Thanksgiving Reads...sort of

I was getting ready for our latest LoLS (League of Literary Snobbery: Storytime for Grownups at Ravenna) and I wanted to make it Thanksgiving themed. I figured it's November, maybe people want to hear about Thanksgiving. But it proved pretty near impossible to come up with something appropriate. Thanksgiving must be the quintessential back-drop for family angst. Worries about success, trouble with relatives, introducing new significant others to parents and children. How has this holiday not been mined for all its literary worth?

I asked Ami for help, and she found me a great short story by Lorrie Moore...which turned out to be about Christmas. We made this mistake more than once. Another co-worker suggested, "Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man." And I said, "Isn't he Irish?" And then she said, "Oh yeah, they were just eating a turkey." And everything I could come up with turned out to be from a movie. So, this must be why The Everyman Pocket Classics series has collected stories about EVERYTHING, except Thanksgiving.

But we were undaunted, here's a little taste of what we eventually came up with:

Sadly, this one is not easy to get your hands on. Which really bums me out because I love Lousia May (obviously, we are on a fist name basis):

An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving by Louisa May Alcott

A heartwarming story set in rural New Hampshire in the 1800s. As the Thanksgiving Day festivities are beginning, the Bassetts must leave on an emergency. The two eldest children are in charge of the household--they prepare a holiday meal like they've never had before!



And here are a couple of SUPER angsty, family-ish novels that take place over the Thanksgiving weekend:

Ice Storm by Rick Moody The year is 1973.

As a freak winter storm bears down on an exclusive, affluent suburb in Connecticut, during Thanksgiving 1973, cars skid out of control, men and women swap partners, and their children experiment with sex, drugs, and even suicide. Here two families, the Hoods and the Williamses, come face-to-face with the seething emotions behind the well-clipped lawns of their lives-in a novel widely hailed as a funny, acerbic, and moving hymn to a dazed and confused era of American life.

Wonder Boys by Michael Chabon

A modern classic, now in a welcome new edition, Wonder Boys firmly established Michael Chabon as a force to be reckoned with in American fiction. At once a deft parody of the American fame factory and a piercing portrait of young and old desire, this novel introduces two unforgettable characters: Grady Tripp, a former publishing prodigy now lost in a fog of pot and passion and stalled in the midst of his endless second book, and Grady’s student, James Leer, a budding writer obsessed with Hollywood self-destruction and struggling with his own searching heart.

And more recently, this hilarious and heartbreaking novel:

Billy Lynn's Long Half-Time Walk by Ben Fountain

This is what Robert had to say:

Ben Fountain has created a sort of inverted "Odyssey" here where our here, Billy Lynn, comes home from the Iraq War to find yet a whole new catalog of trials and challenges awaiting him and the rest of Bravo Company before they are shipped back to the Gulf. It is a novel that gives us a fresh take on how we view capitalism, materialism, our country, and our military while providing a wonderfully empathetic tragic hero in Billy Lynn, at once a brave , fearless fighting machine while still a very innocent young man.

These next two have very short Thanksgiving scenes, but they are so phenomenal I had to include them. Here, the repercussions from one disastrous Thanksgiving night set this dark, and funny novel on its path towards redemption and hard-won happiness:

May We Be Forgiven  by A.M. Homes

Harold Silver has spent a lifetime watching his younger brother, George, a taller, smarter, and more successful high-flying TV executive, acquire a covetable wife, two kids, and a beautiful home in the suburbs of New York City. But Harry, a historian and Nixon scholar, also knows George has a murderous temper, and when George loses control the result is an act of violence so shocking that both brothers are hurled into entirely new lives in which they both must seek absolution.

Harry finds himself suddenly playing parent to his brother’s two adolescent children, tumbling down the rabbit hole of Internet sex, dealing with aging parents who move through time like travelers on a fantastic voyage. As Harry builds a twenty-first-century family created by choice rather than biology, we become all the more aware of the ways in which our history, both personal and political, can become our destiny and either compel us to repeat our errors or be the catalyst for change.

