Summer Reading
Memorial Day may be a distant memory but in the spirit of "better late than never" here is a list of our recommendations for those long, lazy days of summer reading. So grab that glass of lemonade, head for the hammock (or beach chair), and dive right in!
BEACH READING
City of Fire by Robert Ellis
In this spooky, tense crime novel, LAPD detective Lena Gamble watches her city burn while a serial killer is on the loose. All the victims are beautiful women, and the ravenous Hollywood media goes all out, dubbing the killer “Romeo” in the press. It’s the case of a lifetime for Lena and promises to either elevate her to the upper echelons of a publicity hungry department in need of heroes, or bring about a very public and painful fall from grace.
Dedication by Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus
The authors of The Nanny Diaries are back. When Kate Hollis’s childhood friend calls from their Vermont hometown and announces the arrival of Kate’s high school sweetheart, Jake Sharpe, who is now a mega rock star, Kate heads back home to confront the boy who abandoned her before the senior prom and used her personal life as fodder for his most celebrated songs and cheated his high school bandmates out of deserved recognition and royalties. Chapters alternate between the present and middle and high school years. Who thought revisiting high school could be so much fun!
Keep it Real by Bill Bryan
Our hero, Ted Collins, a Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporter turned reality TV producer, works for one of TV’s biggest hits, “The Mogul” (which highlights the entrepreneurial skills of one Roger Dominus and his patented catchphrase “You’re outta here!” and his terrible toupee- sound familiar?). Ted’s journalism career and the rest of his life derailed when his wife left him for an attorney and took him for virtually everything he had, including his beloved seven year old daughter. On a visit to his daughter at his ex’s home, he witnesses a violent altercation between a “Booty” magazine centerfold and her rap performer boyfriend. When she turns up dead shortly thereafter, Ted gets a chance to get his investigative talents back. Funny, suspenseful and a bit coarse and politically incorrect, this is a fast-paced, fun summer read.
The Last Summer (of You and Me) by Ann Brashares
The debut adult novel from the author of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series is set primarily on New York’s Fire Island and features a classic love triangle. Twentysomething sisters Alice and Riley and their next door neighbor Paul have a shared history going back to their early childhoods. During this one fateful summer, external events force them all to grow up. Perceptive and utterly engaging!
Lean Mean Thirteen by Janet Evanovich
Stephanie Plum is back in the 13th book in the series. The stakes are raised even higher as Stephanie finds herself in her most dangerous, hilarious, hottest chase yet!
The New Yorkers by Cathleen Schine
The author of The Love Letter sends a love letter to New Yorkers and the dogs who own them in this ensemble novel set on an Upper West Side street. Schine uses her tail-wagging characters to bring her human beings out of their apartments and onto the street. She captures human joys and sorrows, comedy and drama, beginnings and endings, as the dogs compel their owners to live outside of themselves. A joy for all – give Ms. Schine a biscuit!!
The Overlook by Michael Connelly
Connelly’s 13th Harry Bosch novel reunites Bosch with his former flame, FBI agent Rachel Walling. In his first case since he left the LAPD’s Open Unsolved Unit for the Homicide Special squad, Bosch is called out to investigate a murder that may have chilling consequences for national security.
The Savage Garden by Mark Mills
Set in post-World War II Tuscany, Adam Banting, a Cambridge architecture student, is doing research on a famous Renaissance garden. As he digs into the history and iconography of the garden, he comes to believe that the seemingly tranquil garden is a road map to how the original owner murdered his wife. He also learns more about the family who now owns the garden and follows the trail of a more contemporary murder. High culture mixed with high crime!
Stalin’s Ghost: An Arkady Renko Novel by Martin Cruz Smith
Detective Arkady Renko (Gorky Park) returns to his Moscow base to investigate a murder-for-hire scheme that leads him to suspect two fellow police detectives. Renko must also look into reports that the ghost of Stalin has begun appearing on subway platforms. A glimpse into contemporary Russia as well as a suspenseful and graceful reflection on human passion.
Summer Reading by Hilma Wolitzer 
The story of three women whose paths cross during a summer in the Hamptons. Lissy Snyder, an insecure second wife, is uncertain of her place in her husband’s heart and feels intimidated by her stepchildren. To help cement her position in Hamptons’ society, Lissy decides to host a book club for other young socialites and hires an eccentric former English professor to lead the group. The best part is that you can enjoy the characters’ stories as well as the novels the book group is reading, which are interwoven into the protagonists’ lives in an interesting way!
