Terror strides across the galaxy. The elite who command the wealth of an entire planet. Each is given a warning of impending assassination. Each is surrounded by bodyguards. But in every case, the death-stroke falls on time. The veterans of a thousand offworld battles. He is the Matador; she's the quick-draw chief of the local cools. They alone can stop the march of Brother Death. Against them all stand the Few, the fanatical secret brotherhood. Armed with the secrets of a lost civilization, they revel in their own powers of destruction. And they obey one voice ... Brother Death.
This remarkable book by the distinguished journalist Cyrus Sulzberger is in a modern sense comparable to Burton’s famous The Anatomy of Melancholy. My Brother Death is a thoughtful and finely written effort to discern just what death is, to define both it and its relationship to man, to discuss how to meet its inevitable approach and what may lie beyond. To accomplish this purpose Mr. Sulzberger draws heavily from the history of human thought and experience, from all the principal religions of East and West; from the philosophers, saints, kings and heroes who one by one have crossed to the unknown. He documents and dramatizes the entire panorama of the ways in which men die: by acts curiously attributed to the God of disaster, pestilence, famine and illness; by man’s own hand in murder, war, cannibalism, capital punishment and religious persecution. How does death approach and how and why do the brave best prepare to meet it? Not only does the author introduce the reader to the reflections of outstanding men upon their final des tiny; he himself has spent many years contemplating this problem which is everyone’s secret concern. He has personally investigated death on many battlefields and on all seven continents of this earth. By these investigations and by his own deep study of history, philosophy and the dimly remembered customs of our atavistic past, he has assembled a fascinating and, in a sense, comforting picture of human courage, a courage that triumphs over human evil. This sad but lovely tale of eternity and our own role in its embrace begins appropriately on a happy little Greek island. It ends there, aeons later, among “the soft Aegean waters that bear me northward and backward into time.”
The trauma of losing a sibling when we are in our adult years is one of the most unrecognized and undertreated areas of psychology. There is no other loss in adult life that appears to be so neglected as the death of a brother or sister, says bereavement specialist and psychologist, Therese Rando. And Rando is just one expert author Berman interviews in this moving book about loss. We see here how, when an adult dies, the parents, spouse, and children of that person become the focus, but brothers and sisters most often fall to the sidelines and are left to find a way to deal with the grief and recover alone. Yet, when a brother or sister dies, we lose our longest lifetime companion, someone with whom we have shared an intimate family history. And, in most cases, that was someone for whom we had conflicted feelings: shared identity yet competitive feelings, pride yet jealousy, love yet hate. Most of us come to make peace with the relationship at some point. How to make peace with the death of the sibling - which can conjure up a well of feelings, from wishing you were closer to wanting to change some past events you shared - can haunt an adult. But author Claire Berman, who lost her own sister to heart disease in the week of September 11, 2001, when America lost its innocence, takes us into the emotional world of sibling loss, showing us how to understand and navigate the aftermath of a loss that can leave adults feeling angry, confused, guilty, empty, or just like Berman, wanting to hit that speed dial button still marked with her sister's name.
When T.J. Wray lost her 43-year-old brother, her grief was deep and enduring and, she soon discovered, not fully acknowledged. Despite the longevity of adult sibling relationships, surviving siblings are often made to feel as if their grief is somehow unwarranted. After all, when an adult sibling dies, he or she often leaves behind parents, a spouse, and even children—all of whom suffer a more socially recognized type of loss. Based on the author's own experiences, as well as those of many others, Surviving the Death of a Sibling helps adults who have lost a brother or sister to realize that they are not alone in their struggle. Just as important, it teaches them to understand the unique stages of their grieving process, offering practical and prescriptive advice for dealing with each stage. In Surviving the Death of a Sibling, T.J. Wray discusses: • Searching for and finding meaning in your sibling's passing • Using a grief journal to record your emotions • Choosing a grief partner to help you through tough times • Dealing with insensitive remarks made by others Warm and personal, and a rich source of useful insights and coping strategies, Surviving the Death of a Sibling is a unique addition to the literature of bereavement.
