Downtown & Business Staff Picks

Inspired by her parents' experiences with aging and death, cartoonist Joyce Farmer wrote and illustrated this compassionately observed graphic novel set in Los Angeles in the 1990s. Lars and Rachel support one another emotionally and physically while weathering the Los Angeles riots and their own deteriorating health. This book is an unsentimental, quietly funny and emotionally gripping slice of life.
– Rachel

Summer is the perfect time to relax and enjoy this excellent collection of short stories by some of our finest writers, including John Updike, Tobias Wolff, Louise Erdrich and Walter Mosley. Be sure to read "Gogol" by Jhumpa Lahiri, winner of the 2000 Nobel Prize for Fiction, and marvel at her intimate understanding of first-generation Bengali Indians trying to adjust to life in the United States.
- Natalie

Robert Sullivan and his family make a cross country trip every year. From Oregon to New York their trips are filled with love, laughter, and family fights. This book not only chronicles the Sullivan family road trips but delves into all sorts of characters who had made the trip before them. There are the explorers Lewis and Clark, Emily Post, one of the first cross country writers, beat poets who admire Jack Kerouac and dozens more. A book filled with history and personal anecdotes of cross country adventures, "Cross Country" is sure to fuel any adventurous spirit.
- Leah

A haunting story of how countless modern medical breakthroughs were achieved from the preservation of some "immortal" cancer cells of an unknowing abbreviated life.
- Andy

This succinct practical book touches on all aspects of job-hunting in an engaging accessible way. Richard Bolles, author of the highly-acclaimed job-hunters' bible What Color is Your Parachute?, has distilled the essence of his original weighty book. He covers the most up-to-date approaches to looking for work in a conversational encouraging style. Even a seasoned job seeker will learn something!
- Esther

Journalist Dan Charnas worked in the music industry and has been covering hip hop music and culture since the 1970s. This comprehensive history is full of insider anecdotes you won't find in other hip hop history books. Charnas demonstrates how money, marketing and industry growth have been core to this creative movement from the beginning. His love for hip hop helps him identify the most telling details to share with readers. Read straight through, or check the index for stories about your favorite artists, labels and music moguls.
- Rachel

A fascinating portrait of two Chinese sisters, the two diverse cultures they experience, & the strength & solace they find in each other as they struggle to find a new life in America while bound to their old traditions.
- Andy

Newspaper reports, personal correspondence, and oral testimonies of several Titanic survivors taken from official British and United States investigative findings give a sense of immediacy to events leading up to, and following, the tragic conclusion of this "unsinkable" ship's maiden voyage. Photographs included.
- Natalie

A quirky little collection of short animal tales presented with wit & humor to make us laugh & perhaps learn a lesson along the way. A perfect modern Aesop's Fables for all of us.
- Andy

When U.S. soldiers were sent to liberate the Nazi death camps at the end of World War II, they were totally unprepared for the horrific scenes that awaited them. Interviews with more than 150 of these soldiers, now in their eighties and nineties, provide eyewitness accounts of what they saw, how they reacted to it, and their compassionate care of those who somehow managed to survive.
-- Natalie

Do you ever stop to consider the actual leaves inside a bag of tea before you plop it into a cup of hot water? If so, you might have a sense that tea comes from India. This is very true, but exactly how tea started coming to the west in such large quantities from India is an intriguing tale of a Scottish gardener, botanist and plant hunter named Robert Fortune. In 1848 the British East India Company sent Fortune into China-the source of much of the world's tea at the time-with instructions to smuggle out tea plans that could be grown in India. This Victorian story of disguise, adventure, and intrigue will change the way you view that cup of tea.
-- Jeff

How can you start and run a small business but still keep your day job? Richard Stim's, Running a Side Business may be the answer. Published in 2009 by Nolo, the leading publisher of legal information for consumers, the book covers all the basics and addresses important legal aspects including personal liability, contracts, licenses and taxes. This easy-to-read guide presents legal concepts in plain-English and includes interesting subject-related statistical snapshots from USA TODAY.
-- Nancy

