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| Customer
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| Buy
five books and get five "Books On First" stamps.
Trade this card in for 30% off of any regular priced book
on the shelf. |
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| Best
Sellers:
June
2008
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Fiction:
A June
BookSense Pick!

The
Art of Racing in the Rain
Garth
Stein
$23.95
If you've ever
wondered what your dog is thinking, Stein's third novel offers
an answer. Enzo is a lab terrier mix plucked from a farm outside
Seattle to ride shotgun with race car driver Denny Swift as
he pursues success on the track and off. Denny meets and marries
Eve, has a daughter, Zoë, and risks his savings and his
life to make it on the professional racing circuit. Enzo,
frustrated by his inability to speak and his lack of opposable
thumbs, watches Denny's old racing videos, coins koanlike
aphorisms that apply to both driving and life, and hopes for
the day when his life as a dog will be over and he can be
reborn a man. When Denny hits an extended rough patch, Enzo
remains his most steadfast if silent supporter. Enzo is a
reliable companion and a likable enough narrator, though the
string of Denny's bad luck stories strains believability.
Much like Denny, however, Stein is able to salvage some dignity
from the over-the-top drama.
Books on First
offers 20% off this hardcover adult fiction!
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The
Miracle at Speedy Motors
Alexander
McCall Smith
$22.95
In the ninth
mystery of the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series, Precious
Ramotswe visits a game preserve to uncover the truth about
an elderly American traveler whose safari proves to be his
last journey.
If you're wondering
whether one needs to have read the previous eight books
featuring the pragmatic Precious and the rest of the engaging
characters of her Botswanan world, let us say a resounding,
No! (although after reading this one, we give fair warning
that you may crave to go back and learn the winding history
of them all).
Books on First
offers 20% off this hardcover adult fiction!
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A
Heather (and Anita Rogers) pick!

Water
for Elephants
Sara
Gruen
$13.95
"Gritty,"
sensual and charged with dark secrets involving love, murder
and a majestic, mute heroine (Rosie the Elephant), set in
the circus world circa 1932, by the bestselling author of
Riding Lessons, this was a BookSense Pick.
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The
Host
Stephanie
Meyer
$25.99
The author of
the #1-bestselling Twilight series delivers her brilliant
first novel for adults that's also suitable for teen readers:
a gripping story of love and betrayal in a future with the
fate of humanity at stake, featuring what may be the first
love triangle involving only two bodies.
Books on First
offers 20% off this hardcover adult fiction!
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The
Gathering
Anne
Enright
$14.00
On the 2007 Booker
Prize shortlist, this is the story of the nine surviving children
of the Hegarty clan gathering in Dublin for the wake of their
wayward brother, Liam, drowned in the sea. His sister, Veronica,
collects the body and keeps the dead man company, guarding
the secret she shares with him --something that happened in
their grandmother's house in the winter of 1968. As Enright
traces the line of betrayal and redemption through three generations
her distinctive intelligence twists the world a fraction and
gives it back to us in a new and unforgettable light. "The
Gathering" is a daring, witty, and insightful family epic,
clarified through Anne Enright's unblinking eye. It is a novel
about love and disappointment, about how memories warp and
secrets fester, and how fate is written in the body, not in
the stars.
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The
Great Man
Kate
Christensen
$14.95
Christensen pens
a scintillating comedy of life among the avant-garde--of
the untidy truths, needy egos, and jostling for position
behind the glossy facade of artistic greatness--in this
PEN Faulkner Award-winning story of a New York City painter
living in the heroic generation of the 1940s and 1950s.
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Non
Fiction:

Girls
Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon: And the
Journey of a Generation
Sheila
Weller
$27.95
| A groundbreaking and irresistible biography of three
of America's most important musical artists--Carly Simon,
Carole King, and Joni Mitchell--and offers an epic treatment
of these mid-century women who dared to break tradition.
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In
Defense of Food
Michael
Pollan
$21.95
"Eat
Food. Not Too Much. Mostly Plants."
From the author
of the bestselling "The Omnivore's Dilemma" comes this bracing
and eloquent manifesto that shows readers how they might start
making thoughtful food choices that will enrich their lives
and enlarge their sense of what it means to be healthy.

A
New Earth
Eckhart
Tolle
$14.00
Humanity now, perhaps
more than in any previous time, has an opportunity to create
a new, saner, more loving world. In very practical terms,
Tolle leads readers into this new consciousness to learn to
live and breathe freely.
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The
Man Who Loved China: The Fantastic Story of the Eccentric
Scientist Who Unlocked the Mysteries of the Middle Kingdom
Simon
Winchester
$27.95
Joseph Needham
(1900-1995) is the man who made China "China", forming the
West's understanding of a sophisticated culture with his
masterpiece, Science and Civilization in China,
says bestselling author Winchester (The Professor and
the Madman, Krakatoa). In a life devoted
to recording the Middle Kingdom's intellectual wealth, Needham,
an eccentric, brilliant Cambridge don, made a remarkable
journey from son of a London doctor through scientist-adventurer
to red scare target. In Winchester's estimable hands, Needham's
story comes to life straightaway. From the biochemists arrival
in WWII Chongqing (the smells -- of incense smoke, car exhaust,
hot cooking oil, a particularly acrid kind of pepper, human
waste, oleander, and jasmine) to his steely discipline when
crafting his research into prose (to an old friend: I am
frightfully busy. You come without an appointment, so I
am afraid I cannot see you), Winchester plunges the reader
into the action with hardly a break. As the author notes
in an outstanding epilogue, a swirling 12-page trip through
the kaleidoscope of contemporary China, he is at pains to
place Needham front and center in our understanding of the
nation that now plays such a huge role in American life.
A
Brenda pick!

