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About Netsurfer Books

Netsurfer Books is an e-zine offering short reviews of books and related items. We include listings based on recommendations from our staff and reviews from other individuals. Are we bribed to include any of these items? No. Do we receive a commission if you purchase an item through one of the links included here? Yes. Are we waiting to hear from you about what you'd like to see reviewed? Definitely.

Editor's Choice

The Best Democracy Money Can Buy

The Best Democracy Money Can Buy Greg Palast Plume; ISBN: 0452283914 Here's a book that examines the connections between government policy and big profits for multinational corporations. Greg Palast does the laborious investigative journalism that U.S. commercial media no longer support, since not only does it cut into profits but it may expose complicity between media giants and our representatives in government. So Palast reports for the nonprofit BBC Newsnight and The Guardian and is an underground voice in the U.S., Guerrilla News Network's 2002 Reporter of the Year and "journalist hero of the Internet." Here he details the specifics of the 2000 coup d'etat in Florida that gave us a president we didn't elect. He connects the dots to illuminate how the big energy companies (Enron et al) targeted and stole California's budget surplus and hurt the state's economy by manipulating the energy supply to achieve "shortages" and drive up prices. And he reports the process by which a handful of trade ministers and multinational corporate leaders have devised treaties behind closed doors that transcend their countries' national laws, trumping, for example, not only our Congress and our Supreme Court but our Constitution as well. The hardcover edition of this book was a bestseller last year. The paperback is updated with new information as additional details of the Florida election debacle have emerged, the collusion behind the California energy ripoff is exposed, the Bush administration's warning the CIA away from investigating Saudi terrorist connections is revealed, etc. Palast is clearly a determined and high-energy guy, and it's heartening to find the great American tradition of investigative journalism alive and well, if in temporary exile. [CW]

Biography, History, Society

Life in Mexico

Life in Mexico Frances Calderon de la Barca University of California Press; ISBN: 0520046625 First published in 1843, this vivid picture of Mexico was written by the literate, sharply observant, and tart-tongued Scottish wife of the first Spanish ambassador to Mexico. One is amazed at the danger and discomforts Fanny Calderon de la Barca put up with as she traveled around Mexico by coach and horseback. And one is enlightened and delighted by her comments on the people, the economics, the manners, food, clothing, and the look of towns and wild country she observed over several years. She describes in detail, that will be familiar to anyone trying to buy a house in California today, the difficulty of getting a house in the suburbs of Mexico City in a sellers' market in 1840. She notes the consequences of the recent revolutions ("The countess assured us that she had twice completely furnished the house, but as, in two revolutions, everything was thrown out of the windows and destroyed, she was resolved in future to confine herself to le strict necessaire.") She notes, as any visitor to Mexico will today, the great love of flowers, Indian women in the market garlanded with roses or poppies. She describes, with real poignancy, the ceremony during which a desolate mother gives her daughter up to a convent (the father's essentially political decision). It's clear that she did a great deal of reading before making her journey, and this book is highly recommended to anyone who loves to travel in Mexico or is planning a trip for the first time. [CW]

Antietem: Crossroads of Freedom

Antietem: Crossroads of Freedom James M. McPherson Oxford University Press; ISBN: 0195135210 The study of history has typically been undertaken with 20/20 hindsight. We examine what happened, who did it, and even why it happened. The events themselves seem to have a curious inevitability. To the participants of those events there was no such clarity available, they had to work with the limited resources they had and hope for the best. The current study of historical contingency or counterfactual events seeks to strip away the hindsight and examine historical events as one outcome of many potential outcomes. Viewing history from this reference point makes certain events stand out as crucial tipping points, where small differences in what happened could have had huge effects on the larger historical context. The battle of Antietem/Sharpsburg was one of those tipping points in the US Civil War. Providing a critical Union victory after a string of defeats, Antietem gave Lincoln the political cover to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, forestalled European momentum towards political recognition of the South, and helped Lincoln gain a second term as president. And yet the victory was not assured. The commanding general, McClellan, had proven himself timid and losing in battle, and the Union forces had been repeatedly mauled by their Confederate foe. The chance discovery of the Confederate battle orders gave McClellan just enough of an edge to overcome his own weaknesses as a military leader. James McPherson, author of Battle Cry of Freedom, is one of the most respected and readable of Civil War historians writing today. This volume gives even the casual Civil War reader a thorough understanding of the context of the battle, and of the battle itself. It is one of a series of books "Pivotal Moments in American History," that study similar historical contingencies. If the rest are as good as this one, this will be a terrific set of books to read. [MA]

