Books with category Inspirational
Displaying books 1-48 of 193 in total

The Third Gilmore Girl

2024

by Kelly Bishop

A candid and captivating memoir from award-winning and beloved actress Kelly Bishop, spanning her six decades in show business from Broadway to Hollywood with A Chorus Line, Dirty Dancing, Gilmore Girls, and much more.

Kelly Bishop’s long, storied career has been defined by landmark achievements, from winning a Tony Award for her turn in the original Broadway cast of A Chorus Line to her memorable performance as Jennifer Grey’s mother in Dirty Dancing. But it is probably her iconic role as matriarch Emily in the modern classic Gilmore Girls that cemented her legacy. Now, Bishop reflects on her remarkable life and looks towards the future with The Third Gilmore Girl. She shares some of her greatest stories and the life lessons she’s learned on her journey. From her early transition from dance to drama, to marrying young to a compulsive gambler, to the losses and achievements she experienced—among them marching for women’s rights and losing her second husband to cancer—Bishop offers a rich, genuine celebration of her life. Full of witty insights and featuring a special collection of personal and professional photographs, The Third Gilmore Girl is a warm, unapologetic, and spirited memoir from a woman who has left indelible impressions on her audiences for decades and has no plans on slowing down.

And So I Roar

A stunning, heartwrenching new novel from Abi Daré, New York Times bestselling author of The Girl with the Louding Voice.

When Tia accidentally overhears a whispered conversation between her mother—terminally ill and lying in a hospital bed in Port Harcourt, Nigeria—and her aunt, the repercussions will send her on a desperate quest to uncover a secret her mother has been hiding for nearly two decades.

Back home in Lagos a few days later, Adunni, a plucky fourteen-year-old runaway, is lying awake in Tia’s guest room. Having escaped from her rural village in a desperate bid to seek a better future, she’s finally found refuge with Tia, who has helped her enroll in school. It’s always been Adunni’s dream to get an education, and she’s bursting with excitement.

Suddenly, there’s a horrible knocking at the front gate. . . .

It’s only the beginning of a harrowing ordeal that will see Tia forced to make a terrible choice between protecting Adunni or finally learning the truth behind the secret her mother has hidden from her. And Adunni will learn that her “louding voice,” as she calls it, is more important than ever, as she must advocate to save not only herself but all the young women of her home village, Ikati.

If she succeeds, she may transform Ikati into a place where girls are allowed to claim the bright futures they deserve—and shout their stories to the world.

Woman Of Interest

2024

by Tracy O'Neill

A National Book Foundation's 5 Under 35 honoree delivers her first work of nonfiction: a compulsively readable, genre-bending story of finding her missing birth mother and, along the way, learning the priceless power of self-knowledge.

In 2020, Tracy O'Neill began to rethink her ideas of comfort and safety. Just out of a ten-year relationship, thirtysomething, and in a world playing by new rules, she was driven by an acute awareness that the mysterious birth mother she'd never met--may be dying somewhere in South Korea. Hiring a grizzled private investigator, O'Neill took his suggested homework to heart and, when he disappeared before the job was done, picked up the trail, becoming her own hell-bent detective.

Covid could have already gotten to her mother. Yet the promise of whom and what she might discover--the possibility that her biological mother was her own kind of outlaw, whose life could inspire her own--was too tempting. Written like a mystery novel, Woman of Interest is a tale of self-discovery, featuring a femme fatale of unique proportions, a former CIA operative with a criminal record, and a dogged investigator of radical connections outside the nuclear family and fugitivity from convention.

O'Neill gorgeously bends the detective genre to her own will as a writer, stepping out of the shadows of her own self-conception to illuminate the hope-filled woman of interest she is becoming.

Briefly Perfectly Human: Making an Authentic Life by Getting Real About the End

2024

by Alua Arthur

Briefly Perfectly Human is a deeply transformative memoir that reframes how we think about death and how it can help us lead better, more fulfilling, and authentic lives, from America’s most visible death doula.


For her clients and everyone who has been inspired by her humanity, Alua Arthur is a friend at the end of the world. As our country’s leading death doula, she’s spreading a transformative message: thinking about your death—whether imminent or not—will breathe wild, new potential into your life.


Warm, generous, and funny AF, Alua supports and helps manage end-of-life care on many levels. The business matters, medical directives, memorial planning; but also honoring the quiet moments, when monitors are beeping and loved ones have stepped out to get some air—or maybe not shown up at all—and her clients become deeply contemplative and want to talk. Aching, unfinished business often emerges. Alua has been present for thousands of these sacred moments—when regrets, fears, secret joys, hidden affairs, and dim realities are finally said aloud. When this happens, Alua focuses her attention at the pulsing center of her clients’ anguish and creates space for them, and sometimes their loved ones, to find peace.


This has had a profound effect on Alua, who was already no stranger to death’s periphery. Her family fled a murderous coup d’état in Ghana in the 1980s. She has suffered major, debilitating depressions. And her dear friend and brother-in-law died of lymphoma. Advocating for him in his final months is what led Alua to her life’s calling. She knows firsthand the power of bearing witness and telling the truth about life’s painful complexities, because they do not disappear when you look the other way. They wait for you.


Briefly Perfectly Human is a life-changing, soul-gathering debut, by a writer whose empathy, tenderness, and wisdom shimmers on the page. Alua Arthur combines intimate storytelling with a passionate appeal for loving, courageous end-of-life care—what she calls “death embrace.” Hers is a powerful testament to getting in touch with something deeper in our lives, by embracing the fact of our own mortality. “Hold that truth in your mind,” Alua says, “and wondrous things will begin to grow around it.”

Being Reflected Upon

2024

by Alice Notley

Being Reflected Upon is a memoir in verse from one of America's legendary poets. Alice Notley delivers a collection that serves as a window into the sources of her telepathic and visionary poetics. The book is a reflective journey through Notley's Paris-based life between 2000 and 2017, a period that encapsulates her experiences with illness and recovery following her first breast cancer treatment.

