Nonfiction Reviews: Week of 1/1/2007

By Staff -- Publishers Weekly, 1/1/2007

Taj Mahal: Passion and Genius at the Heart of the Moghul Empire
Diana and Michael Preston. Walker, $26.95 (336p) ISBN 978-0-8027-1511-1

Built in 1631 by the Moghul emperor Shah Jahan after the death of his wife, Mumtaz, the Taj Mahal is one of the world's few instantly recognizable architectural landmarks, "an expression not only of supreme love but also of confident power and opulent majesty." To tell its story, the Prestons (A Pirate of Exquisite Mind), British historians, trace several generations in the violent family history of India's Moghul rulers and the elaborate mausoleums they built. Though Shah Jahan—who ascended to the throne after killing his brother—undoubtedly loved Mumtaz dearly, their lives turn out to have been slightly less romantic than the legend. Mumtaz died while delivering the 14th child of their 19-year marriage, after which her husband honored her wish that he never take another wife but relied on the constant companionship of concubines. It's the family saga and the exotic palace life that hold the Prestons' attention, but they supply just enough architectural details to satisfy those who might be more interested in how the building supports its massive central dome. Though many questions about the Taj remain unanswered, this small history breaks through the legendary facade to reveal a powerful backstory. 8 color and 55 b&w illus. (Apr.)

American Leviathan: Empire, Nation, and Revolutionary Frontier
Patrick Griffin. Hill & Wang, $30 (304p) ISBN 978-0-8090-9515-5

Griffin's erudite account places ordinary settlers of America's frontier at the center of 18th-century political revolution. The British Empire's hold on the western edge of colonies like Pennsylvania was always tenuous, suggests the University of Virginia's Griffin (The People with No Name). The frontier was beset by violence between Indians and white settlers, and the latter thought Britain appeased the Indians at their expense. These settlers' disgust with the inadequacies of imperial policy, says Griffin, fomented the American Revolution, a titanic political clash that ultimately gave ordinary frontiersmen new rights. But they gained those rights at the expense of Native Americans—whom they identified as irreconcilably other. Tensions continued after the revolution. The fragile new American government was unable to enforce order on the frontier, and settlers in the Ohio valley and other border regions believed the state had to eradicate Indians to secure a stable and safe society. (As Griffin puts it with elegant bluntness, the frontiersmen were building a commonwealth "on the bod[ies] of... dead Indian[s].") Griffin judiciously weaves analysis into riveting stories of riots and unrest, and weds attention to race and marginalized people with traditional political and military history. 8 pages of b&w illus., 3 maps. (Apr.)

The Lost World of John Smithson: Science, Revolution, and the Birth of the Smithsonian
Heather Ewing. Bloomsbury, $29.95 (244p) ISBN 978-1-59691-029-4

This pleasing biography (the second recent one of Smithson, after 2003's The Stranger and the Statesman by Nina Burleigh) tells the story of the enigmatic Englishman who left the United States a vast sum of money to found "an establishment for the increase and diffusion of knowledge." Ewing, an architectural historian who has worked at the Smithsonian, traces John Smithson's development as a "gentleman-scientist," describing his study of chemistry at Oxford in the 1780s; his membership in the Coffee House Philosophical Society, where learned men discussed scientific news; and his well-received scientific papers. Two of the most fascinating chapters focus on Smithson's will. Ewing hazards a few suggestions about why an English scientist would leave a huge bequest to the United States government, and she examines the controversy Smithson's gift set off—some argued against accepting what they viewed as Smithson's self-aggrandizing bequest. This book is possible only because Ewing is a dogged researcher in countless archives. References to Smithson in his friends' letters and diaries reveal not the dour recluse historians had once thought him to be but an exuberant if eccentric man with a zeal for learning and for life. Ewing ably conveys all this as well as the mysterious roots of the institution that bears his name. Illus. (Apr.)

Troublesome Young Men: The Rebels Who Brought Churchill to Power and Helped Save England
Lynne Olson. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $27 (464p) ISBN 978-0-374-17954-0

In 1930s England, faced with the gathering menace of fascism, 30 or so junior members of Parliament understood that Hitler would not be dissuaded by Prime Minister Chamberlain's policy of appeasement. Their rebellion against their leader and the "elderly mediocrities" of their own Conservative Party is the subject of Olson's absorbing book. The forces opposed to Chamberlain were initially inhibited by party loyalty and the ferocious reprisals threatened against anyone who challenged the prime minister. Olson traces how Hitler's continuing depredations (Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland) served to recruit more insurgents in the House of Commons and galvanize those shamed by England's inaction. Olson's story picks up energy as she reviews the events of 1940, when at long last Chamberlain was replaced by Churchill. Olson is interested in the moral imperatives driving her protagonists. The dominant figure in the narrative, of course, is Churchill, who despised Chamberlain's defeatism but served loyally in his cabinet until Chamberlain's forced resignation. Infused with the sense of urgency felt by the young Tories, Olson's vivid narrative of a critical generational clash leaves the reader wondering what might have happened had they prevailed earlier on. (Apr.)

