February 15, 2012: Volume LXXX, No 4

KIRKUS v o l. l x x x, n o. 4

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1 5 f e b r ua r y 2 0 1 2

REVIEWS

t h e w o r l d’s t o u g h e s t b o o k c r i t i c s f o r mo r e t h a n 7 5 y e a rs fiction

nonfiction

children & teens

A young woman struggles to understand herself in Catherine Chung’s luminous debut p. 331

Alison Bechdel returns with a psychologically complex, ambitious, illuminating successor to Fun Home p. 360

Laura Vaccaro Seeger applies her die-cut genius to the color green, with sublime results p. 420

in this issue: continuing series round-up kirkus q&a

featured indie

Vaunda Micheaux Nelson discusses her great uncle’s crowded Harlem bookstore, one of the centers of the civil-rights movement in New York City p. 402

Anne Hambleton is off to the races with her modern-day Black Beauty p. 434

w w w. k i r k u s r e v i e w s . c o m

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fiction p. 329 mystery p. 345

science fiction & fantasy p. 354 nonfiction p. 357

children & teens p. 385 kirkus indie p. 427

Chairman H E R B E RT S I M O N # President & Publisher M A RC W I N K E L M A N Editor E L A I N E S Z E WC Z Y K eszewczyk@kirkusreviews.com Managing/Nonfiction Editor E R I C L I E B E T R AU eliebetrau@kirkusreviews.com Features Editor M O L LY B RO W N molly.brown@kirkusreviews.com

Children of Men B Y G RE G O RY MC NA M EE

Children’s & YA Books VICKY SMITH vicky.smith@kirkusreviews.com Kirkus Indie Editor P E R RY C RO W E perry.crowe@kirkusreviews.com Mysteries Editor THOMAS LEITCH Assistant Indie Editor REBECCA CRAMER rebecca.cramer@kirkusreviews.com Editorial Coordinator CHELSEA LANGFORD clangford@kirkusreviews.com

Tigers are disappearing from the world, down to perhaps 3,000 in the wild. Tuna are disappearing from the oceans. The chemicals in our rivers and lakes are doing strange things to the critters that live in and near them. The political scene has become as toxic as the environmental one, and reasoned discourse is the exception, not the norm. Small wonder that people have stopped having children—and not just as a matter of personal choice.

An epidemic of global infertility is the grand premise of P.D. James’ novel The Children of Men, first published 20 years ago, at a time when its setting, the England of 2021, seemed distant. Like José Saramago’s dystopian masterpiece Blindness, published three years later, this change in biological condition—“the magnitude and humiliation of this ultimate failure,” as James puts it—occasions a change of politics: Weary of it all, the people of England have dispensed with parliamentary rule, placing decisions in the hands of a man who calls himself the Warden of England, his foremost role to see that the state is secure and its people safe, which is about as much as anyone aspires to.

Most people, anyway, for there are small pockets of dissent. The Warden’s state is hostile to immigrant workers, whom it lures in to do the jobs no one else wants to do and then spits them back out, forcibly repatriating them as they near retirement age. Naturally, hard feelings arise. Meanwhile, domestic enemies of the state are clapped into irons and shipped off to the Isle of Man, far from a metropolis ever more devoted to pursuits of mindless pleasure.

Enter Theo, an Oxford professor who thinks lofty thoughts about the meaning of it all, pondering what the world of books and art and architecture that he inhabits will look like once the human race dies off, as it inevitably must, given the absence of babies. The search to find the last human born had been an obsession, “an international contest as ultimately pointless as it was fierce and acrimonious.” And now that the last human to be born on the planet has just been killed in a bar brawl, things are looking grim indeed.

But is there no hope? Perhaps not, not if Theo can get a word in to the Warden, who just happens to be his cousin. James, better known as an accomplished spinner of mystery tales, throws down a few red herrings before giving us reason to think that humankind might, just might, have some reason to want to go on living, and the biological wherewithal to do so.

A film version was made of Children of Men, directed by Alfonso Cuarón, a few years back. As with still another dystopian tale, that of Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go, its story line was much altered to meet the simplified requirements of the screen—but quite satisfactorily so. Like the book, it’s a marvel of subtlety and compression, if depressingly close to the shape of the real world. Read the book, then see the film. And then fear for the future.

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This Issue’s Contributors Randy Abbott • Maude Adjarian • Paul Allen • Mark Athitakis • Joseph Barbato • Josh Bell • Amy Boaz • Allie Bochicchio • Hope Bordeaux • Lee E. Cart • Kelli Daley • Dave DeChristopher • Gregory F. DeLaurier • David Delman • Kathleen Devereaux • Daniel Dyer • Gro Flatebo • Julie Foster • Peter Franck • Olivia Caroline Geraci • Amy Goldschlager • Bracha Goykadosh • Peter Heck • Jeff Hoffman • BJ Hollars • Susan J.E. Illis • Robert M. Knight • Paul Lamey • Isaac Larson • Louise Leetch • Judith Leitch • Angela Leroux-Lindsey • Elsbeth Lindner • Swapna Lovin • Michelle Mach • Joe Maniscalco • Don McLeese • Gregory McNamee • Chris Messick • Sara Miller • Carole Moore • Clayton Moore • Chris Morris • Liza Nelson • Mike Newirth • John Noffsinger • Sarah Norris • Donna Marie Nowak • Mike Oppenheim • Jim Piechota • William E. Pike • Gary Presley • Lloyd Sachs • Bob Sanchez • William P. Shumaker • Wendy Smith • Margot E. Spangenberg • Andria Spencer • Heather Talty • Claire Trazenfeld • Roz Warren • Steve Weinberg • Norman Weinstein • Rodney Welch • Carol White • Chris White • Joan Wilentz • Homa Zaryouni • Alex Zimmerman

fiction THE RECONSTRUCTIONIST

THE O’BRIENS

Arvin, Nick Perennial/HarperCollins (352 pp.) $14.99 paperback | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-06-199516-3

A man who uncovers the causes of car accidents is forced to reckon with the one that transformed his childhood.

Ellis, the hero of the second novel

by Arvin (Articles of War, 2005, etc.), has the grim job of investigating car-crash sites on the behalf of lawyers. The gig involves a high degree of precision, which Arvin explains in winning detail: What does a pattern of scratches and dents say about how many times a car flipped over? How far would a passenger be ejected from the windshield of a car that hits another at a particular speed? Ellis and his boss, Boggs, criss-cross the country to study cases, performing their grisly work with the kind of gallows humor common to homicide cops. But Arvin explores what happens when grief can’t be patched over with jokes or cold logic. At the center of Ellis’ transformation is Heather, who plays a host of roles in the story: She’s Boggs’ wife, Ellis’ mistress and was on the scene when Ellis’ half brother was killed in an accident when they were teens. Boggs goes off the rails when he discovers the affair, threatening suicide and sending Ellis on an extended road trip that involves visits to past accident sites. Arvin renders these old accidents in such vivid detail that you can almost, but not quite, ignore the contrivance of the setup. As Ellis struggles to chase down Boggs, he’s also piecing together details of his half brother’s death—which, by the time the truth becomes clear, feels swallowed by the plot. And a subplot involving Ellis’ accidental maiming of a jaywalker feels oddly tacked-on, given the seriousness of its aftermath.

Accidents are everywhere and unavoidable, Arvin means to say, but ironically his characters feel overly controlled.

(Author events in Denver and Boulder )

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Behrens, Peter Pantheon (400 pp.) $25.95 | Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-307-37993-1 Spanning 60 years, this chronicle of an Irish-Canadian family is the second novel from the Canadian Behrens (The Law of Dreams, 2006).

It’s 1900, and the five O’Brien siblings are struggling to survive in barren rural Quebec. Their father has died fighting overseas; their sickly mother has married again, a wastrel. Everything depends on 13-year-old Joe, the oldest. When he learns their stepfather has been molesting his two sisters, he passes an early manhood test by stomping him half to death, then becomes a breadwinner (small logging jobs). At 17, his mother dies, and, needing room to grow, he heads West with brother Grattan, having parked the three youngest with nuns and Jesuits. Waiting for him there, though she doesn’t know it yet, is lovely Iseult, another refugee from the East, another orphan. She has bought herself a bungalow in Venice, Calif.; Grattan was the realtor. By now Joe is 25 and building a railroad in the Canadian Rockies. After a whirlwind courtship, they marry, the perfect couple, tempered by hardship yet ready for more risk. So far, so good; there are glimpses of the elemental in human nature. But then Behrens stops digging, becoming an observer of a marriage with the usual personal and historical markers. Babies: they lose one, keep three. Business booms, more construction projects after the railroad. Returning East, to Montreal. World War I. Grattan, a fighter pilot and decorated hero. Prohibition. Grattan bootlegging. Marital crisis; Iseult bolts. Reconciliation. World War II. Letters from the front.

A son dies; a son-in-law survives. The jerky forward motion begs some profound questions, left unanswered.