And last but not least, my very favorite Thanksgiving scene of all the Thanksgiving scenes. It's a flawless mix of humor and melancholy, and it perfectly captures that horrifying feeling of a long put-off visit to a family that lives light years away from one's "real" life:

Dancer from the Dance by Andrew Holleran

One of the most important works of gay literature, this haunting, brilliant novel is a seriocomic remembrance of things past -- and still poignantly present. It depicts the adventures of Malone, a beautiful young man searching for love amid New York's emerging gay scene.

From Manhattan's Everard Baths and after-hours discos to Fire Island's deserted parks and lavish orgies, Malone looks high and low for meaningful companionship. The person he finds is Sutherland, a campy quintessential queen -- and one of the most memorable literary creations of contemporary fiction. Hilarious, witty, and ultimately heartbreaking, Dancer from the Dance is truthful, provocative, outrageous fiction told in a voice as close to laughter as to tears.

Scary Book Time!

I feel like I just wrote a this post for last year's scary reads. Has this year flown by, or what? But it really is that time again, my favorite time, actually. Time for some SPOOKY books for your Halloween needs!

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Here's an oldie but a goodie. Everyone always says The Shining is where it's at, by I find something profoundly terrifying about The Stand. I'm sure it's related to the whole plague-ridden, end-of-days thing.

The Stand by Stephen King
When a man escapes from a biological testing facility, he sets in motion a deadly domino effect, spreading a mutated strain of the flu that will wipe out 99 percent of humanity within a few weeks. The survivors who remain are scared, bewildered, and in need of a leader. Two emerge--Mother Abagail, the benevolent 108-year-old woman who urges them to build a community in Boulder, Colorado; and Randall Flagg, the nefarious "Dark Man," who delights in chaos and violence.

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I really love Shirley Jackson. And when most people think about her, they think The Haunting of Hill House and my personal favorite, We Have Always Lived in the Castle. But sometimes real life can be more frightening than a spooky book. So check out Life Among the Savages, Jackson's hilarious memoir about raising small children, learning to drive, and trying to maintain her sanity in rural Vermont.

Life Among the Savages by Shirley Jackson
"Our house," writes Jackson, "is old, noisy, and full. When we moved into it we had two children and about five thousand books; I expect that when we finally overflow and move out again we will have perhaps twenty children and easily half a million books." 

Jackson's literary talents are in evidence everywhere, as is her trenchant, unsentimental wit. Yet there is no mistaking the happiness and love in these pages, which are crowded with the raucous voices of an extraordinary family living a wonderfully ordinary life.

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Mark B. would kill me if I didn't include this one in my list of scary tales.

Smoke Gets in Your Eyes: And Other Lessons from the Crematory by Caitlin Doughty
Most people want to avoid thinking about death, but Caitlin Doughty a twenty-something with a degree in medieval history and a flair for the macabre took a job at a crematory, turning morbid curiosity into her life s work. With an original voice that combines fearless curiosity and mordant wit, Caitlin tells an unusual coming-of-age story full of bizarre encounters, gallows humor, and vivid characters (both living and very dead). Describing how she swept ashes from the machines (and sometimes onto her clothes), and cared for bodies of all shapes and sizes, Caitlin becomes an intrepid explorer in the world of the deceased. Her eye-opening memoir shows how our fear of dying warps our culture and society, and she calls for better ways of dealing with death (and our dead). In the spirit of her popular Web series, Ask a Mortician, Caitlin s engaging narrative style makes this otherwise scary topic both approachable and profound."

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And along the same vein...

The American Way of Death Revisited by Jessica Mitford
Only the scathing wit and searching intelligence of Jessica Mitford could turn an exposé of the American funeral industry into a book that is at once deadly serious and side-splittingly funny. When first published in 1963 this landmark of investigative journalism became a runaway bestseller and resulted in legislation to protect grieving families from the unscrupulous sales practices of those in "the dismal trade." 

