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Eric Weiner, author of Ben & Me: In Search of a Founder's Formula for a Long and Useful Life

Ben Franklin lingers in our lives and in our imaginations. One of only two non-presidents to appear on US currency, Franklin was a founder, statesman, scientist, inventor, diplomat, publisher, humorist and philosopher. He believed in the American experiment, but Ben Franklin’s greatest experiment was…Ben Franklin. In that spirit of betterment, Eric Weiner embarks on an ambitious quest to live the way Ben lived. Not a conventional biography, BEN & ME is a guide to living and thinking well, as Ben Franklin did. It is also about curiosity, diligence and, most of all, the elusive goal of self-improvement. As Weiner follows Franklin from Philadelphia to Paris, Boston to London, he attempts to uncover Ben’s life lessons, large and small.

Katherine Center, author of The Rom-Commers

Emma Wheeler desperately longs to be a screenwriter. But she’s also been the sole caretaker for her dad, who needs full-time care. Now, when she gets a chance to rewrite a script for famous screenwriter Charlie Yates, it’s a break too big to pass up. Emma’s younger sister steps in for caretaking duties, and Emma moves to L.A. for the writing gig of a lifetime. But Charlie Yates doesn’t want to write with anyone --- much less “a failed, nobody screenwriter.” Worse, the romantic comedy he’s written is so terrible it might actually bring on the apocalypse. Plus, he doesn’t even care about the script; it’s just a means to get a different one green-lit. But Emma is not going down without a fight. She will convince him that love stories matter --- even if she has to kiss him senseless to do it. But what if that kiss is accidentally amazing?

James Lee Burke, author of Clete: A Dave Robicheaux Novel

Clete Purcel is Dave Robicheaux’s longtime friend and partner in detective work. But he has a troubled past. When Clete leaves his car at the local car wash, only to return to find it ransacked by a group of thugs tied to the drug trade from Mexican cartels to Louisiana, it feels personal. Just as Clete starts to trail the culprits, Clara Bow hires Clete to investigate her scheming ex-husband, and a string of brutal deaths all link back to a heavily tattooed man who seems to lurk around every corner. Clete is experiencing shockingly lifelike hallucinations and questioning Clara’s ulterior motives when he and Dave start to hear rumors of a dangerous substance with potentially catastrophic effects. The thugs who destroyed his car might have been pawns in a scheme far darker than they could have imagined.

Elin Hilderbrand, author of Swan Song

Chief of Police Ed Kapenash is about to retire. Blond Sharon is going through a divorce. But when a 22-million-dollar summer home is purchased by the mysterious Richardsons --- how did they make their money, exactly? --- Ed, Sharon and everyone in the community are swept up in high drama. The Richardsons throw lavish parties, flirt with multiple locals, flaunt their wealth with not one but two yachts, and raise impossible hopes of everyone they meet. When their house burns to the ground and their most essential employee goes missing, the entire island is up in arms. The last of Elin Hilderbrand's bestselling Nantucket novels, SWAN SONG is a propulsive medley of glittering gatherings, sun-soaked drama, wisdom and heart, featuring the return of some of her most beloved characters.

Editorial Content for When Women Ran Fifth Avenue: Glamour and Power at the Dawn of American Fashion

Reviewer (text)

Barbara Bamberger Scott

In WHEN WOMEN RAN FIFTH AVENUE, award-winning journalist Julie Satow details the accomplishments of three women who made quiet, laudable history with their talents, intelligence, zeal for fashion and instinct for commerce. Read More

Teaser

The 20th-century American department store: a palace of consumption where women, shopper and shopgirl alike, could stake out a newfound independence. Whether in New York, Chicago or on Main Street, USA, men owned the buildings, but inside, women ruled. In this hothouse atmosphere, three women rose to the top. In the 1930s, Hortense Odlum of Bonwit Teller came to her husband's department store as a housewife and wound up running the company. Dorothy Shaver of Lord & Taylor championed American designers during World War II --- before which US fashions were almost exclusively Parisian copies --- becoming the first businesswoman to earn a $1 million salary. And in the 1960s, Geraldine Stutz of Henri Bendel reinvented the look of the modern department store and inspired a devoted following of ultra-chic shoppers, as well as decades of copycats.

Promo

The 20th-century American department store: a palace of consumption where women, shopper and shopgirl alike, could stake out a newfound independence. Whether in New York, Chicago or on Main Street, USA, men owned the buildings, but inside, women ruled. In this hothouse atmosphere, three women rose to the top. In the 1930s, Hortense Odlum of Bonwit Teller came to her husband's department store as a housewife and wound up running the company. Dorothy Shaver of Lord & Taylor championed American designers during World War II --- before which US fashions were almost exclusively Parisian copies --- becoming the first businesswoman to earn a $1 million salary. And in the 1960s, Geraldine Stutz of Henri Bendel reinvented the look of the modern department store and inspired a devoted following of ultra-chic shoppers, as well as decades of copycats.