The space between life and death is a moment. But it will remain alive in me for hundreds of thousands of future moments. One phone call. That's all it took to change Stephanie Wittels Wachs' life forever.. Her younger brother Harris, a star in the comedy world known for his work on shows like Parks and Recreation, had died of a heroin overdose. How do you make sense of such a tragic end to a life of so much hilarious brilliance? In beautiful, unsentimental, and surprisingly funny prose, Stephanie Wittels Wachs alternates between her brother's struggle with addiction, which she learned about three days before her wedding, and the first year after his death, in all its emotional devastation. This compelling portrait of a comedic genius and a profound exploration of the love between siblings is A Year of Magical Thinking for a new generation of readers. A heartbreaking but hopeful memoir of addiction, grief, and family, Everything is Horrible and Wonderful will make you laugh, cry, and wonder if that possum on the fence is really your brother's spirit animal.
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The funny, sad, super-honest, all-true story of Chelsea Handler’s year of self-discovery—featuring a nerdily brilliant psychiatrist, a shaman, four Chow Chows, some well-placed security cameras, various family members (living and departed), friends, assistants, and a lot of edibles A SKIMM READS PICK • “This will be one of your favorite books of all time.”—Amy Schumer In a haze of vape smoke on a rare windy night in L.A. in the fall of 2016, Chelsea Handler daydreams about what life will be like with a woman in the White House. And then Donald Trump happens. In a torpor of despair, she decides that she’s had enough of the privileged bubble she’s lived in—a bubble within a bubble—and that it’s time to make some changes, both in her personal life and in the world at large. At home, she embarks on a year of self-sufficiency—learning how to work the remote, how to pick up dog shit, where to find the toaster. She meets her match in an earnest, brainy psychiatrist and enters into therapy, prepared to do the heavy lifting required to look within and make sense of a childhood marked by love and loss and to figure out why people are afraid of her. She becomes politically active—finding her voice as an advocate for change, having difficult conversations, and energizing her base. In the process, she develops a healthy fixation on Special Counsel Robert Mueller and, through unflinching self-reflection and psychological excavation, unearths some glittering truths that light up the road ahead. Thrillingly honest, insightful, and deeply, darkly funny, Chelsea Handler’s memoir keeps readers laughing, even as it inspires us to look within and ask ourselves what really matters in our own lives. Praise for Life Will Be the Death of Me “You thought you knew Chelsea Handler—and she thought she knew herself—but in her new book, she discovers that true progress lies in the direction we haven’t been.”—Gloria Steinem “I always wondered what it would be like to watch Chelsea Handler in session with her therapist. Now I know.”—Ellen DeGeneres “I love this book not just because it made me laugh or because I learned that I feel the same way about certain people in politics as Chelsea does. I love this book because I feel like I finally really got to know Chelsea Handler after all these years. Thank you for sharing, Chelsea!”—Tiffany Haddish
A Richard and Judy Book club selection. In the summer of 1990, Cathy's brother Matty was knocked down by a car on the way home from a night out. It was two weeks before his GCSE results, which turned out to be the best in his school. Sitting by his unconscious body in hospital, holding his hand and watching his heartbeat on the monitors, Cathy and her parents willed him to survive. They did not know then that there are many and various fates worse than death. This is the story of what happened to Cathy and her brother, and the unimaginable decision that she and her parents had to make eight years after the night that changed everything. It's a story for anyone who has ever watched someone suffer or lost someone they loved or lived through a painful time that left them forever changed. Told with boundless warmth and affection, The Last Act of Love by Cathy Rentzenbrink is a heartbreaking yet uplifting testament to a family's survival and the price we pay for love.
A brilliant, genre-defying work—both memoir and epic poem—about the struggle for wisdom, grace, and ritual in the face of unspeakable loss “A bruised and brave love letter from a brother right here to a brother now gone . . . a soaring, unblinking gaze into the meaning of life itself.”—Marlon James, author of Black Leopard, Red Wolf my father said david has taken his own life Adam is in the middle of his own busy life, and approaching a career high in the form of a #1 New York Times bestselling book—when these words from his father open a chasm beneath his feet. I Had a Brother Once is the story of everything that comes after. In the shadow of David’s inexplicable death, Adam is forced to re-remember a brother he thought he knew and to reckon with a ghost, confronting his unsettled family history, his distant relationship with tradition and faith, and his desperate need to understand an event that always slides just out of his grasp. This is an expansive and deeply thoughtful poetic meditation on loss and a raw, darkly funny, human story of trying to create a ritual—of remembrance, mourning, forgiveness, and acceptance—where once there was a life.