Too Close to the Sun: The Audacious Life and Times of Denys Finch Hatton
Sara Wheeler. Random, $27.95 (308p) ISBN 978-1-4000-6069-6

A superlative athlete with an enormous capacity for friendship and a chronically underachieving, charismatic loner with eternal wanderlust, Denys Finch Hatton (1887–1931) emerged as an iconic figure in the memoirs of two lovers, Karen Blixen's Out of Africa and Beryl Markham's West with the Night. In childhood, this earl's son—who would later reject the trappings of worldly success, saw his family fortune depleted, developed a passion for hunting from a nonconformist uncle as well as an appreciation for strong, artistic women like his mother—found Eton a "youthful paradise," says Wheeler, hat made it possible for him "to believe in the African dream." The nonconformist in him was drawn to the freedom the Dark Continent promised; after settling in East Africa, he fought on the WWI battlefield there and later became a hunter shepherding rich clients. Hatton, who died when the plane he was piloting crashed, left no diaries and his inner life remains unknowable, as Wheeler (Cherry) acknowledges, yet in this thoughtful, satisfying work, she masterfully captures his allure through the memories of others and through her deft interpretation of both his East African and British milieus in the tumultuous years surrounding WWI. Photos. (Apr. 24)

The Big Turnoff: Confessions of a TV-Addicted Mom Trying to Raise a TV-Free Kid
Ellen Currey-Wilson. Algonquin, $24.95 (352p) ISBN 978-1-56512-539-1

Currey-Wilson decides in the early stages of her pregnancy that her child will grow up without television so the family can form stronger emotional ties; the only problem is that she herself is totally addicted to the tube. She does manage to cut down her viewing after her son's birth, taking her vigilance in maintaining his abstinence to extremes. She panics when she brings Casey to a friend's house and finds a television on. She grants him permission to watch the Olympics, then leaps in front of the set to block the commercials. But when her son doesn't play with his classmates, her fear runs in the opposite direction—should she have let him watch TV so he'd be able to fit in with other kids? Currey-Wilson's vocal, earnest hostility to mainstream culture (even when she's basking in sitcoms) sometimes makes it hard to sympathize, except that she's also bracingly up-front about her insecurities and petty jealousies. And her anti-TV crusade becomes much less simplistic as she reveals how much she's still playing out the dramas of her own childhood. Curry-Wilson writes with self-effacing humor, and any mom can identify with her sincere effort to give her child the best she can. (Apr. 20)

Happy Birthday or Whatever: Track Suits, Kim Chee, and Other Family Disasters
Annie Choi. Harper Paperbacks, $13.95 (256p) ISBN 978-0-06-113222-3

Choi's volatile relationship with her domineering, chronically dissatisfied mother is at the heart of this memoir, a funny and often moving account of growing up in a family of Korean immigrants. The parent/child compact in Choi's childhood home was as follows: Mommy and Daddy's job is to take care of the child; the child's job is to study hard, go to Harvard and become a doctor. But Choi and her mother face each other across a seemingly unbridgeable divide: Annie has little desire to embody traditional Korean feminine virtues (and no desire to be a doctor); her mother—to whom social status is everything—cannot countenance her daughter's "shortcomings." Whether recounting the shame of bringing home a B-plus on a fourth-grade spelling test (a clear indicator that she's destined for an inferior institution) or the greater horror of having to wear Korean clothes to American school ("The fun of soup bring Spring" reads one pair of her tracksuit bottoms), Choi adds acid wit—mixed with compassion—to her descriptions of immigrant life in the San Fernando Valley. This is that rare book that delivers more than it promises; Choi tackles the theme of mother/daughter conflict with grace and humor. (Apr.)

Here's the Bright Side of Failure, Fear, Cancer, Divorce, and Other Bum Raps
Betty Rollin. Random, $14.95 paper (130p) ISBN 978-1-4000-6565-3

Award-winning television journalist Rollin, formerly an NBC correspondent and author of Last Wish and First, You Cry, urges readers to see the "bright side" of life's disasters. While there is nothing new about finding a silver lining in a cloud, this thought is only comforting if it comes from a credible source—and here, Rollin's voice is comforting. People know she went through two mastectomies back in the days when breast cancer was an unmentionable disease. The first doctor she saw ignored her cancer, but she shows how that terrible experience opened up new perspectives for her. Even the experts, she reports, find that trauma doesn't just produce stress, but "post-traumatic growth." People who've survived catastrophes may develop better self-perceptions and better relations with others. They may adopt a more meaningful life philosophy. Disaster can be a sort of wakeup call. Rollin is not religious; she never rationalizes bad things happening to good people by referring to God's mysterious ways, but she is relentlessly positive (Apr.)

Josephine Baker in Art and Life: The Icon and the Image
Bennetta Jules-Rosette. Univ. of Illinois, $25 paper (304p) ISBN 978-0-252-07412-7

Savage dancer, Black Venus, exotic Jazz Age star, liberated new woman, gender-bending cross-dresser, mother, socialist, war hero and writer—Josephine Baker (1906–1975) was all of those in life and in the images she projected. In this vibrant if academic portrait of Baker, Jules-Rosette alerts the reader that this is "not a biography" but an exploration of "the complex construction of Baker's multiple images in art and life." The first part opens with the tourist attractions that Baker sparked, not with her birth, then moves through her stage performance history, and concludes with an analysis of her films and films about her. In Part II, Baker emerges as a fully independent figure, influencing the art and fashion worlds, and in Part III, Jules-Rosette discusses the obstacles Baker confronted as she struggled to promote her ahead-of-its-time multicultural worldview. Jules-Rosette's scholarly deconstruction, generously documented (including more than 50 illustrations) and supplemented with a chronology, particularly helpful in a thematically structured work, will reward Baker fans. As well, the book's careful documentation, ample bibliography and discography add tremendous value for readers engaged in cultural, ethnic, diaspora or women's studies. (Apr.)

