Authors: Kelly Corrigan.
Audio Cassette, pages
Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Publication Date: 2008-01-08
Edition: Unabridged

Reviews :

    In a coming of age memoir about a woman who loved being a girl and the things that made her finally grow up, Kelly Corrigan brilliantly explores the "middle place" between childhood and adulthood, and how one woman made the leap to the other side.

"The thing you need to know about me," she begins, "is that I am George Corrigan's daughter, his only daughter." Intertwining her own story with that of her larger-than-life, Irish-American, born-salesman father, Corrigan illustrates an unbelievably powerful and healing father/daughter relationship which evolves as they both must battle cancer.

Uplifting without shying away from the realities of illness, Corrigan's highly personal story examines what it means when the one person who has been your source of strength is in need of some himself, and that bittersweet "in between" moment when you're a devoted wife and mother, but you'll always be daddy's girl....

Authors: Danielle Steel.
Audio Cassette, pages
Publisher: Random House Audio
Publication Date: 1998-09-08
Edition: Unabridged

Reviews :

    "This is the story of an extraordinary boy with a brilliant mind, a heart of gold, and a tortured soul. It is the story of an illness, a fight to live, and a race against death."

From the day he was born, Nick Traina was his mother's joy. By nineteen, he was dead. This is Danielle Steel's powerful personal story of the son she lost and the lessons she learned during his courageous battle against darkness. Sharing tender, painful memories and Nick's remarkable journals, Steel brings us a haunting duet between a singular young man and the mother who loved him--and a harrowing portrait of a masked killer called manic depression, which afflicts between two and three million Americans.

Nick rocketed through life like a shooting star. Signs of his illness were subtle, often paradoxical. He spoke in full sentences at age one. He was a brilliant, charming child who never slept. And at first, even his mother explained away his quicksilver moods. Nick always marched to a different drummer. His gift for writing was extraordinary, his musical talent promised a golden future. But by the time he entered junior high, Danielle Steel saw her beloved son hurtling toward disaster and tried desperately to get Nick the help he needed--the opening salvos of what would become a ferocious pitched battle for his life.

Even as he struggled, Nick's charisma and accomplishments remained undimmed. He bared his soul in his journal with uncanny insight, in searing prose, poetry, and song. When he was finally diagnosed and treated, it bought time, but too little. In the end, perhaps nothing could have saved him from the insidious disease that had shadowed him from his earliest years.

At once a loving legacy and an unsparing depiction of a devastating illness, Danielle Steel's tribute to her lost son is a gift of life, hope, healing, and understanding to us all....

    It's hard to listen to any story that deals with the loss of a child, but Danielle Steel's memoir of her son, Nick Traina, is both tender and engrossing. In this unabridged audio version of His Bright Light, Steel leads us through Nick's battle with manic depression and her fight to help him survive. Although Steel herself narrates the introduction, actress Traci Godfrey, who portrays the author's strong emotions without becoming maudlin, reads the book. Anyone who has known a loved one affected by depression will identify strongly with Ms. Steel's passionate recollections of her son's life. (Running time: 9.5 hours, two cassettes) --Sharon Griggins...

Authors:
Audio Cassette, pages
Publisher: Random House Audio
Publication Date: 1999-01-19
Edition: Abridged

Reviews :

    3 cassettes / 4 hours
Read by the Author

"Eloquent, detailed, emotionally honest . . . Lamott deserves a prize for telling it like it is." - People

From the bestselling author of Operating Instructions and Bird by Bird comes a chronicle of faith and spirituality that is at once tough, personal, affectionate, wise, and very funny.

With an exuberant mix of passion, insight, and humor, Anne Lamott takes us on a journey through her often troubled past to illuminate her devout but quirky walk of faith.  In a narrative spiced with stories and scripture, with diatribes, laughter, and tears, Lamott tells how, against all odds, she came to believe in God and them, even more miraculously, in herself.  She shows us the myriad ways n which this sustains and guides her, shining the light of faith on the darkest part of ordinary life an exposing surprising pockets of meaning and hope

Whether talking about her family or her dreadlocks, sick children or old friends, the most religious women of her church of the men she's dated, Lamott reveals the hard-won wisdom gathered along her path to connectedness and liberation.

"Anne Lamott is a cause for celebration.  [Her] real genius lies in capturing the ineffable, describing not perfect moments, but imperfect ones . . .  perfectly. She is nothing short of miraculous." - The New Yorker...

    Anne Lamott admits that she's "ever so slightly more anxious than the average hypochondriac." When faced with a small, irregular mole and a family history of skin cancer, however, she remembers her faith in God and enjoys some peace--despite behaving "a little more like Nathan Lane in The Birdcage than I would have hoped." Author Lamott reads these wonderfully detailed postcards from her meandering journey to faith. With sharp and bittersweet humor, she recounts a past full of bad relationships with men, with food, with drugs, with alcohol, and worst of all, with herself. She battles her demons thanks to the love of her friends and family and her "lurch of faith" to embrace religion, that "puzzling thing inside me that had begun to tug on my sleeve from time to time, trying to get my attention." Inspiring but not dogmatic, Traveling Mercies is a treasure. (Running time: 4 hours, 3 cassettes) --C.B. Delaney...

