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CookbooksAnimals

Celebrating the joys of a dog’s life

Feature by Linda M. Castellitto

Warning: These books will make you want to adopt a dog. Or another. Maybe even several. The pooches featured in the five books here do everything from joy riding to going for a swim (or at least a dog paddle).

OUT FOR A SWIM
So, you’ve memorized the images in Seth Casteel’s Underwater Dogs (2012) and long for more? Never fear, Underwater Puppies is here! It’s worth the wait: These delightfully damp puppies are even sweeter than those that came before, not least because most of the pups are so very tiny (or: automatically cute). Casteel is a master at capturing the looks on their faces, and the effect is irresistible, whether the subject is Sugar (a boxer who serenely floats among the bubbles) or Bentley (a French bulldog whose expression says, what is going ON here?). The dogs pictured hail from shelters and rescue groups and serve as a reminder that, as Casteel writes, “adoption is a fantastic option when considering bringing a puppy into your life.” And how.

JUST BREATHE
Do you know someone who needs a chill pill? Here’s one in book form: Lessons in Balance: A Dog’s Reflections on Life by 9-year-old Scout, the pit bull star of the Tumblr blog “Stuff on Scout’s Head.” And that’s exactly what you get in this book—photo after photo of Scout calmly balancing all sorts of items on his head, with sayings like “Acknowledge your feelings” and “Look beyond appearances.” Turning the pages is a surprisingly hypnotic experience. After a while, the objects fade, and the consistency of Scout’s mellow gaze prompts a feeling of tranquility. The images can be a hoot, for sure: The bunch of asparagus on Scout’s head is funny, the soap-bubble is impressive and the hourglass is poignant. But the humorous images don’t belie the message. As object-placer and owner Jennifer Gillen writes, “From [Scout] I’ve learned to be present and mindful, focus on the task at hand, and complete it.”

DINING A DEUX
If you live alone, it can seem easier to favor quick-and-easy meals. But there’s another way! Judith Jones offers time-tested strategies for feeding yourself and your canine companion in Love Me, Feed Me: Sharing with Your Dog the -Everyday Good Food You Cook and Enjoy. An esteemed editor at Knopf for 50-plus years who edited the likes of Julia Child and Jacques Pépin, Jones has also written cookbooks herself. She now raises grass-fed cattle on her farm in Vermont, with her dog, Mabon, by her side. He’s her kitchen compatriot, as well, which is eminently sensible of him, since Jones is a longtime champion of cooking for pets. She began in 1933 at age 9, when cans of wet food and bags of kibble were not available. “I liked sharing some of what we were eating with a creature I treasured. It was my way of caring for her,” she writes. In Love Me, Feed Me, she offers 50-plus recipes for meats, pasta and more, along with plenty of photos and stories. Clever tips abound, like this one: Why struggle to scrape a pot clean when you’ve got an eager dog who’s happy to help with the task?

HIT THE ROAD, FIDO
Ah, hitting the road—the time-honored tradition that celebrates freedom, possibility and the delights of windblown hair. In Dogs in Cars, photographer Lara Jo Regan, best known as the guardian of the beloved Mr. Winkle, captures “the pure joy of a dog in its most heightened state” via a gorgeously photographed collection of dogs with eyes alight, tongues flapping, fur ruffled by the breeze. The pooches look thrilled (and beautiful—Regan knows her lighting), and will inspire an urge to hug any nearby pets. All of the images were taken in California and showcase the state’s natural beauty: palm trees, mountains, beaches, glorious skies. Cars range from a 1979 Cadillac Eldorado to a 2014 Toyota Prius (there’s a golf cart, too), and indexes at the back identify the various cars and dog breeds. Dogs in Cars is a fun gift for dog lovers, road-trippers, car aficionados and anyone who wants to gaze upon joy, page after page.

FURRY FRIENDS
Brittni Vega’s Harlow & Sage (and Indiana): A True Story About Best Friends is a sweet and funny story told from Harlow the Weimaraner’s perspective. (Thankfully, Harlow doesn’t use the mangled English favored by some Internet sensations—she would never spell cheese with a “z”!) The book began as an Instagram account in 2013, with wonderful photos of the adventures of Harlow and her older sister Sage. Alas, Sage died a few months later. In an effort to assuage everyone’s sadness, Vega and her husband brought home Indiana, a Dac-hshund puppy. Following along as the dogs and their humans move from fresh grief to fond memories, from begrudging acceptance to true sisterhood, is a lovely experience. There’s lots of dog-centric hilarity, too, which makes Harlow & Sage a great choice for reading to or with kids.

 

This article was originally published in the December 2014 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Warning: These books will make you want to adopt a dog. Or another. Maybe even several. The pooches featured in the five books here do everything from joy riding to going for a swim (or at least a dog paddle).
Children's & YAPicture Book

Twinkling lights and candy canes

Feature by Julie Hale

Christmas really is the most wonderful time of the year—especially for book lovers! We’ve selected a stack of seasonal goodies that the little angels and elves on your gift list will love.

GETTING INTO THE SPIRIT
Capturing the only-in-December sense of excitement that accompanies the holidays, Tom Brenner’s And Then Comes Christmas follows a jolly little family as they prepare for the big day. Out in the country, surrounded by snow-covered fields, everybody gets in on Christmas activities: Sis hangs paper snowflakes; Dad’s on light duty; little brother offers encouragement; and Mom accepts mysterious packages from the mailman. This prelude to Christmas is an especially festive affair thanks to Jana Christy’s textured digital illustrations. In her hands, the rituals of December—baking cookies, trimming the tree, sitting on Santa’s lap—have a special candlelit magic. Brenner’s poetic prose distills the essence of the season, including the special solemnity of Christmas Eve, when “the whole world seems to be waiting.”

POEMS FROM SANTA
Who knew Santa was an aspiring writer? In Bob Raczka’s twinkling new book, Santa Clauses: Short Poems from the North Pole, the King of Christmas crafts bite-sized poems just right for little readers. Starting on December 1 and ending on Christmas, the merry old elf himself pens a haiku a day, offering insights into his cozy home life with Mrs. Claus and the holiday preparations at the Pole. On Christmas Eve, Santa writes, “Which is packed tighter, / the sack full of toys or the / red suit full of me?” Through illustrations that are a wonder to study—from Santa’s palatial cabin, with its ornate onion domes, to the blue, lunar landscape of the frozen North—artist Chuck Groenink provides a visionary take on the kingdom of Claus. Raczka’s poems, with their arresting imagery and appealing simplicity, make this an ornament for any Christmas book collection.

A GUIDING LIGHT
Finding the perfect Christmas gift is an issue of unusual import for the adorable angel-heroine of Alison McGhee’s Star Bright. Considering the recipient—a very special baby who’s due in December—it’s no surprise she’s nervous. The angel considers a few gift options—music, wind, rain—but none seems right. When she spies travelers on Earth who are lost in the dark of night as they journey to view the newborn, she sets off to guide them with her own special light—a bright Christmas gift, indeed. Peter H. Rey-nolds’ angels are a spunky bunch who inhabit a celestial realm filled with ladders and catwalks. His swirling watercolor, pen-and-ink drawings keep the proceedings lighthearted. Adding a new angle to the Nativity story, this thoughtful tale serves as a poignant reminder of what Christmas is about: the spirit of giving.

