The Chris Voss Show

In the Mouth of the Wolf: A Murder, a Cover-Up, and the True Cost of Silencing the Press by Katherine Corcoran Regina Martínez was no stranger to retaliation. A journalist out of Mexico’s Gulf Coast state of Veracruz, Regina’s stories for the magazine Proceso laid out the corruption and abuse underlying Mexican politics. She was barred from press conferences, and copies of Proceso often disappeared before they made the newsstands. In 2012, shortly after Proceso published an article on corruption and two Veracruz politicians, and the magazine went missing once again, she was bludgeoned to death in her bathroom. The message was clear: No journalist in Mexico was safe. Katherine Corcoran, then leading the Associated Press coverage of Mexico, admired Regina Martínez’s work. Troubled by the news of her death, Corcoran journeyed to Veracruz to find out what had happened. Regina hadn’t even written the controversial article. But did she have something else that someone didn’t want published? Once there, Katherine bonded with four of Regina’s grief-stricken mentees, each desperate to prove who was to blame for the death of their friend. Together they battled cover-ups, narco-officials, red tape, and threats to sift through the mess of lies―and discover what got Regina killed. A gripping look at reporters who dare to step on the deadly “third rail,” where the state and organized crime have become indistinguishable, In the Mouth of the Wolf confronts how silencing the free press threatens basic protections and rule of law across the globe.

Robert Bell, CEO of 2B3D- A Metaverse Tech Company 2b3d.com

Darrick “DJ” Johnson, CEO, ITech E-Learning Platform itech0.com

Gary Shapiro, President/CEO of Consumer Technology Association on CES Show 2023 CES.tech Gary Shapiro is an acclaimed author, lobbyist, and president and CEO of the Consumer Technology Association (CTA)® which represents over 1,500 consumer technology companies and owns and produces the Consumer Electronics Show (CES)® — The Global Stage for Innovation. He has authored more than 800 opinion pieces highlighting the importance of innovation in the U.S. economy.

Ten Recommandments For Personal Empowerment by Dana Sardano Ten Recommandments for Personal Empowerment is a loose autobiography based on Dana’s dysfunctional up-bringing and how she empowered herself and came out the other side. Showcasing this how-to meets autobiographical approach to her writing style, Dana uses anecdotes from her personal experiences, shares what she’s gleaned from these experiences, and offers insights on how to work through personal trauma in a step-by-step manner. It’s actually pretty amazing! Just ask her. “What I’ve learned through the process of self-exploration is that our personal empowerment is directly linked to our ability to look within and recognize that we are all interconnected and we are all essentially in this together. I learned that I didn’t just suffer; we all suffer. Our humanness is based in suffering and this suffering binds us and hopefully teaches us compassion for ourselves and others along the way. What I also learned is, at the end of the day, I and I alone am responsible for my own suffering, and when I begin taking the steps toward releasing that suffering, then I will truly feel empowered.

The Intimate City: Walking New York by Michael Kimmelman As New York came to a halt with COVID, Michael Kimmelman composed an email to a group of architects, historians, writers, and friends, inviting them to take a walk. Wherever they liked, he wrote—preferably someplace meaningful to them, someplace that illuminated the city and what they loved about it. At first, the goal was distraction. At a scary moment when everything seemed uncertain, walking around New York served as a reminder of all the ways the city was still a rock, joy, and inspiration. What began with a lighthearted trip to explore Broadway’s shuttered theater district and a stroll along Museum Mile when the museums were closed soon took on a much larger meaning and ambition. These intimate, funny, richly detailed conversations between Kimmelman and his companions became anchors for millions of Times readers during the pandemic. The walks unpacked the essence of urban life and its social fabric—the history, plans, laws, feats of structural engineering, architectural highlights, and everyday realities that make up a place Kimmelman calls “humanity’s greatest achievement.” Filled with stunning photographs documenting the city during the era of COVID, The Intimate City is the ultimate insider’s guide. The book includes new walks through LGBTQ Greenwich Village, through Forest Hills, Queens, and Mott Haven, in the Bronx. All the walks can be walked, or just be read for pleasure, by know-it-all New Yorkers or anyone else. They take readers back to an age when Times Square was still a beaver pond and Yankee Stadium a salt marsh; across the Brooklyn Bridge, for green tea ice cream in Chinatown, for momos and samosas in Jackson Heights, to explore historic Black churches in Harlem and midcentury Mad Men skyscrapers on Park Avenue. A kaleidoscopic portrait of an enduring metropolis, The Intimate City reveals why New York, despite COVID and a long history of other calamities, continues to inspire and to mean so much to those who call it home and to countless others.

Lisa Edmondson, Founder & Owner of Leadership Reno Leadershipreno.com

The Leadership Process by Paul B. Thornton Leadership is a process. There are four steps that you need to follow to achieve your vision. -Diagnose the Situation -Identify Opportunities -Present Your Message -Plan and Implement Perfecting each step will definitely help you be a more effective and impactful leader. You will discover many practical and useful ideas in this book. Paul B. Thornton has extensive knowledge and experience in the field of leadership.

AG Flitcher, Author of Award Winning Fantasy Series, Boone and Jacque AG Flitcher is a six time award winning author who placed finals for Fantasy Series for the OZMA Award. Gifting his work to foster children in an act of compassion. In addition, he has taught many the art of storytelling to novice writers and avid readers. His obsession with questioning the good and bad in life, the grey areas, and the scary parts of life, is what makes his work enthralling and colorful.

