On My Radar:

Confess: The Autobiography
by Rob Halford
Hachette Books
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

Most priests hear confessions. This one is making his.

Rob Halford, front man of global iconic metal band Judas Priest, is a true “Metal God.” Raised in Britain’s hard-working, heavy industrial heartland, he and his music were forged in the Black Country. Confess, his full autobiography, is an unforgettable rock ‘n’ roll story-a journey from a Walsall council estate to musical fame via alcoholism, addiction, police cells, ill-fated sexual trysts, and bleak personal tragedy, through to rehab, coming out, redemption . . . and finding love.

Now, he is telling his gospel truth.

Told with Halford’s trademark self-deprecating, deadpan Black Country humor, Confess is the story of an extraordinary five decades in the music industry. It is also the tale of unlikely encounters with everybody from Superman to Andy Warhol, Madonna, Jack Nicholson, and the Queen. More than anything else, it’s a celebration of the fire and power of heavy metal. 

Rob Halford has decided to Confess. Because it’s good for the soul. 

On My Radar:

The Q Factor: The Elusive Search for the Next Great NFL Quarterback
by Brian Billick and James Dale
Twelve Books

Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

There are elite athletes in every sport — people who possess tangible and intangible qualities that allow them to overcome daunting odds, spot opportunity in the midst of adversity, and turn defeat into victory. No position embodies this dynamic more than football quarterbacks, and nothing is a greater test of performance than the NFL.

The tangibles — metrics, stats, ratings, bowl games, championships — are critical to evaluation. But they’re not enough. Every year, highly rated college quarterbacks are analyzed, critiqued, hyped up and/or doubted, and those who manage to survive the scrutiny are drafted early. Some of those early picks make it to the top, some end up journeymen, and some just wash out. Why? What separates the elites from the pack?

In THE Q FACTOR, former NFL coach Brian Billick takes the highly promising 2018 NFL quarterback Draft class — the most touted class since 2004 (Manning, Roethlisberger, Rivers) and 1983 (Elway, Kelly, Marino) — and measures the top five quarterback picks to gauge how, why, and if they succeed. They are all first rounders, all with sterling college credentials, all talented athletes, all taken by teams betting their futures. One or maybe two could go on to greatness. But which ones, and why? Could the prediction process be better? Are the “experts” looking at the wrong factors? How do we find the best of the best?

That’s what THE Q FACTOR explores…and finally explains.

In My TBR Stack:

Mending America's Political Divide: People Over Partisan Politics
by Rene H. Levy PhD
USA Peoplehood Press
Trade Paperback

From the author's website:

What does science tell us about the palpable level of hatred that exists between left and right in America? In MENDING AMERICA’S POLITICAL DIVIDE, prominent neuroscientist Rene Levy tells us why political hatred is our most dangerous emotion, the nuclear weapon of the mind.  The unique potency of political hatred emboldens us to view large groups of people impersonally enough to wage physical war against them, and makes us even more susceptible to propaganda from our own side that nearly consumes our daily lives. 

Levy tells us why a growing number of Americans have now devolved into using the most corrosive and primitive part of their brains.  Our “primitive brains” feed hatred, contempt, paranoia and feelings of moral superiority. When the primitive brain perceives a threat, real or imagined, it gets activated immediately and shuts off our capacity for empathy.  Empathy limits our cruelty.

How can this problem—which isn’t going to magically disappear no matter who wins the election in November—begin to be solved? Levy dispenses with the finger-pointing and instead forces us to take a closer look at how we play into the drama, asking the tough questions that we have to answer about ourselves first, before we can engage in thoughtful dialogue with others.

In My TBR Stack:

Api's Berlin Diaries: My Quest to Understand My Grandfather's Nazi Past

by Gabrielle Robinson

She Writes Press

Trade Paperback

From the publisher's website:

After her mother’s death, Gabrielle Robinson found two diaries her grandfather had kept while serving as doctor during the fall of Berlin 1945. He recorded his daily struggle to survive in the ruined city—“I creep out at 10 o’clock at night to the clinic under whistling grenades and bombs, a wilderness of fire and dust, behind it, although already high in sky, the blood red moon”—and attempts to do what little he could for the wounded and dying without water, light, bedding, and medications. But then the diaries revealed something that had never been mentioned in her family, and it hit Robinson like a punch to the stomach: Api, her beloved grandfather, had been a Nazi.

