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Biography and Memoir January 2021
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| The Last American Aristocrat: The Brilliant Life and Improbable Education of Henry Adams by David S. BrownWhat it is: a richly detailed portrait of historian and intellectual Henry Adams (1838-1918), a member of the Adams political family and author of the classic autobiography The Education of Henry Adams.
What sets it apart: David S. Brown's "critical profile" of his subject examines the imperialist attitudes of the Gilded Age gentry and addresses Adams' racist and anti-Semitic views.
Book buzz: The Last American Aristocrat was named a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice. |
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| Girl Gurl Grrrl: On Womanhood and Belonging in the Age of Black Girl Magic by Kenya HuntWhat is it: a conversational essay collection from Grazia UK fashion director and London-based American expat Kenya Hunt.
What's inside: thought-provoking musings on religion, motherhood, police brutality, the limitations of #BlackGirlMagic, and more.
Featuring: guest essays from a handful of contributors (including Queenie author Candice Carty-Williams and fashion blogger Freddie Harrel) offering insights on their own experiences of Black womanhood. |
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| How Did I Get Here? by Bruce McCall; introduction by Adam GopnikWhat it's about: New Yorker cartoonist Bruce McCall's humble beginnings and rocky path to career success.
Don't miss: a nostalgic chronicle of McCall's creative coming of age in New York City's postwar advertising scene (think Mad Men); reproductions of some of his famed New Yorker covers and illustrations.
Did you know? McCall briefly wrote for Saturday Night Live and The National Lampoon in the 1970s. |
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| Loved and Wanted: A Memoir of Choice, Children, and Womanhood by Christa ParravaniWhat it's about: Faced with mounting bills and a crumbling marriage, struggling West Virginia mom of two Christa Parravani contemplated having an abortion when she became unexpectedly pregnant at age 40.
Read it for: a nuanced take on complex women's healthcare issues.
Food for thought: "I can both want to have had reasonable access to abortion and love and want my son." |
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| How to Make a Slave and Other Essays by Jerald WalkerWhat it is: a darkly humorous essay collection from Emerson College creative writing professor and Street Shadows author Jerald Walker.
Why you might like it: This wide-ranging National Book Award Finalist offers personal reflections on Black identity and culture, life in academia, parenting, disability, and more.
Try this next: For another incisive essay collection by a Black academic, read Kiese Laymon's How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America. |
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Spotlight on: Healthcare Professionals
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| The Choice: Embrace the Possible by Dr. Edith Eva Eger; foreword by Philip Zimbardo, PhDWhat it is: clinical psychologist and Holocaust survivor Edith Eva Eger's moving memoir detailing how she learned to live with her traumatic past.
Read it for: the author's poignant and hopeful exploration of how her own experiences have helped her in her work with survivors of trauma.
For fans of: Man's Search for Meaning, written by psychiatrist Viktor E. Frankl, a friend of Eger's and fellow Holocaust survivor. |
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| The Beauty in Breaking by Michele HarperWhat it's about: emergency room physician Michele Harper's encounters with the patients who changed her life.
Why you might like it: Peppered with anecdotes about her own trials (an abusive father, a painful divorce, being a Black woman in a white male-dominated profession), Harper's candid memoir offers a hopeful, much-needed message of how to heal in times of adversity.
Book buzz: The Beauty in Breaking was named a New York Times Notable Book of 2020. |
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| Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death, and Brain Surgery by Henry MarshWhat it is: British neurosurgeon Henry Marsh's affecting and occasionally gruesome account of his three decades in the field.
Who it's for: Readers who prefer their bedside manner with a dose of brutal honesty will appreciate Marsh's blunt and darkly humorous debut.
Want a taste? "I often have to cut into the brain and it is something I hate doing." |
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| Black Man in a White Coat: A Doctor's Reflections on Race and Medicine by Damon Tweedy, M.D.What it's about: Damon Tweedy discusses his experience as a Black physician in the world of medicine, from his education at Duke University Medical School to his work as a psychiatrist in North Carolina.
Why you should read it: Tweedy's intimate memoir also looks critically at disparities in health care for Black and white Americans.
Reviewers say: “An arresting memoir that personalizes the enduring racial divide in contemporary American medicine” (Kirkus Reviews). |
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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