Parenting Memoir

Hollywood Park is a remarkable memoir of a tumultuous life. Mikel Jollett was born into one of the country’s most infamous cults and subjected to a childhood filled with poverty, addiction, and emotional abuse. Yet, ultimately, his is a story of fierce love and family loyalty told in a raw, poetic voice that signals the emergence of a uniquely gifted writer.

Building from Bunny’s viral memes, Hello Higher Self is a self-care manifesto, calling on listeners to radically shift their perspectives from the Learned Hierarchal Beliefs (LHBs) we’ve all internalized to the self-acceptance we were born into, aka our Higher Selves. This book shines a light into eighteen areas of life where LHBs often lurk—from creativity, to work, to relationships, to race, to sexual pleasure. Bunny’s mix of meditative advice, written exercises, and personal examples make for a jaw-dropping listen.

The Buchmans on Mad About You taught us a lot about love, but mostly they taught us how to laugh. Listen to the couple's male half, Paul Reiser, talk about Couplehood and Babyhood in these two hysterically funny and poignant audiobooks.

Natalie Goldberg has been writing for the past fifty years. But at the beginning of the pandemic, she suddenly wasn’t able to write anymore. Her imaginative wellspring had dried up, and she was forced to ask herself: what do I do when what has always worked for me doesn’t work anymore? In this beautifully written, inspiring personal account, Natalie shares her harrowing journey out of creative paralysis and back onto the page.

When Christa Brown first spoke out about the sexual abuse she endured in her Texas childhood church, she never imagined it would expose the ethical chasm at the core of the Southern Baptist Convention: male religious leaders so focused on institutional protection that they sacrifice the safety of children. A book about speaking out and speaking up, Baptistland weaves together Christa’s revealing story of hope amid Southern patriarchy and religious fundamentalism.

Death is undeniable and unavoidable. We must accept it; there is no other choice. But coming to terms with our mortality can profoundly influence how we live—and how we die. Having been a hospice nurse for decades, Penny Hawkins Smith is an expert on death and dying. As a recovering alcoholic and former drug addict, she knows what it means to change course and become a meaningful contributor to society. Through her work with death, Penny found her purpose in life. In Influencing Death, Penny brings transparency and levity to the grim topic of death.

In her hit Netflix comedy special Baby Cobra, an eight-month pregnant Ali Wong resonated so strongly that she even became a popular Halloween costume. Wong told the world her remarkably unfiltered thoughts on marriage, sex, Asian culture, working women, and why you never see new mom comics on stage but you sure see plenty of new dads.

In Dad is Fat, stand-up comedian Jim Gaffigan, who’s best known for his legendary riffs on Hot Pockets, bacon, manatees, and McDonald's, expresses all the joys and horrors of life with five young children - everything from cousins ("celebrities for little kids") to toddlers’ communication skills ("they always sound like they have traveled by horseback for hours to deliver important news"), to the eating habits of four-year-olds ("there is no difference between a four-year-old eating a taco and throwing a taco on the floor").

Damian is just seven when he is taken in by foster carer Cathy Glass. His mother, Rachel, loves her three young children dearly, but she is vulnerable, naïve and unable to cope on her own. Cathy sets about helping Damian overcome his eating issues, with the hope that he will eventually return home. But when Rachel’s new boyfriend, Troy, arrives on the scene, Cathy becomes deeply concerned. She soon realises that Damian and his siblings are in great danger.

After years of suffering multiple forms of abuse, a vulnerable young girl flees her home only to land straight into the arms of her biological father - a sexual predator. My Daddy the Pedophile tells the harrowing true story of a teenage girl’s affair with her manipulative sociopathic father. After a terrible dark secret comes to light, the real story unfolds and her courageous journey of healing begins.

By the time she was in her late 20s, Tara Schuster was a rising TV executive who had worked for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and helped launch Key & Peele to viral superstardom. By all appearances, she had mastered being a grown-up. But beneath that veneer of success, she was a chronically anxious, self-medicating mess. No one knew that her road to adulthood had been paved with depression, anxiety, and shame. Buy Yourself the F*cking Lilies is the story of Tara’s path to re-parenting herself and becoming a "ninja of self-love".

