The Kindle Reader

Exit, Reading

2012-05-09T09:28:00.001-07:00

On November 30, 2007, shortly after Amazon announced the release of the first Kindle, I began writing The Kindle Reader blog. Since then I have updated it on a regular basis - no vacations, no time off. I hope that during that time regular readers have found at least one or two books they've enjoyed mightily - books that have even changed their lives for the better.

Now it is time for me to move on to new life adventures and maybe even take time to read more of the books I have on my personal reading list. To those Kindle readers who have accompanied me on this reading adventure and to those who have taken the time to write with praise for this blog, my most humble thanks.

The Kindle Reader, with five years of accumulated posts, will remain available to readers for the indefinite future. And (who knows?) after a short vacation I may find that time off is not all it's cracked up to be.

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A Week of Entertainment: Kindle Books Reviewed in Entertainment Weekly's May 4th Issue

2012-05-06T06:24:00.000-07:00

Each week Entertainment Weekly reviews a small selection of popular new books. Titles available for the Kindle reviewed in the May 4th issue include:

Are You My Mother?: A Comic Drama, by Alison Bechdel. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012. Print length: 304 p. Available only for the Kindle Fire and Kindle for Android. GRAPHIC MEMOIR. EW's slant: "The flaw of most memoirs is that the author, whether because of a lack of skill or maturity or humor, gets lost in a tunnel. Bechdel's triumph is not just that she's emerged from her tunnel, with weary but clear eyes, but that she's brought her mother with her." - Karen Valby. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (4 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home was a pop culture and literary phenomenon. Now, a second thrilling tale of filial sleuthery, this time about her mother: voracious reader, music lover, passionate amateur actor. Also a woman, unhappily married to a closeted gay man, whose artistic aspirations simmered under the surface of Bechdel's childhood...and who stopped touching or kissing her daughter good night, forever, when she was seven. Poignantly, hilariously, Bechdel embarks on a quest for answers concerning the mother-daughter gulf. It's a richly layered search that leads readers from the fascinating life and work of the iconic twentieth-century psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott, to one explosively illuminating Dr. Seuss illustration, to Bechdel’s own (serially monogamous) adult love life. And, finally, back to Mother..." - Publisher.

Home, by Toni Morrison. Knopf 2012. Print length: 164 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...a moving testament to taking responsibility for your own life - especially the parts you'd like to look away from" - Melissa Maerz. Amazon customer rating: none yet. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"An angry and self-loathing veteran of the Korean War, Frank Money finds himself back in racist America after enduring trauma on the front lines that left him with more than just physical scars. His home - and himself in it - may no longer be as he remembers it, but Frank is shocked out of his crippling apathy by the need to rescue his medically abused younger sister and take her back to the small Georgia town they come from, which he's hated all his life. As Frank revisits the memories from childhood and the war that leave him questioning his sense of self, he discovers a profound courage he thought he could never possess again." - Publisher.

The Passage of Power (The Years of Lyndon Johnson), by Robert A. Caro. Knopf, 2012. Print length: 736 p. BIOGRAPHY. EW's slant: "...an addictive read, written in glorious prose that suggests the world's most diligent beat reporter channeling William Faulkner." - Darren Franich. Amazon customer rating: 3 1/2 stars (11 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This is book four in the author's series The Years of Lyndon Johnson. The first three volumes - all available in Kindle editions - are The Path to Power (1982), Means of Ascent (1990), Master of the Senate (2002).

"...follows Lyndon Johnson through both the most frustrating and the most triumphant periods of his career - 1958 to 1964. It is a time that would see him trade the extraordinary power he had created for himself as Senate Majority Leader for what became the wretched powerlessness of a Vice President in an administration that disdained and distrusted him. Yet it was, as well, the time in which the presidency, the goal he had always pursued, would be thrust upon him in the moment it took an assassin’s bullet to reach its mark. For the first time, in Caro’s breathtakingly vivid narrative, we see the Kennedy assassination through Lyndon Johnson’s eyes. We watch Johnson step into the presidency, inheriting a staff fiercely loyal to his slain predecessor; a Congress determined to retain its power over the executive branch; and a nation in shock and mourning. We see how within weeks—grasping the reins of the presidency with supreme mastery - he propels through Congress essential legislation that at the time of Kennedy’s death seemed hopelessly logjammed and seizes on a dormant Kennedy program to create the revolutionary War on Poverty. Caro makes clear how the political genius with which Johnson had ruled the Senate now enabled him to make the presidency wholly his own." - Publisher.

A Land More Kind Than Home, by Wiley Cash. William Morrow, 2012. Print length: 320 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...absorbing Southern-fried tale..." - Thom Geier. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (37 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"For a curious boy like Jess Hall, growing up in Marshall means trouble when your mother catches you spying on grown-ups. Adventurous and precocious, Jess is enormously protective of his older brother, Christopher, a mute whom everyone calls Stump. Though their mother has warned them not to snoop, Stump can't help sneaking a look at something he's not supposed to - an act that will have catastrophic repercussions, shattering both his world and Jess's...A Land More Kind Than Home is a haunting tale of courage in the face of cruelty and the power of love to overcome the darkness that lives in us all." - Publisher.

The Presidents Club: Inside the World's Most Exclusive Fraternity, by Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy. Simon & Schuster, 2012. Print length: 656 p. NONFICTION. EW's slant: "Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy reveal the clout of past presidents." - Tina Jordan. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (19 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"The first history of the private relationships among modern American presidents - their backroom deals, rescue missions, secret alliances, and enduring rivalries. The Presidents Club, established at Dwight Eisenhower’s inauguration by Harry Truman and Herbert Hoover, is a complicated place: its members are bound forever by the experience of the Oval Office and yet are eternal rivals for history’s favor. Among their secrets: How Jack Kennedy tried to blame Ike for the Bay of Pigs. How Ike quietly helped Reagan win his first race in 1966. How Richard Nixon conspired with Lyndon Johnson to get elected and then betrayed him. How Jerry Ford and Jimmy Carter turned a deep enmity into an alliance. The letter from Nixon that Bill Clinton rereads every year. The unspoken pact between a father and son named Bush. And the roots of the rivalry between Clinton and Barack Obama." - Publisher.

These Girls, by Sarah Pekkanen. Washington Square Press, 2012. Print Length: 340 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (25 reviews). EW's slant: "...deftly weaves together the lives of roommates and friends, the very different Cate, Renee, and Abby - each battling demons, professional and otherwise - and within a few pages you'll find yourself emotionally invested in all of them." - Sara Vilkomerson. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"Cate, Renee, and Abby have come to New York for very different reasons, and in a bustling city of millions, they are linked together through circumstance and chance. Cate has just been named the features editor of Gloss, a high-end lifestyle magazine. It’s a professional coup, but her new job comes with more complications than Cate ever anticipated. Her roommate Renee will do anything to nab the plum job of beauty editor at Gloss. But snide comments about Renee’s weight send her into an emotional tailspin. Soon she is taking black market diet pills...Then there’s Abby, whom they take in as a third roommate. Once a joyful graduate student working as a nanny part time, she abruptly fled a seemingly happy life in the D.C. suburbs. No one knows what shattered Abby - or why she left everything she once loved behind. Pekkanen’s most compelling, true-to-life novel yet tells the story of three very different women as they navigate the complications of careers and love..." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: I am no longer listing prices for books mentioned in The Kindle Reader as prices can vary literally from one day to the next. Please follow the links to the individual books to check the current price.

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Kindle Genre Watch: New in Fantasy and Science Fiction

2012-05-04T06:15:00.000-07:00

Fantasy

Hide Me Among the Graves by Tim Powers. William Morrow, 2012. Print Length: 533 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (15 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"London, winter of 1862, Adelaide McKee, a former prostitute, arrives on the doorstep of veterinarian John Crawford, a man she met once seven years earlier. Their brief meeting produced a child who, until now, had been presumed dead. McKee has learned that the girl lives - but that her life and soul are in mortal peril from a vampiric ghost. But this is no ordinary spirit; the bloodthirsty wraith is none other than John Polidori, the onetime physician to the mad, bad, and dangerous Romantic poet Lord Byron. Sweeping from the mansions of London's high society to its grimy slums, the elegant salons of the West End to the pre-Roman catacombs beneath St. Paul's Cathedral, Hide Me Among the Graves blends the historical and the supernatural in a dazzling, edge-of-your-seat thrill ride - a modern horror story with a Victorian twist." - harpercollins.com.

Deadlocked: A Sookie Stackhouse Novel by Charlaine Harris. Ace, 2012. Print Length: 335 p. Amazon customer rating: 3 stars (84 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This is book eleven in the author's Southern Vampire series, following Dead in the Family. If you wish to read the series from the beginning, start with Dead Until Dark.

"Growing up with telepathic abilities, Sookie Stackhouse realized early on there were things she’d rather not know. And now that she’s an adult, she also realizes that some things she knows about, she’d rather not see - like Eric Northman feeding off another woman. A younger one. There’s a thing or two she’d like to say about that, but she has to keep quiet - Felipe de Castro, the Vampire King of Louisiana (and Arkansas and Nevada), is in town. It’s the worst possible time for a human body to show up in Eric’s front yard - especially the body of the woman whose blood he just drank. Now, it’s up to Sookie and Bill, the official Area Five investigator, to solve the murder. Sookie thinks that, at least this time, the dead girl’s fate has nothing to do with her. But she is wrong..." - Publisher.

The Wind Through the Keyhole by Stephen King. A Dark Tower Novel. Scribner, 2012. Print Length: 322 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (68 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Disabled. This is book eight in King's Dark Tower series that began with The Gunslinger.

"King returns to the Mid-World of his Dark Tower series in this gory but hopeful set of nested tales. As gunslinger Roland Deschain and his companions quest toward the Dark Tower, Roland tells a story of his early days as a gunslinger, hunting down a murderous shape-shifter on a rampage. Within that tale is a fairy tale Roland tells to a young boy about Tim, a very brave boy tricked into a dangerous quest by an evil man. Tim’s adventure is pitch-perfect, capturing both the feel of Mid-World and the perilous nature of a fairy story. Its placement within the quest works beautifully, and it propels the story of the shape-shifter and the child who holds the key to its identity. Even those who aren’t familiar with the series will find the conclusion both satisfying and moving." - Publishers Weekly.

Science Fiction

Double Share by Nathan Lowell. Ridan Publishing, 2012. Print Length: 315 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (5 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This is book four in the author's Solar Clipper series, following Quarter Share, Half Share, and Full Share.

"In his first assignment as an officer, Ishmael Horatio Wang finds himself fresh out of school, wet behind the ears, and way out of his depth. Aboard the William Tinker the senior officers are derelict and abusive, the crew demoralized and undisciplined, and change unwelcomed and dangerous. Can Ishmael use what he learned aboard the Lois McKendrick to help the crew find the ship’s heart? Or will he discover that bucking the system may come at too high a price?" - Publisher.

Star Wars: Scourge by Jeff Grubb. LucasBooks, 2012. Print Length: 322 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (5 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"While trying to obtain the coordinates of a secretive, peril-packed, but potentially beneficial trade route, a novice Jedi is killed - and the motive for his murder remains shrouded in mystery. Now his former Master, Jedi archivist Mander Zuma, wants answers, even as he fights to erase doubts about his own abilities as a Jedi. What Mander gets is immersion into the perilous underworld of the Hutts as he struggles to stay one step ahead in a game of smugglers, killers, and crime lords bent on total control." - Publisher.

Battleship by Peter David. Del Rey, 2012. Print Length: 304 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (1 review). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"During a routine naval drill at Pearl Harbor, American forces detect a ship of unknown origins that’s crashed in the Pacific Ocean. Lieutenant Alex Hopper, an officer aboard the USS John Paul Jones, is ordered to investigate the ominous-looking vessel - which turns out to be part of an armada of ships that are stronger and faster than any on Earth. And that’s when the Navy’s radar goes down. Ambushed by a ravenous enemy they cannot see, a small U.S. fleet makes their last stand on the open ocean, armed with little more than their instincts, to defend their lives - and the world as we know it." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: I am no longer listing prices for books mentioned in The Kindle Reader as prices can vary literally from one day to the next. Please follow the links to the individual books to check the current price.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

Books They're Talking About: Kindle Books in the Media

2012-05-02T07:34:00.001-07:00

Media interviews are a popular way for writers to introduce new books they hope will catch the viewer's eye and generate interest in their work. Here's a selection of forthcoming Kindle books by authors scheduled for interviews on TV and radio programs. Books are arranged in chronological order by the date of the scheduled interview.

On NBC's Today Show (Apr 24) and on NPR's Diane Rehm Show (Apr 26):

Prague Winter, by Madeleine Albright. Harper Collins, 2012. Print Length: 480 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (16 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Before Madeleine Albright turned twelve, her life was shaken by the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia - the country where she was born - the Battle of Britain, the near total destruction of European Jewry, the Allied victory in World War II, the rise of communism, and the onset of the Cold War. Albright's experiences, and those of her family, provide a lens through which to view the most tumultuous dozen years in modern history. Drawing on her memory, her parents' written reflections, interviews with contemporaries, and newly available documents, Albright recounts a tale that is by turns harrowing and inspiring. Prague Winter is an exploration of the past with timeless dilemmas in mind and, simultaneously, a journey with universal lessons that is intensely personal." - Publisher.

On NPR's Fresh Air (Apr 26):

Garbology: Our Dirty Love Affair with Trash, by Edward Humes. Avery, 2012. Print Length: 279 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (4 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Take a journey inside the secret world of our biggest export, our most prodigious product, and our greatest legacy: our trash. It’s the biggest thing we make: The average American is on track to produce a whopping 102 tons of garbage across a lifetime, $50 billion in squandered riches rolled to the curb each year, more than that produced by any other people in the world. But that trash doesn’t just magically disappear; our bins are merely the starting point for a strange, impressive, mysterious, and costly journey that may also represent the greatest untapped opportunity of the century. In Garbology, Pulitzer Prize–winning author Edward Humes investigates the trail of that 102 tons of trash - what’s in it; how much we pay for it; how we manage to create so much of it; and how some families, communities, and even nations are finding a way back from waste to discover a new kind of prosperity. Along the way , he introduces a collection of garbage denizens unlike anyone you’ve ever met: the trash-tracking detectives of MIT, the bulldozer-driving sanitation workers building Los Angeles’ immense Garbage Mountain landfill, the artists in residence at San Francisco’s dump, and the family whose annual trash output fills not a dumpster or a trash can, but a single mason jar." - Publisher.

On PBS's Charlie Rose (May 1) and on Comedy Central's Daily Show (May 2):

The Debt Bomb: A Bold Plan to Stop Washington from Bankrupting America, by Tom A. Coburn. Thomas Nelson, 2012. Print Length: 368 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (6 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"In a nation whose debt has outgrown the size of its entire economy, the greatest threat comes not from any foreign force but from Washington politicians who refuse to relinquish the intoxicating power to borrow and spend. Senator Tom Coburn reveals the fascinating, maddening story of how we got to this point of fiscal crisis - and how we can escape. Long before America's recent economic downturn, beltway politicians knew the U.S. was going bankrupt. Yet even after several so-called "change" elections, the government has continued its wasteful ways in the face of imminent danger. With passion and clarity, Coburn explains why Washington resists change so fiercely and offers controversial yet commonsense solutions to secure the nation's future." - Publisher.

On MSNBC's Rachel Maddow Show (May 1) and on Comedy Central's Colbert Report (May 7):

End This Depression Now!, by Paul Krugman. W. W. Norton & Company, 2012. Print Length: 272 p. Amazon customer rating: 3 1/2 stars (10 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"The Great Recession is more than four years old - and counting. Yet, as Paul Krugman points out in this powerful volley, 'Nations rich in resources, talent, and knowledge - all the ingredients for prosperity and a decent standard of living for all - remain in a state of intense pain.' How bad have things gotten? How did we get stuck in what now can only be called a depression? And above all, how do we free ourselves? Krugman pursues these questions with his characteristic lucidity and insight. He has a powerful message for anyone who has suffered over these past four years - a quick, strong recovery is just one step away, if our leaders can find the 'intellectual clarity and political will' to end this depression now." - Publisher.

