In My TBR Stack:

The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolutionary to the Civil War
by Andrew Delbanco
Penguin Press
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

For decades after its founding, America was really two nations–one slave, one free. There were many reasons why this composite nation ultimately broke apart, but the fact that enslaved black people repeatedly risked their lives to flee their masters in the South in search of freedom in the North proved that the “united” states was actually a lie. Fugitive slaves exposed the contradiction between the myth that slavery was a benign institution and the reality that a nation based on the principle of human equality was in fact a prison-house in which millions of Americans had no rights at all. By awakening northerners to the true nature of slavery, and by enraging southerners who demanded the return of their human “property,” fugitive slaves forced the nation to confront the truth about itself.

By 1850, with America on the verge of collapse, Congress reached what it hoped was a solution– the notorious Compromise of 1850, which required that fugitive slaves be returned to their masters. Like so many political compromises before and since, it was a deal by which white Americans tried to advance their interests at the expense of black Americans. Yet the Fugitive Slave Act, intended to preserve the Union, in fact set the nation on the path to civil war. It divided not only the American nation, but also the hearts and minds of Americans who struggled with the timeless problem of when to submit to an unjust law and when to resist.  

The fugitive slave story illuminates what brought us to war with ourselves and the terrible legacies of slavery that are with us still.

On My Radar:

Dirty Tricks: Nixon, Watergate, and the CIA
by Shane O'Sullivan
Hot Books
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

The victory of Richard Nixon in the US presidential election of 1968 swung on an “October Surprise”— a treasonous plot engineered by key figures in the Republican Party to keep the South Vietnamese government away from peace talks in Paris, costing thousands of American lives. 

There is growing evidence that the CIA was deeply involved in illegal domestic operations targeting Daniel Ellsberg, and in the Watergate break-ins during Nixon’s 1972 campaign, which ultimately led to his downfall. CIA Director Richard Helms’ relationship with Watergate burglar E. Howard Hunt was much closer than previously disclosed and the CIA agent inside the plot was sent on a double agent mission by American intelligence after he got out of prison.

Drawing on newly-declassified files and previously-unpublished documents, Dirty Tricks debunks the myths around Watergate and deepens our understanding of the “dirty tricks” that undermined democracy during the Nixon years and destroyed public trust in politics during the seventies. These scandals turn on the covert action of two powerful interest groups—the senior CIA officers around Helms, and the key advisers around Nixon – in this chilling story of political espionage and deception.

On My Radar:

Smash! Green Day, The Offspring, Bad Religion, NOFX, and the '90s Punk Explosion
by Ian Winwood
DaCapo Press
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

Two decades after the Sex Pistols and the Ramones birthed punk music into the world, their artistic heirs burst onto the scene and changed the genre forever. While the punk originators remained underground favorites and were slow burns commercially, their heirs shattered commercial expectations for the genre. In 1994, Green Day and The Offspring each released their third albums, and the results were astounding. Green Day’s Dookie went on to sell more than 15 million copies and The Offspring’s Smash remains the all-time bestselling album released on an independent label. The times had changed, and so had the music.

While many books, articles, and documentaries focus on the rise of punk in the ’70s, few spend any substantial time on its resurgence in the ’90s. Smash! will be the first to do so, detailing the circumstances surrounding the shift in ’90s music culture away from grunge and legitimizing what many first-generation punks regard as post-punk, new wave, and generally anything but true punk music.

With astounding access to all the key players of the time, including members of Green Day, The Offspring, NOFX, Rancid, Bad Religion, Social Distortion, and many others, renowned music writer Ian Winwood will at last give this significant, substantive, and compelling story its due. Punk rock bands were never truly successful or indeed truly famous, and that was that–until it wasn’t. Smash! is the story of how the underdogs finally won and forever altered the landscape of mainstream music.

On My Radar:

Thanks A Thousand: A Gratitude Journey
by A.J. Jacobs
TED Books
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

Author A.J. Jacobs discovers that his coffee—and every other item in our lives—would not be possible without hundreds of people we usually take for granted: farmers, chemists, artists, presidents, truckers, mechanics, biologists, miners, smugglers, and goatherds.

