FRESHMAN YEAR READING 2011–12
Free Press is an imprint of Simon & Schuster known for serious nonfiction, affecting memoirs, and notable fiction. We hope that within these pages you will find the perfect title for your common reading program.
FREE PRESS
FREE PRESS Freshman Year Reading Excerpt Sampler �������������������������������������������������������� 1 Speakers Bureau & Book Trailers. ���������������������������� 2 Featured Titles ���������������������������������������������������������� 3 Memoir & Biography �������������������������������������������������� 7 Fiction �����������������������������������������������������������������������10 Science & Philosophy �����������������������������������������������12 Psychology ���������������������������������������������������������������14
Read excerpts from four Freshman Year Reading books by scanning the tag. With a distinguished history that spans more than fifty years of ground-breaking, influential, and award-winning books, Free Press publishes nonfiction and fiction for the general reader in hardcover and paperback. The imprint has a welldeserved reputation for excellence in a wide range of genres including politics, current affairs, biography and memoir, history, religion, narrative nonfiction, business and self-help, as well as fiction by some of today’s most notable writers. We have selected excerpts from four of the books featured in this catalog— All Things Shining, The Memory Palace, Tattoos on the Heart, and The Story of Stuff—and collected them in a sampler for your common reading committee’s consideration. You can access these files by scanning the tag with your mobile device (the free application ScanLife works on most smart phones), or by pointing the browser on your computer or phone to www.FreePressExcerpts.com.
Society �����������������������������������������������������������������������16 Social Justice �������������������������������������������������������������19 For Parents of College Students. ���������������������������� 20 Contact Information. �����������������������������������������������21 Members of common reading committees are welcome to request four free titles from this catalog. To request these books, tear off the card in the center of this catalog, check off the titles you would like to review, print your name and address, and drop the prepaid postcard in the mail. If you need additional books for your committee, please send an email to freepressmarketing@simonandschuster.com.
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The following authors featured in this catalog are available for speaking engagements through the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau. For more information visit www.simonspeakers.com.
FEATURED TITLES
Free Press authors are available for speaking engagements at your university
ANNIE LEONARD
The Story of Stuff The Impact of Overconsumption on the Planet, Our Communities, and Our Health— And How We Can Make It Better NOW IN PAPERBACK
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Carlos Eire
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Sian Beilock
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Thaddeus Russell
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Laura Caldwell
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Ayaan Hirsi Ali
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Priscilla Warner
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Michael Chorost
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Ranya Idliby
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Rebecca Traister
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Suzanne Oliver
Americans have way too much stuff. That’s the message Annie Leonard has been spreading with her short Internet film “The Story of Stuff,” which has been viewed by over twelve million people around the world. This astonishing, inspiring book takes her message to an even higher level. In it she outlines the perils and impact of overconsumption as she traces products back to their sources, through their life spans, and forward into their disposal. The Story of Stuff works on all levels as it brings together information on the environment, the economy, and cultures around the world.
Book Trailers and Author Interviews To view a selection of book trailers and author interviews for books in this catalog, scan the tag below with a mobile device, or point the browser on your computer or phone to www.youtube.com/freepressbooks.
Additional Resources Visit www.simonandschuster.com for Reading Group Guides and Author Q&As.
Annie Leonard is an expert in international sustainability and environmental health issues, with more than twenty years of experience investigating the material economy, working with organizations like Greenpeace International. In 2008, Annie was named one of TIME magazine’s Heroes of the Environment. For information about speaking engagements, write to freepressmarketing@ simonandschuster.com. © Christy McDonald
9781451610291 • PAPERBACK • 368 PAGES • $16.00 9781439148785 • EBOOK • $9.99
“After a rigorous book selection process, The Story of Stuff will help bring the campus’s core theme of stewardship for the 21st century into classrooms, dorm rooms, and living rooms. An extension of a successful online video, the book promotes the appropriate consumption of resources, while accommodating different points of view.” —Midori Yoshimura, Pacific Union College “The Story of Stuff video was a huge hit with my students and my family, and I plan on sharing this amazing book with everyone I know. Leonard expertly guides us through the hard truths of our material economy, from extraction to disposal and she offers concrete and positive alternatives every step of the way.” —David Naguib Pellow, Professor of Sociology, University of Minnesota Selected for common reading programs by Cal Poly Pomona and Pacific Union College.
