Have you ever felt like a book was literally written just for you and that it fell into your life at exactly the right moment? That is the feeling I got when I started listening to Girl, Stop Apologizing, which was released on March 5, 2019.
I have been working on a dream of mine since the beginning of this year, but I started to feel like the dream was fading and I didn’t know what to do next. I started doubting myself and wondering if it was still worth it. As soon as I started listening to this book, I felt so motivated that my self-doubt was gone almost instantly!
Rachel Hollis gives you real examples from her life experiences—both personal and professional—to help you reach your goals. She talks about how she started her company, The Hollis Co., and all the failures she endured in order to get to where she is now. Hollis’s mantra is that it is okay to fail; what really matters is how you decide to continue working towards your goal or dream. That toolbox of knowledge in your head is going to be overflowing with all of the tools she supplies, and you’ll be left motivated to do that thing you have feared for so long. Your dreams will seem less daunting and you will be able to create a road map of the steps needed to reach your goal.
There are plenty of motivational self-help books out there, but Hollis has really set herself apart from the crowd with her relatable writing and narrative style. I honestly felt like she was speaking to me as a close friend, giving me advice on how and what to do in order to bring my dreams to fruition. You’ll finish the book with the understanding that it is perfectly okay to work on your goals and dreams, and not just to help others with theirs (as women sometimes fall into the trap of doing).
Hollis narrates the audiobook herself, and this further enhanced the whole experience; her engaging, positive manner and personal touch indeed captivates the listener. The conviction with which she shares her ideas are sure to make an impact—you will immediately want to start taking action and striving for more.
I highly recommend this book if you are currently working towards a goal or dream, or if you’re simply a fan of motivational self-help books. Her drive and passion for helping other women strive for more are truly inspiring. I would also highly recommend her previous book Girl, Wash Your Facefor even more wisdom and motivation.
Publisher Summary:
“I believe we can change the world. But first, we’ve got to stop living in fear of being judged for who we are.”
Rachel Hollis has seen it too often: women not living into their full potential. They feel a tugging on their hearts for something more, but they’re afraid of embarrassment, of falling short of perfection, of not being enough.
In Girl, Stop Apologizing, #1 New York Times bestselling author and founder of a multimillion-dollar media company, Rachel Hollis sounds a wake-up call. She knows that many women have been taught to define themselves in light of other people—whether as wife, mother, daughter, or employee—instead of learning how to own who they are and what they want. With a challenge to women everywhere to stop talking themselves out of their dreams, Hollis identifies the excuses to let go of, the behaviors to adopt, and the skills to acquire on the path to growth, confidence, and believing in yourself.
As an audiobook exclusive, join Rachel in a guided meditation bonus track designed to ground you in gratitude with focus and intention!
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Hooray! It’s spring! The ice is melting, I don’t have to go out wrapped in a coat that’s like a duvet, and my Chihuahua/Mexican hairless dog can remove himself from the blanket he has been hiding under since November.
For many of us, spring is all about cleaning and organizing. If you’re a naturally tidy person, this is a great time to revisit what works for you. For messy people like me, this is the time of year where we try to do better.
Since I’m not really a big tidier, I find listening to audiobooks while I’m doing household chores very inspiring. So here are a few of our favorite titles to get you motivated – whether you’re a Marie Kondo clone, or someone who will probably end up on a TV special about extreme hoarding. Check out the titles below, and take a look at our Spring Cleaning booklist for more motivation!
Yes, I know I’ve blogged about this one before, but really, can you write a spring cleaning blog in 2019 without mentioning the biggest cleaning phenomenon of the year?
The KonMari method is revolutionizing how we tidy and clean our homes, by using the technique of cleaning by category, not by room. By looking at what “sparks joy” in your life, and then deciding what you really need, you can start to remove excess stuff, clear your clutter and enjoy a nice, calm, clean home.
Publisher’s Summary
Despite constant efforts to declutter your home, do papers still accumulate like snowdrifts and clothes pile up like a tangled mess of noodles?
Japanese cleaning consultant Marie Kondo takes tidying to a whole new level, promising that if you properly simplify and organize your home once, you’ll never have to do it again. Most methods advocate a room-by-room or little-by-little approach, which doom you to pick away at your piles of stuff forever. The KonMari Method, with its revolutionary category-by-category system, leads to lasting results. In fact, none of Kondo’s clients have lapsed (and she still has a three-month waiting list).
