Summary of Bill Bryson's The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid PDF Download
Are you looking for read ebook online? Search for your book and save it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Download Summary of Bill Bryson's The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid PDF full book. Access full book title Summary of Bill Bryson's The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Everest Media. Download full books in PDF and EPUB format.
Author: Everest Media
Publisher: Everest Media LLC
ISBN:
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 38
Get Book Here
Book Description
Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 Isometrics is a form of exercise that involves using any unyielding object and pushing against it with all your might from different positions to tone and strengthen different groups of muscles. It was popular in the 1950s, but my father was a sportswriter for The Des Moines Register, and so he would do isometrics on airplanes to travel to Major League cities. #2 In the 1950s, America was the richest country in the world. The Czekalinski family of Cleveland, Ohio, was shown in a magazine two weeks before my birth, surrounded by the two and a half tons of food that a typical blue-collar family ate in a year. #3 People were happy because they could have things they had never dreamed of having. They looked forward to the future, and many were excited about the small enrichments available right now. #4 My father, who was a sports columnist for the Des Moines Register, would go to the World Series every year for nearly forty years, from 1945 until his retirement. It was the high point of his working year. He would witness many memorable moments of baseball history, and he always seemed to be there when something significant occurred.
Author: Everest Media
Publisher: Everest Media LLC
ISBN:
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 38
Get Book Here
Book Description
Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 Isometrics is a form of exercise that involves using any unyielding object and pushing against it with all your might from different positions to tone and strengthen different groups of muscles. It was popular in the 1950s, but my father was a sportswriter for The Des Moines Register, and so he would do isometrics on airplanes to travel to Major League cities. #2 In the 1950s, America was the richest country in the world. The Czekalinski family of Cleveland, Ohio, was shown in a magazine two weeks before my birth, surrounded by the two and a half tons of food that a typical blue-collar family ate in a year. #3 People were happy because they could have things they had never dreamed of having. They looked forward to the future, and many were excited about the small enrichments available right now. #4 My father, who was a sports columnist for the Des Moines Register, would go to the World Series every year for nearly forty years, from 1945 until his retirement. It was the high point of his working year. He would witness many memorable moments of baseball history, and he always seemed to be there when something significant occurred.
Author: Bill Bryson
Publisher: Anchor Canada
ISBN: 0307373622
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 321
Get Book Here
Book Description
From one of the most beloved and bestselling authors in the English language, a vivid, nostalgic and utterly hilarious memoir of growing up in the middle of the United States in the middle of the last century. A book that delivers on the promise that it is “laugh-out-loud funny.” Some say that the first hints that Bill Bryson was not of Planet Earth came from his discovery, at the age of six, of a woollen jersey of rare fineness. Across the moth-holed chest was a golden thunderbolt. It may have looked like an old college football sweater, but young Bryson knew better. It was obviously the Sacred Jersey of Zap, and proved that he had been placed with this innocuous family in the middle of America to fly, become invisible, shoot guns out of people’s hands from a distance, and wear his underpants over his jeans in the manner of Superman. Bill Bryson’s first travel book opened with the immortal line, “I come from Des Moines. Somebody had to.” In this hilarious new memoir, he travels back to explore the kid he once was and the weird and wonderful world of 1950s America. He modestly claims that this is a book about not very much: about being small and getting much larger slowly. But for the rest of us, it is a laugh-out-loud book that will speak volumes – especially to anyone who has ever been young.