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Big Dreams, Brave Journeys— Immigrant Teens Coming of Age in the U.S.A.
Paperback available in 2012 9781451620801 • EBOOK • $12.99
Hauser’s unforgettable portraits of these charismatic young people, many undocumented, who came to America to seek better lives, include Abdul, a diamond miner’s son from Sierra Leone whose arrival in NYC is shrouded in mystery; Ngawang, who spent twenty-four hours in a suitcase to escape from Tibet; and Burmese refugee Chit Su, a new freshman who is the only person in the entire school who speaks her language. New American High shows the rich, multi-hued face of America through the lives of memorably great characters. “This wonderful book connects us to the complexity, intensity and liveliness of refugee and immigrant teenagers. Hauser is masterful at storytelling. New American High is a must read for anyone interested in teaching, teens, or our new America. It does what the best writing does: it increases our moral imaginations.” —Mary Pipher, author of Reviving Ophelia
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All Things Shining Reading the Western Classics to Find Meaning in a Secular Age
COMING IN SEPTEMBER 2011
NEW
Inspired by the author’s widely acclaimed 2008 New York Times article, “This Strange Thing Called Prom,” New American High is immersion reporting at its most compelling. Brooke Hauser takes us deep inside the unique International High School in New York City, where there are no native English-speaking students and more than twenty-eight languages fill the halls. The students in this modern-day Babel apply to college, fall in love, and rebel against their families like normal teenagers, but many also deal with enormous obstacles—traumas and wars in their countries of origin that haunt them and pressures from their cultures to marry or drop out and go to work.
Hubert Dreyfus and Sean Dorrance Kelly illuminate some of the greatest works of the West to reveal how we have lost our passionate engagement with the world. Their journey takes us from the wonder and openness of Homer’s polytheism to the monotheism of Dante; from the autonomy of Kant to the multiple worlds of Melville; and, finally, to the spiritual difficulties evoked by modern authors such as David Foster Wallace. Dreyfus, a philosopher at UC Berkeley, is an original thinker who finds a new relevance in the classic texts of our culture. Kelly, a professor of philosophy at Harvard, is an eloquent new voice whose sensitivity to the sadness of the culture captures a generation adrift.
© Geneviève Dreyfus
9781439163283 • HARDCOVER • 304 PAGES • $26.00
HUBERT DREYFUS AND SEAN DORRANCE KELLY
Brooke Hauser writes for The New York Times and major magazines. She has covered stories ranging from New York’s broken juvenile justice system to Harlem’s spirited Baptist community. She also writes for The Los Angeles Times, Allure, and MORE Magazine. Originally from Miami, Florida, Hauser began her career as a reporter for The Miami Herald. She is a graduate of Kenyon College. For speaking engagements write to freepressmarketing@ simonandschuster.com. © Karen Wise (Karen Wise Photography)
© Cheryl Kelly Chen
FEATURED TITLES
New American High
FEATURED TITLES
BROOKE HAUSER
9781416596158 • HARDCOVER • 272 PAGES • $26.00
Paperback available in August 2011 9781416596165 • PAPERBACK • 272 PAGES • $15.00 9781439101704 • EBOOK • $12.99
Hubert Dreyfus is a leading interpreter of existential philosophy. He has taught at University of California, Berkeley for more than forty years. His lively, thought provoking lectures have earned him a podcast audience that often reaches the iTunesU Top 40.
“Two distinguished philosophers from the heart of the profession offer a meditation on the meaning of life, in a sharp, engaging style that will appeal to readers both within the academy and beyond it. They provide a compressed narrative of changes in Western understanding of human existence over the course of nearly three millenniums, and argue that reading great works of literature allows us to rediscover the reverence, gratitude and amazement that were available in Homeric times.” —The New York Times Book Review
Sean Dorrance Kelly is Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Department of Philosophy at Harvard University. He is also Co-Chair of Harvard’s interdisciplinary committee for the study of Mind, Brain, and Behavior.
