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The End of an Earring
by Pam St ClementIn January 2012, one of EastEnders' longest-serving and best-loved characters breathed her last when Pat Butcher succumbed to cancer. Her departure from the show gave actress Pam St Clement time to reflect, not only on almost 26 years playing a role that she loved, but also on her whole life.Pam's mother died when she was a baby, leaving her with a father whose life didn't really have space for a child. What followed was an itinerant childhood, with various stepmothers and foster families, before an advertisement in The Lady took 11-year-old Pamela to the farm in Devon that was to become her true home, with the 'aunts' who became her surrogate parents. Time on the farm at Dartmoor, where she discovered her love of animals, alternated with life at The Warren boarding school in West Sussex, where she discovered her passion for acting.On leaving school, Pam was unsure of what direction to take but gradually realised that acting was what she wanted to do with her life. So, in 1966, Pam took up a place at drama school. Pam settled in London and worked on stage and television throughout the sixties and seventies, before her first appearance on EastEnders in 1986 and the offer of a permanent role a few months later.This memoir is far more than simply an actor's tale. Quite apart from her fascinating and unique childhood, Pam also recalls her involvement in the women's movement of the 1970s, her lifelong love of animals and the worries about her weight that have dogged her since her teenage years. It is also a tribute to Pat Butcher, for whom Pam retains a huge affection.This incredibly warm memoir reveals the woman behind the popular EastEnders' character, a woman who, apart perhaps from her earrings, couldn't be more different from Pat.
The End Of An Era: Diaries 1980-1990
by Tony BennTony Benn's final instalment of diaries centres on a decade which saw the disintegration of Eastern Europe, an unprecedented assault on the labour movement at home, the fall of Margaret Thatcher and the tragic war in the Gulf. It is a period which marks the peak of Tony Benn's reputation as a brilliant parliamentarian. This final volume of diaries gives us insight into an era of extraordinary international and domestic political life making it one of the most important political writings of our time.
The End of Autumn: Reflections on My Life in Football
by Michael OriardMuch of Michael Oriard's education took place outside the schoolroom of his native Spokane, Washington, during "slaughter practices" on high school football fields. He was taught to "punish" and "dominate," to rouse his school spirit with religion, and to "tough it" through injuries, even serious ones. At the age of eighteen he entered Notre Dame and walked onto the football team, where studying hard was never harder. By his senior year, playing for Ara Parseghian's Fighting Irish, he was the starting center and co-captain of the team. After graduating, he signed with the Kansas City Chiefs and head coach Hank Stram. There he learned what it meant to be "owned." He rediscovered the game as it was played by grown men with families who were still treated like children and who dreaded nothing more than the end of their football careers. And without their fully realizing the consequences, every hard tackle inflicted its injury, some gradually growing into chronic conditions, some suddenly cutting a player's career short and ushering him off the field to be soon forgotten. In this thoughtful narrative, Oriard describes the dreams of glory, the game day anxieties, the brutal training camps and harsh practices, his starry-eyed experience at Notre Dame, and the cold-blooded business of professional football. Told from the inside, the book leaves aside the hype and the pathos of the game to present a direct and honest account of the personal rewards but also the costs players paid to make others rich and entertained. Originally published in 1982, The End of Autumn recounts the experiences of an ordinary player in a bygone era--before ESPN, before the Bowl Championship Series, before free agency and million-dollar salaries for NFL players. In a new afterword, Oriard reflects on the process of writing the book and how the game has changed in the thirty years since his "retirement" from football at the age of twenty-six.
The End of Boys
by Peter Brown HoffmeisterPeter Hoffmeister was a nervous child who ran away repeatedly and bit his fingernails until they bled. Home-schooled until the age of fourteen, he had only to deal with his parents and siblings on a daily basis, yet even that sometimes proved too much for him. Over the years, he watched his mother disintegrate into her own form of mania, while his father-a scholar and doctor who had once played semi-pro baseball-was strict and pushed Peter particularly hard. He wanted only the best from his son but in the process taught Peter to expect only the worst from himself. In the midst of his chaotic home life, Peter began to hear a voice-an insistent, monotone that would periodically dictate his actions. When Peter finally entered public school he started to break free from his father's control-only to fall sway to the voice more and more. His obsessive-compulsive behavior morphed into ruthless competition in sports and, ultimately, into lies, violence, and drugs.The End of Boys follows Hoffmeister to the very brink of sanity and back, in a harrowing and heartbreaking account of the trauma of adolescence and the redemption available to us all, if only we choose to find it.
