The Anatomy of Violence: The Biological Roots of Crime

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" Neurocriminologist Raine is known for pioneering studies gauging long-term effects of environmental factors on neurological development. In his latest (after Psychopathology of Crime), the University of Pennsylvania professor explains how a startling number of early incidents can retard the development of the prefrontal cortex and other neural sites of learning, focus, and emotion, resulting in violence-prone adults. Indeed, from fetuses malnourished in the womb to children "ushered into the vestibule of violence before they could even sit up on their own, " to adults living near the Twin Towers on 9/11 (brain scans made three years later "showed a reduction in hippocampal gray-matter volumes"), no one is immune. However, Raine insists that drugs, cognitive behavioral therapy, mindfulness training, exercise, and periods of "environmental enrichment" like educating mothers about kids' emotional, educational, and nutritional needs can mitigate damage, and perhaps stave off violent tendencies down the road. Ultimately, Raine is optimistic: "We can use a set of biosocial keys to unlock the cause of crime and set free those who are trapped by their biology." Though sometimes dense, this is a passionately argued, well-written, and fascinating take on the biology of violence and its legal and ethical implications."  (Publishers Weekly)

Where Am I Eating? An Adventure Through the Global Food Economy

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"The local food movement is growing, but not as fast as the global food movement. The United States now imports twice as much food as it did a decade ago. What does this reliance on imported food mean for us, and for the people around the globe who produce our food?
Kelsey Timmerman, author of the acclaimed "Where Am I Wearing?," decided to find out. He traveled around the world on a quest to meet and work alongside the farmers and fishermen who feed us.
He followed his Starbucks coffee to Colombia where he met farmers Starbucks didn't want him to meet, loaded lobster boats in Nicaragua for divers who have the world's deadliest job, discovered that slavery is alive and well in the cocoa industry of the Ivory Coast, shouldered loads of bananas with Costa Rican workers who longed for the good ol' days of banana farming, met apple farmers in Michigan fighting against a changing climate and the global economy, and apple farmers in China who were thrilled to have cornered the apple juice market.
In "Where Am I Eating?," Timmerman explores the global food economy and the issues surrounding it--including workers' and human rights, rural poverty, the loss of cultural and bio-diversity, climate change, and fair trade--through the lives of the workers he met along the way. Timmerman argues neither for nor against the globalization of food, but personalizes the issue by observing the hope and opportunity, and the lack of both, which the global food economy gives to the world's poorest producers. Before you scoop your next batch of coffee into your French press, indulge in a mid-afternoon chocolate bar, or slice a banana, discover how each of your small choices has shaped the lives of a worker thousands of miles away."  (Publisher Description)

Pound Foolish: Exposing the Dark Side of the Personal Finance Industry

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"Dishy dirt on the "financialization" of American life and the hordes of carrion-pickers who swarm us in the hope of lifting still more dollars from our pockets. By Forbes.com blogger and former Los Angeles Times writer Olen's account, this financialization was a bit haphazard and not entirely well-planned-out. The IRA, for example, was intended as a supplement to other retirement measures, whereas "what we today think of as the natural retirement planning landscape started as an accident, a 1978 shift in the tax code designed to clarify a few highly technical points about profit-sharing plans offered by many corporations to high-ranking employees." Lest it make you feel cuddly to think that your retirement account has its source in something meant for the rich and powerful, Olen observes that it's a mook's game these days: Whereas in the 1950s, only 5 percent of Americans were in the stock market, by 2000, that had gone up to fully half, with a vast industry peeling off dollars in the form of management fees, commissions and so forth. The stock market and its ancillaries received promotion as "a way to gain wealth we could not gain through conventional savings or earnings strategies." Unconventional means risky, as a generation of shorn investors has recently come to appreciate, but that risk doesn't stop us from wanting to try our luck again--and that brings in a bunch of Olen's bugaboos, including the "wealth creation seminar business" and people like Suze Orman, "whose riches came from...lecturing the rest of us on our inability to manage our funds." A nice takedown, particularly in its acknowledgement that the deck is always stacked against "participants in a vast experiment" of the deregulated marketplace--namely, the little guys."  (Kirkus Reviews)

Garbology: Our Dirty Love Affair with Trash

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"*Starred Review* We the people of America are living in an official state of garbage denial, Humes, a Pulitzer Prizewinning journalist and author (Eco Barons, 2009), informs us, for we seem totally unaware that each of us, over the course of a lifetime, will generate 102 tons of trash. Zestful in his curiosity and irrepressible in his vivid chronicling, Humes takes us on a garbage tour, beginning with a hoarders' home, where an elderly couple were trapped and nearly killed by accumulated trash, and moving on to Puentes Hills, where a monumental Southern California landfill has become a garbage mountain. As Humes describes the complex and constant operations there, he swings into a fascinating history of trash, from ancient Athens and the first municipal dump to the legendary filth of nineteenth-century New York City to the crux of today's challenges, the plasticization of America. The plague of plastic bags and bottles and mindless, credit-card-fueled consumerism has many dire consequences, the worst of which is the trashing of the oceans, which have become poisonous plastic chowder. Then there arethe toxic politics and big business of garbage. But Humes finds hope in the innovative work of dedicated garbologists, trash trackers, and activists who are intent on exposing the hazards and travesties of excessive trash and pointing the way to the low-waste path."  (Booklist)

