Authors/Books/Links

The Robert E. Shepard Agency is proud of its authors and their accomplishments. Here's a list of many of the Agency's published and forthcoming projects, plus some news about authors' current works in progress. You may order any of the published books from your favorite independent bookseller. (Don't know where to find one? Just click here!)

 

NEW AND CLASSIC

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Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded

A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008

by John Scalzi

with a foreword by Wil Wheaton

2009 Hugo Award winner for Best Related Book

Since 1998, novelist John Scalzi's blog Whatever has been one of the Internet's most popular daily commentaries on contemporary life, politics, science fiction—even cats. John's always brilliantly drawn essays range from the witty "Unasked-for Advice to New Writers About Money" (essential reading for all aspiring authors) to the nuanced and heartbreaking "The Speckless Sky," written on September 12, 2001. Now, the first decade in the life of this always-wise, surprising, and popular (45,000 daily visitors) blog is at last available in one handy place, even if it is in the slightly older form of paper and binding! Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded won the 2009 Hugo Award for Best Related Workand has just been released in paperback by Tor Books. It includes a foreword by actor and popular blogger Wil Wheaton. John Scalzi is one of the bestselling science-fiction novelists in the United States--perhaps the universe--and editions of his books have been published around the world. They include the celebrated Old Man's War series, three of whose four titles were also Hugo Award nominees. A John W. Campbell Award winner, his most recent novel is Zoe's Tale. The Agency is proud to represent his non-fiction works, which include The Rough Guide to Sci-Fi Movies and The Rough Guide to the Universe.


Crisis of Character

Building Corporate Reputation in the Age of Skepticism

by Peter Firestein

Executives no longer operate with complete independence, instead running companies that must listen to many voices, from investors to NGOs to financial media, bloggers, their own employees, and a public hungry for clarity. This is today's expanded group of stakeholders--the influencers whose opinions can determine the destiny of any corporation. Wise executives and boards of directors will seize opportunities to make them partners and allies rather than critics and enemies. In Crisis of Character, Peter Firestein argues for listening to and learning from these influencers. His Seven Strategies of Reputation Leadership show executives, top managers, boards of directors, and consultants how to implement practices and shape beliefs that will earn their companies valid, valuable, and well-deserved reputations. A good reputation can't be built overnight or invented by marketing campaigns; it must be built over time and earned. This guide, published by Union Square Press, will help every company become more responsive to opportunities in its environment-- and, most important, to the best ideas within its ranks. Peter Firestein is CEO of New York-based Global Strategic Communications, Inc. and has been advising senior managers of corporations and government bodies, both in the U.S. and abroad, for two decades. Prior to founding his company in 2002, he led corporate consulting groups for a dozen years. A professional writer and editor as well as a business adviser, he also holds a degree in creative writing from Stanford University. He and his family live in New York City.


The Foie Gras Wars

How a 5,000-Year-Old Delicacy Inspired

The World's Fiercest Food Fight

by Mark Caro

A Gourmand Award and Great Lakes Book Award winner

"An admirably fair-minded yet always engaging account from the front lines of the Culture War. . . a must-have." --Anthony Bourdain, chef and author of Kitchen Confidential

"Essential reading for anyone who is interested in the ethics of using animals for food."--Temple Grandin, author of Animals in Translation and Animals Make us Human

When celebrity chef Charlie Trotter stopped serving foie gras at his legendary Chicago restaurant, he inadvertently triggered a controversy that engulfed chefs nationwide. The Foie Gras Wars pitted animal rights activists against foie gras producers and politicians against food writers, triggering a war of words, sabotage, and even death threats (Trotter jokingly suggested eating the liver of one of his rivals). And all because of a front page Chicago Tribune story by Mark Caro, which won a James Beard Foundation citation and led to Chicago's landmark, on-again/off-again foie gras ban. Then the controversy spread; similar legislation was introduced in New York, New Jersey, Maryland, and California, where foie gras will be history by 2012, and Philadelphia became another battleground, with activists picketing restaurants. In The Foie Gras Wars, published by Simon & Schuster, Caro expands on the darkly comic story of the battle to explore the larger issues it raises. What's the significance of banning a dish that relatively few people eat? Were foie gras ducks and geese being tortured, or weren't they? And what did the French artisans who still produce foie gras the traditional way have to say about the controversy playing out on our side of the Atlantic? The Foie Gras Wars picks up where Fast Food Nation left off, an entertaining story that shows us not only how we decide what to eat but why we so often look the other way when faced with inconvenient truths about our food. Mark Caro is an award-winning reporter for the Chicago Tribune and was one of its two film critics from 1995 to 2004. He lives near Chicago with his wife and their two daughters.


The Audacity of Help

Obama's Economic Plan and the Remaking of America

by John F. Wasik

From taxes to healthcare and energy to education, President Obama's administration has begun one of the most profound revisions of American economic policy since Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal. In this first detailed examination and analysis of these dramatic changes, published by Bloomberg Press late last year, veteran financial columnist and investigative reporter John F. Wasik shows how the new programs are likely to affect the current economic downturn, act to restore competitiveness and stability, and alter the political landscape. His unique insights include a discussion of how Obama's special brand of "social capitalism" may prove adept at addressing short-term problems—but have more difficulty solving such long-term issues as funding Social Security and Medicare and reforming healthcare. John F. Wasik is a Chicago-based author and journalist whose reporting has earned him 18 major awards. He is the author of 10 books, including many on the Agency's list, and his column for Bloomberg News was read in more than 400 publications worldwide each week, including the Financial Times.

