Spirit of survival

Sample

Lauren St John

In 1978, in the final, bloodiest phase of the Rhodesian civil war, 11-year-old Lauren St John moves with her family to Rainbow's End, a wild, beautiful farm and game reserve set on the banks of a slowflowing river. The house has been the scene of a horrific attack by guerrillas, and when Lauren's family settles there, a chain of events is set in motion that will change her life irrevocably. This memoir captures the beauty and danger of life in the African bush. At the height of the war, Lauren rides through the wilderness on her horse, Morning Star, encountering lions, crocodiles, snakes, vicious ostriches, and mad cows. The constant threat of ruthless guerrillas prowling the land underscores everything, making each day more dangerous, vivid, and prized than the last.--From publisher description.

Sample

Meg Mitchell Moore

Desperate to escape her parents' ugly divorce and a former best friend's vicious cyber-bullying, thirteen-year-old Natalie bonds with widowed librarian Kathleen over the diary of an early twentieth-century Boston maid.

Sample

Hanna Davidson Pankowsky

On September 27, 1939, after the Nazi invasion, Poland ceased to exist as a nation. Ten-year-old Hanna Davidson's father, Simon, and older brother, Kazik, had been drafted to defend Warsaw. Hanna and her mother, Sophia, found themselves subjected to Hitler's efforts to dehumanize Poland's Jewish population. But when they got word that Simon and Kazik were alive in the Soviet-occupied zone of Poland, Hanna and her mother decided to risk a harrowing escape from Nazi Poland into safer Soviet territory. With only the clothes on their backs, they left their apartment. If the two-percent chance of surviving the crossing were not daunting enough, then the Davidsons' prospects in the Soviet Union should have been. Simon Davidson's capitalist and anti-communist activities in Poland would brand him an undesirable. Worse, he had been born in Russia - escaping years before by fooling Soviet authorities into presuming him dead - and his resurfacing would endanger those members of his family who remained behind. So the Davidsons were compelled to invent and memorize not only their own new identities but also an extended family history. Moreover, avoiding persecution by the Soviet regime entailed maintaining a pretense of allegiance to Stalin. As recounted by Hanna, the Davidsons' journey into the Soviet interior makes for a singular story.

Sample

Cathy Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy

From September 11, 2001 to May 2, 2011, Osama bin Laden evaded intelligence services and special forces units, drones and hunter killer squads. The Exile tells the extraordinary inside story of that decade through the eyes of those who witnessed it: bin Laden's four wives and many children, his deputies and military strategists, his spiritual advisor, the CIA, Pakistan's ISI, and many others who have never before told their stories. Investigative journalists Cathy Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy gained unique access to Osama bin Laden's inner circle, and they recount the flight of Al Qaeda's forces and bin Laden's innocent family members, the gradual formation of ISIS by bin Laden's lieutenants, and bin Laden's rising paranoia and eroding control over his organization. They also reveal that the Bush White House knew the whereabouts of bin Laden's family and Al Qaeda's military and religious leaders, but rejected opportunities to capture them, pursuing war in the Persian Gulf instead, and offer insights into how Al Qaeda will attempt to regenerate itself in the coming years. While we think we know what happened in Abbottabad on May 2, 2011, we know little about the wilderness years that led to that shocking event. As authoritative in its scope and detail as it is propuslively readable, The Exile is a landmark work of investigation and reporting.