No talkie!! :bash:

Geisha's reveal:



Until The Final Hour: Hitler's Last Secretary
Traudl Junge (w/Melissa Mueller)

Traudl Junge was 22 years old and dreamt of a career as a ballerina, until the 'opportunity of her life' beckoned and she was appointed as Adolf Hitler's secretary. From 1942 until his death she was by his side in the bunker, typing his correspondence, his speeches and even his last private and political will and testament.

It was only after the war that the horrible reality of Hitler's regime began to dawn on her and she became racked with guilt for 'liking the greatest criminal ever to have lived.' Her journal, written in 1947, is a startling eyewitness account of Hitler's court during its final years and of the building sense of doom as the war progressed.

I really loved this book! I just finished it for the ELLE magazine June nonfiction jury!

My reveal:

Kabul Beauty School
by Deborah Rodriguez


This is an advanced Reader Copy. The book is scheduled for release on April 10, 2007.

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. A terrific opening chapter—colorful, suspenseful, funny—ushers readers into the curious closed world of Afghan women. A wedding is about to take place, arranged, of course, but there is a potentially dire secret—the bride is not technically a virgin. How Rodriguez, an admirably resourceful and dynamic woman, set to marry a nice Afghan man, solves this problem makes a great story, embellished as it is with all the traditional wedding preparations. Rodriguez went to Afghanistan in 2002, just after the fall of the Taliban, volunteering as a nurse's aide, but soon found that her skills as a trained hairdresser were far more in demand, both for the Western workers and, as word got out, Afghans. On a trip back to the U.S., she persuaded companies in the beauty industry to donate 10,000 boxes of products and supplies to ship to Kabul, and instantly she started a training school. Political problems ensued ("too much laughing within the school"), financial problems, cultural misunderstandings and finally the government closed the school and salon—though the reader will suspect that the endlessly ingenious Rodriguez, using her book as a wedge against authority, will triumph in the end. This witty and insightful (if light) memoir will be perfect for women's reading groups and daytime talk shows.

Azuki's reveal is:
Casino
by Nicholas Pileggi




From Amazon.com

Note this book is not fiction, nor a novelization of the film Casino. Like Wiseguy, it's the real account that Scorsese fashioned into a film (with Pileggi's help again).

Casino tells the story of the Chicago mob's major role in running Las Vegas, how it happened, and how it more or less ended (or appeared to) in the 1980s. Corporations (institutionalized gangsters) took over, and now we're to assume that gambling is a respectable, fine industry. It's hard to cheer for the state 'gaming' officials as they pursue mobsters who are skimming a casino, of all places. A character in the film says it best when he exclaims, 'You mean the money we're robbing is bein' robbed?!'

A good read before or after the excellent film. There's quite a bit of detail as far shady business dealings, politics, and mob bosses go, but less of the nitty gritty mobster detail from Wiseguy.

Nothing to see here!

Ramson's reveal:




Sex: A Users Guide by Stephen Arnott


When it comes to sex, a little knowledge goes a long, long way. Here, at last, is the perfect little book to tease your imagination and test your sexual IQ (ever heard of the Turtle Stirs position?).

From techniques to tall tales, from the physiology of sex to an astounding guide to Sex Slang (Shuffle the Kit Kat? Play the Boneaphone?), this stimulating collection of titillating tidbits, bizarre curiosities, and historical facts is guaranteed to satisfy your lust for knowledge.

Did you know…

* Nipple rings were popular in the late Victorian Era (see page 27)

* The plain, bland graham cracker was originally invented to smother the sex drive (see page 94)

* Cleopatra owned one of the world’s first vibrators--a small container of buzzing bees (see page 206)

PLUS The History of Sex * Sex in Literature,
Film, and Art * Famous Sexual Athletes (and flops) *Perversions and Taboos *

And Much More!

My reveal was supposed to have a piccie & a link :rolleyes: You can delete the old one when you get a chance HL :unsure:



The Holy Blood & the Holy Grail by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh & Henry Lincoln