SWEDISH CHRISTMAS
A delightful departure from the Christmas story norm, Ulf Stark’s The Yule Tomte and the Little Rabbits is a rollicking holiday adventure that features Sweden’s answer to Santa Claus. Grump is a Yule tomte, or holiday gnome—a miniature St. Nick who delivers Yuletide gifts. Unfortunately, the loss of his favorite red hat and much-needed mittens has turned him into a Christmas crank. Deciding to boycott the big holiday, he holes up in his cottage, but he’s not getting off so easily. Neighboring rabbits Binny and Barty are determined to celebrate the season the traditional way—with tomte in tow. Eva Eriksson’s delicate renderings of Grump and the bunnies are a delight. Told in 25 chapters—one for each day of the Advent calendar—this festive tale is certain to become a Christmas classic.

NIGHT OF WONDERS
For a magical introduction to the miracle of Christmas, it’s hard to top Lee Bennett Hopkins’ Manger. In this luminous new poetry collection, animals of every stripe possess the power of speech on Christmas Eve, and each pays tribute to the baby Jesus in verse. Hopkins, an award-winning poet, selected the 15 accessible pieces in this special volume, which includes work by X.J. Kennedy and Jane Yolen. Helen Cann’s delightful watercolor, collage and mixed-media illustrations are teeming with detail and color, the perfect match for poems that have a plainspoken narrative quality. This is an enchanting look at the holiest of nights.

SEASON OF PEACE
A century has passed since World War I. In Shooting at the Stars: The Christmas Truce of 1914, John Hendrix offers a moving account of the holiday ceasefire achieved by soldiers fighting at the French-Belgian border. Relating events from the front line in a letter to his mother, a young British soldier tells of the remarkable moment on Christmas Day when French, English and German men laid down their weapons and clasped hands, sharing biscuits and good wishes. Hendrix’s expert drawings in graphite, acrylic and gouache bring the battlefield to life. Among the mud and concertina wire, hope takes the shape of tiny Christmas trees in the trenches. Peace, as this solemnly beautiful story proves, is the greatest gift of all. 

 

This article was originally published in the December 2014 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Christmas really is the most wonderful time of the year—especially for book lovers! We’ve selected a stack of seasonal goodies that the little angels and elves on your gift list will love.
Children's & YAPicture BookCrafts, Hobbies & Home

Books to be cherished by curious, creative minds

Feature by Alice Cary

When I was in third grade, my parents gave me a bright red book that still sits on my bookshelf today: Great Stories for Young Readers. Here are some of our favorite new gift books geared toward all sorts of young readers. With luck, your present to a special someone will become a cherished favorite for decades to come.

CREATURES GREAT AND SMALL
Young readers always get a kick out of animals—old and new—and the amusing things they do. Leave Animal Antics on a coffee table, and readers of all ages will dive in. The book combines superb photography with short write-ups about why each animal is behaving so comically. A baby orangutan gazes mischievously from underneath a “hat” of leaves; a koala snoozes while hanging slumped in a tree; and a bobcat sits atop a tall cactus in a prickly attempt to avoid the wrath of a cougar. The cover photo sets the tone as a chimp sticks out its tongue, and images inside explain that chimps’ facial expressions have different meanings from those of humans. The tidbits in Animal Antics are meant to educate and entertain.

If you know a young reader who can’t get enough of dinosaurs, The Great Big Dinosaur Treasury is the perfect choice. This is my favorite sort of storybook collection, containing eight stories from different authors and illustrators, giving kids a chance to sample a variety of tales and styles. It features favorites like Curious George’s Dinosaur Discovery and Bernard Most’s If the Dinosaurs Came Back—always popular in our house. Carol and Donald Carrick’s Patrick’s Dinosaurs is a timeless story about two brothers and the amazing power of imagination. Kids will relish Howard Fine’s dramatic illustrations for Deb Lund’s Dinosailors, about a “dinotough” group of sailing dinosaurs who encounter a nasty squall. A “Meet the Authors and Illustrators” section will no doubt lead readers to more books. And if all that good reading isn’t quite enough, the book contains an access code so fans can download free dinosaur-themed party accessories. ’Tis the season for celebrations, after all!

GATHER 'ROUND
Well-done editions of fairy tales sometimes shine like newly discovered jewels, and several recent offerings do just that.

Chief among them is Little Red Riding Hood. The Brothers Grimm tale is retold in its original form, accompanied by remarkable laser die-cut illustrations by German-born artist Sybille Schenker. Her delicate, colorful pages have transparent layers that look like lace. Colors pop against dramatic black backgrounds as these truly exquisite cutouts transform scenes from the beloved tale into striking silhouettes. The wolf threatens to eat Little Red Cap; through a window we see Grandmother sleeping peacefully in her bed as the wolf approaches; then the wolf lies menacingly underneath Grandmother’s lavender flowered quilt. Everyone knows this fairy tale, but believe me, you’ve never seen it quite so strikingly illustrated.

Robert Sabuda is the king of pop-up, and The Dragon & the Knight: A Pop-up Misadventure is another of his marvels. This collection of nine two-page fairy tales includes favorites such as “The Three Pigs,” “Goldilocks” and “Rapunzel.” Of course, pop-ups are the star here; the short fairy tales simply set the stage for the 3-D action. In the very first story, a mischievous dragon declares that he can’t stop his fire-breathing ways, and from that point on, he and a kindly knight face off on each of the book’s spreads. Sabuda’s paper sculptures rise magically, bursting out of the book’s text-filled pages. As Hansel and Gretel stand in front of the witch and her house, the dragon wisecracks, “You don’t want to know what kind of a sweet tooth SHE has.” By the end, the dragon has begun to burn holes in the pages, throwing stories into increasing disarray. Happily, all concludes in a friendly way, and there’s a fun surprise regarding the knight’s identity.

Classic Bedtime Stories reminds me of the story-books I loved as a child. This large-format book contains 50 vibrant illustrations—influenced by masters like N.C. Wyeth and Arthur Rackham—that took artist Scott Gustafson nearly two years to complete. Tales such as “Sleeping Beauty” and “The Three Billy Goats Gruff” jump to life in Gustafson’s detailed scenes. In “The Lion and the Mouse,” a trapped, scared lion’s head dominates the spread as he gazes apprehensively at a lively, furry mouse. In “Jack and the Beanstalk,” the furious giant glows in candlelight as he angrily tries to grab Jack. Particularly beautiful is “Little Sambha and the Tigers,” based on the enduring, though controversial, tale written by Scottish author Helen Bannerman in 1899 about her experiences living in India. Gustafson injects much-needed cultural context and humanity here, resulting in an updated tale worth telling.

Fans of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, take note. In Percy Jackson’s Greek Gods, author Rick Riordan offers insight into the mythology behind his best-selling series. Written in the voice of Percy, Riordan’s half-god, half-mortal hero, this is a fun yet informative take on mythology, with selections such as “Hermes Goes to Juvie” and “Persephone Marries Her Stalker.” Percy explains in the introduction: “There’s like forty bajillion different versions of the myths, so don’t be all Well, I heard it a different way, so you’re WRONG! I’m going to tell you the versions that make the most sense to me.” This is a fun, breezy take on the gods that many will enjoy, whether or not they’re familiar with Percy Jackson. What’s more, Caldecott Honor-winning illustrator John Rocco adds his signature style to this collection with dramatic, engaging art.

