万本电子书0元读

万本电子书0元读

Purpose
Purpose
Jean, Wyclef
¥90.77
Wyclef Jean is one of the most influential voices in hip-hop. He rocketed to fame in the 1990s with the Fugees, whose multiplatinum album, The Score, would prove a landmark in music history, winning two Grammys and going on to become one of the bestselling hip-hop albums of all time. In Purpose, Wyclef recounts his path to fame from his impoverished childhood in "Baby Doc" Duvalier's Haiti and the mean streets of Brooklyn and Newark to the bright lights of the world stage.The son of a pastor and grandson of a Vodou priest, Wyclef was born and raised in the slums of Haiti, moving with his family to New York when he was nine. He lived in Brooklyn's notorious Marlboro projects until his father, Gesner Jean, took them to Newark, where he converted a burnt-out funeral home into a house for his family and a church for his congregation. But life in New Jersey was no easier for Wyclef, who found it hard to shake his refugee status. Forced to act as a literal and cultural translator for his parents while still trying to master English himself, Wyclef soon learned that fitting in would be a constant struggle. He made his way by competing in "freestyle" rap battles, eventually becoming the best MC in his school. At the same time, Wyclef was singing in his father's choir and learning multiple instruments while also avidly exploring funk, rock, reggae, and jazz an experience that would forever shape his sound. When Wyclef chose to pursue a career in music over attending theological school, Gesner, who hated rap, nearly disowned him, creating a gulf between father and son that would take nearly a decade to bridge.Within a few short years, Wyclef would catapult to international renown with the Fugees. In Purpose he details for the first time ever the inside story of the group: their rise and fall, and his relationships with Pras and Lauryn Hill.Wyclef also looks back with candor at the catastrophic earthquake that struck Haiti in 2010 and his efforts to help rebuild his homeland, including the controversy surrounding Yle, his aid organization, and his exploratory bid for president of the island nation. The story revealed in Purpose is one of inspiration, full of drama and humor, told in compelling detail, about the incredible life of one of our most revered musical icons.
Secrets of Breaking into the Film and TV Business
Secrets of Breaking into the Film and TV Business
Silvers, Dean
¥90.77
A highly successful, award-winning independent producer shares his funny, practical, and innovative approach to breaking into film or television, whether you want to direct, act, write, or produceIt doesn't take film school or expensive, high-tech equipment to make a brilliant and marketable movie today, says successful maverick producer Dean Silvers. For aspiring filmmakers, it's easier than ever to produce and sell their work. Secrets of Breaking into the Film and TV Business is packed with concrete, proven advice to help you follow in the footsteps of today's cinematic giants, many of whom broke out with runaway independent successes. Drawing from his own experience as a filmmaker, Silvers offers essential tips and a wealth of invaluable knowledge about every aspect of the moviemaking business, from Internet shorts to how to adapt, option, and collaborate on feature-length films (with shoestring budgets).
Accidentally on Purpose
Accidentally on Purpose
Pols, Mary F.
¥90.77
At thirty-nine, movie critic Mary Pols knew she wanted to have a baby. But never not in a million years on her own. To take on the physical, emotional, and financial challenges of motherhood without a perfect soul mate/husband would be absurd, kind of like not bothering to use a condom during a one-night stand with an adorable but jobless guy ten years her junior. Pols spends the ensuing weeks despairing over everything, from the financial nightmare of single motherhood to the end of her hopes for a traditional life. Not the least of her worries is finding the right way to drop the bombshell on loved ones, including her five siblings and eighty-four-year-old father, who has a German temper and an Irish Catholic attitude toward babies out of wedlock. Yet faced with the frightening, lonely truth that this might be her only chance at motherhood, she plunges ahead with the pregnancy and an Odd Couple version of a co-parenting relationship that looks like one more disaster in a long line of romantic disappointments. But even as she tries to give her son's young father a radical makeover, she realizes that his devotion and love for their child matters more than his spotty or his inability to remember to put oil in the car. With humor, insight, and compelling honesty, Pols reveals what it means to compromise in the name of love and to find joy in an accidental life, suddenly brimming with purpose.