The Language of the Third Reich: LTI - Lingua Tertii Imperii

The Language of the Third Reich: LTI - Lingua Tertii Imperii Victor Klemperer Continuum; ISBN: 0826457770 Victor Klemperer wrote LTI in 1947. That is, as soon as he could, immediately following the second world war. The book bears witness to the disturbing developments he lived through. Klemperer persevered largely through his will to articulate what he witnessed and endured. A Jew married to a German woman, Klemperer was spared deportation and worse, though he was confronted with constant uncertainties and danger. He remained immersed in mainstream society through the entire Nazi period. This book concerns the intentional change of language by those in power, to reshape generally held values and beliefs. In 1984 George Orwell introduced Newspeak, a direct effort by a totalitarian government to gain complete control of the thoughts of ordinary people. In Nazi Germany, nothing so grand or comprehensive was done. Rather, a crude and limited terminology, a few derogatory expressions and categories were introduced - through every expression made in the media of the day. This book shows appallingly clearly how easily media orchestrated by government can distort, incite and move thoughts and conscience. Klemperer doesn't spare himself; he found that he had internalized and expressed himself in the idiom of his enemies. The book's anecdotes, biographical sketches, and short essays make no attempt to systematically analyze the language of the Third Reich. Instead, the reader is given brilliantly-crafted material, to appreciate and understand what happened in Germany and why. The book is both moving and useful to anyone concerned about how entire populations can be manipulated. It is appalling how easily official jargon can determine what people believe is true, right, and possible. [EG]

Road Scholar: Coast to Coast Late in the Century

Road Scholar: Coast to Coast Late in the Century Andrei Codrescu Hyperion; ISBN: 1562828789 I read this book at the Lucy Parsons Center, a Marxist-Syndicalist bookstore in the South End of Boston, listening to free jazz by Music Now, a powerful trio from New York City. It's a mighty intimate performance space, with revolutionary posters glowering down at you from all the walls, and books filled with conspiracies and earnest advice begging you to read them. By contrast habitual NPR denizen Andrei Codrescu's books seemed positively suburban strip mall material. Reading a book while listening to improvisational music has the effect of burning the material right into the old cerebellum, bypassing the usual worn-out judgment centers. Direct from eyeball to memory cores. The effect is made slightly weirder by Mr. Codrescu's deep Transylvanian burr - it's impossible to read any of his writings without internally hearing him read the material aloud, assuming of course that you've heard his essays on ATC. There's a fantastic old-old-Europe feeling to his writings, even when he's critiquing American culture. Is it just the accent? Or is his a sensibility as honestly dry and dusty as an Eastern European literary archive. He had never learned to drive a car, but did so for the purposes of making a film. This book is the result; I don't know what happened to the documentary. As always, he is looking at the same scenery you or I might see, but he doesn't see the same things. His empathetic style is very nearly sad, but his cockeyed sense of humor makes each episode a hoot to read, even when there's much to think about. Is this a zany road-trip book? Or the painful subsumption of Mr. Codrescu's Eastern European identity into the big American sky. Read it and judge, if you still can. [MA]

The Woman Who Wouldn't Talk

The Woman Who Wouldn't Talk Susan McDougal Carroll & Graf; ISBN: 0786711280 Who would imagine that a thoughtful and considerate young woman from a loving middle-class Arkansas family would have a kafkaesque tale to tell; but she does, and she tells it here with intelligence, honesty, wit, and some righteous anger. A victim of the dogged endeavor to unseat a democratically-elected president and Kenneth Starr's failed effort to turn Whitewater into Watergate, McDougal rejected Starr and his lawyers' efforts to bully her into lying to implicate the Clintons in some sort of wrongdoing. Unwilling to answer their questions before a grand jury unless she could first read a statement, she was judged in civil contempt, handcuffed, shackled, and imprisoned for 21 months, many of them in solitary confinement and 7 weeks in a soundproof plexiglass cell. When she adjusted to one jail, she was moved to another. McDougal is articulate (an avid reader from childhood), self-deprecating, loyal, and, as Starr learned, stubborn when her integrity and self-respect are assumed to be for sale. She makes clear she couldn't have held up without the support of her family and her fiance Pat Harris, who earned a law degree during her tribulations and was there for her throughout. An unexpected outcome of her experience and a consequence of her having been moved to no less than seven jails or prisons, is her work now to improve the conditions in which women are imprisoned. This is an American woman with true grit who showed that one can stand up to an evil system, survive, and ultimately be vindicated, and she has given us a book that's hard to put down. [CW]

