AltWeeklies Wire
Thriller Writer (And Former CIA Recruit) Joseph Finder Shares Trade Secretsnew
Truth can be stranger than fiction. When Boston thriller writer Joseph Finder discovered how easy it would be for someone to sneak into this country with a fake passport, he didn't put that into his 1995 book Zero Hour. But the one-time CIA recruit hasn't held back on other trade secrets.
Boston Phoenix |
Clea Simon |
08-19-2009 |
Author Profiles & Interviews
'Flotsametrics and the Floating World' Looks at Junk and Shipping Trunksnew
Flotsametrics, written by oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer with help from journalist Eric Scigliano, is the biography of a new offshoot of science; "flotsametrics" means, essentially, the application of quantitative measurement to floating trash.
Willamette Week |
Matthew Korfhage |
08-19-2009 |
Nonfiction
'Methland' Tracks a Drug Through America's Cracks and Faultlinesnew
Meth is a drug with no celebrities, and Nick Reding treats his subjects with respect, despite close calls with former addicts who play disc golf with him one minute and threaten his life the next. But Methland's attempt to combine personal reflections on identity and place with an examination of the drug's role in a small town's economic struggles seems formally stale.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Brandon Bussolini |
08-19-2009 |
Nonfiction
In 'Hound Dog,' Songwriting Duo Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller Remember Redefining Postwar Pop Musicnew
Hound Dog: The Leiber and Stoller Autobiography is a delightful read. Both men are terrific storytellers, witty and succinct, with a sharp eye for the telling detail.
Baltimore City Paper |
Geoffrey Himes |
08-18-2009 |
Nonfiction
Ronald Dworkin's Doomed Wish for Rational Politicsnew
Democracy in America is still much as de Tocqueville described it: illogical persnickety white folks, especially not-overly-educated non-urban white folks, asserting their independence. So why does a grown-up intellectual like Dworkin, a distinguished legal theorist with Ivy credentials, believe that these people, these Americans, are going to participate in a reasoned debate about anything?
Artvoice |
Bruce Fisher |
08-17-2009 |
Nonfiction
'Amphibian' is a Sweet and Smart Book for Optimists of Any Agenew
Nine-year-old Phineas Walsh, the narrator of Carla Gunn's Amphibian, makes you feel like you've been cornered on the playground by a sensitive and intelligent young boy who's going to tell you his observations about the world. Hilarious and affecting, he's something special.
NOW Magazine |
Zoe Whittall |
08-17-2009 |
Fiction
Suzanne Simons Gives Us a New -- and Timely -- Biography of the Man Behind Blackwaternew
Heroic in Master of War's opening pages, Simons ends her portrait with Erik Prince sputtering in impotent rage against a media he believes has unfairly maligned his company.
INDY Week |
Gerry Canavan |
08-14-2009 |
Nonfiction
Try As He Might, Glenn Beck Can't Turn a Paperback Book into a Flat-Screen TVnew
Glenn Beck is great on TV; he shouts, he scoffs, and he cries. But when he writes, one thing becomes clear: The man has absolutely nothing of consequence to say. In Common Sense, Beck uses every trick in the book to cover this up.
Las Vegas Weekly |
Rick Lax |
08-14-2009 |
Nonfiction
John Bassett McCleary's 'Hippie Dictionary' Captures Peace & Love for Posteritynew
At first, McCleary says, "The Hippie Dictionary sounded almost like an oxymoron." Yet the more he thought about it, the more he realized that "many new and exciting words and emotions were developed during this profound period of time."
East Bay Express |
Anneli Rufus |
08-12-2009 |
Author Profiles & Interviews
The Founder of Bitch Magazine Brings Her Feminist Sensibility to a New Cookbooknew
For Lisa Jervis' first single-author book -- recently released on PM Press -- she took a surprising turn: She published a cooking manual. Or, to put it more accurately, Jervis published a "manualfesto."
East Bay Express |
Rachel Swan |
08-12-2009 |
Author Profiles & Interviews
'A Saint on Death Row' is an Intervention in Public Memorynew
Thomas Cahill catalogs every disgraceful aspect of Dominique Green's experience with the justice system. His larger mission, though, is to examine the changes Green underwent after receiving his death sentence -- his transformation from a troubled teenager into what Cahill calls "a fully achieved human being."
The Texas Observer |
Todd Moye |
08-12-2009 |
Nonfiction
'That Infernal Little Cuban Republic' Dissects the Shared History of Cuba and Americanew
Lar Schoultz focuses on the Castro years, which he reconstructs in impressive detail, fleshing out such well-known events as the doomed 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion with eye-opening depth. Better yet, often-glossed questions are aired with the fullness of Schoultz's four decades of wrestling with the Cuba question. Still, there's something missing.
The Texas Observer |
Mike Kanin |
08-12-2009 |
Nonfiction
Richard Russo's New Novel is a Beach Read With a Grit of Sandnew
Despite its flaws, That Old Cape Magic succeeds as a funny, forgiving profile of a man crawling his way towards self-knowledge just in time to make things right.
New Haven Advocate |
Jolisa Gracewood |
08-11-2009 |
Fiction
The New Art Book 'The Art of Touring' Moves Past the Mythology of the Roadnew
A multimedia tribute to the road life, the book includes photographs, essays, journal entries, comics, paintings, collages -- and, on the accompanying DVD, plenty of footage by and of touring bands, onstage and off.
Chicago Reader |
Miles Raymer |
08-10-2009 |
Nonfiction
Audrey Niffenegger Gets Ready to Plug Her Second Booknew
Niffenegger was an unfamous visual artist and maker of art books when she wrote The Time Traveler's Wife, which has sold about 2.5 million copies since 2003. Her new book, Her Fearful Symmetry, is due out September 29 from Scribner.
Chicago Reader |
Ed M. Koziarski |
08-10-2009 |
Author Profiles & Interviews
