- Table View
- List View
Ghost on the Wall: The Authorised Biography of Roy Evans
by Derek DohrenGhost on the Wall is the official biography of one of Liverpool Football Club's greatest ever servants: Roy Evans. Born in Bootle in 1948, Evans attracted the attention of many First Division club managers while playing for England's schoolboys team in the early 1960s. In 1964, legendary Liverpool manager Bill Shankly stepped in to sign him. But while the '60s were an exciting time to play for Liverpool, they were also very challenging, and Evans found it hard to break into the first team on a regular basis.Following Shankly's shock resignation in 1974, Evans was given the opportunity to become a member of the backroom staff. It was here that he really made his mark, taking the reserve team to seven Central League titles in nine years and coming of age as a coach and trainer, emerging as an invaluable member of the legendary 'Boot Room'.The decline in the club's fortunes during the 1980s meant that the resignation of manager Graeme Souness in 1994 left the incoming manager facing an exciting challenge - to return the club to its glory days. Roy Evans, 'the last of the Shankly lads', was handed his date with destiny. While the Reds did not win another League Championship under Evans' charge, neither did they finish any lower than fourth, and Evans' commitment to developing future Liverpool stars such as Robbie Fowler, Steve McManaman and Michael Owen ensured that he would not become another 'ghost on the wall' at Anfield.In this engrossing account, Evans reveals the inside story of life as a member of Liverpool's famous Boot Room. He recollects his close working relationships with Reds legends from Shankly to Houllier and provides a vivid portrait of operations at the celebrated club over four action-packed decades.Finally, he discusses the challenges he faces in his new role as assistant manager of the Welsh national side and considers the way forward for Liverpool after their Champions League victory under Rafael Benítez in 2005.
Ghost: My Thirty Years as an FBI Undercover Agent
by Ralph Pezzullo Michael R. McGowanThe explosive memoir of an FBI field operative who has worked more undercover cases than anyone in history.Within FBI field operative circles, groups of people known as “Special” by their titles alone, Michael R. McGowan is an outlier. 10% of FBI Special Agents are trained and certified to work undercover. A quarter of those agents have worked more than one undercover assignment in their careers. And of those, less than 10% of them have been involved in more than five undercover cases. Over the course of his career, McGowan has worked more than 50 undercover cases. In this extraordinary and unprecedented book, McGowan will take readers through some of his biggest cases, from international drug busts, to the Russian and Italian mobs, to biker gangs and contract killers, to corrupt unions and SWAT work. Ghost is an unparalleled view into how the FBI, through the courage of its undercover Special Agents, nails the bad guys. McGowan infiltrates groups at home and abroad, assembles teams to create the myths he lives, concocts fake businesses, coordinates the busts, and helps carry out the arrests. Along the way, we meet his partners and colleagues at the FBI, who pull together for everything from bank jobs to the Boston Marathon bombing case, mafia dons, and, perhaps most significantly, El Chapo himself and his Sinaloa Cartel.Ghost is the ultimate insider's account of one of the most iconic institutions of American government, and a testament to the incredible work of the FBI.
Ghostbelly
by Elizabeth HeinemanEveryone loves to blame a mother for making the "wrong" choices, and Elizabeth Heineman makes plenty of unpopular ones: being of advanced maternal age, having a home birth with a midwife, communing with her dead baby. In Ghostbelly, Heineman's brave, disarming, and stunning memoir, she recounts her indescribable grief after delivering a stillborn son, her shocking and intimate bonding with the baby's body before the burial, and the impossible task of saying goodbye.In 2008 Elizabeth McCracken's memoir broke the silence surrounding stillbirth, which account for one in 160 pregnancies in the United States. Now Ghostbelly provides a searing tale of motherhood, the need to invent our own rituals of grieving, and the unexpected space we occupy when birth and death coincide.