The Gashouse Gang: How Dizzy Dean, Leo Durocher, Branch Rickey, Pepper Martin and Their Colorful, Come-from-Behind Ball Club Won the World Series—and America's Heart—During the Great Depression
John Heidenry. Public Affairs, $25 (304p) ISBN 978-1-58648-419-2

Heidenry (The Boys Who Were Left Behind) offers a thorough if occasionally dry account of the "immortal, implausible, impossible gang of ballplayers known officially as the 1934 St. Louis Cardinals." The author draws on a wealth of books and publications to tell how a visionary named Branch Rickey invented the idea of using a farm system of minor league baseball clubs to develop talent, and then forged an unlikely, low-budget contender in a city far from the sport's Eastern power base. Rickey's team became known as the Gashouse Gang, owing to its role as a ragamuffin bunch with an indomitable spirit to whom Americans in the Depression could relate. The straightforward, detailed storytelling can make for some dull reading, particularly in the beginning, when Heidenry meticulously lays out the background of Rickey and the club. But anecdotes about the Cardinals' memorable characters, who included Leo "the Lip" Durocher, Casey Stengel, Pepper Martin and brothers Dizzy and Paul Dean, liven things up considerably. Dizzy takes center stage in the book, whether scheming new ways to get more money from management or mouthing off to the press. Baseball fans will appreciate this comprehensive look at the oddball pitcher and the team he led to glory. (Apr.)

It Can Happen Here: Authoritarian Peril in the Age of Bush
Joe Conason. St. Martin's/Dunne, $24.95 (256p) ISBN 978-0-312-35605-7

Sinclair Lewis's 1935 novel It Can't Happen Here envisaged a right-wing populist president, advised by a cunning political strategist and backed by a cynical alliance of religious fundamentalists and corporations, who uses security threats to consolidate dictatorial powers, destroy civil liberties and establish folksy fascism. This is a virtual blueprint for the current Bush administration, a "corrupt and authoritarian ruling clique" that accords the president "the prerogatives of a king," argues political columnist Conason (Big Lies) in this lively, if overwrought, j'accuse. He surveys a long list of what he sees as Bush administration affronts to freedom and democracy: military tribunals, torture, warrantless wiretapping, politically motivated terrorism alerts, a war based on fraudulent pretexts, the Abramoff scandals, the handover of policy making to business interests and Christian zealots, tight secrecy coupled with a dissemination of propaganda through the right-wing media and a lawless contempt for constitutional constraints on the presidency. His indictment often hits home, but it's broad and indiscriminate, treating biased journalism, religion-tinged politics and lobbying scandals as signs of creeping fascism rather than age-old commonplaces of democracy. Conason delivers his usual cogent, hard-hitting critique of Republican misdeeds, but his insinuations of authoritarianism, coming just as the Republicans have been voted out of power in Congress, seem badly timed. (Mar. 1)

Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future
Bill McKibben. Times, $25 (288p) ISBN 978-0-8050-7626-4

Challenging the prevailing wisdom that the goal of economies should be unlimited growth, McKibben (The End of Nature) argues that the world doesn't have enough natural resources to sustain endless economic expansion. For example, if the Chinese owned cars in the same numbers as Americans, there would be 1.1 billion more vehicles on the road—untenable in a world that is rapidly running out of oil and clean air. Drawing the phrase "deep economy" from the expression "deep ecology," a term environmentalists use to signify new ways of thinking about the environment, he suggests we need to explore new economic ideas. Rather then promoting accelerated cycles of economic expansion—a mindset that has brought the world to the brink of environmental disaster—we should concentrate on creating localized economies: community-scale power systems instead of huge centralized power plants; cohousing communities instead of sprawling suburbs. He gives examples of promising ventures of this type, such as a community-supported farm in Vermont and a community biosphere reserve, or large national park–like area, in Himalayan India, but some of the ideas—local currencies as supplements to national money, for example—seem overly optimistic. Nevertheless, McKibben's proposals for new, less growth-centered ways of thinking about economics are intriguing, and offer hope that change is possible. (Mar. 20)

The Citizen-Powered Energy Handbook: Community Solutions to a Global Crisis
Greg Pahl. Chelsea Green, $21.95 (376p) ISBN 978-1-933392-12-7

Solar roof panels, backyard wind turbines and biofuel stills: in this how-to vision of a future without hydrocarbon fuels, small really is beautiful. Faced with the paired (and frightfully imminent) dangers of global warming and the point at which half the total recoverable oil on Earth has been extracted and production begins to decline, Pahl champions a spectrum of alternative energy sources. Separate chapters on water, geothermal and biomass (firewood and plant matter) energies in addition to solar, wind and biofuel (the distillate of corn, soy and other crops) sources are both practical and inspirational. First comes technical information; then Pahl reports on community and cooperative alternative-energy successes. In Asheville, N.C., 24 clustered townhouses use solar panels for heat and hot water. Toronto powers 250 homes with a cooperative-owned lakeshore wind turbine. Micro-hydro projects (100 kilowatts or less) power small businesses and homes in Nepal, Pakistan and off-the-grid American communities. A short-run train in Sweden—a nation committed to achieving an oil-free economy by 2020—runs on biogas generated by fermenting cow guts; it gets about two-and-a-half miles per cow—proof, as this readable book illustrates, that ingenuity and small-bore efforts are one way to deal with an energy crisis. (Mar.)

Ethical Markets: Growing the Green Economy
Hazel Henderson. Chelsea Green, $30 (280p) ISBN 978-1-933392-23-3

In this companion to the television series of the same name, economist Henderson delivers an optimistic overview of socially responsible, environmentally sensitive businesses, investors and visionaries. Keeping an eye on the "triple bottom line" that adds "people" and "planet" to the usual focus on "profits," the book divides "cleaner, greener, more ethical and more female sectors of our U.S. economy" into three areas: lifestyles of health and sustainability, socially responsible investing and corporate social responsibility. An economist with a long history of activism in "redefining success" (for example, revamping the GDP to include environmental capital and unpaid labor such as child-rearing), Henderson adeptly packs large amounts of information into chapters within her expertise. Discussion of topics that are further from her experience, such as green building and the health care system, tends to careen from problems to solutions so quickly that a reader can become confused. The interviews after each chapter, meant to show how CEOs are "walking the talk," seem to be taken unedited from the TV show, coming across as incoherent and shallow. Fortunately, the book is crammed with Web references that can offer a fuller picture to readers tantalized by this glimpse of the economic revolution thriving below the radar of mainstream media. (Mar.)