Also recently published by John F. Wasik

John's previous book, also published by Bloomberg in 2009, was The Cul-de-Sac Syndrome: Turning Around the Unsustainable American Dream. In this heavily-quoted instant classic, John takes on the mantra that said "buy bigger, consume more, move farther out of  town, and you'll live out the American Dream." This mythology, he argues, resulted in the development of sprawling suburbs he calls "spurbs"--sprawling regions of McMansions that became pockets of unsustainable, economically and ecologically untenable development. They lay at the heart of the recent mortgage meltdown, consuming precious resources and even endangering our health. In this pithy work, John shows how the spurb came about--and how a return to sensibly scaled living can bring us the true American Dream.  


When the Rivers Ran Red

An Amazing Story of Courage and Triumph in America's Wine Country

by Vivienne Sosnowski

"Intensely moving, horrifying, and inspiring in turns . . . A beautifully written, deeply researched story of liberty and tyranny, the love of life and the sickness of its enemies --Hugh Johnson, bestselling author of The World Atlas of Wine and The Story of Wine

A San Francisco Chronicle Bestseller and Gourmand Award winner

Newspaper editor Vivienne Sosnowski was pursuing her avocation as a photographer when some of the most distinguished winemakers of California's Sonoma County, many of them in their 90s, began describing their families' struggles during Prohibition. The time had come, they'd decided, to breach a decades-old code of silence and describe what really happened to disturb the deceptive beauty and quiet of the Wine Country during those 14 difficult years. These families had carried a tradition of winemaking with them from Italy in the late 19th century and were completely unprepared when Prohibition came to California, then still a political backwater far from the centers of power in the East. Faced with a devil's bargain--abandon wine but face poverty, or make wine and risk jail--most families eventually chose the latter course. Now Sosnowski brings their remarkable stories to light for the first time in When the Rivers Ran Red, published in hardcover by Palgrave Macmillan with a new paperback edition to come in September 2010. The winemakers were helped by unlikely allies, including the Archbishop of San Francisco and Sonoma County's own sympathetic law enforcement authorities. But while the Federal Prohibition forces were outnumbered from the start, they still did tremendous damage to the wine business. The winemakers told Sosnowski of helping to smuggle their parents' wine out of Sonoma and Napa by night as teenagers, and of bribing jailers with bottles of contraband brandy. In the tradition of Wine & War, this book not only reclaims an exciting, untold episode in American history but delivers a cautionary tale about a blundering political experiment gone awry. Vivienne Sosnowski, a longtime journalist in the U.S. and Canada, is also a gifted photographer whose photo essay on winemakers hangs permanently in the town hall of Healdsburg, in Sonoma County's Dry Creek Valley. She lives in Vancouver, BC and Northern California.


Big Boy Rules

America's Mercenaries Fighting in Iraq

by Steve Fainaru

Pulitzer Prize winner for international reporting

"Steve Fainaru tells a story that is at the heart of the war in Iraq: the U.S. military's unprecedented reliance on mercenaries. It is a dark tale that until now has remained largely untold, and is related brilliantly here. To understand this war, you must read this book." --Thomas E. Ricks, author of Fiasco

Steve Fainaru's 2008 Pulitzer Prize was a landmark in an already-illustrious career as a journalist. So is Big Boy Rules (Da Capo Press), now available in paperback and one of the definitive books to emerge from America's adventure in Iraq. Fainaru describes the dangerous, poignant, often insane and always fascinating lives of men who have become known as "security contractors," Americans who have traded the safety of home for the unpredictability of life in Iraq. No one knows exactly how many of these mercenaries are at work, but they have become an alternative army, and they approach their work with different motivations: some for money, some to leave behind lives of failure and confusion, and some because they actually like shooting people. Steve joined a group of contractors on the highways of Iraq as they went about their business--which frequently included standing in for our regular military in places the generals have judged too dangerous for ordinary, sane soldiers. Along the way, though, he found the humanity--and even the dark humor--of these least-described men on America's frontline in Iraq. Like Fight Club mixed with Band of Brothers, Big Boy Rules is a powerful, shocking vivid, strange, and sometimes strangely funny narrative about American men on the fringes of war--and just plain on the fringes. Steve Fainaru is a reporter for The Washington Post. In addition to the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting, he is the winner of the Hal Boyle Award from the Overseas Press Club. He wrote previously for The Boston Globe, and was the co-author of The Duke of Havana (Villard, 2001) about baseball in Cuba.