Ghostbread
by Sonja Livingston"When you eat soup every night, thoughts of bread get you through." Ghostbread makes real for us the shifting homes and unending hunger that shape the life of a girl growing up in poverty during the 1970s. One of seven children brought up by a single mother, Sonja Livingston was raised in areas of western New York that remain relatively hidden from the rest of America. From an old farming town to an Indian reservation to a dead-end urban neighborhood, Livingston and her siblings follow their nonconformist mother from one ramshackle house to another on the perpetual search for something better. Along the way, the young Sonja observes the harsh realities her family encounters, as well as small moments of transcendent beauty that somehow keep them going. While struggling to make sense of her world, Livingston perceives the stresses and patterns that keep children--girls in particular--trapped in the cycle of poverty. Larger cultural experiences such as her love for Wonder Woman and Nancy Drew and her experiences with the Girl Scouts and Roman Catholicism inform this lyrical memoir. Livingston firmly eschews sentimentality, offering instead a meditation on what it means to hunger and showing that poverty can strengthen the spirit just as surely as it can grind it down.
Ghostbread (Association of Writers and Writing Programs Award for Creative Nonfiction Series #11)
by Sonja LivingstonA memoir of growing up poor and hungry in 1970s western New York: &“Like an American version of Angela&’s Ashes.&”—Kathleen Norris, New York Times-bestselling author of The Cloister Walk When you eat soup every night, thoughts of bread get you through. One of seven children brought up by a single mother, Sonja Livingston was raised in areas of western New York that remain relatively hidden from the rest of America. From an old farming town to an Indian reservation to a dead-end urban neighborhood, Livingston and her siblings follow their nonconformist mother from one ramshackle house to another on the perpetual search for something better. Along the way, the young Sonja observes the harsh realities her family encounters, as well as small moments of transcendent beauty that somehow keep them going. While struggling to make sense of her world, Livingston perceives the stresses and patterns that keep children—girls in particular—trapped in the cycle of poverty. Informed by cultural experiences such as Livington&’s love for Wonder Woman and Nancy Drew and her experiences with the Girl Scouts and Roman Catholicism, this lyrical memoir firmly eschews sentimentality, offering instead a meditation on what it means to hunger and showing that poverty can strengthen the spirit just as surely as it can grind it down. &“[A]n absolutely astonishing debut…harrowing and hilarious.&”—Caroline Leavitt, New York Times-bestselling author of With or Without You &“Livingston reveals the daily challenges poverty-stricken young children face.&”—Booklist &“Weaves together a child&’s experience of not belonging, the perilous ease of slipping into failure, and the deep love that can flow from even a highly troubled parent.&”—Dinty W. Moore, author of The Accidental Buddhist
Ghostbuster's Daughter: Life with My Dad, Harold Ramis
by Violet Ramis StielFrom the daughter of comedy legend Harold Ramis (and featuring a Foreword by Seth Rogen) comes a hilarious and heartwarming account of his life, work, and legacy.Most of us know Harold Ramis as the writer, director, and actor who brought warmth and humor to the big screen in classics like Animal House, Caddyshack, Ghostbusters, National Lampoon's Vacation, and Groundhog Day. To his daughter, Violet, he was best known as an amazing father, confidant, and friend. In Ghostbuster's Daughter, Violet reflects on the life and legacy of her father, providing readers with an extraordinarily candid and insightful look into the man who helped shape modern American comedy. Funny, endearing, and vulnerable, Ghostbuster's Daughter takes readers into the private life of the American comedy icon, from his humble roots in Chicago and ascension into Hollywood stardom to his personal philosophies on life, love, and filmmaking. While the book offers a comprehensive history of her father's career, Ghostbuster's Daughter also provides a profound homage to their special father-daughter relationship. Violet weaves anecdotes about her father's unique and devoted parenting style among stories of her own unconventional upbringing, creating a vivid and dynamic portrait of the man behind the movies. A distinctly offbeat memoir as well as a charming family story for the ages, Ghostbuster's Daughter is an intimate look at one of America's preeminent comedy filmmakers.
Ghosted: An American Story
by Nancy FrenchA riveting look inside a life of poverty, success, and the inner circles of political influence--from the foothills of Appalachia all the way to the White House.New York Times bestselling ghostwriter Nancy French is coming out of the shadows to tell her own incredible story.Nancy's family hails from the foothills of the Appalachians, where life was dominated by coal mining, violence, abuse, and poverty. Longing for an adventure, she married a stranger, moved to New York, and dropped out of college. In spite of her lack of education, she found success as a ghostwriter for conservative political leaders. However, when she was unwilling to endorse an unsuitable president, her allies turned on her and she found herself spiritually adrift, politically confused, and occupationally unemployable.Republicans mocked her, white nationalists targeted her, and her church community alienated her. But in spite of death threats, sexual humiliation, and political ostracization, she learned the importance of finding her own voice--and that the people she thought were her enemies could be her closest friends.A poignant and engrossing memoir filled with humor and personal insights, Ghosted is a deeply American story of change, loss, and ultimately love.
