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New York Times Best Sellers - Non-Fiction

Description: Bookshare is pleased to offer the top 10 non-fiction books from the New York Times best seller list on a weekly basis. Books are added in as they become available. The month corresponds to the first time they appeared on the list. #adults


Showing 26 through 50 of 814 results
 
 

A Different Kind of Power

by Jacinda Ardern

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the former prime minister of New Zealand, then the world&’s youngest female head of government and just the second to give birth in office, comes a deeply personal memoir chronicling her extraordinary rise and offering inspiration to a new generation of leaders.&“A clear and compelling case for compassion . . . an implicit repudiation of the strongman style of leadership that has taken hold around the world.&”—The Washington PostWhat if we could redefine leadership? What if kindness came first? Jacinda Ardern grew up the daughter of a police officer in small-town New Zealand, but as the 40th Prime Minister of her country, she commanded global respect for her empathetic leadership that put people first. This is the remarkable story of how a Mormon girl plagued by self-doubt made political history and changed our assumptions of what a global leader can be. When Jacinda Ardern became Prime Minister at age thirty-seven, the world took notice. But it was her compassionate yet powerful response to the 2019 Christchurch mosque attacks, resulting in swift and sweeping gun control laws, that demonstrated her remarkable leadership. She guided her country through unprecedented challenges—a volcanic eruption, a major biosecurity breach, and a global pandemic—while advancing visionary new policies to address climate change, reduce child poverty, and secure historic international trade deals. She did all this while juggling first-time motherhood in the public eye. Ardern exemplifies a new kind of leadership—proving that leaders can be caring, empathetic, and effective. She has become a global icon, and now she is ready to share her story, from the struggles to the surprises, including for the first time the full details of her decision to step down during her sixth year as Prime Minister. Through her personal experiences and reflections, Jacinda is a model for anyone who has ever doubted themselves, or has aspired to lead with compassion, conviction, and courage. A Different Kind of Power is more than a political memoir; it&’s an insight into how it feels to lead, ultimately asking: What if you, too, are capable of more than you ever imagined?

Date Added: 06/26/2025


Year: 2025

Month: June

2024

by Isaac Arnsdorf and Josh Dawsey and Tyler Pager

In 2024, award-winning reporters Josh Dawsey, Tyler Pager, and Isaac Arnsdorf bring us the definitive, inside story of the most tumultuous and consequential presidential campaign in our history."An immersive and philosophical tour of an election whose outcome, [the authors] argue, was anything but inevitable.&” —The New York Times&“The whole world was against me, and I won,&” said Donald Trump in an exclusive interview, ten days before his second inauguration. Nearly four years after Trump&’s first turbulent presidency concluded in a violent attempt to overturn the election, he made a political comeback on a scale that stunned the nation. How did the first U.S. president to become a convicted felon regain control of the White House? And at what cost? 2024 is the explosive account of how Trump and his advisers overcame a dozen primary challengers, four indictments, two assassination attempts, and his own past mistakes to defeat the Democrats, and pave the way for a second term that would be far more aggressive and ruthless than the first.Drawing on extraordinary access to the Trump, Biden, and Harris teams, 2024 takes readers beyond the speeches, rallies, and debates to reveal the innermost workings of the Republican and Democratic presidential campaigns. Beginning in August 2022 with the FBI&’s search of Mar-a-Lago for classified documents, and Trump&’s subsequent decision to run once again for president, Dawsey, Pager, and Arnsdorf chart how Trump stifled the rise of Republican opponents, including Ron DeSantis, and how his campaign, led by Susie Wiles, landed on a winning strategy. They reveal in unrivaled detail how Joe Biden and his team brushed off concerns about his age, ignored polling numbers, and held off the next generation of eager Democratic hopefuls—even as Biden was dealing with his own special counsel investigation and the trial of his son Hunter. After his disastrous debate performance forced him to withdraw, Biden anointed Vice President Kamala Harris as the candidate and tasked her with running the shortest presidential campaign in modern U.S. history. With only 107 days to distinguish herself from the past four years, Harris lacked the time or space to outrun Biden&’s shadow—a challenge in and of itself, but one which Biden would make even more difficult. On November 5th, 2024, Trump was elected the nation&’s forty-seventh president, and would return to power vindicated, emboldened, unrestrained, and burning for revenge.Gripping, revelatory, and deeply reported, 2024 is the shocking inside story of the election that tested American democracy and would go on to shape the future of the free world.

