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  A Rocky Road - Memoirs

  Abraham Levy, Simon Rocker

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  Born into the 300-year-old Jewish community in Gibraltar, Abraham Levy spent his early years, which coincided with the Second World War, on the island of Madeira before returning to "The Rock". There the family remained secure within a relatively observant community. By the age of eight he was attending synagogue for shacharit, or morning prayer, before school and became known as "the religious boy". He was determined to be a rabbi. Abraham Levy first went to a convent school, then a Jewish school, followed by a year with the Christian Brothers, before arriving at Carmel College in England. From the age of thirteen he spent some school holidays in Maida Vale and began to attend Lauderdale Road Synagogue. He went on to study for the rabbinate at Jews' College and, after receiving his Rabbinical Diploma, Lauderdale Road was to be the base for his work for almost sixty years.
  Over those many years, Abraham Levy, as Spiritual Head of the Sephardim in the United Kingdom, has had enormous influence on Jewish life. His deep sense of moderation, tolerance and reason have been consistent throughout his tenure and have brought him into contact both with leaders of different faiths and of the secular world alike. None the less, he has always held the view that each individual in the community is important and, to ensure a future for that community, the young have been central to his energies. He has been responsible for the expansion of a small but prominent Sephardi community in the UK and, crucially, the establishment of the Naima Jewish Preparatory School in London.
  Abraham Levy's deep faith and rare personal qualities were to bring about a remarkable gathering of leaders of the different sections of Anglo-Jewry: the ultra-Orthodox, Orthodox and Progressive movements attended a service to mark 350 years since the readmission of Jews to the UK. The Prime Minister, Tony Blair, also attended and said: "... As the oldest minority faith community in this country, you show how identity through faith can be combined with a deep loyalty for our nation." But for Rabbi Levy the words that moved him most came from four children from the Naima JPS each of whom read a poem they had composed for the day. Abraham Levy's memoir is a testimony to a devotion to public life, to the community, and to the young in an increasingly secular and conflicted world.

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  Blood Bone and Marrow - A...

  Ted Geltner

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  “Brilliantly renders the life of the late writer Harry Crews . . . It captures the wild spirit of an unflinching American writer.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)   In 2010, Ted Geltner drove to Gainesville, Florida, to pay a visit to Harry Crews and ask the legendary author if he would be willing to be the subject of a literary biography. His health rapidly deteriorating, Crews told Geltner he was on board and would even sit for interviews and tell his stories one last time. “Ask me anything you want, bud,” Crews said. “But you’d better do it quick.”   The result is Blood, Bone, and Marrow, the first full-length biography of one of the most unlikely figures in twentieth-century American literature, a writer who emerged from a dirt-poor South Georgia tenant farm and went on to create a singularly unique voice of fiction. With books such as Scar Lover, Body, and Naked in Garden Hills, Crews opened a new window into southern life, focusing his lens on the poor and disenfranchised, the people who skinned the hogs and tended the fields, the “grits,” as Crews affectionately called his characters and himself. He lived by a code of his own design, flouting authority and baring his soul, and the stories of his whiskey-and-blood-soaked lifestyle created a myth to match any of his fictional creations. His outlaw life, his distinctive voice and the context in which he lived combine to form the elements of a singularly compelling narrative about an underappreciated literary treasure.   “Harry Crews led a big, strange, sad and somehow very American life. It is well told here.”—The New York Times

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  The Monsoon Diaries - A Doctor’s...

  Calvin D. Sun, Lisa Ling

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  Read by the author. 
  The Monsoon Diaries is the firsthand account of Dr. Calvin Sun, an emergency room doctor who worked tirelessly on the front lines in multiple hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic. 
  Drawing upon the lessons he learned from his adventures traveling to more than 190 countries in ten years, as well as from the grief he experienced as a teen when his father died, Dr. Sun shares his journey, from growing up as a young Asian American in New York to his calling first to medical school and then to the open road. 
  He believes that the fight for a better world creates meaning when all feels meaningless, and he hopes that telling his story will help readers reframe this tragic moment in our lifetimes into possibility, with the goal of building a more empathetic society.

