Nonfiction Reviews: Week of 9/4/2006
by Staff -- Publishers Weekly, 9/4/2006
[Signature] Reviewed by Justin Kaplan In William James, Robert D. Richardson, biographer of Thoreau and Emerson, has chosen as his subject one of the most radiant of American lives. Author, philosopher, scientist, psychologist, longtime Harvard professor, James (1842–1910) had set out to be a painter, but discouraged from this by his father, instead followed a wandering but ultimately consistent career path. He trained as a medical doctor but never practiced medicine; served as a naturalist and accompanied Louis Agassiz on an expedition to the upper reaches of the Amazon; broke new ground as a physiologist and psychologist; studied religion and psychic phenomena; lectured extensively; and wrote three classic books, Principles of Psychology, The Varieties of Religious Experience and Pragmatism. Richardson's book opens in April 1906, with the 64-year-old James, then a visiting professor at Stanford, shaken from his bed by the 48-second shock of the San Francisco earthquake. His immediate response typified his lifelong openness to experience and risk taking (including, we're told, personal encounters with previously untested drugs and gases). Instead of fear he experienced "glee," "admiration," "delight" and an exhilarating sense of "welcome." For James, Richardson writes, this was a moment of "unhesitating, fierce, joyful embrace of the awful force of nature... of contact with elemental reality." William James was the dutiful but often resistant son of a mercurial Swedenborgian philosopher who, on either whim or principled decision but always supported by more than ample money, moved the members of his large family from place to place on both sides of the Atlantic, virtually transforming them into a tribe of nomads and hotel children. William's sister was the diarist Alice, fully as remarkable but not so publicly fulfilled as her famous elder siblings. William and the novelist Henry coexisted on often competitive but ultimately affectionate terms. One of the most poignant of the 32 pages of illustrations shows the brothers, both in their 60s, standing side by side, with William's arm around the younger Henry's shoulder in a gesture of protection and intimacy. Previous biographers of William James have focused on his thought and character, others on the events of his life, which was often marked by doubt, depression and physical ailments. But no one has managed, as Richardson does so brilliantly, to intertwine the two and account for each with equal authority, penetration and narrative coherence. James's progression from the gently idealizing intellectual climate of Ralph Waldo Emerson to what Richardson calls "the maelstrom of American modernism" makes for a gripping and often inspiring story of intellectual and spiritual adventure. Richardson's enthusiasm for what he calls "the matchless incandescent spirit" of William James is contagious. (Nov. 9) Justin Kaplan is the author of When the Astors Owned New York (Viking, 2006). The 300th birthday of the 18th-century French noblewoman, scientist, freethinker (she considered Jesus "a pious fraud") and paramour of Voltaire brings the second new biography. David Bodanis's Passionate Minds presents her life essentially as a romance novel. Historian Zinsser (A History of Their Own) says more about her subject's scientific work, which groped toward a modern conception of kinetic energy and included an influential recasting of Newton's work on the calculus. Du Châtelet (1706-1749) was certainly an emblematic, if not quite pivotal, figure in the ferment of 18th-century European science and philosophy, and her works could ground an illuminating and accessible intellectual history of the age, but they demand a more systematic treatment than Zinsser gives them. She has a surer footing on social and cultural history, as she surveys the ancien régime's caste system and court protocol at Versailles and regales readers with details of du Châtelet's luxurious wardrobe and household furnishings, as well as her struggle for acceptance by the male scientific establishment. All this makes for an enjoyable study of an unusual woman and feminist pioneer, but du Châtelet still awaits a biography that does full justice to her ideas. Photos. (Dec. 4) It would be too easy to say Vidal's second memoir picks up where Palimpsest left off; as in that earlier book, he essentially lets his memories flow at will, often revisiting yet again the stories of his Washington childhood. The general focus, however, is on the latter half of his life, particularly the deaths of those closest to him, including his longtime companion, Howard Auster. Yet Vidal changes subjects and tone so frequently and abruptly—here tender, here combative—that the family memories and celebrity anecdotes become scattershot, limping to a close with a bizarre summary of somebody else's theory about how organized crime bosses ordered the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Assured of his own genius ("I have never needed an editor"), he repeatedly slams biographer Fred Kaplan as "dull" and sex-obsessed, then jabs at a few other people who've written about him. He also makes frequent observations about the current events unfolding as he writes, and his criticisms of the New York Times and the Bush administration's "oil-and-gas junta" will come as no surprise. In short, the memoir is a perfect encapsulation of Vidal's outsized personality—and readers' reactions will be determined by how they already feel about him. (Nov. 7) L.A.'s answer to the British Invasion, the Doors burned brightly, burned out and left behind a clouded legacy. The continued fascination with the band has everything to do with Jim Morrison, of course, the charismatic singer who died young. Talented, inconsistent and a raging alcoholic, Morrison intentionally tried to channel the contradictory energies of the era and became its shaman stud. In this photo-rich volume, longtime music writer and former Rolling Stone editor Fong-Torres has expertly woven together a narrative from interviews with the band members—Ray Manzarek, Robby Krieger and John Densmore—as well as Morrison's family and closest friends. Collaboration created the Doors' sound and songs, and the biographies of each musician bring perspective to the more famous Morrison story. While there are no shocking revelations, it's useful to discover just how talented Morrison's band mates were in an age of three-chord wonders. Now middle-aged, the remaining Doors are clearheaded about their youthful extravagances and don't waste time with character assassination. Drug use is discussed openly, although Morrison's death is left needlessly vague (when a 27-year-old dies with only his junkie girlfriend, it's a good bet that heroin was involved). For the most part, though, this understated work further elucidates this iconic band. (Nov.) By 1971, Jimi Hendrix, Brian Jones and Janis Joplin were dead and Jim Morrison soon would be. Equally troubled, the Rolling Stones, those bad boy icons of the era, took their decadent circus to the French Riviera to escape British taxes and record an album. In a slang-filled present tense, Greenfield (Dark Star: An Oral Biography of Jerry Garcia) gives good gossip about the mayhem that ensued at the Villa Nellcote, the palatial mansion—and supposed former Gestapo headquarters—that Keith Richards rented as his getaway. Greenfield tells of who slept with whom, Keith's outlaw antics and the massive amounts of drugs consumed. The central story, however, is the struggle between Keith and Mick Jagger, who was increasingly drawn to high society, typified by his marriage to Bianca Perez-Mora. A who's who of celebs passed through Nellcote that summer, including John Lennon and Yoko Ono and Gram Parsons. In the last analysis, it's amazing that the Stones managed to record an album at all, but Exile on Main Street may well be their greatest. Greenberg's writing is cliched at times, but his account is energetic. In the end, he takes sides (Keith's mostly) and settles scores, but that only ups the entertainment value. (Nov.) Pierce offers a genial look at the unlikely rise of New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady from embattled Michigan player through draft afterthought to multiple Super Bowl MVP. But while the book might seem late considering the Patriots won their third Super Bowl in four years in 2004, it actually benefits from Pierce using the team's trying 2005 season as a backdrop against which to highlight his main argument: that Brady's intangible abilities as a leader under any circumstances are worth far more than what can be measured with a stopwatch. In addition to stories from Brady's coaches and teammates that bear out this assessment, journalist Pierce serves up some entertaining prose. He describes the bombastic NFL as "less like family