With his signature straightforward candor, Washington D.C. infrastructure guru Norman F. Anderson unleashes a fascinating, nation-saving plan for the future that is rooted in two questions: What will the U.S. look like in 2030, and what do we want it to look like? Anderson's analysis is driven by the crisis facing America as the cornerstones of society - vast, fast highways; power stations; and telecommunications networks - languish from lack of funds, while the huge opportunity in new infrastructure, including AI, 5G, and new forms of mobility, are set-up to drive extraordinary productive and opportunity across the U.S. economy. What do we need? Leadership, political will, and, ultimately an engaging vision. The answers he offers are equal parts inspiring, terrifying and utterly sensible. In twelve chapters, Anderson explores the nature and power of vision, demonstrating that, as the Fourth Industrial Revolution unfolds in real-time, driven by 5G, machine learning and AI, infrastructure must become the essential strategic pillar of American society - one that, if built and nurtured, will bolster our economy, job market, national security and quality of life. It's where the battlefield on which our bifurcated battle with China is being played out. Anderson uncovers the vast obstacles that have crippled infrastructure growth in the U.S. over the last thirty years and talks to industry veterans and cutting edge-technologists about shifting from a broken system to one that works - and one that will once again allow the U.S. to drive infrastructure growth around the world (especially in the critical areas of health and mobility). Along the way, he shares the mind-bending projects of the future that are under development, explains the dangers of failing to counter China's explosive infrastructure growth, and provides our leaders in Washington with a ten-point plan to remake America as an infrastructure leader. Engaging, timely and daring, Vision: Our Strategic Infrastructure Roadmap Forward turns the stereotyped perceptions of infrastructure on their head. Infrastructure is not tedious subject-matter for wonks who love constructing roads and power-lines - it is core to our economic and social strategy, the DNA that will define our society. And this book is an eye-opening treatise on how to create a future that works for all of us.

Vision: Our Strategic Infrastructure Roadmap Forward

Business & Money

Kaufman, Seth

Anderson, Norman F

Processes & Infrastructure

Strategic Infrastructure Performance Institut

Seth Kaufman (Centric)

University Art Museum, California State University, Long Beach

"One of 2012's most enjoyable novels." --Neil Genzlinger, The New York Times "This is a dark, sharp, very funny novel about imprisonment, torture and the dangerous pleasures of stories." --Zoe Heller, Notes on a Scandal "Seth Kaufman's novel is a hoot and a boot, a zany, unsettling, satisfying, post post-modern, tragic-comic tour of prisons around the world and pain in the human heart. Start it and you won't stop. If you're a claustrophobe, read it out-of-doors." --John Darnton, Neaderthal  A riotously funny portrait of an out-of-control entertainment mogul and a devastating look at torture and imprisonment, The King of Pain is part Jennifer Egan, part Italo Calvino, part "Entourage," and 100% marvelous.  Rick Salter expects to be hated; after all, he’s the mind behind the outrageous—and outrageously successful—reality TV show about torture, “The King of Pain.” What he finds much more worrisome than the ire of cultural critics is that when he wakes up one Saturday morning, he’s trapped underneath his gigantic home entertainment system with no idea how he got there. Rick has 48 long hours ahead of him until his housekeeper will come to his rescue and nothing to pass the time except pain, bad memories—and a strange book he finds lying beside him. Called “A History of Prisons,” it is written by one Seth Kaufman, and it seems mysteriously relevant to Rick’s predicament…

The King of Pain: A Novel with Stories

Literature & Fiction

Humor & Satire

Sukuma Books

The Most Hilarious Man in Hollywood Is Unarmed and Dangerous!“A smart, witty and engrossing satire! Kaufman is a wonderfully sharp-eyed observer of modern American lunacies." —Zoe Heller, Notes on a Scandal
"Literary gold!" The year’s best new reality show concept is actually a book... It's as hilarious as it sounds!"—RadarOnLine.com"Rick is a charismatic antihero bolstered by credible side characters, and in the midst of Kaufman’s sardonic humor, there rings out an earnest outcry for gun reform." — Publishers Weekly Out-of-control producer Rick Salter wants to leave reality TV behind, get married and make movies. But it’s not easy. When a senseless murder touches his life, Rick knows exactly what to do — enlist his pal Sister Rosemarie to make a TV series called Nuns with Guns, about four nuns competing to collect the most firearms. Protests and death threats pile up as the sisters travel the country running gun exchanges. Propelled by the show’s spirited stars and crazy stunts — and the shadow of death that looms over every episode — the series becomes a smash hit. As Rick pushes the envelope, trying to save America from itself, a question emerges: Who will save Rick? 
Laugh-out-loud funny, Nuns with Guns is sure to appeal to fans of Carl Hiaasen and Kurt Vonnegut. Seth Kaufman explores deadly national issues by deftly balancing satire with anxiety and insight. The result is a riotous and disturbing must-read!"Kaufman has done the impossible: he's turned a foul-mouthed, PR-savvy, manipulative, selfish, and occasionally self-righteous reality show producer into a heroic figure. Highly, highly recommended."—Chicago Center for Literature and Photography"A hilarious, moving sequel...one of the most relevant, timely novels you'll read this year."--Downtown Magazine"Kaufman's humor and scope in Nuns with Guns is more vibrant than the pure satire of The King of Pain. He's not making fun of America here so much as trying to improve it."--Tom Rayfiel, In Pinelight

