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New Nonfiction September 2023 |
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Friends of WCPL Book Sale
Thursday, October 19, 5:00 pm
Cynthia Klinck Community Room
Join the Friends of WCPL for a Book Sale October 19-21.
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Every Shot Counts: A Memoir of Resilience by Carlos BoozerA former NBA player recounts his rise to stardom. Boozer was drafted in the second round by an unexpected team that hadn’t even invited him to work out, namely Cleveland. “I’d cycled through pretty much all my emotions in just a few hours—from confidence and excitement to anger and embarrassment,” he writes, adding, “I’d build up an incredible resume at Duke, and that hadn’t been enough.” Both remarks are true: At Duke, which he chose over UCLA, he was a consistent high scorer, which won him the draft spot in the first place, and he performed well enough as a professional—though nowhere near superstar status. Boozer emphasizes that he did his best, every time out. “I’ve loved everything about basketball from day one,” he writes. “I rose to the challenge. I grinded. I agonized. I celebrated. I agonized some more. But I embraced every moment of it. I made every shot count.” The on-the-court reminiscences harbor no surprises, though one feels for Boozer every time he incurs an injury, which is often. The surrounding frame of his life makes for sometimes interesting reading. He opens the book with an account of the murder of a childhood friend and his parents’ subsequent decision to move their family from Washington, D.C., to Juneau, Alaska, where Boozer stood out both as an athlete and as a member of “one of five Black families among a 30,000-person population.” A particularly entertaining anecdote involves the author leasing his Los Angeles mansion to Prince, who turned the place into a purple fantasia. Though Boozer’s narrative is mostly by the numbers, there are some dramatic moments, too, among them the near loss of a young son—now a Major League Baseball prospect—to a blood disorder. Former Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski provides the foreword. A serviceable memoir that will appeal to basketball fans and aspiring players. |
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Eve: How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evolution by Cat Bohannon"Female bodies aren't just male bodies with 'extra stuff' (fat, breasts, uteri)," Bohannon writes. She employs evolutionary biology, gynecology, and paleoanthropology in constructing this history of how the female Homo sapiens body became the marvel it currently is. Nudged along by evolution to become remarkably resilient and amazingly adaptable, women have a compelling case for being the stronger sex. Bohannon's coverage of the science of sex differences, male bias in research studies, and the fact that not all drugs are sex "neutral" make for rousing reading. The discussion moves through conception and birth, childhood and puberty, motherhood and menopause. Love, mating, the brain, perception, language, the musculoskeletal system, and sexism are addressed. The chapter "Milk," dispenses fascinating details about human breast milk, a substance that is nearly 90 percent water but additionally provides nutrition and immunity to nursing babies. "Womb" is another standout chapter with its reporting on the muscular strength of the uterus, function of the placenta, and physiology of menstrual periods. Eve is an enlightening examination of the evolution of the female body, an ode to its remarkable design, intricacies, and capabilities.
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Everything I Learned, I Learned in a Chinese Restaurant: A Memoir by Curtis ChinChin, a cofounder of the Asian American Writers’ Workshop, debuts with a captivating account of growing up gay and Chinese in 1980s Detroit. After immigrating to the U.S., Chin’s paternal grandfather opened Chung’s Cantonese Cuisine in the city in 1940, and his descendants continued operating the restaurant until 2000. In sections organized like a Chinese dinner (“The Tea,” “Main Entrée,” etc.), Chin illuminates the ways that Chung’s provided solace to his family and other local misfits: “It was one of the rare places in the segregated city where everyone felt welcome. Black or white, rich or poor, Christian or Jewish—the restaurant took anyone’s money.” In vivid and moving vignettes, Chin writes of drawing strength from meals at Chung’s after his family moved to the suburbs and faced racism from their white neighbors, and of queer patrons from a nearby drag bar helping him realize as a closeted teenager that “being gay wasn’t a death sentence.” He closes the book with his final meal at Chung’s before moving to New York City in his early 20s, observing that his time at the restaurant “taught me that life was full of endless possibilities. I only had to try new recipes.” In lucid, empathetic prose, Chin mounts an elegy for a now closed community center that doubles as a message of compassion to his former self. Readers will be moved.