Alice Waters and Chez Panisse: The Romantic, Impractical, Often Eccentric, Ultimately Brilliant Making of a Food Revolution
Thomas McNamee. Penguin Press, $27.95 (380p) ISBN 978-1-59420-115-8

Talk about dish: McNamee's book is a gossipy history of the famed restaurant and a biography of the individual behind its three-decade rise from humble beginnings to international renown. Alice Waters was a young, single American woman with strong, confident sense and vision but little experience in the restaurant business when she moved to Berkeley in the 1960s. She loved food and cooking, and dreamed of opening a restaurant; her passion and enthusiasm eventually produced a location, a crew and a clientele. The book chronicles the following decades with extensive detail from a behind-the-scenes viewpoint, going from stovetop to bedroom, from opening night right up through the restaurant's recent 35th anniversary. Larger-than-life personalities abound, but the primary focus is Waters, whose success occasionally comes across as attributable to accidents and other people as often as design. The author researched restaurant archives and interviewed dozens of willing subjects with Waters's approval, and the result is a mélange of reverential biography with restaurant and food history. Sidebars scattered throughout the text provide additional anecdotes and insight into Waters's favorite dishes. Serious foodies will devour this memoir. B&w photos. (Mar.)

Twinkie, Deconstructed: My Journey to Discover How the Ingredients Found in Processed Foods Are Grown, Mined (Yes, Mined), and Manipulated into What America Eats
Steve Ettlinger. Penguin/Hudson Street, $23.95 (288p) ISBN 978-1-59463-018-7

In this delightful romp through the food processing industry, Ettlinger, who writes on consumer products (The Complete Illustrated Guide to Everything Sold in Hardware Stores), says, "Believers of urban legends take note.... Twinkies are not just made of chemicals," nor will their ingredients allow them to last, "even exposed on a roof, for 25 years." But what exactly their ingredients are, and how they come from places like Minnesota and Madagascar to be made into what Ettlinger calls "the uber-iconic food product, the archetype of all processed foods," is the subject of his book. Each chapter looks at individual ingredients, in the same order as on a Twinkie package, so Ettlinger finds himself traveling to eastern Pennsylvania farms to study wheat, as well as to high-security plants that manufacture highly toxic chlorine used in minute amounts to make the bleached flour that is "the only kind that works in sugar-heavy" Twinkies or birthday and wedding cakes. His exploration of the manufacturing processes of cellulose gum ("perfect for lending viscosity to the filling in snack cakes—or rocket fuel"), for example, cleverly reveals how Twinkie ingredients "are produced by or dependent on nearly every basic industry we know." (Mar. 1)

Ending the Tobacco Holocaust: How Big Tobacco Affects Our Health, Pocketbook, and Political Freedom—And What We Can Do About It
Michael Rabinoff. Elite (Midpoint, dist.), $24.95 (394p) ISBN 978-1-60070-012-5

Almost everyone knows that smoking is bad. But thanks to political lobbies, misinformation campaigns and billions of advertising dollars spent by tobacco companies each year, it is hard to know just how bad. Psychiatrist Rabinoff goes a long way toward clarifying the questions surrounding the number one leading cause of preventable death in the U.S., responsible for about 450,000 deaths here each year. Nonsmokers will likely fume over Big Tobacco's cunning strategies for keeping people addicted—particularly children, who are tomorrow's smokers, after all. Smokers may feel browbeaten by Rabinoff's sometimes hyperbolic writing style. For aspiring nonsmokers, there are reasons to quit on nearly every page, whether political (e.g., collusion between the tobacco and pharmaceutical industries; how cigarettes are pushed to children overseas) or scientific (how cigarettes are chemically altered to heighten addiction, and the causality between smoking and mental illness). The evidence Rabinoff amasses is overwhelming, making this recommended reading for anyone who wants to quit. B&w photos. $25,000 marketing budget. (Mar.)

Storm Warning: The Story of a Killer Tornado
Nancy Mathis. Touchstone, $24 (256p) ISBN 978-0-7432-8053-2

On May 3, 1999, a series of 71 tornadoes blasted Oklahoma. The biggest of them all spanned a mile—making it the largest in recorded history—and delivered ground-level winds of over 300 mph. In her exhaustively researched book, journalist Mathis brings the Tornado Alley calamity to life. A native Sooner who spent many hours crouching in fear in her grandmother's root cellar, Mathis has a visceral connection to the region and its heavy weather that she supplements with the expert use of interviews and historical research. Mathis introduces readers to the slow development of weather science, to the families of the victims and to such unique individuals as Tetsuya Fujita and his Fujita Scale for measuring tornado strength. Although her initial, century-spanning onslaught of science and characters can be overwhelming, the story lines eventually coalesce, and by the time the tornadoes touch down on or near Oklahoma City, the reader is engrossed. In an era of Weather Channel "Torn Porn," tornado chasers and even "tornado tours" at $3,000 per person, Mathis has written a book that helps readers locate the story behind the spectacle. (Mar.)

