Discover which books Kathy Griffin picked as her favorites of 2016, and why: http://amzn.to/2f2M9cv
Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers
From the Author“For the last two years, I’ve interviewed nearly two hundred world-class performers for my podcast, The Tim Ferriss Show. The guests range from super celebs (Jamie Foxx, Arnold Schwarzenegger, etc.) and athletes (icons of powerlifting, gymnastics, surfing, etc.) to legendary Special Operations commanders and black-market biochemists. For most of my guests, it’s the first time they’ve agreed to a two-to-three-hour interview, and the show is on the cusp of passing 100 million downloads.
Tools of Titans-Amazon link
“This book contains the distilled tools, tactics, and ‘inside baseball’ you won’t find anywhere else. It also includes new tips from past guests, and life lessons from new ‘guests’ you haven’t met.
“What makes the show different is a relentless focus on actionable details. This is reflected in the questions. For example: What do these people do in the first sixty minutes of each morning? What do their workout routines look like, and why? What books have they gifted most to other people? What are the biggest wastes of time for novices in their field? What supplements do they take on a daily basis?
“I don’t view myself as an interviewer. I view myself as an experimenter. If I can’t test something and replicate results in the messy reality of everyday life, I’m not interested.
“Everything within these pages has been vetted, explored, and applied to my own life in some fashion. I’ve used dozens of the tactics and philosophies in high-stakes negotiations, high-risk environments, or large business dealings. The lessons have made me millions of dollars and saved me years of wasted effort and frustration.
“I created this book, my ultimate notebook of high-leverage tools, for myself. It’s changed my life, and I hope the same for you.”
The latest groundbreaking tome from Tim Ferriss, the #1 New York Times best-selling author of The 4-Hour Workweek .
TIM FERRISS has been listed as one of Fast Company’s “Most Innovative Business People,” one of Forbes’s “Names You Need to Know,” and one of Fortune’s “40 under 40.” He is an early-stage technology investor/advisor (Uber, Facebook, Shopify, Duolingo, Alibaba, and 50+ others) and the author of three #1 New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers: The 4-Hour Workweek, The 4-Hour Body, and The 4-Hour Chef. The Observer and other media have called Tim “the Oprah of audio” due to the influence of The Tim Ferriss Show podcast, which has exceeded 100 million downloads and was selected for “Best of iTunes” in 2015.
How do you style your bookshelves? (via PureWow)
Trump: The Art of the Deal
After last night I feel like I need to brush up on my knowledge of Mr. Trump. What’s your favorite Donald Trump biography?
Amazon: The art of the deal
Republican presidential nominee Donald J. Trump lays out his professional and personal worldview in this classic work—a firsthand account of the rise of America’s foremost deal-maker.
“I like thinking big. I always have. To me it’s very simple: If you’re going to be thinking anyway, you might as well think big.”—Donald J. Trump
Here is Trump in action—how he runs his organization and how he runs his life—as he meets the people he needs to meet, chats with family and friends, clashes with enemies, and challenges conventional thinking. But even a maverick plays by rules, and Trump has formulated time-tested guidelines for success. He isolates the common elements in his greatest accomplishments; he shatters myths; he names names, spells out the zeros, and fully reveals the deal-maker’s art. And throughout, Trump talks—really talks—about how he does it. Trump: The Art of the Deal is an unguarded look at the mind of a brilliant entrepreneur—the ultimate read for anyone interested in the man behind the spotlight.
Praise for Trump: The Art of the Deal
“Trump makes one believe for a moment in the American dream again.” —The New York Times
“Donald Trump is a deal maker. He is a deal maker the way lions are carnivores and water is wet.” —Chicago Tribune
The Chemist By Stephenie Meyer
Stephenie Meyer — world-conquering begetter of Twilight, creator of vampires who glitter in the sunlight — has written an engrossing new novel called The Chemist, which would seem at first glance to be a radical departure for her.
By Charles Finch
It’s a thriller for adults (Little, Brown, 518 pp., ***½ out of four stars) in the vein of David Baldacci or Lee Child, pitting a scientist against the shadowy government figures who once employed her, then tried to eliminate her. There are no werewolves around.
But there are exchanges like this:
“I am intrinsically incompatible with being an object of romantic interest,” says the lovely, ingenious, kind-hearted title character, who seems to us eminently compatible with being an object of romantic interest.
