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11 new books to read for Native American Heritage Month

Celebrate some of the best Native authors writing today with these absorbing titles.
Celebrate some of the best Native authors writing today with these absorbing titles.
NonfictionFood & DrinkCookbooks

4 cookbooks sure to inspire creative moves in the kitchen

Mouthwatering recipes, gorgeous photography and enlightening social context make Our South, Breaking Bao and more cookbooks worthy of a spot on your kitchen shelf.
Mouthwatering recipes, gorgeous photography and enlightening social context make Our South, Breaking Bao and more cookbooks worthy of a spot on your kitchen shelf.
NonfictionMemoir

Gather Me

In her plucky, intimate memoir, Glory Edim, the creator of the Well-Read Black Girl book club, tethers the books and authors she has found and loved to her own rocky journey of self-discovery—it’s reader catnip.
In her plucky, intimate memoir, Glory Edim, the creator of the Well-Read Black Girl book club, tethers the books and authors she has found and loved to her own rocky journey of self-discovery—it’s reader catnip.
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Monet’s last works

If you imagined Claude Monet at work on his late masterpieces, the Water Lilies, you might picture him seated in his garden in Giverny, France, placidly dabbing blues and purples onto canvas, capturing watery impressions with ease. The portrait that Ross King offers in Mad Enchantment is far more complicated.
NonfictionSocial Science

How language makes us human

Review by Henry L. Carrigan Jr.

In his typically colorful and entertaining style, Tom Wolfe brooks no argument as he boldly declares in The Kingdom of Speech that language is the attribute that distinguishes humans from animals. Speech, he proclaims in the book’s opening pages, is “the attribute of all attributes and is 95 percent plus of what lifts man above animal!”

Wolfe arrives at his conclusion after a whirlwind tour of the development of evolutionary theory. Darwin, Wolfe points out, fails to provide in The Origin of Species any clues to the way that natural selection explains the development of language. Wolfe humorously observes that “mildly negative reviews of his book hit [Darwin] like body blows, and the fierce ones cut him through to the gizzard.” 

Wolfe points out that in the 19th century, Max Müller and Alfred Russel Wallace challenged Darwin on the subject of language and natural selection, with Müller contending that language elevates animals in the fullest way. Although Darwin attempts to explain the rise of language as a part of the evolutionary process in The Descent of Man, he fails miserably, according to Wolfe, and, as a result, “in the entire debate over the Evolution of man—language—was abandoned, thrown down the memory hole, from 1872-1949.”

Linguist Noam Chomsky—whom Wolfe calls “Noam Charisma”—rides in on his semantic white horse, introducing “universal grammar,” with which every child is born. Through his field studies with a small tribe in Brazil, one of Chomsky’s students, David Everett, concludes that speech is an artifact and explains “man’s power over all other creatures in a way Evolution all by itself can’t begin to.”

In the end, Wolfe declares that speech will soon be recognized as the “Fourth Kingdom of the Earth” alongside the animal, vegetable and mineral kingdoms.

Stimulating, clever and witty, Wolfe’s little book is sure to provoke discussion about the role language plays in making us human.

 

This article was originally published in the September 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

In his typically colorful and entertaining style, Tom Wolfe brooks no argument as he boldly declares in The Kingdom of Speech that language is the attribute that distinguishes humans from animals. Speech, he proclaims in the book’s opening pages, is “the attribute of all attributes and is 95 percent plus of what lifts man above animal!”

Discovering strength after a betrayal

Glennon Doyle Melton was a mother in crisis when she turned to Facebook. “I’m a recovering alcoholic and bulimic but I still find myself missing binging and booze,” she wrote. Readers instantly responded. Melton’s website, Momastery, has become a go-to for mothers seeking straight talk and compassion, and her first book, Carry On, Warrior, was a bestseller. Now, in Love Warrior, Melton turns her truth-telling gaze toward her husband and shares the story of their marriage: how they came together, how they fell apart, and how they reunited.
NonfictionBiography

Inside the Reich’s rise

Review by Keith Herrell

When it comes to book titles, it’s hard to think of one more ominous than Hitler: Ascent, 1889-1939. The first of a two-volume project by German historian and journalist Volker Ullrich, this is a sprawling and ambitious attempt to explain how a man from humble beginnings with few accomplishments well into adulthood could morph into a ruthless dictator whose name has become a universal insult.