“Occasionally brave philosophers do leap out of their professional lanes and illuminate things for the wider public. [Dreyfus and Kelly] have just done this with their new book, All Things Shining. They take a smart, sweeping run through the history of Western philosophy. But their book is important for the way it illuminates life today and for the controversial advice it offers on how to live.” —David Brooks, The New York Times
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FEATURED TITLES
CARLOS EIRE
Tattoos on the Heart
Waiting for Snow in Havana
The Power of Boundless Compassion Winner of the 2010 Southern California Independent Booksellers Association Award for Nonfiction NOW IN PAPERBACK
For twenty years, Gregory Boyle has run Homeboy Industries, a gang-intervention program located in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles, the gang capital of the world. In Tattoos on the Heart, he distills his experience working in the ghetto into a breathtaking series of parables inspired by faith. Arranged by theme and filled with sparkling humor and glowing generosity, these essays offer a stirring look at how full our lives could be if we could find the joy in loving and helping others. 9781439153154 • PAPERBACK • 240 PAGES • $14.00 9781439171776 • EBOOK • $9.99
“I highly and enthusiastically encourage the committee to select Father Greg Boyle’s Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion. This book is a moving account of struggling youth in the Los Angeles area, a wonderful read that will encourage our students to be serious students and work on behalf of others in our society.” —Marta Lopez-Garza, CSUN Common Reading Committee “Tattoos on the Heart will engage freshmen, draw them into reading and reflecting, and encourage freshmen to grow intellectually. Tattoos on the Heart will also encourage thought and discussion in a variety of courses and it values diverse cultural perspectives and addresses contemporary social issues.” —Antonio Gallo, CSUN Common Reading Committee Considered by California State University Northridge’s common reading program.
“Destined to become a classic of both urban reportage and contemporary spirituality.” —Los Angeles Times
Gregory Boyle is a Jesuit priest who has been the pastor of Dolores Mission in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles since 1986. © Maury Phillios He founded Homeboy Industries, whose various businesses—baking, silkscreening, landscaping—allow young people to work together, side by side, learning the mutual respect that comes from building something together. Among other awards, Boyle received the California Peace Prize and the 2008 Civic Medal of Honor from the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce. For information about speaking engagements, write to freepressmarketing@simonandschuster.
Confessions of a Cuban Boy Winner of the 2003 National Book Award for Nonfiction In 1962, Carlos Eire was one of 14,000 children airlifted out of Cuba—exiled from his family, his country, and his own childhood by the revolution. The memories of Carlos’s life in Havana, cut short when he was just eleven years old, are at the heart of this stunning, evocative, and unforgettable memoir. “Eire is gifted with what might be called lyric precision—a knack for grasping the life of a moment through its sensuous particulars.… Vigorously written and alive.” —The Boston Globe 9780743246415 • PAPERBACK • 400 PAGES • $15.00
One Book, One Philadelphia 2007 Selection
9780743245708 • EBOOK • $11.99
CARLOS EIRE
Learning to Die in Miami Confessions of a Refugee Boy NOW IN PAPERBACK
In Learning to Die in Miami, Carlos Eire explores the consequences associated with the emergence of his new American identity during the Cuban Revolution.
9781439181904 • HARDCOVER • 320 PAGES • $26.00
Paperback available in June 2011 9781439181911 • PAPERBACK • 320 PAGES • $15.00 9781439181928 • EBOOK • $11.99
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FEATURED TITLES MEMOIR & BIOGRAPHY
GREGORY BOYLE
“Eire writes with both levity and wisdom about the tension between Carlos the Cuban and Charles the American, describing his process of maturing as ‘learning to die’—or, more prosaically, to let go of worldly attachments such as his childhood memories of life in Cuba. With each move, unrequited schoolyard crush or achievement in his adopted language, he sheds a former self. Eventually he embraces this continual reinvention as itself something distinctly American.” —The Wall Street Journal 7
FEATURED TITLES MEMOIR & BIOGRAPHY
ANNIA CIEZADLO
The Memory Palace
Day of Honey
NOW IN PAPERBACK
A Memoir of Food, Love, and War
The Memory Palace is a breathtaking literary memoir about the complex impact that Mira Bartók’s mother’s schizophrenia had on her life. With stunning prose and original art created by the author, The Memory Palace explores the connections between parents and children that cannot be broken no matter how much exists—or is lost —between them.
