In this collection of personal essays, the beloved star of Gilmore Girls and Parenthood reveals stories about life, love, and working as a woman in Hollywood—along with behind-the-scenes dispatches from the set of the new Gilmore Girls, where she plays the fast-talking Lorelai Gilmore once again.
 
In Talking as Fast as I Can, Lauren Graham hits pause for a moment and looks back on her life, sharing laugh-out-loud stories about growing up, starting out as an actress, and, years later, sitting in her trailer on the Parenthood set and asking herself, “Did you, um, make it?” She opens up about the challenges of being single in Hollywood (“Strangers were worried about me; that’s how long I was single!”), the time she was asked to audition her butt for a role, and her experience being a judge on Project Runway (“It’s like I had a fashion-induced blackout”).
           
In “What It Was Like, Part One,” Graham sits down for an epic Gilmore Girls marathon and reflects on being cast as the fast-talking Lorelai Gilmore. The essay “What It Was Like, Part Two” reveals how it felt to pick up the role again nine years later, and what doing so has meant to her.
           
Some more things you will learn about Lauren: She once tried to go vegan just to bond with Ellen DeGeneres, she’s aware that meeting guys at awards shows has its pitfalls (“If you’re meeting someone for the first time after three hours of hair, makeup, and styling, you’ve already set the bar too high”), and she’s a card-carrying REI shopper (“My bungee cords now earn points!”).
           
Including photos and excerpts from the diary Graham kept during the filming of the recent Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life, this book is like a cozy night in, catching up with your best friend, laughing and swapping stories, and—of course—talking as fast as you can.

From the Hardcover edition.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

From Lauren Graham, the beloved star of Gilmore Girls and Parenthood, comes a witty, charming, and hilariously relatable debut novel about a struggling young actress trying to get ahead―and keep it together―in New York City.
 
It’s January 1995, and Franny Banks has just six months left of the three-year deadline she set for herself when she came to New York, dreaming of Broadway and doing “important” work. But all she has to show for her efforts so far is a part in an ad for ugly Christmas sweaters, and a gig waiting tables at a comedy club. Her roommates―her best friend Jane, and Dan, an aspiring sci-fi writer―are supportive, yet Franny knows a two-person fan club doesn’t exactly count as success. Everyone tells her she needs a backup plan, and though she can almost picture moving back home and settling down with her perfectly nice ex-boyfriend, she’s not ready to give up on her goal of having a career like her idols Diane Keaton and Meryl Streep. Not just yet. But while she dreams of filling their shoes, in the meantime, she’d happily settle for a speaking part in almost anything—and finding a hair product combination that works.
 
Everything is riding on the upcoming showcase for her acting class, where she’ll finally have a chance to perform for people who could actually hire her. And she can’t let herself be distracted by James Franklin, a notorious flirt and the most successful actor in her class, even though he’s suddenly started paying attention. Meanwhile, her bank account is rapidly dwindling, her father wants her to come home, and her agent doesn’t return her calls. But for some reason, she keeps believing that she just might get what she came for.
 
Someday, Someday, Maybe is a story about hopes and dreams, being young in a city, and wanting something deeply, madly, desperately. It’s about finding love, finding yourself, and perhaps most difficult of all in New York City, finding an acting job.

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“A winning, entertaining read . . . [Lauren Graham] has smartly mined just the right details from her own experience, infusing her work with crackling dialogue and observations about show business that ring funny and true.”—The Washington Post
 
“A charmer of a first novel . . . [Graham] has an easy, unforced style and, when the situation calls for it, a keen sense of the ridiculous.”—The Wall Street Journal
 
“With insight, care, and an abundance of humor . . . Graham demonstrates that her acting chops are not her only talent.”—Library Journal
 
“Thoroughly charming.”—Entertainment Weekly
 
“Sweet, funny, and full of heart . . . a dazzling debut.”—Emily Giffin, New York Times bestselling author of Something Borrowed and Where We Belong
 
“Warm and funny, charming and smart.”—Diane Keaton, New York Times bestselling author of Then Again
 
“Graham deftly captures what it’s like to be young, ambitious, and hopeful in New York City.”—Candace Bushnell, New York Times bestselling author of Sex and the City and The Carrie Diaries
 
“Fresh and funny and full of zingers, Lauren Graham’s charming writing style instantly drew me in.”—Meg Cabot, bestselling author of the Princess Diaries and Heather Wells Mystery series

Homeless.