Poker Nation

Poker Nation Andy Bellin HarperPerennial Library; ISBN: 0060958472 Once again poker is hip. True, it never really goes out of style but as the subject of recent books, movies, and movies in development it is a phenomenon. Andy Bellin's Poker Nation is part memoir, part how-to book and part social history of the game. It works at all levels, and for players of all experience and ability. As a memoir it might well have been subtitled "My Life as a Degenerate Gambler." As an editor of Paris Review, Bellin has a prestigious job and genuine literary chops. But it's not the literary life that drives him. It's the gambling. He takes you right into the smoky, stinking all-night private poker clubs of New York City, and he tries to capture the appeal, but really unless you yourself are a degenerate gambler you'll probably be more horrified than titillated. As a how-to manual this is quite worthwhile as well. Not as thorough as a true poker strategy book, there are still a lot of good tips in here, from understanding the odds, to watching your fellow players for "tells" or physical giveaways to what sort of hand they're holding. The section on "pot odds" is particularly valuable and will serve me well during the regular game I've attended for several years (no, I am not a degenerate gambler, really). This is a fast read, and a good read, and will be interesting even to non-players. But if you are a player, it will be both interesting and useful. [MA]

Toxic Sludge Is Good for You!: Lies, Damn Lies and the Public Relations Industry

Toxic Sludge Is Good for You!: Lies, Damn Lies and the Public Relations Industry John C. Stauber, Sheldon Rampton Common Courage Press; ISBN: 1567510604 Bar the doors, round up the children, the PR firms are coming! An extreme response? You won't think so after perusing this piece. Stauber and Rampton have compiled a damning treatise on the travails of the public relations industry: how they stretch the truth, spin yarns, and lie outright. They do this to get the American public behind their clients' way of thinking, with little concern for the well being of the individual, society or our species. It's about the pursuit of the almighty dollar, and the extremes that kings of commerce will resort to. This is no wacko collection of conspiracy theories. This readable book is chock full of well-researched and referenced specific examples of how you have been manipulated by the mouthpieces of industry. They equate the current promotion of spreading sewage sludge hither and yon with the earlier arguments that "DDT is perfectly safe" and "asbestos is a miracle fiber that poses no danger at all." What goes around comes around and heavy metal isn't only on the radio, it may be in the veggies on your neighborhood market produce counter. Frightening required reading. [GB]

Google Hacks

Google Hacks Tara Calishain, Rael Dornfest O'Reilly & Associates; ISBN: 0596004478 Most people use the Google search engine in only the simplest possible way. You type in your search words, click through the first few results, and more often than not you find what you need. But Google is a complex beast these days with many non-obvious options, features, and applications. The goal of this book is to make readers familiar with all of those features and to have some fun along the way. It contains information about actually searching Google in various creative ways, about third party Google applications - how many people even know there are third party Google applications? - about the web API which lets you create your own programs to interface with Google, about the search engine's special services and collections, and about using Google to drive traffic to your site. There's even a section on how to play web pranks and games using Google. What this collection of 100 tips, tricks and scripts adds up to is a wonderful resource for becoming much more effective in your research - amazingly so in some cases. A must have for any would-be power user of the Net. We should also say that since we first noted this book in Netsurfer Digest it has shot up to the top 20 bestseller list on Amazon, very unusual for a fairly technical book. That's how useful it is. [AB]

