Coffee Table Book Ideas

Words with Wings: A Treasury of African-American Poetry and Art

by: Belinda Rochelle

Amazon Price: $12.91 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $18.99

Editor Belinda Rochelle imaginatively pairs 20 poems by African American poets with 20 works of art by African American artists. Each poem and piece of art evokes the history, identity, and pride of African American people, whether it addresses slavery, family, childhood joy and woes, or racism. (amazon.com review)

All ages; great for young adults.

Release Date: 12/26/2000

Moon in the Pines (Sacred wisdom)

by: Jonathan Clements

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $22.95

Here, illustrated with the finest of Japanese paintings are haikus from classical masters including Sokan, Chiyo-Ni, Soseki, and Basho, alongside some modern-day writers. Jonathan Clements's expert new translations unlock a fresh spirituality that, proffering an instant evocation, invites a transcendent meditation. The Moon in the Pines is a lavish jewel of a gift book. (amazon product description)

"Mouth agape
At falling flowers
A child is Buddha"
~ Kubutsu ~

Release Date: 12/31/1969

The Illustrated Rumi: A Treasury of Wisdom from the Poet of the Soul

by: Jalalu'ddin Rumi, Philip Dunn (Translator), Manuela Dunn Mascetti (Translator), Huston Smith (Introduction)

Amazon Price: $19.77 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $29.95

This sensually illustrated version offers yet another new translation in which readers will find a mixture of Rumi's parables and poetry interwoven into each story. Thus, readers will start off firmly planted in Rumi's straightforward, storytelling voice. Then, about four paragraphs down, the translators will insert one of his ecstatic poems, then the tone will return to the story voice.

The chosen tales are all spiritually inspirational, as Rumi always is, yet they are also a pleasure to read as simple stories told by a master. The illustrations and attentive design artfully enhance the grace and fluidity of Rumi's words. (Gail Hudson)

Release Date: 10/03/2000

A Symphony of Words and Images: Two Sisters, Worlds Apart, Creative Together

by: Theresa L. Kannenberg

Amazon Price: $24.95 (as of 12/30/2009)

This book of poems and photography by two sisters celebrates life in every way. It is a simultaneous journey of two who have found themselves worlds apart but suddenly creative together.

The poems by Theresa are timeless and at times universal in that they evoke inner reflection, give encouragement to follow dreams, and inspire us to listen to our own invisible violins.

The photographs by Linda are detailed works of art that inspire each of us to seek out such beauty for ourselves. (amazon)

The Illustrated Poetry of Edgar Allan Poe

by: Edgar Allan Poe

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

A beautiful edition of the mysterious, brooding poetry of Poe enhanced by the romantic illustrations of Edmund Dulac, whose brilliant interpretations were ideal for Poe's hypnotic words. (amazon)

This book is much better than we can imagine by looking at the information available in the site (that is VERY GOOD, indeed, but the book is FANTASTIC, both in printing and the illustrations). The presentation is very special and makes this a great acquisition. (Ograo Barracuda, "Ograo" amazon reviewer)

Bright Wings: An Illustrated Anthology of Poems About Birds

Amazon Price: $15.61 (as of 12/29/2009)

In this beautiful collection of poems and paintings, Billy Collins, former U.S. poet laureate, joins with David Allen Sibley, America's foremost bird illustrator, to celebrate the winged creatures that have inspired so many poets to sing for centuries. From Catullus and Chaucer to Robert Browning and James Wright, poets have long treated birds as powerful metaphors for beauty, escape, transcendence, and divine expression. (amazon)

The Untouchable Tree: An Illustrated Guide to Earthly Wisdom & Arboreal Delights

by: Peter C. Stone

Amazon Price: $8.89 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $29.95

According to Peter Stone, "any book about trees can't help but be a book about people," and so his book is about our connection to the magnificence, the transcendence, and the essential nature of trees. Throughout human history, they have served as shelter and as symbol. And today, more than ever, our destiny is tied to theirs. The Untouchable Tree is a unique exploration of our relationship with these amazing plants. (amazon product description)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

Botanica

by: Howard Schatz

Amazon Price: $40.50 (as of 12/29/2009)
List Price: $60.00

"Schatz combines exquisite image detail, intensity and contrasting light with expression of line, colour and shape. Ordinary and familiar flowers are dramatically transformed from reality to imagination and back again. It seems that through Schatz's uncanny ability to pre-visualise through the macro lens, the true essence of a plant is revealed...This is a book for plant lovers, photographers, design and horticultural professional and botanists alike" (New York Botanical Garden)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

