Laguna Beach Books
                                                April 2011

Book Group

 Ravens 
Join us to
 discuss Ravens by 
George Dawes Green on Wednesday, April
 20 
at 6:30pm. 
Greetings! 
We're gearing up for tomorrow's Laguna Reads event with New York Times bestselling author Terri Cheney! This city-wide read is co-sponsored by St. Mary's Episcopal Church and Laguna Beach Books. Terri's book is about growing up with bipolar disorder and is sure to be a riveting event. See below for more details. 
  
Also included in this issue are our May event announcements. We have a full schedule beginning with Oprah's fitness guru Bob Greene on May 11. Also included are Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Maurice Possley, Active in Orange County authors Dr. Nanda Fischer and Jutta Gamboa, and Leaving Van Gogh author Carol Wallace. Plus, we'll be selling books at Barbara DeMarco-Barrett's Pen on Fire Salon with Katie Arnoldi and Marisa Matarazzo.
  
And that's not all! Seeing as Mother's Day is just around the corner, we have a few picks for you, as well as royal reading selections. Remember that all of these books are available to order online if you're not able to make it to the store.
  
Happy reading!
AnnouncingAnnouncing Our New Website!
Shop for BooksWe are so pleased to announce the debut of our new website! The bigger, better version of our original site, you can now order books online from us. And that includes eBooks at affordable prices!
  
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LagunaLaguna Reads Event with Terri Cheney

The long-awaited time is finally here! After the success of our very first city-wide reading program, we are so pleased to announce our next Laguna Reads event. Mark your calendars for Thursday, April 28 at 7 pm, when Laguna Beach Books and St. Mary's Episcopal Church will welcome Terri Cheney, author of The Dark Side of Innocence. The event will take place at St. Mary's, which is located at 428 Park Avenue in Laguna.

 

Dark Side of InnocenceAs a young girl, Terri Cheney's life looked perfect. Her family lived in a lovely house in a tranquil Los Angeles suburb where the geraniums never once failed to bloom. She was pretty and smart, an academic superstar and popular cheerleader whose father doted on her. But starting with her first suicide attempt at age seven, it was clear that her inner world was anything but perfect.

 

"There's something wrong with her," her mother would whisper, her voice quivering on the edge of despair. And indeed there was, although no one had a name for it yet. Hostage to her roller-coaster moods, Terri veered from easy A-pluses to total paralysis, from bouts of obsessive hypersexuality to episodes of alcoholic abandon that nearly cost her her life. Throughout Terri's chaotic early years, nothing was certain from day to day except this: whatever was so deeply wrong with her must be kept a secret.

 

Thirty years later, Terri wrote Manic, a harrowing memoir that revealed her adult struggle with bipolar disorder. It became an instant New York Times bestseller and received passionate critical acclaim. But it didn't tell the whole story. The mystery of Terri's childhood remained untouched- too troubling, too painful to fathom. The Dark Side of Innocence explores those tumultuous formative years, finally shattering Terri's well-guarded secret. It also provides a heart-rending, groundbreaking insider's look into the fascinating and frightening world of childhood bipolar disorder, an illness that affects a staggering one million children.

 

TerriTerri Cheney, once a successful entertainment attorney representing the likes of Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones, now devotes her advocacy skills to the cause of mental illness. On the boards of directors of several mental health organizations, she also facilitates a weekly community support group at UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute. Her writings about bipolar disorder have been featured in the New York Times, the Huffington Post, and countless articles and blogs. She currently resides in Los Angeles.

BobEvent with Bob Greene and Dr. Harold Lancer
Mark your calendars for Wednesday, May 11 at 7 pm! We are so pleased to host a special book signing with Oprah's fitness guru Bob Greene and celebrity dermatologist Dr. Harold Lancer. They will be giving a short talk, and will answer questions before signing books.
  

Bob GreeneIt's time to turn back the clock! In 20 Years Younger, Bob Greene offers readers a practical, science-based plan for looking and feeling their best as they age. The cutting-edge program details easy and effective steps we can all take to rebuild the foundation of youth and enjoy better health, improved energy, and a positive outlook on life.  Woven throughout the text is practical advice on changing appearances, controlling stress, staying mentally sharp, navigating medical tests, and much more. Readers will walk away with a greater understanding of how the body ages and what they can do to feel (and look) 20 years younger.
 