The Sopranos Family Cookbook: As Compiled by Artie Bucco

The Sopranos Family Cookbook: As Compiled by Artie Bucco Allen Rucker, Michele Scicolone Warner Books; ISBN: 0446530573 Ok, there is more than one guilty pleasure involved in this review. As one who normally tries to cop an attitude of holier-than-thou cultural superiority, publicly admitting to a Sopranos fixation requires a bit of footscraping and eye-dodging. Nonetheless it's true. Even after we turned off the cable, I get people to tape episodes for me so I can keep current. But being a fan of the show is no reason to have the show-themed cookbook. That would be a bit of the kitsch-too-far. So why? Well, it is pretty funny. Presented by Artie Bucco, the (fictional) cowering chef of the (fictional) Vesuvio restaurant, the cookbook has sections from the show's principal characters and clans. The piece on why Americans eat Italian food like Germans (too much sauce) is hysterical. A second guilty pleasure? The food. As something of a foodie myself, I have several "authentic" Italian cookbooks from which I have prepared really fabulous and tasty meals. The problem is that secretly I don't really feel like it is Italian cooking, it's too exotic. The dishes I think of as Italian aren't in those cookbooks, things like Baked Ziti, or Ricotta Pie with Pineapple aren't really "Italian," they're Italian/American. Like the Sopranos. Buy this cookbook for the recipes. Honestly, they're terrific. This is Italian cooking like you remember it. Not Chef Boy-ar-dee, mind you, not simplistic, but excellent Northern Jersey Italian fare. So maybe you might be a bit embarrassed to have this on your cookbook shelf. Just serve up some of that "Sunday Gravy," sit down and eat. Not a Sopranos fan yet? Start here. [MA]

Our Media, Not Theirs

Our Media, Not Theirs Robert W. McChesney & John Nichols Seven Stories Press; ISBN: 1583225498 Nichols and McChesney are fed up with the control of U.S. media by ever fewer transnational corporations. A healthy democracy is based on good public education and a free press. Both are under attack in the U.S., with the effort to divert tax dollars for education from public to private schools and with the monopolization and commercialization of the media. And, following on the 1996 deregulation, the Bush Administration's Federal Communications Commission is preparing to further reduce protections against monopolization of the media by a few large corporations. Rather than a public resource for Americans, the media have become a cash cow controlled by a handful of multinational corporations that now have an unacceptable degree of social and economic influence over the daily lives of most Americans, not to mention their manipulation of political issues. People have forgotten that the airwaves belong to the people in our country. McChesney and Nichols think the time has come for media reform, for people to take back control of the airwaves and reform the media to make them serve our interests rather than the goal of ever-larger profits. This short, timely book concludes with media reform proposals for debate and action. [CW]

A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail

A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail Bill Bryson Broadway Books; ISBN: 0767902521 The haunting beauty found in the deep wilderness outside the reaches of civilization seems beyond words but Bryson finds just the right ones to describe his adventurous trek. My hiking experience on the left coast usually involved treks through the Sierra Nevada or the Cascades. The source of inspiration for Bryson's words is quite a bit to the right of John Muir's namesake. Bryson writes about the 2,100-mile path that stretches from north Georgia to the tip of Maine: the Appalachian Trail. This book will allow you to enjoy the changes in scenery along the AT as well as the changes induced in those who hike her. A wry wit helps Bryson chronicle the (mis)adventures of himself and good buddy Katz as they go through the process of getting (barely) prepared and then hit the trail. He comically relays his experiences buying a $250 backpack (shoulder straps and rain proofing extra) and proves that being driven out of the mountains by snow only to be holed up in Franklin, North Carolina with twelve other hapless hikers is no picnic. This travelogue flows with the ease of a spring mountain stream and brings the Appalachian Trail to life, even for those who may never tread upon it. [GB]

The Ferrari in the Bedroom

The Ferrari in the Bedroom Jean Shepherd Doubleday; ISBN: 0385237928 Jean Shepherd translated to a new energy level in October of 1999. His words live. His art was that of comic debunkment; the philosophic exposure of imperial nudity. The topics and situations which are the essayist's subject in The Ferrari in the Bedroom are a trifle dated, it is true, but Shepherd's phenomenological reduction of them reveals the universal human experience inside each of them. These stories are all fresh. They are all funny. They are all easily readable. My particular favorite in this collection is the story of the time he was invited to appear on a TV fishing program on a pond on the estate of the Playboy Club Hotel in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. Playboy bunnies were going to meet them out on the lake and serve them hot drinks. Of course what the viewer saw, and what it was like to be there were two entirely different things. Shepherd doesn't do much analysis in his writing, he observes. But he observes so deeply that there is no need to analyze, just watch with him, and see what he sees, how he sees it. Really you could read any of his books as well as this one: Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories: And Other Disasters , A Fistful of Fig Newtons , or In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash. Or you might check out the hilarious Christmas classic A Christmas Story written and narrated by Jean Shepherd. Many think the radio monologues he rattled off in the 1950s were the high point of his career . I can't find any copies of them, but they're still alive as radio waves, spooling out from planet earth, forever. [MA]

