Download or read book The Grass Arena written by John Healy and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2008-07-31 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: John Healy's The Grass Arena describes with unflinching honesty his experiences of addiction, his escape through learning to play chess in prison, and his ongoing search for peace of mind. In his searing autobiography Healy describes his fifteen years living rough in London without state aid, when begging carried an automatic three-year prison sentence and vagrant alcoholics prowled the parks and streets in search of drink or prey. When not united in their common aim of acquiring alcohol, winos sometimes murdered one another over prostitutes or a bottle, or the begging of money. Few modern writers have managed to match Healy's power to refine from the brutal destructive condition of the chronic alcoholic a story so compelling it is beyond comparison. 'Sober and precise, grotesque, violent, sad, charming and hilarious all at once' Literary Review 'Beside it, a book like Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London seems a rather inaccurate tourist guide' Colin MacCabe

Download or read book Arena written by Holly Jennings and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2016-04-05 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fast-paced and gripping near-future science fiction debut about the gritty world of competitive gaming... Every week, Kali Ling fights to the death on national TV. She’s died hundreds of times. And it never gets easier... The RAGE tournaments—the Virtual Gaming League’s elite competition where the best gamers in the world compete in a no-holds-barred fight to the digital death. Every bloody kill is broadcast to millions. Every player is a modern gladiator—leading a life of ultimate fame, responsible only for entertaining the masses. And though their weapons and armor are digital, the pain is real. Chosen to be the first female captain in RAGE tournament history, Kali Ling is at the top of the world—until one of her teammates overdoses. Now, she must confront the truth about the tournament. Because it is much more than a game—and even in the real world, not everything is as it seems. The VGL hides dark secrets. And the only way to change the rules is to fight from the inside...

Download or read book Coffeehouse Chess Tactics written by John Healy and published by New In Chess. This book was released on 2014-11-07 with total page 137 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1988, his autobiography ?The Grass Arena? catapulted John Healy to worldwide literary fame. That harrowing tale described how Healy by discovering chess, escaped alcoholism, violence and crime. Many fans have wondered how Healy did as a chess player. In this book Healy uses over a hundred of his own games to show how unusual tactics or defensive motifs can turn the tide in any position. Along with the games the author describes in eloquent but brutal language the beautiful, sometimes terrible world of chess. The prologue ?Blood Sport? is a fine piece of vintage Healy non-fiction. A must-buy book for chess lovers, tactics buffs and Healy fans.

Download or read book Chess Behind Bars written by Carl Portman and published by Quality Chess. This book was released on 2017 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Chess Behind Bars offers a guide to chess in prisons that will instruct and entertain regardless of your situation. It covers almost every aspect of chess imaginable - from the rules to chess history, from puzzles to famous games, and even some tips for improvement. It is a smorgasbord of chess, seen from an unusual angle.

Download or read book You Can t Win written by Jack Black and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-07-18 with total page 433 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An amazing autobiography of a criminal from a forgotten time in american history. Jack Black was a burgler, safe-cracker, highwayman and petty thief.

Download or read book Across the Green Grass Fields written by Seanan McGuire and published by Tordotcom. This book was released on 2021-01-12 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A young girl discovers a portal to a land filled with centaurs and unicorns in Seanan McGuire's Across the Green Grass Fields, a standalone tale in the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Wayward Children series. “Welcome to the Hooflands. We’re happy to have you, even if you being here means something’s coming.” Regan loves, and is loved, though her school-friend situation has become complicated, of late. When she suddenly finds herself thrust through a doorway that asks her to "Be Sure" before swallowing her whole, Regan must learn to live in a world filled with centaurs, kelpies, and other magical equines—a world that expects its human visitors to step up and be heroes. But after embracing her time with the herd, Regan discovers that not all forms of heroism are equal, and not all quests are as they seem... A standalone Wayward Children story containing all-new characters, and a great jumping-on point for new readers. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Download or read book The Arena written by Rafi Kohan and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2018-09-04 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Finalist • PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing “An inventive, fast-paced look at what have become our modern shrines in a sports-obsessed society.” —Tom Verducci In this “addictive” (Publishers Weekly) romp, intrepid sportswriter Rafi Kohan finagles access to our most beloved fields to find out just what makes them tick: from old-timer Wrigley, creakily adjusting to the twenty-first century, to the oversized monstrosity of Jerry’s World in Dallas. Investigating harrowing logistics and deeply ingrained traditions, Kohan employs his infectious “wit and style” (Christian Science Monitor) to expose the realities of building and maintaining these commercial cathedrals of sports worship. “Highly compelling” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review), The Arena is a must-read for superfans, shameless bandwagoners, athletes, groundskeepers, culture junkies, and anyone who’s ever headed off eagerly to the ballpark to catch a game.

