Library Journal

Ball, Edward. The Tycoon and the Inventor: A Gilded Age and the Birth of Moving Pictures. Doubleday. Nov. 2012. 448p. ISBN 9780385525756. $29.95; eISBN 9780385535496. Downloadable: Random House Audio. BIOGRAPHY
Originally scheduled for April 2012 and featured as a Pick last October, this is the story of how photographer Eadweard Muybridge invented stop-motion photography—the first step on the road to motion pictures—when asked by railroad tycoon and former California governor Leland Stanford to show that at one point a galloping horse’s four hooves leave the ground simultaneously. The dramatic Muybridge later killed his wife’s lover, though he was acquitted after a lot of media coverage. National Book Award winner Ball (Slaves in the Family) here combines art, science, true crime, and history-in-the-making in rough-and-tumble Gilded Age San Francisco.

Bair, Deirdre. Saul Steinberg: A Biography. Nan A. Talese: Doubleday. Nov. 2012. 752p. ISBN 9780385524483. $40; eISBN 9780385534987. BIOGRAPHY
The creator of fabulously spiky, satirical drawings and cartoons—everyone knows the iconic New Yorker cover that makes the rest of the country look like a really little slice of the pie—Steinberg was born in Romania and educated in Italy, which he fled with the rise of fascism. He became a U.S. citizen, a commissioned navy officer, and a member of the OSS in a single day, then went on to become one of the artistic lights of the postwar era. National Book Award winner Bair (for Samuel Beckett) got to rummage through 177 boxes of never-before-seen materials to write this biography. Nothing else out there on Steinberg, and what a fascinating life.

Coyne, Tom. Bury Me at the Finish Line: One Plodder’s Quest To Understand Where We’re Running To. Gotham: Penguin Group (USA). Nov. 2012. 304p. ISBN 9781592406548. $26. SPORTS
Author of the best-selling A Course Called Ireland, Coyne does golf but otherwise has never been that big on exercise. So he surprised himself by opting to run in the 2010 Marathon de Paris (though, hey, I’d go to Paris for anything). To make sure he followed through, he drafted some friends—a breast cancer survivor, a beer-belly Brit, and a chain-smoking waitress—to train with him, enticing them with an all-expenses-paid trip to the City of Light. Here he examines the fun of the run while reflecting on how the sport has turned into a mega-industry.

de Margerie, Caroline. American Lady: The Life of Susan Mary Alsop. Viking. Nov. 2012. 256p. ISBN 9780670025749. $26.95. BIOGRAPHY
A descendant of Founding Father John Jay, born in Rome and raised partly in Argentina, Susan Mary hit Paris in 1945 with first husband William Patten and met everyone, from FDR to Churchill to Garbo. After Patten’s death, she married renowned columnist Joseph Alsop and with him became a legendary powerbroker, dominating Georgetown society for four decades. A fascinating-sounding book about a fascinating-sounding American woman, written by a French author who is now a member of the Conseil d’État, the highest administrative court of France.

Glassie, John. A Man of Misconceptions: The Life of an Eccentric in an Age of Change. Riverhead: Penguin Group (USA). Nov. 2012. 240p. ISBN 9781594488719. $26.95. SCIENCE/HISTORY
A former contributing editor to the New York Times Magazine, Glassie tells the story of Anthanasius Kircher, a 17th-century scientist much admired in his day for discoveries that have since proven to be, politely put, half-cocked. Magnetism is not the force driving the universe, his translations of Egyptian hieroglyphics were all wrong, and what’s this about his proudly displaying a mermaid’s tailbone? An entertaining reminder that skepticism can be good.

Guerrieri, Matthew. The First Four Notes: Beethoven’s Fifth and the Human Imagination. Knopf. Nov. 2012. 368p. ISBN 9780307593283. $26.95; eISBN 9780307960924. MUSIC
Da-da-da-dum! Here’s what looks to be the only book available to lay readers offering an in-depth examination of Beethoven’s beloved and magisterial Fifth Symphony. Guerrieri, music critic for the Boston Globe, explores both the sources and the long-term impact of the symphony, which was, by the way, a source of inspiration during World War II to both the Nazis and the Allies. If this book seems specialized,  just remember that Beethoven has nearly a million followers on Facebook—take that, rock stars! And a similar title, Stuart Isacoff’s A Natural History of the Piano, turned out to be a sleeper hit for the publisher last fall.

Homans, John. What’s a Dog For? The Surprising History, Science, Philosophy, and Politics of Man’s Best Friend. Penguin Pr: Penguin Group (USA). Nov. 2012. 256p. ISBN 9781594205156. $25.95. PETS
Lots of books out there on the human-canine relationship. But Homans, executive editor of New York magazine, homes in on a particular aspect of our love affair with dogs—our treating them as if they were human beings. (Um, they aren’t?) Inspired by his Lab mix, Stella, who started out as his companion in neighborhood rambles and quickly became the centerpiece of the family, Homans considers scientific studies about evolutionary theory, cognitive behavior, and the consequences of dog ownership (great for our health). What a dog for? To learn from and love.

Keller, Timothy. Every Good Endeavor: Connecting Your Work to God’s Plan for the World. Dutton. Nov. 2012. 272p. ISBN 9780525952701. $25.95. Downloadable: Penguin Audio. RELIGION
Pastor of New York’s Redeemer Presbyterian Church, Keller is heard by thousands of congregants on Sunday morning—and his best-selling spirituality titles are read by millions. Here he considers how believers can find meaning and maintain their values in the jungle-out-there world of business today. No easy outs here; Keller helps folks practice what gets preached.

Lizard, Sal with Jonathan Lane. Being Santa Claus: What I Learned about the True Meaning of Christmas. Gotham: Penguin Group (USA). Nov. 2012. 256p. ISBN 9781592407569. $20. MEMOIR
After his hair and beard turned snowy white when he was only in his twenties, Lizard did what every guy should do in that predicament: he opted to play Santa, a job he’s been at year ’round for more than 20 years. More than a life account, this book offers inspiration drawn from the experiences he’s had in his custom-made red velvet suits, e.g., little children can make a big difference in this world, and they’re awe-struck about seeing Santa off-season. A national tour, though probably not by sleigh.

Nasaw, David. The Patriarch: The Remarkable Life and Turbulent Times of Joseph P. Kennedy. Penguin Pr: Penguin Group (USA). Nov. 2012. 832p. ISBN 9781594203763. $40. Downloadable: Penguin Audio. BIOGRAPHY
Celebrated for his biographies of Andrew Carnegie and William Randolph Hearst, Nasaw takes on another larger-than-life figure: Joseph P. Kennedy, businessman, Hollywood mogul, founding chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, U.S. ambassador to Britain as World War II commenced, and, of course, father to our 35th president. Nasaw evidently secured unrestricted and exclusive access to all of his subject’s papers and will address the big questions still hanging around, e.g., was Kennedy an isolationist, a Nazi sympathizer, a bootlegger? And did he really buy JFK’s elections?

Perelman, Deb. The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook. Knopf. Nov. 2012. 336p. ISBN 9780307595652. $35; eISBN 9780307961068. COOKBOOKS
Just ask the Smitten Kitchen’s 63,000 Facebook fans or its four million unique visitors per month: Perelman’s supremely helpful, visually stunning, wittily worded food blog really did deserve to be named one of 2011’s best blogs by Time magazine. (I know because I just checked it out and have already cribbed the recipe for Pasta with Garlicky Broccoli Rabe.) Perelman’s recipes are accessible but not Betty Crocker plain; this is fun, energized eating. Get it! With a six-city tour to Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington, DC.

