Baby, It’s Cold Outside…
Now that we are back in the groove after the holidays, it is time for some new books! Stock up on fiction, nonfiction, hot chocolate and cozy blankets, and sit by the fire. There are lots of topics the men in your life might enjoy reading about; if they are interested in Love, Sports, Music or the Weather, here are some great possibilities!
The author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Think Like a Monk offers a revelatory guide to every stage of romance, drawing on ancient wisdom and new science.
Nobody sits us down and teaches us how to love. So we’re often thrown into relationships with nothing but romance movies and pop culture to help us muddle through. Until now.
Instead of presenting love as an ethereal concept or a collection of cliches, Jay Shetty lays out specific, actionable steps to help you develop the skills to practice and nurture love better than ever before. He shares insights on how to win or lose together, how to define love, and why you don’t break in a break-up. Inspired by Vedic wisdom and modern science, he tackles the entire relationship cycle, from first dates to moving in together to breaking up and starting over. And he shows us how to avoid falling for false promises and unfulfilling partners.
By living Jay Shetty’s eight rules, we can all love ourselves, our partner, and the world better than we ever thought possible.
The Last Kingdom by Steve Berry (Feb. 21)
From celebrated New York Times bestselling author, Steve Berry, comes the latest Cotton Malone adventure, in which the discovery of a lost historical document challenges the global might of the United States.
King Ludwig II of Bavaria was an enigmatic figure who was deposed in 1886, mysteriously drowning three days later. Eccentric to the point of madness, history tells us that in the years before he died Ludwig engaged in a worldwide search for a new kingdom, one separate, apart, and in lieu of Bavaria. A place he could retreat into and rule as he wished. But a question remains: did he succeed?
Enter Cotton Malone. After many months, Malone’s protégé, Luke Daniels, has managed to infiltrate a renegade group intent on winning Bavarian independence from Germany. Daniels has also managed to gain the trust of the prince of Bavaria, a frustrated second son intent on eliminating his brother, the duke, and restoring the Wittelsbach monarchy, only now with him as king. Everything hinges on a 19th century deed which proves that Ludwig’s long-rumored search bore fruit–legal title to lands that Germany, China, and the United States all now want, only for vastly different reasons.
In a race across Bavaria for clues hidden in Ludwig’s three fairytale castles–Neuschwanstein, Linderhof and Herrenchiemsee–Malone and Daniels battle an ever-growing list of deadly adversaries, all intent on finding the last kingdom.
Walk the Blue Line by James Patterson and Matt Eversmann (Feb. 6)
They risk their lives every day to protect and serve our homes, families and communities. Here are their most dramatic true stories, in their own unforgettable words.
From the police academy to the precinct, Walk My Beat with Me is a first-person tour through the days and nights of American policing.
PROTECT
These men and women are our eyes. Our ears. Our protectors. Those who wear a badge, doing their best to help people.
SERVE
These officers serve their community. They serve their country. They’re in the business of saving lives—even at the risk of their own.
DEFEND
These patrol officers and K9 handlers, sheriffs and detectives, reveal what it’s really like to wear the uniform, to carry the weight of the responsibility they’ve been given.
This is a calling. This is the job
How Basketball Can Save the World by David Hollander (Feb. 7)
A thought-provoking exploration of how basketball–and the values rooted in the game–can solve today’s most pressing issues, from the professor behind the popular New York University course
When New York University professor David Hollander introduced a course called “How Basketball Can Save the World,” it became a sensation almost overnight. For the class, Hollander invites current NBA and WNBA superstars, Hall of Fame players, coaches, and other cultural figures to debate and give insights on how the underlying principles of the game of basketball can provide a new blueprint for addressing our diverse challenges and showing what’s possible beyond the court.
Now, in How Basketball Can Save the World, Hollander moves beyond the classroom to present a beautiful new philosophy based on values inherent to basketball, such as inclusion and the balancing of individual success with the needs of the collective. These principles move us beyond conflict and confusion toward a more harmonious and meaningful future:
– Positionless-ness: In basketball, players aren’t siloed into just one position or responsibility. In life, we can learn to be more adaptive to the challenges we face by embracing a positionless mindset.
– Human Alchemy: We talk a lot about team chemistry, but team alchemy means the creation of something totally new–a team far greater than the sum of its parts.
– Sanctuary: Basketball offers players a critical space to feel safe, free, and expressive. Fostering similar spaces in the real world can encourage people to be their best, happiest, and most productive selves.