The Second Arab Awakening: Revolution, Democracy, and the Islamist Challenge from Tunis to Damascus

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"A solid overview of the Arab revolutions, country by country, from the first nationalist stirrings of the 1950s that put the dictators in place to the snowballing events in recent years. Dawisha (Political Science/Miami Univ., Ohio; Iraq: A Political History) lends his insight into recent upheavals in the Arab world prompted by the staggering oppression of the many by the venal, rich few that has gone on for far too long. There is a satisfying sense of fatal payback in the Baghdad-born author's narrative of the spreading "virus of liberation" catching on from Tunis to Cairo to Tripoli and beyond. The people of these oppressed lands demanded greater political rights from their leaders and were not going to back down in 2011, thanks to greater numbers, social media and the inability of police forces to keep news of insurrection from spreading. Flooding the streets with security police and offering the people a few cosmetic reforms worked in some hot spots, such as Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Morocco, but the same tactics quickly led to the toppling of dictators in Tunisia, Egypt and Yemen. In Libya and Syria, however, the leaders did not hesitate to use shocking force against the demonstrators. While Gadhafi died by the same sword, Syria's Bashar al-Assad continues to butcher his own people with impunity, convinced perversely that they love him. Dawisha steps back to examine Nasser's role as galvanizer of the first Arab Revolution, tapping into the humiliation Arabs felt at Western imperialism by the mid-1950s--followed by the "predatory authoritarianism" of the young, idealistic leaders who took the helms and were never really interested in "freedom." A knowledgeable survey for students and a glimpse into what the Islamist future might offer."  (Kirkus Reviews)

Making Sense of Suicide Missions (Expanded & Updated)

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"Suicide attacks have become the defining act of political violence of our age. From New York City to Baghdad, from Sri Lanka to Israel, few can doubt that they are a pervasive and terrifying feature of our political landscape. Based on a wealth of original information and research, and containing contributions from internationally distinguished scholars, Making Sense of Suicide Missions furthers our understanding of this chilling feature of the contemporary world in radically new and unexpected ways."  (Publisher Description)

Big Data: A Revolution That Will Transform How We Live, Work, and Think

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" Academic Mayer-Schnberger and editor Cukier consider big data the new ability to crunch vast collections of information, analyze it instantly, and draw conclusions from it. Big data is about predictions: math applied to large quantities of data in order to infer probabilities. Because big data allows us to analyze far more data, we will move beyond expecting exactness and can no longer be fixated on causation. The authors state, The correlations may not tell us precisely why something is happening, but they alert us that it is happening. For individuals, big data risks an invasion of privacy, as vast amounts of personal data are collected and the potential exists to accuse a person of some possible future behavior that has not happened. The authors conclude that big data is a tool that doesn't offer ultimate answers, just good-enough ones to help us now until better methods and hence better answers come along. This book offers important insights and information for many library patrons"  (Booklist)

Above the Din of War: Afghans Speak about Their Lives, Their Country, and Their Future-And Why America Should Listen

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"A veteran journalist and former Afghanistan country director for the Institute for War and Peace Reporting in the Hague interviews a cross-section of Afghans who are invariably passionate, articulate, and free with vivid but sometimes unsettling opinions on the international conflict that has descended on their homeland. Shopkeepers complain about the ongoing violence, Taliban leaders boast about their "swift" and "free" form of justice, and officials try to explain the country's quandary. Both sexes but especially women tell terrible stories of injustice, cruelty, and murder. But some evince hope for a brighter future; female parliamentarian Shukoria Barekzai, though exhausted, exclaims, "I love to work with the truth." A sophisticated observer, Eichstaedt (Consuming the Congo: War and Conflict Minerals in the World's Deadliest Place) steps back frequently to emphasize recurring themes, and in the obligatory how-to-fix-it finale, he argues convincingly in support of regional partitioning, but admits that it's unlikely to happen. These are vivid, mostly sympathetic portraits of Afghans who have weathered decades of chaos, and though a solution still seems far-off, Eichstaedt has done a great service by bringing their perspectives to the American public." (Publishers Weekly)

