Biographies

Days of Old by Maylis Besserie shows us Samuel Beckett at the end of his life in 1989, living in Le Tiers-Temps retirement home.

Former Secretary of State and CIA Director Mike Pompeo spearheaded the Trump Administration's most significant foreign policy breakthroughs. Now, he reveals how he did it, and how it could happen again. Mike Pompeo is the only person ever to have served as both America's most senior diplomat and the head of its premier espionage agency. As the only four-year national security member of President Trump's Cabinet, he worked to impose crushing pressure on the Islamic Republic of Iran, avert a nuclear crisis with North Korea, deliver unmatched support for Israel, and bring peace to the Middle East. Drawing on his commitment to America's founding principles and his Christian faith, his efforts to promote religious freedom around the world were unequaled in American diplomatic history. Most importantly, he led a much-needed generational transformation of America's relationship with China.Blending remarkable and often humorous stories of his interactions with world leaders and unmatched analysis of geopolitics, Never Give an Inch tells of how Pompeo helped the Trump Administration craft the America First approach that upended Washington wisdom?and made him America's enemies' worst nightmare. It is a raw account of what it took to deliver winning outcomes in the face of a progressive activist media, partisan conspiracies, two impeachments and endless investigations, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Complete with a road map of the trends and players shaping the world today, Never Give an Inch is more than a historical review of the Trump Administration's greatest victories. It is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the challenges of the future. And it is an inspirational story of leadership through dangerous times that will leave you with a greater appreciation for America.

In this funny and poignant memoir and cultural history, the television personality, columnist, and author of Drag pays homage to Lou Reed’s groundbreaking album Transformer on its fiftieth anniversary and recalls its influence on his coming of age and coming out through glam rock.In November 1972, Lou Reed released his album, Transformer because he thought it was “dreary for gay people to have to listen to straight people’s love songs.” That groundbreaking idea echoed with the times. That same year, Sweden was the first country to legalize gender-affirming surgery, and San Francisco struck down employment discrimination based on sexual orientation.Sometimes an artistic creation perfectly aligns with a broader social and political history, and Transformer—with the songs “Walk on the Wild Side,” “Perfect Day,” and “Vicious”—perfectly captured its time. “Walk on the Wild Side” was banned on radio across the country but became a massive hit when young people threatened to boycott stations that would not play it. The album''s cover featured a high-contrast image of Lou, flaunting a new mascara''d glamrock incarnation, shot by legend Mick Rock, thereby underscoring his intention to create "a gay album."In Transformer, Doonan tells the story of how Lou Reed came to make the album with the help of David Bowie, and places its creation within the course of Reed’s life. Doonan offers first-hand testimony of the album’s impact on the LGBTQ+ community, recalling how it transformed his own life as a 20-year-old working class kid from Reading, England, who had just discovered the joys of London Glam Rock and was sparked by the artistic freedom of Warhol’s The Factory. Transformer was a revelation—hearing Reed’s songs, Doonan understood how the world was changing for him and his friends.A poignant, personal addition to modern music and LGBTQ+ history, Transformer captures a pivotal moment when those long silenced were finally given a voice. As transgender icon Candy Darling, highlighted in his lyrics, told Reed, “It’s so nice to hear ourselves.”Transformer includes approximatively 16 pages of black-and-white and color photos.

Based on exclusive interviews with past and present All Blacks, The Jersey reveals the secrets behind how the New Zealand All Blacks have dominated the game of rugby.

Translation of: Ich trug den gelben Stern.

Based on interviews with those who knew him and worked with him, White Knuckles: The Life of Gary Moore comprehensively explores his colourful story, for the very first time.

Belfast 1972. It's the bloodiest year of the Northern Irish 'Troubles', and 16-year-old Eimear O'Callaghan, a Catholic schoolgirl in West Belfast, bears witness in her new diary. What follows is a unique and touching perspective into the daily life of an ordinary teenager coming of age in extraordinary times. The immediacy of the diary entries are complemented with the author's mature reflections written 40 years later. The result is poignant, shocking, wryly funny, and, above all, explicitly honest. Belfast Days is unique book that comes at a time when Northern Ireland is desperately struggling to come to terms with the legacy of its turbulent past. It provides a powerful juxtaposition of the ordinary everyday concerns of a 16-year-old girl--who could be any girl in any British or Irish city at this time, worrying about her hair, exams, boys, clothes, discos--with the unimaginable horror of a society slowly disintegrating before her eyes, a seemingly inevitable descent into a bloody civil war, fuelled by sectarianism, hatred, and fear. Written by an experienced broadcaster and journalist who rediscovered her 1972 diary on the eve of the publication of the Saville Report (also known as the Bloody Sunday Inquiry), Belfast Days demonstrates how one person's examination of her own 'story' provided her with a new perspective on one of the darkest periods in 20th-century Irish and British history. "...the writing is extraordinary." --Stephen Dubner, author of Freakonomics "Brigid Jones in a war-zone." --Anne Cadwallader, author of Lethal Allies "Eimear O'Callaghan's 1972 eloquent eye-witness testimony salutes the hard work, the persistence and the breathtaking courage of those who fought against tyranny and oppression for so many, many years!" --The Celtic Connection, September 2015 [Subject: Memoir, History, Irish Studies, British Studies]

