Nonfiction Reviews

In his pursuit of actively observing his camp in the forests of western Maine and the woods, beaver bog and gardens around his Vermont home, Heinrich (The Trees in My Forest) delights with the surprising activities of local flora and fauna—and his own scientific antics: with a pet grackle named Crackle, he raids wasp nests to see what the red-eyed vireo will do with the paper and builds platforms in trees to find out who visits the sapsucker lick (hummingbirds, hawks and warblers). For entertainment, he recommends, “There is a solution that beats... a television set with 100 channels, by a mile: watching ants and other critters.” The book features such mysteries as the significance of the mating habits of wood frogs and the eating patterns of caterpillars, but Heinrich also takes time to observe Homo sapiens, remarking that, like birds, we live in a perpetual summer, not by “strenuous biannual migrations but by creating and retreating into 'climate bubbles,' ” reminding readers that they need “clear vision and also a spiritual imperative so that we will focus on the ultimate ecology, not the proximate economy.” (Apr.)

Positive psychology pioneer Fredrickson introduces readers to the power of harnessing happiness to transform their lives, backed up by impressive lab research. The author lays out the “core truths” and 10 forms of positivity—joy, gratitude, serenity, interest, hope, pride, amusement, inspiration, awe and love—in a book that promises to change the way people look at feeling good. Disdainful of Pollyannaism, Fredrickson remains realistic in her treatment and provides scientific evidence to illustrate her findings that maintaining a 3:1 “positivity ratio” of positive thoughts to negative emotions creates a “tipping point” between “languishing and flourishing.” The book includes compelling case studies, concrete tips, a Positivity Self Test and a tool kit for decreasing negativity and raising the positivity ratio. Although many of Fredrickson's methods and theories (notes on meditation and karma) will seem familiar to anyone versed in yoga or eastern religions, the scientific foundation of her arguments and additional online resources (www.positivityratio.com) offer readers a chance to experiment with positivity and very possibly lead richer lives. (Feb.)

As if it weren't already difficult enough to find a suitable mate, what if a prerequisite was that the lover be missing an arm or a leg? Or willing to be roasted on a spit? Comparatively, a mild-mannered foot fetish seems, well, pedestrian. Bergner (God of the Rodeo) investigates how “we become who we are sexually, whether our lusts are common or improbable.” The book's combination of titillation, shock value and documentary evokes a set of page-turning conundrums: is a man who desires feet any less odd than the psychiatrist who treats him or the scientist who studies pedophilia or the journalist who describes a whipping session in precise detail or the reader who becomes voyeur? It's all fairly delicate and disturbing material, and while the descriptions can grow florid, the author's strongest moments (e.g., evoking the tabooed desires impelling the artist Hans Bellmer's work) compensate for the lapse. Bergner has an empathetic sensibility and convincingly suggests that what a fetishist needs is a willing and loving partner with complementary interests. (Feb.)

Leamer (The Kennedy Women) reveals the secrets of the Palm Beach elite who reside behind the high walls and manicured hedges of this exclusive enclave. A winter resident since 1994, the author gains the trust of his subjects, playing tennis with them and attending their parties. Such firsthand experience is supplemented by newspaper articles and interviews with scores of men and women who, although usually guarded, are unusually open to Leamer (the informant for the chapter “Palm Beach Millionaire Seeks Playmate” gave the author access to his personal papers, including unpublished memoirs). The book's highly visual vignettes—dominated by divorce, infidelity, excessive drinking and violence—produce a depressing picture of sad, angry, insecure and frequently nasty people hiding behind empty smiles, luxury cars and socially invisible servants. Leamer reflects: “Like [Henry] James, I found that few of the lives have the beauty of the surroundings, or the depths of the artistic vision that inspired this island.” Some readers may find this book a penetrating portrayal of a privileged segment of the American population; others might regard it as a book-length gossip column. (Feb.)

In this frank account, by turns sad and terribly funny, the journalist Federico describes how her distant, patrician octogenarian mother, Addie, grew batty and vulnerable. Federico, the youngest of Addie's five children, rearranged her life with her own family in Nova Scotia to fly back and forth over the course of several years to Oldhill, N.J., to assist, along with her brother William, her mother and her mother's Alzheimer's-addled second husband, Walter. Recently married (Addie's first husband, the author's father, died of a heart attack years before), the couple drank heavily, complicating Walter's tendency to become abusive and Addie's physical frailty and bad eyesight. Finally, constant home care was required for the couple, necessitating the hiring of a team of revolving, frequently in-fighting workers, some truly caring, others downright crooked. The house became a disaster zone, christened the Departure Lounge, where the inhabitants erupted in loony non sequiturs and erratic behavior. Addie would put on all her jewelry and sing show tunes (until the jewelry mysteriously disappeared); Walter began receiving sex toys in the mail; and a trip to the bank resulted in $1,600 in dollar bills flying out of the limo window on the way home. Federico gently delineates the humiliating burden caused by the loss of memory, while humanely portraying a brave new sympathy and understanding between her mother and herself. (Feb.)

