Category: 57th Street Books
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Angela Medearis: The Ultimate Kitchen Diva
“People are eating African American food every day, but they don’t know it,” Angela Shelf Medearis says to me when we chat on the phone. In part, she’s talking about James Hemings who, in the complicated way of slavery, trained in the culinary arts in Paris and became a noted chef de cuisine and yet…
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Hope Rides Again: An Obama Biden Murder
Obama and Biden are back! This time they’re in Chicago solving the mystery of who stole Obama’s Blackberry and killed the thief.
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The Poisoned City by Anna Clark
Like an accident in slow motion, Anna Clark, a Detroit-based journalist followed the crisis of toxic drinking water in Flint, Michigan. “I had my head in it for years and it’s still there, I talk about it and I can’t get my head about how it happened,” says Clark, who has written for The New…
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BOOK REVIEW, SIGNING: New author Ma Ling hones ‘Apocalypse Office’ genre in dark comic novel
Candace Chen’s life is so much about chaos and loss that she finds solace and satisfaction in her job coordinating the sourcing of materials and production of Bibles. It’s a job that entails such minutiae as making sure there’s a supplier for the crushed gems which decorate a specific best-selling Bible even though many of…
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Who Murdered the Supreme Court Candidate: Mental State, a mystery novel by Law Professor M. Todd Henderson
The murder of a good friend and fellow law professor inspired M. Todd Henderson to write Mental State (Down and Out Books 2018; $17.95), his first mystery novel. “He was a professor at Florida State University and had just dropped of his kids and was pulling out of the driveway when he was shot,” says…
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Not for Long: The Life and Career of the NFL Athlete
Robert Turner II was the first member of his family to go to college, attending James Madison University on an athletic scholarship. But he did so because of his love of football and a desire to play at a professional level. “I majored in communications because that’s what the other players did,” says Turner who…
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Young Lincoln: Growing Up in Southern Indiana
Many people aren’t aware that Abraham Lincoln spent his formative years in Southern Indiana, moving there from Kentucky with his family at age seven, leaving with them when he was 21. It’s these years that Jan Jacobi, an avid Lincoln enthusiast and an award-winning educator who currently is teaching at St. Michael School of Clayton…
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Lake Success
“I’ve always wanted to travel the country by Greyhound bus,” says Gary Shteyngart, the New York Times bestselling author about Lake Success, his latest book (PenguinRandom House 2018; $28) which tells the story of Barry Cohen, a hedge fund millionaire who, unable to deal with all the issues impacting his life, jumps on a bus to find…
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Local Flavor: Restaurants That Shaped Chicago’s Neighborhoods
Chicago is a city made of neighborhoods, each individual and diverse, reflective of its residents and also the restaurants anchoring them. In her latest book, Jean Iversen shares with us her impressions and interactions in eight local eateries and the people who made them what they are, chronicling their stories in her latest book, (Northwestern…
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Paris in Stride: An Insider’s Walking Guide
Imagine strolling through Paris with a friend, one who knows the greatest little patisseries, cafes, outdoor markets and shops tucked along winding cobbled streets. Together the two of us try on amazingly chic designer dresses at La boutique Didier Ludot and amble through the courtyard gardens and gaze at the Swedish art work at…
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