entertainment and more and more like the strategy... used to pry Manuel Noriega out of Panama," and skewers Gov. William Weld of Massachusetts as "so flighty that he made Mayor McCheese look like Benjamin Disraeli." In all, it's a buoyant if blindly reverential account that's sure to appeal to anyone with more than a passing interest in one of the game's most celebrated players. Photos not seen by PW. (Nov.) Pollock, who reports on the art market for Bloomberg News, retrieves a uniquely American story: a plucky heroine escapes Russia with her parents, grows up in New York poverty and ends up owning one of the most influential and successful art galleries of the 20th century, one that virtually created the market for American art. Startlingly young when she embarked on her career in 1926, Edith Gregor Halpert (1900–1970) was one of the few gallery owners with an eye for the American avant-garde of the '20s, '30s and '40s. She recognized genius in Stuart Davis, made folk art trendy during the Depression and rescued from obscurity such classic artworks as Raphaelle Peale's After the Bath. She was prickly and often defensive, assertive and opinionated. These qualities brought her independence and financial security; they also led to loneliness and an ungraceful decline. Most interesting in Pollock's account are Halpert's difficult interactions with others in the business and with her artists, particularly Alfred Stieglitz and Georgia O'Keeffe. It's surprising that Halpert, who paved the way for women in a male-dominated field, is so little known today; this book is long overdue. 8 pages of color photos, 28 b&w photos. (Nov. 6) In this insightful book, the author, who won a Pulitzer for Grant: A Biography, focuses on the problematic aspects of the life of American realist painter Thomas Eakins and attempts to show how these are reflected in his works. Eakins (1844–1916) had a fortunate early life, with art studies in Paris and Spain, a sympathetic wife and a promising career at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Nevertheless, he suffered from a sense of failure, bouts of depression and conflicted feelings about his attraction to men. McFeely sees the painting Swimming, in particular, as indicative of Eakins's unfulfilled longings, but also of more than that: the image of the artist and five of his male students swimming in the nude embodies Eakins's Thoreauvian conviction that happiness can be found in freedom from society's constraints, in living at one with nature. Eakins never achieved this freedom, however. In 1886, he was asked to resign from the academy, probably because of his homosexuality and his insistence on using nude models in his life drawing classes, and his life became one of increasing despair. The book's most revealing sections discuss Eakins's portraits, where the sitters' faces exude a sadness that reflects the artist's own emotional state. 16 pages of color illus., 40 b&w illus. (Nov.) The troubled and excitable mind of the young Beat poet is given free rein in this exhaustive and often illuminating collection of his early private writing. The text serves as an evolving portrait of both a writer and a man: from the first, self-conscious high school entries to the stylistically mature entries of the early '50s, the degree of insight and the fluidity of prose multiplies exponentially. Throughout, Ginsberg lives up to his reputation as the most intellectually rigorous as well as the most neurotic of the Columbia gang that included Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs. Luckily, his neuroses—mostly of a sexual/ romantic nature—are often expressed with lucidity and intensity. Ginsberg's obsessive relationship with the charismatic Neal Cassady is discussed at particular length, often in a narrative, slightly fictionalized form that provides a fascinating, and significantly more interior, counterpoint to Kerouac's On the Road. An appendix of early poems provides significant insight into Ginsberg's developing aesthetic. As a whole, the poems are entertaining in their own right, but, like most of the journals, they can best be appreciated in reference to Ginsberg's body of later writing. 16 b&w photos. (Nov.) Humans are the only creatures that cry for both grief and happiness, although many animals shed tears that help protect their eyes. As science journalist and former CNN bureau chief Walter tells readers in this fascinating and superbly written book, there are a handful of characteristics (like crying) that distinguish us from the rest of the animal kingdom and can be explained in evolutionary terms as having been advantageous for our distant ancestors. Laughter is one: dogs may bark happily when they get to go for a ride or play with their canine neighbors, but only humans break into chortles and guffaws. Walter (who coauthored I'm Working on That with William Shatner) says that laughter helps us bond with our friends and co-workers. He points out that we give our big toe little thought until we stub it, but its evolution allowed Homo erectus to stand upright millions of years ago and led to other helpful evolutionary features, like the pharynx—which in turn made speech possible. Readers also learn why we tousle our children's hair, why kissing is so much fun and what may lie ahead as we near the end of our current evolutionary reel. (Nov.) Why do we choose chocolate ice cream over vanilla ice cream? Why do we select one lover rather than another? Baylor University neuroscientist Montague (now a fellow at Princeton's Institute for Advanced Study) deftly marries psychology and neuroscience as he probes how we make choices. On one hand, decision making boils down to simple computation. Montague argues that our brains are efficient computational machines. But unlike computers, our brains fix on the goals of survival and reproduction, realizing that every hasty decision can be costly to the survival of the species. Our brains also harbor experiences (memories) that foster the choices we make. On the other hand, we can make choices that go against survival: for instance, we can choose to die for an idea. Why is that? Because, says Montague, human computations involve valuation, choosing between one value and another, requiring computation of cultural and psychological qualities. Although the notion of the brain as a computational machine can be traced at least as far back as Descartes, Montague adds new ideas to our understanding of how our brains compute. But his sometimes engaging and sometimes plodding book doesn't always explain the complex science for general readers. (Nov.) Physicist Mallett's theory that "space and time can be manipulated" to make time travel possible has gained national media attention. His research and theories flow nicely through this easy-to-read autobiography. Mallett, one of the first African-American Ph.D.s in theoretical physics, has lived under the shadow of his father's death when he was 10. His struggles with poverty, racism and depression, coupled with his extreme drive to succeed at building a time machine and so see his beloved father again are inspirational. Mallett's (and bestselling author Henderson's) simple prose makes for clear and concise explanations of the science involved. The author comes across as a warm, inspired, driven, troubled man who is generous in his descriptions of others and must be an excellent teacher at the University of Connecticut, where he is a physics professor. Mallett describes the path of his education and research into black holes and circulating lasers, which he believes drag time into a closed loop suitable for time travel. Due to the basic level of the science content and the focus on Mallett's personal quest, this book is best suited for a general rather than a science-leaning audience, or as an inspirational text for aspiring young scientists. B&w photos. (Nov. 14) Simon, a health policy expert and law professor, skewers the food industry for undermining the health of Americans with "nutrient deficient factory made pseudofoods." In lawyerly fashion, she explains the ABCs of the business imperative of "Big Food" (Coca-Cola, Kraft Foods and McDonald's, among many others): make short-term profit without regard to the product's nutritional value or societal effects. Permissible tactics, she says, include false advertising, sham "healthy" food initiatives and co-opting the government, press and academia. Simon also argues that food-industry advocates use front groups to attack critics and spread misinformation about nutritional needs. Simon also chastises her fellow food activists for applauding all "steps in the right direction," no matter how inadequate; the press for its passive publication of scientifically dubious industry statements; and the government for abandoning effective regulation of the food industry. Her case made, Simon offers a host of suggestions and a manual-like