There are tons of great new book ideas for every Dad this Father’s Day! Here’s a little selection of some of our picks:

SPORTS:

“Sparky and Me: My Friendship With Sparky Anderson and The Lessons He Shared About Baseball and Life” (SIGNED)- Author Dan Ewald explores his friendship and the lessons imparted on him by the legendary Tigers manager. To Sparky, a real professional was as great away from the diamond as he was on it.  His goal was for his players to be the best husbands, fathers, and community leaders they could be—he believed that was the mark of a winner, not the box score.  Sparky had a gift for taking something as inane as the infield fly rule and turning it into a lecture on how to lead a more meaningful life. SIGNED COPIES BY THE AUTHOR!

For more info, click the link here.

“Summer of ‘68: The Season that Changed Baseball, and America, Forever” by Tim Wendel.  Also on our list for the baseball lover, Tim Wendel’s latest release examines the explosive 1968 season that found the underdog Detroit Tigers facing off against the mighty St. Louis Cardinals in a legendary World Series, framed amidst the political and social upheavals happening throughout the country.

For more info, click the link here.

“Nobody’s Perfect: Two Men, One Call, and a Game for Baseball History” by Jim Joyce, Armando Gallaragga, & Daniel Paisner. The perfect game is one of the rarest accomplishments in sports. No hits, no walks, no men reaching base. In nearly four hundred thousand contests in more than 130 years of Major League Baseball, it has only happened twenty times. On June 2, 2010, Armando Galarraga threw baseball’s twenty-first perfect game. Except that’s not how it entered the record books. That’s because Jim Joyce, a veteran umpire with more than twenty years of big league experience, the man voted the best umpire in the game in 2010 by baseball’s players, missed the call on the final out at first base. “No, I did not get the call correct,” Joyce said after seeing a replay. But rather than throw a tantrum, Galarraga simply turned and smiled, went back to the mound and took care of business. “Nobody’s perfect,” he said later in the locker room. In Nobody’s Perfect, Galarraga and Joyce come together to tell the personal story of a remarkable game that will live forever in baseball lore, and to trace their fascinating lives in sports up until this pivotal moment. It is an absorbing insider’s look at two lives in baseball, a tremendous achievement, and an enduring moment of sportsmanship.

NON-FICTION:

“Car Guys Vs. Bean Counters: The Battle for the Soul of American Business” (SIGNED) by Bob Lutz. In 2001, General Motors hired Lutz out of retirement with a mandate to save the company by making great cars again. As vice chairman, he launched a war against the penny-pinching number-crunchers who ran the company by the bottom line, and reinstated a focus on creativity, design, and cars and trucks that would satisfy GM customers. Lutz’s common-sense lessons, combined with a generous helping of fascinating anecdotes, will inspire readers in any industry. As he writes:
“It applies in any business. Shoe makers should be run by shoe guys, and software firms by software guys, and supermarkets by supermarket guys. With the advice and support of their bean counters, absolutely, but with the final word going to those who live and breathe the customer experience. Passion and drive for excellence will win over the computer-like, dispassionate, analysis- driven philosophy every time.”

“Chrysler’s Turbine Car: The Rise and Fall of Detroit’s Coolest Creation” by Steve Lehto. In 1964, Chrysler gave the world a glimpse of the future. They built a fleet of turbine cars–automobiles with jet engines–and loaned them out to members of the public. The fleet logged over a million miles; the exercise was a raging success. These turbine engines would run on any flammable liquid–tequila, heating oil, Chanel #5, diesel, alcohol, kerosene. If the cars had been mass produced, we might have cars today that do not require petroleum-derived fuels. The engine was also much simpler than the piston engine–it contained one-fifth the number of moving parts and required much less maintenance. The cars had no radiators or fan belts and never needed oil changes.  Yet Chrysler crushed and burned most of the cars two years later; the jet car’s brief glory was over. Where did it all go wrong? Controversy still follows the program, and questions about how and why it was killed have never been satisfactorily answered.

