Art, Art, Lifestyles, Nonfiction

The Work of Art

The Work of Art is a visionary compendium of ephemera that makes visible the bridge between idea and artwork.

Biography, Nonfiction

Ingenious

Richard Munson’s splendid biography of Benjamin Franklin provides an insightful view of the statesman’s lesser known accomplishments in science.

Biography, Literature, Nonfiction

Nonfiction Literature Biography

Didion and Babitz

Lili Anolik’s Didion and Babitz is a freewheeling and engaging narrative about two iconic literary rivals and their world in 1970s Los Angeles.

All Nonfiction Coverage

Filter by genre

Beware of baklava

by bookpagedev

Health & Fitness, Lifestyles

Lifestyles Health & Fitness

If you need to lose weight, consider taking a trip to another country. Two new entries in the ever-expanding category of diet books look at the cultural aspects of maintaining a healthy weight. Dieters often wonder, for example, why French women remain slim and sensual throughout their lives. French Women Don’t Get Fat: The Secret of Eating for Pleasure examines how you can experience joie de vivre without gaining an ounce. In thoroughly charming essays full of restraint but never deprivation, French-born, New-York based author Mireille Guiliano explains the art of appreciating excellent things in smaller portions and feeling full of gratitude. Growing up in Alsace, Guiliano would pick wild blueberries and savor homegrown foods while sharing meals with her family. Now the jet-setting CEO of Clicquot, the Champagne company, Guiliano and her compatriots rarely diet or obsess over food. Instead, they emphasize quality over quantity. She outlines their old-fashioned daily regimen of plenty of mineral water, a good night’s sleep, fresh seasonal foods, moderate exercise, inspiring activity and love. Guiliano’s elegant ideas will surely inspire women looking to live a simpler, slimmer life without feeling shortchanged.

Teacher Man

by bookpagedev

Nonfiction

Nonfiction

Harmonic life lessons

Review by Deanna Larson

by Deanna Larson

Oh Susannah, anybody can play an instrument! That’s the simple revelation made charmingly real in How to Play the Harmonica (and Other Life Lessons) by Sam Barry, a former Presbyterian minister now working for a major book publisher (and co-writing the Author Enablers column for BookPage). Barry is also a musician and music teacher who plays in and around San Francisco in the band Los Train Wreck and tours with the all-author rock band the Rock Bottom Remainders. Clearly, this isn’t his first camp “Kumbaya.”

In this little gem of a book, Barry’s pastorly reassurances loosen ties, bring out inner chickens and enable nascent musicians to let rip like Dylan and the Boss, eventually moving toward pomposity-slaying licks and writing an original blues song (because you know you have one in you). “The greatest crime of all is that we’ve stopped telling our own stories and making our own music,” Barry writes. “It’s just plain wrong.” Chapter by chapter, Barry shares memories from the embarrassments he’s had in life, along with a simple harp lesson charted out in a sidebar. It’s a whole lot more than Mel Bay. “Right now, take your harmonica and pretend you are in the Deep South late in the nineteenth century . . . Tell us a story. Make us remember how sad the world is yet how joyous life is. Take us on a journey.”

In Barry’s hands, this humble portable instrument teaches ideas like patience, letting go, tolerating failure, practice as meditation, listening to others and seeing the beauty in imperfection. “We can have new adventures at any time of life,” Barry writes. “Unfortunately, as we take on the responsibilities of adulthood, our fear of appearing silly or inept or less accomplished in the eyes of others increases and we shy away from trying anything new. We allow these concerns to dictate our behavior and miss a great deal. You don’t need anyone’s permission, so play.”

Recipes for success

by bookpagedev

Memoir

Memoir

Delectable morsels for foodies

Review by bookpagedev

by Lisa Waddle

The latest entry in the memoir-cum-recipes category is truly a mouthful. In Wrestling with Gravy: A Life, with Food playwright and New York Times food columnist Jonathan Reynolds recounts the delights and drama of his remarkable life through meals he’s made and ingested. In each chapter, Reynolds offers a recipe or two to go with the narrative of his life. The wonderful thing is that these recipes which are all over the map as far as cuisine and complexity are directly relevant to whatever tale he’s telling, and not just tacked on as an afterthought. For example, there’s the Tournedos Rossini Reynolds that was served onboard the S.S. France during his college graduation cruise. Then there’s the Monterey County Jail Oatmeal, which Reynolds experienced in his 20s after trespassing at Kim Novak’s house.

What makes this memoir worth reading is that it offers a peek into a life far different than most, and lived with gusto. Reynolds was raised on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, a privileged child who decided to become an actor. His career path was far from straight, and included working on Eugene McCarthy’s 1972 presidential campaign, writing a book on location during the filming of Apocalypse Now and producing The Dick Cavett Show. Reynolds has lived on both coasts, traveled extensively, divorced and remarried (to scene designer Heidi Ettinger) and has two sons and three stepsons. It’s appropriate that this rich life is filled with rich dishes like Fontainebleau Lobster and Cinderella Truffles.

Lisa Waddle is a pastry baker and food writer in Nashville.

