New English Memoires

Starting with her childhood days in East Berlin (“I start with my life as a schoolgirl.... My own conscious life begins at the same time as the socialist life of Leipziger Strasse”), Not a Novel provides a glimpse of growing up in the GDR and of what it was like to be 22 when the wall collapsed; it takes us through Erpenbeck’s early adult years, working in a bakery after immersing herself in the worlds of music, theater, and opera, and ultimately discovering her path as a writer.

The search to find medicines is as old as disease, which is to say as old as the human race. Through serendipity - by chewing, brewing, and snorting - some Neolithic souls discovered opium, alcohol, snakeroot, juniper, frankincense, and other helpful substances. Ötzi the Iceman, the 5,000-year-old hunter frozen in the Italian Alps, was found to have whipworms in his intestines and Bronze Age medicine, a worm-killing birch fungus, knotted to his leggings.

Truman Capote’s best-selling book In Cold Blood has captivated worldwide audiences for over 50 years. It is a gripping story about the consequences of a trivial robbery gone terribly wrong in a remote village of western Kansas. But what if robbery was not the motive at all but something more sinister? And why would the Kansas Bureau of Investigation press the attorney general to launch a ruthless four-year legal battle to prevent fresh details of the state’s most famous crime from being made public, so many years after the case had been solved?

From Marine sniper Jake Wood comes a riveting memoir of leading over 100,000 veterans to a life of renewed service, volunteering to battle, hurricanes, tornados, wildfires, pandemics, and civil wars, and inspiring onlookers as their unique military training saved lives and rebuilt our country.

Nicolas Nabokov, a Russian-born composer and cultural diplomat, befriended many of the 20th century’s greatest musicians and artists. With delightful anecdotes and personal reflections, his memoir is a truly unique historical document that enriches our understanding of the Cold War’s impact on culture.

From an early age, Margaret Fuller provoked and dazzled New England’s intellectual elite. Her famous Conversations changed women’s sense of how they could think and live; her editorship of the Transcendentalist literary journal the Dial shaped American Romanticism. Now, Megan Marshall, whose acclaimed The Peabody Sisters "discovered" three fascinating women, has done it again: No biography of Fuller has made her ideas so alive or her life so moving.

Known for deep dives into true crime, extremist ideologies and fringe subcultures, journalist Leah Sottile turns her investigative eye toward American New Age culture. Today, tarot cards, astrology and crystals are everywhere — from Instagram and TikTok, sold at upscale boutiques and pricey wellness retreats. Sottile investigates how the recent surge of interest in New Age ideas speaks to a culture that is woven into the very fabric of America, and how self-professed gurus like Love Has Won's Mother God and the mysterious channeler Ramtha have built devout followings because of it.

From a probability of death or life in a vegetative state after a severe traumatic brain injury, Nicole used a negative prognosis as a powerful motivator to build a successful career as a rehabilitation counsellor. She is a living testament to how the strategies outlined in this book can work for you. Has a brain injury thrown your life into a cycle of chaos and frustration? Are you worried about the future for yourself or someone you care about because of the impact of a brain injury?

In 2010, a brave whistleblower alerted the police to Dr. Stan Li's corrupt pain management clinic in Queens, New York. Li spent years supplying more than 70 patients a day with oxycodone and Xanax, trading prescriptions for cash. Emergency room doctors, psychiatrists, and desperate family members warned him that his patients were at risk of death, but he would not stop.

In 1902, newly-married Jeannie Gunn (Mrs Aeneas Gunn) left the security and comfort of her Melbourne home to travel to the depths of the Northern Territory, Australia, where her husband had been appointed manager of 'The Elsey', a large cattle station. One of the very few white women in the area, she was at first resented by people on and around the station, till her warmth and spirit won their affection and respect. This is her moving and simple account of her life amidst the beauty and cruelty of the land.

