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Click here for our online events calendar and to preview events through March.
Members always save 20% on our author event books. Click here to register!
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Thursday, February 23
10:30 a.m. Erin Stead - And Then It’s Spring (Roaring Brook, $16.99)
7 p.m. Stacy A. Cordery - Juliette Gordon Low: The Remarkable Founder of the Girl Scouts (Viking, $28.95)
Friday, February 24
7 p.m. Russ Feingold - While America Sleeps: A Wake-up Call for the Post-9/11 Era (Crown, $26)
Saturday, February 25
1 p.m. Mark Long, Jim Demonakos, and Nate Powell - The Silence of Our Friends (First Second, $16.99) - CANCELLED
6 p.m. Jean Edward Smith - Eisenhower in War and Peace (Random House, $40)
Sunday, February 26
5 p.m. Ira Shapiro - The Last Great Senate: Courage and Statesmanship in Times of Crisis (PublicAffairs, $34.99)
Monday, February 27
7 p.m. David Brock - The Fox Effect: How Roger Ailes Turned a Network into a Propaganda Machine (Anchor, $15)
Tuesday, February 28
7 p.m. Craig Taylor - Londoners: The Days and Nights of London Now--As Told by Those Who Love It, Hate It, Live It, Left It, and Long for It (Ecco, $29.99)
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Wednesday, February 29
7 p.m. Cristina Alger - The Darlings (Pamela Dorman, $26.95).
Thursday, March 1
7 p.m. Raymond Bonner - Anatomy of Injustice: A Murder Case Gone Wrong (Knopf, $26.95)
Friday, March 2
7 p.m. Jim Yardley - Brave Dragons: A Chinese Basketball Team, an American Coach, and Two Cultures Clashing (Knopf, $26.95)
Saturday, March 3
1 p.m. Anthony J. Franze - The Last Justice (Sterling & Ross, $24.95)
3:30 p.m. Sara Mansfield Taber - Born Under an Assumed Name: The Memoir of a Cold War Spy's Daughter (Potomac Books, $29.95)
6 p.m. Thomas Mallon - Watergate (Pantheon, $26.95)
Sunday, March 4
1 p.m. Dusko Doder - The Firebird Affair & William Beecher - Nuclear Revenge
5 p.m. Peggielene Bartels (with Eleanor Herman) - King Peggy: An American Secretary, Her Royal Destiny, and the Inspiring Story of How She Changed an African Village (Doubleday, $25.95)
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The Scoop from Brad and Lissa
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Staff Favorites Display - "What We're Reading"
Among the greatest assets of any independent bookstore is its staff, and Politics & Prose is no exception. Our booksellers tend to the more than 60,000 volumes on our shelves, pore over galleys and advance copies to stay abreast of upcoming titles, write blurbs about works that move them, introduce authors at our daily talks, and provide advice to customers in search of everything from current bestsellers to selections that are off-beat or hard-to-find.
Given this reservoir of in-house talent, we wanted to do more to showcase our staff and make it easier for customers to benefit from their expertise and passion for books. So we’ve just launched a revitalized (and much more fun) section called “What We’re Reading.” The section is split between two places in the store—on the non-fiction wall next to the front window, and next to the second entrance to the fiction room. There you’ll find brief introductions to our staff -- their names, photos (not always portraits), favorite quotations, and lists of Literary Top 5 -- as well as each bookseller’s recommended books.
Perhaps not surprisingly, the tastes and preferences of our booksellers span the literary universe. Our staff includes devotees of Tolstoy, Faulkner, David Foster Wallace and Jennifer Egan. Their interests range from mysteries, drama, history, and the classics to graphic novels, “tiny hipster books,” nautical-themed adventures, colonial African history and sociology, contemporary Russian satire, the Cold War, modernism, and books about books.
One of our booksellers professes to love bacon, another is partial to “French flags and deckle edges,” and a third claims to be “a fan of taxidermy and loud pants.” We also have a staffer who loves food books, and one who recommends A Field Guide to North American Mushrooms (National Audubon Society/Knopf, $20.95).