Date Added: 08/10/2025


Year: 2025

Month: July

We Might Just Make It After All

by Elyce Arons

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A moving portrait of friendship by Elyce Arons as she reflects on her long relationship with Kate Spade, whom she met in college and with whom she cofounded the multi-billion-dollar fashion company as they came of age in 1990s New York.When Elyce Arons first met Katy Brosnahan in a University of Kansas dorm room, she had no idea that this polo shirt–wearing Missouri girl would not only become her best friend but also change the course of her life. Back then, Katy and Elyce were preoccupied with frat parties and The Mary Tyler Moore Show; within a decade, they&’d be scraping by in New York City, working day jobs to spend nights building a new line of handbags that would one day revolutionize the accessories industry. We Might Just Make It After All brings us on the rollercoaster of adventures (and misadventures) that the best friends embarked on, from transferring colleges on a whim, to falling in and out of love with suitors, cramming into roach-infested Hell&’s Kitchen apartments, and eventually designing the chic, simple bag that would launch the pair to global fame. Through it all, Katy and Elyce&’s friendship remained unshakeable. This powerful friendship lasted nearly forty years, until Katy&’s tragic suicide in 2018. We Might Just Make It After All celebrates her legacy as a cultural icon and loyal friend. Set against the glitzy and gritty backdrop of downtown New York at the turn of the century, We Might Just Make It After All lovingly and candidly explores the power of a friendship as close as sisterhood, the challenges facing women entrepreneurs in the 1990s, and the timeless elegance of a generation-defining brand.

Date Added: 06/26/2025


Year: 2025

Month: July

Briefly Perfectly Human

by Alua Arthur

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERA deeply transformative memoir that reframes how we think about death and how it can help us lead better, more fulfilling and authentic lives, from America’s most visible death doula."A truly unique, inspiring perspective on the time we have, what we do with it, and how we let go of this world.... There is no one I'd trust more to guide me through an understanding of death, and how it informs life." — Jodi Picoult, New York Times bestselling author of Mad Honey and The Book of Two Ways"Briefly Perfectly Human is a beautiful, raw, light-bringing experience. Alua's voice is shimmering, singular, and pulses with humor, vulnerability, insight, and refreshing candor.... Be prepared for it to grab you, hold you tight, and raise the roof on the power of human connection." — Tembi Locke, author of From Scratch: A Memoir of Love, Sicily, and Finding HomeFor her clients and everyone who has been inspired by her humanity, Alua Arthur is a friend at the end of the world. As our country’s leading death doula, she’s spreading a transformative message: thinking about your death—whether imminent or not—will breathe wild, new potential into your life.Warm, generous, and funny AF, Alua supports and helps manage end-of-life care on many levels. The business matters, medical directives, memorial planning; but also honoring the quiet moments, when monitors are beeping and loved ones have stepped out to get some air—or maybe not shown up at all—and her clients become deeply contemplative and want to talk. Aching, unfinished business often emerges. Alua has been present for thousands of these sacred moments—when regrets, fears, secret joys, hidden affairs, and dim realities are finally said aloud. When this happens, Alua focuses her attention at the pulsing center of her clients’ anguish and creates space for them, and sometimes their loved ones, to find peace.This has had a profound effect on Alua, who was already no stranger to death’s periphery. Her family fled a murderous coup d’état in Ghana in the 1980s. She has suffered major, debilitating depressions. And her dear friend and brother-in-law died of lymphoma. Advocating for him in his final months is what led Alua to her life’s calling. She knows firsthand the power of bearing witness and telling the truth about life’s painful complexities, because they do not disappear when you look the other way. They wait for you.Briefly Perfectly Human is a life-changing, soul-gathering debut, by a writer whose empathy, tenderness, and wisdom shimmers on the page. Alua Arthur combines intimate storytelling with a passionate appeal for loving, courageous end-of-life care—what she calls “death embrace.” Hers is a powerful testament to getting in touch with something deeper in our lives, by embracing the fact of our own mortality. “Hold that truth in your mind,” Alua says, “and wondrous things will begin to grow around it.”

Date Added: 04/27/2024


Year: 2024

Month: May

The Fate of the Day

by Rick Atkinson

In the second volume of the landmark American Revolution trilogy by the Pulitzer Prize–winning and #1 New York Times bestselling author of The British Are Coming, George Washington’s army fights on the knife edge between victory and defeat.

The first twenty-one months of the American Revolution—which began at Lexington and ended at Princeton—was the story of a ragged group of militiamen and soldiers fighting to forge a new nation. By the winter of 1777, the exhausted Continental Army could claim only that it had barely escaped annihilation by the world’s most formidable fighting force.

Two years into the war, George III is as determined as ever to bring his rebellious colonies to heel. But the king’s task is now far more complicated: fighting a determined enemy on the other side of the Atlantic has become ruinously expensive, and spies tell him that the French and Spanish are threatening to join forces with the Americans.

Prize-winning historian Rick Atkinson provides a riveting narrative covering the middle years of the Revolution. Stationed in Paris, Benjamin Franklin woos the French; in Pennsylvania, George Washington pleads with Congress to deliver the money, men, and materiel he needs to continue the fight. In New York, General William Howe, the commander of the greatest army the British have ever sent overseas, plans a new campaign against the Americans—even as he is no longer certain that he can win this searing, bloody war. The months and years that follow bring epic battles at Brandywine, Saratoga, Monmouth, and Charleston, a winter of misery at Valley Forge, and yet more appeals for sacrifice by every American committed to the struggle for freedom.

