Biography For Boys

Jim Gash's comfortable life as a Los Angeles lawyer and law professor nearly ensured that he and Henry, a Ugandan boy languishing in prison for two murders he didn't commit, would never meet. Henry was losing hope and prayed for a sign from God. Halfway around the world, Jim listened to best-selling author of Love Does Bob Goff encourage lawyers to use their legal training to help imprisoned children in Africa. Jim felt an irresistible urge to respond to this call.

A Promise at Sobibór is the story of Fiszel Bialowitz, a teenaged Polish Jew who escaped the Nazi gas chambers. Between April 1942 and October 1943, about 250,000 Jews from European countries and the Soviet Union were sent to the Nazi death camp at Sobibór in occupied Poland. Sobibór was not a transit camp or work camp: Its sole purpose was efficient mass murder. On October 14, 1943, approximately half of the 650 or so prisoners still alive at Sobibór undertook a daring and precisely planned revolt, killing SS officers and fleeing through minefields and machine-gun fire.

Desperate to alleviate her son's constant rages and their crushing toll on the family, Donnie Kanter Winokur comes up with an innovative, untested, four-pawed solution: a golden retriever service dog named Chancer. Chancer is specially trained to give Iyal a unique love he desperately needs. But in this true-life tale infused with moments of despair, tenderness, and humor, Chancer turns out to be what the entire family has needed to stay - and grow - together.

When Greg Cope White's best friend tells him he's spending his summer in Marine Corps boot camp at Parris Island, South Carolina, all Greg hears is "summer" and "camp". Despite dire warnings from his friend, Greg vows to join him in recruit training. He's 18, underweight, he's never run a mile - and he's gay. Greg's sheltered life hadn't prepared him for military service. A prince out of water, he packed five suitcases since he'd never been away from home for 13 weeks.

Christopher A. Roosa grew up the eldest son of Apollo 14 astronaut and command module pilot Stuart A. Roosa. As a child of the space program, Christopher had a ringside seat at the dinner table of one of twenty-four Americans who had either entered lunar orbit or landed on the moon.

Who won the first Daytona 500? Fans still debate whether it was midwestern champion Johnny Beauchamp, declared the victor at the finish line, or longtime NASCAR driver Lee Petty, declared the official winner a few days after the race. Author John Havick interviewed scores of people, analyzed film of the race, and pored over newspaper accounts of the event. He uses this information and his deep knowledge of the sport as it worked then to determine what probably happened. But he also tells a much bigger story.

As head coach of the Oklahoma Sooners, Barry Switzer was the fourth most successful coach in NCAA history. Both praised and reviled by the media as the "outlaw" of college football, Switzer was characterized as the "greatest rogue, pirate, hustler, and con man" ever to command a football team. As head coach for the Dallas Cowboys, he led America's team to victory in Superbowl XXX. In Bootlegger's Boy, Switzer gets the chance to tell it all from his point of view.

In 1910, when Olaf F. Larson was born to tenant livestock and tobacco farmers in Rock County, Wisconsin, the original barn still stood on the property. It was filled with artifacts of an earlier time - an ox yoke, a grain cradle, a scythe used to cut hay by hand. But Larson came of age in a brave new world of modern inventions - tractors, trucks, combines, airplanes - that would change farming and rural life forever. When Horses Pulled the Plow is Larson's account of that rural life in the early 20th century.

When George Alagiah was dropped off at a Hampshire boarding school as a child back in 1967, he was confronted with an extreme version of the private struggle faced by all immigrants: the battle to leave the past behind and fit into a new culture. His arrival in Britain coincided with the unhappy intrusion of race into politics. A key part of the ensuing fight against racism was the concept of multiculturalism. But in a closely argued and forthright chapter, Alagiah suggests that far from improving the prospects for some immigrants, multiculturalism may be an impediment to integration.