Download or read book Adaptive Space How GM and Other Companies are Positively Disrupting Themselves and Transforming into Agile Organizations written by Michael J. Arena and published by McGraw Hill Professional. This book was released on 2018-06-15 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lack of Agility is the kiss of death. Position your company to succeed in world of change.To edge out the competition in today’s disruptive environment, you need to ensure that your company is agile—that it can respond to change instantly and effectively. Because fast and furious change is the only thing you can count on in business today.Network expert Michael Arena helped enable GM’s legendary turnaround. In these pages, he explains how you can transform your own company through the concept of adaptive space. Based on hundreds of interviews and the author’s own groundbreaking study of dozens of organizations spanning a variety of industries, Adaptive Space shows how to position your company for today—and for the future—by enabling creativity, innovation, and novel ideas to flow freely among teams, across departments, and throughout the company. Using GM as the main case study—along with the stories of other highly adaptive organizations, like Apple, Amazon, Disney, and Gore—Arena provides a model you can follow to reinvent your company. It’s about inspiring employees to explore new ideas, empowering the most creative people and teams to spread their ideas across the organization, and operationalizing the entrepreneurial spirit so adaptability is set in stone. Hesitation is a killer in today’s business landscape. With Adaptive Space, you have everything you need to confront disruption with smart, confident actions and seize the valuable opportunities that come with change.

Download or read book Eating Grass written by Feroz Khan and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2012-11-07 with total page 550 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The history of Pakistan's nuclear program is the history of Pakistan. Fascinated with the new nuclear science, the young nation's leaders launched a nuclear energy program in 1956 and consciously interwove nuclear developments into the broader narrative of Pakistani nationalism. Then, impelled first by the 1965 and 1971 India-Pakistan Wars, and more urgently by India's first nuclear weapon test in 1974, Pakistani senior officials tapped into the country's pool of young nuclear scientists and engineers and molded them into a motivated cadre committed to building the 'ultimate weapon.' The tenacity of this group and the central place of its mission in Pakistan's national identity allowed the program to outlast the perennial political crises of the next 20 years, culminating in the test of a nuclear device in 1998. Written by a 30-year professional in the Pakistani Army who played a senior role formulating and advocating Pakistan's security policy on nuclear and conventional arms control, this book tells the compelling story of how and why Pakistan's government, scientists, and military, persevered in the face of a wide array of obstacles to acquire nuclear weapons. It lays out the conditions that sparked the shift from a peaceful quest to acquire nuclear energy into a full-fledged weapons program, details how the nuclear program was organized, reveals the role played by outside powers in nuclear decisions, and explains how Pakistani scientists overcome the many technical hurdles they encountered. Thanks to General Khan's unique insider perspective, it unveils and unravels the fascinating and turbulent interplay of personalities and organizations that took place and reveals how international opposition to the program only made it an even more significant issue of national resolve. Listen to a podcast of a related presentation by Feroz Khan at the Stanford Center for International Security and Cooperation at cisac.stanford.edu/events/recording/7458/2/765.

Download or read book The Arena Man written by Steve Englehart and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2013-02-19 with total page 367 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discovering a Necklace plot to destabilize the U.S. government by using a demonic entity's powers to reawaken terrorist fears, Max August tests his magickal resources and the abilities of companions Pam and Vee to save tens of thousands of spectators in a domed stadium.

