Other books that might interest you

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  Why We Fight - One Man's Search...

  Josh Rosenblatt

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  Finally, we can talk about Fight Club! 
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  A physical and philosophical mediation on why we are drawn to fight each other for sport, what happens to our bodies and brains when we do, and what it all means 
   
  Anyone with guts or madness in him can get hit by someone who knows how; it takes a different kind of madness, a more persistent kind, to stick around long enough to be one of the people who does the knowing. 
  Josh Rosenblatt was thirty-three years old when he first realized he wanted to fight. A lifelong pacifist with a philosopher’s hatred of violence and a dandy’s aversion to exercise, he drank to excess, smoked passionately, ate indifferently, and mocked physical activity that didn’t involve nudity. But deep down inside there was always some part of him that was attracted to the idea of fighting. So, after studying Muay Thai, Krav Maga, Brazilian jiu-jitsu, and boxing, he decided, at age forty, that it was finally time to fight his first—and only—mixed martial arts match: all in the name of experience and transcending ancient fears. 
  An insightful and moving rumination on the nature of fighting, Why We Fight takes us on his journey from the bleachers to the ring. Using his own training as an opportunity to understand how the sport illuminates basic human impulses, Rosenblatt weaves together cultural history, criticism, biology, and anthropology to understand what happens to the human body and mind when under attack, and to explore why he, a self-described “cowardly boy from the suburbs,” discovered so much meaning in putting his body, and others’, at risk. 
  From the psychology of fear to the physiology of pain, from Ukrainian shtetls to Brooklyn boxing gyms, from Lord Byron to George Plimpton, Why We Fight is a fierce inquiry into the abiding appeal of our most conflicted and controversial fixation, interwoven with a firsthand account of what happens when a mild-mannered intellectual decides to step into the ring for his first real showdown. 

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  The Sea Takes No Prisoners

  Peter Clutterbuck

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  Beginning in the 1960s, this audiobook tells of the real-life adventures of the author as a boy. Encouraged by his parents to become more independent, Peter decided to see how far he could get in his family's small open dinghy, Calypso. 
  
  
  Calypso was a wayfarer, a small and very popular class of open dinghy - a boat designed for pottering around coastlines. But along with the occasional brave crewmate, Peter managed to sail her across the Channel, through the Bay of Biscay, down the French canals and into the Mediterranean, then up into the North Sea and the Baltic to Oslo, living aboard for three months at a time.

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  Caleb's List - Climbing the...

  Kellan MacInnes

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  Shortlisted for the 2013 Saltire Society Scottish First Book award. Edinburgh. 1898. On the cusp of the modern age. Caleb George Cash: mountaineer, geographer, antiquarian and teacher stands at the rocky summit of Arthur's Seat. This is the story of Caleb, me and the Scottish mountains visible from Arthur's Seat. Somehow the Cashs or the Calebs didn't sound right so I have called the hills on Caleb's list The Arthurs. More than just a climbing book this is the story of a survivor. Caleb's List is a beautifully descriptive account in which Kellan MacInnes intertwines his own personal struggle with HIV with the life story of Victorian mountaineer Caleb George Cash, beginning with the moment in 1898 when Caleb stood at the top of Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh and made a list of 20 mountains visible from its summit, from Ben Lomond in the west to Lochnager in the east. MacInnes stumbled upon this long forgotten list of hills, now dubbed the Arthurs, and in this book he sets a new hillwalking challenge … climbing the Arthurs. Drawing on history, literature and personal experience, MacInnes offers both practical and emotional insight into climbing these hills, in an account that is a must-read for hillwalkers, visitors to Edinburgh and lovers of Scotland all over the world. This is not just a book about hillwalking and history. At its heart this is powerful landscape writing that explores the strong bond between a person and the hills they love . . . The author writes with skill and considerable authority. ALEX RODDIE, author Caleb Cash himself is an important if neglected figure in the history of the Scottish outdoors and the author's personal story gives the book an emotional power unusual in a guidebook. An excellent book. CHRIS TOWNSHEND, author A triumphant debut. THE GREAT OUTDOORS A tribute to the healing power of the Scottish landscape and to survival against the odds. THE SCOTSMAN

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  Phenomenon - The Incredible...

  Dean Williamson

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  Phenomenon is the rip-roaring story of Brazilian legend Ronaldo, examining the incredible career and life of the greatest number nine in football history. 
  ‘The Phenomenon’ – as he was dubbed by the Italian media as he tore apart the toughest league in the world in the late ’90s – was the heir apparent to Pelé. His incredible career had it all: from a meteoric rise and jubilant highs to the crushing lows of debilitating injuries, and everything imaginable in between. 
  Never without his trademark infectious grin, the breathtakingly brilliant Rio native combined pace and strength that frightened the best defenders in the world, with balletic agility, poise and composure that contradicted his powerful frame. 
  Phenomenon explores Ronaldo’s roller-coaster ride, from local youth football to the biggest clubs in the world. From the mysterious heartbreak of the 1998 World Cup Final in Paris, to triumphant redemption in the Far East four years later. It’s a story that would make Hollywood scriptwriters blush.

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  Get Real Get Gone - How to...

  Rick Page

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  The idea that you have to be rich to travel the world on your own yacht is so universal that it goes largely unquestioned. The ubiquitous images of rich men on super-yachts sipping Martinis only help cement this image. This book hopes to change all that.Rick's recent appearance on Ben Fogle's New Lives in the Wild chronicled his budget lifestyle and adventures aboard Calypso, and introduced the idea of budget sailing to a whole new audience—an audience who may have never considered the possibility that such a dream could be made a reality, on such a small amount of money. This book is for them and for any experienced sailors who want to cast off the yoke of consumerist yachting and get back to what really matters at sea.If you are not rich, but dream of seeing our beautiful world from the deck of your own boat, this book is packed full of practical and spiritual advice to help you cut through the endless marketing and identify what it is you truly need to become a modern sea gypsy and sail away on the greatest adventure of your life . . . Photos and diagrams referenced in this audiobook can be found on sailingcalypso.com.

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  High Drama - The Rise Fall And...

  John Burgman

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  One afternoon in 1987, two renegade climbers in Berkeley, California, hatched an ambitious plan: under the cover of darkness, they would rappel down from a carefully scouted highway on-ramp, gluing artificial handholds onto the load-bearing concrete pillars underneath. Equipped with ingenuity, strong adhesive, and an urban guerilla attitude, Jim Thornburg and Scott Frye created a serviceable climbing wall. But what they were part of was a greater development: the expansion and reimagining of a sport now slated for a highly anticipated Olympic debut in 2020. 
  High Drama explores rock climbing's transformation from a pursuit of select anti-establishment vagabonds to a sport embraced by competitors of all ages, social classes, and backgrounds. Climbing magazine's John Burgman weaves a multi-layered story of traditionalists and opportunists, grassroots organizers and business-minded developers, free-spirited rebels and rigorously coached athletes. Deeply reported and compellingly told, this is a celebration of climbing and the pivotal figures who made its growth possible, from the rock faces of Yosemite to urban bouldering gyms and beyond.

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