set of directions to parents and other food activists on how to work with legislatures, school boards and the media to create a "just food system" that is "sustainable, affordable, accessible, and convenient." (Nov.) Satloff's compelling book details the roles Arabs played in assisting or resisting the Third Reich, Italian Fascism and the Vichy government, and the expansion of the Final Solution into their countries. This includes active collaboration with anti-Semitic policies—Arabs helped run Bizerte, one of 60 labor camps for Jews in Morocco and Algeria established by the Vichy government. It also includes many instances of brave resistance, such as the bey of Tunis, who protected the Jews under his patronage. On the whole, while Jews "were almost always better off ruled by Muslims rather than Christians," Arabs generally displayed indifference to the Jews' plight. Satloff, director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and an expert on Arab culture and history, is careful to explore the nuances of a complicated story and the relationship between fascist European powers and their colonies. Italy and France, for example, overrode local control by imposing anti-Semitic social restraints in Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco. Satloff is, correctly, so careful about nuance that, despite some greatly moving personal narratives, the book as a whole lacks the powerful wallop that we receive from reading David Kertzer or Daniel Goldhagen. But this is important material, and Satloff's work is groundbreaking for Jewish, Middle Eastern and Holocaust studies. 8 pages of b&w photos; maps. (Nov.) Published after Sonnino's death in 1999, this haunting memoir recounts the story of her Italian Jewish family, including her parents and five siblings, who perished in the Holocaust. In spare, beautifully translated language, Sonnino details her life in Genoa prior to 1938, when the racial laws went into effect. Within a lower-middle-class environment, her parents and siblings were "lambs, good people, ready to suffer many wrongs rather than be stained by a single one, eager to make as little noise as possible and occupy the least space possible on this earth." In 1943, when the Germans arrived in Italy, the Sonninos hid in mountain villages, but were betrayed, arrested and, in 1944, sent to Auschwitz. The author's account of the last night they spent together is eloquent. Her parents and two of her brothers were killed in the gas chambers. Sonnino watched her sister, Bice, succumb to dysentery at the Braunschweig concentration camp after the two were incarcerated at the Bergen-Belsen camp. After the war the author spent five years in rehabilitation centers and sanitariums and returned to Genoa in 1950. She married, raised two children and penned this searing testimony for her family in 1960. B&w photos. (Nov.) This surprisingly taut and gripping book by NYU law professor Simon (What Kind of Nation) examines the limits of presidential prerogative during the Civil War. Lincoln and Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger Taney saw eye to eye on certain matters; both, for example, disliked slavery. But beginning in 1857, when Lincoln criticized Taney's decision in the Dred Scott case, the pair began to spar. They diverged further once Lincoln became president when Taney insisted that secession was constitutional and preferable to bloodshed, and blamed the Civil War on Lincoln. In 1861, Taney argued that Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus was illegal. This holding was, Simon argues, "a clarion call for the president to respect the civil liberties of American citizens." In an 1862 group of cases, Taney joined a minority opinion that Lincoln lacked the authority to order the seizure of Southern ships. Had Taney had the chance, suggests Simon, he would have declared the Emancipation Proclamation unconstitutional; he and Lincoln agreed that the Constitution left slavery up to individual states, but Lincoln argued that the president's war powers trumped states' rights. Simon's focus on Lincoln and Taney makes for a dramatic, charged narrative—and the focus on presidential war powers makes this historical study extremely timely. (Nov.) When eight whaling ships became icebound at Point Barrow, the northernmost tip of Alaska, in January 1898, a rescue mission blessed by President McKinley was launched to bring the 275 stranded men reindeer meat to fend off starvation and scurvy. The Overland Relief Expedition drafted Tom Lopp, a missionary and advocate of turning native hunters into self-sufficient reindeer herders, who left his wife, Ellen, and children in Cape Prince of Wales, 55 miles across the Bering Strait from Siberia, and drove his 300-head herd 700 miles across ice and frozen tundra. The three-month trek by Lopp and several native herders was monumental, although the saga becomes anticlimactic when it turns out that the whalers' situation was less dire than reported. Along the way, Taliaferro (Tarzan Forever) describes how the Lopps had adapted brilliantly to the Alaskan wilderness, respecting the indigenous people—in marked contrast to fellow missionary Harrison Thornton, an imperious Southerner who was murdered by native peoples. Although a lucid and diligent storyteller who makes good use of period correspondence, Taliaferro isn't in a class with adventure standouts like Jon Krakauer or Sebastian Junger, and will be best appreciated by readers with a specific interest in Alaskan or missionary history. 8 pages of b&w photos; 2 maps. (Nov. 20) Southern Louisiana University historian Kurtz (Crime of the Century: The Kennedy Assassination from a Historian's Perspective) rehashes the debate about whether or not Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in assassinating JFK, coming down on the side of conspiracy. In this, he is—by his own account—on the same page as some 68% of the American public. Kurtz provides a serviceable summary of the arguments and theories supporting each view: solo shooter vs. triangulated fire orchestrated by an unspecified cabal of malignant forces. The familiar landmarks and debates are all here: the grassy knoll, the "magic" bullet, the possible organized crime connection, the possible Cuban connection and the various, contradictory intrigues of America's intelligence community. Each aspect is detailed, each cogently laid out—all leading nowhere. The facts, both agreed on and debated, remain the same here as they have been in countless other volumes. With regard to the key issue—who killed JFK?—Kurtz admits, "I do not know the answer," while charging everyone—from the CIA, to the Warren Commission and the Kennedy family—of a "continuing coverup" of evidence. In the end, Kurtz leaves us no closer to definitive truth than we've been before regarding the quagmire of November 22, 1963. (Nov.) In his account of the development of "the most significant money game in history" (200 million copies sold in 60 countries since 1935), former Parker Brothers vice president Orbanes (The Monopoly Companion) sets the game against a backdrop of political and economic events spanning a century. He introduces entrepreneurs and game inventors, beginning with Elizabeth Magie, who created the Landlord's Game in 1903 to educate people about Henry George's idea of a "single tax" on landlords (it even had a space called "No Trespassing/Go to Jail"). Initially unpublished, it circulated among game players in handmade copies on oilcloth. In 1930, Quakers in Atlantic City added local street names—Illinois, Pennsylvania, Mediterranean—to their handmade variation, which became the source of the Monopoly game that Charles Darrow marketed in 1934. Tracing this evolution, Orbanes covers collectors, foreign editions, memorabilia, licensing, copyrights and trademarks with fascinating details: Esquire magazine's Esky was the springboard for Monopoly's cartoon financier, and the metal tokens were inspired by the charms from charm bracelets that Darrow's 11-year-old niece used as game pieces. Orbanes heightens the readability by interweaving his own personal story—at Parker Brothers, which he joined in 1979, and judging Monopoly world tournaments—throughout this lively chronicle that puts the iconic game in the context of a slice of social history. 