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Anansi's gold : the man who looted the west, outfoxed Washington, and swindled the world / by Yeebo, Yepoka,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."The astounding, never-before-told story of how an audacious Ghanaian con artist pulled off one of the 20th century's longest-running and most spectacular frauds. When Ghana won its independence from Britain in 1957, it instantly became a target for home-grown opportunists and rapacious Western interests determined to snatch any assets that colonialism hadn't already stripped. A CIA-funded military junta ousted the new nation's inspiring president, Kwame Nkrumah, then falsely accused him of hiding the country's gold overseas. Into this big lie stepped one of history's most charismatic scammers, a con man to rival the trickster god Anansi. Born into poverty in Ghana and trained in the United States, John Ackah Blay-Miezah declared himself custodian of an alleged Nkrumah trust fund worth billions. You, too, could claim a piece--if only you would "invest" in Blay-Miezah's fictitious efforts to release the equally fictitious fund. Over the 1970s and '80s, he and his accomplices--including Ghanaian state officials and Nixon's former attorney general--scammed hundreds of millions of dollars out of thousands of believers. Blay-Miezah lived in luxury, deceiving Philadelphia lawyers, London financiers, and Seoul businessmen alike, all while eluding his FBI pursuers. American prosecutors called his scam "one of the most fascinating--and lucrative--in modern history." In Anansi's Gold, Yepoka Yeebo chases Blay-Miezah's ever-wilder trail and discovers, at long last, what really happened to Ghana's missing wealth. She unfolds a riveting account of Cold War entanglements, international finance, and postcolonial betrayal, revealing how what we call "history" writes itself into being, one lie at a time."--
Subjects: Biographies.; Personal narratives.; True crime stories.; Blay-Miezah, John Ackah.; Fraud; Swindlers and swindling;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The reproach of hunger : food, justice, and money in the twenty-first century / by Rieff, David,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."The 1990s held up the idea that hunger and poverty were the results of war, mismanagement, and undemocratic societies. The international community, and humanitarian focus, acted to address these threats above all others--instilling democracy and free markets would generate greater wealth for more people. The assumption was that natural disasters were unlikely to constitute a challenge on anywhere near the same level as human rights emergencies, which had created tens of millions of refugees and internally displaced people. The plan didn't work. This is a book about the global crisis we did not expect. Even as the world races to grab and hold energy resources the next great challenge is building in complexity: famine--world hunger. In 2009, unlike in 1999, the most important UN relief agency was not the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) but the World Food Program (WFP), and the most pressing crisis is not resettling refugees, but making sure tens of millions of people--many in countries where there is no war at all--do not starve to death. What the food crisis illustrates for us is one dark side of globalism--not the system that will eventually make everyone prosperous, but rather a zero sum game in which full bellies in one country and empty bellies in another are inextricably linked. An increasing push towards "One world, ready or not," has paradoxically raised the living standards of hundreds of millions of people to previously unachieved levels, but at the same time the prosperity of one is fraught with the potential tragedy for another. The Reproach of Hunger describes the tragedy of the world hunger pandemic, and explains how we continue to struggle to feed the "new hungry" of the world. It is an issue not of availability, but rather of affordability."--Provided by publisher.