Film historian and novelist Thomson (The New Biographical Dictionary of Film; Suspects) looks back at his childhood and teen years, beginning with hazy memories of frosty mornings, air-raid shelters in wartime London, fear of bombs and the evacuation of children to the countryside. When the war ended, boys played in bombed-out buildings where staircases stopped in midair: “The living rooms were exposed to the night air, but sometimes suggested that the residents had just left for the moment, like stage sets waiting for the next act.” An only child born in 1941, Thomson talked with an imaginary sister, Sally, as he progressed from reading comic books to listening to BBC dramatizations on the “matchless medium” of radio. Probing personal defeats and triumphs, he reflects on his four years of speech therapy: “Stammering is a silly little thing. It won't kill you, but it'll change the course of your life.” In the heart of this haunting, eloquent memoir, as might be expected, he gets rhapsodic when recalling the films that left an indelible impression on him: Red River, Meet Me in St. Louis, Citizen Kane, East of Eden. While following a film critic in the making, we also see the changing cultural landscape of the 1940s and 1950s through his eyes. (Feb.)

Upon return from embedded duty in Iraq with a marines unit, Ayres, a British journalist, chronicles his brief visit to Los Angeles, the land of glam and glitz. This gonzo-influenced volume opens with Ayres (War Reporting for Cowards) getting the sultry once-over from a beauty in a white bikini at poolside, and everything goes wacky and downhill from there with a bogus assignment to cover singer Michael Jackson, his Neverland estate and his sleepovers. Ayres marvels at the perpetually sunny weather of “the sci-fi metropolis,” and the Tinseltown crowd of “Beverly Hill princesses, plum-cheeked hedonists, journalists with notebooks and bad breath, fleets of android publicists, the rich, the very rich.” Ayres makes note of this life of excess, eco disasters and obsession with physical perfection. Producing a topsy-turvy carnival ride of a book, Ayres knows how to find the laughs and fantasy in this accomplished satire of Los Angeles. (Feb.)

Del Ponte, protagonist of this dogged, hard-nosed memoir, was chief prosecutor for the U.N. International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia and Rwanda, the biggest war crimes prosecution since WWII. Her investigations had her ousted from the Rwandan tribunal and insulted in Yugoslavia (“Carla is a whore,” Belgrade billboards proclaimed), and she lacked police powers to compel cooperation or even respect. Her mission became a battle between moral dudgeon and realpolitik. She repeatedly importunes government officials, especially the Serbs, to arrest and deliver up influential citizens for prosecution as war criminals; when they respond with evasions and stonewalling, she importunes world leaders to use their clout to force compliance with the tribunal's warrants. She accomplished much, including the prosecution of Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic, but the memoir wears itself out detailing her interminable, fruitless efforts to apprehend Serbian fugitives Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic. Del Ponte sometimes comes off as chief scold; even Vatican officials incur tongue-lashings. Her implacable quest for justice is admirable and at times illuminating, but it makes for a repetitive and exhausting read. (Jan.)

Journalists Fitzgerald and Gould do yeoman's labor in clearing the fog and laying bare American failures in Afghanistan in this deeply researched, cogently argued and enormously important book. The authors demonstrate how closely American actions are tied to past miscalculations—and how U.S. policy has placed Afghans and Americans in grave danger. Long at cultural crossroads, Afghanistan's location poised the country to serve as “a fragile buffer” between rival empires. Great Britain's 1947 creation of an arbitrary and indefensible border between Afghanistan and the newly minted Pakistan “from the Afghan point of view... has always been the problem,” but particularly after 9/11 American policymakers have paid scant attention to the concerns of Afghans, preferring to shoehorn an imagined Afghanistan into U.S. power paradigms. “The United States is in a fight for its life, not because of [9/11]... but because of the way America responded.... That response was at once wildly exaggerated, dangerously reckless, and... ineffective,” the authors argue, calling on the incoming president to make radical changes. “Osama is not beating the United States.... The United States is beating itself, and beating itself badly.” (Jan.)