Reef

by: Scubazoo

Amazon Price: $26.40 (as of 12/30/2009)

This brilliant photographic compilation by small Malaysian-based diving collective ScubaZoo introduces the ecology of oceanic reefs, both temperate and tropical. Though technological advances and the devastation of global reefs have spurred many experienced diver-photographers to publish photo collections, the dazzling photography in this one stands out dramatically, as does its inclusion of images made simultaneously by still and video photographers (the book includes a DVD.) (Publisher's Weekly)

Planet Earth: As You've Never Seen It Before

by: Alastair Fothergill

Amazon Price: $26.37 (as of 12/29/2009)

In this gorgeous coffee-table book, an offshoot of the Discovery Channel/ BBC series of the same name, zoologist and BBC producer Fothergill takes readers on a kaleidoscopic tour of the flora, fauna and natural history of the Earth's poles, forests, plains, deserts, mountains and oceans. (Publisher's Weekly)

Cosmos

by: Giles Sparrow

Amazon Price: $40.66 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $40.66

Cosmos makes sense of this dizzying celestial panorama by exploring it one step at a time, illustrating the planets, moons, stars, nebulae, white dwarfs, black holes and other exotica that populate the heavens with some of science's most spectacular photographs. (amazon product description)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

Cosmos

by: Sylvia Arditi, Marc Lachieze-Rey

Amazon Price: $30.36 (as of 12/29/2009)

Cosmos showcases magnificent celestial objects of unparalleled beauty, gathering the most dramatic images of the night sky - from close planets and our sun to the most remote galaxies. It features the latest images from space from sources including Hubble, NASA and the European Space Agency. Cosmos, an inspiring, rare and unobstructed view into the far reaches of space, is for anyone who has ever gazed into the night sky and wondered what was actually out there. (amazon)

Earth from Above, Third Edition

by: Yann Arthus-Bertrand

Amazon Price: $37.80 (as of 12/29/2009)

Arthus-Bertrand, working with the support of UNESCO, has wandered the globe to gather this collection of more than 200 photographs, presented in a folio format. The images are uniformly striking, whether of stalagmite-like fans of algae spreading into the Mediterranean Sea, farmers working their fields in northern India, or destroyed Iraqi tanks littering the deserts of Kuwait. The accompanying text, captions, and short essays by some of France's leading scientists and social critics lend specific depth to the images, which will cheer few readers--but that will shock, and educate, and, with luck, inspire closer attention to the world around us. (Gregory McNamee - amazon)

Mozartiana: Two Centuries of Notes, Quotes, and Anecdotes about Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Amazon Price: $10.20 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $12.00

Short, pithy, collected quotes from a wide variety of writers, thinkers, and even musicians on Mozart. Easy to read, useful for collecting impressions from a wide range of authors. (amazon review Wm. L. Harwood)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

In Focus: National Geographic Greatest Portraits

by: National Geographic Society

Amazon Price: $19.80 (as of 12/29/2009)
List Price: $30.00

The gallery of portraits in this splendid book includes many memorable faces, from the unnerving grin of the Wodaabe tribesman in Niger (who wears colorful makeup as part of a courtship ritual) to the sunny self-possession of a child in Murmansk who holds up four tiny fingers to indicate her age. Beautiful women abound--they have helped sell the magazine from its earliest days. As the decades go by, people everywhere seem more at ease being photographed. But they remain as fascinating as ever, perhaps because we'll never know what they were thinking when the shutter clicked. (Cathy Curtis)

Release Date: 10/01/2004

Faces of Africa: Thirty Years of Photography (National Geographic Collectors Series)

by: Carol Beckwith, Angela Fisher

Amazon Price: $11.53 (as of 12/29/2009)

This astounding collection of rare and intimate photographs depicts a lifetime of events and experiences from birth and coming-of-age to marriage and death from every part of Africa. These varied cultural "faces" are expressed in the rolling eyes and flashing teeth of the Wodaabe charm dancers of Niger, the colorful beaded bodices of the Dinka of Sudan, the striking painted faces of the Karo of Ethiopia, and countless people beaded, draped in beautiful cloth, and veiled to honor a special moment in life. (amazon)

An Inner Silence: The Portraits of Henri Cartier-Bresson

by: Agnes Sire, Jean-Luc Nancy

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

In 2003, the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson, which was created to provide a permanent home for his collected works, opened in Paris. This book is published to coincide with the first exhibition at the Fondation that is drawn entirely from those archives.

