The King's Book Club

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier

2007-04-06T08:27:00.000-07:00

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. This absorbing account by a young man who, as a boy of 12, gets swept up in Sierra Leone's civil war goes beyond even the best journalistic efforts in revealing the life and mind of a child abducted into the horrors of warfare. Beah's harrowing journey transforms him overnight from a child enthralled by American hip-hop music and dance to an internal refugee bereft of family, wandering from village to village in a country grown deeply divided by the indiscriminate atrocities of unruly, sociopathic rebel and army forces. Beah then finds himself in the army—in a drug-filled life of casual mass slaughter that lasts until he is 15, when he's brought to a rehabilitation center sponsored by UNICEF and partnering NGOs. The process marks out Beah as a gifted spokesman for the center's work after his "repatriation" to civilian life in the capital, where he lives with his family and a distant uncle. When the war finally engulfs the capital, it sends 17-year-old Beah fleeing again, this time to the U.S., where he now lives. (Beah graduated from Oberlin College in 2004.) Told in clear, accessible language by a young writer with a gifted literary voice, this memoir seems destined to become a classic firsthand account of war and the ongoing plight of child soldiers in conflicts worldwide. (Feb.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

Washington Post
“Everyone in the world should read this book. Not just because it contains an amazing story, or because it’s our moral, bleeding-heart duty, or because it’s clearly written. We should read it to learn about the world and about what it means to be human.”

Time Magazine
“A breathtaking and unselfpitying account of how a gentle spirit survives a childhood from which all innocence has suddenly been sucked out. It's a truly riveting memoir.”

Newsweek.com
“Beah is a gifted writer. . . Read his memoir and you will be haunted . . . It’s a high price to pay, but it’s worth it.”

People Magazine
“Deeply moving, even uplifting…Beah's story, with its clear-eyed reporting and literate particularity—whether he's dancing to rap, eating a coconut or running toward the burning village where his family is trapped—demands to be read.” (Critic’s Choice, Four stars)

Elle Magazine
“Beah’s memoir, A Long Way Gone (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), is unforgettable testimony that Africa’s children—millions of them dying and orphaned by preventable diseases, hundreds of thousands of them forced into battle—have eyes to see and voices to tell what has happened. And what voices! How is it possible that 26-year-old Beah, a nonnative English speaker, separated from his family at age 12, taught to maim and to kill at 13, can sound such notes of family happiness, of friendship under duress, of quiet horror? No outsider could have written this book, and it’s hard to imagine that many insiders could do so with such acute vision, stark language, and tenderness. It is a heart-rending achievement.” —Melissa Fay Greene

Christian Science Monitor
“When Beah is finally approached about the possibility of serving as a spokesperson on the issue of child soldiers, he knows exactly what he wants to tell the world: “I would always tell people that I believe children have the resilience to outlive their sufferings, if given a chance.”
Others may make the same assertions, but Beah has the advantage of stating them in the first person. That makes A Long Way Gone all the more gripping.”

Minneapolis Star Tribune
“In place of a text that has every right to be a diatribe against Sierra Leone, globalization or even himself, Beah has produced a book of such self-effacing humanity that refugees, political fronts and even death squads resolve themselves back into the faces of mothers, fathers and siblings. A Long Way Gone transports us into the lives of thousands of children whose lives have been altered by war, and it does so with a genuine and disarmingly emotional force.”

Philadelphia Inquirer
“What Beah saw and did during [the war] has haunted him ever since, and if you read his stunning and unflinching memoir, you'll be haunted, too . . . It would have been enough if Ishmael Beah had merely survived the horrors described in A Long Way Gone. That he has written this unforgettable firsthand account of his odyssey is harder still to grasp. Those seeking to understand the human consequences of war, its brutal and brutalizing costs, would be wise to reflect on Ishmael Beah's story.”

The Wall Street Journal
“Beah speaks in a distinctive voice, and he tells an important story.”

Kirkus Reviews
“Hideously effective in conveying the essential horror of his experiences.”

The Guardian UK
“Extraordinary . . . A ferocious and desolate account of how ordinary children were turned into professional killers.”

"A Long Way Gone is one of the most important war stories of our generation. The arming of children is among the greatest evils of the modern world, and yet we know so little about it because the children themselves are swallowed up by the very wars they are forced to wage. Ishmael Beah has not only emerged intact from this chaos, he has become one of its most eloquent chroniclers. We ignore his message at our peril." —Sebastian Junger, author of A Death in Belmont and A Perfect Storm

"This is a beautifully written book about a shocking war and the children who were forced to fight it. Ishmael Beah describes the unthinkable in calm, unforgettable language; his memoir is an important testament to the children elsewhere who continue to be conscripted into armies and militias." —Steve Coll, author of Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001, winner of the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for general Nonfiction

"This is a wrenching, beautiful, and mesmerizing tale. Beah's amazing saga provides a haunting lesson about how gentle folks can be capable of great brutalities as well goodness and courage. It will leave you breathless."
—Walter Isaacson, author of Benjamin Franklin: An American Life

“A Long Way Gone hits you hard in the gut with Sierra Leone’s unimaginable brutality and then it touches your soul with unexpected acts of kindness. Ishmael Beah’s story tears your heart to pieces and then forces you to put it back together again, because if Beah can emerge from such horror with his humanity in tact, it’s the least you can do.”
—Jeannette Walls, author of The Glass Castle: A Memoir

The Road By Cormac McCarthy

2007-03-28T20:46:00.000-07:00

National Bestseller
National Book Critic's Circle Award Finalist

A New York Times Notable Book

One of the Best Books of the Year The Boston Globe, The Christian Science Monitor, The Denver Post, The Kansas City Star, Los Angeles Times, New York, People, Rocky Mountain News, Time, The Village Voice, The Washington Post

The searing, postapocalyptic novel destined to become Cormac McCarthy's masterpiece.

A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don't know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food--and each other.

The Road is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, "each the other's world entire," are sustained by love. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.

About the Author
Cormac McCarthy was born in Rhode Island. He attended the University of Tennessee in the early 1950s, and joined the U.S. Air Force, serving four years, two of them stationed in Alaska. McCarthy then returned to the university, where he published in the student literary magazine and won the Ingram-Merrill Award for creative writing in 1959 and 1960. McCarthy next went to Chicago, where he worked as an auto mechanic while writing his first novel, The Orchard Keeper.

The Orchard Keeper was published by Random House in 1965; McCarthy's editor there was Albert Erskine, William Faulkner's long-time editor. Before publication, McCarthy received a traveling fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which he used to travel to Ireland. In 1966 he also received the Rockefeller Foundation Grant, with which he continued to tour Europe, settling on the island of Ibiza. Here, McCarthy completed revisions of his next novel, Outer Dark.

In 1967, McCarthy returned to the United States, moving to Tennessee. Outer Dark was published by Random House in 1968, and McCarthy received the Guggenheim Fellowship for Creative Writing in 1969. His next novel, Child of God, was published in 1973. From 1974 to 1975, McCarthy worked on the screenplay for a PBS film called The Gardener's Son, which premiered in 1977. A revised version of the screenplay was later published by Ecco Press.

In the late 1970s, McCarthy moved to Texas, and in 1979 published his fourth novel, Suttree, a book that had occupied his writing life on and off for twenty years. He received a MacArthur Fellowship in 1981, and published his fifth novel, Blood Meridian, in 1985.

After the retirement of Albert Erskine, McCarthy moved from Random House to Alfred A. Knopf. All the Pretty Horses, the first volume of The Border Trilogy, was published by Knopf in 1992. It won both the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award and was later turned into a feature film. The Stonemason, a play that McCarthy had written in the mid-1970s and subsequently revised, was published by Ecco Press in 1994. Soon thereafter, Knopf released the second volume of The Border Trilogy, The Crossing; the third volume, Cities of the Plain, was published in 1998.

McCarthy's next novel, No Country for Old Men was published in 2005. This was followed in 2006 by a novel in dramatic form, The Sunset Limited, originally performed by Steppenwolf Theatre Company of Chicago and published in paperback by Vintage Books. McCarthy's most recent novel, The Road, was also published by Knopf in 2006

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

2007-03-02T04:41:00.000-08:00

The Final Chapter
It's official! Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the seventh and final book in J.K. Rowling's magical Harry Potter series, will be released on July 21, 2007. In the February 1 announcement from the book's publisher, Lisa Holton, President of Scholastic Children's Books, said, "We are thrilled to announce the publication date of the seventh installment in this remarkable series. We join J.K. Rowling's millions of readers--young and old, veterans and newcomers--in anticipating what lies ahead." Save the date, and let the countdown begin!

The Seat Of The Soul by Gary Zukav

2007-01-26T04:43:00.000-08:00

Amazon.com
Gary Zukav's American Book Award-winning The Dancing Wu Li Masters masterfully introduces the layman to quantum and particle physics, as well as Einstein's relativity theories. With a similar dose of amiable, easy-to-understand prose, Zukav guides readers into the spiritual realm in his bestselling The Seat of the Soul.
Zukav questions the Western model of the soul, alleging that the human species is in the midst of a great transformation, evolving from a species that pursues power based upon the perceptions of the five senses--"external power"--to one that pursues power based upon perceptions of the soul--"authentic power." He believes that humans are immortal souls first, physical beings second, and that once we become conscious of this transformation--once we align our personalities with our soul--we will stimulate our spiritual growth and become better people in the process. This insightful, lucid synthesis of modern psychology and new-age principles has been described as the "physics of the soul." Who better to explain such heady concepts than Gary Zukav?

Amazon.com Audiobook Review
Ready to attain a higher level of understanding? Author Gary Zukav can help you evolve into a multisensory being, one who "values love more than the physical world." As shown in The Dancing Wu Li Masters, his bestselling exploration of physics, Zukav has a gift for presenting complex, even mind-boggling concepts in clearly worded and reasoned logic. In Seat of the Soul, he leads you on an inspirational and potentially life-changing journey into the seemingly intangible realm of the spirit. Reading in a calm, soothing voice he explains why increased sensory perception will mark the next phase of human evolution, how the power of choice can change your existence, and what you can do to infuse your life with more compassion, trust, and understanding. (Running time: 3 hours, 2 cassettes) --George Laney --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly
"A laser is like a whole personality," writes Zukav. In a sequel to The Dancing Wu Li Masters , this exponent of the spiritual side of the "new physics" goes beyond intriguing parallels. In gracefully written sermonettes with titles like "Evolution," "Light," "Power" and "Addiction," he makes a bold attempt to fuse so-called New Age wisdom with modern psychology, science and sociopolitical reality. Zukav posits two types of people: the "five-sensory human" who puts mind over heart, lacks trust, plays power games and can't tap intuition is contrasted with the "multisensory" individual who seeks alignment of the soul with the personality. One section relates personal and national karma to the theory of Gaia, which holds that Earth is a single living entity with a soul. Though Zukav explores themes long familiar to astrologers and occultists, his high-minded synthesis is something more than old wine in a new bottle.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal
Zukav describes a new form of evolution in which humans learn to value authentic powerApower based on the perceptions and values of the spirit. Authentic power differs from external power in that external power is based on perceptions of the five senses and is thus missing a dimension. Zukav (The Dancing Wu Li Masters) recommends that in order to achieve wholeness, we need to recognize a realm outside and beyond ourselves. He insists that we not become caught up in definitions of this higher power or names. The important thing is that we recognize that we need this sixth sense in order to discover the true meaning of life. The Seat of the Soul depicts the transformation from an ordinary, externally powered world to an authentic, new-dimensional life. Although the author seems to come to few conclusions about the benefits of the authentic self or how to achieve this state, this work, narrated by William Griffith, may be of interest to libraries establishing large alternative religion collections.ARavonne A. Green, Virginia Polytechnic Inst. & State Univ., Blacksburg
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From AudioFile
Zukav, author of THE DANCING WU LI MASTERS, focuses his attention on the spiritual mission of mankind. He delves into the nature of humankind, their five physical senses, and their "multi-senses," or spiritual nature. Zukav cites Ghandi and Christ as examples of spirituality in this life, then describes various aspects of karma and reincarnation, including explanations of how one's soul defines this life and one's action. Griffith's quiet voice is reminiscent of a teacher or spiritual guide without having the ecstatic charisma of a preacher. In his soothing voice, Griffith lulls the listener into accepting the veracity of Zukav's theories. His narration solidly reflects the spirituality of Zukav's theories. M.B.K. © AudioFile 2002, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

Review
Library Journal

A remarkable treatment of thought, evolution, and reincarnation.

Huston Smith, Ph.D.

former professor of philosophy, MIT, and author of The Religions of Man

How remarkable -- to find that one of our finest interpreters of frontier science is equally conversant with the human spirit. This augurs well for our times.

Brian Weiss, M.D.

Chairman of Psychiatry, Mt. Sinai Medical Center, Miami, and author of Many Lives, Many Masters

Filled with wisdom, and written in a beautifully simple, almost poetic style, The Seat of the Soul is a book to be savored.

Library Journal

A readable, thought-provoking [work] on how our perceptions must change dramatically if we are to survive.

Review
Library Journal A readable, thought-provoking [work] on how our perceptions must change dramatically if we are to survive.

Book Description
With the same extraordinary skill that he used to demystify scientific abstraction and the new physics, Gary Zukay, the award-winning author of The Dancing Wu Li Masters, here takes us on a brilliant and penetrating exploration of the new phase of evolution we have now entered.

With lucidity and elegance, Zukav explains that we are evolving from a species that pursues power based upon the perceptions of the five senses -- external power -- into a species that pursues authentic power -- power that is based upon the perceptions and values of the spirit. He shows how the pursuit of external power has produced our survival-of-the-fittest understanding of evolution, generated conflict between lovers, communities, and superpowers, and brought us to the edge of destruction.

