A revelatory look at the tumultuous life of a jazz legend and American cultural icon. In the first biography of Billie Holiday in more than two decades, Paul Alexander - author of heralded lives of Sylvia Plath and J. D. Salinger - gives us an unconventional portrait of arguably America's most eminent jazz singer. He shrewdly focuses on the last year of her life - with relevant flashbacks to provide context - to evoke and examine the persistent magnificence of Holiday's artistry when it was supposed to have declined, in the wake of her drug abuse, relationships with violent men, and run-ins with the law.. During her lifetime and after her death, Billie Holiday was often depicted as a down-on-her-luck junkie severely lacking in self-esteem. Relying on interviews with people who knew her, and new material unearthed in private collections and institutional archives, Bitter Crop - a reference to the last two words of Strange Fruit, her moving song about lynching - limns Holiday as a powerful, ambitious woman who overcame her flaws to triumph as a vital figure of American popular music.
Knopf
|
9780593315903
|
Hardcover
The Fox Hunt
By Samawi, Mohammed Al
A young man's moving story of love, war, and hope in which he recounts his harrowing escape from fanaticism and a brutal civil war in Yemen with the help of a daring plan engineered on social media by a small group of interfaith activists in the West.Born in the Old City of Sana'a, Yemen, to a pair of middle-class Shiite doctors, Mohammed Al Samawi was a devout Muslim raised to think of Jews as his enemy. Everything he believed was thrown into doubt, however, when he secretly received a copy of the Bible at the age of twenty-one. Undergoing a metamorphosis after reading it, Mohammed began reaching out to Jews on social media, joined a peace-building organization, and traveled to international interfaith conferences.When his activities drew death threats, Mohammed was forced to flee to the southern port city of Aden, only to find his life further endangered when civil war broke out in the spring of 2015. Hiding in the bathroom of his apartment as gunfire and grenades exploded throughout the city, Mohammed - believing these were the final moments of his life - desperately appealed to friends across social media.Miraculously, Mohammed's plea was heard. Over thirteen days, four ordinary young people with zero experience in international diplomacy or military exfiltration worked across six technology platforms and ten time zones to save this innocent young man trapped between deadly forces - rebel fighters supported by Iran and Al Qaeda operatives supported by Saudi Arabia.The story of an improbable escape as riveting as the best page-turning thrillers, The Fox Hunt is also an unforgettable story of compassion, friendship, faith, and redemption. Like I Am Malala, A Long Walk Gone, and The Dressmaker of Khair Khana, it sheds light on events roiling the world, and offers hope and inspiration, reminding us that goodness and decency can triumph in the darkest circumstances.
William Morrow
|
9780062678195
|
Hardcover
Jane Crow
By Rosenberg, Rosalind
Throughout her prodigious life, activist and lawyer Pauli Murray systematically fought against all arbitrary distinctions in society, channeling her outrage at the discrimination she faced to make America a more democratic country. In this definitive biography, Rosalind Rosenberg offers a poignant portrait of a figure who played pivotal roles in both the modern civil rights and womens movements. . A mixed-race orphan, Murray grew up in segregated North Carolina before escaping to New York, where she attended Hunter College and became a labor activist in the 1930s. When she applied to graduate school at the University of North Carolina, where her white great-great-grandfather had been a trustee, she was rejected because of her race. She went on to graduate first in her class at Howard Law School, only to be rejected for graduate study again at Harvard University this time on account of her sex. Undaunted, Murray forged a singular career in the law. In the 1950s, her legal scholarship helped Thurgood Marshall challenge segregation head-on in the landmark Brown v. Board of Education case. . When appointed by Eleanor Roosevelt to the Presidents Commission on the Status of Women in 1962, she advanced the idea of Jane Crow, arguing that the same reasons used to condemn race discrimination could be used to battle gender discrimination. In 1965, she became the first African American to earn a JSD from Yale Law School and the following year persuaded Betty Friedan to found an NAACP for women, which became NOW. In the early 1970s, Murray provided Ruth Bader Ginsburg with the argument Ginsburg used to persuade the Supreme Court that the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution protects not only blacks but also women - and potentially other minority groups - from discrimination. By that time, Murray was a tenured history professor at Brandeis, a position she left to become the first black woman ordained a priest by the Episcopal Church in 1976.. Murray accomplished all this while struggling with issues of identity. She believed from childhood she was male and tried unsuccessfully to persuade doctors to give her testosterone. While she would today be identified as transgender, during her lifetime no social movement existed to support this identity. She ultimately used her private feelings of being "in-between" to publicly contend that identities are not fixed, an idea that has powered campaigns for equal rights in the United States for the past half-century.
