Life with Father

Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life

Steve Martin · 216 pages

The author shares the stories of his years in stand-up comedy in a humorous memoir that recalls a first job selling guidebooks at Disneyland, his early magic and comedy act, his years of honing his craft, and the sacrifice, discipline, and originality it took to take him to the top.

All Creatures Great and Small

James Herriot · 442 pages

Delve into the magical, unforgettable world of James Herriot, the world's most beloved veterinarian, and his menagerie of heartwarming, funny, and tragic animal patients. For over forty years, generations of readers have thrilled to Herriot's marvelous tales, deep love of life, and extraordinary storytelling abilities. For decades, Herriot roamed the remote, beautiful Yorkshire Dales, treating

The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid: A Memoir

Bill Bryson · 288 pages

Bill Bryson on his most personal journey yet: into his own childhood in America's Mid-West.Some say that the first hint that Bill Bryson was not of Planet Earth came when his mother sent him to school in lime-green Capri pants. Others think it all started with his discovery, at the age of six, of a woollen jersey of rare fineness. Across the moth-holed chest was a golden thunderbolt. It may have l

My Family and Other Animals

Gerald Durrell · 285 pages

My Family and Other Animals is an autobiographical work by naturalist Gerald Durrell, telling of the part of his childhood he spent on the Greek island of Corfu between 1935 and 1939.

Our Hearts Were Young and Gay: An Unforgettable Comic Chronicle of Innocents Abroad in the 1920s

Cornelia Otis Skinner, Emily Kimbrough · 247 pages

Two ingenues "do the Continent" pre-WWII. Skinner takes us from the innocence of youth in the 1920s to the dawn of WWII, replete with all the faux pas and fiascoes you would expect from youth taking Europe on their own in the early part of the twentieth century when innocence still existed and innuendo was unheard of. A great read.

Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table

Ruth Reichl · 294 pages

For better or worse, almost all of us grow up at the table. It is in this setting that Ruth Reichl's brilliantly written memoir takes its form. For, at a very early age, Reichl discovered that "food could be a way of making sense of the world . . . if you watched people as they ate, you could find out who they were." Tender at the Bone is the story of a life determined, enhanced, and defined in eq

The Autobiography of Mark Twain

Mark Twain, Charles Neider · 388 pages

An autobiography in which American author Mark Twain, writing from his deathbed, tells the story of his life and experiences.

700 Sundays

Billy Crystal · 187 pages

To support his family, Billy Crystal's father, Jack, worked two jobs, having only one day a week to spend with his family. Based on Crystal's one-man Broadway show of the same name, "700 Sundays"--referring sadly to the time shared by an adoring father and his devoted son--offers a heartfelt, hilarious memoir. Photos throughout.

Bossypants

Tina Fey · 277 pages

Tina Fey’s new book *Bossypants* is short, messy, and impossibly funny (an apt description of the comedian herself). From her humble roots growing up in Pennsylvania to her days doing amateur improv in Chicago to her early sketches on Saturday Night Live, Fey gives us a fascinating glimpse behind the curtain of modern comedy with equal doses of wit, candor, and self-deprecation. Some of the funnie

We Took To the Woods

Louise Dickinson Rich · 322 pages

The author describes how she came to live in the remote area of Maine where she lived with her husband and children during the late 1930's

Angela's Ashes

Frank McCourt · 384 pages

"When I look back on my childhood I wonder how I managed to survive at all. It was, of course, a miserable childhood: the happy childhood is hardly worth your while. Worse than the ordinary miserable childhood is the miserable Irish childhood, and worse yet is the miserable Irish Catholic childhood." So begins the luminous memoir of Frank McCourt, born in Depression-era Brooklyn to recent Irish im

Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing

Judy Blume · 120 pages

Any fourth grader would agree that Peter Hatcher has a terrible problem—his little brother, Fudge. But the grown-ups in his life just can't see that there is something wrong with a two-year-old who breaks his front teeth try- ing to fly, decides that he is a dog, goes on a no-eat strike, and scribbles all over his brother's homework. Peter is always asked to perform so that Fudge will be less of

The Mayor of MacDougal Street [2013 edition]: A Memoir

Dave Van Ronk · 246 pages

Love, Nina: Despatches from Family Life

Nina Stibbe · 328 pages

In 1982, 20-year-old Nina Stibbe moved to London to work as a nanny to two opinionated and lively young boys. In frequent letters home to her sister, Nina described her trials and triumphs.