Up in Honey’s Room by Elmore Leonard
Set in the waning days of WWII, Leonard’s 40th novel finds gunslinging U.S. marshal Carl Webster, first introduced in The Hot Kid, now on the trail of two German POWs escaped from an Oklahoma detention camp. The pair wind up in Detroit in the care of Walter Schoen and his ex-wife, wisecracking bottle-blonde Honey Deal. The odd thing about Walter is he’s a dead wringer for Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS and the Gestapo. Gritty, funny and full of surprises!
NEW HARDCOVER FICTION
Consequences by Penelope Lively
A multigenerational love story that begins in a London park in 1935 and ends nearly 70 years later after covering several lifetimes of love and heartbreak. The book tells the story of Lorna and Matt, then shifts to their daughter Molly and settles on Molly’s daughter, Ruth. There is a subtle theme throughout about family legacy and how it can deepen one’s perception and appreciation of life.
The Good Husband of Zebra Drive by Alexander McCall Smith
The eighth installment of the No. 1 Ladies Detective series. As usual, there is rarely a dull moment for our heroine, Precious Ramotswe. First her husband asks to be put in charge of a case involving an errant husband. Then she has a falling out with her assistant Grace, who decides to leave the agency. Along the way, Mma Ramotswe is asked to investigate a couple of tricky cases. Another treat from McCall Smith.
The Gravedigger’s Daughter by Joyce Carol Oates
Incredibly, this is Oates’ 36th novel! This one tells the story of Rebecca Schwart. Her parents escape from the Nazis in 1936 and settle in a small town in upstate New York, where the only job her father, a former high school teacher, can get is gravedigger and cemetery caretaker. After local prejudice and the family’s own emotional frailty result in unspeakable tragedy, the gravedigger’s daughter begins her astonishing pilgrimage into America. Emotionally engaging and intellectually provocative.
Luncheon of the Boating Party by Susan Vreeland
The author of Girl in Hyacinth Blue again imaginatively uses art history as the basis for this carefully constructed historical novel. Imagining the banks of the Seine in the thick of “la vie moderne”, Vreeland tracks Auguste Renoir as he conceives, plans and paints the 1880 masterpiece, which depicts a group of people enjoying leisure time on the terrace of a riverside restaurant.
The Entitled by Frank Deford
After a career spent knocking around in the minor leagues as a player and manager, Howie Traveler has finally made it to the majors as manager of the Cleveland Indians. However, the team is struggling and Howie’s job is in jeopardy when the team’s star player is accused of rape. Now Howie has to choose between his conscience and his dream job. Deford tackles timely and provocative issues without flinching.
On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan
Despite its short length, this book is anything but small as it explores two of McEwan’s favorite themes – the effect of the cataclysmic moment on personal lives and the tensions inherent in human sexuality. We peer behind the closed doors of a young married couple, both virgins, on their honeymoon night. Their fears about sex and their inability to discuss them form the story’s center. Another masterwork from McEwan.
On Kingdom Mountain by Howard Frank Mosher
Set in Vermont in 1930, our heroine, Miss Jane Hubbell Kinneson, is a renowned local ex-teacher, librarian, woodcarver, basketball coach and sole proprietor and last resident of a remote and wild mountain situated on the U.S./Canadian border, now threatened by a new highway. On Miss Jane’s 50th birthday, a mysterious stunt pilot and weathermaker crashes his biplane onto the frozen lake at the foot of the mountain and Miss Jane’s life changes forever. Pure delight!
Peony in Love by Lisa See 
The author of Snow Flower and the Secret Fan is back with a novel set in 17th century China. As Peony, the 15 year old daughter of the wealthy Chen family, approaches an arranged marriage, she commits an unthinkable breach of etiquette when she accidentally comes upon a man who has entered the family garden. See’s new novel addresses universal themes: the bonds of friendship, the power of words, and the age-old desire of women to be heard.
The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolano
The posthumously published English translation of the prizewinning novel that made Chilean author Roberto Bolano famous. The highly stylized novel is ostensibly about two poets and their search for an obscure icon of the Mexican visceral realist literary movement (anti-magical realism). The book spans a decade and follows the poets from Mexico City to the Sonoran Desert, Guatemala, Barcelona, Paris, Israel, Congo, Liberia and the U.S. The journey may prove arduous (for the reader as well as the characters!), but as a road novel, coupled with successful character creation, intriguing experimentation, and a unique premise, it provides a rewarding reading experience.