With the millions of words that have been written about Hitler, why another biography? In his introduction, Ullrich notes that more than 15 years have passed since the last important work on Hitler, with much research occurring in the meantime on him and surrounding figures. Moreover, Ullrich contends, a wealth of new material has appeared, including newly public notes and speeches. And finally, Ullrich sets out to challenge conventional wisdom that Hitler was a man of “limited intellectual horizons and severely restricted social skills” and shed more light on his private life, including his relationships with women and his social interactions.

Ullrich aggressively makes his case, noting that Hitler devoured books on a wide variety of topics during his struggling artist years in Vienna and Munich and that he led a varied social life, albeit one intertwined with his political activities. (Friends such as Winifred Wagner, daughter-in-law of the composer Richard Wagner, had the added bonus of advancing his political interests.) As for Hitler’s relationships with women, including mistress Eva Braun, Ullrich valiantly attempts to sort fact from myth (and downright gossip) but stops short of lurid speculation. 

At more than 1,000 pages, with a readable translation by Jefferson Chase, Hitler: Ascent is no quick read. That’s for the best, as this is a book to be studied with one eye toward the past and the other toward the future—and Volume 2.

 

This article was originally published in the September 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

When it comes to book titles, it’s hard to think of one more ominous than Hitler: Ascent, 1889-1939. The first of a two-volume project by German historian and journalist Volker Ullrich, this is a sprawling and ambitious attempt to explain how a man from humble beginnings with few accomplishments well into adulthood could morph into a ruthless dictator whose name has become a universal insult.

The language of love

When New Yorker staff writer Lauren Collins moved to London, she thought that would be the farthest she’d ever be, both physically and culturally, from her native Wilmington, North Carolina. Then she met Olivier. “Soon I was living with a man who used Chanel deodorant and believed it was a consensus view that Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo was on account of the rain,” she writes in her wry memoir, When in French.
NonfictionBiography

The rise of a New York chef

Review by Becky Libourel Diamond

In Generation Chef: Risking It All for a New American Dream, journalist and food writer Karen Stabiner (Family Table) tells the captivating tale of the journey taken by rising chef Jonah Miller as he fulfills his childhood dream of opening a restaurant, the Spanish-themed Huertas, in the East Village section of New York City. Her behind-the-scenes view chronicles the restaurant’s debut year, providing a vivid look at the challenges faced by Miller and his team. Although it is Miller’s story, Stabiner provides insight from the different players involved, delivering a detailed, richly layered narrative. Their highs and lows feel intensely real, from a game-changing New York Times review to a delayed opening and the initial rejection of a full liquor license. 

Like many young chefs, Miller is an ambitious, passionate perfectionist. He “had a hunch that the city needed the kind of Spanish food he wanted to make” and wasn’t prepared to contemplate getting “lost in the shuffle” of the overflowing world of celebrity chefs. Stabiner meticulously chronicles his growth and maturity as he secures the restaurant’s necessary funding, navigates building codes and liquor license approvals, tackles management duties and personnel issues and gives in to customers’ odd culinary requests that alter the whole structure of his dishes. Smart and frugal in his launch planning, he helped cut tile for the kitchen and enlisted friends to help stain the dining room wainscoting. And in the typical French culinary method, he was determined to incorporate a “no-waste” policy into his menu, enjoying the “challenge of transforming what another chef might throw out.”

Generation Chef will fascinate those eager to devour everything food-related. Even foodies who are well aware of the difficulties faced by any restaurant starting out will find Stabiner’s inside peek into this fast-paced, often cutthroat world enlightening.