About the Book

A glittering portrait of the golden age of American department stores and of three visionary women who led them, from the award-winning author of THE PLAZA.

The 20th-century American department store: a palace of consumption where women, shopper and shopgirl alike, could stake out a newfound independence. Whether in New York, Chicago or on Main Street, USA, men owned the buildings, but inside, women ruled.

In this hothouse atmosphere, three women rose to the top. In the 1930s, Hortense Odlum of Bonwit Teller came to her husband's department store as a housewife and wound up running the company. Dorothy Shaver of Lord & Taylor championed American designers during World War II --- before which US fashions were almost exclusively Parisian copies --- becoming the first businesswoman to earn a $1 million salary. And in the 1960s, Geraldine Stutz of Henri Bendel reinvented the look of the modern department store and inspired a devoted following of ultra-chic shoppers, as well as decades of copycats.

Journalist Julie Satow draws back the curtain on three visionaries in this stylish account, rich with personal drama and trade secrets, and showcases the women who made that beautifully curated world go round.

Audiobook available, read by Karen Murray

Editorial Content for First Frost: A Longmire Mystery

Contributors

Reviewer (text)

Philip Zozzaro

The past is a stubborn presence that refuses to be shaken off. Walt Longmire is rummaging through his past in an attempt to declutter his residence and placate his new paramour, Victoria. The appearance of a surfboard amongst the rubble leads to a remembrance of Walt’s youth when the world was more black and white. Read More

Teaser

It’s the summer of 1964, and recent college graduates Walt Longmire and Henry Standing Bear enlist to serve in the Vietnam War. As they catch a few final waves in California before reporting for duty, a sudden storm assaults the shores and capsizes a nearby cargo boat. Walt and Henry jump to action, but it’s soon revealed by the police who greet them ashore that the sunken boat carried valuable contraband from underground sources. The boys head out on Route 66. The question, of course, is how far they will get before the consequences of their actions catch up to them. Back in the present day, Walt is forced to speak before a judge following the fatal events of THE LONGMIRE DEFENSE. With powerful enemies lurking behind the scenes, the sheriff of Absaroka County must consider his options if he wishes to finish the fight he started.

Promo

It’s the summer of 1964, and recent college graduates Walt Longmire and Henry Standing Bear enlist to serve in the Vietnam War. As they catch a few final waves in California before reporting for duty, a sudden storm assaults the shores and capsizes a nearby cargo boat. Walt and Henry jump to action, but it’s soon revealed by the police who greet them ashore that the sunken boat carried valuable contraband from underground sources. The boys head out on Route 66. The question, of course, is how far they will get before the consequences of their actions catch up to them. Back in the present day, Walt is forced to speak before a judge following the fatal events of THE LONGMIRE DEFENSE. With powerful enemies lurking behind the scenes, the sheriff of Absaroka County must consider his options if he wishes to finish the fight he started.

About the Book

The past and future collide in this gripping new addition to the beloved New York Times bestselling Longmire series.

It’s the summer of 1964, and recent college graduates Walt Longmire and Henry Standing Bear read the writing on the wall and enlist to serve in the Vietnam War. As they catch a few final waves in California before reporting for duty, a sudden storm assaults the shores and capsizes a nearby cargo boat. Walt and Henry jump to action, but it’s soon revealed by the police who greet them ashore that the sunken boat carried valuable contraband from underground sources.

The boys, in their early 20s and in the peak of their physical prowess from playing college football for the last four years, head out on Route 66. The question, of course, is how far they will get before the consequences of their actions catch up to them --- the answer being, not very.

Back in the present day, Walt is forced to speak before a judge following the fatal events of THE LONGMIRE DEFENSE. With powerful enemies lurking behind the scenes, the sheriff of Absaroka County must consider his options if he wishes to finish the fight he started.

Going back and forth between 1964 and the present day, Craig Johnson brings us a propulsive dual timeline as Walt Longmire stands between the crossfire of good and evil, law and anarchy, and compassion and cruelty at two pivotal stages in his life.

