Memoirs & Biographies
story of her family: the struggle to survive
the 1979 revolution, the move to California,
and attempts to acculturate in the face of
teenage rebellion, murder, addiction, and
new traditions.
NORTON
Bastards: A Memoir by Mary Anna
King (June, hardcover, $25.95, ISBN 978-
0-393-08861-8). King watched her
mother give away a newborn sister every
year, five of them, from the commune of
single mothers in southern New Jersey
where she was raised in the 1980s. The siblings start to come together when King is
a college student and she writes hauntingly
and with humor about finding one’s family
and oneself.
OTHER PRESS
A Brief Stop on the Road from Auschwitz by Goran Rosenberg, trans. by
Sara Death (Feb. 24, hardcover, $24.95,
ISBN 978-1-59051-607-2). A journalist
tries to understand his father and his
father’s attempt to survive the aftermath of
Auschwitz in a small industrial town in
Sweden, while observng the chasm
between the child’s world in the collective
oblivion of postwar Sweden and the father’s
dark past. 50,000-copy announced first
printing.
Recapitulations by Vincent Crapanz-ano (Mar. 17, hardcover, $30, ISBN 978-
1-59051-593-8) is an autobiography and
an ethnographic study by an anthropologist who grew up on the grounds of a
psychiatric hospital, including his father’s
early death, his years at school, his love
affairs, his own teaching, and his far-flung
travels. 20,000-copy announced first
printing.
PANTHEON
Screening Room: Family Pictures by
Alan Lightman (Feb. 10, hardcover,
$25.95, ISBN 978-0-307-37939-9). The
author of the bestseller Einstein’s Dreams
writes a lyrical memoir of Memphis from
the 1930s through the 1960s: the music
and the racism, the early days of the movies, and a powerful grandfather whose
ghost continues to haunt the family.
PENGUIN PRESS
Believer: My Forty Years
in Politics by David Axelrod
(Feb. 10, hardcover, $35,
ISBN 978-1-59420-587-3).
The great strategist who masterminded Obama’s historic
election campaigns shares his
life and work over the decades
and opens up about his years as
a young journalist, political
consultant, and eventually
senior adviser to the president.
It’s What I Do: A Photographer’s Life
of Love and War by Lynsey Addario (Feb.
5, hardcover, $29.95, ISBN 978-1-59420-
537-8). After September 11, MacArthur
”genius” grant winner Addario, one of the
few photojournalists with experience in
Afghanistan, was tapped to return and cover
the American invasion. This is the story of
her singular calling as she captures virtually
every major theater of war of the 21st century.
Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by
William Finnegan (July 21, hardcover,
$27.95, ISBN 978-1-59420-347-3). New
Yorker writer and lifelong surfer Finnegan
chases waves all over the world, in this old-school adventure story, intellectual autobiography, social history, and exploration of
the gradual mastering of an exacting, little
understood art.
PLUME
Cabin Fever: The Sizzling Secrets of
a Virgin Airlines Flight Attendant by
Mandy Smith, with contributions by Nicola Stow (June 30, paper, $16, ISBN 978-
0-14-751598-8). In a behind-the-scenes
look at the life of a flight attendant, Smith
updates the genre and shares the good, the
bad, and the naughty from her 12 years
working for Virgin Airlines.
Last Man Off: A True Story of Disaster
and Survival on the Antarctic Seas by
Matt Lewis (May 26, paper, $17, ISBN
978-0-14-751534-6). Marine biologist
Lewis’s firsthand account of an ocean tragedy aboard the fishing boat Sudur Havid,
on a journey from Cape Town to the Antarctic, is a story of disaster and heroism
against a breathtaking backdrop of icebergs and killer whales.
PRINCETON UNIV.
Teaching Plato in Palestine: Philosophy in a
Divided World by Carlos
Fraenkel, foreword by
Michael Walzer (May 25,
hardcover, $27.95, ISBN
978-0-691-15103-8). In an
intellectual travelogue with a
plea for integrating philosophy into our lives, Fraenkel
invites readers on a tour
around the world as he meets
students at Palestinian and Indonesian
universities, lapsed Hasidic Jews in New
York, teenagers in Brazil, and the descendants of Iroquois warriors in Canada.
PUTNAM
The Good Shufu: Finding Love, Self,
and Home on the Far Side of the World
by Tracy Slater (June 30, hardcover,
$26.95, 978-0-399-16620-4). A fiercely
independent American woman leaves a life
as a writer and academic in Boston and
moves to Osaka to live with the most
unlikely mate: a Japanese salaryman who
barely speaks her language.
RANDOM/SPIEGEL & GRAU
My Paris Dream: An Education in
Style, Slang, and Seduction in the Great
City on the Seine by Kate Betts (May 12,
hardcover, $27, ISBN 978-0-679-64442-
2). A coming-of-age memoir by the former
editor of Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar, set in
the fashion world of Paris in the 1980s,
brings to life the enchantment of France.
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD/DOWN
EAST
The Python Trail: An Immigrant’s
Path from Cameroon to America by
Richard Afuma (Apr. 1, hardcover, $22.95,
ISBN 978-1-60893-405-8). Growing up
in a remote region of Cameroon, Afuma
finds his way to a school run by Baptist
missionaries and eventually attends
college in the U.S. He describes an immigrant journey of surprise at povery existing
in America and also tells his story of being
unable to find meaningful employment,
despite having a master’s degree.