32 pages of b&w photos, 40 illus. throughout. (Nov. 30) Three years after her controversial proadultery polemic, Against Love, Kipnis, a professor of media studies at Northwestern University, offers a wide-ranging and equally unorthodox investigation of "the female condition." She examines why women want both power and push-up bras, have fewer orgasms than men, why spouses have a harder time staying connected to each other after the wife quits work to stay home with the kids and why feminists keep focusing on rape, even though rates of female rapes are down while the rape of imprisoned men has escalated. Underlying the failure of feminism to achieve full equality for women, Kipnis says, is women's own ambivalence: they want feminism as well as femininity. Some of Kipnis's avenues of inquiry are well trod—Katha Pollitt, for example, has deconstructed the "opt-out revolution," whose foot soldiers are Ivy League–credentialed moms who trade high-powered careers for full-time motherhood, and Naomi Wolf long ago tackled the cosmetics industry. Countless critics have wondered why feminism was so easily co-opted by a market economy in which everyone works longer hours than they used to. Though not totally fresh, this fluid, sassy volume is guaranteed to electrify media and cocktail party circuits. (Oct. 17) Historian Miller (D-Days in the Pacific) chronicles the story of the U.S. Eighth Air Force in this sprawling, authoritative narrative of the "largest aerial striking force in the war." The Eighth arrived in England in 1942 to engage in "a new kind of warfare": unescorted "high-altitude strategic bombing." In addition to destroying Germany's war-making capacity, the Eighth hoped to validate its "extravagant claim that air power alone would bring down the Reich" and to win autonomy for the air force. As Miller demonstrates, the "hubris of the bomber barons" was misplaced, and the "record of the Eighth Air Force is mixed." Not only did victory require boots on the ground but the air war became a bloody "war of attrition." The Eighth suffered 26,000 combat deaths, a 12.3% fatality rate topped only by submarine crews. Drawing on exhaustive research in oral histories, diaries and government documents, Miller evenhandedly recounts the Eighth's successes and failures, emphasizing the stoic heroism of the crews who flew the missions. That diverse lot included celebrities like the actors Jimmy Stewart and Clark Gable and anonymous fliers like 21-year-old Lt. Chuck Yeager. This eloquent tribute to America's bomber boys should prove popular among fans of military history. (Oct.) Although delivering little in the way of new information, Sides, an Outside magazine editor-at-large and bestselling author (Ghost Soldiers), eloquently paints the landscape and history of the 19th-century Southwest, combining Larry McMurtry's lyricism with the historian's attachment to facts. Inevitably, Sides's main focus is the virtual decimation of the Navajo nation from the 1820s to the late 1860s. Sides depicts the complex role of whites in the subjugation of the Navajos through his portrait of Kit Carson—an illiterate trapper, soldier and scout who knew the Native Americans intimately, married two of them and, without blinking, participated in the Indians' slaughter. Books about Carson have been numerous, but Sides is better than most Carson biographers in setting his exploits against a larger backdrop: the unstoppable idea of manifest destiny. Of course, as counterpoint to the progress of Carson and other whites, Sides details the fierce but doomed defense mounted by the Navajos over long decades. This culminated in their final, desperate "stand" during 1863 at Canyon de Chelly, more than a decade after a contingent of federal troops—operating under a commander whose last name of "Washington" seems ironic in this context—killed their great leader, Narbona. (Oct. 3) Winner of the Pushcart 20th Editors' Book Award, McCall's botanical, zoological, spiritual and neighborhood almanac grew out of his longtime community radio show in coastal Maine. The mountain he refers to is Blue Hill Mountain ("Awanadjo" in Algonkian) near Blue Hill, Maine, where McCall serves as a Congregational minister. Careening from the mystical to the practical, cranky to idealistic, the book offers a year's worth of entries for each phase of each moon, accompanied by charming woodblock illustrations by Jonathan Fisher (first minister of McCall's church). McCall reports, philosophizes and preaches on natural events (e.g., cedar waxwings in the orchard; immigration), "un-natural events" (laws against immigration; machine-made Halloween decorations), as well as singling out "critters of the week" and other things he finds in the fields, forests, mountains and saltwater areas around him. He provides quotations from Walt Whitman, Annie Dillard and others, along with "rank opinions" of his own (e.g., "Many people have survived and flourished for millennia without computers, insurance, automobiles, skyscrapers, credit cards, and televisions, but none could survive long without food and care for children"). By turns inspiring and infuriating, McCall has something for everyone, but as he says at the end of each moon, "Don't take it from me. Go out and see for yourself." (Oct.) Back from living in Paris with his wife and two kids, as chronicled charmingly in Paris to the Moon, Gopnik, a writer for the New Yorker, records in his tidy, writerly and obsessive fashion his family's relocation to the city of his earliest professional aspiration: New York. No longer the grim, decrepit hell of the 1970s, New York of the new century has become a children's city, infused by a "new paternal feeling," and doting father Gopnik is delighted to walk through the Children's Gate of Central Park to relive the romance of childhood. His 20 various essays meander over topics dear to the hearts of New York parents, such as learning to be appropriately Jewish ("A Purim Story"); working with the ad hoc committee called Artists and Anglers at his son's hypercaring private school, on methods of flight for the production of Peter Pan; and his four-year-old daughter's imaginary playmate, Charlie Ravioli, who is simply too booked to play with her. The less structured series of essays on Thanksgiving are most pleasing and read like diaries, ranging from the rage over noise to the safety of riding buses. Gopnik conveys in his mannered, occasionally gilded prose that New York still represents a kind of childlike hope—"for something big to happen." 150,000 copy first printing. (Oct.) It was in 1958 that Elvis Presley and his backing band cut "That's Alright Mama" with Sam Philips at the legendary Sun studios in Memphis. For Elvis, the rest is history—he went on to become the king of rock and roll. For his backing band, the Blue Moon Boys (bassist Bill Black, guitarist Scotty Moore and drummer D.J. Fontana), the story went differently. In this exhaustively researched and well-written book, journalist Burke (Blue Suede News) and Griffin, a producer who later worked with Moore and Fontana, present a vital piece of rock history. Burke and Griffin adeptly recount the band's vital role in creating Elvis's success, from Black's signature enormous stand-up bass lines (one promoter was amazed to learn the band was only a three-piece) and Moore's lilting guitar to Fontana's energetic beats, which fueled Presley's hypersexual performances. Eventually, superstardom on an uncharted scale led to squabbles over everything from egos to credit, and of course money (at one point, while Elvis was making "millions," the band was making just a few hundred dollars per performance). Elvis fans will enjoy this fascinating history, but more than that, Burke and Griffin offer a glimpse at the crucible in which rock and roll was fired. (Oct.) The story of the Ottoman Empire's slaughter of one million Armenians in 1915—a genocide still officially denied by the 83-year-old modern Turkish state—has been dominated by two historiographical traditions. One pictures an embattled empire, increasingly truncated by rapacious Western powers and internal nationalist movements. The other details the attempted eradication of an entire people, amid persecutions of other minorities. Part of historian Akçam's task in this clear, well-researched work is to reconcile these mutually exclusive narratives. He roots his history in an unsparing analysis of Turkish responsibility for one of the most notorious atrocities of a singularly violent century, in internal and international rivalries, and an exclusionary system of religious (Muslim) and ethnic (Turkish) superiority. With novel use of key Ottoman, European and American sources, he reveals that the mass killing of Armenians was no byproduct of WWI, as long claimed in Turkey, but a deliberate, centralized program of state-sponsored extermination. As Turkey now petitions to join the European Union, and ethnic cleansing and collective punishment continues to threaten entire populations around the globe, this groundbreaking and lucid account by a prominent Turkish scholar speaks forcefully to all. (Oct.) Historian Khalidi (Resurrecting Empire), a leading expert on the Middle East and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, brings vital perspective to Palestinian attempts to achieve independence and statehood. Admirably synthesizing the latest scholarship and concentrating on the period of the British Mandate (1920–1948) established by the League of Nations after