Showing results by publisher "-emdashery books-" in Cultural & Regional

She was a successful ad sales rep in Manhattan. He was a homeless 11-year-old panhandler on the street. He asked for spare change; she kept walking. But then something stopped her in her tracks, and she went back. And she continued to go back, again and again. They met up nearly every week for years and built an unexpected, life-changing friendship that has today spanned almost three decades.

Paul Lamb is a hedgelayer. From the end of summer until the birds begin to nest in the spring, his primary employment is the maintenance and restoration of hedgerows. This book, following the rhythm of the seasons, describes Paul’s life on the road and the practical aspects of his job, including the highs and the lows. It is about practising a craft with skill and preserving it for future generations, and celebrating the glory of the landscape he loves so much.

The first and only full biography on legendary Harlem gangster, Bumpy Johnson who was depicted in the movies Cotton Club, Hoodlum, and American Gangster.

What happens when a black detective goes undercover in the KKK? An extraordinary true story. In 1978, Ron Stallworth is the first black detective in the history of the Colorado Springs Police Department. In the local paper, he finds a classified ad for the Ku Klux Klan - and a PO box for interested enquiries. All he's expecting are some racist brochures and a few scraps of information about the white nationalist terrorists in his community. What he gets is a phone call inviting him to join the KKK. So he does.

In Where the Past Begins, best-selling author of The Joy Luck Club and The Valley of Amazement Amy Tan is at her most intimate in revealing the truths and inspirations that underlie her extraordinary fiction. By delving into vivid memories of her traumatic childhood, confessions of self-doubt in her journals, and heartbreaking letters to and from her mother, she gives evidence to all that made it both unlikely and inevitable that she would become a writer.

Sonny Rollins has long been considered an enigma. Known as the "Saxophone Colossus," he is widely acknowledged as one of the greatest jazz improvisers of all time. His seven-decade career has been well documented, but the backstage life of the man once called "the only jazz recluse" has gone largely untold—until now. Based on more than 200 interviews with Rollins himself, family members, friends, and collaborators, as well as Rollins' personal archive, Saxophone Colossus is the comprehensive portrait of this legendary saxophonist and composer, civil rights activist and environmentalist.

What is it like to be a refugee? It is a question few in the West give much thought to, and yet to be a refugee - or an immigrant - is to grapple with your place in the world, attempting to reconcile the life you have known with the unfamiliar. With this comes the weight of the expectations (and fears and resentment) of those born in the host country; foremost is the burden of gratitude: to be forever thankful for the space you have been allowed.

Funny, charming and romantic to a fault, everyone loves Jamie Laing. The affectionate and exuberant blond puppy dog has come a long way - and broken many hearts - since he first graced our screens in 2011 as the joker of the Kings Road on Made in Chelsea. Ten years on, he became king of the ballroom making the final of Strictly Come Dancing. Now he's ready to spill the tea - and (McVitie's) biscuits - about life, love and everything in between.

It'd been a long time since I claimed some solitude in this blessed landscape; since I've done without life's little props. Here I have no friend, no dog, no radio, no clock, no phone, no roof, no body pollutants.

The Soul of Baseball is as much the story of Buck O'Neil as it is the story of baseball. Driven by a relentless optimism and his two great passions - for America's pastime and for jazz, America's music - O'Neil played solely for love. In an era when greedy, steroid-enhanced athletes have come to characterize professional ball, Posnanski offers a salve for the damaged spirit: the uplifting life lessons of a truly extraordinary man who never missed an opportunity to enjoy and love life.

Brought to you by Penguin. In this collection of profiles, essays and travel stories, Chatwin takes us to Benin, where he is arrested as a mercenary during a coup; to Boston to meet an LSD guru who believes he is Christ; to India with Indira Ghandi when she attempted a political comeback in 1978; and to Nepal where he reminds us that 'Man's real home is not a house, but the Road, and that life itself is a journey to be walked on foot'.

In 1893, Liliuokalani, the Queen of Hawaii, was deposed and five years later her nation became an incorporated territory of the United States. Published shortly after these momentous events, her book Hawaii's Story by Hawaii's Queen is an incredibly personal history of the islands that she was born to rule. Liliuokalani covers from her birth in 1838 through the reigns of her forebears to her own turbulent time as Queen of the Hawaiian Islands.

"Lass mich von vorn anfangen. Ma ..." Der Brief eines Sohnes an die vietnamesische Mutter, die ihn nie lesen wird. Die Tochter eines amerikanischen Soldaten und eines vietnamesischen Bauernmädchens ist Analphabetin, kann kaum Englisch und arbeitet in einem Nagelstudio. Sie ist das Produkt eines vergessenen Krieges. Der Sohn, ein schmächtiger Außenseiter, erzählt – von der Schizophrenie der Großmutter, den geschundenen Händen der prügelnden Mutter und seiner tragischen ersten Liebe zu einem amerikanischen Jungen.

The definitive, full-access story of the life and songs of Canada's legendary troubadour. Gordon Lightfoot’s name is synonymous with timeless songs about trains and shipwrecks, rivers and highways, lovers and loneliness. His music defined the folk-pop sound of the 1960s and ‘70s, topped charts and sold millions. He is unquestionably Canada’s greatest songwriter, and an international star who has performed on the world’s biggest stages.While Lightfoot’s songs are well known, the man behind them is elusive. He’s never allowed his life to be chronicled in a book - until now.

In this luminous memoir, Rita Moreno shares her remarkable journey from a young girl with simple beginnings in Puerto Rico to Hollywood legend - and one of the few performers, and the only Hispanic, to win an Oscar, Grammy, Tony, and two Emmys. Born Rosita Dolores Alverio in the idyll of Puerto Rico, Moreno, at age five, embarked on a harrowing sea voyage with her mother and wound up in the harsh barrios of the Bronx, where she discovered dancing, singing, and acting as ways to escape a tumultuous childhood.

Dami Im was an aspiring singer-songwriter and pianist when she auditioned on The X Factor in 2013. Mentored by Dannii Minogue, she would go on to win. From that time on, her life changed as audiences discovered her incredible voice and her electric stage presence. One of Australia's greatest musical talents, Dami is a long way from the girl born in Seoul who came to Australia on what she thought was a holiday only to find out, when she started school—not speaking a word of English—that she was here to stay.

Nakkiah and Miranda are angry, young, vocal, Aboriginal and very, very funny. Join them on their journey, starting with a lesson on teatime etiquette in London where it all began, as they follow the debutante trail and discover that First Nations women across the globe have made this tradition their own. Nakkiah and Miranda ask: can beauty, poise and politeness actually empower them? Or is it better to get angry and start shouting?

North Korea is one of the most troubled societies on earth. The country's 24 million people live under a violent dictatorship led by a single family, which relentlessly pursues the development of nuclear arms, which periodically incites risky military clashes with the larger, richer, liberal South, and which forces each and every person to play a role in the "theater state" even as it pays little more than lip service to the wellbeing of the overwhelming majority.

In Fantasies of Nina Simone, Jordan Alexander Stein examines the space between our collective and individual fantasies about Simone the performer, civil rights activist, and icon, and her own fantasies about herself. Stein outlines how Simone gave voice to personal fantasies through releasing dozens of covers of her white male contemporaries.

Harriet Ann Jacob's autobiography documents her life as a slave and how she attained freedom for herself and her children. Harrowing in its descriptions of sexual abuse, Jacob's slave narrative is notable for the appeal it made to abolitionist women to open their eyes to the realities of slavery. Deemed too shocking for reading audiences at the time, the book was shelved before it was published in 1861 near the start of the Civil War.