Timed to coincide with the 250th anniversary of the beginning of the Revolution, Atkinson’s brilliant account of the lethal conflict between the Americans and the British offers not only deeply researched and spectacularly dramatic history, but also a new perspective on the demands that a democracy makes on its citizens. New York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 05/19/2025


Year: 2025

Month: May

Outlive

by Peter Attia MD

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • OVER TWO MILLION COPIES SOLD • A groundbreaking manifesto on living better and longer that challenges the conventional medical thinking on aging and reveals a new approach to preventing chronic disease and extending long-term health, from a visionary physician and leading longevity expert &“One of the most important books you&’ll ever read.&”—Steven D. Levitt, New York Times bestselling author of Freakonomics AN ECONOMIST AND BLOOMBERG BEST BOOK OF THE YEARWouldn&’t you like to live longer? And better? In this operating manual for longevity, Dr. Peter Attia draws on the latest science to deliver innovative nutritional interventions, techniques for optimizing exercise and sleep, and tools for addressing emotional and mental health. For all its successes, mainstream medicine has failed to make much progress against the diseases of aging that kill most people: heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer&’s disease, and type 2 diabetes. Too often, it intervenes with treatments too late to help, prolonging lifespan at the expense of healthspan, or quality of life. Dr. Attia believes we must replace this outdated framework with a personalized, proactive strategy for longevity, one where we take action now, rather than waiting. This is not &“biohacking,&” it&’s science: a well-founded strategic and tactical approach to extending lifespan while also improving our physical, cognitive, and emotional health. Dr. Attia&’s aim is less to tell you what to do and more to help you learn how to think about long-term health, in order to create the best plan for you as an individual. In Outlive, readers will discover: • Why the cholesterol test at your annual physical doesn&’t tell you enough about your actual risk of dying from a heart attack.• That you may already suffer from an extremely common yet underdiagnosed liver condition that could be a precursor to the chronic diseases of aging.• Why exercise is the most potent pro-longevity &“drug&”—and how to begin training for the &“Centenarian Decathlon.&”• Why you should forget about diets, and focus instead on nutritional biochemistry, using technology and data to personalize your eating pattern.• Why striving for physical health and longevity, but ignoring emotional health, could be the ultimate curse of all. Aging and longevity are far more malleable than we think; our fate is not set in stone. With the right roadmap, you can plot a different path for your life, one that lets you outlive your genes to make each decade better than the one before.

Date Added: 04/06/2023


Year: 2023

Month: April

To Rescue the Constitution

by Catherine Whitney and Bret Baier

#1 New York Times bestselling author Bret Baier reveals how George Washington saved the Constitution–and the American experiment.

A sweeping narrative ranging from the unsettled early American frontier and the battlefields of the Revolution to the history-making clashes within Philadelphia’s Independence Hall, Bret Baier’s To Rescue the Constitution dramatically illuminates the life of George Washington, the Founder who did more than perhaps any other individual to secure the future of the United States.

George Washington rescued the nation three times: first by leading the Continental Army to victory in the Revolutionary War, second by presiding over the Constitutional Convention that set the blueprint for the United States and ushering the Constitution through a fractious ratification process, and third by leading the nation as its first president. There is no doubt that the struggling new nation needed to be rescued—and that Washington was the only American who could bring the together.

After the victorious War of Independence, when a spirit of unity and patriotism might have been expected, instead the nation fractured. The states were no more than a loosely knit and contentious confederation, with no strong central union. It was an urgent matter that led to the calling of a Constitutional Convention to meet in Philadelphia during the summer of 1787.

Setting aside his plan to retire to Mount Vernon, Washington agreed to be a delegate at Philadelphia. There he was unanimously elected president of the convention. After successfully bringing the Constitution into being, Washington then sacrificed any hope of returning to private life by accepting the unanimous election to be the nation’s first president. Washington was not known for brilliant oratory or prose, but his quiet, steady leadership gave life to the Constitution by showing how it should be enacted.

In this vivid and moving portrait of America’s early struggles, Baier captures the critical moments when Washington’s leadership brought the nation from the brink of collapse. Baier exposes an early America that is grittier and far more divided than is often portrayed—one we can see reflected in today’s conflicts.

New York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 11/10/2023


Year: 2023

Month: October

To Rescue the Republic

by Catherine Whitney and Bret Baier

The #1 bestselling author and Fox News Channel’s Chief Political Anchor illuminates the heroic life of Ulysses S. Grant.

An epic history spanning the battlegrounds of the Civil War and the violent turmoil of Reconstruction to the forgotten electoral crisis that nearly fractured a reunited nation, Bret Baier’s To Rescue the Republic dramatically reveals Ulysses S. Grant’s essential yet underappreciated role in preserving the United States during an unprecedented period of division.

Born a tanner’s son in rugged Ohio in 1822 and battle-tested by the Mexican American War, Grant met his destiny on the bloody fields of the Civil War. His daring and resolve as a general gained the attention of President Lincoln, then desperate for bold leadership. Lincoln appointed Grant as Lieutenant General of the Union Army in March 1864. Within a year, Grant’s forces had seized Richmond and forced Robert E. Lee to surrender.