End of Days: The Assassination of John F. Kennedy
by James SwansonIn End of Days, James L. Swanson, the New York Times bestselling author of Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer, brings to life the minute-by-minute details of the JFK assassination—from the Kennedys' arrival in Texas through the shooting in Dealey Plaza and the shocking aftermath that continues to reverberate in our national consciousness fifty years later.The assassination of John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963, has been the subject of enduring debate, speculation, and numerous conspiracy theories, but Swanson's absorbing and complete account follows the event hour-by-hour, from the moment Lee Harvey Oswald conceived of the crime three days before its execution, to his own murder two days later at a Dallas Police precinct at the hands of Jack Ruby, a two-bit nightclub owner.Based on sweeping research never before collected so powerfully in a single volume, and illustrated with photographs, End of Days distills Kennedy's assassination into a pulse-pounding thriller that is sure to become the definitive popular account of this historic crime for years to come.
The End of Eddy: A Novel
by Michael Lucey Édouard Louis<P>An autobiographical novel about growing up gay in a working-class town in Picardy. <P>“Every morning in the bathroom I would repeat the same phrase to myself over and over again . . . Today I’m really gonna be a tough guy.” <P>Growing up in a poor village in northern France, all Eddy Bellegueule wanted was to be a man in the eyes of his family and neighbors. But from childhood, he was different—“girlish,” intellectually precocious, and attracted to other men. <P>Already translated into twenty languages, The End of Eddy captures the violence and desperation of life in a French factory town. It is also a sensitive, universal portrait of boyhood and sexual awakening. <P>Like Karl Ove Knausgaard or Edmund White, Édouard Louis writes from his own undisguised experience, but he writes with an openness and a compassionate intelligence that are all his own. The result—a critical and popular triumph—has made him the most celebrated French writer of his generation.
The End of Empire: Cyprus: A Soldier's Story
by Martin Bell OBEMartin Bell, the former BBC was reporter and Independent MP, served as a soldier in the Suffolk Regiment during the Cyprus emergency between 1957 and 1959. In a chocolate box in the attic many years later he found more than 100 letters that he had sent home to his family. He was not a journalist then, but the letters give a vivid impression of what it was like to be a conscript on active service during the EOKA rebellion against British rule. They describe road blocks and cordons and searches, murders and explosions and riots and a strategy of armed repression that ultimately failed. From this beginning he has written The End of Empire.His narrative is a powerful and personal account of the violent process of decolonization, of the character of the British Army at the time and the impact of National Service on young men who were not much more than kids in uniform. It also gives a graphic insight into the ultimate futility of the use of force in wars among people and it reveals the true story of the insurgency and the campaign to defeat it.By drawing on recently declassified documents, he shows that Cyprus in the late 1950s was run not by the governor but by a military junta. The army commanders were looking for the knockout blow that would deliver victory, but their misguided tactics served only to strengthen support for their enemy.So The End Of Empire is much more than a personal reminiscence. It is an absorbing account of the experience of army life from the perspective of a private soldier, and it is the inside story of how Britain tried to crush a violent rebellion sixty years ago.
The End of Eve: A Memoir
by Ariel GoreAt age 39, Ariel Gore has everything she's always wanted: a successful writing career, a long-term partnership, a beautiful if tiny home, a daughter in college and a son in preschool. But life's happy endings don't always last. If it's not one thing, after all, it's your mother. Her name is Eve. Her epic temper tantrums have already gotten her banned from three cab companies in Portland. And she's here to announce that she's dying. "Pitifully, Ariel," she sighs. "You're all I have." Ariel doesn't want to take care of her crazy dying mother, but she knows she will. It's the right thing to do, isn't it? And, anyway, how long could it go on? "Don't worry," Eve says. "If I'm ever a burden, I'll just blow my brains out." Amidst the chaos of clowns and hospice workers, pie and too much whiskey, Ariel's own ten-year relationship begins to unravel. Darkly humorous and intimately human, The End of Eve redefines the meaning of family and everything we've ever been taught to call "love."
