ODY New Books Collection

Lorne

"Ever since its debut in the fall of 1975, Saturday Night Live's impact on the culture has been lasting and profound. It has been a breeding ground for our brightest comedy stars, launching the careers of John Belushi, Gilda Radner, Bill Murray, Eddie Murphy, Adam Sandler, Will Ferrell, Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Pete Davidson, and many many more. Its iconic sketches--from Wayne's World to Weekend Update to Coneheads to the Californians to of course, More Cowbell--have dominated water cooler talk for five decades, and its catchphrases, from "we're not worthy!" to "Daaaaa Beeeears" are embedded in the public lexicon. And at the center of it all, from the moment of its inception to the present day, is one man: producer Lorne Michaels. Over his 50 years running the show, Lorne Michaels has become a revered, inimitable and bewildering presence in the world of entertainment. He's a mogul, a kingmaker, a tastemaker, a grudge-holder, a mensch, a workaholic, a genius spotter of talent, a ruthless businessman, a name dropper, an obsessive step counter, the inspiration for Dr. Evil, a winner of 90 Emmys--and a mystery. Generations of writers, actors, and stars have spent their lives trying to figure him out. He's "Obi wan Kenobi" (Tracey Morgan), the "Great and Powerful Oz" (Kate McKinnon), the Godfather (Will Forte), or "some kind of very distant, strange Comedy God" (Bob Odenkirk). Lorne will introduce you to him, in full, for the first time. With unprecedented access to Michaels (who has spent his career mostly avoiding reporters) and the entire SNL apparatus, The New Yorker's Susan Morrison takes you behind the curtain for the rollicking, definitive story of how Lorne created the institution that would change comedy forever. Lorne features hundreds of interviews with Michaels, conducted over several years; his close friends (such as Paul Simon, Paul McCartney, and Steve Martin); and the candid, hilarious stars of the show, including Chris Rock, Amy Poehler, Jason Sudeikis, Bill Hader, Buck Henry, Chevy Chase, and more. Nearly a decade in the making, Lorne is an intimate, deeply reported, and wildly entertaining account of a man singularly obsessed with the show that would define his life--and change American culture."-- Provided by publisher

Jesus Wept

"When the jolly Italian peasant-turned-cardinal Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli of Venice was elected Pope John XXIII in 1958, change was in the air. The Church, many said, had refused to enter the 20th century. In response, Pope John launched Vatican II, an "ecumenical council" that summoned hundreds of church leaders to Rome. It marked one of the most progressive turns the Church had taken in centuries: "medicine of mercy," as Pope John called it. Yet, not everyone in the Church was prepared to accept this modernization. The battle lines were drawn. In Jesus Wept, Philip Shenon takes us inside the Holy See to reveal its intricacies, hypocrisies, and hidden maneuverings, bringing all the momentous disputes vividly to life: priestly celibacy, birth control, homosexuality, restoring ties with other Christians and Jews, shameful sex abuse crimes, the role of women in the Church. In his rich portrayals of the popes from John to Francis, Shenon draws on research across four continents, including hundreds of interviews and the exhaustive use of archives. He also brings to light other key figures in the Church, such as Cardinal Ottaviani, the incredibly powerful, conservative, and staunchly anti-communist director of the Holy Office under Pius XII, who lived proudly by the motto Semper Idem-"Always the Same." A consummate, vibrant history of the modern Church."-- Provided by publisher

The Instability of Truth

An acclaimed historian of science uncovers the hidden history of brainwashing--and its troubling implications for today. Because brainwashing affects both the world and our observation of the world, we often don't recognize it while it's happening--unless we know where to look. As Rebecca Lemov writes in The Instability of Truth, "Brainwashing erases itself." What we call brainwashing is more common than we think; it is not so much what happens to other people as what can happen to anyone. The Instability of Truth exposes the myriad ways our minds can be controlled against our will, from the brainwashing techniques used against American POWs in North Korea to the "soft" brainwashing of social media doomscrolling and behavior-shaping. In our increasingly data-driven world, anyone can fall victim to mind control. Lemov identifies invasive forms of emotional engineering that exploit trauma and addiction to coerce and persuade in everyday life. Tracing the word "brainwashing" from deep in the files of an operative of the U.S. Office of Strategic Services in the 1950s to the pioneering research of Robert Jay Lifton, to the public trials of cult leaders and the case of Patty Hearst, Lemov also studies how the idea of mind control has spread across the globe and penetrated courtrooms, secret labs, military schools, and today's digital sites. The Instability of Truth offers lessons from mind-control episodes past and present. Truth is always subject to question in more mundane walks of life than most people believe, and Lemov equips us for the increasing challenges we face from social media, AI, and an unprecedented, global form of surveillance capitalism. The Instability of Truth develops a rigorous new understanding of both brainwashing's paradoxes and its emotional roots, by giving voice to brainwashers, the brainwashed, and third-party observers alike.

