Library New Items

"Colm Tóibín's personal account of encountering James Baldwin's work, published in Baldwin's centenary year. Acclaimed Irish novelist Colm Tóibín first read James Baldwin just after turning eighteen. He had completed his first year at an Irish university and was struggling to free himself from a religious upbringing. He had even considered entering a seminary and was searching for literature that would offer illumination and insight. Inspired by the novel Go Tell It on the Mountain, Tóibín found a writer who would be a lifelong companion and exemplar. From On James Baldwin, Baldwin was interested in the hidden and dramatic areas in his own being, and was prepared as a writer to explore difficult truths about his own private life. In his fiction, he had to battle for the right of his protagonists to choose or influence their destinies. He knew about guilt and rage and bitter privacies in a way that few of his White novelist contemporaries did. And this was not simply because he was Black and homosexual; the difference arose from the very nature of his talent, from the texture of his sensibility. "All art," he wrote, "is a kind of confession, more or less oblique. All artists, if they are to survive, are forced, at last, to tell the whole story, to vomit the anguish up."On James Baldwin is a magnificent contemporary author's tribute to one of his most consequential literary progenitors"-- Provided by publisher.

The memoir from the "Savior of Nike" provides context to media stories including the courting and signing of Michael Jordan, being investigated by the Portland FBI for corporate espionage, close relationships with NBA superstars and Hall of Fame coaches, and the high-stakes drama behind the O'Bannon lawsuit that changed the landscape of college sports.

Born in Korea, raised in the American South, and trying her best to survive British academia, SJ Kim probes her experiences as a writer, a scholar, and a daughter to confront the silences she finds in the world. With curiosity and sensitivity, she writes letters to the institutions that simultaneously support and fail her, intimate accounts of immigration, and interrogations of rising anti-Black and anti-Asian racism. She considers the silences between generations--especially within the Asian diaspora in the West--as she finds her way back to her own family during the pandemic lockdown. Embracing the possibilities and impossibilities of language, Kim rejoices in the similes of Korean, her mother tongue, and draws inspiration from K-dramas and writers across cultures who sustain her. As borders close in and nations enter lockdown, the journey that Kim traces is fraught--and at once illuminates that the act of remaining present has its own power, allowing boundless hope. -- Provided by publisher.

"Living with Dad was like living with a stranger--as a kid I often had trouble connecting and relating to him. But I was always proud of him. Even before Star Trek I'd see him popping up in bit roles on some of my favorite TV shows like Get Smart, Sea Hunt, and The Man From U.N.C.L.E. And then one night he brought home Polaroids of himself in makeup and wardrobe for a pilot he was working on. It was December 1964 and nobody had heard of Star Trek. Still, the eight-year-old me had watched enough Outer Limits and My Favorite Martian to understand exactly what I was looking at. Spock's popularity happened quickly, and soon the fan magazines were writing about dad's personal life, characterizing us as a "close family." But the awkwardness that defined our early relationship blossomed into conflict, sometimes smoldering, sometimes open and intense. There were occasional flashes of warmth between the arguments and hurt feelings--even something akin to love--especially when we were celebrating my father's many successes. The rest of the time, things between us were often strained. My resentment towards my father kept building through the years. I wasn't blameless, I know that now, but my bitterness blinded me to any thought of my own contribution to the problem. I wanted things to be different for my children. I wanted to be the father I never had, so I coached Maddy's soccer, drove Jonah to music lessons, helped them with their homework--all the things dads are supposed to do. All the things I wanted to do. So what if my Dad and I had been estranged for years? I was living one day at a time. And then I got his letter. That marked a turning point in our lives, a moment that cleared the way for a new relationship between us."-- Provided by publisher.

"A memoir of the author's time in Rome after his family was made to leave Egypt, before moving to America"-- Provided by publisher.

"Baruch (Benedictus) Spinoza (1632-1677) was a radical free thinker who led a life guided by strong moral principles despite his disbelief in an all-seeing God. Seen by many--Christians as well as Jews--as Satan's disciple during his lifetime, Spinoza has been regarded as a secular saint since his death. Many contradictory beliefs have been attached to his name: rationalism or metaphysics, atheism or pantheism, liberalism or despotism, Jewishness or anti-Semitism. However, there is no question that he viewed freedom of thought and speech as essential to an open and free society. In this insightful account, the award-winning author Ian Buruma stresses the importance of the time and place that shaped Spinoza, beginning with the Sephardim of Amsterdam and followed by the politics of the Dutch Republic. Though Spinoza rejected the basic assumptions of his family's faith, and was consequently expelled from his Sephardic community, Buruma argues that Spinoza did indeed lead a Jewish life: a modern Jewish life. To Heine, Hess, Marx, Freud, and no doubt many others today, Spinoza exemplified how to be Jewish without believing in Judaism. His defense of universal freedom is as important for our own time as it was in his."-- Publisher's description.

