Bad Choices Make Good Stories is a darkly funny coming-of-age novel based on true events. Oliver, a teenage hacker living in Germany, meets Donna online. She's an American girl living in New York. After chatting and talking on the phone for months, he finally decides to surprise her with a visit. But he soon finds out that things are not what they appeared to be, and that this visit will change his life forever."The most engaging memoir I've ever read."★★★★★ (5/5)-Caitlin Lyle Farley, Readers' Favorite"One whirlwind adventure after another. I was enthralled."★★★★ (4/4)-Christina Rose, Online Book Club"This generation's version of Catcher in the Rye. I kid you not. It's that good."★★★★★ (5/5)-Ray Simmons, Readers' Favorite"An important book. Don't miss it!"★★★★★ (5/5)-James Okun, Bookplex
The strange true story of the first influencer Oliver, a hacker living in Germany, meets Donna online. She's an American girl living in New York. After chatting and talking on the phone for months, he finally decides to surprise her with a visit. But he soon finds out that things are not what they appeared to be, and that this visit will change his life forever. “Nobody has ever killed themselves over a broken arm. But every day, thousands of people kill themselves because of a broken heart. Why? Because emotional pain hurts much worse than physical pain.” -Oliver Markus Malloy, Bad Choices Make Good Stories “Don't ever think you're better than a drug addict, because your brain works the same as theirs. You have the same circuits. And drugs would affect your brain in the same way it affects theirs. The same thought process that makes them screw up over and over again would make you screw up over and over as well, if you were in their shoes. You probably already are doing it, just not with heroin or crack, but with food or cigarettes, or something else you shouldn't be doing.” -Oliver Markus Malloy, Bad Choices Make Good Stories "A must read. One of those rare books that sucks you in from the first to the last page." ★★★★★ - Amazon Review (Alternate cover edition)
Special Anniversary Omnibus: Get all three books for the price of one! _____ Part 1: Going to New York _____ The strange true story of the first influencer. Oliver, a hacker living in Germany, meets Donna online. She's an American girl living in New York. After chatting and talking on the phone for months, he finally decides to surprise her with a visit. But he soon finds out that things are not what they appeared to be, and that this visit will change his life forever. “Nobody has ever killed themselves over a broken arm. But every day, thousands of people kill themselves because of a broken heart. Why? Because emotional pain hurts much worse than physical pain.” -Oliver Markus Malloy, Bad Choices Make Good Stories “Don't ever think you're better than a drug addict, because your brain works the same as theirs. You have the same circuits. And drugs would affect your brain in the same way it affects theirs. The same thought process that makes them screw up over and over again would make you screw up over and over as well, if you were in their shoes. You probably already are doing it, just not with heroin or crack, but with food or cigarettes, or something else you shouldn't be doing.” -Oliver Markus Malloy, Bad Choices Make Good Stories "A must read. One of those rare books that sucks you in from the first to the last page." ★★★★★ - Amazon Review _____ Part 2: The Heroin Scene in Fort Myers _____ America has a heroin problem. Oliver moves from New York to Florida. Battling with depression, he gets sucked into the seedy underworld of Fort Myers, where he encounters a number of female drug addicts. He empathizes with them because of his own traumatic past. Oliver feels compelled to try to help them escape the addict lifestyle, but learns the hard way that he is in way over his head. "A truly fascinating and unexpected look at the darker side of addiction." ★★★★★ - A. Allyson, Goodreads _____ Part 3: Finding Happiness in Los Angeles _____ If you're a fan of Dave Chappelle or John Oliver, you'll love this book. After writing a book about his bizarre adventures in America's underbelly, Oliver finally finds love among his readers on Goodreads. "I think it will become a standard for people who are dealing with loved ones struggling with addictions." ★★★★★ - B. Bridges, Amazon Review Dear Reader, You're a little late to the party. Where the hell have you been? This is already the third and final part of the trilogy, and you're only joining us now? Tsk tsk tsk. Let me get you up to speed on what you've missed so far: In book one, Going to New York, you missed the utterly fascinating, nay spellbinding saga of me growing up in Germany and later emigrating to New York. I was a brooding, troubled teenage hacker. Wow! Good stuff! It's almost like my life was the perfect kind of crazy to make a really awesome book! Anyway, being a teenage hacker came in handy later in life. I went from