Books

Books

This column has previously cited or recommended books on security, risk and leadership. Having just submitted a book manuscript to a publisher that explores the confluence of those three topics, I discovered that I drew most inspiration for my approach and analysis from works that don't directly relate to any of these subjects. (I should note that I tapped this column for content that I updated or more fully developed in the book).

Reading a different language helps you expand your vocabulary and nail down nuances like sentence structure, and for visual learners like myself it can be the ideal way to start really learning information. Lucky for all of us e-reader lovers, Kindle's ebook store has books in all kinds of languages that you can purchase or download through Kindle's subscription services like Kindle Unlimited and Kids+. You can always send an ebook from your library that's in your learning language of choice to your e-reader, too.

Ursula K Le Guin had her Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction; I have my comfy cardigan theory. What Le Guin proposed is that human culture, novels included, didn't begin with technologies of harm, such as flints and spears, but with items of collection and care, such as the wicker basket or, nowadays, the carrier bag. And so, if we make them that way, novels can be gatherings rather than battles.

Signs she's avoiding or preparing to avoid me - I open the door off my dining room, call down, Mom, and she doesn't answer, even though I heard her moving around moments ago. She texts two-letter replies, such as OK and no. She locks the door off the dining room. She takes out her trash before sunrise. She stops feeding the squirrels and birds. She keeps her lights off. She keeps her phone off. She stacks cardboard boxes in the laundry room or garage or on the deck.

Behind every fiat money used in exchange lies a unit of account defined by a monetary standard [which is] underwritten by credible claims to future surpluses monetized by the government and/or the commercial banking system. [...] Claims of a 'Bitcoin standard' or anything like it are completely indefensible" (p. 28).

Dune fans can get a terrific deal on the beautiful hardcover box set collecting the first three novels in Frank Herbert's legendary sci-fi series. The Dune Saga 3-Book Deluxe Hardcover Box Set is on sale for only $65.59 at Amazon, which is well over 50% off its original $150 list price. You're essentially paying $22 for each book, which is one of the best deals we've seen for this set since its release in 2023. Check out Dune's Deluxe Editions below.

"filled with intimate evenings of storytelling, behind-the-scenes anecdotes, and the music that shaped his life,"

Now, that's not to say that books are only good for a hit of escapism though to be clear, they can be terrific at that, as well. This week sees the release of several works of fiction that challenge or outright shrug off the hard rigors of the day-to-day, in pursuit of something far more out there: proof, at least in concept, that other worlds are possible.

It isn't just McEwan's elegiac, indeed patriotic, attentiveness to English landscapes to the wildflowers and hedgerows and crags, to the infinite shingle of Chesil Beach, to the Chilterns turkey oak in the first paragraph of Enduring Love. Nor is it merely the ferocious home counties middle-classness of his later novels, in which every significant character is at the very least a neurosurgeon or a high court judge, everyone is conversant with Proust, Bach and Wordsworth,

Set 12 years after disbanding The Baby-Sitters Club, the musical introduces us to 25-year-old Kristy, Mary Anne, Claudia, and Stacey as they return to Stoneybrook, Connecticut, honoring a pact they made when they were 13 to reunite, reported . Of course, you do a lot of growing up in 12 years, and the girls now face revisiting their past and handling things popping up in their present-day life, from relationships and omg-what-am-I-doing-with-my-life questions to who-the-hell-am-I-now worries.

"I wrote what I thought was five chapters," says actor Jay Ellis, star of Insecure and Running Point, on the tentative first draft of his memoir, Did Everyone Have an Imaginary Friend (or Just Me)?: Adventures in Boyhood, firstpublished in July 2024 and now available in paperback. "Now, after writing a book, I know it was at best half a chapter," he adds, laughing.

Freya, the novel's protagonist, has never swum in the ocean, and over the course of the morning she learns how. She discovers that she can dive under a swell, "feel the tug of the wave's underturn," and shoot up when it has passed; that she can swim fast up waves that are about to break, then "crash through their crests and fall down their backsides";

As I circled the statue, the skies opened. I stayed put, moved by the creature's lonesome, grief-stricken gaze. I ran my hand along his scars and thought of my own, rough and raised beneath my rain jacket. It was impossible not to see myself in this monster. After all, he was why I was there.

At the window he put his nose against the glass, which was beautifully cold, then drew away and saw the new consistency of the air: quick and blurred and sputtering white. The changed air was leaving itself on the tree branches. The care in those words, the sensitivity! Snow-dreaded, beloved; oppressive, angelic; shoveled, ogled-with the agency to leave itself so wonderfully on the branches! For no fault of his own, James is often in need of salvation. Like snow, he is the most beautiful problem.