Brandon Leibowitz of SEO Optimizers on The Importance of Taking Advantage of Free Website Traffic with SEO SEOoptimizers.com

The First Five Minutes: School Shooting Survival Guide For Administrators and Teachers by Daniel Dluzneski According to the FBI, an active school shooter event lasts an average of 3-5 minutes. What you do with that time can save lives. From Dan Dluzneski, school safety expert and retired Lieutenant of the US Secret Service comes The First FIVE Minutes, a proven guide to locking down effectively. In an event as stressful as a school shooting, the normal human response is to freeze. Imagine if instead of panicking, you knew exactly what to do. And even better, that your entire staff and student body could act quickly and seamlessly to secure your school? The First Five Minutes offers tested and proven critical advice that is both affordable and practical. After reading this book, you will: Learn why a lockdown is still the best way to keep safe in the event of a school shooting. Recognize how to drill properly to prepare for an active shooter event. Gain confidence that you know what to do in those critical first five minutes. Understand how implicit memory helps you react automatically in an emergency. Get Dan’s step-by-step framework, backed by 20 years of successful use in schools across America. When the adrenaline hits, make every minutecount. Lockdown. Survive. Save Lives.

The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Catherine R Bell, Founder of Awakened Company, On How To Awaken Your Companies Employees Awakenedcompany.com Catherinerbell.com Awakenly.app There is another way of doing business. The Awakened Company comes at a time of crisis in the business world, as evidenced by current world-wide financial instability, which was a cry for help from a bipolar boom-bust business model that’s failing. From a mentality of profits first and growth at all cost, those in the know in the business world are coming to the realization this approach is no longer sustainable. The book’s premise is that work isn’t separate from life, and the metrics for success in business need to change at a fundamental level if the world is to transcend its present crises, which increasingly threaten us all. There is another way of doing business, and a shift in our behavior could in very short order fuel innovation, open up undreamed of markets, and by so doing bring prosperity to the entire planet. The Awakened Company adopts the premise that the world’s greatest challenges will be solved by people working together in new ways. It is different from other business books in the sense that it blends proven business practices with insight from the wisdom traditions and leaders in business thought in a way that hasn’t been done before. An awakened approach calls for a fundamental reset to today’s economy, a shift to where businesses will be measured by their state of awareness, not profitability alone. ”In a world of economic uncertainty, The Awakened Company gives a roadmap to a new way of doing business — a way that is humane, fosters innovation, and meets the needs of All stakeholders, including Mother Earth.” – Tony Robbins, New York Times #1 Best-Selling Author, Entrepreneur, Philanthopist “This is a must-read for those of us in the organization world”— David Daniels, M.D., Professor Emeritus, Stanford University

Manifest Destiny a Novel by Zach Daniel zachary-daniel.com Digitaledgewm.com Facebook.com/zachary.daniel.50 Linkedin.com/in/zachary-daniel Twitter.com/zachdiddydaniel Left unreconciled, the stories of our past will become the harbingers of our future. Nick Jacob’s father meant the world to him. Murdered during an apparent robbery, the loss of his only mentor, friend, and idol left a crimson stain on the pure fabric of Nick’s teenage life. Carrying the unimaginable burden of grief into his 30s, the haunting events of the past stir a new sensation deep inside of him. Fueled by anger and a sense of injustice, he begins a dark crusade to avenge others who have been similarly wronged. The traumatic events of the past puppeteer Nick toward a destiny that he never chose for himself. Expecting to obtain solace, Nick begins to uncover the truth of his father’s murder. He soon realizes that he isn’t only in a fight with his inner demons, but with what is unearthed in the investigation. A fight that stands between him and the future he desires; which may cost him everything. Manifest Destiny injects readers into a world filled with depth, drama, and timeless wisdom. Nick’s story of a desire for justice shows the gravitational pull that the past exerts on our lives. But unfortunately, seeking vengeance for his father’s murder only condemns his future. Left unforgiven, the dark stories of our history are doomed to play on infinite repeat. But as we beseech the world seeking growth and change, we need only lay down our past as the necessary sacrifice.

The Capital Order How Economists Invented Austerity and Paved the Way to Fascism by Clara E. Mattei A groundbreaking examination of austerity’s dark intellectual origins. For more than a century, governments facing financial crisis have resorted to the economic policies of austerity—cuts to wages, fiscal spending, and public benefits—as a path to solvency. While these policies have been successful in appeasing creditors, they’ve had devastating effects on social and economic welfare in countries all over the world. Today, as austerity remains a favored policy among troubled states, an important question remains: What if solvency was never really the goal? In The Capital Order, political economist Clara E. Mattei explores the intellectual origins of austerity to uncover its originating motives: the protection of capital—and indeed capitalism—in times of social upheaval from below. Mattei traces modern austerity to its origins in interwar Britain and Italy, revealing how the threat of working-class power in the years after World War I animated a set of top-down economic policies that elevated owners, smothered workers, and imposed a rigid economic hierarchy across their societies. Where these policies “succeeded,” relatively speaking, was in their enrichment of certain parties, including employers and foreign-trade interests, who accumulated power and capital at the expense of labor. Here, Mattei argues, is where the true value of austerity can be observed: its insulation of entrenched privilege and its elimination of all alternatives to capitalism. Drawing on newly uncovered archival material from Britain and Italy, much of it translated for the first time, The Capital Order offers a damning and essential new account of the rise of austerity—and of modern economics—at the levers of contemporary political power.

Kevin Sorbo on Loaded Deck Movie, iShook.com and Crypto Token Movie Funding’s New Frontier Loadeddeckmovie.com Sorbostudios.com ishook.com ishook.io megatolia.com

Toxic Superfoods: How Oxalate Overload Is Making You Sick–and How to Get Better by Sally K. Norton MPH An acclaimed nutrition educator reveals how the foods you’re eating to get healthy might be making you sick. “Sally Norton’s well-researched book makes a truly important contribution to the literature in revealing just how much oxalates can damage the human body.”—Nina Teicholz, author of The Big Fat Surprise If you’re eating a healthy diet and you’re still dealing with fatigue, inflammation, anxiety, recurrent injuries, or chronic pain, the problem could be your spinach, almonds, sweet potatoes, and other trusted plant foods. And your key to vibrant health may be quitting these so-called superfoods. After suffering for decades from chronic health problems, nutrition educator Sally K. Norton, MPH, discovered that the culprits were the chemical toxins called oxalates lurking within her “healthy,” organic plant-heavy diet. She shines light on how our modern diets are overloaded with oxalates and offers fresh solutions including: • A complete, research-backed program to safely reverse your oxalate load • Comprehensive charts and resources on foods to avoid and better alternatives • Guidance to improve your energy, optimize mood and brain performance, and find true relief from chronic pain In this groundbreaking guide, Norton reveals that the popular dictum to “eat more plants” can be misleading. Toxic Superfoods gives health-seekers a chance for improved energy, optimum brain performance, graceful aging, and true relief from chronic pain.