Each portrait has been chosen because it perfectly embodies Cartier-Bresson's description of what he was attempting to communicate in his photographs: "I'm seeking above all an inner silence. I am trying to translate the personality and not an expression."

Garden People: The Photographs of Valerie Finnis

by: Ursula Buchan

Amazon Price: $26.60 (as of 12/30/2009)

Together with her husband, Lord David Scott, Finnis traveled through Great Britain, meeting the famous-Vita Sackville-West at Sissinghurst, Lady Birley at Charleston Manor, Roald Dahl and his family at Great Missenden-as well as less-known gardeners, nurserymen, plant enthusiasts, designers, and artists. All are seen at home in their gardens, weeding, inspecting, watering, and standing proudly by their plants, wearing the fashions of the day, epitomizing life and society in the second half of the twentieth century. 200 illustrations, 100 in color. (amazon)

A Canal People: The Photographs of Robert Longden

by: Robert Longden, Sonia Rolt

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

During a few brief years in the 1940s and '50s Robert Longden took a set of photographs of the narrow boat community at Hawkesbury Stop - the main meeting point for those who worked the Midland canals. The images are of a close community representing them at work, at play and in their domestic affairs, as they lived on the paired and single colourful narrow boats of the time. They illustrate the close relationship between all ages and types, and the dramatic boat shapes and infrascape of this rural and industrial area.

Vanity Fair: The Portraits: A Century of Iconic Images

by: Graydon Carter, David Friend

Amazon Price: $40.95 (as of 12/30/2009)

Vanity Fair magazine has a reputation as one of the preeminent showcases for portraits in the world, and this book gathers together a good chunk of them in all their glossy, artificial splendor. There's almost as much celebrity behind the lens as in front of it: Edward Steichen, Herb Ritts, Mario Testino, David LaChapelle and, of course, Annie Leibovitz are all included, and the portraits themselves amount to a who's who of culture and politics, with the quality of the images justifying the inclusion of the occasional lesser-known figures. (publisher's weekly)

People: Favorite Pictures

by: Editors of People Magazine, Editors of People Magazine

Amazon Price: $24.95 (as of 12/30/2009)

From the vast archives of People magazine comes this keepsake collection of memorable images by the world's greatest photographers.

To Bee or Not to Bee: A Book for Beeings Who Feel There's More to Life Than Just Making Honey, Revised Edition

by: John Penberthy, Laurie Barrows

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

To Bee or Not to Bee teaches that the only way out is in, that the greatest present is the present, and that life is a journey from I to we.

No matter what your spiritual path, this touching tale will leave a smile on your face and a glow in your heart.

Artful Words: Mary Engelbreit and the Illustrated Quote

by: Mary Engelbreit

Amazon Price: $16.47 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $24.95

"When I come across writing that really moves me and inspires me, my reaction is twofold. I want to share it with others and I want to draw something that is worthy of it. I love finding quotes that stop people, that really make them think. And I love the idea that my work, combined with meaningful words, can provide comfort or inspiration to someone." (Mary Engelbreit, from Artful Words)

Artful Words, collects the best of Engelbreit's signature artwork, complemented by quotations, adages, and sayings and sprinkled with Mary's commentary and reminiscences about what inspires her.

Release Date: 12/31/1969

I Hope You Dance

by: Mark D. Sanders, Tia Sillers

Amazon Price: $10.19 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $14.99

This beautiful gift book by the Nashville team that wrote the song includes a CD with an acoustic version recorded especially for this book by Lee Ann Womack. This is the perfect gift not only for fans of Lee Ann Womack, but for a new graduate, for someone that needs encouragement, or for anyone who needs or wants to participate in the dance of life. (amazon product description)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

The Wise and Witty Quote Book: More than 2000 Quotes to Enlighten, Encourage, and Enjoy

by: Allen Klein

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

Book is well broken down so you can focus on a specific topic and inspire you in a particular area to make you smile. Many very funny quotes will catch you off guard in the middle of great authors thought-provoking quotes. Good to share with a friend. (City Studio, amazon reviewer)

Unwitting Wisdom: An Anthology of Aesop's Fables

by: Helen Ward

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

The detailed ink-and-watercolor illustrations of animals are gorgeous in this collection of 12 of Aesop's fables.

