A collection of stories-some well known, some more obscure-capturing some of the best storytelling of this golden age of nonfiction.

An anthology of the best new masters of nonfiction storytelling, personally chosen and introduced by Ira Glass, the producer and host of the award-winning public radio program This American Life.

These pieces-on teenage white collar criminals, buying a cow, Saddam Hussein, drunken British soccer culture, and how we know everyone in our Rolodex-are meant to mesmerize and inspire.

"'We're living in an age of great nonfiction writing,' says Glass, the host of the radio program This American Life, who picks out 14 of his favorite journalistic features from writers who are 'entertainers in the best sense of the word,' unafraid to insert their personal perspective into the stories they're telling. The collection really is front-loaded with 'kings' — with Susan Orlean and Coco Henson Scales the only female journalists included, despite any number of valid candidates. There's a greater problem with the anthology than its unintentional chauvinism, though. Far from 'new,' many of its components are more than a decade old — Lawrence Weschler's 'Shapinsky's Karma' dates to the mid-1980s — and several have already been published in other books, like the Malcolm Gladwell article that became a chapter in The Tipping Point or an extract from Bill Buford's Among the Thugs. That's not to say that the articles (and their authors) don't deserve the admiration Glass heaps upon them. The way that Michael Lewis teases out the family drama in the story of a teenage day trader who ran afoul of the SEC, for example, is breathtaking reportage and should be read and reread. For all its excellence, though, this anthology is less revelatory than it makes itself out to be.' Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)" Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

Designed to mesmerize and inspire, this anthology of the best new masters of nonfiction storytelling has been personally chosen and introduced by Glass, the producer and host of the award-winning public radio program, "This American Life."

Ira Glass is the producer and host of the award-winning public radio program, This American Life. Author website: thislife.org.