Showing titles in Biographies & Memoirs

In 1986, 26-year-old Ruth is visiting a friend at the hospital when she notices that the door to one of the hospital rooms is painted red. She witnesses nurses drawing straws to see who will tend to the patient inside, all of them reluctant to enter the room. Out of impulse, Ruth herself enters the quarantined space and immediately begins to care for the young man who cries for his mother in the last moments of his life. Before she can even process what she’s done, word spreads in the community that Ruth is the only person willing to help these young men afflicted by AIDS.

At just four years old, Reza Farahan left Iran for what was supposed to be a quick family trip to Los Angeles. But while he was soaking up the California sun, revolution erupted back home, and Reza's short stay turned into permanent exile. Caught between cultures, identities, and expectations, Reza was an outsider in every sense of the word. He was a half-Muslim, half-Jewish, gay Persian kid just trying to survive 1980s America―a place that saw him as a threat, even when all he wanted was to belong. But with an unapologetic spirit and bold personality, Reza was never destined to simply fit in.

In his powerful debut memoir, beloved comedian Murray Hill (Somebody Somewhere) opens up for the first time about how a painful past led to an unwavering commitment to spread joy—one rimshot at a time. For more than three decades, Murray Hill has been a staple of New York City’s downtown...

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER OVER THREE MILLION COPIES SOLD! “Packed with incredible insight about what it means to be a woman today.”—Reese Witherspoon (Reese’s Book Club Pick) In her most revealing and powerful memoir yet, the activist, speaker, bestselling author, and “patron...

We’re Thankful for the Moisture contains personal essays by award-winning humor columnist Eli McCann for The Salt Lake Tribune, along with corresponding cartoons by the Tribune’s Pat Bagley. McCann explores cultural Mormonism and his experiences growing up in Utah as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the 1990s, coming out as gay in adulthood, leaving his faith, and navigating life in Salt Lake City with his husband and their young child.

A masterful collection of essays from America's most beloved humorist that will take readers to wilder and more entertaining heights than ever. "The preeminent humorist of his generation ... His reluctant charm and talent for observing every inch of the human condition remain intact."...

David Sedaris tells all in a book that is, literally, a lifetime in the making. For forty years, David Sedaris has kept a diary in which he records everything that captures his attention-overheard comments, salacious gossip, soap opera plot twists, secrets confided by total strangers. These...

When indie musician Mike Maimone meets legendary publicist Howard Bragman, neither expects a once-in-a-lifetime love story to unfold. Despite their perceived differences, they quickly build a world together based on music, humor, hard-won wisdom, and the unexpected tenderness that comes from finding your forever person just when you'd given up looking. But when Howard is diagnosed with cancer on the eve of Mike's proposal, the life they had been envisioning together changes overnight.

Timothy Schraeder Rodriguez was an invisible architect behind evangelical Christianity's digital empire, crafting messages of belonging for some of the most influential megachurches, all while secretly questioning his own place within the faith. In a desperate attempt to "fix" himself, he turned to conversion therapy, spending eight years trying to pray the gay away. And he wasn't alone. Even though Exodus International, the largest ex-gay organization, closed in 2013, the practice still thrives in many conservative religious communities.

“This brave and bracing memoir is an urgent reminder that America remains a place where queer people have to fight for their lives… Equal parts sympathy and rage, Boy Erased is a necessary, beautiful book.” —Garth Greenwell “Every sentence of the story will stir your soul” —O...

A NATIONAL BESTSELLER A humorous collection of autobiographical essays from comedian and Emmy Award–winning actor Jeff Hiller, who shares his journey from growing up “profoundly gay” in 1980s Texas to his experiences as an inept social worker and how he clawed, scraped, and brawled to...

The Definitive Biography of Oscar Wilde: Genius, Scandal, and Literary Immortality Oscar Wilde dominated Victorian London like no writer before or since. His plays revolutionized English theater. His fairy tales are still read to children worldwide. His novel The Picture of Dorian Gray remains a masterpiece of Gothic fiction. His wit was legendary, his conversation unmatched, his aesthetic philosophy influential across generations. Then Victorian England destroyed him through a prosecution that was meant to erase his name from cultural memory. It failed. This comprehensive biography follows...

Have you ever struggled with self-doubt, low confidence, or felt like you had to hide parts of who you are? Certainly, I know that in the past, I did! Do you want to develop more self-love, confidence, and emotional strength as a gay man? Are you ready to replace negative self-talk with empowering words that support both your mental health and happiness? 1200+ Affirmations for Gay Men is a powerful and uplifting audiobook created to support you in cultivating self-acceptance, inner peace, and authentic self-expression.

Welcome to the hilarious, strange, elegiac, outrageous world of David Sedaris! In Naked, Sedaris turns the mania for memoir on its ear, mining the exceedingly rich terrain of his life, his family, and his unique worldview-a sensibility at once take-no-prisoners sharp and deeply charitable. A...

*AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES AND USA TODAY BESTSELLER* "Listeners who appreciated Jennette McCurdy's I'm Glad My Mom Died will enjoy [Alyson] Stoner's savvy memoir, which shows how fame and fortune dangled before a parent's eyes can make their morals take a back seat to the desire to give the...

There’s no right way to keep a diary, but if there’s an entertaining way, David Sedaris seems to have mastered it. If it’s navel-gazing you’re after, you’ve come to the wrong place; ditto treacly self-examination. Rather, David Sedaris's observations turn outward: a fight between two...

What kind of child grows up to create Billy on the Street? And who is the real Billy when he's not playing his iconic character? From the voice behind the viral sensation comes a hilarious and poignant memoir exclusively on audio about his unlikely path to stardom, the artists that inspired him...

Rita Gigante grew up in a world swirling with secrets, lies, and multiple sins. Her father, notorious Mafia boss Vincent "The Chin" Gigante, was the leader of the Genovese crime clan and the head of all five New York crime families for decades. But until Rita was sixteen, she was kept in the dark about his underworld activities. She unknowingly hung out at mob headquarters and witnessed her dad's whispered meetings around the dinner table, but only knew what she was told by her mother and siblings about his odd behavior: Dad's sick. Keep your mouth shut. Don't talk about the family.

Hey, I'm Jamie, a 29-year-old trans guy from the UK. I've been transitioning for 12 years now after realising I was trans (by accident!) at sixteen years old. I knew I was a boy since the age of four, but realised whilst growing up that I was different. It was only in my teens that I found the words to express who I was and what I needed to do. Since then, I've been on testosterone for more than a decade - I know, I can't believe it either - I've also had top and bottom surgery and legally changed my sex, so I know a few things about the transitioning process and being trans!

The woman behind the icon known as Elvira, Mistress of the Dark, the undisputed Queen of Halloween, reveals her full story filled with intimate bombshells—told by the bombshell herself. On Good Friday in 1953, at only 18 months old, 25 miles from the nearest hospital in Manhattan, Kansas...