A vast number of people have become enthralled with the story of the nineteenth-century French priest who, in his mountain village at the foot of the Pyrenees, discovered something which enabled him to amass and spend a fortune of millions of pounds. The tale seems to begin with buried treasure and then turns into an unprecedented historical detective story - a modern Grail quest leading back through cryptically coded parchments, secret societies, the Knights Templar, the Cathar heretics of the 12th and 13th centuries and a dynasty of obscure French kings deposed more than 1,300 years ago. Now, after more than ten years of research, Henry Lincoln and his co-authors, Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, publish the results of their inquiry into this taunting enigma. What really lies at the core of this discovery of Rennes-le-Chateau is not material riches, but a secret - a secret of explosive and controversial proportions, which radiates out from the little Pyrenees village to encompass the whole of Western civilisation. The secret is no mere historical curiosity. Its repercussions stretch all the way to the contemporary politics and the entire edice of the Christian faith. It involves nothing less than the Holy Grail - not as a mystical chalice of medieval legend but as something more tangible which has played a vital role in the shaping of Western history. The enigma extends to our own day, implicating such men as de Gaulle and Malraux. It also casts an astonishing new light on such events as the Renaissance and the Crusades. Most startlingly it pertains to the origins of Christianity and the very identity of Jesus.

Xall's reveal is:

Hotel Babylon
by
Imogen Edwards-Jones and Anonymous

Something strange occurs to people as soon as they check in to a luxury hotel. Otherwise well mannered, decent folk cast their scruples aside as they spin through the revolving doors. Normal rules of behaviour no longer seem to apply.

Everything you read in Hotel Babylon is true. Only the names have been changed to protect the guilty. All the anecdotes, the characters, the highs, the lows, the drugs, the scams, the misery and the debauchery are exactly as experienced by Anonymous – someone who has spent his entire career working in some of the most luxurious hotels in London. However, for legal reasons, the stories now take place in the fictional Hotel Babylon. More than a decade is compressed into twenty-four hours. Everything else is as it should be. The rich spend obscene amounts of money, the hotel makes obscene amounts of money and the chambermaids still fight the bellboys over a two-pound coin…

The Shoemaker
by Flora Rheta Schreiber category Biographies & Memoirs

BCID: 047-4462376 new journal entry | make release notes



The true story of Joseph Kallinger(age 38) and his son Michael(age 13)and the trail of terror they left in Pennsylvania,New Jersey and Maryland back in the late 1970's.

Front and back cover are missing , but otherwise book is ok and fully intact.

From the author of Sybil comes the true story of a man possessed by demons -- a man whose ordinary, decent human impulses have been thwarted and diverted into an overwhelming compulsion to kill and destroy. The book is based on the account gained from thousands of hours of interviews with real-life murderer and rapist Joseph Kallinger. In the Shoemaker, Flora Rheta Schrieber not only reveals, the secret life and thoughts of a man overcome by evil despite himself, but succeeds in discovering that precise moment when the sensitive child turns into a creature whose increasingly dark and compelling fantasies move towards the violent visions that eventually destroy him and his innocent victims. The Shoemaker is a document of profound importance. Professor Schreiber takes us on a voyage into the human mind and heart that no reader will ever forget , and shows us an image of evil in which all of us , however reluctantly , will see a reflection of ourselves .

My book is Kate Remembered by A. Scott Berg



From the Publisher
For seven decades Katharine Hepburn played a leading role in the popular culture of the twentieth century - reigning as an admired actress, a beloved movie star, and a treasured icon of the modern American woman. She also remained one of the most private of all the public figures of her time.

In 1983 - at the age of seventy-five, her career cresting - the four-time Academy Award winner opened the door to biographer A. Scott Berg - then thirty-three - and began a special friendship, one that endured to the end of her illustrious life.

From the start, Scott Berg felt that Katharine Hepburn intended his role to be not just that of a friend but also of a chronicler, a confidant who might record for posterity her thoughts and feelings. Over the next twenty years, Kate used their many hours together to reveal all that came to mind, often reflecting on the people and episodes of her past, occasionally on the meaning of life.

Here are the stories from those countless intimate conversations, and much more. In addition to recording heretofore untold biographical details of her entire phenomenal career and her famous relationships with such men as Spencer Tracy and Howard Hughes, Kate Remembered also tells the amusing, often emotional story of one of the most touching friendships in her final years. Scott Berg provides his own memories of Katharine Hepburn offstage - quiet dinners in her town house in New York City, winter swims (she swam, he watched) in the Long Island Sound at Fenwick, her home in Connecticut, weekend visits with family members and dear friends...even some unusual appearances by the likes of Michael Jackson and Warren Beatty. Finally, Kate Remembered discusses the legendary actress's moving farewell, during which her mighty personality surrendered at last to her failing body - all the while remaining true to her courageous character.

Kate Remembered is a book about love and friendship, family and career, Hollywood and Broadway - all punctuated by unforgettable lessons from an extraordinary life.