Searching and Researching on the Internet and the World Wide Web

Searching and Researching on the Internet and the World Wide Web Ernest C. Ackermann, Karen Hartman Franklin Beedle & Assoc; ISBN: 1887902716 Infoglut. Cool word and very descriptive. In the earlier days of research on the web, the problem was finding enough resources. Today the opposite is true: there is often an overwhelming number. How is the casual (or serious) researcher supposed to make heads or tails of it all? By becoming a better searcher. Ackermann and Hartman share the skills necessary to do just that. They show you how to make the most of the wealth of information at your fingertips. You'll learn the intricacies of virtual libraries, directories, search engines, and specialized databases. Each has its own special nuance, and the authors will have you paring down the hits with efficient search strategies based on a 10-step framework. You'll learn the fundamentals of the major browsers, the ins and outs of e-mail and discussion groups and how to cite what you find with examples of MLA and APA references. Each chapter/topic includes on-line exercises that emphasize concepts in the most concrete fashion possible: using the on-line tools themselves. A terrific "how to" resource that will give better search results by helping you to work smarter, not harder. The cover art is of the 1998 edition. (No cover art was available for the 2000 edition.) [GB]

Foghorn Outdoors: California Hiking: The Complete Guide to More Than 1,000 of the Best Hikes

Foghorn Outdoors: California Hiking: The Complete Guide to More Than 1,000 of the Best Hikes Tom Stienstra, Ann Marie Brown Foghorn Pr; ISBN: 1566914876 It doesn't matter what part of the state you're from, north, central or south. If you're serious about hiking in California this year or any year, do yourself a favor and pick up a copy of this book. It's the bible of hiking in California. A perfect balance of volume and detail, I've used the 1995-96 edition for years, and this new version is all of that, plus more. They're serious about the number on the cover. There really are more than 1000 hikes in here. They range from leisurely stroll to goatherd grade. The authors help to distinguish between the two by providing all the pertinent details. Difficulty, scenery, distance, and time are all here, and fees and special rules are included where appropriate. The state is divided into several regions, with tighter zone maps showing roads to the trailheads. I may not be hiking much these days, but I can clearly recall how valuable selecting and planning resources such as this can be. This book, coupled with a good 15-degree quadrangle topographic of the chosen terrain, and you're good to go. [GB]

Nightmare on Main Street: Angels, Sadomasochism and the Culture of the Gothic

Nightmare on Main Street: Angels, Sadomasochism and the Culture of the Gothic Mark Edmundson Harvard University Press; ISBN: 0674624637 Little separates the evening news from horror entertainment. Is life really sordid, or are television audiences merely eager to receive such programming? Mark Edmundson assesses horror in contemporary American popular culture in this fine slim volume. The Gothic horror genre of fiction, he explains, arose in England following the French revolution. It reflected worry about life without constraints and boundaries, that evil and chaos are unleashed when traditional order is overturned. He interprets horror films such as Nightmare on Elm Street and many others, novels, current events, and contemporary journalism. He draws out many themes rather than a single thesis, but the overarching point is that we are compelled by the idiom of horror, convinced of its applicability to our time and experience. The prognosis is not good. Powerless in the face of Evil, salvation can occur only in absurdly pure naive and angelic Good. According to Edmundson, this is consistent with the Romantic era where a visionary ideal, liberating mankind from injustice and tyranny, appeared in fiction - roughly at the same time as Gothic horror. Sadly, in American popular fiction, transcendent hope mostly takes the form of vapid and insubstantial feel-good entertainment and self-improvement cults. Edmundson asserts we are seeing the ascendence of the Gothic, a universe of moral extremes which flatten out discourse and limit rational debate and hope to a vanishing point. I enjoyed this engaging book, got fresh insight into some familiar material and found myself agreeing with many of Edmundson's arguments. [EG]