No other word better describes our modern-day suffering. It reveals one of our deepest and most painful conditions—not having a sense of belonging. However, Alan Graham, founder of Mobile Loaves & Fishes and Community First! Village, is improving the quality of life for a large quantity of people through sharing his personal story of becoming more human through humanizing others. Graham believes the more we can give people dignity, the power of choice, and genuine community, the better we’ll be able to offer solutions that will have impact on the world at large. And while his missionary work is focused on giving a home to the physically homeless, he also wants to transform the lives of every living person by shifting the paradigm in understanding what it means to be “home.” In Welcome Homeless, Graham delves deep into what it means to be connected to God, the earth, and each other. In doing so, he shows us the home we’ve all longed for but never had.

Welcome Homeless is about becoming fully human by being fully present. It is about finally connecting with the disconnected and finding our identity through knowing the true identity of others. Graham wants to engrain the human story in you so deeply that you start being who you were made to be—that you start finally being like the image from which you were made and start empathizing instead of sympathizing with the people around you. Similar to how we can become 100 percent fully human by mimicking the ultimate image, we can shape a better world by mimicking the picture of the new heaven and the new earth—a picture that has reality at the heart of it but is beyond our imagination. Alan Graham also shares his personal story, the stories of the homeless, and the stories of those whose worldviews have been shifted by the homeless. Because of his raw, humorous, and honest voice, he achieves a rare and profound universality. Houses become homes once they embody the stories of the people who have made these spaces into places of significance, meaning, and memory. Home is fundamentally a place of connection and of relationships that are life-giving and foundational. Graham invites you to make everyone feel truly at home by finally inviting those living on the fringes of society into your heart.

This is why Welcome Homeless is about doing, not saying. It is about taking the ultimate and forward-thinking vision of a new heaven and new earth and literally breaking the soil so that new earth can exist here today. It is about realizing that homelessness is not fundamentally a consequence of moral and spiritual inadequacies; but rather it is often the logical and economical outcome for a large part of our population.

So, what does your vision of humanity and love look like? Whatever the vision, it should look like community. People should feel more alive after they meet you. When your consciousness changes from one of self-absorption to a consciousness aware of its human desire for connection, compassion, kindness, and beauty, you will start seeing things differently—and others will start seeing you made anew as well because the absolute greatest self-help occurs when you help others

The complete, uncensored history of the award-winning The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, as told by its correspondents, writers, and host.

For almost seventeen years, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart brilliantly redefined the borders between television comedy, political satire, and opinionated news coverage. It launched the careers of some of today’s most significant comedians, highlighted the hypocrisies of the powerful, and garnered 23 Emmys. Now the show’s behind-the-scenes gags, controversies, and camaraderie will be chronicled by the players themselves, from legendary host Jon Stewart to the star cast members and writers-including Samantha Bee, Stephen Colbert, John Oliver, Steve Carell, Lewis Black, Jessica Williams, John Hodgman, and Larry Wilmore-plus some of The Daily Show‘s most prominent guests and adversaries: John and Cindy McCain, Glenn Beck, Tucker Carlson, and many more.

This oral history takes the reader behind the curtain for all the show’s highlights, from its origins as Comedy Central’s underdog late-night program hosted by Craig Kilborn to Jon Stewart’s long reign to Trevor Noah’s succession, rising from a scrappy jester in the 24-hour political news cycle to become part of the beating heart of politics-a trusted source for not only comedy but also commentary, with a reputation for calling bullshit and an ability to effect real change in the world.

Through years of incisive election coverage, Jon Stewart’s emotional monologue in the wake of 9/11, his infamous confrontation on Crossfire, passionate debates with President Obama and Hillary Clinton, feuds with Bill O’Reilly and Fox, the Indecisions, Mess O’Potamia, and provocative takes on Wall Street and racism, The Daily Show has been a cultural touchstone. Now, for the first time, the people behind the show’s seminal moments come together to share their memories of the last-minute rewrites, improvisations, pranks, romances, blow-ups, and moments of Zen both on and off the set of one of America’s most groundbreaking shows.