Matty Schirle, Founder & CEO of SkinKick on How To Get Better, Healthier Skin Skinkick.com

Nir Eyal, WSJ Bestselling Author of “Hooked” and “Indistractable.” Investor, Consultant, and Public Speaker NirAndFar.com “Indistractable provides a framework that will deliver the focus you need to get results.” —James Clear, author of Atomic Habits “If you value your time, your focus, or your relationships, this book is essential reading. I’m putting these ideas into practice.” —Jonathan Haidt, author of The Righteous Mind NATIONAL BESTSELLER WINNER OF THE OUTSTANDING WORKS OF LITERATURE (OWL) AWARD INCLUDED IN THE TOP 5 BEST PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY AUDIBLE INCLUDED IN THE TOP 20 BEST BUSINESS AND LEADERSHIP BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY AMAZON FEATURED IN THE AMAZON BOOK REVIEW NEWSLETTER, JANUARY 2020 GOODREADS BEST SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY OF 2019 FINALIST You sit down at your desk to work on an important project, but a notification on your phone interrupts your morning. Later, as you’re about to get back to work, a colleague taps you on the shoulder to chat. At home, screens get in the way of quality time with your family. Another day goes by, and once again, your most important personal and professional goals are put on hold. What would be possible if you followed through on your best intentions? What could you accomplish if you could stay focused? What if you had the power to become “indistractable?” International bestselling author, former Stanford lecturer, and behavioral design expert, Nir Eyal, wrote Silicon Valley’s handbook for making technology habit-forming. Five years after publishing Hooked, Eyal reveals distraction’s Achilles’ heel in his groundbreaking new book. In Indistractable, Eyal reveals the hidden psychology driving us to distraction. He describes why solving the problem is not as simple as swearing off our devices: Abstinence is impractical and often makes us want more. Eyal lays bare the secret of finally doing what you say you will do with a four-step, research-backed model. Indistractable reveals the key to getting the best out of technology, without letting it get the best of us. Inside, Eyal overturns conventional wisdom and reveals: • Why distraction at work is a symptom of a dysfunctional company culture—and how to fix it • What really drives human behavior and why “time management is pain management” • Why your relationships (and your sex life) depend on you becoming indistractable • How to raise indistractable children in an increasingly distracting world Empowering and optimistic, Indistractable provides practical, novel techniques to control your time and attention—helping you live the life you really want.

Brett McKay, Thriller and Suspense Author Brettmckaybooks.com After an unexpected turn flushes his chosen career down the toilet, Dex Sanders is struggling to make ends meet as a used car salesman. Despite the drudgery of the job, he manages to put on a brave face for his wife, Reagan, and their two boys, until the day an unsettling encounter with a stranger coincides with a mysterious package appearing on their doorstep. Later that night, Dex and his family are abducted by a group of armed men and taken to an underground bunker, where Dex is tortured. When Dex can’t answer any of their odd questions, the strangers conclude they’ve nabbed the wrong guy, and the entire family is marked for execution. With the clock ticking, Dex must free his family and retrieve the strange box that seems to hold the answers. But doing so means running from relentless killers, uncovering the truth behind an evil as old as time, and stopping a supernatural power that threatens the entire world.

Out of the FOG, into the CLEAR; Journaling to Help You Heal from Toxic Relationships by Shannon Petrovich In the FOG (Fear, Obligation, and Guilt) of a narcissistic, abusive, or other toxic relationship, feelings of paralysis, anxiety, depression, confusion, disorientation, not knowing who you are anymore, or how you got to this dark place in your life, are as terrifying and mystifying as ocean fog. The FOG crept into your relationship so stealthily that you didn’t notice the dramatic swings from love-bombing to devaluing, the constant pressures, the lies, the gaslighting, the flashes of anger, all of it was just a bit of water vapor that was easily dismissed. But over the months, or years, the FOG set in. Toxic relationships are not an act of nature like ocean fog; they are the result of intentional tactics of manipulation, and control. This FOG is not going to just lift. Nothing will change until you change it. So how do you find your bearings, push past this paralysis, clear away your vision, begin to heal the trauma, and rebuild your life? The insights, strategies, and journal prompts in this book are designed to help you sail through the FOG and into the CLEAR. This book is packed with information including; Changing your negative internal self-talk to transform the cycles of depression, self-blame, despair, and hopelessness, into self-encouragement, hope, progress and self-compassion Understanding trauma-bonding and how to untangle this unhealthy attachment Boundaries; how to create and maintain them with people who don’t respect them Placating, people-pleasing, and peacekeeping, and how to stop undermining yourself Finding clarity, staying focused on reality, and letting go of the gaslighting Leaving emotionally as well as physically Rebuilding your sense of self, and creating healthy self-care strategies And so much more It is possible to deal with and heal from toxic relationships, and this book will help you find your way. Welcome aboard, You can do this!

Unreported: Domestic Abuse is an Unreported Crime, and Learning to L.I.V.E. free is a journey… by Ms. Veera Mahajan UNREPORTED is a book for increasing awareness about domestic abuse. Through amazing real stories it provides a step by step guide for finding your way to freedom.

