Sunday, September 13, 2020

iTunes Store: Top 25 Books in Biographies & Memoirs 2020-09-13

Bob Woodward - Rage artwork Rage
Bob Woodward
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $20.99
Expected Publish Date: September 15, 2020
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Seller: Simon & Schuster Canada

Bob Woodward’s new book, Rage, is an unprecedented and intimate tour de force of new reporting on the Trump presidency facing a global pandemic, economic disaster and racial unrest. Woodward, the #1 international bestselling author of Fear: Trump in the White House , has uncovered the precise moment the president was warned that the Covid-19 epidemic would be the biggest national security threat to his presidency. In dramatic detail, Woodward takes readers into the Oval Office as Trump’s head pops up when he is told in January 2020 that the pandemic could reach the scale of the 1918 Spanish Flu that killed 675,000 Americans. In 17 on-the-record interviews with Woodward over seven volatile months—an utterly vivid window into Trump’s mind—the president provides a self-portrait that is part denial and part combative interchange mixed with surprising moments of doubt as he glimpses the perils in the presidency and what he calls the “dynamite behind every door.” At key decision points, Rage shows how Trump’s responses to the crises of 2020 were rooted in the instincts, habits and style he developed during his first three years as president. Revisiting the earliest days of the Trump presidency, Rage reveals how Secretary of Defense James Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats struggled to keep the country safe as the president dismantled any semblance of collegial national security decision making. Rage draws from hundreds of hours of interviews with firsthand witnesses as well as participants’ notes, emails, diaries, calendars and confidential documents. Woodward obtained 25 never-seen personal letters exchanged between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who describes the bond between the two leaders as out of a “fantasy film.” Trump insists to Woodward he will triumph over Covid-19 and the economic calamity. “Don’t worry about it, Bob. Okay?” Trump told the author in July. “Don’t worry about it. We’ll get to do another book. You’ll find I was right.”



Yossi Ghinsberg & Greg McLean - Jungle (Movie Tie-In Edition) artwork Jungle (Movie Tie-In Edition)
A Harrowing True Story of Survival in the Amazon
Yossi Ghinsberg & Greg McLean
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $1.99
Publish Date: October 17, 2017
Publisher: Skyhorse
Seller: Simon & Schuster Canada

Four travelers meet in Bolivia and set off into the heart of the Amazon rainforest, but what begins as a dream adventure quickly deteriorates into a dangerous nightmare, and after weeks of wandering in the dense undergrowth, the four backpackers split up into two groups. But when a terrible rafting accident separates him from his partner, Yossi is forced to survive for weeks alone against one of the wildest backdrops on the planet. Stranded without a knife, map, or survival training, he must improvise shelter and forage for wild fruit to survive. As his feet begin to rot during raging storms, as he loses all sense of direction, and as he begins to lose all hope, he wonders whether he will make it out of the jungle alive. The basis of an upcoming motion picture starring Daniel Radcliffe, Jungle is the story of friendship and the teachings of nature, and a terrifying true account that you won’t be able to put down.



Glennon Doyle - Untamed artwork Untamed
Glennon Doyle
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $16.99
Publish Date: March 10, 2020
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Seller: Penguin Random House Canada

#1  NEW YORK TIMES  BESTSELLER • “Packed with incredible insight about what it means to be a woman today.”—Reese Witherspoon (Reese’s Book Club x Hello Sunshine Book Pick) In her most revealing and powerful memoir yet, the activist, speaker, bestselling author, and “patron saint of female empowerment” ( People ) explores the joy and peace we discover when we stop striving to meet others’ expectations and start trusting the voice deep within us. “ Untamed will liberate women—emotionally, spiritually, and physically.  It is phenomenal. ”—Elizabeth Gilbert, author of City of Girls and  Eat Pray Love This is how you find yourself. There is a voice of longing inside each woman. We strive so mightily to be good: good partners, daughters, mothers, employees, and friends. We hope all this striving will make us feel alive. Instead, it leaves us feeling weary, stuck, overwhelmed, and underwhelmed. We look at our lives and wonder:  Wasn’t it all supposed to be more beautiful than this?  We quickly silence that question, telling ourselves to be grateful, hiding our discontent—even from ourselves. For many years, Glennon Doyle denied her own discontent. Then, while speaking at a conference, she looked at a woman across the room and fell instantly in love. Three words flooded her mind:  There She Is . At first, Glennon assumed these words came to her from on high. But she soon realized they had come to her from within. This was her own voice—the one she had buried beneath decades of numbing addictions, cultural conditioning, and institutional allegiances. This was the voice of the girl she had been before the world told her who to be. Glennon decided to quit abandoning herself and to instead abandon the world’s expectations of her. She quit being good so she could be free. She quit pleasing and started living. Soulful and uproarious, forceful and tender,  Untamed  is both an intimate memoir and a galvanizing wake-up call. It is the story of how one woman learned that a responsible mother is not one who slowly dies for her children, but one who shows them how to fully live. It is the story of navigating divorce, forming a new blended family, and discovering that the brokenness or wholeness of a family depends not on its structure but on each member’s ability to bring her full self to the table. And it is the story of how each of us can begin to trust ourselves enough to set boundaries, make peace with our bodies, honor our anger and heartbreak, and unleash our truest, wildest instincts so that we become women who can finally look at ourselves and say: There She Is . Untamed  shows us how to be brave. As Glennon insists:  The braver we are, the luckier we get.



