The second son

Rabb, J., (2011). The Second Son. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.

Road to freedom

Blight, David W. (2007). A slave no more: two men who escaped to freedom: including their own narratives of emancipation. Orlando: Harcourt.

Kirkus: Two newly discovered narratives of slaves who escaped to freedom during the Civil War ... A powerful, welcome addition to the Civil War library

Norton anthology of Latino literature

The Norton anthology of Latino literature. (2011). Ilan Stavans, general editor. New York: Norton & Co.

2,489 pages of prose, verse and rap lyrics, ranging from  Fray Bartolomé de las Casas (1484-1566) in the Colonization section to  Ivy Queen's Reggaetón (in both Spanish and English). Three appendices follow, adding 177 pages.

Now, the Fary was Spanish. and thus not Latino, but he did write about Latino indigenous peoples.

Natsuo Kirino

Kirkus: From Kirino (Grotesque, 2007, etc.), a tale of teens driven to extremes.

Kirkus: Horrifying violence lurks a hairsbreadth beneath the surface of drab modern Tokyo in veteran Kirino's award-winning English-language debut.

Michael Simon recommended these; they are not my usual fare, but might be worth a read.

The man who made lists

Kendall, Joshua. (2008). The man who made lists: love, death, madness, and the creation of Roget's Thesaurus. New York : Putnam.

Kirkus: Freelance journalist Kendall does his best to jazz up the quiet life of the English polymath who turned finding the right word into a science.

Capitol offense

Accused of murdering a police officer he held responsible for the tragic death of his wife, Professor Dennis Thomas implores high-profile lawyer Ben Kincaid to defend him.

Founding foodies

DeWitt, Dave. (2010). The founding foodies: how Washington, Jefferson, and Franklin revolutionized American cuisine. Naperville: Sourcebooks.

Destiny and desire

Fuentes, Carlos. (2011). Destiny and desire. Translated by Edith Grossman. New York: Random House.

The first time as tragedy, Marx said of history’s repetitions, the second time as farce. He didn’t suggest a mode for the third time, but Carlos Fuentes does: the telenovela, the interminable soap opera of conspiracy and delusion, capitalism and its demons. “Destiny and Desire” is a novel that sprawls and circles, not exactly a parody of “War and Peace,” but certainly a spectral, playful revision of the idea of a novel that competes with history.

Twitter can't save you

Morozov, Evgeny. (2011). The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom. New York: Perseus. 

The Last Brother

Appanah, Nathacha. (2011). The Last Brother. Translated by Geoffrey Strachan. New York: Farrar Straus & Giroux.

Inspired by the largely unknown story of 1,500 Jews who fled Europe only to be imprisoned in Mauritius from 1940 to 1945 after their ship was refused entry into Palestine (then under British rule), the novel recounts the heartfelt friendship between two boys: David, a Czech orphan, and Raj, an Indian-Mauritian grieving for the two brothers he lost in a flash flood. 

Tough without a gun

Has any leading man ever made women work so hard to get his attention? There he is, just minding his own business when along comes some dame who gets it in her head that they should fall in love. She flirts with him, ­kisses him first, talks back when he tells her off, stays when he buys her a ticket to go. He puts up a fight with all the grim resolve of a guy closing the shutters on a storm that’s about to raze his house. Sooner or later, the dame, who happens to be beautiful, wears him down and he comes around, against his better judgment. Humphrey Bogart’s shell was “a carapace,” as Stefan Kanfer writes about one of his roles, “meant to cover the psychic injuries of a decent man trying to forget the past.”

Kanfer, Stefan. (2011). Tough without a gun: the life and extraordinary afterlife of Humphrey Bogart. Knopf: New York.

Museum of the City of New York/Getty Images - Humphrey Bogart, around 1920.

This is not the Bogey we know.

So strong is the force of Bogart’s presence on screen that his performances induce a kind of double vision: we’re watching Rick, or Sam Spade, or Captain Morgan, and Humphrey Bogart at the same time.

 Indeed.

Bogart filmography.

