Immigrant Memoirs

This true story tells of the author's childhood in an idyllic mountain village in Western Honduras. Despite the civil war in El Salvador, young José felt safe in his hometown of Tambla. Even if the fighting spilled into his homeland, surely the US-backed Honduran army would protect them. But when José's papa vanished at the hands of a notorious rogue military unit, his world was shattered. For decades, José lived with gnawing questions about his papa's fate. His quest continued even as he journeyed north in search of a better life in the United States, cheating death along the way.

Tragedy and Triumph is based on the extraordinary life of an Afghan teenager whose loving childhood is shuttered by war. Ahmad Ansari is badly injured in a rocket attack on his house during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the 1970s. The memoir details challenges that young Ahmad faces since then, how he graduates valedictorian in Kabul to eventually earn a doctorate degree in France and join his refugee family in the United States.

Far too often, immigrants are demonized and scapegoated, when they should be celebrated as heroes and revolutionaries. This audiobook strings together both triumphant and painful tales of immigrants who blazed trails and broke barriers in the fight for fundamental human rights. These are ordinary people who have used their own stories on the fight for citizenship to illustrate their triumphs and trials as immigrants in a new land.

A Mexican immigrant and rising star within the Christian community abandons his faith and comes out as a gay atheist in this exceptionally moving and soul-searching memoir. Fernando Alcántar recounts his incredible journey from poor Catholic boy on the dusty streets of Mexico to globetrotting missionary and high-profile Christian leader in the United States - where he eventually left his celebrated life behind to advocate for the liberating power of reason and equality.

Aquilino Gonell era un jóven cuando llegó a los Estados Unidos de la República Dominicana. Aunque no hablaba inglés, se dedicó a su nueva tierra adoptada, luchando para conseguir el dichoso sueño americano. Su resolución de lograr una vida de éxito le llevó a alistarse en el ejército, como manera de pagar sus estudios universitarios. Tras combatir en Irak, volvió a los EEUU con TEPT, pero siguió con confianza en las promesas del gobierno, y se concentró en su familia y en el proceso de sanarse.

Old New Worlds intertwines the immigrant stories of the author and her great-great grandmother. Sarah Barker and her new husband sail from England in 1815 to minister to the indigenous Khoihoi in South Africa’s Eastern Cape. In the midst of conflict, illness, and natural disasters, Sarah bears 16 children. Two hundred years later, Judith leaves post-apartheid South Africa with her new American husband to immigrate to the United States. She is drawn to Sarah’s immigrant story in the context of her own experience, and she sets out to try and trace her.

Jenn Budd, the only former US Border Patrol agent to continually blow the whistle on this federal agency's rampant corruption, challenges us—as individuals and as a nation—to face the consequences of our actions. Her journey offers a vital perspective on the unfolding moral crisis of our time. She also gives harrowing testimony about rape culture, white privilege, women in law enforcement, LGBTQ issues, mental illness, survival, and forgiveness.

Chris Von der Ahe knew next to nothing about baseball when he risked his life’s savings to found the St. Louis Browns, the franchise that would become the St. Louis Cardinals. Yet the German-born beer garden proprietor would become one of the most important - and funniest - figures in the game’s history.

Between 2 Worlds takes you through the life of an immigrant living a life of despair entrenched with a feeling of alienation. It's a heart-touching story that provides the readers with a glimpse of an immigrant surviving in western countries. It's Bahadir's tale of survival, living through the dungeons of Islamophobia and hate. This book provides an in-depth view of the life of an immigrant juggling the dilemma of identity.

Across Cultures and Empires is above all an immigrant's story. Mahir Ibrahimov's fluency in multiple languages offers the perspective of someone who found a way to successfully cross boundaries amid the fall of empire and the resulting cascade of conflicts, even as he provides the listener with insight into an era where mass migration has become a defining dynamic. In the course of telling his personal story and reflecting upon his experiences, Ibrahimov offers clear observations on the deep connections he has made about freedom and America's role in the world.

A quintessential American dream story from a Mexican entrepreneur who shares the tale of building a multi-million-dollar business from scratch, complete with both success and failure, and always a vision of hope.

In Sicily, on March 12, 1909, four gunshots thundered in the night. Two men fled, and investigators soon discovered who they had killed: Giuseppe Petrosino, the legendary American detective whose exploits in New York were celebrated even in Italy. Veteran New York City journalist and historian Paul Moses explores the lives of the nationally celebrated detectives who followed in the slain Petrosino's footsteps as leaders of the New York City investigative squad: Anthony Vachris, Charles Corrao, and Michael Fiaschetti.

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.

After witnessing the beheading of his uncle, a very young Doc Ping and his family escaped from China on foot in fear for their lives. They left everything behind, including his father's position in the nationalist Chinese government and all of their possessions, and fled the country—first to Bangkok, and then to Taiwan. When Doc was nine, his father secretly arranged for him to travel on a freighter with 15 other civilians to the USA to live with the woman who helped resuscitate him from drowning a few years earlier.

Once upon a Time in America: The True Tale of an Immigrant is the debut manuscript from Karl Talla. This coming of age story follows Talla from his early years as an immigrant in the United States, to the highs and lows he experienced as he made his way in the world. With America as its backdrop, this transparent piece of literature gives us a fly on the wall view of how an immigrant family dealt with everything from the tragic events of 9/11, to the election of America's first Black president, Barack Obama.

Sam Louie grew up torn between cultures as part of a first-generation Chinese immigrant family from Hong Kong living in a predominantly African American neighborhood in the United States. He experienced the duality of existence with the tension of two vastly different worldviews, his identity intertwined with the country he lives in and his ancestral ties. What traditions and cultural beliefs get preserved, what gets discarded, and what gets lost in translation? Beneath it all was the presence of three generations of addiction, trauma, and shame.

Witty, sharp, and unflinching, I Named My Dog Pushkin will have fans of Samantha Irby and Jenny Lawson howling with laughter at Margarita’s catastrophes, her victories, and her near misses as she learns to grow as both a woman and an immigrant in a world that often doesn’t appreciate either.

Sinatra’s Tailor is the remarkable story of Umberto Autore, orphaned as a young boy in Italy during WWII and raised by “nuns and Nazis”. He eventually immigrated to America where he became the tailor of Frank Sinatra and The Rat Pack, Steven Spielberg, and many other Hollywood luminaries.

The descendant of survivors of the Armenian genocide, Arlene Avakian was raised in America, where she could live free. But even with that freedom, she found herself a prisoner of both her family and society, denying her heritage along with her true sexuality. After marriage and motherhood, Arlene found herself exploring the growing women’s lib movement of the 1970s, coming to embrace the strength of her grandmother—known as the Lion Woman—and realizing her full potential and personhood.

The House That Love Built is the quintessential story of one woman's questioning what it means to be an American - and a Christian - in light of a broken immigration system. Through tender stories of opening her heart and home to immigrants, Sarah Jackson shines a holy light on loving our neighbor.