Cultural Memoir

The acclaimed actress and dedicated activist shares her personal journey of discovery, and destroys outdated ideas about partnership, love and family that will resonate with anyone in an unconventional life situation. Actress and activist Maria Bello made waves with her essay, “Coming Out as a...

The mixed population is the fastest-growing group in the UK today, but the mainstream conversation around mixedness is stilted, repetitive and often problematic. At a time when ethnically ambiguous models fill our Instagram feeds and our high street shop windows, and when children of interracial relationships are lauded as heralding in the dawn of a post-racial utopia, journalist Natalie Morris takes a deep dive into what it really means to be mixed in Britain today.

DIAMOND: The Memoir of a Lost Daughter of Japan tells the tale of a small girl orphaned in a hostile foreign country, who must live by her wits and courage until fate decides to favor her many years later.

How does a white kid from the New York suburbs, harmonica in hand, end up earning himself a busker's spot on the Harlem sidewalks next to Mr. Satan, a Mississippi-born legend? How did an interracial blues duo fare on the streets of New York during a turbulent, fractious time marked by racially-motivated murders in Howard Beach, Bensonhurst, and Crown Heights?

From a celebrated figure of the food world comes a poignant, provocative memoir about being young and gay during the 1970s punk revolution in America Long before James Oseland was a judge on Top Chef Masters, he was a teenage rebel growing up in the pre–Silicon Valley, California, suburbs...

This "graceful, captivating" (New York Times Book Review) story from a singular new talent paints a portrait of grief and the search for meaning as told through the prism of three generations of her Chinese American family—perfect for readers of Helen Macdonald and Elizabeth Alexander. Kat...

Here is a memoir about the seafaring culture of the West Coast of Scotland and the significance of the Gaelic language. The practice of architecture in Edinburgh and work in foreign fields, some up-roaring poetry and intriguing artistic collaborations follow. It will tell you tales, make you laugh, and also help you to understand what Scotland is now, and how we got here. It reads well, it looks beautiful, and it will last.

Many tales of horror about German occupation have been told through the ages. Some stories are well-known, the history books and television programs documenting them in wretched detail; others are more obscure: the painful separation of families as they attempted to escape an inevitable future, children snatched at a tender age and hidden, everyone wary and vigilant - and afraid. Those years were heavy and their victims mostly silent.

This collection of short essays, written over a period of years, pictures the true Ozarks and its people as Ellen Gray Massey has experienced them. While it captures the scene it also shows how the area has influenced her personal and professional life. From her childhood attending school in Washington, DC, and living all her adult years in the Ozarks, came the material and background to become a writer, her life-long ambition.

Some children still spent summer hopping in Kent. Our class went camping in Ashdown Forest, a change from the bomb sites. We had the cubs and brownies where we earned proficiency badges in a number of skills. On Sundays, the Lido was a short bus ride away. More of our relations now came from Ireland and our Christmas parties were exciting. Passing the scholarship meant losing friends but gaining new ones. Among my friends in the streets of Paddington, this meant I was an outsider once more — a mixed blessed.

This is the story of Veronica Walker. A second generation white African. This is the story of how one woman learnt to accept loss and rebuild her life time and again and how she learnt to fight for herself against a society where women were deemed as second class citizens and the possession of their husbands or fathers. Fighting for her children's safety, Veronica learns to demand her voice be heard and she be accepted for the independent woman she was.

Christine Quinn's improbable journeybegan long before she becameNew York City's second-most-powerfulelected official. The granddaughter of Irishimmigrants—including a grandmother whoescaped the sinking Titanic when most teenagegirls in steerage perished—Christinelearned early in life that...

Alexandra Aldrich, a direct descendant of the famous Astor dynasty, grew up in the servants' quarters of Rokeby, the forty-three-room Hudson Valley mansion built by her ancestors. Her childhood was one of bohemian neglect and real privation. But it was fairly stable until the summer of her tenth...

There’s no college diploma hanging on Donald Thompson’s office wall. He didn’t have a prestigious internship at a Fortune 500 company. And yet, before the age of forty, Donald Thompson was a millionaire CEO and tech entrepreneur. Underestimated follows Don’s unique path, stopping along the way to uncover the business and life lessons he learned, inspirations, and habits that can help anyone realize their dreams.

Don't take speech for granted. Kit Roberts Johnson knows what it is like to have a frozen voice. She knows what it is like for others to have their voices silenced, like children with Down Syndrome, or adults with stuttering. She became a speech therapist to help people with communication disorders and discovered over the span of her career that we have all been silenced in some way.

Through vivid storytelling, Kunda Kalaba invites listeners to reflect on their own journeys, finding strength in adversity and meaning in life's seemingly small moments. This book is more than a personal memoir—it's a celebration of heritage, family, community, and the universal search for purpose.

Daddy is going to camp. That's what I told my children. A child psychologist suggested it. “Words like prison and jail conjure up dangerous images for children,” she explained. But it wasn't camp . . . Neil White, a journalist and magazine publisher, wanted the best for those he loved—nice...

GOOD MORNING AMERICA BUZZ PICK The Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright and co-writer of In the Heights tells her lyrical story of coming of age against the backdrop of an ailing Philadelphia barrio, with her sprawling Puerto Rican family as a collective muse. “Quiara Alegría Hudes is...

William Clyde Thompson: A Champion for the Yowani Choctaw chronicles the life and legacy of a man whose quiet strength and unwavering dedication helped preserve the cultural identity of the Yowani Choctaw people. Through meticulous research and heartfelt storytelling, Leaford Leven Blevins Jr. traces Thompson’s journey from rural Texas to the halls of tribal advocacy, illuminating his role in reclaiming recognition for a community long overlooked.

A veteran dog musher, Dave Olesen finished the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race eight times. After a 15-year career as a sled dog racer, Olesen set out to fulfill a lifelong dream. In four successive winters he steered his dogs and sled on long trips away from his remote Northwest Territories homestead, setting out in turn to the south, east, north and west, and home again to Hoarfrost River. His narrative ranges from the personal and poignant musings of a dogsled driver to loftier planes of introspection and contemplation.