Stuff Happens: Or My Life as a Monkey Review
Who is Dobbin Feldman and why is he saying those awful things about me? In this fictional yet semi-autobiographical novella the author tries to explore the existential experience of being born Jewish into a particularly strange set of familial circumstanc
The Life and Times of a Hyphenated American Review
Writing about the past helps to explain why I am discontent and continuously angry. I am reminded that America is a society dominated by religious fundamentalism and racism.
After a time, I rejected the White American world and went to Asia, seeking another basis for my identity. My identity is still in question. I cannot become an Asian and although I was born in this country, I am not accepted as an American citizen. As my birth certificate clearly states – I am not of an accepted racial color.
Identities For Life And Death: Can We Save Us From Our Toxically-Storied Selves? Review
This book is all about stories. The stories that shape our identities and how those identities shape our destinies for better or worse, for good or evil, in humanizing or dehumanizing ways. Working from the Shakespearian metaphor, "All the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players" Pellegrini argues that only by understanding how our storied selves develop can we acquire the tools to modify the roles they dictate for us to play on the stage in the theater of real life. The author deconstructs a wide variety of what he calls "toxic" dehumanizing, death-oriented self-scripts as well as "creative" humanizing, life-oriented narratives of both individuals and groups. Following the Native American folklore parable of two wolves engaged in mortal combat within us, one good the other evil, the fundamental premise here is that our identity determines which of our inner wolves we feed and thus, which of them will prevail. Pellegrini maintains that what's at stake in this battle between humanity's collective inner wolves is not just the quality but the very survival of life on earth. From this perspective, as individual and group selves are humanizingly or dehumanizingly narratized, so shall life be impacted throughout the world. To advance the cause of "detoxifying" identities in our globalized society, the author presents a rationale and program for an international grass roots social movement aimed at achieving a universal sense of belongingness to a "global life system"
...Always a Fan: True Stories from a Life in Science Fiction Review
Mike Resnick's second collection of essays, anecdotes, speeches, and convention reports (not to mention lists and obituaries), written for science fiction fan magazines, includes topics as diverse as Edgar Rice Burroughs, Teddy Roosevelt, My Most Memorable Collecting Experience, Where Do You Get Those Crazy (Novel) Ideas?, Bathrooms I Have Known, and much more.
Full Swing: Hits, Runs and Errors in a Writer's Life Review
A memoir of life and sport by the New York Times columnist and feature writer, one of the most articulate and admired sports writers in America. Mr. Berkow's very personal story carried him from his youth on the streets of Chicago to his accomplishments in Manhattan and elsewhere.
Writing the Stories of Your Life: How to Turn Memories into Memoir Review
Writing the Stories of Your Life: How to Turn Memoirs into Memoir shows you HOW TO:
- write freely and enjoy writing
- gain access to your memories and shape them into stories
- set goals for your memoir project and complete it
- turn journal entries into stories
- bring out the character in people and pets
- turn places into settings
- find stories from your family's past
- structure a story to engage your reader
- polish your stories and edit your memoir
- illuminate the theme in your story
- discover your own life themes
- decode how to publish your story
Richard M. Nixon: A Life in Full Review
From the late 1940s to the mid-1970s, Nixon was a polarizing figure in American politics, admired for his intelligence, savvy, and strategic skill, and reviled for his shady manner and cutthroat tactics. In deft, masterful prose, Black separates the good in Nixon-his foreign initiatives, some of his domestic policies, and his firm political hand-from the sinister, with his questionable methods and the collection of excesses and offenses associated with the Watergate scandal. Black argues that the hounding of Nixon from office was partly political retribution from a lifetime of enemies and Nixons misplaced loyalty to unworthy subordinates, and not clearly the consequence of crimes in which he participated.
Shiver: the life and times of a serial marrier Review
This is a rollicking novel about marriage in America with epic depictions of bad weather and even worse human behavior [adult situations, language, sexual content]. It is the story of a man who not only loved women but married twelve of them. It is also a chronicle of America; and like the last half of the 20th century, it is a wild ride with our matrimonial hero circumnavigating the country and having adventures you could only hope to imagine and pray to avoid. Alternately shocking, funny, radical, literary, and religious (while only occasionally sad in the tradition of Tom Jones and Moll Flanders), this virtuoso first novel reinvents the picaresque entertainments popularized by Henry Fielding and Daniel Defoe. So put away your other novels of Scandinavian sorrow and introduce yourself to a new American author.
Horsepower War: Our Way of Life Review
Horsepower War shatters nostalgic myths about musclecars and provides historical perspective on today's SUV craze. It proves efficiency and pollution regulation didn't kill the musclecar and that current regulation, which picks winners by favoring SUVs is the real threat. Harless has mined auto literature from the 1960s to the present to reveal granular detail on specific models, while at the same time providing broad perspective on the tectonic shifts in domestic auto making. He approaches political issues as an auto enthusiast, but instead of being an apologist for industry, he offers principles that embrace market rationality, and enhance the long-term sustainability of cars through rational transportation and energy policy. Harless re-discovers the principles of "conspicuous waste" and "conspicuous consumption"-phrases coined by economist Thorstein Veblen, author of Theory of the Leisure Class-to unmask the unacknowledged assumptions of both U.S. consumers and automakers.
"Sea Story!" and Other Sketches: Memories and musings from a life of adventure Review
The book is a collection of previously published stories, essays, rants, and musings by 'Skipper Al' Bell, whose adventurous life has given him a unique perspective on the world. The writings range from interesting accounts of real events to humorous lampoons and fiction. Some are inspiring, while others are ironic. The gentle reader may not agree with the author on some issues, in which case the reader is almost certainly wrong. His writings are part Mark Twain, part Jonathan Swift, and a large dose of Mad magazine. Some stories are serious and uplifting. Others reflect brooding depression. All are entertaining.