In this epic, remarkably readable history of U.S. involvement in the Middle East from Eisenhower to Bush II, Washington Post reporter Tyler uses an up-close, journalistic style to depict the power struggles and compromises that have defined the past half-century. Tyler focuses on key turning points in U.S.–Middle East relations and documents the conversations and real-time decision-making processes of the presidents, cabinet members and other key figures. Readers are treated to an intimate view of Eisenhower's careful, steady diplomacy during the Suez crisis, Kissinger's egocentric and fateful decision to fully arm Israel in the October war of 1973 while Nixon struggled through the Watergate scandal, and the tangled web of communication and intentional deceit during the Reagan administration that led to the Iran-Contra scandal. Tyler makes the issues and relationships clear without resorting to oversimplification or ideological grandstanding, and his journalistic instincts steer him toward direct quotation and telling anecdotes rather than generalization. Readers in the market for an examination of how leadership has embroiled the U.S. in the Middle East are well-advised to consult this riveting text. (Jan.)

Tayler (Siberian Dawn) takes readers on an extraordinary adventure across the largest landmass on earth, from Russia through the Caucasus into South Ossetia and Georgia, on to Central Asia and Kazakhstan, and across Xinjiang and Mongolia. Equal parts history, politics, economic theory and anthropology, he brings into sharp focus the ordinary lives behind the news headlines. Of particular interest are two recurring discoveries he makes—replacing totalitarian dictators with “democratically elected” (often U.S.-backed) leaders opens the door to enormous corruption, and that where there is electricity, there is always a disco. Tayler marshals hundreds of years of history, from the conquests of Genghis Khan through the dislocation caused by WWI and WWII to the Chinese Communist revolution and the glossy, urban China of today. While the author's approach to exploration is haphazard at times, his impressive ability to build instant rapport and cull local knowledge in a remarkably short span of time gives his journey steady momentum. Tayler conveys his encounters in prose that is as richly textured as the stories he gathers in some of the remotest places imaginable. (Jan.)

In this detailed if uneven meditation, Maliszewski explores the complicated world of deception and those who practice it. The book begins with the author defending his own habit of publishing letters to the editor under pseudonyms while working as a reporter in upstate New York. He describes his actions as satire, although his lengthy, sometimes bitter mea culpa drags by the end. However, his analysis of literary and journalistic deception—a sampling that includes Stephen Glass, James Frey and JT LeRoy—finds nuanced differences between the hoaxes, cons and outright lies while connecting them to universal themes. The book abounds with interviews and anecdotes about con men, art forgers and historical fakes, leading Maliszewski to conclude, “Writing, after all, needn't be a mirror in which authors discover only themselves looking back and grinning.” The author could stand to take a bit of his own advice, although the book as a whole does provide some interesting insights into the nature of deception. (Jan.)

With 30 years in public relations, Bragman offers an insider's perspective on creating—or refurbishing—a personal image or brand. His book reads like a who's who of his celebrity clients, from Cameron Diaz to Paula Abdul, lending a sensational quality to the text; Bragman is more on point when he sticks to such details as building a believable and authentic image, describing the finer points of creating an effective Internet presence and knowing when to seek publicity. He makes canny observations about the melding of public relations and the “new media” and sharp advice on how to navigate the divide between perception and reality. But there remains a schizophrenic quality to the book, as readers are instructed to apply celebrity PR and media relations techniques wisdom to their daily lives; the author claims his methods will benefit everyone from the “local environmentalist trying to effect change” to the state representative looking for a writeup in the hometown paper. But Bragman's arguments are more apropos for the glitterati and not for the fictional PTA bent on a recycling initiative. (Jan.)

Roman, former chairman and CEO of Ogilvy & Mather, paints a fascinating portrait of one of advertising's most eccentric—and beloved—characters. Born in a small English town in 1911, David Ogilvy was an indifferent student, struggling through on scholarship at the best schools in Britain, eventually getting himself expelled from Oxford. He started out as a successful salesman for the Aga cooker and became swiftly obsessed with advertising. During his long and storied career at Mather & Crowther—later Ogilvy & Mather—the flamboyantly dressed original “Mad Man” crafted some of the most famous and most successful campaigns in history: he made Schweppes into one of the most popular brands in America and turned Marlboro from a traditionally feminine item (red-tipped to avoid showing lipstick) into an icon of masculinity—and the world's best-selling cigarette. Meanwhile, he married three women, wrote three books, did intelligence work for Churchill and established himself as one of New York's most well-known and entertaining figures. Roman brilliantly renders American culture in the heady days of the '60s through the eyes of an energetic transplant. Lively writing and an affectionate yet honest tone make this an astonishingly charming and informative biography. (Jan.)