On NPR's Diane Rehm Show (May 1):

American Canopy, by Eric Rutkow. Scribner, 2012. Print Length: 416 p. Amazon customer rating: None yet. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"Like many of us, historians have long been guilty of taking trees for granted. Yet the history of trees in America is no less remarkable than the history of the United States itself - from the majestic white pines of New England, which were coveted by the British Crown for use as masts in navy warships, to the orange groves of California, which lured settlers west. In fact, without the country’s vast forests and the hundreds of tree species they contained, there would have been no ships, docks, railroads, stockyards, wagons, barrels, furniture, newspapers, rifles, or firewood. No shingled villages or whaling vessels in New England. No New York City, Miami, or Chicago. No Johnny Appleseed, Paul Bunyan, or Daniel Boone. No Allied planes in World War I, and no suburban sprawl in the middle of the twentieth century. America - if indeed it existed - would be a very different place without its millions of acres of trees. Never before has anyone treated our country’s trees and forests as the subject of a broad historical study, and the result is an accessible, informative, and thoroughly entertaining read. Audacious in its four-hundred-year scope, authoritative in its detail, and elegant in its execution, American Canopy is perfect for history buffs and nature lovers alike..." - Publisher.

On C-SPAN2's BOOKTV (May 5):

Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics, by Ross Douthat. Free Press, 2012. Print Length: 352 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (20 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"As the youngest-ever op-ed columnist for the New York Times, Ross Douthat has emerged as one of the most provocative and influential voices of his generation. In Bad Religion he offers a masterful and hard-hitting account of how American Christianity has gone off the rails - and why it threatens to take American society with it. Writing for an era dominated by recession, gridlock, and fears of American decline, Douthat exposes the spiritual roots of the nation’s political and economic crises. He argues that America’s problem isn’t too much religion, as a growing chorus of atheists have argued; nor is it an intolerant secularism, as many on the Christian right believe. Rather, it’s bad religion: the slow-motion collapse of traditional faith and the rise of a variety of pseudo-Christianities that stroke our egos, indulge our follies, and encourage our worst impulses." - Publisher.

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Note to readers: I am no longer listing prices for books mentioned in The Kindle Reader as prices can vary literally from one day to the next. Please follow the links to the individual books to check the current price.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

What People Magazine is Reading This Week (May 7th Issue)

2012-04-30T07:20:00.001-07:00

For those Kindle readers who, like me, read for entertainment, scanning the book reviews in People magazine is good way to check out new people-related books - celebrity bios, popular novels, absorbing nonfiction - just hitting bookstore shelves. Featured in the May 7th issue of People:

Waiting for Sunrise, by William Boyd. Harper, 2012. Print Length: 373 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (47 reviews). People's slant: "...effortlessly combines historical detail with a sexy, galloping narrative that proves irresistible." - Helen Rogan. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Vienna. 1913. It is a fine day in August when Lysander Rief, a young English actor, walks through the city to his first appointment with the eminent psychiatrist, Dr. Bensimon. Sitting in the waiting room he is anxiously pondering the nature of his problem when an extraordinary woman enters. She is clearly in distress, but Lysander is immediately drawn to her strange, hazel eyes and her unusual, intense beauty.
London, 1914. War is stirring, and events in Vienna have caught up with Lysander. Unable to live an ordinary life, he is plunged into the dangerous theatre of wartime intelligence - a world of sex, scandal and spies, where lines of truth and deception blur with every waking day. Lysander must now discover the key to a secret code which is threatening Britain's safety, and use all his skills to keep the murky world of suspicion and betrayal from invading every corner of his life. Moving from Vienna to London's west end, the battlefields of France and hotel rooms in Geneva, Waiting for Sunrise is a feverish and mesmerising journey into the human psyche, a beautifully observed portrait of wartime Europe, a plot-twisting thriller and a literary tour de force." - William Boyd's website.

Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake, by Anna Quindlen. Random House, 2012. Print Length: 209 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (48 reviews). People's slant: "It's familiar terrain, but some of her observations will have you smiling in solidarity." - Helen Rogan. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"A humorous, sage memoir from the Pulitzer winner and acclaimed novelist. Like having an older, wiser sister or favorite aunt over for a cup of tea, Quindlen's...latest book is full of the counsel and ruminations many of us wish we could learn young. The death of her mother from cancer when she was 19 had a profound effect on the author, instilling in her the certainty that 'life was short, and therefore it made [her] both driven and joyful' and happy to have 'the privilege of aging.' In her sincere and amusing style, the author reflects on feminism, raising her children, marriage and menopause. She muses on the perception of youth and her own changing body image... More threads on which the author meditates in this purposeful book: childbirth, gender issues, the joy of solitude, the difference between being alone and being lonely, retirement and religion. A graceful look at growing older from a wise and accomplished writer" - Kirkus Reviews.

The Gods of Gotham, by Lyndsay Faye. Putman, 2012. Print Length: 429 p. THRILLER. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (34 reviews). People's slant: "...Gaye's taut, intelligent thriller mesmerizes." - Richard Eisenberg. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Set in 1845 New York City, Faye’s knockout first in a new series improves on her impressive debut, Dust and Shadow (2009), which pitted Sherlock Holmes against Jack the Ripper. As Irish immigrants pour into the city, fleeing the potato famine in their homeland, Timothy Wilde, a 27-year-old former bartender, adjusts to life as a policeman in New York’s newly formed police force. As one of the first to wear the copper star, Wilde soon discovers more than one unwelcome surprise. In short order on his lower Manhattan beat, he runs across an infanticide and the body of a 12-year-old Irish boy whose spleen has been removed. The investigation the novice detective launches into the boy’s murder brings him deep into the heart of human darkness. Vivid period details, fully formed characters, and a blockbuster of a twisty plot put Faye in a class with Caleb Carr." - Publishers Weekly.

These Girls, by Sarah Pekkanen. Washington Square Press, 2012. Print Length: 340 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (21 reviews). People's slant: "...doesn't tread new ground, but it's a pleasure." - Lisa Kay Greissinger. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"Cate, Renee, and Abby have come to New York for very different reasons, and in a bustling city of millions, they are linked together through circumstance and chance. Cate has just been named the features editor of Gloss, a high-end lifestyle magazine. It’s a professional coup, but her new job comes with more complications than Cate ever anticipated. Her roommate Renee will do anything to nab the plum job of beauty editor at Gloss. But snide comments about Renee’s weight send her into an emotional tailspin. Soon she is taking black market diet pills...Then there’s Abby, whom they take in as a third roommate. Once a joyful graduate student working as a nanny part time, she abruptly fled a seemingly happy life in the D.C. suburbs. No one knows what shattered Abby - or why she left everything she once loved behind. Pekkanen’s most compelling, true-to-life novel yet tells the story of three very different women as they navigate the complications of careers and love..." - Publisher.

My Two Moms: Lessons of Love, Strength, and What Makes a Family, by Zach Wahls. Gotham Books, 2012. Print Length: 256 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (4 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"On January 31, 2011, Zach Wahls addressed the Iowa House Judiciary Committee in a public forum regarding full marriage equality. The nineteen-year-old son of a same-sex couple, Wahls proudly proclaimed, 'The sexual orientation of my parents has had zero effect on the content of my character.' Hours later, his speech was posted on YouTube, where it went viral, quickly receiving more than two million views. By the end of the week, everyone knew his name and wanted to hear more from the boy with two moms. Same-sex marriage will be a major - possibly the defining - issue in this year’s election cycle, and Wahls speaks to that, but also to a broader issue. Sure, he’s handsome and athletic, an environmental engineering student, and an Eagle Scout. Yet, growing up with two moms, he knows what it’s like to feel different and to fear being made fun of or worse. In the inspirational spirit of It Gets Better edited by Dan Savage and Terry Miller, My Two Moms also delivers a reassuring message to same-sex couples, their kids, and anyone who’s ever felt like an outsider: You are not alone." - Publisher.

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Note to readers: I am no longer listing prices for books mentioned in The Kindle Reader as prices can vary literally from one day to the next. Please follow the links to the individual books to check the current price.

Books of a Feather: New Birding Books for the Kindle Reader

2012-04-28T09:43:00.002-07:00

This morning I heard once again the haunting call of a bird outside my window and wondered fleetingly about the life of this mysterious creature living in a world parallel to ours, seen, heard, but largely independent of our influence. I went to the window, hoping to catch a peek of the singer, but no luck. It was gone. I imagine we've all had this experience at one time or another - an experience that often impels us to learn more about birds in our back yard and maybe even to take up the popular pastime of birding.

Birding, the observation and study of birds and their habits is an activity enjoyed by - it has been estimated - some 50 million Americans and countless others all over the world. For those birders or wannabee birders who are also Kindle readers, new birding books of interest this Spring include:

Bird Sense: What It's Like to Be a Bird, by Tim Birkhead. Walker Books, 2012. Print length: 289 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (18 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled.

"What is it like to be a swift, flying at over one hundred kilometres an hour? Or a kiwi, plodding flightlessly among the humid undergrowth in the pitch dark of a New Zealand night? And what is going on inside the head of a nightingale as it sings, and how does its brain improvise? Bird Sense addresses questions like these and many more, by describing the senses of birds that enable them to interpret their environment and to interact with each other. Our affinity for birds is often said to be the result of shared senses - vision and hearing - but how exactly do their senses compare with our own? And what about a bird's sense of taste, or smell, or touch, or the ability to detect the earth's magnetic field? Or the extraordinary ability of desert birds to detect rain hundreds of kilometres away - how do they do it? Bird Sense is based on a conviction that we have consistently underestimated what goes on in a bird's head. Our understanding of bird behaviour is simultaneously informed and constrained by the way we watch and study them. By drawing attention to the way these frameworks both facilitate and inhibit discovery, Birkhead identifies ways we can escape from them to explore new horizons in bird behaviour." - Publisher.

The Beauty of Birds, by Jeremy Mynott. Princton Short. Princeton University Press, 2012. Print Length: 57 p. Amazon customer rating: None yet. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Spring returns and with it the birds. But it also brings throngs of birders who emerge, binoculars in hand, to catch a glimpse of a rare or previously unseen species or to simply lay eyes on a particularly fine specimen of a familiar type. In a delightful meditation that unexpectedly ranges from the Volga Delta to Central Park and from Charles Dickens's Hard Times to a 1940s London burlesque show, Jeremy Mynott ponders what makes birds so beautiful and alluring to so many people." - Publisher.

The Bluebird Effect: Uncommon Bonds with Common Birds, by Julie Zickefoose. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012. Print Length: 384 p. Optimized for larger screens. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (13 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"The Bluebird Effect is about the change that's set in motion by one single act, such as saving an injured bluebird - or a hummingbird, swift, or phoebe. Each of the twenty five chapters covers a different species, and many depict an individual bird, each with its own personality, habits, and quirks. And each chapter is illustrated with Zickefoose's stunning watercolor paintings and drawings. Not just individual tales about the trials and triumphs of raising birds, The Bluebird Effect mixes humor, natural history, and memoir to give readers an intimate story of a life lived among wild birds." - Publisher.

Life on the Wing: A Bird Chronicle from the pages of The Times, by Derwent May. Robson Press, 2012. Print Length: 288 p. Optimized for larger screens. Amazon customer rating: None yet. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"From dainty avocets prancing along the seashore to panic-stricken waxwings frenziedly gobbling berries, from barking barnacle geese to soaring skylarks, Derwent May writes about birds in a very special way. As he goes in search of birdlife in a variety of places – the English lanes and rolling corn fields that he loves, the lonely Essex marshes, the remote bird-haunted islands of Grassholm and Fair Isle – May reveals just what it feels like to be a birdwatcher. May is an alert observer of avian habits and manners, describing them vividly and poetically, but underlying everything he writes is scientific knowledge and a wealth of experience. Employing all of these skills and drawing on his popular weekly ‘Feather Reports’ column from The Times, May creates a fascinating chronicle of a year in the life of our birds, from robins to rarities, with Peter Brown’s illustrations adding the perfect finishing touch.

What the Robin Knows: How Birds Reveal the Secrets of the Natural World, by Jon Young. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012. Print Length: 272 p. Amazon customer rating: None yet. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"A lifelong birder, tracker, and naturalist, Jon Young is guided in his work and teaching by three basic premises: the robin, junco, and other songbirds know everything important about their environment, be it backyard or forest; by tuning in to their vocalizations and behavior, we can acquire much of this wisdom for our own pleasure and benefit; and the birds' companion calls and warning alarms are just as important as their songs. Birds are the sentries - and our key to understanding the world beyond our front door. Unwitting humans create a zone of disturbance that scatters the wildlife. Respectful humans who heed the birds acquire an awareness that radically changes the dynamic. Deep bird language is an ancient discipline, perfected by Native peoples the world over. Finally, science is catching up. This groundbreaking book unites the indigenous knowledge, the latest research, and the author's own experience of four decades in the field to lead us toward a deeper connection to the animals and, in the end, a deeper connection to ourselves." - Publisher.

Birding Apps for the Kindle Fire

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Note to readers: I am no longer listing prices for books mentioned in The Kindle Reader as prices can vary literally from one day to the next. Please follow the links to the individual books to check the current price.

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A Week of Entertainment: Kindle Books Reviewed in Entertainment Weekly's April 20/27th Issue

2012-04-26T07:41:00.001-07:00

Each week Entertainment Weekly reviews a small selection of popular new books. Titles available for the Kindle reviewed in the April 20/27th issue include:

Truth Like the Sun, by Jim Lynch. Random House, 2012. Print length: 272 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "..."it's the author's own journalistic eye for detail that turns the sterotypically gray city into something vibrantly colorful." - Keith Staskiewicz. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (11 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"A classic and hugely entertaining political novel, the cat-and-mouse story of urban intrigue in Seattle both in 1962, when Seattle hosted the World's Fair, and in 2001, after its transformation in the Microsoft gold rush. Larger than life, Roger Morgan was the mastermind behind the fair that made the city famous and is still a backstage power forty years later, when at the age of seventy he runs for mayor in hopes of restoring all of Seattle's former glory. Helen Gulanos, a reporter every bit as eager to make her mark, sees her assignment to investigate the events of 1962 become front-page news with Morgan's candidacy, and resolves to find out who he really is and where his power comes from: in 1962, a brash and excitable young promoter, greeting everyone from Elvis Presley to Lyndon Johnson, smooth-talking himself out of difficult situations, dipping in and out of secret card games; now, a beloved public figure with, it turns out, still-plentiful secrets." - Publisher.

The Spoiler, by Annalena McAfee. Knopf, 2012. Print length: 304 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...an acid satire of London newspaperdom in the late '90s...synapse-crackling prose: spiky, vivid, and almost pathologically clever..." - Leah Greenblatt. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (1 review). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"A dark hyper-comedy set in London in the late 1990s during the last gasp of the newspaper wars just before the dot-com tidal wave - about two female journalists at opposite ends of their life and work who become locked in a fierce tango of wills and whose lives are forever changed by their (not-so-) brief (head-on) encounter. At the novel's center - a legendary prize-winning war correspondent (called in her day 'The Newsroom Dietrich' because of her luminescent beauty) now in her eighties...her goddess-like beauty long gone, her style of writing - unbiased reportage - obsolete in the age of New Journalism, is rediscovered with the reissue of her frontline journalism, and the about-to-be-published collection of her Pulitzer Prize-winning dispatches. The other, a young up-and-not-so-coming reporter in her twenties; a degree in media studies, a freelance editor who compiles A-lists..., unexpectedly sent to write a feature on the venerated 'doyenne of British journalists' - to get the dirt on her glittering Hollywood days, her many affairs and three marriages...What ensues is a high-stakes, high-risk battle of wit and wills..." - Publisher.

An Unexpected Guest, by Anne Korkeakivi. Little, Brown and Company, 2012. Print length: 289 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...promising debut novel, a politial thriller inspired by Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway..." - Melissa Maerz. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (12 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Clare Moorhouse, the American wife of a high-ranking diplomat in Paris, is arranging an official dinner crucial to her husband's career. As she shops for fresh stalks of asparagus and works out the menu and seating arrangements, her day is complicated by the unexpected arrival of her son and a random encounter with a Turkish man, whom she discovers is a suspected terrorist. Like Virginia Woolf did in Mrs. Dalloway, Anne Korkeakivi brilliantly weaves the complexities of an age into an act as deceptively simple as hosting a dinner party." - Publisher.

