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New York Times Best Sellers - Non-Fiction
Description: Bookshare is pleased to offer the top 10 non-fiction books from the New York Times best seller list on a weekly basis. Books are added in as they become available. The month corresponds to the first time they appeared on the list. #adults
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Ejaculate Responsibly
by Gabrielle Stanley BlairTHE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERIn Ejaculate Responsibly, Gabrielle Blair offers a provocative reframing of the abortion issue in post-Roe America. In a series of 28 brief arguments, Blair deftly makes the case for moving the abortion debate away from controlling and legislating women&’s bodies and instead directs the focus on men&’s lack of accountability in preventing unwanted pregnancies. Highly readable, accessible, funny, and unflinching, Blair builds her argument by walking readers through the basics of fertility (men are 50 times more fertile than women), the unfair burden placed on women when it comes to preventing pregnancy (90% of the birth control market is for women), the wrongheaded stigmas around birth control for men (condoms make sex less pleasurable, vasectomies are scary and emasculating), and the counterintuitive reality that men, who are fertile 100% of the time, take little to no responsibility for preventing pregnancy. The result is a compelling and convincing case for placing the responsibility—and burden—of preventing unwanted pregnancies away from women and onto men.
Bibi
by Benjamin NetanyahuIn Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu’s sweeping, moving autobiography, one of the most formidable and insightful leaders of our time tells the story of his family, his path to leadership, and his unceasing commitment to defending Israel and securing its future.
From their earliest days, Bibi and his close-knit brothers, Yoni and Iddo, were instilled with purpose. Born in the wake of the Holocaust at the dawn of Israel’s independence and raised in a family with a prominent Zionist history, they understood that the Jewish state was a hard-won and still precarious gift. All three studied in American high schools—where they learned to appreciate the United States—before returning to their cherished homeland. The brothers joined an elite special forces outfit of the Israeli Defense Forces known as “the Unit.”
At twenty-two, Bibi was wounded while leading his team in the rescue of hostages from a hijacked plane. Four years later, in 1976, Yoni was killed in Entebbe, Uganda, while leading his men in one of the most daring hostage-rescue missions in modern times. Yoni became a legend; Bibi felt he would never recover from his grief. Yet, inspired by Yoni’s legacy and guided by the wisdom of his visionary historian father, Bibi thrust himself into the international struggle against terrorism, ultimately becoming the longest-serving prime minister in Israel’s history.
In this memoir Bibi weaves together his gripping personal story with the dramatic history of Israel and the Jewish people. Through a host of vivid anecdotes, he narrates his own evolution from soldier to statesman, while providing a unique perspective on leadership, the fraught geopolitics of the Middle East, and his successful efforts to liberate Israel’s economy, which helped turn it into a global powerhouse of technological innovation. Netanyahu gives colorful, detailed, and revealing accounts of his often turbulent relationships and negotiations with Presidents Clinton, Obama, and Trump. With eye-opening candor, he delves into the back channels of high diplomacy—including his struggle against the radical forces that threaten Israel and the world at large, and the decisive events that led to Israel’s groundbreaking 2020 peace agreements with four Arab states.
Offering an unflinching account of a life, a family, and a nation, Netanyahu writes from the heart and embraces controversy head-on. Steely and funny, high-tempo and full of verve, this autobiography will stand as a defining testament to the value of political conviction and personal courage.
New York Times Bestseller
Waxing On
by Ralph MacchioSince The Karate Kid first crane-kicked its way into the pop culture stratosphere in June 1984, there hasn’t been a week Ralph Macchio hasn’t heard friendly shouts of “Wax on, wax off” or “Sweep the leg!” Now, with Macchio reprising his role as Daniel LaRusso in the #1 ranked Netflix show Cobra Kai, he is finally ready to look back at this classic movie and give the fans something they’ve long craved.
The book will be Ralph Macchio’s celebratory reflection on the legacy of The Karate Kid in film, pop culture, and his own life. It will be a comprehensive look at a film that shaped him as much as it influenced the world. Macchio will share an insider's perspective of the untold story behind his starring role—the innocence of the early days, the audition process, and the filmmaking experience—as well as take readers through the birth of some of the film’s most iconic moments.
Ultimately, the book centers on the film itself, focusing on the reason that the characters and themes have endured in such a powerful way and how these personal experiences have impacted Macchio's life. It will bring readers back to the day they met Daniel LaRusso and Mr. Miyagi for the first time, but will also provide a fascinating lens into how our pasts shape all of us and how the past can come back to enrich one's life in surprising and wonderful ways.
