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It's that time of year again; time for fun with family, rest, relaxation, and decadent dishes! The Penguin Online group has put together a collection of our very best recipes from some of our very best cookbooks to help you and yours celebrate Thanksgiving.

Avoid a Thanksgiving disaster: if any of these scenarios hit close to home, you'll be thankful for Penguin Recipes, a wonderful collection of recipes chosen from some of our most popular cookbooks!

Scenario 1: Your 67-year-old Aunt Cleo, who was supposed to cook Thanksgiving dinner, eloped with her 22-year-old masseur and is now honeymooning in Fiji! You are stuck cooking Thanksgiving dinner for 15 people and have NO recipes or cookbooks at home. Penguin Recipes will give you some delicious ideas to help you save the day while your aunt catches rays.

Scenario 2: Your cousin Lauren, aka "Little Miss Perfect," has always made the hors d'oeuvres on Thanksgiving night and, of course, they've always been perfect. This year she's studying for her MCAT (yes, she's decided to go to medical school) so you'll have to handle the appetizers. To absolutely knock everyone's socks off and get the relatives talking about how great YOU are, consult Penguin Recipes.

In writing the book there was never any problem finding enough information about walking and walkers. The problem was always more about what to leave out than what to include. I'm happy to stand by the decisions I made. But every now and then I find a new snippet of information and I'm disappointed that it's too late to include it in the book.

For instance I just saw an interview with Richard Branson, in Parade magazine. They asked, "Are Americans too afraid of taking risks?" And Branson replied, "People do need to be a bit braver. When I was 4 years old, my mother dropped me out of the car to walk three miles to my grandmother's house-to find my own way." Wha?

I would love to have been a fly on the wall of granny's house when young Richard walked in the door: I'm assuming he did walk in the door, though the interview doesn't actually say so. I wonder what kind of celebrations they had.

My other recent discovery, on just reading Bran Stoker's "Dracula" - for the first time I'm ashamed to admit - is that an awful lot of trouble starts because Lucy Westenra, who is quite the sexy minx, goes sleep walking, that's when Dracula gets her, bites her in the neck and turns her into one of his vampires. A lesson learned there.

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Penguin Group (USA) Launches "What to Give & What to Get," A Chance for Readers to Find out which Books Their Favorite Authors will Give this Holiday Season

Elizabeth Gilbert, Khaled Hosseini, Geraldine Brooks, Nick Hornby, Jan Karon, Michael Pollan, Stuart Woods and Mike Lupica Are Among the New York Times Bestselling, Award-winning Penguin Group (USA) Authors Sharing Their Personal "Wish Lists" for Giving Books this Holiday

New York, New York, November 25, 2008 ... Penguin Group (USA) has announced the launch of "What to Give & What to Get," a chance for consumers to get an inside look at the books on the personal wish lists of some of their favorite authors this holiday season. Close to forty beloved authors from across Penguin Group (USA) have shared the books current or classic, and from any publisher, that make up their personal holiday gift lists this year, for readers everywhere as this year's shopping season begins.

Elizabeth Gilbert, Khaled Hosseini, Geraldine Brooks, Nick Hornby, Jan Karon, Michael Pollan, Stuart Woods, Mike Lupica, Jan Brett, W.E.B. Griffin, Nathaniel Philbrick and many other New York Times bestselling, award-winning Penguin Group (USA) writers participated in the campaign and were asked to share the books that they both would like to give and to receive this season. The resulting messages, heartwarming, humorous and generous of spirit are posted on the Penguin website for public viewing. "Important, Elegant, Affordable. This holiday, change a life, give a book" posters and marketing materials are being offered by Penguin Group (USA) sales representatives to booksellers, who also are free to download the materials off the Penguin bookseller site for display in their stores. This campaign is to help customers who are shopping for the perfect books to give as gifts this year, and to help drive consumer traffic into bookstores throughout the holiday season.

» Danielle Younge-Ullman will discuss her writing process as an actress-turned-writer and will read an excerpt.

» Listen to other Penguin Podcasts.

» Read more about Falling Under by Danielle Younge-Ullman

Danielle Younge-Ullman, Falling Under, Podcast

This is the blog for my new book The Lost Art of Walking, a personal wander (stroll? meander? peregrination?) through the history, science, literature, photography, even performance art, of walking.

A couple of early reviews - and I'm told that early reviews mean nothing - seemed to find the book curiously benign. Kirkus Reviews used the word "amiable." Publishers Weekly said "genial."

This came as a bit of a shock. I'd rather fancied myself as the mad dog of pedestrianism, snarling and howling as I strode manically down mean streets and alleyways of perambulation. Still, trust the tale not the teller, I suppose.

The fiercest walker I've ever met is Bruce Gilden, a New York street photography. He not only seems to regard walking as a struggle and a conflict, but sometimes as hand to hand combat. Perhaps he's the walker I'd like to be. There's an interview with Bruce in the book.

It contains a consideration of street photography, and about the way that street photographers do a great deal of walking and inevitably photograph a great number of walkers. I make no claims for myself as a photographer, but I did take a lot of photographs as wrote this book. They're available here on Youtube as a plug-cum-trailer for The Lost Art of Walking.

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Geoff Nicholson is our guest blogger during the week of November 24th. If you have any questions for Geoff Nicholson, add a comment to any of his posts. Here is some more information about The Lost Art of Walking:

A fascinating, definitive, and very personal rumination on the history, science, philosophy, art, and literature of walking, by a skilled cultural commentator.

Geoff Nicholson, author of Bleeding London and Sex Collectors, turns his eye to the intellectual and cultural history of that most common of activities-walking. This simple, omnipresent activity has inspired numerous subcultures, literary and artistic legacies, sporting events, personal memories, epic journeys, mystical revelations, and scandals.

It's a rich tradition that embraces such novelists as Charles Dickens and Paul Auster, musicians like Robert Johnson and Bob Dylan, and moviemakers from Buster Keaton to Werner Herzog. But it's also a tradition that includes obsessives and eccentrics, such as the artist Mudman, who coats his body in mud and then walks the city streets; competitive pedestrians such as Captain Barclay, who walked one mile an hour for a thousand successive hours; and gang members who use the hidden language of the "Crip Walk" to spell out messages in the dirt with their scuffing. How we walk, where we walk, why we walk announces who and what we are.

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November 22, 2008 marks the 45^th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's assassination in Dallas, TX. While we may never know the truth about what happened, here is a selection of books to help you learn some interesting facts about JFK's life—from the people who knew him best—to conspiracy theorists alike.

First, you can listen to the words of President John F. Kennedy: History comes alive through the voices of the great leaders and newsmakers and in the photos of the biggest events of the past 100 years. From Winston Churchill and John F. Kennedy to Martin Luther King, Jr. and General Douglas MacArthur, Words that Shook the World is a collection of history-shaping speeches by some of the world's most exceptional orators.

Read the words of President John F. Kennedy: These are Americans who had something important to say—and said it in powerful, convincing ways. A compendium of commentary, criticism, and oratory excellence from throughout the nation’s history, The Signet Book of American Essays is a perfect resource for those searching for the most timeless essays ever conceived by America’s notable scientists, philosophers, politicians, and writers.

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