The Newlyweds, by Nell Freudenberger. Knopf, 2012. Print length: 352 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...rich, wise, bighearted novel..." - Lisa Schwarzbaum. Amazon customer rating: 3 stars (9 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"A powerful, funny, richly observed tour de force by one of America’s most acclaimed young writers: a story of love and marriage, secrets and betrayals, that takes us from the backyards of America to the back alleys and villages of Bangladesh. In The Newlyweds, we follow the story of Amina Mazid, who at age twenty-four moves from Bangladesh to Rochester, New York, for love. A hundred years ago, Amina would have been called a mail-order bride. But this is an arranged marriage for the twenty-first century: Amina is wooed by - and woos - George Stillman online. For Amina, George offers a chance for a new life and a different kind of happiness than she might find back home. For George, Amina is a woman who doesn’t play games. But each of them is hiding something: someone from the past they thought they could leave behind." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: I am no longer listing prices for books mentioned in The Kindle Reader as prices can vary literally from one day to the next. Please follow the links to the individual books to check the current price.

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Kindle Genre Watch: New in Science Fiction

2012-04-24T10:57:00.001-07:00

Spend less time searching for good books and more time reading them as I watch for newly-released genre fiction in the Kindle Store so you don't have to. Notable new science fiction releases include:

AMPED by Douglas E. Richards. Paragon Press, 2012. Print Length: 326 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (13 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled. This is the sequel to the author's earlier technothriller WIRED.

"Kira Miller is a brilliant scientist who discovers how to temporarily boost human IQ to dizzying levels. But this transcendent intelligence brings with it a ruthless megalomania. Determined to use her discovery to propel human civilization to a higher plane, despite this side effect, Kira and ex-special forces operative David Desh recruit a small group of accomplished scientists, all of whom are safely off the grid. Or so they think...Like its predecessor, AMPED is a smart thriller crammed with breakneck action, unexpected twists, mind-blowing science, and philosophical and ethical concepts readers will be contemplating long after they've read the last page." - Publisher.

Intruder by C. J. Cherryh. Daw, 2012. Print Length: 382 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (22 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This is book thirteen in the author's Foreigner Universe series, following Betrayer. The first volume in the series was Foreigner.

"The civil war among the alien atevi has ended. Tabini-aiji, powerful ruler of the Western Association, along with Cajeiri his son and heir, and his human paidhi, Bren Cameron, have returned to the Bujavid, their seat of power. But factions that remain loyal to the opposition are still present, and the danger these rebels pose is far from over." - Publisher.

Alien Diplomacy by Gini Koch. Daw, 2012. Print Length: 448 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (9 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This is book five in the author's Alien series that began with Touched by an Alien.

"Being newlyweds and new parents is challenging enough. But Jeff and Kitty Martini are also giving up their roles as super-being exterminators and Commanders in Centaurion Division while mastering the political landscape as the new heads of Centaurion's Diplomatic Corps. Enter a shadowy assassination plot and a new set of anti-alien conspirators, and nothing will ever be the same..." - Publisher.

The Company of the Dead by David Kowalski. Titan Books, 2012. Print Length: 430 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (9 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"...a tightly plotted, action-packed tale that will satisfy speculative-history buffs and lovers of political thrillers alike. Titanic enthusiast Jonathan Wells, having discovered a means of time travel, stages a well-intentioned but ill-considered attempt to avert the sinking of the doomed liner on April 15, 1912. The attempt proves fruitless but changes that night's events just enough to keep the United States out of World War I. By the 21st century, unchecked German and Japanese aggression has reduced America to a third-rate power, its streets occupied by Japanese soldiers and fragmented by a second Southern secession. Enter Joseph Kennedy, Confederate intelligence operative and fictional scion of the iconic American clan, who comes across Wells's diary, recovered from the Titanic's wreckage..." - John Harvey for Library Journal.

Out of the Silent Planet by C. S. Lewis. HarperOne, 2012. Print Length: 169 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (201 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled. First published in 1938, this sci-fi classic is newly-available in a Kindle edition.

"Out of the Silent Planet is the first novel in C. S. Lewis's classic science fiction trilogy. It tells the adventure of Dr. Ransom, a Cambridge academic, who is abducted and taken on a spaceship to the red planet of Malacandra, which he knows as Mars. His captors are plotting to plunder the planet's treasures and plan to offer Ransom as a sacrifice to the creatures who live there. Ransom discovers he has come from the 'silent planet' - Earth - whose tragic story is known throughout the universe!" - Publisher.
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Note to readers: I am no longer listing prices for books mentioned in The Kindle Reader as prices can vary literally from one day to the next. Please follow the links to the individual books to check the current price.

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What People Magazine is Reading This Week (April 23rd Issue)

2012-04-22T08:44:00.001-07:00

Briefly Mentioned: Kindle Singles

An Unexpected Twist, by Andy Borowitz. Print Length: 18 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (152 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Andy Borowitz almost died, but lived to tell this stranger-than-fiction tale. In his first-ever work of autobiography, the comedian and New York Times bestselling author tells how a freakish medical condition descended upon him one October afternoon and led him to the brink of death – in a New York hospital 'consistently rated one of the ten best in the country.' What happens when 'one of the funniest people in America' (CBS News Sunday Morning) comes face to face with his own mortality? An Unexpected Twist is in equal parts harrowing and hilarious – and a moving affirmation of what it means to be alive." - Publisher.

Lifeboat No. 8: An Untold Tale of Love, Loss, and Surviving the Titanic, by Elizabeth Kaye. Byliner Inc, 2012. NONFICTION. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (32 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"When the Titanic started sinking, who would make it off alive? The two cousins who had been so eager to see their first iceberg? The maid who desperately tried to escape with the baby in her care? The young newlyweds who’d booked passage despite warnings not to? One hundred years after that disastrous and emblematic voyage, Elizabeth Kaye reveals the extraordinary, little-known story behind one of the first lifeboats to leave the doomed ship. Told in real time and in the actual voices of survivors, Kaye’s poignant, pulse-pounding narrative includes the story of the Countess of Rothes, the wealthiest woman on the ship, bound for California, where she and her husband planned to start an orange farm. It was the Countess, dressed in ermine and pearls, who took command of Lifeboat No. 8, rowing for hours through the black and icy water...Surviving that fateful night in the North Atlantic was not the end of the saga for those aboard Lifeboat No 8. Kaye reveals what happened to each passenger and crew member and how the legendary maritime disaster haunted them forever."

Cooking Solves Everything: How Time in the Kitchen Can Save Your Health, Your Budget, and Even the Planet, by Mark Bittman. Byliner, 2011. Print Length: 37 p. NONFICTION. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (18 reviews). Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled.

"Mark Bittman is one of the nation’s most trusted and beloved food writers, but there was a time when he lived primarily on vanilla ice cream and McDonald’s. Then he discovered cooking, and everything changed. In this story from the new digital publisher Byliner, the New York Times columnist and bestselling author of How to Cook Everything traces his journey from grilled-cheese-making neophyte to confident cook. More than that, he makes the case for why all of us should spend more time in the kitchen, regardless of how comfortable we are there. After all, even he was a beginner once. Bittman argues that a simple meal prepared at home is a powerful tool: It’s one small step toward improving your health and, by extension, the health of the planet. Our reliance on prepared food - in the form of snacks, soft drinks, frozen meals, and fast food - supports a system of agriculture that is playing havoc with our bodies, our economy, and the environment. How can we break the cycle? By cooking." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: I am no longer listing prices for books mentioned in The Kindle Reader as prices can vary literally from one day to the next. Please follow the links to the individual books to check the current price.

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Genre Watch: New Mysteries and Thrillers for the Kindle Reader

2012-04-20T07:39:00.001-07:00

Spend less time searching for good books and more time reading them as I watch for newly-released genre fiction in the Kindle Store so you don't have to. Outstanding new releases in mystery and suspense fiction include:

The Big Cat Nap by Rita Mae Brown. Bantam, 2012. Print Length: 241 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (8 reviews). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Rita Mae Brown and her intrepid feline co-author Sneaky Pie Brown return with a charming claw-biting tale starring Mary Minor 'Harry' Haristeen. Of course prowling faithfully at Harry’s side are the sleuthing cats Mrs. Murphy, ever wise, and Pewter, reliably cranky and always primed with a razor-sharp quip. Fiercely loyal and on the alert, corgi Tee Tucker is also never far behind. It’s mid-May, and Crozet, Virginia, is heating up fast, or so it seems to Harry. The town’s beloved ex–post mistress is never idle, dividing her time between raising this year’s bounty of crops; taking care of her veterinarian husband, Fair; indulging her passion for classic cars; and adding further to her reputation as a nosy neighbor. It starts when Harry’s dear friend Miranda Hogendobber takes her on a leisurely drive that ends in a narrow drainage ditch. The chaos continues when the Very Reverend Herbert Jones’s Chevy pick-up also abruptly goes kaput. But these vehicular mishaps are nothing compared to the much more distressing state of a mechanic discovered by Harry in a local repair shop: His head’s been bashed in..." - from the hardcover edition.

Eyes of Justice by Lis Wiehl, with April Henry. Thomas Nelson, 2012. Print Length: 320 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (25 reviews). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This is book four of the authors' Triple Threat series which began with Face of Betrayal.

"Multiple murders and a bank robbery gone awry - part of a killer’s twisted quest for revenge - propel Wiehl and Henry’s shocking, fast-paced fourth Triple Threat novel... As special agent Nicole Hedges deals with a new by-the-book FBI boss and federal prosecutor Allison Pierce grapples with faith and family issues, Portland, Ore., TV crime reporter Cassidy Shaw is front and center in the investigation. Wiehl and Henry delve deeply into the psyches, pasts, and tragic collisions of their characters, including newcomer Ophelia Moyer, a technical whiz kid and PI brought into the fold by Nic’s paramour and sometime partner, Leif Larson. Readers will be reeling by the denouement, which ties up loose ends and leaves the future open-ended both personally and professionally for the three leads. " - Publishers Weekly.

Dorchester Terrace: A Charlotte and Thomas Pitt Novel by Anne Perry. Ballantine Books, 2012. Print Length: 353 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (10 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Anne Perry’s acclaimed Charlotte and Thomas Pitt novels have made London’s exclusive world of wealth and power an addictive literary destination for readers everywhere. This new masterpiece, a haunting story of love and treason, invites us not only into the secret places of Britain’s power but also into the innermost sanctums of the fin de siècle Austro-Hungarian Empire. Thomas Pitt, once a lowly policeman, is now the powerful head of Britain’s Special Branch, and some people fear that he may have been promoted beyond his abilities. He, too, feels painful moments of self-doubt, especially as rumors reach him of a plot to blow up connections on the Dover-London rail line - on which Austrian duke Alois Habsburg is soon to travel to visit his royal English kin. Why would anyone destroy an entire train to kill one obscure Austrian royal, or are the rumors designed to distract Pitt from an even more devastating plot?" - Publisher.

The Limpopo Academy of Private Detection by Alexander Mccall Smith. Pantheon, 2012. Print Length: 272 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (15 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This is book thirteen of the author's No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series which began with The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency.

"Precious Ramotswe is haunted by a repeated dream: a vision of a tall, strange man who waits for her beneath an acacia tree. Odd as this is, she’s far too busy to worry about it. The best apprentice at Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors is in trouble with the law and stuck with the worst lawyer in Gaborone. Grace Makutsi and Phuti Radiphuti are building the house of their dreams, but their builder is not completely on the up and up. And, most shockingly, Mma Potokwane, defender of Botswana’s weak and downtrodden, has been dismissed from her post as matron at the orphan farm. Can the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency help restore the beloved matron to her rightful position? As wealthy and powerful influences at the orphan farm become allied against their friend, help arrives from an unexpected visitor: the tall stranger from Mma Ramotswe’s dreams, who turns out to be none other than the estimable Clovis Andersen, author of the No. 1 Ladies’ prized manual, The Principles of Private Detection..." - Publisher.

Hush Now, Don't You Cry by Rhys Bowen. Minotaur Books, 2012. Print Length: 319 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (17 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This is book eleven in Bowen's Molly Murphy historical mystery series. If you want to read the series in order, the first book is Murphy's Law.

"Molly Murphy is supposed to give up sleuthing now that she’s married, but the murder of an alderman puts her on the trail of a killer. Molly Murphy, now Molly Sullivan, and her husband Daniel, a captain in the New York Police department, have been invited to spend their honeymoon on the Newport, RI, estate of Alderman Brian Hannan in the spring of 1904. Molly doesn’t entirely trust the offer. Hannan - an ambitious man - has his eye on a senate seat and intentions of taking Tammany Hall to get it. When Hannan is found dead at the base of the cliffs that overlook the Atlantic, Molly’s suspicions are quickly justified, and as much as she wants to keep her promise to Daniel that she won’t do any more sleuthing now, there isn’t much she can do once the chase is on." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

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A Week of Entertainment: Kindle Books Reviewed in Entertainment Weekly's April 13th Issue

2012-04-18T07:56:00.001-07:00

Each week Entertainment Weekly reviews a small selection of popular new books. Titles available for the Kindle reviewed in the April 13th issue include:

Unholy Night, by Seth Grahame-Smith. Grand Central Publishing, 2012. Print length: 321 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "Seth Grahame-Smith is like the world's most deranged history teacher - you can't trust anything you learn from him, but you'll never forget it, either." - Anthony Breznican. Amazon customer rating: 3 1/2 stars (5 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"They're an iconic part of history's most celebrated birth. But what do we really know about the Three Kings of the Nativity, besides the fact that they followed a star to Bethlehem bearing strange gifts? The Bible has little to say about this enigmatic trio. But leave it to Seth Grahame-Smith, the brilliant and twisted mind behind Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter and Pride and Prejudice and Zombies to take a little mystery, bend a little history, and weave an epic tale. In Grahame-Smith's telling, the so-called 'Three Wise Men' are infamous thieves, led by the dark, murderous Balthazar. After a daring escape from Herod's prison, they stumble upon the famous manger and its newborn king. The last thing Balthazar needs is to be slowed down by young Joseph, Mary and their infant. But when Herod's men begin to slaughter the first born in Judea, he has no choice but to help them escape to Egypt..." - Publisher.

The Cove, by Ron Rash. Ecco, 2012. Print length: 272 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...The Cove isn't just an elegant work of literary fiction, written in a voice that's hauntingly simple and Southern; it's also a riveting mystery." - Melissa Maerz. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (22 reviews). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Deep in the rugged Appalachians of North Carolina lies the cove, a dark, forbidding place where spirits and fetches wander, and even the light fears to travel. Or so the townsfolk of Mars Hill believe - just as they know that Laurel Shelton, the lonely young woman who lives within its shadows, is a witch. Alone except for her brother, Hank, newly returned from the trenches of France, she aches for her life to begin. Then it happens - a stranger appears, carrying nothing but a beautiful silver flute and a note explaining that his name is Walter, he is mute, and is bound for New York. Laurel finds him in the woods, nearly stung to death by yellow jackets, and nurses him back to health. As the days pass, Walter slips easily into life in the cove and into Laurel's heart, bringing her the only real happiness she has ever known. But Walter harbors a secret that could destroy everything - and danger is closer than they know." - Publisher.

Let's Pretend This Never Happened: (A Mostly True Memoir), by Jenny Lawson. Putnam, 2012. Print length: 332 p. MEMOIR. EW's slant: "She writes with a rambling irreverence that makes you wish she were your best friend." - Stephan Lee. Amazon customer rating: none yet. Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"When Jenny Lawson was little, all she ever wanted was to fit in. That dream was cut short by her fantastically unbalanced father (a professional taxidermist who created dead-animal hand puppets) and a childhood of wearing winter shoes made out of used bread sacks. It did, however, open up an opportunity for Lawson to find the humor in the strange shame spiral that is her life, and we are all the better for it. Lawson’s long-suffering husband and sweet daughter are the perfect comedic foils to her absurdities, and help her to uncover the surprising discovery that the most terribly human moments - the ones we want to pretend never happened - are the very same moments that make us the people we are today. Let’s Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir is a poignantly disturbing, yet darkly hysterical tome for every intellectual misfit who thought they were the only ones to think the things that Lawson dares to say out loud." - The Bloggess.

