Featured Selections

My Life With the Green and Gold

by Jessie Garcia
Sports
Wisconsin Historical Press
Paperback, 240 pages
$18.95

OK, Packers fans! Here are two new, fun and interesting books for your Packer bookshelf. Jesse Garcia was an unlikely voice of the Packers – she is a woman, a minority and, as a Madison East High cheerleader, she didn’t have a clue about the game. She grew into it and juggled her life as a traveling sportscaster and mother. She reported three Packer Super Bowls and did the coach’s Monday shows with both Holmgren and McCarthy. It’s a personal story loaded with grace and humor.

The Day the Crayons Quit

by Drew Daywalt
Childrens
Philomel
Hardcover, 40 pages
$17.99

Poor Duncan just wants to color. But when he opens his box of crayons, he finds only letters, all saying the same thing: We quit!
Beige is tired of playing second fiddle to Brown. Blue needs a break from coloring all that water, while Pink just wants to be used. Green has no complaints, but Orange and Yellow are no longer speaking to each other.
What is Duncan to do? Debut author Drew Daywalt and New York Times bestseller Oliver Jeffers create a colorful solution in this playful, imaginative story that will have children laughing and playing with their crayons in a whole new way.

The Unlikely Pimgrimage of Harold Fry

by Rachel Joyce
General Fiction
Random House
Paperback, 384 pages
$15.00

Harold Fry is convinced that he must deliver a letter to an old love in order to save her, meeting various characters along the way and reminiscing about the events of his past and people he has known, as he tries to find peace and acceptance. Harold intends a quick walk to the corner mailbox to post his reply but instead, inspired by a chance encounter, he becomes convinced he must deliver his message in person to Queenie--who is 600 miles away--because as long as he keeps walking, Harold believes that Queenie will not die. So without hiking boots, rain gear, map or cell phone, one of the most endearing characters in current fiction begins his unlikely pilgrimage across the English countryside. Along the way, strangers stir up memories--flashbacks, often painful, from when his marriage was filled with promise and then not, of his inadequacy as a father, and of his shortcomings as a husband.

This book has been a customer favorite, and a popular book club choice. You may want to consider it for yours!

The Power of Latino Leadership

by Juana Bordas
General Non-Fiction
Berrett-Koehler Publishers
Paperback, 240 pages
$19.95

By 2050, one in three Americans will be Hispanic/Latino!  One in three! That will cause a sea change in the socio-economic landscape of our once predominately Anglo land. Ray Suarez of NPR says this book “decodes” this new America and its changing workforce demographics. We agree. Bordas tells this story through the voices of nine diverse and outstanding Latino leaders ranging from Dolores Huerta, a founder of the United Farm Workers, to Julian Castro, the mayor of San Antonio and a rising, young political star on the national scene. But, most compelling is Ms. Bordas’ own voice and experience. Her birth in the jungles of Northeastern Nicaragua; her arrival in Florida aboard (literally) a banana boat; her early schooling as a non-English-speaking pupil; her assimilation in a sorority at the University of Florida; and, her “re-assimilation” during a Peace Corps stint in the barrios of Santiago, Chile, gives her the chops to plow this heretofore fallow terrain. Her book is intelligent and accessible and her prose has a jaunty elegance sprinkled with the linguistic spices of her native language.

  The Extraordinary Rendition of Vincent Dellamaria

by Jack Walker
General Fiction
Authorhouse
Paperback, 332 pages
$21.00

What if? What if there was an Italian American Supreme Court justice who was brought on to the court to advance far right political goals? What if he were placed under the direction of the Vice-President and his Scooter Libby-type political hatchetman?  What if his judicial philosophy then veered dramatically and inexplicably away from his record on the Court of Appeals and toward the political and policy blueprint of the executive branch? And then, what if he were kidnapped and de-programmed by a cadre of respectable and upstanding “patriots” and returned to the court to block the right wing agenda?  Wow! That would make a great story however it turned out! Walker tells it with lawyer-like precision and economy.  Pick this one up when you have time to finish it!

