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The Rule of Three (The Sisters Club)
by Megan McdonaldThe play's the thing when sibling rivalry takes center stage in a funny, spot-on, all-new Sisters Club story by the inimitable creator of Judy Moody. Alex has always been the Actor-with-a-capital-A in the Reel family, and middle-sister Stevie has always been content behind the scenes. But when the school play turns out to be a musical, Stevie (the natural-born singer of the family), decides that she may just be tired of being the Sensible One. Maybe, for once, she'd like to be the one in the spotlight! Alex isn't so keen on vying for the same role as her younger sister, however, and soon the dueling divas -- with little sister Joey egging them on -- are engaged in a fierce competition to find out who's got what it takes to play the Princess. Has Stevie broken the rules by going for what she wants -- or will it be Alex who hands down the biggest betrayal of all?
The Rulebreaker: The Life and Times of Barbara Walters
by Susan PageA &“smart, juicy, deeply reported&” (Katie Couric) biography of the most successful female broadcaster of all time—Barbara Walters—a woman whose personal demons fueled an ambition that broke all the rules and finally gave women a permanent place on the air, written by bestselling author Susan Page.Barbara Walters was a force from the time TV was exploding on the American scene in the 1960s to its waning dominance in a new world of competition from streaming services and social media half a century later. She was not just a groundbreaker for women (Oprah announced when she was seventeen that she wanted to be Barbara Walters), but also expanded the big TV interview and then dominated the genre. By the end of her career, she had interviewed more of the famous and infamous, from presidents to movie stars to criminals to despots, than any other journalist in history. Then at sixty-seven, past the age of many female broadcasters found themselves involuntarily retired, she pioneered a new form of talk TV called The View. She is on the short list of those who have left the biggest imprints on television news and on our culture, male or female. So, who was the woman behind the legacy? In The Rulebreaker, Susan Page conducts 150 interviews and extensive archival research to discover that Walters was driven to keep herself and her family afloat after her mercurial and famous impresario father attempted suicide. But she never lost the fear of an impending catastrophe, which is what led her to ask for things no woman had ever asked for before, to ignore the rules of misogynistic culture, to outcompete her most ferocious competitors, and to protect her complicated marriages and love life from scrutiny. Page breaks news on every front—from the daring things Walters did to become the woman who reinvented the TV interview to the secrets she kept until her heath. This is the &“stunning&” (Norah O&’Donnell), &“brilliantly written&” (Andrea Mitchell) account of the woman who knew she had to break all the rules so she could break all the rules about what viewers deserved to know.
The Rules Do Not Apply
by Ariel Levy'Every deep feeling a human is capable of will be shaken loose by this short, but profound book' David Sedaris'I wanted what we all want: everything. We want a mate who feels like family and a lover who is exotic, surprising. We want to be youthful adventurers and middle-aged mothers. We want intimacy and autonomy, safety and stimulation, reassurance and novelty, coziness and thrills. But we can't have it all.'Ariel Levy picks you up and hurls you through the story of how she lived believing that conventional rules no longer applied - that marriage doesn't have to mean monogamy, that aging doesn't have to mean infertility, that she could be 'the kind of woman who is free to do whatever she chooses'. But all of her assumptions about what she can control are undone after a string of overwhelming losses.'I thought I had harnessed the power of my own strength and greed and love in a life that could contain it. But it has exploded.'Levy's own story of resilience becomes an unforgettable portrait of the shifting forces in our culture, of what has changed - and what never can.
