The ostensible purpose of a library is to preserve the printed word. But for fifty years our country’s libraries–including the Library of Congress–have been doing just the opposite, destroying hundreds of thousands of historic newspapers and replacing them with microfilm copies that are difficult to read, lack all the color and quality of the original paper and illustrations, and deteriorate with age.With meticulous detective work and Baker’s well-known explanatory power, D...

Emmett has a wife and two children, a cat, and a duck, and he wants to know what life is about. Every day he gets up before dawn, makes a cup of coffee in the dark, lights a fire with one wooden match, and thinks.What Emmett thinks about is the subject of this wise and closely observed novel, which covers vast distances while moving no further than Emmett’s hearth and home. Nicholson Baker’s extraordinary ability to describe and celebrate life in all its rich ordinariness has never...

Having turned phone sex into the subject of an astonishing national bestseller in Vox, Baker now outdoes himself with an outrageously arousing, acrobatically stylish "X-rated sci-fi fantasy that leaves Vox seeming more like mere fiber-optic foreplay" (Seattle Times). "Sparkling."--San Francisco Chronicle.

The Size of Thoughts, a collection of essays that have appeared in the New Yorker and other publications, includes one never-before-published piece on the world of electronics. The essays celebrate the joy--and exquisite details--of everything from library card catalogs and reading aloud to the significance of wine stains on a tablecloth.Baker turns any subject, from feeding a child to phone sex, into literature with a style that is sparklingly original, frequently...

Selected Short's most popular volume! Over three hours of stories to tickle your funny bone.Nicholson Baker's "Subsoil"performed by Thomas GibsonA darkly comic thriller about a tractor historian besieged by man-eating potatoes.David Schickler's "Jamaica"performed by Isaiah ShefferA man with his head stuck between the banisters has no choice but to listen in on his wife's "Gorgon Book Club."Neil Gaiman's "Chivalry"performe...

**A New York Times Bestseller**“May be the most revealing depiction of the American contemporary classroom that we have to date." —Garret Keizer, The New York Times Book ReviewBestselling author Nicholson Baker, in pursuit of the realities of American public education, signed up as a substitute teacher in a Maine public school district.In 2014, after a brief orientation course and a few fingerprint...

Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, Nicholson Baker has established himself as one of our most brilliant observers of everyday experience. With his keen perception, flawless prose, and endless wit, he has composed both fiction and nonfiction that has become an essential part of our literature.Vintage Baker contains generous selections from the novels Vox*,* The Fermata*,* The Mezzanine*,* andA...

A new novel by bestselling author Nicholson Baker reintroduces feckless but hopeful hero Paul Chowder, whose struggle to get his life together is reflected in his steadfast desire to write a pop song, or a protest song, or both at once.

Provides a comprehensive review of best practice in sugarcane cultivation across the value chain from planting through to post-harvest operationsAssesses alternative uses of sugarcane for bioenergy and other applicationsAssesses the environmental impact of sugarcane cultivation

TOGETHER FOR THE FIRST TIME, BOTH OF NICHOLSON BAKER’S BRILLIANT NOVELS FEATURING BELOVED HERO AND POET PAUL CHOWDERA New York Times notable book and a national bestseller, Nicholson Baker’s The Anthologist introduces his quirkiest and most unforgettable protagonist yet, the “erudite, unpretentious, and often hilarious” (The New Yorker) Paul Chowder.Chowder really needs to write an introduction to his new anthology of verse, O...

“A seriously funny book.”—Salman Rushdie“It pulverized me.”—Hernan DiazAn elegant, refreshed edition of Nicholson Baker’s stunning and highly influential first novel, a witty and boundlessly inventive homage to the profound, neglected details of everyday working lifeThe Mezzanine is a novel told through one man’s ride up an escalator in the office building where he works. In the hands of Nicholson Baker, th...

Nicholson Baker’s stunning and highly influential first novel, a witty and boundlessly inventive homage to the profound, neglected details of everyday working life.The Mezzanine is a novel told through one man’s ride up an escalator in the office building where he works. In the hands of Nicholson Baker, the bestselling and award-winning author of Vox and The Anthologist, this journey is transformed into a stylistically dazzling reappraisal of the objects ...