Using his scientist's eye and philosopher's heart, Zukav shows how infusing the activities of life with reverence, compassion, and trust makes them come alive with meaning and purpose. He illustrates how the emerging values of the spirit are changing marriages into spiritual partnerships, psychology into spiritual psychology, and transforming our everyday lives. The Seat of the Soul describes the remarkable journey to the spirit that each of us is on.

About the Author
Winner of the 1979 American Book Award in Science for The Dancing Wu Li Masters, Gary Zukay, a graduate of Harvard University, lives in Northern California.

The Secret By Rhonda Byrne

2007-01-24T15:38:00.000-08:00

Editorial Reviews

Book Description
Fragments of a Great Secret have been found in the oral traditions, in literature, in religions and philosophies throughout the centuries. For the first time, all the pieces of The Secret come together in an incredible revelation that will be life-transforming for all who experience it.

In this book, you'll learn how to use The Secret in every aspect of your life -- money, health, relationships, happiness, and in every interaction you have in the world. You'll begin to understand the hidden, untapped power that's within you, and this revelation can bring joy to every aspect of your life.

The Secret contains wisdom from modern-day teachers -- men and women who have used it to achieve health, wealth, and happiness. By applying the knowledge of The Secret, they bring to light compelling stories of eradicating disease, acquiring massive wealth, overcoming obstacles, and achieving what many would regard as impossible.

From the Publisher
The Secret is truly the most outstanding book to date that we have published. I am so pleased that Rhonda Byrne was able to bring together this life-changing information so masterfully. She first did it for the movie of the same name that she produced, which has been a phenomenon in its own right. She then added, in only ones month's time, incredible additional content to the transcript of the film that brings even more clarity to the reader. This is absolutely a book that people from all walks of life can read and then "get" the concept of The Secret. It allows them to then take it and apply it to their lives. Children, teenagers and adults of all ages are reporting miraculous stories of positive changes as a result. Rhonda Byrne is dedicated to maintaining the integrity of The Secret and to making sure that now, finally, the whole world knows about The Secret. You will want to share this with your friends and family and they will be grateful for it. This book gives hope for what many have been waiting for-- a shift in the way the world thinks. Its a very exciting time that we are living in, and I as well as everyone at Beyond Words and Atria Books are grateful to be a part of it.

--Cynthia Black, President, Beyond Words Publishing

About the Author
One spring day towards the end of 2004, Rhonda Byrne discovered a secret - the secret laws and principles of the universe. Almost immediately her life was transformed, as she began to put into practice what she had learned. It seemed to Rhonda that almost no-one knew the things that she had discovered, even though the concepts could be found in almost every religion and field of human endeavor throughout history. And in that moment her greatest wish, and mission, was to share this knowledge with the world.

Rhonda began to see that her entire life - everything she had ever done - had been quietly and steadily moving her towards the most perfect place for her to be able to fulfill her wish. And to fulfill it on the grandest possible scale! She had gone from working as a producer at the Nine Network in Melbourne, Australia, to starting her own television production company, Prime Time Productions, in 1994. And after ten years of creating internationally successful shows, Rhonda was ready to take Prime Time Productions in a direction that fulfilled people rather than just entertained them.

On that spring day in 2004, when a small, old book called The Science of Getting Rich was put into her hands, and Rhonda's whole life suddenly pulled into spectacular focus, she knew exactly what her mission was to become. She was going to take this knowledge to the world. She was going to make a movie to carry joy to every corner of the Earth. And so the great journey that was The Secret began.

In early 2005, when The Secret was simply a name and a (momentous) vision, Prime Time Productions was made up of Rhonda, Producer Paul Harrington, and Director Drew Heriot. For eight weeks Rhonda intensively taught everything she had learned about The Secret to Paul and Drew.

One of Rhonda's initial intentions for the creation of the show was that Prime Time Productions would use The Secret to make The Secret... that it would be an effortless, joyful journey as they attracted everything and everyone that was needed to fulfill the vision. And right when the company was ready to begin production, as if by magic, the perfect people to make The Secret began to appear.

The day Rhonda arrived in the United States, she had not one interview set up but she had the firm intention that the teachers for the film would appear. And in a matter of seven weeks, the team arrived and filmed a total of fifty-two 'teachers' of The Secret. Wherever the team went, more and more amazing teachers would emerge--great writers, leaders, philosophers, doctors, and scientists. These teachers created the foundation for The Secret.

Today The Secret is the Prime Time benchmark, and the company's firm intention is to produce work that inspires, uplifts, and, most importantly, continues bringing joy to billions.

The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream By Barack Obama

2007-01-23T07:51:00.000-08:00

Amazon.com
Barack Obama's first book, Dreams from My Father, was a compelling and moving memoir focusing on personal issues of race, identity, and community. With his second book The Audacity of Hope, Obama engages themes raised in his keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, shares personal views on faith and values and offers a vision of the future that involves repairing a "political process that is broken" and restoring a government that has fallen out of touch with the people. We had the opportunity to ask Senator Obama a few questions about writing, reading, and politics, see his responses below. --Daphne Durham

Illinois's Democratic senator illuminates the constraints of mainstream politics all too well in this sonorous manifesto. Obama (Dreams from My Father) castigates divisive partisanship (especially the Republican brand) and calls for a centrist politics based on broad American values. His own cautious liberalism is a model: he's skeptical of big government and of Republican tax cuts for the rich and Social Security privatization; he's prochoice, but respectful of prolifers; supportive of religion, but not of imposing it. The policy result is a tepid Clintonism, featuring tax credits for the poor, a host of small-bore programs to address everything from worker retraining to teen pregnancy, and a health-care program that resembles Clinton's Hillary-care proposals. On Iraq, he floats a phased but open-ended troop withdrawal. His triangulated positions can seem conflicted: he supports free trade, while deploring its effects on American workers (he opposed the Central American Free Trade Agreement), in the end hoping halfheartedly that more support for education, science and renewable energy will see the economy through the dilemmas of globalization. Obama writes insightfully, with vivid firsthand observations, about politics and the compromises forced on politicians by fund-raising, interest groups, the media and legislative horse-trading. Alas, his muddled, uninspiring proposals bear the stamp of those compromises.

What Got You Here Won't Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful By Marshall Goldsmith

2007-01-23T07:46:00.000-08:00

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Goldsmith, an executive coach to the corporate elite, pinpoints 20 bad habits that stifle already successful careers as well as personal goals like succeeding in marriage or as a parent. Most are common behavioral problems, such as speaking when angry, which even the author is prone to do when dealing with a teenage daughter's belly ring. Though Goldsmith deals with touchy-feely material more typical of a self-help book—such as learning to listen or letting go of the past—his approach to curing self-destructive behavior is much harder-edged. For instance, he does not suggest sensitivity training for those prone to voicing morale-deflating sarcasm. His advice is to stop doing it. To stimulate behavior change, he suggests imposing fines (e.g., $10 for each infraction), asserting that monetary penalties can yield results by lunchtime. While Goldsmith's advice applies to everyone, the highly successful audience he targets may be the least likely to seek out his book without a direct order from someone higher up. As he points out, they are apt to attribute their success to their bad behavior. Still, that may allow the less successful to gain ground by improving their people skills first. (Jan. 2)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
By now, the CEO as celebrity is old hat. (Just start counting the books from former company heads.) That goes for the executive-recruiter-cum-president-makers. What has yet to be explored--until now--is the celebrity business coach, the individual who helps C-level executives correct flaws, whether invisible or public. A frequent interviewee in major business magazines like Fortune, Goldsmith, with the sage help and advice of his collaborator Reiter, pens a self-help career book, filled with disguised anecdotes and candid dialogue, all soon slated for bestsellerdom. His steps in coaching for success are simple, honest, without artifice: gather feedback from appropriate colleagues and cohorts, determine which behaviors to change (and remember, Goldsmith specifically focuses on behavior, not skills or knowledge), apologize, advertise, listen, thank, follow up, and practice feed-forward. Admittedly, this shrewd organizational psychologist only works with leaders he knows will listen, follow advice, and change--especially considering that he doesn't receive fees until improvements are secure and visible. On the other hand, these are words and processes anyone will benefit from, whether wannabe manager or senior executive. Barbara Jacobs
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Booklist
"Goldsmith [is] soon slated for bestsellerdom. His steps in coaching for success are simple, honest, without artifice."

BookPage
"You'll see the results whether you're a CEO or just getting started."

Book Description
America’s most sought-after executive coach shows how to climb the last few rungs of the ladder
The corporate world is filled with executives, men and women who have worked hard for years to reach the upper levels of management. They’re intelligent, skilled, and even charismatic. But only a handful of them will ever reach the pinnacle -- and as executive coach Marshall Goldsmith shows in this book, subtle nuances make all the difference. These are small "transactional flaws" performed by one person against another (as simple as not saying thank you enough), which lead to negative perceptions that can hold any executive back. Using Goldsmith’s straightforward, jargonfree advice, it’s amazingly easy behavior to change.

Executives who hire Goldsmith for one-on-one coaching pay $250,000 for the privilege. With this book, his help is available for 1/10,000th of the price.

About the Author
Marshall Goldsmith is corporate America’s preeminent executive coach, having worked with more than sixty CEOs at the world’s leading corporations. He is on the faculty of the executive education programs at Dartmouth College and the University of Michigan. Goldsmith lives in Fairbanks Ranch, California. Mark Reiter has collaborated on thirteen previous books. He is also a literary agent in Bronxville, New York.

You: On A Diet: The Owner's Manual for Waist Management By Mehmet Oz

2007-01-19T14:35:00.000-08:00

For the first time in our history, scientists are uncovering astounding medical evidence about dieting--and why so many of us struggle with our weight and the size of our waists. Now researchers are unraveling biological secrets about such things as why you crave chocolate or gorge at buffets or store so much fat.
Michael Roizen and Mehmet Oz, America's most trusted doctor team and authors of the bestselling YOU series, are now translating this cutting-edge information to help you shave inches off your waist. They're going to do it by giving you the best weapon against fat: knowledge. By understanding how your body's fat-storing and fat-burning systems work, you're going to learn how to crack the code on true and lifelong waist management.

Roizen and Oz will invigorate you with equal parts information, motivation, and change-your-life action to show you how your brain, stomach, hormones, muscles, heart, genetics, and stress levels all interact biologically to determine if your body is the size of a baseball bat or of a baseball stadium. In YOU: On a Diet, Roizen and Oz will redefine what a healthy figure is, then take you through an under-the skin tour of the organs that influence your body's size and its health. You'll even be convinced that the key number to fixate on is not your weight, but your waist size, which best indicates the medical risks of storing too much fat.

Because the world has almost as many diet plans as it has e-mail spammers, you'd think that just about all of us would know everything there is to know about dieting, about fat, and about the reasons why our bellies have grown so large. YOU: On a Diet is much more than a diet plan or a series of instructions and guidelines or a faddish berries-only eating plan. It's a complete manual for waist management. It will show you how to achieve and maintain an ideal and healthy body size by providing a lexicon according to which any weight-loss system can be explained. YOU: On a Diet will serve as the operating system that facilitates future evolution in our dieting software. After you learn about the biology of your body and the biology and psychology of fat, you'll be given the YOU Diet and YOU Workout. Both are easy to learn, follow, and maintain. Following a two-week rebooting program will help you lose up to two inches from your waist right from the start.

With Roizen and Oz's signature accessibility, wit, and humor, YOU: On a Diet--The Owner's Manual for Waist Management will revolutionize the way you think about yourself and the food you consume, so that you'll diet smart, not hard. Welcome to your body on a diet.

The Best Life Diet By Bob Greene

2007-01-18T11:37:00.000-08:00

From the bestselling author of Get With the Program! and Bob Greene's Total Body Makeover comes The Best Life Diet, a lifetime plan for losing weight and keeping it off. Bob Greene helped Oprah achieve her dramatic weight loss, and he can help you too. You'll eat the same delicious food that Oprah enjoys, and, just like Oprah, you'll have Bob to encourage you at every step. Unlike a celebrity, however, you don't need to hire a staff of experts to aid and advise you, because Bob's plan, easily tailored to an array of tastes, lifestyles, and activity levels, acts as your personal trainer and private nutritionist. Just open the book and let Bob help you get started down the path toward your best possible life.

What sets Bob apart from all the other experts who claim to have plans that work is that he admits that weight loss is difficult: seventeen years of watching people struggle to lose weight on a seemingly endless string of trendy crash diets, only to backslide and regain the pounds they've shed, have taught him that dropping pounds is not simply a numbers game. By acknowledging that it is not simple laziness but a complicated web of social rituals, cultural expectations, and habits that drives people to gain weight, Greene is able to attack the problem of weight loss realistically and offer not a short-lived, quick-fix formula, but a long-term program that accounts for the challenges and constraints of the real world.

Divided into three phases, The Best Life Diet gives you the tools you need to change your life. In each phase, you'll be asked to reexamine the decisions you make on a daily basis and gradually alter your habits to achieve lasting results. The book also includes easy-to-follow meal plans that make it simple to meet your daily energy and nutrient requirements, whether you are on the run and breakfast means a quick smoothie or you have time to shop for fresh produce and make something special.

You'll watch the weight disappear as you learn to prepare festive and flavorful dishes like Fire-Roasted Tomato-Shrimp Veracruz, Chicken Sausage Jambalaya, or Flank Steak with Chimichurri Topping and indulge in desserts like Roasted Peaches with Ricotta and Almonds or Apple Rhubarb Walnut Crisp. And for each delicious recipe, there is a detailed nutritional analysis, so you know exactly what you are eating and how it fits into your personal eating plan.