 

This article was originally published in the September 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

In Generation Chef: Risking It All for a New American Dream, journalist and food writer Karen Stabiner (Family Table) tells the captivating tale of the journey taken by rising chef Jonah Miller as he fulfills his childhood dream of opening a restaurant, the Spanish-themed Huertas, in the East Village section of New York City.

Smashing stereotypes, solving equations

The “hidden figures” in the title of Margot Lee Shetterly’s new book will not be hidden much longer. This story of African-American female mathematicians who made a significant impact on the Space Race has already been optioned for a film due out in January. It’s a surprising story, even more so for how long it took to be told.
NonfictionMemoir

A legendary editor recounts a life in books

Review by Edward Morris

Reading Robert Gottlieb’s literary ramblings is more fun than sitting at the elbow of legendary editor Maxwell Perkins and watching him pencil-whip Thomas Wolfe’s manuscripts into shape. A master storyteller, Gottlieb doesn’t just drop names, he cluster-bombs them. Avid Reader gets off to a rather leisurely start as he recounts his early literary enthusiasms while a student at Columbia and Cambridge. But after that, he runs full-tilt through his years mentoring authors at Simon & Schuster, Knopf, The New Yorker and then back to Knopf again as a benign éminence grise. There are also concluding sections on his years working with prominent dance companies and on his emergence as a writer with his own voice.

One of Gottlieb’s duties as an editor was coming up with titles for books and overseeing dust jacket and advertising copy. That being the case, it seems odd at first that the title for his own life story feels so tepid. But the reason soon becomes clear. Ingesting and remembering vast libraries is Gott-lieb’s hallmark. He’s a quick reader, too, he reports, a facility that has enabled him to pass sage judgment on manuscripts virtually within hours of receiving them. One of the headlines that heralded his move from Simon & Schuster blared, “Avid Reader to Head Knopf.”

Joseph Heller, Jessica Mitford, S.J. Perelman, Lauren Bacall, ex-President Bill Clinton, Katharine Hepburn, Toni Morrison, Doris Lessing, John Cheever, Nora Ephron, John le Carré and Bruno Bettelheim are but a few of the literary lambs Gottlieb shepherded—and there are copious personal tales for each. 

It’s interesting to note that William Shawn, the revered New Yorker editor whom Gottlieb replaced amid staff furor, is the only person in the book to whom Gottlieb consistently assigns the honorific “Mr.” He calls Clinton “Bill.” 

 

This article was originally published in the September 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Reading Robert Gottlieb’s literary ramblings is more fun than sitting at the elbow of legendary editor Maxwell Perkins and watching him pencil-whip Thomas Wolfe’s manuscripts into shape.

How trees talk—and we can listen

Already a runaway bestseller in the author’s native Germany, The Hidden Life of Trees now offers English-language readers a compelling look at the “secret world” of the forest. Peter Wohlleben, a forester, documents his conversion from lumber producer to tree whisperer, and in the process he reveals the highly communicative social networks of trees.
Nonfiction

The multitudes inside us

Review by Becky Libourel Diamond

Although it might seem rather creepy, we are all teaming with microscopic organisms, collectively known as our microbiome. These organisms live on our skin, inside our bodies and sometimes inside our cells. They are way too tiny to see with the naked eye, but if our own cells were to mysteriously disappear, they would perhaps show up as a shimmering microbial flicker, outlining our vanished body.

These microbes should not be considered harmful. Microbes help unite us with our fellow creatures, connecting us to each other and the world, also known as symbiosis. In I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life, award-winning science writer Ed Yong (The Atlantic, National Geographic) takes a fascinating topic and illuminates it with attention-getting facts, descriptions and explanations. Spanning a period of two billion years, he goes from explaining how microbes helped create Earth’s first complex organisms and the ways their microbiomes have been exchanged ever since, to describing why formerly balanced environments such as coral reefs are now in danger, a disharmony referred to as dysbiosis.