The Sports Gene

by David Epstein
Sports
Current Hardcover
Hardcover, 352 pages
$26.95

Is it nature or nurture that is the fount of athletic excellence? Epstein, a senior writer for Sports Illustrated, opens with the “10,000-hours rule” as the recipe for success as an athlete (or any other performer for that matter). That rule holds that 10,000 hours of deliberate practice is the route to sufficient skill and expertise to achieve stardom in sports. For example, Stefan Holm, under his father’s stern eye, was rigorously trained from age six to be a world-class high jumper. Sure enough, in Athens in 2004 he won the Olympic gold. But wait! In 2006 Donald Thomas, a student from the Bahamas, tried his first high jump. He cleared 6’6’’. In 2007 he met Holm at the World Championships in Osaka, Japan. Holm dropped out at just under 7’9”. Thomas went on to win at 8”2". Epstein plumbs the depths of sports physiology and psychology to conclude that nature and nurture are so interlaced in any realm of athletic performance that the answer is always: it’s both. Sometimes it’s long, hard work. Sometimes it’s a mutant gene. When they occur together it’s dynamite!

Mrs. Poe

by Lynn Cullen
General Fiction
Gallery Books
Hardcover, 336 pages
$26.00

It's 1845. The Raven has just been published and is widely adored. Frances Osgood is a struggling poet and has just been rejected by her publisher again. He tells her to come up with something similar to Poe's writing, but for women. She is skeptical. Frances then has the opportunity to meet Mr. Poe. She certainly didn't mean to fall in love with this man. She was married to a philandering husband and he to his first cousin half his age. Over two years we experience this troubled relationship with them. The characters and the relationships in this novel are more complex than one would imagine. This novel, which most certainly fiction, is well researched and we learn a lot about Edgar Allen Poe (known to his wife as Eddie). A very well written, entertaining read.

That is Not a Good Idea!

by Mo Willems
Childrens
Balzer & Bray
Hardcover, 48 pages
$17.99

That Is Not a Good Idea! is a hilarious, interactive picture book from bestselling author and illustrator Mo Willems, the creator of books like Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, the Knuffle Bunny series, the Elephant and Piggie series, and many others.
 
Inspired by the evil villains and innocent damsels of silent movies, Willems tells the tale of a hungry fox who invites a plump goose to dinner. As with the beloved Pigeon books, kids will be calling out the signature refrain and begging for repeated readings. The funny details in the colorful illustrations by three-time Caldecott Honoree Mo Willems will bring nonstop laughter to story time.

Manana Means Heaven

by Tim Z. Hernandez
General Fiction
University of Arizona Press
Hardcover, 240 pages
$24.95

There is a photo of a pair of gristled, knotty hands holding a copy of this book.  They belong to the 92-year-old Bea Franco who was “Terry,” Jack Kerouac’s On the Road “Mexican Girl.”  They met on a bus in Bakersfield, California in 1947 – a Chicana migrant worker and a college boy – and carried on a 15-day love affair. That much is true. This novel develops a context around that truth based upon Kerouac’s writings; letters and cards from Bea in the Kerouac archives in the New York Public Library; and the author’s encounter with the elderly Bea and her family. Together with a fertile imagination this makes an interesting addition to Kerouac lore. As fate would have it Bea Franco passed away on August 15^th, 2013 at the age of 92 just before the book was released.

At Night We Walk in Circles

by Daniel Alarcon
General Fiction
Riverhead Hardcover
Hardcover, 384 pages
$27.95

This one resonates with the feel of latter day Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Set in an unnamed Latin American country (Peru, would do) it follows the deteriorating life of young Nelson. He joins a guerilla theatrical group – Diciembre - led by his revolutionary idol, Henry Nunez, and goes on tour. He becomes progressively entangled with the lives and relationships of his fellow actors during performance after performance of The Idiot President. Eventually the pot boils over and a hidden betrayal fuels a chaotic disintegration of the troupe. A meditation on obsession, identity and fate.
 

Burmese Days

by George Orwell
General Fiction
Mariner Books
Paperback, 288 pages
$14.00

Typically the name George Orwell brings to mind his dystopian novels 1984 and Animal Farm, which together by 2009 had sold more copies than any two books by any other 20^th Century author. Those who have delved deeper usually come up with Homage to Catalonia, an account of his experiences in the Spanish Civil War, and Down and Out in Paris and London, the account of his deliberately living the low-life in those European cities in the late 20’s. Buried yet deeper is his novel Burmese Days that portrays the dark and sordid life of colonial society in the waning days of the British Raj. Orwell had spent five years (1922-27) as a police officer in the Indian Imperial Police Force in Burma (now Myanmar). One of his postings was Kathar, a backwater village in the up-country teak forest, which provides the setting for the story. His depiction of the malignant culture of the colonial functionaries and their “burra memsahibs” is alternately humorous and horrifying, but always gripping.

