Banna's Recs

Banna

 


 

 

$18.00
ISBN-13: 9781936873159
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Black Lawrence Press, 12/2011
It’s been fascinating for me to see Jon Chopan evolve from a fellow bookseller at the river’s end to an author in his own right. Pulled from the River is a fine and most unusual book: autobiographical essays, sketches, and letters wend a circuitous path throughout Chopan’s early youth in Rochester and later years in Columbus, Ohio. This impressionistic pastiche touches, retouches, and interweaves themes of male friendship, coming-of-age, coming to terms with ageing and death, and the intense father-and-son bond.
- Banna

$25.00
ISBN-13: 9780547622378
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 4/2012

Why do the Yankees win so often? Sure, money may have something to do with it. But the real reason is juju, as practiced by Hart Seely and his pals. You can learn all about the rules -- both do's and don'ts -- from this hugely entertaining and sometimes deeply touching memoir. Seely's wit, energy, and passion erupt from every page. Reading The Juju Rules is like spending a perfect, sunlit day at Yankee Stadium, ice-cold brew in hand, next to your new best friend. And it's a double header. And they win both. In extra innings.

- Banna

 


Bossypants (Paperback)

$12.79
ISBN-13: 9780316056878
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Reagan Arthur / Back Bay Books, 1/2012
You’ve had a rough day. Or you have a bad cold. Or you’re just in a foul mood. What you need is to spend some time with your new best friend – who just happens to be the wittiest, most observant, most generous, and most outspoken person you’ve ever met. Now’s the time to read ”Bossypants”! Actually, any time is time to read “Bossypants.” Tina (you’ll feel like you’re on a first-name basis, too) is the best antidote to, well, just about anything.
-  Banna

$22.50
ISBN-13: 9781592406234
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Gotham, 4/2011
As the daughter, sister, and mother of inveterate punsters (and as victim of the affliction myself) I simply had to check out this book. What fun! Puns of all kinds in history and literature, education and entertainment. Puns in headlines, in advertising, in other languages! Anyone who loves words will have a ball with this book and learn a lot into the bargain. What’s the difference between a bad pun and a good one? No difference, claims my son, and I tend to agree.
-  Banna

The Art of Fielding (Hardcover)

$25.99
ISBN-13: 9780316126694
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Little, Brown and Company, 9/2011
Henry Skrimshander, a phenomenal young shortstop who’s just out of high school when the book opens, is at the center of this coming-of-age novel times five. The others – Mike Schwartz, his self-appointed mentor; Owen Dunne (“I’ll be your gay mulatto roommate”); Guert Affenlight, a college president experiencing a mid-life awakening, and Pella, his formerly estranged daughter – find their lives entangled in consistently unexpected but seemingly inevitable ways, at the center of which are an errant pitch and an improbable championship season. A wonderful, engrossing book, even for the non-baseball fan.
-  Banna

$19.95
ISBN-13: 9780887849756
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: House of Anansi Press, 9/2011
While I’m not a big fan of winter, I’m a huge fan of Adam Gopnik – even more so after this book. Gopnik explores winter in all its complexity, delving into history, science, art, music, and biography as he views the season through the eyes of artists, composers, explorers, and athletes. His knowledge and research are encyclopedic, and his curiosity and enthusiasm are boundless. Gopnik’s a very smart guy, but in a highly companionable, not a show-offy, way.
 -  Banna

$26.95
ISBN-13: 9781594487941
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Riverhead Hardcover, 2/2012

Allegory, fable, Holocaust saga, realistic fiction – somehow Ausubel combines these elements in an amazing novel that is much more than the sum of its genres. In 1939, when the horror of the impending Holocaust becomes undeniable, the residents of a remote Jewish village in Romania do just that: deny it. They declare the world newly made; the past and everything outside their community no longer exist. The novel’s narrator is 11 when the book begins, a young mother of two at its close. We see her improbable new world through the lens her extraordinary experiences and penetrating vision. This novel uses small details and quotidian moments to explore the essence of identity, family, community, and the nature and fluidity of reality.