Sea Cobra: Admiral Halsey's Task Force and the Great Pacific Typhoon
Buckner F. Melton Jr. Lyons, $24.95 (256p) ISBN 978-1-59228-978-3

The ripple of interest in the typhoon that struck the U.S. Third Fleet in December 1944, sinking three destroyers and drowning 800 sailors, swells onward in this absorbing naval adventure saga. Historian Melton (Aaron Burr) paints a wider canvas than do Bob Drury and Tom Clavin in Halsey's Typhoon (reviewed Oct. 9). Like them, he regales readers with firsthand recollections of the shrieking winds and titanic waves that battered ships to pieces, the ordeal of survivors besieged by thirst and sharks, and the heroism of sailors who rescued them in mountainous seas. He recounts at length the subsequent navy inquiry into the performance of meteorologists, Adm. William Halsey and Cmdr. James Marks of the sunken destroyer Hull, who are pilloried by Drury and Clavin but largely exonerated here. Melton pads out the story with a blow-by-blow of the preceding Battle of Leyte Gulf, an account of another typhoon Halsey sailed the Third Fleet into in 1945, and a chapter on Japanese kamikazes. Melton's prose can be purplish—"The beast was still growing in the heart of the sea... feeding on the heat of the water as if it were mother's milk"—but when the storm breaks, he settles down to a straightforward, gripping narrative. Photos. (Mar.)

At the Same Time: Essays and Speeches
Susan Sontag, edited by Paolo Dilonardo and Anne Jump, foreword by David Rieff. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $23 (224p) ISBN 978-0-374-10072-8

Literature and politics are inextricably intertwined and unified by moral purpose in this powerful collection of pieces (a couple not previously published in English or at all) by iconic critic and novelist Sontag (Regarding the Pain of Others), who died in 2004. Sontag was a dedicated champion of literature in translation, and the book opens with several introductions to such works, led off by a meditation on beauty. The section might have been called "Art and Ardor," so laced is it with artistic passion, both Sontag's own and that of the writers she celebrates, such as Leonid Tsypkin and Anna Banti. Part three contains speeches Sontag gave in accepting the Jerusalem Prize and other awards, and honoring others whose moral courage she admired. But most striking is to re-read the pieces she wrote in the wake of 9/11 and the Abu Ghraib scandal, which constitute the book's middle section. Sontag's controversial attack on the Bush administration immediately after 9/11 may have been an act of courage or of folly, but from a distance of five years, her critique seems on the mark. Sontag's brilliance as a literary critic, her keen analytical skill and her genius for the searingly apt phrase (like her damning "the photographs are us" in relation to the Abu Ghraib photos) are all fiercely displayed here. (Mar. 6)

Too Far from Home: A Story of Life and Death in Space
Chris Jones. Doubleday, $24.95 (320p) ISBN 978-0-385-51465-1

When the space shuttle Columbia broke up during its re-entry into Earth's atmosphere in February 2003, two American astronauts were still aboard the International Space Station, along with a Russian flight engineer. With further NASA flights suspended for months, perhaps years, questions began to emerge not only about how to bring the three men back, but how to provide them with enough supplies while they remained in space. Jones first wrote about the Expedition 6 team in an award-winning article for Esquire (where he is a contributing editor), and his story combines gripping narrative and strongly defined characters. Though extensive accounts of the Americans' backgrounds seems at first to put the brakes on, it's a necessary counterweight to parallel passages about the little-understood Russian space program—essential information because the three eventually took "an accelerated, lung-crushing dive" in a Soyuz capsule. In addition to that adventure, Jones's reporting is filled with details of life aboard the space station, from the amazing beauty of a space walk to the more mundane problem of "taking a crap" in zero gravity. That sort of frank talk enhances readers' identification with the astronauts, making their drama all the more engrossing. (Mar. 6)

Walking on Eggshells: Staying Close to Your Adult Children
Jane Isay. Doubleday/Flying Dolphin, $23.95 (256p) ISBN 978-0-7679-2084-1

As baby boomer parents age, they're discovering the empty-nest syndrome is nothing compared to what happens when their kids graduate from college and start leading lives of their own. To a generation famous for being involved in every aspect of their children's lives, it can be upsetting to find that those children no longer need or welcome your advice. How does one parent children who no longer need parenting? Publishing veteran Isay, an editor and mother of two grown sons, interviews scores of parents and adult children of all ages to see how they are doing it. The stories are heartwarming, and Isay recounts them with intelligence and compassion. What does she find? Nothing Ann Landers hasn't already told us. Mainly: don't give advice; make friends with your children's significant others; and remember that love heals. The most compelling story is Isay's own. One wishes it were the centerpiece of the book rather than tacked on as an epilogue. Her experience is an example of her most interesting discovery: children are quick to forgive and often the ones who take the initiative in forging a new brand of closeness between themselves and their parents—a closeness that is best described as adult. (Mar. 27)

On My Own: The Art of Being a Woman Alone
Florence Falk. Harmony, $23 (304p) ISBN 978-1-4000-9810-1

After two divorces and more than two decades as a psychoanalyst, Falk is an expert on the concept of being a woman alone—a term she prefers because "as a distinct category within women's culture, it formally elevates our presence and status, helps us to achieve visibility and expression, and allows us to redress our marginalized state." Hyperbole aside, there's no denying that to embrace being a woman alone isn't easy in a society where "bachelors are always eligible," while " 'spinsters,' almost by definition, are ready for the dumpster." But as Falk makes clear in this useful and appealing manual, it's inaccurate, unfair and unhealthy to equate being alone with being unwanted or a failure. Some may cringe at her flowery language, but she offers plenty of evidence for her central thesis that "aloneness is an opportunity, a state brimming with potentiality, with resources for renewed life." Drawing from her own experiences, those of her patients, and examples from such writers as Marion Milner and cultural figures like Kitty Carlisle Hart, Falk offers plenty of material to help even women with partners to understand the distinction between being abandoned and choosing to be alone, and to appreciate the healing and nurturing benefits of solitude. (Mar.)