With detailed guidance for determining which items in your house “spark joy” (and which don’t), this international bestseller featuring Tokyo’s newest lifestyle phenomenon will help you clear your clutter and enjoy the unique magic of a tidy home—and the calm, motivated mindset it can inspire.
What I most love about Dana White is the fact that she is a former messy person/borderline hoarder. There’s something lovely about listening to her tell you that she’s been where you are, and hearing what has helped her to get rid of all her stuff. She talks about “Decluttering Paralysis,” which is that feeling when you just don’t know where to begin with the volume of stuff, and also “Decluttering Momentum” which is when you start to really see the effects of the cleaning, and then the whole process starts moving.
There’s no judgement in this book, which I find helps to really inspire you to break through all that mess, and also to get away from that feeling of “But I might need this old hair clip one day!” type of thinking.
Publisher’s Summary
You don’t have to live overwhelmed by stuff—you can get rid of clutter for good! While the world seems to be in love with the idea of tiny houses and minimalism, real women with real families who are constantly growing and changing simply can’t purge it all and start from nothing. Yet a home with too much stuff is a home that is difficult to maintain, so where do we begin? Add in paralyzing emotional attachments and constant life challenges, and it can feel almost impossible to make real decluttering progress.
In Decluttering at the Speed of Life, decluttering expert and author Dana White identifies the mind-sets and emotional challenges that make it difficult to declutter. Then, in her signature humorous approach, she provides workable solutions to break through these struggles and get clutter out—for good!
But more than simply offering strategies, Dana dives deep into how to implement them, no matter the reader’s clutter level or emotional resistance to decluttering. She helps identify procrasticlutter—the stuff that will get done eventually so it doesn’t seem urgent—as well as how to make progress when there’s no time to declutter.
Things are probably going well for you if some of your biggest fans are Reese Witherspoon, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Mindy Kaling. As is shown by their very popular Instagram account, Joanna Teplin and Clea Shearer run a very successful home organization business, and this listen reflects their unique spin on organizing. Their motto is that any space can look good – even your junk drawer!
This is a great listen for when you’ve already KonMari-ed your house, and you’re ready to get organizing and positioning your joyful belongings.
Publisher Summary
There’s decorating, and then there’s organizing. From the Instagram-sensation home experts (with a serious fan club that includes Reese Witherspoon, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Mindy Kaling), here is an accessible, room-by-room guide to establishing new order in your home.
Believe this: every single space in your house has the potential to function efficiently and look great. The mishmash of summer and winter clothes in the closet? Yep. Even the dreaded junk drawer? Consider it done. And the best news: it’s not hard to do—in fact, it’s a lot of fun.
From the home organizers who made their orderly eye candy the method that everyone swears by comes Joanna and Clea’s signature approach to decluttering. The Home Edit walks you through paring down your belongings in every room, arranging them in a stunning and easy-to-find way (hello, labels!), and maintaining the system so you don’t need another do-over in six months. When you’re done, you’ll not only know exactly where to find things, but you’ll also love the way it looks.
The Home Edit is a masterclass filled with detailed tips, from placing plastic dishware in a drawer where little hands can reach to categorizing pantry items by color (there’s nothing like a little ROYGBIV to soothe the soul). Above all, it’s like having your best friends at your side to help you turn the chaos into calm.
My dad is INCREDIBLY tidy. When I was a kid he wondered whether I would ever grow out of being messy. I’ve improved with age (I think), and have even developed one of my dad’s main cleaning quirks – which is obsessively vacuuming just before anyone comes to the house, and then apologizing for how messy the (recently cleaned) house is. My (and my dad’s) all time nightmare is when someone comes over unannounced, and I can’t do my obsessive clean around.
This is why I was so excited about the CHAOS Cure – the fact that CHAOS stands for “Can’t have anyone over syndrome”. If you’re the kind of person who lets dishes build up in the sink, or you have a laundry mountain sitting in your living room, then this is the book for you. But never fear! Marla Calley aka the Fly Lady has the cure for you! With a ton of tips and small ways you can start decluttering, this is the perfect book for those of you who struggle with organization.
