Academic Life

Vincent Torres was never meant to be part of the elite. A former U.S. Marine turned Beverly Hills bodyguard, he spent his days protecting the rich and powerful—until a single moment changed everything. When a smug billionaire laughed in his face, telling him he’d never qualify for an exclusive metal credit card, Vincent didn’t just take it as an insult. He took it as a challenge.

When British-born Elizabeth Blackwell earned her medical degree in America in 1849, there was an international outcry. Few at the time would have disagreed with the actress Fanny Kemble's remark - "What, trust a woman doctor - never!"

Seamus O'Mahony charts the realities of work in the 'ministry of bodies', that huge complex where people come to be cured and to die. From unexpected deaths to moral quandaries and bureaucratic disasters, O'Mahony documents life in the halls and wards that all of us will visit at some point in our lives with his characteristic wit and dry and unsentimental intelligence.

This amazing tale is the story of one of America's oldest and most unusual urban hospitals. From it's inception as a "Poor House" dispensing free medical care to indigents, Chicago's Cook County Hospital has been both a renowned teaching hospital and the healthcare provider of last resort for the city's uninsured. County covers more than thirty years of its history, beginning in the late 1970s when the author began his internship, to the "Final Rounds" when the enormous iconic Victorian hospital building was replaced and hundreds of former trainees gathered to bid it an emotional farewell.

Michael Faraday is regarded as one of the founding fathers of modern physics. His work in the field of electromagnetism revolutionized society, leading to new avenues of study and developments of technology that would leave the world changed forever. Without Faraday’s discoveries, there would be no electronics or electrical power. There would be no technology as we recognize it, or at the very least those technologies would have taken much longer to arise, causing our time to look very different.

August, 1755. Newcastle, on the north bank of the Tyne. In the fields, men and women are getting the harvest in. Sunlight or rain. Scudding clouds and backbreaking labour. Three hundred feet underground, young Charles Hutton is at the coalface. Cramped, dust choked, wielding a five-pound pick by candlelight. Eighteen years old, he’s been down the pits on and off for more than a decade, and now it looks like a life sentence. No unusual story, although Charles is a clever lad - gifted at maths and languages - and for a time he hoped for a different life. Many hoped.

Being diagnosed with cancer is frightening; learning that the cancer is late stage takes that fear to unknown depths. After a year of brutal treatment, Mo Haque heard the dreaded words, 'There is nothing else we can do for you.' His cancer was terminal and left him questioning the price we put on life. Three years on from the 'small chance' of survival the experts had given him, Mo shares his incredible story: of despair and suffering, of hope and healing, of vulnerability and authenticity. This audiobook is for anyone going through the most challenging of times.

Written by a marine scientist (and winner of French eloquence competitions), this work of narrative nonfiction blends Bill François’ personal story with that of sea creatures to create an original and exciting work. In poetic prose, he describes his unlikely journey from being a Parisian child, afraid of the water and crippled by self-consciousness, to an eloquent and self-assured young man with a passion for the ocean and all who inhabit it.

American Urbanist shares the life and wisdom of a man whose advocacy reshaped many of the places we know and love today—from New York's bustling Bryant Park to preserved forests and farmlands around the country.

Sir Bob Reid is former chairman of Shell UK, British Rail, ICE Futures Europe, and deputy governor of the Bank of Scotland, among much else. His is a story of determination and achievement shot through with political upheaval, economic reversal, and industrial catastrophe. His first posting was to Borneo. Stints in Africa, Thailand, and Australia followed, after which he became chair of Shell UK, responsible for all oil exploration, production, refineries, and coastal shipping.

A posthumously published memoir of one of the most renowned Entertainment Industry Attorneys in Hollywood History.

Born months before the start of World War I, William L. Adams left the North Carolina cotton fields behind forever in 1929 and moved to Baltimore as part of the Great Migration. At the age of 15, he became a numbers runner to support himself. With a preternatural understanding of finance and business, he rapidly ascended, becoming the head of his own illegal gambling operation. His leadership of the racket led to an attempt on his life by the Mafia, repeated criminal prosecutions, testimony before a special investigative committee of the U.S. Senate, and a landmark Supreme Court case.

Is it cancer or just a bad pixel? Radiologists are the physicians we rarely get to see. Radiologists at Work contains the most memorable moments from the careers of 20 radiologists who practiced from the 1940s to the present day. These true stories are told with the trademark wit and warmth that has earned Carolyn Jourdan five national best-sellers.

Claus Spreckels (1828-1908) emigrated from his homeland of Germany to the United States with only seventy-five cents in his pocket, built a sugar empire, and became one of the richest Americans in history. Migrating to San Francisco after the gold rush, Spreckels built the largest sugar beet factory of its kind in the United States. When Spreckels gave America its first sugar cube, he became the “Sugar King.” The indomitable Spreckels was a colorful and complicated character on both sides of the Pacific.

Looking across six systems – the police and the recording of hate crimes; dating apps and digital desire; outness in the film and television industry; borders and LGBTQ asylum seekers; health and fitness activities; and DEI initiatives in the workplace – Rainbow Trap documents how inclusive interventions – such as new legislation, revamped diversity policies and tech fixes – have attempted to bring historically marginalized communities out of the shadows.

Paul Owhadi’s improbable entrepreneurial journey began as a first-generation immigrant coming to America with just a few hundred dollars in his pocket. Having learned a remarkable level of self-reliance, as a child sent to a French boarding school at age four, he was educated in London—and then headed to New York City and a whole new life. After an education and a career in urban planning and city management—one of the youngest city managers in the country—he excelled at creating and transforming cities for the betterment of its people.

Finding a cancerous lump in her breast seven weeks after a clean mammogram was terrifying. But fitness expert and race announcer Fitz Koehler refused to play the victim or allow cancer to steal her extraordinary career or time with family. In My Noisy Cancer Comeback, Fitz reveals the juicy and gory details of her 16-month battle, all while zigzagging across the United States.

Grada was only 17 years old when she met her soulmate, Peter. By 19 she was married and had migrated from Holland to live in Peter’s homeland, Tasmania, Australia. Grada lived her dream - homesteading at the "back of beyond" with the love of her life, six children, and a menagerie of farm animals. In 2000 she and Peter opened a wellness clinic in their back yard. At the pinnacle of her life, Grada was hit by a truck - literally. During the near-death experience that followed, Grada had to make the decision to return to her body.

Frank Savage's is an unlikely success story. Raised in segregated Washington, DC, by his mother, a hairdresser and entrepreneur with little formal education, Savage's career has taken him around the world as a globetrotting financier. From his first banking job at Citibank to his current position as Chairman Emeritus of Howard University, The Savage Way shares the life and business lessons he learned along the way.

I thought country club living at home in Long Island during college, with no job or accountability, was the perfect life. Then came a trip to Africa during the Congo Crisis.... That started a nine-year downhill spiral. Back in the US, it was one illness and surgery after another. When my brother Michael returned a completely different person, I accepted an invite to visit him in Los Angeles. There the most shocking awakening happened. Instantly I knew: all is well. An associate once asked me, "How come things happen to you that don't happen to us?" The answers are what this book is all about.