This beautifully illustrated book brings together a dazzling variety of works and provides fresh insight into artistic expressions of life in the Weimar Republic. Between the end of World War I and the Nazi rise to power, Germany’s Weimar Republic (1919-1933) was a thriving laboratory of art and culture. As the country experienced unprecedented and often tumultuous social, economic, and political upheaval, many artists rejected Expressionism in favor of a new realism to capture this emerging society. Dubbed Neue Sachlichkeit―New Objectivity―its adherents turned a cold eye on the new Germany: its desperate prostitutes and crippled war veterans, its alienated urban landscapes, its decadent underworld where anything was available for a price. Showcasing 150 works by more than 50 artists, this book reflects the full diversity and strategies of New Objectivity. Organized around five thematic sections, it mixes photography, works on paper, and painting to bring them into a visual dialogue. Artists such as Otto Dix, George Grosz, and Max Beckmann are included alongside Christian Schad, Alexander Kanoldt, Georg Schrimpf, August Sander, Lotte Jacobi, and Aenne Biermann. Also included are essays that examine the politics of New Objectivity and its legacy; its relation to international art movements of the time; the context of gender roles and sexuality; and the influence of new technology and consumer goods.

Lauren Graham was three weeks away from turning twenty-one-loving college life, her friends, and her family-when her life was turned upside down and changed forever. She was diagnosed with cancer-specifically, with acute lymphoblastic lymphoma. In her memoir, Lauren considers the everyday life of a cancer patient and recalls all the challenges she experienced with humor and brutal honesty. Her unique storytelling, presented through the e-mails that she wrote over the course of nearly three years of cancer treatments, provides an intimate window into her struggle with cancer. Week by week, month by month, and treatment by treatment, she shares her journey and experiences in group e-mails to family and friends with wit, fear, stubbornness, faith, and candor. After recounting the procedures, tests, and general medical things she experienced, she ends each e-mail with several wonderful quotes, which offer as much solace to her as they would to those reading her e-mails. Seriously-Cancer? I Do Not Have Time for This! tells a true story of inspiration for anyone who is facing illness or difficulties in life. “Lauren is a real trooper who viewed her cancer treatment in such a positive, relatable, inspiring, and hilarious perspective . . . This book is a must read for all young adults battling cancer, for healthcare providers, and for families and friends supporting their loved ones during their treatment” -Brenda Muriera-Noggy, senior research nurse, Leukemia/Lymphoma Department, Division of Pediatrics, UT MD Anderson Cancer Center

A collection of humorous autobiographical essays by the Academy Award-nominated actress and star of Up in the Air and Pitch Perfect.

Even before she made a name for herself on the silver screen starring in films like Pitch Perfect, Up in the Air, Twilight, and Into the Woods, Anna Kendrick was unusually small, weird, and “10 percent defiant.”

At the ripe age of thirteen, she had already resolved to “keep the crazy inside my head where it belonged. Forever. But here’s the thing about crazy: It. Wants. Out.” In Scrappy Little Nobody, she invites readers inside her brain, sharing extraordinary and charmingly ordinary stories with candor and winningly wry observations.

With her razor-sharp wit, Anna recounts the absurdities she’s experienced on her way to and from the heart of pop culture as only she can—from her unusual path to the performing arts (Vanilla Ice and baggy neon pants may have played a role) to her double life as a middle-school student who also starred on Broadway to her initial “dating experiments” (including only liking boys who didn’t like her back) to reviewing a binder full of butt doubles to her struggle to live like an adult woman instead of a perpetual “man-child.”

Enter Anna’s world and follow her rise from “scrappy little nobody” to somebody who dazzles on the stage, the screen, and now the page—with an electric, singular voice, at once familiar and surprising, sharp and sweet, funny and serious (well, not that serious).

New York Times bestselling author Shane Dawson returns with another highly entertaining and uproariously funny essay collection, chronicling a mix of real life moments both extraordinary and mortifying, yet always full of heart.

Shane Dawson shared some of his best and worst experiences in I Hate Myselfie, the critically acclaimed book that secured his place as a gifted humorist and keen observer of millennial culture. Fans felt as though they knew him after devouring the New York Times, Publishers Weekly, Los Angeles Times, and Wall Street Journal bestseller. They were right… almost.

In this new collection of original personal essays, Shane goes even deeper, sharing never-before-revealed stories from his life, giving readers a no-holds-barred look at moments both bizarre and relatable, from cult-like Christian after-school activities, dressing in drag, and losing his virginity, to hiring a psychic, clashes with celebrities, and coming to terms with his bisexuality. Every step of the way, Shane maintains his signature brand of humor, proving that even the toughest breaks can be funny when you learn to laugh at yourself.

This is Let’s Pretend This Never Happened and Running With Scissors for the millennial generation: an inspiring, intelligent, and brutally honest collection of true stories by a YouTube sensation-turned one of the freshest new voices out there.