Nonfiction Reviews

Ratliff, the jazz critic for the New York Times, spent just over two years interviewing jazz greats for a recurring feature at the paper: rather than ask musicians like Pat Metheny or Dianne Reeves to name their favorite records, Ratliff sat with them as they listened to songs and picked out the qualities they found most artistically compelling. The approach brings some surprises, as his subjects pick everything from Ukrainian cantorial music to Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Fifth Dimension, but each chapter brings provocative insights and will have readers scurrying to track down various records. (Ratliff also provides a listening guide for each of his interviewees.) Though each chapter stands alone, connections are made from one interview to the next; Metheny and Joshua Redman, for example, both select songs from Sonny Rollins. The interview with Redman also hints at Ratliff's argument in his 2007 Coltrane: The Story of a Sound about jazz as a collaborative medium, while Branford Marsalis speaks candidly about young musicians' failure to understand the melodic legacy they've inherited, then plays a jazz-influenced piece by Stravinsky to make his point. Whether you're a seasoned listener or just discovering the form, Ratliff is a wonderful guide. (Nov. 11)

In a pleasing celebration of the “most difficult of instruments,” Gabbard, a professor of comparative literature and English at Stony Brook University in New York, sheds light on the history of the trumpet. He takes the instrument through the ages from ancient Egypt to the European royal courts, the American battlefield and the “cutting” contests by bebop jazz musicians. The astonishing stories of Buddy Bolden, Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis and Wynton Marsalis—all American originals on the horn—merge with history, art, style and humor as this amateur trumpeter weaves into the colorful narrative large spoonfuls of film and literary references as well as personal observations. Gabbard also lists the long tally of serious physical ailments that dog trumpeters in classical and jazz music. Although this slightly eccentric book meanders a bit, it's never less than engaging and thought provoking in its insights and random chatter. (Nov.)

Freelance journalist Umrigar alternates between sweet and biting accounts of her middle-class Parsi upbringing in 1960s and 1970s Bombay. With a mixture of rawness and warmth, she recalls moments from her tumultuous childhood through her teenage years, and finally into her early 20s when she leaves India for the U.S. She describes her mother's strictness with her and other children (her mother doesn't think twice to strike disobedient kids with a cane), tempering these scenes with memories of the tight bond with her father as well as her Aunt Mehroo's unflappable love. As she encounters worker strikes and student protests, she begins to understand class differences and the gap between her privileged, private school background and India's poverty. In the end, Umrigar's memoir is colorful and moving. (Nov.)

At age 70, singer-actress Carroll, a Golden Globe and Tony Award winner, was described in a 2006 rave review by Stephen Holden in the New York Times as delivering a song “like an emotional volcano,” and the label works equally well for this radiant autobiography, bubbling over with sincere self-insights as well as a potent underlying theme of the “immense cruelties” and racial politics of showbiz. Revealing personal struggles with her mother and men (she details her marriage to singer Vic Damone), she pulls no punches in detailing conflicts with such major figures as Andrew Lloyd Webber, Pearl Bailey and Samuel Goldwyn. Beginning with her Harlem childhood, she traces her life from the High School of Music and Art, modeling and early club performances to theatrical triumphs (No Strings; Sunset Boulevard), TV (Julia; Dynasty), her grandchildren and plastic surgery, plus painful memories of racism. An outstanding chapter probes the “art-directed Negro squalor” and other “demeaning” aspects of the 1959 film Porgy and Bess, a “cliché of noble poverty as reimagined by some very talented white men.” What emerges is an astute analysis of her career along with descriptions of the highs and lows of an often glamorous life, whether she performs at dazzling Vegas venues or in an intimate cabaret space. (Oct.)

Actor and producer Wagner begins this engaging memoir by recalling his childhood fascination with movies and the Hollywood community. Determined to become a part of that world, in 1942, at age 12, he worked as a golf caddy, struggling to make contact with those who could help him. As an 18-year-old Fox contract player, he got a foothold with minor roles: “I wasn't very good in this period, but I was diligent.” Soon he scored with Prince Valiant in 1954, and A Kiss Before Dying, thus beginning a six-decade career in theater, television series and more than 100 movies. His rule of thumb: “Find smart people and listen to them.” Along the way, he realized friends and family were equally as important as show business, and he writes with fondness and humor about his close friendships with David Niven and others while painting a backdrop of Hollywood in transition. As for the women in Wagner's life, he details one-night stands, his four-year affair with Barbara Stanwyck (who was twice his age) and his four marriages (twice to Natalie Wood). His love for Wood threads throughout, and his memory of her last night is chilling as he leads the reader step-by-step through her 1981 disappearance from their boat and the search for her body. (Oct.)