Four years later, the reunified nation faced another leadership void after Lincoln’s assassination and an unworthy successor completed his term. Again, Grant answered the call. At stake once more was the future of the Union, for though the Southern states had been defeated, it remained to be seen if the former Confederacy could be reintegrated into the country—and if the Union could ensure the rights and welfare of African Americans in the South. Grant met the challenge by boldly advancing an agenda of Reconstruction and aggressively countering the Ku Klux Klan. In his final weeks in the White House, however, Grant faced a crisis that threatened to undo his life’s work. The contested presidential election of 1876 produced no clear victory for either Republican Rutherford B. Hayes or Democrat Samuel Tilden, who carried most of the former Confederacy. Soon Southern states vowed to revolt if Tilden was not declared the victor. Grant was determined to use his influence to preserve the Union, establishing an electoral commission to peaceably settle the issue. Grant brokered a grand bargain: the installation of Republican Hayes to the presidency, with concessions to the Democrats that effectively ended Reconstruction. This painful compromise saved the nation, but tragically condemned the South to another century of civil-rights oppression.

Deep with contemporary resonance and brimming with fresh detail that takes readers from the battlefields of the Civil War to the corridors of power where men decided the fate of the nation in back rooms, To Rescue the Republic reveals Grant, for all his complexity, to be among the first rank of American heroes.

Date Added: 01/07/2022


Year: 2021

Month: October

Philip Roth

by Blake Bailey

The renowned biographer’s definitive portrait of a literary titan.

Appointed by Philip Roth and granted independence and complete access, Blake Bailey spent years poring over Roth’s personal archive, interviewing his friends, lovers, and colleagues, and engaging Roth himself in breathtakingly candid conversations. The result is an indelible portrait of an American master and of the postwar literary scene.

Bailey shows how Roth emerged from a lower-middle-class Jewish milieu to achieve the heights of literary fame, how his career was nearly derailed by his catastrophic first marriage, and how he championed the work of dissident novelists behind the Iron Curtain.

Bailey examines Roth’s rivalrous friendships with Saul Bellow, John Updike, and William Styron, and reveals the truths of his florid love life, culminating in his almost-twenty-year relationship with actress Claire Bloom, who pilloried Roth in her 1996 memoir, Leaving a Doll’s House.

Tracing Roth’s path from realism to farce to metafiction to the tragic masterpieces of the American Trilogy, Bailey explores Roth’s engagement with nearly every aspect of postwar American culture.

Date Added: 04/16/2021


Year: 2021

Month: April

The Man Who Ran Washington

by Peter Baker and Susan Glasser

From two of America's most revered political journalists comes the definitive biography of legendary White House chief of staff and secretary of state James A. Baker III: the man who ran Washington when Washington ran the world.

For a quarter-century, from the end of Watergate to the aftermath of the Cold War, no Republican won the presidency without his help or ran the White House without his advice. James Addison Baker III was the indispensable man for four presidents because he understood better than anyone how to make Washington work at a time when America was shaping events around the world. The Man Who Ran Washington is a page-turning portrait of a power broker who influenced America's destiny for generations.

A scion of Texas aristocracy who became George H. W. Bush's best friend on the tennis courts of the Houston Country Club, Baker had never even worked in Washington until a devastating family tragedy struck when he was thirty-nine. Within a few years, he was leading Gerald Ford's campaign and would go on to manage a total of five presidential races and win a sixth for George W. Bush in a Florida recount. He ran Ronald Reagan's White House and became the most consequential secretary of state since Henry Kissinger. He negotiated with Democrats at home and Soviets abroad, rewrote the tax code, assembled the coalition that won the Gulf War, brokered the reunification of Germany and helped bring a decades-long nuclear superpower standoff to an end. Ruthlessly partisan during campaign season, Baker governed as the avatar of pragmatism over purity and deal-making over division, a lost art in today's fractured nation.

His story is a case study in the acquisition, exercise, and preservation of power in late twentieth-century America and the story of Washington and the world in the modern era--how it once worked and how it has transformed into an era of gridlock and polarization. This masterly biography by two brilliant observers of the American political scene is destined to become a classic.

A New York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 10/09/2020


Year: 2020

Month: October

Humanly Possible

by Sarah Bakewell

The New York Times bestseller • One of Barack Obama's Favorite Books of 2023 • A New York Times Notable Book &“A book of big and bold ideas, Humanly Possible is humane in approach and, more important, readable and worth reading. . . Bakewell is wide-ranging, witty and compassionate.&” –Wall Street Journal&“Sweeping… linking philosophical reflections with vibrant anecdotes.&” — The New York Times The bestselling author of How to Live and At the Existentialist Café explores seven hundred years of writers, thinkers, scientists, and artists, all trying to understand what it means to be truly humanHumanism is an expansive tradition of thought that places shared humanity, cultural vibrancy, and moral responsibility at the center of our lives. The humanistic worldview—as clear-eyed and enlightening as it is kaleidoscopic and richly ambiguous—has inspired people for centuries to make their choices by principles of freethinking, intellectual inquiry, fellow feeling, and optimism.In this sweeping new history, Sarah Bakewell, herself a lifelong humanist, illuminates the very personal, individual, and, well, human matter of humanism and takes readers on a grand intellectual adventure.Voyaging from the literary enthusiasts of the fourteenth century to the secular campaigners of our own time, from Erasmus to Esperanto, from anatomists to agnostics, from Christine de Pizan to Bertrand Russell, and from Voltaire to Zora Neale Hurston, Bakewell brings together extraordinary humanists across history. She explores their immense variety: some sought to promote scientific and rationalist ideas, others put more emphasis on moral living, and still others were concerned with the cultural and literary studies known as &“the humanities.&” Humanly Possible asks not only what brings all these aspects of humanism together but why it has such enduring power, despite opposition from fanatics, mystics, and tyrants.A singular examination of this vital tradition as well as a dazzling contribution to its literature, this is an intoxicating, joyful celebration of the human spirit from one of our most beloved writers. And at a moment when we are all too conscious of the world&’s divisions, Humanly Possible—brimming with ideas, experiments in living, and respect for the deepest ethical values—serves as a recentering, a call to care for one another, and a reminder that we are all, together, only human.