Oxford University Press
|
9780190656454
|
Illustrated Edition
John Hughes
By Honeycutt, Kirk
"There's no way I'm going to end a movie on a negative note." - John HughesHe allegedly wrote Ferris Bueller's Day Off in four days, Planes, Trains and Automobiles in three days, The Breakfast Club in two days, and Vacation in a week. He never went to film school or studied cinema. And he spent most of his incredible career in the Midwest, far from the Hollywood Hills.John Hughes was indeed one of the most prolific and successful filmmakers in Hollywood history. He helped launch the careers of Andrew McCarthy, Molly Ringwald, Anthony Michael Hall, Macaulay Culkin, and Judd Nelson. He made John Candy a household name.In this first illustrated tribute to the legendary filmmaker, author Kirk Honeycutt offers a behind-the-scenes look at the genius that was John Hughes--from his humble beginnings in direct mail to his blockbuster success with classics like Pretty in Pink, Sixteen Candles, Weird Science, and Home Alone.
Race Point Publishing
|
9781631060229
|
Hardcover
Love, Loss, and What We Ate
By Lakshmi, Padma
A vivid memoir of food and family, survival and triumph, Love, Loss, and What We Atetraces Padma Lakshmi s unlikely path from an immigrant childhood to a complicated life in front of the camera a tantalizing blend of Ruth Reichl s Tender at the Bone and Nora Ephron s HeartburnLong before Padma Lakshmi ever stepped onto a television set, she learned that how we eat is an extension of how we love, how we comfort, how we forge a sense of home and how we taste the world as we navigate our way through it. Shuttling between continents as a child, never quite at home in the world, she lived a life of dislocation that would become habit as an adult. And yet, through all her travels, her favorite food remained the simple rice she first ate sitting on the cool floor of her grandmother s kitchen in South India. Poignant and surprising, Love, Loss, and What We Ate is Lakshmi s extraordinary account of her journey from that humble kitchen, ruled by ferocious and unforgettable women, to the Top ChefJudges Table and beyond. It chronicles the fierce devotion of the remarkable people who shaped her along the way, from her headstrong mother who flouted conservative Indian convention to make a life in New York, to her Brahmin grandfather a brilliant engineer with an irrepressible sweet tooth to the man who was seemingly wrong for her in every way but proved to be her truest ally. A memoir rich with sensual prose and punctuated with evocative recipes, it is alive with the scents, tastes, and textures of a life that spans complex geographies both internal and external. Love, Loss, and What We Ateis an intimate and unexpected story of food and family both the ones we are born to and the ones we create and their enduring legacies. Praise for Love, Loss, and What We Ate Love, Loss, and What We Ate is the Padma we didn t know a frank, introspective look at a fascinating and unusual life. Surprisingly revealing and disarmingly bittersweet. Anthony Bourdain This vivid, generous, finely written memoir reveals the smart, vulnerable, and resourceful person behind the beautifully dressed judge telling the chefs to pack their knives and go home. And the recipes are great Francine Prose Beautifully written and moving, this book is also a feast for the senses that will leave you hungry for more. It paints an evocative picture on every page, and offers a wonderfully crafted landscape of the culinary textures and cultural touchstones that have shaped both the woman and her palate. Padma has given us something layered and lyrical an immigrant s journey, as well as a young woman s struggle to come into her own. In telling her own story with such grace and artistry, she has created something culturally important for us all. Susan Sarandon"
Ecco, 2016.
