A Day in the Life: Work Memoirs
Top 10 A Day in the Life: Work Memoirs
: All Creatures Great and Small, Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, All Things Wise and Wonderful, Teacher Man, Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science, Waiting: The True Confessions of a Waitress, Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise, Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life, The Midwife: A Memoir of Birth, Joy, and Hard Times
All Creatures Great and Small
| Author | James Herriot |
| ISBN | 0312965788 |
The classic multimillion copy bestseller
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...
Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America
| Author | Barbara Ehrenreich |
| ISBN | 0805063897 |
Reveals low-wage America in all its tenacity, anxiety, and surprising generosity--a land of Big Boxes, fast food, and a thousand desperate stratagems for survival.
Millions of Americans work full-time, year-round, for poverty-level wages. In 1998, Barbara Ehrenreich decided to join...
On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
| Author | Stephen King |
| ISBN | 0743455967 |
"Long live the King" hailed Entertainment Weekly upon the publication of Stephen King's On Writing. Part memoir, part master class by one of the bestselling authors of all time, this superb volume is a revealing and practical view of the writer's craft, comprising the basic tools of the trade every...
All Things Wise and Wonderful
| Author | James Herriot |
| ISBN | 0312335288 |
The third volume in the multimillion copy bestselling series
Readers adored James Herriot's tales of his life as a Yorkshire animal doctor in All Creatures Great and Small and All Things Bright and Beautiful. Now here's a third delightful volume of memoirs rich with Herriot's own brand of...
| Author | Frank McCourt |
| ISBN | 0743243781 |
McCourt's long-awaited book about how his thirty-year teaching career shaped his second act as a writer.
Nearly a decade ago Frank McCourt became an unlikely star when, at the age of sixty-six, he burst onto the literary scene with Angela's Ashes, the Pulitzer Prize-winning memoir of his...
Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science
| Author | Atul Gawande |
| ISBN | 0312421702 |
A year or more ago, I mistakenly placed a review for Gawande's book Better under this title. I have fixed the mix up, and I have now read Complications.
Gawande is pure pleasure to read. His writing is fluid and full of germane examples as he addresses big issues like error and incompetence as well...
Waiting: The True Confessions of a Waitress
| Author | Debra Ginsberg |
| ISBN | 0060932813 |
A veteran waitress dishes up a spicy and robust account of life as it really exists behind kitchen doors.
Part memoir, part social commentary, part guide to how to behave when dining out, Debra Ginsberg's book takes readers on her twentyyear journey as a waitress at a soap-operatic Italian...
Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise
| Author | Ruth Reichl |
| ISBN | 0143036610 |
Ruth Reichl, world-renowned food critic and editor in chief of Gourmet magazine, knows a thing or two about food. She also knows that as the most important food critic in the country, you need to be anonymous when reviewing some of the most high-profile establishments in the biggest restaurant town...
Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life
| Author | Steve Martin |
| ISBN | 1416553649 |
In the midseventies, Steve Martin exploded onto the comedy scene. By 1978 he was the biggest concert draw in the history of stand-up. In 1981 he quit forever. This book is, in his own words, the story of "why I did stand-up and why I walked away."
Emmy and Grammy Award winner, author of the acclaimed...
The Midwife: A Memoir of Birth, Joy, and Hard Times
| Author | Jennifer Worth |
| ISBN | 0143116231 |
Having given birth with the support of a midwife three times, when I heard about this one, I knew I had to make time to read it. The Midwife is the memoir of Jennifer Worth (“Jenny”) and her experiences in the East End Slums of post-war London. I think three things come together to make this a very interesting...
Heads in Beds: A Reckless Memoir of Hotels, Hustles, and So-Called Hospitality
| Author | Jacob Tomsky |
| ISBN | 0385535635 |
In the tradition of Kitchen Confidential and Waiter Rant, a rollicking, eye-opening, fantastically indiscreet memoir of a life spent (and misspent) in the hotel industry.
Jacob Tomsky never intended to go into the hotel business. As a new college graduate, armed only with a philosophy degree...
| Author | Peter Allison |
| ISBN | 0762745657 |
A hilarious, highly original collection of essays based on the Botswana truism: “only food runs!”
In the tradition of Bill Bryson, a new writer brings us the lively adventures and biting wit of an African safari guide. Peter Allison gives us the guide’s-eye view of living in the bush,...
Before Liz Lemon, before "Weekend Update," before "Sarah Palin," Tina Fey was just a young girl with a dream: a recurring stress dream that she was being chased through a local airport by her middle-school gym teacher. She also had a dream that one day she would be a comedian on TV.
