May 17, 2012

	The Dressmaker by Kate Alcott A spirited young maid on board the Titanic captures the attentions of two men including a kindhearted sailor and an enigmatic Chicago millionaire and barely escapes with her life before witnessing media scorn targeting her famous designer mistress.
	I, Steve: Steve Jobs in His Own Words by George Beahm [Biography Jobs] "A collection of direct quotes from Steve Jobs on topics related to business, technology, Apple, and life".
	How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming by Mike Brown [523.492 Bro] The astronomer who inadvertently triggered the "demotion" of Pluto in his effort to officially recognize the solar system's tenth planet describes the ensuing debates and public outcry while revealing the behind-the-scenes story of his discovery.
	Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell [155.92 Gla] The best-selling author of Blink identifies the qualities of successful people, posing theories about the cultural, family, and idiosyncratic factors that shape high achievers, in a resource that covers such topics as the secrets of software billionaires, why certain cultures are associated with better academic performance, and why the Beatles earned their fame.
	Lone Wolf by Jodi Picoult When his father and sister are injured in an accident that has rendered his father comatose, estranged son Edward wants to stop his father's life support so that his organs can be donated, a choice his sister urges him to reconsider.
	The Witness by Nora Roberts Having had a traumatic experience 12 years prior, Abigail Lowery lives in a remote area, holed up on a house with high-tech security measures, a fierce guard dog and a cache of weapons, but this only serves to further inrtrigue police chief Brooks Gleason, who aims to protect Abigail from what she fears.
	The Tehren Initiative by Joel Rosenberg With the stakes high and few viable options left, the president of the United States orders CIA operative David Shirazi and his team to track down and sabotage Iran's nuclear warheads before Iran or Israel can launch a devastating first strike.