Just before her death in 1996, Mitford thoroughly revised and updated her classic study. The American Way of Death Revisited confronts new trends, including the success of the profession's lobbyists in Washington, inflated cremation costs, the telemarketing of pay-in-advance graves, and the effects of monopolies in a death-care industry now dominated by multinational  corporations.

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And now for something truly bone-chilling...and, it's newly revised!

Debt: The First 5,000 Years by David Graeber
Every economics textbook says the same thing: Money was invented to replace onerous and complicated barter systems—to relieve ancient people from having to haul their goods to market. The problem with this version of history? There’s not a shred of evidence to support it. 

Here anthropologist David Graeber presents a stunning reversal of conventional wisdom. He shows that for more than 5,000 years, since the beginnings of the first agrarian empires, humans have used elaborate credit systems to buy and sell goods—that is, long before the invention of coins or cash. It is in this era, Graeber argues, that we also first encounter a society divided into debtors and creditors. 

Graeber shows that arguments about debt and debt forgiveness have been at the center of political debates from Italy to China, as well as sparking innumerable insurrections. He also brilliantly demonstrates that the language of the ancient works of law and religion (words like “guilt,” “sin,” and “redemption”) derive in large part from ancient debates about debt, and shape even our most basic ideas of right and wrong. We are still fighting these battles today without knowing it.

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I've saved the most ghastly, most gruesome, most horrible for last...get it? Scarry? Get it?!!?!!?

Richard Scarry's Bedtime Stories by Richard Scarry
Five funny tales featuring Lowly Worm, Huckle Cat, Bananas Gorilla, and the rest of Scarry's memorable menagerie are collected in a sleepytime anthology.

I'm not even sorry about that pun. Happy Halloween, everybody!

Happy "Independents'" Day!

Man, I love a good pun!  And, it's an actual thing...in Ireland and even England!??!!?  I know, strange.  But apparently, "Independents' Day – which coincides with the July 4 celebrations in the United States – turns the spotlight on the future of our independent stores.  It encourages consumers to buy at least one item from their local shop today, and is aimed at highlighting the positive contribution which independent retailers make to their communities." I have to say, that's displaying a pretty good sense of humor over the whole Revolutionary War thing.

Well, here at Third Place, we are celebrating Independents' Day too.  We are open, and ready to help with all your Fourth of July reading needs (Lake Forest Park until 6PM, and Ravenna until 4PM). Here a few suggestions if you're looking for some American History-themed reading:

Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality by Danielle Allen

In just 1,337 words, the Declaration of Independence altered the course of history. Written in 1776, it is the most profound document in the history of government since the Magna Carta, signed nearly 800 years ago in 1215. Yet despite its paramount importance, the Declaration, curiously, is rarely read from start to finish much less understood.

Troubled by the fact that so few Americans actually know what it says, Danielle Allen, a political philosopher renowned for her work on justice and citizenship, set out to explore the arguments of the Declaration, reading it with both adult night students and University of Chicago undergraduates. Keenly aware that the Declaration is riddled with contradictions liberating some while subjugating slaves and Native Americans Allen and her students nonetheless came to see that the Declaration makes a coherent and riveting argument about equality. They found not a historical text that required memorization, but an animating force that could and did transform the course of their everyday lives. With its cogent analysis and passionate advocacy,

Our Declaration thrillingly affirms the continuing relevance of America s founding text, ultimately revealing what democracy actually means and what it asks of us.

A People's History of the United States: 1492 - Present by Howard Zinn

Known for its lively, clear prose as well as its scholarly research, A People's History of the United States is the only volume to tell America's story from the point of view of -- and in the words of -- America's women, factory workers, African-Americans, Native Americans, working poor, and immigrant laborers. This P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into the book, including author interviews, recommended reading, and more.

Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin by Jill Lepore

From one of our most accomplished and widely admired historians, a revelatory portrait of Benjamin Franklin’s youngest sister and a history of history itself. Like her brother, Jane Franklin was a passionate reader, a gifted writer, and an astonishingly shrewd political commentator. Unlike him, she was a mother of twelve.