Nuns with Guns

Literary

"Great fun!"—Ben Schott, author of Schott’s Original Miscellany "Sharp satire with a poetic heart"—The B&N Review "Seth Kaufman's War Against Boredom is a great antidote to this Kardashianized landscape of selfie-sticks, ISIS attacks, and billionaire presidential wannabes. With lacerating satire, these short stories, riffs, and other insanities will make you laugh. Only our hashtags and Instagram pics can save us now." -- Karl Wolff, The Driftless Area Review The War Against Boredom, by newyorker.com humor contributor Seth Kaufman, is a hilarious and wildly inventive assault on the mind-numbing effects of the modern world. Reverse-engineering obsessions with Big Data, the Internet, movies, coffee shops, pot, spying, rock stars, relationships and sex scandals, Kaufman morphs reality into comedy with 21 short stories and satirical columns. It's a must-read for fans of the author's acclaimed novel The King of Pain and anyone who likes adventurous humor writing. Notable skirmishes in The War Against Boredom: • A husband hires a business consultant to help improve his marriage. • An assistant engineer recalls working with Michael Jackson, Freddie Mercury and a llama. • An insurance actuary becomes a star by decoding the odds for the Academy Awards. • A caustic National Security Administration advice columnist answers questions and exposes employees. • Cheech and Chong reunite over a golden hookah. • A hardcore techie conducts a bizarre old school search for love in “Segway in Overdrive.”

The War Against Boredom: Short Stores, Riffs, Insanities

Humor & Entertainment

Humor

Geoff and Mitchell Schwartz are the NFL’s most improbable pair of offensive linemen. They started their football careers late, not playing a down of organized football until they joined their low-key high school program. Despite all that, they wound up at top-tier college programs and became the first Jewish brothers in the league since 1923.
In Eat My Schwartz, Geoff and Mitch talk about the things that have made them the extraordinary people that they are: their close-knit and supportive family, their Jewish faith and traditions, their love of the game and drive for excellence and, last but not least, the food they love to eat, whether at home or on the road. Theirs is an inspiring story not just for every football fan but for everybody wanting to figure out what it takes for dreams to come true―and how to stay well-fed throughout the process.

Eat My Schwartz: Our Story of NFL Football, Food, Family, and Faith

Biographies & Memoirs

Schwartz, Geoff

Schwartz, Mitch

Professionals & Academics

St.Martin's Press

A hilarious, multi-layered, modern mashup of Don Quixote, Cold Comfort Farm, and The Thirteenth Tale, The Seductive Lady Vanessa of Manhattanshire is an ingenious must-read for fans of romantic fiction, literary satire, and books about books. Famous Arabic translator Oona Noor receives a mysterious manuscript from Cairo entitled The Seductive Lady Vanessa of Manhattanshire and realizes she has discovered a masterpiece. The book, written by an unknown author named Aisha Benengeli, spins the tale of Maxine More, a divorced, romance novel-obsessed New Yorker who envisions herself as a Georgian Lady and sees the world entirely through the prism of her beloved books. Designating her cleaning lady Magdalena Cruz as her lady-in-waiting, Lady Vee embarks on a series of misadventures. She mistakes a plumber for a famous alpha male; pursues her poodle-owning crush, Nelson Dodge; dispenses misguided advice to the lovelorn and goes man-hunting on New York's Upper East Side. Heartbroken when the manuscript ends abruptly, translator Noor journeys to Cairo, hunts for the concluding pages, and uncovers a stunning confession from Lady Vee's creator Benengeli about her own romantic troubles. As the author struggles to find happiness for her crazed character and herself, the translator desperately searches for the elusive writer. In the end, this delightfully inventive novel unspools three tales about three very different women, each on a quest for a perfect love story.

The Seductive Lady Vanessa of Manhattanshire: A Novel

Dramas & Plays

Post Hill Press

A provocative, entertaining but ultimately serious examination of rock's most essential questions: Beatles or Stones? Which is the best air guitar to play? Does Rush suck? And what is the meaning of Billy Joel? Metaphysical Graffiti is a book for music fans, humor fans, and, if a meaningful ontological category, fans of philosophy too. It is a provocative, inflammatory, hilarious, but ultimately serious book about the essential questions of rock―Beatles or Stones? What Kind of Air Guitar Do You Play? Does Rush Suck? and, of course, The Meaning of Billy Joel. In a rich mix of original pieces, Kaufman not only examines the essential issues facing all rock fans, but delves into the deeper, metaphysical roots of these questions. The book's title is a riff on the classic Led Zeppelin album, Physical Graffiti, while the book itself is an innovative, critical work that in many ways mirrors the best rock 'n' roll. Funny, audacious, irreverent, and relentlessly creative, it stretches the parameters of traditional criticism by incorporating short fiction, "Moronic Dialogues," and even a short mini-play, "Godot, The Musical," in order to explore philosophical concepts of Reality, Authenticity, Hype, and, ultimately, the purpose of music criticism itself.

Metaphysical Graffiti: Rock 'n' Roll and the Meaning of Life

Pop Culture

OR Books

VISION: Our Strategic Infrastructure Roadmap Forward

Economics

Independently published

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Books by Kaufman, Seth