New York Times Bestseller
The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man
by Paul NewmanNEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • The raw, candid, unvarnished memoir of an American icon. The greatest movie star of the past 75 years covers everything: his traumatic childhood, his career, his drinking, his thoughts on Marlon Brando, James Dean, Elizabeth Taylor, John Huston, his greatest roles, acting, his intimate life with Joanne Woodward, his innermost fears and passions and joys. With thoughts/comments throughout from Joanne Woodward, George Roy Hill, Tom Cruise, Elia Kazan and many others.A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: TIME and Vanity Fair"Newman at his best…with his self-aware persona, storied marriage and generous charitable activities…this rich book somehow imbues his characters&’ pain and joy with fresh technicolor." —The Wall Street JournalIn 1986, Paul Newman and his closest friend, screenwriter Stewart Stern, began an extraordinary project. Stuart was to compile an oral history, to have Newman&’s family and friends and those who worked closely with him, talk about the actor&’s life. And then Newman would work with Stewart and give his side of the story. The only stipulation was that anyone who spoke on the record had to be completely honest. That same stipulation applied to Newman himself. The project lasted five years. The result is an extraordinary memoir, culled from thousands of pages of transcripts. The book is insightful, revealing, surprising. Newman&’s voice is powerful, sometimes funny, sometimes painful, always meeting that high standard of searing honesty. The additional voices—from childhood friends and Navy buddies, from family members and film and theater collaborators such as Tom Cruise, George Roy Hill, Martin Ritt, and John Huston—that run throughout add richness and color and context to the story Newman is telling. Newman&’s often traumatic childhood is brilliantly detailed. He talks about his teenage insecurities, his early failures with women, his rise to stardom, his early rivals (Marlon Brando and James Dean), his first marriage, his drinking, his philanthropy, the death of his son Scott, his strong desire for his daughters to know and understand the truth about their father. Perhaps the most moving material in the book centers around his relationship with Joanne Woodward—their love for each other, his dependence on her, the way she shaped him intellectually, emotionally and sexually. The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man is revelatory and introspective, personal and analytical, loving and tender in some places, always complex and profound.
And There Was Light
by Jon MeachamPulitzer Prize–winning biographer and #1 New York Times bestselling author Jon Meacham chronicles the life of Abraham Lincoln, charting how—and why—he confronted secession, threats to democracy, and the tragedy of slavery to expand the possibilities of America.
A president who governed a divided country has much to teach us in a twenty-first-century moment of polarization and political crisis. Hated and hailed, excoriated and revered, Abraham Lincoln was at the pinnacle of American power when implacable secessionists gave no quarter in a clash of visions bound up with money, race, identity, and faith. In him we can see the possibilities of the presidency as well as its limitations.
At once familiar and elusive, Lincoln tends to be seen as the greatest of American presidents—a remote icon—or as a politician driven more by calculation than by conviction. This illuminating new portrait gives us a very human Lincoln—an imperfect man whose moral antislavery commitment, essential to the story of justice in America, began as he grew up in an antislavery Baptist community; who insisted that slavery was a moral evil; and who sought, as he put it, to do right as God gave him to see the right.
This book tells the story of Lincoln from his birth on the Kentucky frontier in 1809 to his leadership during the Civil War to his tragic assassination in 1865: his rise, his self-education, his loves, his bouts of depression, his political failures, his deepening faith, and his persistent conviction that slavery must end. In a nation shaped by the courage of the enslaved of the era and by the brave witness of Black Americans, Lincoln’s story illustrates the ways and means of politics in a democracy, the roots and durability of racism, and the capacity of conscience to shape events.
New York Times Bestseller
Beyond the Wand
by Tom FeltonFrom the magical moments on set as Draco Malfoy to the challenges of growing up in the spotlight, get a backstage pass into Tom Felton&’s life on and off the big screen in this #1 New York Times bestseller. Tom Felton&’s adolescence was anything but ordinary. His early rise to fame in beloved films like The Borrowers catapulted him into the limelight, but nothing could prepare him for what was to come after he landed the iconic role of the Draco Malfoy, the bleached blonde villain of the Harry Potter movies. For the next ten years, he was at the center of a huge pop culture phenomenon and yet, in between filming, he would go back to being a normal teenager trying to fit into a normal school. Speaking with great candor and his signature humor, Tom shares his experience growing up as part of the wizarding world while also trying to navigate the muggle world. He tells stories from his early days in the business like his first acting gig where he was mistaken for fellow blonde child actor Macaulay Culkin and his Harry Potter audition where, in a very Draco-like move, he fudged how well he knew the books the series was based on (not at all). He reflects on his experiences working with cinematic greats such as Alan Rickman, Sir Michael Gambon, Dame Maggie Smith, and Ralph Fiennes (including that awkward Voldemort hug). And, perhaps most poignantly, he discusses the lasting relationships he made over that decade of filming, including with Emma Watson, who started out as a pesky nine-year-old whom he mocked for not knowing what a boom mic was but who soon grew into one of his dearest friends. Then, of course, there are the highs and lows of fame and navigating life after such a momentous and life-changing experience. Tom Felton&’s Beyond the Wand is an entertaining, funny, and poignant must-read for any Harry Potter fan. Prepare to meet a real-life wizard.