Author: Becki Chiasson
Publisher: Hyperink Inc
ISBN: 161464957X
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 28
Get Book Here
Book Description
ABOUT THE BOOK “Growing up was easy. It required no thought or effort on my part. It was going to happen anyway. So what follows isn’t terribly eventful, I’m afraid. And yet it was by a very large margin the most fearful, thrilling, interesting, instructive, eye-popping, lustful, eager, troubled, untroubled, confused, serene, and unnerving time of my life.” So begins “The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid,” which was published in 2006. It was a departure from Bill Bryson’s earlier books. His previous work, “A Short History of Nearly Everything,” a book about science written for the average Joe, had taken a lot out of him and he wanted to work on something easier. Bryson told the Guardian: “I promised my wife I would do a book I could stay at home to do ... and I promised my publisher that I would do something more amusing that would corral back the core of my readership, some of whom doubtless were slightly appalled and alienated by A Short History. And also, purely in a selfish way, I wanted to do a book that I wouldn't have to do a lot of hard thinking and research about. I did miss writing humorous things.” MEET THE AUTHOR Becki Chiasson is a Baltimore-based writer who received her BS in Mass Communications from Towson University. Although she spent some time in New York as a crossword puzzle editor, she returned to her hometown in Maryland in 2010 to focus on writing. Her favorite topics include video games and women's issues. When she's not busy writing up a storm, she crochets, plays video games, and bakes. EXCERPT FROM THE BOOK “The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid” centers on Bryson’s life as a young child in Des Moines, Iowa during the 1950s and follows Bryson through puberty. The plot is less of a structured narrative and more of a series of loosely related, humorous anecdotes about growing up during happier, simpler times. A central conceit to the book is the idea that Bryson was the Thunderbolt Kid, a superhero who could make his enemies (usually people Bryson deemed to be morons) disappear in a flash of light by casting a withering stare at them. This superpower is presented in all seriousness, although it is rather doubtful that it ever happened. The first time Bryson used his superpower, he was six years old. He was at a diner with his mother and discovered to his great chagrin that the ancient-looking man next to him had been drinking out of Bryson’s water glass. Worse still, the man had been eating poached eggs, which Bryson positively despised. Bryson freaked out, gagging, and the man only laughed, having no remorse at all. When he turned to leave, “as he reached out to open the door, bolts of electricity flew from my wildly dilated eyes and played over his body. He shimmered for an instant, contorted in a brief, silent rictus of agony, and was gone. It was the birth of ThunderVision. The world had just become a dangerous place for morons.” Buy a copy to keep reading!
Author: Bill Bryson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781846179563
Category : Authors, American
Languages : en
Pages : 362
Get Book Here
Book Description
Some say that the first hint that Bill Bryson was not of Planet Earth came when his mother sent him to school in lime-green Capri pants. Others think it all started with his discovery, at the age of six, of a woollen jersey of rare fineness. In his funny memoir, he travels back in time to explore the ordinary kid he once was.
Author: Bill Bryson
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 1784161810
Category : Travel writers
Languages : en
Pages : 388
Get Book Here
Book Description
Bill Brysonâe(tm)s first travel book opened with the immortal line, âe~I come from Des Moines. Somebody had to.âe(tm) In this deeply funny and personal memoir, he travels back in time to explore the ordinary kid he once was, in the curious world of 1950s Middle America. It was a happy time, when almost everything was good for you, including DDT, cigarettes and nuclear fallout. This is a book about one boyâe(tm)s growing up. But in Brysonâe(tm)s hands, it becomes everyoneâe(tm)s story, one that will speak volumes âe" especially to anyone who has ever been young.
Author: Scott P. Richert
Publisher: Cavendish Square Publishing, LLC
ISBN: 1608703975
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 128
Get Book Here
Book Description
A biography of writer Bill Bryson that describes his era, major works, and life.
Author: James R. Schaffer
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 153819631X
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 229
Get Book Here
Book Description
Sports Journalism combines decades of on-the-field reporting and in-the-classroom teaching to present the most comprehensive and contemporary playbook for student journalists. The third edition features expanded coverage of social media, writing and interviewing skills, as well as discussions on race and gender in the world of sports. Two new authors, Steve Schaffer and Amie Just, join the third edition with stories and insights from their nonstop lives as sports journalists. Since today’s sportswriters are often also bloggers, videographers, commentators, talk show anchors and webmasters, the authors have filled the book with the technologies and techniques they use across their many roles. Chapters provide exercises for practicing concepts and skills as well as discussion prompts about contemporary issues in sports. Features: New chapters on social media and on building relationships with sources, colleagues and media contacts Interviews with journalists whose success is measured by their many, many followers Discussion questions that get students talking about issues like paying collegiate athletes, violence in sports and its long-term physical and mental effects on players and equality issues on and off the field An expanded glossary that includes terms such as “hot takes,” “scrum” and “trolls” Writing tips for journalistic style including how to use numbers and statistics accurately and effectively Helpful examples on interview techniques Discussion of legal terms that apply to published work Promotion of the ethical standards set forth by the American Sports News Editors and the Society of Professional Journalists
Author: Kathryn T. Stofer
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 9780742561748
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 308
Get Book Here
Book Description
Sports Journalism introduces students to sports reporting careers and to the writing style sports writers and media relations professionals use. The book stresses the importance of basic writing fundamentals and high ethical standards, essential values for sports journalists. Introductory chapters acquaint readers with issues and challenges in an industry in transition: changing technology, multimedia capability, citizen journalists and bloggers, shrinking news holes, and the deadline-dictated lifestyle of sports journalists. Skills chapters elaborate on news values and the conventions of journalism as they apply to sports writing. From leads to nut grafs, inverted pyramid to Model T, simple sentences to headlines, interviewing to using quotations, Sports Journalism focuses on the basics. The book expands the writer's experience into building relationships with sources and media contacts, using numbers and statistics, practicing AP style, and abiding by legal and ethical standards. An easily accessible format uses checklists, illustrations, and anecdotes to show story organization, news release format, news conference protocol, and media guide content. Chapters include suggested exercises and activities.