Benjamin Franklin, who wrote more letters to his sister than he wrote to anyone else, was the original American self-made man; his sister spent her life caring for her children. They left very different traces behind. Making use of an amazing cache of little-studied material, including documents, objects, and portraits only just discovered, Jill Lepore brings Jane Franklin to life in a way that illuminates not only this one woman but an entire world—a world usually lost to history. Lepore’s life of Jane Franklin, with its strikingly original vantage on her remarkable brother, is at once a wholly different account of the founding of the United States and one of the great untold stories of American history and letters: a life unknown.

Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West by Dee Brown 

Immediately recognized as a revelatory and enormously controversial book since its first publication in 1971, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee is universally recognized as one of those rare books that forever changes the way its subject is perceived. Now repackaged with a new introduction from bestselling author Hampton Sides to coincide with a major HBO dramatic film of the book, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee is Dee Brown’s classic, eloquent, meticulously documented account of the systematic destruction of the American Indian during the second half of the nineteenth century. A national bestseller in hardcover for more than a year after its initial publication, it has sold over four million copies in multiple editions and has been translated into seventeen languages.

Using council records, autobiographies, and firsthand descriptions, Brown allows great chiefs and warriors of the Dakota, Ute, Sioux, Cheyenne, and other tribes to tell us in their own words of the series of battles, massacres, and broken treaties that finally left them and their people demoralized and decimated. A unique and disturbing narrative told with force and clarity, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee changed forever our vision of how the West was won, and lost. It tells a story that should not be forgotten, and so must be retold from time to time.

Bunker Hill:  A City, a Siege, a Revolution by Nathaniel Philbrick

Boston in 1775 is an island city occupied by British troops after a series of incendiary incidents by patriots who range from sober citizens to thuggish vigilantes. After the Boston Tea Party, British and American soldiers and Massachusetts residents have warily maneuvered around each other until April 19, when violence finally erupts at Lexington and Concord. In June, however, with the city cut off from supplies by a British blockade and Patriot militia poised in siege, skirmishes give way to outright war in the Battle of Bunker Hill. It would be the bloodiest battle of the Revolution to come, and the point of no return for the rebellious colonists.

Philbrick brings a fresh perspective to every aspect of the story. He finds new characters, and new facets to familiar ones. The real work of choreographing rebellion falls to a thirty-three year old physician named Joseph Warren who emerges as the on-the-ground leader of the Patriot cause and is fated to die at Bunker Hill. Others in the cast include Paul Revere, Warren’s fiancé the poet Mercy Scollay, a newly recruited George Washington, the reluctant British combatant General Thomas Gage and his more bellicose successor William Howe, who leads the three charges at Bunker Hill and presides over the claustrophobic cauldron of a city under siege as both sides play a nervy game of brinkmanship for control.

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander

Once in a great while a book comes along that changes the way we see the world and helps to fuel a The New Jim Crow is such a book. Praised by Harvard Law professor Lani Guinier as "brave and bold," this book directly challenges the notion that the election of Barack Obama signals a new era of colorblindness. With dazzling candor, legal scholar Michelle Alexander argues that "we have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it." By targeting black men through the War on Drugs and decimating communities of color, the U.S. criminal justice system functions as a contemporary system of racial control—relegating millions to a permanent second-class status—even as it formally adheres to the principle of colorblindness. In the words of Benjamin Todd Jealous, president and CEO of the NAACP, this book is a "call to action."
nationwide social movement.

Called "stunning" by Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David Levering Lewis, "invaluable" by the Daily Kos, "explosive" by Kirkus, and "profoundly necessary" by the Miami Herald, this updated and revised paperback edition of The New Jim Crow, now with a foreword by Cornel West, is a must-read for all people of conscience.

Have a safe and happy Fourth!

Valentine's Time

Go Seahawks!  Well, now that that's over, we can get back to February.  Which means Valentine's Day is just around the corner.  But don't worry, you've still got a few more days, and we've got some great ideas for you.