|
9780062202611
|
Print book
The Pianist from Syria
By Ahmad, Aeham
An astonishing but true account of a pianist's escape from war-torn Syria to Germany offers a deeply personal perspective on the most devastating refugee crisis of this century.Aeham Ahmad was born a second-generation refugee - the son of a blind violinist and carpenter who recognized Aeham's talent and taught him how to play piano and love music from an early age. When his grandparents and father were forced to flee Israel and seek refuge from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict ravaging their home, Aeham's family built a life in Yarmouk, an unofficial camp to more than 160,000 Palestinian refugees in Damascus. They raised a new generation in Syria while waiting for the conflict to be resolved so they could return to their homeland. Instead, another fight overtook their asylum. Their only haven was in music and in each other. Forced to leave his family behind, Aeham sought out a safe place for them to call home and build a better life, taking solace in the indestructible bond between fathers and sons to keep moving forward. Heart-wrenching yet ultimately full of hope, and told in a raw and poignant voice, The Pianist from Syria is a gripping portrait of one man's search for a peaceful life for his family and of a country being torn apart as the world watches in horror.
Atria Books
|
9781501173493
|
Hardcover
The Pope
By Mccarten, Anthony
From the Academy Award-nominated screenwriter of The Theory of Everything and Darkest Hour comes the fascinating and revealing tale of an unprecedented transfer of power, and of two very different men - who both happen to live in the Vatican. SOON TO BE A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE STARRING ANTHONY HOPKINS AND JONATHAN PRYCE. In February 2013, the arch-conservative Pope Benedict XVI made a startling announcement: he would resign, making him the first pope to willingly vacate his office in over 700 years. Reeling from the news, the College of Cardinals rushed to Rome to congregate in the Sistine Chapel to pick his successor. Their unlikely choice? Francis, the first non-European pope in 1,200 years, a one time tango club bouncer, a passionate soccer fan, a man with the common touch.Why did Benedict walk away at the height of power, knowing his successor might be someone whose views might undo his legacy? How did Francis - who used to ride the bus to work back in his native Buenos Aires - adjust to life as leader to a billion followers? If, as the Church teaches, the pope is infallible, how can two living popes who disagree on almost everything both be right? Having immersed himself in these men's lives to write the screenplay for the upcoming motion picture The Pope, Anthony McCarten masterfully weaves their stories into one gripping narrative. From Benedict and Francis's formative experiences in war-torn Germany and Argentina to the sexual abuse scandal that continues to rock the Church to its foundations to the intrigue and the occasional comedy of life in the Vatican, The Pope glitters with the darker and the lighter details of one of the world's most opaque but significant institutions.