As Notley penned these poems, she discovered connections between events of this period and those from previous decades. The narrative moves from reminiscences of her mother and childhood in California to meditations on illness and recovery. It also encompasses various poetic adventures in cities like Amsterdam, Berlin, Prague, and Edinburgh.

The collection is deeply concerned with the mysteries of consciousness and the connection between the living and the dead. The term "stream-of-consciousness" is not just a stylistic description but also teases out a lived physics or philosophy that Notley explores through her work.

Death Styles

Death Styles is a poignant exploration of the intertwining of style and survival in the face of profound loss. Following her award-winning collection, Toxicon and Arachne, author Joyelle McSweeney embarks on a personal challenge to write a poem each day, using a single icon as a creative spark. From the unexpected muses like River Phoenix and Mary Magdalene to a backyard skunk, McSweeney delves deep into each subject, pushing through the exhaustion of grief.

With its candid and mesmerizing lyrics, Death Styles takes readers on a journey through the contradictory forces of survival and mourning. It is a testament to the power of poetic expression to navigate through life's most challenging moments, discovering hope in the act of creation and the resilience to step out of the shadows of death.

New And Selected Poems

2024

by Marie Howe

New and Selected Poems is an indispensable collection that spans more than three decades of profound, luminous poetry from acclaimed poet Marie Howe. Characterized by "a radical simplicity and seriousness of purpose, along with a fearless interest in autobiography and its tragedies and redemptions," as noted by Matthew Zapruder in the New York Times Magazine, Howe's poetry effortlessly transforms penetrating observations of everyday life into sacred, humane miracles.

This essential volume draws from each of Howe's four previous collections—including What the Living Do (1997), a haunting archive of personal loss, and the National Book Award–longlisted Magdalene (2017), a spiritual and sensual exploration of contemporary womanhood—and contains more than fifteen new poems. Whether speaking in the voice of the goddess Persephone or contemplating aging while walking the dog, Howe is hailed as "a light-bearer, an extraordinary poet of our human sorrow and ordinary joy" by Dorianne Laux.

Lessons For Survival: Mothering Against The Apocalypse

2024

by Emily Raboteau

Award-winning author and critic Emily Raboteau uses the lens of motherhood to craft a powerfully moving meditation on race, climate, environmental justice —and what it takes to find shelter. Lessons For Survival is a probing series of pilgrimages from the perspective of a mother struggling to raise her children to thrive without coming undone in an era of turbulent intersecting crises.

With camera in hand, Raboteau goes in search of birds, fluttering in the air or painted on buildings, and ways her children may safely play in city parks while avoiding pollution, pandemics, and the police. She ventures abroad to learn from indigenous peoples, and in her own family and community discovers the most intimate meanings of resilience. Raboteau bears witness to the inner life of Black women/motherhood, and to the brutalities and possibilities of cities, while celebrating the beauty and fragility of nature.

This innovative work of reportage and autobiography will appeal to readers of the bestseller All We Can Save and Joan Didion’s The White Album alike. Lessons For Survival stitches together multiple stories of protection, offering a profound sense of hope.

I Heard Her Call My Name

2024

by Lucy Sante

An iconic writer's lapidary memoir of a life spent pursuing a dream of artistic truth while evading the truth of her own gender identity, until, finally, she turned to face who she really was. For a long time, Lucy Sante felt unsure of her place. Born in Belgium, the only child of conservative working-class Catholic parents who transplanted their little family to the United States without ever entirely settling here, she only really felt at home when she moved to New York City in the early 1970s. In that feral moment, she found her people among a band of fellow bohemians picking their way through the wreckage. Some of her friends would die young, to drugs and AIDS, and some would become jarringly famous.

Sante flirted with both fates, on her way to building an estimable career as a writer. But in the deepest sense, she still felt like her life a performance. She was presenting a façade, even to herself. Sante's memoir braids together two threads of personal narrative: the arc of her life, and her recent step-by-step transition to a place of inner and outer alignment. It is a story with many twists and turns: however necessary and long overdue her embrace of womanhood was, it was nonetheless a fearful business, filled with pitfalls and pratfalls.

Sante brings a loving irony to her account of her unsteady first steps; there was much she found she still needed to learn about being a woman after some sixty years cloaked in a man's identity, in a man's world. She had found herself, widening the aperture of her heart in the bargain. A marvel of grace and empathy, I Heard Her Call My Name parses with great sensitivity many issues that touch our lives deeply, of gender identity and far beyond.

Be A Revolution

2024

by Ijeoma Oluo

Be A Revolution: How Everyday People Are Fighting Oppression and Changing the World--And How You Can, Too is an eye-opening and galvanizing look at the current state of anti-racist activism across America by Ijeoma Oluo, the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller So You Want To Talk About Race and Mediocre.

In this book, Oluo examines the impact of white male supremacy on our systems, culture, and lives throughout American history and presents a compelling argument for understanding these systems of oppression. More importantly, it addresses the critical question: What can we do about them?

Be A Revolution showcases the efforts of people across America working to create real positive change in our structures. It covers various powerful systems such as education, media, labor, health, housing, policing, and more, highlighting the actions taken to create change for intersectional racial equity.

Moreover, it provides readers with insights into how they can find entryways into change in these areas or contribute to the important work being done elsewhere. Oluo's goal is to educate, inspire action, and shift conversations on race and racism from a place of pain and trauma to a place of loving action. This book is not only an urgent chronicle of an important moment in history but also an inspiring and restorative call for action.

The Fine Art Of Literary Fist-Fighting

2024

by Lee Gutkind

An account of the emergence of creative nonfiction, written by the "godfather" of the genre. In the 1970s, Lee Gutkind, a leather-clad hippie motorcyclist and former public relations writer, fought his way into the academy. Then he took on his colleagues. His goal: to make creative nonfiction an accepted academic discipline, one as vital as poetry, drama, and fiction.