In this clear-eyed memoir, Robinson juxtaposes her grandfather’s harrowing account of his experiences during the war with her memories of his loving protection years afterward, and raises disturbing questions about the political responsibility we all carry as individuals. Moving and provocative, Api’s Berlin Diaries offers a firsthand and personal perspective on the far-reaching aftershocks of the Third Reich—and the author’s own inconvenient past.

On My Radar:

My Life in the Purple Kingdom
by BrownMark
University of Minnesota Press
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

In the summer of 1981, Mark Brown was a teenager working at a 7-11 store when he wasn’t rehearsing with his high school band, Phantasy. Come fall, Brown, now called BrownMark, was onstage with Prince at the Los Angeles Coliseum, opening for the Rolling Stones in front of 90,000 people. My Life in the Purple Kingdom is BrownMark’s memoir of coming of age in the musical orbit of one of the most visionary artists of his generation. Raw, wry, real, this book takes us from his musical awakening as a boy in Minneapolis to the cold call from Prince at nineteen, from touring the world with The Revolution and performing in Purple Rain to inking his own contract with Motown.

BrownMark’s story is that of a hometown kid, living for sunny days when his transistor would pick up KUXL, a solar-powered, shut-down-at-sundown station that was the only one that played R&B music in Minneapolis in 1968. But once he took up the bass guitar—and never looked back—he entered a whole new realm, and, literally at the right hand of Twin Cities musical royalty, he joined the funk revolution that integrated the Minneapolis music scene and catapulted him onto the international stage. BrownMark describes how his funky stylings earned him a reputation (leading to Prince’s call) and how he and Prince first played together at that night’s sudden audition—and never really stopped. He takes us behind the scenes as few can, into the confusing emotional and professional life among the denizens of Paisley Park, and offers a rare, intimate look into music at the heady heights that his childhood self could never have imagined.

An inspiring memoir of making it against stacked odds, experiencing extreme highs and lows of success and pain, and breaking racial barriers, My Life in the Purple Kingdom is also the story of a young man learning his craft and honing his skill like any musician, but in a world like no other and in a way that only BrownMark could tell it.

In My TBR Stack:

When the Red Gates Opened: A Memoir of China's Reawakening
by Dori Jones Yang
She Writes Press
Trade Paperback


From the publisher's website:

When China opened its doors in the 1980s, it shocked the world by allowing private enterprise and free markets. Dori Jones was among the first American correspondents to cover China under Deng Xiaoping, who dared to defy Maoist doctrine to try to catch up with richer nations. Though introverted, Dori used her fluency in Mandarin to get to know the ordinary people she met—people embracing opportunities that had once been unimaginable in China.

Soon, Dori fell for a Chinese man who had fled China with his family in 1949 and only recently returned. Together, they found the relatives his parents had left behind, who were just starting to hope for a better future. This euphoria—shared by American businesses and Chinese citizens alike—reached its peak in 1989, when a million peaceful protestors filled Tiananmen Square, demanding democracy. Dori lived that hope, as well as the despair that followed when the army opened fire. After Tiananmen, dejected and sure that the era of promising possibilities was over, she returned to America in 1990—only to watch as China resumed its growth.

Written in a time when China’s rapid rise is setting off fears in Washington, When the Red Gates Opened offers insight into the daring policies that started it all. 

In My TBR Stack:

The New Science of Narcissism: Understanding One of the Greatest Psychological Challenges of Our Time — and What You Can Do About It
by W. Keith Campbell, PhD
Sounds True Publishing
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

Cut Through the Noise Around Narcissism with the Leading Researcher in the Field
 
“Narcissism” is truly one of the most important words our time—ceaselessly discussed in the media, the subject of millions of online search queries, and at the centerpiece of serious social and political debates. But what does it really mean?
 