By thanking these people face to face, Jacobs finds some much-needed brightness in his life. Gratitude does not come naturally to Jacobs—his disposition is more Larry David than Tom Hanks—but he sets off on the journey on a dare from his son. And by the end, it’s clear to him that scientific research on gratitude is true. Gratitude’s benefits are legion: It improves compassion, heals your body, and helps battle depression.

Jacobs gleans wisdom from vivid characters all over the globe, including the Minnesota miners who extract the iron that makes the steel used in coffee roasters, to the Madison Avenue marketers who captured his wandering attention for a moment, to the farmers in Colombia.

Along the way, Jacobs provides wonderful insights and useful tips, from how to focus on the hundreds of things that go right every day instead of the few that go wrong. And how our culture overemphasizes the individual over the team. And how to practice the art of “savoring meditation” and fall asleep at night. Thanks a Thousand is a reminder of the amazing interconnectedness of our world. It shows us how much we take for granted. It teaches us how gratitude can make our lives happier, kinder, and more impactful. And it will inspire us to follow our own “Gratitude Trails.”

On My Radar:

Abut My Mother: True Stories of a Horse-Crazy Daughter and Her Baseball-Obsessed Mother
by Peggy Rowe
Forefront Books
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

A love letter to mothers everywhere, About My Mother will make you laugh and cry—and see yourself in its reflection. Peggy Rowe’s story of growing up as the daughter of Thelma Knobel is filled with warmth and humor. But Thelma could be your mother—there’s a Thelma in everyone’s life.  Shes the person taking charge—the one who knows instinctively how things should be. Today Thelma would be described as an alpha personality, but while growing up, her daughter Peggy saw her as a dictator—albeit a benevolent, loving one. They clashed from the beginning—Peggy, the horse-crazy tomboy, and Thelma, the genteel-yet-still-controlling mother, committed to raising two refined, ladylike daughters. Good luck.

When major league baseball came to town in the early 1950s and turned sophisticated Thelma into a crazed Baltimore Orioles groupie, nobody was more surprised and embarrassed than Peggy. Life became a series of compromises—Thelma tolerating a daughter who pitched manure and galloped the countryside, while Peggy learned to tolerate the whacky Orioles fan who threw her underwear at the television, shouted insults at umpires, and lived by the orange-and-black schedule taped to the refrigerator door. 

Sometimes, we’re more alike than we know. 

And in case you’re wondering, Peggy knows a thing or two about dirty jobs herself…

On My Radar:

American Overdose: The Opioid Tragedy in Three Acts
by Chris McGreal
Public Affairs Books
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

The opioid epidemic has been described as “one of the greatest mistakes of modern medicine.” But calling it a mistake is a generous rewriting of the history of greed, corruption, and indifference that pushed the US into consuming more than 80 percent of the world’s opioid painkillers.

Journeying through lives and communities wrecked by the epidemic, Chris McGreal reveals not only how Big Pharma hooked Americans on powerfully addictive drugs, but the corrupting of medicine and public institutions that let the opioid makers get away with it.

The starting point for McGreal’s deeply reported investigation is the miners promised that opioid painkillers would restore their wrecked bodies, but who became targets of “drug dealers in white coats.”

A few heroic physicians warned of impending disaster. But American Overdoseexposes the powerful forces they were up against, including the pharmaceutical industry’s coopting of the Food and Drug Administration and Congress in the drive to push painkillers–resulting in the resurgence of heroin cartels in the American heartland. McGreal tells the story, in terms both broad and intimate, of people hit by a catastrophe they never saw coming. Years in the making, its ruinous consequences will stretch years into the future.

On My Radar:

How to Get Rid of a President: History's Guide to Removing Unpopular, Unable, or Unfit Chief Executives
by David Priess
Public Affairs Books
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

To limit executive power, the founding fathers created fixed presidential terms of four years, giving voters regular opportunities to remove their leaders. Even so, Americans have often resorted to more dramatic paths to disempower the chief executive. The American presidency has seen it all, from rejecting a sitting president’s renomination bid and undermining their authority in office to the more drastic methods of impeachment, and, most brutal of all, assassination.