HarperCollins e-books
HarperCollins e-books
Ruggero, Ed
¥90.77
Duty First is a penetrating account of a year inside one of America's premier schools for leadership -- the United States Military Academy -- as it celebrates the bicentennial of its founding. Ed Ruggero, a former West Point cadet and professor, takes an incisive look at how this elite school builds the "leaders of character" who will command the nation's military.Writing with deep insight and superb narrative skill, Ruggero follows the cadet's tumultuous lives: the initial grueling training; the strict student hierarchy and intense classroom work; and the interaction between the lowly first-year plebes and the upper-class cadets who train them. Duty First also shows the role played by the majors, captains, and sergeants, who oversee everything that happens at this unique institution.
Taking Shots
Taking Shots
Glass, Keith
¥90.77
Bring a family of four to an NBA game today, and it costs around $500 to watch a bunch of seven-footers take bad shots. Perhaps the quote often attributed to P.T. Barnum is true there really is a sucker born every minute.The NBA is in trouble. And as NBA agent Keith Glass describes it—he's part of the problem! If team owners are willing to throw millions of dollars his way for marginal players, why should he be the only one with the self-restraint to say "no"?In his insightful, funny, and often mind-numbingly bizarre tales of life in the NBA over the last twenty- five years, Keith Glass lets it fly from half-court. He'll tell you how we got to the present state where an agent who makes millions off the game can't sit through one; why our NBA stars couldn't capture Olympic gold; and why the game he loves is in dire need of help.Glass has seen it all as the representative of players like Mark Eaton, the seven-foot-five center found working as a mechanic because he hated basketball; Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf, who converted to Islam and brought the wrath of the league upon him when he refused to stand for the National Anthem; and first-round draft pick Quincy Douby, who was forced to enter the draft before graduating from Rutgers because of the harsh NCAA rules regarding college eligibility.With informative chapters such as "How to Feed Your Family on Only $14 Million a Year," "Eighty-one Feet of White Centers," and "From 6'11" to the 7- Eleven," Glass shatters the myth of NBA marketing: that everything about the game is great, and that as long as the fans in the luxury boxes are happy and weighed down with expensive merchandise, all is well. But have no fear! Keith Glass doesn't preach about the evils of highlight film slam-dunks he'll just have you falling down laughing as he flagrantly fouls the league that was once the envy of the pro sports world.
Venus Envy
Venus Envy
Wertheim, L. Jon
¥90.77
A behind-the-scenes look at the hugely popular and often controversial world of women's tennis featuring such household names as Venus and Serena Williams and Anna Kournikova. At a time when attendance and TV ratings for women's tennis are at an all-time high, Sports Illustrated writer L.Jon Wertheim, draws on his investigative talents and knowledge of the game to infiltrate the heretofore closed locker rooms of the women's tour and chronicle this remarkable era in the sport's history. With a narrative sweep that rockets along like a Venus Williams serve, it takes the reader from the year's first Grand Slam tournament--where a top player ignited a firestorm of controversy when she decided to come out-- to Venus' epochal victory at Wimbledon to the U.S. Open where Serena Williams defends her title and all the whistle-stop tournaments in between where the Russian vixen Anna Kournikova sent hormonally challenged teenagers, not to mention male sportswriters, into a frenzy, Venus Envy offers the reader the equivalent of a center-court seat and an all-access locker room pass. The book will contain a wealth of previously unreported, inside-the-locker room anecdotes about the marquee names in women's tennis and should engender much off-the-book-page coverage. There are more identifiable stars than ever before and the rivalries are intense and often rancorous. The book will even appeal to those readers with only a passing interest in tennis since many of the players have transcended the sport, appearing on the covers of magazine like GQ, Rolling Stone and Vogue.