Publisher Summary
With the help of New York Times bestselling author and housekeeping guru Marla Cilley, you’ll cure your household CHAOS (Can’t Have Anyone Over Syndrome) by changing your messy home into a soothing sanctuary
Are you suffering from CHAOS, otherwise known as Can’t Have Anyone Over Syndrome? If your house is a jumble of dirty dishes, piles of paper, and never-ending laundry, you are probably afflicted. But don’t give up hope, because now there’s an antidote: The CHAOS Cure.
In her eagerly anticipated new book, Marla Cilley–aka ‘The FlyLady’ to the hundreds of thousands who visit her website for daily domestic inspiration–reaches into our homes to help make housecleaning more meaningful and life less messy. With a little bit of armchair therapy and plenty of practical, tactical tips–such as ‘On the Fly!’ quick fixes and genius uses for sticky notes–she’ll help us get our houses in shipshape order before we can break a sweat. Along the way, the FlyLady teaches us to embrace household maintenance as an act of self-care, and to enjoy the soothing satisfaction of an orderly habitat.
Before you know it, you’ll be on the fast-track to living CHAOS-free, surrounded by sparkling serenity
In Sweden, there is a specific type of cleaning called “döstädning”, which translates to “death cleaning” in English. The idea of death cleaning is that it’s a sweeping cleansing of unnecessary belongings that should be done sooner rather than later – because otherwise someone else will have to do it after you die. Bleak, but true.
Juliet Stevenson‘s ethereal narration adds to the peaceful vibe of this book, and makes it an uplifting listen, rather than a depressing one.
Publisher Summary
A charming, practical, and unsentimental approach to putting a home in order while reflecting on the tiny joys that make up a long life.
In Sweden there is a kind of decluttering called döstädning, dö meaning “death” and städning meaning “cleaning.” This surprising and invigorating process of clearing out unnecessary belongings can be undertaken at any age or life stage but should be done sooner than later, before others have to do it for you. In The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning, artist Margareta Magnusson, with Scandinavian humor and wisdom, instructs readers to embrace minimalism. Her radical and joyous method for putting things in order helps families broach sensitive conversations, and makes the process uplifting rather than overwhelming.
Margareta suggests which possessions you can easily get rid of (unworn clothes, unwanted presents, more plates than you’d ever use) and which you might want to keep (photographs, love letters, a few of your children’s art projects). Digging into her late husband’s tool shed, and her own secret drawer of vices, Margareta introduces an element of fun to a potentially daunting task. Along the way listeners get a glimpse into her life in Sweden, and also become more comfortable with the idea of letting go.
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Have you ever imagined a version of yourself that was more suave, more talented, and cooler than you thought you could ever be? What if you met that person? Have you ever felt like nothing ever goes your way? What if you met the person for whom everything always works out? And what if that person was a brother you never knew you had?
Anansi Boystells the story of Charles Nancy (Fat Charlie) who, upon learning that his embarrassing and estranged father has died on stage singing karaoke, finds his entire past opening its mysteries to him. Charlie learns of his father’s hidden identity as the African god Anansi, and of his long lost brother, Spider, of whom he has no memory. After an evening of drinking, Charles invites Spider into his life, only to find everything turned upside down. Spider has the powers of a God, and with a word can make people believe whatever he chooses. And Spider chooses a lot of things: including making Fat Charlie’s fiancée believe Spider is Fat Charlie, prompting her to fall in love with the much more dynamic and interesting version of her fiancé.
In this novel, Neil Gaiman explores the idea of stories and storytelling. Interspersed through the various characters’ stories are Anansi’s origins in African mythology. We learn how the trickster Anansi stole all of the stories and controls the flow of stories. We hear how he does bad things, but isn’t a bad person. We also hear of Tiger, a brutal killer, and how he is so often tricked by the clever Anansi. These stories are, like many stories of myth, simple in their presentation, but they serve to offer lessons that the heroes of the tale often need to learn in order to survive the strange circumstances that they find themselves in.
Charles Nancy’s journey is one of self-actualization that so many of us strive for ourselves. He has dreams and aspirations but puts them on hold because he’s afraid of being mocked for trying, and because he believes it’s a failure in itself to lack the very things he wants. It’s only as events with his brother unfold that he is forced to face his own potential, and to move out of his comfort zone.
The entire audio experience is expertly narrated by Lenny Henry, who brings to life the wide cast of characters very well. From Charles’s enigmatic boss to Charlie’s old next door neighbor Mrs. Higgler, Lenny Henry does a terrific job bringing this cast of characters to life.
