On My Radar:

Soul City: Race, Equality, and the Lost Dream of an American Utopia
by Thomas Healy
Metropolitan Books
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

In 1969, with America’s cities in turmoil and racial tensions high, civil rights leader Floyd McKissick announced an audacious plan: he would build a new city in rural North Carolina, open to all but intended primarily to benefit Black people. Named Soul City, the community secured funding from the Nixon administration, planning help from Harvard and the University of North Carolina, and endorsements from the New York Times and the Today show. Before long, the brand-new settlement – built on a former slave plantation – had roads, houses, a health care center, and an industrial plant. By the year 2000, projections said, Soul City would have fifty thousand residents.

But the utopian vision was not to be. The race-baiting Jesse Helms, newly elected as senator from North Carolina, swore to stop government spending on the project. Meanwhile, the liberal Raleigh News & Observer mistakenly claimed fraud and corruption in the construction effort. Battered from the left and the right, Soul City was shut down after just a decade. Today, it is a ghost town – and its industrial plant, erected to promote Black economic freedom, has been converted into a prison.

In a gripping, poignant narrative, acclaimed author Thomas Healy resurrects this forgotten saga of race, capitalism, and the struggle for equality. Was it an impossible dream from the beginning? Or a brilliant idea thwarted by prejudice and ignorance? And how might America be different today if Soul City had been allowed to succeed?

In My TBR Stack:

The Encyclopedia of Commercial Real Estate Advice: How to Add Value When Buying, Selling, Repositioning, Developing, Financing, and Managing
by Terry Painter
Wiley Books
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

The Encyclopedia of Commercial Real Estate Advice covers everything anyone would ever need to know from A – Z  on the subject. The 500+ entries inside not only have hard-hitting advice, but many share enlightening stories from the author's experience working on hundreds of deals. This book pulls off making the subjects enjoyable, interesting, and easy to understand. As a bonus, there are 136 time and money savings tips, many of which could save or make you 6 figures or more.

 Some of the questions this informative guidebook will answer for you are:

• How to Buy Foreclosed Commercial Properties at a Discount at Auctions
• Guidelines for Getting Started in Commercial Real Estate and Choosing Low-Risk Properties
• How to Value a Property in 15 Minutes
• How to Fake it Until You Make it When Raising Investors
• Should You Hold, Sell, 1031 Exchange, or Cash-Out Refinance?
• How to Reposition a Property to Achieve its Highest Value when Buying or Selling
• 10 Tested Methods to Recession-Proof Your Property
• How You Can Soar To The Top by Becoming a Developer
• Trade Secrets for Getting The Best Rate and Terms on Your Loan – Revealed!
• 11 Ways Property Managers Will Try and Steal From You - How to Catch and Stop Them!

Whenever you have a question on any commercial real estate subject, just open this invaluable book and get the guidance you are looking for.

On My Radar:

The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power
by Deirdre Mask
St. Martin's Griffin
Trade Paperback


From the publisher's website:

When most people think about street addresses, if they think of them at all, it is in their capacity to ensure that the postman can deliver mail or a traveler won’t get lost. But street addresses were not invented to help you find your way; they were created to find you. In many parts of the world, your address can reveal your race and class. 

In this wide-ranging and remarkable book, Deirdre Mask looks at the fate of streets named after Martin Luther King Jr., the wayfinding means of ancient Romans, and how Nazis haunt the streets of modern Germany. The flipside of having an address is not having one, and we also see what that means for millions of people today, including those who live in the slums of Kolkata and on the streets of London. Filled with fascinating people and histories, The Address Book illuminates the complex and sometimes hidden stories behind street names and their power to name, to hide, to decide who counts, who doesn’t—and why.