Check out Ravenna's lovely, lovey-dovey, book display. And Lake Forest Park has tons of cards and the perfect gifts for your sweetheart.  Don't forget the Theo Chocolate!

Here are a couple romantic reads to warm your heart...

Love Stories edited by Diana Secker Tesdell

An anthology of literary love stories—in a beautiful hardcover Pocket Classics edition—perfect for Valentine’s Day.

Here are nineteen stories from a rich array of writers, and here is every kind of romantic entanglement: from the raw, erotic passion of D. H. Lawrence and Colette to the wickedly cynical comedy of Dorothy Parker and Roald Dahl, from the yearning of unrequited romantic illusions in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “Winter Dreams” to the agonizing madness of jealousy in Vladimir Nabokov’s “That in Aleppo Once . . .” The objects of passion in these stories range from a glamorous silent-movie starlet in Elizabeth Bowen’s haunting “Dead Mabelle” and a faithful ghost in Yasunari Kawabata's "Immortality" to a heart surgeon in Margaret Atwood’s “Bluebeard’s Egg” who spends his days penetrating the mysteries of the human heart but who seems oddly emotionally opaque himself. Jhumpa Lahiri plumbs the despair of a husband and wife sundered by tragedy while Lorrie Moore movingly portrays a couple brought together by it. Katherine Mansfield, Tobias Wolff, and William Trevor explore the intricacies of long-term relationships, while Guy de Maupassant, Italo Calvino, and T. C. Boyle portray the elemental force of love in extremely different ways.

As alluring, moving, and intoxicating as its timeless theme, this collection makes an enticing gift for lovers at any stage of life.

What Makes Love Last:  How to Build Trust and Avoid Betrayal by John Gottman and Nan Silver

In this insightful and long-awaited book, celebrated research psychologist and couples counselor John Gottman plumbs the mysteries of love and shares the results of his famous “Love Lab”: Where does love come from? Why does some love last, and why does some fade? And how can we keep it alive? Based on laboratory findings, this book shows readers how to identify signs, behaviors, and attitudes that indicate a fraying relationship and provides strategies for repairing what may seem lost or broken.


Or maybe you're not such a romantic...

Crap Dates: Disastrous Encounters from Single Life by Rhodri Marsden

A good date can be exhilarating: a shared joke, an improbable spark, long moments of gazing fondly into each other's eyes. Not so for the dating disasters featured in this collection of laugh-out-loud actual tweets about the most terrible evenings imaginable. From seriously unwelcome confessions, to dousing dates in wine, to bringing them back to creepy apartments to meet favorite stuffed animals, here are the funniest and most alarming reports from dating's front lines. Along the way, author Rhodri Marsden offers tips on how to identify and avoid the worst of the bad daters, including married men, blatant liars, deluded optimists, and more. This harrowing collection of real nightmare dates will amuse anyone who's suffered through one of cupid's off nights.

New Year's Reading Resolutions

Forget other ways of improving our lives, we're booksellers so our resolutions are focused on reading.  This year we've got some pretty grand plans.  Ami is endeavoring to get up earlier everyday, perhaps so she can read more.  And Mark B. is determined to read more of the books he already owns. He says he wants to read further into his collection of books he has owned for years.  Though he did tell me this as he was buying a brand new book.

Katherine wants to focus less on how many books she reads over the year and more on the quality of the books (for the record, I already think she does a pretty good job of this since she can easily give up on a book she isn't enjoying; something I am terrible at).  But she says her main reading (related) resolution is to write more.  Stories, observations, poems, folk songs, letters; 2014 is the year of putting pen to paper for Katherine.  As a way of achieving this goal, she plans to fill six whole Moleskine journals.  But don't be too intimidated, it's the little 3 x 5, 64 pagers.

