Harvard Book Store
News from Harvard Book Store
May 25, 2013

It's graduation season, it's moving season, it's the unofficial start of summer. We're all at a point of transition, from shoes to sandals and from serious books to lighter fare. Keep your eyes on our bestseller list, our staff recommendations, and our summer event schedule for ideas about what to read on your next weekend away.

This weekend in particular, as we take a moment to remember our fallen servicemen and women, you might consider picking up one of the recent books that explores the lives of those who serve.  Matterhorn, the first novel by Vietnam War veteran Karl Marlantes, and Yellow Birds, the first novel by Iraq War veteran and poet Kevin Powers are both great places to start.

I mentioned this earlier in the spring, but if you're the late-planning type and a trip to the Pacific Northwest sounds appealing, there's still time to register for the 2013 Chuckanut Writers Conference. For the third year, they're embarking on a weekend designed to help inspire a writing life, from word one to publication. Find more information and register here.

 

'Til Next Week,
Rachel 

The Weekly Bestsellers already Discounted 20%
New on Our Shelves: The Latest in Fiction, Nonfiction, Scholarly Books & In Store Book Printing
Fiction
 
My Fathers' Ghost Is Climbing in the Rain
by Patricio Pron

$24

Alfred A. Knopf, hardcover



A young writer, living abroad, makes the journey home to South America to say good-bye to his dying father. In his parents' house, he finds a cache of documents and begins to unearth his father's obsession with the disappearance of a local man. Suddenly he comes face-to-face with the ghosts of Argentina's dark political past and with the long-hidden memories of his family's underground resistance against an oppressive military regime. As the fragments of the narrator's investigation fall into place, they reveal not only a part of his father's life he had tried to forget but also the legacy of an entire generation.

Nonfiction
 
Hedge Hogs: The Cowboy Traders Behind Wall Street's Largest Hedge Fund Disaster
by Barbara T. Dreyfuss

$28
Random House, hardcover
Order
At its peak, hedge fund Amaranth Advisors LLC had more than $9 billion in assets. A few weeks later, it completely collapsed. The disaster was largely triggered by one man: thirty-two-year-old hotshot trader Brian Hunter. His high-risk bets bankrupted his firm and destroyed his career, while John Arnold, his rival at competitor fund Centaurus, emerged as the highest-paid trader on Wall Street. Hedge Hogs is a fly-on-the-wall account of the largest hedge fund collapse in history: a blistering tale of the recent past that explains our precarious present, and may predict our future.
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Scholarly
 
Philosophy and Melancholy: Benjamin's Early Reflections on Theater and Language    
by Ilit Ferber

$24.95
Stanford University Press, paperback
Order

This book traces the concept of melancholy in Walter Benjamin's early writings. Rather than focusing on the overtly melancholic subject matter of Benjamin's work or the unhappy circumstances of his own fate, Ferber considers the concept's implications for his philosophy. Informed by Heidegger's discussion of moods and their importance for philosophical thought, she contends that a melancholic mood is the organizing principle or structure of Benjamin's early metaphysics and ontology. Philosophy and Melancholy also establishes a relationship between Benjamin and other philosophers.  

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Printed on Paige
Each week, we'll feature a book printed in Harvard Book Store on Paige, our book-making machine. Featured books will range from fresh works from local authors to near-forgotten titles discovered in our extensive print-on-demand database.  
 
The Tribulations of Tommy Tiptop
by M.B.       

$6.65

Print on Demand, paperback
Order

Originally published in 1887, this illustrated morality tale aims to instill kindness toward all of the animal kingdom. Illustrations include "Tribulation with the Birds," "Tribulation with the Puppies," "Tribulation with the Daddy-Longlegs," and "Tribulation with the Butterfly, &c." 

