Showing results by narrator "Susan Crawford" in Biographies & Memoirs

"I want you to like me, to think I am the most beautiful, the smartest, the thinnest...." With these words, Abby Kelly encapsulates the overwhelming struggle of her 15-year bout with anorexia. Beginning in her teenage years when the predatory lies of the disease took root in her psyche as she felt pressured from family and peers for not being "enough", Abby lays bare the reality of anorexia.

Constantin C. Giurescu was Romania's leading historian and author of the seminal work The History of the Romanian People. His granddaughter's fascinating story of this remarkable man and his family follows their struggles in war-torn Romania from 1900 to the fall of the Soviet Union.

Suzzan Blac's early years were the stuff of the darkest nightmares: abject poverty and spirit-crushing abuse. Adolescence brought a harrowing coercion into the horrific world of the sex trade where she was held prisoner. She escaped, but spiraled into depression. Eventual marriage to a loving man and two beautiful children gave her a sense of normalcy for the first time in her life. But the long buried memories kept her an emotional hostage. To free herself and heal, she started painting. Out came 42 pieces.

The terrifying legend of Count Dracula silently skulking through the Transylvania night may have terrified generations of filmgoers, but the tall, elegant vampire captivated and electrified a young Jane Congdon, igniting a dream to one day see his mysterious land of ancient castles and misty hollows. Four decades later she finally takes her long-awaited trip - never dreaming that it will unearth decades-buried memories of life with an alcoholic mother.

Maddie built the village orphans a shelter and a school, and she provided food and clean water. But this was just the start. Despite being bedridden, and then hospital-bound by her disease, until her dying day Maddie became an indefatigable fundraiser for her children. Maddie was recognized, in life and posthumously, with a number of awards, honors, and memorials. But, until the end, all that was important to her was providing hope and future to the village children who had filled her heart.

An all-American, Midwestern farm girl, Jennifer Myers had worked hard toward a successful career as a dancer in Chicago. But just as her star was rising, she fell for the kingpin of a drug trafficking operation. Drawn to his life of excitement, she soon acquiesced to driving marijuana across the country, making easy money she stacked in shoeboxes and spent like an heiress. Steeped inside moral ambiguity, she sought to cleanse her soul with the guidance of spiritual gurus and New Age prophets, to no avail.