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
We were tempted to give a prize to any customer who actually knew the name of the title or author of this book (everyone refers to it as “the new Kite Runner” ). Hosseini does not disappoint in this novel that views the plight of Afghanistan in the last half-century through the eyes of two women - Miriam and Laila, two very different women brought together by dire circumstances. A sad and beautiful testament to Afghani suffering and strength.
NEW PAPERBACK FICTION
Emperor’s Children by Claire Messud
One of the New York Times top 5 novels of the year, this is the perfect big juicy summer read – it reminded me of an Edith Wharton novel set in modern times. The story appears to center on three best friends from Brown who are approaching age 30 as they struggle to live and succeed in Manhattan, but the real center is the “emperor”, Murray Twaite, celebrated social activist, journalist, lecturer, hob-nobber (and Big Bull S***er!). Murray is the father of one of our three Brown grads and uncle to Frederick “Bootie” Tubb, an idealistic, immature college dropout who comes to New York determined to live the life of an intellectual. The story opens in mid-2001 and the characters’ lives intertwine as the days lead unrelentingly to Sept. 11.
Abundance: a Novel of Marie Antoinette by Sena Jeter Naslund
From the author of Ahab’s Wife comes a portrait of a young queen called Marie Antoinette. Despite her efforts to be a good wife and strong queen, she allows herself to remain ignorant of the country’s growing economic and political crises, even as poor harvests, bitter winters, war debts and poverty precipitate rebellion and revenge. The young queen becomes the target of scorn, cruelty and hatred, and we know how it ends…….
As If Love Were Enough by Anne Taylor Fleming 
The story of two sisters, told in two time periods. Clare, a 41 year old, childless magazine writer is seemingly content living in New York as the long time mistress of a married politician. Her life takes a turn when her lover undergoes treatment for prostate cancer and her long-estranged older sister shows up on her doorstep with an urgent request. The story then shifts back to the girls’ childhood in Malibu and other familiar areas where we meet their beautiful, narcissistic, semi-famous actress mother and their screenwriter father. This is a great selection for a bookclub because of the choices the various characters make throughout the novel and because of the sisters – readers are bound to identify, either positively or negatively, with one of the sisters.
Elements of Style by Wendy Wasserstein
Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein’s first novel is a scathing comedy about New York’s high society facing the post-9/11 world. We see through the eyes of Francesca Weissman, an Upper East Side pediatrician rated number one by “Manhattan Magazine”. Through her bemused eyes we meet the thoroughbred socialite Samantha Acton; relentless social climber Judy Tremont; Barry Snatorini, an Oscar winning moviemaker accustomed to having his way; his supermarket heiress wife, and more. “Chick-lit with a pedigree”.
The Foreign Correspondent by Alan Furst
The New York Times calls him “America’s preeminent spy novelist” and the Houston Chronicle calls him the “greatest living writer of espionage fiction”. His latest novel is set in 1938 when hundreds of Italian intellectuals, lawyers and journalists, university professors and scientists escaped Mussolini’s facist government and took refuge in Paris. This is the story of Carlo Weisz and a handful of antifacists; the army officer known as “Colonel Ferrara” who fights for a lost cause in Spain; Arturo Salamone, the shrewd leader of a resistance group in Paris; and Christa von Schirren, the woman who becomes the love of Weisz’s life, involved in a doomed resistance underground in Berlin. Suspenseful and stylish – Furst at his best.
Gatsby’s Girl by Caroline Preston
Before he wrote some of the 20th century’s greatest fiction, before he married Zelda, F. Scott Fitzgerald loved Ginevra, a fickle, young Chicago socialite he met during a winter break from Princeton. After an ardent correspondence and one ill-fated visit, Ginevra threw over the soon-to-be-famous novelist and the rest is literary history. Preston imagines what life might have been like for Fitzgerald’s first love.
Los Angeles Noir edited by Denise Hamilton
A brand new collection of stories by LA’s finest – Michael Connelly, Janet Fitch, Susan Straight, Denise Hamilton and the Palisades own (at least he once lived here!) Scott Phillips offer tight tales of trapped men and women whose passions or desperate circumstances lead them to violent ends.