On My Radar:

Never Mind, We'll Do It Ourselves: The Inside Story of How a Team of Renegades Broke Rules, Shattered Barriers, and Launched a Drone Warfare Revolution
by Alec Bierbauer and Colonel Mark Cooter, USAF (ret.), with Michael Marks
Skyhorse Publishing
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

Never Mind, We’ll Do It Ourselves is the story behind the origins of the Predator drone program and the dawn of unmanned warfare. A firsthand account told by an Air Force team leader and a CIA team leader, Never Mind, We’ll Do It Ourselves takes readers into the back offices and secret government hangars where the robotic revolution went from a mad scientist idea to a pivotal part of global airpower. 

Featuring a foreword by Charlie Allen, an introduction by Lieutenant General John Campbell, USAF (Ret.), and an afterword by Lieutenant Colonel Gabe Brown, the story reveals the often conflicting perspectives between the defense and intelligence communities and puts the reader inside places like the CIA’s counterterrorism center on the morning of 9/11. Through the eyes of the men and women who lived it, you will experience the hunt for Usama bin Laden and the evolution of a program from passive surveillance to the complex hunter-killers that hang above the battlespace like ghosts.

Poised at the junction between The Right Stuff and The Bourne Identity, Never Mind, We’ll Do It Ourselves documents the way a group of cowboys, rogues, and bandits broke rules and defied convention to change the shape of modern warfare.

In My TBR Stack:

Robert E. Lee and Me: A Southerner's Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause
by Ty Seidule
St. Martin's Press
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

Ty Seidule grew up revering Robert E. Lee. From his southern childhood to his service in the U.S. Army, every part of his life reinforced the Lost Cause myth: that Lee was the greatest man who ever lived, and that the Confederates were underdogs who lost the Civil War with honor. Now, as a retired brigadier general and Professor Emeritus of History at West Point, his view has radically changed. From a soldier, a scholar, and a southerner, Ty Seidule believes that American history demands a reckoning.

In a unique blend of history and reflection, Seidule deconstructs the truth about the Confederacy—that its undisputed primary goal was the subjugation and enslavement of Black Americans—and directly challenges the idea of honoring those who labored to preserve that system and committed treason in their failed attempt to achieve it. Through the arc of Seidule’s own life, as well as the culture that formed him, he seeks a path to understanding why the facts of the Civil War have remained buried beneath layers of myth and even outright lies—and how they embody a cultural gulf that separates millions of Americans to this day.

Part history lecture, part meditation on the Civil War and its fallout, and part memoir, Robert E. Lee and Me challenges the deeply-held legends and myths of the Confederacy—and provides a surprising interpretation of essential truths that our country still has a difficult time articulating and accepting.

On My Radar:

The End of Empathy: Why White Protestants Stopped Loving Their Neighbors
by John W. Compton
Oxford University Press
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

When polling data showed that an overwhelming 81% of white evangelicals had voted for Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election, commentators across the political spectrum were left aghast. Even for a community that had been tracking further and further right for decades, this support seemed decidedly out of step. How, after all, could an amoral, twice-divorced businessman from New York garner such devoted admiration from the most vociferous of "values voters?" That this same group had, not a century earlier, rallied national support for such progressive causes as a federal minimum wage, child labor laws, and civil rights made the Trump shift even harder to square.

In The End of Empathy, John W. Compton presents a nuanced portrait of the changing values of evangelical voters over the course of the last century. To explain the rise of white Protestant social concern in the latter part of the nineteenth century and its sudden demise at the end of the twentieth, Compton argues that religious conviction, by itself, is rarely sufficient to motivate empathetic political behavior. When believers do act empathetically--championing reforms that transfer resources or political influence to less privileged groups within society, for example--it is typically because strong religious institutions have compelled them to do so. 

Citizens throughout the previous century had sought membership in churches as a means of ensuring upward mobility, but a deterioration of mainline Protestant authority that started in the 1960s led large groups of white suburbanites to shift away from the mainline Protestant churches. There to pick up the slack were larger evangelical congregations with conservative leaders who discouraged attempts by the government to promote a more equitable distribution of wealth and political authority. That shift, Compton argues, explains the larger revolution in white Protestantism that brought us to this political moment.

