For young single women, every night is Ladies' Night. For Brett Paesel and her friends, Friday happy hour is all they get—if they can wrangle a babysitter. Like most mommies, they support each other through pregnancies, sleep deprivation, and the need to talk about it all. Instead of meeting at the playground, they convene at the local watering hole while sipping Black and Tans and flirting with the cute bartender. With a poignant voice and a fresh style that makes this memoir read like the best women's fiction, Paesel navigates mommyhood in all its forms—the ecstatic, the terrifying, the tedious, the hilarious, the transcendental, and the sticky. Paesel's laugh-out-loud perspective will appeal to all women who are braving the new world of motherhood, where the secret question on their minds at playgroup is "When is it too early in the day to start drinking?"

A collection of twenty of Paglia's out-spoken essays on contemporary issues in America's ongoing cultural debate such as Anita Hill, Robert Mapplethorpe, the beauty myth, and the decline of education in America.

The bestselling author of Sexual Personae and Sex, Art, and American Culture is back with a fiery new collection of essays on everything from art and celebrity to gay activism, Lorena Bobbitt to Bill and Hillary. These essays have never appeared in book form, and many will be appearing in print for the first time.

Traces the history of tofu, explans its health benefits, offers tips on shopping for it, describes how it can be made at home, and includes over one hundred recipes.

From lusciously creamy ice creams and frozen yogurts to light and fruity ices and sorbets, this dishy dessert book has a refreshing treat to delight every palate. Nearly 50 recipes for simple and sophisticated frosty confections are included. No store-bought frozen treat can rival the spectacular laste and heavenly texture of one freshly made at home. More than 20 full-color photos.

"An unbeatable combination of literate writing and superb color photography make this a very special reference." — Travel and Leisure

Created by local writers and photographers, Compass American Guides are the ultimate insider's guides, providing in-depth coverage of the history, culture, and character of America's most spectacular destinations. Covering everything there is to see and do as well as choice lodging and dining, these gorgeous full-color guides are perfect for new and longtime residents as well as
vacationers who want a deep understanding of the region they're visiting.
Spectacular images by two of America's leading photographers
Lively text with historical insights and interesting anecdotes
Literary extracts by famous San Franciscans, from Mark Twain to Allen Ginsberg
Knowledgeable reviews of San Francisco's acclaimed restaurants, from neighborhood bistros to temples
of haute California cuisine
Illustrated guide to the city's hotels, from the grand and historic to the newest chic offerings
Day trips to the Wine Country, with maps to the wineries
Detailed maps to every section of the city

In a book widely hailed for its entertaining prose and provocative research, the award-winning Los Angeles Times food journalist Russ Parsons examines the science behind ordinary cooking processes. Along the way he dispenses hundreds of tips and the reasons behind them, from why you should always begin cooking beans in cold water, to why you should salt meat before sautéing it, to why it's a waste of time to cook a Vidalia onion. Filled with sharp-witted observations ("Frying has become synonymous with minimum-wage labor, yet hardly anyone will try it at home"), intriguing food trivia (fruit deprived of water just before harvest has superior flavor to fruit that is irrigated up to the last moment ), and recipes (from Oven-Steamed Salmon with Cucumber Salad to Ultimate Strawberry Shortcake), How to Read a French Fry contains all the ingredients you need to become a better cook.

In an unnamed South American country, a world-renowned soprano sings at a birthday party in honor of a visiting Japanese industrial titan. His hosts hope that Mr. Hosokawa can be persuaded to build a factory in their Third World backwater. Alas, in the opening sequence, just as the accompanist kisses the soprano, a ragtag band of 18 terrorists enters the vice-presidential mansion through the air conditioning ducts. Their quarry is the president, who has unfortunately stayed home to watch a favorite soap opera. And thus, from the beginning, things go awry.

