JUVENILE · BIOGRAPHY
Jill C. Wheeler
Lemony Snicket, author of A Series of Unfortunate Events, the purportedly true chronicles of the Baudelaire children, was reported dead today by anonymous and possibly unreliable sources.
— from Lemony Snicket
Most acclaimed
Tom Cruise
For two years, award-winning biographer Andrew Morton has been seeking out everyone from former teachers and girlfriends to Scientology insiders to friends who have watched a once-bullied, "nothing special" outsider transform himself into an icon Forbes has called the most powerful celebrity in the world. Here, with never-seen photos and never-heard revelations, is a portrait of the real Tom Cruise--his work, his love life, his marriages, his religion.--From publisher description.
Lemony Snicket
A Warning from the Publisher: Many readers have questions about Lemony Snicket, author of the distressing serial concerning the trials of the charming but unlucky Baudelaire orphans, published under the collective title A Series of Unfortunate Events. Before purchasing, borrowing, or stealing this book, you should be aware that it contains the answers to some of those questions, such as the following: 1. Who is Lemony? 2. Is there a secret organization I should know about? 3. Why does Lemony Snicket spend his time researching and writing distressing books concerning the Baudelaire orphans? 4. Why do all of Lemony Snicket's books contain a sad dedication to a woman named Beatrice? 5. If there's nothing out there, what was that noise? Our advice to you is that you find a book that answers less upsetting questions than this one. Perhaps your librarian, bookseller, or parole officer can recommend a book that answers the question, "Aren't ponies adorable?"
Mother Teresa
When Pope John Paul II beatified Mother Teresa (1910-1997) in October 2003, Magnum photographer Raghu Rai had already paid homage to the extraordinary sister and her exemplary destiny. Know for his numerous reportages on India, especially on Bhopal, Rai met Mother Teresa in the early 1970s. Fascinated by someone who, from the age of twelve, was fully aware of her "mission," he continued to photograph her until her death in 1997. In 1928, when she was only eighteen, she left Macedonia to join the Sisters of Loreto, a community of nuns in Ireland with missions in India. After a few month' training in Dublin, she was sent to India, where on May 24, 1931, she took her initial vows as a nun, choosing the name Teresa in honor of Saint Theresa of Lisieux. From 1931 to 1948, Mother Teresa taught in Kolkata (Calcutta), but the suffering and poverty she glimpsed outside the convent made such a deep impression on her that in 1948 she received permission from her superiors to leave the convent school and devote herself to working in the slums of Kolkata. In October 1950, seh started her own order, Thhe Missionaries of Charity, whose primary thask was to love and care for those persons nobody else was prepared to look after. Less than two years after her death, Pope John Paul II permitted the opening of her Cause of Canonization. On December 20, 2002, a decree approved Mother Teresa's heroic virtues and the miracle attributed to her intercession. The relationship of trust that Raghu Rai and Mother Teresa gradually built up is very apparent in the photographer's work. He observed her daily life and that of her community, successfully conveying its prayerful intensity and strength of Kolkata, where the everpresent poverty and distress illustrated the need for Mother Teresa's work. With nearly a hundred black-and-white photographs, punctuated by anecdotal texts that recall their encounters, Rai has captured the strength of Mother Teresa's commitment and her daily fight against poverty.