Now in Paperback:

The Third Rainbow Girl: The Long Life of a Double Murder in Appalachia
by Emma Copley Eisenberg
Hachette Books
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

In the early evening of June 25, 1980 in Pocahontas County, West Virginia, two middle-class outsiders named Vicki Durian, 26, and Nancy Santomero, 19, were murdered in an isolated clearing. They were hitchhiking to a festival known as the Rainbow Gathering but never arrived. For thirteen years, no one was prosecuted for the “Rainbow Murders” though deep suspicion was cast on a succession of local residents in the community, depicted as poor, dangerous, and backward. In 1993, a local farmer was convicted, only to be released when a known serial killer and diagnosed schizophrenic named Joseph Paul Franklin claimed responsibility. As time passed, the truth seemed to slip away, and the investigation itself inflicted its own traumas — turning neighbor against neighbor and confirming the fears of violence outsiders have done to this region for centuries.

In The Third Rainbow Girl, Emma Copley Eisenberg uses the Rainbow Murders case as a starting point for a thought-provoking tale of an Appalachian community bound by the false stories that have been told about it. Weaving in experiences from her own years spent living in Pocahontas County, she follows the threads of this crime through the complex history of Appalachia, revealing how this mysterious murder has loomed over all those affected for generations, shaping their fears, fates, and desires. Beautifully written and brutally honest, The Third Rainbow Girl presents a searing and wide-ranging portrait of America — divided by gender and class, and haunted by its own violence.

In My TBR Stack:

Kidnapped on Safari: A Thriller
by Peter Riva
Skyhorse Publishing
Hardcover



From the publisher's website:

Expert safari guide Mbuno and wildlife television producer Pero Baltazar are filming on Lake Rudolf in Northern Kenya, East Africa, when they receive news that Mbuno’s son, himself an expert guide, has been kidnapped while on a safari five hundred miles away in Tanzania. After gathering the clues and resources needed to trek through the wilderness, they trace the kidnappers back to an illegal logging operation clear-cutting national park forests, manned by sinister Boko Haram mercenaries. There, they find not only Mbuno's son but also a shocking revelation that has terrifying and far-reaching consequences.

Relying on Mbuno’s legendary bush skills, the pair must overcome the danger both from inside and outside the camp to bring Mbuno’s son out alive. In doing so, Mbuno and Pero discover that kidnapping and deforestation are only the beginning of the terrorist group's aspirations, and they realize a threat that would herald an even more dangerous outcome for Tanzania—a coup. A rescue might just risk the entire stability of the region.

Exciting and expertly plotted using facts ripped from news’ headlines, Kidnapped on Safari is a gripping, edge-of-your-seat thriller set in deepest, darkest, Machiavellian, East Africa.

Now in Paperback:

Humble Pi: When Math Goes Wrong in the Real World
by Matt Parker
Riverhead Books
Trade Paperback



From the publisher's website:

Our whole world is built on math, from the code running a website to the equations enabling the design of skyscrapers and bridges. Most of the time this math works quietly behind the scenes . . . until it doesn’t. All sorts of seemingly innocuous mathematical mistakes can have significant consequences. 

Math is easy to ignore until a misplaced decimal point upends the stock market, a unit conversion error causes a plane to crash, or someone divides by zero and stalls a battleship in the middle of the ocean. 

Exploring and explaining a litany of glitches, near misses, and mathematical mishaps involving the internet, big data, elections, street signs, lotteries, the Roman Empire, and an Olympic team, Matt Parker uncovers the bizarre ways math trips us up, and what this reveals about its essential place in our world. Getting it wrong has never been more fun.

On My Radar:

Sonic Boom: The Impossible Rise of Warner Bros. Records, from Hendrix to Fleetwood Mac to Madonna to Prince
by Peter Ames Carlin
Henry Holt and Co.
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

The roster of Warner Brothers Records and its subsidiary labels reads like the roster of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame: Jimi Hendrix, the Grateful Dead, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, James Taylor, Fleetwood Mac, the Eagles, Prince, Van Halen, Madonna, Tom Petty, R.E.M., Red Hot Chili Peppers, and dozens of others. But the most compelling figures in the Warner Bros. story are the sagacious Mo Ostin and the unlikely crew of hippies, eccentrics, and enlightened execs who were the first in the music business to read the generational writing on the wall in the mid-1960s. By recruiting outsider artists and allowing them to make the music they wanted, Ostin and his staff transformed an out-of-touch company into the voice of a generation. Along the way, they revolutionized the music industry and, within just a few years, created the most successful record label in the history of the American music industry.

