BOOKS IN BRIEF
BLACK FATHERS: A Call
for Healing
Kristin Clark Taylor. Doubleday, $22.95 (208p)
ISBN 0385502494
In this follow-up to Black Mothers: Songs of Praise and Celebration,
journalist Taylor stresses the need for black fathers to become stronger,
more positive paternal presences in their families. Acknowledging that her
own voice "is that of a woman and a mother," Taylor says her father's
"spirit" and "grace" have been with her throughout her life. She draws on
the teachings of Martin Luther King, Jr., the poetry of Helen Steiner
Rice, passages from the Bible, stories from her own past and anecdotes
from friends and acquaintances to urge African-American dads to take a
front and center position in their children's lives. The counsel ranges
from the concrete (e.g., take a father/child walk; visit a child's
teacher) to the vague (e.g., "be there" for children). Taylor's
assessments may trouble some readers, especially her belief that "for too
many black men, fatherhood has become optional." But there's no arguing
with Taylor's goal of better relationships between fathers and their
children, and dads from all walks of life should find her advice useful.
(On sale May 20)
BREAKING RANKS:
Refusing to Serve in the West Bank and Gaza Strip
Ronit Chacham.
Other Press, $25 (154p) ISBN 1590510437
Military
service is an integral part of life in Israel: both men and women serve in
the Israel Defense Forces; devotion to the country's survival is a given.
So disobeying an order is a remarkable action--one discussed in depth here
by nine "refuseniks," Israeli soldiers (all officers) who refused to serve
in the Occupied Territories. They tell Chacham, an Israeli cultural critic
and fiction writer, about their upbringings, their crises of conscience,
the mistreatment of Palestinians by themselves and others ("Our job was
giving the Palestinians a hard time," says one), their attempt to
reconcile support for Palestinian rights with devotion to their homeland,
their refusals to serve and the consequences. "When you're there [in the
territories], you're committing crimes whether you like it or not....I'm
not political," says one. "I speak from personal experience when I say I
can't stand it anymore." Anyone trying to understand why these men have
taken the action they have will be moved by their thoughtfulness and
articulateness. (June)
CODE GREEN:
Money-Driven Hospitals and the Dismantling of Nursing
Dana Beth Weinberg.
Cornell Univ., $25 (256p) ISBN 0801439809
Bad food
is the least of their worries: hospital patients often feel neglected,
Weinberg says, and complain that they spend hours without proper medical
attention from nurses. In this thorough investigation into how the nursing
profession has changed radically over the last decade, she cites hospital
consolidation and 1997's Balanced Budget Act, which brought cuts to
Medicare payments and severely affected hospitals' bottom line, as keys to
the problem. The Brandeis University research associate uses the merger of
Boston's prestigious Beth Israel Hospital with New England Deaconess as an
example of how fiscal problems and consolidation are responsible for the
growing shortage of nurses and rampant dissatisfaction in the field.
Before the merger, Beth Israel was famous for its egalitarian policies,
while the well-respected New England Deaconess was known for its
"restructuring of hospital care" in the name of cost efficiency. The
different philosophies behind nursing and the ensuing political struggles
involved with the marriage of individual institutions contributed heavily
to the drop in nurse retention and, ultimately, to a decline in patient
care. Weinberg's analysis will be important to medical professionals and
hospital administrators, but outsiders may find it a bit academic and dry.
(May)
FATHER FIGURES: A Boy
Goes Searching
Kevin Sweeney. Regan Books, $21.95 (176p) ISBN
0060511923
When environmental consultant Sweeney,
who was three when his father died of heart failure, turned eight, he
chose three men who were friends of his family to serve as stand-ins. At
the time, the men didn't know the role Sweeney had picked for them, but
they wound up teaching him invaluable lessons over the course of his life.
