Fifty years after Oscar Lewis's famous depiction of five Mexican families caught in a "culture of poverty," Caroline Moser tells a very different story of five neighborhood women and their families strategically accumulating assets to escape poverty in the Ecuadoran city of Guayaquil. In Ordinary Families, Extraordinary Lives, Moser shows how a more sophisticated understanding of the complexities of asset accumulation as well as poverty itself can help counter inaccurate stereotypes about global poverty. It provides invaluable insight into strategies that may help people in developing countries improve their wellbeing. The similar socioeconomic characteristics and economic circumstances of the Guayaquil families in 1978, when Moser began her research, set the stage for a natural experiment. By 2004, these circumstances varied widely. Moser captures the causes and consequences of these developments through economic data, anthropological narrative, and personal photos. She then places this compelling story within the broader context of political, economic, and spatial changes in Guayaquil and Ecuador. Moser describes how households in a Third World urban slum relentlessly and systematically fought to accumulate human, social, and financial capital assets. Her longitudinal account of their odyssey captures long-term trends and changes in perception that are missed in snapshot assessments. Chapters in this holistic story cover diverse issues such as housing and infrastructure, community mobilization and political negotiation, employment, family dynamics, violence, and emigration.

This is the story of Condoleezza Rice that has never been told, not that of an ultra-accomplished world leader, but of a little girl--and a young woman--trying to find her place in a sometimes hostile world, of two exceptional parents, and an extended family and community that made all the difference. Condoleezza Rice has excelled as a diplomat, political scientist, and concert pianist. Her achievements run the gamut from helping to oversee the collapse of communism in Europe and the decline of the Soviet Union, to working to protect the country in the aftermath of 9-11, to becoming only the second woman--and the first black woman ever--to serve as Secretary of State. But until she was 25 she never learned to swim, because when she was a little girl in Birmingham, Alabama, Commissioner of Public Safety Bull Connor decided he'd rather shut down the city's pools than give black citizens access. Throughout the 1950's, Birmingham's black middle class largely succeeded in insulating their children from the most corrosive effects of racism, providing multiple support systems to ensure the next generation would live better than the last. But by 1963, Birmingham had become an environment where blacks were expected to keep their head down and do what they were told--or face violent consequences. That spring two bombs exploded in Rice’s neighborhood amid a series of chilling Klu Klux Klan attacks. Months later, four young girls lost their lives in a particularly vicious bombing. So how was Rice able to achieve what she ultimately did? Her father, John, a minister and educator, instilled a love of sports and politics. Her mother, a teacher, developed Condoleezza’s passion for piano and exposed her to the fine arts. From both, Rice learned the value of faith in the face of hardship and the importance of giving back to the community. Her parents’ fierce unwillingness to set limits propelled her to the venerable halls of Stanford University, where she quickly rose through the ranks to become the university’s second-in-command. An expert in Soviet and Eastern European Affairs, she played a leading role in U.S. policy as the Iron Curtain fell and the Soviet Union disintegrated. Less than a decade later, at the apex of the hotly contested 2000 presidential election, she received the exciting news--just shortly before her father’s death--that she would go on to the White House as the first female National Security Advisor. As comfortable describing lighthearted family moments as she is recalling the poignancy of her mother’s cancer battle and the heady challenge of going toe-to-toe with Soviet leaders, Rice holds nothing back in this remarkably candid telling.

Like Everything I Really Needed to Know, I Learned in Kindergarten, or Tuesdays with Morrie, Obit is a wise and deeply moving book that illuminates the human condition. For ten years, Jim Sheeler has scoured Colorado looking for subjects whose stories he will tell for the last time. Most are unknowns, but that doesn't mean they're nobodies. Their obituaries are sometimes humorous, sometimes heartbreaking, and chock full of life lessons as taught by the people we all pass on the street every day. And thanks to Sheeler's brilliant and compassionate prose, it's not too late to meet them.