Behrens is an effective storyteller, but his idiosyncratic vision is not yet fully formed. (Author appearances in Maine, New York, Washington, D.C., and Texas)

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“A slowly unfolding novel that paradoxically contains both engaging characters and wooden dialogue.” from coral glynn

PHANTOM

Bell, Ted Morrow/HarperCollins (496 pp.) $27.99 paperback | Mar. 20, 2012 978-0-06-210707-7 Strange disasters are occurring around the world.

These disasters include the unexplained explosion of ABM missiles in their silos in Alaska and the unlikely sinking of a U.S. cruise ship by a Russian submarine in the Caribbean. The supervillain behind the mishaps is a monolithic supercomputer called Perseus, which sits 2001-like beneath the Persian Gulf. In his latest fanciful globetrotting adventure featuring British counterintelligence star Alex Hawke, Bell (Warlord, 2010, etc.) projects a future in which Artificial Intelligence has advanced to the point where its human creators can only hope to contain it. In fact, Perseus’ increasingly nervous quadriplegic inventor, Dr. Darius Saffari, who answers to the government of Iran, can only pretend to control his creation anymore. The world is at risk. Before Hawke can short-circuit the evil black tower, he must survive a dangerous personal mission in Siberia to rescue his true love Anastasia, long thought dead. In a previous adventure, he killed an old-style imperialist ruler embraced as the new Tsar. Here, vengeful soldiers who remain loyal to the Tsar target both Hawke and Alexei, the 3-year-old son he never knew he had.

A long novel that is short on suspense but still keeps the reader involved with its charmingly unflappable hero and narrative quirks, as well as the ease with which it unfolds on multiple continents, on land and sea and in air.

CORAL GLYNN

Cameron, Peter Farrar, Straus and Giroux (240 pp.) $25.00 | Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-374-29901-9 Shortly after World War II, Coral Glynn, a nurse, shows up at Hart House to take care of an elderly woman dying of cancer, and thus begins a series of unfortunate events.

Although Coral is taciturn and hard to read, these qualities don’t stop Major Hart, son of the dying woman, from being intrigued by her—though perhaps “intrigued” is too strong a word. When the inevitable happens and his mother dies, Major Hart has an aversion to spending the rest of his life alone. He had been badly wounded in the war and has few social contacts beyond his childhood friend Robin, who’s in love with the major, and Robin’s wife, Dolly, who obviously have a marriage of convenience. Hart somewhat ambivalently returns some of Robin’s affection, but he yearns for more and feels that Coral can fill the void in his life, so he and Coral get engaged while Mrs. Hart’s body is still warm, and they 330

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marry about two weeks later. On their wedding night their marriage is immediately thwarted by Inspector Hoke, who’s investigating a mysterious murder that occurred in the woods near Hart House, a venue Coral was known to have visited in her spring walks. Uncertain whether Coral has any culpability in the crime, Hart urges her to disappear to London, where she lives for two years. While there she yields to the amorous blandishments of her landlady’s son but is eventually found out by Hart. Their on-again/off-again relationship teeters on the brink until Coral finally makes up her mind.

A slowly unfolding novel that paradoxically contains both engaging characters and wooden dialogue.

CLAIR DE LUNE

Carleton, Jetta Perennial/HarperCollins (288 pp.) $14.99 paperback | Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-06-208919-9 Newly discovered, the evocative fable of a young teacher’s brush with professional disaster during a simplerseeming era.

Carleton, who died in 1999 and is known for a single, bestselling book, The Moonflower Vine (1962), also, it turns out, wrote another, set in 1941 and capturing a mood of youthful passion increasingly overshadowed by war. Allen Liles, 25 and fresh out of university, takes up a job teaching English at a small-town college in Missouri, a hiatus, she hopes, before moving to New York to become a writer. Two of her brightest students, George and Toby, fall into the habit of visiting her out of hours in her apartment, where the trio loses itself in poetry, music, ideas and heady enjoyment of the night. This chaste rhapsody of exuberant idealism leads to an even closer relationship between Allen and Toby, which breaks up before it is consummated. Nevertheless, the indiscretion has been noted, and Allen quickly realizes her foolishness, vulnerability and shame. With the support of the dean, she survives this near-catastrophe and tries to conform, yet the lure of the alternative is still with her.

Fine and dry, with a faint flavor of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, Carleton’s vignette of innocence and experience has a bright wit and perceptive charm, rendered all the more enjoyable by its retro feel.

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FORGOTTEN COUNTRY

Chung, Catherine Riverhead (352 pp.) $26.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-59448-808-5

A young woman struggles to understand her sometimes-competing roles as daughter, sister, scholar and Korean American in Chung’s darkly luminous debut.

Twenty years ago Janie and Hannah moved with their parents to Michigan to avoid reprisals by South Korea’s then-authoritarian government against their brilliant mathematician father’s incendiary political pamphlet. Janie, now a graduate student in mathematics in Chicago, has always grudgingly accepted the way her family considers it her responsibility as older sister to protect more openly rebellious Hannah. When Hannah drops out of college and takes off for California, cutting off communication with her traditionally tight knit family, Janie is furious. Then her father is diagnosed with a form of cancer best treated, ironically, in Korea. Dispatching Janie to find Hannah and break the news, her parents return to Korea. Janie finds Hannah thriving in Los Angeles. During a quarrel, Janie claims their parents are done with Hannah and tells her not to come to Korea. To Janie’s surprise, Hannah acquiesces and stays behind. Janie arrives in Korea alone, claiming Hannah couldn’t get away. Ensconced with her parents in a lovely Korean home and visited by devoted (if sometimes rancorous) family and friends, Janie develops a deeper appreciation for her parents’ history, particularly her father’s. His health seems to improve, and she luxuriates in his approval and her role as the good daughter.

But when his condition suddenly worsens, Janie’s mother calls Hannah herself. Hannah comes immediately, and, to Janie’s chagrin, the family embraces her as if she never deserted it. As their father’s health deteriorates, Janie and Hannah’s sibling rivalry comes to a head, but their bond is stronger than either has recognized. Despite some missteps into clichés about abuse, Chung delves with aching honesty and beauty into large, difficult questions—the strength and limits of family, the definition of home, the boundaries (or lack thereof) between duty and love—within the context of a Korean experience.

Chung’s limpid prose matches her emotional intelligence.

LESSONS IN LAUGHING OUT LOUD

Coleman, Rowan Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster (352 pp.) $15.00 paperback | Mar. 20, 2012 978-1-4516-0641-6 An unhappy and overweight single Londoner finds her world transformed after donning a very special pair of shoes.

As the reliable and trusted underling to gleefully ruthless talent agent Victoria Kincade, Willow |

Briar is used to fading into the background, especially when surrounded by Victoria’s celebrity clients. Attractive but heavy, she has seen numerous opportunities—and men—pass her by. A bit of a recluse outside of work, she remains close with her twin sister Holly, a slim, sweet mother of 4-year-old girls who lives in the suburbs. Holly is a living reminder of everything Willow could have been. So when Victoria insists Willow hide waifish starlet India Torrance in her dingy flat after an on-set romance goes bad, she knows she doesn’t really have a choice. After reluctantly agreeing, she walks into a vintage shop on a random block and walks out wearing a fabulous pair of sexy pumps.

Almost instantly Willow feels better about herself, and begins to get positive attention from friends and strangers alike. And then Chloe, the pregnant teenage daughter of her ex-husband Sam, shows up on her doorstep. It was Sam, a ruggedly handsome wine merchant, who called off their marriage, but Willow blames herself. Losing Chloe in the process was extremely painful for both of them. Still smarting from Willow’s perceived abandonment, Chloe has attitude to spare, and insists Willow make it up to her by allowing her to crash at her place as well.

With Chloe and the young movie star holed up and bonding, Willow tries out her new shoe-inspired confidence on her longtime best friend Daniel, a photographer with a thing for models.

Willow meets up with Sam again, too, as they try to figure out what is best for Chloe. But when Willow sabotages a chance for new love, she realizes that unresolved issues from her past have kept her from a fulfilling life. Eager to change that, she takes a brave trip back to her hometown to confront an ugly family secret—before it’s too late. Coleman (The Home for Broken Hearts, 2010, etc.) seems to be trying to do too much in this novel, and the shift from comedy to drama is a bit jarring. But Willow manages to be quite a sympathetic creation.

One woman’s attempt to take charge of her destiny— with a side of magic realism.

CLAWBACK

Cooper, Mike Viking (400 pp.) $26.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-670-02329-5 Silas Cade can field strip a Browning .50-caliber machine gun, and he can parachute from an airplane, but he’s done with Iraq and military life and has no interest in hired-gun Blackwater.