Most important, Bob's plan doesn't end once you've lost the weight. Instead, it gives you the tools you need to make living your best life second nature, because for Greene, a diet is not something you go "on" or "off" but a set of guidelines that will help you claim the life you deserve.

The Road By Cormac McCarthy

2006-10-09T05:35:00.000-07:00

Best known for his Border Trilogy, hailed in the San Francisco Chronicle as "an American classic to stand with the finest literary achievements of the century," Cormac McCarthy has written ten rich and often brutal novels, including last year's bestselling No Country for Old Men, and this year's The Road. Profoundly dark, told in spare, searing prose, The Road is a post-apocalyptic masterpiece, one of the best books we've read this year, but in case you need a second (and expert) opinion, we asked Dennis Lehane, author of equally rich, occasionally bleak and brutal novels, to read it and give us his take. Read his glowing review below. --Daphne Durham

Starred Review. Violence, in McCarthy's postapocalyptic tour de force, has been visited worldwide in the form of a "long shear of light and then a series of low concussions" that leaves cities and forests burned, birds and fish dead and the earth shrouded in gray clouds of ash. In this landscape, an unnamed man and his young son journey down a road to get to the sea. (The man's wife, who gave birth to the boy after calamity struck, has killed herself.) They carry blankets and scavenged food in a shopping cart, and the man is armed with a revolver loaded with his last two bullets. Beyond the ever-present possibility of starvation lies the threat of roving bands of cannibalistic thugs. The man assures the boy that the two of them are "good guys," but from the way his father treats other stray survivors the boy sees that his father has turned into an amoral survivalist, tenuously attached to the morality of the past by his fierce love for his son. McCarthy establishes himself here as the closest thing in American literature to an Old Testament prophet, trolling the blackest registers of human emotion to create a haunting and grim novel about civilization's slow death after the power goes out. 250,000 announced first printing; BOMC main selection.(Oct.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From The Washington Post's Book World/washingtonpost.com
In Cormac McCarthy's new novel, The Road, the bloodbath is finally complete. The violence that animated his great Western novels has been superseded by a flash of nuclear annihilation, which also blasts away some of what we expect from the reclusive author's work. With this apocalyptic tale, McCarthy has moved into the allegorical realm of Samuel Beckett and José Saramago — and, weirdly, George Romero. The novel opens on a world that seems to have been demolished by the psychopaths of McCarthy's earlier fiction, as though the Judge from Blood Meridian had graduated from shotguns to atomic bombs and vented his spleen upon the entire planet. It's a shift that transforms not only the physical landscape, reduced now to barren plains of ash, but the moral landscape as well. The fear of dying, so prevalent in McCarthy's previous novels, is balanced here by the fear of surviving: "Creedless shells of men tottering down the causeways like migrants in a feverland. The frailty of everything revealed at last. Old and troubling issues resolved into nothingness and night."
The Road (Knopf, 241 pp., $24) follows two of the last people on Earth, an unnamed man and his young son, as they walk through an incinerated wasteland foraging for food and hiding from gangs of starving cannibals. "The nights now only slightly less black," he writes. "By day the banished sun circles the earth like a grieving mother with a lamp." This marks a significant departure for McCarthy, but it's hardly a departure for apocalyptic fiction and film, which have trafficked in these dark visions for decades. Of course, McCarthy has borrowed from lowbrow forms before. Most of his works are Faulknerian transformations of dime-store Westerns; his first modern-day novel, last year's No Country for Old Men, wore the worn costumes of a drug-crime police chase. Without its rich voice, The Road would read like a remake of "Night of the Living Dead." Indeed, as if to acknowledge that debt, the man remembers his late wife saying, "We're the walking dead in a horror film." More than once, the little boy warns his father they shouldn't go into an abandoned house, but then -- no, stop! -- they go in anyway. There are also the requisite touches of gallows humor: the delicious taste of the last Coke on Earth, the only writing that survives worldwide destruction being a billboard that reads: "See Rock City." And finally, the one-dimensional horror-flick women: Most middle-school boys have a more nuanced understanding of the opposite sex than McCarthy demonstrates in his fiction, and he does nothing to alter that impression here.

But even with its flaws, there's just no getting around it: The Road is a frightening, profound tale that drags us into places we don't want to go, forces us to think about questions we don't want to ask. Readers who sneer at McCarthy's mythic and biblical grandiosity will cringe at the ambition of The Road. At first I kept trying to scoff at it, too, but I was just whistling past the graveyard. Ultimately, my cynicism was overwhelmed by the visceral power of McCarthy's prose and the simple beauty of this hero's love for his son.

The novel is made up of several hundred isolated moments, scraps of dialogue and flashes of action. Here's a typical one that could appear anywhere in the book:

"The land was gullied and eroded and barren. The bones of dead creatures sprawled in the washes. Middens of anonymous trash. Farmhouses in the fields scoured of their paint and the clapboards spooned and sprung from the wallstuds. All of it shadowless and without feature. The road descended through a jungle of dead kudzu. A marsh where the dead reeds lay over the water. Beyond the edge of the fields the sullen haze hung over the earth and sky alike. By late afternoon it had begun to snow and they went on with the tarp over them and the wet snow hissing on the plastic."

These remarkable passages, like a succession of prose poems, are marked by a few flashes of terror, but we're never forced to gorge on the gore that McCarthy's most devoted fans celebrate. There's only a glimpse of the civilization-ending catastrophe itself, which took place years ago, just before the boy was born: "A long shear of light and then a series of low concussions." Afterward this single haunting vision of the early days: "People sitting on the sidewalk in the dawn half immolate and smoking in their clothes. Like failed sectarian suicides. Others would come to help them. Within a year there were fires on the ridges and deranged chanting. The screams of the murdered. By day the dead impaled on spikes along the road."

These glimpses are metered out carefully in a way that only increases the sense of terror. It's the constant potential for carnage that energizes the story -- the hell that can be spotted in the flash of lightning, a baby on a spit roasting over an open fire.

Among his thinly plotted novels, The Road is McCarthy's most thinly plotted of all, as there's literally nowhere to go, no sense in going, just the inexorable impulse to move. The plot, such as it is, comes down to this father's existential need to keep his son alive and hopeful in a world that offers no life or hope. Day after day, month after month, they're starving and freezing, pushing along a cart with the few provisions they scavenge from decrepit homes looted bare years ago. "The boy was all that stood between him and death," McCarthy writes. "He saw for a brief moment the absolute truth of the world. The cold relentless circling of the intestate earth. Darkness implacable. The blind dogs of the sun in their running. The crushing black vacuum of the universe."

But against that lifeless state, the man clings to a raw faith in his mission: "My job is to take care of you," he tells his son. "I was appointed to do that by God. I will kill anyone who touches you." With everything scraped away, the impulse to sanctify, to worship, to create meaning remains. "All of this like some ancient anointing," the man thinks after washing his son's hair in an icy dead lake. "So be it. Evoke the forms. Where you've nothing else construct ceremonies out of the air and breathe upon them."

Concurrent with keeping his son alive is the more metaphysical challenge of sustaining his son's innate goodness while forcing him to witness the corruption of all moral behavior. "Are we still the good guys?" the boy asks in moments of confusion and shock. His father insists they are. "This is what good guys do," he tells him. "They keep trying. They dont give up." Why, then, his son asks, won't he help the stragglers they run across instead of running from them or shooting at them? "We should go to him, Papa. We could get him and take him with us. . . . I'd give that little boy half of my food." How to explain the necessity of abandoning others to certain death (or worse, in one particularly terrifying scene) while maintaining that they're "the good guys," the ones "carrying the fire"?

Under these singularly bleak conditions, the boy's nature -- his impulse to help, his anxiety about stealing others' food -- is, of course, naive. But even when fighting for their lives, his father knows that it's a naiveté inspired by the boy's goodness that makes their fight worthwhile, that allows him to resist the age-old temptation "to curse God and die."

The encounter that illumines the final moments of the novel will infuriate McCarthy die-hards who relish his existential bleakness, but the scene confirms earlier allusions that suggest the roots of this end-of-the-world story reach far past the nuclear age to the apocalypse of Christian faith. The book's climax -- an immaculate conception of Pilgrim's Progress and "Mad Max" -- is a startling shift for McCarthy, but a tender answer to a desperate prayer.

Reviewed by Ron Charles
Copyright 2006, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

From Booklist
A man and a boy, father and son, "each the other's world entire," walk a road in "the ashes of the late world." In this stunning departure from his previous work, McCarthy (No Country for Old Men, 2005) envisions a postapocalyptic scenario. Cities have been destroyed, plants and animals have died, and few humans survive. The sun is hidden by ash, and it is winter. With every scrap of food looted, many of the living have turned to cannibalism. The man and the boy plod toward the sea. The man remembers the world before; as his memories die, so, too dies that world. The boy was born after everything changed. The man, dying, has a fierce paternal love and will to survive--yet he saves his last two bullets for himself and his son. Although the holocaust is never explained, this is the kind of grim warning that leads to nightmares. Its spare, precise language is rich with other explorations, too: hope in the face of hopelessness, the ephemeral nature of our existence, the vanishing worlds we all carry within us. McCarthy evokes Beckett, using repetition and negation to crushing effect, showing us by their absence the things we will miss. Hypnotic and haunting, relentlessly dark, this is a novel to read in late-night solitude. Though the focus never leaves the two travelers, they carry our humanity, and we can't help but feel the world hangs in the balance of their hopeless quest. A masterpiece. Keir Graff
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
“Wrenching, entirely sentimental . . . Trenchant and terrifying, written with stripped-down urgency and fueled by the force of a universal nightmare. The Road would be pure misery if not for its stunning, savage beauty. This is an exquisitely bleak incantation–pure poetic brimstone . . . [Cormac McCarthy] gives voice to the unspeakable in a terse cautionary tale that is too potent to be numbing, despite the stupefying ravages it describes . . . Yet this narrative is also illuminated by extraordinary tenderness . . . [It has] Lord of the Flies—style symbolic impact . . . Mr. McCarthy’s affinity for words like rachitic and crozzled has as much visceral, atmospheric power as precise meaning. His use of language is as exultant as his imaginings are hellish, a hint that The Road will ultimately be more radiant than it is punishing. Somehow Mr. McCarthy is able to hold firm to his pessimism while allowing the reader to see beyond it. This is art that both frightens and inspires . . . The mother’s suicide is one more reason for astonishment at Mr. McCarthy’s final gesture here: an embrace of faith in the face of no hope whatsoever. Coming as it does after such intense moments of despondency, this faith is even more of a leap than it might be in a more forgiving story. It adds immeasurably to the staying power of a book that is simple yet mysterious, simultaneously cryptic and crystal clear. The Road offers nothing in the way of escape or comfort. But its fearless wisdom is more indelible than reassurance could ever be.”
–Janet Maslin, New York Times

“The Road is the logical culmination of everything [McCarthy]’s written. It is also, paradoxically, his most humane and compassionate book . . . The question that the novel implicitly poses–how much can you subtract from human existence before it ceases to be human?–takes on heartbreaking force . . . One measure of a good writer is the ability to surprise. Terse, unsentimental, bleak–McCarthy’s readers have been down that road before. But who would ever have thought you’d call him touching?”
–Malcolm Jones, Newsweek

“[The Road] conjures a compelling and memorable dread . . . Wrenchingly elegiac . . . Single plot twists chill the blood . . . Under Mr. McCarthy’s bleakness burns a retroactive treasuring. To wit, even with rising oil prices, terrorism and insurgencies in Afghanistan and Iraq, there may come a time when readers look back in wonder that they ever had it so good.”
–The Economist

“Its harrowing, utterly realistic descriptions of primal human struggle against an implacable landscape hark back to the author’s definitive work, 1985’s Blood Meridian . . . McCarthy’s depiction of the father’s plight is heartbreaking . . . The novel is, of course, beautifully written . . . Tableaux of the ruined landscape demonstrate that his poetic gifts have only deepened over the years . . . [The Road is] thoroughly arresting in its bleak grandeur, and is a handsome addition to the author’s illustrious canon.”
–Hank Shteamer, Time Out New York

“The novel is awesome, a kind of reality-based Beckett, moving and unbelievably believable in its portrayal of horror and dread and hopelessness in the next Dark Age . . . Transcendently bleak.”
–Kurt Andersen, New York magazine

“Even by McCarthy’s standards, the horrors here are extreme . . . But McCarthy’s prose retains its ability to seduce and there are nods to the gentler aspects of the human spirit.”
–The New Yorker

“A bare description of Cormac McCarthy’s new novel sounds painfully bleak . . . Yet for all this, The Road provides the mesmerized reader with exhilaration, even joy. What makes the novel so profoundly affecting is the intensity of McCarthy’s imaginative immersion: He sees the most extraordinary details . . . The Road deserves to last: It is an overwhelming achievement and may be the first truly great work of American art in the new century.”
–O, The Oprah Magazine

“The genius of McCarthy’s work [is] in its bold, seamless melding of private revelation, cultural insight, and unabashed philosophizing . . . The freshness he brings to this end-of-the-world narrative is quite stunning: It may be the saddest, most haunting book he’s ever written or that you’ll ever read . . . The Road [is] more Time of the Wolf than Mad Max, and more Kuroi Ame than either of those . . . McCarthy’s purest fable yet . . . Hypnotic, gut-punching prose and bracing depictions of emotional longing . . . The tender precariousness of The Road’s human relationships is what finally makes it such a beautiful, difficult, near perfect work.”
–Mark Holcomb, The Village Voice

“The Road is filled with McCarthy’s famous nihilistic violence and moral essentialism. The tense narrative is pared down to the duo’s basic quest for survival, making for some masterful suspense . . . Include[s] terse, powerful elegies . . . Chilling.”
–Florence Williams, Outside magazine