But we don’t want to give away too much. We hope you’ll explore our new “What We’re Reading” offerings, and get to know our booksellers. Seek out staff members for advice, and share your opinions about the books they suggest. And while you’re browsing, be sure to check out our staff’s rotating “shelf-talkers” -- mini-reviews you’ll find on shelves throughout the store. All of this, we hope, will help guide you to many more books that will inspire, enlighten, and entertain.
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eBooks of the Week
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Politics & Prose sells electronic books for most reading devices.
Click here for instructions, including newly updated directions for using the Kindle Fire with our website.
We are very excited about Jonah Lehrer’s forthcoming new book Imagine, as we will be hosting him for an event here at P&P on Tuesday, March 20. In anticipation of the publication, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is running eBook price promotions on two of Lehrer's previous books.
In Proust was a Neuroscientist and How we Decide, Lehrer gave fascinating glimpses into the cognitive science behind remembering and decision-making. Imagine combines science and case studies for a wide-ranging look at creativity from artists like Bob Dylan to corporations like Apple. Click here to preview the eBooks online and to purchase them from our website.
Proust was a neuroscientist, by Jonah Lehrer (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $3.99)
How We Decide, by Jonah Lehrer (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $3.99)
Also click here for other current eBook specials, including one for children and teens: The Borrowers, by Mary Norton (Sandpiper, $1.99) - the inspiration for newest animé from Hayao Miyazaki (Spirited Away, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind).
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Politics & Prose Classes
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Two new spring classes are now open for enrollment:
A one day, two-part workshop geared toward Writing Both Historical Fiction and Narrative Non-Fiction will be held on May 23. The instructor, Carol Wallace, is the author of the historical novel Leaving Van Gogh (Spiegel & Grau, $25), and she is the co-author of an earlier non-fiction book, To Marry an English Lord (Workman, $15.95), which has been cited as one of the inspirations for the television drama “Downton Abbey.”
In June, we will offer a three-week class on Women’s Detective Fiction, focusing on the work of two British Golden-Age writers, Dorothy L. Sayers and Agatha Christie.
Other classes include:
A workshop on the art of painting intricate, vividly colorful Ukrainian Easter eggs - utilizing the pysanky wax resist technique - meets on Good Friday, April 6, 6-8 p.m.
A new session of Elisabeth Griffith’s previously sold-out survey of women’s history, Well Behaved Women Rarely Make History, will be held on four Wednesdays, May 2, 16, 30, and June 6, from 1-3 p.m.
The first in a series on the literature of South Asia will involve an In-Depth Analysis of Rohinton Mistry’s A Fine Balance, taught by journalist and filmmaker Alexandra Viets, Friday, March 2, from 1-3 p.m.
There are still spaces available in:
Angela Williams’s survey of the Cultural Revolution in Contemporary American Poetry beginning March 5;
Dylan Landis’s Close Reading: Harriet Doerr’s Stones for Ibarra, meeting March 26 and 28;
Jackson Bryer’s six-part class on Eugene O’Neill, beginning March 8 and is pegged to productions at Arena Stage and the Shakespeare Theatre.
More classes will be announced soon, but enrollment is already open for:
Andiamo!: A one-day preparation for travel to Italy;
Demystifying the French; and Writing Prompts.
For more information, click the above hyperlinks to our website. For other classes, please visit: http://www.politics-prose.com/classes/2012-classes.
Susan Coll
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David's Deliberations
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 The Literature of Immigration
The well-received publication of Ayad Akhtar's debut novel American Dervish(Little, Brown, $24.99), caused me to think about the ongoing popularity of immigrant novels in America. Akhtar deals with the tensions between secular lifestyles and religious beliefs among immigrant Muslims (in this case -- from Pakistan.)
Each wave of immigration has produced outstanding literature that has examined its own generational conflict, retained and celebrated cultural identity, and embraced adaptation through its unique version of the American "melting pot." Literature of immigration has included both women and men who have spoken for their compatriots' experiences and helped outsiders understand. And whatever the characters' difficulties, they demonstrate immigration as providing an advantage.