Mel Jackson's daughter presented him with a diary on Father's Day and asked him to leave a legacy of words - memories to read to her children after he was gone. The author decided to acquaint her to his father, whom she had never known. Here is an attempt to set to chronicle an experience that, to a young boy, made no sense. At times, telling his childhood stories to his children caused them to laugh. This time it is to inform, sadden, and also amuse. There is no attempt to vilify, but only describe a young boy's longing for the love of his father.

Best known for his unique brand of observational humor - seen on Broadway, in film, and on television - Klein details his life from ages nine to 25 as viewed "through the gauze of time". Klein's theme park of memories alternates dark moments with sunlit humor. Teenage frustrations prompted a visit to a Harlem prostitute, which filled Klein with "shame and triumph and guilt".

This riveting biography of a Massachusetts slave boy who fought in the Revolutionary War illuminates race relations in the Northern colonies, early battles of the revolution, and the experiences of Black soldiers on both sides of the conflict.

In The Poster Boy, Chad Scott tells the story of a Midwestern kid from Missouri who worked up the nerve to move to Chicago and chase his dream of becoming an entrepreneur. He didn’t have a pile of cash or a bunch of connections - just a great idea and the willpower to see it through to the bitter end. This book is half-memoir and half-guide. Chapters alternate between Chad’s story and practical business lessons designed to take you all the way from a bare concept to a lucrative business.

One day, villagers from Lacaune, in the mountains of southern France, returned from the woods with a startling story. They’d glimpsed a naked boy digging in the leaves. A year later - in 1798 - the strange, scarred boy appeared again, and this time woodsmen captured him and marched him down the mountain to the village square, where everyone crowded around to take in the spectacle. And so began the curious public life of the boy known as the Savage of Aveyron, whose journey took him all the way to Paris.

As the story opens, young Alexander Hamilton marches with the Continentals at Fort Lee, New Jersey. He is frustrated by being relegated to the end of the line and missing out on the action. He desperately wants to make a name for himself. His fortunes soon change at the Raritan River when the vanguard of British infantry catches up to Washington's army. Hamilton and his cannons are the only defense line available to prevent the army from being destroyed. Successfully protecting the Continental army and allowing their escape with his rear-guard action, Hamilton catches the attention of George Washington.

As a boy Matthew Waterhouse loved Doctor Who: he watched all the episodes and read all the novels and comic strips. What starts as a heart-warming story, of a boy growing up with Doctor Who as his trusted friend, engaging the listener with memories and nostalgia that will be familiar to any Doctor Who fan, takes a sudden twist when he is thrust into an alien and adult world - cast as Doctor Who's youngest ever travelling companion - for two of the series' most inventive seasons.

Con orígenes en la Depresión norteamericana y a pocos años de la Segunda Guerra Mundial, Daniel James Brown narra la epopeya del equipo de ocho remeros y su timonel de la Universidad de Washington, y su épica misión de ganar la medalla de oro en 1936 en los Juegos Olímpicos del Berlín de Hitler. El equipo de remo estadounidense que sorprendió al mundo y que transformó este deporte atrajo la atención de millones de personas.

¿Quiere conocer a los protagonistas de la maldad? Adéntrese en Para chicos malos, éstos, que lo conducirá por las sendas de la malicia puramente seductora.

The Gunner and the Grunt is written in the voices of two soldiers who fought in the same battles as members of the same recon unit but from different angles. Michael Kelley, the "Gunner," was flying in an armed helicopter above the jungle providing suppressive fire support, while Peter Burbank, the "Grunt," was down in the jungle on foot patrol involved in fire fights with Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army troops. The book follows these two Boston boys from army training through deployment to the war zone and the shock of first combat missions.

Children raised in a world of familial trauma and health scares can develop pretty deep defense and survival mechanisms to simply exist in a scary and ever-changing world. For Ryan Hall, his defense mechanism was that he became silent. On days when he didn’t have to go to school, he would spend upwards of 22 hours a day in his room behind a closed door. He would play video games and watch TV instead of sharing his voice and sharing himself.