WHPC Parlor 7:00 PM 4th Monday 

 Book Ideas for 2011-2012

 

 

David L. Cook 

In life you never really know when you might meet someone who will change your life. And more importantly you never know when your influence might change another. This book is about influence. It is about a man who lived in a simple place but had extraordinary insight. He also had something else on his side. He had time; time to invest himself in the life of another who was lost on his journey. This story is based on the thousands of athletes I have counseled and the great mentors and teachers from whom I have learned. I have brought my twenty plus years of peak performance coaching together and compressed them into a story of two fictitious characters; a rancher with a passion for teaching truth and a young golf

 

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption  
Laura Hillenbrand

From Laura Hillenbrand, the bestselling author of Seabiscuit, comes Unbroken, the inspiring true story of a man who lived through a series of catastrophes almost too incredible to be believed. In evocative, immediate descriptions, Hillenbrand unfurls the story of Louie Zamperini--a juvenile delinquent-turned-Olympic runner-turned-Army hero. During a routine search mission over the Pacific, Louie’s plane crashed into the ocean, and what happened to him over the next three years of his life is a story that will keep you glued to the pages, eagerly awaiting the next turn in the story and fearing it at the same time. You’ll cheer for the man, who somehow maintained his selfhood and humanity, and found God in his life, despite the monumental degradations he suffered.  Nonfiction 
 

Garth Stein

If you've ever wondered what your dog is thinking, Stein's third novel offers an answer. Enzo is a lab terrier mix plucked from a farm outside Seattle to ride shotgun with race car driver Denny Swift as he pursues success on the track and off. Denny meets and marries Eve, has a daughter, Zoë, and risks his savings and his life to make it on the professional racing circuit. Enzo, frustrated by his inability to speak and his lack of opposable thumbs, watches Denny's old racing videos, coins koanlike aphorisms that apply to both driving and life, and hopes for the day when his life as a dog will be over and he can be reborn a man. When Denny hits an extended rough patch, Enzo remains his most steadfast if silent supporter.  This book has everything: love, tragedy, redemption, danger, and--most especially--the canine narrator Enzo. This old soul of a dog has much to teach us about being human. Fiction

 

Barry Petersen

Acclaimed CBS News reporter Barry Petersen, writes about hearing the unimaginable: what it meant, what it still means, what he did--and didn't do--and how this beautiful love story needs to be read by the thousands of families who have already heard that same devastating diagnosis. Jan's Story is a full, rich story of two people--and thousands like them--for whom "forever" suddenly and terrifyingly has an expiration date.  Nonfiction

 

Kamal Saleem

The Blood of Lambs reveals the true inside story of the making and mind-set of a Muslim terrorist. Though his ties with terrorism were severed more than twenty years ago, it was not until 9/11, when radical Muslims rained terror on American shores, that Kamal Saleem stepped out of the shadows and revealed his true identity. Today, he is a different kind of warrior.  Kamal is now an American citizen and has embraced the Christian faith he once sought to destroy. He consults with federal law enforcement agencies and speaks on the dangers of radical Islam at venues across the country, including Stanford University, the University of California at Berkeley, and the U.S. Air Force Academy. Kamal lives with his American family in an undisclosed location somewhere in America. Nonfiction

 

Rebecca Skloot

From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. And from that same life, and those cells, Rebecca Skloot has fashioned in The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks a fascinating and moving story of medicine and family, of how life is sustained in laboratories and in memory.  For a decade, Skloot doggedly but compassionately gathered the threads of these stories, slowly gaining the trust of the family while helping them learn the truth about Henrietta, and with their aid she tells a rich and haunting story that asks the questions, Who owns our bodies? And who carries our memories?