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Golden Years

James Chappel’s thought-provoking Golden Years offers strategies to understand and address the needs of America’s aging population.
James Chappel’s thought-provoking Golden Years offers strategies to understand and address the needs of America’s aging population.
NonfictionArtLifestylesArt

About Face

Jonathan D. Katz’s About Face celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising with deep scholarship and thrilling artworks.
Jonathan D. Katz’s About Face celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising with deep scholarship and thrilling artworks.
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Business & Finance

Making a change

Review by bookpagedev

If it’s time to be moving on to a new career, yet you can’t seem to get going, advice from career consultant Andrea Kay may be what you need. Enter Life’s a Bitch and Then You Change Careers: Nine Steps to Get You Out of Your Funk and on to Your Future. This workbook will help you find work that’s more fitting for the person you are. Guiding you through systematic self-reflection, exercises and checklists, Life’s a Bitch will enable you to find challenging and meaningful work that will use your strengths and fit your values, personality, life and future.

Kay shares insights on thinking about and overcoming some of the factors that can inhibit you as you seek your new career, be they fear of change, the nagging inner voice asking what if I fail? and what will others think? or financial issues. If you’re looking for the energy infusion to get going, this book may be it.

Ellen R. Marsden writes from Mason, Ohio.

If it's time to be moving on to a new career, yet you can't seem to get going, advice from career consultant Andrea Kay may be what you need. Enter Life's a Bitch and Then You Change Careers: Nine Steps to Get You Out of…
Business & Finance

Work it out: reading on the job

Review by bookpagedev

Whether you’re just starting out, re-entering the workforce or simply wanting to make some changes in your work life, these four new books will show you how to succeed in getting where you want to go.

New on the job? As they say, you don’t get a second chance to make a first impression. One in four employees won’t make it through their first year. In Sink or Swim! New Job. New Boss. 12 Weeks to Get It Right, authors Milo Sindell and Thuy Sindell, Ph.D., business and leadership consultants, assert that you lay the groundwork for success or failure in the first three months on the job. Their book helps the new employee make the most of the opportunity by applying the five sink or swim skills they’ve identified: setting goals; learning time management skills; developing a network of knowledge resources; learning how to be a team player and crafting the appropriate professional image through your appearance and actions.

Day by day, week by week, the authors show you what to think and do to ensure you’re at your professional best. With their help, your new job won’t be just a blur of new people and new responsibilities: you’ll be strategically reviewing, planning, reacting and revising. Whether you’re an entry-level employee, middle manager or head honcho, this book offers sound techniques for making you a stand-out in those critical first 12 weeks and beyond. Ellen R. Marsden writes from Mason, Ohio.

 

Whether you're just starting out, re-entering the workforce or simply wanting to make some changes in your work life, these four new books will show you how to succeed in getting where you want to go.

New on the job? As…

Family & Relationships

Love is in the air: books for romantics at any stage

Review by bookpagedev

It’s Valentine’s Day again, and men and women alike are measuring their relationships (or lack thereof) against the picture-perfect images presented by jewelers, candy makers and Hallmark cards. But take heart: whether you’re searching for someone to share your box of chocolates with or unabashedly disposing of the whole box yourself, BookPage has found the advice book for you.

Looking for love Mr. Right, Right Now!: How a Smart Woman Can Land Her Dream Man in 6 Weeks, by E. Jean Carroll, takes a proactive, humorous approach to capturing (and captivating) a great guy in short order. Carroll has written an advice column for Elle magazine for more than 10 years and is the co-founder of the highly trafficked site, GreatBoyfriends.com. (There’s an accompanying GreatGirlfriends.com men walk on Lonely Street too!) This man mogul candidly explains how to use your innate feminine wiles to make first encounters memorable, learn to ask men out and otherwise “mop up the floor with men.” She starts with a program designed to get a woman feeling and looking her best because, as she points out in Man Catching Law #4: “Delight in Your Own Attractions, and You Will Attract.” And getting to that mutual attraction, that “synchronizing,” is the name of the game. Carroll’s advice will get you out of the unproductive (and boring) practice of man-searching in grocery stores and take you to where the men really are. She lists hockey rinks, the Belmont Stakes, yacht clubs, marinas and film festivals among the many places where meeting Mr. Right would be more amenable than experiencing the magic “clicking” moment over wilted spinach in a produce aisle. Besides, think of all the fun you’ll have! Together forever If you found your Mr. Right a while back, married him, and are now wondering where in tarnation toleration went, let alone magic, Lasting Love: The 5 Secrets of Growing a Vital, Conscious Relationship, by Gay Hendricks, Ph.

