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  Arctic Warriors - A Personal...

  Julie Grossmith Deltrice,...

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  In mid-1942 Alfred Grossmith Mason became Navigation/Gunnery Officer on SS Empire Baffin, a 6,978 ton cargo ship assigned to carry essential war supplies to the hard pressed Soviet Union. Fortunately he compiled this remarkable diary of the dramas and disasters that befell the ill-fated Convoy PQ18. This inspiring story follows the movement of his ship and the other merchantmen together with their Royal Naval escorts from the mustering point at Loch Ewe to their destination Archangel.Daily German attacks from the air and sea and long periods at action stations deprived crews of sleep. The loss of many ships and comrades and the ever-present prospect of death through drowning and hypothermia took their toll. Having to function while exhausted, ill-nourished and freezing cold demanded that every man gave of his utmost over a prolonged period. Yet remarkably, as this book shows, humour remained intact.Once in Archangel his insight into the hardships faced by the Russian population is revealing. For the surviving sailors there remained the awesome challenge of the return journey without any escort. Unlike so many, the Author finally reached Britain in December 1942.Arctic Warriors is a rare and graphic personal account that captures the atmosphere of this infamously costly convoy and others like it. If any doubts remain of the terrible conditions and dangers that merchant seamen aced in the hostile waters of the North Atlantic and Barents Sea, this superb record, published in the Year of the Convoy, will surely put them to rest.

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  The Man Who Knew Infinity - A...

  Robert Kanigel

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  The moving, unbelievable true story of how a gifted prodigy stunned the scholars of Cambridge University and revolutionized mathematics. 
   
  In 1913, a young unschooled Indian clerk wrote a letter to G. H. Hardy, begging the preeminent English mathematician’s opinion on several ideas he had about numbers. Realizing the letter was the work of a genius, Hardy arranged for Srinivasa Ramanujan to come to England. 
   
  Thus began one of the most improbable and productive collaborations ever chronicled. With a passion for rich and evocative detail, Robert Kanigel takes us from the temples and slums of Madras to the courts and chapels of Cambridge University, where the devout Hindu Ramanujan, “the Prince of Intuition,” tested his brilliant theories alongside the sophisticated and eccentric Hardy, “the Apostle of Proof.” 
   
  In time, Ramanujan’s creative intensity took its toll: he died at the age of thirty-two, but left behind a magical and inspired legacy that is still being plumbed for its secrets today. 
   
  Now a major motion picture starring Dev Patel and Jeremy Irons.

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  A Bazaar Life - The...

  David Alliance

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  At the age of thirteen, David Alliance was taken out of school by his father and apprenticed into the Grand Bazaar in Tehran, where he learned the business skills that were to prove invaluable in one of the most successful business careers of modern times. In 1950, with just ?14 in his pocket, he arrived in Manchester in search of textile bargains, going hungry and sometimes forced to sleep on the street. Six years later, however, when he was still only twenty-four, he bought a loss-making textile mill, turned it around in six months and went on to build the biggest textile company in the Western world. At one stage his businesses, including his mail-order company, N Brown Group, employed more than 80,000 people. He did it through a mixture of incredibly hard work, creativity and nerve, and some of his takeovers, often of companies many times larger than his own, were breathtaking in their ingenuity. No obstacle was unscalable - his guiding principle all his life was that everything is achievable 'if you put your heart and soul into it'. Humble, charming and delightfully honest, Alliance's extraordinary rags-to-riches tale is not only that of a remarkable journey, but goes far beyond the world of business. Among many stories which have until now remained secret, Alliance tells of how he used the skills he learned in the bazaar to negotiate with the dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam to allow the Ethiopian Jews to be airlifted to Israel, his friendship with the Shah of Iran and the first-hand insight into the infamous Guinness affair. In A Bazaar Life, written with Ivan Fallon, he sets out the lessons he has learned in a long career, and the principles that have guided him. Young - and older - entrepreneurs can learn a lot from his story.

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  Little Known Facts: BD Wong -...

  Ilana Levine

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  BD Wong grew up in San Francisco.  He won a Tony Award for his performance in M. Butterfly. He gained notoriety for playing the roles of Dr. George Huang on Law & Order: SVU, Father Ray Mukada on Oz, Dr. John Lee on Awake, Dr. Henry Wu in the first Jurassic Park film as well as the fourth entry, Jurassic World,  Mulan, and Ngawang Jigme in the film Seven Years in Tibet.He is now appearing in the TV series Gotham as Hugo Strange, making Wong the first actor to play the character in live-action. He was nominated in 2016 for a Critic's Choice Television Award for his recurring role as White Rose in Mr. Robot.Little Known Fact: May 11, 2016 was officially proclaimed to be “BD Wong Day” by New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio.

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  Still Hunting - A Memoir

  Martin Hunter

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  In the 1960s, Toronto was a city of shifting societal dynamics, and this engrossing memoir perfectly captures the essence of this exhilarating and tumultuous time. It begins with Martin Hunter returning to his birthplace, where he marries his teenage sweetheart, goes to work for the family paper company, fathers three children, and settles into a conventional life. But this comfortable bourgeois existence is disrupted with the arrival of the Swinging Sixties and the wild parties and flamboyant characters that accompanied the famously iconoclastic decade. After writing a racy, award-winning play about the city's changing social climate, the University of Toronto offers him a position as playwright-in-residence, thus plunging him into Toronto's vibrant theatre scene and setting the stage for many adventures to follow. Skillfully written and full of unforgettable characters, this book chronicles Hunter's adventures in Europe and the Middle East, reveals his stories of working in the theatre, and shares tales of his spirited friends, colleagues, and loved ones.

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  Make Your Own History - Timeless...

  Joseph Holland

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  Celebrating the vast breadth and scope of Black excellence, Make Your Own History spotlights the principles of success exemplified by the lives of 120 Black role models who have blazed trails throughout American history.Make Your Own History gathers together motivational quotes, historical contexts, and enlightening precepts from Black trailblazers spanning the eighteenth century to the present. These insights encompass twelve central themes: courage, self-discipline, compassion, perseverance, teamwork, integrity, industriousness, self-reliance, optimism, purposefulness, civility, and faith. These vigorous virtues will:● Deepen your courage through journalist Ida B. Wells's activism in the face of professional and personal peril● Fuel your perseverance through tennis superstar Serena Williams's journey to 23 Grand Slam singles titles● Spark optimism through poet Langston Hughes's work as an artistic and intellectual catalyst for the Harlem RenaissanceThrough these perspectives and so many more, Make Your Own History serves not only as an uplifting historical resource, but also as a spiritual road map for the lifelong journey of purposefully setting and meeting personal goals.

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