| FICTION | | THE LATEST | |
When Stephen, an official for an agency known only as “the bureau,” arrives at the gates of Hurst to investigate a mysterious death, he finds himself entering hostile territory. To get inside the secluded, cult-like sanctuary, which long ago cut itself off from society, he must enlist the help of a reluctant deputy, and together this odd couple probes a deepening mystery. As the situation grows increasingly perilous, Stephen must find what he’s looking for before the residents of Hurst uncover the truth about him. From acclaimed novelist Benjamin Percy (The Dead Lands) comes a Blade Runner-meets-Edgar Allan Poe thriller that will keep you guessing until its startling conclusion.
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With the departure of two top editors and a $100 million lawsuit from Hulk Hogan hanging over its head, Gawker—the Internet’s most infamous, controversial and successful gossip website—is facing the kind of media scrutiny it’s used to dishing out. But 13 years after its founding, the website remains at the forefront of a revolution that modernized American media, resuscitated a fearless tabloid sensibility and shaped the future of the Internet. In this extensive and first-ever oral history, the editors, bloggers and reporters who’ve worked at Gawker reveal the inner-workings of the media empire—from the inter-office romances to the rampant attacks on New York’s rich and famous.
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| PAGE-TURNING NARRATIVES | | MEMOIRS | |
On March 24, 2015, a routine flight from Barcelona to Düsseldorf crashed into the French Alps, killing all 150 people on board. In the ensuing days, a picture of the flight’s harrowing last moments began to emerge. Shortly after reaching cruise altitude, 27-year-old first officer Andreas Lubitz locked the captain out of the cockpit, took control of the plane and deliberately caused its descent. Journalist and aviation expert Jeff Wise (author ofThe Plane That Wasn’t There) pieces together a chilling portrait of the killer and the system he betrayed, revealing in heart-pounding detail Lubitz’s sudden plunge into madness, what actually happened inside the cockpit and whether current airline regulations leave us vulnerable to similar attacks in the future.
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In Time Code of a Face, bestselling author Ruth Ozeki recounts, in moment-to-moment detail, a profound encounter with memory and the mirror. The author challenges herself to spend three hours staring into her own reflection, recording her thoughts, and noticing every possible detail. Those solitary hours open up a lifetime's worth of meditations on race, age, family, death, the body, self-doubt and, finally, acceptance. In a lyrical essay suffused with her Zen Buddhist practice and thoroughly unlike anything in the author's celebrated novels, Ozeki shows us just how rich and intimate the terrain of one's own face can be.
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| REPORTING | | HISTORY | |
Manny Ansar and Iyad Ag Ghali had little in common except for one thing: a passion for Mali's desert blues, a haunting mix of traditional music infused with the influence of Elvis Presley and Jimi Hendrix. Together, they created the Festival in the Desert—a grand spectacle in Mali's dunes that attracted some of the most famous musicians in the world. But as the music flourished, the friendship turned to enmity when Ghali succumbed to the pull of radical Islam. In The Desert Blues, Joshua Hammer brings to life the jubilant possibility the festival represented and the deadly drama that ripped it all apart.
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When a volcano on the Indonesian island of Java threatens to explode, one man refuses to obey an order to evacuate: the wizard of Mount Merapi. The danger, says the enigmatic resident of the mountain’s heights, lies below, in the plains by the sea. Based on journalist Marc Herman’s on-the-ground reporting and published on the two-hundred-year anniversary of the largest volcanic blast in recorded history, this story carries readers from the creaking seismographs of a geophysical observatory, to thundering meetings of the gods, and finally to the slopes of an erupting volcano, as a high-stakes crisis unfolds.
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| AT PLAY | | SOCIETY | |
At a glance, the world of Minecraft, the hugely popular video game, bears few similarities to any place we know and inhabit. But upon closer examination, the differences might not be as vast as we think. In How You Play the Game, author and philosopher Charlie Huenemann looks philosophically at the game of Minecraft (“What is the point of this?”) and grapples with the ethical conundrums, existential crises and moral responsibilities of the virtual realm. From the Overworld to the Ender Dragon, Huenemann offers an entertaining, insightful and often hilarious examination of Minecraft and the strange worlds—both virtual and not—surrounding it.
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Suicide is everywhere. It haunts history and current events. It haunts our own networks of friends and family. And yet, the topic remains taboo. In this darkly fascinating exploration, Simon Critchley, Hans Jonas Professor of Philosophy at the New School in New York City, takes on the precarious question of suicide. Through a sweeping historical overview of suicide, a moving literary survey of famous suicide notes, and a psychological analysis of himself, Critchley offers us an authentic portrait of what it means to possess the all too human gift and curse of being able to choose life or death.