Date Added: 04/06/2023


Year: 2023

Month: April

Sure, I'll Join Your Cult

by Maria Bamford

From &“weird, scary, ingenious&” (The New York Times) stand-up comedian Maria Bamford, an instant New York Times bestselling, brutally honest, and &“laugh-out-loud funny&” (Jennette McCurdy, #1 New York Times bestselling author) memoir about show business, mental health, and the comfort of rigid belief systems—from Dale Carnegie&’s How to Win Friends and Influence People, to Richard Simmons, to 12-step programs.Maria Bamford is a comedian&’s comedian (an outsider among outsiders) and has forever fought to find a place to belong. From struggling with an eating disorder as a child of the 1980s, to navigating a career in the arts (and medical debt and psychiatric institutionalization), she has tried just about every method possible to not only be a part of the world, but to want to be a part of it. In Bamford&’s &“trademark blend of disarming intimacy and dark whimsy&” (Publishers Weekly), Sure, I&’ll Join Your Cultbrings us on a quest to participate in something. With sincerity and transparency, she recounts every anonymous fellowship she has joined (including but not limited to: Debtors Anonymous, Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous, and Overeaters Anonymous), every hypomanic episode (from worrying about selling out under capitalism to enforcing union rules on her Netflix TV show set to protect her health), and every easy 1-to-3-step recipe for fudge in between. Packed with &“Bamford&’s brilliance, relentless humor, and insatiable instinct for survival (Library Journal), this memoir explores what it means to keep going, and to be a member of society (or any group she&’s invited to) despite not being very good at it. In turn, she hopes to transform isolating experiences into comedy that will make you feel less alone (without turning into a cult following).

Date Added: 10/01/2023


Year: 2023

Month: September

Big Dumb Eyes

by Nate Bargatze

From one of the hottest stand-up comedians, Nate Bargatze brings his everyman comedy to the page in this hilarious collection of personal stories, opinions, and confessions. Nate Bargatze used to be a genius. That is, until the summer after seventh grade when he slipped, fell off a cliff, hit his head on a rock, and “my skull got, like, dented or something.”

Before this accident, he dreamed of being “an electric engineer, or a doctor that does brain stuff, or a math teacher who teaches the hardest math on earth.” Afterwards, all he could do was stand-up comedy. But the “brain stuff,” industry’s loss, is everyone else’s gain, because Nate went on to become one of today’s top-grossing comedians, breaking both attendance and streaming records.

In his highly anticipated first book, Nate talks about life as a non-genius. From stories about his first car (named Old Blue, a clunky Mazda with a tennis ball stick shift) and his travels as a Southerner (Northerners like to ask if he believes in dinosaurs), to tales of his first apartment where he was almost devoured by rats and his many debates with his wife over his chores, his diet, and even his definition of “shopping.” He also reflects on such heady topics as his irrational passion for Vandy football and the mysterious origins of sushi (how can a California roll come from old-time Japan?).

BIG DUMB EYES is full of heart. It will make readers laugh out loud and nod in recognition, but it probably won’t make them think too much. Nate’s family disputes this entire story. New York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 05/19/2025


Year: 2025

Month: May

One Damn Thing After Another

by William P. Barr

The former attorney general provides a candid account of his historic tenures serving two vastly different presidents, George H.W. Bush and Donald J. Trump.

William Barr’s first tenure as attorney general under President George H.W. Bush was largely the result of chance, while his second tenure under President Donald Trump a deliberate and difficult choice. In this candid memoir, Barr takes readers behind the scenes during seminal moments of the 1990s, from the LA riots to Pan Am 103 and Iran Contra. Thirty years later, Barr faced an unrelenting barrage of issues, such as Russiagate, the COVID outbreak, civil unrest, the impeachments, and the 2020 election fallout. One Damn Thing After Another is vivid, forthright, and essential not only to understanding the Bush and Trump legacies, but also how both men viewed power and justice at critical junctures of their presidencies.

New York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 03/17/2022


Year: 2022

Month: March

Class Clown

by Dave Barry

America’s most beloved wiseass finally tells his life story with all the humor you’d expect from a man who made a career out of making fun of pretty much everything.

How does the son of a Presbyterian minister wind up winning a Pulitzer Prize for writing a wildly inaccurate newspaper column read by millions of people? In Class Clown, Dave Barry takes us on a hilarious ride, starting with a childhood largely spent throwing rocks for entertainment—there was no internet—and preparing for nuclear war by hiding under a classroom desk. After literally getting elected class clown in high school, he went to college, where, as an English major, he read snippets of great literature when he was not busy playing in a rock band (it was the sixties).