How to Get Rid of a President showcases the political dark arts in action: a stew of election dramas, national tragedies, and presidential departures mixed with party intrigue, personal betrayal, and backroom shenanigans. This briskly paced, darkly humorous voyage proves that while the pomp and circumstance of presidential elections might draw more attention, the way that presidents are removed teaches us much more about our political order.

In My TBR Stack:

The Golden Sequence: A Manual for Reclaiming Our Humanity
by Jonni Pollard
BenBella Books
Trade Paperback

From the author's website:

We are a generation trying to make sense of the world and find purpose. At the same time, we are constantly battling an age that drowns us with information, in a society that has become conditioned to mistrust and cynicism. Despite this, our hearts still yearn to connect more deeply and feel like we belong to a world that is compassionate and loving.

Within each of us is an untapped power to create the change we desire in our lives. This change benefits not only the individual but the community as whole, allowing us all to break through toxic beliefs and conditioning.

The key to unlocking our true selves starts by accepting the responsibility of this power and using it to look within.

The Golden Sequence is a response to the greatest need of our time – reclaiming the power of our humanity. Through his genuine, essential lessons, expert meditation teacher Jonni Pollard presents a powerful case that the current global crisis is rooted in our disconnection from our true purpose and responsibility to belong.

A global leader in the field of mindfulness, Jonni's programs have helped more than 100,000 thousand people, across the world, learn how to meditate. Most self-help books trap readers in isolated victimhood, focusing on the person they ought to be rather than seeing the power already present inside. The Golden Sequence shows you how to help yourself by helping the world, by creating authentic, loving connections with everyone and everything around you.

The Golden Sequence will teach you to stop feeling dissatisfied, stop feeling helpless, and stop feeling alone.

Based on ancient Vedic teachings, re-envisioned for a 21st Century mindset, the book provides a practical blueprint to owning one's purpose and power. Rediscover our human nature, learn how to reclaim it as your greatest power, and start to love yourself by seeing the difference you can make in the world.

On My Radar:

Talk on the Wild Side: Why Language Can't Be Tamed
by Lane Greene
Public Affairs Books
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

Language is a wild thing. It is vague and anarchic. Style, meaning, and usage are continually on the move. Throughout history, for every mutation, idiosyncrasy, and ubiquitous mistake, there have been countervailing rules, pronouncements and systems making some attempt to bring language to heel.

From the utopian language-builder to the stereotypical grammatical stickler to the programmer trying to teach a computer to translate, Lane Greene takes the reader through a multi-disciplinary survey of the many different ways in which we attempt to control language, exploring the philosophies, motivations, and complications of each. The result is a highly readable caper that covers history, linguistics, politics, and grammar with the ease and humor of a dinner party anecdote.

Talk on the Wild Side is both a guide to the great debates and controversies of usage, and a love letter to language itself. Holding it together is Greene’s infectious enthusiasm for his subject. While you can walk away with the finer points of who says “whom” and the strange history of “buxom” schoolboys, most of all, it inspires awe in language itself: for its elegance, resourcefulness, and power.

In My TBR Stack:

Blue Blood II: Duke-Carolina ~ The Latest on the Never-Ending and Greatest Rivalry in College Hoops
by Art Chansky
St. Martin's Press
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

When Art Chansky's Blue Blood was published in 2005, ESPN’s Dick Vitale said it was about “the greatest rivalry, not just in college basketball, but in all of sports” and the book was hailed by The East Carolinan as the “holy text for both sides of the rivalry.” Now, 13 years later, Chansky revisits the fiercest college basketball rivalry.

Since 2005, Duke-Carolina has been a study of rival recruiting philosophies, disparate playing styles, classic game encounters, coaching milestones, All-American and NBA draft draft picks galore, plus off -the-court drama, and most recently, the ultimate question of who will be the next caretakers to this national treasure.

Winning more Atlantic Coast Conference and NCAA championships than the rest of the ACC combined made Duke and UNC the true blue bloods of basketball. When the prequel to this book was published in 2005, few fans thought the passionate backyard battle could get any better, but the last 13 years have added new colors and different fabrics to the mosaic that is the remaining virtue of the college game’s regular season, which for everyone else is now a qualifying run to the NCAA tournament and March Madness.

Chansky brings all of these details to light, making Blue Blood II a must-have follow-up for Duke and UNC fans, and college basketball fans in general.