Alex says if his 2014 resolution was the same as his 2013 resolution, to read more women authors, then his next book would be The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt (another shameless Goldfinch plug! man, I love that book).  But his actual resolution is to read more Northwest history.  He's
gonna start with Betty MacDonald's classic The Egg and I, and then move on to The Curve of Time by M. Wylie Blanchet.  This one's about a widow who packs up her five kids in a boat and explores the coastline of the Northwest. Fascinating!

As for me (Erin B), I have a lot of reading plans. This year I resolve to read more nonfiction and more of the books that I've missed.  Unbelievably, I've never read The Bell Jar, so that's on the list.  But my primary resolution I came upon while putting together my 2013 top ten list of books.  Looking at the authors on that list, I realized that all of them are white.  No people color.  So that's my goal.  To add some diversity and perspective to my reading and read more authors of color. My first book of the new year is Kindred by Octavia Butler (who I just learned lived in Lake Forest Park!)

What's your reading resolution this year?  Don't have one?  Well come on out tomorrow, for our New Year's Day Sale, and we'll help you find one! Nothing says "Happy New Year" like 20% off everything at your favorite independent bookstore!  Both locations!

Our Favorite Book Gifts

A few of us booksellers got to talking the other day.  We realized, that as booksellers, we don't often get books as presents.  It makes sense, people just assume that we know what we want to read, or we've already read it, or various other things that keep us from recieving books.  But that isn't always the case, so here are a few of our favorite books we have recieved as gifts:

Patti:

When I was pregnant my husband Rich gave me a copy of The Glass Blower's Children by Maria Gripes. He remembered that it was one of my favorite books when I was kid. It helped make me a lifelong reader and has always stuck with me. I was sad to find out it had gone out of print. Rich tracked down a used copy and surprised me with it! I had so much fun rereading it and imagining reading it to my son someday. Now I've recently discovered that's it being reprinted and due out this spring. I can't wait to introduce it to a whole new generation of new readers.

Katherine:
The year was 1999. I spent all day Christmas Eve reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. That evening my present from my grandma was the recently released box set of the first three books. I spent the rest of vacation reading on the couch.

Erin B.:
When I was a teenager, I was really into space.  I really, really, really wanted to be an astronaut.  I even went to Space Camp (nerd alert!).  One year my parents got me a copy of Moonshot by astronauts Alan Shepard and Deke Slayton.  And it was signed by Alan Shepard.  I still have it.

Family Christmas Reads

The temperature has dropped, the lights are up, paper snowflakes hang in the window.  The store is bustling and busy with people searching for the perfect gift.  But in the midst of all that gift searching, don't forget to get a little something to share with the whole family.  Maybe start a new tradition of reading a book out loud while waiting to hear the sound of reindeer hooves and jingling bells.  Our front table -- here in Ravenna -- is overflowing with Christmas and winter books of all kinds

If you don't know where to start, Emily M. offers these suggestions:


An Otis Christmas by Loren Long
Otis, the underdog of all tractors, saves the day again. When the birth of a new horse goes all wrong, Otis risks his life to get the doctor. How will he make it in time? (Ages 3-8)

Family Christmas Treasury
I know of some families who love to read from anthologies and collections. New to the Christmas table this year is a collection of eight classic stories -- like Tacky, Curious George, and Strega Nona -- to read again and again. And, tucked between each story is a holiday carol to read or sing. (Ages 3-8)


The Christmas Cat by Maryann MacDonald
Some legends tell of a cat who comforted the baby Jesus. And, cats were no strangers to places like barns and mangers; so, maybe? This book was inspired through Da Vinci's La Madonna del Gatto. (Ages 3-8)


The Christmas Tale of Peter Rabbit by Emma Thompson
Vegetarians and non-turkey eaters, this book is for you! Cousins Benjamin Bunny and Peter Rabbit -- whose father was once baked in a pie, if you recall -- will not let McGregor catch William, the large turkey, for Christmas dinner. (Ages 3-8)



Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson
The Herdmans are the bullies of all bullies! So, what are they doing at the first Christmas pageant practice at the local church? And, what will they do first? Beat everyone up before the performance, burn the church down, or steal from the offering plate again?  This one's a classic and a must-read for everyone! (Ages 6+)