Subjects: Food supply.; Hunger.; Money.; Social justice.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Somebody's daughter : a memoir / by Ford, Ashley C.,author.;
"One of the most prominent voices of her generation debuts with an extraordinarily powerful memoir: the story of a childhood defined by the ever looming absence of her incarcerated father and the path we must take to both honor and overcome our origins. For as long as she could remember, Ashley has put her father on a pedestal. Despite having only vague memories of seeing him face-to-face, she believes he's the only person in the entire world who understands her. She thinks she understands him too. He's sensitive like her, an artist, and maybe even just as afraid of the dark. She's certain that one day they'll be reunited again, and she'll finally feel complete. There are just a few problems: he's in prison, and she doesn't know what he did to end up there. Through poverty, puberty, and a fraught relationship with her mother, Ashley returns to her image of her father for hope and encouragement. She doesn't know how to deal with the incessant worries that keep her up at night, or how to handle the changes in her body that draw unwanted attention from men. In her search for unconditional love, Ashley begins dating a boy her mother hates; when the relationship turns sour, he assaults her. Still reeling from the rape, which she keeps secret from her family, Ashley finally finds out why her father is in prison. And that's where the story really begins. Somebody's Daughter steps into the world of growing up a poor Black girl, exploring how isolating and complex such a childhood can be. As Ashley battles her body and her environment, she provides a poignant coming-of-age recollection that speaks to finding the threads between who you are and what you were born into, and the complicated familial love that often binds them."--
Subjects: Biographies.; Autobiographies.; Ford, Ashley C.; African American families; African American women; Children of prisoners; Prisoners' families;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Be useful : seven tools for life / by Schwarzenegger, Arnold,author.;
"The seven rules to follow to realize your true purpose in life--distilled by Arnold Schwarzenegger from his own journey of ceaseless reinvention and extraordinary achievement, and available for absolutely anyone. The world's greatest bodybuilder. The world's highest paid movie star. The leader of the world's sixth largest economy. That these are the same person sounds like the setup to a joke. But this is no joke. This is Arnold Schwarzenegger. And this did not happen by accident. Arnold's stratospheric success happened as part of a process. As the result of clear vision, big thinking, hard work, direct communication, resilient problem-solving, open-minded curiosity, and a commitment to giving back. All of it guided by the one lesson Arnold's father hammered into him above all: be useful. As Arnold conquered every realm he entered, he kept his father's adage close to his heart. Written with his uniquely earnest, blunt, powerful voice, Be Useful takes readers on an inspirational tour through Arnold's toolkit for a meaningful life. Arnold shows us how to put those tools to work, in service of whatever fulfilling future we can dream up for ourselves. He brings his insights to vivid life with compelling personal stories, life-changing successes and life-threatening failures alike--some of them famous, some told here for the first time ever. Too many of us struggle to disconnect from our self-pity and connect to our purpose. At an early age, Arnold forged the mental tools to build the ladder out of the poverty and narrow-mindedness of his rural Austrian hometown, tools he used to add rung after rung from there. Now he has shared that wisdom with all of us. As he puts it, no one is going to come rescue you-you only have yourself. The good news, it turns out, is that you are all you need"--
Subjects: Biographies.; Personal narratives.; Schwarzenegger, Arnold.; Resilience (Personality trait); Self-actualization (Psychology); Success.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Fast food genocide : how processed food is killing us and what we can do about it / by Fuhrman, Joel,author.; Phillips, Robert,contributor.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."Revered nutrition and health expert, PBS personality, and bestselling author of Eat to Live, Super Immunity, and The End of Diabetes, Dr. Joel Fuhrman, delivers a hard-hitting, culture-shifting examination of the role fast and processed food plays in our nation's health crisis and offers a program to help us discover a lasting solution, including a two-week meal plan and 80 recipes. We're eating our way to discomfort, unhappiness, disease, and premature death. Processed and fake foods have become the primary source of calories in the United States--a trend that is growing across the developed world. While these "Frankenfoods" efficiently feed the majority of our citizens, they do not contain the sustaining biological and chemical properties of food produced in nature. This