NEW
“Like the cabinet of wonders that is a frequent motif here, Bartók’s memory palace contains some rare, distinctive and genuinely imaginative treasures.” —The New York Times Book Review
9781439183328 • PAPERBACK • 320 PAGES • $15.00 9781439183335 • EBOOK • $11.99
“A complex web of bewitching verbal and visual images, memories, dreams, true stories and rambling excerpts from the author’s mentally ill mother’s notebooks. It is an extraordinary mix.” —The Washington Post
“Among the least political, and most intimate and valuable [books], to have come out of the Iraq war… Filled with adrenalized scenes from war zones, scenes of narrow escapes and clandestine phone calls and frightening cultural misunderstandings….These things wouldn’t matter much, though, if her sentences didn’t make such a sensual, smart, wired-up sound on the page… readers will feel lucky to find her.” —Dwight Garner, The New York Times “A passionate argument for the idea that whether it’s your mother-in-law or a military enemy, meeting over a meal eases differences, and that knowing the world means dining in it.” — Bookforum
9781416583936 • HARDCOVER • 400 PAGES • $26.00
Paperback available in February 2012 9781416583943 • PAPERBACK • 320 PAGES • $15.00 9781416584223 • EBOOK • $12.99
DANIEL TAMMET
MARK MATHABANE
AYAAN HIRSI ALI
Born on a Blue Day
Kaffir Boy
Infidel
Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant
The True Story Of A Black Youth’s Coming of Age in Apartheid South Africa
Born in Somalia and raised a Muslim, Ayaan Hirsi Ali escaped an arranged marriage and made a new life in the West, championing the reform of Islam and its attitude to women’s rights.
Born on a Blue Day is a journey into one of the world’s most fascinating minds. Daniel Tammet is virtually unique among people who have severe autistic disorders in that he is capable of explaining what is happening inside his head.
Mark Mathabane was weaned on devastating poverty and schooled in the cruel streets of South Africa’s most desperate ghetto, where bloody gang wars and midnight police raids were his rites of passage. Like every other child born in the hopelessness of apartheid, he learned to measure his life in days, not years. Yet Mark Mathabane, armed only with the courage of his family and a hard-won education, raised himself up from the squalor to win a scholarship to an American university.
“Something in the way that Mr. Tammet describes the beautiful, aching, hallucinatory process of arriving at his answers illuminates the excitement of all cogitation.” —The New York Times “Tammet, now 28, manages the feat of introspection—and self-insight. His book brims with humanity. His approach is honest, eloquent, at times funny, and completely free of pity.” —The Plain Dealer (Cleveland)
9781416549017 • PAPERBACK • 256 PAGES • $15.00 9781416548195 • EBOOK • $11.99
Selected for common reading programs by Norfolk State University and Lawrenceville University 9780684848280 • PAPERBACK • 368 PAGES • $15.95
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FEATURED TITLES MEMOIR & BIOGRAPHY
MIRA BARTÓK
“Ayaan Hirsi Ali is one of Europe’s most controversial political figures and a target for terrorists. A notably enigmatic personality.… Soft-spoken but passionate.” —The Boston Globe “Too potent a social critic to be tolerated any longer [in her home country]… an unflinching advocate of women’s rights and an unflinching critic of Islamic extremism.” —The New York Times 9780684848280 • PAPERBACK • 368 PAGES • $15.95 9781416538592 • EBOOK • $12.99
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FICTION
PETER MANSEAU
The Madonnas of Echo Park
Songs for the Butcher’s Daugher
NOW IN PAPERBACK
Winner, 2009 Ribalow Prize for Jewish Fiction Winner, 2009 ALA’s Sophie Brody Medal Winner, 2008 National Jewish Book Award Shortlist, John Sargent Sr. First Novel Prize
Winner of the 2011 Hemingway Foundation/ PEN Award and the 2011 Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction Spiralling from a single, unthinkable act of violence, this sweeping novel of the unseen world of Los Angeles takes us deep inside the lives of the men and women who cook the meals, clean the homes, and struggle to lose their ethnic identity in pursuit of the American Dream. “Rich and textured…. Skyhorse uses elegant prose and vivid storytelling to tackle questions surrounding culture, belonging, and identity.”—The Christian Science Monitor 9781439170847 • PAPERBACK • 240 PAGES • $14.00 9781439170854 • EBOOK • $11.99
