BV Books Hot Picks 11.18.08

Recipes for the Good Life by Patti Labelle
Simon & Schuster/Foundary/KHP, $25
'Tis the season to be cooking. And no one prepares a meal quite like Ms. Patti Labelle. She has two best-selling cookbooks -- one down-home, one for healthy eating. This one is a blend of both. This book is for those who want to live the good life. (Many of the recipes feature Patti's new line of pepper and hot sauces).


Simon & Schuster

The Soloist by Steve Lopez
Penguin, $15.00
The movie, starring Jamie Foxx, doesn't come out until March. So you have plenty of time to read the book that inspired it. Re-released in paperback, this is a tale of a man, a classically trained violist, who attended Julliard and somehow ended up homeless on the streets of Los Angeles.


Penguin Books

Left To Tell by Immaculee Ilibagiza
Hay House, $14.95
Never again? Well, it happened and is still happening. This woman experienced the genocide of her people in Rwanda. This is her first-person account. But in the midst of the surrounding evil, she was able to find and discover God. This book is both depressing and inspirational.


Hay House

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
Penguin Group, $14
This run-away best seller just came out in paperback. This is the journey of a fat, nerdy, Dominican boy, who has shades of the main character in Wally Lamb's 'She's Come Undone.' The style, with its lack of quote marks and sudden breaks into Spanish, may take a minute to adjust to, but this is a wondrous, intimate peek into the culture and history of the Dominican Republic. It also won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2008.


Penguin

Barack (Nonfiction-Children's) by Jonah Winter
Harper Collins, $17.99
Today when a black child says that he or she wants to be president of the United States, this is now a very real possibility. This book is a slice of history -- it's the story of a little boy who wanted to be president who grew up to realize that dream. And his name is Barack.


Collins

Flat Belly Diet! By Liz Vaccariello and Cynthia Sass
Rodale, $25.95
Okay, Thanksgiving is right around the corner, so get this book early. You can either start on your diet early so that the damage done by Thanksgiving won't be so bad, or wait until after the damage is done. As this book says, a flat belly is about food, not about crunches.


Rodale Press

The Ten Roads To Riches by Ken Fisher and Lara Hoffmans
Fisher Investments, $24.95
Recession? Depression? Or opportunity? With the economy in the toilet, now is the time to get some inspiration and make a plan for success during these tough times. So here are ten different paths, and how these people made their millions and billions in very different ways. Maybe one road will be one you can travel.


Fisher Investments

Midnight (Fiction) by Sister Souljah
Atria, $26.95
This is not, I repeat not a sequel or prequel to 'The Coldest Winter Ever' -- at least not in the traditional picking-up-where-we-left-off kind of way. In fact, if you're looking for a book that's even similar, you might be disappointed. But if you have a son or a nephew or a young brother, I urge you to get this book for him as a gift. The main character, Midnight, is an example of what a young man should be -- having a profound love of his mother, respect for the women around him, and respect for self. Now he's not without flaws and drama, but this novel was a refreshing surprise from the "gangster love-story" tag that it bears. Warning: It's 500-plus pages.



Atria