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Anna Wiener, author of Uncanny Valley: A Memoir

In her mid-20s, at the height of tech industry idealism, Anna Wiener --- stuck, broke and looking for meaning in her work, like any good millennial --- left a job in book publishing for the promise of the new digital economy. She moved from New York to San Francisco, where she landed at a big-data startup in the heart of the Silicon Valley bubble: a world of surreal extravagance, dubious success, and fresh-faced entrepreneurs hell-bent on domination, glory and, of course, progress. Anna arrived during a massive cultural shift, as the tech industry rapidly transformed into a locus of wealth and power rivaling Wall Street. But a new Silicon Valley began to emerge: one in far over its head, one that enriched itself at the expense of the idyllic future it claimed to be building.

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Week of January 4, 2021

Paperback releases for the week of January 4th include THE DUTCH HOUSE by Ann Patchett, a richly moving story that explores the indelible bond between two siblings, the house of their childhood, and a past that will not let them go; Anna Wiener’s memoir, UNCANNY VALLEY, a rare first-person glimpse into high-flying, reckless startup culture at a time of unchecked ambition, unregulated surveillance, wild fortune and accelerating political power; HITTING A STRAIGHT LICK WITH A CROOKED STICK, an outstanding collection of stories from Zora Neale Hurston about love and migration, gender and class, racism and sexism that proudly reflect African American folk culture; THE FIRST TO LIE, Hank Phillippi Ryan's twisty, thrilling, cat-and-mouse novel of suspense that will have you guessing, and second-guessing, and then gasping with surprise; and BIG LIES IN A SMALL TOWN by Diane Chamberlain, a novel of chilling intrigue, a decades-old disappearance, and one woman’s quest to find the truth.

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