Bob Greene picBob Greene is an exercise physiologist and certified personal trainer specializing in fitness, metabolism, and weight loss. Greene is also the founder of the highly acclaimed Best Life Diet brand. Through his books, foods, fitness products, and website, he has helped millions lose weight and live their own personal best life. Greene has worked with Oprah Winfrey for more than fifteen years and is perhaps best known as her personal fitness guru. He has made dozens of appearances on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" and is a contributor to O the Oprah Magazine. He also writes articles for Oprah.com and his own
website.

 

LancerHarold Lancer, MD, FAAD is the expert that Hollywood's most recognizable faces and bodies trust to preserve and enhance their looks, their images, and their careers. Over the last 25 years he has grown his practice into a trusted and recognized brand for effective cosmetic rejuvenation. His clients fly from all over the world to receive his unique, cutting-edge treatments. After years of research and witnessing what worked and what didn't, Dr. Lancer developed his own line of exclusive products to help people achieve a radiant glow and confidence in their own skin. 

 

* Please note that this is a ticketed signing only. The purchase of 20 Years Younger ($27.99 plus tax) will include a ticket to the event. Only books purchased from Laguna Beach Books will be signed. Because seating is limited, we recommend that you purchase your tickets early. Feel free to call the store or email us with any questions.

MauriceEvent with Maurice Possley

Join us on Friday, May 13 at 6 pm to welcome Maurice Possley, author of Hitler in the Crosshairs, to the store. Maurice will do a reading from the book, answer questions, and sign copies. This event is free of charge.

 

HitlerA Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist teams up with a university scholar in this compelling, untold historical tale of a young man's courage at a critical time in United States history, and the saga of a dictator's pistol that continues today.

 

The time is World War II. Young soldier Ira "Teen" Palm and his men burst into a Munich apartment, hoping to capture Adolph Hitler. Instead, they find an empty apartment... and a golden gun. As the authors trace the story of the man and the gun, they examine a time and place that shaped men like Palm and transformed them into heroes. They also follow the strange journey of Hitler's pistol.

 

MauriceMaurice Possley is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author who has written about, investigated, and consulted on issues involving criminal justice in the United States and abroad for more than 30 years. Maurice did a nearly 25 year tenure at the Chicago Tribune, during which he worked as a federal courts reporter and then as a deputy metropolitan editor. Later, he returned to his first love - reporting - as an investigative reporter specializing in criminal justice, where he covered a variety of high-profile criminal cases, including those of Timothy McVeigh, Ted Kaczynski, and the murder of JonBenet Ramsey.

 

Maurice left the Tribune in 2008 to pursue investigative work into prosecutorial misconduct, wrongful convictions, and other criminal justice issues in the private sector as a writer and consultant. He is the author of three non-fiction books.

JuttaEvent with Dr. Nanda Fischer and Jutta Gamboa

We hope you can join us on Sunday, May 15 at 4 pm for our event with Dr. Nanda Fischer and Jutta Gamboa, co-authors of Active in Orange County. The authors will give a short talk about the book, answer questions, and sign copies. This event is free of charge.

 

Active in OCCo-authors and friends Dr. Nanda Fischer, a Newport Beach resident, and Jutta Gamboa, an Irvine resident, have been active all their lives. In fact, Fischer, a 30-year cancer survivor, contributes much of her survival all of these years to her active lifestyle. In their new book, the authors invite the reader to be active outdoors and at the same time enjoy the fascinating beauty of Orange County.

 

"Healthy people of all ages and skills levels can exercise with stunning views of the Pacific Ocean, hills and mountains," said Fischer and Gamboa. "Since a great body as well as a great mind is more easily achieved through a variety of exercise, our book outlines lots of activities - hiking, biking, horseback riding, jogging, inline skating, and many more."

 

NandaDr. Nanda Fischer is an internationally top-ranked senior tennis player and enjoys exercising in and on the water and on trails in Orange County as often as possible. She holds a PhD in Sports Science and in Literature and was a professor at Loyola University of Chicago as well as at Technical University of Munich. She is the author of over fifty articles and several books on physical activities, sports science and literature, and is editor or co-editor of five books. She is also a cancer survivor that attributes her wellness to the "positive" stress she has experienced while exercising regularly in the outdoors.