rags to riches thanks to my keen understanding of technology and how to use the web to my advantage. In New York I was married to Donna, a girl I had met online. She was an agoraphobic, prone to temper tantrums. And fun was had by all, which led to a divorce 16 years later. That's where the story gets really interesting. I began dating. It didn't go well. I was no good at it. OK, truth be told, I was really bad at it. Apparently I had terrible taste in women. A heroin-addicted hooker named Alice broke my heart and robbed me of my will to live. Doesn't sound very fun, does it? But it's a fun read, I promise. Dark, but fun. Mesmerizing even! Brokenhearted, I moved from New York to Florida. That's where the first book ends. The second book you missed (I'm not mad at you. I'm just disappointed.) is called The Heroin Scene in Fort Myers, which is a very fitting title, believe me. Sometimes I'm a slow learner, so I dated my way through the heroin scene in Florida, and I couldn't figure out for years why I wasn't finding any wife material. But oh how I tried. And tried. In all the wrong places. Pretty sad. I'm not proud of it. After years of sad pathetic sex with heroin addicts I was a wreck. My younger self wouldn't have even recognized me. Lucy and Veronica had turned me into a broken, humiliated shell of a man. My heart had been ripped out of my chest so many times, it was a miracle I hadn't killed myself yet. (Seriously, it's a fun read. I promise!) At the end of the book I had it up to here with heroin addicts. I told myself never again would I let myself be sucked in by the sweet lies of manipulative, fake love. The name of the final chapter was NO MO HO. No more whores. I needed to change my life before my life was going to kill me. I hopped on a plane, back to my native Germany, to lick my wounds and heal before returning to America. That's where the second book ended. And now, for our third and final act...
This book is about all the ways that I, and millions of people with autism, experience the world.When I was in high school, I attended a seminar for people with Asperger's. There was another individual there (pretty safe bet he was on the spectrum) who raised his hand and repeated the cliché "there's no normal." He said, "We're all different! We're all weird in our own way! So, there really is no such thing as normal."I raised my hand and said, "You know what? That's bullsh*t. There is such thing as normal! The difference between us and everybody else is that they all have quirks that fall within the range of what society considers normal, and we fall outside that range." I almost felt bad, because he didn't have much to say after that.I encourage you to read our first book, Chasing the Rabbit, because it will give you a very different perspective on my life, as it's mostly written from my dad's point of view.The first book I wrote (with my dad) was Chasing the Rabbit: A Dad's Life Raising a Son on the Spectrum. My dad chose that title--he always describes me with the analogy of a greyhound chasing a mechanical rabbit: the greyhound can see the rabbit but can never catch it. My dad says that the rabbit represents normal, and I'm the greyhound. As someone with Asperger's--what's now called "high-functioning autism"--I am always trying to be "normal." I know what "normal" is, and I know what "normal" looks like, but I am perpetually trying to catch the rabbit, which is "normality." A lot of people have an issue with the term "normal." I don't. When people say things like, "There's no such thing as normal," it devalues the struggle I go through every day.
Set yourself up for success in every season of life, for the rest of your life. Discover five game-changing questions to ask every time you make a major decision regarding your finances, relationships, career, and more. Good questions lead to better decisions. And your decisions determine the direction and quality of your life—they create the story of your life. And while nobody plans to complicate their life with bad decisions, far too many people have no plan to make good decisions. In Better Decisions, Fewer Regrets, Andy Stanley—pastor and bestselling author of Irresistible and Not In It To Win It—will help you learn from experience and stop making bad decisions by integrating five questions into every decision you make, big or small. This book will help you live differently by showing you how to: Develop a decision-making filter that reveals which choices will likely lead to positive results. Avoid selling yourself on bad ideas and making quick decisions when time is short. Find truth and clarity in any tricky decision. Improve relationships and heal division through better decisions. Discover the reasons behind your decisions so you can move forward with positive changes. Consider the long-term impact of your choices so you can write a life story worth celebrating. Easily identify any red flags that signal which decisions may result in future regrets.