In-Flight Entertainment, by Helen Simpson. Knopf, 2012. Print length: 176 p. SHORT STORIES. EW's slant: "Helen Simpson knows that people are selfish and delusional, but the reason her short-story collections are such a pleasure to glide through is that she isn't a jerk about it. She's funny, shrewd, alternately wicked and warm - i.e., British." - Jeff Giles. Amazon customer rating: 3 1/2 stars (4 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"A new collection of stories - dazzling, poignant, wickedly funny, and highly addictive - by the internationally acclaimed writer whose work The Times (London) calls 'dangerously close to perfection.' These thirteen stories brilliantly focus on aspects of contemporary living and unerringly capture a generation, a type, a social class, a pattern of behavior. In one story, a squirrel trapped under a dustbin lid in the back garden vanishes, and a woman’s marriage is revealed in the process. In another, a young woman on her way for an MRI reflects on new love, electromagnetism, and Sherlock Holmes, and afterward goes to a museum and finds herself wanting to escape into one of the paintings.

Drop Dead Healthy, by A. J. Jacobs. Simon & Schuster, 2012. Print Length: 416 p. NONFICTION. EW's slant: "...hilarious..." Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (12 reviews). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"Hospitalized with a freak case of tropical pneumonia, goaded by his wife telling him, 'I don’t want to be a widow at forty-five,' and ashamed of a middle-aged body best described as 'a python that swallowed a goat,' A.J. Jacobs felt compelled to change his ways and get healthy. And he didn’t want only to lose weight, or finish a triathlon, or lower his cholesterol. His ambitions were far greater: maximal health from head to toe. The task was epic. He consulted an army of experts - sleep consultants and sex clinicians, nutritionists and dermatologists. He subjected himself to dozens of different workouts - from Strollercize classes to Finger Fitness sessions, from bouldering with cavemen to a treadmill desk. And he took in a cartload of diets: raw foods, veganism, high protein, calorie restriction, extreme chewing, and dozens more. He bought gadgets and helmets, earphones and juicers. He poked and he pinched. He counted and he measured. The story of his transformation is not only brilliantly entertaining, but it just may be the healthiest book ever written." - Publisher.
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Please note: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

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Books They're Talking About: Kindle Books in the Media

2012-04-16T07:49:00.002-07:00

On NPR's Fresh Air (April 10):

Wherever I Wind Up: My Quest for Truth, Authenticity and the Perfect Knuckleball, by R. A. Dickey with Wayne Coffey. Blue Rider Press, 2012. Print Length: 357 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (15 reviews). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"...Mets knuckleballer R.A. Dickey weaves searing honesty and baseball insight in this memoir about his unlikely journey to the big leagues. An English Lit major at the University of Tennessee, Dickey is as articulate and thoughtful as any professional athlete in any sport - and proves it page after page, as he provides fresh and honest insight into baseball and a career unlike any other. Fourteen years ago, Dickey was a heralded No. 1 draft choice of the Texas Rangers, only to have an $810,000 signing bonus, and his lifelong dream, ripped away by an X- ray-and the discovery that he did not have an ulna collateral ligament in his right elbow. Five years ago, he gave up a record six home runs in three innings to the Detroit Tigers - and was effectively consigned to the baseball scrap heap. Sustained by his profound Christian faith, the love of his wife and,and a relentless quest for self-awareness and authenticity, the immensely likable Dickey details his transformation from a reckless, risk-taking loner to a grounded, life-affirming big leaguer." - Publisher.

On NPR's Weekend Edition (April 14):

Prague Fatale, by Philip Kerr. A Bernie Gunther novel. Putnam, 2012. Print Length: 408 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (13 reviews). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"September 1941: Reinhard Heydrich is hosting a gathering to celebrate his appointment as Reichsprotector of Czechoslovakia. He has chosen his guests with care. All are high-ranking Party members and each is a suspect in a crime as yet to be committed: the murder of Heydrich himself. Indeed, a murder does occur, but the victim is a young adjutant on Heydrich’s staff, found dead in his room, the door and windows bolted from the inside. Anticipating foul play, Heydrich had already ordered Bernie Gunther to Prague. After more than a decade in Berlin's Kripo, Bernie had jumped ship as the Nazis came to power, setting himself up as a private detective. But Heydrich, who managed to subsume Kripo into his own SS operations, has forced Bernie back to police work. Now, searching for the killer, Gunther must pick through the lives of some of the Reich’s most odious officials..." - Publisher.

On CSPAN2's BookTV (April 15):

Titanic's Last Secrets: The Further Adventures of Shadow Divers John Chatterton and Richie Kohler, by Brad Matsen. Twelve, 2008. Print Length: 336 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (57 reviews). Kindle edition: $2.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"After rewriting history with their discovery of a Nazi U-boat off the coast of New Jersey, legendary divers John Chatterton and Richie Kohler decided to investigate the great enduring mystery of history's most notorious shipwreck: Why did Titanic sink as quickly as it did? To answer the question, Chatterton and Kohler assemble a team of experts to explore Titanic, study its engineering, and dive to the wreck of its sister ship, Brittanic, where Titanic's last secrets may be revealed. Titanic's Last Secrets is a rollercoaster ride through the shipbuilding history, the transatlantic luxury liner business, and shipwreck forensics. Chatterton and Kohler weave their way through a labyrinth of clues to discover that Titanic was not the strong, heroic ship the world thought she was and that the men who built her covered up her flaws when disaster struck." - Publisher.

On NPR's Diane Rehm Show (April 17):

Crossing the Borders of Time: A True Story of War, Exile, and Love Reclaimed , by Leslie Maitland. Other Press, 2012. Print Length: 512 p. Amazon customer rating: none yet. Kindle edition: $11.19. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"On a pier in Marseille in 1942, with desperate refugees pressing to board one of the last ships to escape France before the Nazis choked off its ports, an 18-year-old German Jewish girl was pried from the arms of the Catholic Frenchman she loved and promised to marry. Investigative reporter Leslie Maitland grew up enthralled by her mother’s accounts of forbidden romance and harrowing flight from the Nazis. Her book is both a journalist’s vivid depiction of a world at war and a daughter’s pursuit of a haunting question: what had become of the handsome Frenchman whose picture her mother continued to treasure almost fifty years after they parted? It is a tale of memory that reporting made real and a story of undying love that crosses the borders of time.

On NBC's Today Show (April 17) and on ABC's The View (April 18):

Total Memory Makeover, by Marilu Henner. Gallery Books, 2012. Print Length: 258 p. Amazon customer rating: none yet. Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"If you could remember the confidence you felt when your prom date said yes, could it embolden you to ask for a raise today? Could the thrill you felt fitting into your skinny jeans five years ago inspire you to skip the doughnuts this morning? Would the details of your early days with a heartbreaking ex help you recognize the potential red flags in a sexy new romance? Marilu Henner says, “YES!” In this revolutionary new book, the New York Times bestselling author, renowned health advocate, actress, performer, and memory expert helps you develop the ability to remember more of your past, to recall it more clearly, and most of all, to understand your memories as a blueprint for the extraordinary life you were meant to have! Marilu is gifted with Highly Superior Auto-biographical Memory (HSAM), a rare and incredible ability that allows her to vividly recall every detail of her life since childhood. While most of us may prefer to keep the unhappy times buried in the past, Marilu has discovered that only by remembering what happened then can we change our lives for a better now." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

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What People Magazine is Reading This Week (April 9th Issue)

2012-04-14T07:49:00.000-07:00

For those Kindle readers who, like me, read for entertainment, scanning the book reviews in People magazine is good way to check out new people-related books - celebrity bios, popular novels, absorbing nonfiction - just hitting bookstore shelves. Featured in the April 9th issue of People:

The Red Book, by Deborah Copaken Kogan. Publisher. Print Length: 347 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (9 reviews). People's slant: "...hilarious, addictive..." Kindle edition $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"The Big Chill meets The Group in Deborah Copaken Kogan’s wry, lively, and irresistible new novel about a once-close circle of friends at their twentieth college reunion. Clover, Addison, Mia, and Jane were roommates at Harvard until their graduation in 1989. Clover, homeschooled on a commune by mixed-race parents, felt woefully out of place. Addison yearned to shed the burden of her Mayflower heritage. Mia mined the depths of her suburban ennui to enact brilliant performances on the Harvard stage. Jane, an adopted Vietnamese war orphan, made sense of her fractured world through words. Like all Harvard grads, they’ve kept abreast of one another via the red book, a class report published every five years, containing brief autobiographical essays by fellow alumni. But there’s the story we tell the world, and then there’s the real story, as these former classmates will learn during their twentieth reunion weekend..." - Publisher.

What They Do in the Dark, by Amanda Coe. W. W. Norton & Company, 2012. Print Length: 257 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (10 reviews). People's slant: "A chilling tale about childhood innocence brutally lost." Kindle edition $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Spoiled but emotionally neglected Gemma, who seems to have everything, and semi-feral Pauline, who has less than nothing, are two very different ten-year-old girls growing up in a tough Yorkshire town in the 1970s. Pauline longs for the simple luxuries of Gemma’s life: her neatly folded socks and her clean hair. Gemma, upset by her parent’s breakup, loses herself in fantasies of meeting the child television star Lallie. When Lallie shoots a movie in their hometown, Gemma and Pauline grab the chance for their wildest dreams to come true. But the film becomes a terrible catalyst for the larger forces acting on the two girls..." - Publisher.

Triggered: A Memoir of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, by Fletcher Wortmann. Thomas Dunne Books, 2012. Print Length: 272 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (6 reviews). People's slant: "...grimly funny memoir..." Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Imagine the worst thing in the world. Picture it. Construct it, carefully and deliberately in your mind. Be careful not to omit anything. Imagine it happening to you, to the people you love. Imagine the worst thing in the world. Now try not to think about it. This is what it is like for Fletcher Wortmann. In his brilliant memoir, the author takes us on an intimate journey across the psychological landscape of OCD, known as the 'doubting disorder,' as populated by God, girls, and apocalyptic nightmares. Wortmann unflinchingly reveals the elaborate series of psychological rituals he constructs as 'preventative measures' to ward off the end times, as well as his learning to cope with intrusive thoughts through Clockwork Orange-like 'trigger' therapy. But even more than this, the author emerges as a preternatural talent as he unfolds a kaleidoscope of culture high and low ranging from his obsessions with David Bowie, X-Men, and Pokemon, to an eclectic education shaped by Shakespeare, Kierkegaard, Catholic mysticism, Christian comic books, and the collegiate dating scene at the 'People’s Republic of Swarthmore.'" - Publisher.

The Big Miss: My Years Coaching Tiger Woods, by Hank Haney. Crown Archetype, 2012. Print Length: 274 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 3 1/2 stars (86 reviews). People's slant: "...paints an unflinching portrait of the pro golfer." Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"The Big Miss is Hank Haney’s candid and surprisingly insightful account of his tumultuous six-year journey with Tiger Woods, during which the supremely gifted golfer collected six major championships and rewrote golf history. Hank was one of the very few people allowed behind the curtain. He was with Tiger 110 days a year, spoke to him over 200 days a year, and stayed at his home up to 30 days a year, observing him in nearly every circumstance: at tournaments, on the practice range, over meals, with his wife, Elin, and relaxing with friends. The relationship between the two men began in March 2004 when Hank received a call from Tiger in which the golf champion asked him to be his coach. It was a call that would change both men’s lives..." - Publisher.

Soldier Dogs, by Maria Goodavage. Dutton, 2012. Print Length: 320 p. NONFICTION. Amazon Customer Rating: 4 1/2 stars (16 reviews). People's slant: "A moving portrait of the loyal, courageious, furry warriors who truly are an enlisted Man's Best Friend." Kindle edition: 12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"People all over the world have been riveted by the story of Cairo, the Belgian Malinois who was a part of the Navy SEAL team that led the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound. A dog's natural intelligence, physical abilities, and pure loyalty contribute more to our military efforts than ever before. You don't have to be a dog lover to be fascinated by the idea that a dog - the cousin of that furry guy begging for scraps under your table - could be one of the heroes who helped execute the most vital and high-tech military mission of the new millennium. Now Maria Goodavage, editor and featured writer for one of the world's most widely read dog blogs, tells heartwarming stories of modern soldier dogs and the amazing bonds that develop between them and their handlers. Beyond tales of training, operations, retirement, and adoption into the families of fallen soldiers, Goodavage talks to leading dog-cognition experts about why dogs like nothing more than to be on a mission with a handler they trust, no matter how deadly the IEDs they are sniffing, nor how far they must parachute or rappel from aircraft into enemy territory." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

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New in Popular Science for the Kindle

2012-04-12T07:45:00.001-07:00

"A fact is a simple statement that everyone believes. It is innocent, unless found guilty. A hypothesis is a novel suggestion that no one wants to believe. It is guilty, until found effective." - Edward Teller.

Even Kindle readers who read for pleasure like to dip into the heady realm of science nonfiction now and then to keep up with what's happening in a world scientists are still uncovering. Recent additions to the Kindle popular science shelves include:

Bird Sense: What It's Like to Be a Bird, by Tim Birkhead. Walker Books, 2012. Print length: 289 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (17 reviews). Kindle edition: $13.75. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled.

"What is it like to be a swift, flying at over one hundred kilometres an hour? Or a kiwi, plodding flightlessly among the humid undergrowth in the pitch dark of a New Zealand night? And what is going on inside the head of a nightingale as it sings, and how does its brain improvise? Bird Sense addresses questions like these and many more, by describing the senses of birds that enable them to interpret their environment and to interact with each other. Our affinity for birds is often said to be the result of shared senses - vision and hearing - but how exactly do their senses compare with our own? And what about a bird's sense of taste, or smell, or touch, or the ability to detect the earth's magnetic field? Or the extraordinary ability of desert birds to detect rain hundreds of kilometres away - how do they do it? Bird Sense is based on a conviction that we have consistently underestimated what goes on in a bird's head. Our understanding of bird behaviour is simultaneously informed and constrained by the way we watch and study them. By drawing attention to the way these frameworks both facilitate and inhibit discovery, Birkhead identifies ways we can escape from them to explore new horizons in bird behaviour." - Publisher.

Why Calories Count: From Science to Politics, by Marion Nestle and Malden Nesheim. University of California Press, 2012. Print length: 304 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (6 reviews). Kindle edition: $16.47. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled.

"Calories - too few or too many - are the source of health problems affecting billions of people in today’s globalized world. Although calories are essential to human health and survival, they cannot be seen, smelled, or tasted. They are also hard to understand. In Why Calories Count, Marion Nestle and Malden Nesheim explain in clear and accessible language what calories are and how they work, both biologically and politically. As they take readers through the issues that are fundamental to our understanding of diet and food, weight gain, loss, and obesity, Nestle and Nesheim sort through a great deal of the misinformation put forth by food manufacturers and diet program promoters. They elucidate the political stakes and show how federal and corporate policies have come together to create an 'eat more' environment. Finally, having armed readers with the necessary information to interpret food labels, evaluate diet claims, and understand evidence as presented in popular media, the authors offer some candid advice: Get organized. Eat less. Eat better. Move more. Get political." - Publisher.

Masters of the Planet: The Search for our Human Origins, by Ian Tattersall. Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. Print length: 288 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (3 reviews). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"50,000 years ago – merely a blip in evolutionary time – our Homo sapiens ancestors were competing for existence with several other human species, just as their own precursors had been doing for millions of years. Yet something about our species separated it from the pack, and led to its survival while the rest became extinct. So just what was it that allowed Homo sapiens to become Masters of the Planet? Curator Emeritus at the American Museum of Natural History, Ian Tattersall takes us deep into the fossil record to uncover what made humans so special. Surveying a vast field from initial bipedality to language and intelligence, Tattersall argues that Homo sapiens acquired a winning combination of traits that was not the result of long term evolutionary refinement. Instead it emerged quickly, shocking their world and changing it forever..." - Publisher.