How did they do it? It all goes back to the day in 1967 when the newly tapped label president Mo Ostin called his team together to share his grand strategy for the struggling company: “We need to stop trying to make hit records. Let’s just make good records and turn those into hits.”

With that, Ostin ushered in a counterintuitive model that matched the counterculture. His offbeat crew reinvented the way business was done, giving their artists free rein while rejecting out-of-date methods of advertising, promotion, and distribution. And even as they set new standards for in-house weirdness, the upstarts’ experiments and innovations paid off, to the tune of hundreds of legendary hit albums.

It may sound like a fairy tale, but once upon a time Warner Bros Records conquered the music business by focusing on the music rather than the business. Their story is as raucous as it is inspiring, pure entertainment that also maps a route to that holy grail: love and money.

On My Radar:

Tribespotting: Undercover Cult(ure) Stories
by Harmon Leon
Cartoons by Keith Knight
39 West Press

Trade Papeback

From the books's website:

The United States is a divided country, where two disparate tribes fight to provoke, condemn, and defeat the other. In Tribespotting: Undercover Cult(ure) Stories, Harmon Leon dives directly into the eye of the tribal storm, drastically changing his look and attitude as he goes undercover in an exploration of tribal behavior and its many manifestations in modern culture.

Employing the same inimitable style that he honed while infiltrating extremist groups, Leon introduces readers to a series of vastly different tribes, including a gathering of five thousand assault weapons fanatics, a clan of white supremacists who recruit at Applebee’s, a church of hookers who walk the streets for Jesus, and a meeting of cult members who stare at their leader’s handsome face.

Some of these tribes engage in harmless, hobby-loving fellowship while others revolve around the adulation of charismatic celebrities. Some of these tribes strive to uplift the individual via religious enlightenment, and a few are actually full-blown cults. But at the root of all these different tribes lies the same psychological need—the desire to be around like-minded people.

With that in mind ... LET'S DO SOME TRIBESPOTTING!

In My TBR Stack:

The Forever Transaction: How to Build a Subscription Model So Compelling Your Customers Will Never Want to Leave
by Robbie Kellman Baxter
McGraw Hill Education
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

More and more companies are concluding that the potential rewards of subscription-based products and services are worth the risk of radically changing their business models. They’re correct. The Membership Economy is here and it’s here to stay—and if you want to compete for the long run, you need to join it.  

Strategy consultant Robbie Kellman Baxter has been helping companies excel in this business environment for more than a decade. Now, in The Forever Transaction, she reveals all her secrets. Whatever industry you’re in, Baxter provides the inspiration, tools, and insight you need to build and execute a business model that will leave your competition in the dust. 

You’ll find out how industry leaders like Under Armour, Microsoft, and Netflix have created an ever-expanding customer base of loyal subscribers?and are keeping them coming back. You’ll learn how to lead your organization through every step of the process?from initial start-up to new product testing, scaling for long-term growth and sustainability to revamping your culture so everyone works together to optimize customer lifetime value. You’ll also master all the essentials of succeeding in the Membership Economy, like subscription pricing, Software-as-a-Service, digital community engagement, and freemium incentives as a way to turn casual browsers into cash-paying super-users.

With The Forever Transaction, you have everything you need to build durable, long-term relationships with every customer, and leverage them for ultimate business success?today, tomorrow, and forever.