Through a close reading of racial identity trials in America, this book offers an eloquent contribution to ongoing debates over affirmative action, identity politics and the construction of a “colorblind” society. Historian Gross argues that racial identity trials—court cases in which outcomes turned on determining a person's “race” and their concomitant rights and privileges—provides an excellent basis for viewing the construction of “whiteness” and assessing the volatile category of race in American society. The author rigorously examines select cases including the outcomes of suits for freedom by onetime slaves like Abby Guy, who in 1857 convinced an all-white male jury that she was white and thus deserving of freedom. Upsetting the familiar notion of the “one-drop rule” in determining racial identity, Gross shows that in such cases the notion of what constituted race was itself as much in play as whether a particular individual could be identified (through some unstable combination of expert and “common sense” opinion) as one race or another. The social “performance” of identity is key, and enduringly so, as Gross periodically underscores by reference to various modern debates and trends. (Oct.)

Alexander, a pseudonymous air force officer, and writer Bruning (House to House), collaborate to tell the stranger-than-fiction “story of the intelligence operation that located and ultimately killed Abu Musab Al Zarqawi,” the head of al-Qaeda in Iraq. An “Air Force investigator turned interrogator,” Alexander was trained in the post–Abu Ghraib interrogation techniques that replace “fear and control” with “respect, rapport, hope, cunning and deception.” He arrived in Iraq in March 2006, a month after al-Qaeda bombed the Golden Dome Mosque in Samarra in an effort to incite sectarian violence, and Zarqawi became “the most wanted man in Iraq” and the primary focus of U.S. intelligence efforts. Using the new methods, Alexander interrogated five captured al-Qaeda members and tracked down Zarqawi's personal spiritual adviser, who unwittingly led U.S. Special Forces to Zarqawi's hideout; this vindicated Alexander's methods and eliminated the key terrorist leader. Alexander provides a front-row seat to the intelligence war inside the “Global War on Terrorism” in a riveting, fast-paced account that reads like a first-rate thriller. (Oct.)

With irreverence and pungent detail, George (A Life Removed) breaks the embarrassed silence over the economic, political, social and environmental problems of human waste disposal. Full of fascinating facts about the evolution of material culture as influenced by changing mores of disgust and decency (the popularity of high-heeled shoes dates back to the time when chamber pots were emptied into the streets)—the book shows how even advanced technology doesn't always meet basic needs: using toilet paper is shockingly unhygienic and millions of government-built latrines in developing countries have been turned into goat sheds and spare rooms due to poor design, a lack of regular water supply or simply because the subsidized (and expensive) cement and stone structures are often more appealing than the village huts. George explores how discussions on the importance of clean drinking water and the eradication of infectious diseases euphemistically address how to handle human waste. From the depths of the world's oldest surviving urban sewers in to Japan's robo-toilet revolution, George leads an intrepid, erudite and entertaining journey through the public consequences of this most private behavior. (Oct.)

“We are a nation of puritanical love junkies,” proclaims Cheever (My Name Is Bill) in her inquiry into the growing scientific and psychological evidence that suggests a chemical basis for sex addiction. Drawing on a hodge-podge of addiction literature, neurobiological studies and her more informal (but most persuasive) role as a seasoned battler of her own obsessions, Cheever believes that American idealism taints our expectations of relationships: “In our world, addiction to other people... is the only addiction that is applauded and embraced.... ” But for Cheever, a lover's destructive behavior can be just as traumatizing as that of an alcoholic, a bulimic or a compulsive gambler. Cheever is best when writing personally; her candid memories of emotionally abusive parents, repeated adultery and consuming love drive an otherwise meandering text. Her cultural subjects are titillating enough and range from the voyeurism of To Catch a Predator to speculation that Bill Wilson, founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, struggled to hide a sex addiction. But the reader strains to connect slim narrative threads of this unstructured meditation on obsession. (Oct.)

Usually overlooked, the dot is given star treatment by the Humez brothers, established writers on language (Latin for People), who cheerfully explore the dot's influence on language through history in this dense, tangent-filled book. Explaining that this is the “smallest meaningful symbol that one can make” with any writing or carving tool, the authors assert that the dot “has been one of the most versatile players in the history of human communication.” Without it, Braille and Morse code would not exist; it would be harder to distinguish dollars from cents and hours from minutes; and music would have no half-beat. Even bullet points, the authors argue, are not unique to Power Point presentations but have been discovered in an ancient Egyptian tomb as the chief scribe of the tomb workers noted the completion of each vital task on his checklist. Ideal for etymologists and trivia buffs, this book covers an array of information and innovations on the relevance of this “speck,” from the pre–Dewey decimal library of Alexandria to the modern global culture of URLs, instant messaging and the music of Stevie Wonder. (Oct.)