 

JuttaGrowing up as a competitive equestrian, Jutta Gamboa now enjoys trail activities like hiking, mountain biking, jogging, inline skating and numerous other sports. She is also actively involved with various local environmental organizations, supporting the preservation of wilderness areas. She earned a Master's Degree in German Literature at the University of California, Irvine as well a certificate for teaching English as a Foreign Language. For the last nineteen years, she has been teaching at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa.

PenPen on Fire Salon with Katie Arnoldi and Marisa Matarazzo

This monthly salon, hosted by Barbara DeMarco-Barrett, features authors, literary agents, and others involved in the field of writing. Set in the atmospheric Scape Gallery in Corona del Mar, the salon is a mecca for literary devotees who listen to readings, take part in discussions, and attend book signings. 

 

Join the salon on Tuesday, May 17 at 7 pm when authors Katie Arnoldi and Marisa Matarazzo visit to discuss their new books. They will join Barbara DeMarco-Barrett in conversation.

  

kateKatie Arnoldi has published three novels. The first, Chemical Pink, was a national bestseller. Her second novel The Wentworths squeaked onto the Los Angeles Times bestseller list as did her most recent book, Point Dume, which was released in May 2010. Katie was the 1992 Southern California Bodybuilding Champion. She was also a competitive longboard surfer, an enthusiastic backcountry survivalist, fanatic scuba diver and a fierce shark advocate. She is currently writing a book about human trafficking, drug cartels, intoxicants and the destructive power of money.

 

marisaThe daughter of a painter and a linguist, Marisa Matarazzo grew up in Los Angeles. She attended Harvard-Westlake high school and pursued acting as a teenager. She earned her BA from Yale, where she received the Wallace Prize for fiction writing, the Jodie Foster Scholarship, the Arthur Willis Colton Scholarship, and was a two-time recipient of the Elmore A. Willets Prize for fiction. Earning her MFA from UC Irvine, she was the recipient of the Dorothy and Donald Strauss Endowed Thesis Fellowship. Her stories have been published in Faultline, Hobart, and fivechapters.com. Drenched, an interconnected group of short stories, will be our focus during the salon.

 

$20.00 includes nibbles, sips and cake. Advance tickets are required. Walk-ins are discouraged as seating is limited. Tickets are available through the Pen on Fire website.
 
CarolEvent with Carol Wallace

Please join us on Thursday, May 26 at 6 pm for an event with Carol Wallace, author of the novel Leaving Van Gogh. Carol will read an excerpt from her book, answer questions, and sign copies. This event is free of charge.

 

Van GoghLeaving Van Gogh is a historical novel about the relationship between Vincent Van Gogh and Dr. Paul Gachet. Van Gogh arrived in Auvers, France in May of 1890, hoping that country life would improve his mental health. Weekend resident Dr. Gachet, who was a Parisian medical man with a history of treating mental illness, was keenly interested in the art of his day. He should have been just the man to help Vincent, but Van Gogh's initial judgment was skeptical. 

 

Van Gogh's attitude softened and the men became friends. Vincent even painted Dr. Gachet, producing a portrait that is famous today. But as we know, Van Gogh ended up a suicide, so perhaps his initial assessment of Gachet was correct. Leaving Van Gogh is narrated by Dr. Gachet, who saw Van Gogh as a painter, a puzzle, a project. It is a novel about friendship, genius, madness, and the art that bound these two men together.

 

CarolCarol Wallace is the author of numerous previous books, including The Official Preppy Handbook, which she co-authored. Leaving Van Gogh is her first historical novel. A graduate of Princeton University, Wallace received an M.A. in art history in 2006. The research for her M.A. thesis provided the foundation for Leaving Van Gogh. Wallace lives in New York.


MotherMother's Day Picks
 
Ruth Reichl
$13.00
 

A former New York Times restaurant critic, editor in chief of Gourmet, and the author of three bestselling memoirs, Ruth Reichl is a beloved cultural figure in the food world and beyond. This is her openhearted investigation of the life of a woman she realizes she never really knew -- her mother. Through letters and diaries, Reichl confronts the transition her mother made from a hopeful young woman to an increasingly unhappy older one and recognizes the huge sacrifices made to ensure that her daughter's life would not be as disappointing as her own.