Part memoir, part tribute and part guide for those who have lost a parent,
this book (which is based on a Salon.com article Sweeney wrote shortly
after September 11) is a thoughtful, touching and realistic look at how
children cope with loss. "I did not feel fatherless," Sweeney writes, "not
exactly, even though my mother never remarried. I had a strategy for
coping. I was a kid with a plan." In spare, unadorned prose studded with
touching details, Sweeney relates what it was like to lean on, and learn
from, the men around him as he charted his own path to adulthood. The book
is a testament of children's strength and resilience in the face of loss.
(May 6)
FOLLOWING HADRIAN: A
Second-Century Journey through the Roman Empire
Elizabeth Speller. Oxford
Univ., $28 (352p) ISBN 0195165764
This is an odd
if appealing amalgam, which the publisher describes as "part travelogue,
biography and fictional memoir," recounting the life of second-century
Roman emperor Hadrian when the empire was at its peak of power. The memoir
is not Hadrian's (though he did in fact write an autobiography that has
been lost to us), but that of Julia Balbilla, an aristocratic woman, poet
and good friend of Hadrian's wife. Inspired by Marguerite Yourcenar's
novel about the emperor, and attempting to flesh out the skimpy historical
record and give readers a taste of real life during the Roman Empire,
Speller, a classics scholar, entwines excerpts from the fictional diary
with historical narrative to relate the life of Hadrian, "a great and
brilliant emperor" and "a passionate and incessant traveler." Through the
imagined words of Julia, Hadrian becomes a man of flesh and blood: "his
hair was more brown than golden and the poetry rather better than the wits
gave him credit for. It was the same with his alleged cowardice in the
wars and his womanising." This is a pleasing introduction to the ancient
world. (May)
FREUD AND THE
NON-EUROPEAN
Edward W. Said. Verso, $13 (96p) ISBN
1859845002
This little book is really an essay
that Said (Culture and Imperialism; etc.)
delivered under the auspices of the Freud Museum in London, stretched out
with Christopher Bollas's unrevised introduction ("...I am pleased to
welcome all of you to this important occasion") and critic Jacqueline
Rose's response--and with double spacing. Nevertheless, it's worthwhile.
In excavating Freud's historical musings on the common origins of Jews and
Palestinians, Said makes a case for a common culture of the Levant, one
that could serve, in a very direct way, as part of finding a path to
peace. Ammiel Alcalay's After Jews and Arabs:
Remaking Levantine Culture makes a fuller case, but Freud has
historical cache. Highlighting what Said calls Freud's "equivocation" on
Zionism is an obviously loaded move, but Said handles it with intellectual
care and equanimity, and with the sort of dry humor that he repeatedly
finds in Freud himself. If readers can ignore the aggressive flap copy
("Israel's relentless march to an exclusively Jewish state denies any
sense of a more complex, inclusive past"), they will find Said's Freud
complex and inclusive. (May 15)
THE GRITS GUIDE TO
LIFE
Deborah Ford
with Edie Hand. Dutton, $22.95 (272p) ISBN 0525947264
GRITS (Girls Raised In The South) authors Ford and
Hand maintain their down-home primer reveals "everything you need to be
the beautiful belle you've always wanted to be." No matter where you're
from, becoming a Grits girl requires daily practice, as well as an
understanding of the basic ingredients of Grits life: style, grace, poise,
manners and kindness. To this end, the authors offer "practical"
instructions on setting the perfect table, recycling bridesmaid's dresses
into tree skirts, sending thank-you notes and speaking like a Southerner
(add syllables whenever possible). Quotes, trivia, recipes (including
Dolly Parton's Favorite Meatloaf and Sun Tea, "The House Wine of the
South") and knee-slapping Grits Pearls of Wisdom such as, "If you can be
ready to go in less than thirty minutes, you probably shouldn't be leaving
the house at all!" round out each chapter, making this handbook a
welcome--and entertaining--addition to anyone aspiring to capture the
unique essence of Southern women. (Apr.)