“McCarthy may have just set to paper the definitive vision of the world after nuclear war . . . It is the love the father feels for his son, a love as deep and acute as his grief, that could surprise readers of McCarthy's previous work . . . McCarthy has always written about the battle between light and darkness; the darkness usually comprises 99.9% of the world, while any illumination is the weak shaft thrown by a penlight running low on batteries. In The Road, those batteries are almost out–the entire world is, quite literally, dying–so the final affirmation of hope in the novel's closing pages is all the more shocking and maybe all the more enduring as the boy takes all of his father's (and McCarthy's) rage at the hopeless folly of man and lays it down, lifting up, in its place, the oddest of all things: faith.”
–Dennis Lehane, Amazon.com

“Cormac McCarthy [is] the elemental prose stylist of our time . . . [His] chilling tenth novel is unlike anything he’s ever written . . . [The Road] is an adventure . . . the sort of book that, if only for the relentless clarity of the writing, the lucid descriptions of the grasses, the mud, the thorns, and the very arc of the road that cuts through all that, presents a clear and episodic progress from one small terror to the next . . . You should read this book because it is exactly what a book about our future ought to be.”
–Tom Chiarella, Esquire (Big Book of the Month)

“In this stunning departure from his previous work, McCarthy envisions a postapocalyptic scenario . . . Its spare, precise language is rich with other explorations, too: hope in the face of hopelessness, the ephemeral nature of our existence, the vanishing world we all carry within us. McCarthy evokes Beckett, using repetition and negation to crushing effect, showing us by their absence the things we will miss. Hypnotic and haunting, relentlessly dark, this is a novel to read in late-night solitude. Though the focus never leaves the two travelers, they carry our humanity, and we can’t help but feel the world hangs in the balance of their hopeless quest. A masterpiece.”
–Keir Graff, Booklist (starred)

“Even within the author’s extraordinary body of work, this stands as a radical achievement, a novel that demands to be read and reread . . . A parable that reads like Night of the Living Dead as rewritten by Samuel Beckett . . . The relationship between father and son has a sweetness that represents all that’s good in a universe where conventional notions of good and evil have been extinguished. Amid the bleakness of survival there are glimmers of comedy . . . [McCarthy’s] prose combines the cadence of prophecy with the indelible images of poetry. A novel of horrific beauty, where death is the only truth.
–Kirkus Reviews (starred)

“[A] postapocalyptic tour de force . . . McCarthy establishes himself here as the closest thing in American literature to an Old Testament prophet, trolling the blackest registers of human emotion to create a haunting and grim novel about civilization’s slow death after the power goes out.”
–Publishers Weekly (starred)

Book Description

A searing, postapocalyptic novel destined to become Cormac McCarthy’s masterpiece.

A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. They sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don’t know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearting, a cart of scavenged food—and each other.

The Road is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, “each the other’s world entire,” are sustained by love. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.

About the Author
Cormac McCarthy is the author of nine previous novels. Among his honors are the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award.

Thirteen Moons By Charles Frazier

2006-10-08T13:41:00.000-07:00

Thirteen Moons Items From EBay

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. When Frazier's debut Cold Mountain blossomed into a National Book Award–winning bestseller with four million copies in print, expectations for the follow-up rose almost immediately. A decade later, the good news is that Frazier's storytelling prowess doesn't falter in this sophomore effort, a bountiful literary panorama again set primarily in North Carolina's Great Smoky Mountains. The story takes place mostly before the Civil War this time, and it is epic in scope. With pristine prose that's often wry, Frazier brings a rough-and-tumble pioneer past magnificently to life, indicts America with painful bluntness for the betrayal of its native people and recounts a romance rife with sadness. In a departure from Cold Mountain's Inman, Will Cooper narrates his own story in retrospect, beginning with his days as an orphaned, literate "bound boy" who is dispatched to run a musty trading post at the edge of the Cherokee Nation. Nearly nine mesmerizing decades later, Will is an eccentric elder of great accomplishments and gargantuan failures, perched cantankerously on his front porch taking potshots at passenger trains rumbling across his property (he owns "quite a few" shares of the railroad). Over the years, Will—modeled very loosely, Frazier acknowledges, on real-life frontiersman William Holland Thomas—becomes a prosperous merchant, a self-taught lawyer and a state senator; he's adopted by a Cherokee elder and later leads the clan as a white Indian chief; he bears terrible witness to the 1838–1839 Trail of Tears; a quarter-century later, he goes to battle for the Confederacy as a self-anointed colonel, leading a mostly Indian force with a "legion of lawyers and bookkeepers and shop clerks" as officers; as time passes, his life intersects with such figures as Davy Crockett, Sen. John C. Calhoun and President Andrew Jackson. After the Civil War, Will fritters away a fortune through wanderlust, neglect and unquenched longing for his one true love, Claire, a girl he won in a card game when they were both 12, wooed for two erotic summers in his teen years and found again several decades later. In the novel's wistful coda, recalling Claire's voice inflicts "flesh wounds of memory, painful but inconclusive"—a voice that an uncertain old Will hears in the static hiss when he answers his newfangled phone in the book's opening pages. The history that Frazier hauntingly unwinds through Will is as melodic as it is melancholy, but the sublime love story is the narrative's true heart. (Oct. 3)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From The Washington Post's Book World/washingtonpost.com
Charles Frazier is an intelligent, occasionally witty author who writes incredibly long-winded, sentimental, soporific novels. His first, Cold Mountain, published nine years ago, was the most unlikely bestseller since Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All (1989), by his fellow North Carolinian Allan Gurganus, and the most improbable National Book Award winner since John O'Hara's Ten North Frederick half a century ago. Now Frazier weighs in with Thirteen Moons, which manages to be even longer and even duller than Cold Mountain. No doubt it too will be a huge bestseller.
That Frazier's success parallels Gurganus's is purely coincidental, but it's just about impossible not to remark upon the oddness of the coincidence. As a rule, the American book-buying public has only a limited appetite for Southern-fried fiction, yet Frazier and Gurganus somehow have tapped into it. They deal (Frazier somewhat more skillfully than Gurganus) in what a North Carolina newspaper editor of my long-ago acquaintance used to call shucks-'n'-nubbins, which is loosely defined as tiny ears of corn. Frazier's corn is anything but tiny -- more than 400 pages of it in the case of Thirteen Moons -- but it's corn all the same.

Reading Frazier is like sitting by the cracker barrel for hour after hour and listening to an amiable but impossibly gassy guy who talks real slow, says "I reckon" a whole lot and never shuts up. His novels have little structure and not much in the way of plot; in Cold Mountain he gave us the wounded Confederate soldier, Inman, limping his way back to his gal, Ada, in the North Carolina mountains, and in Thirteen Moons it's the ancient Will Cooper reminiscing about his nine decades and his Cherokee buddies and the gal, Claire, whom he managed to love and lose. He is a far less interesting man than Frazier obviously believes him to be, which is a little surprising because he's based on a very interesting historical figure.

"Will Cooper is not William Holland Thomas," Frazier says in an author's note, and then coyly adds, "though they do share some DNA." Actually, they share a whole lot. William Holland Thomas was born in North Carolina in 1805, was almost immediately orphaned, worked as a boy in a general store in the mountains, taught himself the law, worked to secure the right of the Cherokees to remain in their territory as Andrew Jackson sought to drive all Indians westward, served in the state senate and organized a company of Cherokee soldiers on behalf of the Confederacy. All of which is exactly what Will Cooper does in Thirteen Moons; where fact and fiction part is that Thomas married and had children while Cooper remains single, and Thomas's mental condition gradually deteriorated after the Civil War while Cooper remains alert, if rather tired, to the novel's end.

In other words, in Thirteen Moons Frazier essentially has fictionalized history. Nothing wrong with that: happens all the time. But the novel provides less imagination and invention than readers are likely to expect; it reads more like a dutifully researched (check out that author's note) graduate school paper than a work of fiction. It also is chock-a-block with homespun aphorisms that aren't exactly full of original wisdom: "One of the few welcome lessons age teaches is that only desire trumps time," and "Grief is a haunting," and "Writers can tell any lie that leaps into their heads," and "Our worst pain is confined within our own skin," and "We are not made strong enough to stand up against endless grief," and so forth. To be sure Frazier's folksy wisdom is a good deal easier to swallow than Gurganus's, but it's folksy all the same and not especially wise.

The novel is narrated in the first person. Early on, Will tells us that "I was always word-smitten" and that he kept journals for years, though the novel obviously is a reconstruction of the journals rather than the journals themselves. It begins with the "bound boy" that Will became at the age of 12, when his uncle and aunt sent him off to be "a shopkeep" for seven years, apprenticed to an elderly gentleman who owned "a trade post out at the edge of the [Cherokee] Nation." He makes his way through the mountain forests on his own, encountering adventures similar to those that beset Inman in Cold Mountain -- Frazier does like to send his men out on interminable treks that often seem to be headed nowhere -- until he finally arrives at the store, which "was hardly bigger than the parlor room of my aunt's house" and provided with "woefully little . . . stock from the outer world."

Will is a go-getter, though, and soon enough the store is busy, at least by mountain standards. Will runs it for four years, then is able to buy it after the owner's death. By this point, he has become something of a fixture in the Indian community, especially after he befriends an old Indian named Bear, "possessor of the deepest and sharpest mind to which I have ever been exposed." At once the reader is in the presence of the Noble Savage, though a bit later Frazier tries to wriggle out of that one:

"It is tempting to look back at Bear's people from the perspective of this modern world and see them as changeless and pure, authentic people in ways impossible for anybody to be anymore. We need Noble Savages for our own purposes. Our happy imaginings about them and the pure world they occupied do us good when incoherent change overwhelms us. But even in those early days when I was first getting to know Bear and his people, I could see that change and brutal loss had been all they had experienced for two centuries. . . . It was not any kind of original people left. No wild Indians at all, and little raw wilderness. They were damaged people, and they lived in a broken world like everybody else."

True enough, but it's also true that Frazier sentimentalizes the Cherokee even as he tries to keep his distance from the Noble Savage cliché. When Bear offers "to stand as your father" -- i.e., to step in for the father whom Will lost before he was born -- it's a true Noble Savage Moment: "If you were born or adopted into a clan, you were Cherokee. Everybody else was an outsider. So when Bear made his offer it was not only between him and me, it was also a deal with his whole people and thus a matter of identity. For them and for me and for him." Or, as Annie Oakley puts it in "Annie Get Your Gun," "I'm an Indian Too."

Corny? Absolutely. It had best be acknowledged, though, that Frazier's sentimental streak is almost certainly what has gotten him to where he is. It comes naturally to him, and readers seem to recognize this. However one may feel about the books that make their way to the upper reaches of the fiction bestseller lists, one thing is true of just about all of them: They are written with the utmost sincerity. Their authors mean what they write. They aren't trying to jerk readers around, and they aren't condescending to them. Readers can sense when they're being patronized, and they rarely fall for it. Whatever else there is to be said about Frazier's fiction -- and in my view there's not much -- its sincerity is unimpeachable.

Which makes it doubly odd that he tries to have it both ways. In Cold Mountain, after Inman and Ada have their ecstatic and endlessly delayed reunion, Frazier pulls up short by killing Inman off in the closing paragraphs. Something similar (though scarcely as violent) happens between Will and Claire toward the end of Thirteen Moons. Even as Frazier is tugging away at our heartstrings, he's trying to show how tough and realistic he can be, but it feels strained and unpersuasive; my own hunch is that he thinks literary respectability can be earned only if sentimentality is served up with a hard-hearted twist, but it's the sentimentality that's believable, not the twist.

Will readers flock to Thirteen Moons as they did to Cold Mountain? Who knows? Frazier's new publisher has a ton of money invested in him and will be pulling out all the stops. One thing is certain: Thirteen Moons is going to be putting a whole bunch of people to sleep.

Copyright 2006, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

Culture Warrior By Bill O'Reilly

2006-09-29T13:48:00.000-07:00

From Publishers Weekly
In his latest screed, the host of Fox News'The O'Reilly Factor mobilizes fellow "traditionalists" against a "secular-progressive movement" supposedly led by billionaire George Soros ("public enemy number one") and the liberal rhetorician George Lakoff. O'Reilly condemns the "erosion of societal discipline" flowing from an alleged "S-P [secular-progressive]" agenda of drug legalization, teenagers' rights, moral relativism, church-state separation, therapy instead of punishment for criminals and, above all, the "communist" freeloader's doctrine that the government should tax the rich to fund housing, health care and early-childhood education for the poor. None of this coheres well, but O'Reilly keeps fans stoked with red meat, including tales of ACLU Christmas-bashers who wanted schools to stop teaching kids to sing carols, and permissive judges who go easy on child molesters. Too often, though, he feuds with personal enemies like "smear-merchant" Al Franken, Hollywood liberals, press critics and unnamed "black-hearted websites." As a result, his populist swagger subsides into kvetching ("Clooney's press agent, a guy named Stan Rosenfield, began badmouthing me and Fox News around Hollywood") and paranoia ("S-P power-brokers... will command their forces to attack me in every way possible"). More resentful and self-pitying than feisty, O'Reilly may be suffering from battle fatigue. Photos. (Sept. 25)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Forget the battle between liberals and conservatives. According to the anchor of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, the real action is the battle between secular progressives and traditionalists engaged in an epic struggle to dominate American culture. Though there is a high correlation between the liberals and SPs and conservatives and traditionalists, it is not absolute, and O'Reilly gives credit to the occasional liberal who stands up for traditional values by his measuring stick. He sees himself as Numero Uno fighting on the side of traditionalists in the front line of the culture war--the media. Rating major media figures, he gives high marks to the late Peter Jennings and low marks to Dan Rather and Tom Brokaw. O'Reilly takes to task conservative talk-show hosts, including Rush Limbaugh, for focusing on politics and ignoring the culture wars. O'Reilly also names names leading the opposing side: UC Berkeley professor George Lakoff, wealthy financier George Soros, and--the usual suspect--the ACLU. O'Reilly outlines the battleground on a number of issues, including the celebration of Christmas, separation of church and state, and gay marriage. O'Reilly offers a "code of the traditional warrior," appealing to traditionalists to take the high ground in the battle and not indulge in the unethical tactics employed by the SP, including personal attacks and invective. Fans of O'Reilly will cheer; detractors will cringe. Vanessa Bush
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

“[Bill O’Reilly’s] aura of command is fascinating. Success gives him extra authority. He is diamond bright, ready to pounce, and never at a loss for words.…I left Mr. O’Reilly’s super-hot domain trying to think of whom he reminded me. It came to me: Gen. George S. Patton, complete with ivory-handled revolvers on his hips, couldn’t exude more confidence, certainty, and know-how than Bill O’Reilly. No wonder Fox feels he’s their gem. His mojo is at an all-time high!”
—Liz Smith, syndicated columnist

Book Description
Bill O’Reilly is the very embodiment of the idea of a Culture Warrior—and in this book he lives up to the title brilliantly, with all the brashness and forthrightness at his command. He sees that America is in the midst of a fierce culture war between those who embrace traditional values and those who want to change America into a “secular-progressive” country. This is a conflict that differs in many ways from the usual liberal/conservative divide, but it is no less heated, and the stakes are even higher.