Among the hostages are not only Hosokawa and Roxane Coss, the American soprano, but an assortment of Russian, Italian, and French diplomatic types. Reuben Iglesias, the diminutive and gracious vice president, quickly gets sideways of the kidnappers, who have no interest in him whatsoever. Meanwhile, a Swiss Red Cross negotiator named Joachim Messner is roped into service while vacationing. He comes and goes, wrangling over terms and demands, and the days stretch into weeks, the weeks into months.

With the omniscience of magic realism, Ann Patchett flits in and out of the hearts and psyches of hostage and terrorist alike, and in doing so reveals a profound, shared humanity. Her voice is suitably lyrical, melodic, full of warmth and compassion. Hearing opera sung live for the first time, a young priest reflects: Never had he thought, never once, that such a woman existed, one who stood so close to God that God's own voice poured from her. How far she must have gone inside herself to call up that voice. It was as if the voice came from the center part of the earth and by the sheer effort and diligence of her will she had pulled it up through the dirt and rock and through the floorboards of the house, up into her feet, where it pulled through her, reaching, lifting, warmed by her, and then out of the white lily of her throat and straight to God in heaven. Joined by no common language except music, the 58 international hostages and their captors forge unexpected bonds. Time stands still, priorities rearrange themselves. Ultimately, of course, something has to give, even in a novel so imbued with the rich imaginative potential of magic realism. But in a fractious world, Bel Canto remains a gentle reminder of the transcendence of beauty and love. —Victoria Jenkins

The Magician's Assistant sustains author Ann Patchett's proven penchant for crafting colorful characters and marrying the ordinary with the fantastic. When Parsifal, Sabine's husband of more than 20 years and the magician of the title, suddenly dies, she begins to discover how she's glimpsed him only through smoke and mirrors. He has managed to keep hidden the existence of a family in Nebraska—his mother, two sisters, and two nephews. Sabine approaches them hungrily, as if they are a bridge to her beloved husband and a key to the mysteries he left behind.

"Beautifully written...Ann Patchett has produced a first novel that second- and third-time novelists would envy for its grace, insight, and compassion."

BOSTON HERALD

St. Elizabeth's is a home for unwed mothers in the 1960s. Life there is not unpleasant and for most, it is temporary. Not so for Rose, a beautiful mysterious woman who comes to the lovely ex-hotel pregnant, but not unwed. She plans to give her baby up because she knows she cannot be the mother it needs. But St. Elizabeth's is near a healing spring, and when Rose's time draws near, she cannot go through with her plans, not all of them. And she cannot remain forever untouched by what she has left behind and who she has become in the leaving....

From the Paperback edition.

Ann Patchett and the late Lucy Grealy met in college in 1981, and, after enrolling in the Iowa Writer's Workshop, began a friendship that would be as defining to both of their lives as their work. In Grealy's critically acclaimed memior, Autobiography of a Face, she wrote about losing part of her jaw to childhood cancer, years of chemotherapy and radiation, and endless reconstructive surgeries. In Truth & Beauty, the story isn't Lucy's life or Ann's life, but the parts of their lives they shared. This is a portrait of unwavering commitment that spans twenty years, from the long winters of the Midwest, to surgical wards, to book parties in New York. Through love, fame, drugs, and despair, this is what it means to be part of two lives that are intertwined ... and what happens when one is left behind.

This is a tender, brutal book about loving the person we cannot save. It is about loyalty, and being lifted up by the sheer effervescence of someone who knew how to live life to the fullest.

Finally a cookbook written by vegan families, for vegan families. Vegan Family Favorites is a collection of down-home delicious meals that were created, tested, and approved by vegan families. Fast and easy preparation with easy to find ingredients makes this the cookbook you'll reach for first. Includes breakfasts, breads, sandwiches, soups, salads, dips, dressings, side dishes, entrees, and desserts.

Knitting finally takes its rightful place on the spectrum of personal obsessions alongside golfing fishing and gardening. The tangled life of the knitter is the subject of inspired nuttiness in this 300 tongue-in-cheek mediatations from the self-proclaimed yarn harlot Stephanie Pearl-McPhee. At Knit's End captures the wickedly funny musings of someone who doesn't believe it's possible to knit too much!