The Rules Do Not Apply: A Memoir
by Ariel LevyA gorgeous memoir about a woman overcoming dramatic loss and finding reinvention—for readers of Cheryl Strayed and Joan Didion When thirty-eight-year-old New Yorker writer Ariel Levy left for a reporting trip to Mongolia in 2012, she was pregnant, married, financially secure, and successful on her own terms. A month later, none of that was true. Levy picks you up and hurls you through the story of how she built an unconventional life and then watched it fall apart with astonishing speed. Like much of her generation, she was raised to resist traditional rules—about work, about love, and about womanhood. “I wanted what we all want: everything. We want a mate who feels like family and a lover who is exotic, surprising. We want to be youthful adventurers and middle-aged mothers. We want intimacy and autonomy, safety and stimulation, reassurance and novelty, coziness and thrills. But we can’t have it all.” In this profound and beautiful memoir, Levy chronicles the adventure and heartbreak of being “a woman who is free to do whatever she chooses.” Her own story of resilience becomes an unforgettable portrait of the shifting forces in our culture, of what has changed—and of what is eternal. Advance praise for The Rules Do Not Apply“I read The Rules Do Not Apply in one long, rapt sitting. Unflinching and intimate, wrenching and revelatory, Ariel Levy’s powerful memoir about love, loss, and finding one’s way shimmers with truth and heart on every page.”—Cheryl Strayed “Every deep feeling a human is capable of will be shaken loose by this profound book. Ariel Levy has taken grief and made art out of it.”—David Sedaris “Ariel Levy is a writer of uncompromising honesty, remarkable clarity, and surprising humor gathered from the wreckage of tragedy. Her account of life doing its darnedest to topple her, and her refusal to be knocked down, will leave you shaken and inspired. I am the better for having read this book.”—Lena Dunham “A great memoir is not a trip through someone else’s life but a series of long looks into your own. Ariel Levy’s book—grieving, hopeful, painful, funny—is that.”—Amy Bloom “It’s become a truism that feminists are living out our mothers’ unlived lives. But Ariel Levy seems to be living out the unlived lives of an entire generation of women, simultaneously. Free to do whatever she chooses, she chooses everything. While reinventing work, marriage, family, pregnancy, sex, and divorce for herself from the ground up, Levy experiences devastating loss. And she recounts it all here with searing intimacy and an unsentimental yet openhearted rigor.”—Alison Bechdel “The Rules Do Not Apply is heartbreaking, brilliant, and disarming, the kind of book that may change you. Ariel Levy writes with a beauty that is ferociously honest and with the fervor of an explorer. No one else has written so insightfully about the current legacy of feminism’s ‘lavish gift’ of freedom. Levy has a voice unlike any other. This is a devastating and inspired book.”—René Steinke
The Rules of Inheritance
by Claire Bidwell SmithA 2012 Books for a Better Life nominee A resonant memoir of the ways untimely good-byes echo through the years by a writer who has considered every nuance of grief. At age fourteen, Claire Bidwell Smith-an only child- learned that both of her parents had cancer. The fear of becoming a family of one before she came of age compels Claire to make a series of fraught choices, set against the glittering backdrop of New York and Los Angeles - and the pall of regret. When the inevitable happens, and Claire is alone in the world, she is inconsolable at the revelation that suddenly she is no one's special person. It is only when Claire eventually falls in love, marries, and becomes a mother that she emerges from the fog of grief. Defying a conventional framework, this story is told using the five stages of grief as a window into Smith's experience. As in the very best memoirs, the author's powerful and exquisite writing renders personal events into universal experience. .
The Rules of Inheritance
by Claire Bidwell SmithIn this astonishing debut, Claire Bidwell Smith, an only child, is just fourteen years old when both of her charismatic parents are diagnosed with cancer. What follows is a coming-of-age story that is both heartbreaking and exhilarating. As Claire hurtles towards loss she throws herself at anything she thinks might help her cope with the weight of this harsh reality: boys, alcohol, traveling, and the anonymity of cities like New York and Los Angeles. By the time she is twenty-five years old they are both gone and Claire is very much alone in the world. Claire's story is less of a tragic tale and more of a remarkable lesson on how to overcome some of life's greatest hardships. Written with suspense and style, and bursting with love and adventure, The Rules of Inheritance vividly captures the deep grief and surprising light of a young woman forging ahead on a journey of loss that humbled, strengthened, and ultimately healed her.(P)2013 Headline Digital
The Rules of Inheritance: A Memoir
by Claire Bidwell SmithClaire Bidwell Smith, an only child, is just fourteen years old when both of her charismatic parents are diagnosed with cancer. What follows is a coming-of-age story that is both heartbreaking and exhilarating. As Claire hurtles towards loss she throws herself at anything she thinks might help her cope with the weight of this harsh reality: boys, alcohol, traveling, and the anonymity of cities like New York and Los Angeles. By the time she is twenty-five years old both her parents are gone and Claire is very much alone in the world. Claire's story is less of a tragic tale and more of a remarkable lesson on how to overcome some of life's greatest hardships. Written with suspense and style, and bursting with love and adventure, The Rules of Inheritance vividly captures the deep grief and surprising light of a young woman forging ahead on a journey of loss that humbled, strengthened, and ultimately healed her.