Darkpunkangel's reveal

The Diary of a Young Girl By Anne Frank



From Amazon.com:

A beloved classic since its initial publication in 1947, this vivid, insightful journal is a fitting memorial to the gifted Jewish teenager who died at Bergen-Belsen, Germany, in 1945. Born in 1929, Anne Frank received a blank diary on her 13th birthday, just weeks before she and her family went into hiding in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam. Her marvelously detailed, engagingly personal entries chronicle 25 trying months of claustrophobic, quarrelsome intimacy with her parents, sister, a second family, and a middle-aged dentist who has little tolerance for Anne's vivacity. The diary's universal appeal stems from its riveting blend of the grubby particulars of life during wartime (scant, bad food; shabby, outgrown clothes that can't be replaced; constant fear of discovery) and candid discussion of emotions familiar to every adolescent (everyone criticizes me, no one sees my real nature, when will I be loved?). Yet Frank was no ordinary teen: the later entries reveal a sense of compassion and a spiritual depth remarkable in a girl barely 15. Her death epitomizes the madness of the Holocaust, but for the millions who meet Anne through her diary, it is also a very individual loss.

Zosime's Reveal:

The River at the Center of the World by Simon Winchester


From the back cover:

Rising in the mountains of the Tibetan border, the river that many regard as the symbolic heart of China pierces 3,900 miles of rugged country before debouching into the oily swells of the East China Sea. Connecting China's heartland cities with the volatile coastal giant Shanghai, the Yangtze has also historically connected China to the outside world through its nearly one thousand miles of navigable waters. To travel the vast extent of the river is to travel back in history, to sense the soul of China, and this Simon Winchester does, taking us along with him as he encounters the very essence of China - its history and politics, its geography, climate, and culture, and above all its people, many of them in remote and almost inaccesible places. This is travel writing at its best: lively, informative, and thoroughly engaging.

Lauren reveals:

My book is:


An Ordinary Man by Paul Rusesabagina

For former hotel manager Paul Rusesabagina, words are the most powerful weapon in the human arsenal. For good and for evil, as was the case in the spring of 1994 in Rwanda. Over 100 days, some 800,000 people were slaughtered, most hacked to death by machete. Rusesabagina—inspiration for the movie Hotel Rwanda—used his facility with words and persuasion to save 1,268 of his fellow countrymen, turning the Belgian luxury hotel under his charge into a sanctuary from madness. Through negotiation, favor, flattery and deception, Rusesabagina managed to keep his "guests" alive another day despite the homicidal gangs just beyond the fence and the world's failure to act. The humble hotel manager not only illuminates the machinery behind the genocide but delves into Rwanda's complex and colorful cultural history as well as his own childhood, the son of a Hutu father and Tutsi mother. This tale of good, evil and moral responsibility winds down with Rusesabagina visiting a church outside Kigali where thousands were massacred and where a multilingual sign-cloth now pledges, "Never Again." He once more stops to consider words, the ones he worries lack true conviction—like those at the church—as well as the ones with the power to heal. For the listener, the words of Paul Rusesabagina won't soon be forgotten.

My book is:
A Year in Provence by Peter Mayle



A personal description of Provencal life as seen through the eyes of the author and his wife when they move into an old farmhouse at the foot of the Luberon mountains between Avignon and Aix

Turtle's reveal:



Peace Pilgrim: Her Life and Work in Her Own Words

The silver-haired woman walked away from her name and vowed to "remain a wanderer until mankind has learned the way of peace". On New Year's Day, 1953, she walked ahead of the Tournament of Roses parade handing out peace messages. It was the beginning of a pilgrimage that would last eighteen years. Traveling on foot without money or possessions, with only the food and shelter offered by well-wishers, she carried her simple yet compelling message throughout the United States and Canada. After the first 25,000 miles she stopped counting.

A Year in Provence is a light-hearted autobiography as well as a travel/restaurant guide and cultural study of the south of France. Peter Mayle, once a British businessman, has finally chucked it all and bought a house in Provence with his wife and two dogs. He recounts a year of their adventures living and working amid the French, including daily struggles with the strong Provençal accent, the nosiness of neighbors, and the self-proclaimed experts on everything from geophysics to truffle hunting. His humorous yet affectionate approach will make you long for France, particularly the south, whether or not you've ever been there.

You won't be able to stop laughing when you read about the author's discovery of French bureaucracy and the bone-chilling winter wind called the Mistral, his desperate tactical maneuvering to get his house remodeled, and the hordes of rude tourists. You'll be tickled by his observations of French greetings and body language. You'll love his French neighbors and hate his English friends. And you will be starving after reading his mouth-watering descriptions of dozens of restaurants and dinner parties.