On My Radar:

Walking with Ghosts: A Memoir
by Gabriel Byrne
Grove Atlantic
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

As a young boy growing up in the outskirts of Dublin, Gabriel Byrne sought refuge in a world of imagination among the fields and hills near his home, at the edge of a rapidly encroaching city. Born to working class parents and the eldest of six children, he harbored a childhood desire to become a priest. When he was eleven years old, Byrne found himself crossing the Irish Sea to join a seminary in England. Four years later, Byrne had been expelled and he quickly returned to his native city. There he took odd jobs as a messenger boy and a factory laborer to get by. In his spare time, he visited the cinema where he could be alone and yet part of a crowd. It was here that he could begin to imagine a life beyond the grey world of 60s Ireland.

He reveled in the theatre and poetry of Dublin’s streets, populated by characters as eccentric and remarkable as any in fiction, those who spin a yarn with acuity and wit. It was a friend who suggested Byrne join an amateur drama group, a decision that would change his life forever and launch him on an extraordinary forty-year career in film and theatre. Moving between sensual recollection of childhood in a now almost vanished Ireland and reflections on stardom in Hollywood and Broadway, Byrne also courageously recounts his battle with addiction and the ambivalence of fame.

Walking with Ghosts is by turns hilarious and heartbreaking as well as a lyrical homage to the people and landscapes that ultimately shape our destinies.

In My TBR Stack:

Relentless: The Forensics of Mobster's Business Practices
by Jerold L. Zimmerman, PhD. with Daniel P. Forrester
Willowcroft Publishing
Trade Paperback


From the author's website:

Every day, iconic brands like J.C. Penny, Sears, Kodak, and Blockbuster vanish. Jeff Bezos himself predicts that Amazon will eventually go bankrupt. While once exemplary lawful firms fail, El Chapo Guzmán, convicted head of the Sinaloa Cartel, and his wife launch their high-profile “El Chapo 701” fashion clothing line. Managers in lawful companies face disruptive technologies, groundbreaking new products, and competition from entrants that challenge their survival. Every organization must manage its way through a rapidly changing environment. Yet some organized crime syndicates endure decades despite massive law enforcement efforts and rival gangs dedicated to their daily demise.

Using rigorous economic analysis, we analyze how these criminal organizations survive, and even thrive, whereas legal companies that play by the rules falter and often fail.

On My Radar:

Black, White, and the Grey: The Story of an Unexpected Friendship and a Beloved Restaurant
by Mashama Bailey and John O. Morisano
Lorena Jones Books
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

In this dual memoir, Mashama Bailey and John O. Morisano take turns telling how they went from tentative business partners to dear friends while turning a dilapidated formerly segregated Greyhound bus station into The Grey, now one of the most celebrated restaurants in the country. Recounting the trying process of building their restaurant business, they examine their most painful and joyous times, revealing how they came to understand their differences, recognize their biases, and continuously challenge themselves and each other to be better. 

  
Through it all, Bailey and Morisano display the uncommon vulnerability, humor, and humanity that anchor their relationship, showing how two citizens commit to playing their own small part in advancing equality against a backdrop of racism.

On My Radar:

The Finn Chronicles (Year One): A Dog's Reports from the Front Lines of Hooman Rescue
by Finnegan Count Smooshie Tushie
as transcribed by Gwen Romack
Off Leash Press
Trade Paperback


From the book publicity:

Training rescued hoomans is a stressful job, but somedoggy has to do it. The Finn Chronicles is a unique story told by an extraordinary dog. He’s irreverent, funny, and full of sass. Based on his real life, join Finn as he issues weekly reports back to K9 Rescue Headquarters on the strange behaviors and rituals of his rescue-hoomans. With sarcastic wit, he observes the curious world around him, heroically saves his unwitting hoomans from dangers (see also: evil electric toothbrush), and shares his musings about the often-lackluster level of service he feels he receives. With bonus content like links to Finn’s social media and videos, you’ll get to see this vocal and energetic dog in action. You’re sure to fall in love with Finn, his hilarious facial expressions, his tantrums and even his dim-witted hoomans. This is the light-hearted and funny read we need in these not so light-hearted times.  Don't miss your chance to fall in love with Finn and follow him on social media for year round laughs and charms! 