The Rules of the Tunnel
by Ned ZemanA journalist faces his toughest assignment: profiling himself as he struggles with mood disorders, memory, shock treatment therapy, and the quest to get back to normal. Twenty-five million Americans suffer from clinical depression. But Ned Zeman never thought he’d be one of them. He had a great life and thriving career at Vanity Fair. Then, at age thirty-two, anxiety and depression gripped Zeman with increasing violence and consequences. He experimented with therapist after therapist, medication after medication, hospital after hospital—including McLean Hospital, the facility famed for its treatment of writers, from Sylvia Plath to Susanna Kaysen to David Foster Wallace. Zeman eventually went further by trying electroconvulsive therapy, aka shock treatment. By the time it was over, Zeman had lost nearly two years’ of memory. He was a reporter with amnesia. He had no choice but to start from scratch, to reassemble the pieces of a life he didn’t remember and, increasingly, didn’t want to. By turns hilarious and heartbreaking, profane and hopeful, The Rules of the Tunnel is a guttural shout of a book that defies conventional notions about mood disorders, unlocks mysteries within mysteries, and proves that sometimes everything you’re looking for is right in front of you. .
The Rumi Prescription: How an Ancient Mystic Poet Changed My Modern Manic Life
by Melody MoezziA powerful personal journey to find meaning and life lessons in the words of a wildly popular 13th century poet.Rumi's inspiring and deceptively simple poems have been called ecstatic, mystical, and devotional. To writer and activist Melody Moezzi, they became a lifeline. In The Rumi Prescription, we follow her path of discovery as she translates Rumi's works for herself - to gain wisdom and insight in the face of a creative and spiritual roadblock. With the help of her father, who is a lifelong fan of Rumi's poetry, she immerses herself in this rich body of work, and discovers a 13th-century prescription for modern life. Addressing isolation, distraction, depression, fear, and other everyday challenges we face, the book offers a roadmap for living with intention and ease, and embracing love at every turn--despite our deeply divided and chaotic times. Most of all, it presents a vivid reminder that we already have the answers we seek, if we can just slow down to honor them. • You went out in search of gold far and wide, but all along you were gold on the inside. • Become the sky and the clouds that create the rain, not the gutter that carries it to the drain. • You already own all the sustenance you seek. If only you'd wake up and take a peek. • Quit being a drop. Make yourself an ocean.<
The Runner: A True Account Of The Amazing Lies And Fantastical Adventures Of The Ivy League Impostor James Hogue
by David Samuels<P>A true tale based on an acclaimed New Yorker article follows the efforts of a homeless itinerant who assumed a false identity was accepted at Princeton University, an endeavor during which he dated a millionaire's daughter, achieved top grades and gained entry into the elite Ivy Club before his deception was exposed.
The Running-Shaped Hole
by Robert Earl StewartA searching, self-deprecating memoir of a man on his way to eating himself to death before discovering the anxiety and fulfillment of distance running.“Uplifting, emotional, and just plain hilarious, The Running-Shaped Hole may even inspire you to put down your fork and pick up those running shoes.” — JAY ONRAIT, TSN host and broadcasterWhen Robert Earl Stewart sees his pants lying across the end of his bed, they remind him of a flag draped over a coffin — his coffin. At thirty-eight years old he weighs 368 pounds and is slowly eating himself to death. The only thing that helps him deal with the fear and shame is eating. But one day, following a terrifying doctor’s appointment, he goes for a walk — an act that sets The Running-Shaped Hole in motion. Within a year, he is running long distances, fulfilling his mother's dying wishes, reversing the disastrous course of his eating, losing 140 pounds, and, after several mishaps and jail time, eventually running the Detroit Free Press Half-Marathon.At turns philosophical and slapstick, this memoir examines the life-altering effects running has on a man who, left to his own devices, struggles to be a husband, a father, a son, and a writer.