BIG INTERACTIVE FUN
These jam-packed volumes offer a fresh spin on several favorite activities.

The Children’s Book of Magic presents a compelling look at the history of magic along with step-by-step instructions that teach young magicians 20 magic tricks. It’s easy to lose yourself in this book, which is teeming with tidbits, photos and illustrations. Did you know that sword swallowing is rarely faked? And have you heard of William Robinson, who pretended to be a Chinese magician named Chung Ling Soo? Students will love learning the tricks within these pages, such as the Rising Aces, Coin Through a Bottle and the Magic String. All require everyday household items such as rope, thread, a ping-pong ball, a deck of cards, a water bottle and so on—no giant saws needed! There’s also a timeline of magic history, a glossary and a list of skills that every magician needs.

Airplane books are another perennial favorite, and kids will flock to Nick Arnold’s Flying Machines. The book includes a brief explanation of how planes fly, along with a timeline of the history of flight, all accompanied by cheery illustrations by Brendan Kearney. The real fun starts with tear-out sheets that allow readers to build two paper planes. There’s also a box containing the materials to build three balsa wood and propeller aircraft, along with suggestions for flight experiments and a log to record notes about various flights. The models are colorful and easy to build, with names like Whirlybird Helicopter, Galactic Glider and Twin-Prop Superstar. There’s a reason why airplane books are so popular: Appealing to both boys and girls, they’re educational and offer hours of fun.

Artsy kids will be inspired by You Call That Art?!: Learn About Modern Sculpture and Make Your Own. The book’s engineers are pop-up creators James Diaz and David A. Carter, the latter known for The 12 Bugs of Christmas and other pop-up bug titles. This collaboration takes a serious look at the history of modern sculpture and includes brief profiles of 10 influential sculptors such as Rodin, Picasso, Duchamp and Calder. Students can dig deeper with the help of a bibliography and a list of websites in the end pages. The entertainment factor is a large envelope containing more than 100 colorful punch-out pieces that can be used to create six different sculptures modeled after those of the masters. These cardboard pieces are easy to maneuver, are numbered and come with instructional diagrams. Of course, kids are encouraged to forget the numbers and make their own creations.

 

This article was originally published in the December 2014 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

When I was in third grade, my parents gave me a bright red book that still sits on my bookshelf today: Great Stories for Young Readers. Here are some of our favorite new gift books geared toward all sorts of young readers. With luck, your present to a special someone will become a cherished favorite for decades to come.
Crafts, Hobbies & Home

Design your best home

Feature by Joanna Brichetto

These five new books on home décor could hardly be more different, yet are unified by a common goal: to help us craft our homes into more comfortable, beautiful and uniquely personalized spaces.

HOW DOES YOUR GARDEN GROW
It’s only natural that most of us focus on fixing up the inside of our home before we even think about the outside. Aside from the mandatory effort to establish minimum curb appeal, the yard doesn’t get much of a plan at all. Cultivating Garden Style can change this. The big book of inspired ideas from popular columnist and blogger Rochelle Greayer guides readers through the process of transforming outdoor spaces—vast or tiny—into practical yet gorgeous reflections of your own style. Wondering if you even have a garden style? You do, and all will be revealed as you respond to chapters that highlight specific styles via beautiful photographs and a framework of recurring elements—how to personalize with outdoor furniture and accessories, how to select plants—which help you discover and articulate what you like and why. Greayer also includes plenty of simple DIY projects to ensure your space has as much room for personal touches as possible.

EUROPEAN GRAND DESIGN
Veranda magazine is all about luxury and the very best in interior design. This means the magazine’s newest coffee table tome, Veranda: A Passion for Living, is not so much a practical guide as it is a showcase of some of the most beautiful homes in Europe, each with its own style, sense of place and personality. This is total eye candy for us average do-it-yourselfers, but it’s sure to inspire, teach and elevate our sense of the possible. If we see big, then we can dream big and perhaps adapt big. This is the perfect treat for both the design enthusiast and the armchair traveler.    

DECORATE WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM FRIENDS
Desha Peacock has lots of friends. From the bushel of folks she’s gathered together to tell us their stories in her new home décor book, Create The Style You Crave On A Budget You Can Afford, it looks like she could get anyone to talk about anything. No wonder she’s an award-winning TV host and producer. Desha enlists her budget-savvy friends into her conspiratorial cohort, so that we readers come to feel that we’re part of the teamas well, making the most out of our own homes with whatever we’ve got. For instance, there’s Corri in Arkansas, who takes us through her house room by room (with Instagram-inspired photos), proudly showing us how she turned her Little Rock, Arkansas, budget (she operates her own restaurant downtown) into a shining example of design magic. In the second half of the book, Desha lays out every last decorating option we might consider, taking us through “Decision Making 101” for our own idiosyncratic case. Tips on mood boards, color, budget and a resource list round out this well-balanced guide.

YOUR STYLE GURU
On the same subject, but on a different tack, HGTV star and Good Housekeeping Home Design Director Sarah Richardson shows so much confidence in her decorative good sense, she even names her approach (and her book) after herself: Sarah Style has much less regard for budgetary constraints, placing all its emphatic wisdom instead on cleanliness, good taste and artful arrangement. If you have the resources and the ambition, then Sarah is the style guru for you. Richardson goes room by room and offers a virtuosic range of visions: formal, informal, bachelor, Parisian, Victorian, Retro, Pop, minimal and many more, all absolutely gorgeous.

YOU CAN RESTORE IT
The art of furniture restoration is an oft-overlooked subject in the DIY design world, but it finally gets the grand treatment it deserves in Christophe Pourny’s sophisticated and engaging guide, The Furniture Bible: Everything You Need to Identify, Restore & Care for Furniture. As one of the official furniture restorers for the City of New York, Pourny knows his stuff. He challenges readers with a formidable syllabus, including the abilities to identify any piece of furniture by its historical period, materials, construction and finish along with a full run-down of repair techniques and methods of refurbishment. Hundreds of detailed photographs and step-by-step montages make this book a complete education.

These five new books on home décor could hardly be more different, yet are unified by a common goal: to help us craft our homes into more comfortable, beautiful and uniquely personalized spaces.
NonfictionPhotographyBiographyArt

Tiny treasures for the stocking

Feature by Joanna Brichetto

Gift books sized right for stocking stuffers abound this season. Small in dimensions but big in style and content, they make ideal holiday gifts for any taste.

Horse and art lovers will appreciate the gorgeous equine celebration Horse: From Noble Steed to Beasts of Burden. A profusion of beautiful illustrations, paintings and sculptures each meticulously identified by captions accompanies short essays and quotes in a hefty hardcover volume. Horse is the latest addition to a charming Watson-Guptill series of mini-books that includes Dog, Cat and Zoo.

Other small and savory selections to slip into a stocking can be found in Abbeville Press' Tiny Folios series, which features subjects from pop culture to fine art. Just four inches square, each title combines text and art for a delightful peek at such topics as Elvis and American Art of the Twentieth Century. To score some points with the love of your life, choose Hugs & Kisses which features photos of touching and heartfelt embraces.

