Great Books

Welcome to the savage and surprising world of Zoo Story, an unprecedented account of the secret life of a zoo and its inhabitants, both animal and human. Based on six years of research, the book follows a handful of unforgettable characters at Tampa's Lowry Park Zoo: an alpha chimp with a weakness for blondes, a ferocious tiger who revels in Obsession perfume, and a brilliant but tyrannical CEO known as El Diablo Blanco. Zoo Story crackles with issues of global urgency: the shadow of extinction, humanity's role in the destruction or survival of other species. More than anything else, though, it's a dramatic and moving true story of seduction and betrayal, exile and loss, and the limits of freedom on an overcrowded planet--all framed inside one zoo reinventing itself for the twenty-first century. Thomas French, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, chronicles the action with vivid power: Wild elephants soaring above the Atlantic on their way to captivity. Predators circling each other in a lethal mating dance. Primates plotting the overthrow of their king. The sweeping narrative takes the reader from the African savannah to the forests of Panama and deep into the inner workings of a place some describe as a sanctuary and others condemn as a prison. All of it comes to life in the book's four-legged characters. Even animal lovers will be startled by the emotional charge of these creatures' histories, which read as though they were co-written by Dickens and Darwin. Zoo Story shows us how these remarkable individuals live, how some die, and what their experiences reveal about the human desire to both exalt and control nature.

Writing Life Stories is a classic text that appears on countless creative nonfiction and composition syllabi the world over. This updated 10th anniversary edition gives readers the same friendly instruction and stimulating exercises along with updated information on current memoir writing trends, ethics, Internet research, and even marketing ideas. Readers will discover how to turn their untold life stories into vivid personal essays and riveting memoirs by learning to open up memory, access emotions, shape scenes from experience, develop characters, and research supporting details. With creativity sparking ideas from signing a form releasing yourself to take risks in your work to drawing a map of a remembered neighborhood, this book is full of innovative techniques that prove that real stories are often the best ones.

This anthology is comprised of two major components: thirteen full-length, autobiographical essays written by persons with learning disabilities and five analytical chapters written by education and psychology scholars. Speaking in terms alternately intimate and analytical, the autobiographical essays each tell of a sustained personal encounter with the challenges and mysteries of living with a learning disability. But these autobiographies are not merely personal, concerned solely with their writers' private lives. Rather, they are also in various ways consciously analytical, offering astute critical readings of culture and society. The scholarly essays are written by such noted educators and psychologists as Lisa Delpit, Robert Kegan, and Janet Lerner. For any educator or parent of students with learning disabilities.

One of art's purest challenges is to translate a human being into words. The New Yorker has met this challenge more successfully and more originally than any other modern American journal. It has indelibly shaped the genre known as the Profile. Starting with light-fantastic evocations of glamorous and idiosyncratic figures of the twenties and thirties, such as Henry Luce and Isadora Duncan, and continuing to the present, with complex pictures of such contemporaries as Mikhail Baryshnikov and Richard Pryor, this collection of New Yorker Profiles presents readers with a portrait gallery of some of the most prominent figures of the twentieth century. These Profiles are literary-journalistic investigations into character and accomplishment, motive and madness, beauty and ugliness, and are unrivalled in their range, their variety of style, and their embrace of humanity.