Cage Rat
Cage Rat
Long, Kevin
¥90.77
From Yankees hitting coach Kevin Long the man who coaches all-stars like Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, and Robinson Cano comes this indispensable guide to hitting, full of practical advice, behind-the-scenes baseball action, and an enduring, inspiring love for America's national pastimeThe legendary Ted Williams often said that "hitting a baseball is the most difficult thing to do in sport." If hitting a baseball is that hard to do, imagine trying to teach how to hit. Yankees hitting coach Kevin Long does just that every day to some of the best players in the game.In Cage Rat, Long draws on more than twenty years of experience playing and coaching professional baseball to demonstrate to readers the techniques, practices, and habits of great hitting. From bat angle to grip, and from plate coverage to athletic stance and hitting drills, Long takes us into the Yankees' batting cage, where he shows us how major-league players hone their hitting and refine their skills. Not just a practical guide to hitting, Cage Rat is also a dynamic, engaging, and moving portrait of a man realizing his goals. From his early days in the minor leagues to his major league dreams of playing with the Kansas City Royals, from the dramatic decision to turn to coaching to the fateful call from the New York Yankees, Kevin Long's story is a quintessentially American narrative that celebrates hard work, perseverance, and a positive attitude.Chock-full of practical advice, behind-the-scenes action, instructional photographs, and inspirational stories, Cage Rat is a must-read for aspiring players, Yankees fans, and anyone who loves baseball.
Doctor Who: The Shakespeare Notebooks
Doctor Who: The Shakespeare Notebooks
Richards, Justin
¥90.77
Many people know about William Shakespeare's famous encounter with the Doctor at the Globe Theatre in 1599. But what few people know (though many have suspected) is that it was not the first time they met.Drawn from recently discovered archives, The Shakespeare Notebooks is the holy grail for Bard scholars: conclusive proof that the Doctor not only appeared throughout Shakespeare's life but also had a significant impact on his writing. In these pages you'll find early drafts of scenes and notes for characters that never appeared in the plays; discarded lines of dialogue and sonnets; never-before-seen journal entries; and much more.From the original notes for Hamlet (with a very different appearance by the ghost) and revealing early versions of the faeries of A Midsummer Night's Dream to strange stage directions revised to remove references to a mysterious blue box, The Shakespeare Notebooks is an astonishing document that offers a unique insight into the mind of one of history's most respected and admired figures. And also, of course, William Shakespeare.
The Girl's Guide to Starting Your Own Business
The Girl's Guide to Starting Your Own Business
Friedman, Caitlin
¥90.77
Geared toward the unique challenges faced by self-employed businesswomen and updated for the social media-driven, post-financial crisis world The Girl's Guide to Starting Your Own Business offers solutions and advice for handling a range of issues, including how to write a business plan, how to secure funding, and how to hire (and fire) employees. Caitlin Friedman and Kimberly Yorio share practical information drawn from their own extensive experience in the public relations, marketing, and consulting fields. Their concise and engaging advice is explained through entertaining tips, lists, and quizzes that speak directly to women who are dreaming of starting, or have already started, their own businesses.
Laying Down the Sword
Laying Down the Sword
Jenkins, Philip
¥90.77
Commands to kill, to commit ethnic cleansing, to institutionalize segregation, to hate and fear other races and religions all are in the Bible, and all occur with a far greater frequency than in the Qur’an. But fanaticism is no more hard-wired in Christianity than it is in Islam. In Laying Down the Sword, one of America’s best scholars of religion” (The Economist) explores how religions grow past their bloody origins, and delivers a fearless examination of the most violent verses of the Bible and an urgent call to read them anew in pursuit of a richer, more genuine faith.Christians cannot engage with neighbors and critics of other traditions nor enjoy the deepest, most mature embodiment of their own faith until they confront the texts of terror in their heritage. Philip Jenkins identifies the holy amnesia” that, while allowing *ural religions to grow and adapt, has demanded a nearly wholesale suppression of the Bible’s most aggressive passages, leaving them dangerously dormant for extremists to revive in times of conflict. Jenkins lays bare the whole Bible, without compromise or apology, and equips us with tools for reading even the most unsettling texts, from the slaughter of the Canaanites to the alarming rhetoric of the book of Revelation.Laying Down the Sword presents a vital framework for understanding both the Bible and the Qur’an, gives Westerners a credible basis for interaction and dialogue with Islam, and delivers a powerful model for how a faith can grow from terror to mercy.
