Collection: Biography & Memoir

"Reeder evocatively shares his distressing, yet ultimately uplifting, story of survival against the odds, and even though readers know he will make it through, this account will keep them engaged until the end." -Publishers Weekly

Filled with quizzes, stats and little known facts, plus illustrated and told with all the fun of a Tom Gates novel, the Soccer Superstars series is perfect for young readers five and up.

Is Kylian Mbappé your ultimate soccer hero? His quick feet and shooting skills have made him one of the world's top forwards and the youngest ever player to score 16 goals in the Champions League.

Mbappé started playing at the age of six and his first coach was his dad. Find out how he went from playing on the pitch he created in his living room to becoming the second teenager in history to score in a World Cup final.

Soccer Superstars is a series aimed at building a love of reading from a young age, with fun cartoons, inspirational stories, a simple narrative style and a cast of characters chipping in with quotes, jokes and comments.

A sharp and witty collection of autobiographical essays by the late Elspeth Barker--acclaimed journalist and author of the beloved modern classic O Caledonia.

Following the publication of her acclaimed, darkly funny novel O Caledonia, Elspeth Barker's sharp and witty essays appeared regularly in the national press. Notes from the Henhouse, a selection of the most personal of these pieces, welcomes readers into the celebrated writer's life.

Tracing Barker's upbringing from her Scottish roots, these essays beautifully capture her time with the poet George Barker and her profound sense of loss following his death. She writes about George's former lover Elizabeth Smart and other figures from 1950s bohemia and 1960s counterculture. Pieces like "Thoughts in a Garden," equal parts hilarious and moving, read like dispatches from the front lines of country living, depicting the vagaries of raising a large family and assorted pets in a damp and drafty farmhouse.

Vivid, charming, and wholly original, Notes from the Henhouse is a wonderful glimpse into the life of an extraordinary writer.

A multigenerational story of hope and resilience, The Garretts of Columbia is an American history of Black struggle, sacrifice, and achievement.

At the heart of David Nicholson's beautifully written and carefully researched book, The Garretts of Columbia: A Black South Carolina Family from Slavery to the Dawn of Integration, are his great-grandparents, Casper George Garrett and his wife, Anna Maria. Papa, as Garrett was known to his family, was a professor at Allen University, a lawyer, and an editor of three newspapers. Dubbed Black South Carolina's "most respected disliked man," he was always ready to attack those he believed disloyal to his race. When his quixotic idealism and acerbic editorials resulted in his dismissal from Allen, his wife, who was called Mama, came into her own as the family bread winner. She was appointed supervisor of rural colored schools, trained teachers, and oversaw the construction of schoolhouses. At 51, this remarkable woman learned to drive, taking to the back roads outside Columbia to supervise classrooms, conduct literacy drives, and instruct rural farm women in the basics of home economics.

Though Papa and Mama came of age in the bleak Jim Crow years after Reconstruction, they believed in the possibility of America. Resolutely supporting their country during the First World War, they sent three of their sons to serve. One son wrote a musical with Langston Hughes during the Harlem Renaissance. Another son became a dentist. A daughter earned a doctorate in French. And the family persevered. But, for all that Papa and Mama did to make Columbia a nurturing place, their sons and daughters joined the Great Migration, scattering north in search of the freedom the South denied them.

The Garretts embraced the hope of America and experienced the melancholy of a family separated by the search for opportunity and belonging. On the basis of decades of research and thousands of family letters--which include Mama's tart-tongued observations of friends and neighbors--The Garretts of Columbia is family history as American history, rich with pivotal events viewed through the lens of the Garretts's lives.

Celebrate the inventor of the dishwasher in this inspiring STEM/STEAM picture book biography about Josephine Garis Cochrane, the brains behind one of the world's most-used kitchen appliances.

Many Americans have a dishwasher in their kitchen. But who invented it?

Meet Josephine Garis Cochrane: entrepreneur, innovator, girlboss. Washing dishes is a pain--it leaves Josephine's cups cracked, her dishes dinged, and her chowder bowls chipped. She'd rather be picking flowers, frosting cakes, or playing piano than dealing with cracked crockery. What to do about a chore that's icky, destructive, and time-consuming? Josephine tackles this task the modern way: she makes a machine to do it for her! She tinkers and tests, and perseveres through fizzles and flops--until she has a government patent for her invention, and there are whirring, whizzing, bubbling dishwashers making a splash across America.

This charming tale includes an author's note, a list of notable women inventors, a timeline of fascinating inventions, and a list of sources.

National Book Award winner Masha Gessen's biography of a ruthless man's ascent to near-absolute power.

"In a country where journalists critical of the government have a way of meeting untimely deaths, Gessen has shown remarkable courage in researching and writing this unflinching indictment of the most powerful man in Russia." --The Wall Street Journal

"Thanks to fearless reporting and acute psychological insights, Masha Gessen has done the impossible in writing a highly readable, compelling life of Russia's mysterious president-for-life." -Tina Brown, The Daily Beast

The Man Without a Face is the chilling account of how a low-level, small-minded KGB operative ascended to the Russian presidency and, in an astonishingly short time, destroyed years of progress and made his country once more a threat to his own people and to the world.