Instead, Cade reconnoiters Wall Street and uses covert tactics to recover missing millions. In Cooper’s debut thriller, ex-special ops Cade has earned his CPA, decided not to bean-count and decided to apply his skill set to become a one-man lost-funds recovery operation. The story begins with a hiccup in Cade’s business. Client Thomas Marlett is killed by a sniper, a murder happening at the same time Cade “claws back” Marlett’s $10 million from an about-to-be-arrested fraud. In the Wall Street milieu where traders “have long ago left behind law, morality and the social compact,” Cade doesn’t

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lack clients. His next, Quint Ganderson, investment-fund managing partner, informs Cade that Marlett’s fund was down 78 percent and two other CEOs of poorly performing funds are also recently dead. As Cade searches for the assassin, Clara Dawson inserts herself into his investigation. She’s a financial blogger-journalist whose legwork has uncovered the fact Cade’s no boring bookkeeper. By mid-tale, Cade’s gone hand-to-hand more than once, dodged a shoot-out and arm-wrestled a helicopter before jumping into the Hudson River to save himself.

Cooper’s characters will probably populate sequels, not only Cade and Clara, but also Johnny, boyhood friend and highvelocity trader; Zeke, a hard-drinking, laconic former specialops buddy; and Rondo, Clara’s roommate and a gay martial arts expert. There’s much snappy, half-cynical repartee reminiscent of 1930s Hollywood cinema, including snarks about the necessity of gun control, and a firefight aboard a mega-yacht followed by a jet ski-Zodiac water pursuit. Cooper sets the action in New York City, a locale he has down pat, from neighborhood diners to the only place it’s legal to live on your boat.

Arm a Hollywood hero with a Beretta and disposable cell, point him at a Gordon Gekko–type, and this book’s big screen ready.

YOURS, MINE, AND OURS Davidson, MaryJanice St. Martin’s (352 pp.) $24.99 | Feb. 28, 2012 978-0-312-53118-8

An FBI agent with multiple personality disorder is on the hunt for a serial killer, in the second of Davidson’s wisecracking series.

Cadence, aka Shiro and Adrienne, is assigned to a Twin Cities–based, literally wacky FBI special-ops unit: BOFFO (Bureau of False Flags Ops), which has gathered together staffers representing the full range of mental disorders the DSM-IV has to offer. Cadence, whose Sybil syndrome surfaced after a childhood trauma, and her sociopath partner George, are short on leads in their search for the June Boy Killer, so named because his victims are always 14-year-old boys, always killed in June, and left, dressed in new shirts and blue jeans, for police to find. A new recruit, Emma Jan, joins the team, but she has an unfortunate tendency to go berserk when she sees herself in a mirror. Supervisor Michaela holds briefings in the office kitchen, while obsessively chopping things with her prize knife collection. Cadence et al. have received some helpful hints (coupled with threats) in the quest for JBK from the ThreeFer, murderous autistic triplets (now reduced to two), at large since installment one, (Me, Myself and Why?, 2010).

Mild-mannered Cadence and her more flamboyant other selves have, not surprisingly, a complicated personal life. Wealthy boyfriend Patrick seeks a commitment, about which Shiro, who has a crush on a victim’s uncle, Dr. Max Gallo, and Adrienne, a psychotic who would rather crush men, period, are, to say the least, ambivalent. When June Boy departs from his pattern and 332

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murders in December, the BOFFO force is stymied. Dr. Max seems to know more about JBK’s habits than his mere status as a bereaved relative would warrant, and trailer-dwelling white supremacists further muddle the mix. In short chapters, the personality “splits” are handled with a minimum of confusion, but witty dialogue is the main attraction.

As in most banter-based mysteries, the action sometimes lags while the characters quip, but readers will enjoy the ride, and the company.

I HADN’T UNDERSTOOD

De Silva, Diego Europa Editions (368 pp.) $15.00 paperback | Mar. 8, 2012 978-1-60945-065-6 Despite the less-than-scintillating title, De Silva has crafted a sharp-edged comedic novel of a semi-hapless Italian lawyer, Vincenzo Malinconico.

Vincenzo is 42, and his life is unraveling. He’s an unsuccessful counselor with a failed marriage (to Nives, a psychologist) and two adolescent children he doesn’t understand. But then things begin to happen. He has an opportunity to defend a member of the Mafia, Mimmo ‘o Burzone—though at first he turns down the case. He then spends some time brushing up on his law skills, which have sadly deteriorated from years of desuetude. About this same time he finds out that a knockout celebrity lawyer, Alessandra Persiano, might be lusting after him—and he can’t quite believe his good luck. But the book doesn’t present a tight narrative line. It’s really about the comic perception of Vincenzo, whose skewed vision of the world is both insightful and wry. Early in the novel, for example, he notes: “I’m an inconsistent narrator.

I’m not a narrator you can rely on. I’m too interested in incidental considerations that can take you off track”—and, one might add here, way off track. He fantasizes for pages about what he’d like to say to his estranged wife, and when he finally beds the comely Alessandra, he starts thinking about St. Francis of Assisi.

De Silva’s strength lies in the creation of Vincenzo’s unique and self-deprecating voice; his awareness of his status as a cuckold (because his wife is having an affair with Emilio, an egregious architect); and his ultimate triumph over the pettiness that has consistently marred his life.

Comic exuberance on a grand scale.

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“A sharp little novel featuring the subtle characterizations of two appealingly flawed young women.” from how to eat a cupcake

HOW TO EAT A CUPCAKE

Donohue, Meg Harper/HarperCollins (320 pp.) $13.99 paperback | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-06-206928-3

A little friendship, a little wit and a little mystery make for a charming debut about two old friends reconciled after starting a cupcakery (a bakery specializing in cupcakes).

Annie Quintana and Julia St. Claire have an unusual relationship. Raised like sisters, there is a gulf between them—Annie’s mother Lucia was nanny and cook to the St. Clair family. The distance between the Pacific Heights carriage house and the mansion may be measured in yards, but as the girls entered high school, it became an impossible distance. Ten years after graduation (which coincided with a prep-school scandal and Lucia’s untimely death), Annie and Julia meet again at a St. Claire fundraiser. Annie, now a talented pastry chef, is catering and

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surprised to see a subdued Julia, who has quit her job in finance and moved back into the manse to plan her wedding. Annie hasn’t forgiven Julia for her past transgressions, and Julia has conveniently forgotten all about them, which makes for some awkwardness when Julia offers to finance Annie’s cupcake shop. As Julia promises to bow out after her wedding, Annie agrees to a business partnership, but every meeting is colored by her anger and Julia’s nonchalance. What Annie doesn’t know: Julia is depressed, recovering from a serious trauma and unsure if she should marry Wes, who may be too good for her. And what Julia doesn’t know about Annie: she’s dating her high school sweetheart and knows the truth about what Julia did to destroy her reputation. In the meantime, their cupcakery is a grand success—except for the frequent vandalism, notes telling them to get out and a frightening man in a hoodie who is always lurking in the shadows. When the truth is finally revealed, it brings real danger to Julia and Annie, who have finally learned to be the sisters they were meant to be.

Despite the sugary title, Donohue has written a sharp little novel featuring the subtle characterizations of two appealingly flawed young women.

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BLOWOUT

Dorgan, Byron L. Hagberg, David Forge (384 pp.) $25.99 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-7653-2737-6 A blistering thriller from Dorgan, a former congressman and senator for North Dakota, and Hagberg, a former U.S. Air Force cryptographer.

In North Dakota, a top-secret project called The Dakota District Initiative seeks to prove the viability of converting coal into pollutionfree energy. The key is bacteria that literally can be taught to eat a coal seam and generate massive quantities of methane. As a result, America would break its dependence on oil for hundreds of years. Geopolitics would never be the same. OPEC nations would lose revenue and power, so one of them decides The Initiative must be destroyed. The job calls for a maniac, and that means Barry Egan of the Posse Comitatus. He will earn a lot of money if he can destroy the project’s test facility, but the killing along the way seems a task he’d gladly take on for free.

It’s a tough old world, Egan continually says, usually as he’s putting a slug in someone’s head. Luckily, the good guys are brave and smart, like Sheriff Nate Osborne, a Medal of Honor winner with a titanium leg. The story begins with a failed attack on the facility, followed by a far more deadly attempt. The science behind the project may be no more than the authors’ imaginations—who knows?—but single-celled coal-eaters make a plausible basis for the yarn. If there is one minor quibble, it’s with the comic-book characterizations: The bad guys are all bad and the good guys (and gals) are all good. There is a thread of romance that adds a little dimension, but nothing that titillates the senses. This book is all about good vs. evil (read: us vs. them), with plenty of action and narrow escapes.

An enjoyable and fast-moving tale that will leave readers eagerly awaiting the next one.

WHEN CAPTAIN FLINT WAS STILL A GOOD MAN

Dybek, Nick Riverhead (320 pp.) $26.95 | Apr. 12, 2012 978-1-59448-809-2

In Dybek’s debut novel, Cal Bollings makes a choice, and beyond wisdom and morality, he chooses loyalty.