Audiobook available, read by George Guidall

Editorial Content for A Walk in the Park: The True Story of a Spectacular Misadventure in the Grand Canyon

Contributors

Reviewer (text)

Jana Siciliano

The climate change debate has been felt in the most remote parts of the world and those closest to us. Although A WALK IN THE PARK is not a memoir that declares itself a story about our shifting natural environments, it sort of is. Without meaning to do so, curling itself into a narrative that revolves around a most insane and dangerous journey, it brings to light the new --- and at times concerning --- directions in which nature is taking everyone, particularly bold explorers. Read More

Teaser

 

A few years after quitting his job to follow an ill-advised dream of becoming a guide on the Colorado River, Kevin Fedarko was approached by his best friend, the National Geographic photographer Pete McBride, with a vision as bold as it was harebrained. Together, they would embark on an end-to-end traverse of the Grand Canyon, a journey that, McBride promised, would be “a walk in the park.” The ensuing ordeal, which lasted more than a year, revealed a place that was deeper, richer and far more complex than anything the two men had imagined --- and came within a hair’s breadth of killing them both.

Promo

A few years after quitting his job to follow an ill-advised dream of becoming a guide on the Colorado River, Kevin Fedarko was approached by his best friend, the National Geographic photographer Pete McBride, with a vision as bold as it was harebrained. Together, they would embark on an end-to-end traverse of the Grand Canyon --- a journey that McBride promised would be “a walk in the park.” Against his better judgment, Fedarko agreed to the scheme, unaware that the small cluster of experts who had completed the crossing billed it as “the toughest hike in the world.” The ensuing ordeal, which lasted more than a year, revealed a place that was deeper, richer and far more complex than anything the two men had imagined --- and came within a hair’s breadth of killing them both.

About the Book

This New York Times bestseller from the author of THE EMERALD MILE is a rollicking and poignant account of an epic 750-mile odyssey, on foot, through the heart of the Grand Canyon.

Two friends, zero preparation, one dream. A few years after quitting his job to follow an ill-advised dream of becoming a guide on the Colorado River, Kevin Fedarko was approached by his best friend, the National Geographic photographer Pete McBride, with a vision as bold as it was harebrained. Together, they would embark on an end-to-end traverse of the Grand Canyon, a journey that, McBride promised, would be “a walk in the park.” Against his better judgment, Fedarko agreed to the scheme, unaware that the small cluster of experts who had completed the crossing billed it as “the toughest hike in the world.”

The ensuing ordeal, which lasted more than a year, revealed a place that was deeper, richer and far more complex than anything the two men had imagined --- and came within a hair’s breadth of killing them both. They struggled to make their way through the all but impenetrable reaches of its truest wilderness, a vertical labyrinth of thousand-foot cliffs, and crumbling ledges where water is measured out by the teaspoon and every step is fraught with peril --- and where, even today, there is still no trail along the length of the country’s best-known and most iconic landmark.

Along the way, veteran long-distance hikers ushered them into secret pockets, invisible to the millions of tourists gathered on the rim, where only a handful of humans have ever laid eyes. Members of the canyon’s 11 Native American tribes brought them face-to-face with layers of history that forced them to reconsider myths at the center of our national parks --- and exposed them to the impinging threats of commercial tourism. Even Fedarko’s dying father, who had first pointed him toward the canyon more than 40 years earlier but had never set foot there himself, opened him to a new way of seeing the landscape.

And always, there was the great gorge itself: austere and unforgiving but suffused with magic, drenched in wonder and redeemed by its own transcendent beauty.

A singular portrait of a sublime place, A WALK IN THE PARK is a deeply moving plea for the preservation of America’s greatest natural treasure.

Audiobook available, read by Kevin Fedarko

Editorial Content for Traveling: On the Path of Joni Mitchell

Contributors

Reviewer (text)

Jana Siciliano

“Here’s how I think Joni Mitchell is a genius. There’s a way to think about the world that changes it from an exclusionary term to a gateway. It’s the oldest definition, from the Latin: a guardian spirit associated with a time, place or community. This kind of genius doesn’t float above things. She recognizes the circumstances that call for her to speak and makes them newly audible.” Read More

Teaser

For decades, Joni Mitchell’s life and music have enraptured listeners. One of the most celebrated artists of her generation, Mitchell has inspired countless musicians --- from peers like James Taylor, to inheritors like Prince and Brandi Carlile --- and authors, who have dissected her music and her life in their writing. At the same time, Mitchell has always been a force beckoning us still closer, as --- with the other arm --- she pushes us away. Given this, music critic Ann Powers wondered if there was another way to draw insights from the life of this singular musician who never stops moving, never stops experimenting. In TRAVELING, Powers seeks to understand Mitchell through her myriad journeys.