– Transcendence: Basketball is about defying gravity, becoming weightless, and flying higher than anyone ever has before. By seeking out this principle, we can elevate ourselves and those around us to a new plane of experience.
Whether you’re a seasoned veteran of the game or have never set foot on a court, How Basketball Can Save the World will empower you to become more resilient, tolerant, and wise in your relationship with yourself, others, and the world around you.
Unscripted by James B. Stewart and Rachel Abrams (Feb. 14)
The shocking inside story of the struggle for power and control of the multibillion media empire helmed by the Redstone family, along with news breaking accounts of corporate warfare, family rifts, sexual misconduct allegations, dirty players, and major settlements, from the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists who first broke the news
In 2016, the fate of Paramount – the media empire that includes Viacom, CBS, and Simon & Schuster – hung precariously in the balance. Its founder and head, 93 year old Sumner Redstone, was facing a very public lawsuit brought by a former romantic companion, Manuela Herzer–a lawsuit that brought Sumner’s deteriorating health and questionable judgement to light. His daughter Shari, whose relationship with Sumner had been less than warm, took control of her father’s business, to the frustration of the board and management who for decades had heard Sumner bemoan his daughter’s ideas. Les Moonves, the popular CEO of CBS, was particularly incensed; scheming with his allies on the board, he worked to strip Shari of power. But while he publicly battled Shari, news began to leak that Moonves was being investigated for several instances of sexual assault; fearing for his job, Moonves began working behind the scenes to try to make the stories disappear.
Unscripted is an explosive and unvarnished look at the usually-secret inner workings of two public companies, their boards of directors, and a wealthy family in the throes of seismic changes. Through the microcosm of this company, whose once victorious business model of cable fees and ticket sales is crumbling under the assault of technological advances, and whose workplace is undergoing radical change in the wake of #MeToo, Black Lives Matter, and a distaste for the old guard, New York Times reporters James B. Stewart and Rachel Abrams lay bare the battle for power at any price–and the carnage that ensued.
Cinema Speculation by Quentin Tarantino
The long-awaited first work of nonfiction from the author of the #1 New York Times bestselling Once Upon a Time in Hollywood: a deliriously entertaining, wickedly intelligent cinema book as unique and creative as anything by Quentin Tarantino.
In addition to being among the most celebrated of contemporary filmmakers, Quentin Tarantino is possibly the most joyously infectious movie lover alive. For years he has touted in interviews his eventual turn to writing books about films. Now, with Cinema Speculation, the time has come, and the results are everything his passionate fans—and all movie lovers—could have hoped for. Organized around key American films from the 1970s, all of which he first saw as a young moviegoer at the time, this book is as intellectually rigorous and insightful as it is rollicking and entertaining. At once film criticism, film theory, a feat of reporting, and wonderful personal history, it is all written in the singular voice recognizable immediately as QT’s and with the rare perspective about cinema possible only from one of the greatest practitioners of the artform ever.
Silent Spring Revolution by Douglas Brinkley
New York Times bestselling author and acclaimed historian Douglas Brinkley chronicles the rise of environmental activism during the Long Sixties, telling a highly charged story of an indomitable generation that quite literally saved the natural world under the leadership of John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon.
With the detonation of an atomic bomb in the New Mexico desert in 1945, humans took control of the earth for the first time. They were dominators and their hubris pervaded the post-World War II economic boom under Presidents Truman and Eisenhower, as America became the world’s leading hyper-industrial and military giant. But the Cold War era’s prosperity came at a high cost: oceans began to die, wilderness vanished, DDT poisoned ecosystems, species went extinct, and smog made breathing difficult in cities. Very few people cared, in part because pollution was typically diverted to the poorest neighborhoods.
In Silent Spring Revolution, Douglas Brinkley pays tribute to those who combated the mauling of the natural world in the Kennedy era, a group of environmental activists consisting of David Brower (Sierra Club), Stewart Udall (Secretary of the Interior), William O. Douglas (Supreme Court Justice) and others who fought for roadless public lands, wilderness preserves, and new national parks. By the 1960s, though, the problem of environmental degradation had grown much bigger. Environmental justice warriors like Barry Commoner, Coretta Scott King, Ralph Nader, Cesar Chavez, and Robert F. Kennedy, who insisted on the protection of the earth and public health, pushed John F. Kennedy to use the federal government to punish chemical polluters, save seashore habitats, and regulate the use of toxic pesticides.
