April 2020 list by Donalee Jacobs
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Arguing with Socialists
by Glenn Beck
The syndicated host and best-selling author of Conform lampoons progressive political philosophies using arguments about how socialist approaches to government invariably result in bankruptcy and other failures that compromise free-market profitability.
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Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism
by Anne Case & Angus Deaton
Case and Deaton argue that market and political power in the United States have moved away from labor towards capital. As unions have weakened and politics have become more favorable to business, corporations have become more powerful. Consolidation in some American industries, healthcare especially, has brought an increase in monopoly power in some product markets so that it is possible for firms to raise prices above what they would be in a freely competitive market. This, the authors argue, is a major cause of wage stagnation among working-class Americans and has played a substantial role in the increase in deaths of despair. Case and Deaton offer a way forward.
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The End of Mental Illness
by Daniel G Amen
The brain specialist and best-selling co-author of Stones of Remembrance challenges enduring stigmas that prevent people from receiving appropriate care for psychological health, outlining rehabilitative lifestyle tips while counseling readers on the drawbacks of today’s treatments.
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Heaven and Hell: A History of the Afterlife
by Bart D Ehrman
Explores literary and cultural sources to reveal that common perceptions about heaven, hell and the afterlife are modern, competing beliefs that are neither found in the Old Testament nor what Jesus taught.
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Hell and Other Destinations
by Madeleine Korbel Albright
Revealing, funny and inspiring, the six-time New York Times bestselling author and former Secretary of State—one of the world’s most admired and tireless public servants—reflects on the final stages of her career and how she has blazed her own trail in her later years.
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How to Be an Artist
by Jerry Saltz
An award-winning art critic at New York magazine and Vulture offers rules, prompts, tips and insights for emerging artists to use to get through creative blocks, get the most from materials, manage career challenges and find joy in their work.
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Humble Pi: When Math Goes Wrong in the Real World
by Matt Parker
This tour of real-world mathematical disasters reveals the importance of math in everyday life. All sorts of seemingly innocuous mathematical mistakes can have significant consequences. Exploring and explaining a litany of glitches, near misses, and mathematical mishaps involving the internet, big data, elections, street signs, lotteries, the Roman Empire, and an Olympic team, Matt Parker uncovers the ways math trips us up.
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I Want You to Know We're Still Here
by Esther Safran Foer
Esther Safran Foer grew up in a family where history was too terrible to speak of. The child of parents who were each the sole survivors of their respective families, for Esther the Holocaust was always felt but never discussed. So when Esther's mother casually mentions an astonishing revelation--that her father had a previous wife and daughter, both killed in the Holocaust--Esther resolves to find the truth. Armed with only a black-and-white photo and hand-drawn map, she travels to Ukraine, determined to find the shtetl where her father hid during the war. What she finds not only reshapes her identity but gives her the long-denied opportunity to mourn the all-but-forgotten dead.
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My Wild Garden: Notes from a Writer's Eden
by Meir Shalev
This book from the best-selling novelist, memoirist and champion gardener takes us to the perimeter of Israel’s Jezreel Valley where he has his beloved garden and shares his appreciation for the joy of living, quite literally, on Earth.
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The NRA: The Unauthorized History
by Frank Smyth
A former arms-trafficking investigator for Human Rights Watch offers a complete account of America’s most powerful, most secretive and most controversial nonprofit, and argues that it has strayed far from its origins.
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Warhol
by Blake Gopnik
To this day, mention the name "Andy Warhol" to almost anyone and you'll hear about his famous images of soup cans and Marilyn Monroe. But though Pop Art became synonymous with Warhol's name and dominated the public's image of him, his life and work are infinitely more complex and multi-faceted than that. This is the definitive biography of a fascinating and paradoxical figure, one of the most influential artists of his—or any—age.
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