Elon’s missteps are not only alienating advertisers, even worse, now he’s costing them billions in stock valuations, likely prompting a new slate of lawsuits and damages. He continues to almost daily make snowballing errors into an avalanche of failures of what may become the worst acquisition of all time next to the Time Warner deal. As I wrote about in my new book Beacons of Leadership, I talk about the challenges of taking over companies and pulling them back from the brink of bankruptcy as I have successfully. Why is everything going wrong for Elon? Well its a few things: 1. Operating from Ego. Elon has been operating in an ego state where he believes his own reputation and swagger is impenetrable. Ego got him into this mess. Ego had him into lording around in Twitter to self-indulge his ego to the point of committing to buying it for a figure far beyond its worth at the top of the market. His ego believes he can buy and fix anything and in doing so he convinced himself he could easily fix Twitter and now he’s entered a gauntlet of failures that are compounding. Sadly, many people worship money and people who make money and regard billionaires as infallible business gods. Billionaires assume that their achievements, sometimes involving luck, means they can solve the world’s problems. Books have been written about how many times they fail and actually make the world worse. Most CEOs know you shouldn’t make a brash ego, vanity purchase and the boards are there to regulate that. It appears that many of Elon’s advisors on the deal were some from the political right who may have sought to encourage him to buy it for their interests rather than on the merits of the financials. If you’ve seen the text messages from the deal now released in a lawsuit, it was awful advice he was getting from people willing to sacrifice him for their gain. 2. Overpaying at the top of an economic market with clouds looming. Again overpaying by ego. He contracted to buy Twitter at the top of the market, thinking by ego he could fix anything. Shortly after, market corrections lowered the value of the company. It became clear he was buying a company anywhere 2 to 3 times its valuation. Then he attempted to break the deal and could not. He blindly ignored the coming recessionary conditions coming as the Federal Reserves tightened the economy. Now the scenario looks even worse as all tech companies took a massive stock dive. Most likely if he would have waited till now, Twitter stock price valuation would be around 7-10 billion, meaning he’s now overpaid by 4-5 times the value. 3. NEVER PANIC EARLY. On my podcast, The Chris Voss Show Podcast, we had Apollo 13’s Fred Haise on to talk about the astronauts’ training and survival in the snowballing failures of the mission that had their lives on the line. The title of the book is from NASA’s training: NEVER PANIC EARLY. In his NASA training, it taught them that panicking will escalate problems and even amplify other failures. They go through thousands of hours of problem solving testing to teach them not to panic, but to METHODICALLY, rationally problem solve. Even in the face of death, which is itself a whole new panic potential. Again, from my book Beacons of Leadership, bailing out failing companies is a DIFFERENT skill set than building them. Elon is used to slowly, methodically building, block by block, testing, failing small experiments in a business. Since his usual business’ are startups, it’s all “up,” the sky is the limit, plenty of runway time. Conversely, when you are trying to pull a company out of descent to its death, it’s a much different game, as many times you are up against the wall, out of time, and the gun of bankruptcy is pressed up against your head. Downward spiral is the rule of every day and you can see the ground coming up at you, which is daunting. Usually, your destination is inevitable. You’re just fighting the odds. You are fighting to right the plane in the short time you know you have left. “Just be calm,” says the man with the gun pressed against your sweating forehead.” Instead, through over paying for an ego project, he’s taken a slow descending plane, torched it on fire and geared it into a death spiral. To resolve the mistake of overpaying, he’s brazenly in a callus manner showing instability and chaos, laid off or lost a massive amount of stabilizing staff, including those that made the platform safe for his core income: advertisers. You overpay, then you have to do massive layoffs. Even worse, he’s made ego “score settling” layoffs, bans from his platform and ego posted on Twitter unstable, panic perceived rhetoric further causing advertisers to be skittish. Doubling down on the oligarch ego “I alone can save it” he’s shockingly attempted to threaten, call out and shame advertisers. Never bite the hand that feeds you and in response advertisers have pulled back to limit the fallout after recently going through similar issues with the Kayne West

Personality and Power: Builders and Destroyers of Modern Europe by Ian Kershaw How far can a single leader alter the course of history? From one of the leading historians of twentieth-century Europe and the author of the definitive biography of Hitler, Personality and Power is a masterful reckoning with how character conspired with opportunity to create the modern age’s uniquely devastating despots—and how and why other countries found better paths. The modern era saw the emergence of individuals who had command over a terrifying array of instruments of control, persuasion and death. Whole societies were reshaped and wars were fought, often with a merciless contempt for the most basic norms. At the summit of these societies were leaders whose personalities somehow enabled them to do whatever they wished, regardless of the consequences for others. Ian Kershaw’s new book is a compelling, lucid and challenging attempt to understand these rulers, whether those operating on the widest stage (Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini) or with a more national impact (Tito, Franco). What was it about these leaders, and the times in which they lived, that allowed them such untrammelled and murderous power? And what brought that era to an end? In a contrasting group of profiles—from Churchill to de Gaulle, Adenauer to Gorbachev and Thatcher to Kohl)—Kershaw uses his exceptional skills as an iconic historian to explore how strikingly different figures wielded power.

The Future Is Analog: How to Create a More Human World by David Sax In The Future Is Analog, David Sax points out that the onset of the pandemic instantly gave us the digital universe we’d spent so long anticipating. Instant communication, online shopping, virtual everything. It didn’t take long to realize how awful it was to live in this promised future. We craved real experiences, relationships, and spaces and got back to real life as quickly and often as we could. In chapters exploring work, school, religion, and more, this book asks pointed questions: Is our future inevitably digital? Can we reject the downsides of digital technology without rejecting change? Can we innovate not for the sake of productivity but for the good of our social and cultural lives? Can we build a future that serves us as humans, first and foremost? This is a manifesto for a different kind of change. We can spend our creativity and money on building new gadgets—or we can spend them on new ways to be together and experience the world, to bake bread, and climb mountains. All we need is the clarity to choose which future we want.