Fifteen-year-old Cal, son of Henry and Donna, lives on a rain-soaked Loyalty Island on the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Henry is captain of the Bering Sea crab boat Laurentide. Donna, who stays at home on Seachase Lane, was a California New Age dabbler and a teacher. One day Donna set out on an impulsive Washington vacation and soon found herself enamored of, and pregnant by, rough-hewn but gentle 334

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Henry. It is now summer 1986. John Gaunt has died. With him may die all of the fishing village, all but the rumors of his relationship with Donna Bollings. Gaunt owned the fishing fleet, and the fleet supports the town, but Gaunt never allowed his son and heir, Richard, a life on the sea. At the cusp of the new season, the town confronts Richard’s decision to sell the Gaunt enterprise to the Japanese. Then word circulates that Richard has relented and decided instead to sail north with the fleet. Donna is suspicious, suspecting a plot by Henry and his fellow boat captains. Donna, who is pregnant, argues with Henry and then asks Cal to accompany her to California. He refuses. Henry, pleased, arranges for Cal to board with another captain’s family. A few days after the crab fleet sails, Richard is reported missing at sea. Cal is confused, and grows more mystified when he discovers Richard imprisoned in the basement of the Bollings’ locked home.

In this tale of good men “doing unspeakable harm to other people,” Dybek proves himself a observant, appealing writer: “Wind told the branches to tremble.” Adult Cal tells the story, one peopled with multidimensional characters and featuring well-drawn settings. Dybek writes well about family, about relationships and loyalty, about responsibility and community, and about all that passes from father to son.

No Deadliest Catch, but rather literary fiction as morality play.

SAIL OF STONE

Edwardson, Åke Simon & Schuster (336 pp.) $15.00 paperback | Mar. 13, 2012 978-1-4516-0850-2 A pair of fresh cases for Erik Winter and Aneta Djanali, of the Gothenburg Police.

Though she hasn’t made any complaints herself, her neighbors have repeatedly indicated that Anette Lindsten has been attacked. Responding to the latest report, Aneta gets barely a glimpse of the alleged victim before she’s turned away. In the absence of a complainant, her inquiries must begin in speculation. The likeliest person to have beaten Anette is her live-in lover, legal archivist Hans Forsblad. Before building a case against Forsblad, however, Aneta’s first order of business is to get Anette out of her house. Imagine her surprise when, on a return visit, she finds Anette’s father and brother packing up her things—and then her even greater surprise when she learns that Anette has no brother and that the solicitous men were a pair of thieves. Winter, meanwhile, is chasing his own will-o’-the-wisp at the urging of his old girlfriend Johanna Osvald, who’s worried because her fisherman father Axel has vanished during a trip to Scotland. It soon becomes clear that Axel was investigating the disappearance of his own father, John Osvald, from a fishing trawler during the war. “Yet another generation of Osvalds takes off to look for the last one,” muses Winter (The Shadow Woman, 2010, etc.). But that’s the only thing that’s clear about a case that will take Winter himself to Scotland in quest of sightings of either Johanna’s

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father or her grandfather. The detection in both cases is as inexorable and tedious as water chipping away stone.

Recommended for readers with a taste for cold climates and a lot of time on their hands. (Agent: Peter Riva)

MAKE IT STAY

Frank, Joan Permanent Press (164 pp.) $26.00 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-57962-227-5 A novel that peers into relationships in the small town of Mira Flores in northern California.

Rachel, the narrator, writes books and deeply loves her husband Neil, a lawyer who has occasional doubts about their marriage. His best friend is Mike, the man who saved him from drowning in the South Pacific. Mike sells exotic fish and is married to Tilda, the only character who has an underlying streak of meanness and deceit. The mix of personalities is perfect: a woman who loves unconditionally; her loyal but sometimes shaky spouse; his do-anything-for-you and screwanything-that-moves friend; and a woman who serves expensive steaks she obtains with “five-finger discounts.” When disaster strikes one of them, the rest are devastated. Frank wraps the reader in a cocoon of finely spun images and rich similes that makes one want to return to the beginning of the book just to savor the language all over again. The “heavy sweetness of roses spilling over fences in Popsicle colors” is just one example of the vivid prose that appears on virtually every page. These images don’t distract from the story but enrich it with the help of four fully developed characters. The reader will hope that Neil realizes how lucky he is to have Rachel, that Mike can avoid being hurt too badly by Tilda, and that nothing can ever harm the friendship between Neil and Mike. There comes a moment when everything seems perfect with the foursome, when one of the characters wants that situation to last forever, to “make it stay.” But happily-ever-afters are for fairy tales, and nothing good lasts forever.

First-class fiction.

FOUR OF A KIND

Frankel, Valerie Random House (352 pp.) $15.00 paperback | Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-345-52540-6 Four women approaching middle age find insight and inspiration at the poker table, in Frankel’s breezy latest (It’s Hard Not to Hate You, 2010, etc.).

To form the new PTA diversity committee at her sons’ elite Brooklyn Heights private school, blond yummy-mummy Bess chooses three other |

mothers as different from herself as possible. There’s Carla, an African-American pediatrician who, with her manipulative husband Claude, is struggling to afford the high tuition that will keep their sons from slipping out of the middle class.

Robin, who lives off her inheritance, was once obese. Slim post-stomach-staple, she’s looking on in horror as daughter Stephanie, conceived in a one-night stand with a suspected “chubby-chaser,” must wear a size 14 at age 10. Advertising copywriter Alicia, whose son Joe was born after a long struggle with infertility, is going through a sexual dry spell: Her husband Tim, a stay-at-home dad, seems to have lost all conjugal interest. The first meeting of these four takes an unexpected turn: Bess announces they will play Texas Hold ‘Em, but, in deference to the bad economy, the stakes will be not money but secrets.

She herself reveals the hidden flaws in her outwardly perfect life: Unlike Tim, Bess’ Wall Street insider husband Borden is oversexed. Her mother, Simone, a second-wave feminist icon, is trying to drive a wedge between Bess and teenage daughter Amy. As the poker nights progress, diversity in the politically correct sense is never discussed: instead the women find that their new connection is more and more crucial as each faces turning points, including Claude’s impending job loss, Alicia’s affair with a younger colleague, the unexpected reappearance of Robin’s chubby-chaser in her and Stephanie’s lives, Amy’s increasing slovenliness and declaration of lesbian leanings and Borden’s depression following his father’s death. Although the closing empowerment scenarios are a bit pat, the poker conceit is an artful framing device, and the four women and their dilemmas are portrayed with Frankel’s trademark witty empathy.

Transcends the conventions of chick lit to dramatize complex and timely issues. (Local author promotion in New York City. Agent: Nancy Yost)

THE WHITE PEARL

Furnivall, Kate Berkley (448 pp.) $15.00 paperback | Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-425-24100-4 An English matron flees the Japanese with her family, in Furnivall’s ripping World War II yarn.

Connie, wife of Nigel Hadley, owner of a thriving rubber plantation in Malaya, is on her way to the country club when she loses control of her car and rams into a native market stand.

A Malay woman, Sai-Ru, is fatally injured, and as her daughter Maya and Connie kneel beside her, Sai-Ru curses “the white lady.” This only adds to Connie’s burden of guilt—her recent affair with a Japanese man ended with his suicide. Nigel, a stereotypical stiff-upper-lipped Englishman, has rebuffed his wife’s affections for years. When Connie tries to make amends by employing Maya and her twin brother Razak, Nigel warms to Razak but banishes Maya, whom he’s seen working in a seedy nightclub. When the Japanese invade Malaya the English colonials are woefully unprepared, and British defenses quickly

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“Fast-paced, emotionally tense and worrisomely true-to-life.” from trigger point

crumble. The Hadleys flee on their yacht, The White Pearl, with fellow refugees, including their son Teddy, wounded Brit flyboy Johnnie, stowaways Maya and Razak, friends Henry and Harriet Court, and, later, Madoc and Kitty, owners of a gambling den destroyed when a deal with the Japanese went south.

Skippering is mysterious seafarer Mr. Fitzpayne, who, when safe harbor in Singapore is impossible, leads the group on a search for a small island on which to wait out the war. Although outwardly grateful to Connie, Maya seeks ways to carry out Sai-Ru’s curse: Harriet ingests poison meant for Connie, and an attempt to drown the family dog will alter everyone’s fate. Madoc plots to shanghai The White Pearl, 7-year-old Teddy grows up speedily and Nigel is exhibiting an unhealthy fondness for handsome Razak, which, Connie realizes, explains his coldness toward her.

However, even as she recognizes his dangerous depths, Connie cannot deny her attraction to Fitzpayne.

Although the characters are thinly motivated, their adventure story, a pleasing mélange of a vintage movie and a Pacific Theater version of Lost, is riveting to the last.

(Agent: Teresa Chris)

TRIGGER POINT

Glass, Matthew Atlantic Monthly (416 pp.) $25.00 | Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-8021-1997-1 In Glass’ (Ultimatum, 2009) geo-political thriller, the anarchist Lord’s Resistance Army has massacred American aid workers in Uganda, and U.S. President Tom Knowles cannot let the terrorist attack go without response because his party must control the 2018 midterm elections.