Click here to read about my favorites.
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Coming Soon to Your Favorite Bookstore
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Click here for our online events calendar and to preview events through March.
Members always save 20% on our author event books. Click here to register!
Thursday, February 23, 10:30 a.m.
Erin Stead - And Then It’s Spring (Roaring Brook, $16.99)
Tired of winter, a boy and his dog plant seeds and, anticipating the fresh greenery to come, wait patiently through the rest of the dull brown season. Julie Fogliano’s tender poem of hope and rebirth is complemented by Caldecott Medal-winner Erin Stead’s whimsical woodblock prints. Ages 3-5.
Thursday, February 23, 7 p.m.
Stacy A. Cordery - Juliette Gordon Low: The Remarkable Founder of the Girl Scouts (Viking, $28.95)
To mark the centennial of the Girl Scouts, Cordery’s biography of its founder presents a woman who earned the description “undaunted.” Low grew up in Georgia and strove to avoid the fate of a Southern Belle. She lost her hearing in an accident, married an Englishman, left both him and England when he betrayed her, and, back in the States, established an organization to teach girls useful skills, values - and how to have fun.
Friday, February 24, 7 p.m.
Russ Feingold - While America Sleeps: A Wake-up Call for the Post-9/11 Era (Crown, $26)
Reviewing the decade since 9/11, the former Wisconsin Senator outlines the lessons about international relations that the U.S. needs to implement to ensure national strength in the next ten years. We should be guided not by fear and slogans, he argues, but by a deeper understanding of Islam and the Middle East, and we should work for greater unity on the domestic front.
Saturday, February 25, 1 p.m.
Mark Long, Jim Demonakos, and Nate Powell - The Silence of Our Friends (First Second, $16.99) - CANCELLED
In this remarkable confluence of talents, Powell’s graphic artistry joins Long’s true story and Demonakos’s narrative skills to depict an episode of the civil rights struggle. In 1967, five black college students in Texas were accused of killing a white policeman. A white family from a notoriously racist neighborhood not only spoke in their defense, but succeeded in getting the charges against them dropped.
Unfortunately, the authors of The Silence of Our Friends have found it necessary to shorten their speaking tour and have had to cancel this appearance.
Saturday, February 25, 6 p.m.
Jean Edward Smith - Eisenhower in War and Peace (Random House, $40)
Using a wealth of untapped primary sources, Smith, author of the magisterial FDR, has written a rich, insightful life of the general and president. From Eisenhower’s youth in Texas to his complicated apprenticeship under MacArthur, from his World War II military achievements to his finances and other personal affairs and on through his role in the 1952 Republican convention and the accomplishments of his presidency, Smith reveals new facets of a multi-talented figure.
Sunday, February 26, 5 p.m.
Ira Shapiro - The Last Great Senate: Courage and Statesmanship in Times of Crisis (PublicAffairs, $34.99)
Before the right took control of the Senate in 1980, it was a very different institution. Shapiro experienced that Senate, working for Senators Gaylord Nelson, Abraham Ribicoff, Thomas Eagleton, Robert Byrd, and Jay Rockefeller and he evokes it here, reliving the 1960s and ’70s which saw the passage of Great Society legislation and battles against the executive branch as the Watergate scandal broke.
Monday, February 27, 7 p.m.
David Brock - The Fox Effect: How Roger Ailes Turned a Network into a Propaganda Machine (Anchor, $15)
With co-author Ari Rabin-Havt, Brock, founder and CEO of Media Matters for America and author of the political memoir Blinded by the Right, traces changes in Fox News since Roger Ailes became its president in 1996. Using memos and tapes leaked by Fox reporters and executives, Brock shows how a right-leaning network has become an advocate for the Republican Party.
Tuesday, February 28, 7 p.m.