Visual Thinking
by Temple GrandinINSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERWINNER OF THE NAUTILUS GOLD AWARD&“A powerful and provocative testament to the diverse coalition of minds we&’ll need to face the mounting challenges of the twenty-first century.&” —Steve Silberman &“An absolute eye-opener.&” —Frans de WaalA landmark book that reveals, celebrates, and advocates for the special minds and contributions of visual thinkersA quarter of a century after her memoir, Thinking in Pictures, forever changed how the world understood autism, Temple Grandin— &“an anthropologist on Mars,&” as Oliver Sacks dubbed her—transforms our awareness of the different ways our brains are wired. Do you have a keen sense of direction, a love of puzzles, the ability to assemble furniture without crying? You are likely a visual thinker. With her genius for demystifying science, Grandin draws on cutting-edge research to take us inside visual thinking. Visual thinkers constitute a far greater proportion of the population than previously believed, she reveals, and a more varied one, from the photo-realistic &“object visualizers&” like Grandin herself, with their intuitive knack for design and problem solving, to the abstract, mathematically inclined &“visual spatial&” thinkers who excel in pattern recognition and systemic thinking. She also makes us understand how a world increasingly geared to the verbal tends to sideline visual thinkers, screening them out at school and passing over them in the workplace. Rather than continuing to waste their singular gifts, driving a collective loss in productivity and innovation, Grandin proposes new approaches to educating, parenting, employing, and collaborating with visual thinkers. In a highly competitive world, this important book helps us see, we need every mind on board.
Hold the Line
by John Shiffman and Michael FanoneAn urgent warning about the growing threat to our democracy from a twenty-year police veteran and former Trump supporter who nearly lost his life during the insurrection of January 6th.
When Michael Fanone self-deployed to the Capitol on January 6, 2021, he had no idea his life was about to change. When he got to the front of the line, he urged his fellow officers to hold it against the growing crowd of insurrectionists—until he found himself pulled into the mob, tased until he had a heart attack, and viciously beaten with a Blue Lives Matter flag as shouts to kill him rang out.
Now, Fanone is ready to tell the full story of that fateful day, along with exploring our country’s most critical issues as someone who has had firsthand experience with many of them. A self-described redneck who voted for Trump in 2016, Fanone’s closest friend was an informant—a Black, transgender, HIV-positive woman who has helped him mature and rethink his methods as a police officer.
With his unique insight as an undercover detective and intense desire to do the right thing no matter the cost, Fanone provides a nuanced look into everything from policing to race to politics in a way that is accessible across all party lines. Determined to make sure no one forgets what happened at the Capitol on January 6th, Fanone has written a timely call to action for anyone who wants to preserve our democracy for future generations.
New York Times Bestseller
Getting Lost
by Annie ErnauxThe diary of one of France’s most important, award-winning writers during the year she had a passionate and secret love affair with a Russian diplomat. Getting Lost is the diary Annie Ernaux kept during the year and a half she had a secret love affair with a younger, married man, a Russian diplomat. Her novel, Simple Passion, was based on this affair, but here her writing is immediate, unfiltered.
In these diaries it is 1989 and Annie is divorced with two grown sons, living outside of Paris and nearing fifty. Her lover escapes the city to see her there and Ernaux seems to survive only in expectation of these encounters, saying “his desire for me is the only thing I can be sure of.” She cannot write, she trudges distractedly through her various other commitments in the world, she awaits his next call; she lives only to feel desire and for the next rendezvous. When he is gone and the desire has faded, she feels that she is a step closer to death.
Lauded for her spare prose, Ernaux here removes all artifice, her writing pared down to its most naked and vulnerable. Getting Lost is as strong a book as any that she has written, a haunting, desperate view of strong and successful woman who seduces a man only to lose herself in love and desire.