The Finn Chronicles (Year Two): A Dog's Reports from the Front Lines of Hooman Rescue
by Finnegan Count Smooshie Tushie
Off Leash Press
Trade Paperback


From the book publicity:

The second book in the wildly popular series is here! Training hoomans is a stressful job, but somedoggy has to do it. The Finn Chronicles is a unique story told by an extraordinary dog. Join Finn as he issues his second year of weekly reports about the strange behaviors rescued hoomans. With sarcastic wit, he observes the curious world around him, heroically saves his hoomans from danger, and vents about the lackluster level of service he receives. With bonus content like links to Finn’s social media and videos, you’ll get to see this vocal and energetic dog in action. You’re sure to fall in love with Finn, his hilarious facial expressions, his tantrums and even his dim-witted hoomans. This is the light-hearted and funny read we need in these not so light-hearted times.

Now in Paperback:

The Red Lotus
by Chris Bohjalian
Penguin Random House
Trade Paperback


From the publisher's website:

Alexis and Austin don’t have a typical “meet cute”—their first encounter involves Alexis, an emergency room doctor, suturing a bullet wound in Austin’s arm. Six months later, they’re on a romantic getaway in Vietnam: a bike tour on which Austin can show Alexis his passion for cycling, and can pay his respects to the place where his father and uncle fought in the war. But then Austin fails to return from a solo ride. Alexis’s boyfriend has vanished, the only clue left behind a bright yellow energy gel dropped on the road. 

As Alexis grapples with this bewildering loss, she starts to uncover a series of strange lies that force her to wonder: Where did Austin go? Why did he really bring her to Vietnam? And how much danger has he left her in? Set amidst the adrenaline-fueled world of the emergency room, The Red Lotus is a global thriller about those who dedicate their lives to saving people—and those who peddle death to the highest bidder.

Now in Paperback:

Tombstone: The Earp Brothers, Doc Holliday, and the Vendetta Ride from Hell
by Tom Clavin
St. Martin's Griffin
Trade Paperback


From the publisher's website:

On the afternoon of October 26, 1881, eight men clashed in what would be known as the most famous shootout in American frontier history. Thirty bullets were exchanged in thirty seconds, killing three men and wounding three others.

The fight sprang forth from a tense, hot summer. Cattle rustlers had been terrorizing the back country of Mexico and selling the livestock they stole to corrupt ranchers. The Mexican government built forts along the border to try to thwart American outlaws, while Arizona citizens became increasingly agitated. Rustlers, who became known as the cow-boys, began to kill each other as well as innocent citizens. That October, tensions boiled over with Ike and Billy Clanton, Tom and Frank McLaury, and Billy Claiborne confronting the Tombstone marshal, Virgil Earp, and the suddenly deputized Wyatt and Morgan Earp and shotgun-toting Doc Holliday.

Bestselling author Tom Clavin peers behind decades of legend surrounding the story of Tombstone to reveal the true story of the drama and violence that made it famous. Tombstone also digs deep into the vendetta ride that followed the tragic gunfight, when Wyatt and Warren Earp and Holliday went vigilante to track down the likes of Johnny Ringo, Curly Bill Brocius, and other cowboys who had cowardly gunned down his brothers. That "vendetta ride" would make the myth of Wyatt Earp complete and punctuate the struggle for power in the American frontier's last boom town.

Now in Paperback:

Consider This: Moments in My Writing Life after Which Everything Was Different
by Chuck Palahniuk
Grand Central Publishing
Trade Paperback


From the publisher's website:

In this spellbinding blend of memoir and insight, bestselling author Chuck Palahniuk shares stories and generous advice on what makes writing powerful and what makes for powerful writing.

With advice grounded in years of careful study and a keenly observed life, Palahniuk combines practical advice and concrete examples from beloved classics, his own books, and a “kitchen-table MFA” culled from an evolving circle of beloved authors and artists, with anecdotes, postcards from the road, and much more.

Clear-eyed, sensitive, illuminating, and knowledgeable, Consider This is Palahniuk’s love letter to stories and storytellers, booksellers and books themselves. Consider it a classic in the making.