A HISTORY OF THE DORA
CAMP: The Untold Story of the Nazi Concentration Camp That Secretly
Manufactured V-2 Rockets
Andre Sellier, translated from the French by Stephen
Wright and Susan Taponier, foreword by Michael J. Neufeld, afterword by
Christian Wagner. Ivan R. Dee, $35 (576p) ISBN 156663511X
Despite the plethora of books on the Holocaust, there
remain little-known corners to be explored, and Sellier casts light on one
of the darkest corners with this account of the Dora Camp, where V-2
rockets--Germany's supposed secret weapon--were produced. The story of
this camp, with its underground factory, has been suppressed or ignored by
the U.S. government, writes historian Michael Neufeld, because of "its
inconvenient connection to an American hero: the rocket scientist Wernher
von Braun," who was in charge of testing the rockets. Sellier, a French
historian and a survivor of Camp Dora, relates how the factory was manned
by slave laborers sent from Buchenwald; describes life in the underground
tunnels, where the prisoners not only worked but lived without running
water or proper sanitation; and tells of the camp's evacuation by death
marches and other means with the approach of Allied forces in 1945.
Sellier quotes directly from the chilling testimony of the camp's former
inmates, who evoke Dante to convey the hellish nature of life there. This
is an important addition to the history of the Holocaust, published in
association with the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. Illus. Maps. (June)
HOW TO BE A BABE:
Overcome Your Romantic Obsessions and Other Obstacles to Having the Sex
Life You Deserve
Joy Davidson. Fair Winds, $19.95 (216p) ISBN
1592330053
In this case, being a "babe" isn't
about being cute and objectified--far from it. Licensed sex therapist and
Playgirl columnist Davidson defines babe-ness
with four words: Balance, Authenticity, Boldness and Eroticism. Then, in
this intentionally sassy volume, she offers a series of step-by-step
chapters showing you how to attain BABE status. The object of her advice
is not to win someone else's affection, but rather to get the sex life you
want and deserve. The book is fun, friendly and flippant, peppered with
interactive quizzes and exercises and frequent "Babe Boosters" (little
pearls of wisdom meant to help readers become a babe). Certain nuggets
miss the mark--one Babe Booster reminds readers, "Don't pretend you like
kung-fu movies to snare a guy if that's really not your speed--the charade
will leave you empty." That's true, but it's not a trap most women fall
into. But overall this is readable and modern, and likely to give most
readers at least a little boost to their sexual chutzpah. (May)
HOW TO BECOME A
MARKETING SUPERSTAR: Unexpected Rules That Ring the Cash Register
Jeffrey J. Fox.
Hyperion, $16.95 (192p) ISBN 0786868244
Fox's
fourth entry in his How to Become series proves again that he has mastered
the short format, advice-driven business book. The book contains 50-odd
short chapters boasting a surprising amount of useful information
delivered in a street-smart style. In the chapter entitled "Banish All
Buying Barriers," Fox advises readers to eliminate anything that makes it
difficult for customers to buy. About merchants featured in Visa ads for
not accepting AmEx, he says, "Not accepting the American Express card is
dumb. Bragging about it is even dumber." Fox lists words to avoid in
advertising (e.g., "lifetime" and "quality") and questions to ask when
drafting a marketing plan. Four "instant challenges" describe a marketing
problem (e.g., how to sell shoe shines during a downpour) and ask readers
to solve it. (Try a sandwich board reading: "Acid Rain! Save your shoes.
Get a shine. Ask about the Rainy Day Special.") Throughout, Fox never
loses sight of what he sees as marketing's ultimate goal, the "super
marketer's anthem: It don't mean a thing. If it don't go ka-ching!" (May)
HOW TO BUILD A TIN
CANOE: Confessions of an Old Salt
Robb White. Hyperion/Theia, $23.95 (240p) ISBN
1401300278
Most readers will never need to build
their own boat, tin or otherwise, but this memoir rarely fails to delight
and sometimes even informs. White passes his days building boats and his
nights writing for publications like Wooden
Boat and Messing About in Boats--not
surprisingly, there's plenty of talk of keels, sterns, tumblehomes and
beam ratios here. Mixed in are his observations on how television rots
children's minds, and the ways in which the Enron scandal resembles
cannibalism in the Pre-Columbian Antilles. Like many skilled storytellers,
White wanders a bit. His childhood, which he spent building boats, getting
into trouble and exploring the South's swamps and ponds, resembles his
adult life, with the latter boasting deeper and more treacherous waters.