New York Times Bestseller
Confidence Man
by Maggie HabermanFrom the Pulitzer-Prize-winning New York Times reporter who has defined Donald J. Trump's presidency like no other journalist, Confidence Man is a magnificent and disturbing reckoning that chronicles his life and its meaning from his rise in New York City to his tortured post-presidency. Few journalists working today have covered Donald Trump more extensively than Maggie Haberman. And few understand him and his motivations better. Now, demonstrating her majestic command of this story, Haberman reveals in full the depth of her understanding of the 45th president himself, and of what the Trump phenomenon means. Interviews with hundreds of sources and numerous interviews over the years with Trump himself portray a complicated and often contradictory historical figure. Capable of kindness but relying on casual cruelty as it suits his purposes. Pugnacious. Insecure. Lonely. Vindictive. Menacing. Smarter than his critics contend and colder and more calculating than his allies believe. A man who embedded himself in popular culture, galvanizing support for a run for high office that he began preliminary spadework for 30 years ago, to ultimately become a president who pushed American democracy to the brink. The through-line of Trump&’s life and his presidency is the enduring question of what is in it for him or what he needs to say to survive short increments of time in the pursuit of his own interests. Confidence Man is also, inevitably, about the world that produced such a singular character, giving rise to his career and becoming his first stage. It is also about a series of relentlessly transactional relationships. The ones that shaped him most were with girlfriends and wives, with Roy Cohn, with George Steinbrenner, with Mike Tyson and Don King and Roger Stone, with city and state politicians like Robert Morgenthau and Rudy Giuliani, with business partners, with prosecutors, with the media, and with the employees who toiled inside what they commonly called amongst themselves the &“Trump Disorganization.&” That world informed the one that Trump tried to recreate while in the White House. All of Trump&’s behavior as President had echoes in what came before. In this revelatory and newsmaking book, Haberman brings together the events of his life into a single mesmerizing work. It is the definitive account of one of the most norms-shattering and consequential eras in American political history.
Adrift
by Scott GallowayFrom bestselling author, CNN+ host of No Mercy, No Malice, and NYU business school professor Scott Galloway comes an urgent examination of the future of our nation – and how we got here.
We are only just beginning to reckon with our post-pandemic future. As political extremism intensifies, the great resignation affects businesses everywhere, and supply chain issues crush bottom lines, we’re faced with daunting questions: Is our democracy under threat? How will Big Tech change our lives? What does job security look like for me? America is on the brink of massive change—change that will disrupt the workings of our economy and drastically impact the financial backbone of our nation: the middle class.
In Adrift, Galloway looks to the past —from 1945 to present day—to explain just how America arrived at this precipice. Telling the story of our nation through 100 charts, Galloway demonstrates how crises such as Jim Crow, World War II, and the Stock Market Crash of 2008, as well as the escalating power of technology, an entrenched white patriarchy, and the socio-economic effects of the pandemic, created today’s perfect storm. Adrift attempts to make sense of it all, and offers Galloway’s unique take on where we’re headed and who we’ll become, touching on topics as wide-ranging as online dating to minimum wage to the American dream. Just as in 1945 and 1980, America is once again a nation at a crossroads. This time, what will it take for our nation to keep up with the fast and violent changes to our new world?
New York Times Bestseller
Killing the Legends
by Bill O'Reilly and Martin DugardIn the next book in the multimillion-selling Killing Series, Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard tell the larger-than-life stories of Elvis Presley, John Lennon, and Muhammad Ali.The King is dead. The Walrus is shot. The Greatest is no more.Elvis Presley, John Lennon, and Muhammad Ali. These three icons changed not only the worlds of music, film, and sports, but the world itself. Their faces were known everywhere, in every nation, across every culture. And their stories became larger than life—until their lives spun out of control at the hands of those they most trusted.In Killing the Legends, Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard explore the lives, legacies, and tragic deaths of three of the most famous people of the 20th century. Each experienced immense success, then failures that forced them to change; each faced the challenge of growing old in fields that privilege youth; and finally, each became isolated, cocooned by wealth but vulnerable to the demands of those in their innermost circles. Dramatic, insightful, and immensely entertaining, Killing the Legends is the twelfth book in O’Reilly and Dugard’s Killing series: the most popular series of narrative history books in the world, with more than 18 million copies in print.
Allow Me To Retort
by Elie MystalAllow Me to Retort is an easily digestible argument about what rights we have, what rights Republicans are trying to take away, and how to stop them.
Mystal explains how to protect the rights of women and people of color instead of cowering to the absolutism of gun owners and bigots. He explains the legal way to stop everything from police brutality to political gerrymandering, just by changing a few judges and justices. He strips out all of the fancy jargon conservatives like to hide behind and lays bare the truth of their project to keep America forever tethered to its slaveholding past.
Mystal brings his trademark humor, expertise, and rhetorical flair to explain concepts like substantive due process and the right for the LGBTQ community to buy a cake, and to arm listeners with the knowledge to defend themselves against conservatives who want everybody to live under the yoke of 18th-century White men. The same tactics Mystal uses to defend the idea of a fair and equal society on MSNBC and CNN are in this book, for anybody who wants to deploy them on social media.
You don’t need to be a legal scholar to understand your own rights. You don’t need to accept the “Whites only” theory of equality pushed by conservative judges. You can listen to this book to understand that the Constitution is trash but doesn’t have to be.
Playing With Myself
by Randy RainbowAn intimate and light-hearted memoir by viral sensation and three-time Emmy-nominated musical comedian Randy Rainbow that takes readers through his life―the highs, the lows, the lipstick, the pink glasses, and the show tunes.