This latest entry in the outstanding Oxford History of the United States is continually engrossing in its overview of American diplomacy. Herring (America's Longest War), an authority on the history of American foreign policy, emphasizes that George Washington's 1796 farewell was not a call for isolationism but simply a warning to be careful in forming alliances; America was already enmeshed in the bitter war between Britain and France. Herring details how aggressively U.S. diplomats and soldiers pressured Spain, Mexico and Britain to yield territory as the nation expanded. The passion for spreading American ideals reached its first peak after WWI with Woodrow Wilson, whose principles the author admires though many, such as national self-determination, have proved disastrous. Entering the 21st century, the U.S. was at its peak as the world's sole superpower. Herring take his narrative up through 9/11, the rise of the renewed passion, led by neoconservatives, to spread democracy and the war in Iraq, whose only winner, Herring says, is Iran. Herring's lucid prose and thought-provoking arguments give this large tome a pace that never flags. 51 b&w illus. (Oct.)

This lively account of the first submarine to sink an opposing ship is an excellent niche history. Chaffin (Sea of Gray) relates that H.L. Hunley was neither soldier nor engineer, but an adventurous New Orleans attorney turned exporter who wanted to make his fortune selling the submarine he developed with several partners to the Confederate Navy. After two unsuccessful tests, in 1863 a third submarine performed decently, but the unenthusiastic local commander extolled its virtues to General Beauregard, who agreed to commission a submarine. It was shipped to Charleston, S.C., where it sank twice during testing, drowning both crews— including Hunley himself. In February 1864, the submarine, named the H.L. Hunley, finally sank a Union blockader with its torpedo but never returned. The event assumed mythic status, culminating in great excitement when divers exhumed the wreck in 2000. Chaffin finishes with a lucid description of the impressive details of this splendid artifact of engineering. Sampling from letters, articles and memoirs, the author succeeds in separating facts from legend in this engrossing examination of a pioneering weapon of war. Maps. (Oct.)

Alsop, a columnist for the Wall Street Journal, explores the emergence of the 80 million strong millennial generation into the workplace and the resulting ramifications in this insightful and in-depth look at Generation Y. Born between 1980 and 2001, “millennials” are a new breed of student, worker and global citizen, with distinctly different—often paradoxical—values and motivations. Millennials have a high sense of entitlement but are also philanthropic and community-minded; they set a high premium on career success but are incorrigible job-hoppers and rarely exhibit loyalty to any particular place of employment; their commitment is to self-determination and to garnering as many skills as possible before moving on in pursuit of their “dream job.” Based on data collected from interviews with student recruiters, particularly in management consulting, and at accounting and investment banking firms, Alsop explains how companies can take the lead in understanding and reaching out to Generation Y and what organizations can expect in their new hires. This well-crafted book will help companies adapt to meet the desires and demands of the millennial generation and retain the best talent. (Oct.)

In 2006, a group of 20-something women saw an episode of Oprah that featured financial experts offering advice on paying down debt. Though all five were outwardly confident in their careers and goals, they were secretly drowning financially; between them, they had a combined $35,000 in credit card debt and barely any savings. Inspired by what they'd seen, they started a money group and took responsibility for educating themselves about spending (and saving) habits, goals and investments. Within a year they made great strides: they'd added thousands to retirement accounts, paid off more than $15,000 in credit card debt, saved more than $15,000 and had all bought or were well on their way to buying homes. The enterprising authors address the nitty-gritty of goal-setting, negotiations for raises, debt management and mortgages, and their plainspoken, encouraging style and helpful breakdown of information make this the perfect gift for recent grads—or anyone who needs convincing that financial health is attainable. (Oct.)

As businesses become increasingly global, companies across the world are grappling with how to effectively position their products and services across different countries and cultures. In this direct and detailed book, branding expert Hollis examines how successful enterprises balance the challenges of expanding globally while creating effective local appeal, introducing his five steps of brand building (presence, relevance, performance, advantage and bonding). While the academic studies and business school matrices such as “Brand Strengths” and “Market Share Prospects” are likely to be more meaningful to industry insiders than to the average business book reader, handy concluding summaries and questions keep the book accessible. Hollis peppers the text with entertaining examples of global marketing initiatives, such as how General Motors turned Buick into a status conscious and in-demand brand in China, how Coca-Cola struggled in India until using Bollywood stars in its commercials boosted its success and how Budweiser was advised to darken the beer's color in the U.K., where consumers perceived the drink as weak due to its light hue. This dense book might seem initially daunting, but marketing pros are sure to find it insightful, informative and a tremendous resource for thinking globally and acting locally. (Oct.)