Fiction

Haussmann or The Distinction

Haussmann or The Distinction Paul LaFarge Picador USA; ISBN: 0312420927 Paul LaFarge gives us an intriguing novel that will appeal especially to those who love Paris or whose notion of Paris is shaped by their own imagination but who want a glimpse of its history. The novel is set in the mid-19th century at a time when the face of the city was changing radically, thanks to the ceaseless efforts of city planner extraordinaire Baron Georges-Eugene Haussmann, who was employed by the Emperor Louis Napoleon to make the old city more grand and less conducive to the brewing of revolution. In addition to demolishing much of the medieval city, Haussmann took on the improvement of the water supply and the development of an extensive sewer system as part of his purview as well. But LaFarge approaches his story elliptically, from the point of view of Madeleine, a beautiful foundling discovered, adopted, and groomed by La Fonce, a demolition man made wealthy by his facility at retrieving valuables from Haussmann's ruins and selling them at fabulous prices. From a few known facts of Haussmann's personal life, LaFarge imagines a compelling tale of ambition, intrigue, love, and betrayal that pulls the reader into its net from the first pages. [CW]

Berlin Stories

Berlin Stories Christopher Isherwood W.W. Norton & Company; ISBN: 0811200701 Most people know of this book through the film Cabaret. The film freely adapts the book, departing from it enormously. Anyone expecting 'Sally Bowles and Christopher Isherwood Do Berlin' from Berlin Stories will be disappointed. The novel is set in Berlin in the turbulent later Weimar Republic. Politics, events, and the decadent lifestyle are portrayed as facts, and generally remain in the background. Isherwood concentrates his attention on a few close friends and acquaintances and through them expresses the times, at least from his perspective. He writes: "I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording not thinking. Recording the man shaving at the window opposite and the woman in the kimono washing her hair. Some day, all this will have to be developed, carefully printed, fixed." The famous phrase 'I am a camera' promises an objectivity and honesty which Isherwood delivers. It is not that the narrating protagonist is uninvolved. Where he is involved, he makes that clear. The stories focus on a small collection of people living confused and erratic lives at a strange time. The first half of the book concerns a few decadent opportunists who get in over their head by losing track of the sinister developments around them. The second half is a series of tragic episodes in the time between 1930 to 1933. Some, like Sally Bowles, indulge in the guilty pleasures Berlin offered at that time. Others - especially the Jewish Landauer family, try to live on as if nothing were happening. Encounters with Isherwood's landlady keep the stories in contact with what many Germans were going though. Isherwood was a sensitive man, who captured the spirit and tragedy of an important moment - Berlin immediately before fascism. He did so without sentimentality or extravagance. This makes his colorful characters believable, however strange and sad their stories become. [EG]

Close to the Machine: Technophilia and its Discontents

Close to the Machine: Technophilia and its Discontents Ellen Ullman City Lights Books; ISBN: 0872863328 This novel is set in the San Francisco Bay Area in 1996, at the onset of the speculative technology boom. We have just enough distance from this time to appreciate the misguided enthusiasm and unreasonable expectations that caught up so many at that time. The protagonist, a woman pushing fifty, struggles to retain some equilibrium as she pushes through difficulties. A contract programmer, she works far too hard on poorly-conceived projects with bright young engineers. She has an ill-conceived affair with a younger awfully quirky cryptographer. She finds that as the pace of change continues to increase, programmers can be gradually overcome by developments. Technical professionals all tend to fall off the edge of their disciplines, though in computer programming the drop is rapid and severely limits one's prospects. The novel concerns reluctant aging. The protagonist cannot accept her growing distance from the youth she works with. Technology and the high-tech business culture surrounding it express, to some extent, an allegory for life on the brink of decline and obsolescence. The book is, however, as much about the exhilaration and vigor of programming as it is about its downside; excessive work, shallow acquisitiveness, and a life spent with machines instead of people and free time. Ullman's novel is stocked with moving anecdotes, keen insights, and determination to come to terms with life. [EG]