Now in Paperback:

Uncanny Valley: A Memoir
by Anna Wiener
Picador Books
Trade Paperback


From the publisher's website:

In her mid-twenties, at the height of tech industry idealism, Anna Wiener—stuck, broke, and looking for meaning in her work, like any good millennial--left a job in book publishing for the promise of the new digital economy. She moved from New York to San Francisco, where she landed at a big-data startup in the heart of the Silicon Valley bubble: a world of surreal extravagance, dubious success, and fresh-faced entrepreneurs hell-bent on domination, glory, and, of course, progress.

Anna arrived amidst a massive cultural shift, as the tech industry rapidly transformed into a locus of wealth and power rivaling Wall Street. But amid the company ski vacations and in-office speakeasies, boyish camaraderie and ride-or-die corporate fealty, a new Silicon Valley began to emerge: one in far over its head, one that enriched itself at the expense of the idyllic future it claimed to be building. 

Part coming-of-age-story, part portrait of an already-bygone era, Anna Wiener’s memoir is a rare first-person glimpse into high-flying, reckless startup culture at a time of unchecked ambition, unregulated surveillance, wild fortune, and accelerating political power. With wit, candor, and heart, Anna deftly charts the tech industry’s shift from self-appointed world savior to democracy-endangering liability, alongside a personal narrative of aspiration, ambivalence, and disillusionment.

Unsparing and incisive, Uncanny Valley is a cautionary tale, and a revelatory interrogation of a world reckoning with consequences its unwitting designers are only beginning to understand.

In My TBR Stack:

To Be Honest: A Memoir
by Michael Leviton
Abrams Press
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

If you’re like most people, you probably lied today. It may have been a small one, some insignificant falsehood meant to protect someone’s feelings or guard your true thoughts. Now imagine if your parents had raised you to never lie, if they’d ingrained in you a compulsion to never, under any circumstances, withhold the truth or fail to speak your mind. It might be wonderfully freeing. Everyone else might not appreciate it so much.

To Be Honest is Michael Leviton’s extraordinary account of being raised in a family he calls a “little honesty cult.” For young Michael, his parents’ core philosophy felt liberating. He loved “just being honest.” By the time he was twenty-nine years old, Michael had told only three “lies” (by most people’s understanding of the word) in his entire life. But this honesty had consequences—in friendships, on dates, and at job interviews. And when honesty slowly poisoned a great romance, Michael decided there had to be something to lying after all. He set himself the task of learning to be as casually dishonest as the rest of us.

To Be Honest is a tender and darkly comic memoir about what it means and how it feels to tell more than the truth.

On My Radar:

A Good Girl's Guide to Murder
by Holly Jackson
Penguin Random House
Trade Paperback


From the publisher's website:

Everyone in Fairview knows the story.

Pretty and popular high school senior Andie Bell was murdered by her boyfriend, Sal Singh, who then killed himself. It was all anyone could talk about. And five years later, Pip sees how the tragedy still haunts her town.

But she can’t shake the feeling that there was more to what happened that day. She knew Sal when she was a child, and he was always so kind to her. How could he possibly have been a killer?

Now a senior herself, Pip decides to reexamine the closed case for her final project, at first just to cast doubt on the original investigation. But soon she discovers a trail of dark secrets that might actually prove Sal innocent . . . and the line between past and present begins to blur. Someone in Fairview doesn’t want Pip digging around for answers, and now her own life might be in danger.

In My TBR Stack:

Life is Beautiful: 12 Universal Rules
by James A. Cusumano
Waterfront Press
Trade Paperback


From the author's website:

James A. Cusumano has led many lives. Drawing on his successes as an entertainer, scientist, corporate executive, and entrepreneur, Dr. Cusumano shares his multifaceted guide to life-long success and personal fulfillment. This easy-to-follow guidebook, Life Is Beautiful: 12 Universal Rules, demonstrates how anyone can manifest into their life literally anything that leads to their long-term happiness and helps create a better world.