He began his journalism career at a small-town Pennsylvania newspaper where he learned the most important rule of local journalism: never confuse a goose with a duck. His journey then took a detour into the business world, where as a writing consultant he spent years trying, with limited success, to get corporate folks to, for God’s sake, get the point. Somehow from there he wound up as a humor columnist for The Miami Herald, where his boss was a wild man who encouraged him to write about anything that struck him as amusing and to never worry about alienating anyone. His columns were not popular with everyone: He managed to alienate a vast army of Neil Diamond fans, and the entire state of Indiana.

But he also developed a loyal following of readers who alerted him to the threat of exploding toilets, not to mention the fire hazards posed by strawberry pop-tarts and Rollerblade Barbie, which he demonstrated to the nation on the David Letterman show. He led his readers on a crusade against telemarketers that ultimately caused the national telemarketers association to stop answering its own phones because it was getting—irony alert—too many unwanted calls. He has also run for president multiple times, although so far without success.

He became a book author and joined a literary rock band, which was not good at playing music but did once perform with Bruce Springsteen, who sang backup to Dave. As for his literary merits, Dave writes: “I’ll never have the critical acclaim of, say, Marcel Proust. But was Marcel Proust ever on Carson? Did he ever steal a hotel sign for Oprah?”

Class Clown isn’t just a memoir; it’s a vibrant celebration of a life rich with humor, absurdity, joy, and sadness. Dave says the most important wisdom imparted by his Midwestern parents was never to take anything too seriously. This laughter-filled book is proof that he learned that lesson well. New York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 06/26/2025


Year: 2025

Month: June

The Great Influenza

by John Barry

At the height of WWI, history's most lethal influenza virus erupted in an army camp in Kansas, moved east with American troops, then exploded, killing as many as 100 million people worldwide.

It killed more people in twenty-four months than AIDS killed in twenty-four years, more in a year than the Black Death killed in a century. But this was not the Middle Ages, and 1918 marked the first collision of science and epidemic disease.

Magisterial in its breadth of perspective and depth of research and now revised to reflect the growing danger of the avian flu, The Great Influenza is ultimately a tale of triumph amid tragedy, which provides us with a precise and sobering model as we confront the epidemics looming on our own horizon.

John M. Barry has written a new afterword for this edition that brings us up to speed on the terrible threat of the avian flu and suggest ways in which we might head off another flu pandemic.

A New York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 03/20/2020


Year: 2020

Month: March

America's Deadliest Election

by Dana Bash

The violent election of 1872 that serves as a warning for today's divided politics.

From CNN’s Chief Political Correspondent Dana Bash, the fast-paced story of the extraordinary election that led to hundreds of murders, warfare in the streets of New Orleans, two governors of Louisiana—and changed the course of politics in our country.

The Election of 1872 was the most contentious in American history. After both parties complained of corruption, neither candidate would concede, two governors claimed office and chaos erupted. Rival newspapers engaged in a bitter war of words, politicians plotted to overthrow the government, and their supporters fought in the streets and attempted assassinations. The entire country watched in grim fascination as the wounds of the Civil War were ripped open and the promise of President Grant’s Reconstruction faltered in the face of violent resistance and the birth of the Ku Klux Klan.

In this riveting book, Dana Bash and David Fisher tell the incredible, little-known story of the election that pushed democracy to the breaking point, and sparked historic events including:

The Colfax Massacre, in which at least 150 Black men were killed by white supremacists The extraordinary train race from New York to New Orleans for control of the state government The election of the first black Congressman from Louisiana in the face of violent resistance The Supreme Court ruling that ended Reconstruction and became the foundation of Southern segregation, changing the American legal system for the next century Readers will find eerie parallels to today's divided political landscape and leaders willing to seize power no matter the cost. An eye-opening warning of what's at stake and what it takes to protect our democracy, this is a must-read tale of America's deadliest election.

New York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 10/16/2024


Year: 2024

Month: September

The Light of Days

by Judy Batalion

One of the most important stories of World War II, already optioned by Steven Spielberg for a major motion picture: a spectacular, searing history that brings to light the extraordinary accomplishments of brave Jewish women who became resistance fighters—a group of unknown heroes whose exploits have never been chronicled in full, until now.

Witnesses to the brutal murder of their families and neighbors and the violent destruction of their communities, a cadre of Jewish women in Poland—some still in their teens—helped transform the Jewish youth groups into resistance cells to fight the Nazis. With courage, guile, and nerves of steel, these “ghetto girls” paid off Gestapo guards, hid revolvers in loaves of bread and jars of marmalade, and helped build systems of underground bunkers. They flirted with German soldiers, bribed them with wine, whiskey, and home cooking, used their Aryan looks to seduce them, and shot and killed them. They bombed German train lines and blew up a town’s water supply. They also nursed the sick and taught children.

Yet the exploits of these courageous resistance fighters have remained virtually unknown.