"In Florida, one of the first things you're taught as a child is that if you're ever chased by a wild alligator, the only way to save yourself is to run away in zigzags. It's a lesson on survival that has guided much of Edgar Gomez's life. Like the night his mother had a stroke while he and his brother stood frozen at the foot of her bed, afraid she'd be angry if they called for an ambulance they couldn't afford. Gomez escaped into his mind, where he could tell himself nothing was wrong with his family. Zig. Or years later, as a broke college student, he got on his knees to put sandals on tourists' smelly, swollen feet for minimum wage at the Flip Flop Shop. After clocking out, his crew of working-class, queer, Latinx friends changed out of their uniforms in the passenger seats of each other's cars, speeding toward the relief they found at Pulse nightclub in Orlando. Zag. From committing a little bankruptcy fraud for the money for veneers to those days he paid his phone bill by giving massages to closeted men on vacation, back when he and his friends would Venmo each other the same emergency twenty dollars over and over. Zig. Zag. Gomez survived this way as long as his legs would carry him. Alligator Tears is a fiercely defiant memoir-in-essays charting Gomez's quest to claw his family out of poverty by any means necessary and exposing the archetype of the humble poor person for what it is: a scam that insists we remain quiet and servile while we wait for a prize that will always be out of reach. For those chasing the American Dream and those jaded by it, Gomez's unforgettable story is a testament to finding love, purpose, and community on your own terms, smiling with all your fake teeth."-- Provided by publisher.

"A young South Asian American woman's story of reconnecting with her identity, family, and heritage through sustainable farming"-- Provided by publisher.

"Perle Mesta was a force to be reckoned with. In her heyday - the 1940's, 50's and 60's - this extremely wealthy globe-trotting Washington widow was one of the most famous women in America, garnering as much media attention as Eleanor Roosevelt. Renowned for her world-class parties featuring politicians and celebrities, she was very close to three presidents - Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower and Lyndon Johnson. After Truman named her as the first female envoy to Luxembourg, Irving Berlin wrote an entire hit musical based on Perle's life - "Call Me Madam" - which starred Ethel Merman, ran on Broadway for two years and later became a movie. Dubbed by Berlin as the "hostess with the mostess'," Perle inherited serious money (Texas oil) and married even more money (a Pittsburgh steel magnate). She had a rollicking life outside of Washington, befriending such Broadway legends as Merman, Angela Lansbury and Pearl Bailey. She also had a serious side. A pioneering supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment dating to the 1930's and influential champion for working women, she was a prodigious Democratic fundraiser and rescued Harry Truman's financially flailing 1948 campaign. In this intensely researched biography, author Meryl Gordon chronicles Perle's lavish life and society adventures in Newport, Manhattan and Washington while highlighting her important, but nearly forgotten contribution to American politics and the feminist movement"-- Provided by publisher.

"The frank and revealing memoir of a writer who draws from her own creativity to heal"-- Provided by publisher.

"When Tsar Nicholas II fell from power in 1917, Imperial Russia faced a series of overlapping crises, from war to social unrest. Though Nicholas's life is often described as tragic, it was not fate that doomed the Romanovs--it was poor leadership and a blinkered faith in autocracy. Based on a trove of new archival discoveries, The Last Tsar narrates how Nicholas's resistance to reform doomed the monarchy. Encompassing the captivating personalities of the era--the bumbling Nicholas, his spiteful wife Alexandra, the family's faith healer Rasputin--it untangles the dramatic struggle by Russia's aristocratic, military, and legislative elite to reform the monarchy. By rejecting compromise, Nicholas undermined his supporters at crucial moments. His blunders cleared the way for all-out civil war and the eventual rise of the Soviet Union. Definitive and engrossing, The Last Tsar uncovers how Nicholas II stumbled into revolution, taking his family, the Romanov dynasty, and the whole Russian Empire down with him"-- Provided by publisher.

