Books and Cooks West is a book club focusing on non-fiction, based in Silicon Valley. We meet once a month or so for a pot-luck dinner and book discussion, though the current members don't take the cooking part too seriously.
This group is an offshoot of the original, but now defunct, Books and Cooks group in Ithaca.
The mailing list is here - if you're interested in joining the group, feel free to send a sign up request and introduce yourself. But the list is restricted to members.
Next meeting
On hiatus
Earlier books
(Books are rated on a scale of 1 to 5)
February 2023 -- The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity by David Graeber and David Wengrow; 4.4 for the discussion; 4 for the discussion
January 2023 -- The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story by Nikole Hannah-Jones (Editor); 4.8 for the book; 4.2 for the discussion
November 2022 -- The Unpersuadables: Adventures with the Enemies of Science by Will Storr; 3.3 for the book; 4.2 for the discussion
September 2022 -- Waiting for an Echo: The Madness of American Incarceration by Christine Montross; 4.7 for the book; 4.6 for the discussion
August 2022 -- Science Fictions: How Fraud, Bias, Negligence, and Hype Undermine the Search for Truth by Stuart Ritchie; 4.8 for the book; 4.6 for the discussion
July 2022 -- An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz; 4.2 for the book; 4.0 for the discussion
May 2022 -- Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male America by Ijeoma Oluo; 4.1 for the book; 3.9 for the discussion
April 2022 -- The Age of Addiction: How Bad Habits Became Big Business by David T. Courtwright; 3 for the book; 4 for the discussion
March 2022 -- Civilizations: A Novel by Laurent Binet; 3.7 for the book ; 3.6 for the discussion
February 2022 -- On the Clock: What Low-Wage Work Did to Me and How It Drives America Insane by Emily Guendelsberger; 4.6 for the book; 3.6 for the discussion
January 2022 -- Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgment by Daniel Kahneman, Olivier Sibony, and Cass R. Sunstein; 3.4 for the book 4.1 for the discussion
December 2021 -- The Selected Works by Audre Lord; 3.9 for the book; 4.1 for the book
October 2021 -- How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence by Michael Pollan; 3.9 for the book; 4.25 for the discussion
September 2021 -- Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson; 4.8 for the book; 4.3 for the discussion
August 2021 -- Fulfillment: Winning and Losing in One-Click America by Alec MacGillis; 3.3 for the book; 3.3 for the discussion
July 2021 -- Persist by Elizabeth Warren; 4.4 for the book; 4 for the discussion
June 2021 -- Race After Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Code by Ruha Benjamin; 3.8 for the book, 4.2 for the discussion
May 2021 -- Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer; 4.25 for the book; 4.25 for the discussion
April 2021 -- An American Genocide: The United States and the California Indian Catastrophe, 1846-1873 by Benjamin Madley; 4 for the book; 4.4 for the discussion
February 2021 -- A History of America in Ten Strikes by Erik Loomis; 3.9 for the book; 4.4 for the discussion
January 2021 -- Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X Kendi; 4.5 for the book; 4.8 for the discussion
December 2020 -- Pushout: The Criminalization of Black Girls in Schools by Monique W. Morris; 4.2 for the book; 4.3 for the the discussion
November 2020 -- Bury the chains by Adam Hoschild; 4 for the book; 3.5 for the discussion
September 2020 -- Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men by Caroline Criado Perez; 3.9 for the book; 4.1 for the discussion
August 2020 -- How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi; 4.4 for the book; 4.3 for the discussion
July 2020 -- The End of Policing by Alex S. Vitale; 3.75 for the book; 4.5 for the discussion
June 2020 -- Modern Death: How Medicine Changed the End of Life by Haider Warraich -- 3.3 for the book; 4.4 for the discussion
May 2020 -- White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism by Robin DiAngelo ; 4.7 for the book; 4.7 for the discussion
