Mike Sandler

Political economist, climate change professional and sustainability advocate

Economic growth is the real third rail of American politics. Question it and you are immediately branded an outsider (or even a Marxist). Who doesn't want a rising tide that lifts all boats? Well, this is a good question to ask, and author Brian Czech bravely asks it, and many others.

Michael Varrati

Actor, writer and pop culture enthusiast

The release of the book has allowed, in an easy way, the opportunity for me, and fans the world over, to say thank you to those five VJs. For we, the pop culture inclined, they changed everything.

Brandon Zarzyczny

Avid Reader

My Dad started to keep track of all of the books that he read in an Excel Spreadsheet. When he died on Wednesday, he had accumulated review scores for 10,496 books.

Ilana Teitelbaum

Writer

Named for the license plate on Manx's murderously sentient Rolls Royce, NOS4A2 is Joe Hill's homage to traditional horror after two novels that did not adhere as clearly to genre conventions.

Rob Asghar

University Fellow, USC Center on Public Diplomacy

A less-well known group of literary figures have taken an opposite approach to championing books -- by capitalizing on the very changes that have even spooked thriller novelist James Patterson.

Monica Edinger

Teacher, Writer, Critic

After receiving an advanced reader's copy of Neil Gaiman's Fortunately, the Milk, I asked my class if they'd like me to read it aloud. Now keep in mind that while Neil Gaiman may have a huge adult fan base, he isn't particularly well-known among young kids. Actually, I'd say he isn't known at all.

Peter Clothier

Author and Blogger, The Buddha Diaries

I'm a big fan of Benjamin Weaver, the Jewish prize-figher turned "thief taker," who is the hero of David Liss's The Devil's Company, the third in the series of crime novels set in 18th century London.

Dora Levy Mossanen

Best-selling novelist of 'Harem' and 'Courtesan'

In The Comfort of Lies, Randy Susan Meyers explores such modern-day themes of love and obsession, motherhood and adoption, trust and infidelity, and above all, the resiliency of the human spirit and the intrinsic need to forgive.

James Franco

Actor and author

Larry Brown's final story/novella at the end of Big Bad Love, "92 Days," is essentially a story about a struggling writer, Barlow, trying to get published. The drive to be published acts as a reprieve from the rambling life of squalor that Barlow lives.

Don Tapscott

Advisor to government and business leaders; Author, 'Macrowikinomics'

Today, rather than savouring our current place and time, we are in constant quest for something better. The obsession with "now" is the topic of Present Shock, the new book from well-known media theorist Douglas Rushkoff.

Phil Simon

Speaker, Author, Thought Leader

While researching Too Big to Ignore: The Business Case for Big Data, it became pretty obvious to me pretty quickly that we don't know nearly as much a...

Anna Leahy

Space Writer, Poet, Teacher

We've not chosen books from best-seller lists. Such books may be quirky, sometimes challenging, often beautifully printed. This year, we turned to Correction of Drift by Pamela Ryder.

John Hennessy

Author, "Coney Island Pilgrims"

The fact of Proust's poems will be news to many, the number and quality of them yet another surprise. Astonishing to virtually all of us, though, comes the revelation that Proust spent much of his life trying to decide whether he was a poet or a prose writer.

Kelli Catana

Blogger, www.kellidaisy.com

This is the kind of book that makes me absolutely envious of authors and their incredible ability to bring their words to life. I found myself up until the wee hours of the night on more than one occasion completely immersed in this book.

Ricardo B. Salinas

Founder and Chairman, Grupo Salinas

The book helps to understand our history and extrapolate lessons to the delicate global situation of public finances, especially since governments that claim to be the solution to the global crisis often represent the problem.

Anne Margaret Daniel

Professor

There were so many terrific words and phrases in the '20s, why not use them? If you're claiming your novel strives for verisimilitude with the lives, and if you cite to the biographies and letters and critical studies, then make the language real, too.