Phillips, Kevin. 1775: A Good Year for Revolution. Viking. Nov. 2012. 640p. ISBN 9780670025121. $36. HISTORY
Every American schoolchild will tell you that 1776 was a very good year for the American Revolution. But contrarian Phillips, Pulitzer finalist for The Cousins’ Wars, makes a case for 1775 as the revolution’s make-or-break year. That’s when Congress delivered a bunch of sharp ultimatums to Britain, British troops and royal governors were sent packing, and local Patriots grabbed the reins of government. Britain never recovered. Great for argumentative nonfiction book groups.

Sacks, Oliver. Hallucinations. Knopf. Nov. 2012. 336p. ISBN 9780307957245. $26.95. CD/downloadable: Random House Audio. MEDICINE
Hallucinations: they don’t belong wholly to the insane. Illness or injury, intoxication or sensory deprivation, or simply falling asleep can cause any one of us to see (or hear, or smell, or sense) swirly, twirly things that aren’t there. Everyone’s favorite neurologist is back to explain types of hallucinations, what they tell us about the brain’s workings, and how they have influenced art and culture. Who knew medicine could be so much fun.

Schwartz, John. Oddly Normal: One Family’s Struggle To Help Their Teenage Son Come to Terms with His Sexuality. Gotham: Penguin Group (USA). Nov. 2012. 288p. ISBN 9781592407286. $26. MEMOIR
A national correspondent with the New York Times, Schwartz faced a terrible tragedy two years ago when his 13-year-old son attempted suicide after coming out to his classmates. Frustrated by the school’s inability to help a student who didn’t fit the mold, he and his wife sought out organizations that could help Joe realize that he wasn’t alone or freakish. Here’s an account of their experiences, clearly as much a parental guide as a memoir.

Talbot, Margaret. The Entertainer: Movies, Magic, and My Father’s Twentieth Century. Riverhead: Penguin Group (USA). Nov. 2012. 416p. ISBN 9781594487064. $28.95. MEMOIR
A New Yorker staff writer, Talbot takes a personal approach to telling the story of popular culture in early 20th century America. She tells the story of her father, Lyle Talbot, born in Nebraska in 1902, who became a magician’s assistant, actor with a traveling theater troupe, romantic lead in early talkies, character actor in big Warner films, and, finally, Ozzie and Harriet and Leave It to Beaver regular. From small-town life to the big screen; sounds enticing, and lots of in-house excitement. 
 
Updike, John. Always Looking: Essays on Art. Knopf. Nov. 2012. 224p. ISBN 9780307957306. $45. ART CRITICISM
After Just Looking (1989) and Still Looking (2005), here’s a final, posthumous volume of essays from a writer whose art criticism was as good as his fiction. The 15 pieces are taken mostly from the New York Review of Books, though readers will also find—and revel in—“The Clarity of Things,” the 2008 Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities and as definitive a statement as we’ll get of Updike’s approach to criticism. With more than 200 color illustrations to go with commentary ranging from Degas to Serra. Bravo!

wa Thiong’o, Ngugi. In the House of the Interpreter: A Memoir. Pantheon. Nov. 2012. 256p. ISBN 9780307907691. $25.95; eISBN 9780307907707. MEMOIR
A 2009 Man Booker International Literary Prize nominee and an Amnesty International Prisoner of Conscience in his native Kenya in the late 1970s after his arrest for writing a controversial play, wa Thiong’o here follows up a first volume of memoirs called Dreams in a Time of War—which, by the way, was a Samuel Johnson Prize nominee. This new work covers wa Thiong’o’s high school years in 1955–59, which places it smack in the middle of the Mau Mau uprising that eventually led to the end of British colonial rule.  Nobel-worthy reading, I’ll bet; wa Thiong’o is often mentioned for the prize.

Applebaum, Anne. Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe, 1945–1956. Doubleday. Oct. 2012. 640p. ISBN 9780385515696. $35; eISBN 9780385536431. CD/downloadable: Random Audio. HISTORY
Slate and Washington Post columnist Applebaum won a Pulitzer for Gulag, so you can bet that a lot of folks will be anticipating her next book. Here she explains how the Soviet Union, suddenly in control of Eastern Europe after World War II, turned those countries into communist regimes and what life was then like for citizens who often found the new ideology utterly alien. Applebaum not only dug into newly opened archives but conducted interviews, which should give this book a personal feel. Exciting!

Bastianich, Lidia Matticchio & Tanya Bastianich Manuali. Lidia’s Favorite Recipes: 100 Foolproof Italian Dishes, from Basic Sauces to Irresistible Entrées. Knopf. Oct. 2012. 240p. ISBN 9780307595669. $24.95; eISBN 9780307960856. COOKBOOKS
Lidia Bastianich has famously written eight cookbooks, five accompanied by nationally syndicated public television series. Here, she again joins forces with daughter Tanya, an Oxford Ph.D. in renaissance art whose travel company arranges art and culinary tours of Italy. They’re aiming for a truly reader-friendly book, with a lower price point and more compact size than the previous titles. But I’m betting that you’ll find the same old Bastianich quality.

Berkus, Nate. The Things That Matter. Spiegel & Grau. Oct. 2012. 288p. ISBN 9780679644316. $35; eISBN 9780679644323. MEMOIR/INTERIOR DESIGN
Made famous by Oprah, star of his own talk show (just wrapping its second and last season), author of the best-selling Home Rules, and, coincidentally, an executive producer of The Help, Berkus is one hot designer. This book, partly a memoir about his rocketing success after founding a design firm in the mid-1990s at age 24, also talks about design precepts and “the things that matter”—the beautiful things he surrounds himself with that remind him of who and what he has loved and where he wants to go next. With a four-city tour to New York, Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles; the media opportunities here are huge.

The Big New Yorker Book of Dogs. Random. Oct. 2012. 304p. ISBN 9780679644750. $40; eISBN 9780679644767. PETS
Essays, short humor, poems, fiction, and cartoons! By Malcolm Gladwell, Ian Frazier, John Updike, Susan Orlean, Arthur Miller, E.B. White, and more! All from The New Yorker! And all about dogs! (Don’t worry, aurilophiles, cats are up next.) 

Brzezinski, Matthew. Isaac’s Army: The Jewish Resistance in Occupied Poland. Random. Oct. 2012. 544p. ISBN 9780553807271. $30; eISBN 9780679645306. HISTORY
Yes, the Jews fought back during World War II, and journalist/author Brzezinski chronicles one telling example: an underground movement in Poland masterminded by Isaac Zuckerman, only in his twenties at the time. Based in the Warsaw Ghetto, the movement sent couriers throughout the country, protecting Jews while battling the Gestapo. All its members escaped through the sewers during the Ghetto Uprising, ultimately surviving the war and helping to smuggle Jews to Palestine; Brzezinski was able to interview many movement members for his book. One story of derring-do that really, really matters.     

Coleman, David G. The Fourteenth Day: JFK and the Aftermath of the Cuban Missile Crisis; The Secret White House Tapes. Norton. Oct. 2012. ISBN 9780393084412. $25.95. HISTORY
On October 28, 1962, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev agreed to remove nuclear missiles from Cuba, effectively ending the Cuban Missile Crisis. Or so we have always thought. In fact, as secretly recorded White House tapes now reveal, nuclear missiles, nuclear bombers, and Soviet troops remained in Cuba after that date, with Kennedy carefully negotiating to get as many of them out as possible within setting off the pugnacious Khrushchev. Director of the Miller Center’s Presidential Recording Program, Coleman has the goods.

Henken, Priscilla J. Taliesin Diary: A Year with Frank Lloyd Wright. Norton. Oct. 2012. 192p. ISBN 9780393733808. $34.95. MEMOIR/ARCHITECTURE
With husband David, Henken lived at Taliesin as part of the Fellowship, the architectural community that worshipfully surrounded Frank Lloyd Wright from the 1930s to the 1950s. Her diary, covering 1942–43, captures not only Wright at his height but an entire movement, spiritual as well as aesthetic, and the conflicts within the community. For smart readers.

