The Baltimore Sun’s weekly bestseller lists of fiction, non-fiction, biography, lifestyle, political, children’s and young adult books are compiled by staff members of Skyhorse Publishing based on publishing houses’, booksellers’, online retailers’ and other sources’ sales data covering the week ending June 8. The reviews and recommendations are compiled by Skyhorse Publishing staff. The Sun welcomes suggestions on local authors to feature via email at books@baltsun.com.
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Bestsellers
Fiction
The First Gentleman: A Thriller
Bill Clinton and James Patterson
Little, Brown and Company (June 2, 2025)
The President of the United States is up for reelection.
Her husband is on trial for murder.
Is the First Gentleman a killer?
Never Flinch
Stephen King
Scribner (May 27, 2025)
The Tenant
Freida McFadden
Poisoned Pen Press (May 6, 2025)
The Housemaid
Freida McFadden
Grand Central Publishing (August 23, 2022)
One Golden Summer
Carley Fortune
Berkley (May 6, 2025)
The Nightingale: A Novel
Kristin Hannah
St. Martin’s Griffin (April 25, 2017)
Atmosphere: A GMA Book Club Pick: A Love Story
Taylor Jenkins Reid
Ballantine Books (June 3, 2025)
Onyx Storm
Rebecca Yarros
Entangled: Red Tower Books (January 21, 2025)
The Women
Kristin Hannah
St. Martin’s Griffin (February 6, 2024)
Nightshade
Michael Connelly
Little, Brown and Company (May 20, 2025)
Non-fiction: Biography & autobiography
Mark Twain
Ron Chernow
Penguin Press (May 13, 2025)
Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis
J.D. Vance
Harper Paperbacks (May 1, 2018)
Big Dumb Eyes: Stories from a Simpler Mind
Nate Bargatze
Grand Central Publishing (May 6, 2025)
Uncommon Favor: Basketball, North Philly, My Mother, and the Life Lessons I Learned from All Three
Dawn Staley
Atria/Black Privilege Publishing (May 20, 2025)
Be Ready When the Luck Happens
Ina Garten
Crown (October 1, 2024)
Non-fiction: Self-help & advice
The Let Them Theory
Mel Robbins and Sawyer Robbins
Hay House LLC (December 24, 2024)
Dad, I Want to Hear Your Story
Jeffrey Mason
Independently Published (May 27, 2019)
Atomic Habits
James Clear
Avery (October 16, 2018)
The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma
Bessel van der Kolk M.D.
Penguin Books (September 8, 2015)
Mom, I Want to Hear Your Story
Jeffrey Mason
Independently Published (July 19, 2019)
Non-fiction: Lifestyle
The Book of Unusual Knowledge
Publications International, Ltd.
Publications International, Ltd. (April 1, 2012)
The Wishbone Kitchen Cookbook
Meredith Hayden
Ten Speed Press (May 6, 2025)
The New Menopause
Mary Claire Haver, MD
Rodale Books (April 30, 2024)
Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health
Casey Means, MD
Avery (May 14, 2024)
Good Energy offers a new, cutting-edge understanding of the true cause of illness that until now has remained hidden. It will help you optimize your ability to live well and stay well at every age.
What to Expect When You’re Expecting: (Updated in 2024)
Heidi Murkoff
Workman Publishing Company (May 31, 2016)
Left, right, and center
Butler: The Untold Story of the Near Assassination of Donald Trump and the Fight for America’s Heartland
Salena Zito
Center Street (July 8, 2025)
Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again
Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson
Penguin Press (May 20, 2025)
The Psychology of Money: Timeless lessons on wealth, greed, and happiness
Morgan Housel
Harriman House (September 8, 2020)
The 48 Laws of Power
Robert Greene
Penguin Books (September 1, 2000)
I Will Teach You to Be Rich
Ramit Sethi
Workman Publishing Company (May 14, 2019)
Abundance
Ezra Klein
Avid Reader Press/ Simon & Schuster (March 18, 2025)
Trump’s Triumph: America’s Greatest Comeback
Newt Gingrich
Center Street (June 3, 2025)
Meditations
Marcus Aurelius, translation by James Harris
Independently Published (November 7, 2016)
The Disenlightenment: Politics, Horror, and Entertainment
David Mamet
Bradside Books (June 3, 2025)
The Constitution of the United States and The Declaration of Independence
Delegates of The Constitutional Convention
Racehorse (October 11, 2016)
Children’s
Oh, the Places You’ll Go!