The End of My Addiction
by Olivier Ameisen"After years of battling uncontrollable addiction, I have achieved the supposedly impossible: complete freedom from craving."Dr. Olivier Ameisen was a brilliant cardiologist on the staff at one of America's top teaching hospitals and running his own successful practice when he developed a profound addiction to alcohol. He broke bones with no memory of falling; he nearly lost his kidneys; he almost died from massive seizures during acute withdrawal. He gave up his flourishing practice and, fearing for his life, immersed himself in Alcoholics Anonymous, rehab, therapy, and a variety of medications. Nothing worked.So he did the only thing he could: he took his treatment into his own hands. Searching for a cure for his deadly disease, he happened upon baclofen, a muscle relaxant that had been used safely for years as a treatment for various types of muscle spasticity, but had more recently shown promising results in studies with laboratory animals addicted to a wide variety of substances. Dr. Ameisen prescribed himself the drug and experimented with increasingly higher dosages until he finally reached a level high enough to leave him free of any craving for alcohol. That was more than five years ago. Alcoholism claims three hundred lives per day in the United States alone; one in four U.S. deaths is attributable to alcohol, tobacco, or illegal drugs. Baclofen, as prescribed under a doctor's care, could possibly free many addicts from tragic and debilitating illness. But as long as the medical and research establishments continue to ignore a cure for one of the most deadly diseases in the world, we won't be able to understand baclofen's full addiction-treatment potential.The End of My Addiction is both a memoir of Dr. Ameisen's own struggle and a groundbreaking call to action—an urgent plea for research that can rescue millions from the scourge of addiction and spare their loved ones the collateral damage of the disease.
The End of Normal
by Stephanie Madoff MackA New York Times bestseller, the explosive and heartbreaking memoir from the widow of Mark Madoff and the daughter-in-law of Bernard Madoff When the news of Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme broke, no one was more shocked than the members of his own family. Before then, Madoff’s son, Mark, and daughter- in-law, Stephanie, had built an idyllic life. Yet, while Mark’s thriving business was entirely separate from his father’s now notorious fund, he and Stephanie found themselves in the eye of the storm—and grappling with their own sense of betrayal. Mark refused to see or speak to his parents, and on the second anniversary of his father’s arrest, he hanged himself. Left to raise her children as a single mother, Stephanie tells the real story of her marriage to Mark, of being a part of the Madoff family, and of life for two years following her father-in-law’s arrest and incarceration. The End of Normal is a searing inside look at one of the most controversial stories of our time, and an extraordinary memoir of surviving personal tragedy amid public scandal. .
The End of Normal: A Wife's Anguish, A Widow's New Life
by Stephanie Madoff Mack Tamara JonesAn explosive, heartbreaking memoir from the widow of Mark Madoff and daughter-in-law of Bernard Madoff, the first genuine inside story from a family member who has lived through -- and survived -- both the public crisis and her own deeply personal tragedy. Stephanie Mack, the daughter-in-law of Bernie Madoff, share's her life story. Bernie scammed many Americans, but Stephanie and her husband knew nothing about his activities. Still his actions had a devistating impact on Stephanie, her husband, and her children.
The End of Protest: A New Playbook for Revolution
by Micah WhiteIs protest broken? Micah White, co-creator of Occupy Wall Street, thinks so. Recent years have witnessed the largest protests in human history. Yet these mass mobilizations no longer change society. Now activism is at a crossroads: innovation or irrelevance. In The End of Protest Micah White heralds the future of activism. Drawing on his unique experience with Occupy Wall Street, a contagious protest that spread to eighty-two countries, White articulates a unified theory of revolution and eight principles of tactical innovation that are destined to catalyze the next generation of social movements. Despite global challenges--catastrophic climate change, economic collapse and the decline of democracy--White finds reason for optimism: the end of protest inaugurates a new era of social change. On the horizon are increasingly sophisticated movements that will emerge in a bid to challenge elections, govern cities and reorient the way we live. In this provocative playbook, White offers three bold, revolutionary scenarios for harnessing the creativity of people from across the political spectrum. He also shows how social movements are created and how they spread, how materialism limits contemporary activism, and why we must re-conceive protest in timelines of centuries, not days. Rigorous, original and compelling, The End of Protest is an exhilarating vision of an all-encompassing revolution of revolution.From the Trade Paperback edition.