Alaska

Brinkley, Douglas. (2011). The quiet world: saving Alaska's wilderness kingdom. New York : Harper.

A tribute to Alaska's wilderness regions details key preservation activities, leading contributors, and historical events.

Septembers of Shiraz

Kirkus: As intelligent as it is gripping.

At What Cost

THE PRICE OF EVERYTHING

Solving the Mystery of Why We Pay What We Do

By Eduardo Porter

296 pp. Portfolio/Penguin. $27.95.

Elizabeth Bishop

Born 8 February 1911

Elizabeth Bishop.: poems, prose, and letters

The inheritance of Rome

Historian Chris Wickham defies conventional views of the "Dark Ages" in European history with a work of rigorous yet accessible scholarship. Drawing on a wealth of new material and featuring a thoughtful synthesis of historical and archaeological approaches, Wickham argues that these centuries were critical in the formulation of European identity.

Sophie's world : a novel about the history of philosophy

Recommended by Ellen Getreu.

The protagonists are Sophie Amundsen, a 14-year-old girl, and Alberto Knox, her philosophy teacher. The novel chronicles their metaphysical relationship as they study Western philosophy from its beginnings to the present. A bestseller in Norway.

Everlasting love

Davidson, Andrew. (2008). The gargoyle. New York: Doubleday.

Kirkus Reviews: A romance spanning centuries and continents finds a grotesque narrator redeemed by the love of a woman who claims they first met seven centuries earlier, in this deliriously ambitious debut novel.It's a credit to the craftsmanship of the Canadian writer that this spellbinding narrative seems considerably less ludicrous when reading it than when summarizing it

Cold War, Nuclear bomb

 At the abyss, Tom Reed

Nuclear Express, Thomas C Reed; Danny B Stillman

The flirt

Maybe not.

Living on the black

"Seasoned pitchers Tom Glavine and Mike Mussina ... experience very different seasons---one on a team dealing with the pressure to get to a World Series for the first time in seven years, the other with a team expected to be there every year. Taking the reader through contract negotiations, spring training, the ups of wins and the downs of losses, and the people in their lives---family, managers, pitching coaches, agents, catchers, other pitchers---Feinstein provides a true insider's look at the pressure cooker of sports at the highest level" -- from publisher's web site.

My father's tears and other stories

Kirkus, on Updike: Reflection and reconsideration abound in the late (1932–2009) great author's final finished collection of stories.

Luminous fish

Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.


"Originally published as Peces luminosos: historias de amor y ciencia by Tusquets Editorial, Barcelona, 2002."--T.p. verso. "A Sciencewriters Book." Stories, fictional and memoir, of scientists in work and in love.

The Chinaman

Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.


Friedrich Glauser (February 4, 1896 in Vienna – December 8, 1938 in Nervi) was a German-language Swiss writer. He was a morphine and opium addict for most of his life. In his first novel Gourrama, written between 1928 and 1930, he treated his own experiences at the French Foreign Legion. The evening before his wedding day, he suffered a stroke caused by cerebral infarction, and died two days later. One of Germany's best-known crime writing awards is the Glauser prize.

Eisenhower : soldier and president

Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.

Condensed version of a two volume work originally published as: Eisenhower. c1983-c1984.

King's dream

Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.

In this new exploration of the "I Have a Dream" speech, Sundquist places it in the history of American debates about racial justice and demonstrates how the speech, an exultant blend of grand poetry and powerful elocution, perfectly expresses the story of African-American freedom.

A short history of women

Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.

Five generations of willful, restless women struggle to find an identity beyond that of wife and mother.

New books

George Washington's America : a biography through his maps: what a fascinating idea

The World of Trees

Homegrown harvest: a season-by-season guide to a sustainable kitchen garden

Avec Eric

American colossus : the triumph of capitalism, 1865-1900 - HW Brands

American rifle

Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.

This spirited and engrossing narrative vividly details the life of a seminal invention--the American rifle--and shows not only how it influenced the course of the nation's history, but reflects the needs and values of America itself.