Peter Strzok - Compromised artwork Compromised
Counterintelligence and the Threat of Donald J. Trump
Peter Strzok
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $18.99
Publish Date: September 08, 2020
Publisher: HMH Books
Seller: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company

“Peter Strzok is the FBI agent who started it all.”—David Martin, CBS Sunday Morning “This is the book I have been waiting for.”—Rachel Maddow The FBI veteran behind the Russia investigation draws on decades of experience hunting foreign agents in the United States to lay bare the threat posed by President Trump. When he opened the FBI investigation into Russia’s election interference, Peter Strzok had already spent more than two decades defending the United States against foreign threats. His career in counterintelligence ended shortly thereafter, when the Trump administration used his private expression of political opinions to force him out of the Bureau in August 2018. But by that time, Strzok had seen more than enough to convince him that the commander in chief had fallen under the sway of America’s adversary in the Kremlin. In Compromised , Strzok draws on lessons from a long career—from his role in the Russian illegals case that inspired The Americans to his service as lead FBI agent on the Mueller investigation—to construct a devastating account of foreign influence at the highest levels of our government. And he grapples with a question that should concern every U.S. citizen: When a president appears to favor personal and Russian interests over those of our nation, has he become a national security threat?



Stephanie Winston Wolkoff - Melania and Me artwork Melania and Me
The Rise and Fall of My Friendship with the First Lady
Stephanie Winston Wolkoff
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $17.99
Publish Date: September 01, 2020
Publisher: Gallery Books
Seller: Simon & Schuster Canada

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER What Melania wants, Melania gets. The former director of special events at Vogue and producer of nine legendary Met Galas, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff met Melania Knauss in 2003 and had a front row seat to the transformation of Donald Trump’s then girlfriend from a rough-cut gem to a precious diamond. As their friendship deepened over lunches at Manhattan hot spots, black-tie parties, and giggle sessions in the penthouse at Trump Tower, Wolkoff watched the newest Mrs. Trump raise her son, Barron, and manage her highly scrutinized marriage. After Trump won the 2016 election, Wolkoff was recruited to help produce the 58th Presidential Inaugu­ration and to become the First Lady’s trusted advisor. Melania put Wolkoff in charge of hiring her staff, organizing her events, helping her write speeches, and creating her debut initiatives. Then it all fell apart when she was made the scapegoat for inauguration finance irregularities. Melania could have defended her innocent friend and confidant, but she stood by her man, knowing full well who was really to blame. The betrayal nearly destroyed Wolkoff. In this candid and emotional memoir, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff takes you into Trump Tower and the White House to tell the funny, thrilling, and heartbreaking story of her intimate friendship with one of the most famous women in the world, a woman few people truly understand. How did Melania react to the Access Hollywood tape and her husband’s affair with Stormy Daniels? Does she get along well with Ivanka? Why did she wear that jacket with “I really don’t care, do u?” printed on the back? Is Melania happy being First Lady? And what really happened with the inauguration’s funding of $107 million? Wolkoff has some ideas...



Scott Douglas - Quiet, Please: Dispatches from a Public Librarian (10th Anniversary Edition) artwork Quiet, Please: Dispatches from a Public Librarian (10th Anniversary Edition)
Scott Douglas
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $0.99
Publish Date: August 20, 2020
Publisher: SD Editions
Seller: Draft2Digital, LLC

A humorist and honest look at life in public service. For most of us, librarians are the quiet people behind the desk, who, apart from the occasional "shush," vanish into the background.  But in Quiet, Please, McSweeney's contributor Scott Douglas puts the quirky caretakers of our literature front and center. With a keen eye for the absurd and a Kesey-esque cast of characters (witness the librarian who is sure Thomas Pynchon is Julia Roberts's latest flame), Douglas takes us where few readers have gone before.  Punctuated by his own highly subjective research into library history-from Andrew Carnegie's Gilded Age to today's Afghanistan-Douglas gives us a surprising (and sometimes hilarious) look at the lives which make up the social institution that is his library. This 10th Anniversary Edition includes nearly 100 pages of added content (including a new forward and afterward).



Lorilee Craker & Marvin J. Besteman - My Journey to Heaven artwork My Journey to Heaven
What I Saw and How It Changed My Life
Lorilee Craker & Marvin J. Besteman
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $2.99
Publish Date: September 01, 2012
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Seller: Baker Book House Company

On April 28, 2006, as he lay in his hospital bed in Ann Arbor, Michigan, visions of celestial beauty were the last thing on Marv Besteman's mind. He had just had surgery to remove a rare pancreatic tumor. It was after visiting hours and his family had left for the day. Alone and racked with pain, Marv tossed and turned, wanting more than anything else to simply sleep and escape the misery and discomfort for a while. The retired banker, father, and grandfather had no idea he was about to get a short reprieve in the form of an experience he never could have imagined. In My Journey to Heaven , Marv Bestman shares the story of his experience of heaven with astounding detail. Readers will hear of his encounters with angels who accompanied him to the gate, his conversation (argument, really) with St. Peter, and his recognition of friends and family members who touched his life. His story offers peace, comfort, and encouragement to those who have lost loved ones and gives security and solace to those who are grieving, dying, or wonder about the afterlife. Marv believed God sent him back to earth to fulfill this mission of comfort and reminds readers that God has work for each of us to do before he calls us to be with him in heaven. Secure in his belief that his book was the fulfillment of his own mission, Marv returned to heaven in January 2012.