From 1910 to 1919, New Orleans suffered at the hands of its very own Jack the Ripper-style killer while two innocent men nearly paid for one of his crimes with their lives. The story has been the subject of websites, short stories, collections of true crime, novels, a graphic novel, and the FX television series American Horror Story. But the real story of the Axeman of New Orleans has never been written - until now.

Thirty-five years of following in the footsteps of Charles de Foucauld color little sister Kathleen’s portrayal of the man and his message. Rather than relying too heavily on Charles de Foucauld's spiritual writings, little sister Kathleen draws on fresh material taken from his correspondence and diaries to set out his legacy for those who live in the deserts of the modern world, reminding us that at the heart of the Christian adventure is friendship with Jesus of Nazareth.

A tale of adventures, as Lin and Larry Pardey continue their voyaging on board their self-built 24'4" cutter. They cross the exotic sea that spawned Homer's tales of Ulysses' Odyssey, then sail through the strife torn Red Sea and across the typhoon tossed waters of the Bay of Bengal.

Ray Walker had a secure career in finance until a wine-tasting vacation ignited a passion that he couldn't stifle. Ray neglected his work, spending hours poring over ancient French winemaking texts, learning the techniques and the language, and daydreaming about vineyards. After Ray experienced his first taste of wine from Burgundy, he could wait no longer. He quit his job and went to France to start a winery - with little money, a limited command of French, and virtually no winemaking experience.

German poet Rainer Maria Rilke’s (1875-1926) Letters to a Young Poet has been treasured for nearly a century. Rilke’s personal reflections on the vocation of writing and the experience of living urge an aspiring poet to look inward, while also offering sage wisdom on further issues including gender, solitude, and romantic love. Barrows and Macy’s translation extends this compilation of timeless advice and wisdom to a fresh generation of readers and listeners.

The Pacific with Sam Neill is the companion audiobook to the Foxtel documentary series of the same name, in which actor and raconteur Sam Neill takes a deeply personal, present-day voyage to map his own understanding of James Cook, Europe's greatest navigator, and the immense Pacific Ocean itself. Voyaging on a wide variety on vessels, from container ships to fishing trawlers and sailing boats, Sam crosses the length and breadth of the largest ocean in the world to experience for himself a contemporary journey in Cook's footsteps.

As Alexis Ohanian learned when he helped to co-found the immensely popular reddit.com, the internet is the most powerful and democratic tool for disseminating information in human history. And when that power is harnessed to create new communities, technologies, businesses or charities, the results can be absolutely stunning. In this audiobook, Alexis will share his ideas, tips and even his own doodles about harnessing the power of the web for good, and along the way, he will share his philosophy with young entrepreneurs all over the globe.

Sal Maggio dropped out of college, and joined the NJ Army National Guard. Then he entered the New Jersey State Police Academy, graduated, and started his police career in central New Jersey as a general road trooper. After numerous transfers (none for disciplinary reasons), Maggio spent 19 years on the "road" as a trooper and road sergeant. He recalls many incidents encountered, while working the highways and policing the towns and townships that do not have a local police department.

When most people hear the word witches, they think of horror films and Halloween, but to the nearly one million Americans who practice Paganism today, it's a nature-worshipping, polytheistic, and very real religion. So Alex Mar discovers when she sets out to film a documentary and finds herself drawn deep into the world of present-day witchcraft. Witches of America follows Mar on her immersive five-year trip into the occult, charting modern paganism.

This story of a real-life Indiana Jones of the 1950s named John Keel contains everything but a trip to Venus in a flying saucer - a subject our newsman/explorer would become famous for a decade later. In Egypt, the fearless Keel was cursed by a mummy and befriended members of a strange snake-charming cult. In Iraq, he played Russian roulette with a notorious desert bandit and lived among the Yezidi devil-worshippers. Later, in India, he was buried alive and discovered the secret of the Indian rope trick, which he then performed for incredulous reporters in New Delhi.