In this salmagundi of abstruse science, informative history and engaging personal anecdotes, Schutt's fascination for “sanguivores” goes a long way toward disarming, while defining, our primal fear of creatures that feed on blood. For all their fearsome rep@utation, only three of 1,100 bat species savor blood, and one of those preys exclusively on chickens. The author doesn't make sanguivores entirely cuddly: part two opens with the horrifying theory that George Washington was likely bled to death by ill-informed doctors and eager leeches, and includes an account of the first dog-to-dog transfusion in 1666 (the first successful human transfusion was in 1901). In part three, Schutt surveys other blood feeders: leeches currently making a comeback in modern medicine, pesky bedbugs and chiggers, and potentially lethal mosquitoes and ticks. One oddity (and typically fascinating tidbit) in the sanguivore world is the “vampire finch” of the Galapagos, which Schutt theorizes is evolving before scientists' eyes, turning to blood-sipping when other nourishment is in short supply. Passages that focus on the science can be a slog, but are quickly alleviated by sections that are witty and illuminating. (Oct.)

While Americans may take a plentiful supply of hamburger patties for granted, the days of easy beef are threatened by climate change, dwindling Great Plains aquifers drained by irrigation and an unsustainable business model's thin profit margins, argue the authors of this lively and unsettling history-cum-polemic. Rimas and Fraser preface their sobering assessment with a panoramic history; they write vividly about the semimystical aurochs that became extinct in 1627, the Spanish bullfighting tradition, the African Masai's continuing reverence for cows, plagues that ravaged European herds in the 19th century, and the cowboy era of great cattle drives. Once fattened entirely on pasture grass, cattle are now confined to feedlots for half their lives, pumped full of hormones and antibiotics and stuffed with grain they aren't naturally equipped to eat, sacrificing quality for quantity. The authors lament that cows “ceased to be animals and they became commodities,” and they certainly aren't antimeat; their colorful account is well-seasoned with a series of “culinary interludes” for such dishes as bull's tail stew, steak tartare, beef jerky and, of course, the great American hamburger. (Oct.)

Peace activist and vocal advocate for “relinquishing the Territories and ending the Occupation,” Israeli novelist Grossman is unafraid of controversy; these six essays, however, address these concerns more obliquely, through the lens of literature. “Books That Have Read Me” merges the young reader's discovery that “books are the place in the world where both the thing and the loss of it can be contained” with the older writer's urge “to describe contemporary political reality in a language that is not the public, general, nationalized idiom.” Grossman's passions are two—an Israel at peace with its neighbors and a citizenry restored to dignity through the individual language of literature, which “can bring us together with the fate of those who are distant and foreign.” Grossman lays claim to an “acquired naïveté” in his hopefulness; how welcome and enlightening it is. (Oct.)

The life of the slave potter Dave unfolds against a backdrop of cruelty, repression, war and unexpected tenderness in this intimate history. Little is known about Dave, whose stunning stoneware vessels are made more exceptional by the fact that he often inscribed verses, usually rhymed couplets, into their wet clay during the era when literacy among blacks was illegal and brutally punished. Driven by the chance discovery that his ancestors had enslaved Dave, Todd traveled to the heart of the antebellum South Carolina pottery industry to draw on local lore, archeological data, slave-era archival records and the famous verses to reconstruct Dave—and his family's—story. What emerges is not so much a definitive biography of Dave as a sweeping tale of the South itself and a touching testament to the artist. Given the paucity of records of Dave's life, much of Todd's account is speculative, with the author filling in the blanks with details taken from slave narratives, oral histories and popular literature of the era, and the book suffers from the author's penchant for imagining events, relationships and even thoughts and feelings on the basis of little documentation. (Oct.)

McGoogan's fascinating biography focuses on a neglected figure from the early era of polar exploration. Born to a wealthy Philadelphia family in 1820, Elisha Kent Kane surmounted his poor health to embark on a series of globe-spanning adventures. Kent's attention turned to the Arctic when he was assigned as an assistant surgeon to an expedition searching for the lost British navigator John Franklin and an “Open Polar Sea” believed to surround the North Pole. Kent's first taste of the Arctic proved addictive and on his return to the States, he organized his own Franklin expedition. After his ship became trapped in ice off the coast of Greenland for over a year, Kane led a daring escape that brought most of his men back to civilization. A sympathetic and intelligent observer, Kane befriended the Inuits camped near his ship and adapted many of their practices for surviving the harsh climate. McGoogan's depiction of Kane's early life is perfunctory and lacking in historical context, but the story comes to life with the narration of the second polar expedition and Kane's doomed love affair with the spiritualist medium Maggie Fox. With his access to previously unknown Kane logbooks, McGoogan makes an impressive case for the bravery and importance of the explorer who first identified the Greenland ice sheet. (Oct.)