Mike Vandemaele, CEO at Pro Services Inc. & Building A Career In The Skilled Trades and Maintenence Tech Fields Prosatwork.com

Manifest.eco George Wojciechowski, Co-Founder and CEO of Manifest Sustainable Ecommerce Fulfillment & Finding Success As An Entrepreneur

The Birth of the Everyday Real Estate Investor: How Real Estate, Not Stocks, Creates Wealth by Glenn Schworm, Amber Schworm Glennandamber.com Real estate investing is the answer to help you live your best life! Whether you want to supplement your income, build your retirement, or switch careers, you know you want to make more money to build your dream life. Are you unhappy where you are, but need more income to get you where you want to go? Do you have a strong desire to advance but aren’t sure how to do so? Maybe you’re an existing real estate investor who wants to grow and scale your business to the next level, but you need guidance to do it. That’s where Glenn and Amber Schworm come in. Whether you have a lot of money or none at all, great credit or bad credit, the average person can create wealth with real estate investing. The Schworms can teach you how—and it’s not as complicated as you think! It is, without a doubt, the best and most effective way for average people to build wealth for themselves.

The Ghosts of Riots Past: The Troubled Conflict in Derry Through The Eyes of a Volunteer First Aider by Jude Morrow Set against a backdrop of the late 1960s Bogside, Martha Bradley is inspired to join the Order of Malta Ambulance Corps at the age of fifteen, following a family tragedy that changes her life forever. This prompted her family to move to the legendary Rossville Flats that dominated the skyline of the Bogside. The teenage first-aiders begin their service by attending sports fixtures, fairs, and religious services, to suddenly administering first aid in a most forbidding active war zone with live ammunition. Martha’s journey with the Order of Malta places her at The Battle of The Bogside, the daily clashes between the Free Derry residents and the security forces, Bloody Sunday, and Operation Motorman, whilst guarding a secret of her own from her unit and her family. Even though we all wore the same thing, white coats and kit bags, everybody wore them and carried themselves a wee bit differently. I would learn everybody’s mannerisms, walks, and small details. I became so close to my unit that I could tell them all apart, even when wearing my gas mask during a riot, outside, and in the dark. I feel it quite symbolic that we wore white coats, almost like we were ghosts. We were the ghosts of riots past, the ghosts of riots present, and the ghosts of riots yet to come. The Ghosts of Riots Past captures the nostalgic perspective of the troubles in Free Derry (1969-1972), the togetherness of the first-aiders, and the spirit of Christian charity and courage of the Order of Malta Ambulance Corps.

Amy Mosher Berry, Founder & CEO of Visions Internships and Why Internships Matter Visionsinternships.com

Do Let’s Have Another Drink!: The Dry Wit and Fizzy Life of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother by Mr. Gareth Russell For fans of The Crown and Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret, a deliciously entertaining collection of 101 fascinating and funny anecdotes about Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother—one for each year of her life. During her lifetime, the Queen Mother was as famous for her clever quips, pointed observations, and dry-as-a-martini delivery style as she was for being a beloved royal. Now, Do Let’s Have Another Drink recounts 101 (one for each year of her remarkable life) amusing and astonishing vignettes from across her long life, including her coming of age during World War I, the abdication of her brother-in-law and her unexpected ascendance to the throne, and her half century of widowhood as her daughter reigned over the United Kingdom. Featuring new revelations and colorful anecdotes about the woman Cecil Beaton, the high society photographer, once summarized as “a marshmallow made on a welding machine,” Do Let’s Have Another Drink is a delightful celebration of one of the most consistently popular members of the royal family.

The Envoy: Mastering the Art of Diplomacy with Trump and the World by Gordon Sondland Grab his book https://amzn.to/3FB05pi This is a behind-the-scenes look at Trump, his cabinet, and an international diplomacy you’ve never seen before—written by someone with no scores to settle, no hidden agenda, no check to cash, and no fucks to give. If you’ve heard of Gordon Sondland, it’s likely for one of the following two reasons: one, that he served as the US ambassador to the European Union as a political appointee of President Trump; or two, that he appeared as a pivotal witness in Trump’s impeachment trial. Yes, Sondland is the “quid pro quo” guy. But as it turns out, he has plenty to say that’s far more memorable. People still stop Sondland at the grocery store or in the airport—Republicans and Democrats alike—and offer him high-fives. Business associates, strangers, and even close friends still ask him: “How did you do that?” What they’re really asking is: How did he survive Trump? How did he handle being grilled by the Senate intelligence committee? How did he come out of the situation intact, able to move on? These are just a few of the questions Sondland wants to answer in The Envoy—a surprising and endlessly amusing account of inflated egos, botched phone calls, bad behavior, and international jujitsu.

Your DNA, Your Life by Cee McDermott Ceemcdermott.com A guide for anyone looking to utilize the key information their DNA inherently provides to unlock the mechanisms for health and wellness. No longer are we bound by the deterministic fate of our genetics. Science now tells us that our health destiny is in our hands. This guide lays the foundation for optimizing living based on your DNA and lifestyle habits. Unlock the key to your wellness destiny by using simple, practical information to up and down regulate the expression of your genes. Backed with scientific data and clinical research, this book provides the reader with novice to expert additions to implement in their life. Along with action and insight prompts, Your DNA, Your Life guides readers to start a path toward optimal wellness. Through these actions, readers find their flow for a life of grace, ease, and joy.