fast-food solution is causing a fast-food genocide that is shaping our bodies and our futures, Joel Fuhrman, MD, warns. Eating these unhealthy foods make us fatter and profoundly affects our brains, behaviors, and even our genetic makeup, leaving us helpless to social forces that will keep us eating fast food forever, he explains. They create an avalanche of harmful problems--chronic disease, lowered intelligence levels, and attention deficits that are intrinsically linked to poverty, reduced educational and occupational opportunities, and even increased drug addiction, violence, and crime. An urgent call to action, Fast Food Genocide also provides a clear and very achievable solution. While food can destroy the world, it can also heal it. We must take back control of our diet--by eating specific natural ingredients in a balanced way--and in doing so, our right to a healthy, long life. "Greater knowledge leads to a solution; a solution to your personal health issues and a solution for our society." Dr. Fuhrman writes. "But it starts with you.""--
Subjects: Nutrition.; Junk food; Processed foods; Diet.;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Born a crime : stories from a South African childhood / by Noah, Trevor,1984-author.;
"One of the comedy world's fastest-rising stars tells his wild coming of age story during the twilight of apartheid in South Africa and the tumultuous days of freedom that followed. Noah provides something deeper than traditional memorists: powerfully funny observations about how farcical political and social systems play out in our lives. Trevor Noah is the host of The Daily Show with Trevor Noah, where he gleefully provides America with its nightly dose of serrated satire. He is a light-footed but cutting observer of the relentless absurdities of politics, nationalism and race--and in particular the craziness of his own young life, which he's lived at the intersections of culture and history. In his first book, Noah tells his coming of age story with his larger-than-life mother during the last gasps of apartheid-era South Africa and the turbulent years that followed. Noah was born illegal--the son of a white, Dutch father and a black Xhosa mother, who had to pretend to be his nanny or his father's servant in the brief moments when the family came together. His brilliantly eccentric mother loomed over his life--a comically zealous Christian (they went to church six days a week and three times on Sunday), a savvy hustler who kept food on their table during rough times, and an aggressively involved, if often seriously misguided, parent who set Noah on his bumpy path to stardom. The stories Noah tells are sometimes dark, occasionally bizarre, frequently tender, and always hilarious--whether he's subsisting on caterpillars during months of extreme poverty or making comically pitiful attempts at teenage romance in a color-obsessed world; whether's he's being thrown into jail as the hapless fall guy for a crime he didn't commit or being thrown by his mother from a speeding car driven by murderous gangsters."--
Subjects: Biographies.; Noah, Trevor, 1984-; Apartheid; Comedians; South African wit and humor.;
Available copies: 2 / Total copies: 2
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The Queen of Fives A Novel [electronic resource] : by Hay, Alex.aut; cloudLibrary;
Nothing is quite as it seems in Victorian high society in this clever novel set against the most magnificent wedding of the season, as a mysterious heiress sets her sights on an illustrious London family “A thrilling and multi-layered story of trickery and deception, truth and lies, poverty and riches, that is sheer delight from start to finish. Absolutely enthralling!” —Janice Hallett, bestselling author of The Appeal A confidence scheme, when properly executed, will follow five movements in close and inviolable order: I. The Mark II. The Intrusion. III. The Ballyhoo. IV. The Knot. V. All In. There may be many counter-strikes along the way, for such is the nature of the game; it contains so many sides, so many endless possibilities... 1898. Quinn le Blanc, London’s most talented con woman, has five days to pull off her most ambitious plot yet: trap a highly eligible duke into marriage and lift a fortune from the richest family in England. Masquerading as the season’s most enviable debutante, Quinn puts on a brilliant act that earns her entrance into the grand drawing rooms and lavish balls of high society—and propels her straight into the inner circle of her target: the charismatic Kendals. Among those she must convince are the handsome bachelor heir, the rebellious younger sister, and the esteemed duchess eager to see her son married. But the deeper she forges into their world, the more Quinn finds herself tangled in a complicated web of love, lies, and loyalty. The Kendals all have secrets of their own, and she may not be the only one playing a game of high deception... “Audacious, cunning, quick-witted—this is a jewel of a book from the seriously talented Alex Hay. I was rooting for the Queen of Fives from the very first line.” —Louise Candlish, author of The Other PassengerGeneral adult.