Hitz, Alex. My Beverly Hills Kitchen: Classic Southern Cooking with a French Twist. Knopf. Oct. 2012. 368p. ISBN 9780307701527. $35; eISBN 9780307960948. COOKBOOKS
Red-Pepper Tart? Salted Caramel Cake? This is not your standard Southern cooking, though Hitz draws inspiration from his Deep South roots (raised in Atlanta, he was a partner in the city’s famed Patio by the River restaurant). Then he mixes it up with what he learned about cooking in France to create…la nourriture au réconfort? Good cooks will know Hitz’s luxury prepared foods line, The Beverly Hills Kitchen, which he promotes on his top-ranked HSN show of the same name. With a six-city tour to Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco; with a 75,000-copy first printing.

Kurzweil, Ray. How To Create a Mind: The Secret of Human Thought Revealed. Viking. Oct. 2012. 384p. ISBN 9780670025299. $27.95. SCIENCE
New York Times best-selling author (The Singularity Is Near), National Medal of Technology winner, and former LJ columnist (note that he was keynote speaker at LJ’s first virtual ebook summit), Kurzweil here explains reverse engineering the brain. It’s a project to understand how the brain works, how the mind emerges from it, and what this means for our understanding of intelligence, human or machine. So that you can stay cutting edge; with a nine-city tour.

London, Stacy. The Truth About Style. Viking. Oct. 2012. 288p. ISBN 9780670026234. $32.95. FASHION
Preteen psoriasis left London physically scarred and emotionally burdened, and later she endured bouts of anorexia and then binge eating that promptly doubled her weight. So the cohost of TLC’s What Not To Wear understands that how we feel about ourselves affects all our choices, including what we wear; our worst fashion don’ts often stem from deep-down crisis. Here, she helps us see the crisis, deflect those choices, and develop a style all our own. I’m already looking in the mirror….

O’Reilly, Bill & Martin Dugard. Killing Kennedy: The End of Camelot. Holt. Oct. 2012. 304p. ISBN 9780805096668. $28. HISTORY
O’Reilly, who presides over the highest-rated cable news show in the country, had a best seller with Killing Lincoln. Here, joined by best-selling author Dugard, he moves forward a century to recount events leading up to the assassination of John F. Kennedy and the terrible day itself. And the subtitle suggests a look at the long-range consequences.

Presilla, Maricel E. Gran Cocina Latina: The Food of Latin America. Norton. Oct. 2012. ISBN 9780393050691. 864p. $45. COOKBOOKS
Lots of cookbooks out there on Latin American favorites, but this one seems truly comprehensive—just look at the page count (and there are 500 recipes). Co-owner of the Latin restaurants Zafra and Cucharamama in Hoboken, NJ (and a Ph.D. in medieval Spanish history—I like that), Presilla ranges from Mexico to Argentina and through the Spanish-speaking Caribbean to show us that Latin American cuisine is not just tamales but adobos, sofritos, sancocho, and more. With a five-city tour to New York, Miami, San Francisco, Napa Valley, and Los Angeles; seems pretty much essential if you’ve got the audience.
Quammen, David. Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic. Norton. Oct. 2012. 480p. ISBN 9780393066807. $28.95. SCIENCE
AIDS. SARS. Ebola. Frightening diseases with one thing in common: like other diseases even now being discovered, they originate with wild animals and are c`ommunicated to humans in a process called spillover. (It’s the price we pay for invading their space.) The John Burroughs Medal–winning author of The Song of the Dodo went into the field with scientists who trap bats in China and monkeys in Bangladesh to understand how and why these diseases emerge. For more on this critical issue, see Craig Timberg and Daniel Halperin’s Tinderbox: How the West Sparked the AIDS Epidemic and How the World Can Finally Overcome It and Peter Piot’s No Time To Lose: Life in Pursuit of Deadly Viruses, both out next month, and Nathan Wolfe’s recent The Viral Storm: The Dawn of a New Pandemic Age.

Queenan, Joe. One for the Books. Viking. Oct. 2012. 256p. ISBN 9780670025824. $24.95. LITERATURE
When he hasn’t been working as a columnist for the Wall Street Journal, Spy, and other publications, writing for venues ranging from Time to Rolling Stone, or coming up with best-selling books like Closing Time: A Memoir, Queenan is reading, reading, reading. But he avoids books praised as “astonishing” and picks his reads in unusual ways: with his eyes closed, for instance, or by digging up books he always thought he would hate. By not taking a glowy aren’t-books-profound approach, he could be showing us what reading is all about. Try this, literati.

Schwalbe, Will. The End of Your Life Book Club. Knopf. Oct. 2012. 352p. ISBN 9780307594037. $25; eISBN 9780307961112. CD/downloadable: Random Audio. MEMOIR/LITERATURE
The hugely accomplished Schwalbe has had a hand in publishing (he’s a former senior vice president and editor in chief at Hyperion Books), journalism (he’s had pieces in the New York Times), and the new media (he founded of Cookstr.com). But then he’s had to keep up with his mother, who taught at Harvard and the Dalton School and then spent ten years building libraries in Afghanistan. When she was preparing for chemotherapy treatments at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, Schwalbe asked her what she had read lately, and so began a habit of reading the same books and discussing them—an activity that sustained Schwalbe’s mother throughout her treatments. A perfect book-club book about books and the community they create that also portrays the love between mother and son; with a reading group guide (no surprise) and a six-city tour to Boston, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington, DC.

Sethi, Aman. A Free Man: A True Story of Life and Death in Delhi. Norton. Oct. 2012. 240p. ISBN 9780393088908. $24.95. BIOGRAPHY/CURRENT EVENTS
A former biology student who has worked as a butcher, tailor, and electrician’s apprentice, Mohammed Ashraf is indeed free of the baggage of everyday life; he is now a homeless day laborer in Old Dehli. Sethi, a correspondent for the Hindu whose reporting has earned him an International Committee of the Red Cross award, aims to illuminate the global economic crisis by detailing what happened to Ashraf, providing vivid scenes of a tuberculosis hospital, Beggars Court, and the Old Delhi Railway Station where Ashraf and his friends gather. Already an international best seller; I’m feeling good about this book.

Tatar, Maria, ed. The Annotated Brothers Grimm. Norton. Oct. 2012. 576p. ISBN 9780393088861. $39.95. FAIRY TALES
It’s been 200 years since the publication of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm’s Children’s Stories and Household Tales, which collected the treasures of Europe’s oral folk tradition. To celebrate, here’s a deluxe edition of indefatigable Harvard folklorist Tatar’s annotated Grimm anthology, first published by Norton in 2004. Six new tales have been added (e.g., “Four Clever Brothers” and “The White Snake”), and even more illustrations grace the pages. (Think Arthur Rackham and George Cruikshank, among others.) Definitely consider replacing those battered 2004 copies.

Brunson, Paul Carrick. It’s Complicated (But It Doesn’t Have To Be): A Modern Guide to Finding and Keeping Love. Gotham: Penguin Books (USA). Sep. 2012. 304p. ISBN 9781592407699. $22.50. RELATIONSHIPS
“Modern Day Matchmaker” Brunson ditched his high-paying portfolio management job to do something far nobler: helping people find love. Young, black, and male, he’s not your average dating coach; he got inspired to switch careers when he realized that all the children at a summer camp he ran for the underserved in Washington, DC, came from single-parent homes. Among other things, Brunson hosts matchmaking events in numerous cities, but  if you can’t make them, you can still get this book. Aimed at everyone.

Burke, Monte. 4th and Goal: From the Gridiron to the Boardroom and Back. Grand Central. Sept. 2012. 288p. ISBN 9781455514045. $26.99. SPORTS/AUTOBIOGRAPHY
Joe Moglia always wanted to coach college football, but family responsibilities meant climbing onto the corporate ladder instead. Eventually, he became the CEO of TD Ameritrade—and then he quit, determined to pursue the dream he’d deferred. Now, after a stint of unpaid coaching to get back into the game after 25 years, he’s head football coach at Coastal Carolina University. We could all use inspiration like this.

