TheBestseller
Observatory

Best Sellers

Hardcover Nonfiction

Week of April 23, 2006

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1
MARLEY & ME
John Grogan
Cover of MARLEY & ME

MARLEY & ME

by John Grogan · Morrow

23 wks at #1 · 25 on list

The story of a family in the making and the wondrously neurotic dog who taught them what really matters in life. Is it possible for humans to discover the key to happiness through a bigger-than-life, bad-boy dog? Just ask the Grogans.--From publisher description.

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GAME OF SHADOWS
Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams
Cover of GAME OF SHADOWS

GAME OF SHADOWS

by Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams · Gotham

3 wks on list

Halpern's affectionate and funny story of her life, one outfit at a time, recalls passionate memories tied not only to the clothes she wore, but to what everyone else was wearing, too. "A girl after our own high-heeled hearts."--Lesley Jane Seymour, "Marie Claire."

3
AMERICAN THEOCRACY
Kevin Phillips
Cover of AMERICAN THEOCRACY

AMERICAN THEOCRACY

by Kevin Phillips · Viking Press

3 wks on list

Former Republican strategist Phillips takes an uncompromising view of the political coalition, led by radical religion, that is driving America to the brink of disaster. From Ancient Rome to the British Empire, Phillips demonstrates that every world-dominating power has been brought down by a related set of causes: a lethal combination of global over-reach, militant religion, resource problems, and ballooning debt. It is this same axis of ills that has come to define America's political and economic identity in the past decade. Military miscalculations in the Middle East, the surge of fundamentalist religion, the staggering national debt, the costs of U.S. oil dependence--together these factors are undermining our nation's security, solvency, and standing in the world. If left unchecked, the same forces will bring a debt-bloated, preachy, energy-starved America to its knees.--From publisher description.

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1
THE JESUS PAPERS
Michael Baigent
Cover of THE JESUS PAPERS

THE JESUS PAPERS

by Michael Baigent · HarperSanFrancisco

2 wks on list

In Holy Blood, Holy Grail Michael Baigent and his co-authors Henry Lincoln and Richard Leigh stunned the world with a controversial theory that Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene married and founded a holy bloodline. The book became an international publishing phenomenon and was one of the sources for Dan Brown's novel The Da Vinci Code. Now, with two additional decades of research behind him, Baigent's The Jesus Papers presents explosive new evidence that challenges everything we know about the life and death of Jesus. Book jacket.

6
COBRA II
Michael R. Gordon and Bernard E. Trainor
Cover of COBRA II

COBRA II

by Michael R. Gordon and Bernard E. Trainor · Pantheon

4 wks on list

Written by the chief military correspondent of the New York Times and a prominent retired Marine general, this is the definitive account of the invasion of Iraq. A stunning work of investigative journalism, Cobra II describes in riveting detail how the American rush to Baghdad provided the opportunity for the virulent insurgency that followed. As Gordon and Trainor show, the brutal aftermath was not inevitable and was a surprise to the generals on both sides. Based on access to unseen documents and exclusive interviews with the men and women at the heart of the war, Cobra II provides firsthand accounts of the fighting on the ground and the high-level planning behind the scenes. Now with a new afterword that addresses what transpired after the fateful events of the summer of 2003, this is a peerless re-creation and analysis of the central event of our times.

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FREAKONOMICS
Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
Cover of FREAKONOMICS

FREAKONOMICS

by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner · Morrow

52 wks on list

The New York Times best-selling Freakonomics was a worldwide sensation, selling over four million copies in thirty-five languages and changing the way we look at the world. Now, Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner return with SuperFreakonomics, and fans and newcomers alike will find that the freakquel is even bolder, funnier, and more surprising than the first. Four years in the making, SuperFreakonomics asks not only the tough questions, but the unexpected ones: What's more dangerous, driving drunk or walking drunk? Why is chemotherapy prescribed so often if it's so ineffective? Can a sex change boost your salary? SuperFreakonomics challenges the way we think all over again, exploring the hidden side of everything with such questions as: How is a street prostitute like a department-store Santa? Why are doctors so bad at washing their hands? How much good do car seats do? What's the best way to catch a terrorist? Did TV cause a rise in crime? What do hurricanes, heart attacks, and highway deaths have in common? Are people hard-wired for altruism or selfishness? Can eating kangaroo save the planet? Which adds more value: a pimp or a Realtor? Levitt and Dubner mix smart thinking and great storytelling like no one else, whether investigating a solution to global warming or explaining why the price of oral sex has fallen so drastically. By examining how people respond to incentives, they show the world for what it really is – good, bad, ugly, and, in the final analysis, super freaky. Freakonomics has been imitated many times over – but only now, with SuperFreakonomics, has it met its match.