"Ever since its debut in the fall of 1975, Saturday Night Live's impact on the culture has been lasting and profound. It has been a breeding ground for our brightest comedy stars, launching the careers of John Belushi, Gilda Radner, Bill Murray, Eddie Murphy, Adam Sandler, Will Ferrell, Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Pete Davidson, and many many more. Its iconic sketches--from Wayne's World to Weekend Update to Coneheads to the Californians to of course, More Cowbell--have dominated water cooler talk for five decades, and its catchphrases, from "we're not worthy!" to ""Daaaaa Beeeears" are embedded in the public lexicon. And at the center of it all, from the moment of its inception to the present day, is one man: producer Lorne Michaels. Over his 50 years running the show, Lorne Michaels has become a revered, inimitable and bewildering presence in the world of entertainment. He's a mogul, a kingmaker, a tastemaker, a grudge-holder, a mensch, a workaholic, a genius spotter of talent, a ruthless businessman, a name dropper, an obsessive step counter, the inspiration for Dr. Evil, a winner of 90 Emmys--and a mystery. Generations of writers, actors, and stars have spent their lives trying to figure him out. He's "Obi wan Kenobi" (Tracey Morgan), the "Great and Powerful Oz" (Kate McKinnon), the Godfather (Will Forte), or "some kind of very distant, strange Comedy God" (Bob Odenkirk). Lorne will introduce you to him, in full, for the first time. With unprecedented access to Michaels (who has spent his career mostly avoiding reporters) and the entire SNL apparatus, The New Yorker's Susan Morrison takes you behind the curtain for the rollicking, definitive story of how Lorne created the institution that would change comedy forever. Lorne features hundreds of interviews with Michaels, conducted over several years; his close friends (such as Paul Simon, Paul McCartney, and Steve Martin); and the candid, hilarious stars of the show, including Chris Rock, Amy Poehler, Jason Sudeikis, Bill Hader, Buck Henry, Chevy Chase, and more. Nearly a decade in the making, Lorne is an intimate, deeply reported, and wildly entertaining account of a man singularly obsessed with the show that would define his life--and change American culture"-- Provided by publisher.

"Hope is the first autobiography in history ever to be published by a Pope. Written over six years, this complete autobiography starts in the early years of the twentieth century, with Pope Francis's Italian roots and his ancestors' courageous migration to Latin America, continuing through his childhood, the enthusiasms and preoccupations of his youth, his vocation, adult life, and the whole of his papacy up to the present day"-- Provided by publisher.

"It was Memorial Day, 2019, when Geraldine Brooks received news that her husband, Tony Horwitz, had collapsed and died, far from home, in the middle of his own book tour. The complex tasks required in the face of such a sudden death left her no time to properly grieve for him. Three years later, still feeling broken and bereft, she booked a flight to a remote island off the coast of Tasmania. Alone on a rugged stretch of coast, she revisited a thirty-five-year marriage filled with risk, adventure, humor, and love. There, she pondered the ways other cultures deal with mourning and finally seized the time and space she needed for her own grief"--Inside jacket flap.

The software giant explores his personal journey, recounting his early influences, friendships, family and first steps in computing that paved the way for his revolutionary career and later philanthropic focus, offering an intimate look at the experiences that shaped him.

"From an early age, comedian and actress Laci Mosley knew her path would be riddled with scams, cons, robberies, and frauds. Little ones. Ones that didn't hurt people or get her in trouble. But ones that would get her where she needed to be. "You see," she writes, "everyone's a scammer and everything's a scam. Some people are better at it than others, but we all do it. The system wasn't built for people like me. Scamming saved me and has taught me how to navigate a messy and unfair world while looking out for myself, too." In Scam Goddess, Laci recounts how her scammer instincts have guided her throughout her life--from a religious childhood in rural Texas, to a stint as a city bartender at what might have been a drug front, to swindling her way past the gatekeepers of Hollywood--recounting the greatest true-crime scam stories that inspired her along the way. Whether it's by the beauty industry, capitalism, or the people we date, we're all getting scammed. In this book, Laci identifies the secrets to flipping the script and coming out ahead"-- Provided by publisher.

"Neko Case has long been revered as one of music's most influential artists, whose authenticity, lyrical storytelling, and sly wit have endeared her to a legion of critics, musicians, and lifelong fans. In The Harder I Fight The More I Love You, Case brings her trademark candor and precision to a memoir that traces her evolution from an invisible girl "raised by two dogs and a space heater" in rural Washington state to her improbable emergence as an internationally-acclaimed talent. In luminous, sharp-edged prose, Case shows readers what it's like to be left alone for hours and hours as a child, to take refuge in the woods around her home, and to channel the monotony and loneliness and joy that comes from music, camaraderie, and shared experience into art. The Harder I Fight The More I Love You is a rebellious meditation on identity and corruption, and a manifesto on how to make space for ourselves in this world, despite the obstacles we face"-- Provided by publisher.

"At eighteen, Bailey Williams bolted from her strict Mormon upbringing to a Marine recruiting office to enlist as a 2600--a military linguist. But the first language the Marine Corps taught her wasn't Arabic, Farsi, or Dari. It was how Marines speak to, and about, women. There are only three kinds of women in the Marine Corps, she was told: you can be a bitch, a dyke, or a whore. Determined to prove she's not whatever it is the men around her believe a woman to be, Private Williams turned to an eating disorder, intending to show her discipline through the visible testament of bone. She ran endurance distances on an increasingly Spartan diet, shoving through her own body's resistance. Pushed to the brink by a leadership and a culture that demands women shrink themselves, she finally looked to the women around her, and began to wonder what else she was losing. Quietly but inexorably, the power of other women's stories whispered an alternative path to what it means to be a woman, and a warrior. Hollow is a story for anyone whose identity has been prescribed to them--and has dared question if there is another way to live" -- Provided by the publisher.