Randy Rainbow, the man who conquered the Internet with a stylish pair of pink glasses, an inexhaustible knowledge of Broadway musicals, and the most gimlet-eyed view of American politics this side of Mark Twain finally tells all in Playing with Myself, a memoir sure to cause more than a few readers to begin singing one of his greatest hits like “A Spoonful of Clorox” or “Cover Your Freakin’ Face.”
As Randy has said, “There’s so much fake news out there about me. I can’t wait to set the record straight and finally give people a peek behind the green screen.” And set the record straight he does. Playing with Myself is a first-hand account of the journey that led Randy Rainbow from his childhood as the over-imaginative, often misunderstood little boy who carried a purse in the second grade to his first job on Broadway as the host at Hooters and on to the creation of his trademark comedy character. In chapters titled “Pajama Bottoms” (a look back at the days when he wore pajama bottoms on his head to pretend he was Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz), “Yes, It’s My Real Name, Shut Up!” (no explanation necessary...) and “Pink Glasses” (a rose-colored homage to his favorite accessory), Playing with Myself is a memoir that answers the question “Can an introverted musical theatre nerd with a MacBook and a dream save the world, one show tune at a time?”
Just Tyrus
by TyrusPro wrestler and political commentator Tyrus goes deep into his wild but triumphant life story, from his painfully dysfunctional upbringing to bodyguarding for Snoop Dogg, to becoming a wrestling icon and one of the most provocative on-air voices today. “I loved Just Tyrus. I read it in one day and cheered for him when I got to the end. Tyrus has written a book that is at once raw, tender, intelligent, candid, and hilarious. Tyrus took a very rough start to his life and used perseverance, confident humility, and accountability to land firmly on his feet. What a triumph!” —Dana Perino, former White House Press Secretary to George W. Bush and Fox News anchor and host The product of a 1970s mixed marriage, George Murdoch learned to fight early in life, fending off both race-baiting bullies and the demons of a dysfunctional home. Couch surfing all through high school and most of college, the quick-witted, sharp-tongued giant played football, ran drugs, and bounced at clubs to try to survive. After a false start with the WWE, he eventually became Snoop Dogg’s bodyguard and traveled the world with the hip hop legend, biding his time and honing his rap. When the WWE urged him to return, George became “Brodus Clay” and, for the next several years, reinvented himself numerous times under the watchful mentorship of the legendary Dusty Rhodes, “the American Dream.” He was eventually christened “Tyrus,” and shortly after, a chance social media encounter with Greg Gutfeld at Fox News resulted in Tyrus finding a new skill: sage social commentator. Ferociously funny, blunt, and tenacious, Just Tyrus traces his unlikely and spectacular rise. As always with Tyrus, it’s in-your-face and offers no apologies. “George aka Tyrus aka the realest most blunt human being on the face of planet earth. Never had a problem telling you what was on his mind or how he felt, good or bad. Tough exterior but a heart of gold. Front liner, great friend, and excellent coach for my youth football team. His work ethic is obvious, taking him from football to bodyguard to pro wrestler to a superb personality on Fox News. I’ve seen him climb the ladder of success, and I’m happy that I was along for the journey.” —Snoop Dogg
Secret City
by James KirchickWashington, D.C., has always been a city of secrets. Few have been more dramatic than the ones revealed in James Kirchick’s Secret City.
For decades, the specter of homosexuality haunted Washington. The mere suggestion that a person might be gay destroyed reputations, ended careers, and ruined lives. At the height of the Cold War, fear of homosexuality became intertwined with the growing threat of international communism, leading to a purge of gay men and lesbians from the federal government. In the fevered atmosphere of political Washington, the secret “too loathsome to mention” held enormous, terrifying power.
Utilizing thousands of pages of declassified documents, interviews with over one hundred people, and material unearthed from presidential libraries and archives around the country, Secret City is a chronicle of American politics like no other. Beginning with the tragic story of Sumner Welles, Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s brilliant diplomatic advisor and the man at the center of “the greatest national scandal since the existence of the United States,” James Kirchick illuminates how homosexuality shaped each successive presidential administration through the end of the twentieth century. Cultural and political anxiety over gay people sparked a decades-long witch hunt, impacting everything from the rivalry between the CIA and the FBI to the ascent of Joseph McCarthy, the struggle for Black civil rights, and the rise of the conservative movement. Among other revelations, Kirchick tells of the World War II–era gay spymaster who pioneered seduction as a tool of American espionage, the devoted aide whom Lyndon Johnson treated as a son yet abandoned once his homosexuality was discovered, and how allegations of a “homosexual ring” controlling Ronald Reagan nearly derailed his 1980 election victory.
Magisterial in scope and intimate in detail, Secret City will forever transform our understanding of American history.