Carrison (Semper Fi) argues that the not-for-profit Federal Bureau of Investigation, one of the most imposing, tightly run and constantly evolving organizations in America, has valuable management lessons to offer the corporate world. The author interviews top FBI management and street agents, who reveal why recruitment, retention, loyalty and willingness to change prevail despite life-threatening danger, low pay and frequent relocation. Exploring the strength of the FBI “brand,” Carrison credits the selective, rigorous two-year and 22-week training and probation program, the FBI-as-family ethos, regular skills training and testing at all levels, and the “One for All, All for One” culture for creating and reinforcing an allegiance virtually unseen in for-profit firms. The author demonstrates how these techniques and principles can be integrated into the corporate world through strong, no-nonsense but sincere top-down leadership and a genuine commitment to common goals, even as those goals change. Although a dense read with an unabashed admiration for military-style management and “self-sacrifice,” the lessons are indisputably germane to corporations and the fascinating sidebar interviews with agents will captivate readers. (Jan.)

Capitalism at its most colorful oozes across the pages of this engrossing study of independent oil men. Vanity Fair special correspondent Burrough (coauthor, Barbarians at the Gate) profiles the Big Four oil dynasties of H.L. Hunt, Roy Cullen, Clint Murchison and Sid Richardson, along with their cronies, rivals, families and, in Hunt's case, bigamous second and third families. The saga begins heroically in the early 20th-century oil boom, with wildcatters roaming the Texas countryside drilling one dry hole after another, scrounging money and fending off creditors until gushers of black gold redeem them. Their second acts as garish nouveaux riches with strident right-wing politics are entertaining, if less dramatic. Decline sets in as rising production costs and cheaper Middle Eastern oil erode profits, and a feckless, feuding second generation squanders family fortunes on debauchery and reckless investment—H.L.'s sons' efforts in 1970 to corner the silver market bankrupted them and almost took down Wall Street. This is a portrait of capitalism as white-knuckle risk taking, yielding fruitful discoveries for the fathers, but only sterile speculation for the sons—a story that resonates with today's economic upheaval. (Jan. 27)

Simms, of Cambridge University, is among the finest of a new generation of British historians. In his most ambitious work to date, he addresses arguably the fundamental question of British identity: is it European or insular? Simms lines up solidly with the Europeanists, but provides a global twist. He interprets Britain's greatness and survival as a function of maintaining a buffer zone on the continent. The Low Countries and the Holy Roman Empire had to remain in friendly hands. In the first half of the 18th century, Britain, as a burgeoning empire, sought allies with economic resources and, when necessary, with armed force. The result was “three victories”—against Spain, Austria and in the Seven Years' War—that established a balance of power. Yet Britain's government and people began to believe the sea and the Royal Navy alone guaranteed Britain's security. Neglecting and alienating its continental neighbors led to the expansion of a debate with the North American colonies into a global war. Britain suffered disaster, but learned a lesson as well, Simms shows, maintaining in succeeding centuries the continental commitment that sustained its existence. Illus., maps. (Jan.)

Hart is the current master of an approach to military history developed by Martin Middlebrook and Lyn Macdonald. Direct quotations from participants establish “the face of battle,” then combined with a narrative/analytical backdrop contextualizing the personal experiences. As oral historian of Britain's Imperial War Museum, Hart has unrivaled access to relevant sources. This book, published in Britain in 2005, is a masterful synthesis of the human and the operational aspects of a campaign that increasingly defines the British experience in the Great War. Hart vividly presents the runup to the “Big Push” expected to end the war; the disaster of July 1, 1916, when the British army suffered nearly 60,000 casualties; and the numbing months of attrition as British troops bled against the German defenses. Hart describes the horror as reflecting not the stupidity of individual generals and politicians but the determination of nations to resolve their differences by a war fought to the finish. The British army learned how to fight battles like the Somme, built around fire power. But its learning curve was slippery with blood. Hart honors the men who paid the price. Photos, maps. (Jan. 7)

Herbert Hoover (1874–1964) would have satisfied anyone who believed a businessman would make an ideal president. In this outstanding addition to the American President series, Bancroft Prize–winning historian Leuchtenburg (The FDR Years) points out that while writers describe Hoover as a mining engineer, he was really a promoter and financier who traveled the world and made a fortune. He vaulted to fame after brilliantly organizing relief for the Belgian famine during WWI. Appointed secretary of commerce in 1920, he operated with a dictatorial manner that infuriated colleagues, but his dynamism and popularity made him a shoo-in for the Republican nomination in 1928. As president, his political ineptitude offended Congress and discouraged supporters even before the 1929 crash. Afterward, he backed imaginative programs to stimulate the economy but insisted that direct relief was socialistic and that local governments and charities were doing fine. In fact, they weren't, and this insistence combined with a dour personality made him a widely hated figure. A veteran historian of this period, Leuchtenburg brings vivid prose and strong opinions to this richly insightful biography of a president whose impressive business acumen served him poorly. (Jan. 6)