“Front Burner: Al Qaeda’s Attack on the USS Cole” (SIGNED) by Commander Kirk S. Lippold, USN (Ret).  On October 12, 2000, eleven months before the 9/11 attacks, the USS Cole docked in the port of Aden in Yemen for a routine fueling stop.  At 1118, on a hot, sunny morning, the 8,400-ton destroyer was rocked by an enormous explosion. The ship’s commander, Kirk Lippold, felt the ship violently thrust up and to the right, as everything not bolted down seemed to float in midair. Tiles tumbled from the ceiling, and the ship was plunged into darkness, beginning to sink. In a matter of moments Lippold knew that the Cole had been attacked. What he didn’t know was how much the world was changing around him.

“Cronkite” by Douglas Brinkley. For decades, Walter Cronkite was known as “the most trusted man in America.” Millions across the nation welcomed him into their homes, first as a print reporter for the United Press on the front lines of World War II, and later, in the emerging medium of television, as a host of numerous documentary programs and as anchor of the CBS Evening News, from 1962 until his retirement in 1981. Yet this very public figure, undoubtedly the twentieth century’s most revered journalist, was a remarkably private man; few know the full story of his life. Drawing on unprecedented access to Cronkite’s private papers as well as interviews with his family and friends, Douglas Brinkley now brings this American icon into focus as never before.

“The True Story of Titanic Thompson- The Man Who Bet on Everything” by Kevin Cook. “The ultimate hustler . . . a rollicking tale.”—Sports Illustrated This “raucous retelling of the life of a consummate gambler, grifter and quintessential American character” (Kirkus Reviews) introduces Alvin “Titanic” Thompson (1892-1974), who traveled with golf clubs, a .45 revolver, and a suitcase full of cash. A terrific read for anyone who has ever laid a bet, Titanic Thompson recaptures the colorful times of a singular figure. 20 black-and-white illustrations

FICTION:

“Say Nice Things About Detroit” by Scott Lasser. Twenty-five years after his high school graduation, David Halpert returns to a place that most people flee. But David is making his own escape—from his divorce and the death of his son. In Detroit, David learns about the double shooting of his high school girlfriend Natalie and her black half-brother, Dirk. As David becomes involved with Natalie’s sister, he will discover that both he and his hometown have reasons to hope. As compelling an urban portrait as The Wire and a touching love story, Say Nice Things About Detroit takes place in a racially polarized, economically collapsing city that doesn’t seem like a place for rebirth. But as David tries to make sense of the mystery behind Natalie’s death and puts back the pieces of his own life, he is forced to answer a simple question: if you want to go home again, what do you do if home is Detroit?

“Kiss Her Goodbye” by Mickey Spillane & Max Allan Collins. Working from a draft left uncompleted when Spillaine died, Collins continues the escapades of Mike Hammer in down-and-out New York City circa 1970.

“Moment in the Sun” by John Sayles. It’s 1897. Gold has been discovered in the Yukon. New York is under the sway of Hearst and Pulitzer. And in a few months, an American battleship will explode in a Cuban harbor, plunging the U.S. into war. Spanning five years and half a dozen countries, this is the unforgettable story of that extraordinary moment: the turn of the twentieth century, as seen by one of the greatest storytellers of our time.
Shot through with a lyrical intensity and stunning detail that recall Doctorow and Deadwood both, A Moment in the Sun takes the whole era in its sights—from the white-racist coup in Wilmington, North Carolina to the bloody dawn of U.S. interventionism in the Philippines. Beginning with Hod Brackenridge searching for his fortune in the North, and hurtling forward on the voices of a breathtaking range of men and women—Royal Scott, an African American infantryman whose life outside the military has been destroyed; Diosdado Concepcíon, a Filipino insurgent fighting against his country’s new colonizers; and more than a dozen others, Mark Twain and President McKinley’s assassin among them—this is a story as big as its subject: history rediscovered through the lives of the people who made it happen.