Bonny Reichert avoided engaging with her family's Holocaust history until, in midlife, she unexpectedly confronted it while writing an article. Her father's survival in Auschwitz-Birkenau was a backdrop to her upbringing, but a transformative experience in Warsaw--a perfect bowl of borscht--sparked a journey to explore her culinary roots. This journey intertwined with her personal life, from her childhood in the restaurant business to the challenges of marriage, motherhood, and her eventual path to becoming a chef. In her memoir How to Share an Egg, Reichert reflects on pivotal life moments through the lens of food. From her baba Sarah's knishes to her father's comforting scrambled eggs, cuisine serves as a symbol of joy, survival, and identity. The book blends poignant stories of scarcity and abundance with her quest for self-discovery, exploring how her personal experiences connect to her family's legacy. It's a moving meditation on heritage, resilience, and the role of food in shaping identity.

"When journalist Annabelle Tometich picks up the phone one June morning, she isn't expecting a collect call from an inmate at the Lee County Jail. And when she accepts, she certainly isn't prepared to hear her mother's voice on the other end of the line. However, explaining the situation to her younger siblings afterwards was easy; all she had to say was, 'Mom shot at some guy. He was messing with her mangoes.' They immediately understood. Answering the questions of the breaking-news reporter--at the same newspaper where Annabelle worked as a restaurant critic--proved more difficult. Annabelle decided to go with a variation of the truth: it was complicated. So begins The Mango Tree, a poignant and deceptively entertaining memoir of growing up as a mixed-race Filipina 'nobody' in suburban Florida as Annabelle traces the roots of her upbringing--all the while reckoning with her erratic father's untimely death in a Fort Myers motel, her fiery mother's bitter yearning for the country she left behind, and her own journey in the pursuit of belonging." -- Publisher annotation.

For Julie, an elementary school librarian and mother of two boys, there was no time for debilitating anxiety. Yet the terrifying aftershocks of her first panic attack left her grappling with questions about the causes of her mental health crisis and where it would lead next. What follows is a hopeful, honest account of love and loss, a husband who can't read minds, disastrous family outings, and finding a path (with help from loved ones and a few key new friends) to the joy of a well-lived life. Sure to resonate with mothers spread thin by the demands of modern family life, Everyone But Myself offers an intimate portrait of how one woman found her way back to herself. --from Amazon.

"A heartfelt and hilarious collection of essays from the comedianand entertainer known for voicing Olaf in the ... Disney franchise of Frozen, and for his award-winning turn as Elder Cunningham in [Broadway's] The Book of Mormon."-- Provided by publisher.

"In February 1946, when the 21-year-old Malcolm Little was sentenced to eight to ten years in a maximum-security prison, he was a petty criminal and street hustler in Boston. By the time of his parole in August 1952, he had transformed into a voracious reader, joined the Black Muslims, and was poised to become Malcolm X, one of the most prominent and important intellectuals of the civil rights era. While scholars and commentators have exhaustively detailed, analyzed, and debated Malcolm X's post-prison life, they have not explored these transformative six and a half transformative years in any depth. Utilizing a trove of previously overlooked documents, Patrick Parr immerses readers into the unique cultures of Charlestown State Prison, the Concord Reformatory, and the Norfolk Prison Colony where Malcolm devoured books, composed poetry, boxed, debated, and joined the Nation of Islam. This time in prison changed the course of Malcom's life and set the stage for a decade of antiracist activism that would fundamentally reshape American culture"-- Provided by publisher.

"With lessons on grief, love, and the incredible joy of parenting, Jennifer Love Hewitt's debut memoir shares wisdom learned from her late mother and shows her readers her real self-who can't be defined by a single label"-- Provided by publisher.

"Facing memory loss at age ninety-three as well as the fallout from a global pandemic that moved much of daily life online, legendary psychotherapist and bestselling author Irvin D. Yalom was forced to vastly reconsider the shape of his sessions with patients. Rather than throw in the towel in the face of change, Dr. Yalom considered head-on the limitations imposed by these new realities and revolutionized his practice. Turning his focus to what might be achieved in a one-hour, one-time-only meeting between patient and practitioner, Dr. Yalom employed an even more concerted use of his "here and now" approach"-- Provided by publisher.

