Prompted by the onset of Covid, Doughty has created a book that is a charming collection of lists, musings, prompts, and illustrations—from the extraordinary to the everyday, from the big to the little.  Here are examples.  Best advice. Handwritten thank-you notes. A stroll through the park at dusk, just as the crickets start to hum. 

One of my favorites is that YouTube video of “Uptown Funk” set to dance clips from old movies of the 30s, 40s, and 50s. Another is the “Little Pieces of Hope” Playlist of 19 songs from the book.  

“Cloud Cuckoo Land” by Anthony Doerr takes readers on a 600-year epic journey.

There are three storylines: Anna and Omeir, on opposite sides of the formidable city wall during the 1453 siege of Constantinople; teenage idealist Seymour and gentle octogenarian Zeno, in an attack on a public library in present day Idaho; and Konstance, on an interstellar ship bound for a distant exoplanet, decades from now.

A single copy of an ancient text—the story of Aethon, who longs to be turned into a bird so that he can fly to the paradise of Cloud Cuckoo Land—provides solace, mystery, and the most profound human connection to this group of characters.

An author of six books, Doerr’s last book, “All the Light We Cannot See,” about people and events during World War II won a Pulitzer Prize and is being produced as a series for Netflix. 

Bestselling, award-winning historian Nathaniel Philbrick's "Travels with George" is a blended account of two road trips separated by about 230 years.  

In the fall of 1789, Washington, only six months into his presidency, set out on his first of four road trips as he attempted to unite what were in essence thirteen independent states into a single nation. 

In the fall of 2018, Philbrick, his wife Melissa, and their dog Dora set out on their own series of road trips as they retraced Washington’s route across the country.  

As for the style of travel, the Philbricks journeyed in a comfortable car with GPS. George traveled in a carriage pulled by four horses.  But ever the soldier, when he neared a town, he’d slip out of the carriage dressed in his general’s uniform, mount his big white horse, and ride down the main thoroughfare to thunderous acclaim.    

Dylan Thuras is co-author of "Gastro Obscura A Food Adventurer’s Guide," a book with 500 entries that span all seven continents and fifty states. Complete with photographs and illustrations, it’s all about food that ranges from the Antarctica Base Stations’ often elegant cuisine for scientists to the largest Asian night market in North America at Richmond in British Columbia. 

But then there's also Elvis’ favorite sandwich, the Fool’s Gold (peanut butter + blueberry jam + bacon on white bread), created in a now defunct restaurant in Denver CO. Story goes that Elvis once flew from Graceland to Denver with friends on his Boeing 727 private jet back in the 1970s just so they could share his cross-country indulgence.  Fool’s Gold is still on the menu today at Nick’s Café in Golden, Colorado.

"The Atlas Obscura Explorer’s Guide for the World’s Most Adventurous Kid," also co-authored by Dylan Thuras, is an illustrated guide to 100 mysterious wonders, both natural and manmade, and is popular with kids, parents and teachers alike.

"The Devil in the Gallery” is a lavishly illustrated book, the latest of more than a dozen books by Noah Charney. It’s a guided tour of the history of art through its scandals, rivalries, and shocking acts, each of which resulted in a positive step forward for art in general and, in most cases, for the careers of the artists in question.

Charney is an American expat who lives with his family and teaches in Slovenia and who is also a professor in Rome. He is the founder of the Association for Research into Crimes against Art and considered by many the Sherlock Holmes of art crime.

Among his other books is the recently released co-authored “Making It: The Artist's Survival Guide.”

This book, “How Magicians Think. Misdirection, Deception, and Why Magic Matters,” is my love letter to magic,” says Jay, ”and it answers the questions people ask me every night after the show.”  This book is divided into 52 essays, same number as a deck of cards, and is filled with Jay's insights from working as a magician since he was a kid. Jay answers common questions like "How do you know who to call up from the audience to help you with your show?" “What do magicians do in secret?,” and “What does it feel like when you perform?" 

An international prize winner for his magic tricks, Jay averages 300 days each year putting on shows and watching other masters at work. He’s performed magic in more than 100 countries and can tell you with precision who is his toughest audience.

Ever wonder why some parents don’t get their kids vaccinated? How reliable are childhood and Covid-19 vaccines anyway? Tune in…

It’s not often that a book published five years ago is more pertinent today. But University of Colorado Denver Professor Jennifer Reich’s  “Calling the Shots: Why Parents Reject Vaccines” is that book because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

“For over a decade, Jennifer Reich has been studying the phenomenon of vaccine refusal from the perspectives of parents who distrust vaccines and the corporations that make them, as well as the health care providers and policy makers who see them as essential to ensuring community health. Reich reveals how parents who opt out of vaccinations see their decision: what they fear, what they hope to control, and what they believe is in their child’s best interest. Based on interviews with parents who fully reject vaccines as well as those who believe in “slow vax,” or altering the number of and time between vaccinations, the author provides a fascinating account of these parents’ points of view.”  New York University Press

Scott Small’s debut book is “Forgetting. The Benefits of Not Remembering.” He's an expert on the memory losses of old age and Alzheimer’s who now introduces us to a third kind of forgetting. The normal one, the one that’s good for us and enhances our lives.

"Small, director of Columbia University’s Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center, puts forgetting in a new light in his eye-opening and reassuring debut. While the standard view in science has been that forgetting is a malfunction of memory, Small makes a case that it ‘is not just normal but beneficial to our cognitive and creative abilities, to our emotional well-being, and even to societal health’...Small keeps things accessible with an easygoing prose and helpful diagrams, and his passion is undeniable. This smart survey will satisfy those curious about memory, or anxious about forgetting.”  Publisher’s Weekly

 “From her many well-loved novels, Hilma Wolitzer--now ninety-one years old and at the top of her game--has gained a reputation as one of our best fiction writers, who “raises ordinary people and everyday occurrences to a new height.” (Washington Post) These collected short stories--most of them originally published in magazines including Esquire and the Saturday Evening Post, in the 1960s and 1970s, along with a new story that brings her early characters into the present--are evocative of an era that still resonates deeply today."

This is the author's 15th book. At age 91 she’s already working on her next novel.  Along with publishing fiction, she’s written a book for writers called “The Company of Writers.” She’s taught in many creative writing programs and received honors and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, NEA, and the American Academy of Arts & Letters.  

"Edward Fosca is a murderer. Of this Mariana is certain. But Fosca is untouchable. A handsome and charismatic Greek Tragedy professor at Cambridge University, Fosca is adored by staff and students alike—particularly by the members of a secret society of female students known as The Maidens. Mariana Andros is a brilliant but troubled group therapist who becomes fixated on The Maidens when one member, a friend of Mariana’s niece Zoe, is found murdered in Cambridge. Mariana, who was once herself a student at the university, quickly suspects that behind the idyllic beauty of the spires and turrets, and beneath the ancient traditions, lies something sinister."

Alex Michaelides’s second novel is “The Maidens.” His first novel, “The Silent Patient,” was written after a self-described disappointing career as a Hollywood screenwriter. An instant bestseller, his first book has been sold in 50 countries. Alex was born and raised in Cyprus, an island in the Mediterranean, where he first learned about the Greek mythology that is woven throughout his books.