Eat,
Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy,
India and Indonesia
Elizabeth
Gilbert
$15.00
A celebrated
writer pens an irresistible, candid, and eloquent account
of her pursuit of worldly pleasure, spiritual devotion,
and what she really wanted out of life. Elizabeth Gilbert
is currently writer-at-large for "GQ," Her journalism has
been published in "Harper's Bazaar," "Spin," and the "New
York Times" Magazine, and her fiction has appeared in "Esquire"
and the "Paris Review." This is a wonderful book,
brilliant and personal, rich in spiritual insight. (Anne
Lamott)
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Ladies
of Liberty: The Women Who Shaped Our Nation
Cokie
Roberts
$26.95
In "Founding
Mothers," Roberts paid homage to the women who helped establish
America. Now she continues the story of more remarkable
women and their achievements in moving the fledgling nation
forward, from the election of John Adams in 1796 to the
election of Andrew Jackson in 1828.
Limited time:
20% off this hardcover title!
A
June BookSense Pick!

The
Woman's Field Guide to Exceptional Living: Practical Steps
for Living a Big, Bold, Beautiful Life!
Corrie
Woods
$14.95
Your Passport
to Creative Expression, Exploration, and Play! For many
women-and men, too-life is a series of "supposed-to's" and
"shoulds." You keep the lid on tight and plod along, knowing
there's a place where life is big, bold, and beautiful but
not sure how to get there, or even where to start. It's
Time for a Cork-popping Change of Direction. The Woman's
Field Guide to Exceptional Living will launch you directly
into your own adventure. There are no limits here, no "shoulds,"
just a guided inner road trip to an extraordinary new outlook
you can return to again and again for inspiration, tips,
support, and motivation. You'll discover how to: *Get out
of your head and into your life *Recognize your true callings
and act on them *Overcome barriers to boldness, bliss, and
beauty *Live without regrets, energy-drainers, and nay-saying
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Children's
Bestsellers
Diary
of a Wimpy Kid and
Diary
of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules
Jeff
Kinney
$12.95
ea
An
exciting new series begins. Greg Heffley is thrust into middle
school, where undersized weaklings share the hallways with
kids who are taller, meaner, and already shaving. The hazards
of growing up are uniquely revealed through words and drawings
as Greg records them in his diary.
Kinney's
popular Web comic, which began in 2004, makes its way to print
as a laugh-out-loud "novel in cartoons," adapted from the
series. Middle school student Greg Heffley takes readers through
an academic year's worth of drama. Greg's mother forces him
to keep a diary ("I know what it says on the cover, but when
Mom went out to buy this thing I "specifically "told her to
get one that didn't say 'diary' on it"), and in it he loosely
recounts each day's events, interspersed with his comic illustrations.
Kinney has a gift for believable preteen dialogue and narration
(e.g., "Don't expect me to be all 'Dear Diary' this and 'Dear
Diary' that"), and the illustrations serve as a hilarious
counterpoint to Greg's often deadpan voice. The hero's utter
obliviousness to his friends and family becomes a running
joke. For instance, on Halloween, Greg and his best friend,
Rowley, take refuge from some high school boys at Greg's grandmother's
house; they taunt the bullies, who then T.P. her house. Greg's
journal entry reads, "I do feel a little bad, because it looked
like it was gonna take a long time to clean up. But on the
bright side, Gramma is retired, so she probably didn't have
anything planned for today anyway." Kinney ably skewers familiar
aspects of junior high life, from dealing with the mysteries
of what makes someone popular to the trauma of a "wrestling
unit" in gym class. His print debut should keep readers in
stitches, eagerly anticipating Greg's further adventures.
Ages 8-13.
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A
Carolyn Pick!

A
Wrinkle in Time
Madeleine
L'Engle
$6.99
Meg's father mysteriously
disappears after experimenting with the fifth dimension
of time travel. Determined to rescue him, Meg and her friends
must outwit the forces of evil on a heart-stopping journey
through space and time. A commemorative edition (first published
in 1962) of a timeless story with an Introduction by the
author . A Newbery Medal winner.

Narnia
Pop-Up Book
C.S.
Lewis and Pop-ups by Robert Sabuda
$29.99
The wonderous
world of Narnia comes to life! C.S. Lewis's classic Narnia
books spring to life in the hands of award-winning paper
engineer Robert Sabuda. Each of the seven books in the series
has its own pop-up spread rendered in spectacular detail
with stunning special effects. Experience a different adventure
from Narnia on every spread in this beautiful addition to
the Narnia library, sure to enchant fans of both C.S. Lewis
and Robert Sabuda.

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