April 2020 -- The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why It Matters by Priya Parker; 4.25 for the book; 3.9 for the dicussion
March 2020 -- The Power of Moments: Why Certain Experiences Have Extraordinary Impact by Chip Heath and Dan Heath; 4.1 for the book, 2.8 for the
January, 2020 -- Blowout by Rachel Maddow; 4.1 for the book; 4.1 for the discussion
December, 2019 -- Cringeworthy: A Theory of Awkwardness
October, 2019 -- Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism by Michelle Goldberg; 4.4 for the book; 4.0 for the discussion
August, 2019 -- Whispers on the Color Line: Rumor and Race in America; 3.3 for the book; 4.3 for the discussion
July, 2019 -- The Attention Merchants: The Epic Scramble to Get Inside Our Heads; 3.6 for the book; 3.9 for the discussion
May, 2019 -- The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Color Blindness; 4.9 for the book; 4.6 for the discussion
April, 2019 -- Traffic by Tom Vanderbilt; 4.7 for the book; 4 for the discussion
March, 2019 -- Imbeciles by Adam Cohen; 4.3 for the book; 4.3 for the discussion
February, 2019 -- Tribe by Sebastian Junger; 3.3 for the book; 3.5 for the discussion
January, 2019 -- Strangers in Their Own Land; 4.5 for the book; 4.7 for the discussion
November, 2018 -- Dark Light: Electricity and Anxiety from the Telegraph to the X-Ray
September, 2018 -- Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy; 4.6 for the book, 3.7 for the discussion
August, 2018 -- The Pimping of Prostitution: Abolishing the Sex Work Myth by Julie Bindel; 2.4 for the book; 3.8 for the discussion
May 2018 -- A Crack in Creation: Gene Editing and the Unthinkable Power to Control Evolution by Jennifer A. Doudna
April 2018 -- Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist by Kate Raworth; 4.0 for the book; 4.0 for the discussion
March 2018 -- The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America by Richard Rothstein; 5.0 for the book; 5.0 for the discussion
January 2018 -- What Works: Gender Equality by Design by Iris Bohnet; 4 for the book; 4 for the discussion
December 2017 -- Mathematical Mindsets by Jo Boaler; 4.7 for the book; 4.1 for the discussion
October 2017 -- Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond; 4.5 for the book; 3.6 for the discussion
September 2017 -- Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick; 4.75 for the book; 4 for the discussion
July 2017 -- Suspicious Minds: How culture shapes madness by Joel Gold and Ian Gold; 3.4 for the book; 4.1 for the discussion
June 2017 -- The Moral Landscape: How science can determine human values by Sam Harris; 3.1 for the book; 4.4 for the discussion
April 2017 -- The Gate to Women's Country by Sheri S Tepper; 3.6 for the book; 3.8 for the discussion
March 2017 -- The Lads Before the Wind by Karen Pryor; 3.75 for the book; 4.2 for the discussion
January 2017 -- The Duchess Who Wouldn't Sit Down: an informal history of hospitality by Jesse Browner, and We Should All be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie; 1.3 and 4.0 for the books; 2.5 and 3.1 for the discussions
December 2016 -- The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett; 4.0 for the book, 3.8 for the discussion
October 2016 -- Give Us the Ballot by Ari Berman; 4.3 for the book, 4 for the discussion
September 2016 -- And Then Comes Marriage: United States vs. Windsor and the Defeat of DOMA by Roberta Kaplan; 4.3 for the book; 2.3 for the discussion
July 2016 -- Everything is Obvious (Once you know the answer) by Duncan J Watts; 3.1 for the book; 2.3 for the discussion
June 2016 -- The Sports Gene: Inside the Science of Extraordinary Athletic Performance by David Epstein; 3.5 for the book; 3.3 for the discussion
May 2016 -- Resilience: Why Things Bounce Back by Andrew Zolli and Ann Marie Healy; 3.6 for the book; 3.4 for the discussion
March 2016 -- The Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown; 3.25 for the book; 2.66 for the discussion
January 2016 -- Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis by Robert Putnam; 4 for the book; 3.9 for the discussion