The Golden Spruce

by John Valliant
Reflections on Nature
WW Norton & Co.
Paperback, 288 pages
$16.95

It was known as K’iid K’iyass (Old Tree) by the Haida people of the Queen Charlotte Islands that lie sixty miles off the northern coast of British Columbia. It was sacred to them and was an eco-tourism boon to the local populace of Port Clements. It was over 300-years-old, had brilliant gold needles and a perfectly coniform shape. Through a random mutation the tree lacked 80% of the Sitka Spruce’s normal chlorophyll and lacked the typical haphazard branching. It stood like a gold jewel against the deep green of the virgin coastal forest on the bank of the Yakoun River. There was none other like it in the world. In 1997 a deranged former logger and arriviste eco-activist took a chainsaw to it and left it lying in the river. This book tells the story and tells it very well indeed.

The Book of Killowen

by Erin Hart
Mystery
Scribner
Hardcover, 352 pages
$26.00

What sort of book is worth a man's life? After a year away from working in the field, archaeologist Cormac Maguire and pathologist Nora Gavin are back in the bogs, investigating a ninth-century body found buried in the trunk of a car. They discover that the ancient corpse is not alone. Pinned beneath it is the body of Benedict Kavanagh, missing for mere months and familiar to television viewers as a philosopher who enjoyed destroying his opponents in debate. Both men were viciously murdered, but centuries apart, so how did they end up buried together in the bog?

This novel by Minnesota author, Erin Hart, is rooted in medieval Ireland and rich in the particulars of monastic manuscripts: how “the gallbladders of eels” and cooking down “gallnuts” make inks are just a few examples. All of this history serves the novel’s suspense and adds to the book’s splendor.

Fire Season

by Philip Connors
Reflections on Nature
Ecco Press
Paperback, 272 pages
$14.99

The tragedy of 19 elite firefighters in Arizona set us to thinking about forest fire literature – Kerouac, Snyder, Dillard and Abbey to name a few. Norman MacLean’s Young Men and Fire probably sets the standard and, with its account of the deaths of 17 young smokejumpers, is most relevant to the Arizona catastrophe. In this book, Connors relates his experience of a decade of summers spent high in a fire tower in New Mexico’s Gila National Forest and the Aldo Leopold Wilderness Area. The writing is both lyrical and energetic; observational and introspective; ruminative and polemical. There is a lot of forest husbandry, pyrotechnics, wildlife management, and contented isolation. He’s a former Wall Street Journal reporter. Go figure!

On Paris

by Ernest Hemingway
General Fiction
Hesperus Press
Paperback, 80 pages
$16.95

If Hemingway still attracts you, you can motor through this one in about an hour or so. Written in 1922-23, it is a series of pieces written for the Toronto Star Weekly during his early time as a Paris-based journalist. They range from the catty and mundane to the politically savvy. He derides his contemporary expats as “the scum of Greenwich Village” who serve as flypaper for tourists in search of atmosphere in the Café Rotonde. At the same time, his notes on the policies of M. Poincare in the post WWI years and the lead-up to Nazism are prescient. It’s an eclectic little collection and all Hemingway and all Paris. We love them both!

Murder Below Montparnasse

by Cara Black
Mystery
Sogo Crime
Paperback, 352 pages
$14.95

Cara Black has written thirteen murder mysteries over the years, all set in Paris. Her heroine, private investigator Aimee Leduc , is a sassy, brash, smart, and sexy sleuth, who always figures out who did it. Aimee has a penchant for vintage fashion labels which she combines with the right shoes and hand bag to be perfectly dressed for whatever occasion; like an autopsy, or a shoot out. All of the titles of her books have a Paris connection and often Aimee acts like a tour guide as she wanders a maze of streets, alleys and boulevards searching for clues to solve the latest murder mystery. Her newest book, Murder Below Montparnasse is no exception as Aimee attempts to solve the murders that happen after the discovery of a piece of art missing for decades. If you like the romantic allure of Paris, enjoy a complex plot with lots of surprises, enjoy good food and wine, then this is the series for you.

Winter in the Blood

by James Welch
General Fiction
Penguin Classics
Paperback, 160 pages
$15.00

We’ve written in these notes about three of our favorite books: Laughing Boy by Oliver LaFarge (1927); The Man Who Killed the Deer by Frank Waters (1942); and, Halfway Man by Wayland Drew (1989).  Our friend Peter Geye (Lighthouse Road) steered us to this beautiful little book published in 1974 that is a worthy addition that trail of literary tears. Each presents a haunting lament of the tectonic impact of European incursion into Native America. Louise Erdrich calls it, “A work of slim majesty, lean, rich, funny, and grim.” The book began as a poem and retains the tone of elegy for the life of the Blackfeet of the Montana Great Plains. As Welch himself has said he is a storyteller “from a long way back.” It is a story that will resonate into the future.

