Life Along The Line

An award-winning chef describes how he lost his sense of taste to cancer, a setback that prompted him to discover alternate cooking methods and create his celebrated progressive cuisine.

"Football gave Ryan O'Callaghan a scholarship to Cal and the chance to earn millions in the NFL, but it also afforded him something far more important: a place to hide. As a closeted gay man, his helmet and pads became tools of deception...O'Callaghan, who retired in 2011 after four seasons, eventually found the courage to live his truth in retirement. His memoir offers an unsparing look at the nexus of sexuality and football." --Sports Illustrated "O'Callaghan came out as gay in 2017 after retiring from the league in 2011. Fearing condemnation while hiding his sexual orientation during a football career that spanned six seasons, O'Callaghan said he had regular suicidal thoughts while growing addicted to painkillers and he had elaborately planned his own death for retirement. In My Life On the Line, co-authored by Outsports co-founder Cyd Zeigler, O'Callaghan...credits then-Kansas City Chiefs executive Scott Pioli and Dr. Susan Wilson for saving his life once he came out to them." --USA Today "In a new book due out in September, O'Callaghan discusses his life story, including the treatment he received from former teammates after coming out." --Boston Globe "Former Patriots lineman Ryan O'Callaghan spent his entire career hiding his sexuality from his teammates, his friends and his family. He is now sharing that battle in his new book, My Life On The Line." --CBS Boston (WBZ TV) "O'Callaghan believes the NFL is moving in the right direction with social issues, albeit slowly...O'Callaghan is part of that change. And that change saved his life." --Boston Globe, feature on Ryan O'Callaghan "As one of the few openly gay former U.S. players, O'Callaghan's goal became making it easier for future athletes to be open about their sexuality and gender identity well before they enter professional sports." --Reuters "O'Callaghan is one of only a few openly gay former NFL players...In his upcoming memoir, My Life on the Line: How the NFL Damn Near Killed Me and Ended Up Saving My Life, O'Callaghan candidly discusses his addictions, mental health and struggles with his sexuality." --Washington Blade Ryan O'Callaghan's plan was always to play football and then, when his career was over, kill himself. Growing up in a politically conservative corner of California, the not-so-subtle messages he heard as a young man from his family and from TV and film routinely equated being gay with disease and death. Letting people in on the darkest secret he kept buried inside was not an option: better death with a secret than life as a gay man. As a kid, Ryan never envisioned just how far his football career would take him. He was recruited by the University of California, Berkeley, where he spent five seasons, playing alongside his friend Aaron Rodgers. Then it was on to the NFL for stints with the almost-undefeated New England Patriots and the often-defeated Kansas City Chiefs. Bubbling under the surface of Ryan's entire NFL career was a collision course between his secret sexuality and his hidden drug use. When the league caught him smoking pot, he turned to NFL-sanctioned prescription painkillers that quickly sent his life into a tailspin. As injuries mounted and his daily intake of opioids reached a near-lethal level, he wrote his suicide note to his parents and plotted his death. Yet someone had been watching. A member of the Chiefs organization stepped in, recognizing the signs of drug addiction. Ryan reluctantly sought psychological help, and it was there that he revealed his lifelong secret for the very first time. Nearing the twilight of his career, Ryan faced the ultimate decision: end it all, or find out if his family and football friends could ever accept a gay man in their lives.

Ninety photographs with captions present the activities of the Norfolk and Western Railway, the last major railroad in America to use steam power. Most of the photographs were taken at night, and Thomas H. Garver's afterword includes description of Link's methods of flash photography.

The renowned photographer’s stirring tribute to the last steam locomotive railway and the end of an American way of life. O. Winston Link photographed the Norfolk and Western, the last major steam railroad in the United States, when it was converting its operations from steam to diesel in the 1950s. Link’s N&W project captured the industry at a moment of transition, before the triumph of the automobile and the airplane that ended an era of passenger rail service. His work also revealed a small-town way of life that was about to experience seismic shifts and, in many cases, vanish completely. Including a collection of more than 180 of Link’s most famous works and rare images that have never before been published, O. Winston Link: Life Along the Line offers a moving account of the people and communities surrounding the last steam railroad.

Pilots relate their combat experiences in Vietnam with tales of bravery and sacrifice, demonstrating that pilots were engaged in combat as often as ground troops

The gripping account of six young doctors enlisted to fight COVID-19, an engrossing, eye-opening book in the tradition of both Sheri Fink's Five Days at Memorial and Scott Turow's One L. In March 2020, soon-to-graduate medical students in New York City were nervously awaiting "match day" when they would learn where they would begin their residencies. Only a week later, these young physicians learned that they would be sent to the front lines of the desperate battle to save lives as the coronavirus plunged the city into crisis. Taking the Hippocratic Oath via Zoom, these new doctors were sent into iconic New York hospitals including Bellevue and Montefiore, the epicenters of the epicenter. In this powerful book, New York Times journalist Emma Goldberg offers an up-close portrait of six bright yet inexperienced health professionals, each of whom defies a stereotype about who gets to don a doctor's white coat. Goldberg illuminates how the pandemic redefines what it means for them to undergo this trial by fire as caregivers, colleagues, classmates, friends, romantic partners and concerned family members. Woven together from in-depth interviews with the doctors, their notes, and Goldberg's own extensive reporting, this page-turning narrative is an unforgettable depiction of a crisis unfolding in real time and a timeless and unique chronicle of the rite of passage of young doctors.

“Heartbreaking and uplifting… a searing book about race and prejudice in America… brims with insights that only someone who has lived on both sides of the racial divide could gain.”—Cleveland Plain Dealer “A triumph of storytelling as well as a triumph of spirit.”—Alex Kotlowitz, award-winning author of There Are No Children Here As a child in 1950s segregated Virginia, Gregory Howard Williams grew up believing he was white. But when the family business failed and his parents’ marriage fell apart, Williams discovered that his dark-skinned father, who had been passing as Italian-American, was half black. The family split up, and Greg, his younger brother, and their father moved to Muncie, Indiana, where the young boys learned the truth about their heritage. Overnight, Greg Williams became black. In this extraordinary and powerful memoir, Williams recounts his remarkable journey along the color line and illuminates the contrasts between the black and white worlds: one of privilege, opportunity and comfort, the other of deprivation, repression, and struggle. He tells of the hostility and prejudice he encountered all too often, from both blacks and whites, and the surprising moments of encouragement and acceptance he found from each. Life on the Color Line is a uniquely important book. It is a wonderfully inspiring testament of purpose, perseverance, and human triumph. Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize

Life Along the Line takes a nostalgiclook at the world of British railwaysthrough the eyes of bestselling authorand antiques expert Paul Atterbury.Focusing on the human experience ofthe railways – the drivers, firemen,guards, station staff, signalmen,engineers, caterers and, of course,passengers – the book is a visualfeast, filled with fascinating archivephotographs of steam trains, otherlocomotives, memorabilia andevocative railway ephemera.Built from archive photographs, oldpostcards, badges and other railwayana,the book is filled with fascinatingmaterial that Atterbury has himselfcollected from tireless searching atpostcard and antique fares and auctionsites. Many of the illustrations aretherefore original and previouslyunpublished.Covers railway life across the networkas well as showcasing local differencesin a series of regional sections.