D. and Kathlyn Hendricks, Ph.

D. (Rodale, $21.95, 272 pages, ISBN 1579548326) can help breathe new life into your long-term relationship. The married authors readily admit to being their own “best customers, as any relationship experts should be.” The Hendricks have discovered that although couples may have different surface issues, such as arguing over sex or money, the underlying source usually boils down to problems in one or more of five distinct areas: commitment, emotional transparency (the ability to clearly identify and state one’s feelings), sharing responsibility, creative individuation (expressing your own creativity on a regular basis), and appreciation (feeling it and communicating it). While this is a couples book, if you are currently between relationships or wondering how to make love last beyond the initial blind infatuation stage next time, Lasting Love can arm you with romantic insights and relationship savvy for the next go ’round. For satisfied singles Finally, Quirkyalone: A Manifesto for Uncompromising Romantics (HarperSanFrancisco, $19.95, 176 pages, ISBN 006057898X), by Sasha Cagen, fills a niche that has long gone unrecognized a relationship book for singles! Cagen defines a “quirkyalone” as “a person who enjoys being single (but is not opposed to being in a relationship), and generally prefers to be alone rather than date for the sake of being in a couple.” A famous example of a quirkyalone would be Katharine Hepburn despite her strong feelings for long-time love and fellow actor Spencer Tracy, she never wanted to marry him. Cagen claims that QAs are “romantic, wistful, idealist, and independent.” She explains that many quirkyalones enjoy “the surplus energy for work and friends, and the exhilarating feeling of waking up unfettered” that comes with “singledom.” If this sounds like you, you may be quirky (i.e. “distinctive; unintentionally different; without artifice”) and alone (i.e. “apart from others, uncoupled”) but you are not alone. Cagen’s book offers numerous testimonies from happy QAs, mainly female, but male as well, and contains a chapter on being “quirkytogether” which explains how QAs can and often do, find each other.

It's Valentine's Day again, and men and women alike are measuring their relationships (or lack thereof) against the picture-perfect images presented by jewelers, candy makers and Hallmark cards. But take heart: whether you're searching for someone to share your box of chocolates with or unabashedly…
Memoir

Talese’s behind-the-books view

Review by bookpagedev
"Eighty percent of the information I have collected from people ends up in the wastebasket." So declares Gay Talese, one of the pioneers (along with Tom Wolfe) of what became known as New Journalism. The man whose probing, detailed profiles of the likes of Frank Sinatra and Joe DiMaggio redefined magazine writing in the ’60s, and whose books—including Honor Thy Father and Unto the Sons—revealed insight derived from total immersion in the subject matter now delivers a memoir that largely obsesses over the projects that got away.
 
A Writer’s Life includes the admission, "Writing is often like driving a truck at night without headlights, losing your way along the road, and spending a decade in a ditch." With that, Talese frankly recounts his unsuccessful efforts to write about subjects as varied as Manhattan restaurants, female Chinese soccer player Liu Ying, an 80-year-old former warehouse building on East 63rd in New York City ("the Willy Loman of buildings") and the headline-making case of Lorena and John Wayne Bobbitt. The latter was initially intended for the New Yorker, until editor Tina Brown pulled the plug. Talese ends the chapter by putting his notes and unsold 10,000-word article into a file.
 
In reopening his files, Talese reveals the angst, obsessions and procrastinations of a heralded man of letters. His journey has never been easy. The acclaimed Unto the Sons took more than a decade to complete (and the manuscript ran 700 pages). Work on Thy Neighbor’s Wife, his 1980s opus about changing sexual mores, spanned nine years and 650 pages. Honor Thy Father required six years’ research. (Though as Talese notes, he had a good excuse: His sources for the groundbreaking expose of the Bonnano crime family were being shot at.)
 