Each beautiful double-page spread is different--from a realistic close-up of the goose that lays the golden eggs to succulent "sour grapes," a fragile dragonfly, and a cricket on a barley stalk. (booklist)

The New Yorker Book of Teacher Cartoons

by: Robert Mankoff

Amazon Price: $14.93 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $21.95

This wonderful collection of the best and funniest cartoons published over the last eighty years in The New Yorker takes a wry look into the classroom--at the students, at thier blindly devoted but demanding parents, and especially, at the teachers who negotiate the delicate balance between those forces every day. With 118 cartoons, this is a perfect gift for teachers and a treasure of laughs for all! (amazon product description)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

Desiderata for Cat Lovers: A Guide to Life & Happiness

by: Max Ehrmann

Amazon Price: $7.95 (as of 12/29/2009)
List Price: $7.95

Does anything illustrate the idea of "being on good terms with all persons" more than a sweet, small feline sitting atop a large, calm dog? From photos of a meowing kitty ("speak your truth quietly and clearly") to another happily licking her paw ("beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself"), this Desiderata will charm every cat lover and provide spiritual sustenance, too. (amazon product description)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

Coffee Table Quotes

by: Jillian Conley

Amazon Price: $38.44 (as of 12/30/2009)

Ralph Waldo Emerson said "By necessity, by proclivity, and by delight, we all quote." Words have shaped our society and we continue to allow them to do so. Jillian Conley's Coffee Table Quotes is an inspirational collection that excites positive thought and confidence. Full of profound and funny quotes to read every day, Coffee Table Quotes enlightens and intrigues the reader with its diversity of subjects and themes.

Cats 24/7: Extraordinary Photographs Of Wonderful Cats

by: Rick Smolan, David Elliot Cohen

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

Cats 24/7 collects more than 500 intimate, funny, and charming photographs taken by professional and amateur photographers. Here are our four-legged companions at their best, up close and personal in small towns and big cities, farms and parks, kitchens and living rooms. Combining great pictures, compelling stories, and insightful essays, this lavish volume is a fitting tribute to our feline friends. (amazon)

Just Moms: A Mother by any Other Squawk, Cheep, Yip or Mew Is Still as Sweet

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $14.95

What is motherhood all about? This book has it covered, with 50 animal mother-and-young images from top wildlife photographers, paired with insightful, funny, famous, and fresh quotations on the topic. The images bring engaging new perspectives to both ancient and modern observations on parenting, making this book an affectionate and thoughtful tribute to all mothers, whether fur- or feather-covered, or human. (amazon product description)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

Just Dads: Nerves of Steel, Wills of Iron, Hearts of Pudding

by: Bonnie Louise Kuchler

Amazon Price: $10.17 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $14.95

"Just Dads" is a unique giftbook that combines engaging and interesting male animal parenting photographs with insightful fatherhood quotations. Along with the quotations are intriguing facts about the paternal care many species provide, including the emperor penguin father who carries the egg on his feet for three months without eating . . .

The delightful images combined with the insightful quotations bring an engaging new perspective to the role of fatherhood, both animal and humankind. (amazon product description)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

Birds of Prey

by: Floyd Scholz

Amazon Price: $37.77 (as of 12/29/2009)

Lavishly illustrated with 500 colour photographs of sharp-shinned hawks, American kestrels, merlins, peregrine falcons, ospreys, golden eagles, ferruginous hawks, bald eagles, and nine other North American raptors. Birds of Prey features shots so close the birds loom as large as life.

Scholz has combined instructive line drawings and engaging and informative text with Merrick's stunning photos to create the most magnificent and comprehensive books on birds of prey. The book includes a section on techniques for the artist and carver. (amazon)

My Underwater Photo Journey

by: Cathy Church

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price:

My Underwater Photo Journey provides powerful visual testimony of just why the world beneath the waves is worth protecting. The book is a stunning showcase for some of the best underwater imagery you'll find. Its coffee table sized, with one or more photographs on every page, making a great birthday present or holiday gift for any diver, photographer, traveler, or art lover. (amazon reviewer Paul Seldon)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

101 Uses for a Dog

Amazon Price: $10.17 (as of 12/30/2009)

A TRUE DOG LOVER'S DELIGHT! Charming, fun, cute, adorable are all words which can be used to describe this wonderful little book. It is a collection of 101 well-chosen pictures of dogs with a descriptive word or phrase as the title of each picture.

