Book + Trailer: One More Thing, by B.J. Novak

B.J. Novak's "One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories" (On-sale by Knopf 2/4/14) is an endlessly entertaining, surprisingly sensitive, and startlingly original debut that signals the arrival of a brilliant new voice in American fiction.

A boy wins a $100,000 prize in a box of Frosted Flakes—only to discover that claiming the winnings might unravel his family. A woman sets out to seduce motivational speaker Tony Robbins—turning for help to the famed motivator himself. A new arrival in Heaven, overwhelmed with options, procrastinates over a long-ago promise to visit his grandmother. We meet Sophia, the first artificially intelligent being capable of love, who falls for a man who might not be ready for it himself; a vengeance-minded hare, obsessed with scoring a rematch against the tortoise who ruined his life; and post-college friends who try to figure out how to host an intervention in the era of Facebook. Along the way, we learn why wearing a red T-shirt every day is the key to finding love, how February got its name, and why the stock market is sometimes just . . . down.

Finding inspiration in questions from the nature of perfection to the icing on carrot cake, "One More Thing" has at its heart the most human of phenomena: love, fear, hope, ambition, and the inner stirring for the one elusive element just that might make a person complete. Across a dazzling range of subjects, themes, tones, and narrative voices, the many pieces in this collection are like nothing else, but they have one thing in common: they share the playful humor, deep heart, sharp eye, inquisitive mind, and altogether electrifying spirit of a writer with a fierce devotion to the entertainment of the reader.

B.J. Novak is a writer and actor best known for his work on NBC's Emmy Award-winning comedy series "The Office" as an actor, writer, director, and executive producer. He is also known for his stand up comedy performances and his roles in motion pictures such as Quentin Tarantino's "Inglourious Basterds" and Disney's "Saving Mr. Banks". He is a graduate of Harvard University with a degree in English and Spanish literature.
(From the YouTube description)

Book Trailer: The Rule of Three, by Eric Walters

A person can last 3 minutes without air, 3 days without water, 3 weeks without food. A community begins to die in just seconds. One shocking afternoon, computers around the globe shut down in a viral catastrophe. At sixteen-year-old Adam Daley's high school, the problem first seems to be a typical electrical outage, until students discover that cell phones are down, municipal utilities are failing, and a few computer-free cars like Adam's are the only vehicles that function. Driving home, Adam encounters a storm tide of anger and fear as the region becomes paralyzed. Soon—as resources dwindle, crises mount, and chaos descends—he will see his suburban neighborhood band together for protection. And Adam will understand that having a police captain for a mother and a retired government spy living next door are not just the facts of his life but the keys to his survival. Welcome to the all-too-possible nightmare of The Rule of Three—a breakout adventure story from acclaimed Canadian author Eric Walters. The Rule of Three Eric Walters Farrar, Straus and Giroux an imprint of Macmillan Children's Publishing Group http://www.macteenbooks.com/books/win... (From the YouTube description)