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How Starbucks Saved My Life
- A Son of Privilege Learns to Live Like Everyone Else
- Narrated by: Dylan Baker
- Length: 7 hrs and 39 mins
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Publisher's summary
In his 50s, Michael Gates Gill had it all: a big house in the suburbs, a loving family, and a top job at an ad agency with a six-figure salary. By the time he turned 60, he had lost everything except his Ivy League education and his sense of entitlement. First, he was downsized at work. Next, an affair ended his 20-year marriage. Then, he was diagnosed with a slow-growing brain tumor, prognosis undetermined. Around the same time, his girlfriend gave birth to a son. Gill had no money, no health insurance, and no prospects.
One day as Gill sat in a Manhattan Starbucks with his last affordable luxury, a latte, brooding about his misfortune and quickly dwindling list of options, a 28-year-old Starbucks manager named Crystal Thompson approached him, half joking, to offer him a job. With nothing to lose, he took it, and went from drinking coffee in a Brooks Brothers suit to serving it in a green uniform.
For the first time in his life, Gill was a minority: the only older white guy working with a team of young African Americans. He was forced to acknowledge his ingrained prejudices and admit to himself that, far from being beneath him, his new job was hard. And his younger coworkers, despite having half the education and twice the personal difficulties he'd ever faced, were running circles around him.
The backdrop to Gill's story is a nearly universal cultural phenomenon: the Starbucks experience. In How Starbucks Saved My Life, we step behind the counter of one of the world's best-known companies and discover how it all really works, who the baristas are, and what they love (and hate) about their jobs. Inside Starbucks, as Crystal and Mike's friendship grows, we see what wonders can happen when we reach out across race, class, and age divisions to help a fellow human being.
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Rosa Guerrero beat the odds as she rose to the top of the corporate world. An attractive woman of a certain age, the longtime chief of human resources at Ellery Consumer Research is still a formidable presence, even if her most vital days are behind her. A leader who wields power with grace and discretion, she has earned the devotion and loyalty of her staff. No one admires Rosa more than her doting lieutenant Leo Smalls, a benefits vice president whose whole world is Ellery.
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Awesome!
- By Donna D. Lewis on 02-05-18
By: Jillian Medoff
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Power & Beauty
- By: Tip "T.I." Harris, David Ritz
- Narrated by: Prentice Onayemi
- Length: 10 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Hip-hop artist Tip "T.I." Harris has received every acclaim the music world has to offer. Now, working with bestselling celebrity collaborator David Ritz, T.I. applies all his talent and experience to the world of fiction by creating the epic love story of Power and Beauty. After the death of his mother, Charlotte, Paul “Power” Clay allows himself to be guided by Slim, a local businessman. Slim always has the best of everything, and Power is sure that if he learns Slim's ways, he'll make something of himself - and perhaps be worthy of Tanya “Beauty” Long.
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Suprised by T.I.'s story telling skills
- By Dream on 07-11-12
By: Tip "T.I." Harris, and others
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All You Could Ask For
- A Novel
- By: Mike Greenberg
- Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert
- Length: 9 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Happily married Brooke discovers her loving husband has led a separate life with…another wife. Newlywed Samantha learns of her husband's cheating heart when she finds the goods on his computer. High-powered career woman Katherine works with heartbreaker Phillip, the man who hurt her early on in her career. Brooke, Samantha, and Katherine don't know one another, but their stories are about to intertwine in ways no one could have imagined. And all three are about to discover the power of friendship to conquer adversity.
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Annoyed by Hidden Theme
- By parsnip on 08-12-13
By: Mike Greenberg
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The Unspeakable
- And Other Subjects of Discussion
- By: Meghan Daum
- Narrated by: Meghan Daum
- Length: 6 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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It's a report tempered by hard times. In "Matricide", Daum unflinchingly describes a parent's death and the uncomfortable emotions it provokes; and in "Diary of a Coma" she relates her own journey to the twilight of the mind. But Daum also operates in a comic register. With perfect precision, she reveals the absurdities of the marriage-industrial complex, of the New Age dating market, and of the peculiar habits of the young and digital.
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Complaining about her dead mom.
- By Erik Hermansen on 11-23-14
By: Meghan Daum
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My Korean Deli
- Risking It All for a Convenience Store
- By: Ben Ryder Howe
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 8 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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This sweet and funny tale of a preppy editor buying a Brooklyn deli with his Korean in-laws is about family, culture clash, and the quest for authentic experiences. It starts with a gift. When Ben Ryder Howe’s wife, the daughter of Korean immigrants, decides to repay her parents’ self-sacrifice by buying them a store, Howe, an editor at the rarefied Paris Review, agrees to go along.
