Other books that might interest you

• 

  Outside the Wire - Ten Lessons...

  Jason Kander

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  A smart and revealing political memoir from a rising star of the Democratic Party. "In life and in politics, the most important work is often that which happens outside the wire."  Going "outside the wire" -- military lingo for leaving the safety of a base -- has taught Jason Kander to take risks and make change rather than settling for the easy option. After you've volunteered to put your life on the line with and for your fellow Americans in Afghanistan, cynical politics and empty posturing back home just feel like an insult.  Kander understands that showing political courage really just means doing the right thing no matter what. He won a seat in the Missouri Legislature at age twenty-seven and then, at thirty-one, became the first millennial in the country elected to statewide office. An unapologetic progressive from the heartland, he rejected conventional political wisdom and stood up to the NRA in 2016 with a now-famous Senate campaign ad in which he argued for gun reform while assembling a rifle blindfolded.  That fearless commitment to service has placed him at the forefront of a new generation of American political leaders. In his final interview as President, Barack Obama pointed to Kander as the future of the Democratic Party.  "...do something rather than be something..."In Outside the Wire, Jason Kander describes his journey from Midwestern suburban kid to soldier to politician and details what he's learned along the way: lessons imparted by his dad on the baseball diamond, wisdom gained outside the wire in Kabul, and cautionary tales witnessed under the Missouri Capitol dome. Kander faced down petty tyrants in Jefferson City -- no big deal after encountering real ones in Afghanistan. He put in 90,000 miles campaigning for statewide office in 2012 -- no sweat compared to the thirty-seven miles between Bagram Air Base and Camp Eggers. When confronted with a choice between what's easy and what's right, he's never hesitated.Outside the Wire is a candid, practical guide for anyone thinking about public service and everyone wishing to make a difference. It's a call to action, an entertaining meditation on the demands and rewards of civic engagement, and, ultimately, a hopeful vision for America's future -- all seen through the eyes of one of its most dedicated servants.

  Show book

• 

  From Rake to Radical - An Irish...

  Anne Chambers

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  From Ireland, England, France, Austria, Greece, Turkey and Italy to America and the West Indies, overflowing with historic events, from the French Revolution to the Great Irish Famine, with a cast of the famous and infamous, Howe Peter Browne, 2nd Marquess of Sligo, lived life to the absolute limits. Privileged yet compassionate, charismatic yet flawed, Regency Buck, Irish landlord, West Indian plantation owner, Knight of St Patrick, Privy Counsellor, intrepid traveller, intimate of kings, emperors and despots, favoured guest in the fashionable salons of London and Paris, patron of artists and pugilists, founder of the Irish Turf Club, friend and fellow traveller of Lord Byron, treasure-seeker, spy, sailor and jailbird, as well as the father of fifteen children, the astonishing range and diversity of Sligo's life is breathtaking.
  
  From a youth of hedonistic self-indulgence in Regency England to a reforming, responsible, well-intentioned legislator and landlord, Sligo became enshrined in the history of Jamaica as 'Emancipator of the Slaves' and in Ireland as 'The Poor Man's Friend' during the most difficult of times.
  
  Eight years in the writing and sourced from over 15,000 primary contemporary manuscripts located by the author in private and public archives around the world, From Rake to Radical sheds new light on significant historical events and on the people who shaped them in Ireland, England, Europe and the West Indies during a period of momentous political turbulence and change.

  Show book

• 

  Code Red Fallujah - A Doctor's...

  Donnelly Wilkes MD

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  Airstrikes rain down, Gatling guns pound, and snipers lurk in the distance—welcome to the combat aid station of a young doctor embedded with the heavily weaponized First Marines Division as the Battle of Fallujah boils over.On the night of April 4th, 2004, First Marine Expeditionary Forces launch a major assault on the city of Fallujah. US Navy Lieutenant Donnelly Wilkes's battalion leads the assault into Fallujah as he is positioned with Navy corpsmen and marines at the tactical highway intersection called "The Cloverleaf." Rarely have US military physicians been so close to combat in a major conflict as they were in the chaotic, embattled streets of Fallujah—Code Red Fallujah will take you there.Sharing the harrowing entries from his field diary, Wilkes becomes the first-ever Navy physician to recount the sights and sounds of one of the most violent events of the entire Iraq War. In heart-pounding detail, he divulges his struggles to save wounded warriors amidst rockets landing close enough to knock him off his feet. When Wilkes—fresh out of medical school—is suddenly thrust into this war zone, his skills, his faith, and his ability to endure are all put to the test. Code Red Fallujah is the firsthand narrative of Wilkes's role in the Battle of Fallujah, scintillating combat trauma, and the spiritual challenges that pierced his journey.