The Human Scale

"Tony Malik is a half-Irish, half-Arab New York based FBI agent, specializing in money flowing from drug and arms deals. The novel opens in shocking fashion, with Malik seriously injured by a terrorist-planted bomb. During his lengthy recuperative process, his life changes radically. A long-term relationship ends, and his job is on the verge of being taken away from him. During this period he learns more about his roots and becomes interested in his father's past and family -- his father came to America years ago from Palestine. He decides to make a trip to his father's homeland to attend the wedding of his niece, whom he has never met. As a result of his plans, he is given a simple assignment by his boss at the FBI, partly to see how well he can still do his job. That simple assignment becomes extremely complicated. As soon as he arrives in Gaza, the Israeli police chief overseeing the area is murdered. Malik is at first a suspect. Then, due to his superior investigative skills, he is invited into the Israeli investigation, seeking the murderer. At the center of this novel is Malik's relationship with Yossi, the hardline anti-Arab Israeli police officer leading the investigation. They must learn to trust each other because, as they move closer to solving the case, they realize there is no one else they can trust on either side. Extraordinary three dimensional characters populate this novel: Yossi's daughter, studying in Paris, trying to escape the violence that surrounds her in Israel; Malik's niece, whose wedding and life are shattered by the murder; her fiancé, a peacenik whose existence is complicated by the fact that his cousin is high up in the Hamas command; religious leaders on both sides; corrupt Israeli cops; Palestinians thirsting for violence against Israel; Israelis determined to crush the Palestinians. Lawrence Wright brings a wide and complicated tapestry to life, one that culminates on October 7 with the deadly Hamas attack on Israel. But he has written more than just a thriller, or even just an examination of all these complicated lives. He has written a novel that manages to explore and explain much of the devastating history that encompasses the relationship between Israel and Palestine--and shows it to us in a way that poignantly reveals the tragic human scale that is involved."-- Provided by publisher

Gliff

"From a literary master, a moving and genre-bending story about our era-spanning search for meaning and knowing. Gliff explores how and why we endeavor to make a mark on the world. In a time when western industry wants to reduce us to algorithms and data--something easily categorizable and predictable--Smith shows us why our humanity, our individual complexities, matter more than ever."-- Provided by publisher

Free

"Amanda Knox spent nearly four years in prison and eight years on trial for a murder she didn't commit-and became a notorious tabloid story in the process. Though she was exonerated, it's taken more than a decade for her to reclaim her identity and truly feel free. Free recounts how Knox survived prison, the mistakes she made and misadventures she had reintegrating into society, and culminates in the untold story of her return to Italy and the extraordinary relationship she's built with the man who sent her to prison. It is the gripping saga of what happens when you become the definition of notorious but have quietly returned to the matters of a normal life-seeking a life partner, finding a job, or even just going out in public. In harrowing (and sometimes hilarious) detail, Amanda tells the story of her personal growth and hard-fought wisdom, recasting her public reckoning as a private reflection on the search for meaning and purpose that will speak to everyone persevering through hardship."-- Provided by publisher

The Echoes

"From the award-winning novelist, a ravishing new novel set between London and rural Australia, both a love story and a ghost story. Max didn't believe in an afterlife. Until he died. Now, as a reluctant ghost trying to work out why he is still here, he watches his girlfriend Hannah lost in grief in the apartment they shared and begins to realize how much of her life was invisible to him. In the weeks and months before Max's death, Hannah was haunted by the secrets she left Australia to escape. A relationship with Max seemed to offer the potential of a fresh new chapter, but the past refused to stay hidden. It found expression in the untold stories of the people she grew up with, and the events that broke her family apart and led her to Max. Both a celebration and autopsy of a relationship, spanning multiple generations, The Echoes is a novel about love and grief, motherhood and sisterhood, secrets and who has the right to reveal them-what of our past can be cast away and what is fixed forever, echoing down through the years." -- Provided by publisher

Class Matters

"Richard Kahlenberg has been on a lifelong journey to expand social and economic opportunity and provide a much wider group of people the opportunity to have a place at the table. In this highly personal and deeply researched book he dramatically and persuasively illustrates that class should be the determining factor for how a wider group of people gain admittance to higher education and the opportunity to "swim in the river of power". While elite universities claim to be on the side of social justice, the dirty secret of higher education in the United States is that the decades-long focus on racial diversity provides cover for an admissions system that mostly benefits the wealthy and shuts out talented working-class students. How to rectify the resulting skyrocketing economic inequality and class antagonism is a question of profound moral and practical importance. Kahlenberg has long worked with prominent civil rights leaders on housing and school integration, but he made a controversial decision to go over to the "other side" and provide research and testimony that helped lead to the controversial Supreme Court decision of 2023 that ended racial preferences. Ironically, he shows, this decision could actually result in a progressive policy outcome - from one that benefited the upper-middle class to one that helps working-class students. By removing legacy admissions, increasing community college transfers, growing financial aid programs, and recruiting students from underrepresented communities, colleges can create more seats for working-class students, a disproportionate share of whom are Black and Latino."-- Provided by publisher