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In Light of All Darkness: Inside the Polly Klaas Kidnapping and the Search for America's Child by Kim CrossFor this stirring account of the 1993 kidnapping and murder of Californian 12-year-old Polly Klaas, a tragedy that captured America’s heart, Cross leveraged family connections to gain extraordinary access to primary sources and investigative teams. She assiduously avoids including unverified facts and dramatization and places emphasis on how the Klaas case directed the development and refinement of investigative methods used by local and federal law enforcement. The case's notoriety meant that every moment of the search fell under nationwide scrutiny, and all elements of the investigation underwent an exhaustive review to identify needed improvements. An epilogue describes the degree of collateral suffering experienced by the family, investigators, and those who followed the case in the news. Cross condemns the persistent unequal amounts of resources and media coverage devoted to similar crimes when the victim belongs to a minority or marginalized group. Cross’ coverage is polished and respectful, with a clear expression of ideas and heartfelt but dispassionate reporting. True crime and police procedural aficionados will find her treatment thoroughly informative and incredibly moving. |
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Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things by Adam GrantThe #1 New York Times bestselling author of Think Again illuminates how we can elevate ourselves and others to unexpected heights. We live in a world that's obsessed with talent. We celebrate gifted students in school, natural athletes in sports, and child prodigies in music. But admiring people who start out with innate advantages leads us to overlook the distance we ourselves can travel. We underestimate the range of skills that we can learn and the amount of ground that we can gain. When opportunity doesn't knock, there are ways to to build a door. Hidden Potential offers a new framework for reaching aspirations and exceeding expectations. Realizing potential isn't about being a workaholic or a perfectionist. What matters most is not how hard we work, but how well we learn. It's not about being a genius-growth depends more on developing character skills than cognitive skills. The character skills that propel progress include the proactivity to absorb and adapt to new information, the courage to embrace discomfort, and the determination to find the beauty in imperfections. Mastering those skills doesn't require us to find the one perfect mentor or expert coach to guide us. Often we just need to borrow a compass to begin charting our own path. And we can clear the path for more people by building better systems of opportunity in our schools, teams, and workplaces. Many writers have chronicled the habits of superstars who accomplish great things. This book breaks new ground by revealing how anyone can rise to achieve greater things. The true measure of your potential isn't the height of the peak you reach, but how far you climb to get there.
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The Six: The Untold Story of America's First Women Astronauts by Loren GrushFor NASA’s first 19 years, the adventure of space flight was only available to white men. Then, in 1978, following a push for diversity in the astronaut corps, the space shuttle class of 35 astronauts included six women. In her engrossing account of the lives of these accomplished and determined women, Grush, a Bloomberg News journalist specializing in space, follows their paths from girls who were told they could never be astronauts to women who became just that (as well as doctors, engineers, and scientists). As their professional competencies and personal choices were scrutinized above and beyond those of their male colleagues, the six persisted, opening doors for generations of diverse astronauts to follow. Based on archival material and interviews with the surviving pioneering female astronauts and the families of those who have passed, this is a well-rounded narrative of the lives of these trailblazing women. Like Margot Lee Shetterly’s Hidden Figures and Nathalia Holt’s Rise of the Rocket Girls, The Six highlights the contributions of women in science and the challenges they face. |
