Childhood Biography

Of Kenya's largest ethnic group, the Kikuyu, Ngugi wa Thiongo was born in 1938 in the backlands of his country (Kiambu district) to a father whose four wives bore him two dozen or so children. Ngugi was the fifth child of the third wife. His father was a peasant farmer forced to become a squatter after the British Imperial Act of 1915. Before going off to school, he had what was then considered a bizarre and inexplicable thirst for learning....

A New York Times bestselling and award-winning author presents a complex story about his coming-of-age journey as a Black boy, from the societal roots of trauma to finding joy. "If I had two wishes, it would be that D. Watkins spend an entire book writing through the terrifying wonder of Black...

The funny, sad and compelling diary kept by an overweight teenage girl that became the basis for the British television sensation of the same name available to stream on HULU. It's 1989 and Rae Earl is a fat, boy-mad 17-year-old girl, living in Stamford, Lincolnshire with her mum and their deaf...

What’s it like to parent a child in transition? Inspired by the acclaimed podcast How to Be a Girl, this is a highly personal and beautifully narrated memoir by Marlo Mack recounting the journey she’s been on since her three-year-old declared he should have been born a girl. And Mack agrees to the child’s request to be a girl.

A delightfully subversive essay collection from Laci Mosley, host of the award-winning “Scam Goddess” podcast, about the frauds, cons, and schemes that make up our world—and how the scammer mindset has affected her own upbringing, career, friendships, love life, and more. ​ From an...

Here are a baker's dozen of Paul Laurence Dunbar's poems brought to life in the medium he always wrote for - the spoken word. As narrated by Bobby Norfolk, these poems evoke the range of moods, from elegy to wonder to celebration, that the poet is remembered for.

February 2022 marked 80 years since the Fall of Singapore and Olga is now ready to tell the story of her years as a child prisoner of war. It's a story of great fear and deprivation; of a childhood utterly lost to conflict. It's also a story of class prejudice and unkindness that didn't end when Olga was freed from the camp and returned to England as a refugee.

Here’s a chance to sit down with Kirk Cousins, record-setting former Michigan State Quaterback and draft pick of the NFL’s Washington Redskins. Get an inside look at high-stakes football and the experiences that helped Cousins put his values and faith into action, on and off the field. In this audiobook, Kirk Cousins tells stories from his own life under the bright lights of college and pro football.

Michaela DePrince was born in Sierra Leone and grew up in the United States. She rose to fame as a ballet dancer in the late 2000s. Learn more about DePrince's life as a famous ballerina!

The inspiring stories of six people who changed history, including Geoffrey Chaucer, writer of the first great works of English literature; William Shakespeare, writer of the greatest plays in history; Charles Dickens, who wanted to make England a better place; Victor Hugo, the French writer who cared about the poor; Leo Tolstoy, the man who wrote War and Peace; and Rudyard Kipling, who wrote The Jungle Book and won a Nobel Prize.

Growing up in the beautiful mountains of Berchtesgaden - just steps from Adolf Hitler's alpine retreat - Irmgard Hunt had a seemingly happy, simple childhood. In her powerful, illuminating, and sometimes frightening memoir, Hunt recounts a youth lived under an evil but persuasive leader. As she grew older, the harsh reality of war - and a few brave adults who opposed the Nazi regime - aroused in her skepticism of National Socialist ideology and the Nazi propaganda she was taught to believe in.

When Lucy Mangan was little, stories were everything. They opened up new worlds and cast light on all the complexities she encountered in this one. She was whisked away to Narnia and Kirrin Island and Wonderland. She ventured down rabbit holes and womble burrows into midnight gardens and chocolate factories. She wandered the countryside with Milly-Molly-Mandy and played by the tracks with the Railway Children.

Before their experiments, inventions, and discoveries that changed the world, the world’s most celebrated scientists had regular-kid problems just like you. Stephen Hawking hated school and preferred to spend his free time building model airplanes, inventing board games, and even building his own computer. Jane Goodall got in trouble for bringing worms and snails into her house. And Neil deGrasse Tyson had to start a dog-walking business to save up money to buy a telescope.

In this follow-up to Billy's first international best seller, an autobiography set largely in Thailand's infamous prison system, Billy sets out to explore his experience of childhood abuse that would lead to a life of drug addiction and near-constant incarceration. After Billy's sentence in Klong Prem prison was commuted as a result of his extraordinary success as a Muay Thai boxer, he returned to the UK. In this vividly told story, Liverpudlian Billy contrasts his first-hand experience of one of the cruellest prison systems in the world with his experience of UK prisons.

The never-before-published diaries of Alathea Fitzalan Howard - who spent her teenaged years living out World War II in Windsor Great Park with her close friends Princess Margaret and Princess Elizabeth, the future queen of the United Kingdom - provide an extraordinary and intimate look at the British royal family.

Dana Trent is only a preschooler the first time she uses a razor blade to cut up weed and fill dime bags for her schizophrenic father, King. While King struggles with his unmedicated psychosis, Dana’s mother, the Lady, a cold and self-absorbed woman whose personality disorders rule the home, guards large bricks of drugs from the safety of their squalid trailer. But when the Lady impulsively plucks Dana from the Midwest and moves the two of them south, their fresh start results in homelessness and bankruptcy.

The inspiring stories of six people who changed history. Contents: Henry J Heinz, the man who invented tomato ketchup; William Lever, who made millions from soap; Michael Marks, founder of the Marks and Spencer stores; Henry Ford, who mass produced cars and made them affordable; Coco Chanel, the businesswoman who changed fashion for women; Ray Kroc, the man who created the McDonald's chain of restaurants.

Growing up in Bexley, Ohio, population 13,000, Bob Greene and his four best friends, Allen, Chuck, Dan, and Jack, were inseparable. Of the four, Jack was Bob's very best friend, a bond forged from the moment they met on the first day of kindergarten. They grew up together, got into trouble together, learned about life together, and were ultimately separated by time and distance, as all adults are. But through the years Bob and Jack stayed close, holding on to the friendship that had formed years before.

The inspiring stories of six people who changed history. Contents: Gaius Julius Caesar, the powerful Roman leader; Queen Elizabeth I, who ruled England for 45 years; George Washington, the first president of the USA; King Louis XVI, the last king of France; Winston Churchill, who led Britain in the Second World War; Che Guevara, the Argentinian doctor who fought for revolution.

Lab Girl meets Brain on Fire in this provocative and poignant memoir delving into a woman's formative experiences as a veritable "lab rat" in a lifelong psychological study, and her pursuit to reclaim autonomy and her identity as a adult. What if your parents turn you into a human lab rat...