American Crusade: How the Supreme Court Is Weaponizing Religious Freedom by Andrew L Seidel Is a fight against equality and for privilege a fight for religious supremacy? Andrew L. Seidel, a constitutional attorney and author of the critically acclaimed book The Founding Myth: Why Christian Nationalism Is Un-American, dives into the debate on religious liberty, the modern attempt to weaponize religious freedom, and the Supreme Court’s role in that “crusade.” Seidel examines some of the key Supreme Court cases of the last thirty years—including Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission (a bakery that refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple), Trump v. Hawaii (the anti-Muslim travel ban case), American Legion v. American Humanist Association (related to a group maintaining a 40-foot Christian cross on government-owned land), and Tandon v. Newsom (a Santa Clara Bible group exempted from Covid health restrictions), as well as the recent overturning of Roe v. Wade—and how a hallowed legal protection, freedom of religion, has been turned into a tool to advance privilege and impose religion on others. This is a meticulously researched and deeply insightful account of our political landscape with a foreword provided by noted constitutional scholar Erwin Chemerinsky, author of The Case Against the Supreme Court. The issue of church versus state is more relevant than ever in today’s political climate and with the conservative majority status of the current Supreme Court. This book is a standout on the shelf for fans of Michelle Alexander, Bob Woodward, and Christopher Hitchens. Readers looking for critiques of the rise of Christian nationalism, like Jesus and John Wayne, and examinations like How Democracies Die will devour Seidel’s analysis.

Retro by Sofía Lapuente, Jarrod Shusterman What starts off as a light-hearted competition to live without modern technology for a year turns into a fight for survival in this unputdownable young adult thriller by New York Times bestselling author Jarrod Shusterman and debut author Sofía Lapuente. It was never meant to happen this way. Things were never supposed to get this out of hand. After a cyberbullying incident at her school goes viral, Luna Iglesias finds herself at the heart of a brewing controversy. When the social media company Limbo—who are also implicated in the scandal—sweeps in with an offer that sounds like an opportunity to turn over a new leaf and receive a scholarship to the college of her dreams, she’s happy to jump on the new trend. It’s called the Retro Challenge, where contestants live without modern technology, wear vintage clothes, party as if the future weren’t already written, and fall in love as if they were living in a movie. At first, the challenge is fun. But then things get dangerous. Kids start disappearing, including Luna’s friends. There are voices in the woods. Bloodred markings on the trees. And Luna increasingly begins to wonder if all these strange happenings are connected with the Retro Challenge. Secrets. Lies. Betrayal. The weight of her family on her shoulders. There’s so much on the line for Luna, not to mention she’s falling in love with the last guy she expected. Unless she can figure out the truth behind who’s sabotaging the challenge, the next person to disappear may be Luna herself.

Michael Brier, CEO of Recovery Connection Center Drughelp.com

The White Wall: How Big Finance Bankrupts Black America by Emily Flitter An explosive and deeply reported look at the systemic racism inside the American financial services industry, from acclaimed New York Times finance reporter Emily Flitter. In 2018, Emily Flitter received a tip that Morgan Stanley had fired a Black employee without cause. Flitter had been searching for a way to investigate the deep-rooted racism in the American financial industry, and that one tip lit the sparkplug for a three-year journey through the shocking yet normalized corruption in our financial institutions. Examining local insurance agencies and corporate titans like JPMorgan Chase, BlackRock, and Wells Fargo, The White Wall reveals the practices that have kept the racial wealth gap practically as wide as it was during the Jim Crow era. Flitter exposes hiring and layoff policies designed to keep Black employees from advancing to high levels; racial profiling of customers in internal emails between bank tellers; major insurers refusing to pay Black policyholders’ claims; and the systematic denial of funding to Black entrepreneurs. She also gives a voice to victims, from single mothers to professional athletes to employees themselves: people who were scammed, lied to, and defrauded by the systems they trusted with their money, and silenced when they attempted to speak out and seek reform. Flitter connects the dots between data, history, legal scholarship, and powerful personal stories to provide an assiduously reported, eye-opening look at what it means to bank while Black. As America continues to confront systemic racism and pave a path forward, The White Wall is an essential examination of one of its most caustic contributors.

Off the Deep End: Jerry and Becki Falwell and the Collapse of an Evangelical Dynasty by Giancarlo Granda, Mark Ebner Giancarlo Granda finally reveals the truth about his relationship with Becki Falwell and her husband Jerry Falwell Jr., and the hidden world of political influence, high finance, and criminal intrigue. Jerry Falwell Jr. is a prominent figure in the evangelical world whose support for presidential candidate Donald J. Trump helped secure Trump’s Republican nomination in 2016. He captured headlines when it was revealed that he and his wife Becki had participated in a years-long bizarre sexual relationship with a pool attendant they met at the Fountainbleu Hotel in Miami Beach. As Falwell Jr. began to deny this relationship, even more damaging news came out, ultimately forcing him to resign as president of Liberty University, which many consider to be the largest evangelical Christian university in the world. Giancarlo Granda is now ready to share the story of his years on an “only in America” rollercoaster ride through the monied corridors of power and profound hypocrisy.

Cybersecurity – Chuck Brooks, ​CEO ＆ Co-Founder of Brooks Consulting International Brooksci.com

Saving Main Street: Small Business in the Time of COVID-19 by Gary Rivlin A veteran journalist follows an inspiring ensemble cast of small business owners fighting to keep their businesses alive through Covid-19, while exploring the sweeping trends and government policies that had brought small businesses to the breaking point long before the coronavirus hit. There is a tendency to fetishize small business even as it shrinks before our eyes. Americans extol the virtues of small, local, often family-run shops, yet buy from big-box retailers and chains that dominate the competition. Even before the pandemic, small businesses seemed endangered. When Covid-19 hit, the resounding question was: How will they be able to survive this? Saving Main Street is an unfiltered, up-close examination of a small group of business owners and their employees, their struggles, and their strategies to survive. It is an eye-opening tale of grit, perseverance, and entrepreneurial spirit that follows three businesses: a restaurant owner and his rambunctious staff, an immigrant running her own hair salon, and the owner of a “non-life sustaining” gift shop—alongside a larger cast of vividly drawn characters. Gary Rivlin focuses on the first days of the Covid lockdown and the ensuing eighteen months of chaos, including the personal and financial risks, a contentious presidential election, and contradictory governmental guidelines—all which compounded the everyday challenges of running an independent business trying to attract and retain customers who expect low prices, convenience, and endless choice. Rivlin keenly observes small businesses from all angles, examining commonly held “myths”; contradictions in government policy; enormous racial and class fissures; a national self-identity intrinsically connected to the ideal of small business, and how the decline of this American way of retail impacts our notions of American exceptionalism, community, and civic duty. As Rivlin reveals, there’s something enduring about small business in the American psyche. Life will have changed in unprecedented ways on the other side of this pandemic, yet hard times will also create opportunities, offering hope and survival.