This is a wonderful book to keep on a coffee table or in a reading basket. Your guests will enjoy perusing it and you will want to just pick it up from time to time when you want to look at something that will quickly elicit a smile. Note that is very small, but the size is appropriate for the format. (Tucker Anderson, amazon reviewer)

On This Earth: Photographs from East Africa

by: Nick Brandt

Amazon Price: $26.40 (as of 12/30/2009)

Nick Brandt creates these majestic sepia and blue-tone photos contrasting moments of quintessential stillness with bursts of dramatic action by engaging with these creatures on an exceptionally intimate level, without the customary use of a telephoto lens. Evocative of classical art, from dignified portraits to sweeping natural tableaux, Brandt's images artfully and simply capture animals in their natural states of being. With a foreword by Alice Sebold and an introduction by Jane Goodall, On This Earth is a gorgeous portfolio of some of the last wild animals and a heartfelt elegy to a vanishing world. (amazon)

Journeys of a Lifetime: 500 of the World's Greatest Trips

by: National Geographic

Amazon Price: (as of 12/29/2009)

Compiled from the favorite trips of National Geographic's travel writers, Journeys of a Lifetime spans the globe to highlight the best of the world's most famous and lesser known sojourns. It presents an incredible diversity of possibilities, from ocean cruises around Antarctica to horse treks in the Andes. Every continent and every possible form of transport is covered.

Each chapter showcases stunning photography, full-color maps, evocative text, and expert advice-including how to get there, when to visit, and how to make the most of the journey-all packaged in a luxurious oversize volume to treasure for years to come. (amazon product description)

Blue Cats, Cats of the Greek Islands

by: Ron Nelson

Amazon Price: $17.95 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $17.95

This book is excellent for anyone who loves excellent photography, cats, or travel (especially with pristine water backdrops); it is beautifully conceived and printed, and would look great on any coffee table or in any library. (amazon reviewer, R. I. Hedges)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

Piazza: Italy's Heart and Soul

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price:

When you open the book, you are immediately captured by the colorful flags born by the sbandieratori of Gubbio, and can almost feel their movement as they run, proudly bearing their flags.

You can feel the press of the crowds when you turn to the depiction of the Ceri Marathon. Then a castle in Vernazza seems to be carved from the seaside bluff it tops, rather than being built upon it by mere men. (reviewer for wild books, at amazon)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

The Lewis & Clark Trail American Landscapes

by: Richard Mack

Amazon Price: $46.80 (as of 12/29/2009)

This may be the most beautiful of the many Lewis and Clark coffee table books published over the past few years. If you ve ever wondered what it must have been like to be with Lewis and Clark on their monumental journey, looking at Mack's beautifully rendered images is as close as you could ever get. --Tom Dickson Editor, Montana Outdoors Magazine

Tibet: Journey to the Forbidden City : Retracing the Steps of Alexandra David-Neel

by: Tiziana Baldizzone, Gianni Baldizzone, Valeria Manferto

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

Born in Paris in 1868, French explorer Alexandra David-Neel was not your average 19th-century woman. Well-versed in Sanskrit and Buddhist philosophy, she eschewed drawing rooms and polite society for the vagabond life of a traveler and explorer. In 1923, at the age of 55, she undertook a daring journey into the heart of the Himalayas and a land at the top of the world: Tibet.

Interspersed among the brilliant images of present-day Tibet are David-Neel's original black-and-white photos, along with excerpts from her journals and the Baldizzones' explanations of the culture and landscape. Tibet: Journey to the Forbidden City is both a celebration of a remarkable woman and an elegiac portrait of a culture teetering on the brink of extinction.

Beijing 360 Degrees

by: ZeMin Yu - Author/Contributor, Tamas D. Varga - Author/Photographer

Amazon Price: $23.76 (as of 12/30/2009)

The author would like with this photo album to acquaint visitors with the capital of China and reacquaint the citizens who already know the city well with some famous sites. Since not all of them have the making of a good scene for panoramic photograph, his album does not follow the common and perhaps expected themes of similar endeavors. That s why there are some lesser known details and atmosphere in the book, on the other hand this makes it even more exciting and interesting. Each panoramic photo has an explanatory text that provides new knowledge s about sites, events or habits. (amazon)

Jindagi: Himalayan Lives and Destinies

by: Silvia Lafranchi

Amazon Price: $34.16 (as of 12/29/2009)