Selected for the Fall Semester Book Club, Occidental College, Los Angeles
FICTION
BRANDO SKYHORSE
Exiled from Russia, Itsik Malpesh works in New York as a typesetter. He is unexpectedly reunited with his greatest love—and later his greatest enemy—with results both serendipitous and tragic. “An extraordinary novel, and Itsik Malpesh is one of literature’s most stunning achievements.” —Junot Díaz “Songs for the Butcher’s Daughter is a book about writing, a warm, funny, and fascinating testament to the power of words, a power that outlives a dying language and transcends love.” —Jewish Book World
9781416538714 • PAPERBACK • 400 PAGES • $14.00 9781416579731 • EBOOK • $10.99
ARAVIND ADIGA
NIKOLAI GROZNI
The White Tiger
Wunderkind
Winner of the Man Booker Prize 2008
COMING IN SEPTEMBER 2011
“Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger is one of the most powerful books I’ve read in decades. No hyperbole. This debut novel from an Indian journalist living in Mumbai hit me like a kick to the head—the same effect Richard Wright’s Native Son and Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man had.” —USA Today
An exquisitely observed, tragicomic glimpse behind the Iron Curtain at the tail end of the Cold War. Brash, brilliant fifteen-yearold Konstantin is a world-class pianist of exceptional sensitivity whose propulsive rage at Soviet oppression threatens to destroy him. Increasingly desperate and reckless, Konstantin struggles toward adulthood in a society where expression of any kind can come at terrible cost. Like Gary Shteyngart and Jonathan Safran Foer, Grozni—himself a native of Bulgaria who was a world-class pianist in his youth—sets an electrifying portrait of eloquent adolescent turmoil.
“Unpretentious and compulsively readable… Aravind Adiga’s auspicious debut novel is at once a fascinating glimpse beneath the surface of an Indian economic ‘miracle,’ a heart-stopping psychological tale of a premeditated murder and its aftermath, and a meticulously conceived allegory of the creative destruction that’s driving globalization.” —The New York Sun Selected for Spokane Falls Community College’s common reading program
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9781451616910 • PAPERBACK • 288 PAGES • $24.00 9781416562603 • PAPERBACK • 304 PAGES • $15.00 9781416562733 • EBOOK • $11.99
9781451616989 • EBOOK • $10.99
“Wunderkind is a gift for all the senses. Nikolai Grozni’s shimmering, visual and visceral prose unfurls like music, as if a baby grand served as his infernal typewriter.” —Patti Smith 11
SCIENCE & PHILOSOPHY
WALTER LEWIN
World Wide Mind
For the Love of Physics
The Coming Integration of Humanity, Machines, and the Internet
With Warren Goldstein
NEW
“A fascinating discussion of optogenetics research… Chorost’s curiosity is contagious… [He] is not only a clear and concise science writer, but also a visionary. The coming integration of humans and machines may be a bit further off than he thinks, but he convinced me that we will get there someday.” —The New York Times
9781439119143 • HARDCOVER • 256 PAGES • $35.00
Paperback available in August 2011 9781439119167 • PAPERBACK • 256 PAGES • $15.00
“Michael Chorost is one of the most thoughtful writers confronting a major question of the 21st century: how will the ability to engineer human minds change the way we live, communicate, and love? This is a remarkable book.” —Ed Boyden, Assistant Professor, MIT
From the End of the Rainbow to the Edge Of Time—A Journey Through the Wonders of Physics NEW
“For the Love of Physics captures Walter Lewin’s extraordinary intellect, passion for physics and brilliance as a teacher. Hopefully, this book will bring even more people into the orbit of this extraordinary educator and scientist.” —Bill Gates “MIT’s Lewin is deservedly popular for his memorable physics lectures.… and this quickpaced autobiography–cum-physics intro fully captures his candor and lively teaching style.… This [book] glows with energy and should please a wide range of readers.” — Publishers Weekly, starred review
9781439141205 • EBOOK • $12.99
9781439119143 • HARDCOVER • 256 PAGES • $35.00
Paperback available in August 2011 9781439119167 • PAPERBACK • 256 PAGES • $15.00 9781439123546 • EBOOK • $12.99
AMY ELLIS NUTT
ALEX BELLOS
