When you learn about topics like history, Shakespeare, science, and politics at high school, the problem is that quite often some of the weirdest and most interesting stories are left out of the textbooks and exam papers. Pick up The Totally Awesome Book of Crazy Stories, your ultimate source of interesting facts about a wide range of diverse topics. What follows are some of the craziest, weirdest, funniest, wackiest, and most awesome stories that you'll have hopefully never heard before. This book is truly a quick read packed with information from cover to cover. In this amazing trivia book, you will find out:?How an impaled stork helped in our understanding of the natural world.?How you might be able to fool your doctor into believing you've given birth to a litter of rabbits ?How much Bach liked coffee, and how much Frederick the Great hated coffee.?How important pee was to the Ancient Romans, and how important farts were to 17th-century plague-fearing Londoners.?And so many more curiosities!Gathered in The Totally Awesome Book of Crazy Stories, you will find some of the craziest, weirdest, wackiest, and most awesome stories we could ever have told you. And what makes it even more awesome, is that there are a lot more crazy stories out there to tell! Grab your copy right now and start having fun!

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Children of Crisis, a profound examination of how listening to stories promotes learning and self-discovery. As a professor emeritus at Harvard University, a renowned child psychiatrist, and the author of more than forty books, including The Moral Intelligence of Children, Robert Coles knows better than anyone the transformative power of learning and literature on young minds. In this “persuasive” book (The New York Times Book Review), Coles convenes a virtual symposium of college, law, and medical school students to explore the phenomenon of storytelling as a source of values and character. Here are transcriptions of classroom conversations in which Coles and his students discuss the impact of particular works of literature on their moral development. Here also are Coles’s intimate personal reflections on his experiences in the civil rights movement, his child psychiatry practice, and his interactions with his own literary mentors including William Carlos Williams and L.E. Sissman. The life lessons learned from these stories are of special resonance to doctors and teachers looking to apply them in classroom and clinical environments. The rare public intellectual to be honored with a MacArthur Award, a Presidential Medal of Freedom, and a National Humanities Medal, Robert Coles is a true national treasure, and The Call of Stories is, in the words of National Book Award winner Walker Percy, “Coles at his wisest and best.”

This collection of true narratives reflects the dynamism and diversity of nurses, who provide the first vital line of patient care. Here, nurses remember their first "sticks," first births, and first deaths, and reflect on what gets them though long, demanding shifts, and keeps them in the profession. The stories reveal many voices from nurses at different stages of their careers: One nurse-in-training longs to be trusted with more "important" procedures, while another questions her ability to care for nursing home residents. An efficient young emergency room nurse finds his life and career irrevocably changed by a car accident. A nurse practitioner wonders whether she has violated professional boundaries in her care for a homeless man with AIDS, and a home care case manager is the sole attendee at a funeral for one of her patients. What connects these stories is the passion and strength of the writers, who struggle against burnout and bureaucracy to serve their patients with skill, empathy, and strength.

Early one evening, I was patrolling alone and decided to stop a vehicle with its taillight out. I had no way of knowing that this seemingly routine decision would lead to a strange twist of fate years later... These true, first-hand accounts from law enforcement officials across the nation reveal how intuition, apparitions, UFOs, prophetic dreams, and other forces beyond our understanding have impacted them in the course of duty. The weird and unexplained experiences in this book take place in the midst of the death-defying gun battles, thrilling rescues, and heart-searing tragedies that police officers face every day—and reveal the fascinating inner lives of the heroic men and women behind the badge.

"What is your pain level on a scale of 1 to 10, where zero would be no pain, and 10 would be if you had an attack of kidney stones while in active labor, and while all that was going on, you were set on fire. Starting with your genitals. And then you were disemboweled, and the bowels that were removed were then also set on fire. And then while you were running around in active labor, passing a kidney stone, on fire with your bowels also on fire, you accidentally stepped on a Lego with your bare foot. And that Lego was also on fire." "It's an 11." Medicine can be funny. It can be sad, painful, inspirational, but also sometimes funny. "11 out of 10" is a collection of humorous medical stories from practitioners in all fields, ranging from physicians to nurses to EMTs to medical students. Some are totally true, some are exaggerated, and some are mostly fiction. But every single one of them aims to put a smile on your face. All profits from this book will be donated to Deworm the World Initiative, a charity that aims to treat parasitic infections in children in developing nations.

The beloved New York Times bestselling author reflects on home, family, friendships and writing in this deeply personal collection of essays. "The elegance of Patchett’s prose is seductive and inviting: with Patchett as a guide, readers will really get to grips with the power of struggles, failures, and triumphs alike." —Publisher's Weekly “Any story that starts will also end.” As a writer, Ann Patchett knows what the outcome of her fiction will be. Life, however, often takes turns we do not see coming. Patchett ponders this truth in these wise essays that afford a fresh and intimate look into her mind and heart. At the center of These Precious Days is the title essay, a surprising and moving meditation on an unexpected friendship that explores “what it means to be seen, to find someone with whom you can be your best and most complete self.” When Patchett chose an early galley of actor and producer Tom Hanks’ short story collection to read one night before bed, she had no idea that this single choice would be life changing. It would introduce her to a remarkable woman—Tom’s brilliant assistant Sooki—with whom she would form a profound bond that held monumental consequences for them both. A literary alchemist, Patchett plumbs the depths of her experiences to create gold: engaging and moving pieces that are both self-portrait and landscape, each vibrant with emotion and rich in insight. Turning her writer’s eye on her own experiences, she transforms the private into the universal, providing us all a way to look at our own worlds anew, and reminds how fleeting and enigmatic life can be. From the enchantments of Kate DiCamillo’s children’s books (author of The Beatryce Prophecy) to youthful memories of Paris; the cherished life gifts given by her three fathers to the unexpected influence of Charles Schultz’s Snoopy; the expansive vision of Eudora Welty to the importance of knitting, Patchett connects life and art as she illuminates what matters most. Infused with the author’s grace, wit, and warmth, the pieces in These Precious Days resonate deep in the soul, leaving an indelible mark—and demonstrate why Ann Patchett is one of the most celebrated writers of our time.