In The New Science of Narcissism, Dr. W Keith Campbell pulls back the curtain on this frequently misused label, presenting the most recent psychological, personality, and social research into the phenomenon.
 
Rather than pathologizing all behaviors associated with the label, Campbell reveals that not only does narcissism occur on a spectrum, but almost everyone exhibits narcissistic tendencies in their day-to-day behavior. Drawing from real-life incidents and case studies, The New Science of Narcissism offers tools, tips, and suggestions for softening toxically selfish behaviors both in yourself and others. Here you will discover:

• An exploration of personality disorders connected with and adjacent to narcissism
• Why minor narcissistic tendencies are common in most people
• The foundational difference between grandiose and vulnerable narcissism
• Different psychological models of personality and how they interpret narcissistic behaviors
• The “recipe” of mental and emotional traits that combine into narcissism
• How to identify when you’re in a relationship with a narcissist and what you can do about it
• Why the 21st century has seen the rise of a “Great Fantasy Migration” into evermore insular subcultures
• The connection between narcissistic tendencies and leadership
• Why “the audience in your pocket” of social media has exacerbated culture-wide narcissistic tendencies

Though narcissism looms large in our cultural consciousness, The New Science of Narcissism offers many different options for understanding and treating it. With Campbell’s straightforward and grounded guidance, you’ll not only discover the latest and best information on the condition, but also a hopeful view of its future. 

On My Radar:

All About the Story: News, Power, Politics, and the Washington Post
by Leonard Downie, Jr.
Public Affairs Books
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

In 1964, as a twenty-two-year-old Ohio State graduate with working-class Cleveland roots and a family to support, Len Downie landed an internship with the Washington Post. He would become a pioneering investigative reporter, news editor, foreign correspondent, and managing editor, before succeeding the legendary Ben Bradlee as executive editor.

Downie’s leadership style differed from Bradlee’s, but he played an equally important role over more than four decades in making the Post one of the world’s leading news organizations. He was one of the editors on the historic Watergate story and drove coverage of the impeachment of President Bill Clinton. He wrestled with the Unabomber’s threat to kill more people unless the Post published a rambling 30,000-word manifesto and he published important national security stories in defiance of presidents and top officials. He managed the Post‘s ascendency to the pinnacle of influence, circulation, and profitability, producing prizewinning investigative reporting with deep impact on American life, before the digital transformation of news media threatened the Post‘s future.

At a dangerous time, when health and economic crises and partisanship are challenging the news media, Downie’s judgment, fairness, and commitment to truth will inspire anyone who wants to know how journalism, at its best, works.

On My Radar:

Dancing with the Octopus: A Memoir of a Crime
by Debora Harding
Bloomsbury USA
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

One Omaha winter day in November 1978, when Debora Harding was just fourteen, she was abducted at knifepoint from a church parking lot. She was thrown into a van, assaulted, held for ransom, and then left to die as an ice storm descended over the city.

Debora survived. She identified her attacker to the police and then returned to her teenage life in a dysfunctional home where she was expected to simply move on. Denial became the family coping strategy offered by her fun-loving, conflicted father and her cruelly resentful mother.

It wasn't until decades later - when beset by the symptoms of PTSD- that Debora undertook a radical project: she met her childhood attacker face-to-face in prison and began to reconsider and reimagine his complex story. This was a quest for the truth that would threaten the lie at the heart of her family and with it the sacred bond that once saved her.
Dexterously shifting between the past and present, Debora Harding untangles the incident of her kidnapping and escape from unexpected angles, offering a vivid, intimate portrait of one family's disintegration in the 1970s Midwest.

Written with dark humor and the pacing of a thriller, Dancing with the Octopus is a literary tour de force and a groundbreaking narrative of reckoning, recovery, and the inexhaustible strength it takes to survive. 

On My Radar:

Three-Ring Circus: Kobe, Shaq, Phil, and the Crazy Years of the Lakers Dynasty
by Jeff Pearlman
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Hardcover


From the publisher's website:

In the history of modern sport, there have never been two high-level teammates who loathed each other the way Shaquille O’Neal loathed Kobe Bryant, and Kobe Bryant loathed Shaquille O’Neal. From public sniping and sparring, to physical altercations and the repeated threats of trade, it was warfare. And yet, despite eight years of infighting and hostility, by turns mediated and encouraged by coach Phil Jackson, the Shaq-Kobe duo resulted in one of the greatest dynasties in NBA history. Together, the two led the Lakers to three straight championships and returned glory and excitement to Los Angeles.  

