Tempting Titles - New Nonfiction 300 - 599

Today’s Tempting Titles include the 300s, 400s, and 500s. More tomorrow.
Click on a title or a picture to find it in the catalog. On order if not already in GPL.

300 Social Sciences

Babyproofing Your Marriage: How to Laugh More, Argue Less, and Communicate Better as Your Family Grows by Cockrell, Stacie / O'Neill, Cathy / Stone, Julia / Martin, Larry (ILT)

Though their admittedly 'pseudo-scientific' research seems to have come mainly from interviewing friends, family and people on the street, they arrive at some reasonable solutions to how couples can keep their marriages fresh and stimulating amid armloads of dirty diapers and screeching babies. Publishers Weekly (Dec. 2006)

Grave Matters: a journey through the modern funeral industry to a natural way of burial by Mark Harris

Harris's case for an eco-friendly burial is also an argument for a graceful and productive afterlife...this practical, powerful and affirming book succeeds as a survey of burial methods, a collection of true stories and a resource guide. Publishers Weekly (Jan. 2007)

Excuse Me, but I Was Next: how to handle 100 manners dilemmas by Peggy Post
Here are solutions for the art of small talk, retorts to the top ten nosy questions, ways of finessing 'name amnesia,' and adoption etiquette, in concise Q&A format...the focus on universal real-life situations makes this book a classic. Library Journal (November 2006)

400 Language

Sister Bernadette’s Barking Dog: the quirky history and lost art of diagramming sentences by Kitty Burns Florey.

Taz, the blog dog, says: It comes down to this: If you don’t think someone can sniff out the meaning in a sentence then don’t bark it out. If you want to spend all that time figuring out how to make a diagram of what that nun’s dog was trying to say without knowing what the dog was really communicating then why call "Hawrf! Hawrf!" just “barking”? (See Emotional Lives of Animals below.)

And, this from Florey's essay of the same title in Harper’s, December, 2004, available with a library card through the Glendale Public Library database, Infotrac: "Mostly we diagrammed sentences out of a grammar book, but sometimes we were assigned the task of making up our own, taking pleasure in coming up with wild Proustian wanderings that--kicking and screaming--had to be corralled, harnessed, and made to trot into the barn in neat rows."

So you see then, diagramming sentences is a lot like herding. Reading how to do either is fun if you’re a working, herding reader or writer. Good book. You liked Eats, Shoots, and Leaves? You may also like this charming work of a former copy editor and novelist. The title doesn’t say it all. It’s even funnier than you’d expect

500 Science

The Emotional Lives of Animals: a leading scientist explores animal joy, sorrow, and empathy – and why they matter by Marc Bekoff and Jane Goodall.

Demonstrating the far-reaching implications for readers’ relationships with any number of living beings, Bekoff’s book is profound, thought-provoking and even touching. Publisher's Weekly.

Taz, the blog dog says: What I’ve been telling you. Hawrf! Hawrf!

Plutonium: a history of the world's most dangerous element, by Jeremy Bernstein

Running through a spectrum of Nobel prize winners, [Bernstein] grippingly portrays the race to develop the first nuclear weapon during World War II as well as the interplay among the global personalities involved. Library Journal.