Wednesday, August 17, 2011

New Releases This Week, Part Five

Eating For Beginners by Melanie Rehak

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt --Trade Paperback

From the publisher website:

With grace, humor, and irresistible recipes, the author of Girl Sleuth takes us on her journey as an amateur chef, amateur farmer, and amateur parent

Melanie Rehak was always a passionate cook and food lover. Since reading the likes of Michael Pollan, Eric Schlosser, and Wendell Berry, she’d tried to eat thoughtfully as well. But after the birth of her son, Jules, she wanted to know more: What mattered most, organic or local? Who were these local farmers? Was it possible to be an ethical consumer and still revel in the delights of food? And why wouldn’t Jules eat anything, organic or not?

Eating for Beginners details the year she spent discovering what how to be an eater and a parent in today’s increasingly complicated world. She joined the kitchen staff at applewood, a small restaurant owned by a young couple committed to using locally grown food, and worked on some of the farms that supplied it. Between prepping the nightly menu, milking goats, and sorting beans, Rehak gained an understanding of her own about what to eat and why. (It didn’t hurt that, along the way, even the most dedicated organic farmers admitted that their children sometimes ate McDonald's.) And as we follow her on her quest to find the pleasure in doing the right thing—and become a better cook in the bargain—we too will make our peace with food. 
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We Is Got Him by Carrie Hagen

Overlook Press -- Hardcover

From the publisher website:

In 1874, a young boy named Charley Ross was snatched from his front yard in Philadelphia. The child’s father received a letter that read: “Mr. Ross; be not uneasy you son charley bruster be all writ. we is got him and no powers on earth can deliver out of our hand. You wil have two pay us before you git him from us, and pay us a big cent to.”

Philadelphia had just won the bid to host America’s centennial celebration. The country had survived revolution, civil war, and recession, and city politicians were eager to prove the country had matured enough to survive another hundred years. What they couldn’t foresee was how a child’s kidnapping threatened to unravel social confidence and plunge a city into despair. Hagen expertly weaves this historical narrative as we see Philadelphia’s mayor fight to preserve his city’s stature, and watch the manhunt spread from Philadelphia to the streets of New York. Based on a tremendous amount of research, the author accurately captures the darker side of America--with its corrupt detectives, thief-catchers, spiritualists, and river pirates--as a country in which innocence had become an ideal of the past.
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The Fall of the House of Walworth by Geoffrey O'Brien

St. Martins Griffin -- Trade Paperback

From the publisher website:


The Walworth family was the very symbol of virtue and distinction for decades, rising to prominence as part of the splendor of New York’s aristocracy. When Frank Walworth travels to New York to “settle a family difficulty” by shooting his father at point blank range, his family must reveal their inner demons in a spectacular trial to save him from execution. The resulting testimony exposes a legacy of mania and abuse, and the stately reputation of the family crumbles in a Gothic drama which theNew York Tribune called “sensational to the last degree.”
 
The Fall of the House of Walworth gives us both the intimate history of a family torn apart by violent obsessions, and a rich portrait of the American social worlds in which they moved. In the tradition of Edith Wharton, this is a riveting true story which “rival[s] the most extravagant Gothic novels of the day” (The Chicago Tribune).

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