Danza, Tony. I’d Like To Apologize to Every Teacher I Ever Had: My Year as a Rookie Teacher at Northeast High. Crown. Sept. 2012. 400p. ISBN 9780770436704. $26. EDUCATION/MEMOIR
Yes, that’s Danza, the Golden Globe and Emmy nominee you know from Taxi, teaching English at Philadelphia’s Northeast High. After years of acting success, he felt it was payback time, and being a teacher appealed. What he discovered: it’s really hard work. A great antidote to all those pieces by folks who consider teaching glorified babysitting; you might know this from a short series on A&E called Teach, which covered Danza’s 2009–10 classroom year.

House, Karen Elliot. On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Contradictions—and Future. Knopf. Sept. 2012. 336p. ISBN 9780307272164. $30; eISBN 9780307960993. CURRENT EVENTS
A Pulitzer Prize–winning reporter and then foreign editor of the Wall Street Journal, House has been familiarizing herself with Saudi Arabia over 30 years. Here she draws on her access to the ruling Al Saud family, including the king, crown prince, and many government ministers, to paint a portrait of a country that remains central to Middle East politics and America’s future—it’s our second largest oil supplier. With a 40,000-copy first printing.

Issenberg, Sasha. The Victory Lab. Crown. Sept. 2012. 304p. ISBN 9780307954794. $26. POLITICS
Explains Issenberg, who covered the 2008 election for the Boston Globe, it’s not business as usual in the political realm. Academics, statisticians, and strategists are shoving aside seasoned advisers, emphasizing data rather than instinct as they change completely how campaigns are managed. A chapter from this book, “Rick Perry and His Eggheads,” was enthusiastically embraced when released as an e-original—Politico called it “Moneyball for Politics”—and Issenberg just launched a column on Slate, also called “The Victory Lab.” So there’s already a readership.

Leman, Talia. a random book about the power of ANYone by a random kid. Free Pr: S. & S. Sept. 2012. 240p. ISBN 9781451664843. pap. $14.99. PHILANTHROPHY
At age ten, Leman did something remarkable: she organized the efforts of kids like herself nationwide and raised $10 million for the survivors of Hurricane Katrina. Then she launched a campaign that again brought youngsters together to help their counterparts in 20 countries worldwide. Here Leman explains how she did it, using advice like “Use Your Inexperience Shamelessly” to show what it takes—enthusiasm, determination, and a ready wit—as she encourages others to follow her example.

Reiss, Tom. The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal, and the Real Count of Monte Cristo. Crown. Sept. 2012. 400p. ISBN 9780307382467. $26. BIOGRAPHY
New Yorker writer Reiss’s The Orientalist, a New York Times best seller, unfolded the complicated life story of a Caucasus-born Jew who declared himself a Muslim prince. So Reiss seems the right man to chronicle Alexandre Dumas, a former slave who became a royal musketeer and eventually a noted general in Napoleon’s army. He would be unknown today had the son who shares his name not used his adventures to write numerous beloved and enduring novels, including, of course, The Count of Monte Cristo. The result of five years of research and bound to be fun.

Prescott, Townes III. Total Frat Move. Grand Central. Sept. 2012. 220p. ISBN 9781455515035. $18.99. HUMOR
Drawing on the raucous website and Twitter feed of the same name, this book celebrates just how raunchy, lowdown, and, shall we say, unstudious frat life has become. Prescott is the (rather glam) pseudonym for a self-described hard-partying rich boy who was among the three Texas State grads who founded the site. Said to make Animal House look quaint; your move.

Robinson, Gene. God Believes in Love: Straight Talk About Gay Marriage. Knopf. Sept. 2012. 208p. ISBN 9780307957887. $24; eISBN 9780307961754. RELIGION
Bishop of the Diocese of New Hampshire in the Episcopal Church and the first openly gay person elected to the historic episcopate, Robinson has penned an argument in favor of gay rights and gay marriage grounded in the Bible that he loves. His audience: gays and lesbians who want to argue their case, heterosexuals who want to understand, and policy makers who need to understand. With a 50,000-copy first printing; inevitably a controversy stirrer despite the devout and congenial tone.

Sheldrake, Rupert. Science Set Free: Dispelling Dogma. Deepak Chopra: Crown. Sept. 2012. 400p. ISBN 9780770436704. $26. SCIENCE
Biologist Sheldrake, once a Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge, and now a Fellow of the Institute of Noetic Sciences in California, aims to persuade fellow scientists that a strictly materialist worldview will eventually hold back their work. What’s interesting here is not just that Shekdrake is the author of the best-selling Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home but that this new work is the lead title in Deepak Chopra’s new imprint.

Thomas, Evan. Ike’s Bluff: President Eisenhower’s Secret Battle To Save the World. Little, Brown. Sept. 2012. 423p. ISBN 9780316091046. $29.99. CD: Hachette Audio. HISTORY
The genial Dwight Eisenhower was apparently a crack poker player, routinely cleaning out his fellow army officers, and, argues Thomas, he took a big, poker-faced gamble when as President he confronted the Soviet Union, China, and his own saber-rattling generals. A former Newsweek editor at large, now teaching at Princeton, Thomas explains how his careful strategy paid off—for him and for the world.

Velasquez-Manoff, Moises. An Epidemic of Absence: A New Way of Understanding Allergies and Autoimmune Diseases. Scribner. Sept. 2012. NAp. ISBN 9781439199381. $26. HEALTH/MEDICINE
Worm therapy. It sounds disgusting, but consider. In the 20th century, many serious diseases were eradicated or sharply curtailed through better hygiene, vaccines, antibiotics, and more. In the process, we may have also eradicated organisms that help keep our bodies in balance, as evidenced by the rise in allergic or autoimmune diseases like asthma and Crohn’s disease. As science journalist Velasquez-Manoff explains, some researchers are trying to counter these diseases through the use of parasitic worms (helminthes) to help the immune system adjust. This should be fascinating if quease-inducing reading.

Witchell, Alex. All Gone: A Memoir of My Mother’s Dementia, with Refreshments. Riverhead: Penguin Group (USA). Sept. 2012. NAp. ISBN 9781594487354. $26.95. MEMOIR
New York Times Magazine columnist Witchell can be hard-driving, but here she reveals a gentle side. As her mother, who always sustained her, slides into dementia, Witchell holds on by cooking up and sharing favorite recipes from her 1950s childhood. We could learn something here.

Ashcroft, Frances. The Spark of Life: Electricity in the Human Body. Norton. Sept. 2012. 352p. ISBN 9780393078039. $28.95. SCIENCE
From the first stirrings in the primordial muck to our brain’s elaborate pulsings when we read or watch Shakespeare, electricity is life, and much-honored Oxford physiologist Ashcroft—recently winner of the top honor in the L’ORÉAL-UNESCO for Women in Science Awards—explains how it drives the body. Historical perspective, too (the book harks back to the Greeks); insight from a master.

The Best Science Writing Online 2012. ed. by Jennifer Ouellette. Scientific American/Farrar. Sept. 2012. 384p. ISBN 9780374533342. pap. $16. SCIENCE
You have to love a science writer whose accomplishments include maintaining the Cocktail Party Physics blog. That’s Ouellette, who here guest edits the sixth edition of an anthology launched by Bora Zivkovic, editor of the blog network at Scientific American. With pieces ranging from fluids to fungi, written by rising stars, here’s online writing about science—how much more cutting edge can you get?

Brown, Lester R. Full Planet, Empty Plates: The New Geopolitics of Food Scarcity. Norton. Sept. 2012. 160p. ISBN 9780393088915. $27.95. SCIENCE/POLICY
As the subtitle suggests, Brown—president of the Earth Policy Institute, a MacArthur Fellow, and a prolific author to boot (e.g., World on the Edge)—has something potent to say about the human-made aspect of the famines that keep stalking this planet. Dedicated readers will appreciate.