Handpicked as a successor by the "family" surrounding an ailing and increasingly unpopular Boris Yeltsin, Vladimir Putin seemed like a perfect choice for the oligarchy to shape according to its own designs. Suddenly the boy who had stood in the shadows, dreaming of ruling the world, was a public figure, and his popularity soared. Russia and an infatuated West were determined to see the progressive leader of their dreams, even as he seized control of media, sent political rivals and critics into exile or to the grave, and smashed the country's fragile electoral system, concentrating power in the hands of his cronies.

As a journalist living in Moscow, Masha Gessen experienced this history firsthand, and for The Man Without a Face has drawn on information and sources no other writer has tapped. This account of how a "faceless" man maneuvered his way into absolute--and absolutely corrupt--power is the definitive biography of Vladimir Putin.

Born into a family of migrant workers, toiling in the fields by the age of six, Jose M. Hernàndez dreamed of traveling through the night skies on a rocket ship. Reaching for the Stars is the inspiring story of how he realized that dream, becoming the first Mexican-American astronaut.

Hernàndez didn't speak English till he was 12, and his peers often joined gangs, or skipped school. And yet, by his twenties he was part of an elite team helping develop technology for the early detection of breast cancer. He was turned down by NASA eleven times on his long journey to donning that famous orange space suit.

Hernàndez message of hard work, education, perseverance, of "reaching for the stars," makes this a classic American autobiography.

'You are either alive and proud or you are dead ... and your method of death can be a politicizing thing' - Steve Biko

Founder of the Black Consciousness Movement, Steve Biko was a natural target for the South African authorities. On 13 August 1977, Steve Biko was arrested, interrogated and beaten. On 12 September he was dead.

Editor of a leading anti-apartheid paper, Donald Woods was a friend of Steve Biko and went into exile in order to write his testimony about the life and work of a remarkable man.

Praise for Biko:

'Courageous and passionate ... Mr Woods's brave attack on the shabby and ultimately murderous expedients of a society dominated by fear and greed should serve as both an inspiration and a warning' - Christopher Hampton in The Sunday Times

'A personal testament to a powerful, tragic figure and an impassioned indictment of a fascist nationalist system responsible for his brutal death in police custody' - The New York Times Book Review

A fifth-generation South African, Donald Woods was born in Transkei in 1933 and studied law in Cape Town before becoming a journalist. At the age of thirty-one he was appointed Editor of the Daily Dispatch, a leading anti-apartheid newspaper in South Africa. Until he was silenced by governmental banning orders in October 1977, he wrote the most widely read syndicated column in the country. He and his wife and their five children escaped to Britain in 1978 and settled in London, where he worked as a writer, broadcaster and lecturer on South African affairs.

In this inspiring travelogue, celebrated traveler and photographer Jessica Nabongo--the first Black woman on record to visit all 195 countries in the world--shares her journey around the globe with fascinating stories of adventure, culture, travel musts, and human connections.

It was a daunting task, but Jessica Nabongo, the beloved voice behind the popular website The Catch Me if You Can, made it happen, completing her journey to all 195 UN-recognized countries in the world in October 2019. Now, in this one-of-a-kind memoir, she reveals her top 100 destinations from her global adventure.
Beautifully illustrated with many of Nabongo's own photographs, the book documents her remarkable experiences in each country, including:

• A harrowing scooter accident in Nauru, the world's least visited country,
• Seeing the life and community swarming around the Hazrat Ali Mazar mosque in Afghanistan,
• Horseback riding and learning to lasso with Black cowboys in Oklahoma,
• Playing dominoes with men on the streets of Havana,
• Learning to make traditional takoyaki (octopus balls) from locals in Japan,
• Dog sledding in Norway and swimming with humpback whales in Tonga,
• A late night adventure with strangers to cross a border in Guinea Bissau,
• And sunbathing on the sandy shores of Los Roques in Venezuela.

Along with beloved destinations like Peru and South Africa, you'll also find tales from far-flung corners and seldom visited destinations, including Tuvalu, North Korea, South Sudan, and the Central African Republic. Nabongo's stories are love letters to diversity, beauty, and culture--and most of all, to the people she meets along the way. Throughout, she offers bucket-list experiences for other travel-lovers looking to follow in her footsteps.

For armchair travelers or readers planning a trip around the globe, this arresting collection will awe and inspire!

Alexander Larman, the master chronicler of the House of Windsor, brings his acclaimed trilogy to a dramatic and poignant conclusion.