New York Times editorial board member Cohen (coauthor, American Pharaoh) delivers an exemplary and remarkably timely narrative of FDR's famous first “Hundred Days” as president. Providing a new perspective on an oft-told story, Cohen zeroes in on the five Roosevelt aides-de-camp whom he rightly sees as having been the most influential in developing FDR's wave of extraordinary actions. These were agriculture secretary Henry Wallace, presidential aide Raymond Moley, budget director Lewis Douglas, labor secretary Frances Perkins and Civil Works Administration director Harry Hopkins. This group, Cohen emphasizes, did not work in concert. The liberal Perkins, Wallace and Hopkins often clashed with Douglas, one of the few free-marketers in FDR's court. Moley hovered somewhere in between the two camps. As Cohen shows, the liberals generally prevailed in debates. However, the vital foundation for FDR's New Deal was crafted through a process of rigorous argument within the president's innermost circle rather than ideological consensus. Cohen's exhaustively researched and eloquently argued book provides a vital new level of insight into Roosevelt's sweeping expansion of the federal government's role in our national life. (Jan. 12)

During his first term as president, FDR became frustrated by a Supreme Court with a majority of Republican appointees that routinely ruled unconstitutional various New Deal initiatives in narrow 5 to 4 votes. Most particularly, the Court crippled the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933—the very heart of FDR's prescription for economic recovery. As Solomon (The Washington Century: Three Families and the Shaping of the Nation's Capital) shows in this compelling and painstakingly researched study, after being re-elected by a large plurality in 1936, FDR attempted to revive a long-dead proposal, arguing that all Supreme Court justices 70 years or older either retire or the president be allowed to appoint a tandem judge to serve side-by-side with the older justice. This formula would have allowed FDR to shift the Court's balance of power. Solomon eloquently reveals how the proposal—hotly debated in Congress and characterized as a direct challenge to the fundamental principles of the Founders—eventually resulted in a stunning and humiliating defeat for FDR, sharply dividing members of his own party in the process. Photos. (Jan.)

There is renewed interest in Milton, particularly his political life, this year, the 400th anniversary of his birth. This substantial biography, seamlessly written by the editors of the Oxford Milton, draws chiefly on documentary evidence and an easy familiarity with the 17th-century English scene. As a prodigy scholar, pamphleteer, government translator on the international stage and the blind (probably from glaucoma) bard of the Bible, Milton found himself astride a world of hardening views, as it spiraled in political and spiritual transition. He wrote on divorce, freedom of expression and the tenure of kings; his De Doctrina Christiana, not unearthed until the 1820s, is an essential work of systematic theology. The authors set Milton's imaginative life against this backdrop, stretching from Shakespeare, to whom Milton's father may have been loosely connected, to Dryden's ingenious staging of Paradise Lost in couplets. With nearly 100 pages of notes and bibliography, this is a no-nonsense contribution to our understanding of a genius who, in many ways, is hardly remote from our times. 25 b&w illus., maps. (Jan.)

Noted author Ackroyd (The Thames) adds to his one-man Brief Lives series this exploration of the short—and predominantly miserable—life of Edgar Allan Poe. Bringing his novelist's skills to bear, Ackroyd opens with Poe's mysterious death in 1849: “Like his narratives and his fables, Poe's own story ends abruptly and inconclusively....” Born in Boston in 1809 to traveling actors and orphaned in 1811, Poe was adopted by Richmond, Va., merchant John Allan. Their relationship soured, and Poe left for a rocky academic career at the University of Virginia and a stint at West Point, and in 1836 he married his 13-year-old cousin, Virginia. Despite critical acclaim for his work—from 1839's “The Fall of the House of Usher” to his famous 1845 poem, “The Raven”—Poe constantly struggled with alcoholism and poverty, alienating almost everyone he met. At age 40, Poe was discovered dying in a Baltimore tavern; his whereabouts for the previous week remain unknown. But Ackroyd never demonizes the melancholic man who influenced writers as diverse as Jules Verne and James Joyce, and his readable account should appeal to Poe devotees and newcomers alike. Illus. (Jan. 20)

Though critical studies of his vast oeuvre abound, King—the bestselling author of the 20th century—has not been the subject of a book-length biography until this strictly serviceable study. Rogak (The Man Behind The Da Vinci Code) doesn't probe her subject or his work too deeply. Rather, she strings together the best-known facts of his life with workmanlike efficiency: his family's early abandonment by his father; the author's triumph over an impoverished childhood; his perseverance and prolificacy as a writer; his determination, despite his comfort with genre fiction, to be regarded as more than a horror writer; his struggles with alcohol and drugs; his generosity toward other writers; the accident that nearly killed him in 1999. Rogak structures her text primarily around the chronology of King's scores of books and their film adaptations. Though she interviewed some of King's friends and colleagues, much of the book is derived from secondary sources. Her text is repetitive and cliché-ridden, but the facts she marshals will serve King fans not familiar with his life. 8 pages of b&w photos. (Jan.)