- Banna

The Latte Rebellion (Paperback)

$9.95
ISBN-13: 9780738722788
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Flux, 1/2011
Mixed-race teens often get lost between the categories; Stevenson puts them front and center. Asha Jamison has conflicting feelings about her Indian/Mexican/Irish heritage. An ethnic slur leads her and two friends to form a club for mixed-race students. But it’s a club in name only, as the trio mostly wants to sell cool t-shirts to finance a post-graduation trip. When the Latte Rebellion takes on a life of its own, Asha’s swept into paths of rebellion at home and at school, leading her to confront issues she’s never dealt with before. An engaging, believable voice for a growing number of teens.
-  Banna

Red Hook Road (Paperback)

$15.00
ISBN-13: 9780307275820
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Anchor, 5/2011
When newlyweds are killed in a freak accident between the church and the reception, their families, an uneasy mix at best, must find a way to come together in their grief. The book follows them over four summers as they grapple with the sadness they share and the class and cultural divide they’ve ignored or denied for years. The coastal Maine setting is as vividly drawn as each of the characters, which is saying a lot. Each member of both families will stay with you long after you’ve finished the book.
- Banna


$17.99
ISBN-13: 9781594744761
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Quirk Books, 6/2011
As a child, Jacob loved looking at his grandfather’s photos of peculiar children, raptly listening to the tales that accompanied them. By adolescence, Jacob decided that the pictures were fake; the stories, fiction. Everything changes when his grandfather dies, victim of a violent attack. Realizing there may be some truth to the old man’s tales leads to a psychological collapse, followed by a trip to Wales to investigate the Home where his grandfather lived for a time as a refugee from the Holocaust. Bizarre vintage photos enliven a whiz-bang story. It’s been labeled a Young Adult novel, but adults will eat it up, too!
-  Banna

Turn of Mind (Hardcover)

$24.00
ISBN-13: 9780802119773
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Atlantic Monthly Press, 7/2011

Observing the past and present through the eyes of someone sliding into the depths of Alzheimer’s might not sound appealing. Here, it’s more than appealing: it’s impossible to put down. Dr. Jennifer White, a surgeon, is a “person of interest” in the death of her best friend. She has no memory of the incident. Or perhaps she does. A gripping mystery, an absorbing study of a family in crisis, and a wrenching look at a mind struggling to overcome its increasing limitations.

-  Banna

 


Vaclav & Lena (Hardcover)

$25.00
ISBN-13: 9781400069316
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: The Dial Press, 5/2011
Two Russian immigrants meet when they are six. The bond they form is immediate, intense, and inviolate. They know what their future holds: Vaclav will be a famous magician, ably assisted by the Lovely Lena. They will be together forever. Torn apart by dreadful circumstances at age 10, each struggles on alone. Reunited at 17, they must grapple with the past, the future, secrets, and dreams. This amazing book is a magical swirl of different perspectives on truth, on love, and on being present in one’s own life.
- Banna

$12.80
ISBN-13: 9781400052189
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Broadway, 3/2011

This is science journalism at its best, addressing history, medicine, family dynamics, and racism in a gripping, well-written book that one needn’t be a scientist to read. Without her knowledge or permission, Henrietta Lacks, a young black woman afflicted with a virulent form of cancer, provided tissue samples for research in 1951. The cells reproduced astronomically and contributed to all kinds of studies. The repercussions for science and for her family are astounding.           

- Banna


$15.00
ISBN-13: 9780812981223
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2/2011

It’s a beautifully written later-life romance, but it’s a great deal more. Major Pettigrew, a 68-year-old widower, is deeply shaken by the death of his younger brother. He finds solace from a surprising source: Mrs. Ali, a widow who owns the shop where he buys his tea and who, it turns out, shares his love of literature. This touchingly told story delves sensitively into matters of race, culture, class, and family loyalty.

-  Banna


$25.95
ISBN-13: 9781594202889
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Penguin Press HC, The, 5/2011

This book is a treasure for both the confirmed Jane-ite and the Austen neoophyte. Deresiewicz views each of Austen's novels through the prism of his own life - or is it the other way around? Austen's view of integrity, love, and family and social life inform his perceptions of his own growth and the choices he made as he elbowed and bumbled his way into adulthood. He sheds much light on why Austen's depth and clarity speak to all of us, at any time in our lives.

- Banna


$27.00
ISBN-13: 9781400064168
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Random House, 11/2010

If this story were fiction, no one would believe it. Louis Zamperini, who’s still going strong in his 90’s, was an incorrigible child, an Olympic runner, and a World War II airman whose plane crashed into the Pacific Ocean. Zamperini survived 47 days on a raft with virtually no water or provisions, only to wind up in a series of Japanese POW camps - each more horrific than the one before. Hillenbrand, author of Seabiscuit, brilliantly tells this breathtaking story of survival, heroism, and relentless determination.

- Banna


$15.99
ISBN-13: 9781439181591
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 days
Published: Simon & Schuster, 7/2010

Wow, can this guy write! These essays cover all manner of subjects and range from political to eccentric to hilarious to deeply moving. In one piece, Weingarten shares what happens when world-famous violinist Joshua Bell performs incognito in a subway station. A very short essay with Roger Maris at its center is a perfect jewel. Two essays about his father will elicit both chuckles and tears.

- Banna