Helga Weiss is an eleven-year-old girl living in Prague in 1939. The words above are hers as are all the words in the book, Helga’s Diary: A Young Girl’s Account of Life in a Concentration Camp. Czechoslovakia has been invaded by the Nazis and in a few short months Helga has seen her carefree life change to one of rules and regulations. By 1941 she and her family ... Read More...
Shakespeare Saved My Life
Dr. Laura Bates is an English professor, specializing in Shakespeare, at Indiana State University. For the past fifteen years she has taught at college and in prison, where she brings Shakespeare into the lives of some of the prison systems most hardened criminals. Shakespeare Saved My Life is her book about this journey and about one inmate in particular that she worked ... Read More...
Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness
You are an outgoing, ambitious journalist already writing for The New York Post at age twenty-four. Suddenly, you start feeling a little off—no appetite, fatigue, and you’re pretty sure people are talking about you. The physical problems increase as do the mental ones—you know people are talking about you and you can see things that no one else can. Your confidence ebbs and ... Read More...
Heads in Beds
Jacob Tomsky graduated from college with a degree in philosophy and no idea what he wanted to do. It is summer in New Orleans and before jumping a career and all that entails he decides to take a job at a new hotel as a valet—to test the working waters. With his personable nature and quick mind, Tomsky rapidly moves from valet to the underworld of housekeeping management while ... Read More...
Hubert Keller’s Souvenirs: Stories & Recipes from My Life
For Chantal and me the restaurant business is a passion and will always be a passion. There is always something new to work on. I like a challenge, to see if I can pull it off, even when it’s an area in which I am not completely comfortable and have to learn as I go along. Every time I undertake something new, I get excited, and I also know I can lose it big-time. While ... Read More...
Does This Church Make Me Look Fat?
I missed Rhoda Janzen’s first book, Mennonite in a Little Black Dress: A Memoir of Going Home so jumping into her newest book, Does This Church Make Look Fat?, was a bit like going to a new high school your sophomore year. Yes, they speak the language but you don’t know any of the backstory or the cliques. Also, I’ll admit it. I wanted to read the book because the title made me ... Read More...