Craig Taylor - Londoners: The Days and Nights of London Now--As Told by Those Who Love It, Hate It, Live It, Left It, and Long for It (Ecco, $29.99)
This lively field guide to Londoners is part Dickens and part Studs Terkel. Interviewing a diverse cross-section of the city’s denizens, from an iconic Buckingham Palace guard to a retired driver to a heroin addict, Taylor gives us some eighty distinct views of life in London.
Wednesday, February 29, 7 p.m
Cristina Alger - The Darlings (Pamela Dorman, $26.95).
Alger’s background as an attorney and a Goldman, Sachs analyst lends authority to her first novel, the story of a young lawyer who marries into a wealthy New York banking family. When an economic downturn coincides with revelations that may destroy the family, Paul has to choose whether to stay loyal to the Darlings or sever his ties and distance himself from the taint of scandal.
Thursday, March 1, 7 p.m.
Raymond Bonner - Anatomy of Injustice: A Murder Case Gone Wrong (Knopf, $26.95)
Bonner applies his skills as a lawyer and a Pulitzer-winning investigative reporter to recount the harrowing story of Edward Lee Elmore, wrongfully convicted of murder in 1982. As he follows a young defense attorney working to free Elmore from death row, Bonner’s exposure of mishandled evidence, an incompetent defense team, and other iniquities constitutes a powerful indictment of the American criminal justice system.
Friday, March 2, 7 p.m.
Jim Yardley - Brave Dragons: A Chinese Basketball Team, an American Coach, and Two Cultures Clashing (Knopf, $26.95)
Taking over the Shanxi Brave Dragons, China’s lowest-ranked professional basketball team, former NBA coach Bob Weiss found that he had to adapt his techniques as much as the players had to change theirs. In this entertaining account of a season with the Brave Dragons, Yardley, former New York Times Beijing bureau chief, profiles players, owners, and fans.
Saturday, March 3, 1 p.m.
Anthony J. Franze - The Last Justice (Sterling & Ross, $24.95)
Franze’s debut thriller is a tale of murder, corruption, and unbridled ambition set in the marble halls and secluded corridors of the U.S. Supreme Court.
Saturday, March 3, 3:30 p.m.
Sara Mansfield Taber - Born Under an Assumed Name: The Memoir of a Cold War Spy's Daughter (Potomac Books, $29.95)
Being repeatedly uprooted makes childhood difficult; the challenges are compounded when your father is a covert CIA operative. In her memoir of life abroad during the Cold War, Taber, a literary journalist and author of Bread of Three Rivers, recounts the dual stories of her own efforts to establish an identity and her father’s struggle to come to terms with an America he grew increasingly disenchanted with.
Saturday, March 3, 6 p.m.
Thomas Mallon - Watergate (Pantheon, $26.95)
With Dewey Defeats Truman, Fellow Travelers, and others, Mallon has proven himself an adept novelist of recent history. His ninth work of fiction revisits the Nixon years and, from several carefully selected perspectives, Mallon lets the scandal’s participants tell us what happened, including the fate of those erased 18 -1/2 minutes of tape.
Sunday, March 4, 1 p.m.
Dusko Doder - The Firebird Affair & William Beecher - Nuclear Revenge
Doder uses his experience as the former Washington Post Moscow correspondent for this gripping thriller involving a journalist, the mysterious death of his wife, and KGB infiltration of the CIA in the last days of the Soviet Union.
In Beecher’s latest novel, the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and former official at the Department of Defense and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, has concocted a pulse-racing story involving academics overseas who stumble onto an al-Qaeda plot to smuggle dirty bombs into the U.S.
Sunday, March 4, 5 p.m.
Peggielene Bartels (with Eleanor Herman) - King Peggy: An American Secretary, Her Royal Destiny, and the Inspiring Story of How She Changed an African Village (Doubleday, $25.95)
When Bartels’s uncle died in 2008, she inherited his position as king of Otuam, a village of 7,000 on Ghana’s central coast. Making this more than a ceremonial role, Bartels, born in Ghana but a naturalized American citizen since 1997, addressed the community’s lack of health care, running water, and educational facilities. This account of her first two years as king stems from Herman’s Washington Post Magazine cover story.