November 2015 -- Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates; 4.25 for the book; 4.4 for the discussion
October 2015 -- Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much by Sendhil Mullainathan, Eldar Shafir; 4.1 for the book; 4.2 for the discussion
September 2015 -- The Secret History of the Mongol Queens: How the Daughters of Genghis Khan Rescued His Empire by Jack Weatherford; 2.8 for the book; 2.9 for the discussion
July 2015 -- Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande; 4.25 for the book; 4.4 for the discussion
June 2015 -- To the End of June: The Intimate Life of American Foster Care by Cris Beam; 4.2 for the book; 3.7 for the discussion
May 2015 -- Gottland: Mostly True Stories from Half of Czechoslovakia by Mariusz Szczygiel and Antonia Lloyd-Jones; 2.4 for the book, 2.4 for the discussion
March 2015 -- Sleights of Mind: What the Neuroscience of Magic Reveals about Our Everyday Deceptions by Stephen L. Macknik , Susana Martinez-Conde , Sandra Blakeslee; 3.8 for the book, 2.9 for the discussion
January 2015 -- Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty by Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson; 3.3 for the book; 3.25 for the discussion
November 2014 -- Living with a Wild God: A Nonbeliever's Search for the Truth about Everything by Barbara Ehrenreich; 1.5 for the book; 2.5 for the discussion
October 2014 -- How Economics Shapes Science by Paula Stephan; 2.8 for the book; 3.1 for the discussion
September 2014 -- Everything I Ever Needed to Know about Economics I Learned from Online Dating by Paul Over; 2.9 for the book; 2.1 for the discussion
August 2104 -- Give and Take: A Revolutionary Approach to Success by Adam Grant; 4.1 for the book; 4.4 for the discussion
June 2014 -- The Locust Effect: Why the end of Poverty Requires the End of Violence by Gary A. Haugen, Victor Boutros; 4 for the book; 2.7 for the discussion
May 2014 -- Mistakes were Made (But not by me) by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson; 4.75 for the book; 4.9 for the discussion
April 2014 -- The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking by Oliver Burkeman; 3.6 for the book; 3.0 for the discussion
March 2014 -- The Why Axis: Hidden Motives and the Undiscovered Economics of Everyday Life by Uri Gneezy , John List; 2.9 for the book; 2 for the discussion
February 2014 -- A Skeptic's Guide to the Mind: What Neuroscience Can and Cannot Tell Us About Ourselves by Robert Burton; 2 for the book; 2.6 for the discussion
January 2014 -- Decisive: How to Make Better Choices in Life and Work by Chip Heath and Dan Heath; 4 for the book; 2.8 for the discussion
November 2013 -- The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies? by Jared Diamond; 3 for the book; 3.875 for the discussion
October 2013 -- Graphic Discovery: A Trout in the Milk and Other Visual Adventures by Howard Wainer; 3.5 for the book; 2.7 for the discussion
August 2013 -- The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools, and Societies by Phil Lapsley; 2.8 for the book, 2.0 for the discussion
July 2013 -- Far From the Tree: Parents, Children and the Search for Identity by Andrew Solomon; 4.25 for the book; 4.5 for the discussion
May 2013 -- The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail; but Some Don't by Nate Silver; 4.625 for the book; 2.7 for the discussion
April 2013 -- Ascent of the A-Word by Geoffrey Nunberg
March 2013 -- The Honor Code: How Moral Revolutions Happen by Kwame Anthony Appiah; 1.75 for the book, 2.9 for the discussion
February 2013 -- The Power of Positive Deviance: How Unlikely Innovators Solve the World's Toughest Problems by Richard Pascale, Jerry Sternin, Monique Sternin; 3.1 for the book. 1.75 for the discussion
January 2013 -- A Mathematician's Lament: How School Cheats Us Out of Our Most Fascinating and Imaginative Art Formby Paul Lockhart; 3.0 for the book; 3.6 for the discussion
November 2012 -- Wait: The Art and Science of Delay by Frank Partnoy; 3.75 for the book; 2.7 for the discussion
September 2013 -- Going Solo: The Extraordinary Rise and Surprising Appeal of Living Alone by Eric Klinenberg; 2.5 for the book, 2.25 for the discussion