Anybody Can Do Anything

Betty MacDonald · 248 pages

Relates the joys and frustrations of life on a poultry farm in the mountains of Washington.

Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life

Amy Krouse Rosenthal · 220 pages

Fever Pitch

Nick Hornby · 247 pages

In America, it is soccer. But in Great Britain, it is the real football. No pads, no prayers, no prisoners. And that's before the players even take the field. Nick Hornby has been a football fan since the moment he was conceived. Call it predestiny. Or call it preschool. Fever Pitch is his tribute to a lifelong obsession. Part autobiography, part comedy, part incisive analysis of insanity, Horn

Dad Is Fat

Jim Gaffigan · 274 pages

"In Dad is Fat, stand-up comedian Jim Gaffigan, who's best known for his legendary riffs on Hot Pockets, bacon, manatees, and McDonald's, expresses all the joys and horrors of life with five young children--everything from cousins ("celebrities for little kids") to toddlers' communication skills ("they always sound like they have traveled by horseback for hours to deliver important news"), to the

Boy: Tales of Childhood

Roald Dahl · 176 pages

Boy is an autobiographical book by British writer Roald Dahl. This book describes his life from birth until leaving school, focusing on living conditions in Britain in the 1920s and 1930s, the public school system at the time, and how his childhood experiences led him to writing as a career. It ends with his first job, working for Royal Dutch Shell. His autobiography continues in the book Going So

Marley and Me: Life and Love With the World's Worst Dog

John Grogan · 368 pages

The heartwarming and unforgettablestory of a family in the making and thewondrously neurotic dog who taughtthem what really matters in lifeJohn and Jenny were just beginning their life together. They were young and in love, with a perfect little house and not a care in the world. Then they brought home Marley, a wiggly yellow furball of a puppy. Life would never be the same.Marley quickly grew int

A Year in Provence

Peter Mayle · 207 pages

In this witty and warm-hearted account, Peter Mayle tells what it is like to realize a long-cherished dream and actually move into a 200-year-old stone farmhouse in the remote country of the Lubéron with his wife and two large dogs. He endures January's frosty mistral as it comes howling down the Rhône Valley, discovers the secrets of goat racing through the middle of town, and delights in the glo

Not That Kind of Girl: A Young Woman Tells You What She's "Learned"

Lena Dunham · 287 pages

"If I could take what I've learned and make one menial job easier for you, or prevent you from having the kind of sex where you feel you must keep your sneakers on in case you want to run away during the act, then every misstep of mine was worthwhile. I'm already predicting my future shame at thinking I had anything to offer you, but also my future glory in having stopped you from trying an expens

Moab Is My Washpot

Stephen Fry · 368 pages

"Stephen Fry has already given readers a taste of his tumultuous adolescence in his autobiographical first novel, The Liar, and now he reveals the equally tumultuous life that inspired it. Sent to boarding school at the age of seven, he survived beatings, misery, love affairs, carnal violation, expulsion, attempted suicide, criminal conviction and imprisonment to emerge, at the age of eighteen, re

Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!: Adventures of a Curious Character

Richard Feynman · 350 pages

The biography of the physicist and Nobel prize winner Richard P. Feynman - a collection of short stories, chapters told to and written down by Ralph Leighton. Feynman tells of his childhood and youth and goes into his adult life, both personally and professionally.