Whether you are interested in learning more about French, "the Hexagon," or cuisine française, A Year in Provence is the book to get you started on your cultural discovery of the south of France. The best discovery of all is that Peter Mayle continues to write about Provence, both non-fiction and novels.

LML's book is:


A Piece of Cake by Cupcake Brown

Cupcake Brown (that's her real name) was 11 in 1976 when her mother died. Custody of Brown and her brother was given to a stranger—their birth father—who only wanted their social security checks. He then left them with an abusive foster mother who encouraged her nephew to rape Brown repeatedly. Brown got better and better at running away. A prostitute taught her to drink, smoke marijuana and charge for sex. Her next foster father traded her LSD and cocaine for oral sex. Eventually she went to live with a great-aunt in South Central L.A., where she joined a gang. Almost 16, having barely survived a shooting, she decided to quit gangbanging. Drugs were her new best friends. A boyfriend taught her to freebase, but then there was crack, which was easier. Before long she was a "trash-can junkie," taking anything and everything. It wasn't until she woke up behind a Dumpster one morning, half-dressed and more than half-dead, that she admitted she needed help. Brown conveys this all in gritty detail, and her struggle to come clean and develop her potential—she's now an attorney with a leading California firm and a motivational speaker—ends her story on a high note. Booksellers, watch out—Cupcake's gonna sell like hotcakes.

My reveal is:

The Mole People:


In "The Mole People" Jennifer Toth tells the story of the New York City homeless who have taken up residence in the subway tunnels and sub-basements of Manhatten. In clear, eloquent prose, Toth introduces the reader to the genuinely surreal existence of people who live out much of their lives in dark, man-made catacombs. With both the eye of a scientist and the compassion of a concerned human being, Toth examines what has driven these people underground, and how it is they exist in such an environment.
This book is astonishing in that something that reads like a bizzare work of fiction is in fact true. It is hard to believe that people could or would live in subway tunnels. but Toth's reporting is compelling. My one complaint is that she didn't do much to research the architetural aspects of sub-surface NYC. I suspect she would have done much to silence her critics if she had mapped her travels and compared them to available blue-prints.

---------------

This book was really interesting. The writing could have been tighter, but the stories are completely compelling and just amazing.

redhot-brat's reveal



Crossing Anartica by Will Steger and Jon Bowermaster

(From Library Journal)
The story of the first transverse of Antarctica by dogsled and ski, a 4000-mile, seven-month (July 1989-March 1990) journey by an expedition of six men from six different countries, is told in expanded journal form by co-leader Steger. His team survived whiteouts, crevasses, 100F windchill, erratic supplies, a pregnant sled dog, a monotonous diet, a hostile National Science Foundation, frostbite and runny noses, and were rewarded by magnificent scenery and a sense of personal and scientific accomplishment. This above-average polar account keeps the reader moving along with the hardy six.

Chronic reveals:





From the Publisher
At age ten, Tatum O'Neal became the youngest Oscar winner in history for her performance in the film classic Paper Moon. She was hailed as a new kind of child star-sassy and precocious-for a hip, cynical age. As the sidekick to her father, the flamboyant star and man-about-town Ryan O'Neal, she became a fixture at the most glamorous Hollywood parties and counted celebrities ranging from Cher to Stanley Kubrick among her childhood friends. But behind the glittering facade of Tatum's life lay heartbreak: abandonment, abuse, and neglect. Her alcoholic mother, the actress Joanna Moore, drifted in and out of her life. Her father, saddled with both Tatum and her brother Griffin, grew increasingly punishing and distant, especially after moving in with his longtime love, Farrah Fawcett. By her late teens, Tatum-though a working actress with ten movies to her credit-had begun a perilous slide into self-destruction.
Then, just before her twenty-first birthday, Tatum met the man who would become her husband: the explosive tennis great John McEnroe. They had three children, Kevin, Sean, and Emily, in quick succession, followed by one of the messiest high-profile divorces on record. With the collapse of her marriage and no real family to turn to, Tatum succumbed to the demons of her past, which would nearly kill her. Now she has emerged clean and sober, rediscovering herself as an actress, mother, and wonderfully vibrant woman in what she considers the prime of her life. A Paper Life is a story of strength and courage: unflinchingly honest, yet poignant, often funny, and unfailingly uplifting. It is a tale of triumph steeped in Hollywood lore-and an inspiring testament to the healing power of love.