In his own words-from rock's most legendary bad boy. Rock 'n' roll legend and Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards has quite a few things to say: about Mick Jagger, the Stones, sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll, and life itself. Sample these nuggets of wit and wisdom chipped from the tablets of Stone: On etiquette: "I've never turned blue in someone else's bathroom. I consider that the height of bad manners." On Mick Jagger: "My aim is always to try to introduce a bit of levity into his life." On the police: "There was a knock on our dressing-room door. Our manager shouted, 'Keith! Ron! The Police are here!' Oh, man, we panicked, flushed everything down the john. Then the door opened and it was Stewart Copeland and Sting." On family: "My father. I snorted my father. He was cremated and I couldn't resist grinding him up with a little bit of blow." On dental care: "Miraculously, due to abstinence and prayer, my teeth grew back."

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What happens when I decide to rewrite Biblical history? Hilarity, that's what. Buy it now. And laugh.

In the summers of the early 1970s, Morris Ardoin and his siblings helped run their family's roadside motel in a hot, buggy, bayou town in Cajun Louisiana. The stifling, sticky heat inspired them to find creative ways to stay cool and out of trouble. When they were not doing their chores—handling a colorful cast of customers, scrubbing motel-room toilets, plucking chicken bones and used condoms from under the beds—they played canasta, an old ladies’ game that provided them with a refuge from the sun and helped them avoid their violent, troubled father. Morris was successful at occupying his time with his siblings and the children of families staying in the motel’s kitchenette apartments but was not so successful at keeping clear of his father, a man unable to shake the horrors he had experienced as a child and, later, as a soldier. The preteen would learn as he matured that his father had reserved his most ferocious attacks for him because of an inability to accept a gay or, to his mind, broken, son. It became his dad’s mission to “fix” his son, and Morris’s mission to resist—and survive intact. He was aided in his struggle immeasurably by the love and encouragement of a selfless and generous grandmother, who provides his story with much of its warmth, wisdom, and humor. There’s also suspense, awkward romance, naughty French lessons, and an insider’s take on a truly remarkable, not-yet-homogenized pocket of American culture.

A memoir by an accomplished former Congressional staffer who left D.C. for L.A. and a job with filmmaker Oliver Stone in 1993. Expecting to make politically engaged films and make a difference for the better, he instead found himself immersed in a wildly dysfunctional world ruled by greed, paranoia, narcissism, competition, alcohol, and drugs. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

When two cases collide, police chief Jesse Stone is caught in the middle in this New York Times bestseller. Autumn in Paradise, Massachusetts, is usually idyllic. Not this time. A Hollywood movie company has come to town and brought troubled star Marisol Hinton—beautiful, talented, demanding, and scared out of her wits that her estranged husband's jealousy might take a violent turn. When she receives a death threat, Jesse and the Paradise police department go on high alert. But more lives are in danger than Jesse imagines—including his own.

"A collection of meditations like polished stones--painstakingly worded, tough-minded, yet partial to mystery, and peerless when it comes to injecting larger resonances into the natural world." — Kirkus Reviews Here, in this compelling assembly of writings, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Annie Dillard explores the world of natural facts and human meanings. Veering away from the long, meditative studies of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek or Holy the Firm, Annie Dillard explores and celebrates moments of spirituality, dipping into descriptions of encounters with flora and fauna, stars, and more, from Ecuador to Miami.