If you are living with bipolar illness or have a family member with the illness, this book may prove to be of some help. Whilst living with a mental health condition can be extremely difficult it can be a great teacher. By the end of the book you will realise that no mental illness defines you as a person. You're on the cusp of a life worth living, it's just a matter of making the next right step.

Grand Central Station, New York in mid-July. It's early morning, but everyone is suffering in the heat. Private investigator Nathan Marley is on his way to another wasted day at the office. But a chance meeting with a homeless woman at the station and a surprise letter changes all of that. Marley starts a journey through parts of the burning summer city he has never visited.

The classic social history of corruption and vice in nineteenth-century NYC: “A cacophonous poem of democracy and greed, like the streets of New York themselves” (John Vernon, Los Angeles Times Book Review). Lucy Sante’s Low Life is a portrait of America’s greatest city, the riotous and anarchic breeding ground of modernity. This is not the familiar saga of mansions, avenues, and robber barons, but the messy, turbulent, often murderous story of the city’s slums; the teeming streets—scene of innumerable cons and crimes whose cramped and overcrowded housing is still a prominent feature of the cityscape. Low Life voyages through Manhattan from four different directions. Part One examines the actual topography of Manhattan from 1840 to 1919; Part Two, the era’s opportunities for vice and entertainment—theaters and saloons, opium and cocaine dens, gambling and prostitution; Part Three investigates the forces of law and order which did and didn’t work to contain the illegalities; Part Four counterposes the city’s tides of revolt and idealism against the city as it actually was. Low Life is one of the most provocative books about urban life ever written—an evocation of the mythology of the quintessential modern metropolis, which has much to say not only about New York’s past but about the present and future of all cities.

In this exploration of secular America, journalist Katherine Ozment takes readers on a quest to understand the trends and ramifications of a nation in flight from organized religion. Studies show that religion makes us happier, healthier and more giving, connecting us to our past and creating tight communal bonds. Most Americans are raised in a religious tradition, but in recent decades many have begun to leave religion, and with it their ancient rituals, mythic narratives, and sense of belonging. So how do the nonreligious fill the need for ritual, story, community, and, above all, purpose and meaning without the one-stop shop of religion? What do they do with the space left after religion? With Nones swelling to one-fourth of American adults, and more than one-third of those under thirty, these questions have never been more urgent. Writer, journalist, and secular mother of three Katherine Ozment came face-to-face with the fundamental issue of the Nones when her son asked her the simplest of questions: "what are we?" Unsettled by her reply -- "Nothing" -- she set out on a journey to find a better answer. She traversed the frontier of American secular life, sought guidance in science and the humanities, talked with noted scholars, and wrestled with her own family's attempts to find meaning and connection after religion.

Bound to captivate the many fans of the motion picture Paris Is Burning, Woodlawn's autobiography is a walk on the wild side with Andy Warhol's last superstar and the avant-garde community of the 1960s and '70s. At the age of 16, Harold became Holly Woodlawn and skyrocketed to fame as a superstar in Warhol's movie Trash. "This is must reading".--Harvey Fierstein. Photographs.

Jeremy Clarke made his girlfriend pregnant, resigned from his job as a refuse collector, resigned his church membership, sold his house, went to the Democratic Republic of Congo, then came back altered. Now the author of the 'Low Life' column in the Spectator, Clarke tells his story.

Roy Brindley has earned over a million pounds, has a contented family life, owns an incredible house and both a Porsche and a Ferrari. But he's not always had money to play with. In fact, he hasn't always had a home. Addicted to gambling like the majority of his family, Roy spent his teens and twenties in the bookies and, week in, week out, frittered away his entire pay packet as he attempted to chase his losses. By the time he was twenty-eight he was on the run from the police and living out of a cardboard box in Southsea. In 2002 he finally ended up in court and decided to turn his life around. After a chance viewing of the Hollywood poker film Rounders, he at last put his phenomenal mathematical talent to constructive use, and his domination of the European poker circuit began. From his dysfunctional early years, through a career as a greyhound trainer and journalist before playing cards for cash became his vocation, the story of Roy the Boy is both an inspirational rags-to-riches story of a man who learnt to trust something other than lady luck, and a fascinating insight into the glamorous, celebrity-filled and ever-more-popular world of poker.