November 2010 On Sale: November 9, 2010 208 pages ISBN: 0061958948 EAN: 9780061958946 Hardcover $22.99 Add to Wish List Non-Fiction Inspirational, Non-Fiction Memoir, Non-Fiction Buy at Amazon.com Motherly lessons Don’t Sing at the Table: Life Lessons from My Grandmothers by Adriana Trigiani The Wisdom Of My Grandmothers As devoted readers of Adriana Trigiani’s New York Times bestselling novels know, this “seemingly effortless storyteller” (Boston Globe) frequently draws inspiration from her own family history, in particular from the lives of her two remarkable grandmothers, who have found their way into all Trigiani’s cherished novels. In Don’t Sing at the Table, this much-beloved writer has gathered their estimable life lessons, revealing how her grandmothers’ simple values have shaped her own life, sharing the experiences, humor, and wisdom of her beloved mentors to delight readers of all ages. Lucia Spada Bonicelli (Lucy) and Yolanda Perin Trigiani (Viola) lived through the twentieth century from beginning to end as working women who juggled careers and motherhood. From the factory line to the family table, Lucy and Viola, the very definition of modern women, cut a path for their granddaughter by demonstrating moxie and pluck in their fearless approach to life, love, and overcoming obstacles. Lucy’s…

Beauty-queen survivalists, time travel, blood magic and a little Cyrano de Bergerac–this jumbo-sized edition of Fresh Takes has a whole bunch of somethings for everyone. CONTEMPORARY (mostly) NOVELS The YA lexicon has yet to come up with a standardized way to classify the wide variety of the category. I usually break my recommendations up into “Paranormal” and “Contemporary” meaning “non-paranormal.” But this time I have a historical novel. And how can I them “realistic” novels when I lead off with a book about a plane-full of Beauty Queens that crash lands on a Lost-slash-Survivor type island? I could, of course, just call them delicious. BEAUTY QUEENS by Libba Bray. (Scholastic; May 24) It’sMiss Teen America plus Lost plus Heart of Darkness. Only funnier. I am constantly awed and amazed by Libba Bray’s ability to reinvent herself between books. Trust me on this–Bray is one Literary Prize Winning author who will never bore you. Beauty Queens mixes slap-stick fun with action adventure, genuine peril and real issues. Devilishly clever and funny, even while asking why girls apologize for things that aren’t their fault, and what does “act like a lady” really mean, and what does it mean to be a girl…

In the pictures I have of my mother she looks like the Duchess of Windsor. My husband, who didn’t like her, would say, “Uh oh, here comes the Duchess,” when he heard her car in the driveway. Raised in an orphanage, how did my mother come by that royal presence? How could she have been so fragile, and yet accomplish so much in her young widowhood, raising my brother and me? How can she exist so powerfully after she is dead? She seems to have left tracks in my brain like indelible markers that are more than memory, leaking into my present. She died while I was downstairs in the hospital coffee shop drinking a milkshake and leafing through Newsweek. I found her on the floor after her last desperate moment of pride trying to get to the bathroom alone. She was crumpled at the foot of the bed, a terrifying stranger in a hospital gown. I screamed for the nurse who came running. It took the two of us to get her back in the bed where she lay, dignified once again, even in this unbelievable death. In life she didn’t look like anyone’s mother. She was too young-looking,…