All the usual Italian-American stories are here—Sunday dinners, being an altar boy, Grandma's gravy, the controlling father and the family's pizza parlor—but Capotorto (whose name is Italian for “twisted head”) adds his own spin to the genre: he describes growing up gay in the Bronx of the 1970s. Capotorto's humorous prose comes to life when he describes his disco-era lifestyle, whether it be dancing the hustle or, as he's primping for the Saturday night disco, overhearing his mom gossiping about Rock Hudson having an affair with Jim Nabors. He describes how he first fought his feelings and then, later, embraced a gay lifestyle despite the misgivings of his stern father. Capotorto, a playwright and actor, does a great job describing the relationship between his parents (his father is traditional, his mother loving yet powerless) and himself and his four sisters, who all struggle to find their way. In the end, Capotorto skillfully weaves stories that are both comic and tragic to capture a family caught between the Old and New worlds. (Oct.)

The horror and violence perpetrated on young girls to feed the sex trade industry in southeast Asia is personalized in this graphic story. Of “mixed race,” Khmer and Phnong, Mam is living on her own in the forest in northern Cambodia around 1980 when a 55-year-old stranger claims he will take her to her missing family. “Grandfather” beats and abuses the nine-year-old Mam and sells her virginity to a Chinese merchant to cover a gambling debt. She is subsequently sold into a brothel in Phnom Penh, and the daily suffering and humiliation she endures is almost impossible to imagine or absorb (“I was dead. I had no affection for anyone”). She recounts recalcitrant girls being tortured and killed, and police collusion and government involvement in the sex trade; she manages to break the cycle only when she discovers the advantages of ferengi (foreign) clients and eventually marries a Frenchman. She comes back to Cambodia from France, now unafraid, and with her husband, Pierre; sets up a charity, AFESIP, “action for women in distressing circumstances”; and fearlessly devotes herself to helping prostitutes and exploited children. The statistics are shocking: one in every 40 Cambodian girls (some as young as five) will be sold into sex slavery. Mam brings to the fore the AIDS crisis, the belief that sex with a virgin will cure the disease and the Khmer tradition of women's obedience and servitude. This moving, disturbing tale is not one of redemption but a cry for justice and support for women's plight everywhere. (Sept.)

With the intriguing premise focused on the neglected citizens of occupied Iraq, Fassihi, the Wall Street Journal's senior Middle East correspondent, gathered numerous interviews throughout the war-torn cities and religious strongholds of Iraq. The author first came to international attention when a personal e-mail chronicling the “rapidly deteriorating situation” in Iraq made its way onto blogs in 2004; in this book, written in the “same spirit” as the e-mail, she dissects the convoluted conflicts and connections that closely bind the two major religious groups jockeying for control in the occupied land. She talks to a wide range of people, from staid government personnel to fiery clerics to zealous students, about the country's unstable political and social climate. Fassihi, of Iranian descent, cajoles the normally media-shy working and middle-class people of Sulaimaniyah, Baghdad, Kirkuk and Tikrit to speak on the before-and-after conditions of their civil freedoms. Through these conversations, Fassihi posits hard political and moral questions. (Sept.)

In a series of open letters to parents, educators, young people, Dr. King—with whom she collaborated on the 1968 Poor People's Campaign—and her own grandchildren—Edelman (The Measure of Our Success), founder and president of the Children's Defense Fund, addresses the millions of children silently suffering from abuse, abandonment and poverty. The author passionately inveighs against parental and community neglect (“Adults are what's wrong with our children,” she writes); however, her rhetoric, marked by repetitive calls for change and use of jargon like “the Cradle to Prison Pipeline,” is an ineffective vehicle for her good intentions, and the text—long on grim statistics—occasionally reads uncomfortably like a grant proposal. Her book comes to life when the author reminisces about her childhood and rousingly condemns government's support of the nation's richest citizens. Readers seriously concerned about the plight of American children may find many concrete suggestions for action, but the slew of numbers and lack of personal stories in the opening sections will certainly dissuade many others. (Sept.)