In this book, Gutkind tells the true story of how creative nonfiction became a leading genre for both readers and writers. Creative nonfiction--true stories enriched by relevant ideas, insights, and intimacies--offered liberation to writers, allowing them to push their work in freewheeling directions. The genre also opened doors to outsiders--doctors, lawyers, construction workers--who felt they had stories to tell about their lives and experiences.

Gutkind documents the evolution of the genre, discussing the lives and work of such practitioners as Joan Didion, Tom Wolfe, Norman Mailer, James Baldwin, Zora Neale Hurston, Rachel Carson, Upton Sinclair, Janet Malcolm, and Vivian Gornick. Gutkind also highlights the ethics of writing creative nonfiction, including how writers handle the distinctions between fact and fiction. Gutkind's book narrates the story not just of a genre but of the person who brought it to the forefront of the literary and journalistic world.

1000 Words

2024

by Jami Attenberg

Inspired by Jami Attenberg's wildly popular literary movement #1000WordsofSummer, this writer's guide features encouraging essays on creativity, productivity, and writing from acclaimed authors including Roxane Gay, Lauren Groff, Celeste Ng, Meg Wolitzer, and Carmen Maria Machado.

In 2018, novelist Jami Attenberg, faced with a looming deadline, needed writing inspiration. Using a bootcamp model, she and a friend set out to write one thousand words daily for two weeks straight. They opened this practice to Attenberg's online community and soon hundreds then thousands of people started using the #1000WordsofSummer hashtag to track their work and support one another. What began as a simple challenge between two friends has become a literary movement—write 1,000 words per day without judgment, or bias, or concerns about writer's block, and see what comes of it.

1000 Words is the book-length extension of this movement. It is about becoming—and staying—motivated, discovering yourself and your creative desires, and approaching your craft from a new direction. It features advice from more than fifty well-known writers, including New York Times bestsellers, Pulitzer Prize winners, and stars of the literary world. Framing these letters are words of wisdom and encouragement, plus specific strategies, from Attenberg on how to carve out a creative path for yourself all year round. Paired with vibrant word art illustrations, 1000 Words is an accessible and motivational craft book that allows you to open any page and get a quick and fulfilling hit of inspiration.

How to Build a Boat

2023

by Elaine Feeney

How to Build a Boat is the story of a remarkable boy and his search for his mother. This tale is told with warmth, tenderness, and flair, capturing the essence of human connection and the quest for belonging.

Join this heartwarming adventure that explores the depths of family bonds and the courage it takes to navigate life's challenges. With every turn of the page, you'll be drawn into a world where hope sails high and dreams are crafted with care.

Unmasking AI

2023

by Joy Buolamwini

"Unmasking AI: My Mission to Protect What Is Human in a World of Machines" is a compelling exploration into the evolution of artificial intelligence and its implications on human rights and society. Penned by Dr. Joy Buolamwini, a leading figure in the field of AI research, this book is a call to action to mitigate the harms caused by unchecked technological development.

Starting from her early engagement with robotics in high school to her groundbreaking research at MIT, Buolamwini unfolds her journey of unmasking the "coded gaze"—a term she coined to describe the encoded discrimination within tech products. Through her work with the Algorithmic Justice League, she has been a pivotal force in the movement against AI-induced biases, advocating for a future where technology serves all of humanity equally.

With an intersectional approach, Buolamwini highlights the overlapping issues of racism, sexism, colorism, and ableism in the tech industry, urging for a collective effort towards algorithmic justice. "Unmasking AI" is not just a critique of the current state of artificial intelligence but a hopeful vision for a more inclusive and equitable technological future.

How To Say Babylon

2023

by Safiya Sinclair

How to Say Babylon is a profound memoir by Safiya Sinclair, offering a glimpse into her journey to find her voice as a woman and a poet amidst a strict Rastafarian upbringing. The narrative echoes the struggles depicted in Educated and Born a Crime, presenting Sinclair's battle against her father's patriarchal views and his obsession with protecting her and her sisters from what Rastas call Babylon—the Western world's immoral and corrupting influences.

The memoir recounts how Sinclair's father, a militant Rastafari and reggae musician, imposed severe restrictions on the women in the family, including the prohibition of pants, makeup, jewelry, and personal opinions. Amidst this repressive environment, Sinclair's mother provided her children with books, including poetry, which became Safiya's solace and a means to develop her own identity.

Through education and the power of words, Sinclair forges a path toward independence, despite the inevitable confrontations with her father that escalate into violence. How to Say Babylon is not only Sinclair's personal reckoning with her cultural roots and the stifling traditions she grew up with but also a lyrical exploration of a woman's resilience and empowerment. It is a story that resonates universally, while offering an intimate look into the world of Rastafari—a culture often named but seldom understood.

King

2023

by Jonathan Eig

King: A Life by Jonathan Eig is the first major biography in decades of the civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr.—and the first to include recently declassified FBI files. This revelatory new portrait offers an intimate view of the preacher and activist who demanded peaceful protest for his movement but was rarely at peace with himself.

Eig casts fresh light on the King family's origins as well as MLK's complex relationships with his wife, father, and fellow activists. He reveals a minister wrestling with his own human frailties and dark moods, a citizen hunted by his own government, and a man determined to fight for justice even if it proved to be a fight to the death.

Following MLK from the classroom to the pulpit to the streets of Birmingham, Selma, and Memphis, Eig dramatically re-creates the journey of a man who recast American race relations and became our only modern-day founding father—as well as the nation's most mourned martyr.

In this landmark biography, Eig presents an MLK who was a deep thinker, a brilliant strategist, and a committed radical who led one of history's greatest movements. His demands for racial and economic justice remain as urgent today as they were in his lifetime. The book also includes 8 pages of black-and-white photographs.