 

In the tradition of Jeff Pearlman’s bestsellers Showtime, Boys Will Be Boys, and The Bad Guys Won, Three-Ring Circus is a rollicking deep dive into one of sports’ most fraught yet successful pairings.  

On My Radar:

Me and Sister Bobbie: Tales of the Family Band
by Willie Nelson & Bobbie Nelson with David Ritz
Random House
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:


Abandoned by their parents as toddlers, Willie and Bobbie Nelson found their love of music almost immediately through their grandparents, who raised them in a small Texas town. Their close relationship—which persists today—is the longest-lasting bond in both their lives.

In alternating chapters, this heartfelt dual memoir weaves together both their stories as they experienced them side by side and apart. The Nelsons share powerful, emotional moments from growing up, playing music in public for the first time, and facing trials in adulthood, as Willie pursued songwriting and Bobbie faced a series of challenging relationships and a musical career that took off only when attitudes about women began to change in Texas. The memoir is Bobbie’s first book, and in it she candidly shares her life story in full for the first time. Her deeply affecting chapters delve into her personal relationships and life as a mother and as a musician with technical skills that even Willie admits surpass his own. In his poignant stories, Willie shares the depth of his bond with his sister, and how that bond carried him through his most troubled moments. Willie and Bobbie have supported each other through unthinkable personal heartbreak, and they’ve always shared in each other’s victories. Through dizzying highs and traumatic lows, spanning almost nine decades of life, Willie and Bobbie have always had each other’s back.

Their story is an inspring, lyrical statement of how family always finds the way.  

On My Radar:

60 Stories about 30 Seconds: How I Got Away With Becoming a Pretty Big Commercial Director Without Losing My Soul (Or Maybe Just Part of It)

by Bruce Van Dusen
Post Hill Press
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

1977. New York City. Cool and crime-ridden, cheap and wild. Bruce Van Dusen shows up in town with a film degree and $150 to his name. He wants to make movies. So he does. The only ones anyone will pay him to make? Little ones. Thirty seconds long. Commercials. He has no idea what he’s doing and the money sucks. But he’s a director.

He quickly learns he has the two things he needs to succeed in the fickle world of commercial-making: a talent for telling short, emotional stories, and the hustle to fight for every job no matter how small. He still has no idea what he’s doing—not that anyone needs to know that. He just keeps making it up as he goes along.

He gets hired by a client on life support in the most depressing hospital in New York. Gets peed on by a lion. Abused by Charles Bronson. Explains peristalsis to a Tony winner. Makes a movie and goes to Sundance. Goes back to little movies when it bombs. Keeps hustling, shooting anything. Gets married, has kids. Pushes, shoves, survives. Gets divorced. Survives some more. Is an asshole, pays the price, finally learns when and how to be an asshole and becomes one of the industry’s stars.

Years go by and it’s not what he expected. It’s harder, weirder, and funnier. But it worked out. It worked out great, actually.

On My Radar:

Constant Comedy: How I Started Comedy Central and Lost My Sense of Humor
by Art Bell
Ulysses Press
Hardcover

From the publisher's website:

In 1988, a young, mid-level employee named Art Bell pitched a novel concept—a television channel focused 100% on just one thing: comedy—to the chairman of HBO. The station that would soon become Comedy Central, with celebrated programs like South Park, Chapelle’s Show, The Daily Show, and The Colbert Report, was born.

 

Constant Comedy takes readers behind the scenes into the comedy startup on its way to becoming one of the most successful and creative purveyors of popular culture in the United States. From disastrous pitch meetings with comedians to the discovery of talents like Bill Maher and Jon Stewart, this intimate biography peers behind the curtain and reveals what it’s really like to work, struggle, and ultimately succeed at the cutting edge of show business.