March 15, 2012

	Midnight Riot by Ben Aaronovitch [Aaronovitch] First in a new series by this British author, this volume introduces UK probationary constable Peter Grant, whose abilities to sense and interact with the paranormal ends up leading him to an apprenticeship to Detective Chief Inspector Thomas Nightingale, the only wizard on the London police force. Midnight Riot crosses the popular urban fantasy genre, popularized by Charlaine Harris, Rachel Caine and Jim Butcher, with the police procedural form of mystery -- Think Ed McBain's 87th precinct, or the cops from TV's Law and Order. Throw in a dollop of obscure mythology and a strong sense of place -- the UK edition is titled "The Rivers of London", and the book has a very strong British flavor -- and a heavy dose of character-based humor, and you've got a compulsively readable series, with two volumes out already and third due this summer.
	MWF Seeking BFF by Rachel Bertsche [Biography Bertsche] When Rachel Bertsche first moves to Chicago, she’s thrilled to finally share a zip code, let alone an apartment, with her boyfriend. But shortly after getting married, Bertsche realizes that her new life is missing one thing: friends. Sure, she has plenty of BFFs—in New York and San Francisco and Boston and Washington, D.C. Still, in her adopted hometown, there’s no one to call at the last minute for girl talk over brunch or a reality-TV marathon over a bottle of wine. Taking matters into her own hands, Bertsche develops a plan: She’ll go on fifty-two friend-dates, one per week for a year, in hopes of meeting her new Best Friend Forever. In her thought-provoking, uproarious memoir, Bertsche blends the story of her girl-dates (whom she meets everywhere from improv class to friend rental websites) with the latest social research to examine how difficult—and hilariously awkward—it is to make new friends as an adult. In a time when women will happily announce they need a man but are embarrassed to admit they need a BFF, Bertsche uncovers the reality that no matter how great your love life is, you’ve gotta have friends.
	The Garner Files by James Garner and Jon Winokur [Biography Garner] As an actor, he's played two of the most recognizable characters in television history -- Bret Maverick and Jim Rockford. He's had major roles in feature films from the 1950s through the present day, including such noteworthy movies as Darby's Rangers, Move Over Darling, The Great Escape, The Americanization of Emily, Grand Prix, Support Your Local Sheriff, Victor/Victoria, Murphy's Romance, and The Notebook. In his first and only authorized autobiography, Garner shares moments from his life with his fans -- both positive and negative. While he doesn't "dish dirt", he tells it like it his, including tidbits about many of his co-stars you might not want to have heard. Garner's "voice" -- that of a crusty but loveable curmudgeon -- comes through very effectively, and the book concludes with an extensive collection of commentaries from various of his friends and co-workers over the years.
	Wings Over Nebraska: Historic Aviation Photographs by Vince Goeres [629.14 qGoe] Published in 2010, this book is the perfect companion to the current exhibit "Pioneering Aviators in Flyover Country", which can be viewed at the Nebraska History Museum (15th & "P") through October 26th. Longtime volunteer researcher Goeres has spent years pouring over the museum's photography archives to assemble an evocative book that captures the rich aviation history of Nebraska from the 1910s through the 1950s. Whether you're interested in Charles Lindbergh's connection to Nebraska, the mail delivery industry across the state, The Lincoln Airplane and Flying School, the history of women aviators in our state, Nebraska's WWII airfields, or the history of airplane crashes in Nebraska, you'll find a wealth of image and information in this excellent volume.
	Taft 2012 by Jason Heller [Heller] He is the perfect presidential candidate. Conservatives love his hard-hitting Republican résumé. Liberals love his peaceful, progressive practicality. The media can’t get enough of his larger-than-life personality. And all the American people love that he’s an honest, hard-working man who tells it like it is. There’s just one problem. He is William Howard Taft...and he was already president a hundred years ago. So what on earth is he doing alive and well and considering a running mate in 2012? A most extraordinary satire, Jason Heller’s debut novel follows the strange new life of a presidential Rip Van Winkle: a man who never even wanted the White House in the first place, yet finds himself hurtling toward it once more—this time, through the media-fueled madness of 21st-century America.
	Below Stairs by Margaret Powell [Biography Powell] A tale of domestic life in domestic service told with wit, warmth, and a sharp eye. From the gentleman with a penchant for stroking housemaids' curlers, to raucous tea dances with errand boys, to the heartbreaking story of Agnes the pregnant under-parlourmaid, fired for being seduced by her mistress's nephew, this book evokes the long vanished world of masters and servants portrayed in Downton Abbey and Upstairs, Downstairs. This is the remarkable true story of an indomitable woman, who, though her position was lowly, never stopped aiming high.
	The House I Loved by Tatiana de Rosnay [Rosnay] Paris, France: 1860’s. Hundreds of houses are being razed, whole neighborhoods reduced to ashes. By order of Emperor Napoleon III, Baron Haussman has set into motion a series of large-scale renovations that will permanently alter the face of old Paris, moulding it into a “modern city.” The reforms will erase generations of history—but in the midst of the tumult, one woman will take a stand. Rose Bazelet is determined to fight against the destruction of her family home until the very end; as others flee, she stakes her claim in the basement of the old house on rue Childebert, ignoring the sounds of change that come closer and closer each day. Attempting to overcome the loneliness of her daily life, she begins to write letters to Armand, her beloved late husband. And as she delves into the ritual of remembering, Rose is forced to come to terms with a secret that has been buried deep in her heart for thirty years. The House I Loved is both a poignant story of one woman’s indelible strength, and an ode to Paris, where houses harbor the joys and sorrows of their inhabitants, and secrets endure in the very walls...
	Divergent by Veronica Roth [YA Roth] In Beatrice Prior’s dystopian Chicago world, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue—Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is—she can’t have both. So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself. During the highly competitive initiation that follows, Beatrice renames herself Tris and struggles alongside her fellow initiates to live out the choice they have made. Together they must undergo extreme physical tests of endurance and intense psychological simulations, some with devastating consequences. As initiation transforms them all, Tris must determine who her friends really are—and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes exasperating boy fits into the life she's chosen. But Tris also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. And as she discovers unrest and growing conflict that threaten to unravel her seemingly perfect society, she also learns that her secret might help her save those she loves...or it might destroy her.