Way back in 1926 the founding editor of The New Yorker suggested that the title Profiles be registered with the copyright bureau. Harold Ross had ample reason, for though he didn't invent the word itself, he certainly invested it with new significance. Over the years, New Yorker Profiles came to represent a new kind of biography: concise, well-researched, and impeccably written sketches of personalities who were often famous--but just as often not. Take for example "Mr. Hunter's Grave," Joseph Mitchell's 1956 Profile of George H. Hunter, the 87-year-old chairman of the board of trustees of the African Methodist church on Staten Island. This delightful piece leads off a select group of Profiles culled from The New Yorker's first 75 years and collected in Life Stories, edited by David Remnick. More a study of a place and a way of life than of a particular man, Mitchell's Profile stretched the parameters of the form. The very next piece, Mark Singer's "Secrets of the Magus," is a prime example of what The New Yorker does best. In Ricky Jay, "perhaps the most gifted sleight-of-hand artist alive," Singer has hit on a quirky, eccentric, and fascinating subject--one that offers plenty of scope for writer and reader alike to dip into an arcane and little-known world of magicians, mountebanks, card handlers, and confidence men. Alva Johnston achieves similar success in "The Education of a Prince," his 1932 Profile of con man Harry F. Gerguson, who spent years masquerading as the lost Prince Michael Alexandrovitch Dmitry Obolensky Romanoff: The Prince had a glittering career in New York, Boston, Newport, on Long Island, in high-caste settlements along the Hudson, and among the aristocracies of a dozen American cities. Twice he swept over Hollywood in a confetti shower of bad checks. He was repeatedly exposed, but exposure does not embarrass him greatly. He is widely admired today, not for his title but for his own sake. He has convinced a fairly large public that a good imposter is preferable to the average prince. Of course The New Yorker covered plenty of household names, as well, and Life Stories contains sketches of such celebrities as Mikhail Baryshnikov, Johnny Carson, Richard Pryor and Marlon Brando. The arts are well represented by pieces on Ernest Hemingway, Anatole Broyard, and David Salle, and even the contributors are stellar, including such well-known scribes as Henry Louis Gates Jr., Truman Capote, and John McPhee. But where is that famous Profile of the sea by Rachel Carson, you ask? Pauline Kael's piece on Cary Grant or Janet Malcolm's controversial study of psychoanalyst Aaron Green? In his introduction Remnick acknowledges the many great Profiles that did not make it into this volume, explaining that he decided to publish pieces only in full. "I wanted the reader to get the real thing--no excerpts, no snippets," he writes. "As a result the reader will have to go elsewhere for a range of long or multipart Profiles." What's here is choice, though, and die-hard New Yorker aficionados who turn to the Profiles even before perusing the cartoons won't be disappointed by what they find. All in all, Life Stories makes a fine 75th anniversary bouquet for the magazine's many devoted readers. --Alix Wilber

All adult speakers in Western cultures have life stories argues Charlotte Linde, and the ways in which these life stories are formed and exchanged with others have a powerful effect on all of us. Life stories express our sense of self, who we are and how we got that way. According to Linde, we also use these stories to show that our lives can be understood as coherent, and to assert or negotiate group membership. These life stories take part in the highest level of social constructions, since they are built on cultural assumptions about what is expected in a life, what the norms for a successful life are, and what common or special belief systems are necessary to establish coherence. The life story, illuminated by this engrossing study, is a form of everyday discourse which has not previously been precisely defined or studied. It is an oral, discontinuous unit, consisting of stories which are retold in a variety of forms over a long period of time, and which may be revised and changed as the speaker comes to drop old meanings and add new ones to parts of the life story. The life story is a particularly rich and important area for study, because it represents a crossroads of linguistic structure and social practice. Linde's analysis is of importance to linguistics, as well as having broader implications for anthropology, psychology, and sociology.

Too many of us have settled for a predictable, mediocre existence when deep down we long to live a life that really counts. In their new book, bestselling authors Eric and Leslie Ludy reveal that the life God has called us to is beyond anything we have dreamed or imagined. This grand adventure can turn ordinary men and women into heroes for Truth—agents in the service of the Most High God. This adventure transforms the impossible challenges of life into amazing opportunities to see the power of God at work. If you are willing to explore the boundless depths of a God-scripted life, this book can help you to embark on a new and magnificent voyage of discovery. Get ready to discover how breathtaking the adventure can be when God writes your life story. Discover the Adventure of a Lifetime As little kids, we dream big dreams for our lives. We want to become CIA operatives, Jedi masters, samurai warriors, or super heroes who save the world from evil villains. We want to be someone who makes a difference—someone who puts a dent into this life before we leave it. But as we grow up, it’s all too easy to lose sight of our big dreams and settle for a predictable, mediocre existence. If you are longing to live a life that counts, this book is for you. When God Writes Your Life Story isn’t just a book about finding your purpose; it’s about the life-altering effect that God—the Author of adventure—can have upon your purpose. If you want to experience the most thrilling, satisfying, and world-altering existence possible, then get ready to discover how breathtaking the adventure can be…when God writes your life story. Story Behind the BookEric and Leslie believe that God is in the business of writing amazing scripts for our lives. Not Hollywood scripts, but heavenly scripts that showcase His awe-inspiring faithfulness and love. This powerful book takes readers on a personal journey to discover their true purpose, proving that when we entrust the pen to the Author of Adventure, the result is a life story more fulfilling than anything we have ever dreamed.