Ghosting: A Double Life
by Jennie ErdalJennie Erdal worked for nearly fifteen years for the flamboyant, extravagant, larger-than-life "Tiger," a London publisher, entrepreneur, and media personality. Officially, she was his personal editor. In truth, Erdal was his ghostwriter and alter ego. Under his name, she produced not only newspaper columns, business columns, and novels, but even love letters. In temperament, the two couldn't have been more different. Yet their relationship weathered storms of all kinds, from temper tantrums to serious financial reversals, with a tenacious bond that is both a wonder and an enigma. With effortless grace, gentle erudition, and wry humour, Erdal shows us vivid snapshots of an austere childhood in Scotland and of the London publishing world, peopled by the elegant and the "Oxbridge"-educated. She introduces us to a thoughtful girl who found her passion in language and the magic of words, a passion that led her by a series of chance events to the publishing house, and the strange, wonderful, and never-dull world of the inimitable Tiger. As original as it is elegant and witty,Ghostingis a remarkable memoir -- more than just one woman's story, it is the tale of her double life, as well as a fascinating glimpse into the symbiotic relationship between two very unusual people.
Ghosts by Daylight: A Modern-Day War Correspondent's Memoir of Love, Loss, and Redemption
by Janine Di GiovanniJanine di Giovanni has spent most of her career--more than twenty years--in war zones recording events on behalf of the voiceless. From Sarajevo to East Timor, from Sierra Leone to Afghanistan, Iraq, and Somalia, she has been under siege and under fire.Along the way she meets Bruno, a French reporter whose spirit and audacity are a match for her own. Their love affair spans nearly a decade and a dozen armed conflicts before they settle in Paris to raise a family. But Janine soon learns that a life lived in war is inevitably haunted. Bruno struggles with physical and emotional pain, and Janine, a new mother and wife in Paris, is afraid for both Bruno and herself and for the work that they do--and doubtful that she can hold their lives together.With stunning scenes of action and heart-wrenching accounts of profound love, personal loss, and redemption, Ghosts by Daylight tells the unforgettable story of a passionate life lived to the fullest.
Ghosts in a Photograph: A Chronicle
by Myrna KostashIn Ghosts in a Photograph, award-winning nonfiction writer Myrna Kostash delves into the lives of her grandparents, all of whom moved from Galicia, now present-day Ukraine, to Alberta at the turn of the twentieth century. Discovering a packet of family mementos, Kostash begins questioning what she knows about her extended families’ pasts and whose narrative is allowed to prevail in Canada.This memoir, however, is not just a personal story, but a public one of immigration, partisan allegiance, and the stark differences in how two sets of families survive in a new country: one as homesteaders, the other as working-class Edmontonians. Working within the gaps in history—including the unsolved murder in Ukraine of her great uncle—Kostash uses her remarkable acumen as a writer and researcher to craft a probable narrative to interrogate the idea of straightforward and singular-voiced pasts and the stories we tell ourselves about where we come from.Rich in detail and propelled by vital curiosity, Ghosts in a Photograph is a determined, compelling, and multifaceted family chronicle.