Subjects: Electronic books.; Historical; Crime; Historical;
© 2025., Graydon House Books,
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Surrender : 40 songs, one story / by Bono,1960-author.;
"Bono, artist, activist, and the lead singer of Irish rock band U2, has written a memoir: honest and irreverent, intimate and profound, Surrender is the story of the remarkable life he's lived, the challenges he's faced, and the friends and family who have shaped and sustained him. 'When I started to write this book, I was hoping to draw in detail what I'd previously only sketched in songs. The people, places, and possibilities in my life. Surrender is a word freighted with meaning for me. Growing up in Ireland in the seventies with my fists up (musically speaking), it was not a natural concept. A word I only circled until I gathered my thoughts for the book. I am still grappling with this most humbling of commands. In the band, in my marriage, in my faith, in my life as an activist. Surrender is the story of one pilgrim's lack of progress ... with a fair amount of fun along the way."-Bono. As one of the music world's most iconic artists and the cofounder of the organizations ONE and (RED), Bono's career has been written about extensively. But in Surrender, it's Bono who picks up the pen, writing for the first time about his remarkable life and those he has shared it with. In his unique voice, Bono takes us from his early days growing up in Dublin, including the sudden loss of his mother when he was fourteen, to U2's unlikely journey to become one of the world's most influential rock bands, to his more than twenty years of activism dedicated to the fight against AIDS and extreme poverty. Writing with candor, self-reflection, and humor, Bono opens the aperture on his life, and the family, friends, and faith that have sustained, challenged, and shaped him. Surrender's subtitle, 40 Songs, One Story, is a nod to the book's forty chapters, which are each named after a U2 song. Bono has also created forty original drawings for Surrender, which will appear throughout the book."--
Subjects: Biographies.; Autobiographies.; Bono, 1960-; U2 (Musical group); Human rights workers; Rock musicians;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Blood money : the story of life, death, and profit inside America's blood industry / by McLaughlin, Kathleen(Journalist),author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."Bad Blood meets Dreamland in this kaleidoscopic investigation into the shadowy and vampiric blood business and the dangerous limits of demand for the crucial resource that runs through our very veins. Every year, about twenty million Americans sell blood plasma for cash in a barely regulated market dominated by private industry and off-the-grid trafficking. These commercial efforts prey on an insatiable market for medical and scientific innovation fed from the veins of some of the country's most marginalized communities, such as undocumented immigrants and residents of poverty-stricken Flint, Michigan. We are often told that "blood donations" are used to save lives, but blood plasma, a component of whole blood, has become a precious commercial good. Blood plasma is collected and marketed by private industry, with the United States one of just five nations on the planet that have not yet banned the practice of pay-for-plasma giving. This precious resource is used for everything from expensive and unproven age-reversing treatments to costly and experimental cures for novel diseases like COVID-19. Based on a cross-country investigation into the plasma-giving capitals of the country, in-depth research into the blood industry, and her personal experience as a beneficiary of plasma-derived treatment for a rare condition, Kathleen McLaughlin's Blood Money reveals the underhanded machinations and unbalanced power structures of the blood industry. Taking us from China's blood black market to Silicon Valley's shadowy tech startups, this is an unforgettable inside look at an industry many of us had no idea even existed. Blood Money is an electrifying exposé that demonstrates the shadowy overlap between big medicine and big business and paints a searing portrait of the extent to which American industry feeds on the country's most vulnerable"--
Subjects: Blood banks; Blood products;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Be Useful Seven Tools for Life [electronic resource] : by Schwarzenegger, Arnold.aut; Schwarzenegger, Arnold.nrt; cloudLibrary;
The seven rules to follow to realize your true purpose in life—distilled by Arnold Schwarzenegger from his own journey of ceaseless reinvention and extraordinary achievement, and available for absolutely anyone The world’s greatest bodybuilder. The world’s highest-paid movie star. The leader of the world’s sixth-largest economy. That these are the same person sounds like the setup to a joke, but this is no joke. This is Arnold Schwarzenegger. And this did not happen by accident.   Arnold’s stratospheric success happened as part of a process. As the result of clear vision, big thinking, hard work, direct communication, resilient problem-solving, open-minded curiosity, and a commitment to giving back. All of it guided by the one lesson Arnold’s father hammered into him above all: be useful. As Arnold conquered every realm he entered, he kept his father’s adage close to his heart.   Written with his uniquely earnest, blunt, powerful voice, Be Useful takes readers on an inspirational tour through Arnold’s tool kit for a meaningful life. He shows us how to put those tools to work, in service of whatever fulfilling future we can dream up for ourselves. He brings his insights to vivid life with compelling personal stories, life-changing successes and life-threatening failures alike—some of them famous; some told here for the first time ever.   Too many of us struggle to disconnect from our self-pity and connect to our purpose. At an early age, Arnold forged the mental tools to build the ladder out of the poverty and narrow-mindedness of his rural Austrian hometown, tools he used to add rung after rung from there. Now he shares that wisdom with all of us. As he puts it, no one is going to come rescue you—you only have yourself. The good news, it turns out, is that you are all you need.
Subjects: Audiobooks.; Personal Memoirs; Inspiration & Personal Growth; Success;
© 2023., Penguin Random House,
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