Power Plays: Energy Options in the Age of Peak Oil, by Robert Rapier. Apress, 2012. Print length: 272 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (4 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.39. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled.

"Many people wonder: Are we really running out of oil, or is it all a ruse to drive prices up? Is nuclear power safe and economical? Is solar energy really the key to providing plenty of carbon-free energy? Do we have enough natural gas or coal to make any loss of oil production irrelevant? In Power Plays: Energy Options in the Age of Peak Oil, energy expert Robert Rapier helps readers sort through energy hype, doom and gloom, and misinformation to understand what really matters in energy, and how it impacts individuals, investors, businesspeople, and policy makers worldwide. The book covers the overall global energy situation, the particular risks for the U.S. with its present energy mix, the energy outlook for the developed world and emerging economies like China and India, what peak oil really means, and the present and likely future of natural gas, coal, oil, nuclear power, and alternative energy sources." - Publisher.

The Great Animal Orchestra: Finding the Origins of Music in the World's Wild Places, by Bernie Krause. Publisher. Print length: 289 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (9 reviews). Kindle edition: $14.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Musician and naturalist Bernie Krause is one of the world's leading experts in natural sound, and he's spent his life discovering and recording nature's rich chorus. Searching far beyond our modern world's honking horns and buzzing machinery, he has sought out the truly wild places that remain, where natural soundscapes exist virtually unchanged from when the earliest humans first inhabited the earth. Krause shares fascinating insight into how deeply animals rely on their aural habitat to survive and the damaging effects of extraneous noise on the delicate balance between predator and prey. But natural soundscapes aren't vital only to the animal kingdom; Krause explores how the myriad voices and rhythms of the natural world formed a basis from which our own musical expression emerged. From snapping shrimp, popping viruses, and the songs of humpback whales - whose voices, if unimpeded, could circle the earth in hours - to cracking glaciers, bubbling streams, and the roar of intense storms; from melody-singing birds to the organlike drone of wind blowing over reeds, the sounds Krause has experienced and describes are like no others. And from recording jaguars at night in the Amazon rain forest to encountering mountain gorillas in Africa's Virunga Mountains, Krause offers an intense and intensely personal narrative of the planet's deep and connected natural sounds and rhythm." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

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A Week of Entertainment: Kindle Books Reviewed in Entertainment Weekly's April 6th Issue

2012-04-10T07:40:00.001-07:00

Each week Entertainment Weekly reviews a small selection of popular new books. Titles available for the Kindle reviewed in the April 6th issue include:

The Beginner's Goodbye, by Anne Tyler. Knopf, 2012. Print length: 208 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "There's a temptation at the start of any Anne Tyler novel to be so lulled by her soothing voice and cozy descriptions of domestic life that you assume you can settle in for an easy read. That's a mistake..." - Karen Valby. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (40 reviews). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Anne Tyler gives us a wise, haunting, and deeply moving new novel in which she explores how a middle-aged man, ripped apart by the death of his wife, is gradually restored by her frequent appearances - in their house, on the roadway, in the market. Gradually he discovers, as he works in the family’s vanity-publishing business, turning out titles that presume to guide beginners through the trials of life, that maybe for this beginner there is a way of saying goodbye. A beautiful, subtle exploration of loss and recovery, pierced throughout with Anne Tyler’s humor, wisdom, and always penetrating look at human foibles." - Publisher.

Suddenly, a Knock on the Door, by Etgar Keret. FSG Originals, 2012. Print length: 209 p. SHORT STORIES. EW's slant: "...guaranteed to put a dopey smile on your face during those 10 or 15 minutes until your train arrives." - Keith Staskiewicz. Amazon customer rating: none yet. Kindle edition: $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Bringing up a child, lying to the boss, placing an order in a fast-food restaurant: in Etgar Keret’s new collection, daily life is complicated, dangerous, and full of yearning. In his most playful and most mature work yet, the living and the dead, silent children and talking animals, dreams and waking life coexist in an uneasy world. Overflowing with absurdity, humor, sadness, and compassion, the tales in Suddenly, a Knock on the Door establish Etgar Keret - declared a 'genius' by The New York Times - as one of the most original writers of his generation." - Publisher.

The Lifeboat, by Charlotte Rogan. Reagan Arthur Books, 2012. Print length: 289 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...a layered and provocative tale of survival and impossible decisions." - Stephan Lee. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (15 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Grace Winter, 22, is both a newlywed and a widow. She is also on trial for her life. In the summer of 1914, the elegant ocean liner carrying her and her husband Henry across the Atlantic suffers a mysterious explosion. Setting aside his own safety, Henry secures Grace a place in a lifeboat, which the survivors quickly realize is over capacity. For any to live, some must die. As the castaways battle the elements, and each other, Grace recollects the unorthodox way she and Henry met, and the new life of privilege she thought she'd found. Will she pay any price to keep it?" - Publisher.

Ninety Days: A Memoir of Recovery, by Bill Clegg. Little, Brown and Company, 2012. Print length: 208 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (4 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"The goal is ninety. Just ninety clean and sober days to loosen the hold of the addiction that caused Bill Clegg to lose everything. With seventy-three days in rehab behind him he returns to New York and attends two or three meetings each day. It is in these refuges that he befriends essential allies including the seemingly unshakably sober Asa and Polly, who struggles daily with her own cycle of recovery and relapse. At first, the support is not enough: Clegg relapses for the first time with only three days left. Written with uncompromised immediacy, Ninety Days begins where Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man ends - and tells the wrenching story Clegg's battle to reclaim his life. As any recovering addict knows, hitting rock bottom is just the beginning." - Publisher.

The Land of Decoration, by Grace McCleen. Henry Holt and Co., 2012. Print length: 321 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...paints an affecting and often unsettling portrait of pure faith." - Leah Greenblatt. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (17 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"In Grace McCleen's harrowing, powerful debut, she introduces an unforgettable heroine in ten-year-old Judith McPherson, a young believer who sees the world with the clear Eyes of Faith. Persecuted at school for her beliefs and struggling with her distant, devout father at home, young Judith finds solace and connection in a model in miniature of the Promised Land that she has constructed in her room from collected discarded scraps - the Land of Decoration. Where others might see rubbish, Judith sees possibility and divinity in even the strangest traces left behind. As ominous forces disrupt the peace in her and Father's modest lives - a strike threatens her father's factory job, and the taunting at school slips into dangerous territory - Judith makes a miracle in the Land of Decoration that solidifies her blossoming convictions. She is God's chosen instrument. But the heady consequences of her newfound power are difficult to control and may threaten the very foundations of her world..." - Pubisher.

Sacré Bleu: A Comedy d'Art, by Christopher Moore. William Morrow, 2012. Print length: 416 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...a consistently compelling blend of love story, mystery, and 'what if?' art-history lesson." - Sara Vilkomerson. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (45 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"In July 1890, Vincent van Gogh went into a cornfield and shot himself. Or did he? Why would an artist at the height of his creative powers attempt to take his own life...and then walk a mile to a doctor's house for help? Who was the crooked little 'color man' Vincent had claimed was stalking him across France? And why had the painter recently become deathly afraid of a certain shade of blue? These are just a few of the questions confronting Vincent's friends - baker-turned-painter Lucien Lessard and bon vivant Henri Toulouse-Lautrec - who vow to discover the truth about van Gogh's untimely death. Their quest will lead them on a surreal odyssey and brothel-crawl deep into the art world of late nineteenth-century Paris."

Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail, by Cheryl Strayed. Knopf, 2012. Print Length: 336 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (67 reviews). EW's slant: "...the physical journey was the easy part." - Melissa Maerz. Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"At twenty-two, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother's death, her family scattered and her own marriage was soon destroyed. Four years later, with nothing more to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her life: to hike the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert through California and Oregon to Washington State - and to do it alone. She had no experience as a long-distance hiker, and the trail was little more than 'an idea, vague and outlandish and full of promise.' But it was a promise of piecing back together a life that had come undone." - Publisher.
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Please note: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

Just Out: Recent and Choice Nonfiction for the Kindle

2012-04-08T00:03:00.001-07:00

What I like about non-fiction is that it covers such a huge territory. The best non-fiction is also creative. - Tracy Kidder.

Nonfiction encompasses a wealth of reading possibilities - history, essays, memoirs, scientific research, travel guides, cookbooks - essentially everything that is based on fact, real events and real people. Recent nonfiction titles for the Kindle that you might have missed:

The Mark Inside: A Perfect Swindle, a Cunning Revenge, and a Small History of the Big Con, by Amy Reading. Knopf, 2012. Print Length: 304 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (5 reviews). Kindle edition: $13.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"In 1919, Texas rancher J. Frank Norfleet lost everything he had in a stock market swindle. He did what many other marks did - he went home, borrowed more money from his family, and returned for another round of swindling.
Only after he lost that second fortune did he reclaim control of his story. Instead of crawling back home in shame, he vowed to hunt down the five men who had conned him. Armed with a revolver and a suitcase full of disguises, Norfleet crisscrossed the country from Texas to Florida to California to Colorado, posing as a country hick and allowing himself to be ensnared by confidence men again and again to gather evidence on his enemies. Within four years, Frank Norfleet had become nationally famous for his quest to out-con the con men. Amy Reading’s fascinating account of con artistry in America and Frank Norfleet’s wild caper invites you into the crooked history of a nation on the hustle, constantly feeding the hunger and the hope of the mark inside." - Publisher.

Drop Dead Healthy, by A. J. Jacobs. Simon & Schuster, 2012. Print Length: 416 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (1 review). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"Hospitalized with a freak case of tropical pneumonia, goaded by his wife telling him, 'I don’t want to be a widow at forty-five,' and ashamed of a middle-aged body best described as 'a python that swallowed a goat,' A.J. Jacobs felt compelled to change his ways and get healthy. And he didn’t want only to lose weight, or finish a triathlon, or lower his cholesterol. His ambitions were far greater: maximal health from head to toe. The task was epic. He consulted an army of experts - sleep consultants and sex clinicians, nutritionists and dermatologists. He subjected himself to dozens of different workouts - from Strollercize classes to Finger Fitness sessions, from bouldering with cavemen to a treadmill desk. And he took in a cartload of diets: raw foods, veganism, high protein, calorie restriction, extreme chewing, and dozens more. He bought gadgets and helmets, earphones and juicers. He poked and he pinched. He counted and he measured. The story of his transformation is not only brilliantly entertaining, but it just may be the healthiest book ever written." - Publisher.

Beautiful Thing: Inside the Secret World of Bombay's Dance Bars, by Sonia Faleiro. Black Cat, 2012. Print Length: 241 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (10 reviews). Kindle edition: $9.69. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Sonia Faleiro was a reporter in search of a story when she met nineteen-year-old Leela, a charismatic exotic dancer with a story to tell. Leela introduced Sonia to the underworld of Bombay’s dance bars: a world of glamorous women; of fierce love, sex, and violence; of gangsters, police, prostitutes, and pimps. When an ambitious politician cashed in on a tide of false morality and had Bombay’s dance bars wiped out, Leela’s proud independence faced its greatest test. In a city where almost everyone is certain that someone, somewhere, is worse off than them, she fights to survive - and to win. Sonia Faleiro has crafted one of the most original works of nonfiction about India in years. Unforgettable for its artistry and intimacy, Beautiful Thing is a vivid portrait of one reporter’s journey into the dark, damaged soul of Bombay." - Publisher.

Ball Four, by Jim Bouton. RosettaBooks, 2012. First published in 1970 and now available in a Kindle edition. Print Length: 544 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (108 reviews). Kindle edition: $8.79. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"When Ball Four was published in 1970, it created a firestorm. Bouton was called a Judas, a Benedict Arnold and a 'social leper' for having violated the 'sanctity of the clubhouse.' Baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn tried to force Bouton to sign a statement saying the book wasn’t true. Ballplayers, most of whom hadn’t read it, denounced the book. It was even banned by a few libraries. Almost everyone else, however, loved Ball Four. Fans liked discovering that athletes were real people - often wildly funny people. Many readers said it gave them strength to get through a difficult period in their lives. Serious critics called it an important document. David Halberstam, who won a Pulitzer for his reporting on Vietnam, wrote a piece in Harper’s that said of Bouton: 'He has written...a book deep in the American vein, so deep in fact that it is by no means a sports book.' This ebook version includes the first edition, the 1980, 1990 and 2000 updates, and 138 photos. - Publisher.

Animal Attraction, by Anna David. Kindle Single. Amazon Digital Services, 2012. Print Length: 33 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (1 review). Kindle edition: $1.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled.

"Anna David never expected to end up a crazy cat lady. A successful author (Party Girl, Bought, Reality Matters, Falling for Me) and dating expert for numerous television shows (including The Today Show, The CBS Morning Show and G4’s Attack of the Show), David had every reason to imagine that at this point in her life, she’d be sharing her bed with a man and not two four-legged furballs. In Animal Attraction, the author that The New York Post credits with creating the subgenre 'Chick Lit With a Message' shares the unusual journey she took from fun-loving party gal to obsessive cat mom (with the Instagram photos and YouTube videos to prove it). The result is an uproarious, poignant, and painfully honest tribute that’s sure appeal to pet (and people) lovers everywhere." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

What People Magazine is Reading This Week (April 2nd Issue)

2012-04-06T07:50:00.001-07:00

For those Kindle readers who, like me, read for entertainment, scanning the book reviews in People magazine is good way to check out new people-related books - celebrity bios, popular novels, absorbing nonfiction - just hitting bookstore shelves. Featured in the April 2nd issue of People:

Stay Close, by Harlan Coben. Dutton, 2012. Print Length: 387 p. THRILLER. Amazon customer rating: 3 1/2 stars (50 reviews). People's slant: "...funnier and darker than many Coben thrillers, and packs a lot of surprises..." - Josh Emmons. Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Megan is a suburban soccer mom who once upon a time walked on the wild side. Now she's got two kids, a perfect husband, a picket fence, and a growing sense of dissatisfaction. Ray used to be a talented documentary photographer, but at age forty he finds himself in a dead-end job posing as a paparazzo pandering to celebrity-obsessed rich kids. Jack is a detective who can't let go of a cold case - a local husband and father disappeared seventeen years ago, and Jack spends the anniversary every year visiting a house frozen in time, the missing man's family still waiting, his slippers left by the recliner as if he might show up any moment to step into them. Three people living lives they never wanted, hiding secrets that even those closest to them would never suspect..." - Publisher.

Hot Cripple: An Incurable Smart-Ass Takes on the Health Care System and Lives to Tell the Tale, by Hogan Gorman. Perigee, 2012. Print Length: 272 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (3 reviews). People's slant: "...sometimes funny, often harrowing look at a fear many of us share..." - Judith Newman. Kindle edition: $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Ex-model Hogan Gorman was living the typical New York working actor's life - auditions and classes by day, waitressing and fending off handsy customers by night - when a wise (or just crazy) friend convinced her to ask the universe for a change. And she got one - coming at her at forty miles per hour. Hit by a car and suffering debilitating injuries, and with no health insurance, the fashionista attempts to bounce back into her (thrift store-purchased) Jimmy Choos even as she deals with short-term memory loss, stalker ambulance drivers, trying to stay vegan on food stamps, crazy judges, hot doctors, and unsympathetic government workers. Inspired by her acclaimed one-woman show, this is a bitingly funny and keenly observed account of the cracks in our medical and social welfare system and how one woman's resilience combined with a generous dollop of humor helped her fight her way to recovery." - Publisher.