Tanqueray
by Stephanie Johnson and Brandon Stanton"A deeply touching memoir . . . A beautiful, sometimes shocking NC-17 story, kept out of the lily-white, upper crust canon of literature--until now."" --The Washington Post The storytelling phenomenon Humans of New York and its #1 bestselling books have captivated a global audience of millions with personal narratives that illuminate the human condition. But one story stands apart from the rest... She is a woman as fabulous, unbowed, and irresistible as the city she lives in. Meet TANQUERAY. In 2019, Humans of New York featured a photo of a woman in an outrageous fur coat and hat she made herself. She instantly captured the attention of millions. Her name is Stephanie Johnson, but she's better known to HONY followers as ""Tanqueray,"" a born performer who was once one of the best-known burlesque dancers in New York City. Reeling from a brutal childhood, immersed in a world of go-go dancers and hustlers, dirty cops and gangsters, Stephanie was determined to become the fiercest thing the city had ever seen. And she succeeded. Real, raw, and unapologetically honest, this is the full story of Tanqueray as told by Brandon Stanton--a book filled with never-before-told stories of Tanqueray's struggles and triumphs through good times and bad, personal photos from her own collection, and glimpses of New York City from back in the day when the name "Tanqueray" was on everyone's lips."
That Bird Has My Wings
by Jarvis Jay MastersJarvis Jay Masters has taken an extraordinary journey of faith. Strangely enough, his moment of enlightenment came behind the bars of San Quentin's death row.
In this compelling memoir, inmate and author Jarvis Jay Masters takes us from the arms of his heroin-addicted mother to an abusive foster home, on his escape to the illusory freedom of the streets and through lonely nights spent in bus stations and juvenile homes, and finally to life inside the walls of San Quentin State Prison. Using the nub and filler from a ballpoint pen (the only writing instrument allowed him in solitary confinement), Masters chronicles the story of a bright boy who turns to a life of crime, and of a penitent man who embraces Buddhism to find hope in this ultimately inspirational story.
Masters has written his remarkable story as a cautionary tale for anyone who might be tempted to follow in his footsteps, and as a plea for under-standing to a world that too often ignores the plight of the forgotten members of society. His personal story dramatically reminds us all that freedom and opportunity are not to be taken for granted, and that no matter what their neighborhood, no matter what their race, every child matters.
New York Times Bestseller
American Psychosis
by David Corn#1 New York Times bestselling author and investigative reporter David Corn tells the wild and harrowing story of the Republican Party&’s decades-long relationship with far-right extremism, bigotry, and paranoia. A fast-paced, rollicking, behind-the-scenes account of how the GOP since the 1950s has encouraged and exploited extremism, bigotry, and paranoia to gain power, American Psychosis offers readers a brisk, can-you-believe-it journey through the netherworld of far-right irrationality and the Republican Party&’s interactions with the darkest forces in America. In a compelling and thoroughly-researched narrative, Corn reveals the hidden history of how the Party of Lincoln forged alliances with extremists, kooks, racists, and conspiracy-mongers and fostered fear, anger, and resentment to win elections—and how this led to Donald Trump&’s triumph and the transformation of the GOP into a Trump personality cult that foments and bolsters the crazy and dangerous excesses of the right. The Trump-incited insurrectionist attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, was no aberration. American Psychosis shows it was a continuation of the long and deep-rooted Republican practice of boosting and weaponizing the rage and derangement of the right. The gripping tale in American Psychosis covers the last seven decades. From McCarthyism to the John Birch Society to segregationists to the New Right to the religious right to Rush Limbaugh to Newt Gingrich to the militia movement to Fox News to Sarah Palin to the Tea Party to Trumpism, the Republican Party has deliberately nurtured and exploited rightwing fear and loathing fueled by paranoia, grievance, and tribalism. This powerful and important account explains how one political party has harnessed the worst elements in politics to poison the nation&’s discourse and threaten American democracy. "[Corn is] a great journalist. I love the way he thinks. I love the way he writes. I'm so glad he's done a super-readable, modern history of the right...We just need smart, digestible history about this stuff right now...[American Psychosis] is perfectly timed...Relevant history for where we are right now." —Rachel Maddow, host, The Rachel Maddow Show "With American Psychosis, David Corn 'did the full homework to take us all the way back to where it really begins.&’" —Lawrence O'Donnell, host, The Last Word
The Mosquito Bowl
by Buzz BissingerAn extraordinary, untold story of the Second World War in the vein of Unbroken and The Boys in the Boat, from the author of Friday Night Lights and Three Nights in August.
When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, college football was at the height of its popularity. As the nation geared up for total war, one branch of the service dominated the aspirations of college football stars: the United States Marine Corps. Which is why, on Christmas Eve of 1944, when the 4th and 29th Marine regiments found themselves in the middle of the Pacific Ocean training for what would be the bloodiest battle of the war—the invasion of Okinawa—their ranks included one of the greatest pools of football talent ever assembled: Former All Americans, captains from Wisconsin and Brown and Notre Dame, and nearly twenty men who were either drafted or would ultimately play in the NFL.