Omid Scobie & Carolyn Durand - Finding Freedom artwork Finding Freedom
Harry and Meghan and the Making of a Modern Royal Family
Omid Scobie & Carolyn Durand
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $17.99
Publish Date: August 11, 2020
Publisher: Dey Street Books
Seller: Harper Collins Canada Limited

INSTANT INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER * NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * #1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER The first, epic and true story of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s life together, finally revealing why they chose to pursue a more independent path and the reasons behind their unprecedented decision to step away from their royal lives, from two top royal reporters who have been behind the scenes since the couple first met. Finding Freedom is complete with full color photographs from Harry and Meghan’s courtship, wedding, Archie’s milestones, and many more unforgettable moments.  When news of the budding romance between a beloved English prince and an American actress broke, it captured the world’s attention and sparked an international media frenzy. But while the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have continued to make headlines—from their engagement, wedding, and birth of their son Archie to their unprecedented decision to step back from their royal lives—few know the true story of Harry and Meghan. For the very first time, Finding Freedom goes beyond the headlines to reveal unknown details of Harry and Meghan’s life together, dispelling the many rumors and misconceptions that plague the couple on both sides of the pond. As members of the select group of reporters that cover the British Royal Family and their engagements, Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand have witnessed the young couple’s lives as few outsiders can. With unique access and written with the participation of those closest to the couple, Finding Freedom is an honest, up-close, and disarming portrait of a confident, influential, and forward-thinking couple who are unafraid to break with tradition, determined to create a new path away from the spotlight, and dedicated to building a humanitarian legacy that will make a profound difference in the world.



Tara Westover - Educated artwork Educated
Tara Westover
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $11.99
Publish Date: February 20, 2018
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Seller: Harper Collins Canada Limited

For readers of The Glass Castle and Wild, a stunning new memoir about family, loss and the struggle for a better future #1 International Bestseller Tara Westover was seventeen when she first set foot in a classroom. Instead of traditional lessons, she grew up learning how to stew herbs into medicine, scavenging in the family scrap yard and helping her family prepare for the apocalypse. She had no birth certificate and no medical records and had never been enrolled in school. Westover’s mother proved a marvel at concocting folk remedies for many ailments. As Tara developed her own coping mechanisms, little by little, she started to realize that what her family was offering didn’t have to be her only education. Her first day of university was her first day in school—ever—and she would eventually win an esteemed fellowship from Cambridge and graduate with a PhD in intellectual history and political thought.



Jeff Blackstock - Murder in the Family artwork Murder in the Family
How the Search for My Mother's Killer Led to My Father
Jeff Blackstock
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $13.99
Publish Date: September 01, 2020
Publisher: Penguin Canada
Seller: Penguin Random House Canada

Diplomat father. Murdered mother. Emotionally neglected children. An apparent cover-up. Family dinners will never be the same. "I think that my father murdered my mother." That terrible belief spurs author Jeff Blackstock to investigate the circumstances of his mother Carol's death when he was a child. Carol Blackstock died at age 24 in 1959--poisoned by arsenic--but the cause of her death remained shrouded in mystery for decades. Jeff's father George Blackstock was a career diplomat in Canada's foreign service, posted to glamorous Buenos Aires with his wife Carol and their three children. A little more than a year after the family's arrival, the vivacious young mother, now emaciated and in terrible pain, was transferred to Montreal for treatment of a mysterious illness that proved fatal. In the following year, George Blackstock remarried, and a young woman named Ingrid became the feared stepmother to Jeff and his two siblings. Carol's parents soon had suspicions about their son-in-law George but were unable to get justice for their daughter. Class privilege--George was the scion of a Toronto establishment family and Carol was from modest beginnings--and an aversion to scandal all figured in an apparent cover-up. But secrets have a way of eventually disrupting all families. A damning autopsy report about arsenic poisoning, found among their grandmother's effects, leads Jeff Blackstock and his sister to horrifying revelations about their father. Eventually, they confront him and accuse him of their mother's murder. But George offers only vague explanations that don't add up. George died a broken man, mostly abandoned by his adult children. A compelling story of a high-society murder, a heartbreaking tale of emotionally neglected children, and an inquiry into the power and privilege of the Anglo upper classes of the time, Murder in the Family chronicles the shocking legacy of deeply buried secrets and betrayal in one's own family.



David Goggins - Can't Hurt Me artwork Can't Hurt Me
Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds
David Goggins
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $9.99
Publish Date: November 15, 2018
Publisher: Lioncrest Publishing
Seller: DIY Media Group DBA BookBaby

For David Goggins, childhood was a nightmare - poverty, prejudice, and physical abuse colored his days and haunted his nights. But through self-discipline, mental toughness, and hard work, Goggins transformed himself from a depressed, overweight young man with no future into a U.S. Armed Forces icon and one of the world's top endurance athletes. The only man in history to complete elite training as a Navy SEAL, Army Ranger, and Air Force Tactical Air Controller, he went on to set records in numerous endurance events, inspiring Outside magazine to name him The Fittest (Real) Man in America. In Can't Hurt Me, he shares his astonishing life story and reveals that most of us tap into only 40% of our capabilities. Goggins calls this The 40% Rule, and his story illuminates a path that anyone can follow to push past pain, demolish fear, and reach their full potential.



