Southern Memoirs

En 2008, Txema Guijarro pidió una excedencia en Telefónica, y viajó a Latinoamérica para participar como asesor demoscópico de los candidatos de izquierda en los procesos electorales de Paraguay y El Salvador. Tras acumular experiencia política, pasó a ser analista de la Cancillería de Relaciones Exteriores del Gobierno ecuatoriano de Rafael Correa. El analista describe, desde el punto de vista de un testigo privilegiado, la fenomenal tormenta política, judicial y mediática que enfrentó al Gobierno ecuatoriano de Rafael Correa con Estados Unidos y Reino Unido.

In the enormous literature of the Second World War, there are surprisingly few accounts of fighting in the southwest Pacific, fewer still by common infantrymen. This memoir, written with a simple and direct honesty that is rare indeed, follows a foot soldier’s career from basic training to mustering out. It takes the listener into the jungles and caves of New Guinea and the Philippines during the long campaign to win the war against Japan.

An inside account of the South Vietnamese elites who strove to carry on the war against the Communists during the US Army’s withdrawal. The book is a personal memoir of the author’s service as a US Army advisor during the end stages of America’s involvement in Vietnam. During the period 1970–71, the US was beginning to draw down its combat forces, and the new watchword was “Vietnamization.”

Rassie Erasmus has been called a genius. He’s been called reckless. All his life, he’s done things differently. Now, with his trademark candour, Rassie talks openly about his adventures and misadventures at the pinnacle of world rugby, both as player and coach. From his role in Nick Mallett's record-breaking Springbok team of the late 1990s, to the devastating injuries that cut short his playing career, to his revolutionary coaching career, Rassie is an essential window into one of the most successful figures of modern rugby.

From Curio Bay to Golden Bay, in Down South writer Bruce Ansley sets off on a vast expedition across the South Island, Te Waipounamu, visiting the places and people who hold clues to the south's famous character. Not so very long ago, the South Island had most of New Zealand's people and just about all of the money. Gold miners found fortunes in the hills and rivers, sheep barons straddled mountains, valleys and plains. Wealthy southerners ruled the government. Where now lies the South Island's golden fleece? And what is its future?

Miami is not unique among American cities for having so many homicides. It is unique however, for having so many bizarre and exotic ones. The book describes twenty some homicides which range from the usual crimes of passion and mob hits to robberies gone-wrong and political assassinations.

Conquistadores (or Conquistadors) were the Spanish and Portuguese conquerors who invaded parts of the world that hadn’t been discovered by the Europeans before the 16th century. Some were incentivized by greed, lust, and dominance, which caused them to pillage, steal, and enslave the indigenous people they encountered. In this audiobook, you will learn more about one infamous sadist in particular: Francisco Pizarro, who abused and attacked the Peruvian peoples, acted as an inquisitor for the Catholic Church, and inflicted physical and psychological wounds on his subjects.

Although he is unquestionably one of the most studied leaders of the 19th century, Simón Bolívar remains today as enigmatic as he was two centuries ago, when his vision and presence largely inspired the overthrow of the Spanish Empire in the New World.

Using a Canadian émigré lens, David Wayne Stewart’s essay collection, True North, Down South, entertains and educates listeners about immigrant and national identity, cultural misunderstandings, and belonging in the modern world. Stewart’s Canadian identity was contested by Quebec separatists when he was a child, then again in his adult life as an immigrant to the United States.

He inspires awe with his colorful costumes and helps ordinary people find a voice. With vocals so effective (in fact, they're almost otherworldly), he turned a four-letter word into a global phenomenon. Without a doubt, CeeLo Green is a superhero of soul - and every superhero has an origin story. This story begins in The Dirty South, where South Atlanta's native son transformed himself into the Abominable SHOWman. Along the way, innocence was lost and his parents passed on. Then one day he teamed up with Danger Mouse and everything went "Crazy."

Growing up as a Black girl in America, Deborah Mouton felt alienated from the stories she learned in class. She yearned for stories she felt connected to—true ones of course—but also fables and mythologies that could help explain both the world and her place in it. What she encountered was almost always written by white writers who prospered in a time when human beings were treated as chattel, such as the Greek and Roman myths, which felt as dusty and foreign as ancient ruins. When she sought myths written by Black authors, they were rooted too far in the past, a continent away.

“Growing up in the Patterson Projects: A South Bronx Tale — Keeping Our Roots Alive” is a poignant collaboration by authors, offering an intimate portrayal of their experiences in the Patterson Projects of the South Bronx. With raw honesty and heartfelt storytelling, they navigate the challenges and triumphs of life in public housing, weaving a narrative that resonates with perseverance and hope.

In 2019, Johannes Radebe became the first male dancer to perform in heels in Strictly Come Dancing history. Wearing black patent leather boots, Johannes danced with a red 'Pose' fan to a rendition of Blondie's Rapture. Two years on, Johannes was part of only the second same-sex pair on the show, dancing with Great British Bake-Off winner, John Whaite and though they were runners up and the response from the UK public was overwhelmingly positive, Johannes still faced abuse that highlighted the continuing fight against homophobia and racism.

Born in Hamburg in the 1930s, Marione Ingram fled Nazi Germany only to find racism as pervasive in the American South as anti-Semitism was in Europe. As a white woman and a Holocaust refugee, Marione was the most unlikely of heroes in the fight for civil rights for African Americans. This is her empowering story - a tale of courage, strength, and determination.

Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa is credited with driving through the deal between the apartheid government and the African National Congress that was at the heart of South Africa’s democratic constitution. He was the ANC’s lead negotiator and the man who persuaded one of the most recalcitrant racist governments in the world to buy into a settlement based on one of its most enlightened bills of rights. But once the ink had dried on the constitution, Ramaphosa found himself politically sidelined.

Between the 18th and early 19th centuries, the West experienced massive leaps in technological, scientific, and economical advancement. This powerful period has since been immortalized as the great Industrial Revolution. With Eli Whitney’s invention of the cotton gin near the end of the 18th century. Able to more effectively separate the cotton fiber from seeds, Whitney’s cotton gin turned the cotton industry into one of the antebellum South’s biggest cash cows, and as a result, the region became even more dependent on slave labor than before.

During his years of reporting from the world's most savage and turbulent regions, Fergal Keane has witnessed the violence of the South African townships and the terror in Rwanda, the most extreme kinds of human behaviour, the horror of genocide, and the bravery of peacekeepers faced with overwhelming odds. As one of the BBC's leading correspondents, he recounts extraordinary encounters on the front lines.

Una crónica que nos abre la puerta a la intimidad de los 365 días transcurridos desde la forzada renuncia de Evo Morales en noviembre de 2019 y su rescate clandestino hasta el regreso triunfante a su país en noviembre de 2020.

Krista Doyle grew up in a small town in Louisiana where everyone was a gossip and a devout church goer. She attended church every Sunday where she listened to her grandfather preach from the stage, where she sang hymns from the audience as her mother led the choir, and where she was strictly taught that everything was black and white, right and wrong. So - how was Krista to cope with being a lesbian?

On 12th May 1982, as the Falklands conflict became a shooting war, journalist Julian Manyon and his TV crew were kidnapped on the streets of Buenos Aires and put through a traumatic mock execution by the secret police. Less than eight hours later, they were invited to film a world exclusive interview with an apologetic President Galtieri, head of the Argentine Junta. Spurred on by the recent release of declassified CIA documents about Argentina's 'Dirty War', Manyon discovered the identity of his kidnapper and his terrifying record of torture and murder