Personal Memoirs Women

Though Chris and Taya Kyle's marriage had its difficult moments, it was always a love story. Together they'd endured military service, a best-selling book, unexpected fame, and a film deal starring a hot Hollywood actor. But just when Taya thought that she and Chris were finally going to live their dream together, her husband was murdered. In the wake of his death, a grieving Taya was left to raise her two young children and handle the many things Chris left behind.

Award-winning filmmaker Tanya Selvaratnam bravely recounts the intimate abuse she suffered from former New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, using her story as a prism to examine the domestic violence crisis plaguing America. Sensitive and nuanced, Assume Nothing details how Tanya’s relationship devolved into abuse, how she found the strength to leave - risking her career, reputation, and life - and how she reclaimed her freedom and her voice.

In What I Told My Daughter, entertainment executive Nina Tassler has brought together a powerful, diverse group of women - from Madeleine Albright to Ruth Bader Ginsburg, from Dr. Susan Love to Whoopi Goldberg - to reflect on the best advice and counsel they have given their daughters either by example, throughout their lives, or in character-building, teachable moments between parent and child.

For decades, osteopathic physician Larry Nassar built a sterling reputation as the go-to doctor for America's Olympians while treating countless others at his office on Michigan State University's campus. It was largely within the high-pressure world of competitive gymnastics that Nassar exploited young girls, sexually assaulting hundreds of them under the guise of medical treatment. In Start by Believing, John Barr and Dan Murphy confront Nassar's acts, which represent the largest sex abuse scandal to impact the sporting world.

Ronald Reagan’s daughter writes with a moving openness about losing her father to Alzheimer’s disease. The simplicity with which she reveals the intensity, the rush, the flow of her feelings encompasses all the surprises and complexities that ambush us when death gradually, unstoppably invades life.

Eager to retell the narrative of her own family and her coming-of-age, Patti Davis casts aside misperceptions that defined her in the past. Far from being the enfant terrible, Dear Mom and Dad reveals young Patti as a sensitive child, who was not able to be the public person her family demanded. Davis casts an empathetic yet honest eye on her parents—on her father, the eternal lifeguard, who saved seventy-seven people, yet failed to create a coherent AIDS policy, and her mother, who never escaped her own tortured youth.

Sally grew up in a dilapidated house by the sea where men were forbidden, her childhood world filled with mystery and intrigue. Hippies trailed through the kitchen looking for God - their leader was Aunt Di, who ruled the house with charismatic force. When Sally’s baby brother vanished from his pram, she became suspicious of the activities going on around her. What happened to Baby David and the woman called Poor Sue? And where did all the people singing and wailing prayers in the front room suddenly go?

Here is a book as joyous and painful, as mysterious and memorable, as childhood itself. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings captures the longing of lonely children, the brute insult of bigotry, and the wonder of words that can make the world right. Maya Angelou’s debut memoir is a modern American classic beloved worldwide.

In the summer of 1962, 19-year-old Mimi Beardsley arrived by train in Washington, D.C., to begin an internship in the White House press office. The Kennedy Administration had reinvigorated the capital and the country - and Mimi was eager to contribute. For a young woman from a privileged but sheltered upbringing, the job was the chance of a lifetime. Mimi made an impression on Kennedy's inner circle and, after just three days at the White House, she was presented to the President himself....

An inspiring and revealing essay about motherhood, self-acceptance, and overcoming the fears that hold you back by the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Open Book.

Was it My Fault? is intended to offer solace and guidance to those ensnared in toxic relationships, dispelling the notion that abuse is solely physical. Inspiring self-discovery, healing, and empowerment, Alana offers a testament to the resilience of the human spirit, a rallying cry for survivors to reclaim their narrative—urging them not just to survive, but to thrive.

Hearts get broken, and even life's best-planned journeys can drop you somewhere unexpected, leading you to ask yourself, 'How did I get here? And, more importantly, who can I blame?' But Christina Ford is here to tell you that is exactly where the real adventure begins. This book will help you redefine love, womanhood, and what it means to come of age ... middle age.

In this powerful and personal memoir, Annelise Duval shares her journey of survival, courage, and healing after escaping the devastating grip of domestic violence. Through raw, honest storytelling, Annelise provides insight into the emotional, physical, and psychological toll of abuse, while offering a message of hope for those still trapped in the cycle.

An honest and compelling memoir, Girl in Need of a Tourniquet is Merri Lisa Johnson’s account of her borderline personality disorder and how it has affected her life and relationships. Johnson describes the feeling of "bleeding out" unable to tell where she stopped and where her partner began. A self-confessed "psycho girlfriend," she was influenced by many emotional factors from her past. She recalls her path through a dysfunctional, destructive relationship, while recounting the experiences that brought her to her breaking point.

Self-deprecating and with an acerbic wit, TikTok star Clara Batten aka @rabatts is every middle-class mother trying to get through the day without another sh*t on the staircase or panic drive to McDonald’s. In Gin and Phonics, she talks candidly about the ups, downs and hilarious reality of trying to parent two small people and fulfil her lifelong dream of becoming an actress without losing her bl**dy mind.

Much is written about children's infancy and toddler years, which is good, since children will never remember those times themselves. It is ages four to 14 that make up the second act, as Catherine Newman puts it in this delightfully candid, outlandishly funny new memoir about the years that "your children will remember as childhood". Following Newman's son and daughter as they blossom from preschoolers into teenagers, Catastrophic Happiness is about the bittersweet joy of raising children and the ever-evolving landscape of issues parents traverse.

Alison Wearing led a largely carefree childhood until she learned, at age 12, that her family was a little more complex than she had realized. Sure her father had always been unusual compared to the other dads in the neighborhood: he loved to bake croissants, wear silk pajamas around the house, and skip down the street singing songs from Gilbert and Sullivan operettas. But when he came out of the closet in the 1970s, when homosexuality was still a cardinal taboo, it was a shock to everyone in the quiet community of Peterborough, Ontario - especially to his wife and three children.

In 2010, Cady Coleman boarded a rocket and blasted off into space for her third NASA mission, a six-month expedition to the International Space Station where she was the only woman on her six-person crew. After years spent overcoming obstacles in competitive and elite environments, including grappling with her own doubts and needing to overturn the expectations of others, Coleman became a success story in a role that wasn’t built with her in mind. In Sharing Space, Cady shares counterintuitive insights integral to her success.

When Rachel Bertsche first moves to Chicago, she’s thrilled to finally share a zip code, let alone an apartment, with her boyfriend. But shortly after getting married, Bertsche realizes that her new life is missing one thing: friends. Sure, she has plenty of BFFs—in New York and San Francisco and Boston and Washington, D.C. Still, in her adopted hometown, there’s no one to call at the last minute for girl talk over brunch or a reality-TV marathon over a bottle of wine. Taking matters into her own hands, Bertsche develops a plan....

After surviving a traumatic childhood in 1970s New York and young adulthood living in the shadow of her flamboyant mother, Rita, a makeup-addicted former television singer, Elissa Altman has managed to build a very different life, settling in Connecticut with her wife of nearly 20 years. After much time, therapy, and wine, Elissa is at last in a healthy place, still orbiting around her mother but keeping far enough away to preserve the stable, independent world she has built as a writer and editor. Then Elissa is confronted with the unthinkable.