JFK had been jolted by Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring, published in 1962. Depicting the deathblow that could be dealt by artificial chemicals, specifically DDT, the book launched an eco-revolution among the American people, which went on to inspire landmark legislation during Lyndon Johnson’s and Richard Nixon’s presidencies. Brinkley records these milestones of the modern environmental movement through the first Earth Day in 1970, after which every American life would forever be touched by the environmental movement of the Long Sixties (1960-1973).
Silent Spring Revolution is crucial to understanding the battle to protect America’s land, water, wildlife, and air. In a fast-evolving era when the nation is witnessing new types of environmental crises due to climate change and resource exhaustion, Douglas Brinkley’s meticulously researched and deftly written book is also a clarion call, reminding us of the passionate grassroots work that still needs to be done as the spirit of the Silent Spring Revolution continues well into the twenty-first century.
Silent Spring Revolution features two 8-page color photo inserts.
Reading the Glass by Elliot Rappaport (Feb. 14)
A sea captain’s beautifully written tour of our planet, our oceans, and our ever-changing atmosphere
“An extraordinary book by a modern-day Melville.”–Mark Vanhoenacker – “Immensely rewarding and entertaining.”–Lincoln Paine – “Full of history, wisdom, and hilarious stories from life on the open seas.”–Daniel Stone
What’s in a cloud? Did you know that water vapor is invisible and actually lighter than dry air? What separates a tropical storm from a winter blizzard? And what exactly is El Ni�o? Elliot Rappaport, a professional captain of traditional sailing ships, has spent three decades at sea, where understanding weather is crucial to the safety of vessels and their crews. In Reading the Glass, he offers a sailor’s-eye view of the moving parts of our atmosphere and unveils the larger patterns it holds: global winds, storms, air masses, jet streams, and the longer arc of our climate.
Told through a series of tall ship voyages, Rappaport’s narrative takes readers from the icy seas of Greenland to the Roaring Forties, places where one can experience all four seasons in an hour. He navigates the turbulent waters of the Strait of Gibraltar, en route to storied port cities of the Mediterranean. In the vast tropical Pacific he crosses the equator, where heat, moisture, and unsettled winds churn out powerful squalls, and drops anchor in isolated ports of call. He explores wide swathes of ocean to explain how the trade winds have carried ships westward for centuries, and how ancient Polynesian explorers pushed back the other way, leveraging their mastery of waves and weather to achieve what may be humanity’s greatest navigational achievement.
Written in stunning prose, brimming with wisdom, curiosity, and humor, Reading the Glassbrilliantly blends science and memoir to reveal how weather has shaped our oceans, our history, and ourselves.
The Grandest Stage by Tyler Kepner
From the New York Times bestselling author of K: A History of Baseball in Ten Pitches, a highly entertaining, revelatory history of the World Series, filled with gripping behind-the-scenes stories from 117 years of the Fall Classic.
The World Series is the most enduring showcase in American team sports. It’s the place where legends are made, where celebration and devastation can hinge on a fly ball off a foul pole or a grounder beneath a first baseman’s glove. And there’s no one better to bring this rich history to life than New York Times national baseball columnist Tyler Kepner, whose bestselling book about pitching, K, was lauded as “Michelangelo explaining the brush strokes on the Sistine Chapel” by Newsday.
In seven scintillating chapters, Kepner delivers an indelible portrait of baseball’s signature event. He digs deep for essential tales dating back to the beginning in 1903, adding insights from Hall of Famers like Reggie Jackson, Mike Schmidt, Jim Palmer, Dennis Eckersley and many others who have thrived – and failed – when it mattered most.
Why do some players, like Madison Bumgarner, Derek Jeter and David Ortiz, crave the pressure? How do players handle a dream that comes up short? What’s it like to manage in the World Series, and what are the secrets of building a champion? Kepner celebrates unexpected heroes like Bill Wambsganss, who pulled off an unassisted triple play in 1920, probes the mysteries behind magic moments (Did Babe Ruth call his shot in 1932? How could Eckersley walk Mike Davis to get to Kirk Gibson in 1988?) and busts some long-time myths (the 1919 Reds were much better than the Black Sox, anyway). The result is a vivid portrait of baseball at its finest and most intense, filled with humor, lore, analysis and unforgettable stories.
THE GRANDEST STAGE is the ultimate history of the World Series, the perfect gift for all the fans who feel their hearts pounding in the bottom of the ninth inning of Game Seven.
This Is Our City by Tony Massarotti
A celebration of the last two decades of sports success in Boston from the co-host of the #1 sports radio show in New England
Boston is a unique sports city. Unlike New York, Los Angeles, or Chicago, New Englanders’ loyalties are not divided among competing franchises; in the four major American sports, the city has one team each: the Red Sox, the Celtics, the Bruins, and the Patriots.