In Culture Warrior, Bill O’Reilly defines this war and analyzes the competing philosophies of the traditionalist and secular-progressive camps. He examines why the nation’s motto “E Pluribus Unum” (“From Many, One”) might change to “What About Me?”; dissects the forces driving the secular-progressive agenda in the media and behind the scenes, including George Soros, George Lakoff, and the ACLU; and dives into matters of race, education, and the war on terror. He also shows how the culture war has played out in such high-profile instances as The Passion of the Christ, Fahrenheit 9/11, the abuse epidemic (child and otherwise), and the embattled place of religion in public life—with special emphasis on the war against Christmas. Whatever controversies are roiling the nation, he fearlessly confronts them—and no one will be in the dark about which side he’s on.

Culture Warrior showcases Bill O’Reilly at his most eloquent and impassioned. He is an unrelenting fighter for the soul of America, and in this book he fights the good fight for the traditional values that have served this country so well for so long.

About the Author

BILL O’REILLY, a two-time Emmy Award winner for excellence in reporting, served as national correspondent for ABC News and as anchor of the nationally syndicated news magazine program Inside Edition before becoming executive producer and anchor of Fox News’s wildly popular The O’Reilly Factor. He is author of the mega-bestsellers The O’Reilly Factor, The No Spin Zone, and Who’s Looking Out for You?, as well as The O’Reilly Factor for Kids and the novel Those Who Trespass. He holds master’s degrees from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and Boston University.

For One More Day By Mitch Albom

2006-09-29T13:46:00.000-07:00

From Publishers Weekly
In this second novel from Tuesdays with Morrie and The Five People You Meet in Heaven author Albom, grief-stricken Charles "Chick" Benetto goes into an alcoholic tailspin when his always-attentive mother, Pauline, dies. Framed as an "as told to" story, Chick quickly narrates her funeral; his drink-fueled loss of savings, job ("sales") and family; and his descent into loneliness and isolation. After a suicide attempt, Chick encounters Pauline's ghost. Together, the two revisit Pauline's travails raising her children alone after his father abandons them: she braves the town's disapproval of her divorce and works at a beauty parlor, taking an extra job to put money aside for the children's education. Pauline cringes at the heartache Chick inflicted as a demanding child, obnoxious teen and brusque, oblivious adult chasing the will-o'-the-wisp of a baseball career. Through their story, Albom foregrounds family sanctity, maternal self-sacrifice and the destructive power of personal ambition and male self-involvement. He wields pathos as if it were a Louisville Slugger—shoveling dirt into Pauline's grave, Chick hears her spirit cry out, " 'Oh, Charley. How could you?' "—but Albom often strikes a nerve on his way to the heart. (Sept. 26)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Book Description
This is the story of Charley, a child of divorce who is always forced to choose between his mother and his father. He grows into a man and starts a family of his own. But one fateful weekend, he leaves his mother to secretly be with his fatherand she dies while he is gone. This haunts him for years. It unravels his own young family. It leads him to depression and drunkenness. One night, he decides to take his life. But somewhere between this world and the next, he encounters his mother again, in their hometown, and gets to spend one last day with herthe day he missed and always wished hed had. He asks the questions many of us yearn to ask, the questions we never ask while our parents are alive. By the end of this magical day, Charley discovers how little he really knew about his mother, the secret of how her love saved their family, and how deeply he wants the second chance to save his own.

About the Author
Mitch Albom is the author of the international bestsellers The Five People You Meet in Heaven and Tuesdays with Morrie, as well as six other books. He also writes screenplays and stage plays. Albom servers on numerous charitable boards and has funded three charities in the Detroit area. He lives with his wife, Janine, in Michigan.

Saving Graces: Finding Solace and Strength from Friends and Strangers

2006-09-29T13:42:00.000-07:00

From Publishers Weekly
The breast cancer diagnosis Edwards received on November 3, 2004, is dismayingly common. Uncommon, however, is the timing and the circumstances surrounding it. Wife of the vice presidential candidate John Edwards, Edwards's discovery of the lump on her breast came the day after the election and subsequent defeat of the Kerry-Edwards ticket. This mixture of the common and the uncommon, of the everyday and the extraordinary, defines Edwards and her life. A lawyer, mother of a grown daughter and two young children, and the wife of a politician, Edwards is both an optimist and a realist with the ability to laugh at herself. Yet she has had to endure a parent's worst nightmare—the death of her teenage son, Wade, in a car accident. In the end, however, Edwards's memoir is not about cancer, politics or even unbearable loss (though the description of her grief is heart-wrenching). It's about the value of people coming together to support each other. You'll find no celebrity gossip here. But like the kiss on the forehead her husband gave her at the end of their first date, this memoir is disarmingly moving. First serial to People, second serial to Ladies' Home Journal; feature in Good Housekeeping; national author tour; October 2 appearances on The Today Show and NBC Nightly News. (Sept. 26)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Book Description

She charmed America with her smart, likable, down-to-earth personality as she campaigned for her husband, then vice-presidential candidate John Edwards. She inspired millions as she valiantly fought advanced breast cancer after being diagnosed only days before the 2004 election. She touched hundreds of similarly grieving families when her own son, Wade, died tragically at age sixteen in 1996. Now she shares her experiences in Saving Graces, an incandescent memoir of Edwards’ trials, tragedies, and triumphs, and of how various communities celebrated her joys and lent her steady strength and quiet hope in darker times.

Edwards writes about growing up in a military family, where she learned how to make friends easily in dozens of new schools and neighborhoods around the world and came to appreciate the unstinting help and comfort naval families shared. Edwards’ reminiscences of her years as a mother focus on the support she and other parents offered one another, from everyday favors to the ultimate test of her own community’s strength—their compassionate response to the death of the Edwards’ teenage son, Wade, in 1996. Her descriptions of her husband’s campaigns for Senate, president, and vice president offer a fascinating perspective on the groups, great and small, that sustain our democracy. Her fight with breast cancer, which stirred an outpouring of support from women across the country, has once again affirmed Edwards’ belief in the power of community to make our lives better and richer.

About the Author

ELIZABETH EDWARDS, a lawyer, has worked for the North Carolina Attorney General’s office and at the law firm Merriman, Nichols, and Crampton in Raleigh, and she has also taught legal writing as an adjunct instructor at the law school of North Carolina University. She lives in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

Busting Loose From the Money Game: Mind-Blowing Strategies for Changing the Rules of a Game You Can't Win

2006-09-29T13:38:00.000-07:00

"Absolutely amazing! It completely shifts your paradigm of life. One of the most wonderful things about it is that the results are immediate. My whole perception and relationship to money made a major, substantial change."- Chris Attwood, writer and teacher, California
"I’ve spent most of my life trying to figure out what’s true and what’s real. I have to say I now have a clear glimpse into what it really is." - Tom Hill, Colorado

"Before Busting Loose, I was very unhappy and frustrated in my life. I was driven to find more ways to make money. I changed jobs, cities, countries, went back to school, read books. Financially the stress was causing anxiety attacks and migraines so severe I stayed in bed… The joy I feel now is priceless. Money is there when I need it, in the amount that’s needed, no matter what occurs (car repairs, unplanned trips, etc.). It’s absolutely amazing!"- Suresh Thakoor, Texas

"As a retired professor on a fixed and limited income, I always lived from a tight budget and felt compressed by it – especially at the end of the year. I don’t use a budget anymore and have opened up to new streams of income that were always closed to me in the past."- Howard Rovics, Connecticut

"It opened a whole new dimension for me and shifted my perspective of life completely. I especially love how practical it is. The application is so simple, so effective and fun!"- Doris Kahle, Hagen, Germany

"I’d had a lot of success in the corporate arena, made a ridiculous amount of money and lost a ridiculous amount of money. But I was caught in a cycle of making it, losing it. I needed to break that cycle – for myself and my family – and this gave me the keys to do that. Busting Loose From The Money Game opened a window I had no clue even existed. This is very cutting-edge; a revolutionary approach to unwrapping yourself from limitations. If you’re not satisfied with where you are financially and you’re concerned about your future, get this book!"- Ben Coleman, Texas

Book Description
Real people, real transformations!

"Absolutely amazing! It completely shifts your paradigm for life. One of the most wonderful things about it is that the results are immediate. My whole perception and relationship to money has undergone a major, substantial change."
-Chris Attwood, writer and teacher, California

"I've spent most of my life trying to figure out what's true and what's real. I have to say I now have a clear glimpse into what it really is."
-Tom Hill, Colorado

"Before Busting Loose from The Money Game, I was very unhappy and frustrated in my life. I was driven to find more ways to make money. I changed jobs, cities, countries, went back to school, read books. Financially, the stress was causing anxiety attacks and migraines so severe I stayed in bed. The joy I feel now is priceless. Money is there when I need it, in the amount that's needed, no matter what occurs (car repairs, unplanned trips, etc.). It's absolutely amazing!"
-Suresh Thakoor, Texas

"As a retired professor on a fixed and limited income, I always lived from a tight budget and felt compressed by it-especially at the end of the year. I don't use a budget anymore and have opened up new streams of income that were always closed to me in the past."
-Howard Rovics, Connecticut

"It opened a whole new dimension for me and shifted my perspective on life completely. I especially love how practical it is. The application is so simple, so effective . . . and fun!"
-Doris Kahle, Hagen, Germany

"I'd had a lot of success in the corporate arena, made a ridiculous amount of money and lost a ridiculous amount of money. But I was caught in a cycle of making it, losing it. I needed to break that cycle-for myself and my family-and this gave me the keys to do that. Busting Loose from The Money Game opened a window I had no clue even existed. This is very cutting-edge, a revolutionary approach to unwrapping yourself from limitations. If you're not satisfied with where you are financially and you're concerned about your future, get this book!"
-Ben Coleman, Texas

From the Inside Flap
All your life, without realizing it, you've been playing The Money Game . . . and losing. Now, finally, you can win.

Are you in debt, struggling to make ends meet or fed up with not having enough money? Are you doing okay financially but want to do much better? Do you feel trapped, restricted, or confined by what it takes to sustain your success?

If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, you've been playing The Money Game. You were taught certain rules and regulations, and you've been following them faithfully, never once questioning their validity or looking for alternatives. You can become better and better at playing the game. You can pile up more and more winnings—but you can't win. Why? Because The Money Game was designed to be unwinnable.

No matter how much money you pile up, there's always a price to pay in the form of restrictions, stress, relationship strain, health issues, disillusionment, and other problems—that is, if you play according to the rules and regulations you were taught. The only way to win The Money Game is to bust loose from it altogether, discard the rules and regulations you thought you had to play by, and start playing a new game with a new set of rules that work for you.

Busting Loose from The Money Game will make money a total non-issue in your life. Once you bust loose, there will be no more worrying about bills or balancing your checkbook. No more denying yourself what you really want because it's too expensive. No more asking yourself "Can I afford this?" or "Should I buy that?" No more complexity, worry, or stress that comes from trying to manage, grow, and protect what you've piled up. Once you bust loose, there will be no limits or restrictions of any kind when it comes to money. And when you reach that point, the other aspects of your life will open up and expand too—in ways you can't even imagine right now.

Sound unbelievable? It's actually very real and absolutely doable—when you have the guidance this book will give you. No matter what you think you know about money, wealth, prosperity, and abundance, or how many books and tapes you've bought or seminars you've attended on the subject, Busting Loose from The Money Game will open a portal to a new relationship with money and a radically different way of living.

About the Author
Robert Scheinfeld is the bestselling author of The Invisible Path to Success and the Wiley title The 11th Element. For more than twenty years, he has helped individuals in more than 190 countries create extraordinary results, in less time, with less effort, and with much more fun. His passion is helping others bust loose from their limitations while carving out and living their ultimate lifestyle.

The Digital Photography Book By Scott Helby

2006-09-25T09:52:00.000-07:00

Scott Kelby, the man who changed the "digital darkroom" forever with his groundbreaking, #1 bestselling, award-winning book The Photoshop Book for Digital Photographers, now tackles the most important side of digital photography--how to take pro-quality shots using the same tricks today's top digital pros use (and it's easier than you'd think).