In the chapter "King Tut," for example, White tires while waiting for his
tugboat to clear the Mississippi's locks and decides to swim across the
river to see a King Tut exhibit at the Sugar Bowl. After nearly being run
over by an oil barge and losing all of his clothes, he does. There's no
telling, of course, how much fact there is to these tales. According to
the book's disclaimer, "none of these stories is true... not a single
word." (May 14)
THE INFO MESA:
Science, Business, and New Age Alchemy on the Santa Fe Plateau
Ed Regis. Norton,
$25.95 (256p) ISBN 0393021238
Regis (Who Got Einstein's Office?) here explores the
desert community of scientist-cum-entrepreneurs besotted with
"intellectual excitement and chaos and seriousness and joy." Unlike
Silicon Valley, Santa Fe's Info Mesa consists largely of academics
channeling pure scientific ideas to business ends. Computer simulations
and ever-increasing amounts of processing power help them tackle questions
on an unprecedented scale. Take, for example, Stu Kauffman's BiosGroup,
which used "fitness landscapes" to contemplate thousands of potential
variations on an airline baggage-handling system in just a few days. The
book's core is the immensely important transfer from "wet" (i.e.
laboratory) chemistry to "virtual" (i.e. computerized) chemistry, which
would yield enormous benefits to the pharmaceutical industry. Regis traces
a few seemingly unrelated stories that eventually knit together, and seems
to not be able to make up his mind on whether the book is primarily about
the ideas or the personalities. But this is not a huge drawback, since his
brisk account of important recent movements in science and business is
highly entertaining and informative. (May)
NATURAL BORN CYBORGS:
Minds, Technologies, and the Future of Human Intelligence
Andy Clark. Oxford Univ.,
$26 (224p) ISBN 0195148665
Cyborgs have long been
a part of America's cinematic imagination (think Arnold Schwarzenegger's
Terminator), but Clark says they're very much
a reality. Not only that; pretty much everyone is a cyborg already,
according to the author, who heads up Indiana University's cognitive
science program. With our laptops, cell phones and PDAs, we're all wired
to the hilt and becoming more so every day. As Clark points out, "the mind
is just less and less in the head"; when we need information, we usually
fire up our PC and access it elsewhere. Clark is at his best when he's
writing for a wide audience, distilling arcane technological advances into
their essential meaning. But sometimes his sheer enthusiasm for the
subject takes over, and the book feels as if it's intended only for tech
wonks who can appreciate the minutiae of various mind-machine experiments.
Clark gives a passing nod to the negative consequences of an increasingly
cyborg world--social alienation, information overload--but retains his
essentially positive take on the "biotechnological merger" that is
transforming so many people's lives. (June)
PUBLIC PLACES: My
Life in the Theater, with Peter O'Toole and Beyond
Siân Phillips. Faber and
Faber, $26 (448p) ISBN 0571211283
"After a
roller-coaster life of much happiness and many troubles, a woman of a
certain age makes a break for freedom," writes noted actor Phillips at the
end of this honest, heartfelt and often witty memoir. Indeed, when the
author takes a younger lover as an alternative to her marriage, readers
will feel great relief. Phillips, a critically praised and popular
performer, charts her professional, domestic and familial lives. Even
though she has her own theater career, the bulk of the book chronicles her
decades-long, volatile--but at times very satisfying--marriage to Peter
O'Toole. As O'Toole becomes increasingly famous in the 1960s, his
histrionics, caused mostly by excessive alcohol consumption, balloon out
of control. By 1975, O'Toole's drinking has brought him close to death (a
situation shockingly told in the book's opening chapters) and Phillips has
to seriously examine her life. While there's plenty of theater lore and
gossip here--much of it quite wonderful, such as Katharine Hepburn calling
Liz Taylor and Richard Burton "those fat pigs"--this memoir is really a
frightening, potently written "scenes from a marriage" and a story of how
the author finds her own way. B&w photos.