And Now We Shall Do Manly Things
And Now We Shall Do Manly Things
Heimbuch, Craig
¥90.77
In the tradition of Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods and A. J. Jacobs's The Know-It-All, Craig J. Heimbuch takes a wry look at some of our most deeply cherished cultural beliefsCraig J. Heimbuch had never even thought of owning a gun when, in his early thirties, he was given a twelve-gauge Winchester over-under shotgun by his father. The black sheep, so to speak, of his Midwestern family, Craig was possibly the only male Heimbuch never to have taken an animal. But now that he had a shotgun, he figured he might as well try it out, and in so doing, explore the meaning of manhood while getting closer to his hunting-enthusiast dad.And Now We Shall Do Manly Things is the witty, moving, and insightful story of one man's quest to free himself from the shackles of his domesticated suburban lifestyle by immersing himself for one year in the hunting culture his family has always cherished. Along the way Heimbuch learns what putting food on the table once entailed and what it means to be a man in America and discovers that it's possible to be a committed father, a loving spouse, and a hunter without being mistaken for a gun-toting lunatic.
The Best of Friends
The Best of Friends
Pasternak, Mariana
¥90.77
Set in a world of luxury and power, this is the story of two remarkable women and a friendship that changed both their lives forever.For more than two decades, Mariana Pasternak and Martha Stewart were nearly inseparable. They first met over a garden gate in Westport, Connecticut, two suburban wives wedded to successful men but with grand aspirations of their own. Their bond only deepened after their marriages ended in divorce. Struggling as a single mother, but drawn into a seductive world of privilege and adventure, Pasternak watched with admiration as her friend built an empire that would make her one of the richest women in America.A European migr with sophisticated tastes, Pasternak helped to smooth Stewart's rough edges, while Stewart drew Pasternak into a rarefied world, where together they navigated the sometimes hilarious and often difficult challenges of being single. The depth of their friendship not only benefited them both but also influenced how they defined themselves, through good times and bad. Friendship between women is never simple and this one was no exception.With Stewart's newfound success and Pasternak's zest for adventure, the two women's friendship was based on their mutual quest for wonder and discovery. They rode horses through the desert dunes of Egypt, hiked the winding Inca Trail to the mysterious Machu Picchu, paddled at night in dugout canoes through the Amazonian jungle. They toasted the good life with thin-stemmed champagne glasses and sipped jade dew" green tea in Martha's Turkey Hill kitchen. This was no ordinary life.As time passed, money, men, and the arrogance of wealth frayed the bonds they had built so carefully over more than twenty years. The final break came when Pasternak was called as a witness in the high-profile trial that brought about Stewart's conviction and prison sentence. Pasternak's deeply personal memoir tells the story of their friendship with honesty and candor, reflecting on the power of such intense relationships to change our lives, and the devastating aftermath when those relationships end.
Unlocking The Sky
Unlocking The Sky
Shulman, Seth
¥90.77
Unlocking the Sky tells the extraordinary tale of the race to design, refine, and manufacture a manned flying machine, a race that took place in the air, on the ground, and in the courtrooms of America. While the Wright brothers threw a veil of secrecy over their flying machine, Glenn Hammond Curtiss -- perhaps the greatest aviator and aeronautical inventor of all time -- freely exchanged information with engineers in America and abroad, resulting in his famous airplane, the June Bug, which made the first ever public flight in America. Fiercely jealous, the Wright brothers took to the courts to keep Curtiss and his airplane out of the sky and off the market. Ultimately, however, it was Curtiss's innovations and designs, not the Wright brothers', that served as the model for the modern airplane.
High Steel
High Steel
Rasenberger, Jim
¥90.77
A powerful first-hand account of the many generations and ethnic groups of men who have built America's skyscrapers.From the early days of steel construction in Chicago, through the great boom years of New York city ironwork, and up through the present, High Steel follows the trajectory of careers inextricably linked to both great accomplishment and catastrophic disaster. The personal stories reveal the lives of ironworkers and the dangers they face as they walk across the windswept, swaying summits of tomorrow's skyscrapers, balanced on steel girders sometimes only six inches wide. Rasenberger explores both the greatest accomplishments of ironwork the vaulting bridges and towers that define America's skyline and the deadliest disasters, such as the Quebec Bridge Collapse of 1907, when 75 ironworkers, including 33 Mohawk Indians, fell to their deaths. High Steel is an accessible, thrilling, and vertiginous portrait of the lives of some of our most brave yet unrecognized men.