And, as any Boston fan will tell you, that loyalty runs deep. Sports just seem to mean more in New England. Over the last 20 years, those fans have been blessed with an extraordinary run of success, including 12 championships, six runners-up, and many more years of heated contention. In the 21st century, Boston became Titletown.
According to Tony Massarotti, longtime Boston sports columnist and host of the #1 sports radio show in New England for the past ten years, this is not a coincidence. Massarotti’s This Is Our City paints a portrait of the last 20 years in Boston sports, showing how one team’s success has led to the next—how they have fed off each other, tried to one-up one another, and have supported each other. This is an account of an era where successes and failures stitched together the region, all playing out against major events such as 9/11 and the devastating Boston Marathon—which led to a memorably profane speech by David Ortiz, who declared, “This is our f@#king city!” Massarotti’s This Is Our City is a valentine to Boston sports and will be loved by those fans, wherever they now live.
Charlie’s Good Tonight by Paul Sexton
The fully authorized and official biography of legendary Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts, one of the world’s most revered and celebrated musicians of the last half century.
Forewords by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards.
Charlie Watts was one of the most decorated musicians in the world, having joined the Rolling Stones, a few months after their formation, early in 1963.
A student of jazz drumming, he was headhunted by the band after bumping into them regularly in London’s rhythm and blues clubs. Once installed at the drum seat, he didn’t miss a gig, album or tour in his 60 years in the band. He was there throughout the swinging sixties, the early shot at superstardom and the Stones’ world conquest; and throughout the debauchery of the 1970s, typified by 1972’s Exile on Main St., considered one of the great albums of the century. By the 1980s, Charlie was battling his own demons, but emerged unscathed to enhance his unparalleled reputation even further over the ensuing decades.
Watts went through band bust-ups, bereavements and changes in personnel, managers, guitarists and rhythm sections, but remained the rock at the heart of the Rolling Stones for nearly 60 years—the thoughtful, intellectual but no less compelling counterpoint to the raucousness of his bandmates Keith Richards, Mick Jagger and Ronnie Wood. And this is his story.
The Philosophy of Modern Song by Bob Dylan
The Philosophy of Modern Song is Bob Dylan’s first book of new writing since 2004’s Chronicles: Volume One—and since winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016.
Dylan, who began working on the book in 2010, offers his extraordinary insight into the nature of popular music. He writes over sixty essays focusing on songs by other artists, spanning from Stephen Foster to Elvis Costello, and in between ranging from Hank Williams to Nina Simone. He analyzes what he calls the trap of easy rhymes, breaks down how the addition of a single syllable can diminish a song, and even explains how bluegrass relates to heavy metal. These essays are written in Dylan’s unique prose. They are mysterious and mercurial, poignant and profound, and often laugh-out-loud funny. And while they are ostensibly about music, they are really meditations and reflections on the human condition. Running throughout the book are nearly 150 carefully curated photos as well as a series of dream-like riffs that, taken together, resemble an epic poem and add to the work’s transcendence.
In 2020, with the release of his outstanding album Rough and Rowdy Ways, Dylan became the first artist to have an album hit the Billboard Top 40 in each decade since the 1960s. The Philosophy of Modern Song contains much of what he has learned about his craft in all those years, and like everything that Dylan does, it is a momentous artistic achievement.
The New Yorkers by Sam Roberts
From award-winning New York Times reporter Sam Roberts, the story of the world’s most exceptional city, told through 31 little-known yet pivotal inhabitants who helped define it.
In Sam Roberts’s pulsating history of the world’s most exceptional metropolis, greet the city anew through thirty-one unique New Yorkers you’ve probably never heard of-just in time for the city’s 400th birthday.
The New Yorkers introduces the first woman to appear nude in a motion picture, becoming the face of Civic Fame as Miss Manhattan; the couple whose soirée ended the Gilded Age with an embarrassing bang; and the husband and wife who invented the modern celebrity talk show. It reveals the victim of the city’s first recorded murder in the seventeenth century and the high school dropout who slashed crime rates in the twentieth. The notorious mobster who was imperiously banished from the city and the woman who successfully sued a bus company for racial discrimination a century before Rosa Parks.
Some deserved monuments, but their grandeur was overlooked or forgotten. Others shepherded the city through its perpetual evolution, but discreetly. Virtually all have vanished into New York’s uncombed history. The New Yorkers is a living biography of the world’s greatest city, and no one knows New York better than Sam Roberts-or is better at bringing its history to life.