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Special Offer for Politics & Prose customers
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2003 Pulitzer Prize-Winning Anna in the Tropics Continues at GALA Theatre!
$5 Off Regular Tickets for Politics & Prose Customers
 Now - Sunday, March 4
GALA Theatre
3333 14th St. NW
Anna in the Tropics, by Nilo Cruz (Theatre Communications Group, $14.95)
Ana en el Trópico, by Nilo Cruz, translation by Nacho Artime (Theatre Communications Group, $12.95)
“…exudes lyricism…graceful and affecting production…” – The Washington Post
"Go and experience it to the fullest. Don’t let this masterpiece disappear like a puff of smoke. " - DC Theatre Scene
GALA presents the DC Premiere of Nilo Cruz’s acclaimed play Ana en el trópico/Anna in the Tropics in Spanish. Set in a 1920s Cuban cigar factory located in Ybor City, Florida, the arrival of a new lector becomes a catalyst amongst the workers. As he reads from Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina, the workers’ lives begin to reflect the plot - unleashing secrets and forbidden passions.
The production is presented in Spanish with English surtitles through March 4, Thursdays to Saturdays at 8pm and Sundays at 3pm.
Regular tickets are $34-$38. Reserve by calling 202-234-7174 or click here to purchase online!
For this offer, enter code tropics12 or mention discount at purchase.
GALA Theatre 3333 14th St. NW WDC 20010 | www.galatheatre.org | info@galatheatre.org
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P&P Customers Are Also Invited To . . .
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Politics & Prose sells books at many book signing parties and events. The events below are open to the public; however, reservations and tickets should be acquired from the hosting organization. Please contact offsite@politics-prose.com if you are planning an event and would like us to supply the books.
Wednesday, February 29, 7:30 p.m.
 National Geographic Live!
1600 M Street, NW
Grosvenor Auditorium
Jim Davidson
The Ledge: An Adventure Story of Friendship and Survival on Mount Rainier (Ballantine, $26)
Descending from the summit of Mount Rainier one day in June 1992, Jim Davidson fell through a snow bridge, dragging his climbing partner with him into a hidden 80-foot deep crevasse. Davidson’s new book, The Ledge, named one of the Best Outdoor & Nature Books for 2011, tells the dramatic story how he witnessed his partner’s death and survived the fall, by making an impossible climb up a sheer ice wall.
Click here for more information and to buy $20 tickets ($18, NG Members).
Thursday, March 1, 7 p.m.
 Sixth & I
600 I Street, NW
Metro: Gallery Place/Chinatown
Doron Petersan
Sticky Fingers’ Sweets! 100 Super-Secret Vegan Recipes (Avery, $27.50)
Since opening the DC-based Sticky Fingers Bakery in 2002, Doron has been on a mission to dispel the myths that anything without butter or eggs can’t taste good, and that your palette will suffer for trying to make the world, your body, and your kitchen a better place. In Sticky Fingers’ Sweets! 100 Super-Secret Vegan Recipes, Doron shares the recipes and techniques behind her bakery’s most popular desserts and breakfast items.
Click here to buy $8 tickets in advance ($10 the day of the event), or purchase the book ($27.50) through Sixth & I and receive two free tickets. If you have questions, call 202.408.3100.
Thursday, March 8, 7 p.m.
 Sixth & I
600 I Street, NW
Metro: Gallery Place/Chinatown
Michael Ian Black
You’re Not Doing It Right: Tales of Marriage, Sex, Death, and Other Humiliations (Gallery, $23.99)
“You’re not doing it right.” Michael Ian Black has been hearing these five words all his life. And now—on the eve of his 40th birthday—the comedian, actor, and bestselling author who brought you Stella and The State is finally beginning to wonder why.
As a husband and father living in the suburbs, Michael asks: How did I end up here? Michael’s debut memoir takes on his childhood, his children, and his career.