Truth & Beauty

2023

by Ann Patchett

Ann Patchett and the late Lucy Grealy met in college in 1981, and, after enrolling in the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, began a friendship that would be as defining to both of their lives as their work.

In Grealy’s critically acclaimed memoir, Autobiography of a Face, she wrote about losing part of her jaw to childhood cancer, years of chemotherapy and radiation, and endless reconstructive surgeries. In Truth & Beauty, the story isn’t Lucy’s life or Ann’s life, but the parts of their lives they shared.

This is a portrait of unwavering commitment that spans twenty years, from the long winters of the Midwest, to surgical wards, to book parties in New York. Through love, fame, drugs, and despair, this is what it means to be part of two lives that are intertwined... and what happens when one is left behind.

This is a tender, brutal book about loving the person we cannot save. It is about loyalty, and being lifted up by the sheer effervescence of someone who knew how to live life to the fullest.

You Could Make This Place Beautiful

2023

by Maggie Smith

In her memoir You Could Make This Place Beautiful, poet Maggie Smith explores the disintegration of her marriage and her renewed commitment to herself. The book begins with one woman's personal heartbreak, but its circles widen into a reckoning with contemporary womanhood, traditional gender roles, and the power dynamics that persist even in many progressive homes.

With the spirit of self-inquiry and empathy she's known for, Smith interweaves snapshots of a life with meditations on secrets, anger, forgiveness, and narrative itself. The power of these pieces is cumulative: page after page, they build into a larger interrogation of family, work, and patriarchy. You Could Make This Place Beautiful, like the work of Deborah Levy, Rachel Cusk, and Gina Frangello, is an unflinching look at what it means to live and write our own lives.

It is a story about a mother's fierce and constant love for her children, and a woman's love and regard for herself. Above all, this memoir is an argument for possibility. Smith reveals how, in the aftermath of loss, we can discover our power and make something new and beautiful.

Hello Beautiful

2023

by Ann Napolitano

An emotionally layered and engrossing story that asks: Can love make a broken person whole?

William Waters grew up in a house silenced by tragedy, where his parents could hardly bear to look at him, much less love him. So it's a relief when his skill on the basketball court earns him a scholarship to college, far away from his childhood home. He soon meets Julia Padavano, a spirited and ambitious young woman who surprises William with her appreciation of his quiet steadiness. With Julia comes her family; she is inseparable from her three younger sisters: Sylvie, the dreamer, is happiest with her nose in a book and imagines a future different from the expected path of wife and mother; Cecelia, the family's artist; and Emeline, who patiently takes care of all of them. Happily, the Padavanos fold Julia's new boyfriend into their loving, chaotic household.

But then darkness from William's past surfaces, jeopardizing not only Julia's carefully orchestrated plans for their future, but the sisters' unshakeable loyalty to one another. The result is a catastrophic family rift that changes their lives for generations. Will the loyalty that once rooted them be strong enough to draw them back together when it matters most?

Vibrating with tenderness, Hello Beautiful is a gorgeous, profoundly moving portrait of what's possible when we choose to love someone not in spite of who they are, but because of it.

What My Bones Know: A Memoir of Healing from Complex Trauma

2023

by Stephanie Foo

A searing memoir of reckoning and healing by acclaimed journalist Stephanie Foo, investigating the little-understood science behind complex PTSD and how it has shaped her life.

"Every cell in my body is filled with the code of generations of trauma, of death, of birth, of migration, of history that I cannot understand. . . . I want to have words for what my bones know."

By age thirty, Stephanie Foo was successful on paper: She had her dream job as an award-winning radio producer at This American Life and a loving boyfriend. But behind her office door, she was having panic attacks and sobbing at her desk every morning. After years of questioning what was wrong with herself, she was diagnosed with complex PTSD—a condition that occurs when trauma happens continuously, over the course of years.

Both of Foo's parents abandoned her when she was a teenager, after years of physical and verbal abuse and neglect. She thought she'd moved on, but her new diagnosis illuminated the way her past continued to threaten her health, relationships, and career. She found limited resources to help her, so Foo set out to heal herself, and to map her experiences onto the scarce literature about C-PTSD.

In this deeply personal and thoroughly researched account, Foo interviews scientists and psychologists and tries a variety of innovative therapies. She returns to her hometown of San Jose, California, to investigate the effects of immigrant trauma on the community, and she uncovers family secrets in the country of her birth, Malaysia, to learn how trauma can be inherited through generations. Ultimately, she discovers that you don't move on from trauma—but you can learn to move with it.

Powerful, enlightening, and hopeful, What My Bones Know is a brave narrative that reckons with the hold of the past over the present, the mind over the body—and examines one woman's ability to reclaim agency from her trauma.

This Other Eden

2023

by Paul Harding

A novel inspired by the true story of the once racially integrated Malaga Island off the coast of Maine, by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Tinkers.

In 1792, formerly enslaved Benjamin Honey and his Irish wife, Patience, discovered an island where they could make a life together. More than a century later, the Honeys' descendants remain there, with an eccentric, diverse band of neighbors: a pair of sisters raising three Penobscot orphans; Theophilus and Candace Larks and their nocturnal brood; the prophetic Zachary Hand To God Proverbs, a Civil War veteran who carves Biblical images in a hollow tree. Then comes the intrusion of civilization: eugenics-minded state officials determine to cleanse the island, and a missionary schoolteacher selects one light-skinned boy to save. The rest will succumb to the authorities' institutions or cast themselves on the waters in a new Noah's Ark.

Full of lyricism and power, This Other Eden explores the hopes and dreams and resilience of those seen not to fit a world brutally intolerant of difference.