Anansi Boys is an excellent listen for anyone who wants to believe in a world a little bigger than our own, and who would love to discover their own amazing place in it.
Publisher Summary:
God is dead. Meet the kids.
Fat Charlie Nancy’s normal life ended the moment his father dropped dead on a Florida karaoke stage. Charlie didn’t know his dad was a god. And he never knew he had a brother.
Now brother Spider’s on his doorstep — about to make Fat Charlie’s life more interesting… and a lot more dangerous.
For years, rumors of the ‘Marsh Girl’ have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark, the so-called Marsh Girl. But Kya is not what they say. Sensitive and intelligent, she has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand. Then the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. When two young men from town become intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new life—until the unthinkable happens.
Pete Banning was Clanton, Mississippi’s favorite son—a decorated World War II hero, the patriarch of a prominent family, a farmer, father, neighbor, and a faithful member of the Methodist church. Then one cool October morning he rose early, drove into town, and committed a shocking crime. Pete’s only statement about it—to the sheriff, to his lawyers, to the judge, to the jury, and to his family—was: ‘I have nothing to say.’ He was not afraid of death and was willing to take his motive to the grave.
In a major novel unlike anything he has written before, John Grisham takes us on an incredible journey, from the Jim Crow South to the jungles of the Philippines during World War II; from an insane asylum filled with secrets to the Clanton courtroom where Pete’s defense attorney tries desperately to save him.
Fixie Farr has always lived by her father’s motto: “Family first.” And since her dad passed away, leaving his charming housewares store in the hands of his wife and children, Fixie spends all her time picking up the slack from her siblings instead of striking out on her own. The way Fixie sees it, if she doesn’t take care of her father’s legacy, who will?
It’s simply not in Fixie’s nature to say no to people. So when a handsome stranger in a coffee shop asks her to watch his laptop for a moment, she not only agrees—she ends up saving it from certain disaster. To thank Fixie for her quick thinking, the computer’s owner, Sebastian, an investment manager, scribbles an IOU on a coffee sleeve and attaches his business card.
When Fixie’s childhood crush, Ryan, comes back into her life jobless and aimless, she’d love for Seb to give Ryan a job. No sooner has Seb agreed than the tables are turned once more and a new series of IOUs between Seb and Fixie—from small favors to life-changing moments—ensues. Soon Fixie, Ms. Fixit for everyone else, is torn between her family and the life she really wants. Does she have the courage to take a stand? Will she finally grab the life, and love, she really wants?
Alicia Berenson’s life is seemingly perfect. A famous painter married to an in-demand fashion photographer, she lives in a grand house with big windows overlooking a park in one of London’s most desirable areas. One evening her husband Gabriel returns home late from a fashion shoot, and Alicia shoots him five times in the face, and then never speaks another word.
Alicia’s refusal to talk, or give any kind of explanation, turns a domestic tragedy into something far grander, a mystery that captures the public imagination and casts Alicia into notoriety. The price of her art skyrockets, and she, the silent patient, is hidden away from the tabloids and spotlight at the Grove, a secure forensic unit in North London.
Theo Faber is a criminal psychotherapist who has waited a long time for the opportunity to work with Alicia. His determination to get her to talk and unravel the mystery of why she shot her husband takes him down a twisting path into his own motivations-a search for the truth that threatens to consume him…
Summoned to a run-down former strip joint, LAPD Lieutenant Milo Sturgis and psychologist Dr. Alex Delaware find themselves crashing a wild Saints and Sinners–themed wedding reception. But they’re not the only uninvited guests.
A horrified bridesmaid has discovered the body of a young woman, dressed to impress in pricey haute couture and accessorized with a grisly red slash around her neck. What’s missing is any means of identification, or a single partygoer who recognizes the victim. The baffled bride is convinced the stranger snuck in to sabotage her big day—and the groom is sure it’s all a dreadful mistake. But Delaware and Sturgis have a hundred guests to question, and a sneaking suspicion that the motive for murder is personal. Now they must separate the sinners from the saints, the true from the false, and the secrets from those keeping them. The party’s over—and the hunt for whoever killed it is on.
