Geek Wisdom: The Sacred Teachings of Nerd Culture


Stephen H. Segal - 2011
    Clearly, geeks know something about life in the 21st century that other folks don’t—something we all can learn from. Geek Wisdom takes as gospel some 200 of the most powerful and oft-cited quotes from movies (“Where we’re going, we don’t need roads”), television (“Now we know—and knowing is half the battle”), literature (“All that is gold does not glitter”), games, science, the Internet, and more. Now these beloved pearls of modern-day culture have been painstakingly interpreted by a diverse team of hardcore nerds with their imaginations turned up to 11. Yes, this collection of mini-essays is by, for, and about geeks—but it’s just so surprisingly profound, the rest of us would have to be dorks not to read it. So say we all.

Grace's Guide: The Art of Pretending to Be a Grown-up


Grace Helbig - 2014
    Well, maybe there are harder things in life…but being an adult is difficult! So Grace Helbig has written a guide that’s perfect for anyone who is faced with the daunting task of becoming an adult.Infused with her trademark saucy, sweet, and funny voice, Grace’s Guide is a tongue-in-cheek handbook for millennials, encompassing everything a young or new (or regular or old) adult needs to know, from surviving a breakup to recovering from a hangover. Beautifully illustrated and full-color, Grace’s Guide features interactive elements and exclusive stories from Grace’s own misadventures—like losing her virginity solely because her date took her to a Macaroni Grill—and many other hilarious lessons she learned the hard way.Amusing and unexpectedly educational, this refreshing and colorful guide proves that becoming an adult doesn’t necessarily mean you have to grow up.

Company


Max Barry - 2006
    From the outside, Zephyr is just another bland corporate monolith, but behind its glass doors business is far from usual: the beautiful receptionist is paid twice as much as anybody else to do nothing, the sales reps use self help books as manuals, no one has seen the CEO, no one knows exactly what they are selling, and missing donuts are the cause of office intrigue. While Jones originally wanted to climb the corporate ladder, he now finds himself descending deeper into the irrational rationality of company policy. What he finds is hilarious, shocking, and utterly telling.

My Mess Is a Bit of a Life: Adventures in Anxiety


Georgia Pritchett - 2021
    Her book is a delightful and perfect reflection of her. Its tenderness sneaks up on you and really packs a punch. What a magnificent read!"--Julia Louis DreyfusJenny Lawson meets Nora Ephron in this joyful memoir-in-vignettes on living--and thriving--with anxiety from a multiple Emmy Award-winning comedy writer whose credits include Succession and Veep.When Georgia Pritchett found herself lost for words--a bit of a predicament for a comedy writer--she turned to a therapist, who suggested she try writing down some of the things that worried her. But instead of a grocery list of concerns, Georgia wrote this book.A natural born worrywart, Georgia's life has been defined by her quirky anxiety. During childhood, she was agitated about the monsters under her bed (Were they comfy enough?). Going into labor, she fretted about making a fuss ("Sorry to interrupt, but the baby is coming out of my body," I said politely). Winning a prestigious award, she agonized over receiving free gifts after the ceremony (It was an excruciating experience. Mortifying).Soul-baring yet lighthearted, poignant yet written with a healthy dose of self-deprecation, My Mess Is a Bit of a Life is a tour through the carnival funhouse of Georgia's life, from her anxiety-ridden early childhood where disaster loomed around every corner (When I was little I used to think that sheep were clouds that had fallen to earth. On cloudy days I used to worry that I would be squashed by a sheep), through the challenges of breaking into an industry dominated by male writers, to the exquisite terror (and incomparable joy) of raising children.Delightfully offbeat, painfully honest, full of surprising wonders, and delivering plenty of hilarious, laugh-out-loud moments, My Mess Is a Bit of a Life reveals a talented, vulnerable, and strong woman in all her wisecracking weirdness, and makes us love it--and her--too.

The Science of Interstellar


Kip S. Thorne - 2014
    Yet in The Science of Interstellar, Kip Thorne, the physicist who assisted Nolan on the scientific aspects of Interstellar, shows us that the movie’s jaw-dropping events and stunning, never-before-attempted visuals are grounded in real science. Thorne shares his experiences working as the science adviser on the film and then moves on to the science itself. In chapters on wormholes, black holes, interstellar travel, and much more, Thorne’s scientific insights—many of them triggered during the actual scripting and shooting of Interstellar—describe the physical laws that govern our universe and the truly astounding phenomena that those laws make possible.Interstellar and all related characters and elements are trademarks of and © Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (s14).

F*ck Feelings: One Shrink's Practical Advice for Managing All Life's Impossible Problems


Michael I. Bennett - 2015
    F*ck Feelings is the last self-help book you will ever need!

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing


Marie Kondō - 2011
    Most methods advocate a room-by-room or little-by-little approach, which doom you to pick away at your piles of stuff forever. The KonMari Method, with its revolutionary category-by-category system, leads to lasting results. In fact, none of Kondo's clients have lapsed (and she still has a three-month waiting list).With detailed guidance for determining which items in your house "spark joy" (and which don't), this international best seller featuring Tokyo's newest lifestyle phenomenon will help you clear your clutter and enjoy the unique magic of a tidy home - and the calm, motivated mindset it can inspire.

Dragon Teeth


Michael Crichton - 2017
    Warring Indian tribes still populate America's western territories, even as lawless gold-rush towns begin to mark the landscape, and two paleontologists pillage the Wild West, hunting for dinosaur fossils while surveilling, deceiving, and sabotaging each other.Into this treacherous territory plunges William Johnson, a student who has joined world-renowned paleontologist Othniel Charles Marsh on his latest expedition. But when Marsh becomes convinced that William is spying for his nemesis, Edwin Drinker Cope, he abandons him in Cheyenne, Wyoming, a locus of crime and vice.William joins forces with Cope and soon stumbles upon a discovery of historic proportions. With this extraordinary treasure, however, comes exceptional danger, and Johnson's newfound resilience will be sorely tested..