Knowles intends to chasten the ragtag murderers with bombs and bullets, but the People’s Republic of China fears the operation will compromise their petroleum interests in neighboring South Sudan. There’s also an East-West dispute over natural-resource–rich South Africa, where the ANC has turned dictatorial. These thorny problems might have been managed with skillful diplomacy, especially since Knowles is an artful politician who has restored confidence in the U.S. economy on a platform of “rectitude and trust,” but into the volatile mix comes billionaire speculator Ed Grey, owner of Red River, a diversified investment vehicle. Grey has taken a stock-market “short” position on Fidelian, a rockily capitalized investment bank in which a Chinese sovereign investment fund has a nearmajority ownership. Grey’s actions sends Fidelian stock into a tailspin, but its board, influenced by the Chinese fund’s government agents, rejects a Knowles Administration–brokered rescue buy-out. Fidelian then goes bankrupt, and the entire stock market takes a nose-dive. As Knowles and his advisers try to engage the Chinese in an effort to stabilize the economy, every decision turns counterproductive, partly because the Chinese government is composed of an uneasy triumvirate. Then when U.S. pilots are shot down and held hostage in South Sudan, 336

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the miscommunications between the U.S. and China descend into a standoff, and a massive naval battle off the African coast seems imminent. Glass deftly handles a cast of characters large enough to require note taking, including a to-be-expected belligerent Defense Secretary and an out-of-the-loop but perceptive UN ambassador. The author has penned an action-driven, bite-your-nails, first-rate thriller, one best characterized by cribbing from the book itself: “The complexity of trying to link everything up together was mind-boggling.”

Fast-paced, emotionally tense and worrisomely trueto-life. (Agent: Ben Evans)

WHAT DOESN’T KILL YOU

Johansen, Iris St. Martin’s (416 pp.) $27.99 | Apr. 17, 2012 978-0-312-65123-7

Johansen revives some of the same characters that populated her previous novels.

Catherine Ling is brilliant, gorgeous and deadly, so it’s a really good thing she’s on the CIA’s payroll. The daughter of a Russian prostitute who practiced her trade in Hong Kong, Catherine was left homeless and alone as a small child. Instead of learning to read and write in a classroom, she spent her childhood learning how to steal to put food on the table and defend herself from the hoodlums and gangsters that roamed the city’s streets. In the process, Catherine became a martialarts expert and a genius in trafficking information, traits that brought her to the attention of an extraordinary chemist named Hu Chang. After saving Hu Chang’s life when she was only 14, Catherine develops a mentee-mentor relationship with the man, which becomes critical when the CIA rescues him from the clutches of an evil manipulator out to abuse Hu Chang’s talents. Although just arrived home from another mission and settling into the business of trying to develop a relationship with her son, Luke, who had been stolen and held captive as a small child, Catherine is sent to find Hu Chang.

Soon, a series of events that bring old lovers, friends and enemies back into her life begins to build as Catherine scrambles to keep her loved ones safe. Johansen knows what readers like and doesn’t hesitate to give it to them, but they may tire of the genius, physical beauty and deadliness shared by the good guys: Catherine’s 11-year-old son reads a Chinese chemistry book, even though he does not speak any Chinese; all of the men who meet Catherine are immediately overcome with lust; and she outfights and outwits both her fellow agents and the forces of evil so often that the reader will be left wondering why the criminals bother trying.

The book, weighed down by a predictable plot, won’t thrill the reader with its super-woman heroine, wickedly handsome love interest and by-the-numbers supporting cast.

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THREE A.M.

John, Steven Tor (304 pp.) $24.99 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-7653-3116-8 A bleak little fable about personal responsibility, set in an apparently postapocalyptic, nameless American city.

Sixteen years ago, millions of people died from a mysterious illness. Not long afterward, the fog drifted in and never left, blanketing the city and cutting it off from the rest of a presumably equally devastated world. Stumbling through the streets is private detective Thomas Vale, drowning his despair in booze and pills, waking every night at 3 a.m. and not knowing why. But when he concludes an investigation of a warehouse theft and accepts a new, dubious-seeming assignment from a gorgeous blonde, he learns the truth about both the illness and the fog.

John does a marvelous job of painting the physical and emotional

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landscape of a corrupt, eternally obscured city, where hope has almost drained away and people cling desperately to (but are deeply wounded by) their mementoes of a brighter, happier world. Unfortunately, once the Big Conspiracy is revealed, the novel shifts from an introspective noir to a still thoughtful but somewhat clichéd thriller where the perennially underestimated hero runs around trying to expose the plot and save his woman before he’s killed. (Really, it’s ridiculous: Vale amply demonstrates that he’s vicious when he’s cornered, and his enemies never take sufficient precautions.) Worse still, Rebecca, the femme fatale turned love interest, is sadly two-dimensional; she’s a beautiful victim who primarily seems to be there to give Vale some focus.

Vale’s relationship with Heller, a young man who owes him money, is far more poignantly and complexly real. John does get props, though, for not forcing an inappropriately happy ending.

A promising, if not entirely satisfying, debut. (Agent: Russell Galen)

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k i r ku s q & a w i t h l i z m o o r e

Heft

Liz Moore Norton (352 pp.) $24.95 Jan. 23, 2012 978-0-393-08150-3

Q: You used several characters in Song and use a similar method here. What do you feel multiple viewpoints bring that a first-person account doesn’t?

Liz Moore’s second novel, Heft, follows the story of an obese recluse in Brooklyn and a teen baseball star in Yonkers, N.Y.—and the intricate ties that intersect their difficult lives.

The story centers around a former academic, Arthur, who fell in love with a student, Charlene, who later had the teen Kel. While Arthur and Kel both wrestle with the difficulties they face in their lives— fractured families, substance abuse, depression and acceptance—Moore expertly weaves together their stories as they eventually work toward one another.

It’s truly one of the first outstanding fiction books of 2012, and Moore’s second starred after her debut The Words of Every Song. We said that “only a hardhearted reader will remain immune to Kel’s troubled charm.”

Here, Moore talks about finding her characters, “banging her head against the wall” and what role music plays in her writing.

A: [Arthur and Kel] are the only voices in the story. [Kel’s mom] Charlene is only seen through them. It felt right.

Originally, she had more of a voice in first draft, but it never felt right or natural to me. Part of her character is that she herself feels kind of voiceless, only capable of seeing herself through the eyes of others. It’s part of her downfall. I felt it was right that she’s only seen through Arthur’s voice or Kel’s voice.

Q: You’re a musician also. How do you think that helps in writing?

A: First, I should say that I’m not playing nearly as much music as I did when I wrote Song. I think my life has just evolved in that direction. I teach full time now, and I’m really more focused on writing fiction. All of the hours of my day go toward teaching and writing, and it leaves very little time for music. I could say that I’m really sad about that, but I also feel that people do what they want to do.

The fact that I’m not playing music is that I don’t want to badly enough anymore.

But it is connected to writing for me—both satisfy similar impulses for me whether I’m writing a song, a story or a novel. I feel the same way prior to creating any of those three. I listen to music a lot while I’m writing, too. I know a lot of authors do…I have very particular rules about what kinds of music I listen to while writing a particular piece…

For this book, I listened to a lot of classical music, especially when writing Arthur. It seemed like the type of music he would listen to. And for Kel, I listened to jazz a lot; there was something cinematic about him, and I liked that feeling.

Q: Many authors rewrite the same story over and over. This is so different from your first novel, The Words of Every Song. How did you get the idea?

A: It’s very different from first book. The idea for the main character Arthur is a little bit foggy for me, it’s not based on anyone in particular I know. He’s based on short story I wrote right out of college, at around the same time I wrote Words. I was almost intentionally looking to write something quite different than Words. Arthur came from that impulse, someone not at all out in world, but cloistered inside and not actively facing the world.

The impulse to write the rest of the book came out of grad school. I was lucky enough to go to Hunter College for its MFA program. While there, I really got a sense that I wanted to write a true novel, not a novel in stories. It was kind of a challenge for me to do that. My goal for grad school was to emerge with a solid base for a novel.

The character of Kel is based on a lot of the kids I grew up with. I grew up in pretty working-class town in Massachusetts, and I was always interested in the particular challenges that young athletes face, which is funny cause I’m not athletic at all. That’s what drove me to write about Kel, remembering lot of kids I grew up with.

Putting them together felt natural ’cause they’re so different. It’s almost a conflict putting them in the same novel, but it felt right to do that. Yet I see certain similarities in them as well.

Q: There were several moments in this book when it could have easily fallen into clichéd territory. How do you avoid those pitfalls?

Q: Like what?

A: Both obviously come from families that are lacking in some way. Both are seeking family, whatever that means.

I think sometimes they look for it in the wrong places, especially with Arthur. So both have the impulse to search out something kindred, and it’s that impulse that I wanted to make one of the major themes of the book.