“Art of Fielding” by Chad Harbach. At Westish College, baseball star Henry Skrimshander seems destined for big league until a routine throw goes disastrously off course. In the aftermath of his error, the fates of five people are upended. Henry’s fight against self-doubt threatens to ruin his future. College president Guert Affenlight has fallen unexpectedly and helplessly in love. Owen Dunne becomes caught up in a dangerous affair. Mike Schwartz realizes he has guided Henry’s career at the expense of his own. And Pella Affenlight returns to Westish after escaping an ill-fated marriage, determined to start a new life.
As the season counts down to its climactic final game, these five are forced to confront their deepest hopes, anxieties, and secrets. Written with boundless intelligence and filled with the tenderness of youth, “The Art of Fielding is mere baseball fiction the way Moby Dick is just a fish story” (Nicholas Dawidoff). It is an expansive, warmhearted novel about ambition and its limits, about family and friendship and love, and about commitment–to oneself and to others.

“The Dark Chronicles: A trilogy” by Jeremy Duns. It’s 1969, and MI6 agent Paul Dark has spent the last twenty-five years betraying his country. When a would-be Russian defector turns up with information about a high-level British double agent, Dark goes on the run—only to discover that everything he believes is a lie.
Bringing together three novels featuring double agent Paul Dark, The Dark Chronicles journeys from London to Nigeria and from Rome to Moscow in a heart-pounding saga of dubious loyalties, deadly conspiracies, and ruthless acts of revenge at the height of the Cold War.

“The Leopard” by Joe Nesbo. Two young women are found murdered in Oslo, both drowned in their own blood. Media coverage quickly reaches fever pitch: Could this be the work of a serial killer?
The crime scenes offer no coherent clues, the police investigation is stalled, and the one man who might be able to help doesn’t want to be found. Traumatized by his last case, Inspector Harry Hole has lost himself in the squalor of Hong Kong’s opium dens. Yet when he is compelled, at last, to return to Norway—his father is dying—Harry’s buried instincts begin to take over. After a female MP is discovered brutally murdered, nothing can keep him from the investigation.

“Burning Midnight” by Loren Estleman. Amos Walker knows Detroit, from the highest to the lowest, and that includes the gangs of Mexicantown. When a friend asks Walker to get his son’s brother-in-law out of one of two feuding gangs, Walker gets in trouble fast. First, dead bodies start to pile up; then come suspicious fires and the bottle bombs. Walker is caught in the middle of a gang war.  Whether or not a middle-aged gringo like him can cool things off between the Maldados and the Zapatistas, he’s got to try; he did promise his friend. Once he gets involved, he realizes there’s something else going on; the specter of an international conspiracy threatens to make this local trouble blow sky-high. And if he ends up dead or in jail for murders he didn’t commit, he might have to put that promise on hold. It’s tough being Amos Walker.

“Raylan” (SIGNED) by Elmore Leonard.  The revered New York Times bestselling author, recognized as “America’s greatest crime writer” (Newsweek), brings back U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, the mesmerizing hero of Pronto, Riding the Rap, and the hit FX series Justified. With the closing of the Harlan County, Kentucky, coal mines, marijuana has become the biggest cash crop in the state. A hundred pounds of it can gross $300,000, but that’s chump change compared to the quarter million a human body can get you—especially when it’s sold off piece by piece.

“HHhh” by Laurent Binet.   HHhH: “Himmlers Hirn heisst Heydrich”, or “Himmler’s brain is called Heydrich”. The most dangerous man in Hitler’s cabinet, Reinhard Heydrich was known as the “Butcher of Prague.” He was feared by all and loathed by most. With his cold Aryan features and implacable cruelty, Heydrich seemed indestructible—until two men, a Slovak and a Czech recruited by the British secret service, killed him in broad daylight on a bustling street in Prague, and thus changed the course of History.