Fordlandia is a fascinating account of the auto magnate's vision of creating an industrial utopia in Brazil based on planting and cultivating rubber trees along the Amazon. However, he failed to realize that rubber trees can be decimated by natural predators, the native population would not embrace a traditional Midwestern lifestyle, and the ever-present dangers and diseases of the jungle were likely to cause madness and death.
-- Natalie

An adopted son shares his views of Pittsburgh from his perch on the North Side. He sees the city with humorous affection & optimism that Pittsburgh will overcome the numerous challenges it faces in the years to come.
-- Andy

Jabari Asim's new book, Taste of Honey, delves into the lives of a fictional African-American community in the Midwest. These 16 inter-related short stories serve to illustrate themes of family, love, race, and coming of age during the late 1960s.
-- Leah and Danelle

Pollution is no longer just about belching smokestacks and ugly sewer pipes; now, it's personal. The most dangerous pollution, it turns out, comes from commonplace items in our homes and workplaces. To prove this point, for one week authors Rick Smith and Bruce Lourie ingested and inhaled a host of things that surround all of us. Using their own bodies as the reference point to tell the story of pollution in our modern world, they expose the miscreant corporate giants who manufacture the toxins, the weak-kneed government officials who let it happen, and the effects on people and families across the globe. This book- - -the testimony of their experience- - -exposes the extent to which we are poisoned every day of our lives, from the simple household dust that is polluting our blood to the toxins in our urine that are created by run-of-the-mill shampoos and toothpaste. Ultimately hopeful, the book empowers readers with some simple ideas for protecting themselves and their families, and changing things for the better.
-- Gail

You've been let go, laid off, or downsized. With a dash of humor, the authors offer insights and options designed to help "recover, reconnect, and reposition yourself after job loss."

Nearing the end of his life, Enzo, a dog with a philosopher's soul, tries to bring a family together who has been pulled apart by a 3-year custody battle between daughter Zoe's maternal grandparents & her father Denny, a race car driver. A compassionate read with a heart-tugging storyline told from a different point of view.

Learn the intriguing stories of the men in charge of the four principal central banks of the world after World War I, Montagu Norman of the Bank of England, Émile Moreau of the Banque de France, Hjalmar Schacht of the Reichsbank in Germany, and Benjamin Strong of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. They attempted to reconstruct international finance after World War I and return to the gold standard. In the mid-1920s, they appeared to succeed in stabilizing the world's currencies, aiding the flow of capital, and creating economic growth. This fascinating book includes a discussion of economist John Maynard Keynes' dissenting views.

Set during the early years of the civil rights movement in Jackson, Mississippi, college graduate Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan becomes intrigued by the plight of black maids who work in white families homes and embarks on a risky writing project of stories that bring the maids' abuse, mistreatment and heartbreaking experiences to light. Authenic and compassionate, this is a story of "social awakening as seen from both sides of the racial divide" in the South.

A haunting tale that tells the story of two generations of twin sisters, their struggles for independence, and the secrets that have shaped their lives. The sisters Valentina and Julia have inherited their estranged Aunt's London flat with the conditions that they live there for a year before selling and that their parents never step inside. The year culminates in some unexpected ways, revealing that the best laid plans rarely turn out as imagined.

Shortly after midnight on March 18, 1990, two men broke into the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston and stole priceless masterworks by Vermeer, Rembrandt and Degas. The author, a crime writer, inherited the case files from a leading fine arts claims adjuster, Harold Smith, upon his death. Hundreds of interviews with suspects linked to the Boston mob, the FBI and the Irish Republican Party have offered tantalizing clues but little solid evidence. Although the Gardner Museum is offering a $5 million reward for information leading to the safe return of the paintings, the greatest art theft in history remains unsolved.