Wild Swans, first published in 1991 and written by Jung Chang with the help of her husband, Irish-born historian and writer Jon Halliday, had a global impact few authors dare to dream of. It told the story of three generations of women in 20th-century China Chang's grandmother, her mother and herself and became one of the most popular nonfiction books in history, selling more than 13m copies in 37 languages and collecting a fistful of awards and commendations.

bell hooks's teachings provided me with a new lens through which to view my role as a father, encouraging me to redefine what love and responsibility truly mean.

The Second Wednesday of every Month, The Setup presents"A Funny Thing Happened", a night of world class storytelling. You'll be joining bestselling authors, Emmy-Award winning writers, TED speakers, stars of The Moth Radio hour, Snap Judgment and accomplished comedic voices in an intimate setting right in the heart of San Francisco. "A Funny Thing Happened" Storytelling Night Every Second Wednesday | 8 pm The Beer Basement, 222 Hyde St,

Just over two years ago, I interviewed Katriona O'Sullivan - then a senior lecturer, but now a professor in Maynooth University's department of psychology - in her sparse on-campus office. We talked, and cried a little, as she detailed the story that would become her memoir, Poor. A remarkable and powerful account of poverty, addiction, neglect, homelessness and trauma, O'Sullivan recalled how she was born in Coventry to parents battling addiction.

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here. Nonfiction books sometimes get a reputation for being hard to slog through. But the qualities that make good novels so enjoyable-the well-paced plot, the engaging characters-can also be found in many of their fact-based counterparts. The Atlantic 's writers and editors answer the question: What is a nonfiction book that reads like fiction?

Every answer is a famous person whose first or last name is geographical -- city, state, country, or otherwise. Ex. Novelist Jack --> Jack LONDON ("The Call of the Wild") 1. Actor River 2. Actor Gooding Jr. 3. Artist O'Keeffe 4. Media personality Hilton 5. Composer Irving 6. Actress Fanning 7. Actress Ferrera 8. Adventurer in film Jones 9. Spy in film Powers 10. Video game traveler Carmen 11. Artist Pollock 12. [Phonetic:] Jazz pianist Chick

It was in a Guardian image gallery that I read Justine Kurland describing her son as giving her pictures. When I read that, I knew I could never put it better myself. I only photograph people I have ties with. These people give me these pictures, particularly my husband, Dylan.

The plot heats up when the siblings enter their truck in a competitive cooking show for publicity, only for a contestant to turn up dead, turning the event into a real elimination challenge. With help from their loyal assistant and Beth's best friend Rylie, they follow clues to solve the twisted case before danger strikes closer to home. This blend of mystery and mouthwatering elements keeps pages turning, offering an escapist read filled with banter and surprises.

Which version of a story we choose to tell, which characters we place in the foreground, which ones we allow to fade into the shadows: these reflect both the teller and the reader, as much as they show the characters of the myth. Considerations of culture and bias have been central to the recent wave of mythic retellings focused on women,

I want to begin with a hard truth most authors don't find out until it's too late: 96% of books sell fewer than 1,000 copies. 🫣 This is not because the authors didn't work hard. Not because the books weren't good. But because the launch (the part that gets the book into readers' hands) didn't have the right strategy behind it.

When Beverly Cleary's fictional Henry Huggins made his debut in 1950, he was a third grader whose "hair looked like a scrubbing brush and most of his grown-up front teeth were in." He was also bored. Apart from having his tonsils out and falling out of a cherry tree, "nothing much happened to Henry." But pretty soon after we meet him, by page three in fact, Henry comes upon a scrawny mutt who stares at him eating an ice cream cone and the adventures begin.

Once in a while, mistakes happen. I mention this mistake because it testifies to something powerful about Patrick Ryan's new novel, Buckeye. When I made a late request for an advance review copy of Buckeye, the copy I received looked fine, but when I opened it I realized it was mistakenly bound backwards. The title page was at the very end of this over-450-page novel.

Calling all lovers of musty, dog-eared, yellow-paged books: a new independent shop for secondhand tomes opened last week in Muswell Hill, north London. In a useful repurposing of a high-street space, it occupies the site of an old funeral parlour - but you'll be thankful to know it stocks more than just horror. The shop, which is on Fortis Green Road, opened on September 6 and is run by husband-and-wife duo Chris and Katrina Masson.

But the Revenue Commissioners also found his tax details to be a page turner. It found that he owed €1.44m for the under-declaration of income tax. It added €271,000 in interest and a further €432,000 in penalties to the bill he owed the taxman. It brought the novelist's settlement with Revenue to more than €2.14m. The amount has been paid in full, according to the latest list of tax defaulters.

In this episode, we explain how anchor plates help hold up brick walls; why metal fire escapes are mostly found on older buildings; what impact camouflaging defensive designs has on public spaces; who benefits from those spray-painted markings on city streets, and more. Drawing from stories in the book, we talk about everything from stoplights and crosswalks to speed cushions and easement plaques.