Showing results for "memoir" in Coming of Age

An extraordinarily vivid and beautifully written first novel exploring the hidden world of the geisha. Memoirs of a Geisha is a rare and utterly engaging experience. The extraordinary tale of Sayuri, a young girl who grows up to become an acclaimed geisha, it spans a quarter of a century, from...

The story blends a bit of imagination with the true story about six-year-old Paddy and his life in New York City, to rural Kilkenny County in Ireland, in the 1960s, and back again to New York, and how he learned that Banshees are real while also managing to navigate and survive a broken home and a variety of other early-life challenges. The boy’s name may not really be Paddy, but to tell this story, a hint of Irishness and anonymity may be necessary.

When reading and writing are the most important things in the world. Jevick, the pepper merchant's son, has been raised on stories of Olondria, a distant land where books are as common as they are rare in his home - but which his mother calls the Ghost Country. When his father dies and Jevick takes his place on the yearly selling trip to Olondria, Jevick's life is as close to perfect as he can imagine. Just as he revels in Olondria's Rabelaisian Feast of Birds, he is pulled drastically off course and becomes haunted by the ghost of an illiterate young girl.

Follow the adventures of a baby boomer born in 1948 from his birth to high school graduation in 1966. Born in a small South Western Pennsylvania town on the edge of Appalachia, the narrator, in a fictional memoir filled with amusing anecdotes, captures life in an absorbing snapshot of coming of age in the Pennsylvania bituminous coalfields of the 1950s.

Take a trip back in time to the 80s when it was a great time to be alive. When Tommy and his 2 friends got drunk for the first time, playing air guitar to AC/DC, they knew their life would never be the same.

When a big project at work goes south, Michelle Black finds herself in the CFO's crosshairs. Trapped in a world that's dictated by everyone else's rules and her own lies, Michelle's controlled mask shatters. Awake or asleep, long-buried memories rise up to re-traumatize her. Faced with the nightmarish prospect of returning to work after a ruinous family vacation, she finally finds the courage to ask for help.

Set at a religious, liberal-arts university, Tabula Rasa tells a story of growing up, falling in and out of love, and forging bonds of friendship that have a lifelong effect. Told through the eyes of a young freshman named Troy Rollins, the novel is at once bitingly witty, frank, tragic, painful, but above all, hopeful. Troy begins his year at Ellis University as a blank slate: no ambition and no other desire than to finally be on his own and maybe be lucky enough to find a nice girlfriend. He is introduced to a wide variety of stimulating, albeit eccentric characters.

Disenchanted with her personal life and faced with mounting career pressures, 39-year-old Michelle Black dreams of escape. But the high-octane finance professional and mother of two is ashamed to admit the depth of her struggles. Michelle’s frustration intensifies when her fumbling attempts to ask for help go unheeded. Then, work goes from bad to worse. Desperate to relieve the bleakness inside, Michelle turns to unspoken addictions and dangerous behaviors for a balm to her wounded soul. When the band-aids fail, what can she do next?

The story follows James Murphy, who lives an extraordinarily unique life learning ordinary life lessons to which everyone can relate through his many misadventures. James' misadventures feature everything from swindling friends out of valuable baseball cards to run-ins with bullies and kids in Connecticut "gangs", from awkward romantic heartbreak to family party fiascos, from sophisticated pranks that build up to a court appearance and community service to a death defying "rafting" incident.