Paperback (1 to 2 lbs)

Texas

Travels in Sri Lanka

"Brilliant." --The Daily Telegraph No one sees the world quite like John Gimlette. In Elephant Complex, he ventures into Sri Lanka, a country only now emerging from twenty-six years of civil war. Beginning in the exuberant capital, Colombo, Gimlette ventures out in all directions: to the dry zones where the island's 5,800 wild elephants congregate around ancient reservoirs; through cinnamon country with its Portuguese forts; to the "Bible Belt" of Buddhism; then up into Kandy, the country's eccentric, aristocratic Shangri-la. In the course of his journey, Gimlette meets farmers, war heroes, cricketers, terrorists, a former president, survivors of great massacres--and perhaps some of their perpetrators. That's to say nothing of the island's beguiling fauna: elephants, crocodiles, snakes, storks, and the greatest concentration of leopards on Earth. Here is a land of beauty and devastation, a place at once heavenly and hellish--all brought to vibrant, fascinating life here on the page.

Elephant Complex

e9d2364c-d9ac-4f76-8ce8-9c193cb39f25-1

Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

Massachusetts

No one sees the world quite like John Gimlette. As The New York Times once noted, "he writes with enormous wit, indignation, and a heightened sense of the absurd." Writing for both the adventurer and the armchair traveler, he has an eye for unusually telling detail, a sense of wonder, and compelling curiosity for the inside story. This time, he travels to Sri Lanka, a country only now emerging from twenty-six years of civil war. Delving deep into the nation's story, Gimlette provides us with an astonishing, multifaceted portrait of the island today.

His travels reveal the country as never before. Beginning in the exuberant capital, Colombo ("a hint of anarchy everywhere"), he ventures out in all directions: to the dry zones where the island's 5,800 wild elephants congregate around ancient reservoirs; through cinnamon country with its Portuguese forts; to the "Bible Belt" of Buddhism--the tsunami-ravaged southeast coast; then up into the great green highlands ("the garden in the sky") and Kandy, the country's eccentric, aristocratic Shangri-la. Along the way, a wild and often desperate history takes shape, a tale of great colonies (Arab, Portuguese, British, and Dutch) and of the cultural divisions that still divide this society. Before long, we're in Jaffna and the Vanni, crucibles of the recent conflict. These areas--the hottest, driest, and least hospitable--have been utterly devastated by war and are only now struggling to their feet.

But this is also a story of friendship and remarkable encounters. In the course of his journey, Gimlette meets farmers, war heroes, ancient tribesmen, world-class cricketers, terrorists, a former president, old planters, survivors of great massacres--and perhaps some of their perpetrators. That's to say nothing of the island's beguiling fauna: elephants, crocodiles, snakes, storks, and the greatest concentration of leopards on Earth.
           
Here is a land of extravagant beauty and profound devastation, of ingenuity and catastrophe, possessed of both a volatile past and an uncertain future--a place capable of being at once heavenly and hellish--all brought to vibrant, fascinating life here on the page.

The Elephant Complex

Light Paperback (1 lb or less)

Minnesota

Travels Through Paraguay

Haven to Nazis, smugglers’ paradise, home to some of the earth’s oddest wildlife and most baroquely awful dictatorships, Paraguay is a nation waiting for the right chronicler. In John Gimlette, at last it has one. With an adventurer’s sang-froid, a historian’s erudition, and a sense of irony so keen you could cut a finger on it, Gimlette celebrates the beauty, horror and–yes–charm of South America’s obscure and remote “island surrounded by land.”

He takes readers from genteel drawing rooms in Asuncion–where ladies still gossip about the nineteenth-century Irish adventuress who became Paraguay’s Empress to the “Green Hell” of the Chaco, a vast, inhospitable tract populated by aging Mennonites and discouraged Indians. Replete with eccentrics and scoundrels, ecologically minded cannibals and utopians from every corner of the earth, At the Tomb of the Inflatable Pig is a madly entertaining book.

At the Tomb of the Inflatable Pig

395bdc41-c3f5-40fe-a16c-de95f11a2b95-1

New York

The Spectacular Rise, Revolution, and Future of HBO

The riveting inside story of HBO, the start-up company that reinvented television--by two veteran media reporters

HBO changed how stories could be told on TV. The Sopranos, Sex and the City, The Wire, Game of Thrones. The network's meteoric rise heralded the second golden age of television with serialized shows that examined and reflected American anxieties, fears, and secret passions through complicated characters who were flawed and often unlikable. HBO's own behind-the-scenes story is as complex, compelling, and innovative as the dramas the network created, driven by unorthodox executives who pushed the boundaries of what viewers understood as television at the turn of the century. Originally conceived by a small upstart group of entrepreneurs to bring Hollywood movies into living rooms across America, the scrappy network grew into one of the most influential and respected players in Hollywood. It's Not TV is the deeply reported, definitive story of one of America's most daring and popular cultural institutions, laying bare HBO's growth, dominance, and vulnerability within the capricious media landscape over the past fifty years.

Through the visionary executives, showrunners, and producers who shaped HBO, seasoned journalists Gillette and Koblin bring to life a dynamic cast of characters who drove the company's creative innovation in astonishing ways--outmaneuvering copycat competitors, taming Hollywood studios, transforming 1980s comedians and athletes like Chris Rock and Mike Tyson into superstars, and in the late 1990s and 2000s elevating the commercial-free, serialized drama to a revered art form. But in the midst of all its success, HBO was also defined by misbehaving executives, internal power struggles, and a few crucial miscalculations.

As data-driven models like Netflix have taken over streaming, HBO's artful, instinctual, and humanistic approach to storytelling is in jeopardy. Taking readers into the boardrooms and behind the camera, It's Not TV tells the surprising, fascinating story of HBO's ascent, its groundbreaking influence on American business, technology, and popular culture, and its increasingly precarious position in the very market it created.

John Gimlette

Elephant Complex

John Gimlette

The Elephant Complex

John Gimlette

At the Tomb of the Inflatable Pig

Felix Gillette; John Koblin

It's Not TV

Felix Gillette; John Koblin

It's Not TV

Ned Gillette; John Dostal

Cross-Country Skiing