Brush up on your Bard with Fandex Shakespeare, a set of double-sided, die-cut cards attached at one end in a lively, colorful fan of facts. Background information and a summary of each play make for quick study. The Fandex Family Field Guide series has 13 other titles, too, like Mythology, Wildflowers and Civil War.

Holiday blues, winter blahs, sugar lows and bad hair days have a new remedy: The Blue Day Book: A Lesson in Cheering Yourself Up. Amusing animal photos are paired with inspiring, witty text designed to lift the spirits. Skip sending that well-intentioned e-card to a blue buddy, and give this charming antidote instead.

A Blue Dog day will cheer up fans of popular cajun artist George Rodrigue. A Blue Dog Christmas is a warm memoir of the artist's childhood holidays and canine companions. It features 19 new holiday prints, and a festive ornament that can be used year after year.

Another artist who happily refuses to grow up is Dan Price, author of The Moonlight Chronicles. Price describes himself as a hobo artist whose mission is to travel without a destination, observing and distilling the joys of simple living. His hand-written journal entries and charming sketches are full of wonder and gratitude. This is an unusual book in an unusual format, and well worth a look for its artwork, honesty, travel writing and journaling techniques.

For the simple joys of sophomoric humor, no one can outdo the usual gang of idiots from MAD Magazine. The MAD Bathroom Companion is a compilation of the magazine's best short pieces that can be read in one sitting. Enough said? The ideal gift for friends and family fond of infantile jokes, smug mockery and great cartooning.

If pearls of wisdom from MAD Magazine are not your style, the erudite gems from The Literary Book of Answers may be. The book is reminiscent of the time-honored practice of divination, where with closed eyes and an open book, a random finger pinpoints the answer. Here, readers are instructed to focus on a closed-ended question, touch the book just so and open to a seemingly random page containing a quotation from Shakespeare, Jane Austen, Sophocles or a host of other famous writers. It may sound corny, but the quotations are pithy, interesting and certainly more grammatical than advice given by friends and family. Should you quit your job? Move to Wisconsin? Have asparagus for dinner? Wait a little, advises Rudyard Kipling; That depends a good deal on where you want to get to, says Lewis Carroll; Enjoy it, all of it, Homer concludes. As a bonus, a truly literary-minded reader can seek out the source of a quote, find the context or discover a favorite new author.

Another new book has all the answers too, but to only one question: why aren't you married? Even God Is Single (So Stop Giving Me a Hard Time) by Karen Salmansohn delivers 26 good, snappy, single-girl comebacks to that dreaded question. This edgy little gift book also offers its philosophy of why it's better to hold out for a soulmate instead of settling for a cellmate.

A true gentleman, of course, never asks a woman why she is not married. He might however, ask guests to dinner without consulting A Gentleman Entertains, by John Bridges and Bryan Curtis. As this elegant manual proves, such an uneducated move could be a mistake. Single or not, a good host must know how to set a table, put guests at ease, have enough ice on hand, avoid disaster when the entree burns and other essential skills. Several likely social scenarios are covered, as well as a few klutz-proof recipes and tips galore.

Two chunky palm-sized books that will fit even the tiniest of stockings are Christmas Joy and A Treasury of Christmas. Irresistibly small, they are nonetheless packed with seasonal delights. The Treasury recounts several classic holiday stories, and Christmas Joy explores a variety of holiday themes such as charity, children and food. Need more books for folks on your holiday list? Euripides says "Go forward to your favorite bookstore," for "Yonder lies some more of the same sort" (Hans Christian Andersen). In other words, plenty of great new titles, big and small, await selection. "You may be sure of that" (Aeschylus).

 

Joanna Brichetto is a Nashville based writer who agrees that good things come in small packages.

Gift books sized right for stocking stuffers abound this season. Small in dimensions but big in style and content, they make ideal holiday gifts for any taste.

NonfictionBusiness & Finance

A makeover for your daily grind

Feature by Linda M. Castellitto

With the new year comes glorious possibility, which makes this a perfect time to think about improving your outlook and productivity at the office. This trio of books offers ideas, support and strategies in equal measure, no matter your goal: Want to get more done? Banish distractions? Feel connected to your work? These titles are here to help—and inspire.

When it comes to work, what gets you revved up? Analysis or action, efficiency or innovation? Do repetitive tasks drive you bonkers, or are they soothing? While most of us can easily answer those questions, in Work Simply: Embracing the Power of Your Personal Productivity Style, Carson Tate points out that most of us don’t actually take the answers into account when we plan our workdays. Calendars and to-do lists are great for some people, but for others, they’re highly detrimental.

“The truth is that the problem is not you. It’s how you are trying to overcome your busyness that is the problem,” Tate says. The workplace productivity expert and career coach explains that, based on research into brain activity and work styles—plus her own experiences and those of her clients—there’s no single, right way to achieve productivity. Instead, there are four predominant “productivity styles”: Prioritizer, Planner, Arranger and Visualizer. A 28-question quiz, the Productivity Style Assessment, will guide readers toward identifying their own style, as well as the styles of their bosses and co-workers. Tate’s on-point assessments of what works for those styles (and what’s never going to, so don’t try to force it!) are supremely useful.

Four detailed case studies are interesting and inspiring, and subject-specific chapters like “Lead a Meeting Revolution” and “Tame Your Inbox” offer hope for the harried. Work Simply is an insightful, supportive book for those who want to do more and better (and have some fun along the way) but haven’t quite figured out how.

FINDING FOCUS
Ah, our techno-centric era—the immediacy of texting, the wonders of wireless, the ability to take photos of anything at any time and send them to anyone. Amazing, sure, but also a recipe for feeling scattered, stressed and always behind. Edward M. Hallowell understands: He’s an M.D. specializing in attention deficit disorder (ADD) and the author of 14 books on the topic, including the best-selling Driven to Distraction.

In Driven to Distraction at Work: How to Focus and Be More Productive, he sets his sights on the six most prevalent time-wasters, from compulsive email-checking to ineffective multitasking to being unable to say no. These distractions are all part of what he calls Attention Deficit Trait (ADT), or “a severe case of modern life.”

While conditions such as ADD and ADHD are genetic, ADT is situational—people may suffer from it at work, but are just fine at home. Wherever it happens, it doesn’t feel good; restlessness, frustration and an inability to focus are the unfortunate result. But there’s hope in these pages.

Based on his treatment of thousands of patients, Hallowell offers ways for readers to identify the distractions in their lives and learn how to deal with them. For example, those who are “toxic worriers” should “Get the facts. Toxic worry is rooted in lack of information, wrong information, or both.”

If achieving “flexible focus” (which he defines as a balance of logical and creative thinking) is proving a challenge, “Draw a picture. Visuals clarify thinking. Draw a diagram, construct a table, cover a page with zigzags. . . . You may soon see the bigger picture you’d been looking for coming into focus.”

Hallowell’s voice is knowledgeable, accessible and, above all, encouraging. We can do it!