Authors:
Audio Cassette, pages
Publisher: Brilliance Audio Unabridged
Publication Date: 1999-05-20
Edition: Unabridged

Reviews :

    The term fisherwoman does not exactly roll trippingly off the tongue, and Linda Greenlaw, the world's only female swordfish boat captain, isn't flattered when people insist on calling her one. "I am a woman. I am a fisherman... I am not a fisherwoman, fisherlady, or fishergirl. If anything else, I am a thirty-seven-year-old tomboy. It's a word I have never outgrown." Greenlaw also happens to be one of the most successful fishermen in the Grand Banks commercial fleet, though until the publication of Sebastian Junger's The Perfect Storm, "nobody cared." Greenlaw's boat, the Hannah Boden, was the sister ship to the doomed Andrea Gail, which disappeared in the mother of all storms in 1991 and became the focus of Junger's book. The Hungry Ocean, Greenlaw's account of a monthlong swordfishing trip over 1,000 nautical miles out to sea, tells the story of what happens when things go right--proving, in the process, that every successful voyage is a study in narrowly averted disaster.There is the weather, the constant danger of mechanical failure, the perils of controlling five sleep-, women-, and booze-deprived young fishermen in close quarters, not to mention the threat of a bad fishing run: "If we don't catch fish, we don't get paid, period. In short, there is no labor union." Greenlaw's straightforward, uncluttered prose underscores the qualities that make her a good captain, regardless of gender: fairness, physical and mental endurance, obsessive attention to detail. But, ultimately, Greenlaw proves that the love of fishing--in all of its grueling, isolating, suspenseful glory--is a matter of the heart and blood, not the mind. "I knew that the ocean had stories to tell me, all I needed to do was listen." --Svenja Soldovieri...

    The term fisherwoman does not exactly roll trippingly off the tongue, and Linda Greenlaw, the world's only female swordfish boat captain, isn't flattered when people insist on calling her one. "I am a woman. I am a fisherman... I am not a fisherwoman, fisherlady, or fishergirl. If anything else, I am a thirty-seven-year-old tomboy. It's a word I have never outgrown." Greenlaw also happens to be one of the most successful fishermen in the Grand Banks commercial fleet, though until the publication of Sebastian Junger's The Perfect Storm, "nobody cared." Greenlaw's boat, the Hannah Boden, was the sister ship to the doomed Andrea Gail, which disappeared in the mother of all storms in 1991 and became the focus of Junger's book. The Hungry Ocean, Greenlaw's account of a monthlong swordfishing trip over 1,000 nautical miles out to sea, tells the story of what happens when things go right--proving, in the process, that every successful voyage is a study in narrowly averted disaster.

There is the weather, the constant danger of mechanical failure, the perils of controlling five sleep-, women-, and booze-deprived young fishermen in close quarters, not to mention the threat of a bad fishing run: "If we don't catch fish, we don't get paid, period. In short, there is no labor union." Greenlaw's straightforward, uncluttered prose underscores the qualities that make her a good captain, regardless of gender: fairness, physical and mental endurance, obsessive attention to detail. But, ultimately, Greenlaw proves that the love of fishing--in all of its grueling, isolating, suspenseful glory--is a matter of the heart and blood, not the mind. "I knew that the ocean had stories to tell me, all I needed to do was listen." --Svenja Soldovieri ...

Authors: Anne Frank.
Audio Cassette, pages
Publisher: Listening Library (Audio)
Publication Date: 1995-07-01
Edition: Unabridged

Reviews :

    Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl is among the most enduring documents of the twentieth century. Since its publication in 1947, Anne Frank's story has become familiar to millions all over the world, and remains a beloved and deeply admired testament to the indestructible nature of the human spirit.

Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl

The Definitive Edition

Included in this Definitive Edition are diary entries previously omitted from the original, passages which reinforce the fact that Anne was first and foremost a teenage girl, not a remote and flawless symbol. She fretted over her emerging sexuality; often found herself in disagreement with the adults around her; and veered between the carefree nature of a child and the full-fledged sorrow of an adult living under extraordinary conditions and unbearable strain. Anne emerges more triumphantly and heart-breakingly human, more vulnerable, and more vital than ever.

Anne Frank and her family hid in the back of an Amsterdam warehouse for two years in an effort to escape the horrors of Nazi occupation. Only thirteen when her family went into the Secret Annex, she reveals her daily life as the world around them succumbed to the worst horror the modern world had seen, facing hunger, the threat of discovery and death, estrangement from the outside world, and above all, the boredom, the petty misunderstandings, and the frustrations of living in such confined quarters.

A timeless story rediscovered by each new generation, The Diary of a Young Girl stands without peer, and acclaimed actress Winona Ryder brings this unforgettable young woman to life in a stunning performance for listeners of all ages to cherish....