Flatiron Books
|
9781250207906
|
Hardcover
Young Elizabeth
By Williams, Kate
A lively and poignant biography of the young princess who, at the impressionable age of eleven, found that she was now heiress to the throne, by the New York Times bestselling author of Becoming Queen Victoria. We can hardly imagine a Britain without Elizabeth II on the throne. It seems to be the job she was born for. And yet for much of her early life the young princess did not know the role that her future would hold. She was our accidental Queen. Elizabeth's determination to share in the struggles of her people marked her out from a young age. Her father initially refused to let her volunteer as a nurse during the Blitz, but relented when she was 18 and allowed her to work as a mechanic and truck driver for the Women's Auxiliary Territorial Service. It was her forward-thinking approach that ensured that her coronation was televised, against the advice of politicians at the time.Kate Williams reveals how the 25-year-old young queen carved out a lasting role for herself amid the changes of the 20th century. Her monarchy would be a very different one to that of her parents and grandparents, and its continuing popularity in the 21st century owes much to the intelligence and elusive personality of this remarkable woman. 16 pages of color and B&W illustrations
Bitter Crop
By Alexander, Paul
A revelatory look at the tumultuous life of a jazz legend and American cultural icon. In the first biography of Billie Holiday in more than two decades, Paul Alexander - author of heralded lives of Sylvia Plath and J. D. Salinger - gives us an unconventional portrait of arguably America's most eminent jazz singer. He shrewdly focuses on the last year of her life - with relevant flashbacks to provide context - to evoke and examine the persistent magnificence of Holiday's artistry when it was supposed to have declined, in the wake of her drug abuse, relationships with violent men, and run-ins with the law.. During her lifetime and after her death, Billie Holiday was often depicted as a down-on-her-luck junkie severely lacking in self-esteem. Relying on interviews with people who knew her, and new material unearthed in private collections and institutional archives, Bitter Crop - a reference to the last two words of Strange Fruit, her moving song about lynching - limns Holiday as a powerful, ambitious woman who overcame her flaws to triumph as a vital figure of American popular music.
The Fox Hunt
By Samawi, Mohammed Al
A young man's moving story of love, war, and hope in which he recounts his harrowing escape from fanaticism and a brutal civil war in Yemen with the help of a daring plan engineered on social media by a small group of interfaith activists in the West.Born in the Old City of Sana'a, Yemen, to a pair of middle-class Shiite doctors, Mohammed Al Samawi was a devout Muslim raised to think of Jews as his enemy. Everything he believed was thrown into doubt, however, when he secretly received a copy of the Bible at the age of twenty-one. Undergoing a metamorphosis after reading it, Mohammed began reaching out to Jews on social media, joined a peace-building organization, and traveled to international interfaith conferences.When his activities drew death threats, Mohammed was forced to flee to the southern port city of Aden, only to find his life further endangered when civil war broke out in the spring of 2015. Hiding in the bathroom of his apartment as gunfire and grenades exploded throughout the city, Mohammed - believing these were the final moments of his life - desperately appealed to friends across social media.Miraculously, Mohammed's plea was heard. Over thirteen days, four ordinary young people with zero experience in international diplomacy or military exfiltration worked across six technology platforms and ten time zones to save this innocent young man trapped between deadly forces - rebel fighters supported by Iran and Al Qaeda operatives supported by Saudi Arabia.The story of an improbable escape as riveting as the best page-turning thrillers, The Fox Hunt is also an unforgettable story of compassion, friendship, faith, and redemption. Like I Am Malala, A Long Walk Gone, and The Dressmaker of Khair Khana, it sheds light on events roiling the world, and offers hope and inspiration, reminding us that goodness and decency can triumph in the darkest circumstances.
Jane Crow
By Rosenberg, Rosalind
Throughout her prodigious life, activist and lawyer Pauli Murray systematically fought against all arbitrary distinctions in society, channeling her outrage at the discrimination she faced to make America a more democratic country. In this definitive biography, Rosalind Rosenberg offers a poignant portrait of a figure who played pivotal roles in both the modern civil rights and womens movements. . A mixed-race orphan, Murray grew up in segregated North Carolina before escaping to New York, where she attended Hunter College and became a labor activist in the 1930s. When she applied to graduate school at the University of North Carolina, where her white great-great-grandfather had been a trustee, she was rejected because of her race. She went on to graduate first in her class at Howard Law School, only to be rejected for graduate study again at Harvard University this time on account of her sex. Undaunted, Murray forged a singular career in the law. In the 1950s, her legal scholarship helped Thurgood Marshall challenge segregation head-on in the landmark Brown v. Board of Education case. . When appointed by Eleanor Roosevelt to the Presidents Commission on the Status of Women in 1962, she advanced the idea of Jane Crow, arguing that the same reasons used to condemn race discrimination could be used to battle gender discrimination. In 1965, she became the first African American to earn a JSD from Yale Law School and the following year persuaded Betty Friedan to found an NAACP for women, which became NOW. In the early 1970s, Murray provided Ruth Bader Ginsburg with the argument Ginsburg used to persuade the Supreme Court that the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution protects not only blacks but also women - and potentially other minority groups - from discrimination. By that time, Murray was a tenured history professor at Brandeis, a position she left to become the first black woman ordained a priest by the Episcopal Church in 1976.. Murray accomplished all this while struggling with issues of identity. She believed from childhood she was male and tried unsuccessfully to persuade doctors to give her testosterone. While she would today be identified as transgender, during her lifetime no social movement existed to support this identity. She ultimately used her private feelings of being "in-between" to publicly contend that identities are not fixed, an idea that has powered campaigns for equal rights in the United States for the past half-century.