Gift of the Magi by O. Henry (illustr. by P.J. Lynch)
For those of you who aren't familiar with this classic, it is a wonderful short story about a poor husband and wife who truly give from the heart. Selling your most treasured possession can bring the most humbling gifts. P.J. Lynch's breathtaking watercolor illustrations reflect the joy and sadness with each page turn. This is no doubt the beautiful-est illustrated edition out there. (Ages 10+)

*We also have a small assortment of Christmas books on sale, so don't forget to swing by our bargain table (just restocked with great money-saver books).* Thank you for shopping with us and supporting small businesses. Happy Holidays!

Holiday Gifts!

Stupendous stocking stuffers!  Delightful decorations! And perfect presents!  Our little elves have been hard at work out at Lake Forest Park. We've got our brand new sidelines for the holiday season out and ready for you to peruse.  So when you stop in to pick out that perfect book to give this season (hint: it's The Goldfinch...just kidding!...not really) don't forget to check out all the festive gifts and holiday decor!

Like these charming and colorful reindeer and tree decorations.

Lots of great games for tons of family fun.

Hedgehogs!!!!  That's all you need to know.

Cool kitchen tools.

Other cool kitchen tools, but this time, with PUNS!

Ornaments!

Snowy snowglobes!

Socks.

And delicious Theo Chocolate...coconut mint is unbelievable!
And oh so much more!

Not-So-Conventional New Year's Resolutions

New Year's resolutions.  Some people love them, some people hate them...actually a lot of people I know hate them.  So in an attempt to step outside the usual (boring), "lose weight" and "de-clutter," here is a list of books to get you thinking a little deeper about your goals for this most-promising, new year.

CLIMB A MOUNTAIN

The Will to Climb: Obsession and Commitment and the Quest to Climb Annapurna--the World's Deadliest Peak, by Ed Viesturs

As a high school student, Ed Viesturs read and was captivated by the French climber Maurice Herzog's famous and grisly account of the first ascent of Annapurna in 1950. When he began his own campaign to climb the world's 14 highest peaks in the late 1980s, Viesturs looked forward with trepidation to undertaking Annapurna himself. Two failures to summit in 2000 and 2002 made Annapurna his nemesis.

In The Will to Climb Viesturs and co-author David Roberts bring the extraordinary challenges of Annapurna to vivid life through edge-of-your-seat accounts of the greatest climbs in the mountain’s history, and of his own failed attempts and eventual success.

SAVE THE WORLD

Wine to Water: How One Man Saved Himself While Trying to Save the World, by Doc Hendley

The captivating story of an ordinary bartender turned humanitarian who’s changing the world through clean water. Doc Hendley never set out to be a hero. A small-town bartender, Doc loved his Harley, music, and booze. Then he learned about the world’s water crisis, and decided to help by hosting fundraisers. But he wanted to do more and soon found himself traveling to one of the world’s most dangerous hot spots: Darfur, Sudan.

STRENGTHEN YOUR RELATIONSHIPS

All There Is : Love Stories from Storycorps, by Dave Isay

In All There Is, StoryCorps founder David Isay shares stories from the revolutionary oral history project, revealing the many remarkable journeys that relationships can take. In these pages we discover that love is found in unexpected places: a New York tollbooth, a military base in Iraq, an airport lounge. We encounter love that survives discrimination, illness, poverty, distance—even death. Carrying us from the excitement and anticipation of courtship to the deep connection of lifelong commitment, All There Is enriches our understanding of love and of the resilience of the human spirit.

BE A BETTER PARENT

Far From the Tree: Parent, Children, and the Search for Identity, by Andrew Solomon

Solomon’s startling proposition is that diversity is what unites us all. He writes about families coping with deafness, dwarfism, Down syndrome, autism, schizophrenia, multiple severe disabilities, with children who are prodigies, who are conceived in rape, who become criminals, who are transgender. While each of these characteristics is potentially isolating, the experience of difference within families is universal, as are the triumphs of love Solomon documents in every chapter.