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–By Molly Brown

9 Molly Brown is the features editor for Kirkus Reviews. |

p hoto © J EF F ERY S TO C K B RI D GE

A: That’s a particular difficulty of mine. Character comes much more naturally to me than plot. That is really just a matter of hard labor. Like seriously, I describe the act of writing for me as banging my head into the wall until the wall actually comes down. I met with scene obstacles over and over again…

I don’t know if it’s true for all authors, but I know if the answers are right or wrong, the same way a math problem is right or wrong. I can’t force the characters to do something they wouldn’t naturally do.

“Some chuckles, no guffaws.” from emperor mollusk versus the sinister brain

TRAIL OF THE SPELLMANS

Lutz, Lisa Simon & Schuster (384 pp.) $25.00 | Feb. 28, 2012 978-1-4516-0812-0

America’s most dysfunctional family of detectives (The Spellmans Strike Again, 2010, etc.) are up to their deerstalkers in another gaggle of featherweight cases.

Even though the Spellmans have assigned themselves animal nicknames to make coded communications among themselves easier, they still can’t conduct coherent conversations. Adam Cooper wants Isabel, the Gopher, to follow his sister Meg. Margaret Slayter wants Izzy’s father Albert, the Tortoise, to follow her husband Edward.

Harvey Blake wants Izzy’s kid sister Rae, the Weasel, to follow his daughter Vivien. Walter Perkins, convinced that something will go wrong in his house every time he leaves, wants Izzy to keep checking on it. Izzy’s mother Olivia, the Eagle, can’t follow anyone because she’s immersed herself in so many crazy hobbies (pottery, yoga, crocheting, Russian). Sydney, the 18-month-old niece of Izzy’s brother David, is too young to follow anyone, but not too young to call everything she sees or wants “banana.” Just in case this sitcom zaniness seems incomplete, there’ll be unexpected roles for Gertrude Stone, mother of San Francisco police inspector Henry Stone, whom Izzy presciently refers to as “Ex-boyfriend #13” even as she’s sleeping with him, and for Al’s mother Ruth, the inimitable Grammy Spellman, along dozens of Izzy’s winking footnotes, which are likely to leave readers first amused, then bemused, then sleepy. Through it all, the clients and their trifling mysteries are hard-pressed to compete for attention with the regulars, who spend far more time battling each other than battling evildoers.

Lutz’s title couldn’t be more apt. (Agent: Stephanie Kip Rostan)

EMPEROR MOLLUSK VERSUS THE SINISTER BRAIN

Martinez, A. Lee Orbit/Little, Brown (306 pp.) $19.99 | Mar. 5, 2012 978-0-316-09352-1 More fantasy humor from the author of Chasing the Moon (2011, etc.).

Lord Mollusk, a small, very smart, squid-like renegade Neptunon, grew bored with being Emperor of the solar system—he’s enslaved the Earth for its own good, you see, by putting chemicals in the water, and defeated everybody else that annoyed him. He gets around using various hi-tech exoskeletons and uses a flying saucer—what else?—for transport. His only companion is his pet, Snarg, an indestructible, intensely loyal ultrapede. Retirement, however, is dull. Humans love him. He’s solved the energy crisis and numerous other problems. Inventing dangerous super-weapons soon palled. He’s not really that evil, so his options are limited. He can’t |

even defeat himself—an attack by his own clone produced little stimulation. So when Zala, a reptilian Venusian warrior, arrives to arrest him for war crimes, he conscripts her as a bodyguard. Zala, however, announces a new threat to his life. Lord Mollusk ponders the list of possible offenders. Saturnites? Mercurials? He’s defeated them all. The invincible assassins of a celebrated secret death cult?

Well, possibly—but then, wouldn’t he already be dead? (Those guys are good.) What about an ambitious newcomer, a brilliant, disembodied megalomaniac who’s stolen Mollusk’s own superscience? Interesting. How do you defeat an opponent that’s built a machine to receive messages from the future telling him how to defeat you? Bland, and that’s what this is, can be amusing but not funny—compare, for instance, the U.S. and U.K. versions of The Office. To elicit convulsive laughter requires a certain amount of acid, an admixture of pain, a willingness to give offense to make a point. Martinez doesn’t have that sort of comedy killer instinct.

Some chuckles, no guffaws.

THIS ISN’T THE SORT OF THING THAT HAPPENS TO SOMEONE LIKE YOU Stories

McGregor, Jon Bloomsbury (272 pp.) $16.00 paperback | Mar. 27, 2012 978-1-59691-349-3 Absorbing, quirky stories by Bookernominated McGregor.

The best stories here are very good indeed. McGregor approaches his narratives elliptically and doesn’t shy away from experimentation. “In Winter the Sky,” for example, focuses on the fortunes of George, a young man who has been visiting his girlfriend. Driving home in a preoccupied state, he accidentally runs over a man, killing him instantly.

Because he knows this would have a less-than-salutary effect on his future, George calmly buries the man and gets on with his relationship with the girl, eventually marrying her and taking care of his debilitated father. Years later the body is discovered, but there are no moral ramifications for George, only a little inconvenience. While McGregor conveys this narrative on the left-hand pages of the story, on the right-hand pages he gives us fragments of poetry written by George’s girlfriend/wife, poetry that gives us an alternative view of the events recounted. Another brilliant story, “Which Reminded Her, Later,” introduces us to Michael, a vicar, and Catherine, his wife. In deft strokes McGregor gives us glimpses of their earlier relationship, but by the time this story begins, they’re a long-suffering married couple. In his role as vicar (and Good Samaritan), Michael has invited a mysterious American woman into their house, a woman who spends much of her time dealing with a mysterious ailment. Catherine has little tolerance for this act of charity, and she and her husband become equally intransigent about how to deal with the situation.

McGregor gives us 30tories here, ranging from a single sentence to dense (and intense) re-creations of relationships.

Impressive and unconventional fiction.

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BRIDGE OF SCARLET LEAVES

McMorris, Kristina Kensington (352 pp.) $15.00 paperback | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7582-4685-1 McMorris continues to explore the themes of love and war in this tale about commitment, passion, prejudice and heroism set against the backdrop of World War II. Maddie used to tag along behind big brother TJ and his buddy, Lane Moritomo, but as the aspiring violinist matured, she and Lane discovered they were much more than friends. Lane, whose stiff and formal Japanese mother and banker father have announced plans to marry their son to a Japanese bride, knows that if he wants to marry Maddie the time is now. But it is December 1941, and interracial marriage is not legal in California. Nineteen-year-old Maddie and Lane must go to neighboring Washington State to wed before Lane returns for his final semester of college. The morning after their wedding the unthinkable happens when the Japanese nation attacks the American fleet at Pearl Harbor, plunging the nation into war and launching an unrelenting hatred directed toward the thousands of Japanese-Americans who live in the U.S. Packed off to a relocation camp after his father’s detention, Lane urges Maddie to divorce him, but she’s unwilling to let go of the man she loves and decides, instead, to join him there.

Fighting dehumanizing conditions, TJ’s disapproval and her mother-in-law’s aloofness, Maddie follows her husband’s family, setting the stage for a sweeping story of two families in wartime America and the paths they take while the world is up-inarms. McMorris, who is of Japanese-American heritage, creates a believable world, taking readers from the camps to the Pacific Theater during the height of the war and into the heart of the Midwest, all while perfectly capturing the flavor of the period.

A sweeping yet intimate novel that will please both romantics and lovers of American history.

AUTUMN: AFTERMATH

Moody, David Dunne/St. Martin’s Griffin (352 pp.) $14.99 paperback | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-312-57002-6 Now that the re-animated dead are an ever decreasing threat, survivors must decide what to do next in the fifth and final book in Moody’s (Autumn, 2010, etc.)

Autumn series. It’s been 26 days since a contagion wiped out the vast majority of the human race and turned some of the dead into zombies.

Pockets of survivors remain, however, emerging from secure hiding places long enough to scavenge supplies. Life is dangerous, as the zombies act aggressively toward the living, and zombie hordes converge wherever they perceive signs of life. But 340

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the zombies are steadily decaying, and before long they will be too weak to pose much of a threat. One group of survivors, shut securely in a castle, is just biding its time, waiting for the last of the dead to rot away before emerging to eke out a meager existence amongst the ruins. Their leader, Jackson, pushes them to plan for a post-zombie future that is very difficult for them to imagine, until a member of the group who was separated during a looting run returns with survivors from an island just off the coast. The islanders have cleared away all of the dead, and are working on setting up a self-sufficient society. The castle dwellers quickly split into two factions: one who thinks they should retreat to the safety of the island, and another hesitant to leave without an easy escape route. When the dispute leads to violence, the survivors must choose sides, and in doing so choose a vision for the human race’s future. While the earlier books in the series were more focused on adrenaline-pumping escapes from the undead, Moody always took time for character development, and it pays off here. His world is well rendered and well thought-out, and by taking the long view, Moody gets to try something new: asking what happens after the reanimated corpses are gone, when humans must decide whether, after all they’ve seen and experienced, merely surviving is enough.