On My Radar:

An Unexplained Death: The True Story of a Body at the Belvedere
by Mikita Brottman
Henry Holt and Co.
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

“The poster is new. I notice it right away, taped to a utility pole. Beneath the word ‘Missing,’ printed in a bold, high-impact font, are two sepia-toned photographs of a man dressed in a bow tie and tux.” 

Most people would keep walking. Maybe they’d pay a bit closer attention to the local news that evening. Mikita Brottman spent ten years sifting through the details of the missing man’s life and disappearance, and his purported suicide by jumping from the roof of her own apartment building, the Belvedere. 

As Brottman delves into the murky circumstances surrounding Rey Rivera’s death—which begins to look more and more like a murder—she contemplates the nature of and motives behind suicide, and uncovers a haunting pattern of guests at the Belvedere, when it was still a historic hotel, taking their own lives on the premises. Finally, she fearlessly takes us to the edge of her own morbid curiosity and asks us to consider our own darker impulses and obsessions.

On My Radar:

Congratulations, Who Are You Again? A Memoir
by Harrison Scott Key
Harper Perennial
Trade Paperback

From the publisher's website:

This funny and wise new memoir from Harrison Scott Key, winner of the Thurber Prize for American Humor, will inspire laughter and hope for anyone who’s ever been possessed by a dream of what they want to be when they grow up.

Little-known author Mark Twain once said that the two most important days in your life are the day you were born, and the day you find out why. He's talking about dreams here, the destiny that calls every living soul to some kind of greatness. What Mr. Twain doesn't say is: A dream is also a monster that wants to eat you. Nobody tells you this part of the American Dream — until now. In this new memoir, Congratulations Who Are You Again, readers join Harrison Scott Key on his outrageous journey to becoming a great American writer. 

As a young boy in Mississippi, Harrison possessed many special gifts, such as the ability to read and complete college applications. And yet, throughout young adulthood, he failed at many vocations, until one day, after drinking perhaps too many beers and dusting off his King James Bible, he stumbled across a passage about a lonely pelican, which burst into flame inside him. In a mad blaze of holy illumination, Harrison realized his dream: to set the world afire with the light inside him. He would write a funny book. This was his dream.

With unforgettable wit and tenderness, Congratulations Who Are You Again is Harrison’s instructive tale of pursuing his destiny with relentless and often misguided devotion, transforming his life beyond all comprehension: He becomes a signer of autographs, a doer of interviews, a casher of checks that are "worth more money than my father had ever imagined any of us might see, this side of a drug-related felony."

On this journey, Harrison finds that as he gains the world, he stands on the precipice of losing everything that means the most: his family, his mind, his soul. Hilarious, honest, and absolutely practical, Congratulations Who Are You Again is a no-holds-barred look at the life of every ambitious human creature, whether you want to write books or make music, start a business or start a revolution. This is a book for the dreamers.

On My Radar:

Beastie Boys Book
by Michael Diamond and Adam Horovitz
Spiegel and Grau (Penguin Random House)
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

Formed as a New York City hardcore band in 1981, Beastie Boys struck an unlikely path to global hip hop superstardom. Here is their story, told for the first time in the words of the band. Adam “ADROCK” Horovitz and Michael “Mike D” Diamond offer revealing and very funny accounts of their transition from teenage punks to budding rappers; their early collaboration with Russell Simmons and Rick Rubin; the debut album that became the first hip hop record ever to hit #1, Licensed to Ill—and the album’s messy fallout as the band broke with Def Jam; their move to Los Angeles and rebirth with the genre-defying masterpiece Paul’s Boutique; their evolution as musicians and social activists over the course of the classic albums Check Your Head, Ill Communication, and Hello Nasty and the Tibetan Freedom Concert benefits conceived by the late Adam “MCA” Yauch; and more. For more than thirty years, this band has had an inescapable and indelible influence on popular culture.
 
With a style as distinctive and eclectic as a Beastie Boys album, Beastie Boys Book upends the typical music memoir. Alongside the band narrative you will find rare photos, original illustrations, a cookbook by chef Roy Choi, a graphic novel, a map of Beastie Boys’ New York, mixtape playlists, pieces by guest contributors, and many more surprises.