The Rural Diaries: Love, Livestock, and Big Life Lessons Down on Mischief Farm
by Hilarie BurtonThe beloved actress and star of One Tree Hill, White Collar, and Lethal Weapon, Hilarie Burton Morgan, tells the story of leaving Hollywood for a radically different kind of life in upstate New York with her husband Jeffrey Dean Morgan—a celebration of community, family, and the value of hard work in small town America. <P><P>While Hilarie Burton Morgan's hectic lifestyle as an actress in New York and Los Angeles gave her a comfortable life, it did not fulfill her spiritually or emotionally. After the birth of their first son, she and her husband Jeffrey Dean Morgan, the star of The Walking Dead, decided to make a major change: they bought a working farm in Rhinebeck, New York, and began a new chapter in their lives. <P><P>The Rural Diaries chronicles her inspiring story of farm life: chopping wood, making dandelion wine, building chicken coops. Burton looks back at her transition from urban to country living—discovering how to manage a farm while raising her son and making friends with her new neighbors. <P><P>She mixes charming stories of learning to raise alpacas and buying and revitalizing the town’s beloved candy store, Samuel’s Sweet Shop, with raw observations on the ups and downs of marriage and her struggles with secondary infertility. Burton also includes delicious recipes that can be made with fresh ingredients at home, as well as home renovation and gardening tips. <P><P>Burton’s charisma, wide eyed attitude, and fortitude—both internal and physical—propels this moving story of transformation and self-discovery. The Rural Diaries honors the values and lifestyle of small-town America and offers inspiration for anyone longing to embark on their own unconventional journey. <p><p><b>A New York Times Bestseller</b>
The Russia Hand: A Memoir of Presidential Diplomacy
by Strobe TalbottDuring the past ten years, few issues have mattered more to America's vital interests or to the shape of the twenty-first century than Russia's fate. To cheer the fall of a bankrupt totalitarian regime is one thing; to build on its ruins a stable democratic state is quite another. The challenge of helping to steer post-Soviet Russia-with its thousands of nuclear weapons and seething ethnic tensions-between the Scylla of a communist restoration and the Charybdis of anarchy fell to the former governor of a poor, landlocked Southern state who had won national election by focusing on domestic issues. No one could have predicted that by the end of Bill Clinton's second term he would meet with his Kremlin counterparts more often than had all of his predecessors from Harry Truman to George Bush combined, or that his presidency and his legacy would be so determined by his need to be his own Russia hand. With Bill Clinton at every step was Strobe Talbott, the deputy secretary of state whose expertise was the former Soviet Union. Talbott was Clinton's old friend, one of his most trusted advisers, a frequent envoy on the most sensitive of diplomatic missions and, as this book shows, a sharp-eyed observer. The Russia Handis without question among the most candid, intimate and illuminating foreign-policy memoirs ever written in the long history of such books. It offers unparalleled insight into the inner workings of policymaking and diplomacy alike. With the scope of nearly a decade, it reveals the hidden play of personalities and the closed-door meetings that shaped the most crucial events of our time, from NATO expansion, missile defense and the Balkan wars to coping with Russia's near-meltdown in the wake of the Asian financial crisis. The book is dominated by two gifted, charismatic and flawed men, Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin, who quickly formed one of the most intense and consequential bonds in the annals of statecraft. It also sheds new light on Vladimir Putin, as well as the altered landscape after September 11, 2001. The Russia Handis the first great memoir about war and peace in the post-cold war world. From the Hardcover edition.
The Russian Affair: The True Story of the Couple who Uncovered the Greatest Sporting Scandal
by David WalshLONGLISTED FOR THE WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR PRIZE 2020 'Reads like a thriller, or even a spy novel...Walsh keeps you gripped' Rosamund Urwin, Sunday Times'A turbulent but ultimately inspiring tale. The candour...is rare and gripping' Matt Dickinson, The TimesIt was the story that shocked the world: Russian athletics was revealed to be corrupt from top to bottom, with institutionalised doping used to help the nation's athletes win medals they did not deserve. But the full story of the couple who blew the whistle has never been told - until now. When Russian anti-doping official Vitaly Stepanov met the young 800m athlete Yuliya Rusanova, for him it was love at first sight. Within two months, they were married. But there was a problem – in fact, there were lots of problems. She admitted she was doping and that everyone else was doping, and she let him know that she came from a dark place … It could all have brought a very swift end to a very hasty marriage, but gradually the Stepanovs began to realise that whatever you did, the system in Russia was stacked against you. In the end, the only ones they could rely upon were each other. Fully aware of the risks they were taking, they decided to turn the tables on those who had manipulated them and cheated the sporting world. The result of their investigative work sent shockwaves around the planet and led to Russia&’s athletes being banned from world sport, while the Stepanovs themselves had to go into hiding. The Russian Affair is a gripping true-life drama that at times reads like a spy novel and at others like an epic love story. But, at the centre of it all, is a quietly determined couple who knew that if they stood together they could shine a light on a corrupt system and bring it crashing to the ground.