WWI, Khalidi describes the process by which a newly arrived European Jewish minority overcame, with help from its imperial ally, the claims and rights of the native Arab majority in what became Israel and the occupied territories. Khalidi shows Palestinians under the mandate facing comparatively severe systemic, institutional and constitutional obstacles to the development of any para-state structure—contrary to British promises of Arab independence and Article 4 of the Covenant of the League of Nations. Meanwhile, the Jewish minority could count on a system biased in its favor to develop the structures that became those of the Israeli government in 1948 amid violent expulsion of over half the indigenous population. In bringing this narrative up to the present, Khalidi rigorously details the missteps of the Palestinians and their leadership. Khalidi curiously refrains from drawing any detailed proposal of his own to resolve the ongoing conflict, but his first-rate and up-to-date historical and political analysis of the Palestinian predicament remains illuminating. (Oct.) In the first Gulf War, the United States routed the Iraqi military with ease, only to find itself unable to win or maintain peace. Having studied the long crisis in Iraq for his Harvard doctoral thesis, the former ad executive brings clear-eyed analysis, deep archival research and interviews with many principal players to support his compelling argument that the first Bush administration's decision to leave Saddam Hussein in power was a deliberate one that unwittingly ensured the continued American presence in Iraq. From Hussein's threats to use chemical weapons against Israel in 1990 up to the discovery that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction to speak of in 2003, Alfonsi reports that the U.S. response to Iraq was hampered by divisions high up in the U.S. government, the lack of reliable intelligence on Iraqi affairs and the collision of political ambitions with messy domestic and international realities. Along the way, Alfonsi shows how a well-financed public relations campaign and Bush's own "Manichaean" rhetoric galvanized widespread domestic support for the war, but left the United States with no clear plan for extricating itself. While Alfonsi's treatment of Iraq after 1992 in the last quarter of the book feels abbreviated, the connections between the two conflicts are striking. (Oct.) As a former assistant attorney general for the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, Yoo was in the center of the debate over where President Bush's administration draws the line on the torture of detained terrorism suspects. He revisits that and other controversies in the war on terror, from NSA wiretapping to the legal status of "enemy combatants." His response to most criticisms is that al-Qaeda is a new kind of enemy, and the old ways of thinking (e.g., the Geneva Conventions) prevent us from stopping another terrorist strike. The cornerstone of Yoo's argument is his belief that as commander-in-chief, the president has broad powers "to act forcefully and independently to repel serious threats to the nation." Even the formal declaration of war by Congress has become archaic; Yoo argues that America is at war whenever the president decides the military can "do what must be done." Thus, the Supreme Court's June decision rendering the prosecution of Guantánamo detainees by military commissions unconstitutional is, in Yoo's eyes, "a dangerous judicial intention to intervene in wartime policy" that forces the president and Congress to waste time crafting legislation when we could be out fighting terrorists. Unambiguous and combative, Yoo's philosophy is sure to spark further debate. (Oct.) With strident confidence, American Congress for Truth founder Gabriel rebukes the American public for being "weak, asleep or careless" in the face of Muslim terrorism. A Christian survivor of the vicious civil war between Lebanese Christians and Muslims in the 1970s, Gabriel leans on her own terrifying experiences to condemn Muslims, without apparent regard for their ethnicity, ideology or historical role. Consistently using the words "Muslim" and "Arab" as if they were interchangeable, she concludes that the U.S. is "facing total destruction" at the hands of people who are uncultured and cruel, and prescribes such solutions as "profile, profile and profile," and banning "hate education" in Islamic institutions. Though her writing is eloquent and her passion tremendous, Gabriel's strict dichotomy between "evil versus goodness" is too extreme to be informative. Readers will be forced to decide whether or not to accept her heart-felt bias. (Oct.) With the midterm elections—and the possibility of majority shifts in both the House and Senate—talk of presidential impeachment is in the air. Holtzman, former congresswoman and Brooklyn D.A., and Cooper, a journalist and lawyer, have assembled a compact but thorough legal and constitutional accounting of five major issues upon which they claim the current president could be impeached. They are "Deceptions into Taking the Country into War in Iraq"; "Reckless Indifference to Human Life in Katrina and Iraq"; "Illegal Wiretapping and Surveillance of Americans"; "Permitting Torture"; and "Leaking Classified Information." While the authors have a clear political agenda, their book also provides a useful guide to the theory behind and the legal mechanisms of presidential impeachment, clearing up many misunderstandings readers might have, such as the fact that "high crimes and misdemeanors are not limited to actual crimes" and the correct use of the Independent Counsel Act (which Holtzman helped author in 1978). The book argues its points based on examples from the impeachments of Nixon and Clinton (Holtzman sat on the House Judiciary Committee during the Nixon impeachment). While this volume will be read and cherished by those who agree with its political stance—and dismissed and argued against by those who don't—it's an important, comprehensive argument and document for our current political moment. (Oct.) According to this hagiography penned by his daughter, the 41st president is brave, loyal, generous, fun-loving (he put "fake dog poop" in the guest room of the vice presidential mansion) and considerate (he cleaned real dog vomit out of his limo himself instead of making the Secret Service do it). He's also graciousness personified, as attested by the many kind notes to acquaintances the author reprints alongside boilerplate testimonials from friends, relatives and dignitaries like Mikhail Gorbachev and Bill Clinton. Koch includes campaign war stories and briefly salutes Bush's budget deal and policy initiatives like the Americans with Disabilities Act, but her father's politics seem mainly an extension of his personal character and charm, as he works with world leaders to finesse the fall of communism and unite against Saddam Hussein. Throughout, she sprinkles in family anecdotes—with sometimes grating results, as when an account of Bush tearing up at the prospect of sending American soldiers to die in Kuwait segues into a Camp David tobogganing mishap. And the Bush clan ethos Koch celebrates—"family and friends always came first"— pays scant attention to public priorities. Photos. (Oct. 6) Baker's grandfather, a prominent Houston lawyer, told his grandson to avoid becoming a politician—hence the title of this memoir. Baker intended to follow that advice, but, at age 40, he switched course after his wife died of cancer, leaving behind four sons. George Herbert Walker Bush persuaded the widower to change parties and work on Bush's Republican Party senatorial campaign to take his mind off his grief. Eventually, Baker played political and policymaking roles in the presidential administrations of Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, with nearly four years as Bush's secretary of state, including during the first Gulf war. More sweeping and less formal than Baker's 1995 memoir of his international adventures, The Politics of Diplomacy, this is also haphazardly organized despite its chronological approach. Baker seems to idolize all three presidents he served directly, though he alludes to character flaws and questionable decisions. His defense of the status quo is likely to please loyal Republicans, annoy loyal Democrats and make independents wonder. (Oct.) Studying the two regimes that troubled her the most—Nazi Germany and the Stalinist Soviet Union—Arendt argued that totalitarianism results when a government prohibits politics or debate about key issues in public spaces. Like Arendt's important work regarding evil in the absence of thought, or "the banality of evil," the word "totalitarianism" has become "a cliché, for many who use it," Young-Bruehl points out. But in this useful overview of Arendt's life, major ideas and works, Young-Bruehl brings Arendt's