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Absolutely delightful!
- By Grace O'Malley on 03-19-11
By: Ben Ryder Howe
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Bend, Not Break
- A Life in Two Worlds
- By: Ping Fu, MeiMei Fox
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 10 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Ping Fu knows what it’s like to be a child soldier, a factory worker, and a political prisoner. To be beaten and raped for the crime of being born into a well-educated family. To be deported with barely enough money for a plane ticket to a bewildering new land. To start all over, without family or friends, as a maid, waitress, and student. Ping Fu also knows what it’s like to be a pioneering software programmer, an innovator, a CEO, and Inc. magazine’s Entrepreneur of the Year.
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A true account as good as any Horatio Alger story!
- By Roy B. Paschal on 01-14-13
By: Ping Fu, and others
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And When She Was Good
- By: Laura Lippman
- Narrated by: Linda Emond
- Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Heloise considers it a blessing to be a person who seldom attracts attention. In her suburb, she's just a mom, the young widow with the forgettable job, who somehow never misses a soccer game. In the state capital, she's the redheaded lobbyist with a good cause and a mediocre track record. But in discreet hotel rooms throughout the area, she's the woman of your dreams - if you can afford the hourly fee. For more than a decade, Heloise believed she was safe, managing to keep up this rigidly compartmentalized life. But her secret life is under siege. One county over, another so-called suburban madam has been found dead in her car, an apparent suicide.
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And When She Was Bad...
- By Carole T. on 08-18-12
By: Laura Lippman
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After I'm Gone
- A Novel
- By: Laura Lippman
- Narrated by: Linda Emond
- Length: 10 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Dead is dead. Missing is gone. When Felix Brewer meets nineteen-year-old Bernadette "Bambi" Gottschalk at a Valentine's Day dance in 1959, he charms her with wild promises, some of which he actually keeps. Thanks to his lucrative - if not all legal - businesses, she and their three little girls live in luxury. But on the Fourth of July in 1976, Bambi's comfortable world implodes when Felix, facing prison, vanishes. Though Bambi has no idea where her husband - or his money - might be, she suspects one woman does: his devoted young mistress, Julie.
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Cannot rate this highly enough!
- By C. Vincent on 03-05-14
By: Laura Lippman
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Mother Daughter Me
- A Memoir
- By: Katie Hafner
- Narrated by: Katie Hafner
- Length: 9 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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The complex, deeply binding relationship between mothers and daughters is brought vividly to life in Katie Hafner's remarkable memoir, an exploration of the year she and her mother, Helen, spent working through, and triumphing over, a lifetime of unresolved emotions. Dreaming of a "year in Provence" with her mother, Katie urges Helen to move to San Francisco to live with her and Zoe, Katie's teenage daughter. Katie and Zoe had become a mother-daughter team, strong enough, Katie thought, to absorb the arrival of a 77-year-old woman set in her ways....
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Listen and be swept away!
- By Barbara Quick on 06-02-22
By: Katie Hafner
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The Power of Being Yourself
- A Game Plan for Success by Putting Passion into Your Life and Work
- By: Joe Plumeri
- Narrated by: Joe Plumeri, Joseph A. Califano Jr.
- Length: 4 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Everyone imagines top CEOs as larger-than-life figures who do things no one else could. But deep down every good business leader is an everyman who combines vision and high energy with the ability to connect with all types of people and learn from them
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Go Play in Traffic!
- By Teri Gasper on 01-03-18
By: Joe Plumeri
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Paper Angels
- A Novel
- By: Jimmy Wayne, Travis Thrasher
- Narrated by: Stephen Bowlby
- Length: 6 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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When his mom decided it was time for them to leave for good, Thomas knew they better get far away or he'd come and find them. It was Christmas Day, with Mom sweating in a tiny room over a tiny stove, and Dad watching college basketball and drinking with a vengeance. "Thomas, I want you to get your sister and go out to the car, okay?" Mom had promised them that they would be getting a special Christmas present today. Just the two kids. They couldn’t mention it to Dad. This is her present, Thomas thought....
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Giving and FORGIVING . . . Great Christmas Story
- By Debbie on 11-25-14
By: Jimmy Wayne, and others
What listeners say about How Starbucks Saved My Life
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Nancy D
- 04-01-13
Great inspiring story
Would you listen to How Starbucks Saved My Life again? Why?
Yes because it was inspiring how someone who had "everything" found more happiness on having less with much more satisfaction.
What about Dylan Baker’s performance did you like?