Shadows Bright as Glass
Here’s Looking at Euclid
The Remarkable Story of One Man’s Journey from Brain Trauma to Artistic Triumph
From Counting Ants to Games of Chance—An Awe-Inspiring Journey Through the World of Numbers
NEW
NOW IN PAPERBACK
“The fascinating story of how a chiropractor, after suffering a massive brain injury, became an acclaimed artist with an entirely new outlook on life. Nutt incisively delves into the emotional and physical implications of such a shift, examining the relationship between the brain and the soul… A mindbending and inspiring book.” — Kirkus Reviews, starred review “Shadows Bright As Glass is a fascinating glimpse into the mysteries of the mind, brain and creativity. Jon Sarkin wrestles with the great questions of the search for self, questions that concern us all.” —Alice Flaherty, M.D., Ph.D., Department of Neurology, Harvard Medical School 12
SCIENCE & PHILOSOPHY
MICHAEL CHOROST
“A smorgasbord for math fans of all abilities.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review
9781439143100 • HARDCOVER • 288 PAGES • $26.00
Paperback available in April 2012 9781439143117 • PAPERBACK • 288 PAGES
9781416588283 • PAPERBACK • 336 PAGES • $15.00 9781416596349 • EBOOK • $12.99
“What Bellos calls the ‘wow factor’ of mathematics leaps out at the reader from every page of this remarkable foray into the realm of numbers…a fascinating journey of discovery. The stories prove so engaging, the personalities so colorful, that readers may forget they are mastering some powerful mathematical concepts. Intellectual entertainment of the first order.” —Booklist
9781439150078 • EBOOK • $12.99
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PSYCHOLOGY
SIAN BEILOCK
The Big Questions
Choke
Tackling the Problems of Philosophy with Ideas from Mathematics, Economics, and Physics
What the Secrets of the Brain Reveal About Getting It Right When You Have To
NOW IN PAPERBACK
NOW IN PAPERBACK
Slate columnist and University of Rochester economics professor Steven Landsburg employs concepts from mathematics, economics, and physics in this sprightly tour of the deepest problems in philosophy: What is real? And how should we live?
Winner of the Association for Psychological Science’s 2011 Janet Taylor Spence Award
He gives us a mathematical analysis for arguments for the existence of God and carefully dissects the meaning of social responsibility on the playground, in the marketplace, and in the voting booth. Stimulating, illuminating, and always surprising, The Big Questions reveals the relationship between the loftiest philosophical quests and our everyday lives.
9781439153598 • EBOOK • $9.99
ROBERT ROWLAND SMITH
Driving with Plato The Meaning of Life’s Milestones NEW
Learn to ride a bicycle with Einstein, have your first kiss with Kant, get your first job with Adam Smith, and weather midlife with Dante. Let history’s greatest minds illuminate life’s turning points. Grounding abstract ideas in concrete experience, Driving with Plato helps us think more deeply about the key events in our lives even as it provides a philosophical education. 9781439186879 • HARDCOVER • 256 PAGES • $19.99
Paperback available in May 2012 9781439186893 • EBOOK • $9.99
In an energetic tour of the latest science, Dr. Sian Beilock, an expert on performance and the brain, explains the inescapable links between body and mind; reveals the surprising similarities among the ways performers, students, athletes, and business people blunder when the stakes are high; and shows how to succeed brilliantly when it matters most. Selected by the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics for their Summer Reading Program.
9781416596189 • PAPERBACK • 304 PAGES • $15.00 9781439109625 • EBOOK • $12.99
JEAN M. TWENGE, PH.D.
ROBERT ROWLAND SMITH
Generation Me
Breakfast with Socrates
Why Today’s Young Americans Are More Confident, Assertive, Entitled— and More Miserable Than Ever Before
An Extraordinary (Philosophical) Journey Through Your Ordinary Day
Called “The Entitlement Generation” or Gen Y, they are storming into schools, colleges, and businesses all over the country. In this provocative new book, psychologist Dr. Jean Twenge explores why the young people she calls “Generation Me”—those born in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s—are tolerant, confident, open-minded, and ambitious but also cynical, depressed, lonely, and anxious.