The Cold Six Thousand

The Cold Six Thousand James Ellroy Vintage Books; ISBN: 037572740X Brutal book by James Ellroy. 672 pages. Sentences five words or less. No connective tissue. No easy similes. No adjectives. No adverbs. Obsessions: violence, drugs, voyeurism, betrayal. Assassinations: Jack, Bobby, Martin. Locations: Las Vegas, Cuba, Saigon, Louisiana. J. Edgar Hoover hates, manipulates. Cryptic cop shorthand perplexes. Reading takes work. Reading changes language's perception. Reading alienates. Short chapters: police reports, surveillance reports, bug transcriptions. Public secrets. Private obsessions, publicly exhibited. Racism. Extortion. Coercion. Torture. Murder. Dismemberment. Sexual inadequacy and perversion. Begins November 22, 1963. Ends June 9, 1968. The mob. The CIA and Bay of Pigs. The FBI and Martin Luther King. Vietnam and the Heroin highway. Howard Hughes and Las Vegas casinos. Jimmy Hoffa and the Kennedys. Mormons and the skim. Richard Nixon and the Cosa Nostra. This is a hard book. This is a dense book. This book is the American Ulysses. [MA]

The No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency

The No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency Alexander McCall Smith Anchor Books; ISBN: 1400034779 If you need a little relief from the news of the world, here is a most delightful escape: not so much a detective story as a story about a unique detective, Mma Precious Ramotswe, proud proprietor of Botswana's only female-owned detective agency. Which is not to say that Mma Ramotswe does not tackle and find solutions to an impressive range of problems brought to her, no doubt a higher success rate and with much less collateral damage than could be expected from the police. She has no patience with miscreants and takes satisfaction in putting them out of business as she serves her clients. Smith, a native of Botswana, clearly loves much about the place, the harsh geography as one nears the Kalahari, and the capacity of the people to live well and to solve their own problems (with the help of the astute and, when necessary, wily Ms. Ramotswe). One gets a sense of how Botswana, formerly a British Protectorate, began to thrive with its independence in the 70s. This novel reminds me of The Milagro Beanfield War, with its warm portrayal of the lives and personalities of a rural community and its dry and earthy humor. I think you'll find it irresistible. [CW]

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Vol. 1

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Vol. 1 Alan Moore, Kevin O'Neill DC Comics; ISBN: 1563898586 Britain, 1898: British Intelligence has learned that a sinister Chinese villain has stolen a cache of cavorite, the material that makes flying machines possible. The mysterious spymaster M recruits five unlikely characters to set things right. Enter Miss Minna Murray (formerly Harker), Dr. Jekyll (and of course his alter ego, Mr. Hyde), the dark and brooding Captain Nemo, Hawley Griffin (a.k.a. the Invisible Man), and Allan Quartermain. They make up the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen in a clever and beautifully illustrated graphic novel. The story and characters are all plucked from Victorian and Edwardian adventure literature, and the book is filled to the brim with period literary allusions. In fact, there's a fan website which includes extensive annotations for virtually every panel - best not to look at them until after you've read the whole thing first. Kevin O'Neill's illustrations are true to the Victorian style, with many clever touches which make you want to linger over each panel in order to find the sometimes startling background details. As an added bonus the back pages include a serial short story detailing an adventure of Allan Quartermain in deliciously chewy Bulwer-Lytton style prose. The wonderful tongue-in-cheek story and beautiful art makes this a must have for any fan of graphic novels, and certainly for any fan of those marvelous adventure books by Wells, Conan Doyle, and Burroughs. Very highly recommended. We should also note that a big budget Hollywood movie is already in the works. Unfortunately it bears only a vague resemblance to this witty gem and based on previews of the trailer and the script floating around the Net it will - how to put it delicately? - suck ass. [AB]

McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales

McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales Michael Chabon, editor Vintage Books; ISBN: 140003339X You get everything the cover promises in its over-the-top style. You'll find a look and feel reminiscent of old pulp Sci-Fi periodicals. Between the cardstocks there are 20 short stories in roughly 460 pages. You do the math. These vignettes are great for a short respite, but they add the extra bonus of some sort of resolution to the "dilemma" in the bargain. These are tales of adventure and suspense, intensely slim and to the point. "The Case of the Nazi Canary" by Moorcock is so information-dense, it'll have you adjusting your reading rate to compensate. You'll recognize some other big names like Crichton, Ellison and King, but you've probably never heard of many. Most are decent fiction and they'll all help suspend your reality if you'll allow some poetic and stylistic license. Escape is escape, regardless of by-line. After all, it's mostly about getting good head time to air out the cerebral nooks and crannies isn't it? If nothing else, you'll be entertained for a few hours. [GB]

