflictions to be part of "the price of the prize." After several decades as a practicing attorney, she joined Court TV, where she gained national prominence covering the O.J. Simpson trial and she went on to host Court TV's daily show Both Sides. Now, at midlife, this warrior with a woman's heart has finally achieved, in her loving marriage to LAPD chief Bill Bratton, the balance many seek but few find. Her dramatic story proves that fairy tales can come true and that great love and great success can go hand in hand.

In Fatwa: Hunted in America, Pamela Geller tells her own story of how she became one of the world's foremost activists for the freedom of speech, individual rights, and equality of rights for all. Pamela Geller recounts her unlikely journey from New York City career girl to indomitably fearless human rights activist, reviled by the enemies of freedom the world over. "I assumed my freedom," she writes. "Never for one moment did I think that it could be taken from me. But all that changed on one day." That day was September 11, 2001 -- when on a beautiful, bright blue sunny morning, the global jihad struck in America with terrifying and murderous force. The United States of America and the free world as a whole would never be the same again. Neither would Pamela Geller. In this book, Geller tells the whole extraordinary story of how she began chronicling her take on news events at her groundbreaking website Atlas Shrugs, then moved into activism, at first on behalf of Muslim girls who were being brutalized and victimized at home for not following the misogynistic rules of Islamic law, and then to stand against the advance of jihad and sharia on numerous fronts, above all for the freedom of speech, which is increasingly embattled in this age of jihad. It's all here: Geller recounts the battle to defeat the sinister Ground Zero mosque project; the ISIS attack at Geller's Mohammed Art Exhibit and Cartoon Contest in Garland, Texas; the fatwa issued to her and plot to behead her; and much more, including the relentless vilification from a mainstream media hell-bent on defaming and destroying everyone who stands for freedom against jihad terror and sharia oppression.Pamela Geller writes: "Any lover of freedom would have been tarred the same way I was, and many have been. I am but a proxy in this terrible, long war. What has happened to me is what happens, in small and large ways, to every American who stands for freedom." At last, in Fatwa: Hunted In America, she tells her story.

A poignant, informal portrait remembers the film legend through anecdotes about her personal life, her secret fantasies, and her ever-fluctuating moods, speculations on her romances and untimely demise, and candid photographs.

Over 2,000 years ago in Shushan, the capital city of the Persian Empire, a Jewish queen saved her people form a wicked man plotting against the Jews. Her name was Esther, and she outwitted the king's chief minister, Haman, who planned to rob and kill the Jews. This retelling of the biblical story, the basis of the Purim holiday, is beautifully presented for young readers.

At seventeen, Dorothea Lange knew she would be a photographer--even though she had never taken a picture. She had grown up observing the life of the poor people in the street with an artist's keen eye. As a young photographer, Dorothea focused that eye on the hungry and homeless people of the Great Depression. She traveled across the country, documenting their struggles. Today her pictured are treasured not only as works of art, but as testaments to human strength.

From a gifted young writer, the story of his quest to reclaim his family's apartment building in Poland--and of the astonishing entanglement with Nazi treasure hunters that follows Menachem Kaiser's brilliantly told story, woven from improbable events and profound revelations, is set in motion when the author takes up his Holocaust-survivor grandfather's former battle to reclaim the family's apartment building in Sosnowiec, Poland. Soon, he is on a circuitous path to encounters with the long-time residents of the building, and with a Polish lawyer known as "The Killer." A surprise discovery--that his grandfather's cousin not only survived the war, but wrote a secret memoir while a slave laborer in a vast, secret Nazi tunnel complex--leads to Kaiser being adopted as a virtual celebrity by a band of Silesian treasure seekers who revere the memoir as the indispensable guidebook to Nazi plunder. Propelled by rich original research, Kaiser immerses readers in profound questions that reach far beyond his personal quest. What does it mean to seize your own legacy? Can reclaimed property repair rifts among the living? Plunder is both a deeply immersive adventure story and an irreverent, daring interrogation of inheritance--material, spiritual, familial, and emotional.