(May)
PURPLE COW: Transform
Your Business by Being Remarkable
Seth Godin. Portfolio, $19.95. (144p) ISBN
159184021X
The world is changing ever more
rapidly, and the rules of marketing are no different, writes Godin, the
field's reigning guru. The old ways--run-of-the-mill TV commercials, ads
in the Wall Street Journal and so on--don't
work like they used to, because such messages are so plentiful that
consumers have tuned them out. This means you have to toss out everything
you know and do something "remarkable" (the way a purple cow in a field of
Guernseys would be remarkable) to have any effect at all, writes Godin (Permission Marketing; Unleashing the Ideavirus). He cites companies
like HBO, Starbucks and JetBlue, all of which created new ways of doing
old businesses and saw their brands sizzle as a result. Godin's style is
punchy and irreverent, using short, sharp messages to drive his points
home. As a result the book is fiery, but not entirely cohesive; at times
it resembles a stream-of-consciousness monologue. Still, his wide-ranging
advice--be outrageous, tell the truth, test the limits and never settle
for just "very good"--is solid and timely. (May
12)
THE SEVEN BELIEFS: A
Step-by-Step Guide to Help Latinas Recognize and Overcome
Depression
Belisa Lozano-Vranich and Jorge Petit.
HarperCollins/Rayo, $23.95 (272p) ISBN 006001265X
With depression "tantamount to a four-letter word" in
Latino communities, Hispanic women struggling with the disorder may suffer
silently instead of seeking help, say the authors of this gentle guide.
Lozano-Vranich, a psychologist and mental health columnist for Latina magazine and others, and Petit, director
of Psychiatric Emergency Services at New York's Mount Sinai, outline seven
beliefs (in yourself; the signs of depression; change; your body; your
spirit; traditions; and the future) they say will help Latinas understand
and combat depression. With testimonials from women who've gone through
their own struggles, motivational tips, suggestions for therapy and an
encouraging tone that recognizes--and celebrates--a Latina's unique
cultural identity, with its "mix of traditional values and modern power,"
this book is an excellent and encouraging primer. An extensive list of
recommended readings, hotlines and organizations points readers to further
resources. (May)
SHE WINS, YOU WIN:
Strategies for Making Women More Powerful in Business
Gail Evans.
Gotham, $25 (208p) ISBN 1592400256
Evans, the
first female to be named an executive vice president at CNN, obviously
knows a thing or two about acquiring power. In this follow-up to her Play Like a Man, Win Like a Woman, she advises
women to trump the old boys' network by playing a "girls' game." Espousing
a one-for-all, all-for one approach, Evans insists women must work
together to "achieve a critical mass at the highest levels," concluding,
"Every woman must always play on the women's team." Leading readers
step-by-step through the process of building formal and informal teams,
Evans explores seven pivotal topics, including mentoring, "rainmaking,"
information-sharing and "webbing" (networking with comprehensive, complex
interconnections), while teaching women how to deal with challenges
(including which people to cultivate and which to avoid) and dismantling
popular myths and allaying common fears. This is an aggressive but
motivating handbook for women who are serious about career success. (On sale Apr. 28)
THE UNITED NATIONS
AND IRAQ: Defanging the Viper
Jean E. Krasno and James S. Sutterlin. Praeger,
$24.95 (264p) ISBN 0275978397
Krasno and Sutterin,
both political scientists at Yale, offer an in-depth study of the United
Nations' Special Commission (UNSCOM) and its efforts to find and eliminate
Iraq's weapons of mass destruction in the 1990s. Drawing on documentary
evidence as well as interviews with the executive directors and members of
the commission, they outline the inspectors' work, Iraq's "noncompliance
and untrustworthy behavior," and the achievements the commission had in
spite of that behavior. It may seem moot at this point, given that war
with Iraq is a fait accompli, but for those interested in assessing for
themselves the role of UNSCOM's work, this is balanced and
enlightening--if dry--reading. As the authors point out, UNSCOM was a new
departure for the UN and a "model of multilateral collaboration" that has
lessons to offer for the future regarding the UN's role as an enforcement
agency, the effectiveness of economic sanctions, and the importance of a
"credible threat of force" against a noncompliant country. (May)
WHAT WOULD ARISTOTLE
DO? Self-Control through the Power of Reason
Elliot D. Cohen.