Dr. Seuss
Random House Books for Young Readers (January 22, 1990)
Why a Daughter Needs a Dad
Gregory E. Lang and Susanna Leonard Hill
Sourcebooks Wonderland (May 7, 2019)
Why a Son Needs a Dad
Gregory E. Lang and Susanna Leonard Hill
Sourcebooks Wonderland (April 1, 2021)
The Very Hungry Caterpillar
Eric Carle
World of Eric Carle (March 23, 1994)
See You Later, Alligator
Sally Hopgood
Sky Pony (September 20, 2016)
Young adult
Sunrise on the Reaping
Suzanne Collins
Scholastic Press (March 18, 2025)
Releasing 10 (Deluxe Edition)
Chloe Walsh
Bloom Books (May 27, 2025)
The Outsiders
S. E. Hinton
Viking Books for Young Readers (April 20, 2006)
Lord of the Flies
William Golding
Penguin Books (December 16, 2003)
Fearless
Lauren Roberts
Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers (April 8, 2025)
Recommended Books
Uncovering Your Path: Spiritual Reflections for Finding Your Purpose
Charles Lattimore Howard
Morehouse Publishing (May 6, 2025)
From an Ivy-League university chaplain comes a profound collection of spiritual reflections designed for people everywhere, including recent college graduates, looking to find their “way” and their “why.”
“Who am I?”, “What is my purpose?”, and “What should I do with my life?” are questions that all of us find ourselves asking at some point or another. In this deeply transformative and lyrical book, Charles “Chaz” Lattimore Howard offers a helpful guide as we venture to answer these questions for ourselves, inviting us to slow down, to actually walk the journey of life, and to allow our path to reveal itself to us. From an enlightening conversation with a Jain college student about the principle of non-violence to a heartwarming episode coaching basketball to an anxious school-aged child, Chaz shares how everyday moments can help you discern your purpose in the universe. Bolstered with poignant anecdotes that follow Chaz’s journey as a priest, professor, student, parent, spouse, social justice advocate, and religious leader, Uncovering Your Path will fill you with renewed vigor, inspire introspection, and encourage you to find your place in God’s world.
How Countries Go Broke: The Big Cycle (Principles)
Ray Dalio
Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster (June 3, 2025)
Do big government debts threaten our collective well-being? Are there limits to debt growth? Can a big, important reserve currency country like the United States really go broke—and what would that look like?
For decades, politicians, policymakers, and investors have debated these questions, but the answers have eluded them. In this groundbreaking book, Ray Dalio, one of the greatest investors of our time who anticipated the 2008 global financial crisis and the 2010–12 European debt crisis, shares for the first time his detailed explanation of what he calls the “Big Debt Cycle.” Understanding this cycle is critical for helping policymakers, investors, and the general public grasp where we are and where we are headed with the debt issue. Dalio’s model points toward surprisingly straightforward solutions for dealing with the debt problems that the US, Europe, Japan, and China face today.
How Countries Go Broke also shows how these debt problems are related to the other forces—political within countries, geopolitical between countries, natural (droughts, floods, and pandemics), and technological (most importantly, AI)—that together are causing what Dalio calls the “Overall Big Cycle” changes in the world order. By reading this book, you will improve your understanding of what’s happening now and what to do about it.
Metabolic Freedom: A 30-Day Guide to Restore Your Metabolism, Heal Hormones & Burn Fat
Ben Azadi
Hay House LLC (May 13, 2025)
Founder of Keto Kamp and health expert reveals the main reason why 93 percent of Americans are metabolically unhealthy, and provides a 30-day reset to restore their metabolism for good.
Metabolic Freedom is for those who are fed up with the failed diet dogma of fad diets, calorie counting and excessive exercise, and are looking to finally break free with a new paradigm on how to reset their metabolism to achieve metabolic freedom.
With Metabolic Freedom, readers will understand how their metabolism works, and the top contributors to why their metabolism has become inefficient, and then deep dive into all of the main factors that influence a free metabolism, including:
- the power of keto fasting
- improved sleep
- cutting edge bio-hacks
- mindset shifts
- smart exercise routines
- specific food swaps
- and more.
This book will also explore the way hormones impact these processes as they impact male and female bodies differently.
Most importantly, all of these tools are combined at the end of the book for the user to start implementing a clear roadmap to achieve Metabolic Freedom within 30 days by customizing their own plan.
Nobody Wants Your Sh*t: The Art of Decluttering Before You Die
Messie Condo
Skyhorse Publishing (March 7, 2023)
Free yourself and your family from the f*cking clutter before you croak!
Inspired by The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning, Nobody Wants Your Sh*t will light a fire under your untidy ass with humor and helpful organizing tips that you’ll actually want to use.
