New Nonfiction Roundup – October 2022

Celebrate the first full month of fall with a bevy of fabulous cookbooks, celebrity biographies, moving memoirs, and so much more!

Several leading cookbook authors are releasing new books in October. “Barefoot Contessa” host Ina Garten returns with her latest crowd-pleaser, Go-To Dinners; Danielle Walker provides easy recipes to keep you Healthy in a Hurry; Tabitha Brown shares easy, delicious, and joyful plant-based inspirations in
Cooking From the Spirit; Kristin Miglore delivers 100 rule-breaking recipes in Food52 Simply Genius; and Noor Murad provides cooks with secret culinary weapons in the latest from the “Ottolenghi Test Kitchen,” Extra Good Things.

Bakers, plan your holiday treats with the The Cookie Bible, the ultimate cookie cookbook by Rose Levy Beranbaum; learn the craft of baking through 100 recipes in The King Arthur Baking School; enjoy the latest from “Great British Baking Show Winner” Nadiya Hussain with Nadiya’s Everyday Baking; or enjoy delicious baked goods for breakfast, dinner and everything in-between with Savory Baking by Erin Jeanne McDowell.

Looking to step it up a bit? Check out Preppy Kitchen, John Kanell’s debut that celebrates decadent, seasonal comfort food; Jacques Pepin: Art of the Chicken, where legendary French chef Jacques Pepin pairs 50 recipes for the humble chicken alongside paintings by the author; discover the cuisine of Puerto Rico with Illyanna Maisonet in Diasporican; and explore recipes from “Little Fat Boy” Frankie Gaw’s Taiwanese-American home in First Generation.

Enjoy 140 vegetable-forward Italian recipes with Jody Williams from her NYC restaurant Via Carota, or trace the roots of the Great Migration and its influence on west coast cuisine in Tanya Holland’s California Soul. Finally, learn how to cook for a crowd with Christian author Jen Hatmaker’s first cookbook, Feed These People: Slam-Dunk Recipes for Your Crew or just see what makes Netflix star Phil Rosenthal happy in Somebody Feed Phil: The Book.

If juicy celebrity biographies are your thing, this is the month for you! Constance Wu chronicles life in the entertainment industry as an Asian American actor, including sexual harassment on the set of “Fresh Off the Boat” in Making a Scene; Hollywood icon and humanitarian Paul Newman’s memoirs have been compiled in the raw and candid The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man; “Outlander” star Sam Heughan details his Scottish journey in Waypoints; quirky actress Geena Davis shares the story of her eccentric childhood and fascinating career in Dying of Politeness; Ralph Macchio looks back on the power of “The Karate Kid” in Waxing On; Linda Rondstadt writes a love letter to the Sonoran Borderlands and her Mexican heritage in Feels Like Home; and “Harry Potter” and “Sense and Sensibility” actor Alan Rickman reveals all through candid diary entries in Madly, Deeply.

If you prefer memoirs, we’ve got you covered. New Yorker writer Hua Hsu writes about male friendship following the senseless death of a friend in Stay True; former Secret Service agent Clint Hill reminisces about Jackie O. in My Travels with Mrs. Kennedy; Reza Aslan (Zealot) recounts the fascinating life and death of little-known missionary Howard Baskerville in An American Martyr in Persia; Jessi Hempel reveals how she came out to her family, only to have nearly her entire family come out in various ways, in The Family Outing; Nora McInerny, host of the podcast “Terrible, Thanks for Asking” embraces sadness and authenticity over “live love laugh” in Bad Vibes Only; activist Chelsea Manning chronicles her decision to leak classified military documents along with the declaration of her gender identity in Readme.txt; and Washington Post columnist Margaret Sullivan talks about four decades in journalism in Newsroom Confidential.

Interested in learning more about current events? New York Times columnist Maggie Haberman provides the definitive account of the life of Donald Trump in the highly anticipated Confidence Man; Anand Giridharadas honors those who are working to change minds and save democracy in The Persuaders; police officer Michael Fanone recounts how he nearly lost his life during the insurrection on January 6th in Hold the Line; Robert Draper chronicles how the Republican Party lost its mind in Weapons of Mass Delusion; Walt Bogdanich exposes the hidden influence of the world’s most powerful consulting firm in When McKinsey Comes to Town; Gabrielle Stanley Blair reframes the abortion debate by putting the focus on men and accountability in Ejaculate Responsibly; Nicholas Dawidoff tells the story of violence and injustice in New Haven, Connecticut in The Other Side of Prospect; Renee Dudley and Daniel Golden reveal how a band of misfits crusade to save the world from cybercrime in Ransomware Hunting Team; Chris Miller explains the fight between the U.S. and China for the world’s most critical technology in Chip War; and Tom Bower reveals all about Megan Markle and the wedge she drove within the British Royal Family in Revenge.

Are you a history buff? Acclaimed author Jon Meacham revisits the Lincoln presidency in And There Was Light; filmmaker Ken Burns shares his favorite photographs chronicling U.S. history in Our America; Adam Hochschild looks back at our nation immediately following the end of World War I in American Midnight while Antony Beevor looks at Eastern Europe during the same period in Russia; and Jonathan Freedland tells the story of Rudolf Vrba, who broke free from Auschwitz to warn the world of the horrors of the Holocaust in The Escape Artist.

In science and medicine, Siddhartha Mukherjee (The Emperor of All Maladies) takes a look at the miniscule building blocks of life and what it means to be human in The Song of the Cell; David Quammen tells the story of the scientific race to defeat the COVID virus in Breathless; and Anthony William provides answers to everything from brain fog to depression in Medical Medium Brain Saver and the companion book Medical Medium Brain Saver Protocols.