 


In the Court of Public Opinion

Winning Strategies for Litigation Communications

by James F. Haggerty

Revised Second Edition

Nearly a quarter of America’s companies are sued every year. Whether they win or lose depends increasingly on how they manage public relations, yet most companies fail to approach legal PR as a business issue. The first book for business owners, corporate communications specialists, lawyers, and analysts on handling media and other public attention that accompany high-stakes litigation, In the Court of Public Opinion has now been revised and expanded to include the latest developments win blogging and social media--critical tools that may make or break public perceptions of companies and influence the outcome of litigation. The Second Edition has just been published by the American Bar Association. James F. Haggerty is an attorney, writer, and CEO of the New York-based PR Consulting Group, an internationally recognized leader in public relations around legal issues and litigation.


A Few Seconds of Panic

A Sportswriter Plays in the NFL

by Stefan Fatsis

"A smart, funny, and relentlessly entertaining look at the strange, scary world of professional football"  --Will Leitch, author of God Save the Fan and editor of Deadspin

In his last narrative work, Stefan Fatsis immersed himself in the surprisingly dark world of obsessive Scrabble players and chronicled his journey in the international bestseller Word Freak. In A Few Seconds of Panic, he turns to a very different kind of game--pro football--and puts both mind and body to an incredible test: rebuilding his body and training with the NFL Denver Broncos to become a pro-grade kicker. He's unlike his teammates in some ways, but remarkably like them in many others, risking crippling injury, enduring the hazing that befalls all rookies, and slogging through twice-daily practices in blistering heat. And he begins to think like one of them, as well. Along the way, he finds out about a remarkable community of players who are seldom seen by fans: the kickers who enter the gridiron to do one thing and must do it perfectly every single time. Not since George Plimpton's Paper Lion, more than 40 years ago, has an author tunneled so deeply into the NFL, a league much transformed in the decades since that classic book. With wry candor and hard-won empathy, A Few Seconds of Panic reveals the mindset of the modern pro athlete and the workings of a storied sports franchise. Stefan Fatsis is a regular sports commentator on National Public Radio's "All Things Considered" and on Slate.com's "Hang Up and Listen" podcast. He has also been a commentator on ESPN, and formerly wrote for the Wall Street Journal covering the business of sports. In addition to Word Freak, he is previously the author of Wild and Outside.


Art Deco San Francisco

The Architecture of Timothy Pflueger

by Therese Poletti

 

An elegant homage to one of the West Coast's greatest 20th century architects, Art Deco San Francisco: The Architecture of Timothy Pflueger was published in 2008 by Princeton Architectural Press. Curiously missing from architectural literature until now, Timothy Pflueger (1894-1946) was a defining force in building modern San Francisco. His famous buildings include the palatial Castro Theater (1922) and many other major movie houses, and his skyscrapers are among the best known on the San Francisco skyline. They include the Pacific Telephone tower, the 1928 "doctors' tower" at 450 Sutter Street, and the luxurious Pacific Stock Exchange Tower. It is a testament to Pflueger's versatility and genius that so many of his projects still exist. One need only drive over the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, America's busiest toll crossing to this day, to understand Pflueger's indispensability. Some of his constructions are sadly lost, including the fantasia of the San Francisco World's Fair of 1939-40 and the St. Francis Hotel's Patent Leather Bar, but they survive in photographs by Ansel Adams, among others, that are featured in this lavish book, which is enhanced by Tom Paiva's magnificent photographs and many rare archival illustrations. Therese Poletti is an award-winning technology columnist for Marketwatch.com and previously wrote for the San Jose Mercury News. In her spare time, she gives architectural walking tours of San Francisco. She holds a master's degree from the Columbia University School of Journalism and lives in San Francisco.


The Rough Guide to Climate Change

2nd Edition

by Robert Henson

"Scientifically up-to-date and clearly written, this courageous book cuts through mystery and controversy to explain climate change for readers who prefer facts."--Richard Somerville, Distinguished Professor, Scripps Institute of Oceanography

A worldwide bestseller now in its 2nd Edition (with a new 3rd Edition to be released this summer), The Rough Guide to Climate Change provides a complete and unbiased guide to one of the most pressing problems we face. From the current situation and background science to possible solutions, this book covers the whole subject, including visible symptoms of climate change, what computer simulations reveal about our past, present, and future climates, what the skeptics say and their grounds for disagreeing with the scientific majority, and that most basic subject of all: how global warming really works. The book not only reviews the last several decades of media coverage of this complex set of issues, separating fact from fiction, but also describes what governments and scientists are doing to try and solve the problem. The guide also includes advice for consumers who want to make a reduce their own carbon footprint, and comes complete with a glossary of websites for further information. The original edition of The Rough Guide to Climate Change was shortlisted for the prestigious Royal Society Prize for Science Books, and achieved further notoriety in 2007, when more than half the British House of Commons (including then-Prime Minister Tony Blair and Conservative Party leader David Cameron) responded to surveys on global warming that had accompanied copies of the book sent to them by the publisher. Robert Henson, a meteorologist by training, is also a writer/editor at the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, one of the world's premier centers of weather research.


Also by Robert Henson

Robert Henson's other Rough Guides title is The Rough Guide to Weather, whose second edition was published in 2008. This spring, the American Meteorological Society will publish a long-awaited revised and expanded edition of his classic history of television weathercasting, Weather on the Air. 


Find Your Focus Zone

by Lucy Jo Palladino, Ph.D.