Download or read book The Man in the Arena written by Theodore Roosevelt and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2003 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first compilation of selections from the major works of Teddy Roosevelt since the resurgence in his popularity due to the major award-winning/bestselling biographies by Edmond Morris and H. W. Brands By the time he was twenty-five the future president of the United States was already a published author. From The Naval War of 1812 through his four-volume Winning of the West, Teddy Roosevelt proved himself a master historian...but one must not make the mistake of labeling him a stodgy academic. The future president was also a great outdoorsman, with such works as Ranch Life and the Hunting Trail and African Game Trails capturing his rough and ready lifestyle. Theodore Roosevelt was part Francis Parkman, part Lowell Thomas, and one hundred percent spirit of America and master of the printed page. The Man in the Arena collects self-contained excerpts from some of his greatest works, including such revealing memoirs as The Rough Riders, the Autobiography, and Through the Brazilian Wilderness, in an effort to capture the many aspects of a great American who was indeed larger than life and his own best "Boswell." "This collection of his writings gives credence to Henry Adams's assertion that Roosevelt was "pure Act": there was, it seems, no subject (or foe) he was afraid to tackle. " - Publishers Weekly

Download or read book Nora written by Nuala O'Connor and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2021-01-05 with total page 482 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Named one of the best books of historical fiction by the New York Times Acclaimed Irish novelist Nuala O’Connor’s bold reimagining of the life of James Joyce’s wife, muse, and the model for Molly Bloom in Ulysses is a “lively and loving paean to the indomitable Nora Barnacle” (Edna O’Brien). Dublin, 1904. Nora Joseph Barnacle is a twenty-year-old from Galway working as a maid at Finn’s Hotel. She enjoys the liveliness of her adopted city and on June 16—Bloomsday—her life is changed when she meets Dubliner James Joyce, a fateful encounter that turns into a lifelong love. Despite his hesitation to marry, Nora follows Joyce in pursuit of a life beyond Ireland, and they surround themselves with a buoyant group of friends that grows to include Samuel Beckett, Peggy Guggenheim, and Sylvia Beach. But as their life unfolds, Nora finds herself in conflict between their intense desire for each other and the constant anxiety of living in poverty throughout Europe. She desperately wants literary success for Jim, believing in his singular gift and knowing that he thrives on being the toast of the town, and it eventually provides her with a security long lacking in her life and his work. So even when Jim writes, drinks, and gambles his way to literary acclaim, Nora provides unflinching support and inspiration, but at a cost to her own happiness and that of their children. With gorgeous and emotionally resonant prose, Nora is a heartfelt portrayal of love, ambition, and the quiet power of an ordinary woman who was, in fact, extraordinary.

Download or read book The Metal Mountain written by John Healy and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fiction. London is a city of ruins and rubble: in fighting against a police state Britain has become almost a police state itself. Rationing is still in place, the black market is thriving, medical shortages have resulted in antibiotics being watered down. Though Britain was possessed of great decency there was a limit to what it might be expected to bear after suffering six years of war. The barbarities of war had changed peoples' attitudes; nobody thought of foreigners in terms of human beings. The Salvation Army were singing of salvation while the kids on the street were singing saucy songs about inn keepers' daughters and German officers that had crossed the line. New arrival seventeen-year old Bridget Kelly dreams of a world where everyone is equal. "There is no cause more dangerous" warns one council official as she sets about the task of trying to make her dream come true. She is courageous and determined and in terrible danger. Her young nephew Michael schemes and plots to win the metal mountain, a gothic edifice, a treacherous Hades, a fabulous kingdom of iron. Meanwhile, his young aunt has come under the scrutiny of the British secret police. Blackmail, betrayal and murder follow. A perverse grand tragedy with an edge of iron. "The skies darken. An urgent, brutal and ultimately tragic resolution is waiting in the railside scrapyard of THE METAL MOUNTAIN.This glittering alp of damage, an unsorted mound heaped from the discarded toys of capitalism, is as potent a symbol for our contemporary confusions as the dust heaps of Dickens. Nature is avenged and Healy has given us a brave sequel, as genuine fiction now, to The Grass Arena."--Iain Sinclair

Download or read book Architecture on Ice written by Howard Shubert and published by McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. This book was released on 2016 with total page 329 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An architectural and cultural history of skating rinks and hockey arenas in North America.