Jesse Thistle - From the Ashes artwork From the Ashes
My Story of Being Métis, Homeless, and Finding My Way
Jesse Thistle
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $9.99
Publish Date: August 06, 2019
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Seller: Simon & Schuster Canada

*Winner, Kobo Emerging Writer Prize Nonfiction *Winner, Indigenous Voices Awards *Finalist, CBC Canada Reads *Finalist, High Plains Book Awards *A Globe and Mail Book of the Year *An Indigo Book of the Year *A CBC Best Canadian Nonfiction Book of the Year In this extraordinary and inspiring debut memoir, Jesse Thistle, once a high school dropout and now a rising Indigenous scholar, chronicles his life on the streets and how he overcame trauma and addiction to discover the truth about who he is. If I can just make it to the next minute...then I might have a chance to live; I might have a chance to be something more than just a struggling crackhead. From the Ashes is a remarkable memoir about hope and resilience, and a revelatory look into the life of a Métis-Cree man who refused to give up. Abandoned by his parents as a toddler, Jesse Thistle briefly found himself in the foster-care system with his two brothers, cut off from all they had known. Eventually the children landed in the home of their paternal grandparents, whose tough-love attitudes quickly resulted in conflicts. Throughout it all, the ghost of Jesse’s drug-addicted father haunted the halls of the house and the memories of every family member. Struggling with all that had happened, Jesse succumbed to a self-destructive cycle of drug and alcohol addiction and petty crime, spending more than a decade on and off the streets, often homeless. Finally, he realized he would die unless he turned his life around. In this heartwarming and heart-wrenching memoir, Jesse Thistle writes honestly and fearlessly about his painful past, the abuse he endured, and how he uncovered the truth about his parents. Through sheer perseverance and education—and newfound love—he found his way back into the circle of his Indigenous culture and family. An eloquent exploration of the impact of prejudice and racism, From the Ashes is, in the end, about how love and support can help us find happiness despite the odds.



Marie-Andrée Fallu - Coeur policier artwork Coeur policier
Marie-Andrée Fallu
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $22.99
Publish Date: September 09, 2020
Publisher: Les Éditions de l'Homme
Seller: Messageries A.D.P. Inc.

«Répondre à un appel 911, c'est la pointe de l'iceberg.» Accident tragique, infanticide, noyade, agression sexuelle, proxénétisme, disparition, incendie, sauvetage d'enfants, identification judiciaire, poursuite routière, déploiement à l'étranger: autant d'interventions marquantes qui font vivre aux policiers et policières des émotions intenses, les forçant parfois à repousser leurs limites et à en subir les conséquences. CÅ“ur policier regroupe les témoignages de 30 membres actifs ou retraités des diverses forces de l'ordre québécoises, dont plusieurs se confient pour la toute première fois. Avec générosité, ils se souviennent des gestes posés pour dénouer des situations de crise où leur apport s'est révélé vital. Au-delà des clichés et des stéréotypes réducteurs, on redécouvre le visage de ceux qui ont choisi de servir et d'aider avec professionnalisme, courage et humanité. Ce livre, qui inclut aussi le récit d'une survivante de la tuerie du Collège Dawson en 2006, leur rend un vibrant hommage.



David Fisher & Dan Abrams - Lincoln's Last Trial: The Murder Case That Propelled Him to the Presidency artwork Lincoln's Last Trial: The Murder Case That Propelled Him to the Presidency
David Fisher & Dan Abrams
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $2.99
Publish Date: June 05, 2018
Publisher: Hanover Square Press
Seller: Harlequin Enterprises Limited

Instant New York Times bestseller! A Washington Independent Review of Books Favorite Book of 2018 A Suspense Magazine Best Book of 2018 A Mental Floss Best Book of 2018 A USA Today Top 10 Hot Book for Summer “Makes you feel as if you are watching a live camera riveted on a courtroom more than 150 years ago.” —Diane Sawyer The true story of Abraham Lincoln’s last murder trial, a case in which he had a deep personal involvement—and which played out in the nation’s newspapers as he began his presidential campaign At the end of the summer of 1859, twenty-two-year-old Peachy Quinn Harrison went on trial for murder in Springfield, Illinois. Abraham Lincoln, who had been involved in more than three thousand cases—including more than twenty-five murder trials—during his two-decades-long career, was hired to defend him. This was to be his last great case as a lawyer. What normally would have been a local case took on momentous meaning. Lincoln’s debates with Senator Stephen Douglas the previous fall had gained him a national following, transforming the little-known, self-taught lawyer into a respected politician. He was being urged to make a dark-horse run for the presidency in 1860. Taking this case involved great risk. His reputation was untarnished, but should he lose this trial, should Harrison be convicted of murder, the spotlight now focused so brightly on him might be dimmed. He had won his most recent murder trial with a daring and dramatic maneuver that had become a local legend, but another had ended with his client dangling from the end of a rope. The case posed painful personal challenges for Lincoln. The murder victim had trained for the law in his office, and Lincoln had been his friend and his mentor. His accused killer, the young man Lincoln would defend, was the son of a close friend and loyal supporter. And to win this trial he would have to form an unholy allegiance with a longtime enemy, a revivalist preacher he had twice run against for political office—and who had bitterly slandered Lincoln as an “infidel…too lacking in faith” to be elected. Lincoln’s Last Trial captures the presidential hopeful’s dramatic courtroom confrontations in vivid detail as he fights for his client—but also for his own blossoming political future. It is a moment in history that shines a light on our legal system, as in this case Lincoln fought a legal battle that remains incredibly relevant today.



