The Battle for Room 314 by Ed Boland, published in 2016, tells the compelling story of his year teaching in an inner-city high school in New York City. As a young man, Boland worked for Project Advance, a non-profit working to place low-income, inner-city students in elite boarding schools and eventually Ivy League universities; however, he begins to feel unfulfilled and wants to widen his impact to help more deserving students.
A must-read for any history fans, Killing the SS by Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard shows the hunt to find the worst war criminals in the world and the race against time to bring them to justice. Dugard and O’Reilly bring you back to the end of WWII, following the stories of multiple “Nazi Hunters” who devoted their lives to catching these immoral individuals.
John Urschel played professional football and is completing his Ph.D. at Harvard University in Mathematics. This memoir reveals John’s challenges of living with divorced parents, trying to become a math major and earning a Ph.D., and making it to the National Football League. Mr. Urschel’s biography is heart-warming and shows the ups and downs of his journey of making it to the NFL and earning a Ph.D. Urschel was interested in math at a very young age and loved solving math problems. It wasn’t until later in middle school that Urschel became interested in football.
Free Lunch is an autobiography by Rex Ogle, following him through the 6th grade being a kid from an under-privileged, abuse home in a wealthy school district. He's living with his half baby brother, his stepdad, and his mother. His mom puts him on the free lunch program at school and he's confused, but above all, embarrassed.
Dreamland tells the tale of America's opiate epidemic in a way that feels as though you are hearing it firsthand; it weaves the stories of addicts and activists alike into a novel that is enticing and shocking. Quinones writes a novel that shows the behind the scenes of an epidemic that hits close to the heart of many Americans, yet he tells it in a way that takes you on an adventure rather than a report.
In The Electric War, readers dive into the initial application of electricity in late 19th century America and the substantial struggle that sprung from it. A decade-long conflict is waged on the effectiveness, danger, and control of direct and alternating current. Great minds such as George Westinghouse, Nikola Tesla, and Thomas Edison utilize their knowledge and prowess of electricity to compete in the race of lighting the world.
This book encompasses the stories of multiple teens who made the journey to America through hardships and struggles in order to live a better life for themselves and their families. The book is written in first person and through short stories that allow the reader to get to know the subjects of the story and from the mouths of the immigrants themselves, without influencing the reader to think a certain way about the issue. I think that the cover was really powerful because It draws the attention directly to the title, which is ultimately the message of the book.
Everyone knows about the Black Plague in Europe during the Middle Ages. But not everyone knows about the 1918 influenza pandemic. It was the worst virus that ever struck mankind. Not even the Black Death comes close to the number of lives it took. No war, natural disaster, or famine has ever claimed so many people. From 1918 to 1919, one third of the global population (500 million) became infected, with an estimated 100 million deaths. This book chronicles the cause and impact of this deadly virus throughout history.
What labels define you? Which boxes contain you? No middle ground. No grey. Keep it simple. Describe yourself with categories. Binaries. Either-ors. Extremes.
Once you tell me, do I know you?
Or do you want to say, "Wait, that's not really me. I'm much more complicated and nuanced than that. Those are mere ideas. I'm a person."?
This book tells the extraordinary story of survival and friendship between a man and his dog during war. This is the story of the dog Judy, the only official prisoner of war in World War ll. It details how she and flight technician Frank Williams met in a POW internment camp in the Pacific theater. Their story of an unbreakable bond during the worst circumstances is one of the great undiscovered stories during the war.
