New Nonfiction Hardcovers This Week:

Provence, 1970: M.F.K. Fisher, Julia Child, James Beard, and the Reinvention of American Taste
by Luke Barr

Clarkson Potter / Crown Publishing / Random House

Hardcover

Provence, 1970 is about a singular historic moment. In the winter of that year, more or less coincidentally, the iconic culinary figures James Beard, M.F.K. Fisher, Julia Child, Richard Olney, Simone Beck, and Judith Jones found themselves together in the South of France. They cooked and ate, talked and argued, about the future of food in America, the meaning of taste, and the limits of snobbery. Without quite realizing it, they were shaping today’s tastes and culture, the way we eat now. The conversations among this group were chronicled by M.F.K. Fisher in journals and letters—some of which were later discovered by Luke Barr, her great-nephew. In Provence, 1970, he captures this seminal season, set against a stunning backdrop in cinematic scope—complete with gossip, drama, and contemporary relevance.

Robert Plant: A Life
by Paul Rees
it Books / Harper Collins

Hardcover

Robert Plant by Paul Rees is the definitive biography of Led Zeppelin's legendary frontman. As lead singer for one of the biggest and most influential rock bands of all time—whose song "Stairway to Heaven" has been played more times on American radio than any other track—Robert Plant defined what it means to be a rock god. 

Over the course of his twenty-year career, British music journalist and editor Paul Rees has interviewed such greats as Sir Paul McCartney, Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, Bono, and AC/DC. Rees now offers a full portrait of Robert Plant for the first time, exploring the forces that shaped him, the ravaging highs and lows of the Zeppelin years—including his relationship with Jimmy Page and John Bonham—and his life as a solo artist today.

Illustrated with more than two dozen photographs, Robert Plant: A LIfe is the never-before-told story of a gifted, complicated music icon who changed the face of rock 'n' roll.  

Robert Plant is a living legend. The front man of Led Zeppelin, one of the biggest and most influential rock bands of all time, Plant defined the very notion of what it means to be a rock god. 

The sheer scale of Led Zeppelin's success is extraordinary. In the United States alone they have sold seventy million records—a figure surpassed only by the Beatles—while "Stairway to Heaven," the band's most famous song, has been played more times on American radio than any other track and is frequently referred to as one of the greatest rock 'n' roll songs ever. 

But Robert Plant's legacy stretches far beyond Led Zeppelin. Robert Plant: A Life is the story of the forces that shaped Plant: from his boyhood in England's Black Country to the ravaging highs and lows of the Zeppelin years; from his relationship with Jimmy Page and John Bonham to the solo career that today, at the age of sixty-two, has him producing some of the most acclaimed work of his career. Author Paul Rees, former editor of Q and Kerrang!, who has in the past interviewed Plant at length, paints a rich, complicated portrait of a man who was only nineteen when he changed the face of rock 'n' roll.

Told with tenacity, emotion, and the spark of brilliance that befits such an enigmatic front man, Robert Plant: A Life is the definitive story of a musical icon.