Jindagi contains true stories of the all-day life in the Himalayas, with fantastic non-tourist pictures. This is an intimate approach to the life of normal, simple, strong, and fragile persons, anti-heroes who live and survive in a physically hard environment, but remain rich in human values. This is a journey to a far, fascinating culture, but also a trip into the hearth of the reader to rediscover and question oneself. (amazon)

Ireland: Coffee table Book

by: Gerald Hoberman, Maggie Davey

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

In this evocative book on Ireland, master photographer Gerald Hoberman chronicles the breathtaking beauty of the Irish landscape, the charm of its cities and towns, and the captivating nature of its people. A stunning and original portrait of Ireland today, this book will appeal to both those who know the place and those who are yet to have the pleasure. It is quarter-bound by hand with finest designer book cloth.

A Photo Tour of Chicago (Photo Tour Books)

by: Christian Heeb

Amazon Price: $13.57 (as of 12/30/2009)

Be blown away by the Windy City with this beautiful coffee-table book. Spectacular color photos, including panoramics, takes the reader on a virtual tour of Chicago. (amazon)

Shakespeare: The Golfer's Companion

by: Syd Pritchard

Amazon Price: $18.65 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $18.65

The book features forty-two aspects of golf, each with its own chapter. Each chapter has an introduction preparing the reader for a varying number of quotations which are serious, flippant or have double meanings. A book to be dipped into for fun or to provide a ready reference source for the apt witticism, pertinent quip or serious comment. A key word index is appended for rapid reference. (amazon product description)

Release Date: 07/06/2006

Canadiens Legends: Montreal's Hockey Heroes

by: Mike Leonetti

Amazon Price: $25.51 (as of 12/29/2009)

This lavishly illustrated look at Montreal's hockey heroes from 1909 to 2004 also includes guest essays by Dave Stubbs, Frank Orr, and Red Fisher.

Winners of the Stanley Cup 24 times, the Canadien's legend encompasses such superstars as Howie Morenz in the early days, Rocket Richard in the 1950s, and Guy Lafleur in the 1970s. Well-known sportswriter Mike Leonetti lovingly details that history, with nearly 100 player profiles and more than 300 historic and contemporary photos.

Baseball: 365 Days of Color Photographs from the Archives of Major League Baseball

by: Joseph Wallace

Amazon Price: $19.77 (as of 12/29/2009)

Baseball: 365 Days, is a colorful, surprising, and even moving panorama of baseball from 1970 until the present day. Drawn from the archives of Major League Baseball, Baseball's photographs-many never before published-trace the arc of star ballplayers' careers: from minor-league triumphs to life in the Big Show to retirement and Hall of Fame election.

Pele: The Illustratrated Autobiography: Photographs and Memorabilia from Soccer's Greatest Player

by: Pele

Amazon Price: $29.16 (as of 12/30/2009)

The world's greatest footballer now gives us the story of his incredible life and career with illustrations and removable memorabilia. Told with his characteristic grace and modesty, PELE: MY LIFE IN PICTURES is an essential volume for all sports fans, and anyone who admires true rarity of spirit.

The Game That Was: The George Brace Baseball Photo Collection

by: Richard Cahan, Mark Jacob

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

Certain to be a collector's item, this volume is baseball's family album--a unique compilation of the game's greatest players relaxing with their families, hunting with the friends, and hanging out with the neighborhood kids. From the first All-Star Game and the planting of the ivy at Wrigley Field to Jackie Robinson in his debut season and Ernie Banks on his first day as a Cub, it's a look at one of the world's largest private collections of never-before-seen baseball photography, containing 380 photos dating from the 1930s to the present and depicting more than 10,000 players.

Historic Photos of the University of Alabama Football

by: Joseph Woodruff

Amazon Price: $28.76 (as of 12/30/2009)

Not yet released but you can pre-order: whenever you pre-order a book, CD, video, DVD, software, or video game, the price we charge when we ship it to you will be the lowest price offered by Amazon.com between the time you placed your order and the end of the day of the release date. A pre-order price guarantee message will appear on your Order Summary during the checkout process.

101 Baseball Places to See Before You Strike Out

by: Josh Pahigian

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

The game of baseball has launched thousands of attractions that reflect the game's rich history and quirky lore: shrines and gravesites, museum exhibits, statues, plaques, bars and restaurants, pop culture landmarks, and more. Josh Pahigian has gathered 101 of the very best of the best along with a collection of essays that explain where to find these sites and how they reflect the soul of this classic American sport.