"For fans of H Is for Hawk and Shop Class as Soulcraft comes a captivating literary memoir, immersing readers in the life of a Scottish carpenter as he perfects his craft, builds a business, and reflects on what inheritance and shared responsibility really mean. The eldest son of a master woodworker, Callum Robinson spent his childhood surrounded by wood and trees, absorbing craft lessons in his father's workshop and playing among the sycamore, oak, and Scots pine that bordered his home. In time he became his father's apprentice, helping to create exquisite bespoke objects. But eventually the need to find his own path led him to establish his own workshop; to chase ever bigger and more commercial projects; to business meetings, bright lights, and bureaucracy; to lose touch with his roots-until the devastating loss of one major job threatened to bring it all crashing down. Faced with the end of his business, his team, and everything he had worked so hard to build, he was forced to question what mattered most. In beautifully wrought prose, Callum tells the story of returning to the workshop and to the wood; to handcrafting furniture for people who will love it and then pass it on to the next generation-an antidote to a culture where everything seems so easily disposable. As he does so, he brings us closer to nature and the physical act of creation. Close enough to smell the sawdust, see the wood's grain and character, and feel the magic of furniture coming to life. At the same time, we begin to understand how he has been shaped, as both a craftsman and a son. Blending memoir and nature writing at its finest, Ingrained is an uplifting meditation on the challenges of working with your hands in our modern age, on community, consumerism, and the beauty of the natural world-one that asks us to see our local trees, and our own wooden objects, in a new and revelatory light"-- Provided by publisher.

"As a little boy, Roger Penrose and his father discovered a sundial in a clearing behind their home. In that machine made of light, shadow, and time, six-year-old Roger discovered a "world behind the world" of transcendently beautiful geometry, beginning a journey toward becoming one of the world's most influential mathematicians, philosophers, and physicists. In the years to come, Penrose earned a Nobel Prize, a knighthood, and dozens of other prestigious honors. He proved the limitations of general relativity, and he set a new agenda for theoretical physics. However, as Patchen Barss documents in The Impossible Man, success came at a price. Penrose's longing for knowledge was matched only by his inability to understand those around him, and he struggled to connect with friends, family, and especially the women in his life. His final years have been spent alone with his research, intentionally cut off from the people who loved him. Erudite and deeply moving, The Impossible Man intimately depicts the relationship between Penrose the scientist and Roger the human being. It reveals the tragic cost-to himself and those closest to him-of Roger Penrose's extraordinary life"-- Provided by publisher.

"From one of the most outspoken and respected NBA athletes comes a groundbreaking and remarkable memoir chronicling a very public struggle with depression, in the hopes that other young men will not suffer alone"-- Provided by publisher.

"From the New York Times bestselling author of A Three Dog Life, a witty and irreverent look at aging and the writing life, delivered with trademark brevity, humor, and wise wit"-- Provided by publisher.

"The powerful story of how an immigrant from the Philippines overcame childhood trauma and an emotionally abusive marriage to find her voice and thrive"-- Provided by publisher.

The novelist Charles Bock was a reluctant parent, tagging along for the ride of fatherhood, obsessed primarily with his dream of a writing career. But when his daughter Lily was six months old, his wife, Diana, was diagnosed with a complex form of leukemia. Two and half years later, when all treatments and therapies had been exhausted, Bock found himself a widower--devastated, drowning in medical bills, and saddled with a daunting responsibility. He had to nurture Lily, and, somehow, maybe even heal himself. I Will Do Better is Charles's pull-no-punches account of what happened next. Playdates, music classes, temper tantrums, oh-so-cool babysitters, first days at school, family reunions, single-parent dating, and a citywide crippling natural disaster--were minefields especially treacherous for Charles and Lily because of their preexisting vulnerability: their grief. Charles sought help from friends, family, and therapists, but this overgrown, middle-aged boy-man and his plucky child became, foremost, a duo--they found their way together. By turns comical and heartbreaking, I Will Do Better does not shy from moments of sadness, anger, or awkwardness. It's the remarkable journey of two defiant and wounded people, and their personal growth in the name of love.

For sixteen years, Angela Merkel was Chancellor of Germany and at the forefront of European and international politics. In her memoir, she looks back on her life in two German states--East Germany until 1990, and reunified Germany thereafter. How did she, coming from the East, rise to the top of the Christian Democratic Union to become the first woman to hold the office of chancellor? And how did she then become one of the most powerful heads of government in the Western world? What guided her?

Dulcé Sloan's first memoir is organized into essays from her life. From a childhood moving between cities, starting her own business selling toys at a Miami flea market, to being a Black kid in a predominately white school, she's always used her masterful wit to challenge the status quo. Her purpose in comedy unfolded while navigating clubs and the set of The Daily Show. Have you ever dated an adult who roller skated, or went out with a mechanic just to get free auto service? Yup, she's got that story for you. Her stories are both wildly entertaining and culturally resonant.