She has seen...
Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within
| Author | Natalie Goldberg |
| ISBN | 1590303164 |
For more than twenty years Natalie Goldberg has been challenging and cheering on writers with her books and workshops. In her groundbreaking first book, she brings together Zen meditation and writing in a new way. Writing practice, as she calls it, is no different from other forms of Zen practice--"it...
| Author | Pete Jordan |
| ISBN | 0060896426 |
Dishwasher is the true story of a man on a mission: to clean dirty dishes professionally in every state in America. Part adventure, part parody, and part miraculous journey of self-discovery, it is the unforgettable account of Pete Jordan's transformation from itinerant seeker into "Dishwasher...
Two Years Before the Mast: A Sailor's Life at Sea
| Author | Richard Henry Dana Jr. |
| ISBN | 1402179626 |
Two Years Before the Mast is a book by the American author Richard Henry Dana, Jr. written after a two-year sea voyage starting in 1834.
While at Harvard College, Dana had an attack of the measles, which affected his vision. Thinking it might help his sight, Dana, rather than going on a Grand Tour...
And So It Goes: Adventures in Television
| Author | Linda Ellerbee |
| ISBN | 0425102378 |
Linda Ellerbee (born Linda Jane Smith) is a journalist who is most known for several jobs at NBC News, including Washington (DC) correspondent, and reporter and co-anchor of NBC News Overnight, which was recognized by the duPont Columbia Awards as "the best written and most intelligent news program...
Blood, Bones, and Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef
Before Gabrielle Hamilton opened her acclaimed New York restaurant Prune, she spent twenty hard-living years trying to find purpose and meaning in her life. Blood, Bones & Butter follows an unconventional journey through the many kitchens Hamilton has inhabited through the years: the rural...
| Author | Kate Braestrup |
| ISBN | 0316066303 |
When the oldest of Kate Braestrup's four children was ten years old, her husband, a Maine state trooper, was killed in a car accident. Stunned and grieving, she decided to pursue her husband's dream of becoming a Unitarian minister, and eventually began working with the Maine Game Warden Service, which...
A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812
| Author | Laurel Thatcher Ulrich |
| ISBN | 0679733760 |
I read this book 15 years ago shortly after it won the Pulitzer, and it was amazing then, and I was equally impressed this time. In fact I was surprised as I read how much of it I could remember reading even that many years ago, so it must have made a deep impression.
I'm just in awe if LTU, the depth and...
| Author | Vicki León |
| ISBN | 0802715567 |
Vicki Le?n, the popular author of the Uppity Women series (more than 335,000 in print), has turned her impressive writing and research skills to the entertaining and unusual array of the peculiar jobs, prized careers and passionate pursuits of ancient Greece and Rome.
From Architect to Vicarius...
Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World
| Author | Tracy Kidder |
| ISBN | 0812973011 |
This powerful and inspiring book shows how one person can make a difference, as Kidder tells the true story of a gifted man who is in love with the world and has set out to do all he can to cure it.
Tracy Kidder is a winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the author of the bestsellers The Soul of a New Machine,...
Travels with Charley: In Search of America
| Author | John Steinbeck |
| ISBN | 0142000701 |
A quest across America, from the northernmost tip of Maine to California’s Monterey Peninsula
To hear the speech of the real America, to smell the grass and the trees, to see the colors and the light—these were John Steinbeck's goals as he set out, at the age of fifty-eight, to rediscover...
Answering 911: Life in the Hot Seat
| Author | Caroline Burau |
| ISBN | 0873515692 |
You answer a call from a fourteen-year-old boy asking for someone to arrest his mother, who is smoking crack in their bathroom. You talk with him until the cops arrive, making sure there are no weapons around and learning that his favorite subject in school is lunch. Five minutes later, you have to deal...
One sunny day on his postal route, Vincent Wyckoff crosses the path of an elderly gentleman whistling for his lost parakeet. The old man is upset, and Wyckoff moves down the block slowly, looking high and low, hoping to spot the little bird. He reaches the man’s house and offers sympathy to his wife,...
Weekends at Bellevue: Nine Years on the Night Shift at the Psych E.R.
| Author | Julie Holland |
| ISBN | 0553807668 |
I don't usually take the time to write a review, but as a psychology major and a human being, I was very disappointed by the actions of Julie Holland as she recounts them in this memoir.
The stories of patients in the ER were often interesting, but I was consistently bothered by how politically...