GETTING YOUR GROOVE BACK
Christine Carter gets things done: She’s a sociologist at UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center; is the best-selling author of Raising Happiness: 10 Simple Steps for More Joyful Kids and Happier Parents; has been cited in The New York Times; interviewed on TV by the likes of Oprah and Dr. Oz; and is raising two daughters. But, as she explains in The Sweet Spot: How to Find Your Groove at Home and Work, not long ago, even she found herself completely overwhelmed and exhausted. Something had to change.

“I needed to get my groove back, to live in my sweet spot . . . that point of optimum impact that athletes strike on a bat or racquet or club, that place where an athlete has both the greatest power and the greatest ease,” she writes. And couldn’t we all benefit from a life that’s easier—less harried, less stressful and more balanced? Carter acknowledges that it might be difficult to achieve a state of flow when there’s so much going on, but her “Sweet Spot Equation” promises to help readers achieve a happier, more relaxed life via tips, strategies and examples in five major areas: Take Recess, Switch Autopilot On, Unshackle Yourself, Cultivate Relationships and Tolerate Some Discomfort. Her data is fascinating, her strategies empowering and, while avid readers of balance-your-life books will have encountered these concepts before, Carter’s take offers fresh approaches; the “Work on your eulogy, not your resume” and “Distinguishing mastery from perfectionism” sections are excellent examples. It’s heady stuff, but if it means getting closer to that sweet spot, it’s definitely worth the effort.

 

This article was originally published in the January 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

With the new year comes glorious possibility, which makes this a perfect time to think about improving your outlook and productivity at the office. This trio of books offers ideas, support and strategies in equal measure, no matter your goal: Want to get more done? Banish distractions? Feel connected to your work? These titles are here to help—and inspire.
Nonfiction

There’s a book for that: Turning over a new leaf in 2015

Feature by Lynn Green

So you want to work on some aspect of yourself this year? BookPage is here to help! We've got reading selections from head to toe. Make a resolution to improve your life with small, consistent changes that can make a big difference in the way you think and feel.

HEAD
Feeling scattered and stressed? The Mindfulness Habit is a short, simple guide that offers a six-week program to help you live in the present moment and achieve a calmer and more focused state.  

MOUTH
If your strategy for winning an argument is to yell louder than the other guy, Dana Caspersen's Changing the Conversation is an innovative look at conflict resolution that will be an eye-opener. Take a deep breath and learn to listen carefully, resist the urge to attack and find ways to move forward.

BELLY
With Zero Belly Diet, the co-author of the popular Eat This, Not That! series delivers a diet-and-exercise plan that promises not only a flatter stomach, but also a lower risk of diabetes, heart disease and Alzheimer’s. The solution lies in our fat genes and nine super nutrients.

WALLET
In Slaying the Debt Dragon, the blogger behind QueenofFree.net credits hard work and faith as the tools that helped her family eliminate a mountain of debt ($127K) in just four years. Her detailed, sensible strategies can help other families get their financial houses in order.

HIPS
David Zulberg taps the wisdom of the ancients to craft a health plan in which you’ll adopt one new habit each week for five weeks. The new habits—like eating light at one of your three daily meals—are simple but have major transformative potential.

FEET
The author of the bicycling manifesto Just Ride challenges conventional wisdom on eating and exercise in this stripped-down guide to getting strong and lean. In Eat Bacon, Don't Jog, Grant Petersen encourages readers to trade long jogs for short bursts of intense activity and ditch that low-fat diet for a low-carb, high-fat eating plan.

So you want to work on some aspect of yourself this year? BookPage is here to help! We've got reading selections from head to toe. Make a resolution to improve your life with small, consistent changes that can make a big difference in the way you think and feel.

NonfictionTrue CrimeBlack HistoryAmerican History

Obstacles on the path to equality

Feature by John T. Slania

The African-American struggle continues in every corner of the nation, from small towns like Ferguson, Missouri, to the boroughs of New York. Thus, Black History Month arrives at a critical time in America. The question is: Can we learn from history? These selections shed new light on the black experience and offer perspectives on the often painful evolution of race relations in America.

Journalist Jill Leovy’s Ghettoside: A True Story of Murder in America chillingly reflects the violence and racial tension that exists in many urban areas. It’s principally the story of Bryant Tennelle, a Los Angeles teenager who was shot and killed in 2007. At first blush, this might simply be viewed as another black-on-black murder, and something the Los Angeles Police Department would typically ignore. But Tennelle’s father was a police officer. An unlikely hero, police detective John Skaggs, emerges to doggedly work the case and solve the crime.

But Ghettoside is more than just the story of one murdered teen. Leovy broadens her focus to examine the cycle of violence among black men in America—a country in which nearly 40 percent of all murder victims are black. She also offers insight into how the killings can be stopped.

“[W]here the criminal justice system fails to respond vigorously to violent injury and death,” she writes, “homicide becomes endemic.” Leovy bolsters her argument with extensive research, which included embedding herself within an LAPD detective squad.

SPYING EYES
Sometimes the conflict between law enforcement and African Americans doesn’t play out through violence. F.B. Eyes: How J. Edgar Hoover’s Ghostreaders Framed African American Literature reveals the covert side of oppression. Scholar William J. Maxwell conducted an exhaustive records search to uncover files showing that the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover spied on African-American writers and silenced some of their work. Maxwell gained access to 51 files demonstrating that over five decades, Hoover was obsessed with black authors, fearing their work might inspire political unrest and violence. He assigned a team of FBI agents to carry out a series of assignments, some as benign as reading advance copies of books, others as serious as persuading publishers to halt the release of books. Targets included Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man and Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, as well as the work of Richard Wright, whose poem “The FB Eye Blues” inspired the book’s title.

Among the most stunning examples of the Bureau’s activity was a hate letter written to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1964. In it, a white FBI agent posing as a black man tells King he is a “complete fraud and a great liability to all us Negroes.” F.B. Eyes is a startling look at how racism has influenced the highest levels of authority.

THE FUGITIVE TRAIL
In Gateway to Freedom: The Hidden History of the Underground Railroad, noted historian Eric Foner gives a detailed and often stirring account of the antebellum network that transported escaped slaves from the South to Northern free states and Canada. Foner, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author who has written many fine books on the Civil War, slavery and Reconstruction, uncovers new evidence of just how extensive the secret path to freedom was for fugitive slaves.

His account centers on the Underground Railroad’s network in New York City, which had the North’s largest community of free blacks, as well as many ardent white abolitionists. Pre-eminent among them was newspaperman Sydney Howard Gay, who documented the activities of the Underground Railroad in a meticulous “Record of Fugitives,” which logged the arrival of fugitives in the city in 1855 and 1856 and related some of their horrifying personal stories. (In the book’s acknowledgements, Foner credits a former Columbia University student who found the document in the university archives.) Gay’s record details the step-by-step movements of escaped slaves through the city and the deeds of abolitionists who aided their flight. Among those recorded by Gay was Harriet Tubman, who reached New York in November 1856 with a group of runaway slaves from Maryland.

Gateway to Freedom is an important addition to the historical view of the Underground Railroad and a salute to the slaves who “faced daunting odds and demonstrated remarkable courage” in their journeys to freedom.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

The African-American struggle continues in every corner of the nation, from small towns like Ferguson, Missouri, to the boroughs of New York. Thus, Black History Month arrives at a critical time in America. The question is: Can we learn from history? These selections shed new light on the black experience and offer perspectives on the often painful evolution of race relations in America.
Literature

Two fascinating explorations into Herman Melville’s world

Feature by James Webb

Books that endure tell us about lives we can only dream of. Austen, Dickens, and Twain all lived what they wrote about, and what they lived was radically different from what we know today.