Prometheus, $21 (230p) ISBN 1591020700
Cohen (Caution: Faulty Thinking Can Be Harmful to Your
Happiness), a professor of philosophy and medical ethics consultant,
here advocates a combination of Aristotelian logic and Rational Emotive
Behavior therapy, popularized by Dr. Albert Ellis. "By taking control of
your life through the power...of reason," he writes, "you can overcome
self-destructive, happiness-defeating ideas, emotions and actions!"
Although somewhat over-written and disorganized, Cohen's book does clearly
outline how purely emotional reasoning, such as over-generalizing,
magnifying risks and wishful thinking, can lead to self-defeating
behavior. When someone trapped in an abusive relationship simply wishes
things would improve, for example, he or she helps perpetrate the cycle of
abuse; Cohen recommends adopting a process of rational thought that will
lead the victim to act for change. Cohen also provides antidotes for
overcoming paralyzing emotional conditions, including anxiety, depression
and guilt that, according to him, are based on faulty reasoning. (Apr.)
WHY CEOS FAIL: The 11
Behaviors That Can Derail Your Climb to the Top--And How to Manage
Them
David L.
Dotlich and Peter C. Cairo. Jossey-Bass, $22.95 (176p) ISBN
0787967637
Businesses are often defined by the
personalities at the top. Enron's Jeff Skilling and Tyco's Dennis
Kozlowski rose through the ranks with their single-minded determination
and abrasive styles, but also saw their careers--and companies--fail
spectacularly because of those same traits. Management consultants Dotlich
and Cairo diagnose the behaviors that can sink even the most talented
businesspeople. Whether it's arrogance, aloofness, volatility or any of
the other personality flaws they've singled out, the authors encourage
CEOs to throttle back on Type A brashness and focus more on team-building
that will create a loyal and honest staff. It's an original melange of
business smarts and accessible psychology, and the authors' able
storytelling brings their diagnoses to life. Unfortunately, after pointing
out everything CEOs are doing wrong, they don't spend much time on what
they should do instead; a quick wrap-up chapter on successful managing
techniques is all that's offered. But as a dissection of the leadership
flaws that saw so many executives crash and burn over the last couple of
years, this is a book without peer. (May
6)
THE YAKUZA MOVIE
BOOK: A Guide to Japanese Gangster Films
Mark Schilling. Stone
Bridge, $19.95 paper (320p) ISBN 1880656760
Yakuza
films, with their "endless variations on the theme of revenge," have
influenced American directors from Francis Ford Coppola to Quentin
Tarantino. These Japanese gangster genre pics are a "great guilty
pleasure," says Japan Times film reviewer
Schilling, and though they had their "Golden Age" in the 1960s and 1970s,
they're now enjoying renewed popularity in the West. Schilling has
compiled profiles of and interviews with directors and actors, along with
100 reviews of yakuza movies, to present what the publisher calls the
first book in English devoted entirely to this genre. Schilling charts
yakuza's development, explains the origin of Japanese gangs, the various
styles and qualities of the films, and the ways in which fans--in Japan
and elsewhere--have responded to these movies. Each film review lists the
director and cast members and offers a plot summary and Schilling's own
critique; 60 black-and-white photos complement the text. It's a
comprehensive package, sure to be of value to fans of yakuza and other
gangster movies. (June)