NOW IN PAPERBACK
Ever want to spend a day with Socrates or Kant and be able to pick their brains about your life? Former Oxford Philosophy Fellow Robert Rowland Smith thought he would, and so with dry wit and marvelous invention, Smith whisks you through a typical day, injecting a little philosophy into it at every turn. “A thoughtful and continuously entertaining picture of human behavior. A filling mental meal that should leave you delightfully satisfied.” —Wired
PSYCHOLOGY
9781439148228 • PAPERBACK • 288 PAGES • $15.00
STEVEN E. LANDSBURG
9780743276986 • PAPERBACK • 304 PAGES • $15.99 9780743288859 • EBOOK • $12.99
Engaging, controversial, prescriptive, funny, Generation Me will give Boomers new insight into their offspring, and help those in their teens, 20s, and 30s finally make sense of themselves and their goals and find their road to happiness.
9781439148686 • PAPERBACK • 256 PAGES • $12.99 9781439171882 • EBOOK • $9.99
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SOCIETY
RICHARD E. NISBETT
Big Girls Don’t Cry
The Geography of Thought
The Election that Changed Everything for American Women NOW IN PAPERBACK
“Rebecca Traister is the most brilliant voice on feminism in this county.” —Anne Lamott, author of Bird by Bird
9781439150290 • PAPERBACK • 352 PAGES • $15.00 9781439154878 • EBOOK • $12.99
“Conversational, thorough, and adept, Big Girls Don’t Cry refuses to engage in an us-versusthem debate over the 2008 election and its attendant fallout. Instead she articulates the ways in which American identity—white, Black, male, female, feminist, conservative, gay, straight—affects who we choose to represent us. I would highly recommend this book to anyone teaching classes on American history, electoral politics, and gender studies.” —Jennifer Maher, Gender Studies professor, Indiana University, Bloomington
SOCIETY
REBECCA TRAISTER
How Asians and Westerners Think Differently… and Why “This landmark book by University of Michigan psychologist Richard E. Nisbett shows conclusively that laboratory experiments limited to American college students or even individuals from the Western Hemisphere simply cannot provide an adequate understanding of how people, in general, think. The book shows that understanding of how individuals in Eastern cultures think is… necessary if we wish to solve the problems we confront in the world today.” —Robert J. Sternberg, Professor of Psychology and Education, Yale University 9780743255356 • PAPERBACK • 288 PAGES • $15.00 9781439106679 • EBOOK • $11.99
CHARLES FISHMAN
THADDEUS RUSSELL
The Big Thirst
A Renegade History of the United States
The Secret Life and Turbulent Future of Water
NOW IN PAPERBACK
NEW
In this groundbreaking book, noted historian Thaddeus Russell tells a new and surprising story about the origins of American freedom. Rather than crediting the standard textbook icons, Russell brilliantly and vibrantly argues that it was history’s iconoclasts who established many of our most cherished liberties.