Improve the quality of your life with some of the latest books in self care: Whole30 co-founder Melissa Urban help readers end resentment, burnout and anxiety and reclaim time, health and energy in The Book of Boundaries; Drs. John Gottman and Julie Schwartz Gottman give readers 7 days to more intimacy, connection and joy in their relationships with The Love Prescription; yung pueblo presents a radically compassionate plan to let go of the past, connect with the present, and expand the future in Lighter; Annie Duke empowers readers to achieve greater success by knowing when to walk away in Quit; and Native American wellness activists Chelsey Luger and Thosh Collins provide all readers with Indigenous teachings for living well in The Seven Circles.

Finally, discover more about America’s fastest growing sport – born right here in Seattle! – in Pickleball is Life.

~posted by Frank B.

Drum Roll, Please: The 2022 Washington State Book Award Winners

Congratulations to the winners of the 2022 Washington State Book Awards!

The Washington Center for the Book and the Library selected winners in eight categories for the awards, which honor outstanding books published by Washington authors in 2021. This is the 56th year of the program, formerly called the Governor’s Writers Awards.

Join us in celebrating these exceptional authors and stories, including all the finalists that were announced in August. (Scroll down for a list of all the finalists.) Find out more about the awards and how to submit for 2023 at the Washington Center for the Book website.

2022 WSBA WINNERS: BOOKS FOR ADULTS CATEGORIES

Biography/Memoir

• Being Seen: One Deafblind Woman’s Fight to End Ableism by Elsa Sjunneson, of Seattle (S&S/Simon Element)

Creative Nonfiction

• The Book of Difficult Fruit: Arguments for the Tart, Tender, and Unruly (with recipes) by Kate Lebo, of Spokane (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

Fiction

• On Fragile Waves by E. Lily Yu, of Western Washington (Erewhon)

General Nonfiction

• Orca: Shared Waters, Shared Home by Lynda Mapes, of Seattle (Braided River and The Seattle Times)

Poetry

• More American by Sharon Hashimoto, of Tukwila (Grid Books / Off the Grid Press)

2022 WSBA WINNERS: BOOKS FOR YOUTH CATEGORIES

Picture Books

• Rock by Rock: The Fantastical Garden of Nek Chand by Jennifer Bradbury, of Burlington; illustrated by Sam Boughton (Atheneum Books for Young Readers)

Books for Young Readers

• Mighty Inside by Sundee Frazier, of Renton (Levine Querido)

 

Books for Young Adult Readers

• Little Thieves by Margaret Owen, of Seattle (Henry Holt and Company)

Fall sports season is here

Fall sports season is underway! The Seahawks (football) kick off their season on Sept 12, the Mariners (baseball) are making a run for the playoffs, with the OL Reign (women’s soccer) likely headed to playoffs and the Sounders (men’s soccer) making a last push for a playoff spot. If all the excitement has you wanting more, delve into one of these books on the history, personalities, and art of sports.

The Forgotten First: Kenny Washington, Woody Strode, Marion Motley, Bill Willis, and the Breaking of the NFL Color Barrier by Keyshawn Johnson and Bob Glauber
A year before Jackie Robinson signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers and broke the color barrier in baseball, UCLA running back Kenny Washington signed with the NFL’s Los Angeles Rams, breaking the color barrier in professional football. The Forgotten First chronicles the life of Washington and the other three first Black players in the NFL in 1946 (two at the LA Rams, two at the Cleveland Browns), their accomplishments, the racism they faced, and the paths they paved for the players who came after them.

Labor Day Reads

2022 has been a big year for Labor movements: the pandemic has changed the way we think about workplace safety and who makes decisions that have impact on employers and employees alike. You may or may not be working today, but as many of us enjoy a long weekend with Monday off, others in industries we rely on may be working today: those in customer service, food, hospitality, agriculture, retail, emergency, health, sanitation, and transportation, to name a few. Thank you to workers in these industries —and thank you to the people who have come before us who have made work better for everyone, bringing humane working conditions within reach for tomorrow.

The following books are brand new titles published in 2022 exploring various aspects of the labor movement: there is something for everyone, from poetry to personal essays, journalism, and history.

We Had Our Reasons by Ricardo Ruiz
This collection of poems by Ricardo Ruiz, a first-generation Mexican American from Othello, Washington, was a collaborative project with his family and the Mexican farming community in Eastern Washington. The poems explore belonging to a diaspora—leaving one’s home and the isolation of working in rural communities in the United States. Told through poetry, transcripts, and biographies, these stories illuminate and uplift the voices of workers and families at the foundation of our local food system.

A Peak at Peak Picks – September 2022

Eight new titles are joining Peak Picks in September!

For nonfiction, New York Times food writer Melissa Clark’s follow up to Dinner in French features 100 one-pot, one-pan and one-sheet recipes that are perfect for weeknights in Dinner in One; poet Javier Zamora tells the harrowing story of his three-thousand mile journey, alone among strangers as a nine-year-old, from El Salvador to the U.S to reunite with family in Solito;  Randall Munroe continues his quest to find serious scientific answers to absurd hypothetical questions in What If? 2; and The Disability Visibility Project founder Alice Wong reflects on her life as an Asian American disabled activist through essays, interviews and artwork in The Year of the Tiger (celebrate the release of this book with authors Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha and Elsa Sjunneson on September 15th in partnership with Seattle Arts & Lectures and Estelita’s Library).