When the trash-talking between the 4th and 29th over who had the better football team reached a fever pitch, it was decided: The two regiments would play each other in a football game as close to the real thing as you could get in the dirt and coral of Guadalcanal. The bruising and bloody game that followed became known as “The Mosquito Bowl.” Within a matter of months, 15 of the 65 players in “The Mosquito Bowl” would be killed at Okinawa, by far the largest number of American athletes ever to die in a single battle.
The Mosquito Bowl is the story of these brave and beautiful young men, those who survived and those who did not. It is the story of the families and the landscape that shaped them. It is a story of a far more innocent time in both college athletics and the life of the country, and of the loss of that innocence.
Writing with the style and rigor that won him a Pulitzer Prize and have made several of his books modern classics, Buzz Bissinger takes us from the playing fields of America’s campuses where boys played at being Marines, to the final time they were allowed to still be boys on that field of dirt and coral, to the darkest and deadliest days that followed at Okinawa.
New York Times Bestseller
Profiles in Ignorance
by Andy BorowitzAndy Borowitz, “one of the funniest people in America” (CBS Sunday Morning), brilliantly examines the intellectual deterioration of American politics, from Ronald Reagan to Dan Quayle, from George W. Bush to Sarah Palin, to its apotheosis in Donald J. Trump.
The winner of the first-ever National Press Club award for humor, Andy Borowitz has been called a “Swiftian satirist” (The Wall Street Journal) and “one of the country’s finest satirists” (The New York Times). Millions of fans and New Yorker readers enjoy his satirical news column “The Borowitz Report.” Now, in Profiles in Ignorance, he offers a witty, spot-on diagnosis of our country’s political troubles by showing how ignorant leaders are degrading, embarrassing, and endangering our nation.
Borowitz argues that over the past fifty years, American politicians have grown increasingly allergic to knowledge, and mass media have encouraged the election of ignoramuses by elevating candidates who are better at performing than thinking. Starting with Ronald Reagan’s first campaign for governor of California in 1966 and culminating with the election of Donald J. Trump to the White House, Borowitz shows how, during the age of twenty-four-hour news and social media, the US has elected politicians to positions of great power whose lack of the most basic information is terrifying. In addition to Reagan, Quayle, Bush, Palin, and Trump, Borowitz covers a host of congresspersons, senators, and governors who have helped lower the bar over the past five decades.
Profiles in Ignorance aims to make us both laugh and cry: laugh at the idiotic antics of these public figures, and cry at the cataclysms these icons of ignorance have caused. But most importantly, the book delivers a call to action and a cause for optimism: History doesn’t move in a straight line, and we can change course if we act now.
New York Times Bestseller
Like a Rolling Stone
by Jann S. WennerIn this New York Times bestseller, Rolling Stone founder, co-editor, and publisher Jann Wenner offers a "touchingly honest" and "wonderfully deep" memoir from the beating heart of classic rock and roll (Bruce Springsteen). Jann Wenner has been called by his peers &“the greatest editor of his generation.&” His deeply personal memoir vividly describes and brings you inside the music, the politics, and the lifestyle of a generation, an epoch of cultural change that swept America and beyond. The age of rock and roll in an era of consequence, what will be considered one of the great watersheds in modern history. Wenner writes with the clarity of a journalist and an essayist. He takes us into the life and work of Bob Dylan, John Lennon, Mick Jagger, Bono, and Bruce Springsteen, to name a few. He was instrumental in the careers of Hunter S. Thompson, Tom Wolfe, and Annie Leibovitz. His journey took him to the Oval Office with his legendary interviews with Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, leaders to whom Rolling Stone gave its historic, full-throated backing. From Jerry Garcia to the Dalai Lama, Aretha Franklin to Greta Thunberg, the people Wenner chose to be seen and heard in the pages of Rolling Stone tried to change American culture, values, and morality.Like a Rolling Stone is a beautifully written portrait of one man&’s life, and the life of his generation.
The Myth of Normal
by Gabor MatéBy the acclaimed author of In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts, a groundbreaking investigation into the causes of illness, a bracing critique of how our society breeds disease, and a pathway to health and healing.
In this revolutionary book, renowned physician Gabor Maté eloquently dissects how in Western countries that pride themselves on their healthcare systems, chronic illness and general ill health are on the rise. Nearly 70 percent of Americans are on at least one prescription drug; more than half take two. In Canada, every fifth person has high blood pressure. In Europe, hypertension is diagnosed in more than 30 percent of the population. And everywhere, adolescent mental illness is on the rise. So what is really “normal” when it comes to health?
