Lauri Ann West Memorial Library 1220 Powers Run Road ~ Pittsburgh, Pa 15238 412-828-9520 Serving Aspinwall, Blawnox, Fox Chapel, Indiana, O'Hara, Sharpsburg and all Allegheny County residents. "Our mission is to cultivate a community of lifelong learners." Hours M W Th    10 am - 8 pm T F         10 am - 5 pm S             9 am - 4 pm Last Updated: 8/2/08       Non-Fiction Bestsellers A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H  I  J  K  L  M  N  O  P  Q  R  S  T  U  V  W  X  Y  Z  # In alphabetical order by author's last name: A   Back to the Top   B Burroughs, Augusten A Wolf at the Table: A Memoir of My Father   Burroughs writes about his father, an alcoholic philosophy professor, with candor and a childlike purity of emotions.   Back to the Top   C Carter, Jimmy A Remarkable Mother   Lillian Carter was a caregiver before the term was even invented.  She became a nurse during WWI, worked with the black community in rural Georgia, volunteered for the Peace Corps and worked in India.  She went against the Southern Baptist stereotype in her willingness to swear, drink, and be a social liberal.  Her life story is told in this biography by her son.   Back to the Top   D Drew, Elizabeth Citizen McCain   John McCain, senior U.S. Senator from Arizona and likely nominee for U.S. Presidnet, has had dramatic careers in the military and in politics.  He graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy, was captured and held as a prisoner of war during the Vietnam War, and experienced torture during his imprisonment.  He ran for U.S. President in 2000, and made campaign finance reform one of is key issues in the Senate.  This book focuses on his struggles over that issue, which led to passage of the McCain-Feingold Act of 2002.   Back to the Top   E Ellis, Joseph J. American Creation   Author Ellis, who won the Pulitzer Prize for "Founding Brothers" examines events such as Valley Forge, the Declaration of Independence, and the Louisiana Purchase and explores how history could have turned out differently.   Back to the Top   F   Back to the Top   G Greenspan, Alan The Age of Turbulence   Economist Greenspan reveals how the aftershock of 9/11 to the U.S. economy was virtually negligible due to a global capitalist economy.  He chronicles the events of his life including his 18 years as Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board from 1987 to 2006.   Back to the Top   H Hiaasen, Carl The Downhill Lie: a Hacker's Return to a Ruinous Sport   Novelist Hiaasen brings the biting wit from his fiction to this nonfiction book about how deeply wrong golf can be, but also tries to give a balanced view of the sport.   Back to the Top   I   Back to the Top   J     Back to the Top   K     Back to the Top   L Levin, Mark R. Rescuing Sprite: a Dog Lover's Story of Joy and Anguish   Sprite and Pepsi were part of Mark Levin's household, but when Sprite became ill, Mark found inspiration to write this story. Luttrell, Marcus Lone Survivor   One Navy SEAL survived overwhelming odds when four SEALS fought against 100 armed Taliban soldiers.  Luttrell later received the Navy Cross for combat heroism from President Bush.   Back to the Top   M   Back to the Top   N   Back to the Top   O Obama, Barack Dreams from my Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance Barack Obama, U.S. Senator from Illinois and likely nominee for U.S. President has had extensive experience as a community organizer and was a civil rights attorney, constitutional law professor, and Illinois State Senator before winning his U.S. Senate seat.  This book tells Obama's story of struggling to understand his childhood and his identity.  His mother's family migrated from Kansas to Hawaii where his mother met Obama's father, a young student from Kenya.  Obama travels to Kenya as an adult to experience the culture of his father.   Back to the Top   P Pausch, Randy The Last Lecture   Carnegie Mellon University computer science professor Randy Pausch produced a modern classic in this expanded version of a lecture he gave on "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams," begun as a hypothetical exercise as the "last lecture" of a lifetime.  At the time of the lecture, Pausch had just been diagnosed with terminal cancer. Back to the Top   Q Quindlen, Anna Good Dog. Stay.   Pulitzer Prize-winning author Anna Quindlen gives us lessons we can learn from the family pet, starting with her black lab Beau.   Back to the Top   R       Back to the Top   S Sedaris, David When You Are Engulfed in Flames You have to use your imagination with story titles like these:  The Monster Mash, Buddy Can You Spare a Tie, The Smoking Section (Sedaris traveled to Tokyo to quit smoking) until you can get your hands on this latest collection of Sedaris.     Back to the Top   T Taylor, Jill Bolte My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist's Personal Journey   Brain scientist Jill Bolte Taylor suffered a massive stroke at the age of 37, and chronicles how she achieved inner peace through the stroke's effects on the right side of her brain.     Back to the Top   T     Back to the Top   U   Back to the Top   V Vonnegut, Kurt Armageddon in Retrospect: and Other New and Unpublished Writings on War and Peace   The only collection of unpublished works by Vonnegut since his death, "Armageddon" contains 12 writings on war and peace including an essay on the WWII destruction of Dresden and a story about how unrealistic it is to expect human beings to completely shun violence.   Back to the Top   W Wall, Elissa Stolen Innocence: My Story of Growing Up in a Polygamous Sect, Becoming a Teenage Bride and Breaking Free of Warren Jeffs   Elissa Wall was a child caught in the sect of Latter Day Saints led by Warren Jeffs.  She was forced to mary her first cousin when she was fourteen, and afterward struggled for her emotional survival, often sleeping in her truck to escape the arranged marriage.  She eventually found a way out and testified against Jeffs in 2007.     Back to the Top   X   Back to the Top   Y   Back to the Top   Z Zakaria, Fareed The Post-American World   The author presents his case that Asian countries, chiefly India and China, are coming to the forefront of the world's national economies, and that the U.S. should be prepared to face economic inferiority.   Back to the Top   #   Back to the Top                     © 2007 Lauri Ann West Memorial Library.  All Rights Reserved.     Back to the Top   U   Back to the Top   V   Back to the Top   W Weisman, Alan The World Without Us   Our world but without humans.  But plastic survives.  One question that's raised: Will we destroy the very things we need to sustain us?     Back to the Top   X   Back to the Top   Y   Back to the Top   Z   Back to the Top   #   Back to the Top                     © 2007 Lauri Ann West Memorial Library.  All Rights Reserved.