It was easy to listen to. So many audio books get people to read them and they are HORRIBLE!! This was not the case with this book.
Any additional comments?
Really enjoyed listening to it and learned a lot about Starbucks too!
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Overall
- Amy
- 03-31-08
Compassion
As a 40 year old woman it gave me a great insight as to what my mother went through when my father walked out on us in the early 1980's. Being a college educated 55 year old housewife, she was left with no other choices but to work in the restaurant industry (after numerous rejections to rejoin the Airline industry she so proudly worked for before having a family.) I now know the pride my mom felt when she was promoted from dishwasher to kitchen help. And from kitchen help to head cook. It was hard for my WASP mother to understand her much younger Hispanic, Indian and Nigerian co-workers. And embarrassing to come home in a fast food uniform smelling like french fries in front of our upper middle class neighbors. I only wish there would have been a Starbucks for my mom back then, I think it would have really helped with her pride and self esteem.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Randy Wade
- 12-04-19
Excellent book
I enjoyed this book very much. I enjoy stories of real people and this was a very good one.
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- Sean French
- 07-30-24
Great story with deep message
A well written account of how scaling down doesn't necessarily mean regression. If it's meant to be marketing for Starbucks, good job. It's an engaging story and makes for easy listening.
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- namaste norine
- 04-04-22
How Starbucks save my life great book
I really enjoyed this book I thought it was great kept my interest I couldn’t wait to press play and find out what was happening next great story very inspirational. I highly recommend
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- mdz
- 02-07-23
Loved this so much!!
As someone who has to figure out what to do after a career that you had for most of your life sees you as weathered and old school…this warmed my heart and was inspiring at the same time. Must read.
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Overall
- Carolyn
- 04-15-08
A Really Good Listen
This book is great. I loved the story, the people in the story. The best part is seeing a guy get over numerous bad situations in his life. Kudos to Starbucks too!
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Overall
- karen
- 03-22-08
Great book - timely reading
The days are long gone when a college grad goes to work for one company and retires 35 years later with a gold watch. Almost all of us have to reinvent ourselves at some point in our lives, move into different professions or adapt to a less-lavish lifestyle. Not all of us fall from the heights Michael Gates Gill did, but still, his story is both fascinating and worthwhile.
Other reviewers have panned the book as a 'company-line' promo for Starbucks – maybe it was. Maybe it did present Starbucks in the best possible light – so? It was still interesting to learn about a company that's doing it different. I'm not a Starbucks loyalist, having just once in my life paid $3.75 for a small cup of regular black coffee, no milk, no sugar, and decided I didn't need to do that again. But I am interested in how businesses work – and hearing the 'inside' story of the Starbucks operation was fascinating. Like Gill, I too spent years in a profession where we were counseled never to praise our employees, because later they could sue us, and use that as evidence. Where competition and nastiness was the order of the day. So hearing about a very successful company that does the exact opposite of that – encourages praise, affirmation and decency – was great. We should all be learning from companies like that.
I enjoyed the Starbucks tales just as much as I enjoyed the details of Gill's personal life. Besides that, it's nice to know that if I ever need a bathroom, somewhere, sometime, Starbucks will welcome me.
The New Yorker magazine trivia was interesting, too, the gossipy asides about Brendan Gill, Truman Capote, Jacqueline Onassis and James Thurber. So Thurber was a mean old guy? I didn't know that!
I loved this book, and I'm sure I'll listen to it again. Now I wish Don Snyder's "The Cliff Walk" – another guy who was forced to reinvent himself -- would appear as an audiobook.
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8 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Pamela Harvey
- 02-14-09
Easy listening, just like a latte.
But like a latte the pleasure fades.
I agree with all that's been said, good and bad. Yes, the author is elitist, naive, and ignorant of the real world and is also a name dropper. But, on the other hand, this is the exact sort of person who can benefit from a learning experience. It's well-written, too. It should be, he's an ad man.
No one has mentioned the "day at the beach" attitude with which he dismisses his marriage and family, goes on to have an affair and then a MANopause baby! What a cliche. He then dismisses that child, too. If that's all true and not just spin for the book, I disagree with his failure to face intimacy and conflict in his marriage.
Like a skinny latte, it tastes good at the time, stimulating, but the pleasure is temporary.
This book has me concerned, though, because if I need to get a job at Starbucks, this book has just dialed up the competition.
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- Kevin J. D
- 08-22-24
Great story
The author talks about what truly is important in life. It is a story of the power of friends and how they can be there in a time of need. He gets real about his misfortune and how he learned from it.
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