A fine study of the human race’s chances in a post-postapocalyptic world.

SACRE BLEU

Moore, Christopher Morrow/HarperCollins (416 pp.) $26.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-06-177974-9 An aspiring painter and unabashed romantic joins the greatest artists of the age in chasing his muse across fin de siècle– era France.

There are really two ages and two operating modes for hugely popular comedic writer Moore (The Griff, 2011, etc.). There’s the deceptively easy humor of his early California novels, which only gets sharper and funnier in his San Francisco–based vampire novels. But from time to time, Moore gets obsessed with a particular subject, lending a richer layer to his peculiar brand of irreverent humor—see Lamb (2003), Fluke (2003) and Fool (2009) for examples. Here, the author gets art deeply under his fingernails for a wryly madcap and sometimes touching romp through the late 19th century.

The story surrounds the mysterious suicide of Vincent van Gogh, who famously shot himself in a French wheat field only to walk a mile to a doctor’s house. The mystery, which is slowly but cleverly revealed through the course of the book, is blue: specifically the exclusive ultramarine pigment that accents pictures created by the likes of Michelangelo and van Gogh. To find the origin of the hue, Moore brings on Lucien Lessard, a baker, aspiring artist and lover of Juliette, the brunette beauty who breaks his heart. After van Gogh’s death, Lucien joins up with the diminutive force of nature Henri Toulouse-Lautrec to track down the inspiration behind the Sacré Bleu. In the shadows, lurking for centuries, is

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a perverse paint dealer dubbed The Colorman, who tempts the world’s great artists with his unique hues and a mysterious female companion who brings revelation—and often syphilis (it is Moore, after all). Into the palette, Moore throws a dizzying array of characters, all expertly portrayed, from the oft-drunk “little gentleman” to a host of artists including Édouard Manet, Paul Gauguin, Georges Seurat, Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro and Pierre-Auguste Renoir.

Moore’s humor is, as ever, sweetly juvenile, but his arty comedy also captures the courage and rebellion of the Impressionists with an exultant joie de vivre. (Author tour to Austin, Boston, Denver, New York, Phoenix, Portland, San Diego, San Francisco and Seattle. Agent: Nicholas Ellison)

DUBLIN DEAD

O’Donovan, Gerard Scribner (288 pp.) $25.00 | Mar. 13, 2012 978-1-4516-1063-5 The deaths of an Irish drug lord who was murdered in Spain and an Irish estate agent who jumped off Bristol’s storied Clifton Bridge turn out to have close and unholy connections.

It seems eminently logical that Cormac Horgan, the millionaire head of his family’s chain of estate agents, would have completed his financial ruin by topping himself at a spot favored by dozens of other suicides. Nor is anyone shedding tears over the demise of Declan (Bingo) Begley in sunny Spain—except for accountant Gemma Kearney’s mother, frantic because she hasn’t heard from her daughter for three weeks. Gemma was Begley’s girlfriend, she tells Sunday Herald reporter Siobhan Fallon, though no one in Begley’s circle can confirm the bond before Siobhan, still wobbly after her last encounter with evil (The Priest, 2011), is forcibly furloughed from the Herald. Neither can DI Mike Mulcahy, Siobhan’s friend in Ireland’s National Drugs Unit. Under mounting pressure because of diminishing budgets to justify his tiny unit’s existence, Mulcahy follows a tip from veteran informant Eddie McTiernan that seems to link still another death, the execution of Liverpool drug wholesaler Trevor Ronson several weeks ago, to an epic consignment of drugs by sea and a welltraveled Colombian assassin. Many dour interviews and ingenious schemes at cross-purposes later, Siobhan and Mulcahy realize that they’re pulling opposite ends of the same tangled skein and reluctantly join forces. And a good thing too, because they’ll both need each other to survive the denouement. Slow to gather momentum, with much checking of airline schedules.

But the final bloody payoff is deeply satisfying.

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THE COLDEST NIGHT

Olmstead, Robert Algonquin (304 pp.) $22.95 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-1-61620-043-5

It’s extremes that rivet us in Olmstead’s searing seventh novel: the heaven of first love; the hell of the battlefield.

Henry Childs grew up in the mountains of West Virginia, raised by his grandfather and his sweet-natured mother Clemmie. (The mystery of his never-mentioned father is a late-revelation shocker.) His forebears were soldiers and horsemen, but they’ve lost their land, and Clemmie must move with Henry to the city, Charleston. In 1950 Henry is a highschool junior with a passion for horses and baseball. He helps out at some stables where he meets Mercy. She comes from money and is university-bound, while Henry seems headed for a factory. The attraction between these virgins is mutual and overwhelming; from the outset their sex is a rapt communication. Henry is warned off by her father and brother. The lovers elope to New Orleans, where an apartment is waiting for them, courtesy of Mercy’s accommodating aunt. They make it their Eden. Father and brother come to expel them, abducting Mercy, giving Henry a final warning. Though underage, he enlists as a Marine and is sent to Korea. He does recon with Lew, a gruff World War II vet. Quite unsentimentally, a bond develops, a wise-guy routine. The cold is arctic. The Chinese come at night, waves of them. It’s kill or be killed; answer atrocity with atrocity. In New Orleans we ached because we feared what was happening had to end; in Korea we ache because we fear it never will. Olmstead’s extraordinary language gives us new eyes. An exceptionally fine study of love, war and the double-edged role of memory, which can both sustain and destroy.

Prize-winning material.

TRUE

Pulkkinen, Riikka Other Press (368 pp.) $16.95 paperback | Mar. 20, 2012 978-1-59051-500-6 In Finnish author Pulkkinen’s first novel to be translated into English, a dying woman and her family become a prism illuminating love from a variety of often-uncomfortable angles.

Child psychologist Elsa and artist Martti Ahlqvist have had a long, apparently successful marriage. Their only child, Eleonoora, is a tirelessly efficient doctor with an understanding husband and two grown daughters of her own. In the final stage of terminal cancer Elsa comes home from the hospital to live her last days to the fullest. When Eleonoora’s older daughter Anna, an emotionally troubled graduate student, comes to visit and give Martti a

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“Hip and hilarious portrait of a crazy person.” from losing clementine

few free hours, Elsa arranges to picnic and play dress-up as they did when Anna was a child. But the dress Anna puts on never belonged to her grandmother. A surprised Elsa explains it belonged to a woman named Eeva. Eeva was Eleonoora’s nanny, hired so that Elsa could leave her very young daughter for weeks at a time while traveling for her career. Eeva also became Martti’s lover. As the characters remember or imagine Eeva’s life, she becomes a receptacle for all the forms love has taken in their lives. Imagining Eeva’s passion for Martti and Eleonoora as a child, Anna is influenced by her own unshakable sense of loss as she continues to miss the child of a former lover. Eleonoora, who does not consciously remember Eeva, has co-mingled memories of mother and nanny, but her deeprooted fear of abandonment keeps her emotionally wary. Even now, while dreading a life without Elsa, whom he has truly loved, Martti remembers Eeva with a mixture of longing and remorse. How much guilt should Martti, or Elsa, feel for what ultimately happened? Is blame even relevant? Was the nanny a surrogate wife and mother or a usurper? Eeva remains tantalizingly elusive as she becomes more real, a girl from the country swept up by the cultural changes of the 1960s.

The emotional intelligence of the prose avoids melodrama to develop authentic poignancy.

LOSING CLEMENTINE

Ream, Ashley Morrow/HarperCollins (320 pp.) $14.99 paperback | $9.99 e-book Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-06-209363-9 978-0-06-209364-6 e-book A successful, bipolar artist decides to live it up for 30 days before ending her own life.

Off her meds and manic (but certain she will never get better), Clementine Pritchard feels a sense of calm and purpose once she finally commits to killing herself. A well-known multimedia artist, Clementine suffers from debilitating, explosive mood swings not unlike the ones she witnessed her own mother going through during her childhood. Those ended badly when her mother shot herself and her younger sister Ramona, leaving Clementine to live with an aunt. Hoping to never leave her own loved ones to such a fate, she scores some animal tranquilizer in Tijuana and tells people she has inoperable brain cancer. Her inner circle, including her devoted assistant Jenny and still-smitten ex-husband Richard, try their best to help her, but her mind is made up. With the clock ticking, she makes good use of her time. She sleeps with both Richard (great) and her former shrink Miles (bad), poses nude for a rival artist and eats her way through the best ethnic takeout food L.A. has to offer. She works, too, hitting her creative stride and producing daring and dark new pieces. She also tries to get her affairs in order and find a home for her cat Chuckles, a male Persian almost as ornery as Clementine herself. Complications ensue, though, when she tracks down her long-lost father in 342

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Kansas City. Her hopes for healing and closure are turned on their head when a family drama gives her a chance, for a change, to be a caregiver rather than the one needing care. But is it enough to change her course? With her razor wit and over-itall candor, Clementine makes for a fascinating companion, and Ream manages to craft an engaging and impressive debut without soft-pedaling how very sick Clementine is. You’ll sure miss her when she’s gone.