The Creative Act

2023

by Rick Rubin

Many famed music producers are known for a particular sound that has its day and then ages out. Rick Rubin is known for something else: creating a space where artists of all different genres and traditions can home in on who they really are and what they really offer. He has made a practice of helping people transcend their self-imposed expectations in order to reconnect with a state of innocence from which the surprising becomes inevitable.

Over the years, as he has thought deeply about where creativity comes from and where it doesn't, he has learned that being an artist isn't about your specific output; it's about your relationship to the world. Creativity has a place in everyone's life, and everyone can make that place larger. In fact, there are few more important responsibilities.

The Creative Act is a beautiful and generous course of study that illuminates the path of the artist as a road we all can follow. It distils the wisdom gleaned from a lifetime's work into a luminous reading experience that puts the power to create moments - and lifetimes - of exhilaration and transcendence within closer reach for all of us.

Master Slave Husband Wife

2023

by Ilyon Woo

The remarkable true story of Ellen and William Craft, who escaped slavery through daring, determination, and disguise, with Ellen passing as a wealthy, disabled White man and William posing as “his” slave.

In 1848, a year of international democratic revolt, a young, enslaved couple, Ellen and William Craft, achieved one of the boldest feats of self-emancipation in American history. Posing as master and slave, while sustained by their love as husband and wife, they made their escape together across more than 1,000 miles, riding out in the open on steamboats, carriages, and trains that took them from bondage in Georgia to the free states of the North.

Along the way, they dodged slave traders, military officers, and even friends of their enslavers, who might have revealed their true identities. The tale of their adventure soon made them celebrities, and generated headlines around the country. Americans could not get enough of this charismatic young couple, who traveled another 1,000 miles criss-crossing New England, drawing thunderous applause as they spoke alongside some of the greatest abolitionist luminaries of the day—among them Frederick Douglass and William Wells Brown.

But even then, they were not out of danger. With the passage of an infamous new Fugitive Slave Act in 1850, all Americans became accountable for returning refugees like the Crafts to slavery. Then yet another adventure began, as slave hunters came up from Georgia, forcing the Crafts to flee once again—this time from the United States, their lives and thousands more on the line and the stakes never higher.

With three epic journeys compressed into one monumental bid for freedom, Master Slave Husband Wife is an American love story—one that would challenge the nation’s core precepts of life, liberty, and justice for all—one that challenges us even now.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version

2022

by Anonymous

The English Standard Version (ESV) Bible is an essentially literal Bible translation that combines word-for-word precision and accuracy with literary excellence, beauty, and depth of meaning.

The ESV Bible is equipped with an enhanced navigation feature. Kindle's index feature can be used to navigate directly to any verse. This feature is not supported on the Kindle 1 or any Kindle applications.

Our Missing Hearts

2022

by Celeste Ng

Our Missing Hearts is a gripping novel about a mother’s unbreakable love in a world consumed by fear. Twelve-year-old Bird Gardner lives a quiet existence with his loving father, a former linguist who now shelves books in a university library. His mother, Margaret, a Chinese American poet, left when he was nine years old, and her books have since been banned.

Bird receives a mysterious letter containing only a cryptic drawing, pulling him into a quest to find her. His journey takes him through the many folktales she once shared, into an underground network of heroic librarians, and finally to New York City, where he uncovers the truth about his mother and the future that awaits them both.

Our Missing Hearts is an old story made new, exploring the ways supposedly civilized communities can ignore searing injustice. It delves into the lessons and legacies we pass on to our children and the power of art to create change.

The Science of Stuck: Breaking Through Inertia to Find Your Path Forward

A research-based tool kit for moving past what’s holding you back—in life, in love, and in work.

We all experience stuckness in our lives. We feel stuck in our relationships, career paths, body struggles, addiction issues, and more. Many of us know what we need to do to move forward—but find ourselves unable to take the leap to make it happen. And then we blame and shame ourselves, and stay in a loop of self-doubt that goes nowhere.

The good news is you’re not lazy, crazy, or unmotivated. In this empowering and action-oriented guide, you’ll discover why we can’t think our way forward—and how to break through what’s holding us back. Using an eclectic approach and a customizable plan that’s as direct or as deep as you want, this life-changing guide empowers you to:

  • Break old habits and patterns
  • Gain perspective on pain and trauma from the past
  • Free yourself from the torturous “why” questions
  • Take control of your choices to create the life you want

Bringing together research-backed solutions that range from shadow work to reparenting, embodied healing, and other clinical practices, along with empowering personal stories, this book is a hands-on road map for moving forward with purpose, confidence, and the freedom to become who you’re truly meant to be.

The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness

2022

by Meghan O'Rourke

The Invisible Kingdom is a landmark exploration of one of the most consequential and mysterious issues of our time: the rise of chronic illness and autoimmune diseases.

A silent epidemic of chronic illnesses afflicts tens of millions of Americans. These are diseases that are poorly understood, frequently marginalized, and can go undiagnosed and unrecognized altogether. Renowned writer Meghan O’Rourke delivers a revelatory investigation into this elusive category of “invisible” illness that encompasses autoimmune diseases, post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome, and now long COVID, synthesizing the personal and the universal to help all of us through this new frontier.

Drawing on her own medical experiences as well as a decade of interviews with doctors, patients, researchers, and public health experts, O’Rourke traces the history of Western definitions of illness, and reveals how inherited ideas of cause, diagnosis, and treatment have led us to ignore a host of hard-to-understand medical conditions, ones that resist easy description or simple cures. As America faces this health crisis of extraordinary proportions, the populations most likely to be neglected by our institutions include women, the working class, and people of color.

Blending lyricism and erudition, candor and empathy, O’Rourke brings together her deep and disparate talents and roles as critic, journalist, poet, teacher, and patient, synthesizing the personal and universal into one monumental project arguing for a seismic shift in our approach to disease. The Invisible Kingdom offers hope for the sick, solace and insight for their loved ones, and a radical new understanding of our bodies and our health.