The New Republic, by Lionel Shriver. Harper, 2012. Print length: 400 p. NOVEL. People's slant: "While Shriver's urge to entertain can be exhausting, her whip-smart observations - about relationships, the role of the media, the cult of personality - are funny and on the mark. - H. R. Amazon customer rating: 3 stars (26 reviews). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Ostracized as a kid, Edgar Kellogg has always yearned to be popular. A disgruntled New York corporate lawyer, he's more than ready to leave his lucrative career for the excitement and uncertainty of journalism. When he's offered the post of foreign correspondent in a Portuguese backwater that has sprouted a homegrown terrorist movement, Edgar recognizes the disappeared larger-than-life reporter he's been sent to replace, Barrington Saddler, as exactly the outsize character he longs to emulate. Infuriatingly, all his fellow journalists cannot stop talking about their beloved 'Bear,' who is no longer lighting up their work lives. Yet all is not as it appears...A droll, playful novel, The New Republic addresses weighty issues like terrorism with the deft, tongue-in-cheek touch that is vintage Shriver. It also presses the more intimate question: What makes particular people so magnetic, while the rest of us inspire a shrug?" - Publisher.

The Good Father, by Noah Hawley. Doubleday, 2012. Print Length: 317 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (47 reviews). People's slant: "...a moving family saga that explores the intriguing notion of a statute of limitations on parental responsibility." - Andrew Abrahams. Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"As the Chief of Rheumatology at Columbia Presbyterian, Dr. Paul Allen's specialty is diagnosing patients with conflicting symptoms, patients other doctors have given up on. He lives a contented life in Westport with his second wife and their twin sons - hard won after a failed marriage earlier in his career that produced a son named Daniel. In the harrowing opening scene of this provocative and affecting novel, Dr. Allen is home with his family when a televised news report announces that the Democratic candidate for president has been shot at a rally, and Daniel is caught on video as the assassin..." - Publisher.

Another Piece of My Heart, by Jane Green. St. Martin's Press, 2012. Print Length: 386 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (44 reviews). People's slant: "Green paints a clear-eyed portrait of the challenges of stepparenting while offering hope that in even the most damaged relationships, dreams can come true." - Lisa Kay Greissinger. Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Andi has spent much of her adult life looking for the perfect man, and at thirty-seven, she's finally found him. Ethan - divorced with two daughters, Emily and Sophia - is a devoted father and even better husband. Always hoping one day she would be a mother, Andi embraces the girls like they were her own. But in Emily’s eyes, Andi is an obstacle to her father’s love, and Emily will do whatever it takes to break her down. When the dynamics between the two escalate, they threaten everything Andi believes about love, family, and motherhood - leaving both women standing at a crossroad in their lives...and in their hearts." - Publisher.

Carry the One, by Carol Anshaw. Simon & Schuster, 2012. Print length: 272 p. NOVEL. People's slant: "Writing with rueful wit and a subtle understanding of the currents and passions that rule us, Anshaw demonstrates that struggling to do one's best, whatever the circumstances, makes for a life of consequence." - Helen Rogan. Amazon customer rating: 3 1/2 stars (30 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"Carry the One begins in the hours following Carmen’s wedding reception, when a car filled with stoned, drunk, and sleepy guests accidentally hits and kills a girl on a dark country road. For the next twenty-five years, those involved, including Carmen and her brother and sister, craft their lives in response to this single tragic moment. As one character says, 'When you add us up, you always have to carry the one.' Through friendships and love affairs; marriage and divorce; parenthood, holidays, and the modest calamities and triumphs of ordinary days, Carry the One shows how one life affects another and how those who thrive and those who self-destruct are closer to each other than we’d expect." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

New Kindle Books for Word Geeks and Language Freaks

2012-04-04T10:59:00.001-07:00

We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary. - Booker T. Washington.

If the origins of words fascinate you and if you are constantly amazed by the variety and richness of the world's languages and the different ways that different languages express the same ideas, here is a small selection of recent books you may covet for your electronic bookshelves:

The Story of English in 100 Words, by David Crystal. Profile Books, 2011. Print Length: 320 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (1 review). Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"In this unique new history of the world's most ubiquitous language, linguistics expert David Crystal draws on words that best illustrate the huge variety of sources, influences and events that have helped to shape our vernacular since the first definitively English word was written down in the fifth century ('roe', in case you are wondering). Featuring Latinate and Celtic words, weasel words and nonce-words, ancient words ('loaf') to cutting edge ('twittersphere') and spanning the indispensable words that shape our tongue ('and','what') to the more fanciful ('fopdoodle'), Crystal takes us along the winding byways of language via the rude, the obscure and the downright surprising." - Publisher.

Language: The Cultural Tool, by Daniel L. Everett. Pantheon, 2012. Print Length: 370 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (1 review). Kindle edition $14.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"For years, the prevailing opinion among academics has been that language is embedded in our genes, existing as an innate and instinctual part of us. But linguist Daniel Everett argues that, like other tools, language was invented by humans and can be reinvented or lost. He shows how the evolution of different language forms - that is, different grammar - reflects how language is influenced by human societies and experiences, and how it expresses their great variety. For example, the Amazonian Pirahã put words together in ways that violate our long-held under-standing of how language works, and Pirahã grammar expresses complex ideas very differently than English grammar does. Drawing on the Wari’ language of Brazil, Everett explains that speakers of all languages, in constructing their stories, omit things that all members of the culture understand. In addition, Everett discusses how some cultures can get by without words for numbers or counting, without verbs for “to say” or “to give,” illustrating how the very nature of what’s important in a language is culturally determined. Combining anthropology, primatology, computer science, philosophy, linguistics, psychology, and his own pioneering - and adventurous - research with the Amazonian Pirahã, and using insights from many different languages and cultures, Everett gives us an unprecedented elucidation of this society-defined nature of language. In doing so, he also gives us a new understanding of how we think and who we are." - Publisher.

Alphabetter Juice: or, The Joy of Text, by Roy Blount, Jr. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011. Print Length: 305 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (4 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"This book is for anyone - novice wordsmith, sensuous reader, or career grammarian - who loves to get physical with words. What is the universal sign of disgust, ew, doing in beautiful and cutie? Why is toadless, but not frogless, in the Oxford English Dictionary? How can the U. S. Supreme Court find relevance in gollywoddles? Might there be scientific evidence for the sonicky value of hunch? And why would someone not bother to spell correctly the very word he is trying to define on Urbandictionary.com? Digging into how locutions evolve, and work, or fail, Blount draws upon everything from The Tempest to The Wire. He takes us to Iceland, for salmon-watching with a 'girl gillie,' and to Georgian England, where a distinguished etymologist bites off more of a 'giantess' than he can chew. Jimmy Stewart appears, in connection with kludge and the bombing of Switzerland. Litigation over supercalifragilisticexpialidocious leads to a vintage werewolf movie; news of possum-tossing, to metanarrative. No man of letters savors the ABC’s, or serves them up, like language-loving humorist Roy Blount Jr." - Publisher.

The World in a Phrase: A Brief History of the Aphorism, by James Geary. Bloomsbury USA, 2011. Print Length: 242 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (12 reviews). Kindle edition $7.96. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled.

"Starting with the ancient Chinese and ending with contemporary Europeans and Americans, The World in a Phrase tells the story of the aphorism through spirited and amusing biographies of some of its greatest practitioners, including Emily Dickinson, and Mark Twain and Dorothy Parker; great French aphorists like Montaigne, La Rochefoucauld, and Chamfort; philosophers like Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and Wittgenstein; as well as prophets and sages like the Buddha, Lao Tzu, and Jesus. In our modern age, The World in a Phrase explores how aphorisms still retain the power to instigate and inspire, enlighten and enrage, entertain and edify." - Publisher.

Trip of the Tongue: Cross-Country Travels in Search of America's Languages, by Elizabeth Little. Bloomsbury USA, 2012. Print Length: 320 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (2 reviews). Kindle edition $13.75. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled.

"Though we speak English as a nation, it's no secret that America is far from uniform. Spanish, in particular, has long been touted as the language that will figure into our national future; much has been written about the need to recognize it in our laws and schools. Yet billing America as a bilingual country is a gross misrepresentation. They speak Basque in Nevada, Hindi in San Jose, and Gullah in South Carolina. We speak European, Asian, and Native American languages, as well as hybrids like Creole and Spanglish. And Elizabeth Little's home - Queens, New York - is among the most ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse places on the planet. Small surprise, then, that Little felt a yearning to find the cultural and linguistic soul of the country. And she has done it in the most American way imaginable: on a road trip. This book is the result: a festive roadmap of the bounties of our country. We'll learn about the struggle of the French-speaking population of Maine to get along with the community around them; the traditional ways of the German-speaking Amish in Pennsylvania; and the rich history of the little-known African population of Nantucket. Elizabeth Little is a witty and endearing tour guide for this memorable and original trip." - Publisher.

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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

A Week of Entertainment: Kindle Books Reviewed in Entertainment Weekly's March 30th Issue

2012-04-02T08:12:00.001-07:00

Each week Entertainment Weekly reviews a small selection of popular new books. Titles available for the Kindle reviewed in the March 30th issue include:

Voyagers of the Titanic: Passengers, Sailors, Shipbuilders, Aristocrats, and the Worlds They Came From, by Richard Davenport-Hines. William Morrow, 2012. Print length: 352 p. NONFICTION. EW's slant: "...paints a provocative portrait of the 'upstairs, downstairs' social stratification in play aboard the doomed ship.' - Stephan Lee and Marc Snetiker. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (6 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Eloquent and absorbing...It will stay afloat long after the armada of other Titanic books have gone down.' - The Telegraph.

"While many accounts of the Titanic’s voyage focus on the technical or mechanical aspects of why the ship sank, Voyagers of the Titanic follows the stories of the men, women, and children whose lives intersected on the vessel’s fateful last day, covering the full range of first, second, and third class - from plutocrats and captains of industry to cobblers and tailors looking for a better life in America. Richard Davenport-Hines delves into the fascinating lives of those who ate, drank, reveled, dreamed, and died aboard the mythic ship: from John Jacob Astor IV, the wealthiest person on board, whose comportment that night was subject to speculation and gossip for years after the event, to Archibald Butt, the much-beloved military aide to Theodore Roosevelt and William Taft, who died helping others into the Titanic’s few lifeboats. With magnificent prose, Voyagers of the Titanic also brings to life the untold stories of the ship’s middle and third classes - clergymen, teachers, hoteliers, engineers, shopkeepers, counterjumpers, and clerks - each of whom had a story that not only illuminates the fascinating ship but also the times in which it sailed..." - Publisher.

Butterfly in the Typewriter: The Tragic Life of John Kennedy Toole and the Remarkable Story of A Confederacy of Dunces, by Cory MacLauchlin. Da Capo Press, 2012. Print length: 354 p. BIOGRAPHY. EW's slant: "...a dutiful account but perhaps a little too schematic and perfunctory for a man so colorful." - Keith Staskiewicz. Amazon customer rating: none yet. Kindle edition $14.30. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"The saga of John Kennedy Toole is one of the greatest stories of American literary history. After writing A Confederacy of Dunces, Toole corresponded with Robert Gottlieb of Simon & Schuster for two years. Exhausted from Gottlieb’s suggested revisions, Toole declared the publication of the manuscript hopeless and stored it in a box. Years later he suffered a mental breakdown, took a two-month journey across the United States, and finally committed suicide on an inconspicuous road outside of Biloxi. Following the funeral, Toole’s mother discovered the manuscript. After many rejections, she cornered Walker Percy, who found it a brilliant novel and spearheaded its publication. In 1981, twelve years after the author’s death, A Confederacy of Dunces won the Pulitzer Prize. In Butterfly in the Typewriter, Cory MacLauchlin draws on scores of new interviews with friends, family, and colleagues as well as full access to the extensive Toole archive at Tulane University, capturing his upbringing in New Orleans, his years in New York City, his frenzy of writing in Puerto Rico, his return to his beloved city, and his descent into paranoia and depression." - Publisher.

The New Republic, by Lionel Shriver. Harper, 2012. Print length: 400 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "The story is baggy and idling, with an ending that thuds. The dialogue zings, though, and the writing is jazzy..." Lisa Schwarzbaum. Amazon customer rating: 3 stars (22 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Ostracized as a kid, Edgar Kellogg has always yearned to be popular. A disgruntled New York corporate lawyer, he's more than ready to leave his lucrative career for the excitement and uncertainty of journalism. When he's offered the post of foreign correspondent in a Portuguese backwater that has sprouted a homegrown terrorist movement, Edgar recognizes the disappeared larger-than-life reporter he's been sent to replace, Barrington Saddler, as exactly the outsize character he longs to emulate. Infuriatingly, all his fellow journalists cannot stop talking about their beloved 'Bear,' who is no longer lighting up their work lives. Yet all is not as it appears...A droll, playful novel, The New Republic addresses weighty issues like terrorism with the deft, tongue-in-cheek touch that is vintage Shriver. It also presses the more intimate question: What makes particular people so magnetic, while the rest of us inspire a shrug?" - Publisher.

Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?, by Jeanette Winterson. Grove Press, 2012. Print Length: 242 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (33 reviews). EW's slant: "There's a lot of flinty humor here, a lot of insight into the emotional legacy of adoption - and a generally refreshing admission that understanding life is as hard as living it. " - Jeff Giles. Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Jeanette Winterson’s novels have establishing her as a major figure in world literature. She has written some of the most admired books of the past few decades, including her internationally bestselling first novel, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, the story of a young girl adopted by Pentecostal parents that is now often required reading in contemporary fiction.
Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? is a memoir about a life’s work to find happiness. It's a book full of stories: about a girl locked out of her home, sitting on the doorstep all night; about a religious zealot disguised as a mother who has two sets of false teeth and a revolver in the dresser, waiting for Armageddon; about growing up in an north England industrial town now changed beyond recognition; about the Universe as Cosmic Dustbin. It is the story of how a painful past that Jeanette thought she'd written over and repainted rose to haunt her, sending her on a journey into madness and out again, in search of her biological mother." - Publisher.

The Sugar Frosted Nutsack, by Mark Leyner. Little, Brown and Company, 2012. Print length: 257 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...somehow both hilarious and extremely tedious - exhausting, puerile, and just brilliant enough to keep you from throwing it across the room." - Rob Brunner. Amazon customer rating: 1 star (1 review). Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"High above the bustling streets of Dubai, in the world's tallest and most luxurious skyscraper, reside the gods and goddesses of the modern world. Since they emerged 14 billion years ago from a bus blaring a tune remarkably similar to the Mister Softee jingle, they've wreaked mischief and havoc on mankind. Unable to control their jealousies, the gods have splintered into several factions, led by the immortal enemies XOXO, Shanice, La Felina, Fast-Cooking Ali, and Mogul Magoo. Ike Karton, an unemployed butcher from New Jersey, is their current obsession..." - Publisher.

Titanic, First Accounts, edited with an introduction by Tim Maltin. Afterword by Nicholas Wade. Penguin Classic, 2012. Print length: 398 p. NONFICTION. EW's slant: "...hugely engaging and adroitly debunks some of the event's great myths..." - Stephan Lee and Marc Snetiker. Amazon customer rating: 3 stars (1 review). Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Historic firsthand accounts and testimonies by survivors and eye-witnesses including Lawrence Beesley, Margaret Brown, Archibald Gracie, Carlos F. Hurd and many more." - Publisher.
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Please note: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

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History Thru the Lens of Fiction: New Historical Novels for the Kindle

2012-03-30T08:24:00.000-07:00

Blending historical fact with fiction, a novel set in other times and places can transport you into the past more convincingly than a dry historical treatise - and entertain you in the bargain. What I look for in historical fiction are books by authors who, after reading the histories and doing the research, create stories based in the past that include characters I want to know better and a plot that keeps me turning pages - books like Peter Ackroyd's The Clerkenwell Tales, Bernard Cornwell's The Last Kingdom, and Ken Follett's The Pillars of the Earth.

Now you can spend less time searching and more time reading as I watch for new historical fiction in the Kindle Store so you don't have to. New on the historical fiction shelves:

The Girl Who Came Home: A Titanic Novel, by Hazel Gaynor. Amazon Digital Services, 2012. TIME FRAME: Early twentieth century. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (11 reviews). Kindle edition $0.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"In a rural Irish village in April 1912, seventeen-year-old Maggie Murphy is anxious about the trip to America. While the thirteen others she will travel with from her Parish anticipate a life of prosperity and opportunity, Maggie is distraught to be leaving Séamus, the man she loves with all her heart. In Southampton, England, Harry Walsh boards Titanic as a Third Class Steward, excited to be working on this magnificent ship. He befriends Maggie and her friends from the Irish group when they board in Queenstown and offers to help Maggie send a telegram home. But when Titanic hits an iceberg on the evening of April 14th, the telegram message is only partly transmitted...
Seventy years later, in Chicago, 1982, twenty-one year old Grace Butler is stunned to learn that her Great Nana Maggie sailed on Titanic. She sets out to write Maggie's story as a way to resurrect her journalism career. Neither Grace nor Maggie can know what far-reaching impact the article will have on them both..." - Amazon.