 

  
Mom Style Icon
Piper Weiss
$18.95
  

Moms are people, too... fashionable people! Before we came along to yank on their skirts, they showed leg, sported killer bangs, and flaunted bikinis. Some even wore feathers and halter tops and drove around on motorcycles. Was their style shocking? Yes. Covetable? Absolutely. Based on Piper Weiss's hugely popular blog of the same name, this book features 200 color photographs from decades past of moms showing us how it's done. A perfect gift for mothers, daughters, and style mavens.

 

 

S'MotherS'Mother

Adam Chester

$15.95

 

And you think your mom is too involved? Meet the mother of all mothers.

Adam Chester is the son of a very loving mom, who for almost 30 years has peppered his life with unsolicited advice, news updates, and opinions in the form of thousands of inappropriate, embarrassing, and utterly crazy letters. S'Mother is a hilarious memoir based on this correspondence showing the pathological extremes maternal instincts can take.

From Girl to Woman
 
Rachel Simon
$24.99
 

It is 1968. Lynnie, a young white woman with a developmental disability, and Homan, an African American deaf man, are locked away in an institution,the School for the Incurable and Feebleminded, and have been left to languish, forgotten. Deeply in love, they escape, and find refuge in the farmhouse of Martha, a retired schoolteacher and widow. When the authorities catch up to them that same night, Homan escapes into the darkness, and Lynnie is caught.  

 


Monique Roffey
$16.00

 

When George and Sabine Harwood arrive in Trinidad from England, George is immediately seduced by the beguiling island, while Sabine feels isolated, heat-fatigued, and ill-at-ease. As they adapt to new circumstances, their marriage endures for better or worse, despite growing political unrest and racial tensions that affect their daily lives. But when George finds a cache of letters that Sabine has hidden from him, the discovery sets off a devastating series of consequences as other secrets begin to emerge.


RoyalRoyal Reading
 
Katharine Holabird
$14.99
 

Angelina is bursting with excitement. She and Princess Sophie are going to be bridesmaids at the most important event in all of Mouseland -- the royal wedding! But when the big day arrives, Angelina and Sophie are so busy dancing and exploring that they accidentally get stuck in the old tower in the palace gardens. Will anyone come to their rescue? Will they get to the wedding on time?

  

 

Elizabeth I
Margaret George
$30.00  

 

One of today's premier historical novelists, Margaret George, dazzles here as she tackles her most difficult subject yet: the legendary Elizabeth Tudor, queen of enigma -- the Virgin Queen who had many suitors, the victor of the Armada who hated war; the gorgeously attired, jewel-bedecked woman who pinched pennies. England's greatest monarch has baffled and intrigued the world for centuries. But what was she really like?

 

 

Uncommon ReaderThe Uncommon Reader

Alan Bennett

$12.00

 

When her corgis stray into a mobile library parked near Buckingham Palace, the Queen feels duty-bound to borrow a book. Discovering the joy of reading widely and intelligently, she finds that her view of the world changes dramatically. Abetted in her newfound obsession by Norman, a young man from the royal kitchens, the Queen comes to question the prescribed order of the world and loses patience with the routines of her role as monarch. Her new passion for reading initially alarms the palace staff and soon leads to surprising and very funny consequences for the country at large. 

Eat, Pray, Leave?
 
Luca Spaghetti
$15.00 

 

When Luca Spaghetti (yes, that's really his name) was asked to show a writer named Elizabeth Gilbert around Rome, he had no idea how his life was about to change. Filled with colorful anecdotes about food, language, soccer, daily life in Rome, and Luca's own fish-out-of-water moments as a visitor to the United States-- and culminating with the episodes in Liz's bestselling memoir, told from Luca's side of the table, this is a book that no fan of Eat, Pray, Love will want to miss.

 

 

French Leave

French Leave

Anna Gavalda

$15.00

 

Simon, Garance and Lola flee a family wedding that promises to be dull to visit their younger brother, Vincent, who is working as a guide at a ch�teau in the heart of the charming Tours countryside. For a few hours, they forget about kids, spouses, work and the many demands adulthood makes upon them and lose themselves in a day of laughter, teasing, and memories. As simply and as spontaneously as the adventure began, it ends. All four return to their everyday lives, carrying with them the magic of their brief reunion. They are stronger now, and happier, for having rediscovered the ties that bind them.

Top Sellers

  This Vacant Paradise Dark Side The Help 

 See what's been selling this month. Visit our Top Sellers Page.
Happy Reading!
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