The Power of a Positive No: How to Say No and Still Get to Yes
William Ury. Bantam, $25 (272p) ISBN 978-0-553-80498-0

Twenty-five years after the publication of the bestselling Getting to Yes, Ury addresses the other side of the coin, but his version of "No" is not a simple rejection. "A Positive No begins with Yes and ends with Yes," he says, because it defines the nay-sayer's self-interests and paves the way for a continued relationship. Ury delineates this "Yes! No. Yes?" pattern recursively, so that each step is itself another three-part process. In addition to drawing on his own experiences as a negotiator for conflicts in countries like Chechnya and Venezuela, and the historical examples of activists like Rosa Parks, Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi, he shows how his principles can be used in the home and the workplace. He even throws in a few literary precedents, citing Melville's Bartleby the Scrivener, whose repetition of the phrase "I would prefer not to" is cited as a "simple and admirable" method of polite refusal. Some of Ury's advice, like describing how another's actions make you feel rather than attacking the action, may strike the more cynical minded as touchy-feely, but his reminders to consider the other person's perspective while asserting your own position create a clear, unambiguous path to win-win situations. (Mar. 6)

The Jamestown Project
Karen Ordahl Kupperman. Harvard/Belknap, $29.95 (408p) ISBN 978-0-674-02474-8

The Jamestown story needs retelling, says NYU historian Kupperman (Providence Island) not just because 2007 marks the 400th anniversary of its settlement. It also needs retelling because Americans tend to locate our origins in Plymouth and distance ourselves from Jamestown, which we associate with "greedy, grasping colonists" backed by "arrogant" English patrons. The first decade of Jamestown's history was messy, admits Kupperman, but through that mess, settlers figured out how to make colonization work. Plymouth, in fact, benefited from the lessons learned at Jamestown. What is remarkable is that a colonial outpost on the edge of Virginia, in a not very hospitable location, survived at all. Kupperman, of course, shows how the colonists negotiated relationships with Indians. But her more innovative chapters focus on labor. Colonists began experimenting with tobacco, and colonial elites gradually realized that people were more willing to work when they were laboring for themselves. Backers in England began to think more flexibly about how to create colonial profits. But the dark side of this success story is the institution of indentured servitude, which proved key to Jamestown's success. Kupperman, marrying vivid narration with trenchant analysis, has done the history of Jamestown, and of early America, a great service. 41 b&w illus. (Mar.)

The Poincaré Conjecture: In Search of the Shape of the Universe
Donal O'Shea. Walker, $25.95 (304p) ISBN 978-0-8027-1532-6

The reclusive Russian mathematician Grigory Perelman became a minor media celebrity last summer when he refused the prestigious Fields medal, awarded every four years to a mathematician under the age of 40. Perelman had succeeded in solving the Poincaré conjecture, named for 19th-century French mathematician Henri Poincaré, and which contemporary cosmologists believe has implications for our understanding of the shape of the universe. O'Shea, a professor of mathematics at Mount Holyoke College, begins his account of the long and contentious search for a solution to the puzzle by looking at how we came to understand the shape of the Earth, beginning with the Greeks, in particular Pythagoras and Plato. Writing for generalist science buffs, O'Shea gives a brief course in geometry and in topology and the topological structures called manifolds that are the basis of Poincaré's puzzle. Inexplicably, however, O'Shea doesn't give readers a formal statement of the conjecture itself until well into the book. O'Shea describes mind-bending structures in topology as clearly as most of us can describe a cube, but readers will need to do a little Wikipedia-ing first to find out just what it is they're reading about. Illus. (Mar.)

It's Good to Be the King: The Seriously Funny Life of Mel Brooks
James Robert Parish. Wiley, $25.95 (336p) ISBN 978-0-471-75267-7

Parish, author of many books including Katharine Hepburn: The Untold Story and Fiasco: A History of Hollywood's Iconic Flaps), here traces the life and career of mirthmaker Mel Brooks from the Borscht Belt to Broadway. Born Melvin Kaminsky, he grew up as a Brooklyn classroom clown, honing his stage skills in the Catskills before arriving in WWII France as an army combat engineer. The bombastic Brooks clawed his way into early television as a writer for Sid Caesar: "I was aggressive. I was a terrier, a pit bull terrier. I was unstoppable. I would keep going until my joke or my sketch was in the show." Caesar's shows were a launchpad, catapulting Brooks into a multifaceted comedy career that embraced theater (Shinbone Alley) and sitcoms (Get Smart), recordings (the 2000 Year Old Man series) and acting (Mad About You). He began directing in 1968 with The Producers, followed by the equally hilarious Blazing Saddles and Young Frankenstein. Along the way, he picked up Emmys, Tonys, a Grammy, an Oscar and Anne Bancroft, whom he married in 1964. Brooks's probing self-insights and clever quotes abound. While his sense of timing, delivery and charming goofiness may not always translate to the written page, readers will be satisfied with the details unearthed by Parish's exhaustive research. 16 b&w photos. (Mar.)

Alamo in the Ardennes: The Untold Story of the American Soldiers Who Made the Defense of Bastogne Possible
John C. McManus. Wiley, $24.95 (288p) ISBN 978-0-471-73905-0

The 101st Airborne's legendary defense of Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge hinged on small groups of outnumbered American soldiers slowing the German advance, argues McManus in this spirited account of December 16–20, 1944, before the 101st arrived. By that time, Hitler knew that stopping the Russians was hopeless, but gambled that a crushing blow to the Allies might win a negotiated peace. His plan pivoted on the capture of Bastogne in two days, with German forces moving in fast before their advantage of surprise and local superiority in forces evaporated. Hitler believed American forces would crumble at the massive onslaught—and many units did flee or surrender. But McManus (The Americans at D-Day) makes an excellent case that victory came down to a dozen units battling against overwhelming odds until, after four days of brutal attrition, the remnants straggled into Bastogne to join the newly arrived 101st. Like all good niche military history, the book describes small unit actions in detail. Soldiers who ran away left few records, so almost everyone here fights bravely. By focusing on a less familiar period, McManus makes a modest but original contribution to the vast WWII literature. 20 b&w photos. (Mar.)

Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic
Chalmers Johnson. Metropolitan, $26 (320p) ISBN 978-0-8050-7911-4

Like ancient Rome, America is saddled with an empire that is fatally undermining its republican government, argues Johnson (The Sorrows of Empire), in this bleak jeremiad. He surveys the trappings of empire: the brutal war of choice in Iraq and other foreign interventions going back decades; the militarization of space; the hundreds of overseas U.S. military bases full of "swaggering soldiers who brawl and sometimes rape." At home, the growth of an "imperial presidency," with the CIA as its "private army," has culminated in the Bush administration's resort to warrantless wiretaps, torture, a "gulag" of secret CIA prisons and an unconstitutional arrogation of "dictatorial" powers, while a corrupt Congress bows like the Roman Senate to Caesar. Retribution looms, the author warns, as the American economy, dependent on a bloated military-industrial complex and foreign borrowing, staggers toward bankruptcy, maybe a military coup. Johnson's is a biting, often effective indictment of some ugly and troubling features of America's foreign policy and domestic politics. But his doom-laden trope of empire ("the capacity for things to get worse is limitless.... the American republic may be coming to its end") seems overstated. With Bush a lame duck, not a Caesar, and his military adventures repudiated by the electorate, the Republic seems more robust than Johnson allows. (Feb.)

Commander in Chief: How Truman, Johnson, and Bush Turned a Presidential Power into a Threat to America's Future
Geoffrey Perret. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $27 (496p) ISBN 978-0-374-10217-3

Few presidents have taken on the title of commander-in-chief of the armed forces with such enthusiasm as George W. Bush, who has advanced a wartime executive power unfettered by judicial or legislative oversight on far-ranging topics like the Geneva Conventions, intelligence gathering methods and targeted assassinations. Presidential and military historian Perret (Winged Victory, etc.) explores how wars like Korea, Vietnam and Iraq have been used to consolidate power in the hands of a single man. Charting Truman's anti-intellectualism and fetishization of the military, Johnson's shortsighted escalation of the Vietnam conflict and the current administration's hubris, Perret reveals the steps by which presidential power widened. (Inexplicably, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who created Japanese internment camps during WWII and attempted a coup against the Supreme Court, gets a pass.) While readers at all levels will benefit from Perret's analysis, some sections may be too specialized for nonexperts. The book ends with a thesis that deserves more attention in the body of the work: "China is the only country to have gained strategic advantages from America's three unwinnable wars. The United States has gained nothing, not even the gratitude of South Korea.... Iraq will break American power. Hello, China." (Feb.)

With the Heart of a King: Elizabeth I of England, Philip II of Spain, and the Fight for a Nation's Soul and Crown
Benton Rain Patterson. St. Martin's, $27.95 (352p) ISBN 978-0-312-34844-1

He was the dour Catholic despot bent on stamping out the Reformation; she was the plucky ruler of Europe's leading Protestant power. He was the widower who proposed marriage to his sister-in-law; she was the coy virgin queen who kept him off-balance by flirting with other potentates. As they move from dalliance to open war during the expedition of the Spanish Armada, Philip II of Spain and Elizabeth I of England shape the 16th century into a romance saga. Well, not really; a similar book could be written about many duos among Europe's incestuous ruling class, where power marriages were treated as the gravest matters of state. Journalist Patterson writes an enjoyable narrative of the intensely personal politics of the era, with plenty of intrigue and colorful characters, including the tragic Mary Queen of Scots and the dashing Francis Drake. The author sets it all against a backdrop of Renaissance pageantry and ritualistic burnings and beheadings of heretics and papists. The Elizabeth-Philip relationship is not an unduly cogent framework for a history of the age, but it makes for diverting true-life soap opera on an epic scale. 8 pages of b&w photos. (Feb.)

Pistol: The Life of Pete Maravich
Mark Kriegel. Free Press, $26 (320p) ISBN 978-0-7432-8497-4

As he did for another larger-than-life sports star whose achievements in his game were always shadowed by his demons outside of it, Kriegel (Namath) offers a rounded, insightful look at one of basketball's enigmatic icons. Kriegel presents Pete Maravich (1947–1988) as a "child prodigy, prodigal son, his father's ransom in a Faustian bargain." His father, Press Maravich, was the poor son of Serbian immigrants to Pennsylvania, a man obsessed with basketball as a means of personal and financial redemption. His rise as a coach loomed over Pete, who described himself as a boy as "a basketball android." A veteran sportswriter, Kriegel is more than up to the task of eliciting Pete's on-court greatness and describing basketball action in a fluid, dramatic fashion (Pete's deadeye shot earned him the nickname "Pistol"). But the book is more notable for how Kriegel evokes Press's support turning into suffocation, and the effect of the impossible expectations on Pete (he played for Louisiana State, then later for the New Orleans Jazz). In the end, Kriegel's portrait is a sad celebration of a gifted player whose collegiate legend never quite blossomed into professional greatness as he battled alcoholism, sought solace in religion and left a troubled legacy that's still felt by his children and those who knew him. (Feb.)