Cantu, Robert, MD & Mark Hyman. Concussions and Our Kids: America’s Leading Expert on How To Protect Young Athletes and Keep Sports Safe. Houghton Harcourt. Sept. 2012. 224p. ISBN 9780547773940. $27. SPORTS/HEALTH
Concussion has become a major issue in sports, plaguing professional athletes and youngsters alike. A clinical professor of neurosurgery and codirector of Boston University’s Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy, as well as chair of the Department of Surgery at Emerson Hospital, Cantu has treated of thousands of patients with brain trauma. Here he both explains how to treat concussions and, more important, how to prevent them. There will be national TV coverage, so expect interest.

Chafe, William H. Bill and Hillary: The Politics of the Personal. Farrar. Sept. 2012. 400p. ISBN 9780809094653. $28. BIOGRAPHY
That the personal is political is a well-worn adage, but it takes on new meaning when examining not one politician but two—specifically, Bill and Hillary Clinton, whose commitment to each other, as well as to key issues like race and gender equality, have shaped their careers. Duke history professor Chafe, whose numerous titles include The Rise and Fall of the American Century, considers their early years, “copresidency,” tempestuous relationship, and more.

Cotton, Dorothy. If Your Back’s Not Bent: The Role of the Citizenship Education Program in the Civil Rights Movement. Atria: S. & S. Sept. 2012. 304p. ISBN 9780743296830. $25; eISBN 9781439187425. AUTOBIOGRAPHY
This autobiography by Cotton, former director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference’s Citizens Education Project and the only woman in Martin Luther King’s inner circle, was featured here as a pick in September 2011. The subtitle change since then (from “How the Civil Rights Movement Gained Victory”) suggests a shift in focus that makes the book more personal.

Dauch, Richard. American Drive: The Road to More Jobs, a Stronger Economy, and Renewed Industrial Dominance in America. St. Martin’s. Sept. 2012. 352p. ISBN 9781250010827. $27.99; eISBN 9781250010834. ECONOMICS
In 1994, after 30 years in the automotive industry, Dauch decided to get behind the wheel and bought an ailing axle and supply company, which included five crumbling plants in the center of Detroit. After rebuilding the plants, renegotiating with unions, and instituting job training, he opened up for business—and made a $60 million profit in the first month. His account is being positioned as a blueprint for fixing our economic woes.

Eco, Umberto. Inventing the Enemy: Essays. Houghton Harcourt. Sept. 2012. 256p. ISBN 9780547640976. $25. ESSAYS
Eco’s recent The Prague Cemetery proposed that countries needs enemies and invent them if none are to be found—an intriguingly relevant thought in today’s world and the basis of one of the essays in his new collection. Other topics: censorship, Wikileaks, James Joyce’s Ulysses, lost islands, and—not surprisingly from the author of the immortal The Name of the Rose—the medieval world. Bonbons for the literati and maybe others.

Elie, Paul. Soundabout: Reinventing Bach. Farrar. Sept. 2012. 496p. ISBN 9780374281076. $30. MUSIC
A senior fellow with Georgetown University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs whose first book, The Life You Save May Be Your Own, received the PEN/Martha Albrand Prize, Elie explains how Bach shaped music—not simply through his ineffable compositions but by perfecting the tuning scheme we use today, for instance—and how subsequently Bach has been shaped by musicians from Albert Schweitzer to Pablo Casals, Glenn Gould, and Yo-Yo Ma. Today, technology from smartphones to multimedia presentations is allowing us to hear Bach’s multiple voices in different ways. Such a cool idea if it works.

Gottman, John & Nan Silver. What Makes Love Last?: How To Build Trust and Avoid Betrayal. S. & S. Sept. 2012. 384p. ISBN 9781451608472. $26; eISBN 9781451608496. SELF-HELP
Gottman runs the Love Lab at the University of Washington, Seattle, which sounds hippy-dippy until you realize that his 35 years of research into marriage have earned him honors from the National Institute of Mental Health and the American Psychological Association, among other organizations. Here he talks about maintaining trust, rebuilding after betrayal, and watching out for what he calls sliding door moments—pivotal points when a couple can connect more deeply or start to spin apart. Bigger than your standard self-help stuff.

Makary, Marty. MD. Unaccountable: What Hospitals Won’t Tell You and How Transparency Can Revolutionize Health Care. Bloomsbury, dist. by Macmillan. Sept. 2012. 320p. ISBN 9781608198368. $28. HEALTH
The Johns Hopkins surgeon who developed the checklist that inspired Atul Gawande’s best-selling The Checklist Manifesto, Makary here challenges the lack of transparency in health care, which leaves patients ignorant and error rates uncomfortably high despite efforts to curb them. Here he argues for accountability, aiming to reward the good doctors and ditch the bad ones. Let’s hear it from the inside! With a five-city tour to Baltimore, Boston, Washington, DC, Philadelphia, and New York.

Marshall, Penny. My Mother Was Nuts. New Harvest: Houghton Harcourt. Sept. 2012. 352p. ISBN 9780547892627. $26. MEMOIR
Marshall started out as Laverne in the beloved sitcom Laverne and Shirley but made her mark as the first woman to direct films that made more than $100 million, namely, Big and A League of Their Own. Your chance to spend some more time in Hollywood.

Min, Janice. How To Look Hot in a Minivan: A Real Woman’s Guide to Losing Weight, Looking Great, and Dressing Chic in the Age of the Celebrity Mom. St. Martin’s. Sept. 2012. 240p. ISBN 9780312658977. $26.99; eISBN 9781429960588. FITNESS/GROOMING
The former editor of US Weekly and current editorial director of The Hollywood Reporter, Min knows how Hollywood types make motherhood look glam. Now she’s sharing these secrets with ordinary mortals. Too late for me, but the rest of you might be interested; check out the author tour and heavyweight promotion, which will include fashion, parenting, and mommy blogs.

Pinsky, Drew. Recovering Intimacy. Atria: S. & S. Sept. 2012. 288p. ISBN 9781451605716. $26; eISBN 9781451605730. SELF-HELP
Despite our in-your-face interconnectedness via social media, achieving true intimacy is hard—some would say harder than ever. Doctor, best-selling author, and TV personality, Pinsky explains how to sense when a relationship is faltering and to build and maintain deep personal bonds, whether with friends, family, or partners. Pinsky has fans.

Roth, Marco. The Scientists: A Family Romance. Farrar. Sept. 2012. 192p. ISBN 9780374210281. $23. MEMOIR
Dinnertime conversations about scientific advances and house concerts open to guests—that’s what it was like for Roth, who grew up in New York, the only child of a doctor and a concert pianist. Then his father started exhibiting the first signs of AIDS, which he had contracted in the 1980s, radically rearranging Roth’s world and leaving behind a legacy of silence. A cofounder of n + 1 and recipient of the 2011 Roger Shattuck Prize for Criticism, Roth can be expected to offer an elegant examination of what we learn from our parents and what we have to learn for ourselves.

Self, Robert O. All in the Family: The Realignment of American Democracy Since the 1960s. Hill & Wang: Farrar. Sept. 2012. 512p. ISBN 9780809095025. $30. HISTORY
Here’s what family values have meant to the Left since the 1960s: first Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society and War on Poverty, then the fight for racial and gender equality, then the fight for gay rights, health care reform, and welfare reform. Those multiplying interests have fractured Leftist ranks, allowing the Right to sweep in with its version of family values: a single-minded traditional take. So argues Brown history professor Self, a James A. Rawley Prize winner for American Babylon, who’s clarifying an idea many of us have sensed for some time. Intriguing to think of this as backdrop for the elections.