Messenger of Truth: A Maisie Dobbs Novel by Jacqueline Winspear
The night before an exhibition of his artwork opens, controversial artist Nick Bassington-Hope falls to his death. His twin sister seeks out Maisie Dobbs, psychologist and investigator, for help. Before long the case leads Maisie into the sinister underbelly of the city’s art world. Another vivid, thrilling, and unique episode in the life of Maisie Dobbs.
Restless by William Boyd
A masterful and thrilling espionage story from the author of Village Books’ favorite Any Human Heart. The book begins in England in 1976 and focuses on the everyday preoccupations of Ruth Gilmartin, a single mother who teaches English to foreigners in Oxford. Ruth’s life changes when her mother begins to reveal her past to her daughter – in the early years of WWII she was recruited as a spy by British Intelligence. In alternating chapters, Boyd tells the two women’s stories.
Rise and Shine by Anna Quindlen
Meghan Fitzmaurice is a household name as the host of “Rise and Shine”, the country’s highest-rated morning talk show. One day she cuts to a commercial break-but not before she mutters two forbidden words into her open mike, and in an instant, it’s the end of an era, not only for Meghan but also for her younger sister, Bridget, a social worker in the Bronx who has always lived in Meghan’s long shadow.
Thirteen Moons by Charles Frazier
Another stunner from the author of Cold Mountain. Orphaned Will Cooper is sold by his aunt and uncle as an indentured servant to a tradesman in the South Carolina moutains, at the edge of the Cherokee nation. He “wins” a girl from a mixed race Indian and will be besotted with her for the rest of his life. His passion will extend into personal involvements in Indian affairs to the highest level of politics. Like Cold Mountain, this is a slow and painfully beautiful read.
COMING LATER THIS SUMMER IN PAPERBACK…..
Digging to America by Anne Tyler
Tyler’s 17th novel considers what it is to be an American. Two families, who would otherwise never have come together, meet by chance at the Baltimore airport while awaiting the arrival of their adopted infant daughters from Korea. The very American Donaldsons invite Iranian born Maryam and her fully assimilated son and his attractive Iranian wife to celebrate the arrival of their daughters, and the two families become more and more deeply interwined. Like The Namesake, by Jhumpa Lahiri, which examines the immigrant experience of an Indian family, Digging to America reveals Maryam’s struggle with her feelings of “outsiderness” in contrast to the assimilation of her son, and the way the two families choose to raise their Korean born daughters. Another treat from Tyler!
The Keep by Jennifer Egan
Two cousins, irreversibly damaged by a childhood prank, reunite twenty years later to renovate a medieval castle in Eastern Europe. You don’t want to know too much about the plot of this gothic, creepy mindbender, so you can totally enjoy the experience of reading it. Imagination is the ultimate drug! Alto!
The Lay of the Land by Richard Ford
In 1985 Ford published The Sportswriter, and with protagonist Frank Bascombe began an epic story of everyman. Ten years later Bascombe returned in Independence Day, winner of both the Pulitzer Prize and the PEN/Faulkner award. The new novel unfolds in November 2000, with the Gore/Bush election still undecided and Thanksgiving on the way. Ford again summons a remarkable voice for now 55 year old Frank as he prepares for the family holiday and the ”permanent period” of life.
Talk Talk by T.C. Boyle 
If you have any anxiety about identity theft, you may never sleep peacefully again after reading this thriller. Our heroine, deaf schoolteacher Dana Halter, is pulled over for running a four-way stop sign and ends up in jail for actions taken by someone using her name and identity. When she is released, she and her boyfriend piece together enough information about the “other” Dana to follow him across the country in order to exact retribution for what the justice system deems a victimless crime. The book also offers insight into the experience of a deaf person in a hearing world and raises the question – what is identity?
HARDCOVER NONFICTION
The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
A black swan is a highly improbable event with three principal characteristics: it is unpredictable; it carries a massive impact; and, after the fact, we concoct an explanation that makes it appear less random. The rapid spread of the internet and the 9/11 attacks are examples. Taleb looks at why a book becomes a bestseller or how an entrepreneur becomes a billionaire, taking pit stops with philosophers who have addressed the meaning of the unexpected and confounding. Fans of The Tipping Point and Blink by Malcolm Gladwell will enjoy this.
