Books
‘Running With Scissors’ author tackles self-help
After delving into his demons in best-selling memoirs, Augusten Burroughs tackles yours in a self-help book
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Books
Jill McCorkle celebrates life in new novel
If Jill McCorkle had to sum up her new novel, the description would go something like this: “It ain’t over ’til it’s over.”
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Fiction
Newcomers change an unfulfilled woman
Claire Messud latest character, a disappointed teacher, dazzles and fascinates in this page-turner.
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History
Turning point
Historian Nathaniel Philbrick paints a clear and compelling portrait of the burgeoning American Revolution
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Fiction
Fast motorcycles and labor revolts
In Rachel Kushner’s deeply layered second novel, a woman navigates turbulent times in the ‘70s.
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Nonfiction
The elements (and importance) of cooking
Michael Pollan is hands-on in his argument that it would behoove us all to connect with our food again.
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What are you reading now?
“The Snow Child [by Eowyn Ivey]. It was good, very intriguing. It’s one of those books that sends you into another world, and I got lost in it. You’re never quite sure if is this really happening or if it’s a fable.”
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Essays
Witty words from a master
David Sedaris entertains with pieces about his relationship with his father and observations of life on the road.
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Drugs on Bieber tour bus?
More trouble on Justin Bieber’s European tour: Swedish police said Thursday they had found drugs and a stun gun on the pop singer’s bus.
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Author! Author!
A chat with Kristin Hannah about her sequel to ‘Firefly Lane’
Kristin Hannah has written 20 novels and had never once been moved to write a sequel.
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Fiction and essays
Companionable volumes
Elinor Lipman’s latest novel and essay collection share the author’s humorous sensibility — with a twist.
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Fiction
Isabel Allende’s latest novel about a modern troubled teen still satisfying for fans of magical realism.
Isabel Allende’s latest novel about a modern troubled teen still satisfying for fans of magical realism.
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Stories
Fantastic author’s top hits
The Story Until Now provides the wonderful opportunity to revisit the long and distinguished career of a singular American voice. Much to her credit, Kit Reed is a difficult writer to categorize. Her novels and short stories traffic in science fiction and fabulism, in the surreal and the fantastic, sometimes separately and sometimes all at once. She has described her fiction, quite appropriately, as “trans-genred” and it has earned her a Guggenheim fellowship among other awards.
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Memoir
Exorcist’ director revisits old demons
A self-made, scrappy professional reaches the top only to be brought down by conflicting desires and his own hubris. Amid the wreckage, he reconsiders what’s important to him and begins anew.
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Biography
Bringing a Latin American leader to light
Marie Arana’s history of liberator Simon Bolivar a masterful addition to a subject neglected in the United States.
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What are you reading now?
“Rest in Pieces: The Curious Fates of Famous Corpses by Bess Lovejoy. To me, death is an endlessly fascinating topic. This book trails the remains of famous figures in history. It’s fun to see the journey they took (their bodies, anyway,) after dying.”
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Fiction
Ursula Todd lives and dies (and lives again) in ‘Life After Life’
Kate Atkinson’s clever novel expounds on the premise that we can start over if we don’t like the outcome
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Nonfiction
All guts — and very little glory
Mary Roach goes deep inside the digestive system to figure out how and why things work.
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FICTION
Intertwined in youth, six lives are changed forever
Decades breeze by in this novel about long-lasting friendships, family secrets and money.
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What are you reading now?
“I recently read Where’d You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple, and it pretty much knocked my socks off. Uniquely written and wryly funny, this novel is about what happens when an eccentric artist/mother suddenly vanishes and her teen daughter is left to figure out why. All I can say is once you begin it, you’d best clear your schedule: you won’t want to put it down until it’s done.”
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Nonfiction
Twists and turns of a murder case
Oddities and contradictions plague the conviction of Bill Macumber for a double murder in 1962.
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Nonfiction
Questioning the so-called experts
A skeptic delves into statistics and choices on issues that surround our lives.
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Books
‘Drunken Botanist’ author explores the plants behind our favorite cocktails
When you pry a piece of corn silk out of your teeth, you’re yanking out a fallopian tube. Good sake should never, ever be served hot. And though you might shudder to hear it, some brewers in Brussels are quite happy when bugs fall into open vats of yeast, because they churn it up, thus becoming “unwitting accomplices in the dance between sugar and yeast.”
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Fiction
Insiders vs. outsiders
Elizabeth Strout’s new novel addresses complicated ties of family, home and change
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Graphic novels
Ellis conjures up 12 imaginative tales
Global Frequency. Warren Ellis. DC Comics. 288 pages. $19.99.
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Nonfiction
Dark chapter in American justice
The author makes a case that double standards and rigged outcomes are the usual at Guantanamo Bay.
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What are you reading now?
“I read Portrait of a Marriage: Vita-Sackville West and Harold Nicolson by Nigel Nicolson [their son]. For me reading anything firsthand about that period is fascinating. There are all these details about her life . . . . and it’s interesting because it’s about her lesbian love affair during her marriage. We think, ‘Oh, that didn’t happen then,’ but of course it did. The book is beautifully written and very evocative.”
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Fiction
Tales from father, son twist together
This ambiguous book spotlights aging, loss and the bonds of family.
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Biography
The rise and fall of author Charles Jackson, a one-hit wonder of the ’40s, is downright depressing
The rise and fall of author Charles Jackson, a one-hit wonder of the ’40s, is downright depressing
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Poetry
Time to rhyme: O, Miami poetry festival starts this week
The first time around, O, Miami grabbed poetry, dragged it from the dusty confines of the classroom and out to the streets, the beaches, the Everglades — even down to the thrift stores and up to the skies.
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Memoir
Clive Davis offers music business 101 in new autobiography
Clive Davis tells how his instincts drove the success of his artists.
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Nonfiction
Breaking the glass ceiling
Sheryl Sandberg urges women to make changes to join the guys at the top of the corporate world.
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Stories
Social misfits smothered by cynicism
A wordsmith uses biting prose to bring disillusioned characters to life.
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Fiction
Diary pulls woman into the past
Interlocking narratives about a Japanese girl and a writer drive this compelling novel.
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Author! Author!
Jon Meacham discusses his new biography on Thomas Jefferson
When President John F. Kennedy hosted all living recipients of the Nobel Prize in 1962, he told them, “I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White House with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.’’
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Nonfiction
BOOK REVIEW: What Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez left behind
A journalist delves into the good and bad of Hugo Chávez’s legacy
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Science fiction
Wool: Is the silo shelter or prison?
In a post-apocalyptic world, society lives underground, kept in the dark in multiple ways.
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What are you reading now?
“Right now I’m reading the novel Schroder by Amity Gaige. It’s about a first-generation German immigrant who passes himself off as a Kennedy and, years later, kidnaps his daughter for six days during a heated custody battle with his wife . . . . It doesn’t seem like this guy should be particularly sympathetic, but the book is so beautifully written that you get completely caught up in it. And I think a lot of people can relate to the idea of parents who would do anything at all for their children.”
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