Include Me Out: My Life from Goldwyn to Broadway
Farley Granger and
Robert Calhoun. St. Martin's, $25.95 (256p) ISBN 978-0-312-35773-3

With a title taken from Samuel Goldwyn's famed malaprop catchphrase, this polished and perceptive memoir etches a scintillating portrait of life inside Tinseltown soundstages where "nothing was real except anxiety, insecurity and fear." Granger notes that only three of his films (Senso, Strangers on a Train and They Live by Night) gave him a "sense of pride" as he struggled to free himself from his Goldwyn contract in order to do theater. Granger arranges his life into three acts: Act I begins with a 17-year-old Granger being discovered by Goldwyn's casting director, his first films and his WWII navy hitch in Hawaii. In Act II he recalls working with Hitchcock and Nicholas Ray. By Act III, Granger is on the East Coast doing theater and live television. Contrasting fame and obscurity, Granger regales the reader with anecdotes about the people in his past, recollecting relationships with Ava Gardner, Arthur Laurents and Shelley Winters: "She adored being a star. I hated it." The book has a huge celebrity cast, from Mike Todd, Rita Hayworth and Cornelia Otis Skinner to Leonard Bernstein and Peggy Guggenheim. Granger and Calhoun write with a stylish and iridescent flair, in this autobiography's anecdotal 100 short chapters. 16-page b&w photo insert. (Feb. 6)

Camelia: Save Yourself by Telling the Truth: A Memoir of Iran
Camelia Entekhabifard. Seven Stories, $23.95 (250p) ISBN 978-1-58322-719-0

Entekhabifard, an Iranian-born journalist now living in the U.S., opens her intriguing memoir on January 16, 1979, the day the Shah fled Tehran. She'd just turned six, so she didn't understand the tumult; she knew her parents preferred the Shah to Khomeini's mullahs, but neither of them discussed leaving Iran. She explains, how, instead, they adjusted. Mother and daughters observed hijab when necessary and, like others, learned not to attract the attention of the revolutionary guards. A poet, Entekhabifard took advantage of the Khatami regime's reformist climate to start work as a journalist. When political winds shifted, she was jailed for three months, where she cultivated a romantic attachment with her interrogator. His passion secured her release, but soon she realized she had to leave Iran, and him, and try a career in America. Rather than narrate her story chronologically (which would emphasize a repression-to-freedom theme), Entekhabifard intercuts accounts of various incidents, so that heavier stories—like her romance with her interrogator—emerge gradually. In the end, hers is a strangely disorienting account of that period. (Feb.)

Loyal to the Sky: Notes from an Activist
Marisa Handler. Berrett-Koehler, $22.95 (230p) ISBN 978-1-57675-392-1

In this memoir–cum–call to arms, Handler examines her literal and metaphorical journey from her South African childhood through her family's politically motivated move to America to her adult involvement in the global justice movement. From assisting Amazon Basin communities threatened by oil companies, to protesting at the 2004 Republican National Convention, Handler has put her values into action with tenacious creativity. She ably conveys the histories of places many people couldn't find on a map in a lively, moving and funny voice. Unfortunately, Handler is often self-involved—even for a memoirist—and too frequently leans on stereotype (the noble savage, the emotionally barren upper-class marriage), though she manages to regard herself with enough irony to mitigate her worst indulgences. The book's greatest weakness lies in Handler's decision to "condense or conflate" some of the "real people and events" she draws on, and occasionally to alter "the setting or timing of a revelation or personal experience." In the wake of the James Frey scandal, some readers may find it difficult to believe that many of the beautifully rendered vignettes here are not fiction. (Feb.)

Reflections of Literature and Culture
Hannah Arendt, edited and with an intro. by
Susannah Young-Ah Gottlieb. Stanford Univ., $65 (416p) ISBN 978-0-8047-4498-0; paper $24.95 ISBN 978-0-8047-4499-7

The late German-Jewish political theorist Arendt returned repeatedly in her work to the effects and proper uses of power and authority. This career-spanning collection of essays will reinforce for any reader that these preoccupations followed her even into literary criticism, as when she discusses Rilke's Duino Elegies in terms of religion and the search for God. Literature and culture are defined broadly, as the volume includes essays on novelists and poets like Proust, Kipling and Auden, as well as political theorists and economists. Pieces written in German were translated by different people, which renders Arendt's style somewhat harder to assess than those written in English, where the author's dry wit as well as her erudition are evident, as when she writes, in "The Jew as Pariah": "when it comes to claiming its own in the field of European arts and letters, the attitude of the Jewish people may best be described as one of reckless magnanimity. With a grand gesture and without a murmur of protest it has calmly allowed the credit for its great writers to go to other peoples, itself receiving in return... the doubtful privilege of being acclaimed father of every notorious swindler and mountebank." (Feb.)

Notebooks
Tennessee Williams, edited by
Margaret Bradham Thornton. Yale Univ., $40 (848p) ISBN 978-0-300-11682-3

This magnificent tome is a treasure trove for Williams scholars and fans. Independent scholar Thornton not only tracked down Williams's early short stories and poems but often presents photo reproductions of the original manuscripts. A talented sleuth, Thornton cross-checks journal entries with letters Williams wrote to friends, offers minibiographies of people mentioned in the journals and has found photos of most of the cast of characters at the time they were in touch with Williams. Her detective work is fully one half of this massive book. (Williams's journal entries, from 1936 to 1958 and 1979 to 1981 run on the right-hand pages opposite Thornton's annotations.) As the playwright, according to Thornton, "modulated his tone and style to suit the recipient" of his voluminous correspondence, his journal reveals his authentic voice. These entries primarily showcase the budding artist who was plagued with insecurities, increasing drug dependency and an equally destructive addiction to celebrity, but his loyalty to his work remained so strong that he was still able to write The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire, Summer and Smoke, The Rose Tattoo and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof all between 1945 and 1955—the period that reflects the bulk of these notebooks.. Williams's dramatic life may be familiar to many, but thanks to Thornton's superb scholarship, his interior conflicts, motivations and drive are at last revealed. Photos. (Jan. 30)

Correction: A corrected version of Evan Rosen's The Culture of Collaboration (Dec. 4, 2006) appears at http://www.publishersweekly.com/collaboration.