The Friday night knitting club

Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.

Kirkus Reviews: A Steel Magnolias for the 21st-century set in a New York City knitting shop

As they see 'em

Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.

A New York Times reporter describes the perspectives he gained into the game of baseball while attending umpire training school and umpiring games firsthand, in an insider fan's account that also draws on the experiences of dozens of professional umpires.

Elegance of the hedgehog

I'm reading it now (20 January). Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.

2 Parisians, a concierge in a building where wealthy people live, and the 13-year-old daughter of one of those familes, both snarter than they let one, each for her own reasons, are the main characters.

God's crucible

Islam and the making of Europe, 570 to 1215. David Levering Lewis.


Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.

Caucasia

Senna, Danzy. (1998). Caucasia. New York: Riverhead Books.

How Colombia almost meets US

Vida. By Patricia Engel. 182 pages. Black Cat. $14.

Sunday Book Review: ‘Vida’ by Patricia Engel (October 10, 2010)

Lowboy

Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.

Possessing paranoid schizophrenic beliefs that he can save the planet from climate change by cooling down his own overheated body, sixteen-year-old New York youth Will Heller pursues a terrifying and delusional odyssey through the city's tunnels and backalleys.

The art of uncontrolled flight

Tinisima

Getting a grip

Book of the day on Book-a-Day calendar.

The hellhound of Wall Street

Perino, Michael A.(2010). The hellhound of Wall Street : how Ferdinand Pecora's investigation of the Great Crash forever changed American finance. New York : Penguin Press.

Wittgenstein's poker

A regular patron told me about this book; seems interesting.

The Andy Goldsworthy Project

Zeitoun

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, longtime New Orleans residents Abdulrahman and Kathy Zeitoun are cast into an unthinkable struggle with forces beyond wind and water. In the days after the storm, Abdulrahman traveled the flooded streets in a secondhand canoe, passing on supplies and helping those he could. A week later, on September 6, 2005, Zeitoun abruptly disappeared-- arrested and accused of being an agent of al Qaeda.

Mennonite in a little black dress

Today a patron asked for these; seem interesting.

The art of the essay 1999

The Art of the personal essay : an anthology from the classical era to the present

Triumph and tragedy in Mudville

Paleontologist and baseball fan.

"For baseball fans who admire fine writing as much as a home-run swing,"

Even Kirkus praised it: "In this sparkling collection, the late paleontologist and popular science essayist (The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister's Pox, see above) gathers random writings on one of his many passions: baseball"

Among schoolchildren

Tracy Kidder book; looks interesting. A patron reserved it today.

New books

Saw these books on Readers Advisory desk when I arrived at 11 this morning; seemed interesting.

Joe Speedboat. Tommy Wieringa. translated from the Dutch by Sam Garrett.

Nothing happened and then it did: a chronicle in fact and fiction. Jake Silverstein.


Skylark. Dezso Kosztolányi ; introduction by Péter Esterházy ; translated by Richard Aczel.

Stations West. Allison Amend. (Recommended it to a patron; she took it.)


Plus, a patron asked for William Trevor's latest book, Love and Summer.

In NY Times book review: Theodore Roosevelt, Empire Builder.

‘Muriel Spark: The Biography’ (well reviewed in Journal last week)

Wanna laugh and get angry at the same time? Books by Republicans. NO APOLOGY. The Case for American Greatness. Mitt Romney. and one by Karl Rove. Oy.

‘13 Bankers’

By SIMON JOHNSON and JAMES KWAK
Reviewed by LOUIS UCHITELLE 

 

The Radical Center: The History of an Idea

By SAM TANENHAUS

The Tea Party is new. But this is not the first time we’ve seen an angry populist politics emerge from the American middle class.

 

This book is overdue!

Johnson, Marilyn. This book is overdue!: how librarians and cybrarians can save us all.

Burning down the house

Burning down the house : essays on fiction, Charles Baxter. Has back-cover blurb in Schlepping through the Alps : my search for Austria's Jewish past with its last wandering shepherd / Sam Apple.