Then there's Herman Melville. In my humble opinion, Melville's Moby Dick is the greatest novel ever written. As we learned in English class, Moby Dick is really about man's struggle against death. Well, of course it is. Moby Dick is about death, but first and foremost it is about whaling. We no longer hunt whales; at least most nations don't. This shouldn't preclude readers from enjoying two books that are fascinating explorations into Melville's world.

The first, In the Heart of the Sea by Nathaniel Philbrick, details the little-known incident that provided Melville with the foundation of his masterpiece. In 1820, the whaling ship Essex, out of Nantucket, was deliberately hit and sunk in the south Pacific by an enraged sperm whale. The ship's stunned crew of 20 was forced to make their way across 3,000 miles of open ocean to the western coast of South America. It took three months, and along the way they faced death, dehydration, starvation, and ultimately, cannibalism.

Philbrick presents this horrifying tale in a direct, deliberate manner, detailing the culture of the New England whalers, how they fit into the wider world of the early 19th century, and why their fate considering what they had to do to survive was not what we in the 21st century would expect. A sailor as well as an historian, Philbrick's richly detailed account of this tragedy stands on its own merits as a narrative; the fact that the story is the basis for one of the great novels of literature only adds to its attraction.

So, Melville had a historical basis for the sinking of the Pequod. What about Moby Dick himself? Was there a basis for this fish tale? Surprisingly, the answer is yes. Tim Severin's forthcoming book, In Search of Moby Dick, explores the existence of a white whale from both an historical and a modern perspective. As Howard Schliemann searched for the gates of Troy by following Homer's writings, Severin retraces the voyage of the Pequod as well as Melville's travels through the south Pacific to get to the roots of the story. Was there a white whale? Does one exist today? He finds some surprising answers. Tropical island gods and legends lead to modern-day whale hunters who search for the great beasts much the same as their ancestors; gasoline motors attached to their outrigger canoes are their only modern innovations. Their physical daring is amazing, and their whispered stories will raise goosebumps. The vividness of Severin's writing as well as his careless disregard for his own safety make In Search of Moby Dick compelling reading.

With a major biography of Melville also on the way for summer, this promises to be a banner year for whaling or at least for the examination of it. If you are a fan of true adventure stories, snap up In Search of Moby Dick and In the Heart of the Sea.

 

James Neal Webb doesn't go fishing that often, but when he does, he always throws 'em back.

Editor’s Note: This review has been edited after publication.

So many books these days are like Chinese cooking—they're a great meal, but they don't stay with you very long. Books that endure tell us about lives we can only dream of. Austen, Dickens, and Twain all lived what they wrote about, and what they lived was radically different from what we know today.
Children's & YAPicture Book

New picture books honor powerful moments in black history

Feature by Robin Smith

It’s hard to know what to do about Black History Month. On one hand, it might be the only time of year that schoolchildren will learn about the important moments and people in black history that shaped our country and world. On the other hand, one month seems paltry when there are so many stories. This year, when the news of Ferguson, Missouri, #WeNeedDiverseBooks and #BlackLivesMatter were trending issues that only the most out-of-touch could ignore, we need books about Black History more than ever. Lucky for us, there are some wonderful books out this month.

THE RIGHT TO LEARN
Starting with books for the very young, husband and wife team Lesa Cline-Ransome and James E. Ransome explore the importance of education for newly enfranchised African Americans in Freedom’s School. Attending school in a very simple one-room schoolhouse turns out to be joyful and painful. Joyful because Miss Howard’s gentle and loving teaching inspires all the children to help each other learn and to share their knowledge with their parents. Painful because local white children are cruel as the kids walk to school, and eventually the school is burned to the ground. Though fiction, this is based on many stories and is an important slice of history to share with all children. Ransome’s illustrations, rendered in watercolor, are filled with emotion, extend the gentle text and are respectful of the subject.

CHRONICLING HISTORY
In Gordon Parks: How the Photographer Captured Black and White America, Carole Boston Weatherford and illustrator Jamey Christoph have created a moving volume for young photographers and historians. Adults might know Parks as the first black photographer for Life magazine, but it’s doubtful that children have heard of him at all. They should. His life is fascinating. He was brought back to life by a bucket of ice water after he was thought to be stillborn; he photographed everyone from models and famous people to the most ordinary of folk; he wrote novels, composed music and made movies. The story is told in Weatherford’s clear, understandable and beautiful present-tense prose and is digitally illustrated by Christoph. In one especially evocative spread, we see Parks, with the Capitol building lightly drawn in the background, observing life in the alleys of D.C. where poor blacks lived. They became his favorite subjects to photograph. The story of his famous study of Ella Watson, a D.C. chairwoman, is also beautifully told in words and images. The final line of the book tells it all: “Through Gordon’s lens, her struggle gained a voice. You don’t have to hear her story to know her prayer.” Wow.

A NONVIOLENT VICTORY
I have a friend who grew up in Huntsville during the period that Hester Bass and E.B. Lewis explore in Seeds of Freedom: The Peaceful Integration of Huntsville, Alabama, so I was especially interested to read a longer book about this era. The title refers to the little things that the people of Huntsville did to integrate this small Alabama city, also called in 1962 the “Space Center of the Universe.”

After making reference to the various injustices that black people faced all over America (Jim Crow laws, segregated public spaces and schools, etc.), Bass goes deeper. The first “seed” amazed me: Three black women (a college student, a very pregnant doctor’s wife and a dentist’s wife with her new baby in arms) sat at a public lunch counter and were arrested. The baby’s presence in jail made read news—the kind of news that the city with the space program and funding from the U.S. government could ill afford. Second was as economic boycott of the Huntsville stores for Easter, when everyone, black and white, was known to spend a lot of money on clothes. Instead, they created Blue Jean Sunday, and local merchants lost hundreds of thousands of dollars. For me, the most amazing story came when Governor Wallace closed Alabama public schools rather than integrate. In one private religious school for blacks, 12 white students integrated!

E.B. Lewis’ familiar and emotional watercolors add much to these stories, especially the heart-stopping scene of water hoses turned on Birmingham protestors juxtaposed with a small image of the March on Washington. For children and teachers who are looking for a new and inspiring true story, this gorgeous volume is a must-have.

 

Robin Smith is a second-grade teacher at the Ensworth School in Nashville, Tennessee. She also reviews for Kirkus and The Horn Book Magazine and has served on multiple award committees.

It’s hard to know what to do about Black History Month. On one hand, it might be the only time of year that schoolchildren will learn about the important moments and people in black history that shaped our country and world. On the other hand, one month seems paltry when there are so many stories. This year, when the news of Ferguson, Missouri, #WeNeedDiverseBooks and #BlackLivesMatter were trending issues that only the most out-of-touch could ignore, we need books about Black History more than ever. Lucky for us, there are some wonderful books out this month.