"Joan Rivers is an enduring icon of the 20th century, and her wildly popular humor has appealed to generations of fans. With a career that began in the late 1950s, Joan kept mementos over the course of her entire working life, and Joan Rivers Confidential is a compilation of never-before-seen personal archives. Assembled by her daughter Melissa with Scott Currie, the book contains scripts and monologues, letters from famous friends, exchanges with fans, rare photographs, as well as classic and never-before-heard jokes--many simply scribbled on everything from hotel stationery to airplane boarding passes. Touching on subjects from her 50 years in show business (The Tonight Show, Las Vegas, Elizabeth Taylor, Heidi Abromowitz, the red carpet, and Fashion Police), this is a revelatory and humor-filled insider look at the popular, multitalented comedian."--Provided by Amazon.com.

Our captain and leader has not left us, today, tomorrow, this year, next … Our endeavors will reflect our love and admiration for him.” —Honorary plaque to Munson in Yankee Stadium Thurman Munson is remembered by fans as the fiercely competitive, tough, and—most of all—inspiring Yankee captain and champion from the wild Bronx Zoo years. He is also remembered for his tragic death, at age thirty-two, when the private plane he was piloting crashed in Canton, Ohio, on August 2, 1979. Munson is the intimate biography of a complex and larger-than-life legend. Written by former Yankees public relations director Marty Appel, who worked closely with Thurman throughout his career, Munson captures the little-known details of the young man from Canton and his meteoric rise to stardom in baseball’s most storied franchise. Appel examines the tumultuous childhood that led Thurman to work feverishly to escape Canton—and also the marriage and cultural roots that continually drew him back. Appel also opens a fascinating door on the famed Yankees of the 1970s, recounting moments and stories that have never been told before. From the clubhouse and the dugout to the front office and the owner’s box, this thoughtful baseball biography delves into the affectionately gruff captain’s relationships with friends, fans, and teammates such as Lou Piniella, Bobby Murcer, Graig Nettles, and Reggie Jackson, as well as his colorful dealings with manager Billy Martin and his surprisingly close bond with owner George Steinbrenner. Munson paints a revealing portrait of a private Yankee superstar, as well as a nostalgic and revelatory look at the culture—and amazing highs and lows—of the 1970s New York Yankees teams. More than a biography, Munson is the definitive account of a champion who has not been forgotten and of the era he helped define—written with the intimate detail available only to a true insider. www.doubleday.com

NOW AN ACCLAIMED DOCUMENTARY, Winter Journey Set amid the growing tyranny of Germany's Third Reich, here is the riveting and emotional tale of Günther Goldschmidt and Rosemarie Gumpert, two courageous Jewish musicians who struggled to perform under unimaginable circumstances--and found themselves falling in love in a country bent on destroying them. In the spring of 1933, as the full weight of Germany's National Socialism was brought to bear against Germany's Jews, more than 8,000 Jewish musicians, actors, and other artists found themselves expelled from their positions with German orchestras, opera companies, and theater groups, and Jews were forbidden even to attend "Aryan" theaters. Later that year, the Jüdische Kulturbund, or Jewish Culture Association, was created under the auspices of Joseph Goebbels's Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. Providing for Jewish artists to perform for Jewish audiences, the Kulturbund, which included an orchestra, an opera company, and an acting troupe, became an unlikely haven for Jewish artists and offered much-needed spiritual enrichment for a besieged people--while at the same time providing the Nazis with a powerful propaganda tool for showing the rest of the world how well Jews were ostensibly being treated under the Third Reich. It was during this period that twenty-two-year-old flutist Günther Goldschmidt was expelled from music school because of his Jewish roots. While preparing to flee the ever-tightening grip of Nazi Germany for Sweden, Günther was invited to fill in for an ailing flutist with the Frankfurt Kulturbund Orchestra. It was there, during rehearsals, that he met the dazzling nineteen-year-old violist Rosemarie Gumpert--a woman who would change the course of his life. Despite their strong attraction, Günther eventually embarked for the safety of Sweden as planned, only to risk his life six months later returning to the woman he could not forget--and to the perilous country where hatred and brutality had begun to flourish. Here is Günther and Rosemarie's story, a deeply moving tale of love and the remarkable resilience of the human spirit in the face of terror and persecution. Beautifully and simply told by their son, National Public Radio commentator Martin Goldsmith, The Inextinguishable Symphony takes us from the cafés of Frankfurt, where Rosemarie and Günther fell in love, to the concert halls that offered solace and hope for the beleaguered Jews, to the United States, where the two made a new life for themselves that would nevertheless remain shadowed by the fate of their families. Along with the fate of Günther and Rosemarie's families, this rare memoir also illuminates the Kulturbund and the lives of other fascinating figures associated with it, including Kubu director Kurt Singer--a man so committed to the organization that he objected to his artists' plans for flight, fearing that his productions would suffer. The Kubu, which included some of the most prominent artists of the day and young performers who would gain international fame after the war, became the sole source of culture and entertainment for Germany's Jews. A poignant testament to the enduring vitality of music and love even in the harshest times, The Inextinguishable Symphony gives us a compelling look at an important piece of Holocaust history that has heretofore gone largely untold.