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| THE KINDLE SINGLES INTERVIEW | | PULP NONFICTION | |
With a hit Netflix series (“Grace and Frankie”) and a much buzzed-about feature film (“Grandma”) on the way, actress and comedian Lily Tomlin is all the rage. In this wide-ranging, intimate and often hilarious Kindle Singles Interview, Tomlin opens up about all aspects of her extraordinary life and career, turning a drab Manhattan hotel room into a one-woman show with tales of her childhood in Detroit, her first ever on-stage experience, and the origins of those classic characters, from Ernestine, the condescending telephone operator on “Laugh-In,” to Violet Newstead, the secretary in “9 to 5.”
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Bradford Bishop had it all: a beautiful family, Ivy League degrees, and a promising career as a U.S. diplomat. But on a mild March night in 1976, he threw it all away, brutally murdering his wife, three sons and 68-year-old mother, and then disappearing into the Great Smoky Mountains. Forty years later, Bishop still hasn't been found. In “A Killer in the Family,” Peter Ross Range (author of Murder in the Yoga Store) delivers a gripping tale of Bishop’s life and crime, following the trail from his privileged upbringing in California to his wily escape, including never-before reported details and chilling theories as to where he might be today.
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| ESSAYS & IDEAS | | HUMOR | |
As a CIA case officer, John Braddock was responsible for assessing, recruiting and handling sources with access to intelligence on weapons proliferation, counter-terrorism and political-military matters. In “A Spy’s Guide to Thinking,” Braddock reveals two simple tools for thinking like a spy. The first describes how we think. The second helps us think ahead. Together, they get us closer to the Holy Grail of thinking: Predicting what others will do next. Part self-help, part practical guide, “A Spy’s Guide to Thinking” shows how individuals and organizations who learn to think like spies can increase the speed and success of everyday decision-making.
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What happens when bestselling author Sloane Crosley attempts to overcome the biggest hurdle of her life? In Up the Down Volcano, Crosley delivers a hilariously honest account of her trip to South America to climb one of the highest volcanoes in the world. Armed with a prescription for malaria pills, a fleece vest, and a few feminine hygiene products, Crosley’s attempt to channel her inner Jon Krakauer doesn't go exactly as planned. Crosley expertly describes the misunderstandings that arise through interacting with another culture in another language, turning the classic adventure story on its funny bone. The results are, of course, touching and amusingly disastrous.
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| WORLD STAGE | | SCIENCES | |
On a mission to learn the fate of her great-great-grandmother Anna, award-winning author Bonnie J. Rough separates from her family for a surprising journey into the difficult past and precarious present of Estonia, the former Soviet state of her heritage. Accompanied by an old friend and her own self-doubt, Rough hits the sauna, bares it all, and learns the true meaning of "saga" in an adventure that delivers unexpected lessons from her foremothers about happiness, autonomy, women’s legacies and the writer’s life. With wit, empathy, and humor, The Girls, Alone brings its readers to uncharted territory both emotional and geographic, and beautifully answers its own high stakes.
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In November 2011, after years in remission, 58-year-old Walter Keller had nearly lost his latest battle with leukemia. Desperate, his family turned to a radical, barely tested gene-therapy treatment. What happened next may change the course of medicine -- and offer new hope to millions of cancer sufferers and their families.
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| ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT | | PROFILES | |
Following Jerry Garcia’s death in 1995, bestselling music journalist Alan Paul (One Way Out) conducted dozens of interviews with the surviving members of the Grateful Dead as they tried to find their footing and make peace with life after Garcia. In Reckoning, Paul collects the best of his encounters with the Dead, including never-published interviews with those brave enough to stare down Garcia’s ghost, from Lesh and Kreutzmann, to Weir and Robert Hunter, the Dead’s reclusive lyricist. With abounding depth and insight, Paul probes to the heart of the band’s enduring legacy with those who continue to carry it on twenty years later.
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In 2008, a troubled Vietnam veteran turned struggling actor named Hamilton Meadows became obsessed with a question: What did William Shakespeare's English sound like when the Bard and his actors spoke it? Though he wasn't the first such seeker, Meadows was undoubtedly the least likely among them. Thrice-divorced and drinking too much, he was living off of military disability checks aboard a derelict yacht. In Finding Shakespeare, journalist Daniel Fromson chronicles Meadows’ attempt to stage the first-ever professional "original pronunciation" production of Shakespeare's work in New York City and quest for one last shot at redemption after a lifetime of tragedy.
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