Over four decades of clinical experience, Maté has come to recognize the prevailing understanding of “normal” as false, neglecting the roles that trauma and stress, and the pressures of modern-day living, exert on our bodies and our minds at the expense of good health. For all our expertise and technological sophistication, Western medicine often fails to treat the whole person, ignoring how today’s culture stresses the body, burdens the immune system, and undermines emotional balance.
Now Maté brings his perspective to the great untangling of common myths about what makes us sick, connects the dots between the maladies of individuals and the declining soundness of society—and offers a compassionate guide for health and healing. Cowritten with his son Daniel, The Myth of Normal is Maté’s most ambitious and urgent book yet.
New York Times Bestseller
Dinners with Ruth
by Nina TotenbergCelebrated NPR correspondent Nina Totenberg delivers an extraordinary memoir of her personal successes, struggles, and life-affirming relationships, including her beautiful friendship of nearly fifty years with Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.Four years before Nina Totenberg was hired at NPR, where she cemented her legacy as a prizewinning reporter, and nearly twenty-two years before Ruth Bader Ginsburg was appointed to the Supreme Court, Nina called Ruth. A reporter for The National Observer, Nina was curious about Ruth&’s legal brief, asking the Supreme Court to do something revolutionary: declare a law that discriminated &“on the basis of sex&” to be unconstitutional. In a time when women were fired for becoming pregnant, often could not apply for credit cards, or get a mortgage in their own names, Ruth patiently explained her argument. That call launched a remarkable, nearly fifty-year friendship. Dinners with Ruth is an extraordinary account of two women who paved the way for future generations by tearing down professional and legal barriers. It is also an intimate memoir of the power of friendships as women began to pry open career doors and transform the workplace. At the story&’s heart is one, special relationship: Ruth and Nina saw each other not only through personal joys, but also illness, loss, and widowhood. During the devastating illness and eventual death of Nina&’s first husband, Ruth drew her out of grief; twelve years later, Nina would reciprocate when Ruth&’s beloved husband died. They shared not only a love of opera, but also of shopping, as they instinctively understood that clothes were armor for women who wanted to be taken seriously in a workplace dominated by men. During Ruth&’s last year, they shared so many small dinners that Saturdays were &“reserved for Ruth&” in Nina&’s house. Dinners with Ruth also weaves together compelling, personal portraits of other fascinating women and men from Nina&’s life, including her cherished NPR colleagues Cokie Roberts and Linda Wertheimer; her beloved husbands; her friendships with multiple Supreme Court Justices, including Lewis Powell, William Brennan, and Antonin Scalia, and Nina&’s own family—her father, the legendary violinist Roman Totenberg, and her &“best friends,&” her sisters. Inspiring and revelatory, Dinners with Ruth is a moving story of the joy and true meaning of friendship.
Holding the Line
by Geoffrey Berman"Throughout my tenure as US attorney, Trump's Justice Department kept demanding that I use my office to aid them politically, and I kept declining—in ways just tactful enough to keep me from being fired. I walked this tightrope for two and a half years. Eventually, the rope snapped." - from Holding the Line.
The gripping and explosive memoir of serving as US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, in the face of the Justice Department’s attempts to protect Trump’s friends and punish his enemies.
Ascending to the leadership role of US Attorney for the Southern District, which includes Manhattan and several counties to the north, is a capstone to any legal career: it entails guiding a team of the best lawyers in America in selecting and winning cases that often have global import. Geoffrey Berman was honored to be tapped for the job by Donald Trump in 2018. The manner in which Trump had dispatched his predecessor, Preet Bharara, was troubling, but the institution was fabled for its independence. Surely he could manage. So began one of the most tumultuous two-and-a-half-year stretches in the over two-hundred-thirty year history of the office. Almost immediately, Berman found himself pushing back against the Trump Justice Department’s blatant efforts to bring weak cases against political foes and squash worthy cases that threatened to tarnish allies and Trump himself. When Bill Barr became attorney general, Berman hoped and believed things would get better, but instead they got much worse.
The heart of Holding the Line is his never-before-told account of the lengths Barr went to in corrupting the independence of the office, and the lengths Berman had to go in preserving it. Finally, Trump and Barr, fed up with Berman’s principles, summarily fired him, though he refused to go quietly and prevented Barr from installing someone who might be more compliant. Berman’s determined defense of the values of prosecutorial independence, without fear or favor, made him a hero to everyone who shares those values.
Holding the Line also relates the remarkable casework of the Southern District in Berman’s time there, including taking down notorious sex traffickers Jeffrey Epstein and Lawrence Ray, Big Pharma executives, and vicious criminal syndicates, and repatriating Nazi-looted art. Riveting in themselves, these stories showcase the esprit de corps that makes the Southern District so special, and the stakes Berman felt in protecting its integrity against all foes, up to and including the US attorney general and the president of the United States.
New York Times Bestseller