Book Description
An Angel Knocks on Hells Door is a riveting story of a young girls perilous journey into womanhood. When sixteen-year-old Gia discovers her father with another woman and reveals his betrayal to her family, he deserts them. They lose everything, plummeting from a comfortable middle-class existence into a neighborhood rife with crime, gangs, racial tension and drugs. It is there that the stage is set for Gia to come of age under the obsessive sexual attentions of a neighborhood gang leader. Suffering from the belief that she is guilty of having shattered her family and that she has become a loose woman, she is convinced that she is condemned to hell. Her sins are so great in her eyes that she can never confess them to a priest or anyone for that matter. And if you cant confess, you cant be forgiven. This is the story of Gias battle, triumph and salvation from hell -- without ever confessing a thing to a priest. Insecure and reeling from the departure of her husband, Gias mother is not prepared to raise her three children and support her mother. Unable to accept her leadership role, she emotionally abandons her family in favor of her new boyfriend. The children are left under the watchful eye of Nanny, her mother, who is nicknamed The Iron Lady. Nanny is a tough, no-nonsense woman with a rough-edged sense of humor. She is caught between protecting her grandchildren and risking her already fragile relationship with her daughter. Keenly aware that her family is dangerously close to self-destructing, she fears losing them to their personal demons: Tony to gangs, drugs and drinking; Mario, inwardly, to the solitary pursuit of running; and Gia to sexual awakening. The stakes are raised when Gia, the object of obsession for Nicky, a neighborhood Greek gang leader, unknowingly rebuffs him in favor of his younger brother. A ballistic Nicky rapes her, warning her that if she tells anyone, he will kill her and her family. Obsessed with controlling her, he takes over every facet of her life, from choosing what she wears, chauffeuring her to and from school, to physically and emotionally assaulting her if she doesnt do as he says. If Gia thought she was knocking on Hells door before, she is absolutely certain that Satan has answered it in the form of Nicky. A man of starkly contrasting dark and light personality traits, Nicky alternately abuses Gia and treats her like a princess. All the while he asserts, You will love me. Despite her initial fear and hatred of him, she slowly, and with much guilt and confusion, finds herself drawn to him both emotionally and physically. She struggles to understand how she can possibly love the devil unless shes evil too. This sets her on a treacherous pilgrimage of self-discovery. What she comes to realize is that in order to face Nicky, she has to face herself, even if she doesnt like what she sees. And sometimes the devil teaches us lessons that we dont want to learn but must learn in order to survive. Gia discovers exactly what she represents to Nicky and it involves more than just sex. He uses her as his sword against his controlling parents, his arranged marriage and his impending return to Greece. Gia's story ends in a stunning climax, surprising to both her and Nicky.
Author: Jerry Langton Publisher: John Wiley & Sons ISBN: 0470739940 Category : True Crime Languages : en Pages : 289
Book Description
Walter Stadnick is not an imposing man. At five-foot-four, his face and arms scarred by fire in a motorcycle accident, he would not spring to mind as a leader of Canada's most notorious biker gang, the Hells Angels. yet through sheer guts and determination, intelligence and luck, this Hamilton-born youth who had the nickname of "Nurget" rose in the Hells Angels ranks to become national president. Not only did he lead the Angels through the violent war with their rivals the rock machine in Montreal in the Nineties, Stadnick saw opportunity to grow the Hells Angels into a national criminal gang. he was a visionary--and a highly successful one. Bikers are not known for their fondness for rival gangs. Stadnick and the Angels fought and defeated rival gangs, or used power of persuasion to patch them over. As Stadnick's influence spread, law enforcement took notice of the growing presence of the Angels in Ontario, Manitoba and British Columbia. However, Stadnick's success did not come without a price. Arrested and charged with 13 counts of first-degree murder, stadnick beat the murder charges but was convicted of gangsterism and is currently serving time. Fallen Angel details one man's improbable rise to power in one of the world's most violent organizations, while shedding light on how this enigmatic and dangerous biker gang operated and why it remains so powerful.
Author: Idries Shah Publisher: eBook Partnership ISBN: 1784793256 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 342
Book Description
In his writing about Sufism, Idries Shah did some revolutionary things.Critically, and almost alone, he said that it was possible to divorce the essence of Sufi philosophy from what he insisted were secondary accretions of islamic culture and religion. Moreover, he said, in making this material available to the West, you could not only do this, you must do it. This is because, he believed, you can only absorb materials that are designed for your own time and place. Sufism as an essence may be 'truth without form' but, in order to penetrate into the human mind, it must be delivered in a package shaped to fit the receiving culture.'When something new enters a culture, there is a period where, like a new object being thrown into the chimpanzee pen at a zoo, all the chimps rush over to touch it, throw it on the floor, fight over it and so on,' he once told me. 'We must wait until the dust settles; only then will people be in a position to assess this material.'My father died in 1996 and the dust is settling fast. He leaves a body of work behind and, on this work alone, he believed, he should and would be judged. This anthology is intended to provide a basic sample of his work, an essential reader, to allow people to do exactly what he would have wished them to do: to think for themselves and to make up their own minds.- From the Editor's Note, by Saira Shah
Author: Dr. Oliver Akamnonu Publisher: Xlibris Corporation ISBN: 1469151286 Category : Fiction Languages : en Pages : 216
Book Description
Rap to Mars, a book of poetry, satire, and prose, attempts by words and art to dissect and sift through diverse aspects of the life of man in his quest to assert himself as the king or queen of the universe. This is even in spite of mans obvious lapses, frailties, and entrapment. During the course of various attempts, sometimes, success smiles on man. But when failures present themselves, arrogant and deceitful man refuses to accept his obvious limitations. Often, in his ever-willing efforts to deceive the more gullible, man in his cowardice plays the monkey that uses the cats paws to extract nuts from the fi re. From a safe distance, the minion, man, details his more gullible fellow men to sacrifi ce themselves and others in silly and assumed defense of the Almighty Maker. The martyr and suicide bomber along with their victims become the willing and unwilling by-products But even in spite of his sometimes comical shenanigans, man, who unsuccessfully plays the angel on Earth, remains man and suffers or causes others to suffer the pains arising from a perpetual struggle between the good and the bad as represented in Rap to Mars by Earths angels, suicide bombers, and whores. At the end of the day, man, mere mortal man, still fi nds himself trapped in his self-imposed cocoon of a shanty or a mansion. In the latter, man again plays the elitist parent of a lone child while the downtrodden fi nd their pleasure by doggedly obeying the injunction of increase and multiply. Rap to Mars is a mixed grill of fun, challenges, and what the evolving society was, what it is, and what it should fi ght hard not to be.
Author: Suzé DiPietro
Author: Mark Oppenheimer
Author: 
Author: Alexander Guinn
Author: Jerry Langton
Author: 
Author: Alfred Emanuel Smith
Author: Idries Shah
Author: Henry Ward Beecher
Author: Dr. Oliver Akamnonu