“Canada” by Richard Ford.  “First, I’ll tell about the robbery our parents committed. Then about the murders, which happened later.”

“A Hologram for the King” by Dave Eggers. In a rising Saudi Arabian city, far from weary, recession-scarred America, a struggling businessman pursues a last-ditch attempt to stave off foreclosure, pay his daughter’s college tuition, and finally do something great. In A Hologram for the King, Dave Eggers takes us around the world to show how one man fights to hold himself and his splintering family together in the face of the global economy’s gale-force winds. This taut, richly layered, and elegiac novel is a powerful evocation of our contemporary moment — and a moving story of how we got here.

“Best American Noir of the Century” ed. by James Ellroy & Otto Penzler. Hardcover sale copies are available for $9.99 while supplies last!

“Alif the Unseen” by G. Willow Wilson. In an unnamed Middle Eastern security state, a young Arab-Indian hacker shields his clients—dissidents, outlaws, Islamists, and other watched groups—from surveillance and tries to stay out of trouble. He goes by Alif—the first letter of the Arabic alphabet, and a convenient handle to hide behind. The aristocratic woman Alif loves has jilted him for a prince chosen by her parents, and his computer has just been breached by the State’s electronic security force, putting his clients and his own neck on the line. Then it turns out his lover’s new fiancé is the head of State security, and his henchmen come after Alif, driving him underground. When Alif discovers The Thousand and One Days, the secret book of the jinn, which both he and the Hand suspect may unleash a new level of information technology, the stakes are raised and Alif must struggle for life or death, aided by forces seen and unseen. With shades of Neal Stephenson, Neil Gaiman, Philip Pullman, and The Thousand and One Nights, Alif the Unseen is a tour de force debut—a sophisticated melting pot of ideas, philosophy, religion, technology and spirituality smuggled inside an irresistible page-turner.

MUSIC:

“Devils and Blue Dresses” by Mitch Ryder. A gifted writer with an original voice, Mitch Ryder first gained fame as the leader of the iconic rock group Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels. With hits such as Devil With a Blue Dress On / Good Golly, Miss Molly, Sock it to Me Baby, and Jenny Take a Ride, Mitch quickly rocketed to international fame. This resulted in a roller coaster ride of sex, drugs, celebrity, and rock and roll. Along the way, he became a legend who did it all. Here, Mitch emerges as a real person who wants nothing more than goodness a fair person who loves his family and is amazed they still love him despite his many mistakes. Readers learn how John Lennon saved Mitch s life, about Mitch s plan to kidnap a celebrity s son, of Percy Sledge s stage secret, and many other backstage tales. Includes more than three-dozen previously unpublished photos, and copies of personal letters from and to the author. A full discography of Mitch s musical works, an index, and a CD of Mitch s music are also included.

“FUG YOU: An Informal History of the Peace Eye Bookstore, the Fuck You Press, the FUGS. and the Counterculture in the Lower East Side” (SIGNED) by Ed Sanders.   Fug You is Ed Sanders’s unapologetic and often hilarious account of eight key years of “total assault on the culture,” to quote his novelist friend William S. Burroughs. Fug You traces the flowering years of New York’s downtown bohemia in the sixties, starting with the marketing problems presented by publishing Fuck You / A Magazine of the Arts, as it faced the aboveground’s scrutiny, and leading to Sanders’s arrest after a raid on his Peace Eye Bookstore. The memoir also traces the career of the Fugs–formed in 1964 by Sanders and his neighbor, the legendary Tuli Kupferberg (called “the world’s oldest living hippie” by Allen Ginsberg)–as Sanders strives to find a home for this famous postmodern, innovative anarcho-folk-rock band in the world of record labels.

“Life” by Keith Richards. We have a limited number of sale copies in hardcover for $7.99! While Supplies last.