Silber, William L. Volcker: Central Banker. Bloomsbury, dist. by Macmillan. Sept. 2012. 352p. ISBN 9781608190706. $30. BIOGRAPHY
We owe a lot to Paul A. Volcker. As Federal Reserve chair, he helped curb booming inflation in the 1970s, while as chair of the Economic Recovery Advisory Board he grappled with 2008’s financial implosion; Obama dubbed the centerpiece of his Wall Street regulation the Volcker Rule. Silber is not just director of the Glucksman Institute for Research in Securities Markets at NYU’s Stern School of Business but an author as well—from trade titles to the standard textbook Money, Banking and Financial Markets—so should be able to explain Volcker’s accomplishments to the financially challenged.

Sullivan, Robert. My American Revolution. Farrar. Sept. 2012. 272p. ISBN 9780374217457. $26. HISTORY
Maybe the shot heard ’round the world was fired in Lexington, MA, but most of the fighting during the Revolutionary War took place in the Middle Colonies. This I know, having grown up in a family deeply invested in supporting Trenton’s Old Barracks and in visiting Pennsylvania’s Valley Forge. Sullivan wanted to experience the war where it actually happened, so he witnessed reenactments of the crossing of the Delaware, tramped through New Jersey backyards, built a Colonial-style signal beacon, and even evacuated illegally from Brooklyn to Manhattan in a handmade boat. History as lived, not just read—which sounds great.

Tough, Paul. How Children Succeed: Rethinking Character and Intelligence. Houghton Harcourt. Sept. 2012. 272p. ISBN 9780547564654. $27. EDUCATION
Listen up, pushy parents; intelligence is not necessarily the attribute children need to develop most. Psychologists, neuroscientists, and even economists are now refocusing on qualities like perseverance, optimism, and curiosity as the true catalysts of success. So may we now throw out the SATs? This book served as the basis of a New York Times magazine cover story, and there’s a 12-city tour to Boston, New York, Washington, DC, Denver, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Toronto, and Montreal, so expect demand.

Tyler, Patrick. Fortress Israel: The Inside Story of the Military Elite Who Run the Country—And Why They Can’t Make Peace. Farrar. Sept. 2012. 560p. ISBN 9780374281045. $30. POLITICAL SCIENCE
A longtime reporter at the Washington Post and then the New York Times whose The Great Wall won the 2000 Lionel Gelber Prize, Tyler here argues that Israel is not the democracy it proclaims itself to be but a military society built with the Holocaust in mind and now committed to maintaining war. Look for the controversy over this one.

Auster, Paul. Winter Journal. Holt. Aug. 2012. 240p. ISBN 9780805095531. $26. MEMOIR
This book is called a memoir, but as might be expected of the brilliantly offbeat award-winning author of The New York Trilogy, it’s not a standard retelling of life events. Instead, as he approaches his mid-Sixties, Auster considers bodily pain and pleasure, the passage of time, and the weight of memory, stirring in reflections on his mother’s life and death. High-minded readers will anticipate.

Banner, Lois. Revelations: The Passion and Paradox of Marilyn Monroe. Bloomsbury USA, dist. by Macmillan. Aug. 2012. 288p. ISBN 9781608195312. $26. BIOGRAPHY
Yes, it’s the year of Marilyn; with the 50th anniversary of her death coming in August, she stars not only in nonfiction but in fiction (see J.I. Baker’s The Empty Glass, coming from Blue Rider in July, and Michel Schneider’s Marilyn’s Last Sessions: A Novel, previewed in fiction). This book is especially interesting for its author, not your standard celeb biographer but a founder of the field of women’s history, cofounder of the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians, and the first woman president of the American Studies Association. Obviously, she’s going to take Marilyn seriously.

Chaudhary, Arun. First Cameraman: The Improbable Story of How a Disheveled Film Professor Became the First Official White House Videographer, and What He Learned Inside. Times Bks: Holt. Aug. 2012. 320p. ISBN 9780805095722. $28. MEMOIR/POLITICS
From 2009 to 2011, filmmaker and NYU film professor Chaudhary served as the White House’s first official videographer. He describes it best: “I [was] sort of like President Obama’s wedding videographer, if every day was a wedding with the same groom but a constantly rotating set of hysterical guests.” The insights range from observations of top political players to what it’s like being stuck in a White House bathroom as President Obama conducts a YouTube town hall on the other side of the door. Hmm, fun, and Chaudhary’s story has been featured in the media.

Cusk, Rachel. Aftermath: On Marriage and Separation. Farrar. Aug. 2012. 160p. ISBN 9780374102135. $23. SOCIAL SCIENCE
One of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists in 2003 and a Whitbread and Somerset Maugham award winner, Cusk often writes perceptively in her fiction about domestic entanglements and their larger consequences. Here she switches to nonfiction, using her own painful separation to ponder the effects of divorce on both individual and society. Love her writing; a book I’m excited to see.

Garrett-Davis, Josh. Ghost Dances: Proving Up on the Great Plains. Little, Brown. Aug. 2012. 256p. ISBN 9780316199841. $27.99. SOCIAL SCIENCE
Enough with the coasts; let’s get to the heart of things. We need more writing about the often overlooked Great Plains. Here,  Garrett-Davis, who was born in South Dakota and kept looking for a way out (he is now studying for a Ph.D. in American history at Princeton), returns to reflect on Native American ghost dancers, his homesteading great-great-grandparents, and the fate of the noble bison. Take a good look.

Kelly, John. The Graves Are Walking: The Great Famine and the Saga of the Irish People. Holt. Aug. 2012. 416p. ISBN 9780805091847. $30. HISTORY
Author of the praised and popular The Great Mortality: An Intimate History of the Black Death, the Most Devastating Plague of All Time, Kelly moves on to a major catastrophe of the 19th century, the Great Irish Potato Famine, which cost twice as many lives as the American Civil War. Kelly investigates both causes and consequences, as the British used the famine as a pretext for further oppressing Irish society and desperate Irish emigrants remade the countries where they settled, especially America. Good popular history.

Malone, Michael S. The Guardian of All Things: The Epic Story of Human Memory. St. Martin’s. Aug. 2012. 304p. ISBN 9780312620318. $25.99; eISBN 9781250014924. SCIENCE
A recurrent theme in fiction today is amnesia, depicting, I think, our recognition that we are utterly defined by memory, our fear of losing it, yet simultaneously how intrigued we are at the idea of wiping away the burdensome past. Malone, the ABCNew.com “Silicon Insider” columnist, here investigates how human civilization is rooted in memory and how our means of preserving it have evolved, from cave paintings to the Internet. Science ideas are so important, and it’s good to have them communicated by someone who talks regularly and felicitously to lay readers.  

Torregrosa, Luisita López. Before the Rain. Houghton Harcourt. Aug. 2012. 240p. ISBN 9780547669205. $25; eISBN 9780547669236. MEMOIR
Former New York Times editor Torregrosa, author of The Noise of Infinite Longing, a memoir of her Puerto Rican family, here details how she fell in love with married reporter Elizabeth in the Eighties. Their love is played out in the Philippines, with the fall of Ferdinand Marcos as backdrop. Definitely different. Lots of reading group activity; investigate.

Bennett, Amanda. The Cost of Hope. Random. Jun. 2012. 240p. ISBN 9781400069842. $26; eISBN 9780679604846. MEMOIR/HEALTHCARE
Not your standard memoir. Yes, Bennett is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist, currently executive editor at Bloomberg and cochair of the Pulitzer Prize board. And, yes, she writes about her marriage to the wacky, delightful Terrence and their struggle when he was diagnosed with cancer. But after Terrence’s death she requested his medical records and learned something about how medical costs are set that she wants to share with us all. A 30,000-copy first printing; not fluff.