France's leading public intellectual voices vestigial allegiance to the Left—while trashing it—in this convoluted manifesto. Philosopher-journalist Lévy (American Vertigo) feels a “family” loyalty not to a dead programmatic socialism but to “images,” “events” and “reflexes”—drawn from the Dreyfus Affair, the 1968 upheavals and other historical milestones that expressed the French Left's opposition to racism and fascism, its support of egalitarianism and its attitude of all-embracing moral responsibility. Lévy follows this muted tribute with a harsh critique of present-day leftist politics. Flogging everyone from Noam Chomsky to Cindy Sheehan, the author attacks the Left for its antiliberalism and anti-Americanism (a veiled anti-Semitism, he believes) and for being soft on “Fascislamism,” warning that this “progressivism without progress” adopts the Right's worst features with its isolationism and resistance to humanitarian interventions in Bosnia and Darfur. Lévy is a more cerebral—and judicious—Christopher Hitchens; despite his grandiosity, arcane allusions and the high rhetoric of his long, coiling sentences, he is a lucid, cogent polemicist. Although the dudgeon he directs at the diminished sins of a marginalized postcommunist Left seems overdone, Lévy's many American fans will relish it. (Sept. 16)

Veteran CBS newsman and Face the Nation anchor Schieffer (This Just In) compiles 171 essays spanning his career from the Nixon administration to the present day, Schieffer reminisces about the pre-television era when politicians "had to be entertaining to hold a crowd," a tongue and cheek rhetoric allows the author to create his own exploratory committee because, "everyone else seems to be doing it....and people for some reason send them million of dollars." In a critique of the current administration, Schieffer laments that "we had elected an administration that feared the future." The hypocrisy of American foreign policy is brought to the forefront of the text in a discussion about democ-racy, war and the loss of humanity in politics. As an ardent fan of human interest journalism, comic personal writing and America, Schieffer presents an optimistic portrayal of citizens while harshly criticizing the current policies in Washington. Schieffer’s ruminations are interesting (though hardly groundbreaking), but a choppy organization and Schieffer’s tendency towards repetition and over-emphasis of few themes detract from an otherwise humorous, albeit simple, collection of essays. (Sept.)Vanity Fair: The Portraits: A Century of Iconic Images Foreword by Graydon Carter, essays by Christopher Hitchens, David Friend and Terence Pepper. Abrams, $65 (384p) ISBN 978-0-8109-7298-8

Vanity Fair magazine has a reputation as one of the preeminent showcases for portraits in the world, and this book gathers together a good chunk of them in all their glossy, artificial splendor. There's almost as much celebrity behind the lens as in front of it: Edward Steichen, Herb Ritts, Mario Testino, David LaChapelle and, of course, Annie Leibovitz are all included, and the portraits themselves amount to a who's who of culture and politics, with the quality of the images justifying the inclusion of the occasional lesser-known figures. The photographs have been arranged to supply the reader with subtle (and not so subtle) visual and cultural frisson: what are we meant to think when Joseph Goebbels is juxtaposed with Richard Perle? In a face-off between Rob Lowe and Louise Brooks, who has the most glamorous jaw line? For posing questions such as this, and for the production values and sheer scale, not to mention introductory essays by Graydon Carter, Christopher Hitchens, Terence Pepper and David Friend, this is a book that will no doubt be adorning the coffee tables of the world's culture brokers for many years to come. (Sept.)

Skiff, an award-winning investigative journalist and correspondent for CNN, compiles an inspiring if uneven assortment of real-life accounts of meeting with the divine. Whether readers are actively religious or die-hard skeptics, the stories recounted will reaffirm God's existence and intervention in human affairs. Skiff draws upon such themes as listening to God's voice, answers to prayer, healing and confirmation of an afterlife. While less spiritually inclined readers may find some stories more attributable to coincidence than divine intervention, other tales are beyond rational explanation. In one account, a woman who had irreparable brain and organ damage was completely healed and discharged from the hospital after prayer. A man felt an urgent caution against taking an airline flight on which nine people were subsequently killed. In a similar tale of miraculous warnings about danger, a woman heard an audible voice tell her to stop right before she stepped in front of a seven-foot Australian snake's mouth. Mysterious and faith-inspiring, these stories are valuable even if some don't conform to readers' particular religious beliefs. (Nov. 11)

Burke, founder of Gateway Church in Austin, Tex., and author of No Perfect People Allowed, asks powerful questions in his second book: “What drives us to strive so hard? What are we really after? What do we long for?” Burke believes our deepest longings are fulfilled through relationships with God and others, and he provides a way to create those relationships through a 60-day experiment in faith. He says that willingness is the key to staying connected to God at least once every 60 minutes for 60 days. His book offers a roadmap for the “60-60 Experiment” through loving God, loving people, building character and demonstrating God's love to the world. Burke uses Bible texts and real-life examples liberally, as well as action steps with each chapter to make principles personal. He encourages accountability, yet eschews traditional groups that encourage participants to “try harder” because “we can never become all that God intends just by trying harder.” Connecting to God creates genuine change, he says. This is a thorough, well-written and challenging book. (Oct.)