An intimate, powerful, and inspiring memoir by the former First Lady of the United States. Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her—from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to her years as an executive balancing the demands of motherhood and work, to her time spent at the world’s most famous address. With unerring honesty and lively wit, she describes her triumphs and her disappointments, both public and private, telling her full story as she has lived it—in her own words and on her own terms.
On March 16, 2018, just twenty-six hours before his scheduled retirement from the organization he had served with distinction for more than two decades, Andrew G. McCabe was fired from his position as deputy director of the FBI. President Donald Trump celebrated on Twitter: ‘Andrew McCabe FIRED, a great day for the hard working men and women of the FBI – A great day for Democracy.’
In The Threat: How the FBI Protects America in the Age of Terror and Trump, Andrew G. McCabe offers a dramatic and candid account of his career, and an impassioned defense of the FBI’s agents, and of the institution’s integrity and independence in protecting America and upholding our Constitution.
The Threat recounts in compelling detail the time between Donald Trump’s November 2016 election and McCabe’s firing, set against a page-turning narrative spanning two decades when the FBI’s mission shifted to a new goal: preventing terrorist attacks on Americans. But as McCabe shows, right now the greatest threat to the United States comes from within, as President Trump and his administration ignore the law, attack democratic institutions, degrade human rights, and undermine the U.S. Constitution that protects every citizen.
One hundred thousand years ago, at least six different species of humans inhabited Earth. Yet today there is only one—homo sapiens. What happened to the others? And what may happen to us?
Most books about the history of humanity pursue either a historical or a biological approach, but Dr. Yuval Noah Harari breaks the mold with this highly original book that begins about 70,000 years ago with the appearance of modern cognition. From examining the role evolving humans have played in the global ecosystem to charting the rise of empires, Sapiens integrates history and science to reconsider accepted narratives, connect past developments with contemporary concerns, and examine specific events within the context of larger ideas.
Dr. Harari also compels us to look ahead, because over the last few decades humans have begun to bend laws of natural selection that have governed life for the past four billion years. We are acquiring the ability to design not only the world around us, but also ourselves. Where is this leading us, and what do we want to become?
Combat, the most intense and dynamic environment imaginable, teaches the toughest leadership lessons, with absolutely everything at stake. Jocko Willink and Leif Babin learned this reality first-hand on the most violent and dangerous battlefield in Iraq. As leaders of SEAL Team Three’s Task Unit Bruiser, their mission was one many thought impossible: help U.S. forces secure Ramadi, a violent, insurgent-held city deemed “all but lost.” In gripping, firsthand accounts of heroism, tragic loss, and hard-won victories, they learned that leadership—at every level—is the most important factor in whether a team succeeds or fails.
Willink and Babin returned home from deployment and instituted SEAL leadership training to pass on their harsh lessons learned in combat to help forge the next generation of SEAL leaders. After leaving the SEAL Teams, they launched a company, Echelon Front, to teach those same leadership principles to leaders in businesses, companies, and organizations across the civilian sector. Since that time, they have trained countless leaders and worked with hundreds of companies in virtually every industry across the U.S. and internationally, teaching them how to develop their own high-performance teams and most effectively lead those teams to dominate their battlefields.
Despite constant efforts to declutter your home, do papers still accumulate like snowdrifts and clothes pile up like a tangled mess of noodles?
Japanese cleaning consultant Marie Kondo takes tidying to a whole new level, promising that if you properly simplify and organize your home once, you’ll never have to do it again. Most methods advocate a room-by-room or little-by-little approach, which doom you to pick away at your piles of stuff forever. The KonMari Method, with its revolutionary category-by-category system, leads to lasting results.
New to Audiobooks.com? Get a free audiobook when you sign up for our one month free trial. Digital audiobooks make audible stories come to life when you’re commuting, working out, cleaning, cooking and more! Listening is easy with our top-rated free audiobook apps for iOS and Android, which let you download & listen to bestselling audiobooks on the go, wherever you are. Click here to get your free audiobook!
Daisy Ridley, Tom Holland, and Nick Jonas are joining forces to bring to life Patrick Ness’s bestselling Young Adult series. Based on the first novel in the Chaos Walking Trilogy, The Knife of Never Letting Go, the story is set in a dystopian town called Prentisstown where everyone can hear everyone else’s thoughts. When the only boy in town, Todd (Holland), discovers an awful secret, he’s forced to run for his life.
