Personal Memoirs

A Spontaneous Life is structured around the mechanics of self-discovery and overcoming adversity, and the importance of human connection. Events instigated by a severe, life-changing bike accident, and the struggles, both personal and professional, that ensued from it, drove elite fitness trainer and biohacker Danny David to undergo a transformational upleveling of his core values and being. His book is divided into three parts, each focusing on a different aspect of his life philosophy: learning about the world, finding one’s way, and harmonizing with the world.

At 53, Kevin Nealon thought he had it all: a massive international celebrity with legions of loyal fans; a fabulous modeling career; hundreds of millions of dollars in the bank; and the most recognizable face on the planet. Nealon had accomplished the impossible: a 30-year career in show business with only limited trips to rehab. But just like every other celebrity, he felt that was not enough. The perpetually insatiable Nealon wanted more, and for him "more" meant a little addition that drooled, burped, and pooped (no, not a Pomeranian).

Between 1930 and 1932, Henry Ford sent 450 of his Detroit employees plus their families to live in Gorky, Russia, to operate a new manufacturing facility. This is the true story of one of those families—Carl and Elisabeth Werner and their young daughter Margaret—and their terrifying life in Russia under brutal dictator Joseph Stalin.

A stand-up comedian beloved for her combination of feisty wit and Southern charm, Pierce knows all too well that life is funny—until it’s not. But she also knows that it will become funny again. She’s held on to that hope—and that promise—through tragedy and triumph. And now she’s finally ready to tell her full story. In Life Is Funny until It’s Not, Pierce recounts a preacher’s daughter’s childhood filled with heartbreak, including abuse, her parents’ divorce, and the sudden deaths of her two sisters in the span of two years.

Dr. Temple Grandin gets to the real issues of autism, the ones parents, teachers, and individuals on the spectrum face every day. Temple offers helpful dos and don'ts, practical strategies, and try-it-now tips, all based on her insider perspective and a great deal of research.

This is Emily Bloom’s journey towards and through motherhood, a path that has become, for the average woman, laden with data and medical technology. Emily faces decisions regarding genetic testing and diagnosis, technologies that offer the illusion of certainty but carry the weight of hard decisions. Her desire to know more thrusts her back into the history of science, as she traces the discoveries that impacted the modern state of pregnancy and motherhood.

"Seven years on from its original publication, Pastrix remains bracing and beautiful. Nadia’s bold vulnerability and tender heart are timeless gifts. And the words she has added to this edition remind me: We need her call to tender grace and a loving, forgiving God now more than ever." -- Jeff...

How to Be Like is a "character biography" series: biographies that also draw out important lessons from the life of their subjects. In this new book - by far the most exhaustive in the series - Pat Williams tackles one of the most influential people in recent history. While many recent biographies of Walt Disney have reveled in the negative, this audiobook takes an honest but positive look at the man behind the myth. For the first time, the book pulls together all the various strands of Disney's life into one straightforward, easy-to-listen-to tale.

Why I Run is my story of fighting depression. Listen about this unique experience from someone who experienced it firsthand, as this audiobook has not been written by a doctor or a therapist. My story is honest, bold, and most of all truthful. This audiobook runs walks you through the thoughts and feelings of a depressed man who has beaten himself up for most of his life. It takes you to the edge of where the darkest thoughts and actions are to times of true depression and heartbreaking desperation.

What does it really mean to be a man? In Man Alive, Thomas Page McBee attempts to answer that question by focusing on two of the men who most impacted his life - one, his otherwise ordinary father who abused him as a child, and the other, a mugger who almost killed him. Standing at the brink of the life-changing decision to transition from female to male, McBee seeks to understand these examples of flawed manhood and tells us how a brush with violence sent him on the quest to untangle a sinister past and freed him to become the man he was meant to be.

In her memoir, Monica, 54, tells the story of her childhood, when her mother, Betty Mount, forced her head under running bathroom taps and tried to strangle her. She had previously tried to kill Monica as a baby. Monica was taken into foster care, where her new parents ran a brutal regime. To the outside world, the family was devoutly religious and respectable, but behind closed doors, Monica was physically and sexually abused.

Early motherhood is supposed to be joyous, but for Aaisha Alvi those early days were ruined by terrifying thoughts about her baby and family. Her experience was the antithesis of everything she had ever been told about motherhood, far beyond the trials of breastfeeding or putting her baby to sleep. Aaisha did recover and began to enjoy motherhood. She was thrilled when she fell pregnant again. Sadly, that pregnancy ended in a miscarriage, and the psychosis returned. This time, however, she was blindsided by the unimaginable: voices urged her to stab her daughter and to harm innocent people.

Often misdiagnosed and misunderstood, traumatic brain injury (TBI) may be a life-altering event that can produce a wide range of symptoms affecting physical as well as psychological health. Now, a physician shares her personal journey with TBI after suffering a life-changing accident. In this touching and informative book, Dr. Chrisanne Gordon chronicles her struggles - the high points as well as the lows - as she is challenged to make sense of what happened and realizes that her medical training did not prepare her for these struggles.

When Lee Metoyer is hired to be the new housekeeper, she has no idea that she’s about to become the anchor to a family in an abusive patriarch’s home, setting a mystery in motion that will take decades to uncover. At the age of seventy-two, Lee falls ill and on her deathbed asks Sandy to write her story. The only problem is, Sandy doesn’t know the story. Embarking on a quest to honor Lee’s final wishes, Sandy takes an emotional and thrilling journey, unveiling shocking truths not only about her beloved housekeeper but also her own upbringing.

"Bracing, brilliant, and fury-inducing.... a survival story like no other. With positively outstanding storytelling, this is a book that cannot be put down." —Booklist, starred review AN OPEN FIELD PUBLICATION FROM MARIA SHRIVER One of Booklist’s Best Memoirs of 2024 One of Booklist...

The first known autobiography by a Native American woman, Life Among the Paiutes is an eye-opening hybrid of history and memoir by a pioneering activist who witnessed firsthand the impact of the US’s westward expansion.

The powerful and inspiring story of an all-American wrestler who defied the odds—soon to be an original movie produced by Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, starring Jennifer Lopez, Jharrel Jerome, Don Cheadle, Michael Peña and Bobby Cannavale! Anthony Robles is a three-time all-American...

From the early lessons she learned growing up in South London, to the moment she gave up the 9 to 5 to do what she loved, Patricia Bright’s story will revolutionise how you think about work, life, and what it means to succeed.

After a nearly fatal bout of appendicitis, Hal Borland decided to leave the city behind and move with his wife to a farmhouse in rural Connecticut. Their new home on one hundred acres inspired Borland to return to nature. In this masterpiece of American nature writing, he describes such wonders as the peace of a sky full of stars, the breathless beauty of blossoming plants, the way rain swishes as it hits a river, and the invigorating renewal brought by the changing seasons. The delights of nature as Borland observes them seem boundless, and his sense of awe is contagious.

In The Double Life of Fidel Castro, one of Castro's soldiers of 17 years breaks his silence and shares his memoir of years of service, and eventual imprisonment and torture for displeasing the notorious dictator, and his dramatic escape from Cuba. Responsible for protecting the lider maximo for two decades, Juan Reinaldo Sanchez was party to his secret life - because everything around Castro was hidden.