Constructing an icon

by bookpagedev

Memoir

Memoir

He thinks different

Review by bookpagedev

by Ron Wynn

Steve Wozniak’s iWoz: From Computer Geek to Cult Icon How I Invented the Personal Computer, Co-founded Apple, and Had Fun Doing It, written with Gina Smith, is part confessional, part strategic overview and part business memoir. In it, the engineer/inventor and occasional concert promoter and philanthropist recounts his adventures, triumphs and missteps in the world of high technology. Wozniak invented the Apple computer in a manner he admits was more accidental success than tactical masterpiece: He was experimenting with both a TV screen and keyboard and later he stepped back and realized that he’d not only reduced the size of the machinery required to generate the programs and data, but also given individuals access to landmark technology.

iWoz corrects some misconceptions and outright inaccuracies previously presented about Wozniak’s life. His interest in social justice and progressive politics triggered his later involvement with music and charitable giving, and the book covers such events as his sale of Apple stock to 40 employees prior to the company going public. iWoz traces the life and times of a brilliant, gifted and sometimes exasperating individual whose contributions to the scientific, business and cultural realms are extensive.

Steve Wozniak's iWoz: From Computer Geek to Cult Icon How I Invented the Personal Computer, Co-founded Apple, and Had Fun Doing It, written with Gina Smith, is part confessional, part strategic overview and part business memoir. In it, the engineer/inventor and occasional concert promoter…

iPod, therefore I am

by bookpagedev

Nonfiction, True Crime

Nonfiction True Crime

The birth of the American Mafia

Review by Pete Croatto

by Pete Croatto

Thanks mostly to movies and television, the Mafia has been romanticized and glamorized. Historian Mike Dash isn’t interested in adding to that. Instead, his readable, revealing saga, The First Family, chronicles the birth and early days of an American institution.

Dozens of men and women figure prominently in this checkered history, so much so that Dash provides a rogues’ gallery for readers to keep up. (Note: you’ll need it.) Three people play prominent roles: Giuseppe “The Clutch Hand” Morello, a thug from Sicily—the real birthplace of the Mafia—who immigrates to New York City in 1894 and builds “the first family of organized crime in the United States.” Two lawmen give him perpetual trouble. One is Italian-born detective Joseph Petrosino, whose standing as “New York’s great expert on Italian crime” proves invaluable to the city but ultimately deadly to him. The other is William Flynn, head of the Secret Service’s New York bureau, whose dogged investigation into Morello’s counterfeiting operation marks the beginning of the end for “The Clutch Hand.”

There’s a lot to digest, but Dash (Batavia’s Graveyard) goes beyond offering a timeline with thugs. He describes the awful conditions in Sicily that created the Mafia, while examining the harsh lives of Italian immigrants in New York in the 1890s and early 20th century. Crime was a most appealing option, and since amateurs could be successful, there certainly was room for a professional outfit. Like any good entrepreneur, Morello saw a need and provided a service. He had a good run, but after his imprisonment in 1910, greed, infighting and bloodshed became increasingly common. Let’s just say that lots of people didn’t die from natural causes, including Morello in 1930.

Sexy, macho details aren’t prominent, but by eschewing those, Dash clearly shows the dark side of the plucky immigrant story. For Giuseppe Morello, the American Dream meant bringing the Mafia—his salvation—to America. Morello was a success story, just not the kind you learned about in school.

New Jersey writer Pete Croatto belongs to AAA, but not the Mafia.

Dozens of men and women figure…

Going inside Intel

by bookpagedev

Arts & Culture, Photography

Photography Arts & Culture

The years in pictures

Review by bookpagedev

by MiChelle Jones

Annie Leibovitz has photographed some of the most famous faces of our time, creating iconic portraits in her work for Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair, Gap, American Express and others. The images in A Photographer’s Life, 1990-2005 go from color to black-and-white, landscape to portraiture, artists (Baryshnikov, Welty, Avedon) to revolutionaries (Mandela, Bill Gates), Hollywood to war-torn Sarajevo. Leibovitz makes frequent use of four-panel spreads, especially when documenting her family. Sometimes, however, one photograph is enough: waves crashing into the Havana shore; Philip Johnson at his Glass House; a portrait of Susan Sontag, Leibovitz’s companion, with cropped white hair melting into a thick black turtleneck. Intimate photos of Sontag working, breakfasting in Venice, coping with and finally succumbing to cancer punctuate the years chronicled in A Photographer’s Life.

A companion exhibition to the book opened at the Brooklyn Museum in October and a documentary about Leibovitz (directed by her sister Barbara) will air on PBS’ American Masters series in January. After emotionally draining years during which Leibovitz lost both her father and Sontag and then celebrated the birth of twins, it’s a particularly apt time for a retrospective of her life and career.

Grandest of all

by bookpagedev

Want more BookPage?

Stay on top of new releases: Sign up for our newsletter to receive reading recommendations in your favorite genres.

Trending Nonfiction

Nonfiction Politics Memoir

How to Stand Up to a Dictator

Maria Ressa

By Sarojini Seupersad

Maria Ressa’s book is a political history of the Philippines and an intimate memoir, but it’s also a warning to democracies everywhere: Authoritarianism is a threat to us all.