Family Memoir

As a genealogist, what would you give to spend one day with one of your ancestors? To witness everyday details of his or her life, whether it involved a favorite recipe, cooking methods, gardening, transportation or how children spent their day? Genealogy and stories related to major life events are often found in journals and other sources, but what about activities such as holiday celebrations or games children played on balmy summer evenings? Wouldn't you like to go one step beyond vague stories about walking four miles to school through two feet of snow or canning peaches on a woodstove...

At the tender ages of five and seven years old, sisters Judy and Cherie were removed from the loving home of their maternal grandparent's farm in Sycamore Illinois and put on a plane to go live in Southern California with their mother and soon to be stepfather; a sadistic perpetrator and child molester. Violence, torture, sexual abuse, and the unconscionable acts of their mother would be the theme of their lives for the next eleven years. Even though they were physically separated from their grandparents, the grandparents never forgot their granddaughters. Their continuous love and devotion...

Séamas O’Reilly’s mother died when he was five, leaving him, his ten (!) brothers and sisters, and their beloved father in their sprawling bungalow in rural Derry. It was the 1990s; the Troubles were a background rumble, but Séamas was more preoccupied with dinosaurs, Star Wars, and the actual location of heaven than the political climate. ­

“Pat, we need to kill the dog.” When a sudden mental illness struck his wife, Patrick Dylan found himself living with an eerie stranger. Scared and unprepared, he began a desperate battle to protect her from a mysterious disease, shelter their children from her bizarre behavior, and recover the woman he loved. Within weeks, she had been admitted to the emergency room, the hospital, and the local crisis facility, but none of the experts could provide an answer. As her illness eluded diagnosis, the family’s struggle was only beginning.

From well-known nature and adventure writer Dan Koeppel, whose work has appeared in Audubon and National Geographic Adventure, comes this true story of one bird watcher's incredible achievements.

In this family history interwoven with recipes, Kathleen Flinn returns listeners to the mix of food and memoir beloved by fans of her best-selling The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry. Burnt Toast Makes You Sing Good explores the very beginnings of her love affair with food and its connection to home. It is the story of her Midwestern childhood, its memorable home cooks, and the delicious recipes she grew up with.

While much has been written about his father, Sam, a titan of industry, there is no public record of Charles Bronfman’s thoughts on his own life, family, career and his significant accomplishments in sport and philanthropy. Distilled does just that, chronicling key events in the life of the heir to one of Canada’s great fortunes. Born in 1931 to the fabulously wealthy Bronfmans, Charles grew up in a 20-room mansion with many staff. Via their control of the distilling giant Seagram, the Bronfman family dominated the liquor business.

Escape from Xanadu is a gripping admixture of Huckleberry Finn, The Great Santini, and Penrod. Read how Donnie gets shot, discovers a Nazi spy hideout, barely avoids being trampled by a war horse, and almost bronco-busts a five-hundred-and-fifty pound hog. It's a rollicking, poignant, defiant, great adventure.

In the early 1990s, Demetrius "Big Meech" Flenory and his brother, Terry "Southwest T", rose up from the slums of Detroit to build one of the largest cocaine empires in American history: the Black Mafia Family. They socialized with music mogul Sean "Diddy" Combs, did business with New York's king of bling Jacob "The Jeweler" Arabo, and built allegiances with rap superstars Young Jeezy and Fabolous. Yet even as BMF was attracting celebrity attention, its crew members struck fear in a city.

Nagel tells a remarkable story of an astonishing woman, from her birth, to her upbringing by doting parents, through to Revolution, imprisonment, exile, Restoration, and, finally, her reincarnation as saint and matriarch.

When Brooke Shields welcomed her newborn daughter, Rowan Francis Henchy, into the world, something unexpected followed: a crippling depression. Now, for the first time, Brooke talks about the trials, tribulations, and finally the triumphs that occurred before, during, and after the birth of her daughter.

On a picturesque street in Sacramento County, California, three healthy saplings stand side by side. But what they symbolize are the deaths of three innocent people - two of them children. The man who took their lives, then planted trees in their honor, was their own husband and father. Hearts went out to Jack Barron when his wife, Irene, died mysteriously in her sleep. Soon after, his two young children were also found dead in their beds. Barron claimed they suffered from the same rare genetic disorder as their mother.

From USA Today Bestselling Author, Uvi Poznansky, comes a passionate wartime love story: Lenny goes as far back as the moment he met Natasha during WWII, when he was a wounded warrior and she—a star, brilliant yet illusive. Natasha was a riddle to him then, and to this day, with all the changes she has gone through, she still is. “Digging into the past, mining its moments, trying to piece them together this way and that, dusting off each memory of Natasha, of how we were, the highs and lows of the music of us, to find out where the problem may have started?” To their son, Ben, that ...

Married for 26 years, Jose and Kitty Menendez appeared to be a happy couple and proud parents. Twenty-one-year-old Lyle Menendez was enrolled at Princeton, where he was a star on the tennis team. Eighteen-year-old Erik Menendez had just graduated from Beverly Hills High and was about to start college at UCLA. The Menendezes appeared to be living the American dream. But it was all a façade.

Karen Gravano is the daughter of Sammy “the Bull” Gravano, once one of the mafia's most feared hit men. With 19 confessed murders, the former Gambino Crime Family underboss - and John Gotti’s right-hand man - is the highest ranking gangster ever to turn State’s evidence and testify against members of his high-profile crime family. But to Karen, Sammy Gravano was a sometimes elusive but always loving father figure. He was ever-present at the head of the dinner table.

Mom loved adages, quotes, slogans. There were always little reminders pasted on the kitchen wall. For example, the word THINK. I found THINK thumbtacked on a bulletin board in her darkroom. I saw it Scotch-taped on a pencil box she’d collaged. I even found a pamphlet titled THINK on her bedside table. Mom liked to THINK.

"There is really no better indicator you're a mother than acquiring the ability to catch throw-up in a plastic bag, disinfect your hands, and immediately ask your friend to pass the beef jerky as you put on another Taylor Swift song and act as if nothing has happened." This is the type of insight Melanie Shankle offers in this quirky memoir of motherhood.

Dive into the clandestine world of one of New York's most enigmatic and feared crime syndicates with this comprehensive exploration of the Bonanno Mafia Crime Family. This meticulously researched book unveils the dark and complex web of activities, power struggles, and influential figures that shaped the Bonanno family's legacy. From its roots in the 1890s under the guidance of founder Salvatore Maranzano, this narrative traces the Bonanno family's rise to power in the American underworld.

Alexandra Fuller won worldwide attention, popular acclaim, and critical accolades for her memoir of her childhood in Africa, Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight. This engaging follow-up explores Fuller’s parents’ childhoods and charts the trajectories of their lives through all the British couple’s experiences in war-torn Africa. With the same sharply etched narrative that has earned the author such immense praise, Fuller expands on and offers new insights into her family’s remarkable trials and successes.

Millions of families are affected by eating disorders, which usually strike young women between the ages of fourteen and twenty. But current medical practice ties these families' hands when it comes to helping their children recover. Conventional medical wisdom dictates separating the patient from the family and insists that 'it's not about the food', even as a family watches a child waste away before their eyes.