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1
MANHUNT
James L. Swanson
Cover of MANHUNT

MANHUNT

by James L. Swanson · Morrow

9 wks on list

The murder of Abraham Lincoln set off the greatest manhunt in American history. From April 14 to April 26, 1865, the assassin led Union cavalry and detectives on a wild twelve-day chase through the streets of Washington, D.C., across the swamps of Maryland, and into the forests of Virginia, while the nation, still reeling from the just-ended Civil War, watched in horror. A Confederate sympathizer and a member of a celebrated acting family, John Wilkes Booth threw away his fame and wealth for a chance to avenge the South's defeat. Based on rare archival materials, obscure trial transcripts, and Lincoln's own blood relics, this book is a fully documented work, but it is also a tale of murder, intrigue, and betrayal, an hour-by-hour account told through the eyes of the hunted and the hunters. --From publisher description.

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MY LIFE IN FRANCE
Julia Child with Alex Prud'homme
Cover of MY LIFE IN FRANCE

MY LIFE IN FRANCE

by Julia Child with Alex Prud'homme · Knopf

1 wks on list

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Julia's story of her transformative years in France in her own words is "captivating ... her marvelously distinctive voice is present on every page.” (San Francisco Chronicle). Although she would later singlehandedly create a new approach to American cuisine with her cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking and her television show The French Chef, Julia Child was not always a master chef. Indeed, when she first arrived in France in 1948 with her husband, Paul, who was to work for the USIS, she spoke no French and knew nothing about the country itself. But as she dove into French culture, buying food at local markets and taking classes at the Cordon Bleu, her life changed forever with her newfound passion for cooking and teaching. Julia’s unforgettable story—struggles with the head of the Cordon Bleu, rejections from publishers to whom she sent her now-famous cookbook, a wonderful, nearly fifty-year long marriage that took the Childs across the globe—unfolds with the spirit so key to Julia’s success as a chef and a writer, brilliantly capturing one of America’s most endearing personalities.

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1
BLINK
Malcolm Gladwell
Cover of BLINK

BLINK

by Malcolm Gladwell · Little, Brown

62 wks on list

Kennen Sie die kurzen Momente, in denen wir blitzartige Entscheidungen treffen - Momente, in denen wir denken, ohne zu denken?

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THE GOSPEL OF JUDAS
Rodolphe Kasser, Marvin Meyer, and Gregor Wurst
Cover of THE GOSPEL OF JUDAS

THE GOSPEL OF JUDAS

by Rodolphe Kasser, Marvin Meyer, and Gregor Wurst · National Geographic

1 wks on list

Esta es la trascripcion e interpretacion del manuscrito copto apocrifo datado en el siglo IV despues de Cristo y atribuido a Judas. El Evangelio trata de demostrar que Judas actuo bajo ordenes de Dios, cuando traiciono a Jesus vendiendolo a los romanos por 30 monedas de plata. El traductor del Evangelio de Judas, el suizo Rodolphe Kasser, es el experto mas destacado en el analisis de textos Copticos de la Universidad de Ginebra (Suiza). Un antiguo manuscrito desvela hoy, casi dos mil anos despues de su escritura, una vision muy diferente de Judas Iscariote. Una imagen que le aleja de ser un traidor para convertirle en discipulo predilecto de Cristo. La obra contradice lo que narra el Nuevo Testamento en los Evangelios de Mateo, Marcos, Lucas y Juan, en los que se retrata a Judas como un traidor, este evangelio descubierto recientemente afirma que Judas, al entregar a Jesus a las autoridades, estaba cumpliendo los deseos de su maestro. El profesor Kasser es el director del proyecto de traduccion del B"evangelioB." Kasser dijo que el texto es un manuscrito de 62 paginas que fue descubierto en la decada de 1950 o quiza un poco despues, en Egipto, aparentemente como parte de una una excavacion clandestina. B"El codice ha sido autentificado como una obra genuina de la literatura apocrifa cristiana mediante cinco pruebas: datacion por radiocarbono, analisis de tinta, imagen multiespectral, evidencia contextual y evidencia paleograficaB," afirmo Terry Garcia, vicepresidente ejecutivo de Proyectos de National Geographic Society. B"Este espectacular descubrimiento de un texto antiguo no biblico, considerado por algunos como el mas significativo de los ultimos 60 anos, amplia nuestro conocimientode la historia y de las perspectivas teologicas del periodo cristiano primitivo, y es digno de seguir siendo estudiado por historiadores, eruditos y teologos. Este proceso requerira tiempo y un dialogo continuado que solo acaba de empezar.B"

