Recommended Books

WE ARE all CRIMINALS - BY Emily Baxter

We Are All Criminals weaves compelling photographs and first-person narrative with an incisive introduction to America’s criminal justice system, providing a look at how the policies and prejudices of the past and present are bankrupting our nation.

The book combines criminal justice statistics and statutes with photographs and personal stories to demonstrate the destruction caused by decades of mass criminalization, while leaving the reader with a sense of hope and inspiration to affect change. From the pediatrician who blew up a porta potty to the chiefs of police who burglarized a liquor distribution center to the countless students who smoked and sold pot, this photo-packed book is filled with stories of people who got away with crimes—and parallel stories of people laboring under the stigma of a criminal record. It’s an examination of criminality, privilege, punishment, and second chances. Woven throughout is incisive commentary on the havoc our carceral state has wreaked upon the nation; the disparate impact of our legal system on poor communities and communities of color; and the exploration of innumerable life barriers created by criminal and juvenile records. About the author: Emily Baxter is the founder and executive director of We Are All Criminals (WAAC). She has served as the director of advocacy and public policy at the Council on Crime and Justice in Minnesota and as an assistant public defender at the Regional Native Public Defense Corporation. Emily is a former Fellow at the Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice. She began developing WAAC through a Bush Fellowship in 2012.

As Iron Sharpens Iron - By Howard Hendricks

Think about the people who influenced your life most.

Why did they do it? What did they do? How did they go about it?

Answer these questions and you will be hooked on mentoring for the rest of your life.

In As Iron Sharpens Iron, respected authors, Howard and Bill Hendricks, show that the most dramatic spiritual and personal growth often happens through the influence of a mentor.

Rooted in biblical principles, this book is both a profound and practical guide to mentoring relationships for men.

You'll learn how to:

• Identify the kind of mentor you need.

• Maximize your mentoring relationship.

• Model your relationship after biblical examples.

• Grow through the shared wisdom of another believer.

• Influence others as you replicate the mentoring process.

Whether you are looking for a mentor or wish to mentor someone else, this book provides specific steps to begin the relationship and make the most of it.

Untapped Talent:

How Second Chance Hiring Works for Your Business and the Community - By Jeffrey D. Korzenik

Tens of millions of people in the U.S. with criminal records are highly talented, reliable, and eager to work. Implement these second chance hiring practices to give your company a significant competitive advantage over those that do not.

Researched, tested, and written by the chief investment strategist of one of the country’s leading business banks, Jeffrey Korzenik includes dozens of examples of businesses that have successfully implemented the second chance hiring practices outlined in this book.

Korzenik shows those companies that have learned to go beyond the label and to evaluate the qualities of the individual applicant have tapped into an often-overlooked source of loyal and productive talent.

In Untapped Talent, you will:

• Understand what goes into a successful second chance hire, from the support that will be needed internally to the resources that are available from outside agencies.

• Learn how businesses from a variety of industries have instituted successful second chance hiring programs and how this has positively impacted their culture and bottom line.

• Gain practical onboarding and coaching strategies that will help ensure a smooth transition and a productive, happy new employee.

• Acquire relevant knowledge of the criminal justice system to provide context in identifying the potential of second chance hiring.

Your path to a loyal, engaged, and productive workforce starts with the clear competitive advantage you’ll gain by implementing the second-chance hiring practices within Untapped Talent.

How to Know a Person:

The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen - By David Brooks

As David Brooks observes, “There is one skill that lies at the heart of any healthy person, family, school, community organization, or society: the ability to see someone else deeply and make them feel seen—to accurately know another person, to let them feel valued, heard, and understood.”

And yet we humans don’t do this well. All around us are people who feel invisible, unseen, and misunderstood. In How to Know a Person, Brooks sets out to help us do better, posing questions that are essential for all of us: If you want to know a person, what kind of attention should you cast on them? What kind of conversations should you have? What parts of a person’s story should you pay attention to?

Driven by his trademark sense of curiosity and his determination to grow as a person, Brooks draws from the fields of psychology and neuroscience and from the worlds of theater, philosophy, history, and education to present a welcoming, hopeful, integrated approach to human connection. How to Know a Person helps readers become more understanding and considerate toward others, and to find the joy that comes from being seen. Along the way it offers a possible remedy for a society that is riven by fragmentation, hostility, and misperception.

The act of seeing another person, Brooks argues, is profoundly creative: How can we look somebody in the eye and see something large in them, and in turn, see something larger in ourselves? How to Know a Person is for anyone searching for connection, and yearning to be understood.

reaching out: The three moments of the spiritual life

By henri j. m. nouwen

Henri Nouwen views our spiritual “ascent” as evolving in three movements:

• The first, from loneliness to solitude, focuses on the spiritual life as it relates to the experience of our own selves.

• The second, from hostility to hospitality, explores our spiritual life as a life for others.

• The final movement, from illusion to prayer, offers penetrating thoughts on the most mysterious relationship of all: our relationship with God.

Throughout, Nouwen emphasizes that the more we understand (and not simply deny) our inner struggles, the more we will be able to embrace a prayerful and genuine life that is also open to others’ needs.

Reaching Out is a rich book to be read, reread, pondered, and shared. It “does not offer answers or solutions,” Nouwen cautions, “but is written in the conviction that the quest for an authentic Christian spirituality is worth the effort and the pain, since in the midst of this quest we can find signs offering hope, courage, and confidence.”

The choice: embrace the possible

By dr. edith eva eger

At the age of sixteen, Edith Eger was sent to Auschwitz. Hours after her parents were killed, Nazi officer Dr. Josef Mengele, forced Edie to dance for his amusement and her survival. Edie was pulled from a pile of corpses when the American troops liberated the camps in 1945.

Edie spent decades struggling with flashbacks and survivor’s guilt, determined to stay silent and hide from the past. Thirty-five years after the war ended, she returned to Auschwitz and was finally able to fully heal and forgive the one person she’d been unable to forgive—herself.

Edie weaves her remarkable personal journey with the moving stories of those she has helped heal. She explores how we can be imprisoned in our own minds and shows us how to find the key to freedom. The Choice is a life-changing book that will provide hope and comfort to generations of readers.

The gift: 14 lessons to save your life

By dr. edith eva eger

The Gift, expands on her message of healing in the book “The Choice” and provides a hands-on guide that gently encourages readers to change the thoughts and behaviors that may be keeping them imprisoned in the past.

Eger explains that the worst prison she experienced is not the prison that Nazis put her in but the one she created for herself: the prison within her own mind. She describes the most pervasive imprisoning beliefs she has known—including fear, grief, anger, secrets, stress, guilt, shame, and avoidance—and the tools she has discovered to deal with these universal challenges. These lessons are offered through riveting and inspiring stories from her life and the lives of her patients.

Filled with empathy, insight, and humor, The Gift captures the vulnerability and common challenges we all face and provides encouragement and advice for breaking out of our personal prisons to find healing and greater joy in life.