“The Wrecking Crew: Inside Story of Rock n Roll’s Best Kept Secret” by Kent Hartman. If you were a fan of popular music in the 1960s and early ’70s, you were a fan of the Wrecking Crew—whether you knew it or not. On hit record after hit record by everyone from the Byrds, the Beach Boys, and the Monkees to the Grass Roots, the 5th Dimension, Sonny &  Cher, and Simon & Garfunkel, this collection of West Coast studio musicians from diverse backgrounds established themselves as the driving sound of pop music—sometimes over the objection of actual band members forced to make way for Wrecking Crew members. Industry insider Kent Hartman tells the dramatic, definitive story of the musicians who forged a reputation throughout the business as the secret weapons behind the top recording stars.

“My Cross To Bear” by Greg Allman. The story begins simply: with Gregg and his older brother, Duane, growing up in the South, raising hell with their guitars, and drifting from one band to another. But all that changed when Duane and Gregg came together with four other men to forge something new—a unique sound shaped by soul, rock, and blues and brimming with experimentation; a sound not just of a band, but of a family. Bringing to life the carefree early days of the Allman Brothers Band, Gregg holds nothing back—from run-ins with the law to meeting girls on the road, from jamming at the Fillmore East to experimenting with drugs. Along the way, he goes behind the scenes of some of greatest rock music ever recorded, without shying away from the infamous and painful deaths of his brother, Duane, and Allman Brothers bassist Berry Oakley. Speaking for the first time about the profound impact that his brother’s death had on him, Gregg offers a tribute to Duane that only a younger brother could write, showing how, to this day, he still confronts the grief of losing his big brother, even as Duane continues to guide and inspire him.

Setting the record straight about the band’s struggles in the face of death, Gregg shows how the decision to persevere came with a heavy price. While the rock and roll excesses of drugs, alcohol, and personality clashes led to a series of breakups that culminated with the band’s permanent reunion in 1989, Gregg fought his own battle with substance abuse, going to rehab no less than eleven times and floating through a string of failed marriages, including his tabloid-frenzied relationship with Cher, before finally cleaning up once and for all.

LOCAL INTEREST:

“Coney Detroit” (SIGNED) by Katherine Yung and Joe Grimm. Coney Detroit showcases such Metro Detroit favorites as American Coney Island, Lafayette Coney Island, Duly’s Coney Island, Kerby’s Coney Island, National Coney Island, and Leo’s Coney Island. As Yung and Grimm uncover the secret ingredients of an authentic Detroit coney, they introduce readers to the suppliers who produce the hot dogs, chili sauce, and buns, and also reveal the many variations of the coney—including coney tacos, coney pizzas, and coney omelets. While the coney legend is centered in Detroit, Yung and Grimm explore coney traditions in other Michigan cities, including Flint, Jackson, Kalamazoo, Port Huron, Pontiac, and Traverse City, and even venture to some notable coney islands outside of Michigan, from the east coast to the west. Most importantly, the book introduces and celebrates the families and individuals that created and continue to proudly serve Detroit’s favorite food.

“313: Life in the Motor City” by John Carlisle. Since 2007, John Carlisle has fascinated readers with his untold stories of Detroit in his “Detroitblogger John” column for the Metro Times. His words and photographs shed light on the overlooked and forgotten while bringing life to neglected, far-flung neighborhoods. The Detroit chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists named Carlisle the 2011 Journalist of the Year for his work on the city. This collection features dozens of his previously unpublished photographs and forty-two of his most unforgettable stories, including a man who has a strip club in his living room, a bar in a ghost town, a coffee shop for the city’s homeless, an art gallery in a mattress store and an old-fashioned debutante ball in the unlikeliest of places.