Leslie Chen, Owner of Rise Lean – The Ultimate Coach For Sustainable Weight Loss Riselean.com

Saints and Soldiers Inside Internet-Age Terrorism, From Syria to the Capitol Siege by Rita Katz More than a decade ago, counterterrorism expert Rita Katz began browsing white supremacist and neo-Nazi forums. The hateful rhetoric and constant threats of violence immediately reminded her of the jihadist militants she spent her days monitoring, but law enforcement and policy makers barely paid attention to the Far Right. Now, years of attacks committed by extremists radicalized online―including mass murders at a synagogue in Pittsburgh and mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, as well as the Capitol siege―have brought home the danger. How has the internet shaped today’s threats, and what do the online origins of these movements reveal about how to stop them? In Saints and Soldiers, Katz reveals a new generation of terrorist movements that don’t just use the internet, but exist almost entirely on it. She provides a vivid view from the trenches, spanning edgy video game chat groups to what ISIS and Far-Right mass-shooters in El Paso, Orlando and elsewhere unwittingly reveal between the lines of their manifestos. Katz shows how the online cultures of these movements―far more than their ideologies and leaders―create today’s terrorists and shape how they commit “real world” violence. From ISIS to QAnon, Saints and Soldiers pinpoints the approaches needed for a new era in which arrests and military campaigns alone cannot stop these never-before-seen threats.

THE DEATH AND RESURRECTION OF BASEBALL: ECHOES FROM A DISTANT PAST by WILLIAM R. DOUGLAS Authorwilliamrdouglas.com In the year 2166, a post Second Civil War America is finally back on its feet. Among the countless personal and cultural casualties of the war, the sport of baseball has been dead for over a hundred years. 12-year-old Joe Scott lives in the northern Illinois city of McHenry and goes exploring in the woods one day in a no man’s land that a hundred years earlier was the site of the bloodiest battle of the war. While there, he discovers a relic from the distant past, from before the war. It sparks a search for its meaning. Little does he know that the wheels of Providence have been unwittingly set in motion which leads to a stunning discovery in Dyersville, Iowa. This second discovery has a direct connection with the relic found in McHenry. As events unfold, Joe finds himself at the center of the rediscovery of a sport long lost and forgotten by the ravages of time and war. With no living person having any first-hand knowledge of the game, can he figure out the pieces of the puzzle to resurrect the game of baseball? Will his friends take to the game? What will the adults think? Soon, the answers begin to unfold, and a magical sequence of events leads to an epic finale on a national stage!

Ruari Fairbairns, Founder of One Year No Beer Oneyearnobeer.com

Picking Presidents: How to Make the Most Consequential Decision in the World by Gautam Mukunda Celebrated leadership expert and political scientist Gautam Mukunda provides a comprehensive, objective, and non-partisan method for answering the most important question in the world: is someone up to the job of president of the United States? In Picking Presidents, Gautam Mukunda sets his sights on presidential candidates, proposing an objective and tested method to assess whether they will succeed or fail if they win the White House. Combining political science, psychology, organizational behavior, and economics, Picking Presidents will enable every American to cast an informed vote. In his 2012 book Indispensable, which all but predicted the Trump presidency, Mukunda explained how both the very best and very worst leaders are “unfiltered”—outsiders who take power without the understanding or support of traditional elites. Picking Presidents provides deep analysis of filtered and unfiltered presidents alike, from failed haberdasher and skillful president Harry Truman, to the exceptionally well-qualified—and ultimately reviled—James Buchanan; from Andrew Johnson, who set civil rights back by a century, to Theodore Roosevelt, who evaded party opposition to transform American society. Picking Presidents lays out a clear framework that anyone can use to judge a candidate and answer the all-important question: are they up to the job?

Lauren V. Mingee, Founder & CEO of Quintessa Marketing Quintessamarketing.com

Call Him Jack: The Story of Jackie Robinson, Black Freedom Fighter by Yohuru Williams, Michael G. Long An enthralling, eye-opening portrayal of this barrier-breaking American hero as a lifelong, relentlessly proud fighter for Black justice and civil rights. According to Martin Luther King, Jr., Jackie Robinson was “a sit-inner before the sit-ins, a freedom rider before the Freedom Rides.” According to Hank Aaron, Robinson was a leader of the Black Power movement before there was a Black Power movement. According to his wife, Rachel Robinson, he was always Jack, not Jackie―the diminutive form of his name bestowed on him in college by white sports writers. And throughout his whole life, Jack Robinson was a fighter for justice, an advocate for equality, and an inspiration beyond just baseball. From prominent Robinson scholars Yohuru Williams and Michael G. Long comes Call Him Jack, an exciting biography that recovers the real person behind the legend, reanimating this famed figure’s legacy for new generations, widening our focus from the sportsman to the man as a whole, and deepening our appreciation for his achievements on the playing field in the process.