Learn More
Bargain Books
Bargain Books are new books at used-book prices. We have a limited number of copies of these titles, so if you see something that you're interested in, come in and check it out soon. To see more of our Bargain Books section, visit our Bargain Books page.
A Day in the Life of a Smiling Woman 
by Margaret Drabble        
$5.99, paperback (originally $13.95)

Margaret Drabble's penetrating evocations of character and place, her wide-ranging curiosity, her sense of irony--all are on display here, in stories that explore marriage, female friendships, the English tourist abroad, love affairs with houses, peace demonstrations, gin and tonics, cultural TV programs, in stories that are perceptive, sharp, and funny.
The Romantic Revolution: A History      
by Tim Blanning
$5.99, hardcover (originally $22)
A rebellion against the rationality of the Enlightenment, Romanticism was a profound shift in expression that altered the arts and ushered in modernity, even as it championed a return to the intuitive and the primitive. Long overshadowed by the contemporaneous American, French, and Industrial revolutions, the Romantic Revolution receives its due in Tim Blanning's work.
The Rejection Collection, Vol. 1 and 2      
edited by Matthew Diffee       
each $5.99, hardcover (originally $22.95)
 

   
Each week The New Yorker receives more than five hundred submissions from its regular cartoonists, all vying for one of the twenty spots in the magazine. What happens to the cartoons that don't make the cut? Some go back in a drawer, up on the refrigerator or into a filing cabinet, but the very best of all the rejects can be found right here in these pages.
Recent Finds Downstairs in the Used Book Department

 

Featured used books go fast, so if any titles interest you, stop in to check them out soon. We will hold the book if you are the first caller to reserve it. To reserve a book, call (617) 661-1515 and ask for our Used Department. We're also always looking for books to buy. Learn about selling your used books, including textbooks, here.
Treasury of the True Dharma:
Zen Master Dogen's Shobo Genzo
edited by Kazuaki Tanahashi
Originally published by Shambhala in 2012
$55 (hardcover) in Very Good Condition
This collection of essays by Eihei Dogen (1200-1253), founder of Zen's Soto school, is considered to be one of the most profound expressions of Zen wisdom ever put on paper. Kazuaki Tanahashi and a team of translators have produced a translation that combines accuracy with a deep understanding of Dogen's voice and literary gifts.
An Anthology of Sanskrit Court Poetry
translated by Daniel H.H. Ingalls
Originally published by Harvard University Press in 1965
$20 (hardcover) in Very Good Condition
This collection of Sanskrit verse provides English readers with a wide variety of poetry from the vast anthology of eleventh-century Buddhist scholar Vidyakara. The style of poetry presented here originated in royal courts but adapted to all aspects of life, and came to address issues as diverse as love, sex, heroes, nature, and peace.
Winslow Homer and the Poetics of Place
by Thomas Andrew Denenberg  
Originally published by Portland Museum of Art in 2010
$25 (hardcover) in Very Good Condition  
This monograph features full-page, color prints of Winslow Homer's paintings exhibited at the Portland Museum of Art in 2010. A brief essay accompanies each painting, giving details about the painting within the context of Mr. Homer's life. He spent the final decades of his life in Prouts Neck, Maine, the landscape of which figures prominently in his paintings.

Author Events

   

On sale now:

Niall Ferguson (6/13)
Marc Maron (6/14)
 

 

Subscribe to the Harvard Book Store Google Event Calendar here.

All Upcoming Events 


Daphne Kalotay
Tues, May 28, 7PM   

Award-winning author of Russian Winter Daphne Kalotay reads from her new novel, Sight Reading.
At Harvard Book Store
Learn More

George Packer
Wed, May 29, 7PM    

New Yorker staff writer and The Assassins' Gate author George Packer discusses The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America.
At Harvard Book Store
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Cynthia Wight Rossano
Fri, May 31, 7PM    

Cynthia Wight Rossano, sole editor of the late Reverend Peter Gomes, discusses Durable Values: Selected Writings of Peter J. Gomes.
At Harvard Book Store
Learn More

Fiction Friday!
Fridays through August

Fiction Fridays are back for their third summer! Through the end of August, all new paperback and hardcover fiction will be 15% off in the store on Fridays. Stock up on beach reading today!
At Harvard Book Store Learn More

Things to know about our $5 tickets...

 

$5 tickets are also coupons good for $5 off a purchase at events or at Harvard Book Store. Coupons expire 30 days after the event, and cannot be used for online purchases, event tickets, or gift certificates. Please note that your ticket only guarantees you a seat until 5 minutes before an event begins.


Find it here. Buy it here. Keep us here.

We appreciate the feedback we get from readers of this e-newsletter.

 

Please send your comments and suggestions to Rachel at rcass@harvard.com. Thanks for reading, and we hope to see you in the store!

 

Rachel Cass
Marketing Manager
rcass@harvard.com 

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