Fire Season: Field Notes from a Wilderness Lookout
| Author | Philip Connors |
| ISBN | 0061859362 |
A decade ago Philip Connors left work as an editor at the Wall Street Journal and talked his way into a job far from the streets of lower Manhattan: working as one of the last fire lookouts in America. Spending nearly half the year in a 7' x 7' tower, 10,000 feet above sea level in remote New Mexico, his tasks...
Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda
| Author | Roméo Dallaire |
| ISBN | 0786715103 |
On the 10th anniversary of when UN peacekeepers landed in Rwanda, Random House Canada proudly publishes the unforgettable 1st-hand account of the genocide by the leader of the mission. Digging deep into shattering memories, Dallaire has written a powerful story of betrayal, naïveté, racism &...
| Author | Nancy Peacock |
| ISBN | 0061357871 |
For the twice-published novelist, reading an article about herself in the National Enquirer—under the headline "Here's One for the Books: Cleaning Lady Is an Acclaimed Author"—was more than a shock. It was an inspiration.
In A Broom of One's Own, Nancy Peacock, whose first novel was...
Banker to the Poor: Micro-Lending and the Battle Against World Poverty
| Author | Muhammad Yunus |
| ISBN | 1586481983 |
Muhammad Yunus is that rare thing: a bona fide visionary. His dream is the total eradication of poverty from the world. In 1983, against the advice of banking and government officials, Yunus established Grameen, a bank devoted to providing the poorest of Bangladesh with minuscule loans. Grameen Bank,...
| Author | Theresa Brown |
| ISBN | 0061791555 |
“Among all the recent books on medicine, Critical Care stands alone.“ — Pauline Chen, author of Final Exam
“A must read for anyone who wants to understand healthcare. Extraordinary.” — Elizabeth Cohen, MPH, CNN Senior Medical Correspondent
Critical Care is the powerful...
Other People's Dirt: A Housecleaner's Curious Adventures
| Author | Louise Rafkin |
| ISBN | 0452280818 |
After earning an M.A. in Comparative Literature, Louise Ratkin, facing a career choice, took the road less traveled. She became a housecleaner. The money was better than teaching, the lifestyle intriguing for someone with an insatiable curiosity about her fellow human beings. And while she quickly...
Young people starting out in television sometimes say to me: “I want to be you.” My stock reply is always: “Then you have to take the whole package.”
And now, at last, the most important woman in the history of television journalism gives us that “whole package,” in her inspiring...
| Author | Andrea Lankford |
| ISBN | 0762752637 |
The real stories behind the scenery of America’s national parks
For twelve years, Andrea Lankford lived in the biggest, most impressive national parks in the world, working a job she loved. She chaperoned baby sea turtles on their journey to sea. She pursued bad guys on her galloping patrol...
Clapton: The Autobiography
I found a pattern in my behavior that had been repeating itself for years, decades even. Bad choices were my specialty, and if something honest and decent came along, I would shun it or run the other way.”
With striking intimacy and candor, Eric Clapton tells the story of his eventful and inspiring...
Hot Lights, Cold Steel: Life, Death and Sleepless Nights in a Surgeon's First Years
| Author | Michael J. Collins |
| ISBN | 0312352697 |
When Michael Collins decides to become a surgeon, he is totally unprepared for the chaotic life of a resident at a major hospital. A natural overachiever, Collins' success, in college and medical school led to a surgical residency at one of the most respected medical centers in the world, the famed Mayo...
| Author | Roald Dahl |
| ISBN | 0141311428 |
Superb Stories, Daring Deeds, Fantastic Adventures
Here is the action-packed sequel to Boy, a tale of Dahl's exploits as a World War II pilot. Told with the same irresistible appeal that has made Roald Dahl one the world's best-loved writers, Going Solo brings you directly into the action...
| Author | Lois Lee |
| ISBN | 1597775428 |
So funny, a lot of us have the same comments in our reviews.
No this is not a well-written book.
No this is not a book that should be read by many.
However, if I'm still talking about it (as I did after concurring with a friend about not loving Shades of Gray 2 but then saying "BUT did you ever...
| Author | Jordan Fisher Smith |
| ISBN | 0618711953 |
A nature book unlike any other, Jordan Fisher Smith's startling account of fourteen years as a park ranger thoroughly dispels our idealized visions of life in the great outdoors. Instead of scout troops and placid birdwatchers, Smith's beat -- a stretch of land that has been officially condemned to...
| Author | Lea Jacobson |
| ISBN | 0312368976 |
During daylight hours, the city of Tokyo is the very image of robotic conformity. At night, however, it transforms into a “floating world” of escapism, as “all-work” salarymen seek a place to play.
Though fascinated by Japanese language and culture, American Lea Jacobson had...