The Universe Within: Discovering the Common History of Rocks, Planets, and People


Neil Shubin - 2013
    Starting once again with fossils, he turns his gaze skyward, showing us how the entirety of the universe’s fourteen-billion-year history can be seen in our bodies. As he moves from our very molecular composition (a result of stellar events at the origin of our solar system) through the workings of our eyes, Shubin makes clear how the evolution of the cosmos has profoundly marked our own bodies. Fully illustrated with black and white drawings.

The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human


Jonathan Gottschall - 2012
    We spin fantasies. We devour novels, films, and plays. Even sporting events and criminal trials unfold as narratives. Yet the world of story has long remained an undiscovered and unmapped country. It’s easy to say that humans are “wired” for story, but why?In this delightful and original book, Jonathan Gottschall offers the first unified theory of storytelling. He argues that stories help us navigate life’s complex social problems—just as flight simulators prepare pilots for difficult situations. Storytelling has evolved, like other behaviors, to ensure our survival.Drawing on the latest research in neuroscience, psychology, and evolutionary biology, Gottschall tells us what it means to be a storytelling animal. Did you know that the more absorbed you are in a story, the more it changes your behavior? That all children act out the same kinds of stories, whether they grow up in a slum or a suburb? That people who read more fiction are more empathetic?Of course, our story instinct has a darker side. It makes us vulnerable to conspiracy theories, advertisements, and narratives about ourselves that are more “truthy” than true. National myths can also be terribly dangerous: Hitler’s ambitions were partly fueled by a story.But as Gottschall shows in this remarkable book, stories can also change the world for the better. Most successful stories are moral—they teach us how to live, whether explicitly or implicitly, and bind us together around common values. We know we are master shapers of story. The Storytelling Animal finally reveals how stories shape us.

The Demon in the Freezer


Richard Preston - 2002
    In The Demon in the Freezer, his first nonfiction book since The Hot Zone, a #1 New York Times bestseller, Richard Preston takes us into the heart of Usamriid, the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick, Maryland, once the headquarters of the U.S. biological weapons program and now the epicenter of national biodefense.Peter Jahrling, the top scientist at Usamriid, a wry virologist who cut his teeth on Ebola, one of the world’s most lethal emerging viruses, has ORCON security clearance that gives him access to top secret information on bioweapons. His most urgent priority is to develop a drug that will take on smallpox-and win. Eradicated from the planet in 1979 in one of the great triumphs of modern science, the smallpox virus now resides, officially, in only two high-security freezers-at the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta and in Siberia, at a Russian virology institute called Vector. But the demon in the freezer has been set loose. It is almost certain that illegal stocks are in the possession of hostile states, including Iraq and North Korea. Jahrling is haunted by the thought that biologists in secret labs are using genetic engineering to create a new superpox virus, a smallpox resistant to all vaccines.Usamriid went into a state of Delta Alert on September 11 and activated its emergency response teams when the first anthrax letters were opened in New York and Washington, D.C. Preston reports, in unprecedented detail, on the government’s response to the attacks and takes us into the ongoing FBI investigation. His story is based on interviews with top-level FBI agents and with Dr. Steven Hatfill.Jahrling is leading a team of scientists doing controversial experiments with live smallpox virus at CDC. Preston takes us into the lab where Jahrling is reawakening smallpox and explains, with cool and devastating precision, what may be at stake if his last bold experiment fails.

The Hilarious World of Depression


John Moe - 2020
    As Moe came to terms with his own illness, he began to see similar patterns of behavior and coping mechanisms surfacing in conversations with others, including high-profile comedians who'd struggled with the disease. Moe saw that there was tremendous comfort and community in open dialogue about these shared experiences and that humor had a unique power. Thus was born the podcast The Hilarious World of Depression.Inspired by the immediate success of the podcast, Moe has written a remarkable investigation of the disease, part memoir of his own journey, part treasure trove of laugh-out-loud stories and insights drawn from years of interviews with some of the most brilliant minds facing similar challenges. Throughout the course of this powerful narrative, depression's universal themes come to light, among them, struggles with identity, lack of understanding of the symptoms, the challenges of work-life, self-medicating, the fallout of the disease in the lives of our loved ones, the tragedy of suicide, and the hereditary aspects of the disease.The Hilarious World of Depression illuminates depression in an entirely fresh and inspiring way.

The Great Pretender: The Undercover Mission That Changed Our Understanding of Madness


Susannah Cahalan - 2019
    Forced to remain inside until they'd "proven" themselves sane, all eight emerged with alarming diagnoses and even more troubling stories of their treatment. Rosenhan's study broke open the field of psychiatry, closing down institutions and changing mental health diagnosis forever. But, as Cahalan's new research shows, very little in this saga is exactly as it seems. What really happened behind those closed asylum doors, and what does it mean for our understanding of mental illness today?

This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor


Adam Kay - 2017
    Hilarious, horrifying and heartbreaking, this diary is everything you wanted to know – and more than a few things you didn't – about life on and off the hospital ward. As seen on ITV's Zoe Ball Book Club This edition includes extra diary entries and a new afterword by the author.

The Survivors Club: The Secrets and Science That Could Save Your Life


Ben Sherwood - 2009
    The Survivors Club: The Secrets and Science that Could Save Your Life