Books

Laughing Through Life

To kill weeds, his father set fire to their yard and nearly burned down their house. To impress a girl, he made his school basketball team, but when he was called onto the court during an important game – all the coach wanted of him was his shorts for the star player. Through it all though, author Larry Moran continued to laugh.

In his new book “Laughing Through Life,” Moran gives detailed stories of growing up with nine siblings and all of the humor that can come from a big family in the 1950s and 1960s. Moran also goes into detail about his career and shares how comical life can be through the situations he went through. “Laughing Through Life” proves that life is fun, growing up in a big family is automatic chaos, and laughing is medicine for the soul

World-renowned builder Yoshihito Isogawa believes his books should be like the LEGO brick—minimalist, colorful, and full of possibility.


Lego Power

In his new nearly-wordless releases from No Starch Press, The LEGO Power Functions Idea Books (No Starch Press, $24.95 each, 324 pp./328pp., October 2015), Isogawa shares hundreds of creative ways to build mechanisms with Power Functions, a wildly popular LEGO TECHNIC system of electronic components. In these books, Power Functions gears, lights, motors, and control units are used to make sliding doors, walking robots, steerable tanks, and more, with each project encouraging readers to become inventive LEGO builders.

Isogawa’s previous books have been praised as “invaluable” (BrickJournal), “fantastic” (Boing Boing), “minimalistic but highly informative” (Booklist), and “indispensable” (The NXT STEP Blog), and this two-volume set is a treasure trove of tiny but surprisingly elegant creations that millions of LEGO Power Functions owners will use for design inspiration.

The LEGO Power Functions Idea Books showcase small projects to build with LEGO TECHNIC gears, motors, and other moving elements that are depicted in vibrant, detailed photographs. Each model includes a list of required parts that guides readers through the build while exploring the principles of simple machines, gear systems, and power translation.

In Volume 1: Machines and Mechanisms, readers will build:

• Sliding doors
• Grasping claws
• Rack-and-pinion mechanisms
• Ball-shooting devices

In Volume 2: Cars and Contraptions, readers will build:

• Four-wheel drive cars
• Adorable walking bots
• Steerable tanks
• Robotic inchworms
• Cars that can drive on the edge of a table

Each of these volumes continues No Starch Press’s tradition of publishing high-quality books that inspire readers of all ages to stretch the limits of their imagination and build creatively with LEGO. The LEGO Power Functions Idea Books are available now in fine bookstores everywhere.


CELEBRATE: Food, Family, Shabbos

A home cooked meal says I love you and I want you to be healthy.  A home cooked meal is also something to be cherished and remembered forever, so says Chef Elizabeth Kurtz, creator of Gourmet Kosher Cooking, the premier website for kosher recipes, wine and more. The holidays are a time when we celebrate love and friendship with those close to us with food and this fall Elizabeth shares her passion for delicious home cooked meals in her new cookbook, CELEBRATE: Food, Family, Shabbos. Packed with 200 sensational recipes and magnificent photos, CELEBRATE has something for everyone for any holiday, occasion and Shabbat.  Proceeds from sale of the book benefit Emunah’s Children’s homes in Israel, making CELEBRATE the perfect holiday gift.


Affairs to Remember

Have you ever thought about what happens behind-the-scenes at a catered event or dinner party?  Have you ever thought you could do it better?  Founder of Food and Fond Memories, a popular food website, Sandy Axelrod, a former caterer, has produced numerous parties and events, during the course of her stellar culinary career. 

In her first cookbook, Affairs to Remember, she shares insider tips and advice, along with some of her best recipes for good eating and easy entertaining.  Filled with beautiful photographs, Sandy has created a tasty as well as a compelling book that can provide home cooks with everything needed to create a memorable party or dinner.

Affairs to Remember is the perfect holiday cookbook or gift and would be great in a holiday round up or food story.  I can send you two recipes and photos for reprint, just let me know which ones you want.

The recipes in Affairs to Remember have been taste tested by literally thousands of guests at events that were catered by Sandy’s company, Affairs to Remember Catering over 18 years. Only those that received rave reviews were included in the book.  Many of her “small bites” are familiar crowd pleasers as well as many of her favorite recipes which can be served at a large party or can be halved and frozen for another time.  Recipes are divided by category from Small Bites and First Courses to Pasta, Meat, Chicken, Seafood, Sides Dishes, Brunch and Sweet Endings.  The book has something for everyone for any occasion, with recipes such as:

• Crispy Artichoke Fritters Served with Ginger Lime Dipping Sauce
• Bubbie’s Chicken Soup with Knaidlach
• Iced Beet Borscht Served in Bubble Wine Goblets
• Penne with Garlic Shrimp and Artichokes
• Sweet and Sour Brisket with Carrots and Sweet Potatoes
• Shrimp with Fig Jam and Preserved Lemon
• Corn Soufflé
• Orange Cranberry Raisin Bread
• Chocolate Banana Coconut Cream Pie
• Bittersweet Chocolate Pudding Pie with Crème Fraîche 

The recipes can be multiplied easily with great success for those who want to tackle larger parties, but Sandy has also provided information on how to put together a great menu for a cohesive meal.