"The letters of one of the greatest observers of the human species, revealing his intimate thoughts on life and work, friendship and art, medicine and society, and the richness of his relationships with friends, family and scientists over the decades A prolific correspondent, Dr. Oliver Sacks--who describes himself variously in these pages as "a philosophical physician," "an astronomer of the inward," a "neuropathological Talmudist," and "a consummate observer" with "a pure love for phenomena"--wrote letters throughout his life to his parents, his beloved Aunt Lennie, to friends and colleagues from London, Oxford, California, and around the world. The pages begin with his arrival in America as a young man, eager to establish himself away from the confines of postwar England, and carry us through his bumpy early career in medicine and the discovery of his writer's voice and métier; his weightlifting, motorcycle-riding years and his explosive seasons of discovery with the patients who populate his book Awakenings; his growing interest in matters of sight and the musical brain; his many friendships and exchanges with fellow writers, artists and scientists (to say nothing of astronauts, botanists, and mathematicians), and his deep gratitude for all these relationships at the end of his life. From Francis Crick and Jane Goodall to W. H. Auden and Susan Sontag, from lovers to patients, and ordinary folk who wrote to him with their odd symptoms and questions, all are treated equally to Sacks's lyrical, ferocious, penetrating and at times hilarious observations. His musings often contain the first detailed sketches of an essay forming in his mind. Sensitively introduced and edited by Kate Edgar, Sacks's longtime assistant (and one of his correspondents), the letters deliver a complete portrait of Sacks as he wrestles with the workings of the brain and mind. We see, through his eyes, the beginnings of modern neuroscience as it unlocks many secrets of how the human brain defines us. We experience the arc of a remarkable personal evolution, closely following the thought processes of one of the twentieth century's great intellectuals, whose life was long and productive and whose words, as evidenced in these pages, were unfailingly shaped with generosity and wonder toward other people."-- Provided by publisher.

"A darkly comic memoir about being a working creative person in a world that is growing ever more dysfunctional, by acclaimed New Yorker cartoonist and television writer Bruce Eric Kaplan In January of 2022, Bruce Eric Kaplan found himself confused and upset by the state of the world and the state of his life as a television writer in Los Angeles. He started a journal to keep from going mad. That journal is now They Went Another Way. The book's through line traces his trying to get a television project set up in the increasingly Byzantine world of Hollywood. But as he details the project's ups and downs, Kaplan finds himself not only ruminating on show business, but also on today's political and social issues, on old movies and TV shows and music, on his family, on his friends, on his past, on his failing heating system, and on all the dead birds that kept showing up in his backyard. This hilarious and surprisingly moving book is about life-about art, about love, about alienation, about connection, about ugliness and beauty, about disappointment and wonder and hope. In short, it is about everything. And if it's not, it almost is"-- Provided by publisher.

Benjamin Franklin was one of the preeminent scientists of his time. Driven by curiosity, he conducted cutting-edge research on electricity, heat, ocean currents, weather patterns, chemical bonds, and plants. But today, Franklin is remembered more for his political prowess and diplomatic achievements than his scientific creativity. Franklin was a shrewd experimenter, clever innovator, and visionary physicist whose fame opened doors to negotiate French support and funding for American independence. Munson argues that Franklin's political life cannot be understood without giving proper credit to his scientific accomplishments.

"'Do you know what happens if you laugh while crying? Hair grows out of your butthole.' It was a constant truism Youngmi Mayer’s mother would say threateningly after she would make her daughter laugh while crying. Her mother used it to cheer her up in moments when she could tell Youngmi was overtaken with grief. The humorous saying would never fail to lighten the mood, causing both daughter and mother to laugh and cry at the same time. Her mother had learned this trick from her mother, and her mother had learned this from her mother before her: it had also helped an endless string of her family laugh through suffering.In I’m Laughing Because I’m Crying, Youngmi jokes through the retelling of her childhood as an offbeat biracial kid in Saipan, a place next to a place that Americans might know. She jokes through her difficult adolescence where she must parent her own parents: a mother who married her husband because he looked like white Jesus (and the singer of The Bee Gees). And with humor and irreverence and full-throated openness, she jokes even while sharing the story of what her family went through during the last century of colonialism and war in Korea, while reflecting how years later, their wounds affect her in New York City as a single mom, all the while interrogating whiteness, gender, and sexuality.Youngmi jokes through these stories in hopes of passing onto the reader what her family passed down to her: The gift of laughing while crying. The gift of a hairy butthole. Because throughout it all, the one thing she learned was one cannot exist without the other. And like a yin and yang, this duality is reflected in this whip-smart, heart-wrenching, and disarmingly funny memoir told by a bright new voice with so much heart and wisdom." —Amazon