Chronicles the experiences of a young Jewish woman who ventured behind enemy lines and masqueraded as a German nurse searching for her soldier boyfriend in order to acquire critical information about German troop movements for the Allies.

"You can't let people be treated in an inhuman way around you....Otherwise you start to become inhuman." So declares rescuer Hetty Voûte in this updated edition of THE HEART HAS REASONS, an acclaimed historical account that offers an in-depth look into the hearts and minds of the Holocaust rescuers and explores the meaning that their lives and deeds have for us today. Individually or in small "humanitarian cells," the ten Dutch people Klempner profiles saved the lives of thousands of Jewish children during the Nazi occupation of Holland. How did they do what they did--and why did they risk everything to do it? Although their tales of rescue vary greatly, the integrity of the rescuers does not. Thus these narratives provide a glimpse into their personalities and character while shedding light on their extraordinary acts of courage and kindness. Framed by Klempner's quest for meaning, the rescuers' words resonate across generations, providing timeless insight into how people of conscience can navigate morally and resist tyranny in a world where the old specters of prejudice and fascism are again ascendant.

A former Broadway and Hollywood actress reveals her sixteen-year fight against alcoholism and mental illness

My Nine Lives is a powerful and stirring memoir of one of the greatest pianists of the postwar era—an inspiring tale of courage, compassion, and triumph over outstanding odds. At the peak of his career, celebrated pianist Leon Fleisher suddenly lost the use of two fingers on his right hand. Miraculously, at the age of sixty-six, he was diagnosed with focal dystonia, and learned to manage it through a combination of physical therapy and experimental Botox injections. In 2003 Fleisher returned to Carnegie Hall to give his first two-handed performance in over three decades and brought down the house. With his coauthor, celebrated music critic Anne Midgette, Fleisher reveals here for the first time the depression that threatened to engulf him as his condition worsened, and the sheer love of music that rescued him from complete self-destruction.

Some musicians want to challenge an audience, force-feeding fans something that's new, different, and ostensibly "good for" them. Others take the more trad route, serving up the sonic equivalent of comfort food, tunes that lend themselves to almost instant sing-alongs (or at least Bic-flick-alongs). Lenny Kravitz has always unabashedly slotted himself into the latter category, and his righteous channeling of the spirit of '76 (1976, that is) has seldom been more effective than on this outing, which reconciles his strutting rocker side and his sweet soul singer side with panache. Kravitz's crooning has brought him many a chart hit, and this set doesn't skimp on hits-in-the-making -- although even make-out moaners like "A Million Miles Away" and "Believe in Me" are injected with a certain street savvy this time around. He's at his best when leaning into crunchy, riff-laden rockers, like "Dig In" and the Bad Company-meets-Zeppelin lust-fest "If I Could Fall in Love," and when slipping just a touch of bad-boy attitude into the mix, as on the chunky "Bank Robber Man." As is his wont, Kravitz also toys with post-hippie spirituality, but he's a bit less heavy-handed this time, making songs like "God Save Us All"--Which features a smile-inducing vocoder solo straight out of Peter Frampton's book of tricks -- seem less preachy than merely commiserating. While some might be tempted to grab Lenny Kravitz by the feather boa and let him know we've entered a new millennium, there's something reassuring about having a key to the way-back machine at the ready, and Lenny fires up the engine in no time flat.