". . . a roadmap for eliminating the bombardment of daily distractions and focusing on the things that matter most to you, whether that be running a marathon, running a business, running a family, or just plain running your life."--Dean Karnazes, author of Ultramarathon Man: Confessions of an All-Night Runner

Lucy Jo Palladino, Ph.D.'s latest book is for and about the millions of people--just about all of us--who must fight to pay attention in a world full of distractions, from digital gadgets and the Internet to the usual background noise in our homes and offices. In Find Your Focus Zone: An Effective New Plan to Defeat Distraction and Overload (published by Free Press), Dr. Palladino distills the latest research and makes the best new psychological tools accessible to everyone. She provides eight "keychains" that will help you find your personal focus zone by developing new emotional, mental, and behavior skills--plus the three keys that will help you unlock your potential in each of these areas. Imagine feeling confident that when co-workers interrupt your work, ads pop-up on your computer screen, and impulses jump into your brain, you'll still stay focused and get your work done on time. Find Your Focus Zone will help you beat procrastination and tackle even boring jobs; overcome obstacles and finish what you start; prevent overwhelm and burnout; build trust in your close relationships; boost your self-confidence; and increase your efficiency and effectiveness--all by paying better attention Envision taking charge of the way others see you, because you have more awareness of how you look to them! Learn more at Dr. Palladino's website, www.yourfocuszone.com, for more helpful advice, updates on Dr. Palladino's speaking engagements, and much more!


The Rough Guide to Jimi Hendrix

by Richie Unterberger

This latest title by longtime Agency author and notable music historian Richie Unterberger is the definitive guide to rock's greatest guitar virtuoso. From the early Seattle days to world stardom, this book explores all aspects of a genuine rock legend, whose posthumous reputation has only continued to grow. It covers Hendrix's childhood and army service, early session work with the Isley Brothers, Little Richard, and others, and the glory years. In includes a complete guide to all of the studio and live albums, side projects, compilations, and 30 essential Hendrix songs... and much more. Author and researcher Richie Unterberger is based in the San Francisco Bay Area and is the author of several books on the Agency's list.


Also by Richie Unterberger

Richie Unterberger's books about popular music include The Unreleased Beatles, Turn! Turn! Turn! and Eight Miles High: Folk-Rock's Flight from Haight-Ashbury to Woodstock. On the Agency's list, he is also the author of The Rough Guide to Shopping With a Conscience, Urban Spacemen and Wayfaring Strangers, and The Rough Guide to Music USA, and co-author of The Rough Guide to Seattle.


Night Draws Near

by Anthony Shadid

Pulitzer Prize winner for international reporting

Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize

"No one writing about Iraq today understands that tormented country and its people better than Anthony Shadid. Night Draws Near tells a timeless and powerful story of individuals caught in war's crossfire."--Rick Atkinson, author of In the Company of Soldiers and the Pulitzer Prize-winning An Army at Dawn

Anthony Shadid's courageous reports from Iraq earned him the Pulitzer Prize and a place as one of America's most distinguished foreign correspondents. In Night Draws Near, he brings life to the stories of ordinary Iraqis forced to cope with or succumb to dictatorship, war, and an uncertain future. From Karima, a widowed mother of eight sending her last son off to battle to Amal, her 14-year-old daughter, whose tattered diary is perhaps as powerful and poignant as that of Anne Frank, to Nasir, a government "minder" appointed by Saddam Hussein's government to watch over Anthony who later turns renegade, these vivid characters humanize a city and a people who have been known to Americans only in caricature, as well as capturing the heart of a drama characterized in part by amgibuity. Honest, powerful, at times personal and always emotionally engaged, Night Draws Near, like Steve Fainaru's Big Boy Rules (above) is one of the definitive works to have emerged from the collision between America and Iraq. Anthony Shadid is a foreign correspondent for The New York Times and formerly reported for The Washington Post and The Boston Globe. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting and many other prizes, he is also the author of Legacy of the Prophet: Despots, Democrats, and the New Politics of Islam (Westview/Basic Books, 2002). A native of Oklahoma, he continues to report from the Middle East.


         About the author . . . Anthony Shadid

Night Draws Near, published by Henry Holt in hardcover and in a Picador paperback, won the prestigious Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Current Issues and the Ron Ridenhour Book Prize. It was also a nominee for the National Book Critics Circle Award for General Nonfiction and was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Piemme published the Italian edition. Anthony Shadid is now at work on a new book about his family's ancestral town in Lebanon and the changing state of Arab identity, to be published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt next year.


Women of Valor

The Rochambelles on the WWII Front

by Ellen Hampton, Ph.D.

Their formal name was the Rochambeau Group, but to history they've always been the Rochambelles. The story of these courageous women, ambulance drivers who risked their lives in World War II, deserves to be famous--and receives its chance in Women of Valor. The Rochambelles owed their existence to Florence Conrad, a wealthy American who had served during the First World War and lived in France during the all-to-brief decades of peace that followed. When war came again to Europe and Conrad was forced to return home, she decided to create an all-female ambulance corps, convincing the U.S. military to train them; she provided their ambulances and uniforms herself. The Rochambelles served with distinction through the end of the war, the first women to be part of an armored combat unit, becoming celebrated heroes in France but remaining virtually unknown in the U.S. Women of Valor, published by Palgrave Macmillan, tells their often death-defying story and is a vivid chronicle of women, each of them an outstanding character, who served heroically alongside their male comrades. Be sure to visit Ellen Hampton's Rochambelles website. Ellen Hampton, Ph.D. was previously a journalist for Cox newspapers and covered, among other stories, the conflicts in Central America in the 1980s. She holds a doctorate in history and lives outside Paris with her husband and family.