John Hughes
By Honeycutt, Kirk
"There's no way I'm going to end a movie on a negative note." - John HughesHe allegedly wrote Ferris Bueller's Day Off in four days, Planes, Trains and Automobiles in three days, The Breakfast Club in two days, and Vacation in a week. He never went to film school or studied cinema. And he spent most of his incredible career in the Midwest, far from the Hollywood Hills.John Hughes was indeed one of the most prolific and successful filmmakers in Hollywood history. He helped launch the careers of Andrew McCarthy, Molly Ringwald, Anthony Michael Hall, Macaulay Culkin, and Judd Nelson. He made John Candy a household name.In this first illustrated tribute to the legendary filmmaker, author Kirk Honeycutt offers a behind-the-scenes look at the genius that was John Hughes--from his humble beginnings in direct mail to his blockbuster success with classics like Pretty in Pink, Sixteen Candles, Weird Science, and Home Alone.
Love, Loss, and What We Ate
By Lakshmi, Padma
A vivid memoir of food and family, survival and triumph, Love, Loss, and What We Atetraces Padma Lakshmi s unlikely path from an immigrant childhood to a complicated life in front of the camera a tantalizing blend of Ruth Reichl s Tender at the Bone and Nora Ephron s HeartburnLong before Padma Lakshmi ever stepped onto a television set, she learned that how we eat is an extension of how we love, how we comfort, how we forge a sense of home and how we taste the world as we navigate our way through it. Shuttling between continents as a child, never quite at home in the world, she lived a life of dislocation that would become habit as an adult. And yet, through all her travels, her favorite food remained the simple rice she first ate sitting on the cool floor of her grandmother s kitchen in South India. Poignant and surprising, Love, Loss, and What We Ate is Lakshmi s extraordinary account of her journey from that humble kitchen, ruled by ferocious and unforgettable women, to the Top ChefJudges Table and beyond. It chronicles the fierce devotion of the remarkable people who shaped her along the way, from her headstrong mother who flouted conservative Indian convention to make a life in New York, to her Brahmin grandfather a brilliant engineer with an irrepressible sweet tooth to the man who was seemingly wrong for her in every way but proved to be her truest ally. A memoir rich with sensual prose and punctuated with evocative recipes, it is alive with the scents, tastes, and textures of a life that spans complex geographies both internal and external. Love, Loss, and What We Ateis an intimate and unexpected story of food and family both the ones we are born to and the ones we create and their enduring legacies. Praise for Love, Loss, and What We Ate Love, Loss, and What We Ate is the Padma we didn t know a frank, introspective look at a fascinating and unusual life. Surprisingly revealing and disarmingly bittersweet. Anthony Bourdain This vivid, generous, finely written memoir reveals the smart, vulnerable, and resourceful person behind the beautifully dressed judge telling the chefs to pack their knives and go home. And the recipes are great Francine Prose Beautifully written and moving, this book is also a feast for the senses that will leave you hungry for more. It paints an evocative picture on every page, and offers a wonderfully crafted landscape of the culinary textures and cultural touchstones that have shaped both the woman and her palate. Padma has given us something layered and lyrical an immigrant s journey, as well as a young woman s struggle to come into her own. In telling her own story with such grace and artistry, she has created something culturally important for us all. Susan Sarandon"
The Pianist from Syria
By Ahmad, Aeham