Click here to purchase $12 tickets or to buy 1 book + 2 tickets for $28. Questions? Call 202.408.3100.
Thursday, March 15, 7 p.m.
 Sixth & I
600 I Street, NW
Metro: Gallery Place/Chinatown
Jodi Picoult
Lone Wolf (Atria/ Emily Bestler, $28)
A father is injured in a car accident and is on lifesupport. He is divorced and his son is estranged from him. He has remained close to his daughter. Who decides his fate? What are their motives for keeping him alive - or letting him go? This is the medical and moral dilemma at the heart of Picoult’s gripping new novel.
Picoult will be in conversation with Ron Charles, deputy editor and a weekly fiction critic for The Washington Post Book World. Book signing to follow.
Click here to purchase 1 book + 1 ticket for $28 OR 1 book + 2 tickets for $38. If you have questions, call 202.408.3100.
Monday, March 19, 7 p.m.
 Sixth & I
600 I Street, NW
Metro: Gallery Place/Chinatown
Jonathan Safran Foer and Nathan Englander
New American Haggadah (Little, Brown, $29.99)
Read each year around the seder table, the Haggadah recounts through prayer, song, and ritual the story of Exodus, when Moses led the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt to wander the desert for forty years before reaching the Promised Land.
Now, Foer has orchestrated a new way of experiencing and understanding one of our oldest and sacred stories, with a new translation of the traditional text by Nathan Englander and commentary by major Jewish writers and thinkers Jeffrey Goldberg, Lemony Snicket, Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, and Nathaniel Deutsch.
Tickets are $12 or receive 2 FREE tickets with the purchase of the book through Sixth & I ($30). Purchase here. If you have questions, call 202.408.3100. |
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From the Children and Teens' Department
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Children's Book of the Week
(20% off for everyone through February 29)
Jackie Robinson’s historic first season of Major League Baseball in 1947 was a huge step toward integrated sports teams in America. But many people dismissed his talent, saying that one great African American athlete was just a fluke. Larry Doby, who helped lead the Cleveland Indians to their 1948 World Series win, helped prove to America that black athletes were Just as Good (Candlewick, $16.99). By telling Doby’s story from the perspective of a young boy who has just been banned from his Little League team because he is black, author Chris Crowe and illustrator Mike Benning capture the hope that people invested in Doby’s success. Ages 6-9 – Amy Kane
Come visit the Children and Teens’ Department, where many of our favorite books about Presidents are on display.
 Children’s Blast from the Past
(20% off for Members through February 29)
When 16-year-old Sally Lockhart’s father dies, she is left with vague clues about the suspicious circumstances of his death. Leaving an unbearable living situation with relatives, she sets out into the heart of Victorian London to investigate, armed only with minimal knowledge about The Ruby in the Smoke (Knopf, $7.99) that once belonged to her family. Along the way she makes unexpected friends, but she also encounters many sinister characters bent on keeping her from uncovering the truth of her past. This first book in Philip Pullman’s Sally Lockhart mystery series is a masterfully crafted web of intrigue that will keep readers guessing until the very end. Ages 14 and up. – Amy Kane
Read about - and buy - more of our favorite books for children and teens by clicking here.
Click here to see the Children and Teens' Department 2011 Favorites.
Story Hour
Each Monday at 10:30 a.m., BearSong offers storytelling and guitar music for children from birth to 5 years old. Click here to sign up to receive email updates. We will inform you of these special story hours, changes or cancellations.
I LOVE: SONGS OF FOX HOLLOW
 In 1974, Tom T. Hall released Songs of Fox Hollow, an album of children’s songs, many about the animals around his farm. It included a number one hit, “I Love,” one of the tenderest songs ever written for parents and children alike.