Jessica Simpson - Open Book artwork Open Book
Jessica Simpson
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $14.99
Publish Date: February 04, 2020
Publisher: Dey Street Books
Seller: Harper Collins Canada Limited

The #1 New York Times Bestseller Jessica reveals for the first time her inner monologue and most intimate struggles. Guided by the journals she's kept since age fifteen, and brimming with her unique humor and down-to-earth humanity, Open Book is as inspiring as it is entertaining. This was supposed to be a very different book. Five years ago, Jessica Simpson was approached to write a motivational guide to living your best life. She walked away from the offer, and nobody understood why. The truth is that she didn’t want to lie. Jessica couldn’t be authentic with her readers if she wasn’t fully honest with herself first. Now America’s Sweetheart, preacher’s daughter, pop phenomenon, reality tv pioneer, and the billion-dollar fashion mogul invites readers on a remarkable journey, examining a life that blessed her with the compassion to help others, but also burdened her with an almost crippling need to please. Open Book is Jessica Simpson using her voice, heart, soul, and humor to share things she’s never shared before. First celebrated for her voice, she became one of the most talked-about women in the world, whether for music and fashion, her relationship struggles, or as a walking blonde joke. But now, instead of being talked about, Jessica is doing the talking. Her book shares the wisdom and inspirations she’s learned and shows the real woman behind all the pop-culture cliché’s — “chicken or fish,” “Daisy Duke,” "football jinx," “mom jeans,” “sexual napalm…” and more. Open Book is an opportunity to laugh and cry with a close friend, one that will inspire you to live your best, most authentic life, now that she is finally living hers.



Edmund de Waal - The Hare with Amber Eyes artwork The Hare with Amber Eyes
A Family's Century of Art and Loss
Edmund de Waal
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $2.99
Publish Date: August 31, 2010
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Seller: Macmillan

The Ephrussis were a grand banking family, as rich and respected as the Rothschilds, who "burned like a comet" in nineteenth-century Paris and Vienna society. Yet by the end of World War II, almost the only thing remaining of their vast empire was a collection of 264 wood and ivory carvings, none of them larger than a matchbox. The renowned ceramicist Edmund de Waal became the fifth generation to inherit this small and exquisite collection of netsuke. Entranced by their beauty and mystery, he determined to trace the story of his family through the story of the collection. The netsuke—drunken monks, almost-ripe plums, snarling tigers—were gathered by Charles Ephrussi at the height of the Parisian rage for all things Japanese. Charles had shunned the place set aside for him in the family business to make a study of art, and of beautiful living. An early supporter of the Impressionists, he appears, oddly formal in a top hat, in Renoir's Luncheon of the Boating Party . Marcel Proust studied Charles closely enough to use him as a model for the aesthete and lover Swann in Remembrance of Things Past . Charles gave the carvings as a wedding gift to his cousin Viktor in Vienna; his children were allowed to play with one netsuke each while they watched their mother, the Baroness Emmy, dress for ball after ball. Her older daughter grew up to disdain fashionable society. Longing to write, she struck up a correspondence with Rilke, who encouraged her in her poetry. The Anschluss changed their world beyond recognition. Ephrussi and his cosmopolitan family were imprisoned or scattered, and Hitler's theorist on the "Jewish question" appropriated their magnificent palace on the Ringstrasse. A library of priceless books and a collection of Old Master paintings were confiscated by the Nazis. But the netsuke were smuggled away by a loyal maid, Anna, and hidden in her straw mattress. Years after the war, she would find a way to return them to the family she'd served even in their exile. In The Hare with Amber Eyes , Edmund de Waal unfolds the story of a remarkable family and a tumultuous century. Sweeping yet intimate, it is a highly original meditation on art, history, and family, as elegant and precise as the netsuke themselves.



Vicki Laveau-Harvie - The Erratics artwork The Erratics
Vicki Laveau-Harvie
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $14.99
Publish Date: August 25, 2020
Publisher: Doubleday Canada
Seller: Penguin Random House Canada

In this award-winning memoir, two sisters reckon with the convalescence and death of their outlandishly tyrannical mother and the care of their psychologically terrorized father, all relayed with dark humour and brutal honesty. When Vicki and her sister learn their mother has been hospitalized for a broken hip, they return to their parents' home in Alberta to put things back in order. Though their parents disowned them years before, the sisters now reassert themselves in the dysfunctional household: their father, undernourished and suffering from Stockholm syndrome, is unable to see that he is in danger from his outlandish and vindictive wife. Rearranging their lives to be the daughters they were never allowed to be, the sisters focus their efforts on helping their father cope with the unending manipulations of their mother, and must encounter all the characters common in the circus of caretaking--oddball nurses and home helpers; over-opinionated hospital staff who have fallen for their mother's compulsive lies--along with the pressures that come with caring for elderly loved (and sometimes unloved) ones. Set against the natural world of remotest Alberta ("in winter the cold will kill you, nothing personal"), this memoir--at once dark and hopeful--shatters precedents about grief, anger and family trauma with surprising tenderness and humour.