Joe Journeyman Volume 1  

Perfect for kids, families and sports fans, Joe Journeyman Volume 1 tells the story of “NFL legend” Joe Journeyman, “the only player to play for all 32 NFL teams.”

Featuring hand-drawn, original artwork, Joe Journeyman takes you on a search adventure as Joe and his friends travel from one NFL team to the next. Readers are challenged to find more than 500 things – including characters, historical and city references, and tons of wild and wacky things – as they explore each NFL team’s two-page spread. In addition to the book, puzzles, posters and canvas prints are available for each team in Volume 1. (More information is below.)

A product for kids, benefiting kids, a portion of every sale supports Joe’s Kids and local children’s hospitals around the country.


The Machine: A Radical Approach to the Design of the Sales Function

Backed by his 20+ years as the founder and President of Ballistx, a sales management and marketing consultancy specializing in the implementation and ongoing support of SPE, sales management radical Justin Roff-Marsh is starting a revolution. It’s started small yet its ideas have been building ridiculously efficient sales functions—and market-dominating enterprises—as a consequence over the last 15 years. 

Now, with the release of his new book, The Machine: A Radical Approach to the Design of the Sales Function [Greenleaf Book Group; October 20, 2015], Roff-Marsh is inviting all executives to ‘viva la revolucion!’ and exploit the new sales order, or avoid falling victim to it. He’s immediate available to discuss, in both interviews and contributed articles:

• Why it’s imperative for organizations to shift to this new sales function design, or go down with the ship!
• Real-world success stories of implementing the structure, and how salespeople commonly react before and after understanding the concept of SPE
• The six deeply held sales assumptions most executives fall trap to
• The death of field sales: Odds are you need an inside sales team
• If salespeople don’t have the opportunity to earn a commission, why would they sell?
• Why CRMs suck: The dirty secret of sales is that, with few exceptions, this technology has done nothing to improve productivity


The Caregiving Trap

As a long-time caregiving advocate, care navigator, and caregiving educator, Pamela D. Wilson CSA, MS, BS/BA, CG has personally helped thousands of family and professional caregivers. Her new book, The Caregiving Trap arms caregivers with the knowledge to advocate on behalf of their loved one and provides advice on how the caregiver can maintain a healthy lifestyle, too.


Health Attitude: Unraveling and Solving the Complexities of Healthcare

The race for 2016 is intensifying, and healthcare has become a defining issue in every candidate’s campaign—with most presidential hopefuls calling for the repeal of Obamacare. But healthcare expert Dr. John R. Patrick is revealing an eye-opening roadmap to transform the industry and bring affordable and effective healthcare to all—no repeal required.

In his new book, Health Attitude: Unraveling and Solving the Complexities of Healthcare, Dr. Patrick reveals:

• The positives and negatives of Obamacare, and why it should be reformed, not repealed.
• How innovative new technology, including 3-D printing, robots, electronic health records, and mobile devices will revolutionize medical care.
• The number one problem with America’s healthcare system, and what can be done to fix it
• The consumer-based movement that is taking shape right now in healthcare as patient attitudes and expectations evolve.

As an internet pioneer (the former VP of IBM), Dr. Patrick accurately predicted the evolution of the web in his previous book, Net Attitude. Now, he’s doing the same for healthcare.


The World’s Healthiest Foods

An award winning nutritional blockbuster, The World’s Healthiest Foods (GMF Publishing, 2015), by George Mateljan has just been revised into a long-awaited second edition, and is hitting store bookshelves January 1, 2015.

The definitive guidebook for a healthy lifestyle through eating and cooking the right foods, this encyclopedic guide spans more than a thousand pages. Mateljan is a longtime leader in the revolution to healthy eating, and this latest edition is the culmination of years of wisdom.

The book focuses on the top 100 foods we all need to maximize our health, including fruits and vegetables, eggs and dairy, seafood, nuts and seeds, legumes, grains, fish, meats and flavorings. There are foolproof tips on selection and storage, cooking to retain maximum nutrition, and how to combine foods for even more health-boosting potency. Hundreds of recipes (including 300 new ones) cover every meal including snacks.

Based on proven science and the latest research, this authoritative book goes far beyond meal planning. It’s a tour de force for a health lifestyle, with comprehensive, updated information on nutritional benefits from vitamins to minerals, anti-inflammatories and anti-oxidants. Countless misconceptions and myths are replaced with helpful, genuine expertise, including “best way” tips for handling every ingredient. Moreover, some 10,000 new scientific studies were consulted for this edition.

If you are just getting started on the road to transforming their own health, or avid healthy living aficionados looking for the ultimate reference, this is the ideal guide, sure to become a mainstay in the healthy kitchen.

George Mateljan is a renown expert on health-promoting foods and healthy cooking, and a pioneer in the organic food movement. The founder of Health Valley Foods, one of the largest health food companies in the world, he is the author of eight best-selling books. Learn more at whfoods.org.

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