Like a delightfully foul-mouthed best friend, this book dishes out the funny, unpretentious advice you need to hear most. You’ll discover how to deal with your sh*t like there’s no tomorrow, live in the moment without the f*cking mess, and make your life and your eventual death a hell of a lot easier. With this witty guide, you’ll learn how to:
- ditch the d*mn indecision
- get your sh*t together and feel fantastic
- give your busy family a f*cking break
- and more!
Whether you’re getting ready to move in, move on, or just move your ass, Nobody Wants Your Sh*t will help you take control of your f*cking life.
Bruce Wagner’s Pick of the Week
The Great Pyramids: Collected Stories
by Frederick Bathelme, Foreword by Bret Easton Ellis
Arcade (April 8, 2025)
Like a mythic underground river, Frederick Barthelme’s influence shaped and nourished American literature from the moment his short stories appeared in The New Yorker in 1981. He was thirty-eight years old; until then, he was in a psychedelic noise band and was a conceptual artist. (The river runs deep.) In the foreword to The Great Pyramids, you learn something unexpected about the fauna and flora fed by those mystical, deceptively meandering, wry, absurdist, warm-cold Barthelmean springs. Bret Easton Ellis writes, “I can remember with a lasting clarity, flashes of Barthelme’s influence on both The Informers, a collection of short stories I wrote during 1981–1986 while a student at Bennington, as well as my first novel Less Than Zero.” Barthelme has been called a minimalist (convenient for lazy critics), but in any estimation, he’s a maximalist in his breadth and apprehension of the Human Tragicomedy. Minimalism may connote a kind of ephemera; the work of Barthelme has maximalist legs, and a timeless heart and soul that endures, towering over the ruins of lesser artists. The Great Pyramids, a collection of many of his stories (which includes early classics such as “Cut Glass,” “Aluminum House,” and “Shopgirls,” as well as later works—“Retreat” and “Socorro”—and previously unpublished stories) arrives like an essential, marine-celestial gift to drown the broken landscape of much of contemporary literature. The gift card reads, You won’t be able to do what I do—but come on. Try and do something extraordinary.
Book of the Week
Selective Persecution: The Legalization of American Fascism
by Simone Gold, Foreword by Dennis Prager
Skyhorse Publishing (June 3, 2025)
Simone Gold, MD, JD is an emergency physician and Stanford University-educated attorney. She is the founder of America’s Frontline Doctors (AFLDS) and of GoldCare®. She is the author of I Do Not Consent: My Fight Against Medical Cancel Culture, and in her documentary, What Is a Doctor? Dr. Gold engages in the culture war being waged against families.
“Selective Persecution is a chilling exposé of America’s two-tiered justice system, where due process is sacrificed for political vengeance. This is something I know about firsthand, and a recurring theme exposed in my movies. With firsthand experience and meticulous detail, Dr. Gold unveils how J6 defendants have been subjected to government overreach reminiscent of authoritarian regimes—SWAT raids, indefinite detention, and Orwellian surveillance. But the punishment extends far beyond the courtroom: financial ruin, public shaming, and blacklisting serve as extra-judicial tools of intimidation. This book is a warning. If constitutional rights can be stripped from some, they can be stripped from all.”
—Dinesh D’Souza, author and filmmaker
“My life’s work has been to observe why and when people do the right thing. Dr. Simone Gold has chosen to consistently act ethically despite overwhelming obstacles against doing so. She stared down the medical cabal, she saved thousands of lives when public health government officials misled the world, and she repeatedly took heroic action when other doctors were silent. Gold’s firsthand account demands that we pay attention to the brutal reality of political imprisonment, state-sponsored intimidation, and the silencing of dissent. This book is more than a personal story—it is a warning and a call to action. Read this and take a stand.
—Eric Metaxas, New York Times bestselling author of Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy and Letter to the American Church
An Excerpt from Selective Persecution
In 2020, I decided to sidestep the media and organize doctors and social media influencers to meet in Washington, DC, for a White Coat Summit. This was an entire day of physicians educating, lecturing, speaking on topics such as masks, lockdowns, schools, children, the healthy elderly, the frail elderly, early treatment, and Africa models. In the middle of the education day, we walked over to the Supreme Court steps and held a press conference. In eight hours, we had 20 million views, becoming the most rapidly viral video of all time.
Between seven and eight ET that night, all the big tech companies deplatformed us within one hour of each other. All these different companies, ostensibly competitors, acted as a single entity. Our 20 million views just stopped—we were suddenly off Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, even LinkedIn, Squarespace, everywhere. And then within hours, I was attacked by everyone, and I mean everyone. There wasn’t anyone sizable who didn’t slander me. I was a quack, a lunatic, fringe, right wing, conspiracy theorist, evil, you name it. And my personal life trajectory changed overnight.