Mary L. Trump - Too Much and Never Enough artwork Too Much and Never Enough
How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man
Mary L. Trump
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $17.99
Publish Date: July 14, 2020
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Seller: Simon & Schuster Canada

In this revelatory, authoritative portrait of Donald J. Trump and the toxic family that made him, Mary L. Trump, a trained clinical psychologist and Donald’s only niece, shines a bright light on the dark history of their family in order to explain how her uncle became the man who now threatens the world’s health, economic security, and social fabric. Mary Trump spent much of her childhood in her grandparents’ large, imposing house in the heart of Queens, New York, where Donald and his four siblings grew up. She describes a nightmare of traumas, destructive relationships, and a tragic combination of neglect and abuse. She explains how specific events and general family patterns created the damaged man who currently occupies the Oval Office, including the strange and harmful relationship between Fred Trump and his two oldest sons, Fred Jr. and Donald. A firsthand witness to countless holiday meals and interactions, Mary brings an incisive wit and unexpected humor to sometimes grim, often confounding family events. She recounts in unsparing detail everything from her uncle Donald’s place in the family spotlight and Ivana’s penchant for regifting to her grandmother’s frequent injuries and illnesses and the appalling way Donald, Fred Trump’s favorite son, dismissed and derided him when he began to succumb to Alzheimer’s. Numerous pundits, armchair psychologists, and journalists have sought to parse Donald J. Trump’s lethal flaws. Mary L. Trump has the education, insight, and intimate familiarity needed to reveal what makes Donald, and the rest of her clan, tick. She alone can recount this fascinating, unnerving saga, not just because of her insider’s perspective but also because she is the only Trump willing to tell the truth about one of the world’s most powerful and dysfunctional families.



Lori Gottlieb - Maybe You Should Talk to Someone artwork Maybe You Should Talk to Someone
A Therapist, HER Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed
Lori Gottlieb
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $15.99
Publish Date: April 02, 2019
Publisher: HMH Books
Seller: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! Now being developed as a television series with Eva Longoria and ABC! “Rarely have I read a book that challenged me to see myself in an entirely new light, and was at the same time laugh-out-loud funny and utterly absorbing.”—Katie Couric   “This is a daring, delightful, and transformative book.”— Arianna Huffington, Founder,  Huffington Post  and Founder & CEO, Thrive Global   “Wise, warm, smart, and funny. You must read this book.”— Susan Cain, New York Times best-selling author of  Quiet From a New York Times best-selling author, psychotherapist, and national advice columnist, a hilarious, thought-provoking, and surprising new book that takes us behind the scenes of a therapist’s world—where her patients are looking for answers (and so is she). One day, Lori Gottlieb is a therapist who helps patients in her Los Angeles practice. The next, a crisis causes her world to come crashing down. Enter Wendell, the quirky but seasoned therapist in whose of­fice she suddenly lands. With his balding head, cardigan, and khakis, he seems to have come straight from Therapist Central Casting. Yet he will turn out to be anything but.   As Gottlieb explores the inner chambers of her patients’ lives — a self-absorbed Hollywood producer, a young newlywed diagnosed with a terminal illness, a senior citizen threatening to end her life on her birthday if nothing gets better, and a twenty-something who can’t stop hooking up with the wrong guys — she finds that the questions they are struggling with are the very ones she is now bringing to Wendell.   With startling wisdom and humor, Gottlieb invites us into her world as both clinician and patient, examining the truths and fictions we tell ourselves and others as we teeter on the tightrope between love and desire, meaning and mortality, guilt and redemption, terror and courage, hope and change.   Maybe You Should Talk to Someone is rev­olutionary in its candor, offering a deeply per­sonal yet universal tour of our hearts and minds and providing the rarest of gifts: a boldly reveal­ing portrait of what it means to be human, and a disarmingly funny and illuminating account of our own mysterious lives and our power to transform them.



Denise Jackson - It's All About Him artwork It's All About Him
Finding the Love of My Life
Denise Jackson
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $1.99
Publish Date: July 29, 2007
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Seller: Harper Collins Canada Limited

Alan and Denise Jackson's life seemed like a fairy tale: high school sweethearts marry young and leave small-town Georgia to pursue big dreams in Music City. They pay their dues, work hard, weather deep disappointments. Then their dreams come true. In fairy tales, the Jacksons' material success plus their "perfect" marriage, their three beautiful daughters, and their supportive families would have signaled a happily-ever-after ending. But real life is different from fairy tales. At the pinnacle of their success, the Jacksons separated. For Alan, musical renown fame, and wealth still did not make up for the marital problems the Jacksons had struggled with for years. And for Denise, building her life around Alan and riding the tide of his success had somehow left her hollow, unsure of just who she really was. You don't have to be rich and famous to go through struggles like these. Sooner or later, we all come to the point when we relize that real joy and peace isn't just around the corner of the next achievement, the next relationship, the next new thing. That's why Alan and Denise Jackson's story isn't just a great read and a dramatic, intimate look at the golden world of celebrity. It's a story of the greatest love of all, the love that will never let you go . . . and how to find it, no matter who you are, where you live, or what you've done. "Denise's story is an inside perspective on the results of the ups and downs of fame. Her personal struggles with life's ordinary and extraordinary consequences, her passion to have a stronger marriage, and her desire to have a closer walk with God make for a truly inspiring life." Carrie Underwood, 2005 American Idol Winner, ACM & CMA Female Vocalist of the Year