October 2012 -- Bastard Tongues: A Trail-Blazing Linguist Finds Clues to Our Common Humanity in the World's Lowliest Languages by Derek Bickerton; 4 for the book; 3 for the discussion
September 2012 -- The Longevity Project: Surprising Discoveries for Health and Long Life from the Landmark Eight-Decade Study Howard S. Friedman, Leslie R. Martin; 3.25 for the book; 3 for the discussion
August 2012 -- Debt: The First 5,000 Years by David Graeber; 3.75 for the book, 3.7 for the discussion
July 2012 -- Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking Susan Cain; 3.9 for the book, 3.4 for the discussion
June 2012 -- Surveillance or Security?: The Risks Posed by New Wiretapping Technologies by Susan Landau: 2.4 for the book, 2.5 for the discussion
April 2012 -- Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human by Richard Wrangham: 3.3 for the book, 2 for the discussion
March 2012 -- Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman; 4.6 for the book; 3.2 for the discussion
February 2012 -- The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves by Matt Ridley; 3.6 for the book; 3.75 for the discussion
December 2011 -- Proofiness: The Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception by Charles Seife; 3.1 for the book; 3.3 for the discussion
October 2011 -- You Are Here: Why We Can Find Our Way to the Moon, but Get Lost in the Mall by Colin Ellard; 2.5 for the book; 1.9 for the discussion
September 2011 -- The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies by Bryan Caplan; 3.1 for the book; 3.6 for the discussion
August 2011 -- The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood by James Gleik; 2.7 for the book; 1.6 for the discussion
June 2011 -- Bright Sided by Barbara Ehrenreich; 3.1 for the book; 3.3 for the discussion
May 2011 -- Cloud Atlas: A Novel by David Mitchell; 2.2 for the book; 3.2 for the discussion
April 2011 -- Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things by Randy O. Frost, Gail Steketee; 3.4 for the book; 3.25 for the discussion
March 2011 -- The Watercooler Effect: An Indispensable Guide to Understanding and Harnessing the Power of Rumors by Nicholas DiFonzo; 3.25 for the book; 2.3 for the discussion
February 2011 -- The Secret Life of the Grown-up Brain: The Surprising Talents of the Middle-Aged Mind by Barbara Strauch; 3 for the book; 1.7 for the discussion.
January 2011 -- Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference by Cordelia Fine; 4.25 for the book; 3.75 for the discussion.
December 2010 -- Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein: 2.2 for the book; 2.2 for the discussion. Book suggestions
November 2010 -- The Collapse of Complex Societies by Joseph Tainter: 2.1 for the book; 2.8 for the discussion
October 2010 -- Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel H. Pink: 2.6 for the book; 3.7 for the discussion
August 2010 -- Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America by Robert Whitaker: 4.0 for the book; 3.8 for the discussion
July 2010 -- Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard by Dan Heath and Chip Heath. Rating: 4.0 for the book; 3.5 for the discussion
June 2010 -- Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity by James C. Hansen. Rating: 3.1 cups of tea.
May 2010 -- A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon. Rating: 3.1 cups of tea.
March 2010 -- Delete: The Virtue of Forgetting in the Digital Age by Viktor Mayer-Schonberger. Rating: 1.7 cups of tea.
Feburary 2010 -- Overtreated: Why Too Much Medicine Is Making Us Sicker and Poorer by Shannon Brownlee. Rating: 3.9 cups of tea.
January 2010 -- Free: The Future of a Radical Price by Chris Anderson. Rating: 3.9 cups of tea.
December 2009 -- The Hungry Gene: The Inside Story of the Obesity Industry by Ellen Ruppel Shell. Rating: 2.9 cups of tea.
November 2009 -- The Help by Kathryn Stockett. Rating: 5 cups of tea.
September 2009 -- Buyology: The Truth about Why We Buy by Martin Lindstrom. Rating: 2.4 cups of tea.
August 2009 -- Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations by Clay Shirky. Rating: 4 cups of tea.