Eric Brace (from the alt-country band, Last Train Home) and Peter Cooper rounded up a host of Nashville country and roots performers to pay tribute to this classic album I Love: Songs of Fox Hollow (Red Beet Records, $12.98) features a different vocalist on each song: highlights include Patty Griffin’s “I Love;” Buddy Miller’s “Sneaky Snake,” featuring Duane Eddy on guitar; Bobby Bare’s “I Care;” Last Train Home’s “The Mysterious Fox of Fox Hollow,” and Tom T. Hall himself joining in on a new song he wrote for the album, “I Made a Friend of a Flower Today,” featuring Fayssoux Starling McLean.
There is also a special deluxe edition of I Love which comes with a coloring book that features the beautiful linocuts of Julie Sola ($13.98). András Goldinger |
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Markdown Books
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Howard Jacobson, whose literary aspiration is to be “the Jewish Jane Austen,” won the Man Booker Prize two years ago for The Finkler Question. The matter raised in the title is Jewish identity, as personified by Howard Finkler, a self-help intellectual and author of The Existentialist in the Kitchen. But the perspective here is that of a non-Jew, Julian Treslove, who knows and dislikes Finkler, yet seems obsessed with him. As Treslove studies his old nemesis and struggles to understand his antipathy, Jacobson unleashes a barrage of wit, humor, and satire. Available in paperback, $5.98.
Building your dream house can be closer to a nightmare. For Annie Proulx, the award-winning author of The Shipping News and Brokeback Mountain, the realization of her ideal retreat was fraught from the beginning, but she persevered. She tells the story of the dream, the house, and the land in Bird Cloud, which begins with memoir and family history and moves to the Wyoming landscape where she decides to build. Her account includes the usual frustrations of delays and missing materials, but also tells dramatic stories of the area’s people, politics, birds, and weather. She also provides a few glimpses of her writing habits. Available in hardcover, $6.98.
There’s an old truism that books should both teach and delight. Richard Restak and Scott Kim, neuroscientist and puzzle-master, respectively, take this seriously in their book about puzzles and cognitive function, The Playful Brain: The Surprising Science of How Puzzles Improve Your Mind. Focusing on memory, perception, and cognition, the authors describe the mental processes, outline how various kinds of games can enhance skills, and provide puzzles so the reader can put the techniques into practice. Available in hardcover, $7.98.
Please call us at 202-364-1919 or stop by the store to shop for these and other discounted titles.
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Music News
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CDs are now searchable on our website, but stock status is not currently visible as we are in a Beta-testing phase. Please feel free to place orders online - or call the store at 202-364-1919 with questions. You may also continue to email me at agoldinger@politics-prose.com to order.
NEW
The Chieftains, Voice of Ages (Hear Music, $13.98) – The Chieftains are celebrating 50 years together. They have done wonderful collaborative projects before: The Long Black Veil, Down the Old Plank Road, and San Patricio all featured big-name guest stars. On The Voice of Ages, the Chieftains get together with a younger generation of alternative and traditional singers and players: Bon Iver, the Carolina Chocolate Drops, the Punch Brothers, the Civil Wars, and the Pistol Annies among them. You’ll recognize many of the tunes, but not the fresh interpretations.
Punch Brothers, Who’s Feeling Young Now? (Nonesuch, $15.98) – Speaking of the Punch Brothers, their lead singer and mandolinist Chris Thile has been a busy man lately: he recorded with Yo-Yo Ma on his Goat Rodeo Sessions, as well a “brother harmony” duo project with guitarist Michael Daves, Sleep With One Eye Open (Ryko, $15.98). The five members of the Punch Brothers are all acoustic virtuosos, write collaboratively, and have taken “new-grass” to new heights.
Air, Le Voyage dans la Lune (Astralworks, CD & DVD, $20.98) –Georges Méliès’s A Trip to the Moon (Le voyage dans la lune) was the wistful centerpiece for Martin Scorsese’s Hugo. The French duo Air was commissioned to write a new score to the recently discovered hand-tinted version of the Méliès film. The CD has their expanded score, and the DVD contains the restored film.