This entire book is written with a brilliant premise, and here’s how Scott describes it: "If you and I were out on a shoot, and you asked me, 'Hey, how do I get this flower to be in focus, but I want the background out of focus?' I wouldn't stand there and give you a lecture about aperture, exposure, and depth of field. In real life, I'd just say, 'Get out your telephoto lens, set your f/stop to f/2.8, focus on the flower, and fire away.' You d say, 'OK,' and you'd get the shot. That's what this book is all about. A book of you and I shooting, and I answer the questions, give you advice, and share the secrets I've learned just like I would with a friend, without all the technical explanations and without all the techno-photo-speak."

This isn't a book of theory—it isn't full of confusing jargon and detailed concepts: this is a book of which button to push, which setting to use, when to use them, and nearly two hundred of the most closely guarded photographic "tricks of the trade" to get you shooting dramatically better-looking, sharper, more colorful, more professional-looking photos with your digital camera every time you press the shutter button.

Here's another thing that makes this book different: each page covers just one trick, just one single concept that makes your photography better. Every time you turn the page, you'll learn another pro setting, another pro tool, another pro trick to transform your work from snapshots into gallery prints. There's never been a book like it, and if you're tired of taking shots that look "OK," and if you’re tired of looking in photography magazines and thinking, "Why don't my shots look like that?" then this is the book for you.

About the Author
Scott Kelby is President of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) and Editor-in-Chief of both Photoshop User and Layers magazines. Scott serves as training director for the Adobe Photoshop Seminar Tour and is the technical chair of the largest Photoshop gathering in the industry, Photoshop World. He has written numerous best-selling creative technology books.

The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million By Daniel Mendelsohn

2006-09-25T09:46:00.000-07:00

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. As a boy in the 1960s, Mendelsohn could make elderly relatives cry just by entering the room, so much did he resemble his great-uncle Shmiel Jäger, who had been "killed by the Nazis." This short phrase was all Mendelsohn knew of his maternal grandfather Abraham's brother, who had remained with his wife and four daughters in the Ukrainian shtetl of Bolechow after Abraham left for America. Long obsessed with family history, Mendelsohn (The Elusive Embrace) embarked in 2001 on a series of journeys to learn exactly what had happened to Shmiel and his family. The result is a rich, ruminative "mythic narrative... about closeness and distance, intimacy and violence, love and death." Mendelsohn uses these words to describe the biblical story of Cain and Abel, for one of the book's most striking elements is the author's recounting of the book of Genesis in parallel with his own story, highlighting eternal themes of origins and family, temptation and exile, brotherly betrayal, creation and annihilation. In Ukraine, Australia, Israel and Scandinavia, Mendelsohn locates a handful of extraordinary, aged Bolechow survivors. Especially poignant is his relationship with novelist Louis Begley's 90-year-old mother, from a town near the shtetl, an irascible, scene-stealing woman who eagerly follows Mendelsohn's remarkable effort to retrieve her lost world. B&w photos, maps. (Sept.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
As a boy, Mendelsohn was not only entranced by the stories his grandfather told about growing up in the little Galician town of Bolechow but also attuned to the sorrow that shadowed every tale: his grandfather's oldest brother, Shmiel, his wife, and their four daughters had been killed by the Nazis. So affected was Mendelsohn by his legacy, he eventually embarked on a quest to find out exactly what happened to his six lost relatives. A classicist and formidable literary critic, Mendelsohn performs extraordinary feats of factual and emotional excavation in this finely wrought, many-faceted narrative, a work best described as Talmudic. Autobiography is entwined with revelatory commentary on the Torah, while his affecting chronicle of his journeys to Israel, Australia, Stockholm, Vienna, and, most movingly, Bolechow itself set the stage for Mendelsohn's sometimes perplexing, always intense conversations with his newly discovered cousins. Shmiel, Ester, Lorka, Frydka, Ruchele, and Bronia gradually come into focus, as does a shocking vision of the hell Bolechow became as neighbors tortured and murdered neighbors. Mendelsohn's tenacious yet artistic, penetrating, and empathic work of remembrance recalibrates our perception of the Holocaust and of human nature. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Book Description

In this rich and riveting narrative, a writer's search for the truth behind his family's tragic past in World War II becomes a remarkably original epic-part memoir, part reportage, part mystery, and part scholarly detective work-that brilliantly explores the nature of time and memory, family and history.

The Lost begins as the story of a boy who grew up in a family haunted by the disappearance of six relatives during the Holocaust-an unmentionable subject that gripped his imagination from earliest childhood. Decades later, spurred by the discovery of a cache of desperate letters written to his grandfather in 1939 and tantalized by fragmentary tales of a terrible betrayal, Daniel Mendelsohn sets out to find the remaining eyewitnesses to his relatives' fates. That quest eventually takes him to a dozen countries on four continents, and forces him to confront the wrenching discrepancies between the histories we live and the stories we tell. And it leads him, finally, back to the small Ukrainian town where his family's story began, and where the solution to a decades-old mystery awaits him.

Deftly moving between past and present, interweaving a world-wandering odyssey with childhood memories of a now-lost generation of immigrant Jews and provocative ruminations on biblical texts and Jewish history, The Lost transforms the story of one family into a profound, morally searching meditation on our fragile hold on the past. Deeply personal, grippingly suspenseful, and beautifully written, this literary tour de force illuminates all that is lost, and found, in the passage of time.

The God Delusion By Richard Dawkins

2006-09-25T09:44:00.000-07:00

From Publishers Weekly
The antireligion wars started by Daniel Dennett and Sam Harris will heat up even more with this salvo from celebrated Oxford biologist Dawkins. For a scientist who criticizes religion for its intolerance, Dawkins has written a surprisingly intolerant book, full of scorn for religion and those who believe. But Dawkins, who gave us the selfish gene, anticipates this criticism. He says it's the scientist and humanist in him that makes him hostile to religions—fundamentalist Christianity and Islam come in for the most opprobrium—that close people's minds to scientific truth, oppress women and abuse children psychologically with the notion of eternal damnation. While Dawkins can be witty, even confirmed atheists who agree with his advocacy of science and vigorous rationalism may have trouble stomaching some of the rhetoric: the biblical Yahweh is "psychotic," Aquinas's proofs of God's existence are "fatuous" and religion generally is "nonsense." The most effective chapters are those in which Dawkins calms down, for instance, drawing on evolution to disprove the ideas behind intelligent design. In other chapters, he attempts to construct a scientific scaffolding for atheism, such as using evolution again to rebut the notion that without God there can be no morality. He insists that religion is a divisive and oppressive force, but he is less convincing in arguing that the world would be better and more peaceful without it. (Oct. 18)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review
"At last, one of the best nonfiction writers alive today has assembled his thoughts on religion into a characteristically elegant book." --Steven Pinker, Johnstone Professor, Harvard University, author of The Language Instinct, How the Mind Works, and The Blank Slate
"A resounding trumpet blast for truth . . . It feels like coming up for air." --Matt Ridley, author of Genome and Francis Crick
"Dawkins gives human sympathies and emotions their proper value, which...lends his criticisms of religion such force." --Philip Pullman, author of His Dark Materials trilogy
"This is a brave and important book." --Desmond Morris, author of The Naked Ape and The Human Animal
"Richard Dawkins is the leading soothsayer of our time. . . . The God Delusion continues his thought-provoking tradition." --J. Craig Venter, decoder of the human genome
"The God Delusion is smart, compassionate, and true . . . If this book doesn't change the world, we're all screwed." --Penn & Teller
"The world needs . . . passionate rationalists . . . Richard Dawkins so stands out through the cutting intelligence of The God Delusion." --James D. Watson, co-discoverer of DNA, author of The Double Helix

Book Description
Discover magazine recently called Richard Dawkins "Darwin's Rottweiler" for his fierce and effective defense of evolution. Prospect magazine voted him among the top three public intellectuals in the world (along with Umberto Eco and Noam Chomsky). Now Dawkins turns his considerable intellect on religion, denouncing its faulty logic and the suffering it causes. He critiques God in all his forms, from the sex-obsessed tyrant of the Old Testament to the more benign (but still illogical) Celestial Watchmaker favored by some Enlightenment thinkers. He eviscerates the major arguments for religion and demonstrates the supreme improbability of a supreme being. He shows how religion fuels war, foments bigotry, and abuses children, buttressing his points with historical and contemporary evidence. In so doing, he makes a compelling case that belief in God is not just irrational, but potentially deadly. Dawkins has fashioned an impassioned, rigorous rebuttal to religion, to be embraced by anyone who sputters at the inconsistencies and cruelties that riddle the Bible, bristles at the inanity of "intelligent design," or agonizes over fundamentalism in the Middle East—or Middle America.

About the Author
RICHARD DAWKINS is one of the most influential scientists of our time. The New York Times Book Review has hailed him as a writer who "'understands the issues so clearly that he forces his reader to understand them too."' Recently awarded the distinction of "'public intellectual"' in Britain, Dawkins is Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University.

Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance By Norm Chomsky

2006-09-22T05:37:00.000-07:00

Amazon.com
Noam Chomsky is considered the father of modern linguistics. In this richly detailed criticism of American foreign policy, he seeks to redefine many of the terms commonly used in the ongoing American war on terrorism. Surveying U.S. actions in Cuba, Nicaragua, Turkey, the Far East and elsewhere over the past half a century along with the modern American war in Iraq, Chomsky indicates that America is just as much a terrorist state as any other government or rogue organization. George W. Bush's 2003 invasion of Iraq drew worldwide criticism, in part because it seemed to present a new philosophy of pre-emptive war and an appearance of global empire building. But according to Chomsky, such has been the operating philosophy of American foreign policy for decades. Opponents of the Bush administration's tactics consistently point out how the American government supported Saddam Hussein for many years prior to the 1990 invasion of Kuwait (pictures of Donald Rumsfeld shaking Saddam's hand are easy to come by) as a means of pointing out how the United States is happy to fund despots when it's in American interests. But Chomsky, armed with extensive historical notation, takes this notion further, arguing how the repression of other nations' citizenry is, in fact, the very reason Americans support certain foreign leaders. The charges made throughout the book are severe, as are the dire consequences he posits if current trends are not reversed, and Chomsky is no more likely to make friends or gain supporters from the mainstream now than he's ever been. But Hegemony or Survival is relatively dispassionate. Instead of relying on camp or shock value or personal attacks as some of his contemporaries have done, Chomsky drives his well-supported points steadily forward in an earnest and highly readable style. --John Moe --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly
In this highly readable, heavily footnoted critique of American foreign policy from the late 1950s to the present, Chomsky (whose 9-11 was a bestseller last year) argues that current U.S. policies in Afghanistan and Iraq are not a specific response to September 11, but simply the continuation of a consistent half-century of foreign policy-an "imperial grand strategy"-in which the United States has attempted to "maintain its hegemony through the threat or use of military force." Such an analysis is bound to be met with skepticism or antagonism in post-September 11 America, but Chomsky builds his arguments carefully, substantiates claims with appropriate documentation and answers expected counterclaims. Chomsky is also deeply critical of inconsistency in making the charge of "terrorism." Using the official U.S. legal code definition of terrorism, he argues that it is an exact description of U.S. foreign policy (especially regarding Cuba, Central America, Vietnam and much of the Middle East), although the term is rarely used in this way in the U.S. media, he notes, even when the World Court in 1986 condemned Washington for "unlawful use of force" ("international terrorism, in lay terms" Chomsky argues) in Nicaragua. Claiming that the U.S. is a rogue nation in its foreign policies and its "contempt for international law," Chomsky brings together many themes he has mined in the past, making this cogent and provocative book an important addition to an ongoing public discussion about U.S. policy.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From AudioFile
The much-respected linguist, Noam Chomsky, makes a brief appearance at the beginning of this densely written audiobook. While he has an interesting voice, it's a blessing that Brian Jones takes care of the reading duties, which he does with little trouble, despite the preponderance of layered concepts deeply steeped in historical layers of democratic deeds and misdeeds. Hegemony? A word not many of us kick around the water cooler, but used often enough here for listeners to appreciate Chomsky's erudite outrage at the course of American events since the nation's inception. In this revealing and well-researched work, which is sure to raise the hackles of Republican listeners, Chomsky is the foil to Orwell's Big Brother--twenty years after 1984. D.J.B. © AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

From Booklist
Intellectual activist Chomsky takes aim at the Bush administration's policy of preemptive force against terrorism and sees it as part of a U.S. bent toward hegemony. Citing examples of similarly aggressive policies from previous administrations, Chomsky posits that the U.S. has been heading in this direction for generations. As the world's lone superpower and with the justification of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the U.S. has accelerated the troubling trend, with disastrous implications for foreign and domestic policy. Drawing parallels with nineteenth-century Britain, Chomsky examines the current U.S. world posture and growing willingness to act unilaterally. The country's sense of its role in world history and its noble ideals--not to mention its military might--have given rise to the notion that its motives and actions are not to be questioned at home or abroad. Chomsky offers a cautionary look at where we may be headed as a nation and the growing threats to world peace and personal freedom. Vanessa Bush
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review

Praise for Hegemony or Survival:
"If, for reasons of chance, or circumstance (or sloth), you have to pick just one book on the subject of the American Empire, I'd say pick this one. It's the Full Monty. It's Chomsky at his best. Hegemony or Survival is necessary reading."
-Arundhati Roy

Review
Praise for Noam Chomsky

“Judged in terms of the power, range, novelty, and influence of his thought, Noam Chomsky is arguably the most important intellectual alive.” —The New York Times
--This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

Book Description
"Reading Chomsky today is sobering and instructive . . . He is a global phenomenon . . . perhaps the most widely read voice on foreign policy on the planet." The New York Times Book ReviewAn immediate national bestseller, Hegemony or Survival demonstrates how, for more than half a century the United States has been pursuing a grand imperial strategy with the aim of staking out the globe. Our leaders have shown themselves willing-as in the Cuban missile crisis-to follow the dream of dominance no matter how high the risks. World-renowned intellectual Noam Chomsky investigates how we came to this perilous moment and why our rulers are willing to jeopardize the future of our species.With the striking logic that is his trademark, Chomsky tracks the U.S. government's aggressive pursuit of "full spectrum dominance" and vividly lays out how the most recent manifestations of the politics of global control-from unilateralism to the dismantling of international agreements to state terrorism-cohere in a drive for hegemony that ultimately threatens our existence. Lucidly written, thoroughly documented, and featuring a new afterword by the author, Hegemony or Survival is a definitive statement from one of today's most influential thinkers.

