Memorable Memoirs

Many of our authors have had incredible lives or incredible experiences -- or both! Surely, you can find one or more that sits beside you and keeps you company for years. All are difficult to put down.

 Looking for love in your 40’s, 50’s, 60’s, 70’s and yes, even your 80’s or 90’s? 57 Steps to Paradise will help you navigate dating in midlife and beyond. Lorenz unzips her soul and exposes her foibles during 50 years of men weaving their way in and out of her life, providing a heap of wit and wisdom to help you make life-changing decisions about love and, perhaps, a life partner.

A diverting and informative story of searching for love in mid-life by a divorced social worker, who intertwines entertaining stories of successful love interests with well-known movies containing similar plots and themes. Written as diary entries covering a 15-year period, the author shares openly, in detail, and with insights her experiences with dating, friendships, affairs, and relationships. Written candidly with a light hand and turns of phrase that reflect her personality and make the book hard to put down.

 As a young child, outraged by the hypocrisy she finds in a church that does nothing to alleviate the physical and sexual abuse she experiences on a regular basis, Beth delivers an accusatory youth sermon and gets her family expelled from the church. Having locked the door on God, Beth goes on to raise a family of seven children, learn 17 languages, and enjoy a career that takes her to NASA, Washington, and 24 countries. All the time, however, God keeps knocking at the door, protecting and blessing her, which she realizes only decades later. Ultimately, Beth finds God in a very simple yet most unusual way.

Al Stites has lived a rich 88 years. His orientation toward thinking positively has led him to an incredible 71 jobs, each of them providing him with rich experiences. Many of the people that the author has worked with would be recognized by anyone, ranging from Hal Holbrook to Ethel Kennedy to Prince Borghese of Italy. He has never taken a job because he had to or a job he has not liked. Throughout his life, he has worked not for money but for happiness — and he has had a happy life. How many of us can say the same?

Criminals, innocent victims, perpetrators–all without a voice, driven by their demons to suffer a lifetime of serious mental illness–share their innermost secrets with the author, a clinical and forensic psychologist. Enter the dialogue: open to the first page. You won’t stop reading!

When she was a child, her father said that he had “good blood” and it was why he and his wife survived and healed from the Holocaust. The author searched for the meaning and significance of her father’s words over two continents and through four generations. Her journey uncovered a unique voice of wisdom revealing mysteries of the healing powers within us and the existence of light in every situation that helps us overcome and transcend any obstacle.

This book is a quest into the depth of the human spirit. It is a rich family memoir, being deeply personal, sharing pain and joy and fear and forgiveness. It encompasses the themes of life and a topic in common with every reader: complicated family relationships.

Endorsed by Pam Huston and Dr. Norm Shealy.

In speaking about Healing from Incest, Susan J. Lewis, Ph.D., J.D., Healing writes: “”Brave, profound, touching, healing. This well-written, honest book takes the reader inside the complexities of the therapeutic healing process from the patient and therapist’s unique perspective. It is the story of hard work, hope, commitment and recovery!” Healing from Incest tells the journey of a victim-turned-survivor, working with her therapist to find healing. Readers are pulled into the therapeutic process as Henderson relates her conversations and feelings as a victim of child abuse and Emerton interprets those feelings and describes interventions. For those who recognize this as their own story, this frank and genuine narrative will be reassuring in its descriptions of one woman’s journey toward hope and healing. About the front cover: kintsukuroi(n.) (v. phr.) “to repair with gold”; the art of repairing pottery with gold or silver lacquer and understanding that the piece is more beautiful for having been broken.

Abandoned, neglected and beaten by a mother who really did care about her but suffered from her own demons and addictions, left with friends and relatives, as well as placed in foster homes, molested and raped on more than one occasion, including by men considered upright, the little girl who grew up to become an educator, minister, and entrepreneur learned to survive by running away again and again. This heartbreaking and heartwarming story, told with courageous frankness, reveals a deep trust in God that, in the long run, promoted an unbelievable resilience, allowing a young girl, turned young woman, to forgive those who hurt her and to reach out to all those who hurt with a message of healing and hope.

Las historias que se han seleccionado para este texto, de alguna manera se asemejan en ciertos aspectos a nuestras propias vivencias. Vivencias en el amar, en el perdonar, en el arte de reír, en la nostalgia del llorar, en el correr – a veces – sin sentido, en el trabajar desenfrenadamente, en el no saber para que estamos y para que andamos de tanta prisa.

A heaping slice of old-fashioned Southern storytelling, this book gives readers a taste of genuine American life that will keep them coming back for more. Join the journey as a preacher’s kid survives his father’s stern discipline, rattlesnakes, and harvesting okra. The deep-fried characters are unforgettable, and the furry and feathered folks will steal the heart of animal lovers. Soaked in faith, people survived the lean, mean times, thanks to the velvet hearts they carried under their calluses, hard work, the good sense to laugh at themselves, and, often, the hand of God. What a delightful legacy they left us! Once you pick up this book, you’ll be pleading, “Don’t stop now and don’t ever grow up!”

Humanity is astonishingly diverse, and that reality can be at the same moment both beautiful and disconcerting. One of our greatest challenges as a species has been and continues to be how to hold with respect our almost endless diversity while at the same time recognizing our common humanity. How can we come together? Where do we even begin? This book describes how and why a child born into a Jewish family, who still walks the path of Judaism, grew up to become an Interfaith minister who calls all of humanity his family.

It was every parent’s worst nightmare. On a sun-drenched morning in April 2012, a Maryland state trooper knocked on Betty Shaw’s front door and delivered the grim news that her 17-year-old daughter, Liz, had been involved in a horrible car accident and was clinging to life
Liz recovered from her life-threatening injuries but suffered  permanent effects from the accident. Texting while driving caused Liz’s crash, and she and her mother went on a mission to educate people about the perils of distracted driving. The pair began to speak before various groups, and as their popularity grew, they launched a video about Liz’s story which went viral, spawning magazine and online articles, as well as several TV appearances, including one on Oprah Winfrey’s show.

In One Simple Text, Betty Shaw recounts her daughter’s frightening and arduous but ultimately uplifting and inspirational journey. Betty chronicles Liz’s ordeal from the day of the accident and provides a glimpse of their life on the speaking circuit. This is a poignant memoir about a young woman who triumphed over tragedy; a mother and daughter’s love; and the indomitable power of the human spirit.

Road to Damascus describes the Middle Eastern journey of an American who meets and falls in love with a Syrian when they are both attending school in New York. Giving up her country and her religion to follow her husband back to Syria, Elaine Imady has made a life that has successfully bridged two cultures and two continents. Raising three bi-cultural, bilingual children, Elaine has important insights to offer to readers from either the West or the Middle East about how we can all not only get along with each other but learn to love each other. Her life is symbolic of the best of what can be when two cultures come together.

The Optimistic Food Addict explores the author’s journey through recovery from binge eating disorder. Inspirational, honest, and motivating, this book is guaranteed to contribute significantly to the recovery of readers who also suffer from food addiction as they feel the gritty, raw truth behind the author’s words.

Tucker & Me: Growing Up A Part-Time Southern Boy is the story of a child growing up in the Mad Men era of the 1960’s. Filled with humor, sadness, and harrowing incidents, the memoir refl ects all the emotions of life one experiences growing up, in this case, with a single mom who lived in Los Angeles and a father who lived in a small town suburb of Atlanta, Georgia known as Tucker. Traveling in the summers to the alternate universe in Tucker, the author experienced a roller coaster ride of two completely different lifestyles.