“I understand you,” is the heartfelt reply of the man she’s recently finished torturing. (Literally torturing.) “I just don’t agree.”
As this moony, sweet exchange shows, Meyer’s heart is still in Forks, Washington, despite the change of genre. Her millions of readers will be happy.
The chemist’s name is Alex, or at least that’s what she goes by — she’s on the run as the book begins, sleeping in a gas mask every night, surrounded by elaborate booby traps designed to kill anyone who gets near her. This lifestyle is a major problem socially. She spends a lot of time buying peaches — with some effort, a deadly toxin can be extracted from their pits — but not much dating or hanging out.
Then she gets a message, offering her a chance to come in from the cold. Is it real, or only a more subtle attempt on her life? The uncertain answer lands her on the run with a pair of dreamy brothers, and one of them, a doe-eyed schoolteacher named Daniel, falls in love with her on sight, becoming her guide back into the realm of human contact.
There are a hundred objections you could make to The Chemist. Its biggest twist is visible from space. It’s full of the same daffy blitheness toward blood and pain that always made the Twilight books unsettling, at least to me. Alex’s foes within the government never quite come into focus in the third act, one lesson she didn’t take from Baldacci or Child.
But Meyer is also just a really good storyteller. The Chemist is consistently fast-paced fun, especially the way that Alex’s scientific genius gives her an array of potions — she’s small, but you don’t want to get within swiping distance of the rings on her fingers — that verge on the magical. Meyer knows how to stick close to the arc of Alex’s redemption, tracking her emotions as she tentatively learns to trust again. It’s a terrific ride.
The immense power of the Twilight saga was the way it captured the adolescent conviction of one’s own unlovability, and confronted it with a handsome boy’s implacable insistence to the contrary. It was far from being a thriller, but then the thriller itself is a kind of teenage daydream — of specialness, toughness, power.
The Chemist, absorbing, romantic, and goofy, recycles Meyer’s formula into a genre whose fantasies appeal to a whole different set of readers. Is there any doubt it will sell a trillion copies?
Check out the full article in the USA Today: http://usat.ly/2flzBup
Calling All Bookworms: Enter to Win $1,500 and a Year’s Worth of Books
By Jamie Cattanach
As a Penny Hoarder, very little motivates me as much as free money.
But as an English major and bonafide, unabashed nerd, free books are a very close second.
That’s why I was stoked to hear about this sweepstakes from Penguin Random House: It offers the chance to win both of those things.
And as tempted as I was to keep the secret to myself (and increase my chance of winning!), I just had to share it with you.
After all, what’s a good story without a few friends to tell it to?
Win $1,500 — and Free Books! — From Penguin Random House
Penguin Random House is giving away a bunch of free money and a 25-book “library” of its 2016 releases to one lucky winner.
The books will be in the genre(s) of the winner’s choosing, and will definitely keep their weekend reading supply stocked through the end of the year.
Even if reading isn’t your thing, it’s hard to argue with free cash… and if you win this sweepstakes, you’ll get lots of it.
Specifically, you’ll win a $500 shopping spree at ShopStyle, a fashion site that’ll keep you wrapped up in seasonal scarves and sweaters while you dive into your new books.
You’ll also get a $1,000 Visa gift card to use however you see fit. (With the holidays coming up, I’m sure you’ll find no shortage of places to put that extra money!)
Entering couldn’t be simpler: Just click here and provide your email address and genres of choice.
Penguin Random House publishes a huge range of material, and 2016 was a great year for books (if nothing else). You could win Alton Brown’s “Everyday Cook,” the newest Dean Koontz and John Grisham books, and work by Elizabeth Gilbert — who, yes, has continued to write after “Eat, Pray, Love.”
You’ll also be prompted to sign up for the publisher’s newsletter, which will get you 20% off your next order.
It’s totally free to enter, so what do you have to lose… other than the five minutes it’ll take to unsubscribe from the sponsors’ email newsletters?
The drawing closes at 11 p.m. ET on Nov. 18, so don’t put it off. And if you win, don’t worry, you can keep all the money for yourself.
But is it cool if I borrow a few of your books?
Your Turn: What’s your favorite book?