Fun With Problems

by Robert Stone
General Fiction
Mariner Books
Paperback, 208 pages
$13.95

As Jon Krakauer once wrote about climbing Mt. Everest, “It’s something like fun, only different!” The same might be said for this book. Stone has written beautifully for decades. His Vietnam War novel Dog Soldiers is a classic of the genre. These seven stories are grim profiles of a variety of failing characters set in diverse locales – New England, Silicon Valley, the Eastern Shore, Hollywood, the Caribbean. These places are rendered as characters as much as the junkies and other losers that inhabit them. It’s a short walk on the dark, dark side for those so inclined and with great writing to boot. For some, it might be toxic. Hmmmmm…he rode on the bus with Ken Kesey!

Touching a Nerve

by Patricia S. Churchland
Health
WW Norton & Co.
Hardcover, 304 pages
$26.95

The nerve that’s touched here is the author’s assertion that everything we feel and think stems not from an immaterial spirit but from electrical and chemical activity in our brains. In other words: No soul! Only Brain! So, can humans still live a moral and spiritual life without a soul? You bet they can, according to Churchland, and off she goes into the current state of neuroscience with surpassing clarity, elegance and humor. Values? Free will? The self? Criminal intent? She is careful to avoid polemics and sticks to the power of the data. The scientific content is not a walk in the park, but is made reasonably understandable to the lay reader. A thoroughly thought-provoking book.

Ready Player One

by Ernest Cline
Sci-Fi/Fantasy
Broadway Books
Paperback, 384 pages
$14.00

Imagine Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, or Willy Wonka for the movie fans, was set in the not too distant future but the Oompa Loompas sang your favorite pop songs from the 1980s instead of slightly disturbing mantras about proper manners. Imagine Wonka quoting The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off while playing Q-Bert on an Atari 2600. While you are at it, imagine what the world would be like if everyone had access to a virtual reality universe that seems endless. Give poor Charlie Bucket access to this virtual world and watch everyone hunt for the golden ticket, or Easter Egg, left by one of the multi-billionaires that created this virtual world. Put all of those things together with a dash of The Matrix, a hint of Dungeons and Dragons, and a mountain of mixed tapes and VHS classics and you have Ernest Cline’s novel Ready Player One. Whether or not your teenage years were spent watching actual music videos on MTV or dropping quarters into games like Space Invaders or Pitfall this novel will be hard to put down.

A Farewell to Arms

by Ernest Hemingway
General Fiction
Scribner
Paperback, 332 pages
$16.00

One would like to have never read this book so that it could be read for the first time now. That, of course, cannot be. But, this volume brings a new and fascinating dimension not only to this book, but to Hemingway’s work as a whole. What it brings is not only the classic ending, but something like 47 alternative endings that Hemingway wrote and considered before settling upon his final draft. These were drawn from the Hemingway archive by his grandson, Sean Hemingway, who provides an introduction to the Hemingway Library Edition. It’s a lens into Hemingway’s craft and creative processes and into the evolution of one of great novels of the 20^th Century. If you read A Farewell to Arms ten, twenty or fifty years ago, you will enjoy reading it again in the light of this intriguing new material. We still like the original ending!

The Dog Stars

by Peter Heller
General Fiction
Vintage, 2013
Paperback, 336 pages
$15.00

This post-apocalyptic novel – in the genre ranging from On the Beach to The Road – embeds seeds of redemption in a world of devastation and casual, preemptive violence. There are threads of A Boy and His Dog; Boy Meets Girl; Helping Your Neighbor; and, Tough Old Codgers. But, for the most part, it’s Dog-Eat-Dog (or, more precisely, Dog-Eat-Man!). The writing is inventive and often appealing with one-word sentences and some rhythmic phrasing that brings life and color to an otherwise bleak landscape. A virulent flu virus (with an HIV-type blood disease chaser) has decimated the human population. Climate change is drying, rotting and burning everything else. The setting is Colorado mountain country and we see it from the air in the 1956 Cessna piloted by our young protagonist. He’s “one-of-us” – sometimes savvy, sometimes naïve – amidst a small cast of uber-competents each of whom slowly succumbs to his influence. It’s a good book!