Ghosts in the Garden
by Beth Kephart William Sulit?National Book Award nominee Beth Kephart's new book is an enchanting midlife meditation on aging, identity, and memory set against the backdrop of Chanticleer garden in Pennsylvania. On the morning of her forty-?rst birthday, Kephart -- a mother, a wife, and a writer pressured by deadlines -- finds herself at Chanticleer, one of the world's most celebrated pleasure gardens. She knows little of the language of flowers. She cannot name the birds in the trees. She is a stranger among the gardeners and the people passing by. And yet she understands that she has somehow found her way to a place that can teach her about life and growth, about the past and the future. Week after week, she returns to Chanticleer -- recalling her childhood self, mulling over legacy and soul, striking up friendships with gardeners and conversations with other visitors. Succored by the seasons and the weather, she finds the grace in approaching middle age. There are lessons in seeds, and she finds them. There are lessons in letting go. Kephart writes about questions we all ask ourselves: How do we remember who we used to be? How do we imagine who we'll become? Have we lived our lives as we set out to? What legacies do we wish to leave behind? The book spans a two-year cycle, and each chapter is accompanied by a gorgeous black-and-white photograph of Chanticleer by William Sulit. Ghosts in the Garden pulses with possibility and purpose, with wisdom that is ageless and transcendent.
Ghosts of Home: The Afterlife of Czernowitz in Jewish Memory
by Marianne Hirsch Leo SpitzerIn this original blend of history and communal memoir, Marianne Hirsch, a literary critic and the daughter of Czernowitz Holocaust survivors, and Leo Spitzer, a historian and Hirsch's husband, chronicle the city's survival in personal, familial, and cultural memory.
Ghosts of Manila: The Fateful Blood Feud Between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier
by Mark Kram Jr.When Muhammad Ali met Joe Frazier in Manila for their third fight, their rivalry had spun out of control. The Ali-Frazier matchup had become a madness, inflamed by the media and the politics of race. When the "Thrilla in Manila" was over, one man was left with a ruin of a life; the other was battered to his soul. Mark Kram covered that fight for Sports Illustrated in an award-winning article. Now his riveting book reappraises the boxers -- who they are and who they were. And in a voice as powerful as a heavyweight punch, Kram explodes the myths surrounding each fighter, particularly Ali. A controversial, no-holds-barred account, Ghosts of Manila ranks with the finest boxing books ever written.
Ghosts of Revolution: Rekindled Memories of Imprisonment in Iran
by Shahla TalebiIn this powerful memoir, Talebi (religious studies, Arizona State U. ) recounts her time as a political prisoner in her homeland, Iran. First a prisoner of the Shah during his last years in power, then (for a much longer time) held in the Islamic Republic's infamous Nevin Prison, the author sacrificed a decade of her life for her political activities. Talebi shares with readers how she and other prisoners withstood their own suffering and retained hope and humanity in those dark years, often with brutal honesty. While this book will clearly have great appeal for readers interested in Iran's recent history, it also has much to say to anyone concerned with the issues of government-sanctioned torture and violence in any country. Annotation ©2011 Book News, Inc. , Portland, OR (booknews. com)
Ghosts of Slavery: A Literary Archaeology of Black Women's Lives
by Jenny SharpeGhosts of Slavery: A Literary Archaeology of Black Women's Lives
Ghosts of War: The True Story of a 19-Year-Old GI
by Ryan SmithsonIn this extraordinary and harrowing memoir, follow one GI’s tour of duty as Ryan Smithson brings readers inside a world that few understand. This is no ordinary teenager’s story. Instead of opting for college life, Ryan Smithson joined the Army Reserve when he was seventeen. Two years later, he was deployed to Iraq as an Army engineer.His story—and the stories of thousands of other soldiers—is nothing like what you see on CNN or read about in the New York Times. This unforgettable story about combat, friendship, fear, and a soldier’s commitment to his country peels back the curtain on the realities of war in a story all Americans should read.
Ghosts of the Fireground: Echoes of the Great Peshtigo Fire and the Calling of a Wildland Firefighter
by Peter M LeschakIn October 1871, a massive forest fire incinerated the town of Peshtigo, Wisconsin. It was the deadliest fire in North American history, an event so intense that its release of energy was not approximated until the advent of thermo-nuclear weapons. At least 1,200 people perished—some in bizarre and disturbing ways—and the actual number of fatalities is unknown, perhaps as many as 1,500 were lost. Since the Great Chicago Fire occurred at the same time, Peshtigo was overshadowed and almost forgotten. In 2000, veteran wild-land firefighter Peter Leschak was faced with a hot and challenging fire season, tasked with the leadership of a helitack crew—an airborne fire team expected to be the “tip of the spear” on wildfire initial attacks. During that long summer he studied Father Peter Pernon’s eyewitness account of the Pehstigo holocaust, and using his knowledge and experience as a firefighter, Leschak placed himself in Pernin’s shoes, as much as possible being transported to the firestorm of 1871. Ghosts of the Fireground tells both tales: the horrific saga of Peshtigo, and the modern battles of a wildfire helicopter crew, seamlessly intertwining the stories to enhance them both.