The Canon: A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science by Natalie Angier
Buckle up for a joy ride through physics, chemistry, biology and astronomy with this guide to science by Pulitzer Prize winner Angier. It’s vital reading for anyone who wants to understand the great issues of our time – from stem cells and bird flu to evolution and global warning. I loved the review quote from Sylvia Nasar, author of A Beautiful Mind: “Natalie Angier makes planets and particles sexy…She turns guys with lab coats and pocket protectors into Daniel Craig.”
The Dangerous Book for Boys by Conn and Hal Iggulden 
The bestselling book for every boy from eight to eighty, covering essential boyhood skills such as building treehouses, learning how to fish, finding true north, and even answering the age old question of what the big deal with girls is. Dozens of short chapters, in fairly random order, cover a wide range of topics in conversational prose. The dangerous aspect is more apparent in such chapters as “Making Cloth Fireproof” and “Hunting and Cooking a Rabbit”, but also applies to the overall premise that action is fun and can be worth the risk. This book is classified as a children’s book, but we noticed that it’s the “more mature” children who really love it!
Empires of Blue Water: Captain Morgan’s Great Pirate Army, the Epic Battle for the Americas and the Catastrophe that Ended the Outlaws’ Bloo by Stephan Talty
This is the real story of the pirates of the Caribbean. Henry Morgan, a twenty year old Welshman, crossed the Atlantic in 1655, hell-bent on making his fortune. Over the next three decades, his exploits in the Caribbean in the service of the English became legendary. Awash with bloody battles, political intrigues, natural disaster and a cast of characters more compelling, bizarre and memorable than any found in a Hollywood swashbuckler!
Edith Wharton by Hermione Lee
Born in 1862, Wharton escaped the suffocating fate of the well-born female, traveled adventurously in Europe and eventually settled in France. She developed a forceful literary professionalism and thrived in a luminous society that included Aldous Huxley and Henry James. Wharton’s life was fed by nonliterary enthusiasms as well, including her fabled houses and gardens and her heroic relief efforts during the Great War. Yet intimacy eluded her – unhappily married and childless, her one brush with passion came and went with middle age.
The Last Mrs. Astor: A New York Story by Frances Keirnan
In this enjoyable and flattering biography, former New Yorker editor Frances Kiernan, who knows Mrs. Astor personally, describes how, after a disastrous early marriage, Brooke Astor married the notoriously ill-tempered Vincent Astor, who died in 1959. In a highly publicized courtroom battle, Brooke fought off an attempt to break Vincent’s will, which left some $67 million to the Vincent Astor Foundation. As the foundation’s president, Brooke used this money to benefit New York, where the Astor fortune was made. At her 100th birthday, princes and presidents honored her, but after reports that her son was keeping her on a shoestring budget in her Manhattan apartment, a grandson petitioned the courts to have his father removed as Brooke’s guardian. Once again, an Astor court battle became the stuff of headlines…
Mediterranean Summer: A Season on France’s Cote D’Azur and Italy’s Costa Bella by David Shalleck
Shalleck began his cooking career in some of New York’s and San Francisco’s best restaurants, and undertook a quest to discover what it really means to be a chef through a series of demanding internships in Provence and throughout Italy. Then he stumbled on a rare opportunity: to become chef on board “Serenity”, the classic sailing yacht owned by one of Italy’s most prominent couples. They present Shalleck with the ultimate challenge – to prepare all the meals for them and their guests for the summer, with no repeats, comprised exclusively of local ingredients that reflect the flavors of each port, presented flawlessly to the couple’s uncompromising taste – all from the confines of the yacht’s galley while at sea!
Plato and a Platypus Walk Into a Bar…: Understanding Philosophy Through Jokes by Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein
A lively, hilarious crash course through the great philosophical traditions, schools, concepts and thinkers. Some of the Big Ideas are Existentialism (what do Hegel and Bette Midler have in common?) and Philosophy of Language (how to express what its like being stranded on a desert island with Halle Berry). Its Philosophy 101 made funny!
Summer at Tiffany by Marjorie Hart 
The debut memoir from Hart, now age 82 and retired from a university post. She recalls the summer of 1945 when the Iowa sorority girl and her best friend ventured into Manhattan in search of shop-girl positions at Lord & Taylor. When that didn’t work out, they called on an affluent lawyer reference, who helped them get jobs as the first female pages at Tiffany & Co. Hart recounts all the excitement of that summer when she fell in love, learned unforgettable lessons and made life changing decisions. A real gem (no pun intended!).