As propulsive and thrilling as Hidden Figures, In the Garden of Beasts, Band of Brothers, and A Train in Winter, The Light of Days at last tells the true story of these incredible women whose courageous yet little-known feats have been eclipsed by time. Judy Batalion—the granddaughter of Polish Holocaust survivors—takes us back to 1939 and introduces us to Renia Kukielka, a weapons smuggler and messenger who risked death traveling across occupied Poland on foot and by train. Joining Renia are other women who served as couriers, armed fighters, intelligence agents, and saboteurs, all who put their lives in mortal danger to carry out their missions. Batalion follows these women through the savage destruction of the ghettos, arrest and internment in Gestapo prisons and concentration camps, and for a lucky few—like Renia, who orchestrated her own audacious escape from a brutal Nazi jail—into the late 20th century and beyond.

Powerful and inspiring, featuring twenty black-and-white photographs, The Light of Days is an unforgettable true tale of war, the fight for freedom, exceptional bravery, female friendship, and survival in the face of staggering odds.

Date Added: 04/16/2021


Year: 2021

Month: April

The Devil at His Elbow

by Valerie Bauerlein

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • &“The definitive account of the Murdaugh murders. Forget the podcasts, the TV specials, and the documentaries—this is the version of the story you&’ll want to read. And once you pick it up, you won&’t be able to put it down.&”—John Carreyrou, Pulitzer Prize winner and bestselling author of Bad BloodPower, privilege, and blood—this is the true story of Alex Murdaugh&’s violent downfall, from a veteran Wall Street Journal reporter who has become an authority on the case. Alex Murdaugh was a benevolent dictator—the president of the South Carolina trial lawyers&’ association, a political boss, a part-time prosecutor, and a partner in his family&’s law firm. He was always ready with a favor, a drink, and an invitation to Moselle, his family&’s 1,700-acre hunting estate. The Murdaugh name ignited respect—and fear—for a hundred miles.When he murdered his wife, Maggie, and son Paul at Moselle on a dark summer night, the fragile façade of Alex&’s world could no longer hold. His forefathers had covered up a midnight suicide at a remote railroad crossing, a bootlegging ring run from a courthouse, and the attempted murder of a pregnant lover. Alex, too, almost walked away from his unspeakable crimes with his reputation intact, but his downfall was secured by a twist of fate, some stray mistakes, and a fateful decision by an old friend who&’d finally seen enough.Why would a man who had everything kill his wife and grown son? To unwind the roots of Alex&’s ruin, award-winning journalist Valerie Bauerlein reported not just from the courthouse every day but also along the backroads and through the tidal marshes of South Carolina&’s Lowcountry. When the jurors made their pilgrimage to the crime scene, trying to envision Maggie and Paul&’s last moments, she walked right behind them, sensing the ghosts that haunt the Murdaughs&’ now-shattered legacy.Through masterful research and cinematic writing, The Devil at His Elbow is a transporting journey through Alex&’s life, the night of the murders, and the investigation that culminated in a trial that held tens of millions spellbound. With her stunning insights and fearless instinct for the truth, Bauerlein uncovers layers of the Murdaugh murder case that have not been told.

Date Added: 10/14/2024


Year: 2024

Month: September

Welcome to Dunder Mifflin

by Ben Silverman and Brian Baumgartner

Join the entire Dunder Mifflin gang on a journey back to Scranton ... Based on hundreds of hours of exclusive interviews with the cast and creators and illustrated with 100 behind-the-scenes photographs, here, at last, is the untold inside story of The Office, featuring a foreword by Greg Daniels, who adapted the series for the U.S. and was its guiding creative force, and narrated by star Brian Baumgartner (aka “Kevin Malone”) and executive producer Ben Silverman.

Reuniting after nearly a decade, the entire Dunder Mifflin gang gathers again to share their favorite inside stories, spill untold secrets, and reveal how a little show that barely survived its first season became the most watched series in the universe. Welcome to Dunder Mifflin pulls back the curtain as never before on all the absurdity, genius, love, passion, and dumb luck that went into creating America's beloved The Office.

Featuring the memories of Steve Carell, John Krasinkski, Jenna Fischer, Greg Daniels, Ricky Gervais, Rainn Wilson, Angela Kinsey, Craig Robinson, Brian Baumgartner, Phyllis Smith, Kate Flannery, Ed Helms, Oscar Nunez, Amy Ryan, Ellie Kemper, Creed Bratton, Paul Lieberstein, Ben Silverman, Mike Schur, and many more.

Date Added: 01/07/2022


Year: 2021

Month: November

Superagency

by Reid Hoffman and Greg Beato

Instant New York Times and USA Today Bestseller. Tech visionary and co-founder of Manas AI Reid Hoffman shares his unique insider’s perspective on an AI-powered future, making the case for its potential to unlock a world of possibilities.

"An essential companion." — Fei-Fei Li

"An important read." —Bill Gates

"Brilliant mind. Compassionate heart. Bold ideas…Read this book!” —Van Jones

"Refreshingly optimistic and welcome perspective." — Ariana Huffington

"A fascinating and insightful book." —Yuval Noah Harari

As taught at UPenn's Wharton and Stanford. Superagency offers a roadmap for using AI inclusively and adaptively to improve our lives and create positive change. While acknowledging challenges like disinformation and potential job changes, the book focuses on AI’s immense potential to increase individual agency and create better outcomes for society as a whole. Imagine AI tutors personalizing education for each child, researchers rapidly discovering cures for diseases like Alzheimer's and cancer, and AI advisors empowering people to navigate complex systems and achieve their goals. Hoffman and co-author, tech and culture writer Greg Beato envision a world where these possibilities, and many more, become a reality.