"If you know Tim Matheson, odds are it's as Eric "Otter" Stratten, known for the iconic line "Damn glad to meet you" in Animal House-the National Lampoon's iconic, endlessly imitated raunch comedy that imprinted at least three generations with all kinds of terrible ideas of what college was going to be like. But that's not the only time Matheson has graced our screens-in fact, FAR from it. A longtime pro actor in Hollywood, Matheson was a contract player in the studio system. He's been an on-screen favorite all the way back to Leave It to Beaver, then on classic TV like Hawaii 5.0, The West Wing, Ironside, Kung Fu, Medical Center, Police Story, Adam 12, and Night Gallery, as well as films like Clint Eastwood's Dirty Harry vehicle Magnum Force, National Lampoon's Van Wilder, the Chevy Chase comedy smash Fletch, and the role of Carol Brady's "presumed-dead" husband in A Very Brady Sequel. What's more, he's far from slowing down in his career; he's enjoying a fifth season as Vernon "Doc" Mullins on the Netflix smash hit, Virgin River. He's old school Hollywood and, at some point or another, he's crossed paths and collaborated with, quite literally, everyone. In this memoir, Matheson reveals what it was like to learn from and work alongside everyone from Lucille Ball, Bob Hope, Dick Van Dyke, and Debbie Reynolds to Chevy Chase, Mel Brooks, John Belushi, Steve Martin, John Candy, Chris Farley, Ryan Reynolds, and so many more. In addition to sharing his favorite stories from behind-the-scenes of his most iconic projects, he also talks about how he transitioned from acting to directing, the time he bought (and then sold) National Lampoon with a business partner in the '90s, and how his recurring role as Vice President Hoynes on The West Wing nabbed him not just one, but TWO nominations for "Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series" at the Primetime Emmy Awards. Thoughtful, heartfelt, and filled to the brim with fun stories of the ever-changing entertainment industry, you're gonna be "damn glad" you read this fascinating memoir"-- Provided by publisher.

"Keke Palmer thought she knew who she was. What it means to be a good person and what it takes to be a success. It all seemed so simple, until she realized the challenges she would have to face to prove to herself who she wanted to be. From feeling alienated to having to restart her career after ten years in to becoming a single mother just months after her son was born-everything she worked for in life that she felt granted her what she wanted now also reminded her that "life is going to life" and throw curveballs regardless of what you deserve. It was in this realization that her understanding of value changed: "Real value doesn't come from what you experience in the world but from how you manage yourself in the midst of those storms." She found herself asking, Where do I find my power? How do I master myself? In her own raw and intimate words, Keke talks about everything from her struggles with boundaries to unconditional love, forgiveness, and worthiness. "Don't block your blessings and potential opportunities by allowing the voices of other people to influence your actions," she says. "How you're choosing to set yourself up for success is between you and the person looking back at you in the mirror." Throughout the book, Keke also poses readers with the questions needed to get them through their own challenging times by sharing personal stories and lessons she's learned along the way. She gets candid about the tools she's developed to take the reins, harness her vulnerability, and recognize ownership in the narrative of her life-which allowed her to turn personal power into major power. In this exhilarating, deeply poignant, and often laugh-out-loud book, Lauren Keyana Palmer gets real about life, work, love, and belief. These pages will encourage readers to empower themselves with the truth, leverage their currency, and find the keys to master themselves and the art of alchemy. Keke writes. "You are not on anyone else's timeline, only your own." The result is a tour de force. They said, "Jack of all Trades, Master of None." She said, "No, I am the Master. Of Me.""-- Provided by publisher.

"Gidon Lev is eighty-eight years old. He's been a dance teacher and a farmer. He loves soccer, his kids, grandkids, and great-grandkids, his beloved wife of forty years, Susan, who died at age sixty-nine, and his unexpected late-in-life partner, Julie, who he met when he was eighty-one. He's a self-identified rascal and optimist. Gidon Lev is also a Holocaust survivor who was imprisoned for nearly four years in the concentration camp of Theresienstadt. Liberated when he was ten, he lost at least twenty-six members of his family in the Holocaust, including his father, grandfather, aunts and uncles. After decades of silence, Gidon first told his story of being imprisoned in Theresienstadt concentration camp at age six to a group of German high school students. What followed was nothing less than extraordinary: from that one talk, Gidon has spoken to celebrities and diplomats, took social media by storm, all with his signature bluntness, charm, and wisdom. Gidon's life is extraordinary not only because he is one of the few living survivors, but because of his lessons learned over nearly a century. As Gidon says, "you don't get the life you want, you get the life you get"-and it's what you do with it that counts. "Let's Make Things Better" is the calling card of an indomitable spirit-sharing timeless simple beliefs and truths, from reconciling with the past, standing up to hate, living for the moment, bringing people together, and where to find hope for the future. Gidon's ultimate lesson for all of us is that we have many opportunities, large and small, in front of us every day. And our single most readily available and possibly best purpose is to make things better-to incrementally improve what is in front of us and to leave something better behind us. This is a power that we all have, at any moment, and Gidon's life is a lesson of how to do it, even in the face of astonishing adversity"-- Provided by publisher.

