Personal Essay

The long-awaited craft book from Steve Almond, based on three decades of writing, failing, and trying again. In Truth is the Arrow, Mercy is the Bow, Steve Almond shares the insights gleaned from three decades as a beloved teacher and mentor, and a considerably less-beloved literary rabble...

Drawing on the author’s seven years of caring for his mother through Alzheimer's, Be With: Letters to a Caregiver is what its title promises: four dispatches to an anonymous long-term caregiver. In brief passages that cast fresh light on what it means to live with dementia, Barnes shares trials, insights, solace - and, ultimately, inspiration.

He Never Came Home is a collection of 22 personal essays written by girls and women who have been separated from their fathers by way of divorce, abandonment, or death. The contributors to this collection come from a wide range of different backgrounds in terms of race, socioeconomic status, religion, and geographic location. Their essays offer deep insights into the emotions related to losing one’s father, including sadness, indifference, anger, acceptance—and everything in between.

In his latest book, Essays, best-selling author Thibaut Meurisse shares his insights on a variety of topics such as success, happiness, money, personal development and the meaning of life. He raises questions, shares frameworks, and offers tools to help readers figure out how to make the most of their life.

"The Greatest Story Ever ToldDispute over land and kingdom may lie at the heart of this story of war between cousins-the Pandavas and the Kouravas-but the Mahabharata is about conflicts of dharma. These conflicts are immense and various, singular and commonplace. Throughout the epic, characters...

What would you get if the Seinfeld, Reiner, Crystal, and Kagan families got together for dinner? You’d get fatter, guiltier, and hoarser from trying to get a word in edgewise and suffer muscle cramps from laughing. When you get into My Shorts, you get all that and more. An uproarious collection of true stories featuring a chubby Cheetos-loving Jewish middle child with overactive sweat glands and an abundant imagination.

Author, critic, and traveler, Marina Vaizey reflects on her experiences of the international art world, in a career spanning six decades, including eighteen years as the chief art critic at the Sunday Times. I can offer a lecture, very short, on the art world post war until now. Here it is. More. More artists, more money, more collectors, more collections, more scholarship, more publications, more museums, more galleries, more countries involved publicly world wide: Just - for good and ill - more.

A road map for rewiring our brains to unlearn harmful beliefs, heal broken bonds, and transform our communities The beliefs that hold us back—inherited prejudices, self-limiting thoughts, destructive patterns—often feel permanent. But what if they're not? In Radical Unlearning, you’ll...

The only thing bigger than Carrie Hope Fletcher’s hair is her heart. Eternally upbeat, this twenty-two-year-old dynamo has sung her way to fame, both as Éponine in the London cast of Les Mis, and on her wildly popular YouTube channel, It’s Way Past My Bedtime. But here’s her not-so-secret...

Marianne Williamson has gained international prominence through her spiritual reflections on modern life. In this Audio Program, she discusses topics such as: the power of meditation and prayer; the great "I AM" within us all; the need for a "Return to the Father"; and the power of consciousness...

Acres of Diamonds - essay, written by Russell Herman Conwell (February 15, 1843 – December 6, 1925) was an American Baptist minister, orator, philanthropist, lawyer, and writer. The original inspiration for Acres of Diamonds, his most famous essay, occurred in 1869 when Conwell was traveling in the Middle East. The work began as a speech, "at first given," wrote Conwell in 1913, "before a reunion of my old comrades of the Forty-sixth Massachusetts Regiment, which served in the Civil War and in which I was captain."

How do we add to archives of ecological memory? How can we notice and document what’s missing in the landscapes closest to us? In her debut essay collection, Laura Marris reframes environmental loss by setting aside the catastrophic framework of the Anthropocene in favor of that of the Eremocene, the age of loneliness, which is marked by the dramatic thinning of wildlife populations and by isolation between and among species.

From Denne Michele Norris and Electric Literature, a vital anthology of essays by trans and gender-nonconforming writers of color, sharing stories of joy, heartbreak, rage, and self-discovery. Featuring seventeen essays by trans people of color—spanning writers, scientists, actors, activists...

With a sprightly dose of insightful inspiration, a sprinkling of practical advice, and a bounty of exuberant stories by great writers, O's Little Book of Happiness features some of the best work ever to have appeared in O, The Oprah Magazine. Inside you'll find Elizabeth Gilbert's ode to the...

I am a recovering ass. Of course, at times I still am one, but it's less often. I now recognize my “assness” more quickly, recalibrate, and take action to make amends for my poor behavior. It's important to acknowledge the truth of our mistakes without turning toward self-contempt, shame, or beating ourselves up for the harm we have caused to those we love. Yet, we must take full responsibility for our poor behavior and fully own what we have done and learn to live differently, becoming men who bring life rather than further heartache.

Based on the NPR series of the same name, This I Believe features 80 Americans—from the famous to the unknown—completing the thought that begins with the book's title. The pieces that make up the program compel listeners to re-think not only what and how they have arrived at their own personal beliefs, but also the extent to which they share them with others.

In Inner Flight, Malek Hanna - award-winning actor, singer, filmmaker, and spiritual seeker - invites you into a deeply personal and universally relatable journey of awakening. Blending storytelling, ancient wisdom, and raw reflection, this spiritual memoir explores healing, identity, purpose, and the sacred power of presence. Raised between cultures, caught between expectations, and drawn to the mystery of life, Malek spent years people-pleasing and performing - until life cracked him open. What followed was a metamorphosis of heart, soul, and truth.

How to Die is both an absorbing excursion through some of Western literature’s most compelling works on the subject of death as well as an anecdote-driven argument for cultivating a better understanding of death in the belief that, if we do, we’ll know more about what it means to live a meaningful life.

This audiobook is a collection of essays on topics concerning the existence of humankind on Earth to aid listeners in personal reflection and transformation. Essay authors have been chosen to write personal essays on areas of their expertise or interest. It is broken into four sections: Self, humankind, religion, and Earth. It is very personal and subjective, and it challenges listeners to do their own deep dive to come up with their own conclusions on the various topics. It is not a political audiobook, nor should it reviewed from a political lens.

A growing number of intrepid Arab and Middle Eastern sahafiyat - female journalists - are working tirelessly to shape nuanced narratives about their changing homelands, often risking their lives on the front lines of war. From sexual harassment on the streets of Cairo to the difficulty of traveling without a male relative in Yemen, their challenges are unique - as are their advantages, such as being able to speak candidly with other women at a Syrian medical clinic or with men on Whatsapp who will go on to become ISIS fighters, rebels, or pro-regime soldiers.