concepts back into focus, by synthesizing them and applying them to recent and current events, such as the war on terrorism and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa. Young-Bruehl (Hannah Arendt: For Love of the World) succeeds best when illustrating the application of Arendt's work and undermines her mission when she assumes Arendt's pen: "Arendt, had she been alive in 2001, would have gone straight to her writing table to protest that the World Trade Center was not Pearl Harbor and that 'war on terror' was a meaningless phrase." Still, Young-Bruehl is more responsible with Arendt's work than others have been, and makes it clear by the end that Arendt should matter. Published to coincide with the 100th anniversary of Arendt's birth, the book is the first in a new series of books from Yale on people and ideas. (Oct.) For the iPod's fifth anniversary, Newsweek technology writer and longtime Apple Computer enthusiast Levy (Insanely Great) offers a brightly written paean to "the most familiar, and certainly the most desirable, new object of the twenty-first century." Combining upbeat reportage about the device's origins and development with higher-minded ruminations about its place at "the center of just about every controversy in the digital age," he explores how the iPod "set the technology world, the business world, and especially the music industry on its head." Levy discusses its place in the "movement of portable cocooning" begun by the Sony Walkman, exploring how the ubiquitous white buds are affecting social connections. The book's in-no-particular-sequence chapters—intended to evoke the iPod's shuffle function—don't build much momentum, and there's more about Apple CEO Steve Jobs and his leaps over design and technical hurdles than the average user may need to know. But Levy's zeal and insider anecdotes ("I once found myself in a heated discussion with Bill Gates about the nature of cool") carry things along. Apple fans and iPod owners will enjoy Levy's exploration—and will probably forgive his gushing about the iPod's "universally celebrated, endlessly pleasing, devilishly functional, drop-dead gorgeous design." (Oct.) On first glance, back-to-the-land hippies and dot-com entrepreneurs might not seem much alike, but it turns out that they have a whole lot in common underneath those scraggly beards and goatees. Drawing a direct line from dog-eared copies of the Whole Earth Catalog to the slickly techno-libertarian Wired magazine, Stanford University communications professor Turner follows countercultural figures like Stewart Brand, who shaped the information revolution, according to their aspirations to break down the boundaries of individual experience and embrace a larger collective consciousness. Less a biography of Brand than of the swirl of relationships surrounding him, the book shows how the ride of the Merry Pranksters and LSD experimentation led to the early online discussion board Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link (the WELL), and into the digital utopianism surrounding the hyperlinked World Wide Web. Turner offers a compelling genealogy of both the ideals and the disappointments of our digital world, one that is as important for scholars as it is illuminating for general readers. (Oct.) Entrepreneurship is the hammer that Schramm wields, and everything looks like a nail. He calls the freedom to start one's own business key to the nation's survival, "the only uniquely American resource at our disposal" and "the only answer if we hope to continue to thrive." Schramm makes a solid case for emphasizing entrepreneurial thinking and policy; he notes that globalization has stripped away any U.S. advantage in technology, education and manufacturing, and argues that big companies must remodel themselves after technologically savvy startups. But as with any monomaniac, his rigidity is hard to take seriously. ("Aren't there other solutions?" he asks on the book's first page, answering: "No.") His "sweeping manifesto" rails against bureaucracy, the Small Business Administration and "big business, big government, and big labor." Some readers will raise eyebrows at his take on entrepreneurship's role in democracy's rise, at his rant about antibusiness attitudes in the academy or at his contention that "entrepreneurship must be the basis of our foreign policy." Schramm may be right in insisting that only entrepreneurial capitalism "will allow us to continue to enjoy our standard of living," but his perspective is too narrow to draw in many people who don't already share it. (Oct.) This fast-paced account of the murder of three young teenage boys in Chicago in 1955 reads like a Law and Order SVU episode. Despite an intensive investigation and a series of promising but ultimately false leads, the case goes unsolved for 40 years, until a breakthrough leads to a man (Kenneth Hansen), who is charged and convicted. Though the conviction is reversed on appeal five years later, the suspect is retried, convicted and sentenced to 200–300 years for each death. Jack, the lead police detective on the case who followed the investigation for more than four decades, brings an authentic voice and a Mickey Spillane style to this account. But the book falls apart in its last third, at the second trial. Although there is testimony against the suspect, it is relatively weak (one of the witnesses is a married ex-boyfriend of the accused with a criminal record) and is recalled long after the events. Critical readers may begin to mistrust the narrator, who is convinced of Hansen's guilt and the strength of the evidence. The book's subtitle doesn't help, either: the investigation includes some other sexual offenders, but there is never a sense that a broader conspiracy is at play here. (Oct.) In this revealing study of a Southside Chicago neighborhood, sociologist Venkatesh opens a window on how the poor live. Focusing on domestics, entrepreneurs, hustlers, preachers and gangs linked in an underground economy that "manages to touch all households," the book reveals how residents struggle between "their desires to live a just life and their needs to make ends meet as best they can." In this milieu, African-American mechanics, painters, hairdressers, musicians and informal security guards are linked to prostitutes, drug dealers, gun dealers and car thieves in illegal enterprises that even police and politicians are involved in, though not all are criminals in the usual sense. Storefront clergy, often dependent "on the underground for their own livelihood," serve as mediators and brokers between individuals and gang members, who have "insinuated themselves—and their drug money—into the deepest reaches of the community." Although the book's academic tenor is occasionally wearying, Venkatesh keeps his work vital and poignant by using the words of his subjects, who are as dependent on this intricate web as they are fearful of its dangers. (Oct.) Lifestyle Food & Entertaining The noodle reigns supreme in this fun but singularly focused collection of recipes. Drawing from decades of experience, the James Beard Award–winning owners of Al Forno in Providence, R.I., and coauthors of Cucina Sympatica explore their favorite recipes at home and in the restaurant, including their favorite after-work treat, Midnight Spaghetti. The chapter Pasta Tips offers useful tidbits of information such as how to heat serving bowls and when and how to add grated cheese. The remainder of the book consists of the recipes, which are split up into sections by type, such as with vegetables, tomato sauce or seafood; there are also sections on fresh and various baked pasta dishes. The majority are quick and simple and feature the usual saucy suspects like capers, red pepper flakes and Parmigiano-Reggiano. Yet the authors cover a wide expanse of Italian culinary traditions, and there are some intriguing surprises, like George's Spaghetti with Raw Cucumber and Basil, and Pappardelle and Saffron-Scented Milk-Braised Chicken. Throughout, the directions are straightforward and consistent. Each dish is followed by suggestions for rounding out the meal and using leftovers—though most of these creations are unlikely to leave any behind. (Nov.) With respect for the past and an enlightened, modern sensibility, the Lee brothers roll up their sleeves and get elbow-deep in Southern cooking in all its sugary, fried goodness. The authors grew up in Charleston, S.C., where they developed a love for boiled peanuts, shrimp and grits, and she-crab soup. Now New Yorkers (and co-proprietors of a mail-order source for Southern pantry staples), the brothers are aware that certain Southern foods have quite a reputation elsewhere in the country ("grits run a close second to lard as the longest-running joke about southern food, perceived by the uninitiated to be a curiosity rather than what they are: a pillar of southern cooking"). As