Wine & War

The French, the Nazis, and the Battle for France's Greatest Treasure

 

by Don and Petie Kladstrup

"An incredible tale"--Dominique LaPierre, author of Is Paris Burning?

"An engrossing addition to the popular literature of WWII--and a treat for oenophiles as well."--Kirkus Reviews

A classic work of popular history, Wine & War was tailor-made for at least three different audiences: those interested in World War II, in France and in wine. It went straight to national bestseller lists when it was published by Broadway Books/Random House in 2001, and now has over 140,000 copies in print in the U.S. alone; it has been published in 10 countries. This is the "homefront" story of French winemakers as they struggled to keep their business, and the heritage it represented, alive during their country's occupation. As France surrendered in 1940, the nation's winemakers scrambled to save their vineyards, wineries, and most distinguished wines, resorting to tactics Janet Flanner once aptly called "hiding, fibbing, and fobbing off." For this gripping narrative, the Kladstrups interviewed surviving vignerons and their children, as well as the children of German officers, learning how Paris restaurateurs hid priceless wines behind hastily constructed walls (covered with dust and cobwebs to look old), winemakers hid Jewish neighbors, refugees, and partisans, and German weinfuehrers appointed to oversee the industry in some cases colluded with the French to save the business. There were traitors, too, collaborators with the Nazis who paid with their lives and reputations after the war. Now in its 14th U.S. printing, Wine & War has also been published in the UK, France, Germany, Brazil, Japan, the Netherlands, South Korea, Spain, and Sweden. Don Kladstrup, one of America's most distinguished news correspondents, reported for ABC News and, previously, CBS News, winning three Emmy Awards, the du Pont Columbia Award, and many others. He and his wife, the award-winning journalist Petie Kladstrup, divide their time between Normandy and Paris

 


Also by Don and Petie Kladstrup

The Kladstrups are also the authors of Champagne: How the World's Most Glamorous Wine Triumphed Over War and Hard Times published in hardcover by William Morrow and in paperback by Harper Perennial. The book was named a New York Times "Editors' Choice." We associate champagne with celebration and camaraderie, but both the wine and the region have known tremendous hardship, from revolution to war. the First World War virtually destroyed the region's wine center, Reims, driving most of the population underground to live in the very caves where champagne has been aging for centuries.  This celebrated wine's extraordinary history more than fills the pages of this justly praised book, which has been published in many countries.

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COMING SOON


Super Competent

The Six Keys to Perform at Your Productive Best

by Laura Stack, the Productivity Pro

Even if the recession is behind us, the new corporate mantra is "buckle down." In this back-to-basics climate, quality again trumps quantity and doing a good job is paramount. That means being not just competent but supercompetent—able to survive and thrive in your work when all those around you are struggling. And that's the subject of Laura Stack's next book, due this spring from John Wiley & Sons. The good news is that competence isn't in the genes, but something we can all learn. The key is mastering six traits: Connection, Decisiveness, Effort, Consistency, Productivity, and Personal Responsibility. When we do, we can move from the "zero thinking" of the average performer to the "hero thinking" of the supercompetent professional. Who better than Laura Stack to show us how? The Vice President of the National Speakers Association and bestselling author of five books, including Leave the Office Earlier and, most recently, The Exhaustion Cure, Laura addresses major corporate and organizational audiences more than 120 days a year. She has been a corporate spokesperson for Microsoft, 3M, and DayTimers, for whom she developed a line of time-management tools. The president of the Denver-based time-management training company The Productivity Pro, Inc., she is author or co-author of five books. Her newsletter is read by subcsribers in 38 countries.

Also by Laura Stack:

In her bestselling Leave the Office Earlier, Laura Stack introduced a vital, lifetime-learning approach to using time more productively in the workplace. With Laura's help, you can tailor a program that works best for you, Leave the Office Earlier has been published in Italy, Japan, the U.K., Korea, China and Taiwan. Turning next to the "home front" in Find More Time, Laura tackled household timewasters that rob us of the precious hours we need for ourselves, our families, and even volunteer work. Where to get the energy for all of this work and fun? The Exhaustion Cure will show you how (see below).

 

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BACKLIST HIGHLIGHTS


Word Freak

In the justly praised national bestseller Word Freak: Heartbreak, Triumph, Genius, and Obsession in the World of Competitive Scrabble Players, Stefan Fatsis recounts his remarkable rise through the ranks of elite Scrabble players while exploring the game's strange, potent hold over them--and him. The most talented players of this classic game, a fixture in more than 30 million American homes, inhabit a sphere far removed from the masses of "living room players." Theirs is a surprisingly diverse subculture that is often funny but at other times quite dark and even addictive. In the course of this brilliant narrative, published in hardcover by Houghton Mifflin and in a Penguin paperback that is now in its 13th printing, Fatsis is transformed from a journalist on the outside, looking in, to one of the denizens of this strange world--someone who memorizes thousands of obscure words and fills his evenings with solo Scrabble played on his living room floor so he can begin to compete with the world's best players at tournaments. Stefan Fatsis is also the author of Wild and Outside: How a Renegade Minor League Revived the Spirit of Baseball in America's Heartland (Walker, 1995) and A Few Seconds of Panic (see above).

