An extraordinarily moving memoir from an iconoclastic new talent—an artist, cook, and illustrator whose adventures at home and abroad reveal the importance of living life with your eyes wide open. Best known for her witty illustrations, and as a cook beside her mischievous father in her family’s legendary Manhattan restaurant, in Mumbai New York Scranton, Tamara Shopsin offers a brilliantly inventive, spare, and elegant chronicle of a year in her life characterized by impermanence. In a refreshingly original voice alternating between tender and brazen, Shopsin recounts a trip to the Far East with her sidekick husband and the harrowing adventure that unfolds when she comes home. Entire worlds, deep relationships, and indelible experiences are portrayed in Shopsin’s deceptively simple and sparse language and drawings. Blending humor, love, suspense—and featuring photographs by Jason Fulford—Mumbai New York Scranton inspires a kaleidoscope of emotions. Shopsin’s surprising and affecting tale will keep you on the edge of your seat.

A WIRED Pick for the 7 Books You Need to Read This Winter and one of Vox's 11 Titles Not to Miss From the incomparable New York Times and New Yorker illustrator Tamara Shopsin, a debut novel about a NYC printer repair technician who comes of age alongside the Apple computer—featuring original artistic designs by the author. LaserWriter II is a coming-of-age tale set in the legendary 90s indie NYC Mac repair shop TekServe—a voyage back in time to when the internet was new, when New York City was gritty, and when Apple made off-beat computers for weirdos. Our guide is Claire, a 19-year-old who barely speaks to her bohemian co-workers, but knows when it’s time to snap on an antistatic bracelet. Tamara Shopsin brings us a classically New York novel that couldn’t feel more timely. Interweaving the history of digital technology with a tale both touchingly human and delightfully technical, Shopsin brings an idiosyncratic cast of characters to life with a light touch, a sharp eye, and an unmistakable voice. Filled with pixelated philosophy and lots of printers, LaserWriter II is, at its heart, a parable about an apple.

"An extraordinarily moving memoir from an iconoclastic new talent--an artist, cook, and New York Times illustrator whose adventures at home and abroad revealed the importance of living life with your eyes wide open. Best known for her witty, sparse illustrations, and as a cook beside her mischievous father in her family's iconic Manhattan restaurant, in Mumbai New York Scranton, Tamara Shopsin chronicles a year in her life when impermanence was the theme. Told in a refreshingly original voice that alternates between tender and brazen, Shopsin recounts her trip to the Far East with her sidekick husband and the harrowing adventure that unfolds after returning home. Blending humor, love, and suspense--and featuring photographs by Jason Fulford--Mumbai New York Scranton reveals and inspires a kaleidoscope of emotions. Shopsin's surprising and affecting tale is guaranteed to keep you on the edge of your seat"--From publisher's website.

Return to the real world! A coupon-style booklet of 52 activities for offline fun, from Jason Fulford and Tamara Shopsin Jason Fulford and Tamara Shopsin's Offline Activities is a book of 52 suggestions for things you can do in real life. Rearrange your furniture; invite an old friend to lunch; bring something home from the supermarket and treat it as sculpture. Part novelty, part self-help guide, Offline Activities encourages you to seek out the chance and mystery that is often lacking in the digital age. Featuring the kind of ingenious, charming design you expect from a Jason Fulford and Tamara Shopsin project, Offline Activities is designed as a coupon book with tear-out pages, with one inspirational suggestion and quote per page. You are encouraged to physically do the activity and rip the page out of the book as proof. If you do one offline activity per week, the book will last a year. Offline Activities is a delightfully analog, pleasantly practical guide to shaking up your offscreen life. Tamara Shopsin (born 1979) is an illustrator, graphic designer, writer and part-time cook in her family's New York restaurant. She is the author of two memoirs, Mumbai New York Scranton (2013) and Arbitrary Stupid Goal (2017), designer of the 5 Year Diary and coauthor, with Jason Fulford, of the children's book This Equals That (2014), among many other projects. Jason Fulford (born 1973) is a photographer and cofounder of J&L Books. He is a Guggenheim Fellow, a frequent lecturer at universities and has led workshops across the globe. His numerous monographs include The Mushroom Collector (2011) and Hotel Oracle (2013).