Whether you are an armchair traveler, a sports fan, or a lover of local folklore, this intriguing and colorful tribute to the game will be a welcome addition to your sports collection. (from inside jacket flap)

Dream Homes Deserts: An Exclusive Showcase of the Deserts' Finest Architects

by: LLC Panache Partners

Amazon Price: (as of 12/29/2009)

Featuring contemporary and classic residences in Las Vegas, New Mexico, and Palm Springs, this breathtaking photographic tour displays project themes ranging from the Tuscany-inspired to the luscious oasis of the Mediterranean, proving that not only can life be found in the desert, but it also thrives amongst these ecologically conscious edifices. (amazon)

Still Standing: A Century of Urban Train Station Design (Railroads Past and Present)

by: Christopher Brown

Amazon Price: $37.96 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $49.95

This beautiful photographic collection of urban train station design covers a 100-year period from roughly 1850 to 1950. Striking original photographs chronicle 40 large passenger station buildings still in existence in cities around the world. From the great terminals of London, across the world to Auckland, New Zealand; from Toronto's Union Station to the grand and crumbling Retiro Station in Buenos Aires - vastly different architectural forms are displayed and presented chronologically. (amazon product description)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

Dream Homes Pacific Northwest: An Exclusive Showcase of the Finest Architects, Designers & Builders in Oregon & Washington

by: LLC Panache Partners

Amazon Price: $23.07 (as of 12/30/2009)

Featuring some of the world's most aesthetically creative and environmentally conscious residential design and construction, this gorgeous collection reflects homes with a deep reverence for their natural and cultural contexts, from coastal dwellings along the shores of Lake Washington to contemporary urban dwellings and snug mountain cottages in Oregon. With more than 30 leading pioneers of the Green movement.

Great Cathedrals

by: Bernhard Sch?tz

Amazon Price: $69.30 (as of 12/29/2009)

The main attraction here is the inclusion of 270 crisp, oversized color plates, which capture Gothic structures from every angle, supplemented by historic, undated photos of cathedrals and their artworks and decorations. Schutz (emeritus, Univ. of Munich), a noted German authority on medieval and Baroque architecture, covers five to eight cathedrals each in France, England, Spain, Germany, and Italy. (Library Journal)

The Abundant Garden: A Celebration of Color, Texture, and Blooms

by: Barbara J Denk, Debra Prinzing

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

An "abundant garden" is one that is effusive, emotional, demonstrative, and unrestrained. ABUNDANT GARDEN identifies nine design aspects of an abundant garden-and shows how each one is used in a specific garden. Each garden is located on Bainbridge Island, Seattle, WA, in the heart of one of America's most highly regarded horticultural "edens." The book takes the reader on a tour with insightful and imaginative photographs and beautifully written text.

Includes specific plant recommendations and practical recommendations that will address the needs of gardeners across the country. (amazon)

More Beautiful Rooms

by: Perla Lichi

Amazon Price: $30.36 (as of 12/30/2009)

Interior Designer Perla Lichi presents a portfolio of her work organized by room. In other words, the book begins with an array of foyers, from elaborate, classic foyers with soaring stairways to sleek contemporary designs . . . Famous quotations from people of all times and many different fields of expertise are presented to create added interest as readers study the colors and textures; furniture, art, and accessories; floor, wall and ceiling treatments, and every other design element used to compose these splendid rooms . . .

Old World Interiors: A Modern Interpretation

by: Naylor David

Amazon Price: $26.40 (as of 12/30/2009)

Fabulous! Bold! Beautiful! So handsome, so gorgeous! Loved it! I wanted to tear out the page and walk into the room. It would be nice to see the outside of the house with all the beautiful inside to it. (A. Lamm, amazon reviewer)

Incredible book. The photos are amazing and David's vision for each and every home he does is spot on. You will not be disappointed by this book. I especially loved the house on the cover. It is hard to imagine being so lucky as to live there. (N. DeLaurentis, amazon reviewer)

Masterpieces: Great Paintings of the World in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

by: Gilian Shallcross

Amazon Price: $43.80 (as of 12/30/2009)

Featuring artists such as Rembrandt, El Greco, Copley, Monet, Sargent and Picasso, anonymous masters of medieval Europe and Asia and living artists of uncompromising vision such as Gerhard Richter and David Hockney, this book is a celebration of the possibilities of paint.