Cellar Rat

"As Hannah Selinger will tell you, to be a good restaurant employee is to be invisible. At the height of her career as a server and then sommelier at some of New York’s most famed dining institutions, Selinger was the hand that folded your napkin while you were in the bathroom, the employee silently slipping into the night through a side door after serving meals worth more than her rent. During her tenure, Selinger rubbed shoulders with David Chang, Bobby Flay, Johnny Iuzzini, and countless other food celebrities of the early 2000’s. Her position allowed her access to a life she never expected; the lavish parties, the tasting courses, the wildly expensive wines – the rare world we see romanticized in countless movies and television shows. But the thing about being invisible is that people forget you’re there, and most act differently when they think no one is looking. In Cellar Rat, Selinger chronicles her rise and fall in the restaurant business, beginning with the gritty hometown pub where she fell in love with the industry and ending with her final post serving celebrities at the Hamptons classic Nick & Toni’s. In between, readers will join Selinger on her emotional journey as she learns the joys of fine fine dining, the allure and danger of power, and what it takes to walk away from a career you love when it no longer serves you." -- Amazon

Care and Feeding

"In this moving, hilarious, and insightful memoir, Laurie Woolever traces her path from a small-town childhood to working at revered restaurants and food publications, alternately bolstered and overshadowed by two of the most powerful men in the business. But there's more to the story than the two bold-faced names on her resume: Mario Batali and Anthony Bourdain. Behind the scenes, Laurie's life is frequently chaotic, an often pleasurable buffet of bad decisions at which she frequently overstays her welcome. Acerbic and wryly self-deprecating, Laurie attempts to carve her own space as a woman in this world that is by turns toxic and intoxicating. Laurie seeks to try it all--from a seedy Atlantic City strip club to the Park Hyatt Tokyo, from a hippie vegetarian co-op to the legendary El Bulli--while balancing her consuming work with her sometimes ambivalent relationship to marriage and motherhood. As the food world careens toward an overdue reckoning and Laurie's mentors face their own high-profile descents, she is confronted with the questions of where she belongs and how to hold on to the parts of her life's work that she truly values: care and feeding."-- Amazon.com

Birds, Sex and Beauty

In all animals, mating is a deal. But few creatures behave as if sex is a simple transaction. Many treat it with reverence, suspicion, angst and violence. In the case of the Black Grouse, the bird at the centre of Matt Ridley's investigation, the males dance and sing for hours a day, for several exhausting months, in an exhausting and sometimes deadly ritual called a 'lek'. To prepare for the ordeal, they grow, preen and display fancy, twisted, bold-colored feathers. But why are males the eager sellers and females the discerning buyers? Why do increasingly baroque and bizarre males put themselves at risk of attack by circling hawks and rival birds? And why are these displays considered beautiful by humans at all?

The Antidote

"A gripping Dust Bowl epic about five characters whose fates become entangled after a storm ravages their small Nebraska town."-- Provided by publisher

All Systems Red

"A murderous android discovers itself in 'All Systems Red', a tense science fiction adventure by Martha Wells that interrogates the roots of consciousness through Artificial intelligence. In a corporate-dominated spacefaring future, planetary missions must be approved and supplied by the Company. Exploratory teams are accompanied by Company-supplied security androids, for their own safety. But in a society where contracts are awarded to the lowest bidder, safety isn't a primary concern. On a distant planet, a team of scientists are conducting surface tests, shadowed by their Company-supplied 'droid -- a self-aware SecUnit that has hacked its own governor module, and refers to itself (though never out loud) as 'Murderbot.' Scornful of humans, all it really wants is to be left alone long enough to figure out who it is. But when a neighboring mission goes dark, it's up to the scientists and their Murderbot to get to the truth." -- Provided by publisher

Bees, and after

"The 119th winner of the Yale Series of Younger Poets prize places science at the heart of his powerful poems. For John Liles, science and the natural world form a route into the workings of love, of grief, and of joy in the thrum of life. Judge Rae Armantrout calls his poems 'dense, sonically gorgeous studies of various natural things and creatures, including light, bees, minerals, shellfish and crabs, insects, and the workings (and failure) of the heart.' Written under the shadow of our changing climate, Liles's poems are tender elegies but also praise-songs for the continual unfolding richness of the world. Writes Liles, 'oh unending animal, / you go where / the light goes.'" --Amazon.ca