Four years before Nina Totenberg was hired at NPR, where she cemented her legacy as a prizewinning reporter, and nearly twenty-two years before Ruth Bader Ginsburg was appointed to the Supreme Court, Nina called Ruth. A reporter for The National Observer, Nina was curious about Ruth’s legal brief, asking the Supreme Court to do something revolutionary: declare a law that discriminated “on the basis of sex” to be unconstitutional. That call launched a remarkable, nearly fifty-year friendship.

Eva Hagberg Fisher spent her lonely youth looking everywhere for connection: drugs, alcohol, therapists, boyfriends, girlfriends. Sometimes she found it, but always temporarily. Then, at age 30, an undiscovered mass in her brain ruptured. So did her life. A brain surgery marked only the beginning of a long journey, and when her illness hit a critical stage, it forced her to finally admit the long suppressed truth: she was vulnerable, she needed help, and she longed to grow. She needed true friendship for the first time.

The Marshalls were the model family of Tom’s River, New Jersey, living the American dream and seemingly in possession of all that money could buy. Rob Marshall, a successful insurance broker, was the big breadwinner, king of the country-club set. Maria Marshall was his stunningly beautiful wife and the perfect mom to their three great kids.Then one night, while the couple drove home from Atlantic City, Rob, his head bloodied, reported Maria had been brutally slain. Sympathy poured in - until disquieting facts began to surface....

In 1995, Jean-Dominique Bauby was the editor-in-chief of French Elle, the father of two young childen, a 44-year-old man known and loved for his wit, his style, and his impassioned approach to life. By the end of the year he was also the victim of a rare kind of stroke to the brainstem. After 20 days in a coma, Bauby awoke into a body which had all but stopped working: only his left eye functioned, allowing him to see and, by blinking it, to make clear that his mind was unimpaired.

Held against her will and raped by her 38-year-old boss, 19-year-old Anna tries to make sense of her unbelievable situation. How did an innocent friendship with her boss turn into weeks of forced sex and the inability to leave her oppressor's side? Furthermore, what happens when weeks of rape result in a pregnancy? This true-life novel depicts a graphic and raw recounting of the unimaginable horrors of the Summer of 2010.

Trish Hinde, 35, was sexually abused by her father, Gerard King, from the age of six. Alone and scared, she internalised her trauma and began suffering from violent seizures. Her father took responsibility for her epilepsy care, even abusing her on hospital visits. Trish and her five siblings were neglected, often relying on neighbours for food and watching helplessly as bailiffs carried away their possessions. In her early teens, Trish was recklessly promiscuous and became a victim of child sexual exploitation, often finding herself in danger.

How much better would your world be if you deliberately trained and developed your confidence, competence, discipline, motivation, mental toughness, and more - like an elite member of the Special Operations community? Whether fighting the war against terrorism or applying their mentality and leadership principles in the marketplace and at home, this book is for anyone who wants to cultivate the champion mindset required to do more and win.

Harrison Scott Key was born in Memphis, but he grew up in Mississippi, among pious, Bible-reading women and men who either shot things or got women pregnant. At the center of his world was his larger-than-life father - a hunter, a fighter, and a football coach. Harrison, with his love of books and excessive interest in hugging, couldn't have been less like Pop, and when it became clear that he was not able to kill anything very well or otherwise make his father happy, he resolved to become everything his father was not.

When Seán Hewitt meets Elias, the two fall headlong into a love story. But as Elias struggles with severe mental illness, they soon come face-to-face with crisis. All Down Darkness Wide is a perceptive and unflinching meditation on the burden of living in a world that too often sets happiness and queer life at odds, and a tender and honest portrayal of what it’s like to be caught in the undertow of a loved one’s deep depression. As lives are made and unmade, this memoir asks what love can endure and what it cannot.