All parenting turns on a crucial question: to what extent parents should accept their children for who they are, and to what extent they should help them become their best selves. Drawing on forty thousand pages of interview transcripts with more than three hundred families, Solomon mines the eloquence of ordinary people facing extreme challenges. Whether considering prenatal screening for genetic disorders, cochlear implants for the deaf, or gender reassignment surgery for transgender people, Solomon narrates a universal struggle toward compassion. Many families grow closer through caring for a challenging child; most discover supportive communities of others similarly affected; some are inspired to become advocates and activists, celebrating the very conditions they once feared. Woven into their courageous and affirming stories is Solomon’s journey to accepting his own identity, which culminated in his midlife decision, influenced by this research, to become a parent.

 Elegantly reported by a spectacularly original thinker, Far from the Tree explores themes of generosity, acceptance, and tolerance—all rooted in the insight that love can transcend every prejudice. This crucial and revelatory book expands our definition of what it is to be human.

SHOP LOCAL

The Great A & P: And the Struggle For Small Business in America, by Marc Levinson

From modest beginnings as a tea shop, the Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company became the largest retailer in the world. It was a juggernaut, with nearly sixteen thousand stores. But its explosive growth made it a mortal threat to mom-and-pop grocery stores across the nation. Main Street fought back tooth and nail, leading the Hoover, Roosevelt, and Truman administrations to investigate the Great A&P. In a remarkable court case, the government pressed criminal charges against the company for selling food too cheaply—and won.
In The Great A&P and the Struggle for Small Business in America, the acclaimed historian Marc Levinson tells the story of a struggle between small business and big business that tore America apart. George and John Hartford took over their father’s business and reshaped it again and again, turning it into a vertically integrated behemoth that paved the way for every big-box retailer to come. George demanded a rock-solid balance sheet; John was the marketer-entrepreneur who led A&P through seven decades of rapid changes. Together, they set the stage for the modern consumer economy by turning an archaic retail industry into a highly efficient system for distributing food at low cost.

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Pow!, by Mo Yan

Pow! is a comic masterpiece. In this bizarre romp through the Chinese countryside, the author treats us to a cornucopia of cooked animal flesh—ostrich, camel, donkey, dog, as well as the more common varieties. As his dual narratives merge and feather into one another, each informing and illuminating the other, Mo probes the character and lifestyle of modern China. Displaying his many talents, as fabulist, storyteller, scatologist, master of allusion and cliché, and more, Pow! carries the reader along quickly, hungrily, and giddily, up until its surprising dénouement.

Mo Yan has been called one of the great novelists of modern Chinese literature and the New York Times Book Review has hailed his work as harsh and gritty, raunchy and funny. He writes big, sometimes mystifying, sometimes infuriating, but always entertaining novels—and Pow! is no exception. “If China has a Kafka, it may be Mo Yan. Like Kafka, Mo Yan has the ability to examine his society through a variety of lenses, creating fanciful, Metamorphosis-like transformations or evoking the numbing bureaucracy and casual cruelty of modern governments.

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You Are Not So Smart: Why You Have Too Many Friends on Facebook, Why Your Memory Is Mostly Fiction, and 46 Other Ways You're DeludingYourself, David McRaney

Whether you’re deciding which smartphone to purchase or which politician to believe, you think you are a rational being whose every decision is based on cool, detached logic. But here’s the truth: You are not so smart. You’re just as deluded as the rest of us—but that’s okay, because being deluded is part of being human.

Growing out of David McRaney’s popular blog, You Are Not So Smart reveals that every decision we make, every thought we contemplate, and every emotion we feel comes with a story we tell ourselves to explain them. But often these stories aren’t true. Each short chapter—covering topics such as Learned Helplessness, Selling Out, and the Illusion of Transparency—is like a psychology course with all the boring parts taken out.

Bringing together popular science and psychology with humor and wit, You Are Not So Smart is a celebration of our irrational, thoroughly human behavior.