Chandrasekaran, Rajiv. Little America: The War Within the War for Afghanistan. Knopf. Jun. 2012. 320p. ISBN 9780307967146. $27.95; eISBN 9780307958425. Downloadable: Random Audio. CURRENT EVENTS
Having taken on America’s pie-in-the-sky planning for the occupation of Iraq in Life in the Emerald City, an Overseas Press Club Book Award winner, Chandrasekaran is well equipped to consider the “war within the war” in southern Afghanistan in the year of Obama’s surge. There, the military parted ways with President Obama’s directives as nation building gave way to compromise and tacit acceptance of corruption. Important documentation that I hope readers aren’t too jaded to consider; with a 100,000-copy first printing.  

Cohen, Andy. Here’s What: Stories from the Front Lines of Pop Culture. Holt. Jun. 2012. 288p. ISBN 9780805095838. $25. MEMOIR/PERFORMING ARTS
Bravo’s executive vice president of original programming and development, Cohen is the man who gave us Real Housewives. Here he talks about his enduring love for television (as a kid, he wrote home from camp to remind his mother to record the soaps) and his experiences as a gay man. Go for it, pop fans.

Keen, Andrew. Digital Vertigo: How Today’s Online Social Revolution Is Dividing, Diminishing, and Disorienting Us. St. Martin’s. Jun. 2012. 272p. ISBN 9780312624989. $25.99. TECHNOLOGY/SOCIAL SCIENCE
Social-media networking is supposed to be bringing us closer together. But in fact, argues Keen, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur who writes regularly for venues from the Weekly Standard to Jazziz, it ends up dividing rather than uniting us; the desire for individualistic expression (“it’s all about me”) trumps efforts at community building. An informed contrarian; keep your eye out.

McDermott, Terry & Josh Meyer, The Hunt for KSM. Little, Brown. Jun. 2012. 352p. ISBN 9780316186599. $27.99. CURRENT EVENTS
Responsible for al-Qaeda’s recruitment, training, and terrorism, Khalid Sheik Mohammad is considered the chief architect of the 9/11 attacks; he was captured in March 2003 by American and Pakistani intelligence agents and remains in the Guantánamo Bay detention camp. This story of his capture is based on hundreds of interviews conducted by journalist McDermott (Perfect Soldiers), author of an eye-opening piece on KSM (as he is known) in The New Yorker, and Pulitzer Prize winner Meyer, whose “Inside al Qaeda” series ran in the Los Angeles Times. Serious politicos will want this.  

McMillan, Tracy. Why You’re Not Married: Straight Talk You Need To Get the Relationship You Deserve. Ballantine. Jun. 2012. 256p. ISBN 9780345532923. $25; eISBN 9780345532930. RELATIONSHIPS
McMillan has two interesting qualifications for writing this book. First, her Huffington Post piece on the subject is the fourth most viewed in Huffington history, having hit 1.4 million views and counting. Second, she has been married three times herself and has some idea of what went wrong. Pretty no-nonsense; one chapter called “You’re a Bitch” examines issues of anger and fear. Given the popularity of the original piece and the subject itself, this looks like a strong purchase.

Samuelsson, Marcus. Yes, Chef. Random. Jun. 2012. 304p. ISBN 9780385342605. $26; eISBN 9780440338819. CD: Random Audio. MEMOIR/FOOD
Orphaned in Ethiopia, raised by an adoptive family in Sweden, the youngest chef ever to be given three stars by the New York Times, and recent proprietor of Red Rooster in Harlem, James Beard Award–winning chef Samuelsson has some story to tell. Yes, food memoirs are sizzling, Samuelsson has 30,000 Twitter followers, and the issues here go beyond eating—Samuelsson considers what it’s like to be a black man in the white-white world of upscale cooking.   

Sennett, Frank. Groupon’s Biggest Deal Ever: The Inside Story of How One Insane Gamble, Tons of Unbelievable Hype, and Millions of Wild Deals Made Billions for One Ballsy Joker. St. Martin’s. Jun. 2012. 320p. ISBN 9781250000842. $25.99. ECONOMICS
A discount service offering a deal a day at local merchants in cities worldwide, Groupon was founded by Andrew Mason, who turned down a $6 billion buyout offer from Google in 2010 and is now an online behemoth worth $30 billion. Groupon is now reputedly the fastest-growing company in Internet history. Sennett, who is Time Out Chicago’s editor in chief, profiles the company and risk-taker Mason. If you want to stay au courant.

Shriver, Mark. A Good Man: Rediscovering My Father, Sarge Shriver. Holt. Jun. 2012. 240p. ISBN 9780805095302. $24; CD: Macmillan Audio. MEMOIR
Sargent Shriver founded the Peace Corps and helped bring about President Johnson’s War on Poverty, but this is not an account of his accomplishments. Instead, son Mark portrays a kind and good man whose daily behavior was shaped by the principles articulated here, which the author determined through conversations and examination of notes and letters after his father’s death. A heart warmer.

Stott, Rebecca. Darwin’s Ghosts. Spiegel & Grau. Jun. 2012. 400p. ISBN 9781400069378. $27; eISBN 9780679604136. SCIENCE
There’s so much that’s intriguing about this book. First, the subject: Stott points out that evolution was not an idea dreamed up by Charles Darwin but evolved (pardon the expression) over millennia. Here she provides the history of an idea, starting with Aristotle and working up through the Arab world to the 1859 publication of On the Origin of Species. Second, Stott is not a scientist, which at first gave me pause, but a noteworthy novelist (Ghostwalk) and English literature professor. But she’s proved her science bona fides with the well-received Darwin and the Barnacle, and her writing skills should enhance the telling of this tale.

Stutz, Phil & Barry Michels. The Tools. Spiegel & Grau. Jun. 2012. 304p. ISBN 9780679644446. $25; eISBN 9780679644453. CD: Random Audio. SELF-HELP/PSYCHOLOGY
Frustrated with how long standard therapy takes—the complaint of plenty of patients, too—psychotherapist Michels turned to Stutz, a psychiatrist who had devised a set of tools aimed at bringing about quick, decisive change. The results have been good enough to bring the authors a New Yorker profile, and because their Los Angeles–based practices bring celebrity patients as well, testimonials are promised that will surely drive readership. For me, though, the idea of rapid improvement instead of just talk, talk, talk is what appeals. With a 100,000-copy first printing.

Tye, Larry. Superman: The High-Flying History of America’s Most Enduring Hero. Random. Jun. 2012. 448p. ISBN 9781400068661. $27; eISBN 9781588369185. CD: Random Audio. POP CULTURE/HISTORY
The best-selling author of Satchel, about Negro Leagues pitcher Satchel Paige, here profiles a very different kind of American hero—one that is in fact imaginary. But as Tye shows, Superman both reflected and affected the American psyche tremendously. Tye uses his skills as a former Boston Globe reporter to interview over 300 people involved with the Superman story and even gives us some little-known facts about this hero—for instance, he’s Jewish. Now that should get people to read the book.

Bowker, Gordon. James Joyce: A New Biography. Farrar. Jun. 2012. 624p. ISBN 9780374178727. $35. BIOGRAPHY
The biographer of Malcolm Lowry, George Orwell, and Lawrence Durrell, Bowker now takes on the literary Everest that is James Joyce. Working with newly discovered materials, he aims to reveal more of the author’s interior landscape, exploring his commitment to writing despite poverty, censorship, and relentless criticism. Richard Ellmann’s monumental biography still tops the charts; let see how this one does.

