Shelf Life

From my shelf to yours

FROM MY SHELF TO YOURS

June 7, 2017

Chicago’s Fabulous Fountains by Greg Borzo with photos by Julia Thiel

Hiding in plain sight, Chicago’s many fountains are gems of art, history, politics and culture, their stories often overlooked. Sure we all know Buckingham Fountain and the Crown Fountain in Millennial Park. But what about the Nelson Algren Fountain at Division Street and Ashland and Milwaukee avenues which was opposed by the Polish community and many…
May 21, 2017

Testimony by Scott Turow

More than 30 years ago, Scott Turow released his first legal mystery, Presumed Innocent, a best seller that soon had any lawyer with a modicum of writing ability penning novels. Since then, Turow, a Chicago attorney, has continued to specialize in complex, multi-faceted books about the legal scene in scene in Kindle County—think Cook County.…
May 17, 2017

Into the Water: A New Thriller by Paula Hawkins

Paula Hawking, author of the international best-selling The Girl on the Train, which was translated into 40 languages and made into a movie, will be in Chicago next Friday, May 19 to talk about her newest book, Into the Water (Riverhead Books 2017; $A tense, psychological thriller told from the different viewpoints of all those…
May 14, 2017

Fabio Viviani: Fabio’s 30-Minute Italian

“Good cooking and a lot of flavor don’t have to take a lot of time,” says Fabio Viviani, chef, restauranteur and TV personality, explaining why he wrote Fabio’s 30-Minute Italian (St. Martin’s 2017; $27.99), his beautifully photographed cookbook filled with wonderfully accessible recipes. “The whole premise is easy.” Viviani, who grew up in Florence, Italy,…
April 30, 2017

King Solomon’s Table: A Culinary Exploration of Jewish Cooking from Around the World

For her new book King Solomon’s Table: A Culinary Exploration of Jewish Cooking from Around the World (Alfred A. Knopf 2017; $35), Joan Nathan, the multiple James Beard award winner, followed in the footsteps of Jewish traders as they circumvented the globe centuries and even millenniums ago. As they traveled, they brought the food cultures…
April 29, 2017

Matt Moore’s Secrets to Good BBQ

When it comes to barbecue, geography is everything. That according to Matt Moore, author of the recently released “The South’s Best Butts: Pitmaster Secrets for Southern Barbecue Perfection.” He explains how barbecue differs in the 12 southern states he calls the Barbecue Belt. And just to end the suspense, Indiana is definitely not one of…
April 12, 2017

My Cubs: A Love Story by Scott Simon

Change is an important part of life says Scott Simon, now a devoted husband and father who at one time was happy being single and childless. But for Simon, the award winning host of NPR’s Weekend Edition Saturday, there’s one change that’s just not going to happen. Enamored (or should we say obsessed) with the…
March 24, 2017

Marisol Murano’s Valentina Goldman Books Now Available as Audiobooks

When Marisol Murano’s first novel Valentina Goldman’s Immaculate Confusion hit the shelves five years ago, readers were delighted at her heroine’s brash and completely unique voice that shone through in every short and sweet chapter. Reading the book is a lot like gossiping with your best friend–if your best friend is a no-holds-barred Latina who has recently…
March 24, 2017

Don’t Let My Baby Do Rodeo

The spark for his second novel stems from what it means to be an adopted child from a land very far away says Boris Fishman, author of (Harper/HarperCollins 2016 $26.99) which was just named as one of the 100 best books of 2016 by the New York Times, Fishman, who was born in Minsk, Belarus…
March 15, 2017

Duck Season: Eating, Drinking, and Other Misadventures in Gascony, France’s Last Best Place

When David McAninch first moved to Plaisance du Gers, a small village in Gascony, with his wife Michele and their young daughter, Charlotte, he was going full-force Francophile by indulging a dream he’d nourished for years—to become part of French village life, a move he chronicles in Duck Season: Eating, Drinking, and Other Misadventures in…