NonfictionMemoir

Reckoning with the power of love

Feature by bookpagedev

Ah, love—everyone wants it, but many feel unsure how to get it or keep it. These titles offer valuable, often entertaining insight on many facets of love. Personal stories, wit and wisdom abound. Go forth and be romantic!

FINDING A LATER SPARK
The New York Times “Modern Love” column has launched many memoirs, and Eve Pell’s popular 2013 essay has grown into Love, Again: The Wisdom of Unexpected Romance. “How do old people meet new loves?” Pell writes. “Here’s how it happened for me: I schemed.” She, 67 and twice-divorced, asked a mutual friend to invite Sam, a 77-year-old widower, to a party. Next came a movie date . . . and three years later, they married. Pell shares their stories, plus those of 14 more couples who found later-life love. Times are changing, Pell notes: “Old people who follow their own hearts are not considered exceptional or outlandish—less Auntie Mame and more Judi Dench.” She adds that, since there will likely be a caretaker (and grieving spouse) in every older couple, “old love” can feel risky, but some find the best way to face the truth of mortality is to seek happiness and enjoy each moment. Pell’s greatest lesson learned: “Trust yourself. Whatever your age, you have the right to live as fully as you can, as fully as you want to.” This lovely, poignant read will bring out the romantic in readers of any age. 

DEVOTION’S DARK SIDE
Lisa A. Phillips tackles a timely, deeply personal topic in Unrequited: Women and Romantic Obsession. Phillips admits that, 20 years ago at age 29, she became obsessed with “B.” The two dated despite his long-distance girlfriend, but as Phillips (fresh off a breakup) fell in love, he pulled away. “For years after I stopped pursuing B.,” she writes, “I could not acknowledge that I’d gone too far.” Friends comforted her, but if she’d been a man, “They would have accused me of stalking.” Phillips acknowledges that, and uses it as a powerful jumping-off point for her far-ranging exploration of women’s obsessive love and its consequences. Unrequited features women’s personal stories and examines obsessive behavior through the lenses of psychology, literature and popular culture. Phillips herself eventually decided that unrequited love was not to be her fate. Meeting her now-husband and years of self-assessment got her there; for others, cognitive behavioral therapy helped with “disrupting the unsatisfying cycle.” Phillips also explores obsession’s impact on its objects, and cautions readers against the “gender pass” (downplaying women’s stalking behavior as somehow less dangerous than men’s). This is a compellingly written, eye-opening guide.

FUN AND MARRIAGE
Tim Dowling professes to be surprised at his evolution from Manhattan bachelor to London husband of 20 years and father of three boys. Of course, as the humor columnist for The Guardian reveals in How to Be a Husband, he’s not really surprised—but he does find it amazing he had the gumption. His relationship started with a meet-cheat: He decided he must be with his now-wife so he cheated on and dumped his long-term girlfriend to do so. It wasn’t characteristic of him, but with new love came more changes, like visits to her London home, immigration-related stress and finally, “We simply agreed —we’ll get married—with the resigned determination of two people plotting to bury a body in the woods.” Dowling admits this is far from a self-help book, as his “successful marriage is built of mistakes.” But he shares lessons despite himself, like the Twelve Labors of Marriage (“Housework,” “Finding Things,” “Nameless Dread”) along with the 40 Precepts of Gross Marital Happiness: “It’s okay to steal small amounts of money from each other” and “Go to bed angry if you want to.” With these clever lists and remembrances of joy, grief and hilarity, Dowling has crafted a heartfelt tale of his married life so far. He pokes fun at stereotypes and advises the hapless: “I’ve always felt that being a good husband and father is a simple matter of occasionally reminding one’s wife and children that they could do a whole lot worse.”

LONG-LIVED LOVE
When you want to learn something, you look to the experts. It worked for Karl Pillemer’s 30 Lessons for Living: Tried and True Advice from the Wisest Americans, and he knew it would work for 30 Lessons for Loving: Advice from the Wisest Americans on Love, Relationships, and Marriage. The seeds of Pillemer’s second book originated from the Marriage Advice Project: He and his team interviewed 700 older Americans in committed relationships lasting from 30 to 70 years, including cohabitants and widows/widowers. Pillemer writes, “For them, it’s no longer a mystery as to how everything will turn out —it’s already happened.”

According to stories the elders share, what we all hear about long-term love (don’t hold grudges; share the chores!) aren’t just empty phrases, but rather words to live by. Readers can start with one of the book’s five sections (“Lessons for Finding a Mate”; “Communication and Conflict”) or delve into 30 lessons on topics like manners, in-laws, work and children. Pillemer, married 36 years, shares his own perspective-shift: “I came to a revelation. They are talking about marriage as a discipline . . . a developmental path where you get better at something by mindfully attending to it and continual practice.” Also, seeing is believing: “Nothing convinces you of the value of making a lifelong commitment like being in the presence of couples who have done just that.” Long live love!

 

This article was originally published in the February 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Ah, love—everyone wants it, but many feel unsure how to get it or keep it. These titles offer valuable, often entertaining insight on many facets of love. Personal stories, wit and wisdom abound. Go forth and be romantic!
NonfictionMedicine

Making up your mind: Brain and body working together

Feature by Sheila M. Trask

“I’m of two minds,” we say. Or, “I changed my mind.” These phrases roll casually off the tongue, but we don’t mean them literally. Maybe we should, according to two new books that explore the fascinating history and tantalizing future of neuroscience.

COGNITIVE WONDERS
Are you primarily right-brained or left-brained? You might think you know, but Michael S. Gazzaniga is here to tell you it’s not that simple. Gazzaniga pioneered split-brain research with his colleagues at the California Institute of Technology in the 1960s. In Tales from Both Sides of the Brain: A Life in Neuroscience, he details the experiments that led us to talk about the brain’s two hemispheres in the first place. Filled with scientific luminaries like psychobiologist Roger W. Sperry and theoretical physicist Richard Feynman, Tales from Both Sides of the Brain takes us back to the intellectually energetic laboratories of Caltech. In scenes that read like episodes of “The Big Bang Theory”—intellectual energy abounds—we sit in on experiments done with split-brain patients, whose brains’ hemispheres had been surgically separated to treat epilepsy.

Gazzaniga meticulously documents the strange things that happen when the two sides of the brain aren’t communicating, such as losing the ability to label an item held in the left hand, even though the answer comes swiftly when the same object rests in the right. What’s even more fascinating, though, is the way the brain can sometimes overcome such limits. As Gazzaniga says, the brain is not a “random bowl of spaghetti” but a “biologic machine” with the power to rewire itself. Gazzaniga tells the stories of split-brain patients who have regained lost functionality as their brains’ hemispheres learned to “cue” each other in new ways.

Director of the SAGE Center for the Study of the Mind at the University of California, Santa Barbara and president of the Cognitive Neuroscience Institute, Gazzaniga continues to search for answers about how the brain works. His impassioned writing invites readers into his world, where the science of the past sets the stage for even greater discoveries to come.

BRAIN, HEAL THYSELF
Where Gazzaniga carefully documents the past, Norman Doidge, M.D. marches enthusiastically into the future in a dazzling collection of stories about neuroplasticity and the ever-changing brain. Following up on his 2007 bestseller, The Brain That Changes Itself, which brought the science of neuroplasticity to a mainstream audience, in The Brain's Way of Healing, Doidge considers cutting-edge treatments that use the body’s senses to access, and improve, neurological functioning.