Ron Feldman, President of World Business Services Inc. Worldbusinessservices.com

Bridge to the Sun: The Secret Role of the Japanese Americans Who Fought in the Pacific in World War II by Bruce Henderson, Gerald Yamada One of the last, great untold stories of World War II—kept hidden for decades—even after most of the World War II records were declassified in 1972, many of the files remained untouched in various archives—a gripping true tale of courage and adventure from Bruce Henderson, master storyteller, historian, and New York Times best-selling author of Sons and Soldiers—the saga of the Japanese American U.S. Army soldiers who fought in the Pacific theater, in Burma, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, with their families back home in America, under U.S. Executive Order 9066, held behind barbed wire in government internment camps. After Japan’s surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. military was desperate to find Americans who spoke Japanese to serve in the Pacific war. They soon turned to the Nisei—first-generation U.S. citizens whose parents were immigrants from Japan. Eager to prove their loyalty to America, several thousand Nisei—many of them volunteering from the internment camps where they were being held behind barbed wire—were selected by the Army for top-secret training, then were rushed to the Pacific theater. Highly valued as expert translators and interrogators, these Japanese American soldiers operated in elite intelligence teams alongside Army infantrymen and Marines on the front lines of the Pacific war, from Iwo Jima to Burma, from the Solomons to Okinawa. Henderson reveals, in riveting detail, the harrowing untold story of the Nisei and their major contributions in the war of the Pacific, through six Japanese American soldiers. After the war, these soldiers became translators and interrogators for war crime trials, and later helped to rebuild Japan as a modern democracy and a pivotal U.S. ally.

Gonzo Wall Street: RIOTS,RADICALS,RACISM AND REVOLUTION: How the Go-Go Bankers of the 1960s Crashed the Financial System and Bamboozled Washington by Richard E. Farley The long-hidden history of how the corrupt Wall Street investment banks of the 1960s held Congress over a barrel and got an outrageous taxpayer-funded bailout of what they owed their customers—and how little Congress and the SEC got from Wall Street in return. This set the precedent for the bailouts of the 2008 Financial Crisis—and the next Wall Street bailout. A story of corruption and financial malfeasance, it unfolds throughout the tumultuous 1960s, during the administrations of Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon with a surprising cast of famous and infamous characters playing roles: Abbie Hoffman, Roy Cohn, Ross Perot, Donald Regan, Michael Bloomberg, Felix Rohaytn, Sandy Weill, Ken Langone, and many others. In the 1960s, the fabric of American society was torn apart by deep divisions over the Vietnam War, violence in our cities, and the senseless assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., and Senator Robert Kennedy. Civil rights, as well as women’s and gay liberation movements, were challenging America. Music, literature, fashion, and “substances” were transforming the culture and upending conventional morality and manners. The public, the media, and politicians, preoccupied with these dramatic changes, paid little attention to Wall Street, where a crisis was brewing that would cause more investment banks to fail than during the Great Depression. The year 1968 should have been the best of times on Wall Street. It was the greatest bull market since the Roaring ’20s. The Dow was breaking records. Trading volume was exploding. A hot IPO market for high-flying technology companies was defying gravity. And a swashbuckling mergers and acquisitions wave was generating enormous profits. Despite how flush Wall Street firms looked to outsiders, in truth, they were not a thundering herd but one in need of culling. Hidden from view was the fact that many of the best-known firms on Wall Street were in very precarious financial positions. Rather than investing in desperately needed state-of-the-art computer systems, the executives of these firms overpaid themselves, leaving them overextended and overleveraged. When business exploded in 1968, they were so overwhelmed by the stacks of stock certificates piled from floor to ceiling that their antiquated back offices were unable to process them. The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), under the oversight of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), was the principal regulator of the Wall Street firms at the time. The NYSE still had many of the vestiges of the private club it was prior to the Depression-era laws that created the SEC and brought Wall Street under the control of the federal government. The NYSE even referred to itself as the “Club,” controlled by an old guard of firms that were among the most overleveraged. Through means legal, and likely illegal, this old guard kept many insolvent firms open while keeping the SEC and Congress in the dark until it was too late. With a systemic financial crisis at hand, the boom turned to bust and they went, hat in hand, to Washington for a bailout. This is the long-hidden history of how the Wall Street investment banks held Congress over a barrel and got a taxpayer-funded guarantee of what they owed their customers—and how little Congress and the SEC got from Wall Street in return. More than anything else, this set the precedent for the bailouts of the 2008 Financial Crisis—and the next Wall Street bailout. In a story that unfolds throughout the tumultuous 1960s, during the administrations of Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon, a surprising cast of famous and infamous characters play roles: Abbie Hoffman, Roy Cohn, Ross Perot, Donald Regan, Michael Bloomberg, Felix Rohaytn, Sandy Weill, Ken Langone, and many others. The stranger than fiction stories include: —Tino De Angelis, the Salad Oil Swindler who took down a prominent investment bank on the day President Kennedy was assassinated—and nearly took down many more. —John Coleman, the most powerful man on Wall Street in the twentieth century that you have never heard of—and why he liked it that way. —Francine Gottfried, the humble heroine whose dignity in the face of cruel mistreatment as a result of her voluptuous figure inspired a revolution for women on Wall Street. —The Hard Hat Riot of blue-collar builders of the World Trade Center who turned on the antiwar protestors and ushered in the backlash. —The last IPO of the Go-Go Era—and perhaps the most outrageous offering in history—was of the magazine that discovered Hunter Thompson and gave birth to Gonzo Journalism.

Gleanings: Stories from the Arc of a Scythe by Neal Shusterman The New York Times bestselling Arc of the Scythe series continues with thrilling stories that span the timeline. Storylines continue. Origin stories are revealed. And new Scythes emerge! There are still countless tales of the Scythedom to tell. Centuries passed between the Thunderhead cradling humanity and Scythe Goddard trying to turn it upside down. For years humans lived in a world without hunger, disease, or death with Scythes as the living instruments of population control. Neal Shusterman—along with collaborators David Yoon, Jarrod Shusterman, Sofía Lapuente, Michael H. Payne, Michelle Knowlden, and Joelle Shusterman—returns to the world throughout the timeline of the Arc of a Scythe series. Discover secrets and histories of characters you’ve followed for three volumes and meet new heroes, new foes, and some figures in between. Gleanings shows just how expansive, terrifying, and thrilling the world that began with the Printz Honor–winning Scythe truly is.