Download or read book The Man in the Arena written by Eddie Gallagher and published by . This book was released on 2020-12-08 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On September 11, 2018, Navy SEAL Chief Edward Gallagher-a highly-decorated combat veteran with deployments to war zones in Cosovo, Africa, Afghanistan, and Iraq-was arrested for war crimes at the TBI medical clinic where he was receiving treatment. His incarceration was the culmination of a year-long whisper campaign started by a group of disgruntled underlings after a successful deployment decimating ISIS in Mosul, Iraq. After that deployment, Chief Gallagher was named the #1 Chief at SEAL Team 7, nominated for a Silver Star for valor on the battlefield, and listed for promotion. A few junior members of the platoon whom Chief Gallagher had called out for cowardice and ineptitude decided they couldn't let those things stand, and escalated minor leadership complaints into false accusations of stabbing a captured ISIS fighter and shooting noncombatants. Fighting against a corrupt investigation and a deceitful prosecutor who would be removed from the case for spying on defense attorneys, Chief Gallagher was found innocent on all major charges, and freed from prison. But only after he and his family were put through hell. President Trump had to intervene for Chief Gallagher to have access to his lawyers before trial, then restored his rank and insured his Trident pin was not taken after the acquittal. This tell-all exposes a military justice system designed to break and persecute our country's warfighters, told by a family who was targeted by it. While heavily covered in the media, the full story of how a war hero was railroaded and nearly sent to prison for life for crimes he didn't commit has never been told. Chief Gallagher did not testify at his trial and has spoken in little detail about how this travesty came about. Until now. A shocking, raw, exposé that pulls no punches and calls out each and every bad actor in this surreal story."People always tell me, if our life was a movie, no one would believe it." -Andrea Gallagher

Download or read book Vintage Cavs written by Terry Pluto and published by Gray Publishers. This book was released on 2019-11-07 with total page 214 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Cleveland Arena and Richfield Coliseum are long gone, but they and the Cavaliers teams from 1970 to the 1990s come alive in this personal history by a sportswriter who was there as a young fan and later an NBA beat writer. From expansion team to the brink of greatness with Austin Carr, World B. Free, "Hot Rod" Williams, Mark Price, and others.

Download or read book Skin Deep written by Steven Burton and published by powerHouse Books. This book was released on 2017-10-24 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For decades now tattoos have been potent symbols of the Los Angeles gang-life scene. The black and white tattoos with recognizable gang symbols appear on members' faces, necks and all over their bodies, making their gang affiliation immediately clear to whomever crosses their path. This can mean the difference between life and death on he streets, and just as often, in prison. What does this prominently placed imagery mean for those men and women who somehow extricate themselves from gang life or are released from prison or want to separate themselves from the gang and start life anew? The very tattoos which may have helped guard against the constant threat of rival gangs now bar many ex-gang members from employment, life without harassment, and the freedom to move on from a past they have worked hard to overcome. Skin Deep is a photography project that seeks to show the effects of this ongoing gang conflict in Los Angeles. Photographer Steven Burton set out to photograph realistic portraits of former gang members who are trying to escape the revolving door of death and prison. For these men and women, the aftermath of gang life is not only carried within--it is also scrawled across their faces and bodies. Skin Deep uniquely highlights the impact tattoos have on the way a person is perceived by showing what each participant might look like without them. Utilizing before and, thanks to the advantages of Photoshop, after photographs, these men and women got a chance to see what they'd look like without the inked visual armor. After the bare images were presented to each, they were asked to talk about themselves and their families, what tattoos represent to them, and their aspirations for the future. Seeing themselves without tattoos--many for the first time in decades--naturally brought about a wide range of emotions, recollections, hopes, and dreams, with responses such as: "I am shocked. I don't know what to say about this. I am going to give this to my mom, she is going to be so happy." "I think this guy in the pictures would judge the one with tattoos right off the top." "That's crazy, that looks real crazy. Those came out cool man! I think I like it better without the tattoos." Burton met his subjects thanks to Father Greg Boyle, the founder of Homeboy Industries in LA, and the entire project is inspired by his tireless work to help rehabilitate these former gang members and give them all a crucial second chance in life. Skin Deep offers a chance to expose the realities these individuals face when trying to rebuild their lives and re-enter society. As importantly, for the public, the project provokes consideration regarding how society perceives and judges people with tattoos and violent pasts and seeks to garner empathy for those caught in the crosshairs of gang life as they try to change their futures.