July 2009 -- Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us) by Tom Vanderbilt
May 2009 -- The Seven Sins of Memory: How the Mind Forgets and Remembers by Daniel L. Schacter Anathem by Neal Stephenson
April 2009 -- Anathem by Neal Stephanson
February 2009 -- The Time Paradox: The New Psychology of Time That Will Change Your Life_ by Philip Zimbardo and John Boyd
January 2009 -- Three Cups Of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin
November 2008 -- Looks: Why They Matter More Than You Ever Imagined by Gordon Patzer
October 2008 -- Soldier's Heart: Reading Literature Through Peace and War at West Point by Elizabeth D. Samet
September 2008 -- Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex by Mary Roach
July 2008 --- Hotel: An American History by Andrew Sandoval-Strausz
June 2008 -- Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions by Dan Ariely
May 2008 -- The Cult of Pharmacology: How America Became the World's Most Troubled Drug Culture by Richard DeGrandpre
April 2008 -- Sin in the Second City: Madams, Ministers, Playboys, and the Battle for America's Soul by Karen Abbott
March 2008 -- Super Crunchers: Why Thinking-by-Numbers Is the New Way to Be Smart by Ian Ayres
January 2008 -- No Two Alike by Judith Rich Harris
December 2007 -- Children At War by P. W. Singer
October 2007 -- The World Without Us by Alan Weisman
September 2007 -- The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil by Philip Zimbardo
July 2007 -- Survival of the Sickest by Sharon Moalem
June 2007 -- The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for Our Time by Jeffrey Sachs
May 2007 -- A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge
March 2007 -- Made to Stick by Chip Heath
February 2007 -- Another Day in the Frontal Lobe by Katrina Firlik
January 2007 -- The Singularity is Near by Ray Kurzweil
October 2006 -- 1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus by Charles C. Mann
September 2006 -- The Human Factor: Revolutionizing the Way People Live with Technology by Kim Vincente.
August 2006 -- Journey of the Jahidist: Inside Muslim Militancy by Fawaz A. Gerges.
July 2006 -- Moral Politics by George Lakoff. Rating: 3.5 cups of tea.
June 2006 -- Unlocking the Clubhouse: Women in Computing by Jane Margolis and Allan Fisher. Rating: 3.6 cups of tea.
May 2006 -- The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. Rating: 4 cups of tea.
April 2006 -- What's the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America by Thomas Frank. Rating: 3.5 cups of tea.
February 2006 -- The Wisdom of Crowds: Why the Many Are Smarter Than the Few and How Collective Wisdom Shapes Business, Economies, Societies and Nations by James Surowiecki. Rating: 4.1 cups of tea.
January 2006 -- Imperial Grunts: The American Military on the Ground by Robert D. Kaplan. Rating: 2.75 cups of tea.
November 2005 -- Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner. Rating: 4 cups of tea.
October 2005 -- Marriage, a History: From Obedience to Intimacy, or How Love Conquered Marriage by Stephanie Coontz. Rating: 4 cups of tea.
September 2005 -- Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides. Rating: 2.8 cups of tea.
July 2005 -- Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jared Diamond. Rating: 4.2 cups of tea.
June 2005 -- Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcom Gladwell. Rating: 3.5 cups of tea.
May 2005 -- American Dream: Three Women, Ten Kids, and a Nation's Drive to End Welfare by Jason DeParle. Rating: 3.75 cups of tea.
April 2005 -- The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan by Ian Buruma. Rating: 2.9 cups of tea.
February 2005 -- The Language Police: How Pressure Groups Restrict What Students Learn by Diane Ravitch. Rating: 3.3 cups of tea.
January 2005 -- The Transformation of American Religion: How We Actually Live Our Faith by Alan Wolfe. Rating: 3.5 cups of tea.
December 2004 -- The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon. Rating: 4.6 cups of tea.
November 2004 -- The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature by Stephen Pinker. Rating: 3.9 cups of tea.
October 2004 -- The Outlaw Sea: A World of Freedom, Chaos, and Crime by William Langewiesche. Rating: 3.4 cups of tea.
August 2004 -- The Mommy Myth: The Idealization of Motherhood and How It Has Undermined Women by Susan Douglas and Meredith Michaels. Rating: 2.2 cups of tea.
June 2004 -- Blood of the Liberals by George Packer. Rating: 3.4 cups of tea.
May 2004 -- Meaning, Medicine and the 'Placebo Effect' by Daniel E. Moerman. Rating: 4.2 cups of tea.
April 2004 -- Inevitable Illusions: How Mistakes of Reason Rule Our Minds by Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini. Rating: 2.5 cups of tea.
March 2004 -- Nature Via Nurture: Genes, Experience, and What Makes Us Human by Matt Ridley. Rating: 4 cups of tea.