The End of San Francisco
by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore"Mattilda is a dazzling writer of uncommon truths, a challenging writer who refuses to conform to conventionality. Her agitation is an inspiration."-Justin Torres, author of We the Animals"Author Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore is the artistic love child of John Genet and David Wojnarowicz, deconstructing language swathed in unbridled sensuality, while flinging readers into a disrupted, chaotic life of queer anarchy."-- Gay and Lesbian ReviewThe End of San Francisco breaks apart the conventions of memoir to reveal the passions and perils of a life that refuses to conform to the rules of straight or gay normalcy. A budding queer activist escapes to San Francisco, in search of a world more politically charged, sexually saturated, and ethically consistent-this is the person who evolves into Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore, infamous radical queer troublemaker, organizer and agitator, community builder, and anti-assimilationist commentator. Here is the tender, provocative, and exuberant story of the formation of one of the contemporary queer movement's most savvy and outrageous writers and spokespersons.Using an unrestrained associative style to move kaleidoscopically between past, present, and future, Sycamore conjures the untidy push and pull of memory, exposing the tensions between idealism and critical engagement, trauma and self-actualization, inspiration and loss. Part memoir, part social history, and part elegy, The End of San Francisco explores and explodes the dream of a radical queer community and the mythical city that was supposed to nurture it.Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore is the editor of four anthologies, including Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots, That's Revolting, and Nobody Passes, and two novels."Bring on The End of San Francisco! And Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore, whose new book has reinvented memoir without the predictable gloss of passive resolution. This book is undeniably brave and new, and the internal energy churning at its core is like nothing you've seen, heard or read before. I swear."-T Cooper, author of Real Man Adventures
The End of the Rainy Season: Discovering My Family's Hidden Past in Brazil
by Marian LindbergMarian Lindberg grew up being told that Walter Lindberg, the man who raised her father, was a brave explorer who had been murdered in the Amazon. She took her father's claims at face value, basking in her exotic roots, until she started to notice things. The unverified legend became a riddle she couldn't solve.As Lindberg moved from journalism to law, fell in love, and sought a family of her own, her father repeatedly interfered. He had a closed vision of his family, and she-unlike the silent Walter-was breaking out. Yet her father's story of the past haunted Lindberg. Long after her father's death, Lindberg set off for the Amazon, determined to find out the truth about Walter. Aided by generous Brazilians who adopted her search as if it were their own, she discovered as much about herself and her family as about Walter, whose true role in Brazil's history turned out to be unexpected and deeply troubling.Sharply observant, wrought with honesty, and sweeping in its ambitions, The End of the Rainy Season is a powerful examination of identity and human relationships with nature, and between one another.
End of the Rope: Mountains, Marriage, and Motherhood
by Jan RedfordIn the tradition of Cheryl Strayed's Wild, the gritty, funny, achingly honest story of a young climber's struggle to become whole by testing herself on mountains and life.As a young teenager Jan Redford runs away from a cottage where her father has just put her down for the zillionth time and throws herself against a 100-foot cliff face. Somewhere in that shaky, outraged kid is a bedrock belief in her right to exist, which carries her to the top. In that brief flash of victory, she sets her sights on becoming a climber.Falling in love with climbing eventually leads to falling in love with the climbers in her tight-knit western Canadian climbing community. It also means that the people she loves regularly vanish in an instant, caught in an avalanche or by a split second of inattention. It almost crushes Jan when her boyfriend, the gifted climber Dan Guthrie, is killed. Instead of marrying Dan, she marries one of his best friends, a driven climber who was there for her when she was grieving and becomes the father of her two children. Not what either of them planned.End of the Rope is raw and real. Mountains challenge Jan, marriage almost annihilates her, and motherhood could have been the last straw...but it isn't. How she climbs out of the hole she digs for herself is as thrilling and inspiring as any of her climbs--and just as much an act of bravery.
End of the Rope: Mountains, Marriage, and Motherhood
by Jan Redford"Jan Redford is a bad–ass. She is also a born storyteller." —John Vaillant, author of The TigerIn this funny and gritty debut memoir, praised by Outside, Sierra, Alpinist, and more, Jan Redford grows from a reckless rock climber to a mother who fights to win back her future.As a teenager, she sets her sights on the improbable dream of climbing mountains. By age twenty, she’s a climber with a magnetic attraction to misadventures and the wrong men.Redford finally finds the love of her life, an affable Rockies climber. When he is killed in an avalanche in Alaska, a grieving Redford finds comfort in the arms of another extreme alpinist. Before long, they are married, with a baby on the way. While her husband works as a logger, Redford tackles the traditional role of wife and mother. But soon, she pursues her own dream, one that pits her against her husband. End of the Rope is Redford's telling of heart–stopping adventures, from being rescued off El Capitan to leading a group of bumbling cadets across a glacier. It is her laughter–filled memoir of friendships with women in that masculine world. Most moving, this is the story of her struggle to make her own way in the mountains and in life. To lead, not follow.