First-person narratives are a fundamental tool of the qualitative researcher. This volume provides specific suggestions and guidelines for preparing and executing a life story interview. Robert Atkinson places the life story interview into a wider research context before elaborating on planning and then conducting the interview. Finally, the book deals with the issues of transcribing and interpreting the interview. The author provides a sample life story interview in the appendix.

Just after noon on a spring day in 2006, aspiring singer songwriter Hilary Williams and her sister Holly – the granddaughters of country legend Hank Williams and daughters of country music star Hank Williams Jr. – were driving through Mississippi down a rural stretch of Route 61 on their way to their grandfather’s funeral. Suddenly, the front wheel of the truck became caught in one of the many deep ruts and gravel lining the road, causing the vehicle and its passengers to flip over several times, crushing steel and breaking fragile bones as it crashed. Holly was lucky. She only suffered a broken wrist and cuts and bruises. But when the Jaws of Life finally pried Hilary's shattered body free of the wreckage, she was in shock and barely breathing.She had suffered two broken legs, several broken ribs, a ruptured colon, and bruised lungs. Her back, collarbone, tailbone, pelvis, and right femur were fractured. Her hips were crushed. It had taken nearly 30 minutes for an ambulance to arrive, and she had already lost a large amount of blood. Then, as EMTs scrambled to stabilize her in the middle of a muddy Mississippi field, Hilary Williams died.   But that was only the beginning.   This is a story of struggle and pain. But more so, it is a story of second chances, of love and resolve and recovery. When she was pulled back into life, Hilary’s world changed. It was the beginning of a long, courageous, and inspiring journey during which she would undergo twenty-three surgeries and years of therapy. Along the way, with her family at her side, Hilary has learned the meaning of strength, not only the strength to survive, but the strength to live with the legend, the talent, the burden, and the privilege of her place in country music’s most famous family.

Newbery Honor author Gary Paulsen has long been an ardent supporter of books, reading, and literacy programs. To further the cause of ProLiteracy Worldwide, he asked prominent authors to write an original story; the only restriction was that each story was to include mention of a book. The result is this collection, Shelf Life: Stories by the Book. From Jennifer L. Holm's story of a girl on Mars trying desperately to return to Earth to Gregory Maguire's domestic intrigue; from Kathleen Karr's story of a thief in turn-of-the-century Chicago to M. T. Anderson's mysterious shipboard adventure; from A. LaFaye's tale of magical wonderment to Marion Dane Bauer's story of doing good, this volume provides a full range of reading for every taste. Other authors featured here are Joan Bauer, Ellen Conford, Margaret Peterson Haddix, and Ellen Wittlinger. Sales of this book benefit ProLiteracy Worldwide, an international network with more than 1,400 programs in the United States and 79 partner programs abroad, whose mission is to change lives through literacy.

In this attractively illustrated volume, eminent biologist Sir Richard Southwood offers a remarkable survey of life in all its forms, ranging from the earliest single-celled bacteria, to the evolution and extinction of animals such as the dinosaurs, to the variety of life today. The book follows the major geological periods--such as the Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, and Devonian--explaining how great planetary changes such as the movement of the continents, the rising and falling of sea level, and the periods of glaciation, affected the forms of life on Earth. Beginning with the earliest and simplest forms of life, Southwood discusses such amazing creatures as bacteria that live around geysers and thermal vents and can survive in boiling water. He explains how the development of skeletons triggered the Cambrian Explosion, when animals such as trilobites, sea scorpions, shellfish, cephalopods first spread around the earth. He also examines such landmarks of evolution as the appearance of eggs in shells and of insects in flight. We read about the great dinosaurs and the arrival of the mammals and the primates, and the great extinctions, including the Permian (the largest in fossil history, wiping out 95% of animals) and the Cretaceous/Tertiary (K/T) extinction (the one that wiped out the dinosaurs). Southwood concludes by examining the impact of humanity on Earth, considering if we ourselves might not unleash the next major extinction. Southwood's love for his subject, for the life he describes so vividly, shines through this carefully crafted story. Generously illustrated with line drawings showing the fauna and flora of the Earth, both past and present, The Story of Life will enthrall anyone interested in nature and natural history.