Children's Books

My Name Is Yoon

My Name Is Yoon Helen Recorvits; pictures by Gabi Swiatkowska Frances Foster Books, Farrar Straus Giroux; ISBN: 0374351147 This book gives us, from a child's point of view, the experience of starting school in a new country and learning a new language. The strange letters that form her name in English don't please Yoon as much as the dancing characters of her name in Korean. She longs for her old home where the teacher likes her and she has many friends. Yoon commiserates with a small bird outside who hops about by himself, just as lonely as she feels. But he inspires her to draw a picture for her teacher. She resists writing the English letters for her name but she tries out those for cat, and cupcake, and bird. And finally, once she finds a friend and she is sure the teacher likes her, she practices the new way to write her name. Beautiful paintings illuminate the spare text. Here's a good book to read to a child starting kindergarten or first grade whether new to the language or in a class where a child from another country is learning English. [CW]

The Man Who Made Time Travel

The Man Who Made Time Travel Kathryn Lasky; illustrated by Kevin Hawkes Farrar Straus & Giroux; ISBN: 0374347883 Enhanced by warm and vivid illustrations, this book conveys the excitement of invention and the perfectionism that can drive an inventor to devote his life from childhood to old age to meet his own high standards. The invention is the chronometer - the means of determining longitude - and the inventor John Harrison. As a boy he was bell ringer in his village church and learned carpentry from his father, and he began to build clocks while still in his teens. When he was 21 the English government, after having suffered countless shipwrecks from lack of a means to determine longitude and thus precise location, announced the Longitude Prize of 20,000 pounds. Harrison concluded that an accurate clock, designed to withstand changes of temperature and heaving seas, could make it possible to measure distance and establish longitude, and he set about designing and building one. Without formal education, Harrison was not well received by the scientific establishment even though his several chronometers, each smaller and more accurate than the last, proved themselves in tests at sea over the years. It was finally a petition to King George III that won him the prize late in his life. Kathryn Lasky's admiration for Harrison's intelligence and perseverance gives her book dramatic momentum. Those of you who were fascinated by Dava Sobel's Longitude) will be pleased to see a book to introduce the subject to 8 to 10-year old kids. [CW]

Monsieur Eek

Monsieur Eek David Ives Harpercollins Juvenile Books; ISBN: 0060295295 This slim cornucopia of treats for kids has much in it, even for adults who usually shy away from juvenile fiction. Settings for adventure stories tend to be exotic and improbable. This book is set in a town so small and unremarkable that it lends itself to expanding a series of what would be banal events bigger than life. The inhabitants of MacOongafoodnsen (population 21) have delightful names, characteristics, and play a part in a sort of cartoon political thriller. Two kids confront injustice, xenophobia and indifference. They rise to the challenge, even though it means taking on the corrupt mayor and policeman. The adults defer to authority; their ignorance and fear allow them to be manipulated. The central story would be extremely silly if it weren't really about preventing a lynching. Playwright David Ives' first children's book has humor - heaps of word play, comic situations and goofy characters. It has a 'serious side,' too, of civic courage and justified civil disobedience. [EG]

The Rose and the Ring

The Rose and the Ring William Makepeace Thackeray Sun Hill Rose and Briar Books; ISBN: 1930142307 Thackeray wrote lots of enormous, funny and complicated dramas in the middle of the nineteenth century. He also wrote this humorous children's book. It has all the elements one expects in a conventional fairy tale: royal families, usurpers, capricious fairies, creepy opportunists and fate-changing enchantments. All these are put in a sort of blender and recombined in extraordinary ways. The place and character names are silly, making it easier to keep track of the complicated scenario. But it's really the twisted plot filled with unfortunate turns in the story which keep the book rolling. This keeps things interesting and gives the book a very distinct flavor. Most children's literature (not to mention cartoons and film) follow a very simple and direct arc. The central idea in this book is that advantages in life spoil young people. The protagonists prevail only despite their origins, through humility and perseverance through much gruesome and perverse adversity. You may find the writing somewhat dated and ornate, but it goes with this kind of story. The large-print edition makes the book inviting for children to read themselves. [EG]