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The Sisterhood: The Secret History of Women at the CIA by Liza MundyThe New York Times bestselling author of Code Girls reveals the untold story of how women at the CIA ushered in the modern intelligence age, a sweeping story of a "sisterhood" of women spies spanning three generations who broke the glass ceiling, helpedtransform spycraft, and tracked down Osama Bin Laden. Upon its creation in 1947, the Central Intelligence Agency instantly became one of the most important spy services in the world. Like every male-dominated workplace in Eisenhower America, the growing intelligence agency needed women to type memos, send messages, manipulate expense accounts, and keep secrets. Despite discrimination-even because of it-these clerks and secretaries rose to become some of the shrewdest, toughest operatives the agency employed. Because women were seen as unimportant, they moved unnoticed on the streets of Bonn, Geneva, and Moscow, stealing secrets under the noses of the KGB. Back at headquarters, they built the CIA's critical archives-first by hand, then by computer. These women also battled institutional stereotyping and beat it. Men argued they alone could run spy rings. But the women proved they could be spymasters, too. During the Cold War, women made critical contributions to U.S. intelligence, sometimes as officers, sometimes as unpaid spouses, working together as their numbers grew. The women also made unique sacrifices, giving up marriage, children, even their own lives. They noticed things that the men at the top didn't see. In the final years of the twentieth century, it was a close-knit network of female CIA analysts who warned about the rising threat of Al Qaeda. After the 9/11 attacks, women rushed to join the fight as a new job, "targeter," came to prominence. They showed that painstaking data analysis would be crucial to the post-9/11 national security landscape-an effort that culminated spectacularly in the CIA's successful efforts to track down Osama Bin Laden and, later, Ayman al-Zawahiri. With the same meticulous reporting and storytelling verve that she brought to her New York Times bestseller Code Girls, Liza Mundy has written an indispensable and sweeping history that reveals how women at the CIA ushered in the modern intelligence age.
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The Woman in Me by Britney SpearsIn June 2021, the whole world was listening as Britney Spears spoke in open court. The impact of sharing her voice--her truth--was undeniable, and it changed the course of her life and the lives of countless others. The Woman in Me reveals for the first time her incredible journey--and the strength at the core of one of the greatest performers in pop music history. |
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Being Henry: The Fonz . . . and Beyond by Henry WinklerIn 1973, Henry Winkler was a 28-year-old auditioning for the role of Arthur Fonzarelli on the sitcom Happy Days. His ability to take charge and lose himself in the role got him the part and launched his career. Throughout the author’s youth, acting provided a worthwhile escape from the learning difficulties he experienced in school, though he wouldn’t receive a dyslexia diagnosis until his thirties. Winkler’s enthusiasm for acting led him to Los Angeles, where he surfed from one friend’s couch to another while awaiting his big break. Initially, his role on Happy Days was a supporting one, but Winkler’s charisma and popularity turned Fonzie into the show’s centerpiece. After Happy Days’ 11-season run, Winkler would continue a long career in show business, both in front of and behind the camera, while also co-writing the Hank Zipzer series of children’s books dealing with dyslexia. Sharing memorable and funny behind-the-scenes moments, Being Henry entertains as an introspective, self-deprecating, and quite moving memoir from a versatile actor. |
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Surely You Can't Be Serious: The True Story of Airplane! by David ZuckerThis oral history of the making of the 1980 smash hit Airplane! takes readers back to the film’s writer-director team’s origins, as founders of the sketch-comedy troupe Kentucky Fried Theater (which led to a movie directed by a pre–Animal House John Landis), and narrates the long creative process that gave us one of the most popular comedies of all time. For several years, it seemed Airplane!, a comedic remake of the 1957 film Zero Hour!, would never get made. Then, when writers and first-time directors Zucker, Abrahams, and Zucker (collectively known as ZAZ) finally got a studio to back the project, they demanded casting serious actors who would play their roles straight. Nobody knew what to expect or how it would pan out. This is a wonderful book, full of laughs, surprises, high drama, low comedy, and that delightful feeling of excitement when the underdog scores big. For fans of the movie, a must-read. Ditto for fans of making-of books. |
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Centerville Library
111 W. Spring Valley Rd
Centerville, OH 45458
(937) 433-8091
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Woodbourne Library
6060 Far Hills Ave Centerville, OH 45459
(937) 435-3700
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Creativity Commons
895 Miamisburg Centerville Rd
Centerville, OH 45459
(937) 610-4425
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