Small Life

A few years ago Alexis Fleming was bedridden with a chronic illness. Things became so bad that she wanted to end her life many times during this period - but her beloved dog, Maggie, kept her going, especially when doctors gave her just six weeks to live. Incredibly, Alexis fought her way back to health with Maggie by her side, only for Maggie to die of lung cancer two years later on a vet's operating table.

We exhaust ourselves and the planet in the search for very large pleasures, while all around us lies a wealth of small pleasures, which—if we only pay more attention—can bring us solace and joy on a daily basis. This is a guidebook to life's small pleasures: everything from the distinct delight of holding a child's hand to the joy of watching the evening sky. It's an intriguing, evocative collection that will heighten our senses and return us to the world with newfound excitement and enthusiasm.

Discover the potent force of kaizen... and use it to easily, effortlessly achieve any goal or make any change you want to!We've been programmed to believe that change is a "battle" - something hard fought and hard won, something that demands struggle and sacrifice. But as anyone who uses the technique known as kaizen can tell you, nothing could be further from the truth. With kaizen, it's effortless, simple, and inevitable to change your life.

Texas, 1934. Elsa Martinelli had finally found the life she’d yearned for. A family, a home and a livelihood on a farm on the Great Plains. But when drought threatens all she and her community hold dear, Elsa’s world is shattered to the winds. Fearful of the future, when Elsa wakes to find her husband has fled, she is forced to make the most agonizing decision of her life. Fight for the land she loves or take her beloved children, Loreda and Ant, west to California in search of a better life. Will it be the land of milk and honey?

Celia Burrows thought she had it all - a handsome husband, two successful children, and a gorgeous beach house on the northern coast of Maine. But her perfect life cracks apart when her husband of 30 years informs her that he's leaving. In a note. And since problems come in threes, her adult children reveal they've both been struggling with issues of their own.

Set against a background of political turbulence in Kerala, Southern India, The God of Small Things tells the story of twins Esthappen and Rahel. Amongst the vats of banana jam and heaps of peppercorns in their grandmother's factory, they try to craft a childhood for themselves amidst what constitutes their family - their lonely, lovely mother; their beloved uncle Chacko (pickle baron, radical Marxist and bottom pincher); and their avowed enemy, Baby Kochamma (ex-nun and incumbent grand-aunt).

When Kate was 22, she had an intense and passionate affair with a married man, Callum, which ended in heartbreak. Kate thought she'd never get over it. Seventeen years later, life has moved on - Kate, now a successful actress, is living in London, married to Matt and mother to little Tallulah. Meanwhile Callum and his wife, Belinda, are happy together, living in Edinburgh and watching their kids grow up. The past, it would seem, is well and truly behind them all....

A small girl is sent to live with foster parents on a farm in rural Ireland, without knowing when she will return home. In the strangers' house, she finds a warmth and affection she has not known before and slowly begins to blossom in their care. And then a secret is revealed, and suddenly, she realises how fragile her idyll is.

Armpit and X-Ray are living in Austin, Texas. It is three years since they left the confines of Camp Green Lake Detention Centre and Armpit is taking small steps to turn his life around. He is working for a landscape gardener because he is good at digging holes, he is going to school and he is enjoying his first proper romance, but is he going to be able to stay out of trouble when there is so much building up against him?

Grab your front-row seat in the story of a lifetime. Witness how one family escapes the rat race - the world's economic religion - and how you can too. By all appearances, Jeff and Samantha Trotman are living the American dream. But behind the white picket fence, they endure an American nightmare. With little time for each other, a pile of debt, and Ferrari taste on a Ford budget, the ruse of affluence is killing them.

In the summer of 1974 a heatwave blankets Boston and Mary Pat Fennessey is trying to stay one step ahead of the bill collectors. Mary Pat has lived her entire life in the housing projects of 'Southie', the Irish American enclave that stubbornly adheres to old tradition and stands proudly apart. One night Mary Pat's teenage daughter Jules stays out late and doesn't come home. That same evening, a young Black man is found dead, struck by a subway train under mysterious circumstances. The two events seem unconnected.

The new audiobook from number one best-selling author Jodi Picoult, with the biggest of themes: birth, death, and responsibility. When a newborn baby dies after a routine hospital procedure, there is no doubt about who will be held responsible: the nurse who had been banned from looking after him by his father. What the nurse, her lawyer and the father of the child cannot know is how this death will irrevocably change all of their lives, in ways both expected and not.

In a North Carolina mountain town filled with moonshine and rotten husbands, Sadie Blue is only the latest girl to face a dead-end future at the mercy of a dangerous drunk. She's been married to Roy Tupkin for 15 days, and she knows now that she should have listened to the folks who said he was trouble. But when a stranger sweeps in and knocks the world off-kilter for everyone in town, Sadie begins to think there might be more to life than being Roy's wife.

'What starts here changes the world' was the university slogan that inspired William H. McRaven to take charge of the small things that could change his life...and even the world. Here McRaven shares the 10 life-changing principles he learned during his 37 years as a Navy SEAL. These 10 philosophies helped him to overcome challenges not only in his career but also throughout his life. What's more anyone can use these basic lessons to change themselves, and the world, for the better....

Small Graces is a journey into the sacred moments that illuminate our everyday lives. In 20 elegant pieces, writer, sculptor, and theologian Kent Nerburn celebrates the daily rituals that reveal our deeper truths. Through the exploration of simple acts, Small Graces reminds us to chart a course each day that nourishes the soul, honors the body, and engages the mind.

Other people find Majella odd. She keeps herself to herself, she doesn't like gossip and she isn't interested in knowing her neighbours' business. But suddenly everyone in the small town in Northern Ireland where she grew up wants to know all about hers. Since her da disappeared during the Troubles, Majella has tried to live a quiet life with her alcoholic mother.

Maggie Bailey has not had an easy childhood. Her father, Michael, always too easy with his fists after spending the family’s rent money down the pub. Just sixteen, in love and blinded by promises, Maggie sees marriage to handsome Jack as her great escape. However, she soon finds herself abandoned with a beautiful baby when Jack disappears. Maggie is forced to seek a new life away from the East End of London and finds herself a job at a hotel in Yarmouth.

It should be the most wonderful time of the year for Samantha and Josh as they prepare for the arrival of their first baby. But life at Hedgehog Hollow rarely goes to plan and the pair are faced with adversaries, old and new, and unexpected challenges to overcome. Fizz's job at the heart of the rescue centre is a dream come true but her personal life is more like a nightmare. With her love life a disaster and her past about to dramatically catch up with her, she needs the love and support of her Hedgehog Hollow family more than ever.

Since you were old enough to hold a job, you've been hoodwinked to believe that wealth can be created by blindly trusting in the uncontrollable and unpredictable markets: the housing market, the stock market, and the job market. I call this soul-sucking, dream-stealing dogma "The Slowlane" - an impotent financial gamble that dubiously promises wealth in a wheelchair. For those who don't want a lifetime subscription to "settle-for-less", there is an alternative.

This is the story of Alex James’s transition from a leading light of the Britpop movement in the 1990s, to gentleman farmer, artisan cheese-maker and father of five. All Cheeses Great and Small is the follow-up memoir to Alex James's first book, Bit of a Blur, the story of his excessive pop star lifestyle during the nineties. But now Alex has grown up, fallen in love and got married.