The International Bank of Bob: Connecting Our Worlds One $25 Kiva Loan at a Time

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"While on assignment in Dubai to cover the world's most luxurious hotels, Harris got sidetracked by the stories of the indentured immigrant laborers conscripted to build these palaces of opulence. Determined to do something to help the families of the working poor worldwide, he signed up with Kiva, an organization that allows individuals to lend money via the Internet to people in developing countries by providing microfinancing loans to small family businesses, for everything from buying material and supplies to the purchase of cows and goats. Not content with merely helping from afar, Harris volunteered to tour the world and meet some of the Kiva recipients, and this is where the story really begins. Traveling to challenging and often war-torn places like Peru, Bosnia, Rwanda, Cambodia, and Beirut, Lebanon, he checks out the repair shops, furniture businesses, hair salons, yogurt makers, and livestock owners who have been made successful by the microloans, but, most important, he learns firsthand about their personal and political struggles and is deeply impacted by the lives of the new friends he makes along the way."  (Booklist)

What Is Marriage?: Man and Woman: A Defense

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"Until yesterday, no society had seen marriage as anything other than a conjugal partnership: a male-female union. "What Is Marriage?" identifies and defends the reasons for this historic consensus and shows why redefining civil marriage is unnecessary, unreasonable, and contrary to the common good.
Originally published in the "Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy," this book's core argument quickly became the year's most widely read essay on the most prominent scholarly network in the social sciences. Since then, it has been cited and debated by scholars and activists throughout the world as the most formidable defense of the tradition ever written. Now revamped, expanded, and vastly improved, "What Is Marriage?" stands poised to meet its moment as few books of this generation have.
Rhodes Scholar Sherif Girgis, Heritage Foundation Fellow Ryan T. Anderson, and Robert P. George offer a devastating critique of the idea that equality requires redefining marriage. They show why both sides must first answer the question of what marriage really "is." They defend the principle that marriage, as a comprehensive union of mind and body ordered to family life, unites a man and a woman as husband and wife, and they document the social value of applying this principle in law.
Most compellingly, they show that those who embrace same-sex civil marriage leave no firm ground--none--for not recognizing every relationship describable in polite English, including polyamorous sexual unions, and that enshrining their view would further erode the norms of marriage, and hence the common good.
Finally, "What Is Marriage?" decisively answers common objections: that the historic view is rooted in bigotry, like laws forbidding interracial marriage; that it is callous to people's needs; that it can't show the harm of recognizing same-sex couplings, or the point of recognizing infertile ones; and that it treats a mere "social construct" as if it were natural, or an unreasoned religious view as if it were rational.
If the marriage debate in America is decided soon, it will be with this book's help or despite its powerful arguments." (Publisher Description)

Behind the Kitchen Door

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"A groundbreaking exploration of the political, economic, and moral implications of dining out, focusing on the lives of restaurant workers in major cities across the United States."  (Publisher Description)

Dangerous Convictions: What's Really Wrong with the U.S. Congress

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"In Dangerous Convictions, former Democratic Congressman Tom Allen, explains how beneath the surface of our political debates, the incompatible world views of the two parties have turned Congress into a dysfunctional body. "Years of listening to what seemed to me to be preposterous arguments in committee, on the House floor, or in private conversations," he writes, "changed my mind about our capacity to find bipartisan agreement on the most fundamental topics." Likewise, most Republican Members of Congress gave no credence to Democratic arguments on budget and tax issues, health care, and climate change. Allen argues that "smaller government, lower taxes" in all times and circumstances is not an economic policy, but an ideological barrier to meaningful debate and the simplest compromises. In the last thirty years, he suggests, Republicans and Democrats have been speaking different languages; GOP Members increasingly see government as a threat to personal liberty, while Democrats continue to believe it can be a vehicle to expand opportunity and serve the common good. Combining personal experience with the insights of George Lakoff, Norman Ornstein, Robert Bellah, Isaiah Berlin, and many others, Allen explains why we need to understand the ideological conflict and escape its grip--and allow Congress to work productively on our 21st century challenges. "--(Publisher Description)

The Federal Reserve and the Financial Crisis

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"In 2012, Ben Bernanke, chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, gave a series of lectures about the Federal Reserve and the 2008 financial crisis, as part of a course at George Washington University on the role of the Federal Reserve in the economy. In this unusual event, Bernanke revealed important background and insights into the central bank's crucial actions during the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Taken directly from these historic talks, "The Federal Reserve and the Financial Crisis" offers insight into the guiding principles behind the Fed's activities and the lessons to be learned from its handling of recent economic challenges.
Bernanke traces the origins of the Federal Reserve, from its inception in 1914 through the Second World War, and he looks at the Fed post-1945, when it began operating independently from other governmental departments such as the Treasury. During this time the Fed grappled with episodes of high inflation, finally tamed by then-chairman Paul Volcker. Bernanke also explores the period under his predecessor, Alan Greenspan, known as the Great Moderation. Bernanke then delves into the Fed's reaction to the recent financial crisis, focusing on the central bank's role as the lender of last resort and discussing efforts that injected liquidity into the banking system. Bernanke points out that monetary policies alone cannot revive the economy, and he describes ongoing structural and regulatory problems that need to be addressed.
Providing first-hand knowledge of how problems in the financial system were handled, "The Federal Reserve and the Financial Crisis" will long be studied by those interested in this critical moment in history."  (Publisher Description)