Pete Sampras is arguably the greatest tennis player ever, a man whose hard-nosed work ethic led to an unprecedented number one world ranking for 286 weeks, and whose prodigious talent made possible a record-setting fourteen Grand Slam titles. While his more vocal rivals sometimes grabbed the headlines, Pete always preferred to let his racket do the talking.,Until now.,In A Champion???s Mind, the tennis great who so often exhibited visible discomfort with letting people ???inside his head??? finally opens up. An athletic prodigy, Pete resolved from his earliest playing days never to let anything get in the way of his love for the game. But while this single-minded determination led to tennis domination, success didn???t come without a price. The constant pressure of competing on the world???s biggest stage???in the unblinking eye of a media machine hungry for more than mere athletic greatness???took its toll.,Here for the first time Pete speaks freely about what it was like to possess what he calls ???the Gift.??? He writes about the personal trials he faced???including the death of a longtime coach and confidant???and the struggles he gutted his way through while being seemingly on top of the world. Among the book???s most riveting scenes are an early devastating loss to Stefan Edberg that led Pete to make a monastic commitment to delivering on his natural talent; a grueling, four-hour-plus match against Alex Corretja during which Pete became seriously ill; fierce on-court battles with rival and friend Andre Agassi; and the triumphant last match of Pete???s career at the finals of the 2002 U.S. Open.,In A Champion???s Mind, one of the most revered, successful, and intensely private players in the history of tennis offers an intimate look at the life of an elite athlete.
G.H. Hardy was one of this century’s finest mathematical thinkers, renowned among his contemporaries as a ‘real mathematician ??? the purest of the pure’. He was also, as C. P. Snow recounts in his Foreword, ‘unorthodox, eccentric, radical, ready to talk about anything’. This ‘apology’, written in 1940, offers a brilliant and engaging account of mathematics as very much more than a science; when it was first published, Graham Greene hailed it alongside Henry James’s notebooks as ‘the best account of what it was like to be a creative artist’. C. P. Snow’s Foreword gives sympathetic and witty insights into Hardy’s life, with its rich store of anecdotes concerning his collaboration with the brilliant Indian mathematician Ramanujan, his idiosyncrasies and his passion for cricket. This is a unique account of the fascination of mathematics and of one of its most compelling exponents in modern times.
The triumphant true story of the man who achieved one of the greatest feats of our era???the mapping of the human genome.,Growing up in California, Craig Venter didn???t appear to have much of a future. An unremarkable student, he nearly flunked out of high school. After being drafted into the army, he enlisted in the navy and went to Vietnam, where the life and death struggles he encountered as a medic piqued his interest in science and medicine. After pursuing his advanced degrees, Venter quickly established himself as a brilliant and outspoken scientist. In 1984 he joined the National Institutes of Health, where he introduced novel techniques for rapid gene discovery, and left in 1991 to form his own nonprofit genomics research center, where he sequenced the first genome in history in 1995. In 1998 he announced that he would successfully sequence the human genome years earlier, and for far less money, than the government-sponsored Human Genome Project would??? a prediction he kept in 2001, is the triumphant story of one of the most fascinating and controversial figures in science today. In his riveting and inspiring account Venter tells of the unparalleled drama of the quest for the human genome, a tale that involves as much politics (personal and political) as science. He also reveals how he went on to be the first to read and interpret his own genome and what it will mean for all of us to do the same. He describes his recent sailing expedition to sequence microbial life in the ocean, as well as his groundbreaking attempt to create synthetic life. Here is one of the key scientific chronicles of our lifetime, as told by the man who beat the odds to make it happen.
One of the most famous science books of our time, the phenomenal national bestseller that “buzzes with energy, anecdote and life. It almost makes you want to become a physicist” (Science Digest).,Richard P. Feynman, winner of the Nobel Prize in physics, thrived on outrageous adventures. In this lively work that ???can shatter the stereotype of the stuffy scientist??? (Detroit Free Press), Feynman recounts his experiences trading ideas on atomic physics with Einstein and cracking the uncrackable safes guarding the most deeply held nuclear secrets???and much more of an eyebrow-raising nature. In his stories, Feynman???s life shines through in all its eccentric glory???a combustible mixture of high intelligence, unlimited curiosity, and raging chutzpah.
