Beacon Broadside

Order any book at Beacon.org (including the ones featured in our Buzz Report below) by December 31st and receive 20% off your order and free standard shipping.* And orders of $75 or more will receive a free King Legacy Series tote bag. 

Plus, Beacon Press will donate 15% of total sales to the Teachers College Literacy Lifeboats Initiative. Use Promo Code GIFT20 at checkout.

*Due to the increased volume of mail shipping during the holiday season, we cannot guarantee orders submitted after December 13 will arrive by December 24. If you would like to ensure your package arrives by that date, we offer paid shipping options via UPS. A 15% donation from each sale using promo code GIFT20 will be given to the Teacher's College Literacy Lifeboats Initiative to aid those affected by Hurricane Sandy.

Must Watch

Sacred Ground: Pluralism, Prejudice, and the Promise of America by Eboo Patel

Eboo Patel spoke at TEDx Women in Washington DC about his grandmother,
Dorothy Day, and his growth as an interfaith activist. 

 

 

 

 

Big-Box Swindle: The True Cost of Mega-Retailers and
the Fight for America’s Independent Businesses, by Stacy Mitchell

Stacy Mitchell spoke at TEDx Dirigo on “Why We Can’t Shop Our Way to a
Better Economy.”

 

I Told You So, by Kate Clinton

Kate Clinton talks about her job as a lesbian feminist comic and how
humor gets us through the most discouraging of times at TEDx Women.

 

 

Notable Mentions

The $60,000 Dog: My Life With Animals, by Lauren
Slater

Wisconsin Public Radio's Joy Cardin Show, Nov. 30, live by phone.

ELLE magazine’s December issue: “A thoughtful memoir
unravels the depth of our animal attachments.”

 

 

Faitheist: How an Atheist Found Common Ground with the
Religious, by Chris Stedman

Minneapolis Star
Tribune review: “ [an] enlightening and engaging memoir.”

Skeptic
blog write-up:  

Atheism
is actually not a duopoly of firebrands and diplomats. These two types of
evangelists no more describe “both kinds” of atheist than “country and western”
describes “both kinds” of music.

Stedman
explicitly rejects “the demise of religion”—that is not a goal he shares. He
also rejects the firebrands versus diplomats dichotomy. “I believe how
pushy should we be? is the wrong question,” he writes. The better
question is how do we make the world a better place?

 

Before They’re Gone: A Family's Year-Long Quest to
Explore America's Most Endangered National Parks, by Michael Lanza

2012 National Outdoor Book Awards NOBA Honorable Mention for Outdoor Literature. 

 

A Gift of Love: Sermons from Strength to Love and
Other Preachings, by Martin Luther King, Jr, Coretta Scott King, and Rev.
Dr. Raphael G. Warnock 

Beliefnet
ran an excerpt, “Loving Your Enemies.”

Upheaval after upheaval has reminded us
that modern man is traveling along a road called hate, in a journey
that will bring us to destruction and damnation. Far from being the pious
injunction of a Utopian dreamer, the command to love one’s enemy is an absolute
necessity for our survival. Love even for enemies is the key to the solution of
the problems of our world. Jesus is not an impractical idealist: he is the
practical realist.

 

Soul Repair: Recovering from Moral Injury after War,
by Rita Nakashima Brock and Gabriella Lettini 

Two great radio interviews with Rita Brock: Northern
Spirit Radio and KPCC
Take Two (interview highlights and book excerpt online at KPCC) 

Blue Revolution: Unmaking America's Water Crisis,
by Cynthia Barnett

Barnett was interviewed for a Marketplace
story on a water desalination plan for San Diego.

Educational Courage: Resisting the Ambush on Public
Education, by Mara Sapon-Shevin and Nancy Schniedewind

Poughkeepsie
Journal: “In “Educational Courage,”
veteran educators and activists Schniedewind and Mara Sapon-Shevin bring
together the voices of those resisting market-driven initiatives such as
high-stakes testing, charter schools, mayoral control and merit pay.”

 

Coming Soon

Brokers of Deceit: How the U.S. Has Undermined Peace
in the Middle East, by Rashid Khalidi (March 12, 2013)

Foreign
Policy post by Khalidi, Nov. 29: “Obama’s Three Options”

Advance praise for Brokers of Deceit:

"Khalidi has combined history, common sense and his
first-hand understanding of arab-israeli peace talks, as brokered by
Washington, to make the case that American national security interests would be
best served by a just peace in the Middle East.  Instead, he write with
great sadness, Washington's efforts to be a honest broker fall "somewhere
between high irony and farce" –and puts democratic America, with its
avowed commitment to freedom for all, in the position of enabling the continued
subjugation of the Palestine people.  This is an important book." —Seymour
M. Hersh, the New Yorker; Winner of the Pulitzer Prize

 

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