An astonishing but true account of a pianist's escape from war-torn Syria to Germany offers a deeply personal perspective on the most devastating refugee crisis of this century.Aeham Ahmad was born a second-generation refugee - the son of a blind violinist and carpenter who recognized Aeham's talent and taught him how to play piano and love music from an early age. When his grandparents and father were forced to flee Israel and seek refuge from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict ravaging their home, Aeham's family built a life in Yarmouk, an unofficial camp to more than 160,000 Palestinian refugees in Damascus. They raised a new generation in Syria while waiting for the conflict to be resolved so they could return to their homeland. Instead, another fight overtook their asylum. Their only haven was in music and in each other. Forced to leave his family behind, Aeham sought out a safe place for them to call home and build a better life, taking solace in the indestructible bond between fathers and sons to keep moving forward. Heart-wrenching yet ultimately full of hope, and told in a raw and poignant voice, The Pianist from Syria is a gripping portrait of one man's search for a peaceful life for his family and of a country being torn apart as the world watches in horror.
The Pope
By Mccarten, Anthony
From the Academy Award-nominated screenwriter of The Theory of Everything and Darkest Hour comes the fascinating and revealing tale of an unprecedented transfer of power, and of two very different men - who both happen to live in the Vatican. SOON TO BE A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE STARRING ANTHONY HOPKINS AND JONATHAN PRYCE. In February 2013, the arch-conservative Pope Benedict XVI made a startling announcement: he would resign, making him the first pope to willingly vacate his office in over 700 years. Reeling from the news, the College of Cardinals rushed to Rome to congregate in the Sistine Chapel to pick his successor. Their unlikely choice? Francis, the first non-European pope in 1,200 years, a one time tango club bouncer, a passionate soccer fan, a man with the common touch.Why did Benedict walk away at the height of power, knowing his successor might be someone whose views might undo his legacy? How did Francis - who used to ride the bus to work back in his native Buenos Aires - adjust to life as leader to a billion followers? If, as the Church teaches, the pope is infallible, how can two living popes who disagree on almost everything both be right? Having immersed himself in these men's lives to write the screenplay for the upcoming motion picture The Pope, Anthony McCarten masterfully weaves their stories into one gripping narrative. From Benedict and Francis's formative experiences in war-torn Germany and Argentina to the sexual abuse scandal that continues to rock the Church to its foundations to the intrigue and the occasional comedy of life in the Vatican, The Pope glitters with the darker and the lighter details of one of the world's most opaque but significant institutions.
Young Elizabeth
By Williams, Kate
A lively and poignant biography of the young princess who, at the impressionable age of eleven, found that she was now heiress to the throne, by the New York Times bestselling author of Becoming Queen Victoria. We can hardly imagine a Britain without Elizabeth II on the throne. It seems to be the job she was born for. And yet for much of her early life the young princess did not know the role that her future would hold. She was our accidental Queen. Elizabeth's determination to share in the struggles of her people marked her out from a young age. Her father initially refused to let her volunteer as a nurse during the Blitz, but relented when she was 18 and allowed her to work as a mechanic and truck driver for the Women's Auxiliary Territorial Service. It was her forward-thinking approach that ensured that her coronation was televised, against the advice of politicians at the time.Kate Williams reveals how the 25-year-old young queen carved out a lasting role for herself amid the changes of the 20th century. Her monarchy would be a very different one to that of her parents and grandparents, and its continuing popularity in the 21st century owes much to the intelligence and elusive personality of this remarkable woman. 16 pages of color and B&W illustrations