Ghosts of the White House
by Cheryl HarnessGeorge Washington's ghost pulls a girl out of her school White House tour and takes her on a personal tour of the building, introducing her to the ghosts of previous presidents and to the history of the White House and the United States.
Ghosts on the Roof: Selected Journalism
by Milton Hindus Terry Teachout Whittaker ChambersWhittaker Chambers is one of the most controversial figures in modern American history a former Communist spy who left the party, testified against Alger Hiss before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and wrote a classic autobiography, Witness. Dismissed by some as a crank, reviled by others as a traitor, Chambers still looms as a Dostoevskian figure over three decades after his death in 1961. A man of profound pessimism, rare vision, and remarkable literary talents, his continuing importance was attested to when Ronald Reagan posthumously awarded him the Medal of Freedom in 1984. Ghosts on the Roof, originally published in 1989, brings together more than fifty short stories, essays, articles, and reviews that originally appeared in Time, Life, National Review, Commonweal, The American Mercury, and the New Masses. Included are essays on Karl Marx, Reinhold Niebuhr, James Joyce, Franz Kafka, George Santayana, Dame Rebecca West, Ayn Rand, and Greta Garbo. These show Chambers at his best, as a peerless historian of ideas.
Ghostwriter: Shakespeare, Literary Landmines, and an Eccentric Patron's Royal Obsession
by Lawrence WellsPart literary mystery, part an examination of what constitutes fiction versus reality, Ghostwriter is based on the true story of author Lawrence Wells, then 45, hired by the University of Mississippi in 1987 to ghostwrite a novel for a wealthy, eccentric donor (“Mrs. F,” then 75), who was convinced that Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, was William Shakespeare. Believing herself to be the reincarnation of Queen Elizabeth I, Mrs. F treated ghostwriter Wells as a “captive” Edward de Vere.Their roller-coaster literary collaboration dramatized Elizabeth and de Vere’s romance, which according to legend produced a son (Henry Wriothesley) born in secret. Henry grew up to become the 3rd Earl of Southampton, who is universally acknowledged as “The Fair Youth” of Shakespeare’s sonnets and whose real-life descendants include Princess Diana and her sons, Prince Harry and William, Prince of Wales.Wells and his late wife, Dean Faulkner Wells, niece of William Faulkner, traveled to England to research the life of Edward de Vere and interview proponents of the Shakespeare authorship debate. That summer, London tabloids headlined the royal breakup of Prince Charles and Princess Diana, incidentally echoing Wells and Mrs. F’s tempestuous love story about Edward de Vere and Queen Elizabeth I.Flashbacks weave several elements together—the seventeenth-century mystery of Queen Elizabeth’s “royal bastard,” Wells’s evolving relationship with his eccentric patron, his search for the “real” Shakespeare, and the bawdy Elizabethan narrative he composed for his benefactor. The stories merge, leading to a surprising conclusion.
Giacometti: A Biography
by James LordThe work of one of the towering creative spirits of the century, Alberto Giacometti's visionary sculptures and paintings from a testament to the artist's intriguing life story. From modest beginnings in a Swiss village, Giacometti went on to flourish in the picturesque milieu of prewar Paris and then to achieve international acclaim in the fifties and sixties. Picasso, Balthus, Samuel Beckett, Stravinsky and Sartre have parts in his story, along with flamboyant art dealers, whores, shady drifters, unscrupulous collectors, poets and thieves. Women were a complex yet important element of his life--particularly his wife, Annette, and his last mistress and model, Caroline--as was the intimate relationship he shared with his brother Diego, who was both Alberto's confidant and collaborator.James Lord was personally acquainted with Giacometti and his entourage, and combines firsthand experience with a unique knowledge gathered during many years of observation and research. In this exceptional biography Lord unfolds the personal history of a man who managed to achieve a heroic destiny by remaining utterly true to himself and to his calling.Giacometti: A Biography was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award. James Lord has subsequently published three volumes of memoirs. In recognition of his contribution to French culture he has been made an officer of the Legion of Honour.