Scholar and activist Radford Ruether issues a clarion call to fellow progressive Catholics to stay the course for change in a church she says has become “deeply polarized.” In what the book's foreword (authored by Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite, president of Chicago Theological Seminary) calls a “great 'encyclical,' ” Radford Ruether lays blame for the present situation at the feet of the late Pope John Paul II. It was he, she writes, who sought to reverse much of the progress that was achieved in ecumenism, modern scholarship and social justice following the reforming Second Vatican Council of the 1960s. In the face of a church leadership that is committed to John Paul II's vision, Radford Ruether restates the progressive agenda, zeroing in on such issues as reproductive rights and clericalism and taking aim at the church's male-only priesthood in her concluding essay, “Can Men Be Ordained?” Radford Ruether will have her intended audience cheering and perhaps inspired to work anew for the church she envisions—one that is multicultural, admittedly fallible, free from sexism, democratic and committed to the poor and oppressed. (Oct.)

Siedell likens Christians' encounter with modern and contemporary fine art to St. Paul's discovery of the “altar to an unknown god” on Mars Hill (Acts 17:23). Responding to those who have called for a separate Christian art (particularly Francis Schaeffer and H.R. Rookmaaker), he strives to reveal what modern art is “only able to point to, not to name.” Siedell uses his in-depth knowledge as former art curator and current assistant professor of art history at the University of Nebraska at Omaha to argue that perceptions of this “legitimate cultural practice” can be “nourished by a robust Nicene Christianity.” These disparate essays tackle subjects both ambitious (a history of modern art) and esoteric (a single work by artist Enrique Martínez Celaya; the conflict between art critics Harold Rosenberg and Clement Greenberg). Siedell's love of contemporary art is obvious, but his sometimes abstruse writing doesn't always clarify his formidable subject; indeed, it may reinforce some Christians' view of modern art as unapproachable. His primary audience is clearly art specialists, whether students or professionals; Siedell's interesting thesis may not reach the larger audience it deserves. (Oct.)

North American Christianity is presently undergoing a change every bit as radical as the Protestant Reformation, possibly even as monumental as its natal break with Judaism. And it's right on schedule. Tickle, author of God-Talk in America and PW's founding religion editor, observes that Christianity is holding its semimillennial rummage sale of ideas. With an elegance of argument and economy of description, Tickle escorts readers through the centuries of church history leading to this moment and persuasively charts the character of and possibilities for the emerging church. Don't let this book's brevity fool you. It is packed with keen insights about what this “great emergence” is, how it came to be and where it may be headed. Tickle issues a clear call to acknowledge the inevitability of change, discern the church's new shape and participate responsibly in the transformation. Although Tickle's particular focus excludes the dynamic forces of Asian, African and Central/South American Christianity, this is a must-read for anyone seeking to understand the face and future of Christianity. (Oct.)

This potpourri of Jewish short stories and essays was diligently amassed for many years by Rabbi Elkins, author and anthologist. He begins his presentation with the mistaken claim that Jews “are the original storytelling people,” ignoring that in all societies, a significant way of transmitting culture from one generation to the next is through stories. The 69 stories presented represent Elkins's “passion for uplifting stories.” They come from a variety of sources, including books, newspaper articles and journals. The authors are, for the most part, rabbis, doctors, writers and teachers. Their work is sorted by Elkins into nine topical sections, each containing from five to nine stories as well as an introduction by him. Two sections deal with the Holocaust, while the others explore timeless virtues like goodness, hope, endurance, tradition and providence. A final section addresses Israel as a land of miracles. Although they are uneven in quality, the simply written stories testify eloquently to the Jewish capacity for survival despite the long litany of suffering that has dogged the tearful history of Jews through the ages. (Oct.)

Mention the Inquisition to any informed person and you're likely to garner a response somewhere between horror and disgust. Kirsch, a prolific writer and documenter of our past (A History of the End of the World; Gods Against the Gods), offers up an amazing recounting of the abuses by clergy and state in those terrible times. Clinical in its descriptions, the narrative's lively and crisp prose brings us right into the torture chamber, shining a much-needed light into the mindset of the church and its representatives. Alarmingly, the author insists that although the Inquisition is but a memory for us today, the inquisitional mindset is alive and well. Kirsch discovers many examples in more modern and familiar history: the Salem witch trials, Hitler's Germany, Roosevelt's placing Japanese-Americans in interment camps and Senator McCarthy's Communist-hunting. All of these injustices, he says, find their root in the same sense of power and privilege. Kirsch's forceful and cautionary account is essential reading for historians and anyone who wants to understand the potential dark side of religion. (Oct.)