 

Return of the Condor

The California condor lives 50 years or more, can fly 150 miles in a day, often mates for life, and was believed by Native Americans to have supernatural powers. But its strength and endurance were not enough to save it from near-extinction. The race to save North America's largest bird is at the heart of Return of the Condor, author and naturalist John Moir's riveting narrative about the effort to save this magnificent species. Human greed and ignorance caused the condor's decline; human ingenuity and insight became its only hope. Down to only 22 individuals by the 1980s, the condor owes its survival and recovery to a team of scientists who flouted conventional wisdom and pursued the most controversial means to save it. Moir puts a human face on the dramatic rescue effort but also makes some of the individual condors central characters. For anyone who has been able to see a condor in the air, there can be no doubt that the sacrifices of the humans and birds responsible for so much progress were worth recounting in this classic, published by Lyons Press. John Moir is an award-winning author, journalist, and science educator who recently won the Writer's Digest magazine grand prize for his article "Condors in a Coalmine?" He and his family live in Northern California.

Audubon himself would be delighted to read John Moir's exciting and authoritative account of the difficult, politically fraught, but ultimately rewarding effort to save the largest of all the living birds, a great shadow in the sky above the Western range. I certainly was. --Pulitzer Prize winner Richard Rhodes, author of John James Audubon: The Making of an American

 

 

The Exhaustion Cure

If you're like millions of people, you get home from a long day with barely enough energy to lift the remote control. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that fatigue and lack of energy affect more than 14 million otherwise-healthy people in the prime of life. Just think of all the wonderful business and personal goals people could accomplish if they only had the energy to get up and go! The Exhaustion Cure (Broadway Books/Random House) was written for people who have too much to do and not enough energy to do it. It shows us how to eliminate the "energy bandits" that trip us up in all aspects of our lives, from our diets and work schedules to our relationships and leisure time. Then, we can at last find the energy we need to attain a full and productive lifestyle-- in 21 days! Anyone who must be productive, in any arena, will benefit from this upbeat book, from professionals to stay-at-home parents to retirees and college students. Laura Stack, The Productivity Pro is addresses scores of corporate and organizational audiences a year on energy, time management, and efficiency issues. See also Supercompetent, above, and learn more at Laura's website, www.theproductivitypro.com.

 

American Band

Every year, three million teenagers take part in a unique American tradition, playing and marching in high school bands. The best, as Kristen Laine shows in American Band, published in hardcover and paperback by Gotham Books, are serious in a way few of us appreciate. They spend all year preparing to compete against each other before expert judges, for state titles and national championships, striving for an almost unreachable ideal. And nowhere is "band" more serious than at Concord High School in Elkhart, Indiana, where the entire community is involved in the success of the defending state champions, and the band director demands--and gets--perfection. In the state where high school bands may have originated, in the city that was the "band instrument capital of the world," band is almost a religion, and not the only religion in Kristen Laine's powerful, emotional narrative. American Band, which won the PEN/New England Winship Award, is about the profound and changing role faith plays in a typical heartland community, and about how "ordinary" teenagers and adults can  be anything but ordinary. Kristen Laine is a writer, editor, and Indiana native who returned to her home state after 25 years to research this book. A graduate of Radcliffe College and the University of Wisconsin, she is a regular contributor to Vermont Public Radio, and lives with her husband and children in western New Hampshire. Read more about American Band, including photos and music, at www.americanbandbook.com.

"American Band has everything going for it, from tempo to heart to the grand bittersweet finale. What a gift for readers: a pitch-perfect tribute to kids and song and community."--Madeleine Blais, Pulitzer Prize winner and author of In These Girls, Hope Is a Muscle

 

Your Symptoms are Real

Benjamin H. Natelson, M.D. is the nation's leading expert on a group of "unexplained illnesses" that plague 5 million American patients a year--patients who are frustrated when they receive a diagnosis of "there's nothing wrong with you" from specialist after specialist. Most of these patients are women, and the epidemic of discomfort caused by chronic fatigue, pain, difficulty concentrating, poor sleep, and other symptoms now accounts for nearly a quarter of all visits to doctors. In Your Symptoms are Real: What to Do When Your Doctor Says Nothing Is Wrong, Dr. Natelson shares the techniques he has used to help more than 1500 of his own patients feel better. He shows readers how to communicate with doctors in the most effective way, explains what doctors really know about symptoms that don't fit the textbook definitions for CFS, Fibromyalgia, and other often-misdiagnosed illnesses, and shows how the symptoms for these and other conditions frequently overlap, leading doctors astray. He shares a comprehensive program of exercise, coaching, stress reduction, and sleep improvement. In one of the book's most significant departures, he takes his colleagues to task for failing to respond adequately to patients' needs. Published by John Wiley & Sons. Benjamin Natelson, M.D. is professor of neurology at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York and director of the Pain & Fatigue Study Center at Beth Israel Medical Center. A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and its medical school, he is the author of two previous books.