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  Plato - all dialogues summarized

  Hoshang Khambatta

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  The works of Plato, who is considered to be the father of Western Philosophy, are in the form of dialogues conducted by Socrates, his mentor. The late Professor of Philosophy, Walter Kaufmann, of Princeton University noted that many intelligent people read Plato for pleasure. However, we could not find all of Plato’s Dialogues in a concise form in a single English language volume. Our presentation is the first and only such endeavor to make a brief introduction to Plato’s work available to all.  
   
  In this book we have presented the highlights of each of Plato’s Dialogues, preceded by a brief overview. This book is directed to those wanting an introduction to the roots of Ancient Western Philosophy, but not at the level for a Plato scholar or someone studying for a doctorate in philosophy. 
   
  Written in modern colloquial English, this book will also be of interest to a young person who has reached an age of understanding. It will not replace the conventional English language 1500 page book of Plato’s Dialogues, but rather will provide a readily available starting point to it. We hope that this book will challenge the inquisitive mind to delve further into these ancient thoughts and discover how they apply in today’s world. 
   
  Following overwhelming requests from our readers, a comprehensive index has been added to the 2nd revised edition

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  The Quaker and the Gamecock -...

  Andrew Waters

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  This story of a conflict between two commanders amid the struggle to oust the British from South Carolina is “great for anyone teaching leadership” (Military Review).   As the newly appointed commander of the Southern Continental Army in December 1780, Nathanael Greene quickly realized victory would not only require defeating the British Army, but also subduing the region’s brutal civil war. “The division among the people is much greater than I imagined, and the Whigs and the Tories persecute each other, with little less than savage fury,” wrote Greene.   Part of Greene’s challenge involved managing South Carolina’s determined but unreliable Patriot militia, led by Thomas Sumter, the famed “Gamecock.” Though Sumter would go on to a long political career, it was as a defiant partisan that he first earned the respect of his fellow backcountry settlers, a command that would compete with Greene for status and stature in the Revolutionary War’s “Southern Campaign.”   Despite these challenges, Greene was undaunted. Born to a devout Quaker family, and influenced by the faith’s tenets, Greene instinctively understood that the war’s Southern theater involved complex political, personal, and socioeconomic challenges, not just military ones. Though he was never a master of the battlefield, Greene’s mindful leadership style established his historic legacy.  The Quaker and the Gameccock tells the story of these two wildly divergent leaders against the backdrop of the American Revolution’s last gasp, the effort to extricate a British occupation force from the wild and lawless South Carolina frontier. For Greene, the campaign meant a last chance to prove his capabilities as a general, not just a talented administrator. For Sumter, it was a quest of personal revenge that showcased his innate understanding of the backcountry character. Both men needed the other to defeat the British, yet their forceful personalities, divergent leadership styles, and opposing objectives would clash again and again, in a fascinating story of our nation’s bloody birth that still influences our political culture.   “A brilliant account of the military campaigns and collaborations between Greene and Sumter.” —The Colonial Review

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  Cuscus Fur Stilton Cheese And A...

  Sally Cook

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  I have survived a plane which caught on fire over the Tasman, have lived with a tribe in pre-Indenpendence Papuan New Guinea.I have hugged a three toed sloth in Colombia and worked for an antiquated group of newspapers in London where I covered murder trials, magistrates courts, cinema and theatre reviews.I have  been stuck in mud in Tayrona National Park in Colombia, accompanied by shrieking monkeys, a mirthful friend and guide.  A client once requested that my statue be built and that I be made a dame. I have had a murderer as a tenancy client and been called by a magistrate to take over a tribunal hearing whilst she fetched police. The guttering from the front of a disgruntled tenant’s house has landed on my work desk, I have worked with a community organisation servicing fifty nationalities.And in riding my Honda 90 across Cambridgeshire’s frozen fens, I have reported on Jack Spratt and Joe Blogs., one of whom was drunk on a turnip planter.Welcome to my world where I have been held hostage for a couple of hours by an irate service user, have worked with young offenders and have dealt with a tenant’s suspicion of ghosts. My account is quirky, covering aspects of my travels and work.

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