Academic Life

February 1, 2003. A light flashed over a Texas sky and twisted metal rained across the countryside. As images of the wreckage from the Space Shuttle Columbia streamed across the nation's television screens, they became forever burned into our memories. But behind those images were stories that remained untold...until now.

In 1895, William James, the father of American philosophy, delivered a lecture entitled "Is Life Worth Living?" It was no theoretical question for James, who had contemplated suicide during an existential crisis as a young man a quarter century earlier. Sick Souls, Healthy Minds is a compelling introduction to James's life and thought that shows why the founder of pragmatism and empirical psychology -and an inspiration for Alcoholics Anonymous - can still speak so directly and profoundly to anyone struggling to make a life worth living.

Nine Lives is about blazing a way out from a rough childhood through talent and an unbridled passion for the craft of cooking. A story that's still being written as Brandon works with Crux, the pop-up culinary collective he founded, and plans for the opening of his own restaurant, Nine Lives serves up a raw and riveting memoir about food, rock-and-roll, and redemption.

In this debut collection of essays, Pace tells of his years as a career paramedic—wandering through the highs and the lows, the saves and the losses, the patients he remembers, and the ones he tries to forget. In 1997, Pace began his career as an EMT because he wanted to do something exciting. He wanted to help people too. And he thought those two things—excitement and helping people—would exist hand in hand. With a little sprinkle of glory thrown in for good measure.

In this engrossing memoir, internationally renowned libel lawyer Paul Tweed lays bare the reality of defending the world's biggest names in the court of law. During his four-decade career, Tweed has successfully represented scores of A-list celebrities and members of the British Royal Family, with many media giants being forced to withdraw stories, issue apologies or make substantial payouts when faced with his prowess.

Humanity is on an astronomical trajectory and according to aerospace professional and popular science communicator Kellie Gerardi, that future doesn’t rest solely on the shoulders of rocket scientists. Gerardi’s non-traditional path in the space industry shows us that humanity’s next giant leap will require the contributions of artists, engineers, and everyone in between. Gerardi takes us on a tour of this unique window in history and offers encouragement and advice for anyone who has ever dreamed of the stars and galaxies far, far away.

When it opened a decade ago, the acclaimed Los Angeles speakeasy The Varnish - owned, designed, and managed by award-winning cocktail aficionado Eric Alperin - quickly became the stylish standard bearer for modern bars. Unvarnished is a candid, voice-driven, no-holds-barred look at the workings of a bar, and the foundation of The Varnish’s success: attention to hospitality and an abiding belief in the nobility of service.

Born to a family of modest means in Kentucky, Jim Glidewell overcame insurmountable odds to create a business of staggering success. In January of 1970, he opened Glidewell Laboratories - one of the largest and most successful dental laboratories in the world with multiple locations worldwide. Jim Glidewell’s story is one of the great American success stories of our times and offers valuable wisdom on topics ranging from relationships to investing and ways to navigate insurmountable obstacles in a changing world.

Actor Jim Beaver (Supernatural, Deadwood, Justified) and his wife Cecily Adams (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's Moogie) were at the peaks of their careers and happily raising a beautiful two-year old daughter, Madeline. Then tragedy struck, not once, but twice. What followed was laid down by Jim in a moving, poignant, and uplifting journal of the following year, a year filled with heartbreak as well as enormous gifts and invaluable lessons, not just for Jim and his family but for listeners who traveled along with him on his journey.

In March 2020, soon-to-graduate medical students in New York City were nervously awaiting “match day” when they would learn where they would begin their residencies. Only a week later, these young physicians learned that they would be sent to the front lines of the desperate battle to save lives as the coronavirus plunged the city into crisis. In this powerful book, New York Times journalist Emma Goldberg offers an up-close portrait of six bright yet inexperienced health professionals, each of whom defies a stereotype about who gets to don a doctor’s white coat.

Today, Lipton means tea. However, in his time Sir Thomas Lipton was known for much more. Raised in desperate poverty, he became rich beyond his wildest dreams. he built a global empire of markets, factories, plantations, and stockyards. And his colorful pursuit of the America's Cup trophy made him a beloved figure on both sides of the Atlantic.

Armed with unprecedented access to Edison's workshop diaries, notebooks, and letters, Israel brings fresh insights into how the inventor's creative mind worked. For the first time, much attention is devoted to his early family life in Ohio and Michigan, where the young Edison honed his entrepreneurial sense and eye for innovation as a newsstand owner and editor of a weekly newspaper. These experiences underscore the inventor's later successes with new resonance and pathos.

In 1989, Brad Schaeffer was working as an artist when his trader brother invited him to visit the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. Schaeffer promptly quit his job and became a clerk in that most iconic arena of raw capitalism. During the next six years, Schaeffer rose from clerk to trader, making markets on Eurodollar options in Chicago and heating oil options in New York. In that time, jammed literally shoulder-to-shoulder, he screamed, flailed his arms, hurled expletives, and pushed and shoved his way through his day.

Is it cancer or just a bad pixel? Radiologists are the physicians we rarely get to see. Radiologists at Work contains the most memorable moments from the careers of 20 radiologists who practiced from the 1940s to the present day. These true stories are told with the trademark wit and warmth that has earned Carolyn Jourdan five national best-sellers.

Veteran journalists Simon Pearson and Fiona Gorman follow the remarkable life of heart surgeon Magdi Yacoub from his formative years in Egypt, through spectacular success at Cairo University, to his long and distinguished career in Britain. Although at times he clashed with the medical establishment in London, Yacoub pioneered great advances in heart surgery. He was knighted in 1992, and in 2014, he was awarded the highest honor in the gift of the Queen, the Order of Merit.

In this warm collection of personal essays and recipes, best-selling author Ann Hood nourishes both our bodies and our souls. From her Italian-American childhood through raising and feeding a growing family and cooking with her new husband, food writer Michael Ruhlman, Ann Hood has long appreciated the power of a good meal. Hood details recipes and more in Kitchen Yarns, along with tales of loss and starting from scratch, family love, and feasts with friends, and how the perfect meal is one that tastes like home.

John Dee was one of the greatest scientific minds of his time, but also one of the most controversial. He was a learned man in fields as varied as mathematics and astronomy, centuries before they became formalized fields of study, but he is better remembered for performing magic and alchemy. Instead of astronomy, he became renowned across England for astrology, and he was one of the country’s most notorious occult writers during his life.

This collection reveals the lives, lessons, and rules for success that have influenced Elon Musk, Warren Buffett, and Jeff Bezos, three billionaire businessmen who single-handedly disrupted and transformed the world in which we live. To become a billionaire from scratch is no easy feat. It can seem an impossible dream that’s exclusive only to the lucky few. However, this audiobook shows it is possible with the right know-how and that becoming a billionaire is less about luck and more about making the right decisions and working hard.

From medical expert Leana Wen, MD, Lifelines is an insider's account of public health and its crucial role - from opioid addiction to global pandemic - and an inspiring story of her journey from struggling immigrant to being one of Time’s 100 Most Influential People.

Many of us know little about Archimedes other than his "Eureka" exclamation upon discovering that he could immerse an object in a full tub of water and measure the spillage to determine the object's weight. That seemingly simple observation not only proved to King Hieron II of Syracuse that a certain amount of silver had been used in what was supposed to be his solid-gold crown, it established the key principles of buoyancy that govern the flotation of hot-air balloons, ships, and denizens of the sea.