In friendly vignettes reminiscent of Oliver Sacks’ case studies, Doidge chronicles the heroic efforts of patients with a wide variety of apparently intractable ailments, from chronic pain to multiple sclerosis. All have been treated successfully with non-invasive, natural methods that take advantage of the adaptive abilities of the nervous system. In-depth, personal stories describe patients like John Pepper, who has kept his Parkinson’s disease symptoms in check with a vigorous, yet careful, exercise regimen, and David Webber, whose blindness was relieved with a series of relaxation and visualization exercises.

The list of successful healings is long and impressive; it’s tempting to be skeptical of such a wealth of glowing accounts, except that Doidge truly takes a holistic approach to his subjects, getting to know them and their doctors and sharing every detail with his readers. Doidge doesn’t just read about low-light laser treatments, for example, but actually sits in on multiple sessions and discusses the science behind them. Similarly, he delves into the lives and careers of innovators like Moshé Feldenkrais, whose integrative movement protocol is well known, but whose escape from Nazi Germany is likely not.

Each of Doidge’s examples suggests tangible treatment ideas for patients who may have thought they were out of options. Doidge’s penchant for considering unconventional approaches to healing offers hope for all.

“I’m of two minds,” we say. Or, “I changed my mind.” These phrases roll casually off the tongue, but we don’t mean them literally. Maybe we should, according to two new books that explore the fascinating history and tantalizing future of neuroscience.
Romance

The allure of the bad boy

Feature by Lois Dyer

Strong heroes have always been a fixture in romance novels, but lately, authors have been pushing readers’ comfort zones with bad boys who are off-the-charts wicked. We thought it might be fun to sample a few books from boundary-testing authors this month, so we suggest you read on, sigh and enjoy!

BAD BOYS ON MOTORCYCLES
In Rough Justice by Sarah Castille, rival motorcycle gangs battle for supremacy in a Montana town. Growing up with her brother inside the world of the Black Jacks motorcycle gang, beautiful Arianne Wilder wants nothing more than to escape and live a normal life. But her father is the vicious leader of the gang; he believes he owns Arianne, and he refuses to let her go.

The Black Jacks are feuding with the Sinner’s Tribe, a rival gang ruled by ex-military warrior Jagger. When an arsonist torches the Sinner’s clubhouse and the gang discovers an unconscious Arianne at the scene, Sinner’s members demand her death in revenge. Jagger refuses, instead he keeps her safe. He doesn’t learn until a week later that the beautiful woman he captured and released is the daughter of his arch-enemy. Nevertheless, he won’t abandon her; he vowed to protect her, and there are far too many people who want her dead. Besides, he just happens to be falling in love with her.

Arianne knows her best chance of surviving is to remain under Jagger’s protection, but her brother needs her help. Whom will she choose and whom will she betray: her brother or Jagger?

The author has crafted an interesting plot with lots of action, mayhem and danger. When combined with the heated attraction between Arianne and Jagger—who are equally matched in brains and cool street smarts— and the intriguing details about life in the world of a motorcycle gang, the end result is a riveting story. Readers who like their romance with an edge and lots of action will adore Rough Justice and eagerly await the next book in this new series from Castille.

PLAYING WITH FIRE
New York Times best-selling author Jay Crownover delivers another riveting read in her Welcome To The Point series with the second installment, Better When He’s Bold. Brysen Carter can barely juggle college classes, her job at a bar and protecting her little sister from their mother’s rapidly escalating alcoholic rages. She doesn’t have a spare moment to deal with the very dangerous, very handsome and all too sexy Race Hartman. Still, she can’t stop thinking about him.

Race knows the beautiful, cool blonde is out of his league. Brysen is a law-abiding citizen, and he’s breaking every law that won’t bend. But Brysen is a good friend to his sister, and fate keeps throwing the mismatched pair together. When someone targets Brysen and puts her life is in danger, Race steps in to protect her. While he has always wanted to sleep with her, he doesn’t want to admit that he needs far more from her than a one night stand.

Crownover brings her signature multi-layered characters with complex backstories to her latest novel. Both the hero and heroine are struggling to deal with less-than-noble parents while coping with vulnerable siblings and career challenges. Readers will surely cheer for this couple and their fight to reach a happy ending.

THE SINS OF OUR FATHERS
Samantha Young sets her latest novel, Hero, in the upper-class world of Boston society. After losing her mother three months prior, Alexa Holland has struggled to come to grips with harsh truths about her family. When she arrives for work at a photo shoot and sees powerful, rich and handsome Caine Carraway, she’s shocked. Caine makes a pass at her and she blurts out the truth: Her father is the man responsible for his mother’s death. Stunned and furious, Caine demands a different photographer and fires Alexa’s boss. In turn, her boss fires her. When Caine offers her a job, a desperate Alexa accepts, knowing full well that he plans to make her life miserable. Since she has to pay rent, however, Alexa feels she has little choice.

The two have unexpectedly off-the-charts chemistry, and before long, their love-hate relationship has added lust to the mix. Both strong-willed, honorable yet damaged people, Caine and Alexa struggle to find a balance between their two worlds. When Alexa is attacked, however, those worlds collide, and family secrets are revealed. The secrets have the potential to destroy any hope of a happy ending for them.

Hero is filled with emotional drama and witty exchanges between the hero and heroine as they fight to ignore and resist the attraction that pulls them together. Fans will be delighted with this latest story from Young.

GAMBLING WITH DESIRE
Best-selling author Sarah McCarty continues her popular Hell’s Eight series with the seventh book in the series, Ace’s Wild. In a small town in 1860s Texas, gambler and Texas Ranger Ace Parker does his best to annoy elegant blonde schoolteacher Petunia Wayfield at every opportunity. He does it because, of course, he wants her—badly. She also makes him want things he’s never had, like a wife and a family. Things he’s convinced men like him can never have.

What Ace doesn’t know is that Petunia wants him just as much. He enthralls her, even while he’s irritating her, and she privately admits he stirs  “crave-it-no-matter-what lust” in her heart. When Petunia asks him for to help one of her young students, Ace strikes a bargain with her. He’ll help her in return for a kiss. The bargain seems simple enough, but there’s nothing uncomplicated about the way that kiss rocks both their worlds. Fate seems determined to entangle the two in a growing number of ways, despite Ace’s determination to stay away from Petunia. The whole town knows the two are meant to be together. The question is, how long will it take for them to stop fighting their inevitable pairing?

The dialogue in Aces Wild is a delight—sharp and insightful, often funny and wry. Both Ace and Petunia are endearing, strong and stubbornly independent. It’s a pleasure to watch these two struggle to come to terms with falling in love. The charming cast of supporting characters includes a loveable young boy, a practical ex-saloon-girl and Ace’s childhood friend. Readers are certain to love this latest entry in the series.

Lois Dyer writes from Port Orchard, Washington. 

Strong heroes have always been a fixture in romance novels, but lately, authors have been pushing readers’ comfort zones with bad boys who are off-the-charts wicked. We thought it might be fun to sample a few books from boundary-testing authors this month, so we suggest you read on, sigh and enjoy!

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