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LAURA BUSH
Ronald Kessler
Cover of LAURA BUSH

LAURA BUSH

by Ronald Kessler · Doubleday

1 wks on list

When Laura Bush moved into the White House on January 20, 2001, everyone wanted to know what kind of first lady she would be. Would she be like Mamie Eisenhower? Would she follow in Barbara Bush’s footsteps? Would she be another Hillary Clinton? “I think I’ll just be Laura Bush,” she would say. On Saturday, April 30, 2005, the world got a glimpse of what that meant when she pushed aside the leader of the free world and stole the show at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner. Wearing a shimmering lime green Oscar de la Renta gown, Laura wisecracked that she was a “desperate housewife” married to a president who was always asleep at nine. Replayed constantly on the air, the stand-up routine with its impeccable comedic timing turned the first lady into a glittering star. But while the performance catapulted her to new status, it did not answer the question of who this former teacher and librarian really is and just what role she plays in influencing her husband and shaping his administration. The Bushes are more effective than the FBI or CIA at keeping secret what goes on behind the scenes at the White House, the ranch, or Camp David. Now, New York Times bestselling author Ronald Kessler draws back that curtain in the first biography of Laura Bush to be written with White House cooperation. Based on interviews with her closest friends and confidantes from childhood to the present, as well as family members and administration heavyweights like Condoleezza Rice and Andrew Card, Kessler paints a portrait of a woman who, even as she ascended to the heights of political fortune and power, never lost touch with the bedrock American values she absorbed in her youth. In this unprecedented account, Kessler reveals: How Laura’s opinions have brought budget changes to a range of federal agencies and have affected her husband’s policies, appointments, and worldview. Why Laura told her press secretary in May 2001 she did not want to do any more media interviews. What President Bush said to Laura at the dinner table after giving the “go” for the invasion of Iraq, and what his father, former President George H. W. Bush, wrote him the next day about the war. What Laura’s own political opinions are and what her relationship with twin daughters Jenna and Barbara is really like. What Laura says in private about Hillary Clinton, media attacks on her husband, and his victory in the 2004 election. And why Laura, at the age of seventeen, missed a stop sign and caused a fatal accident that tragically left one of her best friends dead. LAURA BUSH offers a remarkable look at the private world of this famously reserved woman, as well as the beliefs and attitudes that shape it. The book will surprise readers whose knowledge of the first lady comes from cautious media interviews and speeches. Laura Bush’s approval rating stands at 85 percent. Since opinion polls first began asking about them, no first lady has received a higher rating. This moving biography is the first to penetrate the secret world of the president’s stealth counselor who is one of our most admired public figures.

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MISQUOTING JESUS
Bart D. Ehrman
Cover of MISQUOTING JESUS

MISQUOTING JESUS

by Bart D. Ehrman · HarperSanFrancisco

7 wks on list

Dr. Ehrman discusses the development of passages of the New Testament, most of which have been handed down from the Middle Ages, centuries after the Books were originally written. He examines accidental (inattention) and intentional (clarity and theological) changes made by the scribes as they attempted to make copies of copies of copies of copies of the original Gospel manuscripts.

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THE BROTHERS BULGER
Howie Carr
Cover of THE BROTHERS BULGER

THE BROTHERS BULGER

by Howie Carr · Warner

5 wks on list

The riveting New York Times bestseller by the award-winning columnist—now with a stunning new afterword detailing Whitey Bulger's capture. For years their familiar story was of two siblings who took different paths out of South Boston: William "Billy" Bulger, former president of the Massachusetts State Senate; and his brother James "Whitey" Bulger, a vicious criminal who became the FBI's second most-wanted man after Osama Bin Laden. While Billy cavorted with the state's blue bloods to become a powerful political force, Whitey blazed a murderous trail to the top rung of organized crime. Now, in this compelling narrative, Carr uncovers a sinister world of FBI turncoats, alliances between various branches of organized crime, St. Patrick's Day shenanigans, political infighting, and the complex relationship between two brothers who were at one time kings. "A smashing true crime book . . . a rich depiction of a city gone bad and a superb meditation on personal and official corruption. Howie Carr brilliantly analyzes, scrutinizes, indicts . . . A howl of rage at the most hellish old-boy network imaginable." —James Ellroy, New York Times-bestselling author "Crime and politics pay off big-time in Howie Carr's two-fisted account of the brothers Bulger. I laughed, I cried, and I kept turning the pages of this outrageous true story of zany mobsters, political hacks, and corrupt G-men." —Mike Stanton, New York Times-bestselling author

Historical bestseller data sourced from the New York Times Book Review, archived by Hawes Publications.