January 2004 -- A Bed for the Night: Humanitarianism in Crisis by David Rieff. Rating: 2.7 cups of tea.
November 2003 -- Beyond Fear: Thinking Sensibly About Security in an Uncertain World by Bruce Schneier. Rating: 4.5 cups of tea.
October 2003 -- Murder and the Reasonable Man: Passion and Fear in the Criminal Courtroom by Cynthia Lee. Rating: 2.75 cups of tea.
September 2003 -- Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi. Rating: 3.9 cups of tea.
August 2003 -- The Geography of Thought: How Asians and Westerners Think Differently...and Why by Richard Nisbett. Rating: 3.7 cups of tea.
July 2003 -- The West and the Rest: Globalization and the Terrorist Threat by Roger Scruton. Rating: 2.6 cups of tea.
May 2003 -- Against the Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk by by Peter L. Bernstein. Rating: 2.6 cups of tea.
March 2003 -- Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science by Atul Gawande. Rating: 4.4 cups of tea.
February 2003 -- Bowling Alone by Robert D. Putnam. Rating: 4.5 cups of tea.
January 2003 -- The Intuitionist by Colson Whitehead. Rating: 3.75 cups of tea.
December 2002 -- The World We're In by Will Hutton. Rating: 3 cups of tea.
November 2002 -- Afraid of the Dark: What Whites and Blacks Need to Know About Each Other by Jim Myers. Rating: 3.2 cups of tea.
October 2002 -- Class Dismissed: A Year in the Life of an American High School: A Glimpse into the Heart of a Nation by Meredith Maran. Rating: 3.7 cups of tea.
September 2002 -- Mother Nature: Maternal Instincts and How They Shape the Human Species by Sarah Blaffer Hrdy. Rating: 4.1 cups of tea.
August 2002 -- Genome by Matt Ridley and He, She, and It by Marge Piercy. Rating (for both): 4.1 cups of tea.
June 2002 -- Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge by Edward O. Wilson. Rating: 4 cups of tea.
May 2002 -- Granta 77: What We Think of America. Rating: 3 cups of tea.
April 2002 -- Crossings: A White Man's Journey into Black America by Walt Harrison. Rating: 3.3 cups of tea.
March 2002 -- Just and Unjust Wars: A Moral Argument With Historical Illustrations by Michael Walzer. Rating: 4 cups of tea.
January 2002 -- Why Things Bite Back: Technology and the Revenge of Unintended Consequences by Edward Tenner. Rating: 2.9 cups of tea.
December 2001 -- Stiffed by Susan Faludi. Rating: 4.25 cups of tea.
November 2001 -- Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich. Rating: 4.4 cups of tea.
October 2001 -- That's Not What We Meant to Do by Stephen M. Gillon. Rating: 3.25 cups of tea.
September 2001 -- Words and Rules by Stephen Pinker. Rating: 3.4 cups of tea.
August 2001 -- The Moral Animal by Robert Wright. Rating: 3.25 cups of tea.
June 2001 -- A History of the Wife by Marilyn Yalom. Rating: 3.3 cups of tea.
Cancelled -- A Discussion of Guns and Gun Control
March 2001 -- Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky. Rating: 2.17 cups of tea.
January 2001 -- It Didn't Happen Here: Why Socialism Failed in the United States by Gary Wolfe Marks and Seymour Martin Lipset. Rating: 3.5 cups of tea.
December 2000 -- Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond. Rating: 3.9 cups of tea.
October 2000 -- The Gender Knot by Allan G. Johnson. Rating: 3.75 cups of tea.
September 2000 -- The Spirit in the Gene by Reg Morrison, Lynn Margulis. Rating: 2.12 cups of tea.
August 2000 -- The Battle for God by Karen Armstrong. Rating: 3.00 cups of tea.
June 2000 -- The Federalist Papers by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay. Rating: 4.33 cups of tea.
May 2000 -- The Cost of Living by Arundhati Roy. Rating: 4.17 cups of tea.
February 2000 -- The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels. Rating: 3.67 cups of tea.
January 2000 -- The Walking People by Paula Underwood. Rating: 4 cups of tea.