Bowling with Corpses & Other Strange Tales From Lands Unknown

"This anthology features eight fantasy stories blending elements of the supernatural, myth, and dark fantasy written and illustrated by Hellboy creator Mike Mignola. Inspired by folklore, the collection includes tales such as a quest for a long-dead sorcerer, to a pirate girl who makes a deal with the devil, to the titular boy who wins a grim prize in a game with some undead interlopers, and more. Mignola builds a brand-new world filled with the weird, wicked and whimsical in this volume that will delight longtime Hellboy fans and new readers alike."-- Provided by publisher

The Story of Witches

Delve into the beguiling history of witches and uncover a fascinating world laden with myth, magic and superstition. The Story of Witches offers a tantalising insight into the dark past and modern fascination with the occult in its many forms. Demonic and deviant or liberated and revered, witches have cast a compelling spell over the cultural zeitgeist for hundreds of years, often occupying a space at the forefront of art and culture. In this enchantingly illustrated book, Willow Winsham separates fact from fiction by exploring the demonisation and reclamation of witches throughout history.

Theory & Practice

A new novel of startling intelligence from prizewinning Australian author Michelle de Kretser, following a writer looking back on her young adulthood and grappling with what happens when life smashes through the boundaries of art. It's 1986, and "beautiful, radical ideas" are in the air. The narrator of Theory & Practice, a young woman originally from Sri Lanka, arrives in Melbourne for graduate school to research the novels of Virginia Woolf. In the bohemian neighborhood of St. Kilda she meets artists, activists, students--and Kit. He claims to be in a "deconstructed relationship." They become lovers, and the narrator's feminism comes up against her jealousy. Meanwhile, an entry in Woolf's diary upends what the narrator knows about her literary idol, and throws her own work into disarray. What happens when our desires run contrary to our beliefs? What should we do when the failings of revered figures come to light? Who is shamed when the truth is told? Michelle de Kretser's new novel offers a spellbinding meditation on the moral complexities that arise in the gap between our values and our lives.

Strike

"Historian Sarah E. Bond retells the traditional story of Ancient Rome, revealing how groups of ancient workers unified, connected, and protested as they helped build an empire From plebeians refusing to join the Roman army to bakers withholding bread, this is the first book to explore how Roman workers used strikes, boycotts, riots, and rebellion to get their voices--and their labor--acknowledged. Sarah E. Bond explores Ancient Rome from a new angle to show that the history of labor conflicts and collective action goes back thousands of years, uncovering a world far more similar to our own than we realize. Workers often turned to their associations for solidarity and shared identity in the ancient world. Some of these groups even negotiated contracts, wages, and work conditions in a manner similar to modern labor unions. As the world begins to consider the value--and indeed the necessity--of unionization to protect workers, this book demonstrates that we can learn valuable lessons from ancient laborers and from attempts by the Roman government to limit their freedom." -- Provided by publisher

Stone Yard Devotional

"Burnt out and in need of retreat, a middle-aged woman leaves Sydney to return to the place she grew up, taking refuge in a small religious community hidden away on the stark plains of rural Australia. She doesn't believe in God, or know what prayer is, and finds herself living this strange, reclusive existence almost by accident. But disquiet interrupts this secluded life with three visitations. First comes a terrible mouse plague, each day signaling a new battle against the rising infestation. Second is the return of the skeletal remains of a sister who disappeared decades before, presumed murdered. And finally, a troubling visitor plunges the narrator further back into her past."-- Provided by publisher

Seeking Shelter

"In the tradition of Evicted and Invisible Child, Jeff Hobbs masterfully explores America's housing crisis through the real-life story of Evelyn. This is Hobbs's first book since The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace that focuses on a single character and her extraordinarily illuminating journey. In 2018, poverty and domestic violence cast Evelyn and her children into the urban wilderness of Los Angeles, where she avoids the family crisis network that offers no clear pathway for her children to remain together and in a decent school. For the next five years, Evelyn works full time as a waitress yet remains unable to afford legitimate housing or qualify for government aid. All the while she strives to provide stability, education, loving memories, and college aspirations for her children even as they sleep in motels and in her car, living in fear of both her ex and the nation's largest child welfare agency. Eventually Evelyn encounters Wendi Gaines, a recently trained social worker who decades earlier survived her own abusive marriage and housing crisis. Evelyn becomes one of Wendi's first clients, and the relationship transforms them both. Told from the perspectives of Evelyn, Wendi, and Evelyn's teenaged son, Orlando, Seeking Shelter is a powerful and urgent exploration of the issues of homelessness, poverty, and education in America-a must-read for anyone interested in understanding not just social inequality and economic disparity in our society but also the power of a mother's love and vision for her kids."-- Provided by publisher