Promo

For decades, Joni Mitchell’s life and music have enraptured listeners. One of the most celebrated artists of her generation, Mitchell has inspired countless musicians --- from peers like James Taylor, to inheritors like Prince and Brandi Carlile --- and authors, who have dissected her music and her life in their writing. At the same time, Mitchell has always been a force beckoning us still closer, as --- with the other arm --- she pushes us away. Given this, music critic Ann Powers wondered if there was another way to draw insights from the life of this singular musician who never stops moving, never stops experimenting. In TRAVELING, Powers seeks to understand Mitchell through her myriad journeys.

About the Book

Celebrated NPR music critic Ann Powers explores the life and career of Joni Mitchell in a lyrical style as fascinating and ethereal as the songs of the artist herself.

For decades, Joni Mitchell’s life and music have enraptured listeners. One of the most celebrated artists of her generation, Mitchell has inspired countless musicians --- from peers like James Taylor, to inheritors like Prince and Brandi Carlile --- and authors, who have dissected her music and her life in their writing. At the same time, Mitchell has always been a force beckoning us still closer, as --- with the other arm --- she pushes us away. Given this, music critic Ann Powers wondered if there was another way to draw insights from the life of this singular musician who never stops moving, never stops experimenting.

In TRAVELING, Powers seeks to understand Mitchell through her myriad journeys. Through extensive interviews with Mitchell's peers and deep archival research, she takes readers to rural Canada, mapping the singer’s childhood battle with polio. She charts the course of Mitchell’s musical evolution, ranging from early folk to jazz fusion to experimentation with pop synthetics. She follows the winding road of Mitchell’s collaborations with other greats, and the loves that emerged along the way, all the way through to the remarkable return of Mitchell to music-making after the 2015 aneurysm that nearly took her life.

Along this journey, Powers’ wide-ranging musings on the artist’s life and career reconsider the biographer’s role and the way it twines against the reality of a fan. In doing so, TRAVELING illustrates the shifting nature of biography, and the ultimate contradiction of celebrity: that an icon cannot truly, completely be known to a fan.

Kaleidoscopic in scope and intimate in its detail, TRAVELING is a fresh and fascinating addition to the Joni Mitchell canon, written by a biographer in full command of her gifts who asks as much of herself as of her subject.

Audiobook available, read by Hillary Huber

Editorial Content for Middletide

Book

Contributors

Reviewer (text)

Jane T. Krebs

The opening chapters of Sarah Crouch’s debut novel, MIDDLETIDE, are a series of quick back-and-forth checks that put together the chronology of her story. Read More

Teaser

In the small, Puget Sound town of Point Orchards, the lifeless body of Dr. Erin Landry is found hanging from a tree on the property of prodigal son and failed writer Elijah Leith. Sheriff Jim Godbout’s initial investigation points to an obvious suicide, but upon closer inspection, there seem to be clues of foul play when he discovers that the circumstances of the beautiful doctor’s death were ripped straight from the pages of Elijah Leith’s own novel. Out of money and motivation, Elijah throws himself into restoring the ramshackle cabin his father left behind and rekindling his relationship with Nakita, whom he betrayed but was never able to forget. As the town turns against him, Elijah must fight for his innocence against an unexpected foe who is close and cunning enough to flawlessly frame him for murder.

Promo

In the small, Puget Sound town of Point Orchards, the lifeless body of Dr. Erin Landry is found hanging from a tree on the property of prodigal son and failed writer Elijah Leith. Sheriff Jim Godbout’s initial investigation points to an obvious suicide, but upon closer inspection, there seem to be clues of foul play when he discovers that the circumstances of the beautiful doctor’s death were ripped straight from the pages of Elijah Leith’s own novel. Out of money and motivation, Elijah throws himself into restoring the ramshackle cabin his father left behind and rekindling his relationship with Nakita, whom he betrayed but was never able to forget. As the town turns against him, Elijah must fight for his innocence against an unexpected foe who is close and cunning enough to flawlessly frame him for murder.

About the Book

In this gripping and intensely atmospheric debut, disquiet descends on a small town after the suspicious death of a beautiful young doctor, with all clues pointing to the reclusive young man who abandoned the community in chase of big city dreams but returned for the first love he left behind. Perfect for fans of ALL GOOD PEOPLE HERE and WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING.

One peaceful morning, in the small, Puget Sound town of Point Orchards, the lifeless body of Dr. Erin Landry is found hanging from a tree on the property of prodigal son and failed writer Elijah Leith. Sheriff Jim Godbout’s initial investigation points to an obvious suicide, but upon closer inspection, there seem to be clues of foul play when he discovers that the circumstances of the beautiful doctor’s death were ripped straight from the pages of Elijah Leith’s own novel.