Being a writer can mean navigating a lonely and confusing path. Bad Choices can help make the road a little easier. Is this a craft book? Encouragement and support for those who are stuck or feeling as though they don't have what it takes? A meditation on why write in the first place? Yes to all of those things. Bad Choices Make Good Stories is a collection of essays about craft, revision, and the community and struggles that go along with the writing life. Author Erin Dionne has taught writing for over two decades, has published seven novels and two picture books, and shares her experience--peppered with a healthy dose of humor--with readers in this honest and funny collection.
The strange true story of a writer who falls in love with one of his readers and meets his future wife on Goodreads. Dear Reader, You're a little late to the party. Where the hell have you been? This is already the third and final part of the trilogy, and you're only joining us now? Tsk tsk tsk. Let me get you up to speed on what you've missed so far: In book one, Going to New York, you missed the utterly fascinating, nay spellbinding saga of me growing up in Germany and later emigrating to New York. I was a brooding, troubled teenage hacker. Wow! Good stuff! It's almost like my life was the perfect kind of crazy to make a really awesome book! Anyway, being a teenage hacker came in handy later in life. I went from rags to riches thanks to my keen understanding of technology and how to use the web to my advantage. In New York I was married to Donna, a girl I had met online. She was an agoraphobic, prone to temper tantrums. And fun was had by all, which led to a divorce 16 years later. That's where the story gets really interesting. I began dating. It didn't go well. I was no good at it. OK, truth be told, I was really bad at it. Apparently I had terrible taste in women. A heroin-addicted hooker named Alice broke my heart and robbed me of my will to live. Doesn't sound very fun, does it? But it's a fun read, I promise. Dark, but fun. Mesmerizing even! Brokenhearted, I moved from New York to Florida. That's where the first book ends. The second book you missed (I'm not mad at you. I'm just disappointed.) is called The Heroin Scene in Fort Myers, which is a very fitting title, believe you me. Sometimes I'm a slow learner, so I dated my way through the heroin scene in Florida, and I couldn't figure out for years why I wasn't finding any wife material. But oh how I tried. And tried. In all the wrong places. Pretty sad. I'm not proud of it. After years of sad pathetic sex with heroin addicts I was a wreck. My younger self wouldn't have even recognized me. Lucy and Veronica had turned me into a broken, humiliated shell of a man. My heart had been ripped out of my chest so many times, it was a miracle I hadn't killed myself yet. (Seriously, it's a fun read. I promise!) At the end of the book I had it up to here with heroin addicts. I told myself never again would I let myself be sucked in by the sweet lies of manipulative, fake love. The name of the final chapter was NO MO HO. No more whores. I needed to change my life before my life was going to kill me. I hopped on a plane, back to my native Germany, to lick my wounds and heal before returning to America. That's where the second book ended. And now, for our third and final act...
FOREWORD BY GUY KAWASAKI Presentation designer and internationally acclaimed communications expert Garr Reynolds, creator of the most popular Web site on presentation design and delivery on the Net — presentationzen.com — shares his experience in a provocative mix of illumination, inspiration, education, and guidance that will change the way you think about making presentations with PowerPoint or Keynote. Presentation Zen challenges the conventional wisdom of making "slide presentations" in today’s world and encourages you to think differently and more creatively about the preparation, design, and delivery of your presentations. Garr shares lessons and perspectives that draw upon practical advice from the fields of communication and business. Combining solid principles of design with the tenets of Zen simplicity, this book will help you along the path to simpler, more effective presentations.
Once upon a time there was a war . . . and a young American who thought of himself as the Quiet American and the Ugly American, and who wished to be neither, who wanted instead to be the Wise American, or the Good American, but who eventually came to witness himself as the Real American and finally as simply the Fucking American. That’s me. This is the story of Skip Sands—spy-in-training, engaged in Psychological Operations against the Vietcong—and the disasters that befall him thanks to his famous uncle, a war hero known in intelligence circles simply as the Colonel. This is also the story of the Houston brothers, Bill and James, young men who drift out of the Arizona desert into a war in which the line between disinformation and delusion has blurred away. In its vision of human folly, and its gritty, sympathetic portraits of men and women desperate for an end to their loneliness, whether in sex or death or by the grace of God, this is a story like nothing in our literature. Tree of Smoke is Denis Johnson’s first full-length novel in nine years, and his most gripping, beautiful, and powerful work to date. Tree of Smoke is the 2007 National Book Award Winner for Fiction.