"An inspirational and practical guide for anyone who wants to incorporate the dynamic skills of entrepreneurs into their own lives and work. A new generation of "life entrepreneurs" is emerging: people who apply their vision, talents, creativity, and energy not only to their work but to their entire lives, changing the world for themselves and those around them. In this book, successful entrepreneurs Christopher Gergen and Gregg Vanourek draw on numerous interviews with fifty-five leading entrepreneurs worldwide as well as the wisdom of multiple thought leaders to provide vivid examples, moving vignettes, concrete frameworks, and practical strategies for revving up our work and play through entrepreneurial leadership. This book starts by providing strategies for integrating life, work, and purpose and ends by capturing the implications of the current entrepreneurial boom for our workplaces, learning institutions, communities, and families. Christopher Gergen (Washington, D.C.) is a founding partner of New Mountain Ventures, co-founder and chairman of SMARTHINKING, Adjunct Professor and Director of the Entrepreneurial Leadership Initiative at Duke University, and a life-long entrepreneur, Gregg Vanourek (Thornton, CO) is a founding partner of New Mountain Ventures, former CEO of Vanourek Consulting Solutions, and former Senior Vice President of School Development for K12 Inc."

From Condoleezza Rice, former secretary of state and New York Times bestselling author of Democracy: Stories from the Long Road to Freedom, comes a captivating memoir of her remarkable childhood. Condoleezza Rice’s life began in Birmingham, Alabama in the 1950s, a place and time where black people lived in a segregated parallel universe away from their white neighbors. She grew up during the violent and shocking 1960s, when bloodshed became a part of daily life in the South. Rice’s portrait of her parents, John and Angelena, highlights their ambitions and frustrations and shows how much they sacrificed to give their beloved only child the best chance for success. Rice also discusses the challenges of being a precocious child who was passionate about music, ice skating, history, and current affairs. Her memoir reveals with vivid clarity how her early experiences sowed the seeds of her political beliefs and helped her become a vibrant, successful woman. Condoleezza Rice: A Memoir of My Extraordinary, Ordinary Parents and Me is a fascinating and inspirational story for young people, adapted from Condoleeza Rice’s adult sensation Extraordinary, Ordinary People: A Memoir of Family. Includes a 16-page photo insert. Praise for Extraordinary, Ordinary People: A Memoir of Family: “An origins story . . . memoir is teeming with fascinating detail.” —The New York Times “A thrilling, inspiring life of achievement.” —Publishers Weekly “Surprisingly engrossing . . .” —Daily Beast “Vivid and heartfelt writing . . . Highly recommended.”—Library Journal

Brings to life the breathtaking and often heartbreaking stories of the workers who built New York City in the Twentieth Century Ordinary People, Extraordinary Lives tells the stories of the men and women who built the City—of towering structures and the beam walkers who assembled them; of immigrant youths in factories and women in sweatshops; of longshoremen and typewriter girls; of dock workers and captains of industry. It provides a glimpse of the traditions they carried with them to this country and how they helped create new ones, in the form of labor organizations that provided recent immigrants, often overwhelmed by the intensity of New York life, with a sense of solidarity and security. Astounding in their own right, the book's photographic images, most drawn from seldom-seen labor movement photographers, are complemented by poignant oral histories which tell the stories behind the images. Among the extraordinary lives chronicled are those of Philip Keating, who, seven years after a fellow worker photographed him painting the Queensboro Bridge in 1949, plunged to his death from another worksite; William Atkinson, who broke the color bar at Macy’s and tells of fighting racism at home after fighting fascism abroad during World War II; and Cynthia Long, who fought gender barriers to become, in the late 1970s, an electrician with International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 3. With narratives at the beginning of each section providing historical context, this book brings the past clearly, emotionally, and fascinatingly alive.

This illustrated children’s book celebrates the extraordinary potential of ordinary deeds—showing how one child’s act of kindness can change the world One ordinary day, Ordinary Mary stumbles upon some ordinary blueberries. When she decides to pick them for her neighbor, Mrs. Bishop, her thoughtful act starts a chain reaction that multiplies around the world. Mrs. Bishop makes blueberry muffins and gives them to her paperboy and four others—one of whom is Mr. Stevens, who then helps five different people with their luggage—one of whom is Maria, who then helps five other people—and so on, until the deed comes back to Mary.