All My Life
All My Life
Lucci, Susan
¥90.77
"See that moon up thereYou can reach that high. Never be afraid because you can be anything you want to be." Susan Lucci was only five years old when her father shared these encouraging words with her. They inspired the highly imaginative child who loved make-believe to craft one of the most enduring characters in television history, an achievement that would earn her a record twenty-one Emmy nominations the most for an actor in the award's history and the crown as "Leading Lady of Daytime." When Lucci and All My Children were introduced to the world in 1971, American television changed forever. Susan's character, the beautiful, spirited, and mercurial Erica Kane, was an original the first vixen viewers loved to hate. But while millions have enjoyed getting to know Erica's many sides and have been awed at how this character has continually remade herself the woman who plays her has remained a mystery. In her long-awaited memoir, this very private actress, wife, mother, daughter, grandmother, sister, friend, and entrepreneur pulls back the curtain to reveal her story. Susan, like Erica Kane, has undergone a metamorphosis many times. All My Life shares the stories of those transformations: starring in roles on television and stage, where she took Broadway not just by storm but "by tsunami" as one critic raved about her performance in Annie Get Your Gun; mounting successful cabaret acts (solo and with Regis Philbin); bringing art and joy back to New York in the wake of 9/11; conquering the tango with Tony Dovolani on ABC's hit show Dancing with the Stars; and building a successful career as an entrepreneur with a signature line of products. Susan goes beyond her success to talk about the darker moments, too, including the childhood guilt she harbored over the death of her dear grandmother, the car accident that nearly took away her career and her eyesight, her newborn son's life-threatening illness, coping with her husband's cancer, and the pain of miscarriage one of the many parallels between her Erica Kane.As charming, down-to-earth, and compelling as the woman whose story it tells, All My Life shines a spotlight on one of our most popular stars and reminds us of the power of dreams and how we can find the courage and tenacity to make them come true.
Unflinching Courage
Unflinching Courage
Hutchison, Kay Bailey
¥90.77
From New York Times bestselling author and groundbreaking politician Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison comes a history of the extraordinary women who shaped the state of Texas.The only woman ever to represent Texas in the United States Senate, Kay Bailey Hutchison has been a trailblazer in the Lone Star State. Nevertheless, Hutchison is just one of many women who, for two hundred years, have embodied what we've come to recognize as the spirit of Texas rugged independence, fierce loyalty, and an unflappable entrepreneurial streak. In Unflinching Courage, Senator Hutchison tells the dynamic history of her home state through the lives of some of these pioneering women and their remarkable achievements.Among the brave souls Senator Hutchison profiles are Jane Wilkinson Long, the Mother of Texas, and others who claimed a stake in the land when it struggled under Spanish and Mexican rule; Dilue Rose Harris, whose memoir of the Runaway Scrape exhibits the strength so many women were forced to call upon as the Texas Revolution drew able-bodied husbands, sons, and brothers to the battlefield; Margaret Houston and Emily Austin Bryan Perry, who stood behind the great leaders of a burgeoning republic and helped usher in a new era of statehood; Henrietta King, Molly Goodnight, Sarah Cockrell, and Oveta Culp Hobby, ranchers and entrepreneurs who have helped Texas thrive; and numerous others who valiantly held their ground in the face of raids and unimaginable violence. In Unflinching Courage, Senator Hutchison pays tribute to these extraordinary Texan women whose lives inspire us today and will continue to do so for generations to come.
Red Sox Rule
Red Sox Rule
Holley, Michael
¥90.77
The story of the changing face of baseball and the inner workings of its finest organization After a hundred "cursed" years, the Boston Red Sox rose gloriously to baseball domination. Under the leadership of manager Terry Francona, an extraordinary team of wildly disparate personalities from the inscrutable Manny Ramirez to the affable David "Big Papi" Ortiz pulled off two improbable post-season comebacks to make it to the World Series twice in three years . . . and ultimately emerged victorious. In Red Sox Rule, Michael Holley, bestselling author of Patriot Reign, provides a fascinating, insightful, and surprising inside look at how it all happened.With the exclusive cooperation of Terry Francona and stories from the clubhouse and the conference room, Holley reveals the private sessions and the dugout and front-office strategies that have made the Red Sox a budding dynasty, overtaking their archrivals, the powerful New York Yankees, as the American League's elite team.