The day before, strangers applauded my heroism. The day after, I was mocked.
The day before, I ran the COVID ward in two hospitals. The day after, I was fired.
The day before, I had a pristine reputation. The day after, I did not.
You cannot find a negative word printed about me until that date. Now you search my name in any browser and lies about me abound. The defamation intensified into outright persecution after January 6. (Here’s a nifty trick. When doing a Google search, if you want a more accurate result, include “before:2020” at the beginning of your search. Presto—the disinformation disappears.)
Over the years many people have asked me how I emotionally coped with the massive attacks on my character. It certainly helped to stay laser focused on more important objectives. But my faith also protected me. Let me share a story, which I learned in my childhood.
In a small town in Eastern Europe lived a man who gossiped. He knew it was wrong, but it was too tempting. One day he shared a story about a businessman who eventually went to the rabbi of the town and complained that he was ruined. His good name and his reputation were gone with the wind. The rabbi decided to summon the gossipy man.
When the man heard from the rabbi how devastated his neighbor was, he felt remorse. “What can I do to make it undone?” he sobbed. “I will do anything you say!” The rabbi said: “Bring me a feather pillow from your house.” The man was mystified, but he did as instructed. The rabbi opened the window and handed him a knife. “Cut it open.”
The man cut the pillow. A cloud of feathers came out. They landed on the chairs, on the bookcase, and on the clock. They floated over the table and into the teacups, on the rabbi and on the man with the knife, and most of them flew out of the window in a big swirling, whirling trail. The rabbi waited ten minutes. Then he ordered the man: “Now bring me back all the feathers, and stuff them back in your pillow. All of them, mind you. Not one may be missing.”
The man stared at the rabbi. “That is impossible. The feathers in the room I might get, but the ones that flew out of the window are gone. Rabbi, I can’t do that, you know it.”
“Yes,” said the rabbi and nodded gravely, “that is how it is: Once a rumor, a gossipy story, a ‘secret,’ whether true or false, leaves your mouth, you do not know where it ends up. It flies on the wings of the wind, and you can never get it back.”
When I faced massive defamation, it helped that I already knew that, although it was unfair, there was very little I could do to change it. Armed with that foreknowledge, I made the practical and emotionally healthy choice not to focus on it.
I was a victim of cancel culture. That is the modern version of severe defamation. I had been both digitally assassinated—my website was canceled—and persona non grata with many people, including my employers who fired me. I had had the audacity to not follow tyrannical orders about what to think, say, or do. I acted as though I was a citizen who is free to speak the truth.
George Orwell famously observed that “freedom is the freedom to say two plus two make four.” Why did he not say “freedom is the freedom to say two plus two make five?” Because tyrants don’t care about people who speak falsely. False words don’t gain traction like true words do. Only Truth could have gotten 20 million views in eight hours. That I was so censored and so persecuted is proof positive that there are extremely vested interests in keeping the truth hidden.
I knew the medical truth because of my training, my education, my experience, and I was uniquely able to save lives by speaking of what I knew. So of course I spoke up. Even if I had known the defamation and persecution that was going to befall me, I would make the same choice. This is why I write this book: to encourage you to recognize the moments in your life when you should speak up no matter the cost. You can get through persecution. But you will not emerge intact when you silence yourself.
Because there was so much urgency, because people’s parents, grandparents, and siblings were in jeopardy, I felt compelled to keep speaking publicly. Prior to 2020, I had lived my whole life as a private citizen. But I am a doctor. My knowledge could save people’s lives. My words needed to be heard.
Since I was censored on social media, I spoke in person everywhere I could. I spoke in churches, in restaurants, before state legislatures. I spoke at civic meetings, I spoke to community groups, I spoke at rallies. I always spoke of what I knew from my education, training, and experience. There are no speeches by me on politics, elections, election fraud, the 2020 election. I spoke on medical freedom, on the true medical facts, and about every person’s inalienable right to make their own medical choices. And so of course I accepted an invitation to speak at the Capitol on January 6 because there would be a large audience.
I personally was not there for any reason other than to save lives. I realize this may seem irrational to others. But that is my story. I was one of twenty scheduled speakers, including various congressmen who were all canceled at the last moment, and so I started to speak from where I was—at the top of the Capitol steps. That is why I was in our nation’s capital on January 6, 2021.This is when the words against me turned from mockery and contempt to aggressive persecution. That is where this story begins.