From Pluto's 1930 discovery to the emotional reaction worldwide to its demotion from planetary status, astrophysicist, science popularizer and Hayden Planetarium director deGrasse Tyson (Death by Black Hole) offers a lighthearted look at the planet. Astronomical calculations predicted the presence of a “mysterious and distant Planet X” decades before Clyde Tombaugh spotted it in 1930. DeGrasse Tyson speculates on why straw polls show Pluto to be the favorite planet of American elementary school students (for one, “Pluto sounds the most like a punch line to a hilarious joke”). But Pluto's rock and ice composition, backward rotation and problematic orbit raised suspicions. As the question of Pluto's nature was being debated by scientists, the newly constructed Rose Center for Earth and Space at the Hayden Planetarium quietly but definitively relegated Pluto to the icy realm of Kuiper Belt Objects (cold, distant leftovers from the solar system's formation), raising a firestorm. Astronomers discussed and argued and finally created an official definition of what makes a planet. This account, if a bit Tyson-centric, presents the medicine of hard science with a sugarcoating of lightness and humor. 35 color and 10 b&w illus. (Jan.)

In this wide-ranging assortment of 150 brief essays, well-known figures from every conceivable field demonstrate why it's a prerogative of all thoughtful people to change their mind once in a while. Technologist Ray Kurzweil says he now shares Enrico Fermi's question: if other intelligent civilizations exist, then where are they? Nassim Nicholas Taleb (The Black Swan) reveals that he has lost faith in probability as a guiding light for making decisions. Oliver Morton (Mapping Mars) confesses that he has lost his childlike faith in the value of manned space flight to distant worlds. J. Craig Venter, celebrated for his work on the human genome, has ceased to believe that nature can absorb any abuses that we subject it to, and that world governments must move quickly to prevent global disaster. Alan Alda says, “So far, I've changed my mind twice about God,” going from believer to atheist to agnostic. Brockman, editor of Edge.org and numerous anthologies, has pulled together a thought-provoking collection of focused and tightly argued pieces demonstrating the courage to change strongly held convictions. (Jan.)

Without discounting the very real impact of climate change, de Villiers (Windswept) steps back from global warming brinkmanship to suggest that, in fact, “we've been living in a little bubble of stability in a great sea of chaotic change” and that cataclysm is the universe's normal condition. He casts back billions of years to report that mass extinctions have at times wiped out 96% of all species living in the seas, the world has cycled through several monumental ice ages, collisions with comets and asteroids have altered life on Earth (in 1996 a three-quarter-mile-long asteroid passed within four hours of our planet) and land-shattering earthquakes have a transformed continents. More recently in known history, massive volcanic explosions have dramatically influenced global temperatures and human life half a dozen times, most recently Krakatoa in 1883 and Pinatobu in 1991, and notes that noxious gases, mammoth tsunamis, great floods, “vile winds, tropical cyclones and tornadoes,” plagues and pandemics continue to threaten human survival. De Villiers's conclusion, contrarian and more controversial than calming, is that despite the fight against global warming, “the planet is always changing, and so must we.” (Jan.)

The harrowing route of Marco Polo's 13th-century trek from Venice to ancient Cathay over the traditional Silk Road to Kublai Khan's territories consumed 24 years of the famous explorer's life. Award-winning photographer Belliveau and sculptor/lecturer O'Donnell, a former marine, spent two years retracing the journey,, to “[t]raverse the world's largest land mass and back, climb its highest mountains, cross its most desolate deserts and seas.” The curious, intrepid risk-takers forgo air travel to recreate the 25,000-mile experience, facing rolls of red tape, internecine politics, horrendous climates, language barriers, civil war and border authorities while traveling through what is now Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Tibet, China and Mongolia, among others. The authors have a remarkable ability to form relationships in varied cultures, as with a group of rough Afghan soldiers: “All had in common... losses so terrible that we had stopped asking questions about families.” Fascinatingly, many of the customs, locales and physical landscapes are identical, 700 years later, to Polo's descriptions. Alongside Belliveau and O'Donnell's enthusiastic narrative are marvelous full-color photos that bring the travelogue to vivid life. (Dec.)