 

The Merchant of Power

Samuel Insull is one of the most fascinating characters in American business history, an English waif who talked his way across the Atlantic and into a job with his boyhood idol, Thomas Edison. In The Merchant of Power, award-winning author and journalist John F. Wasik tells the extraordinary rags-to-riches-to-rags story of this brilliant, largely misunderstood business leader. Insull became Edison's trusted secretary and rescued the inventor's notoriously ill-managed businesses from bankruptcy. It was Insull who consolidated Edison's companies into the giant General Electric Company. From his Chicago base, he later came to control a third of the nation's electric power. More than a tycoon, Insull believed in electricity's power to liberate the masses and set himself to revolutionizing the American city. But the Great Depression proved Insull's undoing, and he died penniless in a Paris exile after trying to make good on his debts. His remarkable rise and fall is the subject of this wonderful biography, published by Palgrave Macmillan. John F. Wasik is the author of 10 books, including The Audacity of Help and The Cul-de-Sac Syndrome (see above). A journalist who has won 18 major prizes for his work, he has written for Bloomberg News and edited Consumers Digest magazine.

 

The Government Manual for New Pirates

Avast, ye landlubbers! Matthew David Brozik and Jacob Sager Weinstein have done it again, publishing the third title in their much-loved series of Government Manuals. The Government Manual for New Pirates (like the Government Manuals for new superheroes and wizards, before it) supplies you with all the information you'd want if the government actually furnished free consumer information on these subjects. Lest you be set upon by buccaneers even more dauntless than you are, this whimsical manual takes you on an ocean-by-ocean tour of all the pirate hotspots in the world. Along the way, you'll learn everything you need to know about pirate fashion, choosing and naming your ship, dealing with denizens of the deep (from sharks to Godzilla), and even favorite (and not so favorite) pirate chanteys. All three titles are published by Andrews McMeel. Matthew David Brozik is an attorney and writer whose fiction has appeared in such publications as McSweeney's, Sycamore Review, Spout Magazine, Sidewalks, and Barbaric Yawp. A former standup comedian who edges ever closer to being a terrific novelist, he lives on Long Island. Jacob Sager Weinstein was an award-winning writer for HBO's "Dennis Miller Live" and a contributing editor to the Washingtonian magazine. A full-time writer and screenwriter, he lives in London with his wife and daughter.

 

When Illness Goes Public

Steve McQueen's high profile cancer battle and sad end changed the way the public perceived a dreaded disease and its treatment, and is just one of the stories of celebrity illness that Barron H. Lerner, M.D. examines in When Illness Goes Public, published in hardcover and paperback by Johns Hopkins University Press and his first book since the celebrated The Breast Cancer Wars. Lerner describes the evolution of celebrities' illnesses from private matters to stories of great public interest, tracing the rise of patient activism in line with an evolution in the way the media have covered sickness and treatment over the past 70 years. Marrying great storytelling with an exploration of the intersection of science, journalism, fame, and legend, this book is a groundbreaking contribution to our understanding of health and illness. Barron H. Lerner is a physician and the Angelica Berrie-Gold Foundation Associate Professor of Medicine and Public Health at Columbia University. He is a frequent contributor to The New York Times Science Times section.

 

The Root of Wild Madder

The intricate weaves of Persian carpets tell us a great deal about the people who made them. Persian rugs, Brian Murphy tells us, carry with them centuries of stories, the dreams and aspirations of families, and even, according to some, the souls of those who once owned them. They signify the human search for a perfection we can never quite achieve. In The Root of Wild Madder, published by Simon & Schuster in hardcover and paperback, Brian introduces us to the weavers (often girls, who create some of the carpets for their dowries), the "mules" who move them from place to place, the tradesmen who sell them in the bazaars of Tehran and Isfahan, and the poets who write about them. He shows us how to look at carpets in a new way, understanding not only how we value them, but how their creators valued them. Brian Murphy, international religion reporter of the Associated Press and formerly AP bureau chief in Athens, is one of the only American journalists who reports regularly from Iran and other central Asian countries. He reported previously from Rwanda and from Rome.


Also by Brian Murphy:

In The New Men, (Putnam/Riverhead, 1998), Brian Murphy describes a year in the life of a prestigious but little known college in the shadow of the Vatican, where 40 young men from the United States prepare to become the leaders of their Church. What they learn about themselves, their chosen profession, and the collision between American values and their faith is at the heart of this remarkable book.

 

Coal: A Human History

Barbara Freese was an assistant attorney general of the State of Minnesota when she became interested in humanity's long history of interaction with coal. The result is Coal: A Human History, a bestselling work of science, history, and literature that was hailed as "engrossing and sometimes stunning" by The New York Times Book Review. For all its humble origins, coal remains the main energy source for our televisions, computers, and other conveniences of modern life, and the age-old problems associated with it have only grown more serious. For 700 years, coal has redefined the way people live. From 16th century England (where Queen Elizabeth complained about the smell and soot produced by coalburning) to the Industrial Revolution in America to China in our own time, coal has been a major player in world events, but different societies have dealt with its effects--both positive and negative--in very different ways. Published by Perseus in hardcover and Penguin in paperback, Coal: A Human History makes a complex topic fascinating for all of us. It has also been published in the UK, Taiwan, and China. 