Dan Rooney was one of the most influential sports executives of his generation, the man who transformed the Pittsburgh Steelers into one of the National Football League???s great dynasties and premiere franchises. Some of his most important achievements, however, took place off the playing field as he sought to bring about equity in the league???s hiring practices and peace in his ancestral homeland of Ireland. As a business leader, a philanthropist, a diplomat and the author of the famous Rooney Rule, Dan Rooney was known for his core values, his quiet strength, his effectiveness, and his willingness to talk to and hear from those who disagreed with him.,In this poignant account of his father???s life, Jim Rooney takes readers behind the scenes to share stories from his hundreds of hours of interviews with business and political leaders; sports and celebrity influencers; and family members. Part memoir, part business biography, part history book, A Different Way to Win underscores the importance of focusing on the long game and the effectiveness in building consensus in a way that is meaningful and sustainable for decades to come.
In 1999, after a series of wildly adventurous jobs around the world, Sam Sheridan found himself in Australia, loaded with cash and intent on not working until he???d spent it all. It occurred to him that, without distractions, he could finally indulge a long-dormant obsession: fighting. Within a year, he was in Bangkok training with the greatest fighter in muay Thai (Thai kickboxing) history and stepping through the ropes for a professional bout. That one fight wasn???t enough. Sheridan set out to test himself on an epic journey into how and why we fight, facing Olympic boxers, Brazilian jiu-jitsu stars, and Ultimate Fighting champions. Along the way, Sheridan delivers an insightful look at violence as a career and a spectator sport, a behind-the-pageantry glimpse of athletes at the top of their terrifying game. ??An extraordinary combination of gonzo journalism and participatory sports writing, , is a dizzying first-hand account of what it???s like to reach the peak of finely disciplined personal aggression, to hit???and be hit.
In the New York Times bestseller that the Washington Post called ???Lean In for misfits,??? Sophia Amoruso shares how she went from dumpster diving to founding one of the fastest-growing retailers in the world.,Amoruso spent her teens hitchhiking, committing petty theft, and scrounging in dumpsters for leftover bagels. By age twenty-two she had dropped out of school, and was broke, directionless, and checking IDs in the lobby of an art school???a job she???d taken for the health insurance. It was in that lobby that Sophia decided to start selling vintage clothes on eBay.,Flash forward to today, and she???s the founder of Nasty Gal and the founder and CEO of Girlboss. Sophia was never a typical CEO, or a typical anything, and she???s written GIRLBOSS for other girls like her: outsiders (and insiders) seeking a unique path to success, even when that path is windy as all hell and lined with naysayers.,GIRLBOSS proves that being successful isn???t about where you went to college or how popular you were in high school. It???s about trusting your instincts and following your gut; knowing which rules to follow and which to break; when to button up and when to let your freak flag fly.
How does a good kid overcome a bad childhood? Jason Schmidt’s searing debut memoir explores that question with unflinching clarity and wit, in the tradition of Jeannette Walls??? ,.,Jason Schmidt wasn’t surprised when he came home one day during his junior year of high school and found his father, Mark, crawling around in a giant pool of blood. Things like that had been happening a lot since Mark had been diagnosed with HIV, three years earlier.,Jason???s life with Mark was full of secrets???about drugs, crime, and sex. If the straights???people with normal lives???ever found out any of those secrets, the police would come. Jason???s home would be torn apart. So the rule, since Jason had been in preschool, was never to tell the straights anything., is a funny, disturbing memoir full of brutal insights and unexpected wit that explores the question: How do you find your moral center in a world that doesn’t seem to have one?
Categories: | arts & entertainment, Biographies & Memoirs, History, non-fiction |
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The first major account of the history of reggae, black music journalist Lloyd Bradley describes its origins and development in Jamaica, from ska to rock-steady to dub and then to reggae itself, a local music which conquered the world. There are many extraordinary stories about characters like Prince Buster, King Tubby and Bob Marley. But this is more than a book of music history: it relates the story of reggae to the whole history of Jamaica, from colonial island to troubled independence, and Jamaicans, from Kingston to London.
Categories: | arts & entertainment, Biographies & Memoirs, History, non-fiction |
---|
Recommended By | |
---|---|
Published By |
The first major account of the history of reggae, black music journalist Lloyd Bradley describes its origins and development in Jamaica, from ska to rock-steady to dub and then to reggae itself, a local music which conquered the world. There are many extraordinary stories about characters like Prince Buster, King Tubby and Bob Marley. But this is more than a book of music history: it relates the story of reggae to the whole history of Jamaica, from colonial island to troubled independence, and Jamaicans, from Kingston to London.
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