Run: Book One

First you march, then you run. From the #1 bestselling, award–winning team behind March comes the first book in their new, groundbreaking graphic novel series, Run: Book One.

“In sharing my story, it is my hope that a new generation will be inspired by Run to actively participate in the democratic process and help build a more perfect Union here in America.” –Congressman John Lewis

The sequel to the #1 New York Times bestselling graphic novel series March—the continuation of the life story of John Lewis and the struggles seen across the United States after the Selma voting rights campaign.

To John Lewis, the civil rights movement came to an end with the signing of the Voting Rights Act in 1965. But that was after more than five years as one of the preeminent figures of the movement, leading sit–in protests and fighting segregation on interstate busways as an original Freedom Rider. It was after becoming chairman of SNCC (the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) and being the youngest speaker at the March on Washington. It was after helping organize the Mississippi Freedom Summer and the ensuing delegate challenge at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. And after coleading the march from Selma to Montgomery on what became known as “Bloody Sunday.”

All too often, the depiction of history ends with a great victory. But John Lewis knew that victories are just the beginning. In Run: Book One, John Lewis and longtime collaborator Andrew Aydin reteam with Nate Powell—the award–winning illustrator of the March trilogy—and are joined by L. Fury—making an astonishing graphic novel debut—to tell this often overlooked chapter of civil rights history.

Antiracist Baby

Antiracist Baby is a transformative book that introduces the youngest readers and the grown-ups in their lives to the concept and power of antiracism. This engaging board book, crafted by the National Book Award-winning author of Stamped from the Beginning and How to Be an Antiracist, empowers parents and children to challenge racism in our society and within ourselves.

Take your first steps with Antiracist Baby by following its nine easy steps for building a more equitable world. With bold art and thoughtful yet playful text, this book provides the language necessary to begin critical conversations at the earliest age.

Antiracist Baby is the perfect gift for readers of all ages who are dedicated to forming a just society. It has been featured in various media, emphasizing its importance and impact in nurturing a society that values equality and justice for all.

Four Hundred Souls

An epoch-defining history of African America, the first to appear in a generation, Four Hundred Souls is a chronological account of four hundred years of Black America as told by ninety of America's leading Black writers.

Curated by Ibram X. Kendi, author of the number one bestseller How To Be an Antiracist, and fellow historian Keisha N. Blain, Four Hundred Souls begins with the arrival of twenty enslaved Ndongo people on the shores of the British colony in mainland America in 1619, the year before the arrival of the Mayflower.

In eighty chronological chapters, the book charts the tragic and triumphant four-hundred-year history of Black American experience in a choral work of exceptional power and beauty.

Contributors include some of the best-known scholars, writers, historians, journalists, lawyers, poets, and activists of contemporary America who together bring to vivid life countless new facets to the drama of slavery and resistance, segregation and survival, migration and self-discovery, cultural oppression and world-changing artistic, literary, and musical creativity. In these pages are dozens of extraordinary lives and personalities, rescued from the archives and restored to their rightful place in America's narrative, as well as the ghosts of millions more.

Four Hundred Souls is an essential work of storytelling and reclamation that redefines America and changes our notion of how history is written.

Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times

2020

by Katherine May

An intimate, revelatory book exploring the ways we can care for and repair ourselves when life knocks us down.

Sometimes you slip through the cracks: unforeseen circumstances like an abrupt illness, the death of a loved one, a break up, or a job loss can derail a life. These periods of dislocation can be lonely and unexpected. For May, her husband fell ill, her son stopped attending school, and her own medical issues led her to leave a demanding job. Wintering explores how she not only endured this painful time, but embraced the singular opportunities it offered.

A moving personal narrative shot through with lessons from literature, mythology, and the natural world, May’s story offers instruction on the transformative power of rest and retreat. Illumination emerges from many sources: solstice celebrations and dormice hibernation, C.S. Lewis and Sylvia Plath, swimming in icy waters and sailing arctic seas.

Ultimately, Wintering invites us to change how we relate to our own fallow times. May models an active acceptance of sadness and finds nourishment in deep retreat, joy in the hushed beauty of winter, and encouragement in understanding life as cyclical, not linear. A secular mystic, May forms a guiding philosophy for transforming the hardships that arise before the ushering in of a new season.

All Dogs Have ADHD

2020

by Kathy Hoopmann

All Dogs Have ADHD takes an inspiring and affectionate look at Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), using images and ideas from the canine world to explore a variety of traits that will be instantly recognizable to those who are familiar with ADHD.

Following the style of the award-winning All Cats Have Asperger Syndrome, charming color photographs of dogs bring to life familiar ADHD characteristics such as being restless and excitable, getting easily distracted, and acting on impulse.

This delightful book combines humor with understanding to reflect the difficulties and joys of raising a child with ADHD and celebrates what it means to be considered 'different'. This absorbing and enjoyable book takes a refreshing approach to understanding ADHD.

The Holy Bible: New American Standard Version, NASB

2020

by Anonymous

The New American Standard Version of the Holy Bible.

Reflection

2019

by Tyler Lockett

Reflection is the debut poetry book from All-Pro NFL wide receiver Tyler Lockett. It is a reflective and positive journey through faith, identity, and life's many challenges and rewards. This book serves as a scorching read, an evocative portrait of a professional athlete, and a captivating exercise in rhythm and verse.

Fueled by faith and powered by a strong work ethic, Lockett's poetry explores topics such as identity, sports, race, relationships, and how to live a purposeful life. As an NFL All-Pro wide receiver and return specialist for the Seattle Seahawks, Lockett draws on his unique perspective to address life's many challenges, temptations, and rewards.

From reminding young people to pursue their dreams, to pleading with a friend not to take his own life, Lockett's poetry encourages readers to stay positive even when confronting impossible odds.

