School Memoirs

Following her retirement from Princeton University, celebrated historian Dr. Nell Irvin Painter surprised everyone in her life by returning to school - in her 60s - to earn a BFA and MFA in painting. In Old in Art School, she travels from her beloved Newark to the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design; finds meaning in the artists she loves, even as she comes to understand how they may be undervalued; and struggles with the unstable balance between the pursuit of art and the inevitable, sometimes painful, demands of a life fully lived.

Teacher and former rugby league player Chris Dawson appeared to have it all - a loving family and a beautiful home in Sydney's Northern Beaches. But in the summer of 1982 his wife Lynette disappeared and not long afterwards Dawson married a much younger woman, a former student. Less than a decade later this young woman escaped the marriage and went to the police to record her suspicions that Dawson had been involved in Lynette's disappearance. A homicide investigation followed but got nowhere until 1998, when Detective Sergeant Damian Loone was handed Lynette's file.

Christina Asquith presents a moving firsthand account of her year teaching in one of Philadelphia’s worst schools. Told with striking humor and honesty, her story begins when the School District of Philadelphia, in desperate need of 1,500 new teachers, instituted a policy of hiring "emergency certified" instructors. Asquith, then a 25-year-old reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer, joined their untrained ranks. More challenging than her classroom in the crime-infested neighborhood known as "the Badlands" are the trials she faced outside.

Corey White was a golden child. He knew this because his father would hit his mother and his sisters but not him. And his mother adored him so much she let him drop out of primary school. After losing his father to jail and his mother to heroin, though, he became a target for cruelty and...

One of the most influential public intellectuals in the world and the architect of the two biggest ideas to reshape the American conversation about fairness offers the intimate story of how her life gave birth to these ideas. It is not very often that someone comes along and permanently reshapes...

In Beer School, authors and entrepreneurs Steve Hindy and Tom Potter share the improbable saga of Brooklyn Brewery, the company they grew from a home-brew hobby into a multimillion-dollar business - all in the most competitive beer market in the United States. If you have a thirst for entrepreneurial success, drink up. If you are a business manager or owner and want fresh ideas and insight, tap in. You'll learn entrepreneurial basics, plus some things textbooks don't teach you, as you follow the company's successes (and a few failures).

Welcome to Noreen Olson's kitchen table, where everything happens. She loves birds, animals, family, children, friends, growing things and life on the farm, and writes about them and all the odd situations they manage to get into with engaging liveliness. Many of the pieces are humorous, but more than that, they are heartwarming and true. In them you will see reflections of your own loves, life, guilt, laughter, nostalgia, memories and beliefs. All of the animals, people, and incidents are real and names have been changed for "her own protection".

School taught us specific subjects, like maths and history. But the most important situations we face as adults were never discussed with us when we were students. We weren't taught these skills in school, and this makes all the success stories we hear about seem out of reach; it makes us feel...

A gripping chronicle of psychological manipulation and abuse at a “therapeutic” boarding school for troubled teens, and how one young woman fought to heal in the aftermath. At fifteen, Elizabeth Gilpin was an honor student, a state-ranked swimmer and a rising soccer star, but behind closed...

“When I become mayor, we become mayor.” Ras Baraka’s famous words speak to exactly who he is as a leader - a fiercely loyal member of his community. In this innovative and ground-breaking Audible Original, hear how Baraka - the mayor of Newark, New Jersey - grew from spoken-word artist to school principal to successful politician.

A wild ride through a disaffected youth by a gifted writer. Dominic Gordon explores his memories in tight prose bursting with insight, audacious ideas and dark humour. What happens to the adolescent spirit when all vestiges of innocence about the world are foregone, replaced within the grinding...

In this “entertaining mix of social science, memoir, and humor, as if a Daniel Goleman book were filtered through the lens of Will Ferrell” (The New York Times Book Review) a middle-aged man embarks on an entertaining and relatable quest to reprioritize his ties with his buddies and forge...

Barnes's extremely frank and highly detailed memoir is a fast-paced tale of courage, loss, and eventual redemption that feels like someone telling you their story across the kitchen table. Above all else, this book tells the unvarnished truth of the modern-day veteran experience from a senior non-commissioned officer's point of view.

High school is the jungle. This is your field guide. Four Years in the Jungle is a coming-of-age memoir that doesn’t sugarcoat a thing. With unfiltered honesty and unforgettable stories, JJ takes you inside the real high school experience—cafeteria politics, sports pressure, hallway chaos, awkward dances, academic tournaments, and the deep, hilarious friendships that make it all worth it.

John's medical memoir was born from chaotic, disjointed, funny and frightening late-night letters to friends over email (any recipients of which all those years ago will likely walk away now). Those manic blogs from the hospital wards during under-slept call nights (which left a few friends wondering if he had invaded the hospital pharmacy) were the genesis for this book, Playing Doctor.

A poignant young adult graphic memoir that follows one teen's year abroad in Japan, as she seeks to reconcile both sides of her biracial identity. Christine has always felt she is just half: Half American, half Japanese. As a biracial Japanese American who was born in Tokyo but raised in the US...

The powerful stories told in And Then They Were Gone: Teenagers of Peoples Temple from High School to Jonestown begin in San Francisco at the small school where Reverend Jim Jones enrolled the teens of his Peoples Temple church in 1976. Within a year, most of these kids had joined Jones and his other congregants in what Jones promised was a tropical paradise based on egalitarian values, but which turned out to be a deadly prison camp.

Although we rely on physicians, calling on them at birth and death and every medical event in between, rarely do we consider the personal challenges faced by doctors-to-be. In 2005 author Jacqueline Marino and photojournalist Tim Harrison had the unprecedented opportunity to chronicle the experience of three students as they learned to become doctors at the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine.

This is a story of the 1970s. Of a road trip in a wood-paneled station wagon, with the kids in the way-back, singing along to the Steve Miller Band. Of brothers waking up early on Saturday mornings for five consecutive hours of cartoons. Of growing up in a magical era populated by Bic pens, Mr...

Third year of medical school is the greatest test in a doctor’s life, a year of rotating throughout specialties, teams, hospitals, and lives. It leaves an indelible mark on every physician, but the story is often untold…until now. Told through gonzo-style, bare-it-all journaling, Love, Sanity, or Medical School takes you on a tour of third year with Dr. Stephanie Benjamin, a 9/11 and Katrina-surviving, former Junior Olympic fencer with a tenacious spirit and keen humor.