The much-anticipated second season of Neil Gaiman’sAmerican Gods is finally coming to Starz on March 10 in the US and internationally on Amazon Prime Video. First debuting in April 2017, the series follows ex-convict, Shadow Moon (Ricky Whittle), who is hired as a bodyguard, driver, and errand boy by the enigmatic Mr. Wednesday (Ian McShane). Season two will pick up about 30 minutes after the end of season one.
Grab your tissues, folks, this looks like it could reach John Green levels of heartbreak. When Stella Grant (Haley Lu Richardson) meets Will Newman (Cole Sprouse), they both feel an instant attraction. The only catch? As Cystic Fibrosis patients, they must stay at least five feet apart from each other, which gets harder and harder the deeper they fall in love.
Set in Hamburg after the end of World War II, The Aftermath finds Colonel Lewis Morgan (Jason Clarke) and his wife Rachel (Kiera Knightley) forced to share a house with a German widower (Alexander Skarsgård) and his daughter, where tensions and passion inevitably erupt.
Maria Semple’s bestselling dramedy begins when notorious and opinionated Bernadette Fox, played by Cate Blanchett, disappears out of the blue. In an effort to track down her mother, Bernadette’s 15-year-old daughter, Bee, combs through email messages, official documents, and secret correspondences to piece together the story of her mother’s troubled past.
New to Audiobooks.com? Get a free audiobook when you sign up for our one month free trial. Digital audiobooks make audible stories come to life when you’re commuting, working out, cleaning, cooking and more! Listening is easy with our top-rated free audiobook apps for iOS and Android, which let you download & listen to bestselling audiobooks on the go, wherever you are. Click here to get your free audiobook!
The Audie Awards recognize outstanding achievement from the authors, narrators, and producers of the most talked-about audiobooks in the industry. See below for some of the winners! For the full list, take a look at our book list.
Publisher Summary: In Children of Blood and Bone, Tomi Adeyemi conjures a stunning world of dark magic and danger in her West African-inspired fantasy debut.
They killed my mother. They took our magic. They tried to bury us. Now we rise.
Zélie Adebola remembers when the soil of Orïsha hummed with magic. Burners ignited flames, Tiders beckoned waves, and Zélie’s Reaper mother summoned forth souls.
But everything changed the night magic disappeared. Under the orders of a ruthless king, maji were killed, leaving Zélie without a mother and her people without hope.
Now Zélie has one chance to bring back magic and strike against the monarchy. With the help of a rogue princess, Zélie must outwit and outrun the crown prince, who is hell-bent on eradicating magic for good. Danger lurks in Orïsha, where snow leoponaires prowl and vengeful spirits wait in the waters. Yet the greatest danger may be Zélie herself as she struggles to control her powers-and her growing feelings for an enemy.
Born to survivalists in the mountains of Idaho, Tara Westover was seventeen the first time she set foot in a classroom. Her family was so isolated from mainstream society that there was no one to ensure the children received an education, and no one to intervene when one of Tara’s older brothers became violent. When another brother got himself into college, Tara decided to try a new kind of life. Her quest for knowledge transformed her, taking her over oceans and across continents, to Harvard and to Cambridge University. Only then would she wonder if she’d traveled too far, if there was still a way home.
On his thirty-sixth birthday, Travis Cornell hikes into the foothills of the Santa Ana Mountains. But his path is soon blocked by a bedraggled Golden Retriever who will let him go no further into the dark woods.
That morning, Travis had been desperate to find some happiness in his lonely, seemingly cursed life. What he finds is a dog of alarming intelligence that soon leads him into a relentless storm of mankind’s darkest creation.
This beautiful, illuminating tale of hope and courage is based on interviews that were conducted with Holocaust survivor and Auschwitz-Birkenau tattooist Ludwig (Lale) Sokolov—an unforgettable love story in the midst of atrocity.
In April 1942, Lale Sokolov, a Slovakian Jew, is forcibly transported to the concentration camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau. When his captors discover that he speaks several languages, he is put to work as a Tätowierer (the German word for tattooist), tasked with permanently marking his fellow prisoners. Imprisoned for over two and a half years, Lale witnesses horrific atrocities and barbarism—but also incredible acts of bravery and compassion. Risking his own life, he uses his privileged position to exchange jewels and money from murdered Jews for food to keep his fellow prisoners alive.