The Song of Achilles, by Madeline Miller. Harper Collins, 2012. Print Length: 389 p. TIME FRAME: The Trojan War, ca. 1194–1184 BC. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (39 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Patroclus, an awkward young prince, has been exiled to the kingdom of Phthia to be raised in the shadow of King Peleus and his golden son, Achilles. 'The best of all the Greeks' - strong, beautiful, and the child of a goddess - Achilles is everything the shamed Patroclus is not. Yet despite their differences, the boys become steadfast companions. Their bond deepens as they grow into young men and become skilled in the arts of war and medicine... When word comes that Helen of Sparta has been kidnapped, the men of Greece, bound by blood and oath, must lay siege to Troy in her name. Seduced by the promise of a glorious destiny, Achilles joins their cause, and torn between love and fear for his friend, Patroclus follows. Little do they know that the Fates will test them both as never before and demand a terrible sacrifice." - Publisher.

Half-Blood Blues, by Esi Edugyan. Picador, 2012. Print Length: 356 p. TIME FRAME: 1939/1940 Paris, Berlin. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (37 reviews). Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"...a mournful tribute to the Hot-Time Swingers, a once-legendary six-piece German-American multiracial jazz ensemble gigging in Berlin on the eve of WWII. When the pianist is picked up by the Gestapo, the remaining members flee to Paris with forged passports to meet Louis Armstrong in hopes of cutting a record. After the German occupation of Paris, 'the Boots' arrest Hieronymous ('Hiero') Falk, the band’s 20-year-old-genius Afro-German trumpet player, leaving the band with one half-finished record, one shattered love affair, and one too many secrets. The story of the band’s demise and partial resurrection, as seen through the eyes of Sid Griffiths - the upright bass player - unfolds in richly scripted vignettes alternating between 1939/1940 (when Hiero disappears) and 1992 (when Sid and Chip Jones, the percussionist, revisit Berlin... By the book’s end, readers will have pieced together most of the truth behind Sid’s biased recounting of events, but nothing will prepare them for the disclosure of an ultimate betrayal..." - Publishers Weekly.

Cain at Gettysburg, by Ralph Peters. Forge Books, 2012. Print Length: 432 p. TIME FRAME: The Battle of Gettysburg, 1863. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (22 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Two mighty armies blunder toward each other, one led by confident, beloved Robert E. Lee and the other by dour George Meade. They’ll meet in a Pennsylvania crossroads town where no one planned to fight. In this sweeping, savagely realistic novel, the greatest battle ever fought on American soil explodes into life at Gettysburg. As generals squabble, staffs err. Tragedy unfolds for immigrants in blue and barefoot Rebels alike. The fate of our nation will be decided in a few square miles of fields. Following a tough Confederate sergeant from the Blue Ridge, a bitter Irish survivor of the Great Famine, a German political refugee, and gun crews in blue and gray, Cain at Gettysburg is as grand in scale as its depictions of combat are unflinching." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

What People Magazine is Reading This Week (March 26th Issue)

2012-03-28T07:54:00.001-07:00

Briefly Mentioned:

Imagine: How Creativity Works, by Jonah Lehrer. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012. Print Length: 247 p. NONFICTION. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (17 reviews). Kindle edition: $9.59. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Did you know that the most creative companies have centralized bathrooms? That brainstorming meetings are a terrible idea? That the color blue can help you double your creative output? From the New York Times best-selling author of How We Decide comes a sparkling and revelatory look at the new science of creativity. Shattering the myth of muses, higher powers, even creative 'types,' Jonah Lehrer demonstrates that creativity is not a single gift possessed by the lucky few. It’s a variety of distinct thought processes that we can all learn to use more effectively. You’ll learn about Bob Dylan’s writing habits and the drug addictions of poets. You’ll meet a Manhattan bartender who thinks like a chemist, and an autistic surfer who invented an entirely new surfing move. You’ll see why Elizabethan England experienced a creative explosion, and how Pixar’s office space is designed to spark the next big leap in animation." - Publisher.

Witches of East End, by Melissa de la Cruz. Hyperion, 2011. Print length: 292 p. NOVEL. People's slant: "...a bubbling cauldron of mystery and romance..." Amazon customer rating: 3 1/2 stars (118 reviews). Kindle edition: $2.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"The three Beauchamp women - Joanna and her daughters Freya and Ingrid - live in North Hampton, out on the tip of Long Island. Their beautiful, mist-shrouded town seems almost stuck in time, and all three women lead seemingly quiet, uneventful existences. But they are harboring a mighty secret - they are powerful witches banned from using their magic. For centuries, all three women have been forced to suppress their abilities. But then Freya, who is about to get married to the wealthy and mysterious Bran Gardiner, finds that her increasingly complicated romantic life makes it more difficult than ever to hide her secret...this is a page-turning, deliciously fun, magical summer read fraught with love affairs, witchcraft, and an unforgettable battle between good and evil." - Amazon.

The Weird Sisters, by Eleanor Brown. Putnam, 2011. Print Length: 336 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars stars (179 reviews). NOVEL. People's slant: "A delightful debut." Kindle edition: $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Three sisters have returned to their childhood home, reuniting the eccentric Andreas family. Here, books are a passion (there is no problem a library card can't solve) and TV is something other people watch. Their father - a professor of Shakespeare who speaks almost exclusively in verse - named them after the Bard's heroines. It's a lot to live up to. The sisters have a hard time communicating with their parents and their lovers, but especially with one another. What can the shy homebody eldest sister, the fast-living middle child, and the bohemian youngest sibling have in common? Only that none has found life to be what was expected; and now, faced with their parents' frailty and their own personal disappointments, not even a book can solve what ails them..." - Publisher.

Untied: A Memoir of Family, Fame, and Floundering, by Meredith Baxter. Crown Archetype, 2011. Print Length: 304 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (58 reviews). Kindle edition $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"Meredith Baxter is a beloved and iconic television actress, most well-known for her enormously popular role as hippie mom, Elyse Keaton, on Family Ties. Her warmth, humor, and brilliant smile made her one of the most popular women on television, with millions of viewers following her on the small screen each week. Yet her success masked a tumultuous personal story and a harrowing private life. For the first time, Baxter is ready to share her incredible highs, (working with Robert Redford, Doris Day, Lana Turner, and the cast of Family Ties), and lows (a thorny relationship with her mother, a difficult marriage to David Birney, a bout with breast cancer), finally revealing the woman behind the image." - Publisher.

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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

Kindle Genre Watch: New in Romance & Western Fiction

2012-03-26T07:53:00.001-07:00

Romance

Dog Nanny, by Ann Whitaker. Texas Twang Publishing, 2012. Print length: 332 p. Amazon customer rating: 14 1/2 stars (14 reviews). Kindle edition: $2.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled. Originally published in 2009 and now available in a Kindle edition.

"Doggy do-gooder Julie Shields has one month to save two delinquent poodles from becoming doggies of divorce. A self-proclaimed born-again virgin with a biological clock running out of juice, she also needs to find a husband. When hunky pilot Nick Worthington arrives at the Abilene airport to fly her to Waco, he sends Julie into a tailspin. But he also may be a drug trafficker and smuggler of illegal aliens. Not only that, he's involved with another woman. Julie's quest for a suitable husband leads to several misfires. Only Nick leaves her panting for more. Will she have to put a choke chain on him before the month is out?" - Publisher.

Hoping for Love, by Marie Force. HTJB, 2012. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (18 reviews). Kindle edition: $2.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled. This is book five in the author's McCarthys of Gansett Island series that began with Maid for Love.

"All her life, Grace Ryan was the 'fat girl.' Taunted and teased and ignored by her peers, she tried every diet ever invented to no avail. Desperate to change her life as her twenties slipped away, she decided it was time for drastic measures and had lap-band surgery. More than a year later, she's lost 130 pounds and is venturing into the dating world for the first time. During a boat trip to Gansett Island with the new guy in her life, Grace refuses to have sex with him and finds herself abandoned without a dollar to her name at McCarthy's Gansett Island Marina. At home for the summer awaiting the launch of his debut CD, music star-in-the-making Evan McCarthy is performing at the Tiki Bar when he notices Grace looking lost in a sea of happy people. Evan comes to her aid and quickly finds himself smitten. But the last thing Grace needs after all she’s been through is a guy who 'doesn't do relationships.' Will Evan change his ways to win Grace's heart?" - Publisher.

The Duchess Diaries, by Jillian Hunter. Signet, 2012. Print length: 354 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (10 reviews). Kindle edition: $7.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"As headmistress of the Scarfield Academy for Young Ladies, Miss Charlotte Boscastle is tasked with keeping her charges free from notoriety. But when Charlotte's diary goes missing, she can't imagine having her most intimate secrets fall into the wrong hands. Although the confessions in the diary he found spark his interest, the Duke of Wynfield has every intention of returning the journal. But when Gideon's encounter with Charlotte takes on an unexpectedly passionate nature, his indiscretion causes a scandal that only marriage can cure..." - Publisher.

Barefoot Season, by Susan Mallery. Mira, 2012. Print length: 363 p. Amazon customer rating: none yet. Kindle edition: $8.79. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This is book one in the author's new Blackberry Island series.

"Michelle Sanderson may appear to be a strong, independent woman, but on the inside, she’s still the wounded girl who fled home years ago. A young army vet, Michelle returns to the quaint Blackberry Island Inn to claim her inheritance and recover from the perils of war. Instead, she finds the owner’s suite occupied by the last person she wants to see. Carly Williams and Michelle were once inseparable, until a shocking betrayal destroyed their friendship. And now Carly is implicated in the financial disaster lurking behind the inn’s cheerful veneer." - Author's web site.

I Only Have Eyes for You, by Bella Andre. Oak Press, 2012. Print length: 174 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (69 reviews). Kindle edition: $4.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled. This is book four in the author's The Sullivans, a contemporary romance series that began with The Look of Love.

"Sophie Sullivan, a librarian in San Francisco, was five years old when she fell head over heels in love with Jake McCann. Twenty years later, she’s convinced the notorious bad boy still sees her as the 'nice' Sullivan twin. That is, when he bothers to look at her at all. But when they both get caught up in the magic of the first Sullivan wedding, she knows it’s long past time to do whatever it takes to make him see her for who she truly is... Jake has always been a magnet for women, especially since his Irish pubs made him extremely wealthy. But the only woman he really wants is the one he can never have. Not only is Sophie his best friend’s off-limits younger sister...he can’t risk letting her get close enough to discover his deeply hidden secret." - Publisher.

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Westerns

Tombstone Rose, by J. Carson Black. Breakaway Media, 2012. Amazon customer rating: 3 1/2 stars (5 reviews). Kindle edition: $3.47. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled.

"English-born Charlotte Tate has longed to be an actress from the time she was a little girl. Instead, she finds herself in the rough boomtown of 1880's Tombstone Arizona, looking helplessly on as her sister Mary takes her last breath. Mary made foolish choices—with men and their future prospects--and now Charlotte is left alone in a foreign land. Charlotte is made of stern stuff, though; she is determined to make her mark. Headstrong and ambitious, she becomes a theater headliner in Tombstone during the heady days when the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday stride the boardwalks. Jake Cottrell has a ranch in the Sulphur Springs Valley - a dream realized, and one he’s held for a long time. But he lost his beloved wife to illness, and this colors his view of the world. In Charlotte Tate he sees passion and wildness--and a chance to love again.

High Country Greed, by Jon Sharpe. The Trailsman, #365. Signet, 2012. Print length: 176 p. Amazon customer rating: none yet. Kindle edition: $6.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"When Fargo comes across two murdered Arapaho, he tracks the killers...and walks right into a trap. Now, he's on the trail of the gang of ruthless gold-hunters heading straight into the Rockies, where both man and nature are cold, merciless, and deadly. Because if anyone tries to get the best of the Trailsman, they're going to end up getting the worst of him..." - Publisher.

Slocum and the Misty Creek Massacre, by Jake Logan. Slocum, #397. Jove, 2012. Print length: 192 p. Amazon customer rating: none yet. Kindle edition: $6.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"After a drunken night in Dodge City, Slocum realizes he was robbed in a game of poker. And when he find the men responsible, he sets out to beat them at their own game." - Publisher.
"Slocum Westerns are the longest running series of Westerns ever written, encompassing over 400 books, all of which are published under the pen name Jake Logan. The books have been written by a number of authors, and all feature John Slocum as the protagonist." - Wikipedia.

Blood Mountain, by Peter Brandvold. Mean Pete Press, 2012. 2nd edition. Print length: 272 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (4 reviews). Kindle edition: $2.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Lending: Enabled.

"Stranded in the rugged northern Rockies, a wagon train of settlers is about to learn that the most dangerous things on the frontier are the men who inhabit it. They respect no law, believe in no code. Violence is their currency and cruelty their creed. And they've just found a whole wagon train of settlers who are about to become their newest victims. Nordstrom was a simple man of the West who helped the settlers find their way. The relentless outlaws repaid him by destroying everything he had lived, work, a fought for. Now he is going to show them what one man can do...when he has nothing left to lose." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

A Week of Entertainment: Kindle Books Reviewed in Entertainment Weekly's March 16th/March 23rd Issues

2012-03-24T08:18:00.001-07:00

Each week Entertainment Weekly reviews a small selection of popular new books. Titles available for the Kindle reviewed in the March 16th and March 23rd issues include:

The Expats by Chris Pavone. Crown, 2012. Print Length: 338 p. EW's slant: "After a slow start, Expats eventually reaches its full, bombshell-a-minute pace. And Pavone creates a fascinating, complicated hero in Kate Moore." - Stephan Lee. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (58 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Kate Moore is a working mother, struggling to make ends meet, to raise children, to keep a spark in her marriage...and to maintain an increasingly unbearable life-defining secret. So when her husband is offered a lucrative job in Luxembourg, she jumps at the chance to leave behind her double-life, to start anew. She begins to reinvent herself as an expat, finding her way in a language she doesn’t speak, doing the housewifely things she’s never before done - playdates and coffee mornings, daily cooking and never-ending laundry. Meanwhile, her husband works incessantly, at a job Kate has never understood, for a banking client she’s not allowed to know. He’s becoming distant and evasive; she’s getting lonely and bored. Then another American couple arrives. Kate soon becomes suspicious that these people are not who they say they are, and she’s terrified that her own past is catching up to her..." - Publisher.

Guts: The Endless Follies and Tiny Triumphs of a Giant Disaster, by Kristen Johnston. Gallery Books, 2012. Print length: 288 p. MEMOIR. EW's slant: "In 2006, former 3rd Rock From the Sun star Kristen Johnston's stomach exploded after years of drug and alcohol abuse. Now the 44-year-old actress relives that nightmare in her fascinating memoir, Guts." - Clark Collis. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (18 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"A stage actress whose most famous role was as Sally Solomon in TV’s 3rd Rock from the Sun, Johnston offers a brash, loud, expletive-peppered, unapologetic account of her manic drug-and-alcohol-infused career. Hailing from a wealthy suburb of Milwaukee, Wis., and growing to be six feet tall by the time she was 12, Johnston felt like a 'freak' at her Catholic grade school, learning early on that being funny was the way to deflect nasty criticism by other kids. She took naturally to the stage, studying theater at NYU under the benevolent influence of a certain gay stage actor she refers to only as 'David'... Fame suddenly struck with 3rd Rock, starring John Lithgow, along with heavy painkillers and alcohol abuse, and yo-yoing weight gain; in 2006, while doing a play in London, acute peritonitis caused extended hospitalization, surgery, and deep self-examination. In her sarcastic, self-deprecating manner..., Johnston re-creates her desperate hospital episode and subsequent rehab." - Publishers Weekly.