A-Rod
A-Rod
Roberts, Selena
¥90.77
Alex Rodriguez is the highest-paid player in the history of baseball, a once-in-a-generation talent poised to break many of the sport's most hallowed records. In 2007 he became the youngest player, at 32, ever to hit 500 home runs, solidifying his status as the greatest player in the modern game, and months later he signed a contract that would keep him with the Yankees through the end of his career. His reputation changed drastically in February 2009 when Selena Roberts broke the news in Sports Illustrated that A-Rod had used performance-enhancing drugs during his 2003 MVP season with the Texas Rangers. Her report prompted a contrite Rodriguez to admit illegal drug use during his 2001–2003 seasons with the Rangers, who had signed him to the most expensive contract in Major League Baseball history. Although he admitted to three seasons of steroid use, the man teammates call "A-Fraud" was still hiding the truth. In the first definitive biography of Alex Rodriguez, Roberts assembles the strands of a bizarre and extraordinary life: from his boyhood in New York and the Dominican Republic through his near-mythic high school career and fast track to the big leagues, the whole of A-Rod's career mirrors the rise and fall of the steroid generation. Roberts goes beyond the sensational headlines, probing A-Rod's childhood to reveal a man torn by obligation to his family and the pull of his insatiable hedonism, a conflict--epitomized by his relationship with Madonna and devotion to Kabbalah--that led to the end of his six-year marriage. Roberts sheds new light on A-Rod's abuse of performance-enhancing drugs, a practice he appears to have begun as early as high school and that extended into his Yankee years. She chronicles his secretive real estate deals, gets inside the negotiations for his latest record-breaking contract with the Yankees, and examines the insecurities that compel him to seek support from a motivational guru before every game. In A-Rod, Roberts captures baseball's greatest player as a tragic figure in pinstripes: the man once considered the clean exception of the steroid generation revealed as an unmistakable product of its greed and dissolution.
Immoveable Feast
Immoveable Feast
Baxter, John
¥90.77
A witty cultural and culinary education, Immoveable Feast is the charming, funny, and improbable tale of how a man who was raised on white bread and didn't speak a word of French unexpectedly ended up with the sacred duty of preparing the annual Christmas dinner for a venerable Parisian family.Ernest Hemingway called Paris "a moveable feast" a city ready to embrace you at any time in life. For Los Angeles based film critic John Baxter, that moment came when he fell in love with a French woman and impulsively moved to Paris to marry her. As a test of his love, his skeptical in-laws charged him with cooking the next Christmas banquet for eighteen people in their ancestral country home. Baxter's memoir of his yearlong quest takes readers along his misadventures and delicious triumphs as he visits the farthest corners of France in search of the country's best recipes and ingredients. Irresistible and fascinating, Immoveable Feast is a warmhearted tale of good food, romance, family, and the Christmas spirit, Parisian style.
Promise Ahead
Promise Ahead
Elgin, Duane
¥90.77
When Duane Elgin's classic bestseller, Voluntary Simplicity, was published in 1981, it transformed the lives of thousands and was hailed as the "bible" of the simplicity movement by the Wall Street Journal. Now, for anyone seeking to navigate today's profoundly changing world, Promise Ahead is the powerful sequel to a road map for securing a promising future.
The Freedom Manifesto
The Freedom Manifesto
Hodgkinson, Tom
¥90.77
The author of How to Be Idle, Tom Hodgkinson, now shares his delightfully irreverent musings on what true independence means and what it takes to be free. The Freedom Manifesto draws on French existentialists, British punks, beat poets, hippies and yippies, medieval thinkers, and anarchists to provide a new, simple, joyful blueprint for modern living. From growing your own vegetables to canceling your credit cards to reading Jean-Paul Sartre, here are excellent suggestions for nourishing mind, body, and spirit witty, provocative, sometimes outrageous, yet eminently sage advice for breaking with convention and living an uncluttered, unfettered, and therefore happier, life.