Giacomo Puccini
by Conrad WilsonGiacomo Puccini (1858--1924), composer of such popular operas as La Bohème and Madame Butterfly, is most renowned for his gift as a melodist. With his final opera, Turandot, Puccini composed the last Italian work in the genre to hold a firm place in the international repertoire. The author draws attention to the felicity, daring and extraordinary colouring of his music, countering the view held during Puccini's lifetime that he was a retrogressive who aimed to shock. Puccini is shown to have been a new force in musical drama, and yet a man who remained insecure about his creative powers. Conrad Wilson's book is a polemical, passionate and rational attempt to set the man from Lucca among the immortal greats.
Giacomo Puccini and His World
by Emanuele Senici Arman SchwartzGiacomo Puccini (1858-1924) is the world's most frequently performed operatic composer, yet he is only beginning to receive serious scholarly attention. In Giacomo Puccini and His World, an international roster of music specialists, several writing on Puccini for the first time, offers a variety of new critical perspectives on the composer and his works. Containing discussions of all of Puccini's operas from Manon Lescaut (1893) to Turandot (1926), this volume aims to move beyond clichés of the composer as a Romantic epigone and to resituate him at the heart of early twentieth-century musical modernity. This collection's essays explore Puccini's engagement with spoken theater and operetta, and with new technologies like photography and cinema. Other essays consider the philosophical problems raised by "realist" opera, discuss the composer's place in a variety of cosmopolitan formations, and reevaluate Puccini's orientalism and his complex interactions with the Italian fascist state. A rich array of primary source material, including previously unpublished letters and documents, provides vital information on Puccini's interactions with singers, conductors, and stage directors, and on the early reception of the verismo movement. Excerpts from Fausto Torrefranca's notorious Giacomo Puccini and International Opera, perhaps the most vicious diatribe ever directed against the composer, appear here in English for the first time. The contributors are Micaela Baranello, Leon Botstein, Alessandra Campana, Delia Casadei, Ben Earle, Elaine Fitz Gibbon, Walter Frisch, Michele Girardi, Arthur Groos, Steven Huebner, Ellen Lockhart, Christopher Morris, Arman Schwartz, Emanuele Senici, and Alexandra Wilson.
Giambattista Bodoni: His Life And His World
by Valerie LesterThis is the first English-language biography of the relentlessly ambitious and incomparably talented printer Giambattista Bodoni (1740-1813). Born to a printing family in the small foothill town of Saluzzo, he left his comfortable life to travel to Rome in 1758 where he served as an apprentice of Cardinal Spinelli at the Propaganda Fide press. There, under the sponsorship of Ruggieri, he learned all aspects of the printing craft. Even then, his real talent lay in type design and punchcutting, especially of the exotic foreign alphabets needed by the papal office to spread the faith. His life changed when at age 28 he was invited by the Duke of Parma to abandon Rome for that very French city to establish and direct the ducal press. He remained in Parma, overseeing a vast variety of printing, some of it pedestrian, but much of it glorious. And all of it making use of the typefaces he personally designed and engraved. This fine book goes beyond Bodoni's capacity as a printer; it examines the life and times in which he lived, the turbulent and always fragile political climate, the fascinating cast of characters that enlivened the ducal court, the impressive list of visitors making the pilgrimage to Parma, and the unique position Parma occupied, politically Italian but very much French in terms of taste and culture. Even the food gets its due. The illustrations—of the city, of the press, of the types and matrices—are captivating, but most striking are the pages from the books he designed, especially pages from his typographic masterpiece, the Manuale Tipografico, which displayed the myriad typefaces in multiple sizes that Bodoni had designed and engraved over a long and prolific career. Intriguing, scholarly, visually arresting, and designed and printed to Bodoni's standards, this title belongs on the shelf of any self-respecting bibliophile. It not only makes for compelling reading, it will be considered the biography of record of a great printer for years to come.
Giambologna: Narrator of the Catholic Reformation (California Studies in the History of Art #33)
by Mary Weitzel GibbonsThis title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1995.This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived</DIV