 

Veering Right

President George W. Bush methodically manipulated the law to deliver for right-wing political and social causes, frequently under a veil of secrecy. In this searing indictment of Bush Administration policy (from national security and defense to taxes, trade, and privacy), originally published in hardcover in 2004 and in paperback two years later (both by the University of California Press), law professor Charles Tiefer argued that Bush’s two terms would permanently alter policy on behalf of groups that most Americans considered too extreme. Charles Tiefer is Professor of Law at the University of Baltimore. He was Solicitor of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1984 to 1995 and, previously, General Counsel of the United States Senate. The author of three previous books, he lives near Washington,

 

"An impressive work of argumentation." --Kirkus.

 

 

The Biotech Investor

Award-winning San Francisco Chronicle reporter Tom Abate is one of the nation's most influential observers of the biotechnology industry. In The Biotech Investor (Henry Holt & Co.) he provides the most comprehensive overview ever undertaken of this cutting-edge industry, giving investors the analytical foundation to understand the science, finances, time horizons, and technical and commercial potential of biotechnologies. From learning how to anticipate the impact of drug trials to understanding the role of the FDA approval process and how to analyze the patent protection strength of new ventures, investors will find the information they need to make smart decisions. They'll also learn all about the structures and directions of one of the world's most fascinating industries--one that trumps other technology sectors by producing products people absolutely need.

 

Mumford on Modern Art in the 1930s

Robert Wojtowicz is one of the nation's leading experts on the life and work of Lewis Mumford (1895-1990), the great urbanist, critic, social commentator, and National Book Award winning author. One of Mumford's early and little-known literary achievements, however, was a set of reviews he wrote for The New Yorker magazine between 1932 and 1937, under the heading "The Art Galleries." In Mumford on Modern Art in the 1930s, published by the University of California Press in hardcover and paperback, Robert Wojtowicz gathers the best of these more than 40 reviews, which chronicled the arrival of art by some of the era's most distinguished contemporary artists. Mainly centered on the art galleries of New York, but also covering Mumford's travels in Europe, these engaging reviews capture a time when Matisse was still considered modern and Georgia O'Keeffe was just rising to prominence. Robert Wojtowicz, Ph.D. is Associate Dean and Professor of Art History at Old Dominion University in Virginia, and literary executor of the Mumford estate.


Also edited by Robert Wojtowicz

Mumford on Modern Art in the 1930s is the second of two Mumford collections deriving from the urbanist's long association with The New Yorker. Prof. Wojtowicz also edited Sidewalk Critic: Lewis Mumford's Writings on New York (published in hardcover and paperback by Princeton Architectural Press), which The New York Times named on of the top 10 architecture books of 1998. This time spanning the 1930s and 40s, the book includes Mumford's reviews of iconic New York buildings of the period. Also see Frank Lloyd Wright and Lewis Mumford, below.

 

Frank Lloyd Wright and Lewis Mumford

Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer and Robert Wojtowicz have co-edited this superb volume, a major addition to the literature on two of the 20th century's leading figures in architecture and criticism. Over the course of three decades, these two fascinating men exchanged sometimes warm, sometimes vituperative letters--collected here for the first time--that are sure to be enlightening and enjoyable not only to scholars but also to general readers interested in the lives and work of both men. Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer is vice president of the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, headquartered at Taliesin West in Scottsdale, Arizona, and head of its archives, as well as the author of numerous books and articles about Wright. Robert Wojtowicz (see also above) is the literary executor of the Lewis Mumford estate, and teaches at Old Dominion University.

 

The Rough Guide to the Universe and

The Rough Guide to Sci-Fi Movies

John M. Scalzi has the distinction of being equally at home as a writer in both the electronic and print realms--and of having a remarkable command of subjects as diverse as science fiction, astronomy, and the craft of writing (see Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded, above). So it's especially appropriate that he wrote a book with the intriguingly all-encompassing title of The Rough Guide to the Universe, a comprehensive guide to astronomy that is now available in a revised, second edition. This book will delight novice and accomplished space enthusiast, alike. Loaded with star charts and dazzling illustrations, it traces the history of people's fascination with the night sky--and the history of the universe, itself. It describes the sun, moon, Earth and other planets, and such heavenly bodies and phenomena as comets, meteors, asteroids, nebulas, and supernovas, and provides resources on telescopes and other tools. There's even a complete guide to planetariums, observatories, and places where the sky is especially dark at night. Nor is it a major leap from there to John's The Rough Guide to Sci-Fi Movies. With background and capsule reviews of hundreds of sci-fi movies from around the world, this comprehensive guide is a must for any fan of the genre that will far surpass guides that merely summarize plotlines. It includes a complete history of sci-fi on film, talks about what's real and not-so-real in the science, and even devotes an entire chapter to aliens.