Helen Plum Library

"Two unrelated yet equally momentous things happened to Alexandra Park at once: she was cast a lead character in a big American TV show, "The Royals," and she was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. Sugar High follows the next four years of Alex's life as she leaves home and travels the world, vacillating between the highs of starring in a hit TV show and the fear, denial, and loneliness that stem from a life-threatening, commonly misunderstood medical...

"A daughter's tale of living in the thrall of her magnetic, complicated mother, and the chilling consequences of her complicity. On a hot July night on Cape Cod when Adrienne was 14, her mother, Malabar, woke her at midnight with five simple words that would set the course of both of their lives for years to come: Ben Souther just kissed me. Adrienne instantly became her mother's confidante and helpmate, blossoming in the sudden light of her attention,...

"A Very Private School offers a clear-eyed, first-hand account of a culture of cruelty at the school Charles Spencer attended in his youth and provides important insights into an antiquated boarding system. Drawing on the memories of many of his schoolboy contemporaries, as well as his own letters and diaries from the time, he reflects on the hopelessness and abandonment he felt at aged eight, viscerally describing the intense pain of homesickness...

"With remarkably brave and vulnerable writing, Barnett expands on her personal story to confront the dire state of addiction in America, the rise of alcoholism in American women in the last century, and the lack of rehabilitation options available to addicts. At a time when opioid addiction is a national epidemic and one in twelve Americans suffers from alcohol abuse disorder, Quitter is essential reading for our age and an ultimately hopeful story...

"A memoir by one of the greatest minds of our age, preeminent philosopher and cognitive scientist Daniel C. Dennett."--Amazon Daniel C. Dennett, preeminent philosopher and cognitive scientist, has spent his career considering the thorniest, most fundamental mysteries of the mind. Do we have free will? What is consciousness and how did it come about? What distinguishes human minds from the minds of animals? Dennett's answers have profoundly shaped...

"A powerful account, by Israeli peace activist Miko Peled, of his transformation from a young man who'd grown up in the heart of Israel's elite and served proudly in its military into a fearless advocate of nonviolent struggle and equal rights for all Palestinians and Israelis. His journey is mirrored in many ways the transformation his father, a much-decorated Israeli general, had undergone three decades earlier. Alice Walker contributed a foreword...

"A deeply moving and inspiring memoir about fathers and daughters, grief and renewal, adventure and obsession, and the power of running to change your life." -- From book jacket

"This searing memoir tells the story of a young doctor and activist who ran an underground hospital in Syria"--

"No one was less likely to take her own life. That's what her Oxford thesis advisor wrote. From the moment I stumbled across the obituary, late at night when I couldn't sleep, I was captivated, and it wasn't the terrible details of her death: That she leapt from the balcony of a high rise in Century City. That she was 27, and a newlywed." So begins Jessica Teich's quest to unravel a mystery: the suicide of someone she never met. Bright and accomplished,...