Tales from Q School: Inside Golf’s Fifth Major by John Feinstein
The annual PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament is one of the most grueling competitions in any sport. Every fall, veterans and talented hopefuls sweat through six rounds of hell at Q school to get a shot at the PGA Tour. Feinstein tells the story of the players who compete for these coveted positions with accounts from the players, established winners, rising stars, the defeated and the endlessly hopeful.
PAPERBACK NONFICTION
1000 Places to See in the U.S.A. & Canada Before You Die by Patricia Schultz
The title says it all! Arranged by region with subject-specific indices in the back that sort the book by interest – wilderness, great dining, best beaches, world-class museums, sports and adventures, road trips, and more. There’s also an index that breaks out the best destinations for families with children. Following each entry are addresses, websites, phone numbers, costs and best times to visit.
American Vertigo: Traveling America in the Footsteps of Tocqueville by Bernard-Henri Levy
Levy is one of France’s most famous philosophers, and a bestselling author in Europe. He spent a year traveling throughout America in the footsteps of another great Frenchman, Alexis de Tocqueville, whose Democracy in America is one of the most influential books written about our country. Through interview based portraits across the spectrum of the American people, Levy fills his book with a tapestry of American voices.
Ava Gardner: Love is Nothing by Lee Server
In this first full biography of Gardner, Server recreates the actress’s life, from her beginnings as a barefoot North Carolina farm girl to her heady days as a Hollywood goddess. We see the full spectacle of her tumultuous private life, including her string of failed marriages to Mickey Rooney, Sinatra and Artie Shaw.
Hotel California: The True-Life Adventures of Crosby, Stills, Nash, Young, Mitchell, Taylor, Browne, Ronstadt, Geffen, the Eagles and T by Barney Hoskyns
Journalist Hoskyns re-creates all the excitement and mayhem of the L.A. pop music scene in the sixties and seventies. Drawing on candid firsthand interviews Hoskyns has conducted over more than three decades, Hotel California takes you on an intimate tour of the creative and personal lives of the legendary songwriters, superstars and producers who made the music that everyone listened (and still listens) to.
Laurel Canyon: The Inside Story of Rock-and-Roll’s Legendary Neighborhood by Michael Walker
In the late sixties and early seventies, an impromptu collection of musicians colonized a eucalyptus-scented canyon deep in the Hollywood Hills and melded folk, rock and American pop into a sound that conquered the world as the songs of the Beatles and Rolling Stones had before them. Veteran journalist Michael Walker tells the inside story of this unprecedented gathering of some of the baby boom’s leading musical lights, who turned Los Angeles into the music capital of the world and changed the way popular music is recorded, marketed and consumed.
The Mad Dog Hall of Fame: The Ultimate Top-Ten Rankings of the Best in Sports by Christopher Russo and Allen St. John Russo and St. John have put together an entertaining, fast-paced and provocative tour of the world of sports, full of close calls and tough choices designed not to end arguments… but to start them! Each chapter is full of intriguing facts and sidebars.
The Lemon Tree: An Arab, a Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East by Sandy Tolan
In 1967, a 25 year old Palestinian journeyed to Israel with the goal of seeing the beloved old stone house, with the lemon tree behind it, that he and his family had fled nineteen years earlier. When he found the house, it was inhabited by a nineteen year old Israeli college student, whose family fled Europe for Israel following the Holocaust. The two begin a rare friendship that is tested over the next 35 years in ways that neither could imagine. Tolan brings the Israeli-Palestinian conflict down to its most human level, suggesting that even amid bleak political realities, there exist stories of hope and reconciliation.
Reporting: Writings from the New Yorker by David Remnick
From the editor of The New Yorker comes a collection of his New Yorker profiles from the last 15 years. Profiles include the decline and fall of Mike Tyson; Al Gore’s struggle to move forward after his loss in the 2000 election, and Vladimir Putin dealing with Gorbachev’s legacy. An exciting and panoramic portrait of our times.
Uncommon Carriers by John McPhee
McPhee looks at the people who drive trucks, captain trucks and ships, pilot towboats, drive coal trains and carry lobsters through the air. McPhee’s prose is filled with his warm humor, keen insight, and rich sense of human character.