San Francisco's Jewel City; the Panama-Pacific International Exposition of 1915 by Laura A. Ackley $40 Nine years after the great earthquake of 1906, San Francisco put on quite the party. The Panama-Pacific International Exposition of 1915 celebrates it's 100th anniversary this year. Heyday has produced this absolutely gorgeous book of photos, history and accounts of the amazing expo. From the Polo Grounds to Fort Mason, the world's fair created an amazing destination for the latest and greatest in food, technology, and cultures of the world.
The Secret Wisdom of the Earth by Christopher Scotton $26.00 After witnessing the death of his younger brother in a terrible home accident, 14-year-old Kevin and his grieving mother are sent for the summer to live with Kevin's grandfather. In this peeled-paint coal town deep in Appalachia, Kevin quickly falls in with a half-wild hollow kid named Buzzy Fink who schools him in the mysteries and magnificence of the woods. The events of this fateful summer will affect the entire town of Medgar, Kentucky.
Wildalone by Krassi Zoukova $25.99 A freshman at Princeton, Thea Slavin, away from her family and her Eastern European homeland for the first time, falls into a romantic entanglement with two brothers who draw her into a sensual mythic underworld as irresistible as it is dangerous where she uncovers a terrifying truth about her own family.
The 30 Day Vegan Challenge by Colleen Patrick-Goudreau $29.95 Are you finding that you want to be healthier in the new year? Oakland author Patrick-Goudreau has authored several books on vegan cooking and this one will give you a chance to explore eating in a new way. I know from experience that her recipes are not terribly difficult and uniformly delicious. You owe it to yourself to take a look.
***Just booked! Sunday, January 25 meet Colleen and try some of her treats at 3pm!***
Speaking of food, here's a brand new arrival.
My Usual Table; A Life in Restaurants by Colman Andrews $14.99 Combining his own story of growing up during Hollywood's golden age with tales of traveling the world in pursuit of great food, the founding editor of Saveur reveals how, from his usual table, he has watched the changing history and culture of food in America and Western Europe.
Fans of Ruth Reichl will eat this up.
This House, My Bones by Elmaz Abinader $18.95
Author Statement: The conversation with history is witnessed by the earth and etches the collisions on its body-every rock and road, riverbed and meadow hold the marks of migrations, escapes, exiles, alienations, aging and evolutions. In This House, My Bones, the body and the earth exchange their positions and perspectives. The memories of war are on the skin as well as on the mesa, the exile is written in dust and cells. Through mining experience of occupation, dislocation, and aging, I created poems where the body and the earth examine their bruises.
**Author Event on February 20**
And if you are looking for inspiration for the new year, here are three good choices:
Happier At Home by Gretchen Rubin $15 The author of The Happiness Project has subtitled the new book "Kiss More , Jump More, Abandon Self-Control, and My Other Experiments in Everyday Living" She sets out to make home a place that calmed her, and energized her. A place that, by making her feel safe, would free her to take risks. Also, while Rubin wanted to be happier at home, she wanted to appreciate how much happiness was there already.
10% Happer; How I Tamed the Voice in My Head, Reduced Stress Without Losing My Edge, and Found Self-help That Actually Works- A True Story by Dan Harris $15.99 The Nightline anchor, who had a nationally televised panic attack on Good Morning America, takes readers on a rollicking ride through the outer reaches of neuroscience to the inner sanctum of network news during which he discovered a way to get happier that is truly achievable.
Small Move, Big Change; Using Microresolutions to Transform Your Life Permanently by Caroline L. Arnold $16.00 Whether trying to lose weight, save money, get organized, or advance on the job, we're always setting goals and making resolutions, but rarely following through on them. According to longtime Wall Street technology strategist Caroline Arnold, the big push" strategy of the New Year's resolution is designed to fail, because it broadly pits our limited willpower stores against an autopilot of entrenched behaviors and attitudes that is far more powerful.
Compass and a Camera; A Year in Vietnam by Steven Burchik