For eighteen years, Holly Hughes has scoured both the online and print world to serve up the finest collection of food writing. This year, Best food Writing delves into the intersection of fine dining and food justice, culture and ownership, tradition and modernity; as well as profiles on some of the most fascinating people in the culinary world today. Once again, these standout essays--compelling, hilarious, poignant, illuminating--speak to the core of our hearts and fill our bellies. Whether you're a fan of Michel Richard or Guy Fieri--or both--there's something for everyone here. Take a seat and dig in.

    Kennedy Jr., from The Atlantic Monthly “Watching the Detectives” by Jay Kirk, from Harper’s Magazine “For the Love of God” by Jon Krakauer, from GQ “Chief Bratton Takes on LA” by Heather Mac Donald, from City Journal “Not Guilty by Reason of Afghanistan” by John H. Richardson, from Esquire “Megan’s Law and Me” by Brendan Riley, from Details “Unfortunate Con” by Mark Schone, from The Oxford American “To Kill or Not to Kill” by Scott Turow, from The New Yorker

    Linda Pastan writes, "the art that mattered / was the life led fully / stanza by swollen stanza." That life is portrayed here, from memories of the poet's earliest childhood and the ambiguities of marriage and love to the surprises that come with age, always with a consciousness of what is happening in the larger world.

    As it turns out, we were sold a pack of lies! What if the only thing causing your anxiety is your own thoughts? And what if underneath your anxious thinking was your true, perfect self--whole and healthy and untouched by all your fears? How would this change your life? For Jill Whalen, understanding this information switched off a lifetime of anxiety and addictive behaviors. In Victim of Thought: Seeing Through the Illusion of Anxiety, Jill describes how she spent over 50 years in a constant state of anxiousness. While she could feel fine one minute, she never knew what might be lurking around the corner that could seemingly disturb her peace. It was only when she learned the simple truth of where her anxiety was really coming from--and that underneath it was her innate well-being--that she no longer was a victim to it. In this easy to read and understand book, Jill logically explains how having one or more insightful "aha moments" can wipe away a lifetime of anxious thinking. She shares numerous relatable stories and examples from her own life to help you see the truth in her words. Jill also provides you with step-by-step instructions to become more aware of your own thoughts, which in turn puts you back in the driver's seat of your life. But the proof is really in the pudding, and Jill encourages you at every turn seek your own examples and evidence of how you've let yourself become a victim of your own thoughts. Once you see this for yourself, your life and your anxiety will magically transform before your eyes! If you're tired of believing that you're a victim to your anxiety, and are looking for a more peaceful life, then this book is for you. ======================================================================= INITIAL REVIEWS "The book was fascinating, particularly as someone who also struggles with anxiety. I think you did a great job of explaining the concepts to a layperson. I particularly found both the Thought Stream and also the Thoughts Storm as a snow globe metaphors extremely effective! It's very easy to relate to and very eye-opening. Hopefully I can find a way to start practicing some of this thought work into my own life! The idea that our normal state is peace - so simple, but so difficult to realize without it being pointed out!" - Ashley R. "I love your book. It's so wise and clear. I'm very grateful that you sent me a copy!" - Ingrid M. "I found the thought processes you speak of very enlightening and it does seem to make the complex reasons for anxiety simpler to understand." - Cyndy F. "It's great! Well written and flows well. I like that you began with your story and laid things out really nicely. The separate sections are super helpful and make logical sense to anyone who is new (or old) to the concept. Overall this book is VERY needed and useful and just has a really nice feeling to it as well. I think it would also be a reference for someone who has anxiety. A book they go back to when they get caught up in their thoughts." - Lana B.

    There are new stories from Neil Gaiman and Etgar Keret and David Vann (can you guess which one contains pterodactyls and Aztecs?), there is Saïd Sayrafiezadeh awaiting the uprising at Occupy Wall Street and a special compendium of the incredible writing that inspired the Egyptian Revolution, and, in its own volume, there is Rick Bass's extraordinary account of a week in Rwanda‹the most ambitious nonfiction piece McSweeney¹s has ever run, and without a doubt one of the best essays of the year.

    Each volume's series editor selects notable works from hundreds of periodicals. A special guest editor, a leading writer in the field, then chooses the very best twenty or so pieces to publish. This unique system has made the Best American series the most respected--and most popular--of its kind.The Best American Essays 2005 includesRoger Angell • Andrea Barrett • Jonathan Franzen • Ian Frazier • Edward Hoagland • Ted Kooser • Jonathan Lethem • Danielle Ofri • Oliver Sacks • Cathleen Schine • David Sedaris • Robert Stone • David Foster Wallace • and othersSusan Orlean, guest editor, is the author of My Kind of Place, The Orchid Thief, The Bullfighter Checks Her Makeup, and Saturday Night. A staff writer for The New Yorker since 1982, she has also written for Outside, Esquire, Rolling Stone, and Vogue.La vie en rose / Roger Angell --The sea of information / Andrea Barrett --Storm county / Paul Crenshaw --Joyas voladoras / Brian Doyle --Sister Bernadette's barking dog / Kitty Burns Florey --The comfort zone / Jonathan Franzen --If memory doesn't serve / Ian Frazier --Against exercise / Mark Greif --Small silences / Edward Hoagland --Small rooms in time / Ted Kooser --Speak, Hoyt-Schermerhorn / Jonathan Lethem --Mastering the art of French cooking / E.J. Levy --Contributor's note / Michael Martone --My friend Lodovico / David Masello --Living will / Danielle Ofri --Dog days / Sam Pickering --Speed / Oliver Sacks --Dog trouble / Cathleen Schine --Old faithful / David Sedaris --Six seconds / Paula Speck --Skill display in birding groups / Bert O. States --The prince of possibility / Robert Stone --Dining with robots / Ellen Ullman --Consider the lobster / David Foster Wallace --Satin worship / Holly Welker

    Michael Theune's breakthrough concept encourages students, teachers, and writers to use structure as a tool to see the fundamental affinities between strikingly different kinds of poetry and radically different literary eras. The book includes examination of the mid-course turn and the elegy, as well as the ironic, concessional, emblem, and retrospective-prospective structures, among others. In addition, 14 contemporary poets provide an example of and commentary on their own work.

