Showing results by publisher "Penguin Audio" in Sports & Outdoors

Baseball's all-time Iron Man, Cal Ripken, Jr., retired from baseball in 2001 after breaking countless records, including Lou Gehrig's record for consecutive games played. Ripken is admired by thousands of fans not only for his relentless perseverance, but also for his unparalleled integrity. Now, in a stirring audiobook that draws on his exhilarating career as well as the wisdom of his legendary father, Ripken shares rousing advice centered around his proven Eight Elements of Perseverance.

Freddy, Phil and Don are three grumpy old men, travelling at various speeds in the slow lane of retirement, at a loss to understand the mad modern world around them.Their chosen method of escape from all this is a shared weekly hike in the Peak District, come gale, hail, snow or torrential rain. They pass the time bumping into colourful and eccentric locals, but their real passion is bickering among themselves.

For football fans who hungrily feed on gossip and rumour, Christmas comes twice a year - once in August and again in January. These are the months when the transfer window dominates thoughts, when the prospect of a new signing or two reinvigorates the hopes and dreams of the hopelessly devoted. Nige Tassell goes behind the scenes to observe the workings of the transfer window and to examine why it continues to hold such fascination for a nation of football lovers.

'While the beautiful game has taught me a lot, becoming King of the Jungle got me thinking... I’ve had quite a life outside of football too. The World According to Harry is my take on the important things ­- from what makes true team spirit and not forgetting your East End roots, to the joys of jam roly-poly and knowing how lucky I am to have met a girl like Sandra. I can’t claim to be clued up on showbiz, but I’m certainly not short of a story or two.'

Who was Alice Marble? In her public life, she was the biggest tennis star of the pre-war era, a household name like Joe DiMaggio and Joe Louis. She was famous for overcoming serious illness to win the biggest tournaments, including Wimbledon. She was also a fashion designer and trendsetter, a contributor to a pioneering new comic called Wonder Woman - and friend to the biggest names in Hollywood and society, like Carole Lombard and Clark Gable, William Randolph Hearst and Marion Davies, and members of families named Bloomingdale, Loew, and du Pont.

This book tells the story of one exceptional great tit that Len called Star. With patience, consistency and sensitivity, Len succeeds in teaching this little bird to count using taps. Star's character and intelligence is revealed in this intimate bird biography, unlike any told before. In opening her home to wild birds, Len gains their trust enough to make astonishing discoveries about their capabilities.

In 2011, a young wolf named Slavc set out from Slovenia. Tracked by GPS, he travelled a thousand miles through the Alps, arriving four months later on the Lessinian plateau, north of Verona. There had been no wolves in northern Italy for a century, but here he crossed paths with a female wolf on a walkabout of her own. A decade later and there are more than a hundred wolves back in the area, the result of their remarkable meeting. In Lone Wolf, Weymouth walks Slavc's path, examining the changes facing these wild corners of Europe.

A shelter cat teaches us that our damaged parts, too, are worthy of love... a captive orca shows us that inconvenience and difficulties are the blessing of a full life... a gorilla teaches the universal language of grief... a group of oysters who prove that magic and science can and do coexist…

The Possibility of Tenderness is a personal history narrated through the lens of the ‘grung’ and plants. It’s also a people’s history of the land, a family saga, an archival detective story through time. It’s the migration tale of a young scholar who arrives in Britain from rural Jamaica to study at Oxford to achieve ‘upward social mobility’ and who now lives in Roundhay Leeds. Suddenly, amidst his journey of dreams and class aspiration, the plants and people of his native district, Coffee Grove, begin to offer different ways of living, alternative dreams, and the possibility of tenderness.

Recently diagnosed with terminal cancer, Sven talks candidly about his extraordinary successes (as well as overcoming his failures). He shares the lessons he has learned on the way – about life, leadership and love. It is a story of lives touched and connections made in the dogged pursuit of excellence. But for Sven the true journey he wants to share is the one he’s made on the inside – the man he has become.

What do you do when your world changes in an instant? For Jon Harvey, after the sudden death of his brother, it meant turning to the thing that had given him support, joy and a lifetime of memories: sport, in all its myriad sublime and ridiculous forms. A kaleidoscopic twelve months took him from London Olympia to ancient Olympia, from rugby balls to Rubik's Cubes, Wimbledon tennis to Wimbledon greyhounds, Twickenham to Frimley Green, Roger Federer to Martin 'Wolfie' Adams, and much, much more. It's a celebration, of a life shaped by sport, and the ultimate season ticket.