About this product: In this lyrical, unsentimental, and compelling memoir, the son of a black African father and a white American mother searches for a workable meaning to his life as a black American. It begins in New York, where Barack Obama learns that his father—a figure he knows more as a myth than as a man—has been killed in a car accident. This sudden death inspires an emotional odyssey—first to a small town in Kansas, from which he retraces the migration of his mother’s family to Hawaii, and then to Kenya, where he meets the African side of his family, confronts the bitter truth of his father’s life, and at last reconciles his divided inheritance.
About this product: For a world of devoted readers, a much-awaited new volume of absorbing stories and inspirational wisdom from one of our best-loved writers.
Dedicated to the daughter she never had but sees all around her, Letter to My Daughter reveals Maya Angelou’s path to living well and living a life with meaning. Told in her own inimitable style, this book 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.”
In this moving memoir, Robert J. Wagner opens his heart to share the romances, the drama, and the humor of an incredible life
He grew up in Bel Air next door to a golf course that changed his life. As a young boy, he saw a foursome playing one morning featuring none other than Fred Astaire, Clark Gable, Randolph Scott, and Cary Grant. Seeing these giants of the silver screen awed him and fueled his dreams of becoming a movie star. Battling a revolving door of boarding schools and a father who wanted him to forget Hollywood and join the family business, sixteen-year-old Wagner started like any naïve kid would—walking along Sunset Boulevard, hoping that a producer or director would notice him.
Under the mentorship of stars like Spencer Tracy, he would become a salaried actor in Hollywood's studio system among other hot actors of the moment such as his friends Rock Hudson and Tony Curtis. Working with studio mogul Darryl Zanuck, Wagner began to appear in a number of films alongside the most beautiful starlets—but his first love was Barbara Stanwyck, an actress twice his age. As his career blossomed, and after he separated from Stanwyck, he met the woman who would change his life forever, Natalie Wood. They fell instantly and deeply in love and stayed together until the stress of their careers—hers marching upward, his inexplicably deflating—drove them to divorce.
Trying to forget the pain, he made more movies and spent his time in Europe with the likes of Steve McQueen, Sophia Loren, Peter Sellers, Laurence Olivier, David Niven, Liz Taylor, and Joan Collins. He would meet and marry the beautiful former model and actress Marion Marshall. Together they had a daughter and made their way back to America, where he found himself at the beginning of a new era in Hollywood—the blossoming of television. Lew Wasserman and later Aaron Spelling would work with Wagner as he produced and starred in some of the most successful programs in history.
Despite his newfound success, his marriage to Marion fell apart. He looked no further than Natalie Wood, for whom he still pined. To the world's surprise, they fell in love all over again, this time more deeply and with maturity. As she settled into a domestic life, raising their own daughter, Courtney, as well as their children from previous marriages, Wagner became the sole provider, reaping the riches of television success. Their life together was cut tragically short, though, when Wood died after falling from their yacht.
For the first time, Wagner writes about that tremendously painful time. After a serious bout with depression, he finally resurfaced and eventually married Jill St. John, who helped keep his family and his fractured heart together.
With color photographs and never-before-told stories, this is a quintessentially American story of one of the great sons of Hollywood.
In this raucous collection of true-life stories, actress and comedian Chelsea Handler recounts her time spent in the social trenches with that wild, strange, irresistible, and often gratifying beast: the one-night stand.
You've either done it or know someone who has: the one-night stand, the familiar outcome of a night spent at a bar, sometimes the sole payoff for your friend's irritating wedding, or the only relief from a disastrous vacation. Often embarrassing and uncomfortable, occasionally outlandish, but most times just a necessary and irresistible evil, the one-night stand is a social rite as old as sex itself and as common as a bar stool.
Enter Chelsea Handler. Gorgeous, sharp, and anything but shy, Chelsea loves men and lots of them. My Horizontal Life chronicles her romp through the different bedrooms of a variety of suitors, a no-holds-barred account of what can happen between a man and a sometimes very intoxicated, outgoing woman during one night of passion. From her short fling with a Vegas stripper to her even shorter dalliance with a well-endowed little person, from her uncomfortable tryst with a cruise ship performer to her misguided rebound with a man who likes to play leather dress-up, Chelsea recalls the highs and lows of her one-night stands with hilarious honesty. Encouraged by her motley collection of friends (aka: her partners in crime) but challenged by her family members (who at times find themselves a surprise part of the encounter), Chelsea hits bottom and bounces back, unafraid to share the gritty details. My Horizontal Life is one guilty pleasure you won't be ashamed to talk about in the morning.
Meg Finn is in a tough spot. Really tough. For her last act on Earth, she committed a crime - and lost her life as a result. Now Meg's spirit is stuck in limbo, due to a dead-even tally of good and evil deeds. Meg's only chance at salvation is to return to Earth and stack on a few more good deeds - namely, helping the old man whose apartment she was robbing during her last appearance. For better or worse, that man needs a lot of help. In fact, he has a whole list of wishes he wants to fill before he dies. And it's up to Meg to make those wishes come true - before her own time is up....