According to Weinstein and Scarbrough, authors of the Ultimate cookbook series, Americans eat more than 46 slices of takeout pizza per year. On a mission to enable pie lovers to make fresh, quality pizza at home, the duo has created 100 recipes ranging from classics like four cheese and sausage and pepper to more inventive concoctions such as one made with squash and chard and another with duck confit. A primer chapter includes easy-to-follow instructions for a variety of doughs, including semolina and gluten-free dough that can be mixed and matched with recipes throughout the book. An eight-step “Road Map for Pizza” is a simple and effective guide to pizza making for all level of cooks. Options for using prepared crusts, as well as those made on pizza stones, baking sheets or the grill, give the home cook a desirable flexibility with crust preparation. Worthy chapters on deep-dish and salad-topped pizzas round out the book. (Jan.)

This nutritionally sound, flavor-savvy cookbook, first published in 1994, was arguably ahead of its time—at least for American readers. Of course, a wave of American dieters and nutritionists have since come to advocate Mediterranean eating habits, including a largely plant-based diet with modest amounts of proteins and plenty of good fats. Jenkins's updated and revised version will surely reach a wider audience. Jenkins, an American who has lived in Italy, France, Lebanon, Cyprus and Spain, zeros in on the dietary patterns that link these nations. Yet Jenkins's approach is hardly prescriptive; she prefers to gently encourage good habits rather than lay out a daily regime. The 250 recipes are largely traditional dishes, some of which may be novel to her readership, such as Provençal chickpea soup; Moroccan lamb tagine with apricots; and kourabiedes, Greek butter almond cookies. Jenkins has removed the nutritional data from the previous edition, which allows for a greater emphasis on the food itself. Jenkins's recipes are reliable, and though dishes like pizza made from scratch require extra time and effort, the payoff is in the “slow food,” Mediterranean approach: an overall respect and enjoyment for what we eat that translates into greater health. Jenkins is an effective ambassador for this way of thinking about food, and her cookbook is a wonderful resource for anyone considering it. (Dec.)

Sometimes the simplest-seeming cookbooks yield the most surprising revelations, as in nutritionist Yarnell's guide to one-pot cooking. Yarnell's signature “infusion” method, cooking in a dutch oven at a very hot temperature renders layered vegetables, starches and proteins like tandoori salmon and kale with butternut squash over basmati rice, into a surprisingly well-textured, hearty meal. (It's also foolproof: when you smell the aroma of dinner, you're three minutes from the end of the cooking time.) Dishes like citrus ginger chicken with root vegetables; penne puttanesca; and fiesta steak are simple choices for busy weeknight dinners. The real genius, of course, is the single pot—Yarnell's all-inclusive meals don't require the usual juggling of oven times to coordinate complementary dishes, and cleanup is simplified even further by a preliminary canola oil spritz on the pot. Her emphasis on whole foods, abundant servings of vegetables, moderate amounts of protein and the incorporation of whole grains like amaranth and quinoa justifies her health claims. Yarnell also guides readers in creating their own custom versions of the one-pot meal, even offering a one-pot meal weekly grocery list. (Dec.)

Niall (Sweet & Natural Baking), expands the world of “sweet” to home bakers with his extensive knowledge of natural sweeteners and over 100 recipes. Raw sugar such as turbinado, moist brown sugars like demerara and muscovado, and nonsugarcane options like agave syrup and fruit juice concentrates are incorporated in an enticing selection of recipes for cakes, pies, cookies, entrées and more. Niall spans the culinary world with international choices like Thai sticky black rice and mangoes, dulce de leche sandwich cookies and Vietnamese caramel chicken. American favorites such as sweet potatoes with a sorghum glaze, Meyer Lemon Shaker Pi and caramel applesauce cake can also be found. An informative primer and side notes provide additional recipe options, technique tips and nutritional information. This is a unique addition to the baker's shelf. (Dec.)

For those intimidated by cooking with whole grains, veteran cookbook author Sass (The New Vegan Cookbook; Whole Grains Every Day, Every Way; etc.) breaks down the “what” and “how” of whole grains in this accessible title brimming with healthy and appealing dishes. A primer on grains, including where to buy and brand recommendations, prefaces a collection of 125 recipes, each designed to take the home cook under 30 minutes to prepare. Whole grain takes on American classics including quinoa-creamed spinach and skillet macaroni and cheese, are mixed in among versions of well-known international dishes such as barley cioppino, faro risotto and tortilla lasagne. Unique recipes such as popcorn-crusted turkey cutlets with cherry tomato salsa and ham-and-egg couscous round out the list. Speed tips offer additional time-saving advice to the already quick-to-prepare meals. Full-color photos highlight collection standouts. (Dec.)