The End of the Russian Empire
by Prof. Michael T. FlorinskyTHE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION—FROM THE TSARS TO THE SOVIETSThis economic, political, and social study by a distinguished Russian authority uses a wealth of contemporary evidence—state documents, memoirs, correspondence, statistics—to analyze “the forces which brought about the fall of the Tsars and paved the way for Bolshevism” in the crucial years 1914-1917.Beginning with a survey of the state of the Russian Empire on the eve of World War I, Professor Florinsky shows how the Imperial system failed to meet the challenges raised by that conflict and why the Bolsheviks were able to assume control of the national Revolution.Every aspect of the collapse is scrutinized, from the absolutist tradition inherited by Nicholas II to the estrangement of the intelligentsia, from the peasant masses, whose only aims were peace and land. The principals are strikingly portrayed—Tsar Nicholas, Tsaritsa Alexandra, Grand Duke Nicholas Nikolaevich, and Rasputin—as are the breakdown of the ministerial bureaucracy, the impotence of the Duma and Union of Zemstvos, and the colossal losses of the army. This richly documented account of the Provisional Government’s failure to meet the nation’s Revolutionary goals and of the Bolsheviks’ spectacular success in formulating and giving voice to Russian aspirations is basic to an understanding of the origins of today’s Soviet state.
End of the Spear: A True Story
by Steve SaintAsked to return to Ecuador by the same tribe who killed his father and other missionaries 40 years earlier, Saint and his family try to help a Stone Age people transition to the 21st century. Their efforts lead to the discovery of the tribal intrigue behind the murders, resulting in very difficult decisions.
The End of White World Supremacy: Four Speeches
by Malcolm XThe classic collection of major speeches, now bundled with an audio download of Malcolm X delivering two of them. Malcolm X remains a touchstone figure for black America and in American culture at large. He gave African Americans not only their consciousness but their history, dignity, and a new pride. No single individual can claim more important responsibility for a social and historical leap forward such as the one sparked in America in the sixties. When, in 1965, Malcolm X was gunned down on the stage of a Harlem theater, America lost one of its most dynamic political thinkers. Yet, as Michael Eric Dyson has observed, &“he remains relevant because he spoke presciently to the issues that matter today: black identity, the politics of black rage, the expression of black dissent, the politics of black power, and the importance of consolidating varieties of expressions within black communities—different ideologies and politics—and bringing them together under a banner of functional solidarity.&” The End of White World Supremacy contains four major speeches by Malcolm X, including: &“Black Man's History,&” &“The Black Revolution,&” &“The Old Negro and the New Negro,&” and the famous &“The Chickens Are Coming Home to Roost&” speech ("God's Judgment of White America"), delivered after the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Several of the speeches include a discussion with the moderator, among whom Adam Clayton Powell, or a question-and-answer with the audience. This new edition bundles with the book an audio download of Malcolm's stirring delivery of &“Black Man's History&” in Harlem's Temple No.7 and &“The Black Revolution&” in the Abyssinian Baptist Church.
The End of Your Life Book Club
by Will Schwalbe'A wonderful book about wonderful books and mothers and sons and the enduring braid between them.' - Mitch Albom, author of Tuesdays With Morrie'a true meditation on what books can do.' - Edmund de Waal, author of The Hare with Amber EyesMary Anne Schwalbe is waiting for her chemotherapy treatments when Will casually asks her what she's reading. The conversation they have grows into tradition: soon they are reading the same books so they can have something to talk about in the hospital waiting room. Their choices range from classic (Howards End) to popular (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), from fantastic (The Hobbit) to spiritual (Jon Kabat-Zinn), with many more in between. We hear their passion for reading and their love for each other in their intimate and searching discussions. The End of Your Life Book Club is a profoundly moving testament to the unconditional love between a child and parent, and the power of reading in our lives.