Download Description
The United States is in the process of staking out not just the globe but the last unarmed spot in our neighborhood-the heavens-as a militarized sphere of influence. Our earth and its skies are, for the Bush administration, the final frontiers of imperial control. In Hegemony or Survival, Noam Chomsky investigates how we came to this moment, what kind of peril we find ourselves in, and why our rulers are willing to jeopardize the future of our species.

About the Author

Noam Chomsky is the author of numerous bestselling political works, from American Power and The New Mandarins to 9-11. Institute Professor of Linguistics and Philosophy at MIT, he is widely credited with having revolutionized modern linguistics. He lives in Lexington, Massachusetts.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

We are entering a period of human history that may provide an answer to the question of whether there is intelligent life on earth, at least in the sense of "intelligence" that might be admired by a sensible extraterrestrial observer. The most hopeful prospect is that the question will not be answered: for any definitive response can only conclude that humans are a kind of "biological error," using their allotted 100,000 years—the life expectancy of a species—to destroy themselves and, in the process, much else. Humans have surely developed the capacity to do just that: our hypothetical extraterrestrial observer might argue that they have demonstrated that destructiveness throughout their history, and dramatically so in the past few hundred years—with an assault on biological diversity, on the environment that sustains life, and, with cold and calculated savagery, on each other as well.

The Confession By James McGreevey

2006-09-22T05:31:00.000-07:00

In August 2004, Governor James E. McGreevey of New Jersey made history when he stepped before microphones, declared "My truth is that I am a gay American," and announced his resignation. The story made international headlines-;but what led to that moment was a human and political drama more complex and fascinating than anyone knew. Now, in this extraordinarily candid memoir, McGreevey shares his story of a life of ambition, moral compromise, and redemption.

From childhood, McGreevey lived a kind of idealized American life. The son of working-class Irish Catholic parents, named for an uncle who died at Iwo Jima, he strove to exceed expectations in everything he did, meeting each new challenge as though his "future rode on every move." As a young man he was tempted by the priesthood, yet it was another calling—politics—that he found irresistible. Plunging early into the dangerous waters of New Jersey politics, he won three elections by the age of thirty-six, and soon thereafter nearly toppled the state's popular governor, Christie Todd Whitman, in a photo-finish election. Four years later, he won the governorship by a landslide.

Throughout his adult life, however, Jim McGreevey had been forced to suppress a fundamental truth about himself: that he was gay. He knew at once that the only clear path to his dreams was to live a straight life, and so he split in two, accepting the traditional role of family man while denying his deepest emotions. And he discovered, to his surprise, that becoming a political player demanded ethical shortcuts that became as corrosive as living in the closet. In the cutthroat culture of political bosses, backroom deals, and the insidious practice known as "pay-to-play," he writes, "political compromises came easy to me because I'd learned how to keep a part of myself innocent of them." His policy triumphs as governor were tempered by scandal, as the transgressions of his staff came back to haunt him. Yet only when a former lover threatened to expose him did he finally confront his divided soul, and find the authentic self that had always eluded him.

More than a coming-out memoir, The Confession is the story of one man's quest to repair the rift between his public and private selves, at a time in our culture when the personal and political have become tangled like frayed electric cables. Teeming with larger-than-life characters, written with honesty, grace, and rare insight into what it means to negotiate the minefields of American public life, it may be among the most honest political memoirs ever written.

About the Author
James E. McGreevey was the governor of New Jersey from January 2002 to November 2004. Born in Jersey City, he earned degrees from Columbia, Georgetown, and Harvard before serving three terms as the mayor of Woodbridge, New Jersey. After a narrow defeat in 1997, he was elected to the governor's seat in 2001. He lives in Plainfield, New Jersey, with his partner, Mark O'Donnell, and daughter Jacqueline; his daughter Morag lives in British Columbia.

The Innocent Man By John Grisham

2006-09-22T05:24:00.000-07:00

John Grisham’s first work of nonfiction, an exploration of small town justice gone terribly awry, is his most extraordinary legal thriller yet.

In the major league draft of 1971, the first player chosen from the State of Oklahoma was Ron Williamson. When he signed with the Oakland A’s, he said goodbye to his hometown of Ada and left to pursue his dreams of big league glory.
Six years later he was back, his dreams broken by a bad arm and bad habits—drinking, drugs, and women. He began to show signs of mental illness. Unable to keep a job, he moved in with his mother and slept twenty hours a day on her sofa.
In 1982, a 21-year-old cocktail waitress in Ada named Debra Sue Carter was raped and murdered, and for five years the police could not solve the crime. For reasons that were never clear, they suspected Ron Williamson and his friend Dennis Fritz. The two were finally arrested in 1987 and charged with capital murder.
With no physical evidence, the prosecution’s case was built on junk science and the testimony of jailhouse snitches and convicts. Dennis Fritz was found guilty and given a life sentence. Ron Williamson was sent to death row.
If you believe that in America you are innocent until proven guilty, this book will shock you. If you believe in the death penalty, this book will disturb you. If you believe the criminal justice system is fair, this book will infuriate you.

About the Author
John Grisham is the author of Skipping Christmas, The Summons, A Painted House, The Brethren, The Testament, The Street Lawyer, The Partner, The Runaway Jury, The Rainmaker, The Chamber, The Client, The Pelican Brief, The Firm, and A Time to Kill. He lives with his family in Mississippi and Virginia.

Ultrametabolism By Mark Hyman

2006-09-19T09:10:00.000-07:00

Physician Hyman (Ultra-Prevention: The 6 Week Plan That Will Make You Healthy for Life) delivers plenty of scientifically grounded information about weight loss myths, effective individualized strategies centered around the theme of stoking metabolism and a detailed six-week plan—complete with menus and recipes—that "will help you lose 11 to 21 pounds" in those first six weeks. The data and prescription the author provides are far from simple, and results, if attained, are not automatic. But dogged readers will come away from the book with a thorough understanding of dieting principles, such as the timing of meals, portion size, glycemic load, phytonutrient index, the weight loss benefits of relaxation and the optimized functioning of the thyroid. There are straightforward principles buried in the text, such as "eat fruits and vegetables" and "move your body," plus tips for eating out (e.g., "don't be afraid to ask for substitutions in a dish," "request a 'crudités platter'... instead of the breadbasket" and "order a light drink"); adhering to these tips alone should prove beneficial. The opportunity for readers to remember and apply any of the more involved information is a possible positive side effect. (Apr.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

"Dr. Hyman, an expert's expert on healing, shares his secrets to harvesting your body's potential for weight loss. Reading this compelling book is the next best thing to entering a cutting-edge health program."

-- Mehmet Oz, MD, coauthor of the NY Times #1 Bestselling You: The Owner's Manual: An Insider's Guide to the Body that Will Make You Healthier and Younger

"At long last, a clear and practical book by an internationally recognized clinician who creates a sound diet as the cornerstone of a healthy lifestyle. There are no gimmicks, quick fixes, or misleading before and after photos since this diet is based on the latest science which underlies all effective weight management. If you are going to read and use only one book on diet and lifestyle, this is the one!"

-- Dr. Kenneth Pelletier, author of Sound Mind, Sound Body: A New Model For Lifelong Health and Professor, University of Arizona School of Medicine

"Dr Hyman has worked at the interface of science, Western medicine and alternative health for over 20 years. In Ultrametabolism, he distills this experience into a provocative prescription for weight loss. I have no doubt that this book will make an important difference in the lives of many Americans seeking optimal health."

-- David Ludwig, M.D., Ph.D., Director, Obesity Program, Children's Hospital Boston

"Combining cutting edge science and clinical wisdom, Mark Hyman provides a clear, carefully individualized, blueprint for weight loss and good health. It is, quite simply, the best book I've seen on the subject."

-- James S. Gordon, M.D., Founder and Director of the Center for Mind-Body Medicine, Washington DC, and author of Manifesto for a New Medicine

"Congratulations to Dr. Hyman for another masterpiece. This is the most comprehensive explanation of the underlying causes of weight gain I have seen."

-- Joseph E. Pizzorno, ND, Editor, Integrative Medicine: A Clinician's Journal, Coauthor, Encyclopedia of Natural Medicine

Book Description

No wonder it's so hard to lose weight -- our bodies are designed to keep weight on at all costs; it's a matter of survival. It's embedded in our DNA. Our diet has changed dramatically over the past ten thousand years, but our genetic blueprint has not -- our bodies are not designed to process the types of food we are fed today. It's like putting diesel fuel into a regular car -- it just won't work. And making matters worse is the fact that diets don't work either: less than 6 percent of weight-loss attempts succeed. The average person who goes on a diet actually gains five pounds. But a medical revolution is under way, finally showing us precisely how the powerful forces that keep weight on can actually be reprogrammed to automatically burn fat and keep weight off for good. The concept is simple. By learning how to work with our bodies instead of against them, we can ignite the natural fat-burning furnaces that lie dormant within us. For the first time ever, Dr. Mark Hyman makes this new science of weight loss available to the general public. This medical revolution is based on a groundbreaking concept called nutrigenomics -- the science of how food talks to our genes. This science is actually startlingly simple. Food contains information and instructions for our bodies -- eat the right foods and send instructions of weight loss and health; eat the wrong foods and send messages of weight gain and disease. After spending the last ten years conducting pioneering, hands-on research with over two thousand patients at Canyon Ranch, one of the world's leading health resorts, Dr. Hyman has discovered the seven fundamental causes of obesity. While fad diets have identified one or two of these causes, never before have they all been integrated into a single, simple plan for automatic weight loss -- this is the promise of UltraMetabolism.

UltraMetabolism is an easy-to-follow eight-week plan to help you lose weight based on your own unique genetic needs. Since each of our bodies is different and may require more or less of certain nutrients to awaken our fat-burning DNA, Dr. Hyman shows you exactly how to customize the program for your own particular needs. The program includes menus, recipes, and shopping lists, as well as recommendations for supplements and exercise and lifestyle treatments designed to create a healthy metabolism -- an UltraMetabolism -- permanent weight loss, and lifelong health.

Ultrametabolism Testimonials

"...I lost 50 pounds and have kept it off for 4 years."

"The last five years have become the healthiest years of my life. Because of Dr. Hyman's program, I have an in-depth understanding of my physical condition and have tailored a weight loss program for my needs. Since following his plan, I've significantly reduced my cholesterol from 240 to 160. In addition, I lost 50 pounds and have kept it off for 4 years."

-- Joseph Bernstein Milwaukee, WI

"I've dropped 2 dress sizes (so far)...Dr. Hyman literally gave me my life back."

"Over the past few years I had gained 70 lbs and felt progressively worse as I bounced from doctor to doctor without any real answers for my weight gain, my migraines, or my many other ailments. Dr. Hyman helped me understand how many of my health issues were due to food allergies. Lab tests showed I was allergic to 28 different foods! I started on the DeTox phase of Dr. Hymans program and within 3 weeks, I lost 11 pounds and my swollen wrists and puffy face went away. I used to wake up extremely exhausted, but now I wake up at 6 am and maintain a constant level of energy throughout the day. No other program gave me a means to discover the real source of my problems. Now I have the energy to play with my 8-year-old and 11-year-old children. My entire family is finally eating healthier, and I've dropped 2 dress sizes (so far!) Dr Hyman literally gave me my life back."

-- Audrey Meyer Lampert North Granby, CT

"The menu was easy to implement, in spite of my hectic lifestyle..."

"Through Dr. Hyman's program, I not only dropped my cholesterol from 335 to below 200, but I lost 20 lbs and have kept if off for the last 2 years through his instructions including a specific meal plan, exercise, and supplements. The menu was easy to implement, in spite of my hectic lifestyle and easy to adapt when I traveled to hotels and restaurants. Matter of fact, I went from a pant size of 38 to a 36 and needed to buy a lot of new clothes."

-- Cavas Gobhai Cambridge, MA

"It was easy! All I needed to do was follow his instructions; in the first 30 days I lost 21 pounds."

"Substituting simple foods with other healthy foods that I love helped me lose the cravings for all the junk I used to eat. Dr. Hyman's weight loss program gave me a lot of information about my body. It was easy! All I needed to do was follow his instructions; in the first 30 days I lost 21 pounds. I feel better than I have in 10 years and can now walk up the stairs without losing my breath. I forgot how good I could I feel."

-- Deede Dominick Phippsburg, Maine

"I was ready for a change, and Dr. Hyman's program helped me prioritize my life."

"After I quit smoking three years ago, I snacked a lot in order to forget about smoking. After doing that for 6 months, I gained almost 30 pounds. I was sick and tired of having no energy, and I wanted to feel good again. In addition, I love to shop, and I wanted to buy fancy clothes without having to shop at the big and tall store. I was ready for a change, and Dr. Hyman's program helped me prioritize my life. Since I started in 2003 I have lost over 60 pounds and have maintained the loss. In addition, I've gone from a size 18 to a size 10. When I look at old pictures, I realize that I feel and look better than I did 15 years ago."