“An engrossing, globe-trotting narrative [and] a comprehensive, remarkably readable panorama of our dependence on—and responsibilities to—a priceless resource.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review “[A] lively and invaluable assessment of the current politics, economics, and culture of water. Lyrical in his descriptions of the beauty and wonder of water, Fishman is rigorous when explaining that the water we have now is all the water we will ever have.” —Booklist, starred review “A wide-ranging look at thatmost precious of goods, water, and a world in which it is a subject of constantcrisis… A timely warning.” —Kirkus Reviews 16
9781439102077 • HARDCOVER • 400 PAGES • $26.99
Paperback available in March 2012 9781439124932 • EBOOK • $12.99
9781416576136 • PAPERBACK • 400 PAGES • $16.00 9781416571094 • EBOOK • $12.99
“A bold, controversial, original view of American history that will amuse, inspire, outrage, and most of all instruct readers. Russell strips away conventional wisdom and explodes many myths. In the process, he sheds new light on ideas, institutions, and people.” —Alan Brinkley, Allan Nevins Professor of History, Columbia University, and author of The Publisher: Henry Luce and His American Century
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SOCIETY Paperback available in February 2012 9781439154878 • EBOOK • $12.99
JUDY PASTERNAK
Allah, Liberty and Love
Yellow Dirt
The Courage to Reconcile Faith and Freedom
A Poisoned Land and the Betrayal of the Navajos
COMING IN JUNE 2011
NOW IN PAPERBACK
“Like the uprisings against Middle East dictators, Allah, Liberty and Love is a jolt of adrenalin in the struggle against enemies of humanity—those who would coerce a people’s rights or an individual’s conscience. Irshad Manji is a brave woman whose moral courage brings threats against her life. Now, even as she equips her Muslim brothers and sisters to ‘stay with integrity’ in their effort to replace dogma with faith, Manji challenges us who are not Muslims to take on the closed minds of our own religion, party, community, or clan. This is a passionate yet practical guide for the journey of moral courage that each of us must begin if we are to live with dignity on a crowded planet.” —Bill Moyers
Winner of the J. Anthony Lukas Prize “Disturbing and illuminating. Pasternak evokes the magnitude of a nuclear disaster that continues to reverberate. Unfolds like true crime, where real-life heroes and villains play dynamic roles in a drama that escalates page by page. Eye-opening and riveting, Yellow Dirt gives a sobering glimpse into our atomic past and adds a critical voice to the debate about resurrecting America’s nuclear industry.” —The Washington Post “This story will break your heart…. An enormous achievement.” —The Christian Science Monitor
9781439100462 • EBOOK • $12.99
Long Way Home A Young Man Lost in the System and the Two Women Who Found Him
The Faith Club A Muslim, A Christian, a Jew— Three Women Search for Understanding
NEW
Nineteen-year-old Jovan Mosley, a good kid from one of Chicago’s very bad neighborhoods, was coerced into confessing to a crime he didn’t commit. Charged with murder, he spent five years and eight months in a prison for violent criminals— without a trial.
A groundbreaking book about Americans searching for faith and mutual respect, The Faith Club weaves the story of three women, their three religions, and their urgent quest to understand one another. “More ‘Fight Club’ than book club, the coauthors pull no punches; their outstanding honesty makes for a page-turning read, rare for a religion non-fiction book . . . almost every taboo topic is explored on this engaging spiritual ride.” —Publishers Weekly
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9781439163207 • PAPERBACK • 272 PAGES • $16.00
LAURA CALDWELL
RANYA IDLIBY, SUZANNE OLIVER, AND PRICILLA WARNER
Includes a discussion guide in English, Hebrew, and Arabic for campus faith clubs.
SOCIAL JUSTICE
9781439150283 • HARDCOVER • 352 PAGES • $26.00
IRSHAD MANJI
9780743290487 • PAPERBACK • 416 PAGES • $15.99 9780743298629 • EBOOK • $12.99
9781439100233 • HARDCOVER • 320 PAGES • $26.00 9781439123027 • EBOOK • $12.99
This is a harrowing true story about justice, friendship, failure, and success. It would take a triumph of human kindness, ingenuity, and legal jousting to give Jovan even a fighting chance. Deeply affecting, Long Way Home is a remarkable story of how change can happen even in a flawed system and of how friendship can emanate from the most unexpected places.
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BARBARA K. HOFER, PH. D. AND ABIGAIL SULLIVAN MOORE
The iConnected Parent Staying Close to Your Kids in College (and Beyond) While Letting Them Grow Up NOW IN PAPERBACK
“Just let go!” That’s what parents have been told to do when their kids go to college. But in our speed-dial culture, with BlackBerries and even Skype, parents and kids are now more than ever in constant contact.
9781439148297 • HARDCOVER • 288 PAGES • $25.00
Paperback available in June 2011 9781439148303 • PAPERBACK • 288 PAGES • $15.00 9781439154182 • EBOOK • $14.99
Dr. Barbara Hofer, a Middlebury College professor of psychology, and Abigail Sullivan Moore, a journalist who has reported on college and high school trends for the New York Times, offer a groundbreaking and compelling account of the positive and negative impact of communication between parents and children during the college years and beyond. The iConnected Parent is an invaluable guide for any parent with a child heading to or already on campus.
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