Needless to say I am not a financial whiz. I can run a retail store with the best of them but I am aware that I would have no idea how to run a corporation. And, stock market talk gives me hives. But...I can't get enough of books about the current financial crisis. Maybe it's just an attempt on my part to understand something so complex or maybe it's just because I love a good real-life whodunit, but there's a new book on the financial meltdown horizon. A COLOSSAL FAILURE OF COMMON SENSE: The Inside Story of the Collapse of Lehman Brothers (Crown Business) by Lawrence G. McDonald and Patrick Robinson hits store shelves in paperback this week. The official book website has more information....
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Also new this week is THE WHITES OF THEIR EYES: The Tea Party's Revolution and the Battle Over American History (Princeton University Press) by Jill Lepore. From the book website:
"Jill Lepore, Harvard historian and New Yorker staff writer, offers a wry and bemused look at American history according to the far right, from the "rant heard round the world," which launched the Tea Party, to the Texas School Board's adoption of a social-studies curriculum that teaches that the United States was established as a Christian nation. Along the way, she provides rare insight into the eighteenth-century struggle for independence--the real one, that is. Lepore traces the roots of the far right's reactionary history to the bicentennial in the 1970s, when no one could agree on what story a divided nation should tell about its unruly beginnings. Behind the Tea Party's Revolution, she argues, lies a nostalgic and even heartbreaking yearning for an imagined past--a time less troubled by ambiguity, strife, and uncertainty--a yearning for an America that never was.
The Whites of Their Eyes reveals that the far right has embraced a narrative about America's founding that is not only a fable but is also, finally, a variety of fundamentalism--anti-intellectual, antihistorical, and dangerously antipluralist."
Sounds about right....
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I am nowhere near the pop culture addict that I was in my 20's and 30's so it comes as no surprise to me that I am not very familiar with the next author, who is making a name for himself with his storytelling. The new book, SLEEPWALK WITH ME: And Other Painfully True Stories (Simon & Schuster) by Mike Birbiglia, is getting rave reviews as one of those laugh-out-loud books. Birbiglia himself gives this description:
"This is my first book. It’s difficult to describe. It’s a comedic memoir, but I’m only 32 years old so I’d hate for you to think I’m “wrapping it up,” so to speak. But I tell some personal stories. Some REALLY personal stories. Stories that I considered not publishing time and time again, especially when my father said, “Michael, you might want to stay away from the personal stuff.” I said, “Dad, just read the dedication.” (Which I’m telling you to do too.)
Some of the stories are about my childhood, some are about girls I made out with when I was thirteen, some are about my parents, and some are, of course, about my bouts with sleepwalking. Bring this book to bed. And sleepwalk with me."
The author's website has more information....
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As a veteran, I am often interested in military memoirs. Especially books that promise first-person accounts of political events that I'm interested in. New this week is WITHOUT HESITATION: The Odyssey of an American Warrior (St. Martin's Press) by General Hugh Shelton with Ronald Levinson and Malcolm McConnell.
From the book publicity:
"The powerful unvarnished memoir of General Hugh Shelton, war hero, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during 9/11, and one of the leading military figures of our time.
Whether serving under a Democratic president or a Republican president, General Shelton was never afraid to speak out and tell it like it is. Shelton chronicles his incredible journey from a small farming community in North Carolina to the highest level of American military and political power at the Pentagon and White House."
Some of the shocking revelations in this book:
* High-ranking Cabinet member proposes intentionally allowing an American pilot to be killed by the Iraqis to have an excuse to retaliate and go to war.
* Details of a contentious Camp David meeting among President George W. Bush and his National Security Council immediately after 9/11, where internal battle lines were drawn---and Shelton (along with Colin Powell) convinced President Bush to do the right thing.
* How Rumsfeld persuaded General Tommy Franks to bypass the Joint Chiefs, leading to a badly flawed Iraq war plan that failed to anticipate the devastating after-effects of the insurgency and civil war.
* Attempts to kill Usama bin Laden that were shot down by our State Department.
It that doesn't make you want to read the book, nothing I say will
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