The Collectible Moment: Photographs in the Norton Simon Museum

Amazon Price: $36.63 (as of 12/30/2009)

First-person recollections by a number of important figures in the world of photography provide immediate and vivid accounts of the period and the photo artists . . .

This catalogue publishes for the first time the 548 photographs in the Norton Simon Museum of Art collection, more than 90 per cent of which were acquired . . . from 1969 to 1974.

100 Photographs That Changed the World

by: Editors of Life Magazine

Amazon Price: $16.47 (as of 12/30/2009)
List Price: $24.95

Nominated through on-line votes and selected by Life editors, the 100 images in this compendium cover unforgettable moments in "The Arts," "Society," "War & Peace" and "Science & Nature." The photographs are all striking-whether visually or viscerally, artistically or emotionally-but many are difficult to look at. (publisher's weekly)

Release Date: 12/31/1969

Renoir Landscapes: 1865-1883 (National Gallery Company)

by: Mr. Colin B. Bailey, Christopher Riopelle

Amazon Price: $40.95 (as of 12/29/2009)

This stunning book is the first to examine Renoir's landscape art in depth, tracing its evolution from the beginning of his career through his Impressionist period and the early 1880s.

With over 200 illustrations, a detailed chronology, and bibliography, the book includes essays by highly distinguished scholars that discuss the range and importance of these works and present many fresh discoveries. They also place Renoir's landscapes in the overall context of the genre in 19th-century France, revealing how his experiments were radical and--in ways that have not yet been fully acknowledged--influential on the later development of modern art. (amazon)

Masterpieces of Art

by: Lucia Gasparini

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

Can't comment much on the text because there's really not much of it, and the coverage of the entire world of art is, of course, thin in a 176-page book. However, the images are gorgeous, luminous, and at an immense 14"x17" suitable for framing!

Basically, this is a fine art poster book! Dozens of fine prints for pennies apiece! Buy one for the coffee table, another to unbind and hang! (J. Potter, amazon reviewer)

Fly Now!: The Poster Collection of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum

by: Joanne Gernstein London

Amazon Price: $16.50 (as of 12/30/2009)

From 19th-century circus impresarios offering rides in gaudy hot-air balloons to the sleek 21st-century airliners, they offer a fascinating illustrated history of flight as it evolved from an exotic realm inhabited only by visionaries and daredevils into our modern world of speedy jets and frequent flyers-no longer extraordinary, perhaps, but still echoing with the exhilarating thrill and glamorous excitement captured here. (amazon)

I've been a fan of vintage flying and travel posters for many years. This book is one of the best I've seen. There is a poster on every page describing a little about each one. (E. J. Hanson, amazon reviewer)

TV Guide: Fifty Years of Television

by: TV Guide, Mark Lasswell

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

The engine of American culture receives an affectionate and often perceptive overview in this retrospective from the nation's biggest weekly magazine. Classic shows from I Love Lucy and Howdy Doody to The Sopranos and Survivor are given lavishly illustrated spreads along with quirkier cult favorites like The Prisoner and I, Claudius. TV's milestone discoveries of politics (All in the Family), social realism (Hill Street Blues) and nihilism (Seinfeld) are duly noted, while through-the-years thematic comparison of news broadcasts, sit-com families and TV detectives-and even the antics Ozzy and Harriet and The Osbournes-remind us that the more things change, the more they stay the same. (publisher's weekly)

Impressionists in Winter: Effets de Neige

by: Charles S. Moffett, Eliza Rathbone, Katherine Rothkopf, Joel Isaacson

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

the works are astonishing! whoever asssembled them deserves the thanks of anyone who has known the cold, stark beauty of winter and kept its memory in their souls. the artists who captured these moments in time are unmatched in contemporary painting. (R. Sexton, amazon reviewer)

Advertising in America: The First Two Hundred Years

by: Charles A. Goodrum, Helen Dalrymple

Amazon Price: (as of 12/30/2009)

Goodrum ( Treasures of the Library of Congress ) and Dalrymple, Library of Congress staff member, here announce that they have set out to chart--but not necessarily to debunk--the phenomenon that for 200 years has amused, shamed and seduced us into buying products we may or may not need. Their well-organized, if simplistic, book is an encyclopedia of the print advertising image, with a skeletal timeline delineating influences, styles and techniques, later fleshed out with analyses of why the advertising industry has flourished.