    Anne Frank's diaries have always been among the most moving and eloquent documents of the Holocaust. This new edition restores diary entries omitted from the original edition, revealing a new depth to Anne's dreams, irritations, hardships, and passions. Anne emerges as more real, more human, and more vital than ever. If you've never read this remarkable autobiography, do so. If you have read it, you owe it to yourself to read it again....

Authors: Susan Powter.
Audio Cassette, pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
Publication Date: 1997-10-01


Reviews :

    As an eleven-year-old child in a family ravaged by alcoholism, Susan Powter was one of the youngest members of Alanon. In recent years she has had to confront this disease in herself. With the same fierce determination that took her on a journey to understand and cure her own obesity in her first bestseller, "Stop The Insanity", she set out to find the answers to her own alcoholism. In "Sober... and Staying That Way", Susan Powter shares her discovery of a vitamin-based nutrition program that has yeilded an 80% recovery rate. By combining this treatment with other crucial components-- overcoming the shame associated with the disease, healthy eating, exercise, and education-- Powter devised a program that cured her and will work for millions of others. With "Sober... and Staying That Way", you will be able to: Make the connection between alcoholism and disease Make the connection between politicts, profit, powerful lobbyists, and your sobriety Heal the damage caused by alcoholism Wipe out the morality, weakness-of-will, and powerlessness thinking of current recovery programs At once a personal story, an expose, and a program for lasting recovery, "Sober... and Staying That Way" isn't just for alcoholics. It is for everyone who wants to participate in the solution to a problem that affects us all....

    Alcoholics Anonymous has a 12 percent recovery rate, but what about the remaining 88 percent? "Waiting for the right time to quit, the motivation? Well, there is none," writes Susan Powter in her characteristically direct but chatty style. It's the Powter magic that makes accessible--even persuasive--what has been known in the field for almost 40 years: alcoholism is a biochemical disease. If that's the case, Powter asks in Sober ... and Staying That Way, then why the adamant belief that alcoholism is incurable? Powter's combination of personal disclosure, exposé, and a program for lasting recovery looks soberly at the biochemical and psychological components of alcoholism.

Powter's national prominence as a fitness expert and author of Stop the Insanity! made her disclosure all the more difficult. But it's when Prowter recollects her famous struggle with obesity, drawing from the lessons of goal setting and values searching, that Sober acquires credibility. There was not, she remembers, any instant cure, nor should there be for alcoholism. Recalling the discipline and self-education that preceded her dramatic weight loss, Powter discovered a vitamin-based nutrition program with an 80 percent recovery rate.

Powter presents facts unforgetably: "Did you know that alcohol is one of the richest foods known to man?... This stuff is amazing. It's got calories, it's a food, it gives you energy, but ... it's a food with only calories, nothing else.... Malnutrition. You and I are malnourished." Smart and upbeat--a combination of Powter's triumph over her ordeal with the biochemical and psychological components of recovery--Sober ... and Staying That Way is like a 12-step personal trainer....

Authors: Sue Bender.
Audio Cassette, pages
Publisher: Audio Renaissance
Publication Date: 1995-11-01
Edition: Unabridged

Reviews :

    Sue Bender captivated audiences with her wonderful ability to uncover the special meaning of everyday experience in Plain and Simple. In Everyday Sacred, Bender once again captures moments from her own life that speak powerfully to listeners' shared longings to make every day truly count. Simultaneous harcover release from Harper San Francisco. 2 cassettes....

    When Sue Bender proudly announced to a friend that her first book, Plain and Simple had made it to the New York Times bestseller list, her friend immediately shot back, "But what number on the list are you?" Bender was shocked, realizing that nothing we accomplish seems like enough in our overly pressured world. In Everyday Sacred we follow Bender on her quest to make every moment enough. Cleaning a desk, sipping cappuccino, making computer connections, and appreciating freshly painted walls all become opportunities to satiate one's life with sacred encounters. The end product reads like an Amish quilt--simple vignettes sewn together to create a comfortable lifetime companion....

Authors: James Whitaker.
Audio Cassette, 1 pages
Publisher: Highbridge Audio
Publication Date: 1993-07-01
Edition: Abridged

Reviews :

    This definitive story of the relationship between Charles and Diana includes never-before-revealed information that will have worldwide repercussions on publication. The only journalist to have specialized for over 20 years in writing about the Royal Family, Whitaker knew Princess Diana and her family before she married Prince Charles....

Authors: Elizabeth K. Stratton.
Audio Cassette, pages
Publisher: Sound Ideas
Publication Date: 1996-10-01


Reviews :

    The founder of a spiritual healing school reveals conveys her techniques for a new life, such as meditation, spiritual counseling, psychic self-defense, and the laying-on-of-hands. Read by Elizabeth K. Stratton. ...

Authors: A & E Television Network.
Audio Cassette, pages
Publisher: New Video Group
Publication Date: 1998-03
Edition: Unabridged

Reviews :

    Learn how Earhart followed her dream of flying, and hear radio broadcasts from her final flight in this riveting portrait of the "Queen of the Air."

Documentary, approx. 50 mins....