Academic Life

The Dealmaker is a frank and honest account of how a severely dyslexic child who struggled at school went on to graduate from Oxford and become a serial entrepreneur. It describes Guy Hand's career in private equity, first at Nomura and then as head of his own company, Terra Firma. It looks in detail at the huge deals that Terra Firma has done over the years, involving everything from cinema chains and pubs to waste management, aircraft leasing and green energy.

An entertaining, humorous, and inspirational memoir by the founder and chief creative officer of the multimillion-dollar lifestyle brand ban.do, who "has become a hero among women (and likely some men too) who struggle with mental health" (Forbes). Hilarious, hyper-relatable, and filled with fascinating insights and hard-won wisdom on everything from why it’s okay to cry at work to the myth of busyness and perfection to the emotional rating system she uses every day, Gotch’s inspirational memoir dares listeners to live each day with hope, optimism, kindness, and humor.

"Spectacular" is a mild word for describing the strange experiment with life that comprises the story of Nikola Tesla, and "amazing" fails to do adequate justice to the results that burst from his experiences like an exploding rocket. It is the story of the dazzling scintillations of a superman who created a new world.

Beyond the rehashed clichés, this book inspires us to rediscover Diogenes' philosophical legacy—whether it be the challenge to the established order, the detachment from materialism, the choice of a return to nature, or the formulation of a cosmopolitan ideal strongly rooted in the belief that virtue is better revealed in action than in theory.

In the fall of 2019, John Hendrickson wrote a groundbreaking story for The Atlantic about Joe Biden’s decades-long journey with stuttering, as well as his own. The article went viral, reaching listeners around the world and altering the course of Hendrickson’s life. Overnight, he was forced to publicly confront an element of himself that still caused him great pain.

It begins with numbness on her left leg. Then it spreads. Even though an MRI finds a "mass" on her brainstem, it takes two more years for Meredith O'Brien to learn what is causing that numbness. Months after her sixty-five-year-old mother dies from a fast-moving cancer, weeks after her father is hospitalized and she experiences an unexpected job change, she learns she has multiple sclerosis. Suddenly, Meredith, a married mother of three teens, has to figure out how to move forward into a life she no longer recognizes.

A compelling look inside the Space Shuttle missions that helped lay the groundwork for the Space Age, Shuttle, Houston explores the determined personalities, technological miracles, and 11th-hour saves that have given us human spaceflight. Relaying stories of missions (and their grueling training) in vivid detail, Paul Dye, NASA's longest-serving flight director, examines the split-second decisions that the directors and astronauts were forced to make in a field where mistakes are unthinkable and errors led to the loss of national resources - and more importantly one's crew.

Harvard geometer and Fields medalist Shing-Tung Yau has provided a mathematical foundation for string theory, offered new insights into black holes, and mathematically demonstrated the stability of our universe. In this autobiography, Yau reflects on his improbable journey to becoming one of the world’s most distinguished mathematicians. With complicated ideas explained for a broad audience, listeners not only get insights into the life of an eminent mathematician, but also an accessible way to understand advanced and highly abstract concepts in mathematics and theoretical physics.

From a businessman who is extraordinarily humble yet is considered one of the world's most visionary, The First Billion Is the Hardest is both a riveting account of a life spent pulling off improbable triumphs and a report back from the front of the global energy and natural-resource wars - of vital interest to anyone who has a stake in America's future.

Born in 1870 in Chiaravalle, Italy, Maria Montessori would grow up to embody almost every trait men of her era detested in the fairer sex. She was self-confident, strong-willed, and had a fiery temper at a time when women were supposed to be soft and pliable. At around age thirty, Montessori was struck by the condition of children in the slums of Rome's San Lorenzo neighborhood, and realized what she wanted to do with her life: change the school, and therefore the world, through a new approach to the child's mind.

A visionary carpenter shares meditations on work, creativity, and design, revealing powerful lessons on building a meaningful life through his experience constructing some of New York’s most iconic spaces.

Discover the the life and accomplishments of Max Planck, theoretical physicist whose revolutionary discovery of energy quanta and formulation of fundamental quantum theory allowed for countless others to expand on the knowledge of atomic processes.

Eighteen years ago, Stanford MBA Michele Raffin pulled off the road to help an injured dove, a momentary impulse that ignited in her a fervent commitment to saving vulnerable bird species. Today, her suburban home plays host to Pandemonium Aviaries, one of the largest avian rescue sanctuaries and endangered breeding facilities in the country, with a maze of 54 individual aviaries that house over 40 species, 14 of which are listed as threatened with extinction.

Acclaimed historian Edward J. Renehan, Jr. - author of Dark Genius of Wall Street - draws upon previously unreleased documents to deliver the definitive biography of Cornelius Vanderbilt, the 19th-century transportation tycoon who accumulated the largest private fortune in U.S. history.

The definitive biography of the king of the rock 'n' roll business, Ahmet Ertegun, the founder of Atlantic Records.

Wouldn't it be nice to have an entertaining and illuminating guide to living life out loud? Accidentally on Purpose: Tripping Through Life with Regina is a rollicking, true-life travel guide into how outrageous twists and serendipitous turns can become blessings and give life purpose, dimension, and joy. From ridiculous depths to surprising heights and everywhere in between, Regina Meredith takes the listener on a carpet ride of the improbable, where dreams abound and realities intrude to weave a life story that is compelling, informative, and inspirational.

One of the most brilliant biologists of our time, and a charismatic daredevil, Dr. Joe Slowinski had been obsessed with venomous snakes since his youth. In 2001 Slowinski led a team of young scientists deep into the wilds of Burma on a final tragic expedition. Immediately after being bitten by the many-banded krait, the deadliest serpent in Asia, Joe knew his life was in grave and imminent peril.

As 'a little girl from a little school in a little village in North Yorkshire', she only went into the law because her headteacher told her she wasn't clever enough to study history. She became the most senior judge in the country, but it was an unconventional path to the top. Wise, warm and inspiring, Spider Woman shows how the law shapes our world and supports us in crisis. It is the story of how Lady Hale found that she could overcome the odds, which shows that anyone from similar beginnings will find that they can cope, too.

Anyone who lives with an eating disorder fights their own thoughts, their own anxieties, their own self, every second of every minute of every day. For Lizzie this was her reality from the age of 14. However through professional help, the support of her loving family, and her Christian faith, she somehow found the hope and strength to overcome. Life Hurts tells Lizzie's story, reflecting on it from her perspective as a doctor. Her vision is to inspire and encourage other to see that, although eating disorders can be devastating, there is hope for all of us.

What are you going to do for the rest of your life? For David Lawrence, Jr., a brilliant newspaper editor and publisher with a distinguished, three-decade-long journalism career who retired in 1999 at the age of 56, the answer in his words was to dedicate his life to a "[N]ewly energized purposefulness: that every child have a real chance to succeed."