Coates, John. The Hour Between Dog and Wolf: Risk Taking, Gut Feelings, and the Biology of Boom and Bust. Penguin Pr: Penguin Group (USA). Jun. 2012. 368p. ISBN 9781594203381. $27.95. BUSINESS/SCIENCE
The French refer to twilight as entre le chien et le loup—between the dog and the wolf, the time when one has trouble telling the two apart.Wall Streeters use the term to highlight that shifty moment when a trader can take a risk or retreat to cut possible losses. Coates, a research fellow in neuroscience and finance at Cambridge, once worked in derivatives and came to believe that trading behavior was deeply related to hormones. His experiments showed that testosterone, bolstered by success, reduces the fear of risk in men, particularly young men (but not women), while failure causes an increase in cortisol, which inhibits risk taking. This biology of risk helps us understand how mind and body work together for success, separating the dogs from the wolves in a wide range of endeavors. For smart readers; makes sense, right?

Cohen, Rich. The Fish That Ate the Whale: The Life and Times of America’s Banana King. Farrar. Jun. 2012. 320p. ISBN 9780374299279. $27. BIOGRAPHY
Arriving in America in 1891, Samuel Zemurray started out as a fruit peddler and ended up as head of the United Fruit Company—and one of the richest men in the world. As told by Cohen, his is both a rags-to-riches success story and a cautionary tale about the damage done by corporate greed and the exploitation of other countries. A Rolling Stone and Vanity Fair contributing editor with a bunch of best sellers to his name, Cohen should pull this off nicely.

Dolan, Marc. Bruce Springsteen and the Promise of Rock ’n’ Roll. Norton. Jun. 2012. 592p. ISBN 9780393081350. $29.95. BIOGRAPHY/MUSIC
Associate professor of English, American studies, and film studies at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York, and at the City University of New York Graduate Center, Dolan would seem to have the background to write something more than a flashy account of Springsteen’s rise to fame. And that’s what he intends, probing the cultural and political forces that shaped Springsteen while drawing on numerous sources, including unreleased studio recordings and bootlegs of live performances. For serious fans.

Gallagher, Michael & Jonathan Fetter-Vorm. Trinity: Graphic History of the First Atomic Bomb. Hill & Wang. Jun. 2012. 160p. ISBN 9780809094684. $22. GRAPHIC NOVEL/HISTORY
Fetter-Vorm has illustrated a number of literary sources, including Beowulf and Moby-Dick, but here he takes on an important aspect of history, chronicling the development of the atomic bomb. The book moves from early research and a vividly rendered depiction of a nuclear chain reaction to the launching of the Manhattan Project and the ethical quandaries of those involved. Strongly consider wherever graphic nonfiction moves.

Jarnow, Jesse. Big Day Coming: Yo La Tengo and the Rise of Indie Rock. Gotham: Penguin Group (USA). 288p. ISBN 9781592407156. $18. MUSIC
Yo La Tengo has been around for three decades, defining indie rock and refusing to go glam by joining a big record label. Music journalist and radio show host Jarnow (The Frow Show, WFMU) tells their story. Note the paperback original format, absolutely fitting to the content and the audience. Get wherever music books beyond those celeb bios circulate.

Johnson, Boris. Johnson’s Life of London: The People Who Made the City That Made the World. Riverhead: Penguin Group (USA). Jun. 2012. 336p. ISBN 9781594487477. $27.95. HISTORY
London is a fascinating city, and who better to tell its story that the mayor himself, familiarly known as Boris. This he does by focusing not on events but individuals, from Hadrian to Shakespeare to the Rolling Stones. Before serving in the House of Commons and then becoming mayor, Johnson was a journalist (he was eventually editor of the Spectator), so he should be able to write. Just in time for the 2012 Olympics, this should be an entertainingly irreverent take on a powerhouse city.  

Kemper, Steve. A Labyrinth of Kingdoms: 10,000 Miles Through Islamic Africa. Norton. Jun. 2012. 432p. ISBN 9780393079661. $27.95. HISTORY
Never heard of Heinrich Barth? Acting for the British government, this German national became part of an expedition through North and Central Africa in 1849, enduring a five-and-a-half year trek over 10,000 miles and the deaths of most of his comrades before finally reaching that shining, legendary city, Timbuktu. But because of Europe’s changing political landscape and Barth’s concern with learning about the African peoples rather than figuring out how to exploit them, he didn’t get the attention at the time that he deserved. His story is known primarily by scholars, to whom his discoveries remain invaluable, which makes this an important corrective to our understanding of Africa’s exploration. And it sounds fascinating.  

Koslow, Sally, Slouching Toward Adulthood: Observations from the Not-So-Empty Nest. Viking. Jun. 2012. 272p. ISBN 9780670023622. $25.95. CURRENT EVENTS
A novelist (With Friends Like These) and journalist (O: The Oprah Magazine, Huffington Post), Koslow draws on her own experience, as well as research and interviews, to talk about a crucial issue these days: the number of adult children who have returned home to live with their parents. She calls these children adultescents, and her book seems less a discussion of why this is happening and what (if anything) to do about it than a portrait of the adjustments families are now making.

 Mann, James. The Obamians: How a Band of Newcomers Redefined American Power. Viking. Jun. 2012. 432p. ISBN 9780670023769. $26.95. CURRENT EVENTS
In his best-selling Rise of the Vulcans, Mann profiled the advisers who helped shape George W. Bush’s foreign policy. Here he looks at the idealistic young advisers Obama brought with him to the White House who found themselves up against both the messy realities of world politics and an older, more seasoned group of advisers (e.g., Joseph Biden, Hilary Clinton) who had a different view of things. Food for the political nuts among us, and there are lots.

Rees, Martin. From Here to Infinity: A Vision for the Future of Science. Norton. Jun. 2012. 160p. ISBN 9780393063073. $23.95. SCIENCE
A lot of folks are intimated by science, and Cambridge astrophysicist Rees wants them to get over it. After all, many of the crucial issues we face today, from health care to energy policy to climate change, demand an understanding of science. Rees here makes a case for increased communication between scientists and nonscientists so that we can all be better informed. It’s an important idea that I hope finds readers.

Sullivan, Randall. Untouchable: The Strange Life and Tragic Death of Michael Jackson. Grove. Jun. 2012. 388p. ISBN 9780802119629. $26.95; eISBN 9780802195654. BIOGRAPHY/MUSIC
As the subtitle suggests, this book by a former Rolling Stone contributing editor and writer recounts not only Jackson’s in-the-spotlight upbringing and the controversies of his adult life—the business errors, pedophilia accusations, savaged reputation, and comeback album and 50 megaconcerts he was planning at his death—but the death itself, including the public’s reaction, the estate battles, and the trial of Dr. Conrad Murray. Seems there’s an effort here at balance; likely lots of demand.

Wahls, Zach. My Two Moms: Everything I Needed To Know About Gay Marriage I Learned in Boy Scouts. Gotham Bks: Penguin Group (USA). Jun. 2012. NAp. ISBN 9781592407132. $26. MEMOIR
There are plenty of charming, Eagle Scout engineering students about, but only one testified before the Iowa House of Representatives in January 2011 that the sexual orientation of his two moms had had, as he said, “zero effect on the content of his character.” That was Wahls, just 19, and his speech subsequently appeared on YouTube, soon racking up more than two million views. Here he expands on his life story, speaking first to youngers like himself, raised by a same-sex couple, and then to all those who feel like outsiders, telling them that they are not alone. A needed book, and Wahls is now a known quantity.

Zuckerman, Peter & Amanda Padoan. Buried in the Sky: The Extraordinary Story of the Sherpa Climbers on K2’s Deadliest Day. Norton. Jun. 2012. 320p. ISBN 9780393079883. $26.95. MOUNTAINEERING
As long as Westerners have been scaling the Himalayas, Sherpas—inhabitants of Nepal’s most mountainous regions—have climbed with them, not merely as porters but as expert mountaineers. Yet they have never been given their due. Here is the story of Chhiring Dorje Sherpa and Pasang Lama, who participated in the 2008 assault on K2 that left 11 climbers dead, though they themselves survived. The book takes pains to explore their culture and the burden felt by such impoverished young men who take on dangerous work that pays well yet remains an offense to the mountains they revere. Sobering.