Author: Nicole Cipri
Publisher: Hyperink Inc
ISBN: 1614640610
Category : Study Aids
Languages : en
Pages : 32
Get Book Here
Book Description
ABOUT THE BOOK In his introduction to A Short History of Nearly Everything, author Bill Bryson describes a childhood experience common to many of us: a brief infatuation with science, with all its potential and possibility. For Bryson, it was inspired by a textbook’s cut-away illustration of the interior strata of the Earth, with the molten core at the center. For myself, it was a children’s biography of Jacques Cousteau. Excited by the nearly endless prospects of science, the questions that could finally satisfy a child’s curiosity, we both reached for more books, and found our budding passions firmly squashed by an impenetrable wall of unfathomable writing. As Bryson writes in his introduction, “there seemed to be a mystifying universal conspiracy among textbook authors to make certain the material they dealt with never strayed too near the realm of the mildly interesting.” Bryson wrote A Short History of Nearly Everything as an antidote to the dry-as-dust science tomes that weigh down students’ backpacks. It is a layman’s love song to science, to its strange history and stranger characters. Published in 2003, it has been become a popular addition to the popular science genre. MEET THE AUTHOR Nicole Cipri is a restless wanderer and passionate writer. A graduate of the Evergreen State School in Olympia, WA, Nicole has since written about such varied topics as modern urban farming, the role of glitterbombing as political theater, and the economic impacts of natural disasters. You can follow her adventures on Twitter, @nicolecipri. EXCERPT FROM THE BOOK Drama abounded in the 19th century. After the discovery of the first dinosaur fossil in 1784, and with subsequent uncovering of massive bones that belonged to other extinct species, there was an uncomfortable public debate concerning extinctions. Why, after all, would an omniscient God create species of animals only to casually wipe them out? Throughout history, the sciences have routinely butted heads with the Church, a trend that continues today. From geology and paleontology, Bryson moves to chemistry. With its origins in the enigmatic studies of alchemy, chemistry evolved along its own strange path. Bryson tells one exemplifying story, in which an amateur alchemist became convinced the he could distill gold from human urine. “The similarity of color,” Bryson explains, “seems to have been a factor in his conclusion.” In an attempt to prove his hypothesis, the man collected fifty buckets of human urine, which he kept in his cellar. After a few months, the man noted, the substance in the buckets began to glow or explode into flames when exposed to air. He had failed in distilling gold from urine, but he had succeeded in creating phosphorous. Buy a copy to keep reading!
Author: Ann Marie VanDerZanden
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0470480939
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 274
Get Book Here
Book Description
THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO THE SUSTAINABLE MANAGEMENT OF LANDSCAPES A must-have guide for anyone working with landscapes, Sustainable Landscape Management eases the transition of the landscape industry into a new era of green consciousness. Filled with examples that illustrate best practices, the book provides a practical framework for the development of sustainable management strategies from design to execution and, eventually, to maintenance in an effort to construct landscapes that function more efficiently and minimize the impact on the environment. Sustainable Landscape Management includes: An overview of sustainable design and construction techniques as the basis for the maintenance and management of constructed landscapes Coverage of ecosystem development, managing landscape beds, managing trees and shrubs, and lawn care An entire chapter devoted to issues associated with the use of chemicals in landscape management Guidance on retrofitting existing landscapes for sustainability Reshaping the landscape takes on more significance as society embraces a new value system for advancing environmentally friendly ideals. By following the management principles laid out in this book, readers will learn the key elements for building landscapes that integrate beauty and function to create a sustainable presence that extends well into the future.
