By Kurt Hoelting Da Capo Press, $25.00, 262 pages After learning that his carbon footprint was more than twice the national average, wilderness guide Kurt Hoelting embarked on a personal experiment: to give up his car for a year, staying within a 100-kilometer radius of his home on Whidbey Island, Washington. The Circumference of Home [...]
By Tom Grimes Tin House Books, $24.95, 256 pages This book began as a eulogy, one written by a writer for his former teacher at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Tom Grimes met Frank Conroy, the author of Stop-Time and a writing instructor, when he was still an applicant to the Workshop. Conroy seems to have [...]
By Christopher Hitchens Twelve, $26.99, 448 pages Christopher Hitchens has become one of the more controversial authors in America, having penned opinion pieces on why Mother Theresa was a sadist and God is not great. And Hitchens’s memoir will likely raise the ire of some, but it is a must-read. Hitch-22 differs from many other [...]
By Chauncey W. Crandall FaithWords, $19.99, 199 pages 40 minutes after collapsing of a massive heart attack in the emergency room of a Palm Beach hospital, Jeff Markin was declared dead. Dr. Chauncey Crandall, the attending cardiologist, suddenly had the sensation of God telling him to pray for the patient. After praying Dr. Crandall instructed [...]
By Charles Clark Xlibris, $19.99, 151 pages I Know How It Feels is about a man’s journey with God, and his constant disagreements with Him. Clark explores his past, his anger, and his eventual redemption, and does so in light of his personal faith. He covers a life lived large, starting with his gang background, [...]
By David C. Scott and Brendan Murphy Red Honor Press, $24.95, 403 pages Despite shortcomings (that are not necessary to discuss here), Boy Scouts of America are squeaky clean. It comes as a shock to learn the conflict that embroiled the organization in its early years. The Scouting Party delves into the confrontations between three [...]
By Robin Easton HCI, $24.95, 340 pages Australia is a vast continent populated by some of the most venomous dangerous animals the world over. To drop out of regular society to hike into the wilds of the Daintree Rainforest, in Australia, would seem to be illogical, foolhardy, and just plain crazy. Naked in Eden is [...]
By Barbara Sinor Modern History Press, $32.95, 101 pages Dr. Sinor is a psychologist and a writer who has a passion to help people heal from addictions. At her public appearances in Northern California over the past few years, she requested of her audiences that they write to her of their own addiction stories. From [...]
By Martin Lemelman Bloomsbury, $26.00, 314 pages Two Cents Plain takes the cutting edge form of a graphic novel, but it’s a classic coming of age story set in Brooklyn in the 1950s and ’60s. Lemelman’s detailed pencil drawings, sprinkled with Yiddish sayings and dialogue capturing the colorful, broken English of his immigrant parents, tell [...]
By Paul Provenza, Dan Dion It Books, $29.99, 345 pages George Carlin. Stephen Colbert. P.J. O’Rourke. The Smothers Brothers. Trey Parker and Matt Stone. Lizz Winstead. Judd Apatow. Mike Nichols. Bill Maher. Henry Rollins. Cheech & Chong. Margaret Cho. Lily Tomlin. The Upright Citizens Brigade. Robin Williams. Lewis Black. Penn Jillette. A hitlist of some [...]
By Paul D. Hufstedler CreateSpace, $18.95, 232 pages The first book of Paul Hufstedler, always the off-centered one in a Mid-West family, contains a collection of memories that recount tales of family, friends, and an outhouse named Eleanor. Never Felt Better reads as a loose narrative of events and stories from the author’s youth and [...]
By William Furlong Phaidon Press, $39.95, 272 pages Audio Arts captured the voice of artists around the world since the mid-1970s. Moving beyond the conventional interview, now you could actually hear the artist speak, the inflection, intonation, humorous or serious. It was a change to how artists communicated and a new way for everyone else [...]
By Chely Wright Pantheon, $25.95, 288 pages Country music–the music of America. It speaks of traditional values and American values. So what happens to the world of country music when one of its biggest stars twists those values upside down? You get Like Me, Chely Wright’s personal journey and struggle of being gay in the [...]
By Raquel Welch Weinstein Books, $26.95, 336 pages I often sit back and imagine what life would be like as an international sex symbol. I imagine my life would be very much like that of Raquel Welch. I was excited to read her book Raquel: Beyond the Cleavagebecause she has always been a fascinating person [...]
By James L. Haley The Basic Book Group, $29.95, 364 pages Jack London is a pillar of American literature, but perhaps he is also one of the most misunderstood—or mischaracterized—American writers as well, which is not usually an easy thing to get away with. London led a complicated and all-too-short life (he died at age [...]
By Nelson George Da Capo Press, $24.00, 241 pages The music album Thriller was Michael Jackson’s greatest success, both artistically and financially. It was also the beginning of the end for a talented yet tragically flawed young man. “Michael’s drive bordered on the psychopathic…he was possessed….when [THRILLER] occasionally fell to second place….he’d panic. Hysterical , [...]
