Books with category đź—ž Journalism
Displaying 8 books

Unearthing

2023

by Kyo Maclear

An unforgettable memoir about a family secret revealed by a DNA test, the lessons learned in its aftermath, and the indelible power of love.

Three months after Kyo Maclear’s father dies in December 2018, she gets the results of a DNA test showing that she and the father who raised her are not biologically related. Suddenly Maclear becomes a detective in her own life, unravelling a family mystery piece by piece, and assembling the story of her biological father. Along the way, larger questions arise: what exactly is kinship? And what does it mean to be a family? Thoughtful in its reflections on race and lineage, unflinching in its insights on grief and loyalty, Unearthing is a captivating and propulsive story of inheritance that goes beyond heredity. What gets planted, and what gets buried? What role does storytelling play in unearthing the past and making sense of a life? Can the humble act of tending a garden provide common ground for an inquisitive daughter and her complicated mother? As it seeks to answer these questions, Unearthing bursts with the very love it seeks to understand.

Negative Space

2021

by Lilly Dancyger

Despite her parents’ struggles with addiction, Lilly Dancyger always thought of her childhood as a happy one. But what happens when a journalist interrogates her own rosy memories to reveal the instability around the edges? 

Dancyger’s father, Joe Schactman, was part of the iconic 1980s East Village art scene. He created provocative sculptures out of found materials like animal bones, human hair, and broken glass, and brought his young daughter into his gritty, iconoclastic world. She idolized him—despite the escalating heroin addiction that sometimes overshadowed his creative passion. When Schactman died suddenly, just as Dancyger was entering adolescence, she went into her own self-destructive spiral, raging against a world that had taken her father away. As an adult, Dancyger began to question the mythology she’d created about her father—the brilliant artist, struck down in his prime. Using his sculptures, paintings, and prints as a guide, Dancyger sought out the characters from his world who could help her decode the language of her father’s work to find the truth of who he really was.

Breath

2020

by James Nestor

Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art is not just a book about breathing; it is a journey into the scientific, cultural, spiritual, and evolutionary history of this most fundamental practice. Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Big Magic and Eat Pray Love, describes it as a long overdue look at the importance of this simple act.

Journalist James Nestor takes readers around the world to uncover the mysteries of breath. From ancient burial sites and secret Soviet facilities to New Jersey choir schools and the streets of SĂŁo Paulo, Nestor seeks out those who are uncovering the hidden science behind ancient breathing practices such as Pranayama, Sudarshan Kriya, and Tummo.

As it turns out, the way we breathe affects everything from athletic performance to the health of our internal organs. Nestor's exploration reveals that slight adjustments to our breathing can have profound impacts on our health, including halting snoring, asthma, autoimmune diseases, and even correcting scoliotic spines.

With insights drawn from medical texts spanning thousands of years and cutting-edge studies in pulmonology, psychology, biochemistry, and human physiology, Breath challenges the conventional wisdom about the biological function that we thought we knew so well. After reading this book, you might just find yourself breathing in a whole new way.

We Keep the Dead Close

2020

by Becky Cooper

We Keep the Dead Close is a true crime narrative that delves into the unsolved murder of Jane Britton, a Harvard graduate student, in 1969. This book is not only a meticulous work of investigative journalism but also a reflection on the pervasive violence and misogyny within prestigious institutions. Becky Cooper, once a curious undergrad, unravels a complex tale of gender inequality, institutional power dynamics, and the haunting legacy of a story that refused to be forgotten.

Harvard's history is interwoven with the narrative, as the institution's legacy looms over the events that transpired. The initial rumors of a scandalous affair with a professor and a subsequent murder are debunked, but the truth that emerges is no less compelling. Cooper's decade-long investigation sheds light on the cowboy culture among male elites and the silencing effect of institutions, leading to a broader conversation about our collective narrative of female victims.

We Keep the Dead Close is a memoir that acts as a mirror to society's misogyny and murder, a ghost story that connects past and present, and a love story dedicated to a girl whose life was tragically cut short and lost to history.

Billion Dollar Whale

Billion Dollar Whale reveals the epic story of how a young social climber from Malaysia, Jho Low, pulled off one of the biggest financial heists in history. In 2009, Low set in motion a fraud that would symbolize the next great threat to the global financial system.

With the aid of Goldman Sachs and others, Low siphoned billions of dollars from an investment fund, all under the watchful eyes of global financial industry watchdogs. His elaborate schemes financed elections, luxury real estate, extravagant parties, and even Hollywood films like The Wolf of Wall Street.

This harrowing parable of hubris and greed in the financial world is a classic tale of a 'modern Gatsby', who emerged from obscurity to orchestrate a heist that shook the financial industry, and how this industry let it happen.

Killers of the Flower Moon

2017

by David Grann

Killers of the Flower Moon delves into the haunting true-life murder mystery of one of the most monstrous crimes in American history. In the 1920s, members of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma were the wealthiest people per capita in the world, thanks to oil discovered beneath their land. They lived opulently with chauffeured automobiles, mansions, and European-educated children. However, a sinister series of events unfolded as they began to be systematically murdered.

The family of an Osage woman, Mollie Burkhart, was a prime target, with relatives being shot and poisoned. As the body count grew, the newly formed FBI stepped in, with the young director, J. Edgar Hoover, assigning former Texas Ranger Tom White to the case. White assembled an undercover team, including a Native American agent, to work with the Osage and uncover a chilling conspiracy.

Author David Grann presents a masterful work of literary journalism that captures the urgency of the mystery. Killers of the Flower Moon is not only a riveting account but also a searing indictment of the era's racial injustice.

The Monster of Florence

In the nonfiction tradition of John Berendt and Erik Larson, New York Times bestselling author Douglas Preston presents a gripping account of crime and punishment in the lush hills surrounding Florence, Italy.

In 2000, Douglas Preston fulfilled a dream to move his family to Italy. Then he discovered that the olive grove in front of their 14th century farmhouse had been the scene of the most infamous double-murders in Italian history, committed by a serial killer known as the Monster of Florence. Preston, intrigued, meets Italian investigative journalist Mario Spezi to learn more.

This is the true story of their search for—and identification of—the man they believe committed the crimes, and their chilling interview with him. And then, in a strange twist of fate, Preston and Spezi themselves become targets of the police investigation. Preston has his phone tapped, is interrogated, and told to leave the country. Spezi fares worse: he is thrown into Italy's grim Capanne prison, accused of being the Monster of Florence himself. Like one of Preston's thrillers, The Monster of Florence, tells a remarkable and harrowing story involving murder, mutilation, and suicide—and at the center of it, Preston and Spezi, caught in a bizarre prosecutorial vendetta.

The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine

2011

by Michael Lewis

The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine is a #1 New York Times bestseller and a major motion picture from Paramount Pictures. Michael Lewis, the author of The Blind Side and Moneyball, tells the compelling story of four outsiders in the high-finance world who predicted the credit and housing bubble collapse before anyone else.

The narrative starts with the silent crash that took place in the obscure markets of bonds and real estate derivatives. These are the places where complex securities are created to profit from the financial struggles of lower- and middle-class Americans. Lewis provides a character-driven narrative filled with indignation and dark humor, presenting a group of unlikely heroes whose stories are as compelling as they are improbable, establishing him yet again as an exceptional and witty chronicler of our times.

Are you sure you want to delete this?