Superagency challenges conventional fears, inviting us to view the future through a lens of opportunity, rather than fear. It’s a call to action – to embrace AI with excitement and actively shape a world where human ingenuity and the power of AI combine to create something extraordinary. Entrepreneur Reid Hoffman is a co-founder of LinkedIn, Inflection AI, and Manas AI. He is also host of the podcasts Possible and Masters of Scale. New York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 04/17/2025


Year: 2025

Month: February

Nöthin' But a Good Time

by Tom Beaujour and Richard Bienstock

Now streaming on Paramount+ as an exclusive docuseries!The New York Times BestsellerThe Explosive National Bestseller"A backstage pass to the wildest and loudest party in rock history—you'll feel like you were right there with us!" —Bret Michaels of PoisonNothin' But a Good Time is the definitive, no-holds-barred oral history of 1980s hard rock and hair metal, told by the musicians and industry insiders who lived it. Hard rock in the 1980s was a hedonistic and often intensely creative wellspring of escapism that perfectly encapsulated—and maybe even helped to define—a spectacularly over-the-top decade. Indeed, fist-pumping hits like Twisted Sister’s “We’re Not Gonna Take It,” Mötley Crüe’s “Girls, Girls, Girls,” and Guns N’ Roses’ “Welcome to the Jungle” are as inextricably linked to the era as Reaganomics, PAC-MAN, and E.T.From the do-or-die early days of self-financed recordings and D.I.Y. concert productions that were as flashy as they were foolhardy, to the multi-Platinum, MTV-powered glory years of stadium-shaking anthems and chart-topping power ballads, to the ultimate crash when grunge bands like Nirvana forever altered the entire climate of the business, Tom Beaujour and Richard Bienstock's Nothin' But a Good Time captures the energy and excess of the hair metal years in the words of the musicians, managers, producers, engineers, label executives, publicists, stylists, costume designers, photographers, journalists, magazine publishers, video directors, club bookers, roadies, groupies, and hangers-on who lived it. Featuring an impassioned foreword by Slipknot and Stone Sour vocalist and avowed glam metal fanatic Corey Taylor, and drawn from over two hundred author interviews with members of Van Halen, Mötley Crüe, Poison, Guns N’ Roses, Skid Row, Bon Jovi, Ratt, Twisted Sister, Winger, Warrant, Cinderella, Quiet Riot and others, as well as Ozzy Osbourne, Lita Ford, and many more, this is the ultimate, uncensored, and often unhinged, chronicle of a time where excess and success walked hand in hand, told by the men and women who created a sound and style that came to define a musical era—one in which the bands and their fans went looking for nothin’ but a good time…and found it.

Date Added: 04/30/2021


Year: 2021

Month: April

The Man I Knew

by Jean Becker

A heartfelt portrait of President George H.W. Bush—and his post-presidential life—by the confidante who knew him best.

A New York Times Best Seller

Date Added: 06/25/2021


Year: 2021

Month: July

Arguing with Socialists

by Glenn Beck

In Arguing With Socialists, New York Times bestselling author Glenn Beck arms readers to the teeth with information necessary to debunk the socialist arguments that have once again become popular, and proves that the free market is the only way to go.

With his trademark humor, Beck lampoons the resurgence of this bankrupt leftist philosophy with thousands of stories, facts, arguments and easy-to-understand graphics for anyone who is willing to ask the hard questions. He shows that this new shiny socialism is just the same as the old one: a costly and dangerous failure that leaves desperation, poverty, and bodies in its wake.

A New York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 04/16/2020


Year: 2020

Month: April

Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza

by Peter Beinart

A bold, urgent appeal from the acclaimed columnist and political commentator, addressing one of the most important issues of our time.

In Peter Beinart’s view, one story dominates Jewish communal life: that of persecution and victimhood. It is a story that erases much of the nuance of Jewish religious tradition and warps our understanding of Israel and Palestine. After Gaza, where Jewish texts, history, and language have been deployed to justify mass slaughter and starvation, Beinart argues, Jews must tell a new story. After this war, whose horror will echo for generations, they must do nothing less than offer a new answer to the question: What does it mean to be a Jew?

Beinart imagines an alternate narrative, which would draw on other nations’ efforts at moral reconstruction and a different reading of Jewish tradition. A story in which Israeli Jews have the right to equality, not supremacy, and in which Jewish and Palestinian safety are not mutually exclusive but intertwined. One that recognizes the danger of venerating states at the expense of human life.

Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza is a provocative argument that will expand and inform one of the defining conversations of our time. It is a book that only Peter Beinart could write: a passionate yet measured work that brings together his personal experience, his commanding grasp of history, his keen understanding of political and moral dilemmas, and a clear vision for the future. new York Times Bestseller

Date Added: 04/17/2025


Year: 2025

Month: February


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