Oddbird has always been on his own. And he’s managed pretty well. But that’s changing – now, he wishes for a family. When Oddbird’s friends plan a big surprise for him, he realizes he’s surrounded by those who accept and care for him. All families don’t look the same, and sometimes the families we choose are where we belong.
Oddbird has always been on his own. And he’s managed pretty well. But that’s changing – now, he wishes for a family. When Oddbird’s friends plan a big surprise for him, he realizes he’s surrounded by those who accept and care for him. All families don’t look the same, and sometimes the families we choose are where we belong.
The year is 1961. Seventy-year-old Cosimo Infante Cano, a Cuban-born artist in need of inspiration, follows his lover to Texas in what was to be a temporary sabbatical from their life in France. Unexpectedly, he finds himself stranded in San Antonio, nearly penniless, with little more than the clothes on his back and an extraordinary pocket watch. His long hair and eccentric attire make him an odd sight in what he has been told is a conservative cultural backwater. Cosimo’s French and Cuban passports put a cloud of suspicion over him as events elsewhere in the world play out. Algeria is in open revolt against France. Freedom Riders are being assaulted in Mississippi, and the Bay of Pigs debacle is front-page news. Cosimo confronts nightmares and waking terrors rooted in the horror he experienced during the Great War of 1914–1918. His friends—students, librarians, shopkeepers, laborers, lawyers, bankers, and even a parrot—coalesce around this elderly French artist as he attempts to return to what remains of his shattered life. His new friends feel empathy for his impoverished condition, but his unconventional actions and uncompromising ethics confuse them. He creates charming drawings he refuses to sell and paints a house simply for the pleasure of making a difference. In the process he forever alters the lives of those who thought they were helping him.
A 7-time Teen Choice Award Winner on Freeform's most-watched series, Pretty Little Liars ... A social media influencer with over 7 million followers ... An avid birdwatcher? Yes, you read that correctly. Ian Harding is all of these things, and so much more. In this memoir, explore the unexpected world of a young celebrity through the lens of his favorite pastime — birding. Odd Birds is more than just a Hollywood memoir or tell-all. At its heart, this book is a coming-of-age story in which Ian wrestles with an ever evolving question— how can he still be himself, while also being a celebrity. Each humorous and heartfelt story features a particular bird—sometimes literal, at other times figurative. Using this framework, Ian explores a variety of topics, including growing up, life as a television actor and nature lover, and whether it is better to shave or wax one’s chest for an on-screen love scene. A funny and heartwarming window into Ian’s life, Odd Birds is a must-read for fans of nature writing and memoir alike.
Katerina’s small, safe life in London is upended on Christmas Eve when her beloved mum passes away. Two days later, she sees her boyfriend of five years kissing the local librarian. Kat goes to bed and pulls the covers over her head, convinced she will never recover from these losses. To Kat’s great surprise, her mum has left her four letters to guide her through her grief and an air ticket to Swedish Lapland for a wild adventure. Before Kat knows it, she’s at the top of the world with a backpack and her headstrong French bulldog, Olive. On the challenging, exhilarating eight-day trek, Kat learns she can come to terms with her mum’s death. She also encounters Anna, lanky and gorgeous, who invites her to Stockholm for a weekend of passion. The three days they share awakens Kat to her truth. It leads the way to her desires, including a long ambition to open a small bookshop in her London neighborhood. But how can she do that and follow her heart with her new love? Will the dangers and complications that face both her and Anna force her hand?
The killing of thirty-four miners by police at Marikana in August 2012 was the largest massacre of civilians in South Africa since Sharpeville. The events have been covered in newspaper articles, on TV news and in a commission of inquiry, but there is still confusion about what happened on that fateful day. In Murder at Small Koppie, renowned photojournalist Greg Marinovich explores the truth behind the Marikana massacre. He investigates the shootings near Wonderkop hill, which happened in view of the media, as well as the killings that happened beyond the view of cameras at a nondescript collection of boulders known as Small Koppie, some 300 metres away. Many of the men killed here were shot in cold blood at close range. Drawing on his own meticulous research, eyewitness accounts and the findings of the Marikana Commission of Inquiry, Marinovich accurately reconstructs that fateful day as well as the events leading up to the strike, and looks at the subsequent denials, obfuscation and buck-passing by Lonmin, the SAPS and the government. This is the definitive account of the Marikana massacre from the journalist whose award-winning investigation into the tragedy has been called the most important piece of South African journalism since apartheid.