The Russian Album
by Michael IgnatieffWinner of the Royal Society of Literature AwardIn The Russian Album, Michael Ignatieff chronicles five generations of his Russian family, beginning in 1815. Drawing on family diaries, on the contemplation of intriguing photographs in an old family album, and on stories passed down from father to son, he comes to terms with the meaning of his family's memories and histories. Focusing on his grandparents, Count Paul Ignatieff and Princess Natasha Mestchersky, he recreates their lives before, during, and after the Russian Revolution.
The Russian Baltic Fleet in the Time of War and Revolution, 1914–1918: The Recollections of Admiral S N Timiryov
by Stephen C. EllisThe first English-language edition. “A useful read for anyone interested in early 20th century Russia and naval operations in the Great War.” —StrategyPageRear Admiral S. N. Timiryov, was well placed to make observations on the character of many of the significant commanding officers and also many of the operations of the Baltic Fleet from the beginning of the war in 1914 up to exit from it in 1918. He trained with many of the key figures and shared battle experience with them in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05 and the siege of Port Arthur; and he spent a year in Japan as a prisoner of war with a number of them. In his subsequent career in the Navy he had roles which brought him into contact with new recruits as well as with many serving officers, and as the Executive Officer on the imperial yacht Shtandart for some years, he came into contact with senior members of the navy establishment and of the government, including the imperial household. The translation of these memoirs brings an important and authoritative historical source to those interested in Russian or naval history who are unable to access them in the original Russian.“An excellent addition to the historiography of the Imperial Russian Navy during the twilight of its existence. A key resource for scholars of the Baltic Fleet and naval aspects of the Russian Revolution.” —The Northern Mariner “The coverage of Russian operations, command structure dynamics, and their impact on operational capability make it worthy of recommendation.” —Australian Naval Institute
The Russian Campaign of 1812: The Memoirs of a Russian Artilleryman
by Alexander Mikaberidze Peter G. PhillipsThe inspiration for Leo Tolstoy's famous "War and Peace", this translation of Ilya Timofeyevich Radozhitskii's memoirs includes vivid accounts of the battles of Ostrovno, Smolensk, Lubino (Valutina Gora), Borodino, Moscow, Vyazma and Krasnyi.The first of three volumes, this book represents the first English translation of the memoirs that rank among the best in the vast Napoleonic memoir literature. The author, Ilya Timofeyevich Radozhitskii, served with distinction during the wars against Napoleon and wrote down his reminisces shortly after the war based on the notes that he kept while campaigning. Born in 1788, Radozhitskii studied at the Imperial Orphanage, enlisted in the artillery unit in 1806, and steadily rose through the ranks, earning a reputation of a capable officer. Napoleon’s invasion of Russia in 1812 changed his life. Serving as an artillery lieutenant, he saw action in virtually every major battle of that historic campaign. Wounded at the battle of Ostrovno, he remained in ranks and later fought at Smolensk, Lubino (Valutina Gora) and Borodino, lamented the surrender of Moscow, and celebrated Russian victories at Vyazma and Krasnyi. He watched in bewilderment the catastrophe that engulfed Napoleon’s forces that winter, an event he vividly describes in his memoirs. Radozhitskii offers fresh insight into the life and daily experiences of Russian officers during the Napoleonic Wars. Starting in the summer of 1812 and following the travails of his unit over the next six months, Radozhitskii’s narrative contains striking descriptions of the wartime experiences of soldiers and officers, vivid accounts of the battles, and heartrending stories from the French retreat. When published in Russia, these memoirs garnered considerable public attention and Leo Tolstoy consulted them extensively while writing his famous “War and Peace”. The second and third volumes, entitled The German Liberation 1813 and The Invasion of France 1814, will also be published by Pen & Sword Books.