  Show book

• 

  Dickens's Favourite Blacking...

  Neil Price

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  ‘Dickens’s Favourite Blacking Factory’ is the extraordinary story of Charles Day, a self-made nineteenth-century boot-blacking entrepreneur, the dispute over whose Will led Charles Dickens to create the apparently endless case of ‘Jarndyce and Jarndyce’ in his novel ‘Bleak House’. In this remarkable and highly imaginative telling of a true story, after a decades-long search for information on his ancestor, the author makes a fluke discovery, revealing a sweeping story of Regency and early-Victorian London. An actual 170,000-word document uncovered in the National Archives exposes the tragic last two months of the life of Charles Day. This includes his deteriorating mental faculties resulting from tertiary syphilis, his remarkable philanthropy, blackmail by a dodgy solicitor, the inertia of the contemporary legal system and the shame of illegitimacy, particularly in the wealthy classes. Perhaps the plot of Dickens’s ‘Bleak House’ even reflects aspects of Charles Day’s own life?

  Show book

• 

  Winners are Driven - A...

  Bobby Unser

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  Throughout his life, three-time Indianapolis 500 winner Bobby Unser has approached his racing career and personal life the same way—with a relentless drive to succeed. Talk to him today and he’ll tell you, “I never really retired from racing, I just retired from what I was racing.” This philosophy has allowed him to achieve success in business and in life, and it can help you do the same. 
   
  In Winners Are Driven, racing legend Bobby Unser discusses the principles, strategies, and beliefs that have earned him prosperity, fame, and victory; and reveals how you can apply his winning formula. Blending his personal experiences from both on and off the track with some of today’s most compelling business stories, Unser will help you go faster, take the lead, and win! 
   
  Step-by-step, Unser details each of his tenets and discusses how you can apply them to reach your goals. He begins by explaining how the road to success should start with a burning desire to succeed at whatever you do. From here you’ll discover how to visualize a clear objective, sustain mental toughness, plot a course consisting of small objectives that ultimately lead to the prize, and create a workable and flexible strategy to get there. To complete the cycle, Unser shows you how to put your plans into action, recover from failure, rely on family for support, and finish strong. But that’s not all. Winners Are Driven also demonstrates how you can increase your performance while elevating the standard of those around you. You’ll learn how trust and integrity as well as accountability and responsibility can play a significant role in both individual endeavors and team projects. 
   
  Overcoming life’s most difficult obstacles and finding the motivation to keep moving toward the checkered flag can be difficult if you’re not prepared. Drawing from the experiences that made him a racing legend—from Pikes Peak Hill Climb to the Indianapolis 500—Bobby Unser will guide you on your quest for success and show you how Winners Are Driven.

  Show book

• 

  Involuntary Bliss

  Devon Code

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  Even in death, he said, the novella's power would bind us together, all of us who had read it, appealing as it did equally to our emotions and our intellects. Intense and densely layered, Involuntary Bliss is the latest intriguing story from the award-winning young Canadian writer Devon Code. Situated in modern-day Montreal during a weekend in late August, two young men attempt to restore their friendship. From the streets of Montreal's Plateau to the mountainous hillsides of Machu Picchu and beyond, this high-spirited picaresque investigates themes of mortality, idealism, and transgressive art from the perspective of two young men, who have met up in modern-day Montreal during a weekend in late August in an attempt to restore their friendship. Readers of literary fiction who appreciate stylistically sophisticated and edgy novels will happily lose themselves in this circuitous story that combines the dark humor and elements of psychological compulsion of Thomas Bernhard and Roberto Bolaño with the eroticism, narrative momentum and intimations of violence in the novels of Haruki Murakami.

  Show book