Colin Jost - A Very Punchable Face artwork A Very Punchable Face
A Memoir
Colin Jost
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $16.99
Publish Date: July 14, 2020
Publisher: Crown
Seller: Penguin Random House Canada

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • In these hilarious essays, the  Saturday Night Live  head writer and Weekend Update co-anchor learns how to take a beating. “I always wanted to punch his face before I read this book. Now I just want to kick him in the balls.”—Larry David If there’s one trait that makes someone well suited to comedy, it’s being able to take a punch—metaphorically and, occasionally, physically.  From growing up in a family of firefighters on Staten Island to commuting three hours a day to high school and “seeing the sights” (like watching a Russian woman throw a stroller off the back of a ferry), to attending Harvard while Facebook was created, Jost shares how he has navigated the world like a slightly smarter Forrest Gump. You’ll also discover things about Jost that will surprise and confuse you, like how Jimmy Buffett saved his life, how Czech teenagers attacked him with potato salad, how an insect laid eggs inside his legs, and how he competed in a twenty-five-man match at WrestleMania (and almost won). You'll go behind the scenes at SNL and Weekend Update (where he's written some of the most memorable sketches and jokes of the past fifteen years). And you’ll experience the life of a touring stand-up comedian—from performing in rural college cafeterias at noon to opening for Dave Chappelle at Radio City Music Hall. For every accomplishment (hosting the Emmys), there is a setback (hosting the Emmys). And for every absurd moment (watching paramedics give CPR to a raccoon), there is an honest, emotional one (recounting his mother’s experience on the scene of the Twin Towers’ collapse on 9/11). Told with a healthy dose of self-deprecation,  A Very Punchable Face  reveals the brilliant mind behind some of the dumbest sketches on television, and lays bare the heart and humor of a hardworking guy—with a face you can’t help but want to punch.



Barbara Amiel - Friends and Enemies artwork Friends and Enemies
A Memoir
Barbara Amiel
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $18.99
Expected Publish Date: October 13, 2020
Publisher: McClelland & Stewart
Seller: Penguin Random House Canada

Barbara Amiel's much-talked-about life has been a subject of endless fascination for the media, many unauthorized biographies, as well as screen depictions. An instinctive feminist and now a foe of feminism's political correctness, she covers a formidable array of experiences--political, sexual, marital, and material--in these memoirs. Born in London during World War II's Blitz, the only consistent strains in her life were a fi erce belief in her identity as a Jew, even as the Jewish community disowned her, and an unquestioned view that women were free to do anything in any arena they chose without the need to win society's approval. Which she very often did not. Her rise to the senior rungs of journalism began in Canada after the emigration of her family and continued in the United Kingdom on her return. With four marriages and an assorted number of beaus, some famous, some infamous (some rather young, some rather elderly), she moved through different worlds, encountering problems made more intractable on occasion by her own faulty choices. Though her views on political and social issues were controversial and unpopular, it is a measure of her writing skill that she held down plum jobs for many decades in Canadian and British journalism, as well as appearances in U.S. publications ranging from the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times to the National Enquirer and Vogue . When Barbara Amiel's family life broke apart in her early teens, she faced problems solved without the benefi t of parental guidance in moments that are often hilarious as well as touching. As an adult and a writer of unabashedly libertarian views, she was derided as much for her wardrobe as for her ideas. Promoted by Maclean's magazine with the slogan "Love her or hate her," she was philosophical. "I love liberty, opera, sex, and fashion," she once told an interviewer. "But life would have been easier if my passions had been for trainspotting and stamp collecting." Her life has an operatic quality played out against a backdrop of physical and mental difficulties with a wildly diverse cast including Elton John, Henry Kissinger, Anna Wintour, Oscar de la Renta, Princess Diana, Tom Stoppard, Brooke Astor, Margaret Thatcher, Gianni Agnelli, David Frost, and an array of the aristocrats of Manhattan and the stately homes of England. All handled, she writes "with my fatal combination of naiveté and self-absorption." The epic battle with the U.S. justice system leading to the trial and imprisonment of her husband, Conrad Black (eventually substantially vindicated), became a litmus paper for sorting out friends from those who were quick to judge and brutal in their dismissal. Friends and Enemies is not a book of vengeance but an attempt to fi nd her own truth: a life that reads like a novel--eloquent, surprising, written with deeply personal candour and utterly unputdownable.