The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse

2019

by Charlie Mackesy

Enter the world of Charlie's four unlikely friends, and discover their story and their most important life lessons. The conversations of the boy, the mole, the fox, and the horse have been shared thousands of times online, recreated in school art classes, hung on hospital walls, and even turned into tattoos.

In Charlie's first book, you will find his most-loved illustrations and some new ones too. This book offers inspiration and hope in uncertain times, following the tale of a curious boy, a greedy mole, a wary fox, and a wise horse who find themselves together in sometimes difficult terrain, sharing their greatest fears and biggest discoveries about vulnerability, kindness, hope, friendship, and love.

The shared adventures and important conversations between the four friends are full of life lessons that have connected with readers of all ages.

Over the Top

Who gave Jonathan Van Ness permission to be the radiant human he is today? No one, honey.

The truth is, it hasn’t always been gorgeous for this beacon of positivity and joy.

Before he stole our hearts as the grooming and self-care expert on Netflix’s hit show Queer Eye, Jonathan was growing up in a small Midwestern town that didn’t understand why he was so…over the top. From choreographed carpet figure skating routines to the unavoidable fact that he was Just. So. Gay., Jonathan was an easy target and endured years of judgement, ridicule and trauma—yet none of it crushed his uniquely effervescent spirit.

Over the Top uncovers the pain and passion it took to end up becoming the model of self-love and acceptance that Jonathan is today. In this revelatory, raw, and rambunctious memoir, Jonathan shares never-before-told secrets and reveals sides of himself that the public has never seen. JVN fans may think they know the man behind the stiletto heels, the crop tops, and the iconic sayings, but there’s much more to him than meets the Queer Eye.

You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, and you’ll come away knowing that no matter how broken or lost you may be, you’re a Kelly Clarkson song, you’re strong, and you’ve got this.

The Ultimate Religion

2019

by Gillian Dance

Megan grew up in care and suffered all kinds of abuse, then struggled in adulthood to build a normal life. Hampered by her differences and lack of identity, Megan was lured into the embrace of a fundamentalist Christian group.

Attracted to the church because of her desire to know God and the warmth and inclusivity of the members, their promise of answers and healing, backed up by their deeper than usual knowledge of the bible, Megan experienced genuine miracles and love. But alongside the religious fanaticism came the cunning, gradual introduction of social control, flagrant sexism and violence.

An engrossing read, inspired by real-life events, investigating topics such as abuse, terminal illness, sexuality and gender roles in relation to faith. A story of the making and breaking of convictions and loyalties and the quest for actual truth. Quoting biblical scriptures to illuminate the characters’ mindsets, this book will resonate powerfully with those who have experience of such 'churches' or who wish to understand the mentality of people who lead and join such organisations.

Heart of a Warrior Angel

2019

by Lali A. Love

Award winning Author Lali A. Love provides a supernatural thriller of metaphysical and visionary fantasy with her own revolutionary philosophy and unique narrative skills to produce this emotionally invoking, heart-wrenching and gripping tale of a family's rise from poverty, oppression and abuse.

Lilac Noble must face the traumatic experiences of her childhood before she can conquer the dark entities that have wreaked havoc on her family. On this epic journey, Lilac undergoes the destructive process of spiritual enlightenment in order to lift the veil of darkness and shame that has obscured her youth. As Lilac unlocks painful memories of abuse, suppressed in her subconscious from years of fear-based conditioning, she uncovers menacing secrets feeding the evil within her generational bloodline. In an attempt to vanquish the sinister energies, Lilac finds the courage to discover her inner truth, vulnerability, and authenticity, as she awakens her divine light and overcomes her debilitating fears of the past.

Lilac's unconditional love for her family guides her through her process of healing and transformation, fuelling her instinct for survival and her burning desire to illuminate the world. Spanning two continents and three generations, this inspirational novel portrays the best and worst of humanity and shows how the "tiniest spark of light can overcome the darkness of any magnitude," through forgiveness, compassion, and the most powerful force in the universe – Love.

The Atlas of Happiness

2019

by Helen Russell

The Atlas of Happiness is a fun, illustrated guide that takes us on a journey around the world, uncovering the secrets to happiness. Helen Russell, the author of The Year of Living Danishly, explores the fascinating ways that different nations search for happiness in their lives and what they can teach us about our own quest for meaning.


This charming and diverse assortment of advice, history, and philosophies includes:

  • Sobremesa from Spain
  • Turangawaewae from New Zealand
  • Azart from Russia
  • Tarab from Syria
  • Joie de vivre from Canada
  • and many more.

From Australia to Wales, via Bhutan, Ireland, Finland, Turkey, Syria, Japan, and many more, The Atlas of Happiness uncovers the global secrets to happiness and how they can change our lives.

Love is the Answer, God is the Cure: A True Story of Abuse, Betrayal and Unconditional Love

Her family secrets burst in the spotlight when Aimee and her sister went to the authorities. In this riveting memoir, Aimee Cabo shares the inside story of a young girl's courage to stand up to sexual, physical, and emotional abuse while facing her abusers in a trial the media dubbed "The Case from Hell." As she fought court battles, poverty, abuse, and addiction, Aimee always turned to love and God.

Love is the Answer, God is the Cure is a story of a woman who triumphed against all odds, persevered to find true love and form a family that could withstand anything.

Drum Beats, Heart Beats (Dancing Soul Trilogy, #3)

2018

by Maria Nhambu

In this final volume of The Dancing Soul Trilogy, we join an ever insightful and passionate Nhambu as she traverses diverse cultures and continents and negotiates a complex and shifting web of mixed identities—African immigrant and African American—through marriage, parenthood, and the search for the father she has never known. Through trauma and triumph, love and betrayal, the “Drum Beats” and “Heart Beats” of her native Africa lead her on an ultimate journey of transcendence that will enthrall and inspire readers around the world.