The Russian Revolutionary Emigres, 1825-1870 (The Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science #104)
by Martin A. MillerOriginally published in 1986. Martin A. Miller, author of the definitive biography of the exiled revolutionary Peter Kropotkin, traces the history of the first generations of Russians who went to Western Europe to devote their lives to anti-tsarist politics. Refusing to assimilate abroad and unable to return home, the émigrés political orientations were influenced by intellectual and social currents in both Russia and Europe. Miller undertakes a major reassessment of the émigré contribution to the Russian revolutionary movement. Starting with Nikolai Turgenev, who in 1825 was declared the first "émigré" by a special act of the Russian government, the exiles formed a unique social and political group. Miller takes a biographical approach in tracing the progression from a disparate community of intellectuals, unable to act together to promote their own program for change, to a more cohesive second émigré generation that provided the foundation for collective action and the development of a revolutionary ideology. The creation of the Russian émigré press, Miller argues, gave identity and momentum to the émigrés and helped promote their program of revolution and a new social order. The Russian Revolutionary Emigres, 1825-1870 concludes with the death in 1870 of the leading émigré figure, Alexander Herzen, and with an analysis of the impact upon the émigrés of the emergence of the populist revolutionary movement within Russia. The émigrés overcame the loss of their homeland through their version of a future Russia, one transformed into a new society where their ideals could be realized. When, two generations later, Lenin returned to Russia after decades in Europe and made this vision a reality, his actions built on the foundation laid by his nineteenth-century predecessors.
The Rye Bread Marriage: How I Found Happiness with a Partner I'll Never Understand
by Michaele WeissmanHow do partners in long-lasting relationships live together without driving each other up a wall? After forty years of marriage, Michaele Weissman has a few answers. When they first meet, John— a dashing European, a Latvian refugee, a physics PhD—is hoping to settle down. Michaele, a fast-talking American college student, is hungry for an independent life as a writer and historian. &“I am too young, and you are too Latvian,&” the twenty-year-old Michaele tells the twenty-eight-year-old John, explaining why she is ending their four-month romance. Fifteen years later, the two are married. Their love for each other does not assuage the trauma John experienced as a child during World War II; nor does it help Michaele understand her husband&’s unwavering devotion to every aspect of Latvian culture, particularly his passion for the dark, intense rye bread of his birthplace (nothing like the rye she knew growing up in her secular Jewish household). Michaele feels like an outsider in her own relationship, unable to touch a core piece of her husband&’s being. So, as John realizes his dream of opening a rye bread bakery, Michaele embarks on a fascinating journey. Delving into history and traveling across Europe with John, she excavates poignant stories of war, privation, and resilience—and realizes at last that rye bread represents everything about John&’s homeland that he loved and lost. Eventually Michaele even comes to love rye bread, too. How do the stories we live and the stories we inherit play out in our relationships? How do individuals learn to tolerate ethnic, religious, and national differences? The Rye Bread Marriage is a beautifully told, often humorous, love story about the messiness of spending a lifetime with another human being. Michaele Weissman reminds us that every relationship is a mystery—and a miracle.
The S Word: A Memoir About Secrets
by Paolina MilanaIn accordance with her Sicilian Catholic family&’s unspoken code, Paolina Milana learned at an early age to keep her secrets locked away where no one could find them. Nobody outside the family needed to know about the voices her Mamma battled in her head; or about how Paolina forged her birth certificate at thirteen so she could get a job at The Donut Shop; or about the police officer twenty-six years her senior whose promise to her Papà to &“keep an eye on her&” quickly translated into something sinister. And perhaps that&’s why no one saw it coming when—on the eve of her sweet sixteen, pushed to edge—Paolina attempted to take her own mother&’s life. Raw and compelling, The S Word is the true story of a girl who nearly suffocates in the silence she was taught to value above all else—until she finally finds the strength to break free of the secrets binding her and save herself.
The S.S. Officer's Armchair: Uncovering the Hidden Life of a Nazi
by Daniel LeeBased on documents discovered concealed within a simple chair for seventy years, this gripping investigation into the life of a single S.S. officer during World War Two encapsulates the tragic experience of a generation of EuropeansOne night at a dinner party in Florence, historian Daniel Lee was told about a remarkable discovery. An upholsterer in Amsterdam had found a bundle of swastika-covered documents inside the cushion of an armchair he was repairing. They belonged to Dr. Robert Griesinger, a lawyer from Stuttgart, who joined the S.S. and worked at the Reich's Ministry of Economics and Labor in Nazi-occupied Prague during the war. An expert in the history of the Holocaust, Lee was fascinated to know more about this man--and how his most precious documents ended up hidden inside a chair, hundreds of miles from Prague and Stuttgart.In The S.S. Officer's Armchair, Lee weaves detection with biography to tell an astonishing narrative of ambition and intimacy in the Third Reich. He uncovers Griesinger's American back-story--his father was born in New Orleans and the family had ties to the plantations and music halls of nineteenth century Louisiana. As Lee follows the footsteps of a rank and file Nazi official seventy years later, and chronicles what became of him and his family at the war's end, Griesinger's role in Nazi crimes comes into focus. When Lee stumbles on an unforeseen connection between Griesinger and the murder of his own relatives in the Holocaust, he must grapple with potent questions about blame, manipulation, and responsibility.The S.S. Officer's Armchair is an enthralling detective story and a reconsideration of daily life in the Third Reich. It provides a window into the lives of Hitler's millions of nameless followers and into the mechanisms through which ordinary people enacted history's most extraordinary atrocity.