Maya Angelou - Letter to My Daughter artwork Letter to My Daughter
Maya Angelou
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $2.99
Publish Date: September 23, 2008
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Seller: Penguin Random House Canada

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Maya Angelou shares her path to living well and with meaning in this absorbing book of personal essays.   Dedicated to the daughter she never had but sees all around her, Letter to My Daughter transcends genres and categories: guidebook, memoir, poetry, and pure delight. Here in short spellbinding essays are glimpses of the tumultuous life that led Angelou to an exalted place in American letters and taught her lessons in compassion and fortitude: how she was brought up by her indomitable grandmother in segregated Arkansas, taken in at thirteen by her more worldly and less religious mother, and grew to be an awkward, six-foot-tall teenager whose first experience of loveless sex paradoxically left her with her greatest gift, a son. Whether she is recalling such lost friends as Coretta Scott King and Ossie Davis, extolling honesty, decrying vulgarity, explaining why becoming a Christian is a “lifelong endeavor,” or simply singing the praises of a meal of red rice–Maya Angelou writes from the heart to millions of women she considers her extended family. Like the rest of her remarkable work, Letter to My Daughter entertains and teaches; it is a book to cherish, savor, re-read, and share. “I gave birth to one child, a son, but I have thousands of daughters. You are Black and White, Jewish and Muslim, Asian, Spanish speaking, Native Americans and Aleut. You are fat and thin and pretty and plain, gay and straight, educated and unlettered, and I am speaking to you all. Here is my offering to you.”—from Letter to My Daughter



Catherine Gray - The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober artwork The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober
Discovering a happy, healthy, wealthy alcohol-free life
Catherine Gray
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $8.99
Publish Date: December 28, 2017
Publisher: Octopus Books
Seller: Hachette Digital, Inc.

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER 'Not remotely preachy' - The Times 'Jaunty, shrewd and convincing' - Sunday Telegraph 'Admirably honest, light, bubbly and remarkably rarely annoying.' - Alice O'Keeffe, Guardian 'Truthful, modern and real' - Stylist 'Brave, witty and brilliantly written' - Marie Claire Ever sworn off alcohol for a month and found yourself drinking by the 7th? Think there's 'no point' in just one drink? Welcome! There are millions of us. 64% of Brits want to drink less. Catherine Gray was stuck in a hellish whirligig of Drink, Make horrible decisions, Hangover, Repeat. She had her fair share of 'drunk tank' jail cells and topless-in-a-hot-tub misadventures. But this book goes beyond the binges and blackouts to deep-dive into uncharted territory: What happens after you quit drinking? This gripping, heart-breaking and witty book takes us down the rabbit-hole of an alternative reality. A life with zero hangovers, through sober weddings, sex, Christmases and breakups. In The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober , Catherine Gray shines a light on society's drink-pushing and talks to top neuroscientists and psychologists about why we drink, delving into the science behind what it does to our brains and bodies. Much more than a tale from the netherworld of addicted drinking, this book is about the escape, and why a sober life can be more intoxicating than you ever imagined. Whether you're a hopelessly devoted drinker, merely sober-curious, or you've already ditched the drink, you will love this book . 'Haunting, admirable and enlightening' - The Pool 'A riveting, raw, yet humorous memoir with actionable advice.' - Annie Grace, author of This Naked Mind 'Like listening to your best friend teach you to be sober. Lighthearted but serious, it's packed with ideas, tools, tips and, most importantly, reasons for living a sober life.' - Eric Zimmer, host of podcast The One You Feed 'Gray's fizzy writing succeeds in making this potentially boring-as-hell subject both engaging and highly seductive' - The Bookseller 'Her exquisitely crafted thoughts on the joys of being sober are not only deeply honest and pragmatic, but she manages to infuse tons of humor. This is a delightful, informative, and compelling read for all those who are sober or seeking sobriety.' - Sasha Tozzi, Huffington Post



David Chang & Gabe Ulla - Eat a Peach artwork Eat a Peach
A Memoir
David Chang & Gabe Ulla
Genre: Biographies & Memoirs
Price: $16.99
Publish Date: September 08, 2020
Publisher: Potter/Ten Speed/Harmony/Rodale
Seller: Penguin Random House Canada

From the chef behind Momofuku and star of Netflix’s  Ugly Delicious —an intimate account of the making of a chef, the story of the modern restaurant world that he helped shape, and how he discovered that success can be much harder to understand than failure. “David puts words to so many of the things we all feel, sharing generously of his own journey so we can all benefit in the process.”—Chrissy Teigen In 2004, Momofuku Noodle Bar opened in a tiny, stark space in Manhattan’s East Village. Its young chef-owner, David Chang, worked the line, serving ramen and pork buns to a mix of fellow restaurant cooks and confused diners whose idea of ramen was instant noodles in Styrofoam cups. It would have been impossible to know it at the time—and certainly Chang would have bet against himself—but he, who had failed at almost every endeavor in his life, was about to become one of the most influential chefs of his generation, driven by the question, “What if the underground could become the mainstream?”   Chang grew up the youngest son of a deeply religious Korean American family in Virginia. Graduating college aimless and depressed, he fled the States for Japan, hoping to find some sense of belonging. While teaching English in a backwater town, he experienced the highs of his first full-blown manic episode, and began to think that the cooking and sharing of food could give him both purpose and agency in his life. Full of grace, candor, grit, and humor, Eat a Peach chronicles Chang’s switchback path. He lays bare his mistakes and wonders about his extraordinary luck as he recounts the improbable series of events that led him to the top of his profession. He wrestles with his lifelong feelings of otherness and inadequacy, explores the mental illness that almost killed him, and finds hope in the shared value of deliciousness. Along the way, Chang gives us a penetrating look at restaurant life, in which he balances his deep love for the kitchen with unflinching honesty about the industry’s history of brutishness and its uncertain future.