Known for his natty attire (he is, after all, the son of a tailor), Talese is a literary lion who is unafraid to reveal his insecurities. A memoir of the creative process, A Writer’s Life will resonate with anyone who has ever sat in front of a blank computer screen. As Talese delves into his past influences (including family and heritage), as well as yellowed thoughts and research files, he delivers a creative tapestry that reminds us that often, it’s what you don’t read on the printed page that remains the most compelling.
 
A journalist and biographer, Los Angeles-based Pat H. Broeske writes about entertainment for many publications, including the New York Times.

"Eighty percent of the information I have collected from people ends up in the wastebasket." So declares Gay Talese, one of the pioneers (along with Tom Wolfe) of what became known as New Journalism. The man whose probing, detailed profiles of the likes of Frank…
NonfictionHistory

The real-life Count of Monte Cristo

Review by John T. Slania

The Count of Monte Cristo is a classic tale of betrayal and revenge, penned by the renowned 19th-century author Alexandre Dumas. But it turns out the novel is not merely fiction; key plot developments were based on the true-life experiences of the author’s father. This is the premise of The Black Count, a new book by Tom Reiss that traces the incredible rise and precipitous fall of Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, the father of author Alexandre Dumas.

In many ways, the life of the elder Dumas mirrors that of Edmond Dantes, the hero of The Count of Monte Cristo. In the novel, Dantes is falsely accused of being a supporter of Napoleon, who has been exiled from France. Dantes is imprisoned for 14 years before escaping and enacting revenge on his accusers.

While some occurrences in Thomas-Alexandre Dumas’ life were not as dramatic as those of the fictional Dantes, other aspects were even more remarkable. Dumas was born in present-day Haiti to a French nobleman and a black slave. Brought to France by his father, the mixed-race Dumas became a general under Napoleon Bonaparte.

But General Dumas’ fortunes abruptly changed. He was captured in Italy, thrown into a dungeon and left to rot. Though he was finally released, he died impoverished and embittered. Perhaps his revenge was achieved with his son’s writing of The Count of Monte Cristo, which takes a critical look at France’s tumultuous political climate.

The Black Count is a thoroughly researched, lively piece of nonfiction that will be savored by fans of Alexandre Dumas. But The Black Count needs no partner: It is fascinating enough to stand on its own.

The Count of Monte Cristo is a classic tale of betrayal and revenge, penned by the renowned 19th-century author Alexandre Dumas. But it turns out the novel is not merely fiction; key plot developments were based on the true-life experiences of the author’s father. This…

NonfictionMilitary HistoryHistory

Keeping the dogs of war at bay

Review by Roger Bishop

In 1952, with the Cold War beginning and a hot war raging in Korea, American voters sought a leader whose foreign policy could bring peace and security. Toward that end, they elected war hero Dwight Eisenhower as their president. With an escalating nuclear arms race, Ike found he was the first person in history with the power to destroy the world. As Evan Thomas demonstrates in his riveting Ike’s Bluff, the new president’s single most important preoccupation was avoiding war. How he did it, with subtlety and a pragmatic approach, is the focus of the book.

At the heart of Eisenhower’s strategy on nuclear weapons was confidentiality—he was the only person who knew whether he would drop the bomb. His ability to convince the enemies of the U.S. as well as his own supporters that he would use nuclear weapons was, Thomas writes, “a bluff of epic proportions.” To do this required extraordinary patience and self-discipline.

As Thomas points out, “Eisenhower’s critical insight was that nuclear warfare had made war itself the enemy.”

Thomas shows that Eisenhower’s approach to nuclear weapons would have worked only for him, a highly respected and popular military hero. As Thomas writes, “Ike was more comfortable as a soldier, yet his greatest victories were the wars he did not fight.”

In 1952, with the Cold War beginning and a hot war raging in Korea, American voters sought a leader whose foreign policy could bring peace and security. Toward that end, they elected war hero Dwight Eisenhower as their president. With an escalating nuclear arms race,…

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