One day in July 1942, Lale, prisoner 32407, comforts a trembling young woman waiting in line to have the number 34902 tattooed onto her arm. Her name is Gita, and in that first encounter, Lale vows to somehow survive the camp and marry her.
A vivid, harrowing, and ultimately hopeful re-creation of Lale Sokolov’s experiences as the man who tattooed the arms of thousands of prisoners with what would become one of the most potent symbols of the Holocaust, The Tattooist of Auschwitz is also a testament to the endurance of love and humanity under the darkest possible conditions.
The year: 2000. The setting: Los Angeles. A gorgeous virtuoso of an actress agreed to star in a random play, and a basement-dwelling scenic carpenter said he would assay a supporting role in the selfsame pageant. At the first rehearsal she surveyed her fellow cast members, determining if any of the men might qualify to provide her with a satisfying fling. Her gaze fell upon the carpenter, and like a bolt of lightning the thought struck her: no dice. Moving on.
Yet, unbeknownst to our protagonists, Cupid had merely set down his bow and picked up a rocket launcher…that fired a love rocket (not a euphemism). The players were Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman, and the resulting romance, once ignited, was . . . epic. Beyond epic. It resulted in a coupling that has endured to this day; a sizzling, perpetual tryst that has captivated the world with its kindness, athleticism, astonishingly low-brow humor, and true (fire emoji) passion.
How did they do it? They came from completely different families, ignored a significant age difference, and were separated by the gulf of several social strata. Megan loved books and art history; Nick loved hammers. But much more than these seemingly unsurpassable obstacles were the values they held in common: respect, decency, the ability to mention genitalia in almost any context, and an abiding obsession with the songs of Tom Waits.
Eighteen years later, they’re still very much in love and have finally decided to reveal the philosophical mountains they have conquered, the lessons they’ve learned, and the myriad jigsaw puzzles they’ve completed. Presented as an oral history in a series of conversations between the couple, the book features anecdotes, hijinks, photos, and a veritable grab bag of tomfoolery. This is not only the intoxicating book that Mullally’s and Offerman’s fans have been waiting for, it might just hold the solution to the greatest threat facing our modern world: the single life.
May 1940. Britain is at war, Winston Churchill has unexpectedly been promoted to Prime Minister, the horrors of Blitzkreig witness one western European Democracy fall after another in rapid succession. Facing this horror, with pen in hand and typist-secretary at the ready, Churchill wonders what words could capture the public mood when the invasion of Britain seems mere hours away.
It is this fascinating period that Anthony McCarten captures in this deeply researched and wonderfully written new book, The Darkest Hour. A day-by-day (and often hour-by-hour) narrative of this crucial moment in history provides a revisionist look at Churchill—a man plagued by doubt through those turbulent weeks—but who emerged having made himself into the iconic, lionized figure we remember.
The revered New York Times bestselling author traces the development of technology from the Industrial Age to the Digital Age to explore the single component crucial to advancement—precision—in a superb history that is both an homage and a warning for our future.
The rise of manufacturing could not have happened without an attention to precision. At the dawn of the Industrial Revolution in eighteenth-century England, standards of measurement were established, giving way to the development of machine tools—machines that make machines. Eventually, the application of precision tools and methods resulted in the creation and mass production of items from guns and glass to mirrors, lenses, and cameras—and eventually gave way to further breakthroughs, including gene splicing, microchips, and the Hadron Collider.
Simon Winchester takes us back to origins of the Industrial Age, to England where he introduces the scientific minds that helped usher in modern production: John Wilkinson, Henry Maudslay, Joseph Bramah, Jesse Ramsden, and Joseph Whitworth. It was Thomas Jefferson who later exported their discoveries to the fledgling United States, setting the nation on its course to become a manufacturing titan. Winchester moves forward through time, to today’s cutting-edge developments occurring around the world, from America to Western Europe to Asia.
As he introduces the minds and methods that have changed the modern world, Winchester explores fundamental questions. Why is precision important? What are the different tools we use to measure it? Who has invented and perfected it? Has the pursuit of the ultra-precise in so many facets of human life blinded us to other things of equal value, such as an appreciation for the age-old traditions of craftsmanship, art, and high culture? Are we missing something that reflects the world as it is, rather than the world as we think we would wish it to be? And can the precise and the natural co-exist in society?
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