When the Royal Family took to the balcony of Buckingham Palace on VE Day in 1945, they knew that the happiness and excitement of the day was illusory. Britain may have been victorious in a painful war, but the peace would be no easier. Between the abdication crisis, the death of King George VI, and the ascension of young Elizabeth II to the throne, the continued existence of the monarchy seemed uncertain. And the presence of the former Edward VIII, now the Duke of Windsor, conniving and sniping from the sidelines in an attempt to regain relevance, even down to writing a controversial and revelatory memoir, could only make matters worse. Still, the question of whether or not Elizabeth could succeed and make the monarchy something that once again inspired international pride and even love remained.

In Power and Glory, Alexander Larman completes his acclaimed Windsor family trilogy, using rare and previously unseen documents to illuminate their unique family dynamic. Through his chronicling of events like the Royal Wedding, George VI's death and the discovery of the Duke of Windsor's treacherous activities in WWII, Larman paints a vivid portrait of the end of one sovereign's reign and the beginning of another's that heralded a new Elizabethan Age which would bring power and glory back to a monarchy desperately in need of it.

The renowned literary and cultural critic Edward Said was one of our era's most provocative and important thinkers. This comprehensive collection of his work, expanded from the earlier Edward Said Reader, now draws from across his entire four-decade career, including his posthumously published books, making it a definitive one-volume source.

The Selected Works includes key sections from all of Said's books, including his groundbreaking Orientalism; his memoir, Out of Place; and his last book, On Late Style. Whether writing of Zionism or Palestinian self-determination, Jane Austen or Yeats, or of music or the media, Said's uncompromising intelligence casts urgent light on every subject he undertakes. The Selected Works is a joy for the general reader and an indispensable resource for scholars in the many fields that his work has influenced and transformed.

An exuberant picture book celebrating the life and legacy of Selena Quintanilla, beloved Queen of Tejano music.

From a very early age, young Selena knew how to connect with people and bring them together with music. Sing with Me follows Selena's rise to stardom, from front-lining her family's band at rodeos and quinceañeras to performing in front of tens of thousands at the Houston Astrodome. Young readers will be empowered by Selena's dedication--learning Spanish as a teenager, designing her own clothes, and traveling around the country with her family--sharing her pride in her Mexican-American roots and her love of music and fashion with the world.

Fools Crow: Wisdom and Power is a classic in Native American literature. It is fully illustrated with drawings by Thomas E Mails and photographs of Frank Fools Crow. Fools Crow, the great Sioux spiritual leader believed Wakan-Tanka gave humans minds and natural powers that they should learn to use in keeping with the Above Beings infinitely capable guidance.

"The survival of the world," Fools Crow said, "depends upon our sharing and working together. If we don't," he warned,"the whole world will die."

As seen on the Discovery ID TV series Murder is Forever, these two true-crime thrillers follow a lawyer struggling to stop a killer and a detective angling to solve a double homicide.
Home Sweet Murder (with Andrew Bourelle): Lawyer Leo Fisher and his wife Sue are a sixty-one-year-old couple enjoying a quiet Sunday dinner at home. Until a man in a suit rings their front door claiming to be an SEC agent. By the end of the evening, two people will be shot, stabbed, and tortured. And two others will fare worse . . .
Murder on the Run (with Scott Slaven): The middle-aged housekeeper found dead with a knife in her throat was bad. But the little boy was worse. After a bloody double homicide that puts Omaha, Nebraska, on the map, Detective Derek Mois promises the boy's parents he will catch the killer, no matter how long or far he runs . . .

Bestselling memoir Fatty Legs for younger readers. Olemaun is eight and knows a lot of things. But she does not know how to read. Ignoring her father's warnings, she travels far from her Arctic home to the outsiders' school to learn. The nuns at the school call her Margaret. They cut off her long hair and force her to do menial chores, but she remains undaunted. Her tenacity draws the attention of a black-cloaked nun who tries to break her spirit at every turn. But the young girl is more determined than ever to learn how to read. Based on the true story of Margaret Pokiak-Fenton, and complemented by stunning illustrations, When I Was Eight makes the bestselling Fatty Legs accessible to younger readers. Now they, too, can meet this remarkable girl who reminds us what power we hold when we can read.

The Adirondack Park in New York State is not just home to the majestic Adirondack Mountains - an outdoor enthusiast's paradise - but it is home to approximately 130,000 full-time residents in 101 towns and villages. Witherbee is a hamlet in one of those small towns and the place where Author Alice Paden Green learned a harsh reality about race growing up Black in a predominantly white area. "Outsider: Stories of Growing Up Black in the Adirondacks" details many of Green's experiences as her family grappled with poverty, race and acceptance in the mid-20^th century. This memoir, prompted by a recent gathering of Blacks and whites in the Adirondacks for a discussion on race relations, explores perceptions of Black families in the 1950s and '60s and whether Blacks are still viewed as outsiders or welcomed with open arms in this four-season, recreational playground still dominated by white residents. This book adds to the narrative on whether more work should be done to diversify the Adirondack regions and can be used by individuals, groups, and government agencies to further those discussions.