    Ecclesiastes is gloomy, skeptical, and irreverent. It is caustic and drolly splenetic. It is unapologetically human. It refuses to abet our hunger for clean narratives and happy endings. It is a hopeless book. Insisting on life’s futility, the world’s capriciousness, and God’s inscrutability, it deliberately cultivates despair. It sees such bone-deep hopelessness as the only cure for what ails us. Ecclesiastes is a hard book full of hard sayings. It is an anvil against which our hearts must be hammered. No wonder we avoid it. But the cost of avoidance is high. As Paul insists, in order to become Christian, we must first learn to be hopeless. Hopelessness is the door to Zion. Hopelessness is crucial to a consecrated life. Before we can find hope in Christ, we must give up hope in everything else." In "Nothing New Under the Sun," Adam S. Miller provides a sharp, contemporary paraphrase of Ecclesiastes, continuing to work in the same vein as the popular "Grace is Not God's Backup Plan: An Urgent Paraphrase of Paul's Letter to the Romans" (2015).

    Brooks shows that Faulkner's strong attachment to his region, with its rich particularity and deep sense of community, gave him a special vantage point from which to view the modern world.Books's consideration of such novels as Light in August, The Unvanquished, As I Lay Dying, and Intruder in the Dust shows the ways in which Faulkner used Yoknapatawpha County to examine the characteristic themes of the twentieth century. Contending that a complete understanding of Faulkner's writing cannot be had without a thorough grasp of fictional detail, Brooks gives careful attention to what happens: In the Yoknapatawpha novels. He also includes useful genealogies of Faulkner's fictional clans and a character index.

    Stafford's advice to beginning poets has become a favorite text in writing programs

    A core book for any golfer--how to read a golf course, through the eyes of a course architect.

    The three long poems in Eye Against Eye convey the wrought particulars of intimate human relations, perceptions of the landscape, and the historical moment, tense with political exigencies. Mayan ruins invoke the collapsing Twin Towers, love between parents and child blister with tension, and a bicycle thief shatters the narcotic illusion of a private accord. Also contained is Late Summer Entry, a series of poetic commentaries on Sally Mann's landscape photographs. Eye Against Eye, Forrest Gander's third book with New Directions, cries out an ethical concern for the ways we see each other and the world, the potential to share a vision that acknowledges our commonality. As always with Gander's poetry, suspensions and repetitions drive toward a complex emotional experience, evoking the multifaceted, multi-vocal surge of our present.

    It helped in the American conquest of California, the launch of the Republican Party, and the ignition of the western Indian wars. And along the way, Lake Tahoe even found the time to invent the ski industry, spark the sexual revolution, and win countless Academy Awards. Tahoe beneath the Surface brings this hidden history of America s largest mountain lake to life through the stories of its most celebrated residents and visitors over the last ten thousand years. It mixes local Washoe Indian legends with tales of murderous Mafia dons, and Rat Pack tunes with Steinbeck novels. It establishes Tahoe as one of America s literary hot spots by tracing the steps of more than a dozen authors including Bertrand Russell, Maxine Hong Kingston, and Michael Ondaatje. Tahoe beneath the Surface reveals how the lake transformed the lives of conservationists like John Muir, humorists like Mark Twain, and Hollywood icons like Frank Sinatra. It even touches upon some of the darker aspects of American history, including anti-Chinese racism and the Kennedy assassination. Despite the impact Lake Tahoe has had on America, environmental threats loom large, and Tahoe Blue a term that Lankford uses to encompass the whole range of life, beauty, and meaning the lake represents grows increasingly vulnerable. In Tahoe beneath the Surface, human history and natural history combine in a most engaging way, one that will both inform and inspire all who would keep Tahoe blue.

    He has been a busy man. Yet, for the last two years, he has also managed to squeeze in a weekly column for The Times. Without fail, he sat down every week and wracked his brain to think of something to write 900 words about. Dispatches From the Sofa is the brilliant result. Alighting on such random topics as the potential demise of Margaret Thatcher, the love-hate relationship with your football club, Mike Read's musical of Oscar Wilde, fat pop stars, Serbian breakfast banter, the pleasures of air-guitar, the banking crisis and the evil phenomenon of Jedward, this is a thought-provoking, wide-reaching, hilarious and self-deprecating collection - which also includes the first two chapters from his unpublished novel - from one of our funniest, quickest and most beloved comedians.

    Under the codename ‘Echo 7’, he was ‘licenced to kill’ bringing down scores of targets, sometimes with deadly force. In 1985 he opened fire on a suspect to save a four-year-old girl whose mother had been stabbed to death by her assailant. Two years later he was involved in another high profile shooting while confronting three armed criminals. On both occasions Tony was commended by the Metropolitan Police Commissioner. But in the spring of 2005, coming face to face with suspected drug dealer and armed robber Azelle Rodney, a volley of point blank shots would bring his career crashing to an end, tarnish his reputation and leave him fighting a murder charge and possible life sentence. From life or death cases and botched operations to political fallouts, this book charts the controversial career from rookie seventies beat cop to Long's command of SO19 – the Met’s most elite specialist firearms unit. Long’s personal testimony and professional insight raises serious issues about the duties, pressures and responsibilities that fall on the shoulders of those we task to risk their lives, and take the lives of others, in our name.