LABEL FOCUS: ECM NEW SERIES
 ECM, started by Manfred Eicher, has been a leading jazz label for over forty years. The ECM New Series was started in the 1980s as its classical sister label. Here are some of their latest titles:
Lisa Smirnova, Handel: Die Acht Grossen Suiten (ECM, 2CDs, reg. $29.98; our price $27.98) – This is a one of my favorite new releases: Handel’s Eight Great Suites played by pianist Lisa Smirnova.
Gidon Kremer and Kremerata Baltica, Gubaidulina: The Canticle of the Sun (ECM, $18.98) – Violinist Gidon Kremer has long been a champion of Russian composer Sofia Gubaidulina. Her work for cello, percussion, celeste and choir, The Canticle of the Sun is juxtaposed with the premier recording of 2009’s The Lyre of Orpheus for violin and chamber ensemble.
Carolin Widman & Alexander Lonquich, Franz Schubert (ECM, $18.98) – The violinist and pianist play the C major Fantasy of 1827 and the Violin Sonata in A of 1817, as well as the B minor Rondo of 1826.
Miklós Perényi, Britten/Bach/Ligeti (ECM, $18.98) – A powerful solo cello recital.
CATHERINE RUSSELL ON FRESH AIR
I wrote about Catherine Russell’s new vocal album, Strictly Romancin’ (World Village, reg. $19.98; our price $18.98), last week. You can listen to an interview and mini-concert on Fresh Air from this past Tuesday .
BLUES SUGGESTIONS
Yes, President Obama joined in on a little bit of “Sweet Home Chicago” at the end of the White House blues showcase this past Tuesday night (it will be broadcast on WETA next Monday, February 27 on In Performance at the White House). I put together a list of music from the performers (plus a few book suggestions as well).
Music Suggestions:
- B. B. King, Live at the Regal
- Buddy Guy, The Definitive Buddy Guy
- Keb Mo, Keep It Simple
- Gary Clark, Jr., The Bright Lights EP
- Trombone Shorty, For True
- Susan Tedeschi-Derek Trucks Band, Revelator
- Shemekia Copeland, Never Going Back
- Booker T. Jones, The Road from Memphis
- Jeff Beck, Performing This Week…Live at Ronnie Scott’s
- Mick Jagger, England’s Newest Hitmakers (the Rolling Stones’ first [and most blues-influenced] album)
Book Suggestions:
- Robert Palmer, Deep Blues
- LeRoi Jones (Amiri Baraka), Blues People
- Alan Lomax, The Land Where the Blues Began
- Francis Davis, The History of the Blues
- Peter Guralnick, Robert Santelli, Holly George-Warren, Christopher John Farley, editors, Martin Scorsese Presents The Blues: A Musical Journey
Click here for more news and reviews.
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Book Groups
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P&P's book groups meet monthly and are free and open to the public.
Click here to see all of our upcoming in-store book groups.
Thursday, February 23, 7:30 p.m.
Fascinating History Book Group
Eden's Outcasts: The Story of Louisa May Alcott and her Father, by John Matteson
March 22 selection: Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, by Jack Weatherford
Monday, February 27, 7:30 p.m.
Public Affairs Book Group
Alone Together by Sherry Turkle
March 26 selection: Too Big to Fail, by Andrew Ross Sorkin
Tuesday, February 28, 7:30 p.m.
Poetry Book Group
Sorrow Gondola by Tomas Transtromer
March 27 selection: Carl Sandburg: Selected Poems; Edited by Paul Berman
Thursday, March 1, 7:30 p.m.
Capital James Joyce Book Group
Paradiso by Dante Alghieri and Ulysses by James Joyce
The group will be reading last 3 cantos of Paradiso and resume on p. 15 of chapter 1 of Ulysses.
April 5 selections: TBA
Monday, March 5, 7:30 p.m.
Classics Book Group
Prometheus Bound and The Suppliants, by Aeschylus
April 2 selection: The Landmark Xenophon's Hellenika
To receive monthly updates about suggestions for private book groups as well as book groups at Politics & Prose, click here to add "Monthly Book Group Recommendations and News" to your mailing lists!
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