When Women Invented Television: The Untold Story of the Female Powerhouses Who Pioneered the Way We Watch Today by Jennifer Keishin Armstrong
It was the Golden Age of Radio and powerful men were making millions in advertising dollars reaching thousands of listeners every day. When television arrived, few radio moguls were interested in the upstart industry and its tiny production budgets, and expensive television sets were out of reach for most families. But four women—each an independent visionary— saw an opportunity and carved their own paths, and in so doing invented the way we watch tv today. New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Keishin Armstrong tells the little-known story of these four trailblazing women who laid the foundation of the industry we know today.
Lawbreaking Ladies: 50 Tales of Daring, Defiant, and Dangerous Women from History by Erika Owen & Alexander Wright
Many of us are familiar with the popular slogan “Well-behaved women seldom make history.” But that adage is taken to the next level in this book, which looks at women from the past who weren’t afraid to break the law or challenge gender norms. From pirates to madams, gamblers to bootleggers, and serial killers to outlaws, women throughout the ages haven’t always decided to be sugar, spice, and everything nice.
The Beauty of Living Twice by Sharon Stone
Stone made headlines not just for her beauty and her talent, but for her candor and her refusal to “play nice,” and it’s those same qualities that make this memoir so powerful. The Beauty of Living Twice is a book for the wounded and a book for the survivors; it’s a celebration of women’s strength and resilience, a reckoning, and a call to activism. It is proof that it’s never too late to raise your voice and speak out.
Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist by Judith Heumann & Kristen Joiner
Paralyzed from polio at eighteen months, Judy’s struggle for equality began early in life. From fighting to attend grade school after being described as a “fire hazard” to later winning a lawsuit against the New York City school system for denying her a teacher’s license because of her paralysis, Judy’s actions set a precedent that fundamentally improved rights for disabled people. Candid, intimate, and irreverent, Judy Heumann’s memoir about resistance to exclusion invites readers to imagine and make real a world in which we all belong.
True Believer: The Rise and Fall of Stan Lee by Abraham Riesman
Stan Lee was one of the most beloved and influential entertainers to emerge from the twentieth century. Without him, the global entertainment industry would be wildly different—and a great deal poorer. But Lee’s unprecedented career was also filled with spectacular failures, controversy, and bitter disputes. Stretching from the Romanian shtetls of Lee’s ancestors to his own final moments in Los Angeles, True Believer chronicles the world-changing triumphs and tragic missteps of an extraordinary life, and leaves it to readers to decide whether Lee lived up to the responsibilities of his own talent.
Walking with Ghosts by Gabriel Byrne
As a young boy growing up in the outskirts of Dublin, Gabriel Byrne sought refuge in a world of imagination among the fields and hills near his home, at the edge of a rapidly encroaching city. He reveled in the theatre and poetry of Dublin’s streets, populated by characters as eccentric and remarkable as any in fiction, those who spin a yarn with acuity and wit. It was a friend who suggested Byrne join an amateur drama group, a decision that would change his life forever and launch him on an extraordinary forty-year career in film and theatre. Moving between sensual recollection of childhood in a now almost vanished Ireland and reflections on stardom in Hollywood and Broadway, Byrne also courageously recounts his battle with addiction and the ambivalence of fame.
Queen of Thieves: The True Story of “Marm” Mandelbaum and Her Gangs of New York by J. North Conway
Queen of Thieves is the gritty, fast-paced story of Fredericka “Marm” Mandelbaum, a poor Jewish woman who rose to the top of her profession in organized crime during the Gilded Age in New York City. During her more than twenty-five-year reign as the country’s top receiver of stolen goods, she accumulated great wealth and power inconceivable for women engaged in business, legitimate or otherwise. The New York Times called Mandelbaum “the nucleus and center of the whole organization of crime in New York City.”
The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X by Les Payne & Tamara Payne
Les Payne embarked in 1990 on a nearly thirty-year-long quest to interview anyone he could find who had actually known Malcolm X—all living siblings of the Malcolm Little family, classmates, street friends, cellmates, Nation of Islam figures, FBI moles and cops, and political leaders around the world. His goal was ambitious: to transform what would become over a hundred hours of interviews into an unprecedented portrait of Malcolm X, one that would separate fact from fiction. The result is this historic biography that conjures a never-before-seen world of its protagonist. Setting Malcolm’s life not only within the Nation of Islam but against the larger backdrop of American history, the book traces the life of one of the twentieth century’s most politically relevant figures “from street criminal to devoted moralist and revolutionary.”
Reclaiming Her Time: The Power of Maxine Waters by Helena Andrews-Dyer & R. Eric Thomas
Reclaiming Her Time pays tribute to all things Maxine Waters, from growing up in St. Louis “too skinny” and “too black,” to taking on Wall Street during the financial crisis and coming out on top in her legendary showdowns with Trump and his cronies. Featuring inspiring highlights from her personal life and political career, beloved memes, and testimonies from her many friends and fans, Reclaiming Her Time is a funny, warm, and admiring portrait of a champion who refuses to stay silent in the face of corruption and injustice; a powerful woman who is an inspiration to us all.
All text above from publisher’s descriptions.