"On 27 January 1945 Otto Frank was liberated from Auschwitz by Russian soldiers. At that point not only his journey home started, but also his long quest to find out what had happened to his wife Edith, his daughters Margot and Anne and the four other people with whom he had been in hiding in the Annex at 263 Prinsengracht in Amsterdam: Herman and Auguste van Pels, their son Peter and dentist Fritz Pfeffer. In the months after his liberation Otto Frank would discover that he is the only survivor out of these eight people. After the Annex continues the journey that Otto began. It is the ultimate attempt, based on thorough research in archives and available eye witness accounts, to reconstruct as precisely as possible what happened to the eight people in hiding after their arrest."--Amazon.com.

"The Trans Memoir We've Always Needed." ?Autostraddle "This blistering memoir is the book I didn't know I needed... I'm so grateful they had the courage to share their experience in such a transparent, authentic way." ?One of BuzzFeed's Most Anticipated Books of 2022• One of The Millions' Most Anticipated Books of the Month • One of Ms. Magazine's Most Anticipated Reads of 2022 • One of BookRiot's LGBTQ Books You Need to Read • When divorce moves young R/B Mertz away from rural Pennsylvania and their abusive father, Mertz's life is torn in two. Mertz's mom and new stepdad dive headfirst into conservative Catholic homeschooling, entrenching themselves in a world dominated by saints, prayers, and having as many babies as possible, just as Mertz is starting to realize they might be queer.Mertz clings to Catholicism as a rebellion against their anti-Catholic bio-dad, and to movies and musicals as beacons of the world outside the conservative closet constructed by the homeschoolers?who might actually be more concerned with being conservative than with being good, while Mertz's bio-dad just wants them to be "normal." Trying to stave off the inevitable, Mertz enrolls in a conservative Catholic college in Ohio. Coming of age in the early aughts, they grapple with flirtations, sexual encounters, and confusing relationships with students and faculty, as they try to figure out how to live a life in a world hell-bent on making them choose between their community and their identity. At turns rebellious, charming, and self-effacing, Mertz struggles to navigate this oppressive environment, questioning whether or not there is a place for them inside or outside of the Catholic Church; whether they can be themselves on the left or the right; whether they can be "conservative" or "liberal;" or whether they can be at all. Ultimately, Burning Butch is the courageous story of a trans / non-binary butch on a quest to survive with their authenticity intact.

John Lloyd was the poster boy of British tennis - a former British number one, Grand Slam finalist, Wimbledon mixed-doubles champion and Davis Cup captain. Remarkably, he and his two brothers, David (of leisure club fame) and Tony, all played in the singles championship at Wimbledon in the same year: a testament to the parents who believed in their sons' dreams as the boys batted tennis balls against a garage wall in Essex. Told with humour and honesty, John's autobiography is filled with intimate insight and captivating tales of Hollywood celebrities, tennis icons, broadcasting greats and loves lost - from his marriage to the legendary Chris Evert and dealings with Donald Trump to his sobering battle with cancer and drug addiction at the heart of his family. As the story unfolds, the John of today sends letters of advice to his former self in a yearnful act of 'if I only knew then what I know now'. What we now know for certain is that John Lloyd has lived an extraordinary life.

A fully illustrated account of Van Gogh's time at the asylum in Saint-Remy.

The essential guide to Karl Lagerfeld's tenure at Chanel from his early days in the 1980s, charting his constant reinvention of the fashion house that maintained Chanel as the most illustrious couture house in the world.

An inventive translation of a great historical epic, and the oldest surviving literary work in the Mongolian language, recounting the turbulent life and times of Genghis Khan and his Dothraki-like, nomadic horse lordsA Penguin ClassicThe Secret History of the Mongols is one of the literary wonders of the world. Writing in the thirteenth century, the Secret Historian - whose identity remains unknown - combines insider history and verse to chronicle the life of Genghis Khan and the empire he founded. Following Genghis from his early years, through feasts and fights, alliances, rivalries and betrayals, we witness the birth of a new regime, and a unified Mongolia whose hordes swept across the steppe and remade the medieval world. It was a world of vast nomad tent cities and warrior horse lords, governed by a distant Heaven, a world which draws near in this vivid new translation.

The Captain of a 30ft sailboat finds himself finds himself adrift without the ability to steer his boat 1000 miles from Hawaii in the largest ocean on the planet. These journals document his thoughts and emotions during this remarkable voyage.

Unapologetically embrace your empowered feminist self. Snarky feminists and crafty cross-stitch lovers alike will love carrying around this notebook that lets them proudly display their opinions.

The true story of how a ten-year-old's charity challenge created an endowment and led through young philanthropy to a career in medicine. A light-hearted but poignant parent-child journey, its excitement and suspense, purpose and fulfilment, recalled by the girl as a young woman. A portrait of coastal Suffolk, its cultural and natural heritage.

Wilderness guide Sicelo Mbatha shares lessons learnt from a lifetime's intimate association with Africa's wildest nature.