January 19, 2012

	More Room in a Broken Heart: The True Adventures of Carly Simon by Stephen Davis [Biography Simon] Carly Simon has won two Grammys and an Academy Award, and her albums have sold more than forty million copies. Her music has touched countless lives since her debut in the 1970s, yet her own life story has remained unpublished-until now. Tapping private archives, family interviews, and a forty-year friendship with the legend herself, Stephen Davis at last captures Carly Simon's extraordinary journey from shy teenager to superstar. More Room in a Broken Heart candidly covers everything her fans want to know.
	The Woman in Black: A Ghost Story by Susan Hill [Hill] Arthur Kipps is an up-and-coming London solicitor who is sent to Crythin Gifford—a faraway town in the windswept salt marshes beyond Nine Lives Causeway—to attend the funeral and settle the affairs of a client, Mrs. Alice Drablow of Eel Marsh House. Mrs. Drablow’s house stands at the end of the causeway, wreathed in fog and mystery, but Kipps is unaware of the tragic secrets that lie hidden behind its sheltered windows. The routine business trip he anticipated quickly takes a horrifying turn when he finds himself haunted by a series of mysterious sounds and images—a rocking chair in a deserted nursery, the eerie sound of a pony and trap, a child’s scream in the fog, and, most terrifying of all, a ghostly woman dressed all in black. Psychologically terrifying and deliciously eerie, The Woman in Black is a remarkable thriller of the first rate.
	The House of Silk by Anthony Horowitz [Horowitz] London, 1890. 221B Baker St. A fine art dealer named Edmund Carstairs visits Sherlock Holmes and Dr John Watson to beg for their help. He is being menaced by a strange man in a flat cap - a wanted criminal who seems to have followed him all the way from America. In the days that follow, his home is robbed, his family is threatened. And then the first murder takes place. Almost unwillingly, Holmes and Watson find themselves being drawn ever deeper into an international conspiracy connected to the teeming criminal underworld of Boston, the gaslit streets of London, opium dens and much, much more. And as they dig, they begin to hear the whispered phrase -- the House of Silk -- a mysterious entity that connects the highest levels of government to the deepest depths of criminality. Holmes begins to fear that he has uncovered a conspiracy that threatens to tear apart the very fabric of society.
	Eisenhower, the White House Years by Jim Newton [Biography Eisenhower] America’s thirty-fourth president was belittled by his critics as the babysitter-in-chief. This new look reveals how wrong they were. Dwight Eisenhower was bequeathed the atomic bomb and refused to use it. He ground down Joseph McCarthy and McCarthyism until both became, as he said, "McCarthywasm." He stimulated the economy to lift it from recession, built an interstate highway system, turned an $8 billion deficit in 1953 into a $500 million surplus in 1960. (Ike was the last President until Bill Clinton to leave his country in the black.)
	The Tower, the Zoo and the Tortoise by Julia Stuart [Stuart] Balthazar Jones has lived in the Tower of London with his loving wife, Hebe, and his 120-year-old pet tortoise for the past eight years. That’s right, he is a Beefeater (they really do live there). It’s no easy job living and working in the tourist attraction in present-day London. Among the eccentric characters who call the Tower’s maze of ancient buildings and spiral staircases home are the Tower’s Rack & Ruin barmaid, Ruby Dore, who just found out she’s pregnant; portly Valerie Jennings, who is falling for ticket inspector Arthur Catnip; the lifelong bachelor Reverend Septimus Drew, who secretly pens a series of principled erot­ica; and the philandering Ravenmaster, aiming to avenge the death of one of his insufferable ravens.
	The Quest: Energy, Security and the Remaking of the Modern World by Daniel Yergin [338.272 Yer] In this gripping account of the quest for the energy that our world needs, Daniel Yergin continues the riveting story begun in his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Prize. A master storyteller as well as a leading energy expert, Yergin shows us how energy is an engine of global political and economic change. It is a story that spans the energies on which our civilization has been built and the new energies that are competing to replace them. From the jammed streets of Beijing to the shores of the Caspian Sea, from the conflicts in the Mideast to Capitol Hill and Silicon Valley, Yergin takes us into the decisions that are shaping our future. The drama of oil-the struggle for access, the battle for control, the insecurity of supply, the consequences of use, its impact on the global economy, and the geopolitics that dominate it-continues to profoundly affect our world.. Yergin tells the inside stories of the oil market and the surge in oil prices, the race to control the resources of the former Soviet empire, and the massive mergers that transformed the landscape of world oil. Selected by The New York Times Book Review as a Notable Book of the Year.