Members of the Chrysostom Society, Christian writers from varied denominations offer essays on aspects of the writing life and craft. While pieces in such collections tend to vary in quality, the lineup of prominent contributors—including Scott Cairns, Philip Yancey, Luci Shaw, Richard J. Foster, Virginia Stem Owens, Diane Glancy and John Wilson—turn this book into a valuable resource for aspiring writers. It addresses the usual beginners' issues (keeping a journal; research; overcoming writer's block), but the strongest section, on literary genres, yields keen insights on poetry, drama, journalism, the short story and memoir, rounded out by a rather surprising two essays on the art of translation (including one by Eugene Peterson, author of the popular Bible paraphrase The Message). The resources for further reading by each contributor are excellent. Most of the insights are applicable to all good writing, and Christian readers may find that the essays don't engage as deeply with the intersection of faith and writing as they might wish. But these writers' love for their chosen art and craft is contagious. (Oct.)

Chellew-Hodge, a former journalist, is a UCC pastor who runs the online magazine Whosoever.org. Her experiences as a gay Christian searching for how to live with integrity while contending with sometimes hateful opposition inform this book. The “spiritual survival tips” that conclude each chapter serve not only as summaries but also as direct points of advice for GLBT persons coping with inevitable conflict. She also includes brief meditation exercises. Chellew-Hodge offers a realistic voice of experience filled with compassion and love—not just for her intended audience but also for their attackers. Although some may find her impulse to forgive premature, Chellew-Hodge does not naïvely excuse much less accept the abusive language and behavior of antigay Christians. This is not a book explaining relevant Bible passages and their interpretations, though Chellew-Hodge advocates biblical literacy beyond literalism. Instead, it is a confident, sensible approach to handling the opposition and self-doubt that can undermine a GLBT person's sense of worth and belonging as a Christian. (Oct.)

What's more sinful: angrily beating a child for no apparent reason, sleeping with a neighbor's wife or husband or eating all of the cheesecake so nobody else can have any? In his simplistic book, Tel Aviv University professor Kleinberg attempts a very partial answer to this question. He acknowledges that there is no sin without context, so that while child abuse may not be a wrong in one culture, it is horribly wrong in another. Using the Catholic Church's list of the seven deadly sins as his foil, Kleinberg proceeds to show that sin is relative and that even the worst of sins can be excused or seen in different lights depending on circumstances. For example, he understands sloth as the tendency to avoid the daily struggle against evil and injustice, and he counsels avoiding such slothfulness. Ultimately dissatisfying, Kleinberg's unfocused reflections comprise a book without a mission, for it fails to be either a deep personal meditation on the subject or a thoughtful theological exploration of a subject much better covered by Oxford University's series on the seven deadly sins. (Oct.)

Sociologist Zuckerman spent a year in Scandinavia seeking to understand how Denmark and Sweden became “probably the least religious countries in the world, and possibly in the history of the world.” While many people, especially Christian conservatives, argue that godless societies devolve into lawlessness and immorality, Denmark and Sweden enjoy strong economies, low crime rates, high standards of living and social equality. Zuckerman interviewed 150 Danes and Swedes, and extended transcripts from some of those interviews provide the book's most interesting and revealing moments. What emerges is a portrait of a people unconcerned and even incurious about questions of faith, God and life's meaning. Zuckerman ventures to answer why Scandinavians remain irreligious—e.g., the religious monopoly of state-subsidized churches, the preponderance of working women and the security of a stable society—but academics may find this discussion a tad thin. Zuckerman also fails to answer the question of contentment his subtitle speaks to. Still, for those interested in the burgeoning field of secular studies—or for those curious about a world much different from the devout U.S.—this book will offer some compelling reading. (Oct.)

Past the age of 80 now, the indefatigable Vietnamese Buddhist monk Nhat Hanh continues teaching. As peace flows from Buddhist teachings, so too does an environmental ethic rooted in awareness and interrelatedness. Nhat Hanh's engaged Buddhism, a Buddhist school that emphasizes social responsibility, takes on the task of preserving and protecting the earth. A special bodhisattva (enlightened being)—Dharanimdhara, the Earth Holder—will guide human efforts to guard and restore the natural world. No effort is too small; an “Earth Peace Treaty Commitment Sheet” in an appendix lists nearly 60 easy behaviors to minimize ecological impact. The Zen monk's often poetic voice redeems what might otherwise seem repetitive writing or simplistic views; seeing with “the eye of the elephant queen” provides deep insight. A foreword by environmental journalist Alan Weisman (The World Without Us) adds a fresh framework for understanding Nhat Hanh's Buddhist insights about interrelationships with the natural world. This is an urgent call from a revered spiritual teacher about the moral imperative to treat the earth with respectful awareness. (Oct.)