This volume of winter wonderland of color and light offers a festive tour of downtown Chicago and the surrounding counties. Author Edsey, a Chicago native who has for 10 years hosted holiday bus tours around that city, puts her hometown savvy to excellent use: photos of displays are accompanied by stories about the people who create them, viewing hours, directions and maps. Edsey also provides a history of outdoor holiday decorations, noting that Americans' endeavors echo those of the ancient Romans, who festooned their homes to celebrate the new year. Edsey's visual tour of holiday-themed Chicagoland visits well-known landmarks like Navy Pier and the Art Institute of Chicago, plus neighborhoods like the one that's home to Candy Cane Lane, where, from the mid-1950s to the early 1970s, a parade of 10-foot candy canes stood in residents' front lawns. Readers inspired to create or augment their own display will appreciate the book's many tips—for example, how to disguise floodlights as giant presents—and its appendix of suppliers. (Nov.)

Signature

Reviewed by James L. Swanson

Between this fall and the bicentennial of Lincoln's birth in February 2009, publishers will overwhelm bookstores and readers alike with a flood of more than 60 titles on the ever-popular president. One can hardly keep track of them all: one certainly cannot read them all. Of the dozens of these books competing for attention, a few stand out, foremost among them this title.

The trend in Lincoln scholarship has been away from the magisterial narrative comprehensiveness of Carl Sandburg in favor of a narrow, deep dive resulting in the so-called “slice” book: thus entire volumes about one magnificent speech; a key incident; the deepest crisis; the most pivotal year; and so on. A number of these works have merit, but have failed to capture a wide, popular audience.

Abraham Lincoln: A Life is the antithesis of a thin slice from the Lincoln pie. In the sweeping style of Doris Kearns Goodwin's Team of Rivals, Burlingame has produced the finest Lincoln biography in more than 60 years and one of the two or three best Lincoln books on any subject in a generation.

A distinguished scholar who probably knows more about Abraham Lincoln and his world than anyone else alive, Burlingame has devoted the last quarter century to editing 11 books on the Lincoln primary sources, including the writings of the president's secretaries John Hay, John Nicolay and William Stoddard. Now Burlingame has produced the most meticulously researched Lincoln biography ever written. He resurrected Lincoln's lost early journalism, when the young prairie politician—little more than an immature, unscrupulous hack—wrote more than 200 anonymous op-eds; Burlingame scoured thousands of 19th-century newspapers and discovered hitherto unknown stories; he read hundreds of oral histories, unpublished letters, and journals from Lincoln's contemporaries; and he re-examined the vast manuscript collections at the Library of Congress and National Archives. Burlingame's astonishing chapters covering Lincoln's hard early years and his difficult marriage, and his fresh insights on the profound crisis that made Lincoln great, are worth the price of the book.

Do not let the intimidating length or the formidable price deter you. The book need not be read in one sitting. Each part stands alone. Burlingame's Lincoln comes alive as the author unfolds vast amounts of new research while breathing new life into familiar stories. This is a critical, skeptical, loving but never fawning tribute to the man Burlingame praises for “achiev[ing] a level of psychological maturity unmatched in the history of American public life.”

This book supplants Sandburg and supersedes all other biographies. Future Lincoln books cannot be written without it, and from no other book can a general reader learn so much about Abraham Lincoln. It is the essential title for the bicentennial. (Nov.)

James L. Swanson is the author of Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer. His next book is Chasing Lincoln's Killer (Scholastic, Feb. 2009).

Fisher has fictionalized her life in several novels (notably Postcards from the Edge), but her first memoir (she calls it “a really, really detailed personals ad”) proves that truth is stranger than fiction. There are more juicy confessions and outrageously funny observations packed in these honest pages than most celebrity bios twice the length. After describing how she underwent electroshock therapy for her manic depression, Fisher then sorts through her life as her memories return. She predicts that by the end of the book, “you'll feel so close to me that you'll want to divorce me.” At one point, this daughter of Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher (“one an icon, the other an arm piece to icons”) hilariously diagrams her family tree of Hollywood marriages and remarriages to make sure her daughter's potential date is not a relative. Revealing that at 15 she got a vibrator for Christmas from her mother, she writes, “You might be thinking that a lot of the stories I'm telling you are over the top... but you can't imagine what I'm leaving out.” With acerbic precision and brash humor, she writes of struggling with and enjoying aspects of her alcoholism, drug addiction and mental breakdowns. Her razor-sharp observations about celebrity, addiction and sexuality demand to be read aloud to friends. (Dec.)