"Philadelphia's progressive district attorney offers an inspiring vision of how people can take back power to reform criminal justice, based on lessons from a life's work as an advocate for the accused." --

Free for All is an irresistible behind-the-scenes look at one of America’s most beloved and important cultural institutions. Under the inspired leadership of founder Joseph Papp, the Public Theater and the New York Shakespeare Festival brought revolutionary performances to the public for decades. This compulsively readable history of those years—much of it told in Papp’s own words—is fascinating, ranging from a dramatic early showdown with Robert Moses over keeping Shakespeare in the Park free to the launching of such landmark productions as Hair and A Chorus Line. To bring the story to life, film critic Kenneth Turan interviewed some 160 luminaries—including George C. Scott, Meryl Streep, Mike Nichols, Kevin Kline, James Earl Jones, David Rabe, Jerry Stiller, Tommy Lee Jones, and Wallace Shawn—and masterfully weaves their voices into a dizzyingly rich tale of creativity, conflict, and achievement.

Learning to Drive • Now a major motion picture starring Patricia Clarkson and Ben Kingsley Celebrated for her award-winning political columns, criticism, and poetry, Katha Pollitt now shows us another side of her talent. Learning to Drive is a surprising, revealing, and entertaining collection of essays drawn from the author’s own life. With deep feeling and sharp insight, Pollitt writes about the death of her father; the sad but noble final days of a leftist study group of which she was a member; and the betrayal and heartbreak inflicted by a man who seriously deceived her. (Her infinitely patient, gentle driving instructor points out her weakness—“Observation, Katha, observation!”) She also offers a candid view of her preoccupation with her ex-lover’s haunting presence on the Internet, and her search there for a secret link that might provide a revelation about him that will Explain Everything. Other topics include the differences between women and men—“More than half the male members of the Donner party died of cold and starvation, but three quarters of the females survived, saved by that extra layer of fat we spend our lives trying to get rid of”—and the practical implications of political theory: “What if socialism—all that warmhearted folderol about community and solidarity and sharing was just an elaborate con job, a way for men to avoid supporting their kids?” Learning to Drive demonstrates that while Katha Pollitt is undeniably one of our era’s most profound observers of culture, society, and politics, she is just as impressively a wise, graceful, and honest observer of her own and others’ human nature. Praise for Learning to Drive “The kind of book you want to look up from at points so you can read aloud certain passages to a friend or lover.” — Chicago Tribune “A powerful personal narrative . . . full of insight and charm . . . Pollitt is her own Jane Austen character . . . haughty and modest, moral and irresponsible, sensible and, happily for us, lost in sensibility.” — The New York Review of Books “With . . . bracing self-honesty, Pollitt takes us through the maddening swirl of contradictions at the heart of being fifty-something: the sense of slowing down, of urgency, of wisdom, of ignorance, of strength, of helplessness, of breakdown, of renewal.” — The Seattle Times “Essays of breathtaking candor and razor-sharp humor . . . [Pollitt] has outdone herself. . . . [Her] observations are acute and her confessions tonic. Forget face-lifts; Pollitt’s essays elevate the spirit.” — Booklist (starred review)

"Raskin's biography of Abbie Hoffman pleases precisely because it does not evade the ambiguities of that wild time. For a cynical age, Raskin evokes some of its innocent pleasures: great rock-and-roll, movements against injustices, exuberant sex."--Jonathan Rieder, New York Times Book Review "As much a corrective to a New Left history of the time as a biography of Abbie Hoffman, the wildest of the wildmen...Raskin's book is arranged like a series of filmed calender pages; behind the pages stand descriptions as vivid as movies of the formative influences moving with lightning speed across those few amazing years while Abbie, and the rhetoric inside him, grew apace."--Vivian Gornick, The Nation "Hoffman remains one of the most vivid figures in an era that specialized in them...It would be very hard to read his life's story and not be affected by it."--Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post "The book takes [Hoffman], his w ritings, and his politics seriously...Well-researched, well-reported, well-illustrated, and scrupulously documented."--Bruce McCabe, Boston Globe "Not only a biography of an individual...but a fully rounded portrait of that era...Hoffman remains an utterly fascinating American icon, one of the most important performance-art patriots of our time."--Bernard Weiner, San Francisco Chronicle