a result, their approach to the cuisine is steeped in research and never snobby. Many recipes are coded "quick knockout," meaning they use just a few ingredients and can be prepared relatively quickly (Fried Oysters, Shrimp Burgers). More involved recipes (Lady Baltimore Cake; Kentucky Burgoo, a meat stew) come with fascinating asides on their origins. Classy, matter-of-fact and welcoming, this volume deserves a permanent place on cooks' shelves by day and on bedside tables by night, as a browsable primer on a world and its food. Photos, line drawings. (Oct.) Few writers could get away with what London Observer columnist Slater does here: jotting down what he eats and recording recipes for the homemade items over the course of a year. Slater, though, has the writing chops to make it work—as proven in his memoir Toast. His style is lazily thoughtful, but also honest and unfussy: January 9 sees a "gray, endless drizzle" that makes it "the sort of day on which to light the fire, turn on the radio and bake a cake." The recipe for Double Ginger Cake that follows, however, highlights this book's sometimes problematic Britishness when it calls for both golden syrup and stem ginger in syrup, available, a footnote claims, "in some supermarkets and specialty shops." Slater's food isn't British in the stodgy sense. Indeed, he smoothly incorporates the flavors of other cultures into his cooking to make Indian-influenced Spiced Roast Potatoes with Yogurt and Mint, for example. Yet local references and recommendations, such as a tip that the best hummus may be purchased "at the Green Valley, just off the Edgware Road," will frustrate readers in the U.S. As George Bernard Shaw once said, the British and the Americans are two peoples divided by a common language. Sadly, much of this wonderful book is lost in translation, or lack thereof. (Oct.) Koehler does an excellent job of deconstructing paella, an often intimidating dishes. He clearly explains the different types of rice and the best pans (from which the name paella comes); the largest section of the book focuses on the endless variations of paella, starting with the original Paella Valenciana, made with fresh beans and snails. Paella à la marinera (Fisherman's Paella), one of many seafood versions, includes mussels, monkfish and squid, while Paella de pescado azul is made with bluefish and artichokes. The popular Mixed Poultry and Seafood Paella is included as well as Rosa'sfamous Shellfish Paella. Other delightful versions are Paella with Rabbit and Artichokes and Paella with Pork Ribs and Turnips. Freelance food and travel writer Koehler also presents dishes using the traditionally Spanish cazuela (a wide, shallow terra-cotta casserole) and the caldero (a heavy cast-iron or terra-cotta pot), which produce dishes that are moister and soupier than paella. Two rice pudding recipes make up the dessert section, and Koehler finishes with sources on where to buy rice-cooking equipment and Spanish ingredients, as well as a list of restaurants in Spain that will accommodate every desire. (Nov.) Lieberman, of the Food Network's Good Deal and author of Young & Hungry, has an assured but unpretentious strategy for cooking tasty meals quickly. His Drinks and Finger Foods section is full of good bets for impressing guests, such as an Orange-Cardamon Bellini or Mini Moroccan Lamb Burgers with Lemon Yogurt Sauce. The book proceeds to offer a selection of soup, salad, main dish and dessert recipes, any of which would be worthy of a Saturday night, yet easy enough to throw together on a Wednesday. The dishes display the author's ingenuity, like a Shaved Zucchini and Radish Salad over Smoked Salmon, or Plum-Ginger Glazed Chicken with Cauliflower-Parsnip Mash. Global flavors are represented, too, like Asia (Curried Calamari and Green Bean Stir-Fry) and the Caribbean (Jerk Chicken with Banana Fried Rice). The lists of ingredients, however, are consistently short and the directions are spare—Lieberman encourages readers to rely on visual and tactile cues to test doneness rather than exact cooking times. This relaxed yet informative approach is as appealing at home as it is on TV. (Oct.) An introduction covering the most basic of basics and dishes such as Tex-Mex Taco Salad might send serious home chefs in search of another book, but this straightforward, convenience- and health-driven volume has more gourmet gusto than readers might expect. And Romanoff, recipe developer for EatingWell magazine, provides recipes that make enough dinner for two people and can be prepared "in 45 minutes or less (under 30 minutes, in some cases)." Each recipe includes information on active time and total time to complete the dish and nutrition data; many have make-ahead instructions. Especially tempting options include Lamb, Fig & Olive Stew; a dressed-up grilled cheese (Grilled Manchego with Spinach and Spicy Plum Chutney); Pomegranate Duck; Coffee Bean & Peppercorn Steak; and quick desserts like Balsamic Vinegar-Spiked Strawberries, and Roasted Grapes. A section on sides such as Quick Cheese Grits and Avocado-Corn Salsa and suggested menus for a variety of occasions—New Year's Eve, a "hot date," pizza night—make planning a healthy meal easy, even when time is limited. (Oct.) Health According to Wansink, director of the Cornell University Food and Brand Lab, the mind makes food-related decisions, more than 200 a day, and many of them without pause for actual thought. This peppy, somewhat pop-psych book argues that we don't have to change what we eat as much as how, and that by making more mindful food-related decisions we can start to eat and live better. The author's approach isn't so much a diet book as a how-to on better facilitating the interaction between the feed-me messages of our stomachs and the controls in our heads. In their particulars, the research summaries are entertaining, like an experiment that measured how people ate when their plates were literally "bottomless," but the cumulative message and even the approach feels familiar and not especially fresh. Wansink examines popular diets like the South Beach and Atkins regimes, and offers a number of his own strategies to help focus on what you eat: at a dinner party, "try to be the last person to start eating." Whether readers take time to weigh their decisions and their fruits and vegetables remains to be seen. (Oct.) Although the number of strokes that occur annually continues to increase, up to 75 percent of them could be prevented if symptoms were accurately diagnosed and current treatment options applied, says Spence, director of the Stroke Prevention and Atherosclerosis Research Centre at the Robarts Research Institute. And in his book, he aims to provide all the information that at-risk patients need to understand the underlying causes of strokes, risk factors and remedies, from diet and exercise to drugs and surgery. He discusses well-known risks (smoking, alcohol, a diet high in saturated fat, diabetes, high blood pressure and cholesterol levels) and those that have more recently come to light (genetics, vitamin deficiencies, infections, stress). While Spence's style tends to be dry and technical, readers will likely glean insights not provided by their own doctors (the adverse effects of decongestants and appetite suppressants on blood pressure; the importance of arterial management after symptoms are under control). Recipes for a variety of delicious dishes based on the typical Mediterranean and Asian diet (barley stuffed peppers, pad thai noodles, Singapore chow mein fun and vegetarian paella, etc.) are among the most attractive elements of Spence's effort and could persuade confirmed carnivores to choose vegetarian meals more often. (Oct.) Home & Gardening In answering the question "What is Country?" this lush, colorful coffee-table book offers an impressively detailed look at country style as presented by design writer and author Irvine. She breaks this particular aesthetic into six major categories: farmhouse, grand country, cozy cottage, rusticators, clean simplicity and urban arcadia. Detailed descriptions, closeup photos and Irvine's explanations of the various shades' relationship to personality and lifestyle (are you artistic and edgy? or stately and traditional?) offer myriad options for architecture, design and crafts that can be used to create the country look and feel that best suits a home's inhabitants. Ideas include layered wallpaper, wall-mounted china collections, and shells used to decorate everything from a mantel to a headboard. The author's own upstate New York country home is used as an example of comfortable yet opulent country style, as are homes in Maine, Montana and elsewhere in the U.S. A resources section provides contact information for antiques, carpet, ceramics and flooring dealers, plus a list of museum houses (nearly all are in New York) that may serve as inspiration. (Oct.)