The Vanishers, by Heidi Julavits. Doubleday, 2012. Print length: 306 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...an absorbing meditation on female competition with Hitchcockian twists." - Melissa Maerz. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (5 reviews). Kindle edition: $13.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Julia Severn is a student at an elite institute for psychics. Her mentor, the legendary Madame Ackermann, afflicted by jealousy, refuses to pass the torch to her young disciple. Instead, she subjects Julia to the humiliation of reliving her mother's suicide when Julia was an infant. As the two lock horns, and Julia gains power, Madame Ackermann launches a desperate psychic attack that leaves Julia the victim of a crippling ailment. Julia retreats to a faceless job in Manhattan. But others have noted Julia's emerging gifts, and soon she's recruited to track down an elusive missing person - a controversial artist who might have a connection to her mother..." - Publisher.

Religion for Atheists: A Non-believer's Guide to the Uses of Religion, by Alain De Botton. Pantheon, 2012. Print length: 320 p. This title has complex layouts and has been optimized for reading on devices with larger screens. NONFICTION. EW's slant: "...a slightly precious, upper-middle-brow tract with ideas both reasonable and ridiculous." - Jeff Giles. Amazon customer rating: 3 stars (21 reviews). Kindle edition $13.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Atheism is a form of faith. The convinced atheist believes that there is no god and no supernatural, and that religion is nothing but superstitious bunk. The atheist is therefore unlikely to see that there is a lot that is useful and good in religion. De Botton (How Proust Can Change Your Life), a convinced atheist but a Jew by birth, shows how much of religion is indeed very good and worth keeping, even in a society tending (at least in Europe) toward atheism. There is strong community, for instance, and high art, especially in architecture, painting, sculpture, and music. De Botton discusses these and many other benefits, while rejecting religious doctrine and ritual. He demonstrates his usual urbane, intelligent, and witty prose, always entertaining and worth reading..." - James F. DeRoche for Library Journal.

Tough Sh*t: Life Advice from a Fat, Lazy Slob Who Did Good, by Kevin Smith. Gotham Books, 2012. Print length: 272 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (5 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Take one look at Kevin Smith: He's a balding fatty who wears a size XXL hockey jersey, shorts, and slippers year-round. Not a likely source for life advice. But take a second look at Kevin Smith: He changed filmmaking forever when he was twenty-four with the release of Clerks, and since then has gone on to make nine more profitable movies, runs his own production company, wrote a bestselling graphic novel, and has a beautiful wife and kids. So he must be doing something right. As Kevin's millions of Twitter followers and millions of podcast listeners know, he's the first one to admit his flaws and the last one to care about them. In early 2011, he began using his platform to answer big questions from fans - like 'What should I do with my life?' - and he discovered that he had a lot to say. Tough Sh*t distills his four decades of breaking all the rules down to direct and brutally honest advice..." - Publisher.

Fifty Shades of Grey, by E L James. Vintage, 2011. Print length: 372 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...steamy female-centric erotica out of what began as Twilight fan fiction." - Lisa Schwarzbaum. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (597 reviews). Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"When literature student Anastasia Steele goes to interview young entrepreneur Christian Grey, she encounters a man who is beautiful, brilliant, and intimidating. The unworldly, innocent Ana is startled to realize she wants this man and, despite his enigmatic reserve, finds she is desperate to get close to him. Unable to resist Ana’s quiet beauty, wit, and independent spirit, Grey admits he wants her, too - but on his own terms. Shocked yet thrilled by Grey’s singular erotic tastes, Ana hesitates. For all the trappings of success - his multinational businesses, his vast wealth, his loving family - Grey is a man tormented by demons and consumed by the need to control. When the couple embarks on a daring, passionately physical affair, Ana discovers Christian Grey’s secrets and explores her own dark desires." - Publisher.

Arcadia, by Lauren Groff. Voice, 2012. Print Length: 304 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (9 reviews). People's slant: "...a moving look at the value of human connection in a scary, chaotic world" - Lauren Groff. Kindle edition: $10.39. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This edition includes a Reading Group Guide and a Q&A with the author.

"In the fields of western New York State in the 1970s, a few dozen idealists set out to live off the land, founding what would become a commune centered on the grounds of a decaying mansion called Arcadia House. Arcadia follows this romantic, rollicking, and tragic utopian dream from its hopeful start through its heyday and after. Arcadia’s inhabitants include Handy, a musician and the group’s charismatic leader; Astrid, a midwife; Abe, a master carpenter; Hannah, a baker and historian; and Abe and Hannah’s only child, the book’s protagonist, Bit, who is born soon after the commune is created." - Publisher.
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Please note: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

Savoring the Past: New Kindle Books for History Buffs

2012-03-22T07:45:00.001-07:00

History is a kind of introduction to more interesting people than we can possibly meet in our restricted lives; let us not neglect the opportunity. - Dexter Perkins.

The American philosopher George Santayana is quoted as saying that those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it. With more than 224,000 books in the Amazon Kindle bookstore's "history" category, Kindle-owning history buffs will not run out of reading material any time soon. Outstanding among recent history nonfiction are:

Hell Above Earth: The Incredible True Story of an American WWII Bomber Commander and the Copilot Ordered to Kill Him , by Stephen Frater. St. Martin's Press, 2012. Print Length: 320 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (4 reviews). Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

The air battle over Nazi Germany in WWII was hell above earth. It lasted three years and cost 125,000 Allied aircrew men, including 26,000 Americans from the US Army's Eighth Air Force in England, their lives. For bomber crews, every day they flew was like D-Day, exacting tremendous amounts of emotional uncertainty and trauma. Some men, like twenty-year-old U.S. Captain Werner Goering, accepted this, even thrived on and welcomed the adrenaline rush. They knew that death could come in a variety of ways: an unlucky flak burst, Luftwaffe fighters that could appear anywhere at any time, or pilot error while flying less than twenty feet apart. Werner Goering was an exceptional pilot. He was also the nephew of Herman Goering, leading member of the Nazi party and Commander in Chief of the Luftwaffe. When Werner qualified to become a bomber commander in 1942, J. Edgar Hoover issued a top secret order to ensure that if his plane was downed for any reason over Nazi-occupied Europe, someone would be there in the cockpit to shoot Captain Werner Goering dead..." - Publisher.
"...an exciting read full of little-known facts about the war. A WWII thrill ride." - Kirkus Reviews.

If Walls Could Talk: An Intimate History of the Home, by Lucy Worsley. Walker Books, 2012. Print length: 373 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (7 reviews). Kindle edition $14.85. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Why did the flushing toilet take two centuries to catch on? Why did Samuel Pepys never give his mistresses an orgasm? Why did medieval people sleep sitting up? When were the two 'dirty centuries'? Why did gas lighting cause Victorian ladies to faint? Why, for centuries, did people fear fruit? All these questions will be answered in this juicy, smelly, and truly intimate history of home life. Lucy Worsley takes us through the bedroom, bathroom, living room, and kitchen, covering the architectural history of each room, but concentrating on what people actually did in bed, in the bath, at the table, and at the stove. From sauce-stirring to breast-feeding, teeth-cleaning to masturbation, getting dressed to getting married, this book will make you see your home with new eyes. Lucy Worsley is, by day, Chief Curator at Historic Royal Palaces, the independent charity that looks after The Tower of London, Hampton Court Palace, Kensington Palace State Apartments, the Banqueting House in Whitehall, and Kew Palace in Kew Gardens." - Publisher.

The Pope Who Quit: A True Medieval Tale of Mystery, Death, and Salvation, by Jon M. Sweeney. Image, 2012. Print length: 306 p. Amazon customer rating: 3 1/2 stars (3 reviews). Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"At the close of the tumultuous Middle Ages, there lived a man who seemed destined from birth to save the world. His name was Peter Morrone, a hermit, a founder of a religious order, and, depending on whom you talk to, a reformer, an instigator, a prophet, a coward, a saint, and possibly the victim of murder. A stroke of fate would, practically overnight, transform this humble servant of God into the most powerful man in the Catholic Church. Half a year later, he would be the only pope in history to abdicate the chair of St. Peter, an act that nearly brought the papacy to its knees. What led him to make that decision and what happened afterward would be shrouded in mystery for centuries. The Pope Who Quit pulls back the veil of secrecy on this dramatic time in history and showcases a story that involves deadly dealings, apocalyptic maneuverings, and papal intrigue." - Publisher.

Island of Vice: Theodore Roosevelt's Doomed Quest to Clean Up Sin-Loving New York, by Richard Zacks. Doubleday, 2012. Print length: 466 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (29 reviews). Kindle edition $13.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"In the 1890s, New York City was America’s financial, manufacturing, and entertainment capital, and also its preferred destination for sin, teeming with forty thousand prostitutes, glittery casinos, and all-night dives. Police captains took hefty bribes to see nothing while reformers writhed in frustration. In Island of Vice, Richard Zacks paints a vivid portrait of the lewd underbelly of 1890s New York, and of Theodore Roosevelt, the puritanical, cocksure police commissioner resolved to clean it up. Writing with great wit and zest, Zacks explores how young Roosevelt goes head to head with Tammany Hall, takes midnight rambles with muckraker Jacob Riis, and tries to convince two million New Yorkers to enjoy wholesome family fun. When Roosevelt’s crackdown succeeds too well, even his supporters turn on him, and TR discovers that New York loves its sin more than its salvation. With cameos by Stephen Crane, Mark Twain, and a horde of very angry cops, Island of Vice is an unforgettable snapshot of turn-of-the-century New York in all its seedy glory and a brilliant miniature of one of America’s most colorful presidents." - Publisher.

Enemies: A History of the FBI, by Tim Weiner. Random House, 2012. Print length: 560 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (16 reviews). Kindle edition: $14.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Enemies is the first definitive history of the FBI’s secret intelligence operations, from an author whose work on the Pentagon and the CIA won him the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. We think of the FBI as America’s police force. But secret intelligence is the Bureau’s first and foremost mission. Enemies is the story of how presidents have used the FBI as the most formidable intelligence force in American history. Here is the hidden history of America’s hundred-year war on terror. The FBI has fought against terrorists, spies, anyone it deemed subversive - and sometimes American presidents. The FBI’s secret intelligence and surveillance techniques have created a tug-of-war between protecting national security and infringing upon civil liberties. It is a tension that strains the very fabric of a free republic." - Publisher.

A Magnificent Obsession: Victoria, Albert, and the Death That Changed the British Monarchy, by Helen Rappaport. St. Martin's Press, 2012. Print length: 352 p. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (3 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"As she did in her critically acclaimed The Last Days of the Romanovs, Helen Rappaport brings a compelling documentary feel to the story of this royal marriage and of the queen’s obsessive love for her husband - a story that began as fairy tale and ended in tragedy. After the untimely death of Prince Albert, the queen and her nation were plunged into a state of grief so profound that this one event would dramatically alter the shape of the British monarchy. For Britain had not just lost a prince: during his twenty year marriage to Queen Victoria, Prince Albert had increasingly performed the function of King in all but name. The outpouring of grief after Albert’s death was so extreme, that its like would not be seen again until the death of Princess Diana 136 years later. Drawing on many letters, diaries and memoirs from the Royal Archives and other neglected sources, as well as the newspapers of the day, Rappaport offers a new perspective on this compelling historical psychodrama." - Publisher.

Hitlerland, by Andrew Nagorski. Simon & Schuster, 2012. Print length: 402 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (11 reviews). Kindle edition $14.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"Some of the Americans in Weimar and then Hitler’s Germany were merely casual observers, others deliberately blind; a few were Nazi apologists. But most slowly began to understand the horror of what was unfolding, even when they found it difficult to grasp the breadth of the catastrophe. Hitler’s rise to power, Germany’s march to the abyss, as seen through the eyes of Americans - diplomats, military, expats, visiting authors, Olympic athletes - who watched horrified and up close. By tapping a rich vein of personal testimonies, Hitlerland offers a gripping narrative full of surprising twists - and a startlingly fresh perspective on this heavily dissected era." - Publisher.

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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

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What People Magazine is Reading This Week (March 19th Issue)

2012-03-20T07:40:00.001-07:00

For those Kindle readers who, like me, read for entertainment, scanning the book reviews in People magazine is good way to check out new people-related books - celebrity bios, popular novels, absorbing nonfiction - just hitting bookstore shelves. Featured in the March 19th issue of People:

Arcadia, by Lauren Groff. Voice, 2012. Print Length: 304 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (8 reviews). People's slant: "What was it like to grow up in a utopian commune in New York State in the 1970s? Beautiful and terrible, to judge from the experience of this fascinating novel's protagonist..." - Anne Leslie. Kindle edition: $10.39. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This edition includes a Reading Group Guide and a Q&A with the author.

"In the fields of western New York State in the 1970s, a few dozen idealists set out to live off the land, founding what would become a commune centered on the grounds of a decaying mansion called Arcadia House. Arcadia follows this romantic, rollicking, and tragic utopian dream from its hopeful start through its heyday and after. Arcadia’s inhabitants include Handy, a musician and the group’s charismatic leader; Astrid, a midwife; Abe, a master carpenter; Hannah, a baker and historian; and Abe and Hannah’s only child, the book’s protagonist, Bit, who is born soon after the commune is created." - Publisher.

Catch Me by Lisa Gardner. Dutton, 2012. Print Length: 400 p. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (77 reviews.) People's slant: "Gardner's sixth Det. D.D. Warren thriller grabs from the get-go..." - Lisa Gardner. Kindle edition: $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Detective D. D. Warren is hard to surprise. But a lone woman outside D.D.'s latest crime scene shocks her with a remarkable proposition: Charlene Rosalind Carter Grant believes she will be murdered in four days. And she wants Boston's top detective to handle the death investigation. Charlie tells a chilling story: Each year at 8:00 p.m. on January 21st, a woman has died. The victims have been childhood best friends from a small town in New Hampshire; the motive remains unknown. Now only one friend, Charlie, remains to count down her final hours. But as D.D. quickly learns, Charlie Grant doesn't plan on going down without a fight. By her own admission, the girl can outshoot, outfight, and outrun anyone in Boston. Which begs the question, is Charlie the next victim, or the perfect perpetrator?" - Publisher.

Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?, by Jeanette Winterson. Grove Press, 2012. Print Length: 242 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (33 reviews). People's slant: "With raw honesty and wit, Winterson reveals how she fought her way to adulthood, finding success, love - and ultimately forgiveness." - Helen Rogan. Kindle edition: $9.59. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Jeanette Winterson’s novels have establishing her as a major figure in world literature. She has written some of the most admired books of the past few decades, including her internationally bestselling first novel, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, the story of a young girl adopted by Pentecostal parents that is now often required reading in contemporary fiction.
Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? is a memoir about a life’s work to find happiness. It's a book full of stories: about a girl locked out of her home, sitting on the doorstep all night; about a religious zealot disguised as a mother who has two sets of false teeth and a revolver in the dresser, waiting for Armageddon; about growing up in an north England industrial town now changed beyond recognition; about the Universe as Cosmic Dustbin. It is the story of how a painful past that Jeanette thought she'd written over and repainted rose to haunt her, sending her on a journey into madness and out again, in search of her biological mother." - Publisher.

Monday Mornings, by Sanjay Gupta. Grand Central Publishing. Print Length: 304 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (10 reviews). Kindle edition: $11.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Every time surgeons operate, they're betting their skills are better than the brain tumor, the faulty heart valve, the fractured femur. Sometimes, they're wrong. At Chelsea General, surgeons answer for bad outcomes at the Morbidity and Mortality conference, known as M & M. This extraordinary peek behind the curtain into what is considered the most secretive meeting in all of medicine is the back drop for the entire book...Dr. Sanjay Gupta, follows the lives of five surgeons at Chelsea General as they push the limits of their abilities and confront their personal and professional failings, often in front of their peers at M & M. It is on Monday mornings that reflection and introspection occurs, usually in private. It is Monday Mornings that provides a unique look at the real method in which surgeons learn - through their mistakes. It is Monday Mornings when, if you're lucky, you have a chance at redemption." - Publisher.
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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.

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