The SS-Sonderkommando "Dirlewanger": A Memoir
by Rolf MichaelisA rare look inside the Sonderkommando "Dirlewanger," the SS anti-partisan unit notorious for atrocities in Poland and Russia during World War II. These memoirs were written by a former member of the unit from its formation in 1940 to the end of the war and took part in nearly all its operations. A first hand account of the brutal and barbaric methods used by Dirlewanger against partisans – methods that appalled even some SS commanders – are revealed here in this memoir. SS-Sonderkommando "Dirlewanger" was originally manned by convicted poachers, however as the war progressed replacements were found by emptying prisons and filling the ranks with more hardened criminals. Here are the chilling recollections of a soldier in the SS-Sonderkommando "Dirlewanger" during the Polish and Russian campaigns, the 1944 Warsaw uprising and the final battles near Berlin.
The Sable Cloak
by Gail Milissa GrantIn this atmospheric novel set in the Jim Crow South, a powerful Black family fights to protect their empire—for readers of Tayari Jones. Jordan Sable, a prosperous undertaker turned political boss, has controlled the Black vote in St. Louis for decades. Sara, his equally formidable wife, runs the renowned funeral establishment that put the Sable name on the map. Together they have pushed through obstacles in order to create a legacy for their children. When tragedy bursts their carefully constructed empire of dignity and safety, the family rallies around an unconventional solution. But at what cost? Set in the Midwest in the 1940s, The Sable Cloak is a rarely seen portrait of an upper middle class, African American family in the pre-Civil Rights era. This deeply personal novel inspired by the author's own family history delves into legacy and the stories we tell ourselves, and celebrates a largely self-sustaining, culturally rich Missouri community that most Americans may not be aware of.
The Saboteur of Auschwitz: The Inspiring True Story of a British Soldier Held Prisoner in Auschwitz
by Colin RushtonFor fans of The Tattooist of Auschwitz, The Librarian of Auschwitz and The Choice, this is the incredible true story of a British soldier POW.In 1942, young British soldier Arthur Dodd was taken prisoner by the German Army and transported to Oswiecim in Polish Upper Silesia. The Germans gave it another name, now synonymous with mankind’s darkest hours. They called it Auschwitz.Forced to do hard labour, starved and savagely beaten, Arthur thought his life would end in Auschwitz. Determined to go down fighting, he sabotaged Nazi industrial work, risked his life to alleviate the suffering of the Jewish prisoners and aided a partisan group planning a mass break-out.This shocking true story sheds new light on the operations at the camp, exposes a hierarchy of prisoner treatment by the SS and presents the largely unknown story of the military POWs held there.
The Sacred Acre: The Ed Thomas Story
by Mark TabbOn a Sunday in May 2008, an F-5 tornado struck the town of Parkersburg, Iowa, killing eight people and destroying 250 homes and businesses within 34 seconds. The next day, Parkersburg's beloved football coach, Ed Thomas, made a stunning prediction: 'God willing, we will play our first home game here on this field this season. ' One hundred days later, the home team scored a victory on the field they dubbed 'The Sacred Acre,' serving as a galvanizing point for the town to band together and rebuild. But just as Parkersburg was recovering, another devastating tragedy struck. While working with a group of football and volleyball players early one morning, one of Ed's former students walked in and gunned him down point blank. Ed Thomas was 58. The murder of this hometown hero spread across national news headlines. Ed's community and family reeled from shock. Yet the story doesn't end here. What happened next proves that even a double tragedy is no match for faith, love . . . and the power of forgiveness.