It is never too early to learn about abstraction--especially if celebrated illustrator Tamara Shopsin is doing the teaching. What Is This? is Shopsin's wordless children's book that will encourage imaginative thinking in readers both young and old. The miniature book, made for small hands, is filled with simple line drawings, executed with characteristic charm by Shopsin. Each drawing playfully adds to and alters the same basic squiggle, which is transformed across different contexts on each successive page: first the squiggle appears as the petals of a flower, next as a bird's nest, then a cowboy's lasso, then a plume of smoke from a factory chimney. Each time, only a few extra lines are required to suggest the conversion. By the end of the book, faced with an innocent squiggle, the question is not "what is this?" but rather, "what isn't this?" Tamara Shopsin (born 1979) is a graphic designer and illustrator whose work has been featured in The New York Times, Good, Time, Wired and Newsweek. She is the author of the memoir Mumbai New York Scranton, designer of the 5 Year Diary and coauthor, with Jason Fulford, of the children's book This Equals That. She is also a cook at her family's restaurant, Shopsin's, in New York.

"An extraordinarily moving memoir from an iconoclastic new talent--an artist, cook, and New York Times illustrator whose adventures at home and abroad revealed the importance of living life with your eyes wide open. Best known for her witty, sparse illustrations, and as a cook beside her mischievous father in her family's iconic Manhattan restaurant, in Mumbai New York Scranton, Tamara Shopsin chronicles a year in her life when impermanence was the theme. Told in a refreshingly original voice that alternates between tender and brazen, Shopsin recounts her trip to the Far East with her sidekick husband and the harrowing adventure that unfolds after returning home. Blending humor, love, and suspense--and featuring photographs by Jason Fulford--Mumbai New York Scranton reveals and inspires a kaleidoscope of emotions. Shopsin's surprising and affecting tale is guaranteed to keep you on the edge of your seat"--From publisher's website.

An illuminating look at the surprising upside of ambiguity—and how, properly harnessed, it can inspire learning, creativity, even empathy Life today feels more overwhelming and chaotic than ever. Whether it’s a confounding work problem or a faltering relationship or an unclear medical diagnosis, we face constant uncertainty. And we’re continually bombarded with information, much of it contradictory. Managing ambiguity—in our jobs, our relationships, and daily lives—is quickly becoming an essential skill. Yet most of us don’t know where to begin. As Jamie Holmes shows in Nonsense, being confused is unpleasant, so we tend to shutter our minds as we grasp for meaning and stability, especially in stressful circumstances. We’re hard-wired to resolve contradictions quickly and extinguish anomalies. This can be useful, of course. When a tiger is chasing you, you can’t be indecisive. But as Nonsense reveals, our need for closure has its own dangers. It makes us stick to our first answer, which is not always the best, and it makes us search for meaning in the wrong places. When we latch onto fast and easy truths, we lose a vital opportunity to learn something new, solve a hard problem, or see the world from another perspective. In other words, confusion—that uncomfortable mental place—has a hidden upside. We just need to know how to use it. This lively and original book points the way. Over the last few years, new insights from social psychology and cognitive science have deepened our understanding of the role of ambiguity in our lives and Holmes brings this research together for the first time, showing how we can use uncertainty to our advantage. Filled with illuminating stories—from spy games and doomsday cults to Absolut Vodka’s ad campaign and the creation of Mad Libs—Nonsense promises to transform the way we conduct business, educate our children, and make decisions. In an increasingly unpredictable, complex world, it turns out that what matters most isn’t IQ, willpower, or confidence in what we know. It’s how we deal with what we don’t understand.