Jamie Cattanach is a staff writer at The Penny Hoarder and total bookworm. Her writing has also been featured at The Write Life, Word Riot, Nashville Review and elsewhere. Find @JamieCattanach on Twitter to wave hello.
http://www.thepennyhoarder.com/free-money-and-free-books/?utm_source=Facebook_20161105
After Alice and half way through
About half way through this one… Review to come soon. Interest is still piqued. Imagine if Alice wasn’t the only one to find the rabbit hole.
VIEWPOINTS: The Book Of Life By Deborah Harness
Hello fellow readers: Considering this is “All Souls Day” I felt it was appropriate to check out “The Book of Life” by Deborah Harness. More information can be found at: Amazon: The Book of Life (All Souls Trilogy, Book 3)
The highly anticipated finale to the #1 New York Times bestselling trilogy that began with A Discovery of Witches
After traveling through time in Shadow of Night, the second book in Deborah Harkness’s enchanting series, historian and witch Diana Bishop and vampire scientist Matthew Clairmont return to the present to face new crises and old enemies. At Matthew’s ancestral home at Sept-Tours, they reunite with the cast of characters from A Discovery of Witches—with one significant exception. But the real threat to their future has yet to be revealed, and when it is, the search for Ashmole 782 and its missing pages takes on even more urgency. In the trilogy’s final volume, Harkness deepens her themes of power and passion, family and caring, past deeds and their present consequences. In ancestral homes and university laboratories, using ancient knowledge and modern science, from the hills of the Auvergne to the palaces of Venice and beyond, the couple at last learn what the witches discovered so many centuries ago.
With more than one million copies sold in the United States and appearing in thirty-eight foreign editions, A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night have landed on all of the major bestseller lists and garnered rave reviews from countless publications. Eagerly awaited by Harkness’s legion of fans, The Book of Life brings this superbly written series to a deeply satisfying close.
“Weaving an extraordinarily rich story of magic and science, history and fiction, passion and power, secrets and truths, Harkness delivers an unforgettable and spellbinding finale that’s not to be missed.”—USA Today
“Juicy and action-packed . . . Even at 561 pages, this is one hardcover no one will mind lugging to the beach.”
—People
“Pure escapist summer fun.”
—Jodi Picoult, Parade
“The epic and erudite vampire-witch romance comes to a thoroughly satisfying conclusion in the action-packed All Souls trilogy ender.”
—Entertainment Weekly
“A stirring, poignant saga.”
—Us Weekly
“The charm in Deborah Harkness’s wildly successful All Souls trilogy lies not merely in the spells that its creature characters cast as they lurk pretty much in plain sight of humans, but in the adroit way Harkness has insinuated her world of demons, witches, and vampires into ours. . . . From the novel’s poignant opening, Harkness casts her own indelible spell of enchantment, heartbreak, and resilience. . . . She is terrific at bringing her magic world to life, maintaining a fast-paced, page-turning narrative.”
—The Boston Globe
“This trilogy is a superlative example in a subgenre you could call realistic fantasy—think Harry Potter but for grown-ups or Susanna Clarke’s Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. Witches, vampires, and daemons exist, along with time travel. But this world also is recognizably ours, not a wholly made-up setting like George R.R. Martin’s Westeros. When done well, as it is here, this sort of fiction provides characters who are recognizably human in their desires and actions even if most of them are creatures with supernatural powers. Through them Harkness succeeds at the hardest part of writing fantasy: She makes this world so real that you believe it exists—or at the very least that you wish that it did.”
—Miami Herald
“Harkness has immersed and spellbound readers with her alternative universe. . . . Her ambitious melding of scientific and historical detail is inventive and brings surprising depth. . . . The Book of Life brims with sensuality, intrigue, violence and much-welcome humor.”
—Los Angeles Times
“There is no shortage of action in this sprawling sequel, and nearly every chapter brings a wrinkle to the tale. The storytelling is lively and energetic, and Diana remains an appealing heroine even as her life becomes ever more extraordinary. A delightful wrap-up to the trilogy.”
—Publishers Weekly
About the Author: Deborah Harkness is a professor of history at the University of Southern California. She has received Fullbright, Guggenheim, and National Humanities Center fellowships, and her most recent scholarly work is The Jewel House: Elizabethan London and the Scientific Revolution. She also writes an award-winning wine blog.
Happy Halloween
hortonreader 