The End of Your Life Book Club
by Will Schwalbe"What are you reading?" That's the question Will Schwalbe asks his mother, Mary Anne, as they sit in the waiting room of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. In 2007, Mary Anne returned from a humanitarian trip to Pakistan and Afghanistan suffering from what her doctors believed was a rare type of hepatitis. Months later she was diagnosed with a form of advanced pancreatic cancer, which is almost always fatal, often in six months or less. This is the inspiring true story of a son and his mother, who start a "book club" that brings them together as her life comes to a close. Over the next two years, Will and Mary Anne carry on conversations that are both wide-ranging and deeply personal, prompted by an eclectic array of books and a shared passion for reading. Their list jumps from classic to popular, from poetry to mysteries, from fantastic to spiritual. The issues they discuss include questions of faith and courage as well as everyday topics such as expressing gratitude and learning to listen. Throughout, they are constantly reminded of the power of books to comfort us, astonish us, teach us, and tell us what we need to do with our lives and in the world. Reading isn't the opposite of doing; it's the opposite of dying. Will and Mary Anne share their hopes and concerns with each other--and rediscover their lives--through their favorite books. When they read, they aren't a sick person and a well person, but a mother and a son taking a journey together. The result is a profoundly moving tale of loss that is also a joyful, and often humorous, celebration of life: Will's love letter to his mother, and theirs to the printed page. This eBook edition includes a Reading Group Guide.
End the Silence
by Dorothy Read Ilse Evelijn Veere SmitEnd the Silence tells the story of Ilse, an Indo-European born into an idyllic childhood in the colonial society of the Dutch East Indies. Ilse's privileged life was forever changed when the Japanese invaded her homeland during World War II. She recounts her years of internment in a Japanese concentration camp on Java. Then, at the war's end she walked out of Camp Halmaheira only to walk into the bloody Indonesian revolution where she was targeted for execution by native freedom fighters. Finally, she tells of the pain she suffered trying to cope with her memories in a family that refused to talk about it. As Ilse recalls the scenes in her remarkable journey, Dorothy Read paints them in the words of both the young Ilse who lived them and today's Ilse who reflects upon them.
End to End: 'A really great read, fascinating, moving’ Adrian Chiles
by Paul JonesThe End to End record is the longest place-to-place cycling record in Britain. It is a daunting 842 miles and for the men and women who attempt to break the record, there can be no second place, only the binary outcome of total success or failure. Paul Jones decided to ride from Land's End to John O' Groats in an attempt to understand the relentless physical and mental challenges involved. End to End is a captivating and beautifully written narrative. A lyrical account of the journey sits alongside meetings with amazing cyclists; people like Eileen Sheridan; who covered the distance in under three days in 1954, or current men's record holder Michael Broadwith who did it in a scarcely believable 43 hours. Paul Jones reaches further back to the very first attempts in the 1880s, undertaken on penny farthings, fuelled by Victorian values and patent medicine.For the author, what starts as a simple way to frame the narrative transforms into a deeper search for meaning amidst the ceaseless clamour of life, work and relationships. It becomes a trip through the contours of the mind as well as the map, from Bodmin Moor to Shap Fell, the Cairngorms and the Caithness coast. End to End is a portrayal of hope and ambition, of what happens when things go wrong and how hard it is to make them right. It is about courage, obsession and joy, but above all else, it is a compelling exploration of why journeys matter for all of us.
An End to Suffering: The Buddha in the World
by Pankaj MishraAn End to Suffering is a deeply original and provocative book about the Buddha's life and his influence throughout history, told in the form of the author's search to understand the Buddha's relevance in a world where class oppression and religious violence are rife, and where poverty and terrorism cast a long, constant shadow. Mishra describes his restless journeys into India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, among Islamists and the emerging Hindu middle class, looking for this most enigmatic of religious figures, exploring the myths and places of the Buddha's life, and discussing Western explorers' "discovery" of Buddhism in the nineteenth century. He also considers the impact of Buddhist ideas on such modern politicians as Gandhi and Nelson Mandela. As he reflects on his travels and on his own past, Mishra shows how the Buddha wrestled with problems of personal identity, alienation, and suffering in his own, no less bewildering, times. In the process Mishra discovers the living meaning of the Buddha's teaching, in the world and for himself. The result is the most three-dimensional, convincing book on the Buddha that we have.