-- Margarida Glenhage Gothenburg Sweden

"...I lost 30 lbs with no exercise."

"As a single mother, I was tired of feeling sick all the time and decided to change my life so that I could become healthy for my 3%-year-old daughter. After relearning how to feed myself and my daughter, I lost 30 lbs with no exercise from June to December and I dropped my cholesterol 105 points."

-- Nancy Grey DC Bronxville, NY

"I lost 30 lbs, went back to a size 4, and no longer have migraines."

"After going through an 8-month period of being very sick with hives, having extreme inflammation in my face, and gaining 30 pounds, I found Dr. Hyman's program. Because I went through his simple plan, I uncovered that I am allergic to gluten, the protein in wheat, which was the source of all my problems. After getting on his plan, I lost 30 lbs, went back to a size 4, and no longer have migraines. My husband even noticed the change and went on the program too; so far, he's lost 45 pounds."

-- Debbie Gosney Charlotte, NC

"...it's easy to jump back on when I occasionally fall off..."

"This program gave me the satisfaction of being in control of my body and life. I've maintained my 18-pound weight loss since 2002, reduced my glucose levels from 170 to 102, and taken control over my diabetes to the point where I no longer have any symptoms. Going on a program like this is like a religious conversion; it's easy to jump back on when I occasionally fall off and I have more energy than I've ever had. At the age of 71, I run 4 miles a day and feel great."

Letter To A Christian Nation By Sam Harris

2006-09-19T09:03:00.000-07:00

“Sam Harris’s elegant little book is most refreshing and a wonderful source of ammunition for those who, like me, hold to no religious doctrine. Yet I have some sympathy also with those who might be worried by his uncompromising stance. Read it and form your own view, but do not ignore its message.”
–Sir Roger Penrose, emeritus professor of mathematics, Oxford University,
author of The Road to Reality

“Reading Harris’ Letter to a Christian Nation was like sitting ring side, cheering the champion, yelling ‘Yes!’ at every jab. For those of us who feel depressed by this country’s ever increasing unification of church and state, and the ever decreasing support for the sciences that deliver knowledge and reduce ignorance, this little book is a welcome hit of adrenalin.”
–Marc Hauser, Harvard College Professor, author of Moral Minds: How Nature Designed Our Sense of Right and Wrong

“I can’t sign my name to this blurb. As a New York Times best selling author of books about business, my career will evaporate if I endorse a book that challenges the deeply held superstitions and bigotry of the masses. That’s exactly why you should (no, you must) read this angry and honest book right away. As long as science and rational thought are under attack by the misguided yet pious majority, our nation is in jeopardy. I’m scared. You should be too. Please buy two, one for you and one for a friend you care about.”
–Unsigned, New York Times best selling author

“It’s a shame that not everyone in this country will read Sam Harris’ marvelous little book Letter to a Christian Nation. They won’t but they should.”
–Leonard Susskind, Felix Bloch Professor in theoretical physics, Stanford University, author of The Cosmic Landscape: String Theory and the Illusion of Intelligent Design

“We all know about good things that have been derived from bad ideas. Modern religions serve many social goods such as health care for the poor. The problem is that is also services many reprehensible ideas. Harris blows the whistle, pointing out the religions of the world are based on human generated vengeful stories. Read this book and you decide your stance for the future.”
–Michael S. Gazzaniga, Director of the Sage Center for the Study of Mind, University of California, Santa Barbara, author of The Ethical Brain

“Sam Harris fearlessly describes a moral and intellectual emergency precipitated by religious fantasies–misguided beliefs that create suffering, that rationalize violence, that have endangered our nation and our future. His argument for the morality, the honesty, and the humility of atheism is galvanizing. It is a relief that someone has spoken so frankly, with such passion yet such rationality. Now when the subject arises, as it inevitably does, I can simply say: Read Sam Harris’ Letter to a Christian Nation.”
–Janna Levin, Columbia University, author of How the Universe Got Its Spots and A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines

Book Description
“Thousands of people have written to tell me that I am wrong not to believe in God. The most hostile of these communications have come from Christians. This is ironic, as Christians generally imagine that no faith imparts the virtues of love and forgiveness more effectively than their own. The truth is that many who claim to be transformed by Christ’s love are deeply, even murderously, intolerant of criticism. While we may want to ascribe this to human nature, it is clear that such hatred draws considerable support from the Bible. How do I know this? The most disturbed of my correspondents always cite chapter and verse.”

So begins Letter to a Christian Nation…

www.samharris.org

About the Author
Sam Harris is the author of the New York Times best seller The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason, winner of the 2005 PEN/Martha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction.

The Greatest Story Ever Sold: The Decline and Fall of Truth from 9/11 to Katrina

2006-09-19T08:59:00.000-07:00

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. This blistering j'accuse has vitriol to spare for George Bush—calling him a "spoiled brat" and "blowhard"—and his policies, but its main target is the PR machinery that promoted those policies to the American people. New York Times columnist Rich revisits nearly every Bush administration publicity gambit, including Iraqi WMD claims, Bush's "Mission Accomplished" triumph, the Swift-boating of John Kerry and the writing of fake prowar letters-to-the-editor from soldiers. He uncovers nothing new, but his meticulously researched recap-cum-debunking—complete with appended 80-page time line comparing administration spin to actual events—builds a comprehensive picture of a White House propaganda campaign to bamboozle the public, smear critics, camouflage policy disasters and win the 2002 and 2004 elections through trumped-up security anxieties. Along the way, he pillories a sycophantic media (Bob Woodward gets spanked hard), spineless Democrats and an infotainment culture that happily accommodates the Bush administration's erasure of the line between reality and fiction. Sometimes Rich's critique of Republican politics as cynical image-manipulation goes overboard, as in his "wag the dog" theory of the Iraq war as a Karl Rove electoral maneuver; more often, though, it's on target. The result is a caustic, hard-hitting indictment of the Bush administration, timed to make a splash in the upcoming election campaign. (Sept. 19)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
New York Times columnist Rich offers few revelations, but the weight of all the things already published about the war in Iraq and the rationale for going to war provides a staggering indictment of the Bush administration's penchant for "truthiness" and public-relations glitter rather than substantive policy. Rich's analysis is acidly pointed as he reviews the litany of half-truths told by the Bush administration in the lead-up to the war and since then. Faced with the prospect of an FBI whistle blower disclosing the administration's incompetence in recognizing terrorist threats before 9/11, the administration launched a stream of PR distractions: Bush's Top Gun appearance on a carrier with a banner announcing "Mission Accomplished," the false packaging of Private Jessica Lynch, the blustering about uncovering administration leakers when Valerie Plame was publicly revealed as an undercover agent. Rich maintains that Bush himself was behind the leak. By the time Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, the PR spin machine that had sustained the president since 9/11 was in undeniable tatters. Rich offers a time line of events and commentary that makes the case that the government has played fast and loose with the facts regarding Iraq for political advantage. Vanessa Bush
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Kirkus Reviews
...a scathing rebuke of the current administration's definition of truth...

Book Description
New York Times columnist Frank Rich examines the trail of fictions manufactured by the Bush administration from 9/11 to Hurricane Katrina, exposing the most brilliant spin campaign ever waged.
When America was attacked on 9/11, its citizens almost unanimously rallied behind its new, untested president as he went to war. What they didn't know at the time was that the Bush administration's highest priority was not to vanquish Al Qaeda but to consolidate its own power at any cost. It was a mission that could be accomplished only by a propaganda presidency in which reality was steadily replaced by a scenario of the White House's own invention-and such was that scenario's devious brilliance that it fashioned a second war against an enemy that did not attack America on 9/11, intimidated the Democrats into incoherence and impotence, and turned a presidential election into an irrelevant referendum on macho imagery and same-sex marriage.

As only he can, acclaimed New York Times columnist Frank Rich delivers a step-by-step chronicle of how skillfully the White House built its house of cards and how the institutions that should have exposed these fictions, the mainstream news media, were too often left powerless by the administration's relentless attack machine, their own post-9/11 timidity, and an unending parade of self-inflicted scandals (typified by those at The New York Times). Demonstrating the candor and conviction that have made him one of our most trusted and incisive public voices, Rich brilliantly and meticulously illuminates the White House's disturbing love affair with "truthiness," and the ways in which a bungled war, a seemingly obscure Washington leak, and a devastating hurricane at long last revealed the man-behind-the-curtain and the story that had so effectively been sold to the nation, as god-given patriotic fact.

About the Author
Frank Rich joined The New York Times in 1980 as the chief drama critic. He has been an Op-Ed columnist there since 1994. From 2003 to 2005, he was the front-page columnist for the Sunday Arts & Leisure section. He has worked as a film and television critic for Time, film critic for the New York Post, and was founding editor of the Richmond Mercury, a weekly newspaper, in the early 1970s. He is the author of Ghost Light, a childhood memoir; Hot Seat: Theater Criticism for The New York Times, 1980-1993; and The Theatre Art of Boris Aronson, coauthored with Lisa Aronson. He lives with his wife, the author and novelist Alex Witchel, who is a reporter for The New York Times.

YOU: The Owner's Manual: An Insider's Guide to the Body that Will Make You Healthier and Younger

2006-09-19T08:53:00.000-07:00

Amazon.com
If there ever was a pair of docs who can make the small intestine seem truly intriguing, here they are. Dr. Mehmet Oz is an alternative-medicine maverick and a cardiologist known to implement acupuncture during open-heart surgery. Dr. Michael Roizen developed the RealAge concept of calculating one's biological, as opposed to chronological, age. Here they've whipped up a witty guide to the workings of the entire body, appropriate not just for those who can't tell their pancreas from their pituitary. Even Cheers’ Cliff Claven types who think they know it all will likely be humbled by the 50-question "body-quotient" quiz that starts off the book.
With much sassy humor (they describe the adrenals as similar in shape to Mr. Potato Head's hat), they give a guided tour of the body's anatomy and major systems (hormonal, nervous, digestive, sensory, etc.) including plenty of fascinating trivia along the way. How often should you get your thyroid level checked? How much gas does the average person produce in a day? And, most important, how many times a year do most people have sex?? Drs. Oz and Roizen know. They also reveal plenty of bizarre (and potentially life-saving) facts such as this: If your earlobe has a prominent vertical wrinkle, it's likely that your arteries are aging faster than they ought to be. If only 8th-grade health class had been this fun.

The docs' main goal in presenting all this info is twofold: first, it's your body, so shouldn't you finally learn how it works? And, second, they want to help teach ways of preserving the body's health and youthfulness. To that end, they've included an "Owner's Manual Diet," a 10-day menu plan designed not for weight loss, but to make you feel "years younger." Its simple recipes are each meant to benefit a certain body system, such as Tomato Bruschetta, packed with the antioxidant lycopene, which has been proven to boost immunity. --Erica Jorgensen

From Publishers Weekly
Anti-aging guru Roizen and celebrated heart surgeon Oz combine their popular approaches to patient-centered care in this assessment of how much, or more to the point, how little, readers know about their bodies. After taking the quizzes in the book, readers may feel shocked by their ignorance of basic anatomy and the processes required to maintain physical and mental functioning. Each chapter focuses on a body part or system (heart, brain, digestive, reproductive, etc.) and discusses diseases associated with it; genetic and lifestyle influences on its aging process; and foods, supplements and habits that can prevent or reverse related illnesses. The book has an entertaining feel: friendly elves guide readers through illustrations of the body and cartoons feature alien creatures that enter the body and cause illness. The humor is irreverent (e.g., muscle cells surrounding dead heart tissue "start fighting with each other, like Jerry Springer's guests, instead of supporting each other, like Oprah's" [incidentally, the authors will appear on Oprah in May to promote the book]). Despite a 10-day, 30-recipe food plan and a less-is-more exercise regime, however, readers may have trouble using the information to create a lifestyle that will fulfill the authors' promise of weight loss, disease prevention and longevity. Even the recipes target one specific area of the body and weaken the overall conceptual framework. This lighthearted book will be most useful to those who like their health lessons served with a side of humor. (May 1)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Book Description

Between your full-length mirror and high-school biology class, you probably think you know a lot about the human body. While it's true that we live in an age when we're as obsessed with our bodies as we are with celebrity hairstyles, the reality is that most of us know very little about what chugs, churns, and thumps throughout this miraculous, scientific, and artistic system of anatomy. Yes, you've owned your skin-covered shell for decades, but you probably know more about your cell-phone plan than you do about your own body. When it comes to your longevity and quality of life, understanding your internal systems gives you the power, authority, and ability to live a healthier, younger, and better life.

You: The Owner's Manual challenges your preconceived notions about how the human body works and ages, then takes you on a tour through all of the highways, back roads, and landmarks inside of you. After taking a quiz that tests your body of knowledge, you'll learn about all of your blood-pumping, food-digesting, and keys-remembering systems and organs.

Just as important, you'll get the facts and advice you need to keep your body running long and strong. You'll find out how diseases start and how they affect your body -- as well as advice on how to prevent and beat conditions that threaten your quality of life. Complete with exercise tips, nutritional guidelines, simple lifestyle changes, and alternative approaches, You: The Owner's Manual gives you an easy, comprehensive, and life-changing how-to plan for fending off the gremlins of aging. To top it off, you'll also get the great-tasting and calorie-saving Owner's Manual Diet -- a thirty-recipe eating plan that's designed with only one goal in mind: to help you live a younger life.

Welcome to your body. Why don't you come on in and take a look around?

About the Author
Mehmet C. Oz, M.D., is professor and vice-chairman of surgery, Columbia University. He is medical director of the Integrated Medicine Center and director of the Heart Institute, New York Presbyterian/Columbia Medical Center.