Catalog Search Results
Author
Language
English
Description
Ada Byron, the daughter of poet Lord Byron, was tutored in math by her mother. As a result, she grew up comfortable with the combination of art and science. She met Charles Babbage, a science and math expert. Babbage demonstrated a model of a machine that he built called a Difference Engine that could solve polynomial equations.
Ada was inspired by Babbage's Difference Engine and decided to undertake advanced lessons in mathematics. Ada became interested...
Author
Language
English
Description
Summary of Joe Biden's Promise Me, Dad recounts the grueling anxiety and fear he and his family underwent in the months leading up to the death of his son Beau. As Delaware's attorney general, Beau had crafted a promising political career and had gained popularity among his state's residents…
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild
Chris McCandless is a name that resonates with those looking to find the answers to everyday life in the boundless beauty and mystique of nature. And yet, his unfortunate death at age 24 proves that nature can never fully grant you everything you want.
Jon Krakauer looks into the strange yet inspiring existence of McCandless in Into the Wild (1996), from his comfortable, upper middle-class...
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from Casey Wilson's The Wreckage of My Presence
Casey Wilson is an actress, comedian, mother, and above all, lifetime fan of The Real Housewives of Orange County.
Wilson's book, The Wreckage of My Presence (2021), is her unflinching thoughts and feelings about a smattering of subjects, from cults and spin classes (which aren't all that different) to the reality of spiritual healers in Hollywood. But the book also...
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from Mike Duncan's Hero of Two Worlds
In Hero of Two Worlds (2021), Mike Duncan takes readers on a ride down history to discover the life of the Marquis de Lafayette, the French aristocrat and general who became an American hero. In his historical biography, Duncan highlights the political events that traced Lafayette's heroic life and how he profoundly contributed to the evolution of French and American society...
Author
Language
English
Description
Summary of Jon Meacham's Destiny and Power is a biography of George H.W. Bush, the 41st president of the United States, who served from 1988 to 1992. The author argues that as president and as a politician, Bush used prudence and compromise to an extent that would seem out of place in today's era of highly partisan US politics.
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from William H. McRaven's Sea Stories
Sea Stories (2019) is the autobiography of four-star Admiral William H. McRaven. As a five-year-old, McRaven would sneak around the American Officers' Club in Fontainebleau, France, and hide near the bar while his father sat with three other Air Force officers. Their tales of air-to-air combat, life on the front lines, and bold escapes fueled McRaven's yearning for adventure....
Author
Language
English
Description
Summary of Anderson Cooper & Gloria Vanderbilt's The Rainbow Comes and Goes is the result of a year of email exchanges between a son and his mother. They explore themes of life, love, and loss. When Vanderbilt was nearing her ninety-first birthday, she was hospitalized with a respiratory infection. This led Cooper to consider her mortality and to wonder if he and his mother knew one another as well as they could. After the untimely death of his father...
Author
Language
English
Description
Summary of Richard P. Feynman's Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! is an unconventional memoir by a decidedly unconventional theoretical physicist. Feynman was a brilliant and eccentric thinker who was present for some of the key scientific developments of the twentieth century.
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from Elton John's Love is the Cure
In Love Is the Cure (2012), pop superstar Elton John recounts his life in parallel with his AIDS activism, starting from the beginning of the epidemic in 1981. He tells about people who have fought against AIDS, those he has lost to the disease, and his foundation's effort to bring an end to it. The keys are education, research, fund-raising, and above all, compassion.
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from Jason L. Riley's Maverick
Throughout history, the world has witnessed discriminations, hostilities, and injustices. It seems that no matter how much human beings evolve, racism will always be manifested in societies, and the fight against it is far deeper and more complicated than what activists, movements, and organizations like to acknowledge.
In Maverick: A Biography of Thomas Sowell (2021), Jason L. Riley...
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from Kati Marton's The Chancellor
The chancellor of Germany does not rule with sovereign power, but by persuasion and support of its political parties. That's what makes Angela Merkel's contributions to Germany, Europe, and the entire world during her 16 years as chancellor so remarkable.
Kati Marton's The Chancellor (2021) details this legacy from Merkel's humble beginnings in East Germany through her meteoric rise...
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from Charles Schwab's Invested
In his memoir Invested (2019), Charles Schwab recounts the story of the brokerage firm that revolutionized the industry. Despite suffering from dyslexia and struggling through many financial crises, he managed to keep the Charles Schwab Corporation afloat and grow it into an industry giant. The key to his success was his client-oriented approach and constant implementation of innovative...
Author
Language
English
Description
Summary of Michelle Obama's Becoming recounts the familial, educational, romantic, and political experiences that culminated in her tenure as first lady of the United States between 2009 and 2017. A native of Chicago, Michelle was an ambitious student who grew into a driven adult...
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from Mike Lindell's What Are the Odds?
As a man with severe addiction to gambling, card counting, and cocaine, Mike Lindell made terrible life choices that ultimately cost him his wife, family, and financial stability. However, even as he was drowning in despair, God revealed himself in his life and showed him the miracles he could do, if only he had a flicker of hope.
What Are the Odds? traces the troubled chapters...
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from Mo Rocca's Mobituaries
Mo Rocca immortalizes a selection of people, concepts, and even objects in Mobituaries (2019). Rocca creates the send-off that he believes the subjects deserve, whatever was said about them when they died or faded away, and helps readers fully understand their impact. Some things are meant to be remembered, so Rocca has provided these humorous yet informative retellings.
Author
Language
English
Description
Summary of Walter Isaacson's Einstein is a meticulous and engaging account of the life of Albert Einstein, best known for discovering the principle of relativity. The narrative uncovers Einstein's nuanced personality and describes the ways in which his passions governed his personal, political, and scientific life…
Author
Language
English
Description
Summary of Timothy Egan's The Immortal Irishman is a biography of Thomas Meagher: Irish revolutionary, convict, and Civil War general. The book also offers a broad portrait of the experiences of the Irish during the period, both at home and abroad.
Meagher was born in 1823 into a prominent and wealthy Catholic family. This gave him advantages of education and standing. At the same time, Catholics in Ireland were brutally oppressed, with limits on...
Author
Language
English
Description
Buy now to get the main key ideas from Norm Macdonald's Based on a True Story
In Based on a True Story (2016), Norm Macdonald pieces together a tale of a once famed Canadian comedian who became a Saturday Night Live writer and presenter at the peak of his career. Norm merges together two plot lines, a main one led by himself, as he dives deeper and deeper into the world of gambling and morphine abuse, and a secondary one led by a fictional ghostwriter,...
In Find More Illinois
Didn't find what you need? Items not owned by Helen Plum Library can be requested from other Find More Illinois libraries to be delivered to your local library for pickup.
Didn't find it?
We are constantly adding to our collection! Make a request and we'll consider the submission along with the needs of the community. Submit Request