Yong provides enlightening clarifications about the power wielded by these miniscule beings. Microbes are still viewed as unwanted, filthy germs by many people. But most are not harbingers of illness. The thousands of microbial species colonizing our guts are typically harmless, important components of our existence, helping us digest food, produce vitamins and break down toxins.

Scientists are discovering more and more about microbes every day. It’s a rapidly changing, uncertain and controversial field, one that includes concepts such as probiotics; a new surgical procedure known as fecal microbiota transplant (FMT), in which microbes are transplanted via donor stools; and the prospect of a terrifying post-antibiotic era due to overuse, which disrupts our microbiome and encourages the growth of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

A must-read for the curious and science-minded, Yong’s book helps guide us through this exciting landscape.

Although it might seem rather creepy, we are all teaming with microscopic organisms, collectively known as our microbiome. These organisms live on our skin, inside our bodies and sometimes inside our cells. They are way too tiny to see with the naked eye, but if our own cells were to mysteriously disappear, they would perhaps show up as a shimmering microbial flicker, outlining our vanished body.

A son’s search for answers

Novelist William Giraldi's muscular, sometimes meandering and poignant memoir, The Hero's Body, joins a growing list of recent father-son memoirs, revealing his insights about this pivotal relationship through the experience of growing up and carving out his manhood in a small New Jersey town.
NonfictionMusicBody, Mind & Spirit

Discovering the healing power of music

Review by Priscilla Kipp

Following successful surgery that, unexpectedly, sends his body into shock, Andrew Schulman lies in a coma in Mount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital’s Surgical Intensive Care Unit (SICU). Nothing is helping; death is near. Desperate, his wife Wendy reaches into her bag for her cell phone and instead finds the one thing she hopes might save him: his iPod. Gently placing one earbud in his ear and the other in her own, she plays his favorite, Bach’s St. Matthew Passion. Terrified it won’t help, or even make things worse, she waits. Waking the Spirit: A Musician's Journey Healing Body, Mind, and Soul is the patient’s own astounding account of what happens next.

Andrew Schulman is a classical guitarist who has played New York’s many venues for years, from restaurants and cabarets to concert halls. In each, he learned to know his audience, and—often from memory—play the music that reaches and touches them. Now, working to recover playing skills and memory damaged by his near-death ordeal, he wants to give something back to those responsible for saving his life. Remembering what the nurses call his own “St. Matthew Miracle,” Schulman returns to the SICU with his guitar and, three times a week for 90 minutes, plays for patients and staff. Amid the constant cacophony of life-support machines, he counters with the likes of Bach, the Beatles, Gershwin and Queen.

While his experiences, and the reactions they inspire, constitute much of the book, there is a lot to learn along the way as well. Music—how it affects the brain, its historical use as therapy and its future promising role in more humane and palliative care—is the true subject here, told by a “medical musician” (a term first used by Pythagoras) who learns firsthand that music can indeed help to heal both player and listener.

 

Priscilla Kipp is a writer in Townsend, Massachusetts.

Following successful surgery that, unexpectedly, sends his body into shock, Andrew Schulman lies in a coma in Mount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital’s Surgical Intensive Care Unit (SICU). Nothing is helping; death is near. Desperate, his wife Wendy reaches into her bag for her cell phone and instead finds the one thing she hopes might save him: his iPod. Gently placing one earbud in his ear and the other in her own, she plays his favorite, Bach’s St. Matthew Passion. Terrified it won’t help, or even make things worse, she waits. Waking the Spirit: A Musician's Journey Healing Body, Mind, and Soul is the patient’s own astounding account of what happens next.

The shadow of grief

Decca Aitkenhead never meant to fall in love with Tony. A drug dealer who was already married, Tony seemed the least likely candidate for a serious love affair. But insuppressible attraction and deep emotional intimacy led the British couple to a partnership that lasted nearly 10 years—until Tony, a man in his prime, suddenly died inside the space of 10 minutes while on vacation with his wife and two children in Jamaica.

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