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

In 1845, runaway slave Frederick Douglass became, almost overnight, the most celebrated African American author in history with the publication of his Narrative. In stark, powerful prose, he conveyed his observations of owners and overseers, the demoralizing effects of slavery on both slave and slaveholder, and his own triumph over oppression.

In the latter part of the century, Douglass became a public figure of enormous stature: an orator, a newspaper publisher, and a statesman. But he is perhaps best remembered as America's first major African American writer, a man whose work still makes a powerful impact on both our minds and hearts.

For a new perspective on Douglass' narrative, Henry Louis Gates, Jr.'s, introduction examines its literary and social importance, and considers the issues Douglass raised as the foundation for today's field of African American studies. Gates's illuminating insights, and an extensive bibliography, make this edition essential reading for scholars, historians, and students of African American literature.

Almost Everything

2018

by Anne Lamott

From Anne Lamott, the New York Times-bestselling author of Help, Thanks, Wow, comes the book we need from her now: How to bring hope back into our lives.


"I am stockpiling antibiotics for the Apocalypse, even as I await the blossoming of paperwhites on the windowsill in the kitchen," Anne Lamott admits at the beginning of Almost Everything. Despair and uncertainty surround us: in the news, in our families, and in ourselves. But even when life is at its bleakest--when we are, as she puts it, "doomed, stunned, exhausted, and over-caffeinated"--the seeds of rejuvenation are at hand. "All truth is paradox," Lamott writes, "and this turns out to be a reason for hope. If you arrive at a place in life that is miserable, it will change." That is the time when we must pledge not to give up but "to do what Wendell Berry wrote: 'Be joyful, though you have considered all the facts.'"


In this profound and funny book, Lamott calls for each of us to rediscover the nuggets of hope and wisdom that are buried within us that can make life sweeter than we ever imagined. Divided into short chapters that explore life's essential truths, Almost Everything pinpoints these moments of insight as it shines an encouraging light forward.

It's a Storm Without God... It's the Perfect Journey When You Know the Name of Jesus Is Guaranteed!!!: My Life Testimony: There's No Excuse to Not Be Who You Want to Be... God's So Great!!!

2018

by Larry Taylor

He's that little bit of hope, when your back's against the ropes, YO i made it(THANK YOU JESUS!!!), he's the World's greatest(THANK YOU JESUS!!!). i just asked the lord to help me... GOD'S SO GREAT!!! I just said in the name of JESUS... GOD'S SO GREAT!!! GOD used my health problems to pull me out of the real storm, the storm/battle against myself; I was fighting and drowning myself... BUT GOD!!! THANK YOU JESUS!!! my health problems was nothing compared to what I was doing to myself. God allowed me to see why I went through everything I did as a kid, teen, and a younger adult! Just know NO matter what you go through, GOD IS GUARANTEED!!!

Journey Through Trauma

For survivors of PTSD and repeated, relational trauma — and the people who love them.

Gretchen Schmelzer watched too many people quit during treatment for trauma recovery. They found it too difficult or too frightening or just decided that for them it was too late. But as a therapist and trauma survivor herself, Dr. Schmelzer wants us to know that it is never too late to heal from trauma, whether it is the suffering caused within an abusive relationship or PTSD resulting from combat. Sometimes what feels like a big setback is actually an unexpected difficult step forward.

So she wrote Journey Through Trauma specifically for survivors—to help them understand the terrain of the healing process and stay on the path. There are three basic principles that every trauma survivor should know: Healing is possible. It requires courage. And it cannot be done alone. Traumas that happen more than once—child abuse, sexual abuse, domestic violence, gang violence, even war—are all relational traumas. They happened inside a relationship and therefore must be healed inside a relationship, whether that relationship is with a therapist or within a group.

Journey Through Trauma gives us a map to help guide us through that healing process, see where the hard parts show up, and persevere in the process of getting well. We learn the five phases that every survivor must negotiate along the way and come to understand that since the cycle of healing is not linear, circling back around to a previous stage does not mean defeat—it actually means progress as well as facing new challenges.

Authoritative and accessible, Journey Through Trauma provides support for survivors and their loved ones through one of the most challenging but necessary processes of healing that anyone can face.

12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos

What does everyone in the modern world need to know? Renowned psychologist Jordan B. Peterson's answer to this most difficult of questions uniquely combines the hard-won truths of ancient tradition with the stunning revelations of cutting-edge scientific research.

Humorous, surprising, and informative, Dr. Peterson tells us why skateboarding boys and girls must be left alone, what terrible fate awaits those who criticize too easily, and why you should always pet a cat when you meet one on the street.

What does the nervous system of the lowly lobster have to tell us about standing up straight (with our shoulders back) and about success in life? Why did ancient Egyptians worship the capacity to pay careful attention as the highest of gods? What dreadful paths do people tread when they become resentful, arrogant, and vengeful?

Dr. Peterson journeys broadly, discussing discipline, freedom, adventure, and responsibility, distilling the world's wisdom into 12 practical and profound rules for life. 12 Rules for Life shatters the modern commonplaces of science, faith, and human nature, while transforming and ennobling the mind and spirit of its readers.

Christy

The train taking nineteen-year-old teacher Christy Huddleston from her home in Asheville, North Carolina, might as well be transporting her to another world. The Smoky Mountain community of Cutter Gap feels suspended in time, trapped by poverty, superstitions, and century-old traditions.

But as Christy struggles to find acceptance in her new home, some see her — and her one-room school — as a threat to their way of life. Her faith is challenged and her heart is torn between two strong men with conflicting views about how to care for the families of the Cove.

Yearning to make a difference, will Christy’s determination and devotion be enough?

Freak the Mighty

Two boys – a slow learner stuck in the body of a teenage giant and a tiny Einstein in leg braces – forge a unique friendship when they pair up to create one formidable human force. A wonderful story of triumph over imperfection, shame, and loss.

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