About this product: The Wish List is a quirky little gift book that sounds an irresistible call to get out there and start living. In the same chunky format as the authorfs bestselling 14,000 Things to Be Happy About, The Wish List presents a compulsively readable list of unexpected goals. There are wishes large--retrace Odysseus' route around the Mediterranean--and wishes small--find a genuine arrowhead. There are artistic wishes--write a sonnet. Athletic wishes--learn to box. Practical wishes--master the rudiments of plumbing. Whimsical wishes--become a taster at Ben & Jerry's. And fantasy wishes--live in a Venetian palazzo. The Wish List is meant to plant seeds, jog us out of complacency, and articulate unspoken desires.
About this product: With all of the "big names" in this anthology, I expected to find at least one story that was worth reading and keeping. But to my dissapointment, none of them were.
I had high hopes for Lisa Klepas' story I WILL, given that it had won a RITA award. Reading this made me wonder what other awful stories this must have been up against, because I was so disgusted. Granted, Kleypas is talented, but she never seems able to refrain from doing something truly revolting with her characters. When the heroine basically rapes the hero while he's handcuffed to a bed, I was so sickened that this book almost flew across the room. Just because a man is physically aroused doesn't mean he should be ignored when he repeatedly says no. Forcing someone to have sex with you is rape, no matter who does it or under what circumstances. Now I remember why I no longer buy books by Kleypas; this isn't the first time she'd used the disgusting lie of romantic rape in her stories. One star for this story, only because no stars isn't an option on Amazon.
Lisa Cach's PUDDINGS, PASTRIES, AND THOU was more a story about the heroine constantly stuffing her face than it was about romance. Seriously, every time we encounter the heroine, she's pigging out on something. It was just ridiculous. Not only was she always eating (and I mean ALWAYS), but she was constantly using food as a comfort whenever something stressed or upset her. Can you say eating disorder? This is not romantic. And I read romance for a developing relationship, not to read about food. It could have been an interesting story about an poor gentlewoman hoping to marry so that she no longer has to rely on the grudgingly given charity of her relatives, but instead, it was just a story about a gluttonous woman chowing down on everything in sight. Two stars.
The next story was Claudia Dain's UNION. It was so boring. I couldn't get more than twenty pages into it. There are a ton of characters to keep track off, and none of them are at all interesting. Okay, so the basic story is that the heroine is coming out in society and needs to marry. Only, she has no wish to marry an English gentlemen. She considers herself Irish, and wants to marry an Irish man. Unfortunately, the heroine came across as more of a spoiled child than a woman I could cheer for. And the hero wasn't anything special. He was just taking up space. I never got to the "pitchcapping" torture scene (mentioned by another reviewer), but I'm glad I didn't, as I don't like to read disturbing, graphic violence that keeps me awake at night. Two stars.
Lynsay Sands' ALL I WANT had the most promise. In this story, the heroine is attempting to save her family from debtor's prison. Her father is gambling and drinking all of their money away and won't stop. Since women are not allowed in the gambling establishment, she dresses in her father's clothes and sneaks inside, determined to make her father listen to reason. But of course, her ruse is discovered and pandemonium ensues.
Seems interesting, but the author wasted her talent by falling back on the old romance cliche of "big brawny hero kisses the heroine to shut her up while they're having an argument" scene. And this is basically right after they meet. Arrrgh! I am sooo sick of this contrived scene. It's overdone, and stupid in the first place. As if any woman alive wouldn't smack a guy's face if he tried to do that to her. I will probably try one of this author's full-length novels, as it's obvious she has talent and could write an enjoyable book, if only that talent was properly used. But this novella was very dissapointing. Two stars.
Romance anthologies are usually a hit-or-miss situation. This one was a complete and total miss. There are far better Christmas romances out there. See my list "Christmas romance books worth reading" for a list of my keepers and re-reads. As for WISH LIST, I recommend that you either borrow it from the library, or skip it altogether.
About this product: In this heartwarming collection of all-new, original Regency stories, five bestselling authors share the one gift that lasts all year round: the gift of love.
Featuring romantic new Christmas stories by:
* Elisabeth Fairchild Winner of the Romantic Times Best Regency Novel Award * Carla Kelly Winner of a Career Achieve-ment Award from Romantic Times and two RITA Awards * Allison Lane Winner of the Romantic Times Reviewers' Choice Award * Edith Layton Winner of numerous awards * Barbara Metzger Winner of a Reviewers' Choice Award and a National Readers' Choice Award
About this product: After two failed marriages, Hollywood actress Aerial Hart decides to make major changes in her life, leaving Hollywood for her old hometown of Chula Vista, where she had once been in love with a boy named Felix and where she encounters a strangely familiar Lex Sanders, a wealthy rancher. Original.
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