"A deliciously witty and inspiring memoir by One Tree Hill star Bethany Joy Lenz about her decade in a cult and her quest to break free. In the early 2000s, after years of hard work and determination to breakthrough as an actor, Bethany Joy Lenz was finally cast as one of the leads on the hit drama One Tree Hill. Her career was about to take off, but her personal life was slowly beginning to unravel. What none of the show's millions of fans knew, hidden even from her costars, was her secret double life in a cult. An only child who often had to fend for herself and always wanted a place to belong, Lenzfound the safe haven she'd been searching for in a Bible study group with other Hollywood creatives. However, the group soon morphed into something more sinister--a slowly woven web of manipulation, abuse, and fear under the guise of a church covenant called The Big House Family. Piece by piece, Lenz began to give away her autonomy, ultimately relocating to the Family's Pacific Northwest compound, overseen by a domineering minister who would convince Lenz to marry one ofhis sons and steadily drained millions of her TV income without herknowledge. Family "minders" assigned to her on set, "Maoist struggle session"-inspired meetings in the basement of a filthy house, and regular counseling with "Leadership" were just part of the tactics used to keep her loyal. Only when she became a mother did Lenz find the courage to leave and spare her child from a similar fate. After nearly a decade (and with the unlikely help of a One Tree Hill superfan), she finally managed to escape the family's grip and begin to heal from the deep trauma that forever altered her relationship with God and her understanding of faith."-- Provided by publisher.

"The acclaimed Pulitzer Prize finalist and #1 New York Times bestselling author of Galileo's Daughter crafts a luminous chronicle of the most famous woman in the history of science, and the untold story of the many remarkable young women trained in her laboratory who were launched into stellar scientific careers of their own. "Even now, nearly a century after her death, Marie Curie remains the only female scientist most people can name," writes Dava Sobel at the opening of her shining portrait of the sole Nobel laureate decorated in two separate fields of science--Physics in 1903 with her husband Pierre and Chemistry by herself in 1911. And yet, Sobel makes clear, as brilliant as she was in the laboratory, Marie Curie was equally memorable outside it. Grieving Pierre's untimely death in 1906, she took his place as professor of physics at the Sorbonne; devotedly raised two brilliant daughters; drove a van she outfitted with X-ray equipment to the front lines of World War I; befriended Albert Einstein and other luminaries of twentieth-century physics; won support from two US presidents; and inspired generations of young women the world over to pursue science as a way of life. As Sobel did so memorably in her portrait of Galileo through the prism of his daughter, she approaches Marie Curie from a unique angle, narrating her remarkable life of discovery and fame alongside the women who became her legacy--from France's Marguerite Perey, who discovered the element francium, and Norway's Ellen Gleditsch, to Mme. Curie's elder daughter, Irène, winner of the 1935 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. For decades the only woman in the room at international scientific gatherings that probed new theories about the interior of the atom, Marie Curie traveled far and wide, despite constant illness, to share the secrets of radioactivity, a term she coined. Her two triumphant tours of the United States won her admirers for her modesty even as she was mobbed at every stop; her daughters, in Ève's later recollection, "discovered all at once what the retiring woman with whom they had always lived meant to the world." With the consummate skill that made bestsellers of Longitude and Galileo's Daughter, and the appreciation for women in science at the heart of her most recent The Glass Universe, Dava Sobel has crafted a radiant biography and a masterpiece of storytelling, illuminating the life and enduring influence of one of the most consequential figures of our time"-- Provided by publisher.

"A groundbreaking look at the life and art of one of the most influential and modern painters of the late nineteenth century and founder of the Impressionist movement. Drawing on thousands of never-before translated letters and unpublished sources, this new biography reveals dramatic new information about the life and work of one of the late 19th century's most important painters. Despite being mocked at the beginning of his career, and living hand to mouth, Monet risked all to pursue his vision, and his early work along the banks of the Seine in the 1860s-70s would come to be revered as Impressionism. In the following decades, he emerged as a celebrated leader of the new painting in one of the most exciting cultural moments in Paris, before withdrawing to his house and garden to paint the late Water Lilies, which were ignored during his lifetime and would later would have a major influence on all 20th century painters both figurative and abstract. This is the first time we see the turbulent life of this volatile and voracious man who was as obsessed by his love affairs as he was by nature. He changed his art three times when the women at the center of his life changed with a nod to the behavior of such painters as Picasso. His closest friend was Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau but Proust as well as Zola, Renoir, Pissarro and Manet were also a part of his life. Brilliant and absorbing, this biography will forever change our understanding of Monet's life and work"-- Provided by publisher.

"Ina Garten, the author of thirteen best-selling cookbooks, beloved Food Network personality, Instagram sensation, and the cultural icon whose face has launched a thousand memes, shares her personal story with readers hungry for a seat at her table"-- Provided by publisher.

A political freedom fighter who paid the ultimate price for his convictions recounts his political career, the many attempts on his life and the lives of the people closest to him and the relentless campaign he and his team waged against an increasingly dictatorial regime.