PAGE 8 • GO! MAGAZINE
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 2021 • THE BULLETIN
national bestsellers
Here are the bestsellers for the week that ended
Saturday, Feb. 13, compiled from data from
independent and chain bookstores, book wholesalers
and independent distributors nationwide.
HARDCOVER FICTION
1. The Four Winds. Kristin Hannah. St. Martin’s
2. Faithless in Death. J.D. Robb. St. Martin’s
3. The Sanatorium. Sarah Pearse. Viking/Dorman
4. The Vanishing Half. Brit Bennett. Riverhead
5. The Midnight Library. Matt Haig. Viking
6. The Russian. Patterson/Born. Little, Brown
7. The Invisible Life of Addie Larue. V.E. Schwab. Tor
8. The Paris Library. Janet Skeslien Charles. Atria
9. In Love & Pajamas. Catana Chetwynd.
Continued from previous page
separately, and then write that section up,”
he said. “The other person will edit heavily.
… We’re both used to being edited. We don’t
take it personally.”
For “Tightrope,” WuDunn tackled more
of the stories from around the nation, while
Kristof interviewed and wrote about people
around his hometown of Yamhill, where he
grew up on a sheep and cherry farm before
attending Harvard and studying law at Ox-
ford University as a Rhodes scholar.
In addition to writing books, Kristof is
Andrews McMeel
10. The Return. Nicholas Sparks. Grand Central
HARDCOVER NONFICTION
1. Keep Sharp. Sanjay Gupta. Simon & Schuster
2. Walk in My Combat Boots. Patterson/Eversmann.
Little, Brown
3. Think Again. Adam Grant. Viking
4. A Promised Land. Barack Obama. Crown
5. Greenlights. Matthew McConaughey. Crown
6. Four Hundred Souls. Kendi/Blain. One World
7. Just as I Am. Cicely Tyson. HarperCollins
8. Caste. Isabel Wilkerson. Random House
9. Untamed. Glennon Doyle. Dial
10. Unmasked. Andy Ngo. Center Street
renowned for his travels and his opinion
writing in The New York Times. He’s been
called the Indiana Jones of journalism, as
well as its North Star. He’s traveled to dozens
of countries, creating a body of work that
has contributed to real change. His series of
columns on Darfur in 2005 helped to shine
a light on the genocide happening there and
netted him the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for com-
mentary.
Helping the world to notice what was
happening there is among his proudest ac-
complishments, Kristof said, but his im-
MASS MARKET
1. Reckless Road. Christine Feehan. Berkley
2. Rafael. Laurell K. Hamilton. Berkley
3. The Numbers Game. Danielle Steel. Dell
4. The Lost and Found Bookshop. Susan Wiggs. Avon
5. Long Range. C.J. Box. Putnam
6. The Sea Glass Cottage. RaeAnne Thayne. HQN
7. Highland Treasure. Lynsay Sands. Avon
8. Revenge. Patterson/Holmes. Grand Central
9. Perfect Partners. Debbie Macomber. Mira
10. Trailing a Killer. Carol J. Post. Love Inspired Suspense
TRADE PAPERBACK
1. Burn After Writing (pink). Sharon Jones.
portant work continues today. Last year, he
spent months investigating the video site
Pornhub, exposing flaws in site policies that
enabled unverified users to post videos de-
picting rape and underage victims in a Dec.
4 piece. As a result of Kristof’s work, Porn-
hub removed unverified videos within days,
reducing its content from 13.5 million vid-
eos to fewer than 3 million , according to a
CNN report.
While the pandemic curtailed the kind of
international travel he’s become known for,
Kristof did manage to travel domestically,
including a visit to the Navajo Nation and
time back in New York. Otherwise, they’ve
spent much of the past year at the family
farm where he grew up.
“We began doing our last book, ‘Tight-
rope,’ at the beginning of 2018, so we began
spending disproportionate time on the farm,
and, boy,” Kristof said, laughing, “it’s a lot nicer
being on the farm than in New York.”
Being in Yamhill keeps Kristof grounded,
he said.
“I really think that’s hugely important,” he
said. “Because in New York, I tend to be in a
fairly liberal bubble, and in Yamhill I tend to
be in a pretty conservative bubble. Because
while Oregon as a whole may be blue, the
town of Yamhill is pretty red. My neighbors
certainly tend to be pro-Trump conserva-
tives. And they have very different concerns.
It’s very useful for my reporting to be re-
minded of that and to see people who have
different perspectives.”
Kristof has addressed his neighbors directly
in columns such as “A Letter to My Conser-
vative Friends,” a Jan. 27 piece assuring neigh-
bors they won’t be sent to re education camps.
He implores them to pressure liberals for hon-
esty — and to apply the same pressure to the
“con artists waving flags” who have “hood-
winked, exploited and manipulated” them.
So he does what he can to mend fences.
“At a time when the whole country is so po-
larized, I can try to build my little bridges, but
also one by one with neighbors who I deeply
care about, even if they’re completely wrong
politically,” he said, laughing.
TarcherPerigee
2. Fair Warning. Michael Connelly.
Grand Central
3. Home Body. Rupi Kaur. Andrews McMeel
4. The Step-by-Step Instant Pot Cookbook. Jeffrey Eisner.
Voracious
5. 28 Summers. Elin Hilderbrand. Back Bay
6. The Girl from the Channel Islands. Jenny Lecoat.
Graydon House
7. The Body Is Not an Apology (second ed.). Sonya Renee
Taylor. Berrett-Koehler
8. The Dutch House. Ann Patchett. Harper Perennial
9. Circe. Madeline Miller. Back Bay
10. Firefly Lane (TV tie-in). Kristin Hannah. Griffin
If You Go
What: Author! Author! featuring a virtual
conversation with Pulitzer-winning authors
Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn
When: 7 p.m. March 4
Cost: $25 at dplfoundation.org/tickets
Contact: dplfoundation.org/author-author
Joking aside, Kristof does not write to
please other liberals. In fact, in that Jan. 27 col-
umn, he wrote “We need Republicans! Amer-
ica benefits from a loyal opposition,” and that
he believes Republicans have been more cor-
rect than many Democrats on matters such
as wanting to keep schools open during the
pandemic.
“I’ve particularly felt that a lot of work-
ing -class Americans have been neglected by
both parties,” he said. “And that a lot of con-
servatives are unsympathetic because they
say, ‘Pull yourself up by your bootstraps,’
‘ it’s all about bad choices.’ And a lot of liber-
als say, ‘Oh, they’re all bigots who voted for
Trump.’ I think both approaches are mistaken,
and that we should be doing less finger-point-
ing and more offering of helping hands.”
That’s not to suggest he liked it last year
when his more conspiratorially minded
neighbors thought antifa was responsible for
forest fires. One went so far as to call the sher-
iff’s office to report Kristof’s vehicle, “because
he thought I might be antifa setting forest
fires. It was like, holy-moly,” Kristof said.
“I have a real frustration and exasper-
ation with conspiracy theories, but I also
think that it doesn’t help to mock people. It
doesn’t help to insult them,” he said. “It’s got
to involve some process of conversation and
bridge-building, and I think actually cities
like Bend are in somewhat better condition
to do that. There are a lot of liberals in Bend
itself, but go a little bit in any direction, and
it’s all red country. So Bend is kind of on the
frontier of these kinds of discussions and ar-
guments.”
ý
David Jasper: 541-383-0349, djasper@bendbulletin.com