“Bill Rauhauser: 20th Century Photography in Detroit” by Mary Desjarlais.  An artist monograph with photographs by Bill Rauhauser and an essay by Mary Desjarlais. This book is essential for anyone interested in fine art photography or Detroit history. Bill Rauhauser has been on the cutting edge of artistic movements throughout his life. He is a pioneer in the development of photographic culture in the city of Detroit and his outstanding Street Photography, taken over a period of sixty years, provides a unique historic archive of the city of Detroit. Starting during the forties through the present, Rauhauser photographed images that capture the rhythms of city street life in Detroit landscapes. Many of the buildings and houses no longer exist. Any of the millions of people who ever lived in Detroit would be interested in this book, to see Detroit as it changed over the century. Additionally, art history aficionados and photography collectors will find in this book a unique collection of exquisitely crafted photographs.

“Robert Wilson: Ennobling the Ordinary” by Gere Baskin. Robert Wilbert’s work has been collected by numerous institutions, including the Detroit Institute of Arts and several national corporations. Among his many commissions are the design of the 1987 U.S. postage stamp commemorating the state of Michigan’s sesquicentennial, the official portrait of James Blanchard, governor of Michigan, and that of Irvin D. Reid, President of Wayne State University. Additionally, his thirty-eight years as a professor in the art department at Wayne State University and coordinator of the painting area were instrumental in bringing the program to prominence, locally and nationally. Wilbert nurtured generations of students who have gone on to successful national careers, contributing to the arts in very positive ways, as artists, writers, educators, curators, and art dealers. This volume traces Wilbert’s career as an artist, teacher, mentor, and advocate for the arts in essays and interviews with the artist and various contributors close to him.

“Detroit Revealed Photographs 2000-2010” ed. by Nancy Barr. Detroit Revealed is a 79 page color and black and white illustrated hardcover catalog that accompanies the exhibition at the Detroit Institute of Arts. It is new with a dustjacket.More than 50 large-scale color and traditional black-and-white photographs by Michelle Andonian, Carlos Diaz, Scott Hocking, Andrew Moore, Alec Soth and Corine Vermeulen are included. Photography and video by Dawoud Bey and Ari Marcopoulos are also featured.

The artists were selected for their diverse and critical perspectives, ability to uncover what lies beneath the surface of life in Detroit and the importance of the city to their artistic practice. They see Detroit as a challenging place of dramatic transformation. Their work appears together for the first time in a deliberately eclectic and sometimes contradictory mix, with subjects ranging from the factory to the community farm, to the vibrant neighborhoods’ ethnic enclave.

“Detroit: 138 Miles” by Julia Reyes Taubman. Over the past six years, documentary photographer and architectural historian Julia Reyes Taubman has taken more than 30,000 photographs across the sprawled terrain of Detroit, ambitiously mapping out a comprehensive survey of a major American city. Photographing on the ground, in the buildings and by air and water, Reyes Taubman believes that when buildings and landscape are manipulated by nature and time they become more visually compelling than almost any architectural intervention. Reyes Taubman is not pessimistic, however: “It is not a disgrace but a privilege and an obligation to listen to the stories only ruins can tell,” she writes in regard to this project. “They tell us a lot about who we were, what we once valued most, and perhaps where we may be going.” As Reyes Taubman scrutinizes this 138-square-mile metropolis in transition, she pays particular attention to the scale and the solidity of the buildings that characterized the former “Motor City” at the height of its industrial wealth and power. More than a photographic saturation job of a single city, Detroit: 138 Square Miles provides contextual perspective in an extended caption section in which Reyes Taubman collaborated with University of Michigan professors Robert Fishman and Michael McCulloch to emphasize the social imperatives driving her documentation. An essay by native Detroiter and bestselling author Elmore Leonard addresses the social and cultural significance of the post-industrial condition of this metropolis. The volume’s spine is specially treated with black ink to evoke the industrial character of its subject.

FOOD:

“BBQ Bible- Best Ribs Ever” by Steven Raichlen.

“Steven Raichlen’s BBQ USA” by Steven Raichlen.

“How to Grill” by Steven Raichlen.