Out of money and motivation, 33-year-old Elijah returns to his empty childhood home to lick the wounds of his futile writing career. Hungry for purpose, he throws himself into restoring the ramshackle cabin his father left behind and rekindling his relationship with Nakita, the extraordinary girl from the nearby reservation whom he betrayed but was never able to forget.

As the town of Point Orchards turns against him, Elijah must fight for his innocence against an unexpected foe who is close and cunning enough to flawlessly frame him for murder in this scintillating literary thriller that seeks to uncover a case of love, loss and revenge.

Audiobook available, read by Kaleo Griffith

Editorial Content for The Last of His Kind: Clayton Kershaw and the Burden of Greatness

Contributors

Reviewer (text)

Ron Kaplan (www.RonKaplansBaseballBookshelf.com)

Many baseball fans of a certain age rue what has befallen their favorite game. “They don’t make ’em like they used to” is a familiar phrase when comparing the current generation of players to their predecessors. The standards for who should be counted among the all-time greats has dropped as the sport has changed in recent years. It’s doubtful that we’ll see another 300-game winner or 3,000 strikeouts. Read More

Teaser

Clayton Kershaw has embodied the burden of athletic greatness, the prizes and perils that await those who strive for it all. He is a three-time Cy Young award winner, the first pitcher to win National League MVP since Bob Gibson, and a surefire, first-ballot Hall of Famer. In an age when baseball became more impersonal, a sport altered by adherence to algorithms and actuarial tables, Kershaw personified the game’s lingering humanity. THE LAST OF HIS KIND traces Kershaw’s path from a boyhood fractured by divorce to his development as one of the most heralded pitching prospects in Texas history to his emergence in Los Angeles as the spiritual heir to Sandy Koufax. But the book also charts Kershaw’s place in baseball’s changing landscape, as his own stubbornness butted against the game’s evolution.

Promo

Clayton Kershaw has embodied the burden of athletic greatness, the prizes and perils that await those who strive for it all. He is a three-time Cy Young award winner, the first pitcher to win National League MVP since Bob Gibson, and a surefire, first-ballot Hall of Famer. In an age when baseball became more impersonal, a sport altered by adherence to algorithms and actuarial tables, Kershaw personified the game’s lingering humanity. THE LAST OF HIS KIND traces Kershaw’s path from a boyhood fractured by divorce to his development as one of the most heralded pitching prospects in Texas history to his emergence in Los Angeles as the spiritual heir to Sandy Koufax. But the book also charts Kershaw’s place in baseball’s changing landscape, as his own stubbornness butted against the game’s evolution.

About the Book

The definitive biography of Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw, examining the genesis of his brilliance, his epic quest to win the World Series, and his singular place within the evolving baseball landscape --- based on exclusive interviews with Kershaw and more than 200 others.​ Now in paperback with a new Epilogue.

More than any baseball player of his generation, Clayton Kershaw has embodied the burden of athletic greatness, the prizes and perils that await those who strive for it all. He is a three-time Cy Young award winner, the first pitcher to win National League MVP since Bob Gibson, and a surefire, first-ballot Hall of Famer. Many of his peers consider him the greatest pitcher to ever climb atop a big-league mound.

In an age when baseball became more impersonal, a sport altered by adherence to algorithms and actuarial tables, Kershaw personified the game’s lingering humanity, with his joy and suffering on display each October as he chased a championship. He pitched through pain, placing his future at risk on the game’s grandest stages. He endeared himself to teammates and foes alike with his refusal to make excuses, with his willingness to shoulder the blame when he failed. And he only further impressed them when he returned, year after year, even as his body broke down from the strain of his profession. The journey captivated fans in Los Angeles and beyond, so much so that when the Dodgers finally won a title in 2020, the baseball world exulted in his triumph.

THE LAST OF HIS KIND traces Kershaw’s path from a boyhood fractured by divorce to his development as one of the most heralded pitching prospects in Texas history to his emergence in Los Angeles as the spiritual heir to Sandy Koufax. But the book also charts Kershaw’s place in baseball’s changing landscape, as his own stubbornness butted against the game’s evolution. The story of baseball in the 21st century can be told through Kershaw’s career, from his apprenticeship with icons like Joe Torre and Greg Maddux, to his wary relationship with the implementation of analytics, to his victimhood in the 2017 sign-stealing scandal at the hands of the Houston Astros.

The game has changed so much during Kershaw’s illustrious career. To understand how baseball is played today, and how it got that way, you must understand the journey of Clayton Kershaw.

Audiobook available, read by LJ Ganser