William James: In the Maelstrom of American Modernity
Robert D. Richardson. Houghton Mifflin, $30 (640p) ISBN 978-0-618-43325-4
La Dame d'Esprit: A Biography of the Marquise du Châtelet
Judith P. Zinsser. Viking, $24.95 (400p) ISBN 0-670-03800-8
Gore Vidal. Doubleday, $26 (272p) ISBN 0-385-51721-1
The Doors, with Ben Fong-Torres. Hyperion, $45 paper (304p) ISBN 1-4013-0303-X
Robert Greenfield, Photos by Dominic Tarle. Da Capo, $24 (224p) ISBN 978-0-306-81433-1
Charles P. Pierce. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $23 (256p) ISBN 978-0-374-29923-1
Lindsay Pollock. Public Affairs, $30 (464p) ISBN 978-1-58648-302-9
William S. McFeely. Norton, $26.95 (256p) ISBN 978-0-393-05065-3
The Book of Martyrdom and Artifice: First Journals and Poems, 1937–1952
Allen Ginsberg, edited by Juanita Lieberman-Plimpton and Bill Morgan. Da Capo, $27.50 (416p) ISBN 978-0-306-81462-4
Chip Walter. Walker, $25.95 (272p) ISBN 978-0-8027-1527-2
Read Montague. Dutton, $24.95 (240p) ISBN 0-525-94982-8
Ronald L. Mallett with Bruce Henderson. Thunder's Mouth, $24.95 (240p) ISBN 1-56025-869-1
Michele Simon. Nation, $14.95 paper (416p) ISBN 1-56025-932-9
Robert Satloff. Public Affairs, $26 (256p) ISBN 978-1-58648-399-9
This Has Happened: An Italian Family in Auschwitz
Piera Sonnino, trans. from the Italian by Ann Goldstein, foreword by David Denby, afterword by Mary Doria Russell. Palgrave MacMillan, $21.95 (192p) ISBN 1-4039-7508-6
Lincoln and Chief Justice Taney: Slavery, Secession and the President's War Powers
James F. Simon. Simon & Schuster, $27 (352p) ISBN 978-0-7432-5032-0
John Taliaferro. Public Affairs, $26.95 (416p) ISBN 978-1-58648-221-3
Michael L. Kurtz. Univ. Press of Kansas, $29.95 (256p) ISBN 0-7006-1474-5
Philip E. Orbanes. Da Capo, $27.50 (288p) ISBN 978-0-306-81489-1
Laura Kipnis. Pantheon, $23.95 (192p) ISBN 0-375-42417-2
Donald L. Miller. Simon & Schuster, $30 (608p) ISBN 978-0-7432-3544-0
Hampton Sides. Doubleday, $26.95 (416p) ISBN 0-385-50777-1
Rob McCall. Pushcart, $22 (280p) ISBN 978-1-888889-45-1
Adam Gopnik. Knopf, $25 (272p) ISBN 1-4000-4181-3
Ken Burke and
Dan Griffin, foreword by Brian Setzer. Chicago Review, $24.95 (320p) ISBN 1-55652-614-8
A Shameful Act: The Armenian Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility
Taner Akçam. Metropolitan, $30 (448p) ISBN 978-0-8050-7932-7
Rashid Khalidi. Beacon, $24.95 (352p) ISBN 978-0-8070-0308-4
Christian Alfonsi. Doubleday, $26.95 (384p) ISBN 978-0-385-51598-6
John Yoo. Atlantic Monthly, $24 (336p) ISBN 978-0-87113-945-0
Brigitte Gabriel. St. Martin's, $23.95 (272p) ISBN 978-0-312-35837-2
Elizabeth Holtzman and Cindy Cooper. Nation, $14.95 paper (256p) ISBN 1-56025-940-X
Doro Bush Koch. Warner, $29.99 (352p) ISBN 978-0-446-57990-2
James A. Baker III with Steve Fiffer. Putnam, $28.95 (480p) ISBN 0-399-15377-2
Elisabeth Young-Bruehl. Yale Univ., $22 (240p) ISBN 978-0-300-12044-8
Steven Levy. Simon & Schuster, $25 (272p) ISBN 0-7432-8522-0
Fred Turner. Univ. of Chicago, $29 (360p) ISBN 0-226-81741-5
Carl J. Schramm. Collins, $24.95 (208p) ISBN 978-0-06-084163-8
James A. Jack. HPH (www.hphpublishing.com), $22.95 (416p) ISBN 0-9776281-4-0
Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh. Harvard Univ., $27.95 (310p) ISBN 978-0-674-02355-0
Johanne Killeen and George Germon. Morrow, $24.95 (288p) ISBN 978-0-06-059873-0
The Lee Bros. Cookbook: Stories and Recipes for Southerners and Would-Be Southerners
Matt Lee and Ted Lee. Norton, $35 (416p) ISBN 978-0-393-05781-2
Nigel Slater. Gotham, $40 (416p) ISBN 1-592-40234-8
Jeff Koehler. Chronicle, $18.95 (146p) ISBN 978-0-8118-5251-7
Dave Lieberman. Hyperion, $27.50 (224p) ISBN 1-4013-0129-0
Jim Romanoff and the test kitchens of Eating Well, photos by Ken Burris. Countryman, $24.95 (256p) ISBN 978-0-88150-723-2
Brian Wansink. Bantam, $25 (304p) ISBN 978-0-553-80434-8
J. David Spence. Vanderbilt Univ., $19.95 paper (200p) ISBN 0-8265-1537-1
Chippy Irvine. Taunton, $40 (224p) ISBN 1-56158-816-4
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