Hip and hilarious portrait of a crazy person.

THE MAN FROM PRIMROSE LANE

Renner, James Sarah Crichton/Farrar, Straus and Giroux (384 pp.) $26.00 | Feb. 28, 2012 978-0-374-20095-4 This semi-autobiographical first novel, from the author of two true-crime works, is an anything-goes mashup involving child abductions and murders, time travel and the tribulations of a writer of the true-crime variety.

That writer is 34-year-old David Neff, living in Akron, Ohio, in 2012. When David was working as a journalist for an alternative newspaper, he became fascinated by the Brune case.

Brune, proclaiming his innocence, had been executed 10 years earlier for the murder of several young girls. Working through his “haunted” papers, David became convinced the killer was Brune’s roommate, Trimble, and wrote an accusatory book. His research came at a cost. Brune, no killer but really bad news, tried to possess David’s spirit. The writer had psychotic episodes until his therapist prescribed a strong medication. It was all worth it; Trimble confessed and the book became a huge bestseller. Commercial success was accompanied by personal tragedy: David’s wife Elizabeth committed suicide. Four years pass and David’s publisher presses him to write another true crime story, this one about the eponymous Man: an Akron recluse, identity a mystery, found murdered in his home. A tangled tale indeed, as timelines dissolve and Renner goes back and forth between the Brune/Trimble story and the new story of The Man. It would be nice if David was a stable element in the flux, but he’s not. Foolishly ignoring his therapist’s advice, he goes off his meds to write his new book, with disastrous results. But it’s in the novel’s final third that we move deep into fantasy. David’s character splits in two and half of him arrives in 2036. As he says, “Understanding time travel and its ramifications is a bit like going insane.” True enough, in Renner’s world.

A black egg will hatch as David returns to the present. Watch for a satanic cat and a second killer of young girls.

An incoherent muddle from start to finish.

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THE IGUANA TREE

Stone, Michel Hub City Press (220 pp.) $24.95 | Mar. 15, 2012 978-1-891885-88-4 Stone’s debut literary fiction gives face and spirit, emotion and character, to those braving the deadly trail across our southern border, seeking only to find work, living only to be pursued as illegal immigrants.

Héctor has set out from Puerto Isadore, a bucolic village near Oaxaca, Mexico, paying a coyote to smuggle him into America. Héctor has left his wife Lilia and baby daughter Alejandra, who live with Lilia’s beloved grandmother, Crucita. Lilia loves her village life, but Héctor is adamant that happiness and prosperity lie north, and he stakes his life on his quest, enduring a claustrophobic cross-border ride in a weldedshut compartment secreted under a delivery truck. After finding kinship with Miguel, another pollo, Héctor follows Miguel to Edisto Island, S.C., where Miguel’s cousin, Pablo, provides safe haven and help finding work. Héctor is fortunate in his new employers, Lucas and Elizabeth, owners of a tree farm, who reward his hard work and dedication. However, Héctor’s plans to save money to bring Lilia and Alejandra to America collapse when Crucita dies, and lonely Lilia defies Héctor’s demands she wait. With the help of a childhood friend, Emanuel, Lilia begins an illicit journey that soon descends into horror. After being repeatedly raped by her coyote, Lilia’s coerced into leaving Alejandra at the border to be smuggled in later. The latter third of the novel deals powerfully with Alejandra’s disappearance, Lilia’s helplessness and Héctor’s rage and despair, with Stone’s narrative flowing inescapably toward realistic resolution. Each character resonates authentically, and the contrasts between idyllic but circumscribed life in Mexico, the bloody border and the welcome success hard work can bring to an appreciative immigrant is empathetically rendered. Stone has done exceptional work in making real the struggles and despair, the resolute discipline and hope, driving the desire to find a better life while also illuminating unexpected connections of near-familial love among people of difference cultures who live and work together.

A haunting tale of hope and heartbreak.

WISH YOU WERE HERE

Swift, Graham Knopf (336 pp.) $25.00 | Apr. 17, 2012 978-0-307-70012-4

A novel as contemporary as international terrorism and the war in Iraq and as timeless as mortality, from one of Britain’s literary masters.

“The past is past, and the dead are the dead,” was the belief of the strongwilled Ellie, whose husband, Jack, a stolid former farmer, is the |

protagonist of Swift’s ninth and most powerful novel. As anyone will recognize who is familiar with his prize-winning masterworks (Last Orders, 1996, etc.), such a perspective on the past is in serious need of correction, which this novel provides in a subtly virtuosic and surprisingly suspenseful manner. It’s a sign of Swift’s literary alchemy that he gleans so much emotional and thematic richness from such deceptively common stock.

Jack and Ellie have grown up together in the British farm country, and their marriage is practically inevitable once both are on their own. Jack’s mother died when he was a boy; Ellie’s left home for another man. Jack’s brother, Tom, eight years younger but in many ways more worldly and self-assertive, forsakes the farm life to join the army as soon as he can. The fathers of Jack and Ellie both die; Tom remains out of contact for more than a decade. At Ellie’s insistence, they sell their property in order to run a seaside vacation park she has inherited. Every winter the childless couple takes a Caribbean vacation. When Tom dies in Iraq, Jack must deal with the arrangements. He cancels the annual vacation and his marriage all but unravels. The minister who had handled the funeral of Jack’s father and now his brother knows that the eulogy needs to be “as little and simple as possible…as simple as possible being really the essence of the thing.” Swift somehow cuts to the essence of both a family’s legacy and the modern malaise through the reticent Jack, who comes to terms with the realization that “all the things that had once been dead and buried had come back again.”

Profound empathy and understated eloquence mark a novel so artfully nuanced that the last few pages send the reader back to the first few, with fresh understanding.

THE BEGINNER’S GOODBYE

Tyler, Anne Knopf (208 pp.) $24.95 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-307-95727-6

Though the plot finds a man in early middle age coming to terms with the death of his wife, the tone of this whimsical fable is so light that it practically floats off the page.

Some might consider the latest from Tyler (Noah’s Compass, 2010, etc.) typically wise and charming, while others will dismiss it as cloying. She employs a first-person narrator, a 36-year-old man named Aaron, who works for a small-family publishing firm that specializes in its Beginners series. “These were something on the order of the Dummies books, but without the cheerleader tone of voice,” explains Aaron, who proceeds to offer the sort of insight that could come from almost any Tyler novel: “Anything is manageable if it’s divided into small enough increments, was the theory, even life’s most complicated lessons.” At the start of the book, Aaron is in the beginning stages of mourning, after a tree crashed through his house and crushed his slightly older wife. She was a doctor; Aaron is “crippled” and something of an oddball. As Tyler’s readers recognize, we are each

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of us crippled and oddball, deep down inside, and the fact that Aaron’s was a marriage of misfits makes it no different from any other. Early on, Aaron receives visits from his dead wife, whom no one else can see, and whom he admits might well be a projection or an apparition. If he is an unreliable narrator, he is also a flawed one, often sounding more like a much older woman than like a man his age (very few of whom use terms like “busy-busy”). Mourning is both a rite of passage and a process of discovery for Aaron, who early worries that, “I can’t do this…I don’t know how. They don’t offer any courses in this; I haven’t had any practice,” but who is ultimately not a tragic but comic figure, one who will (more or less) live happily ever after.

An uncharacteristically slight work by a major novelist.

LEAVING SOPHIE DEAN

Whitaker, Alexandra 5 Spot/Grand Central Publishing (352 pp.) $13.99 paperback | Mar. 26, 2012 978-0-446-58394-7 Your husband’s leaving you for another woman?

Why not wrong-foot him and get out yourself instead? That’s Sophie Dean’s move in a lightweight yet abrasive take on modern manners. Although it’s architect Adam Dean’s adultery that sets Whitaker’s debut in motion, this is a story in which predictable female figures predominate: best friends; professional vixens; innocent wives; co-conspirators in the battle of the sexes. When sophisticated, calculating Valerie Hughes, originally a colleague of Adam’s and now his mistress, forces him to choose between Sophie, his wholesome wife and the mother of his two adorable young children, and her, Adam, whose feelings are obscure, picks Valerie. But Sophie, although devastated, seizes the initiative and moves out of the family home in Boston’s suburbs herself, leaving Adam to cope with the kids. That’s the one original twist in Whitaker’s tale of marital discord, which is populated with characters tending either toward the unappealing or unconvincing and many of whom come with sharp edges. The exception is saintly Sophie, who emerges sadder, wiser and readier to accommodate an updated lifestyle and a husband who has suddenly discovered human and paternal feelings.

Whitaker has moments of insight, but her journey from brittle to peaceable lacks consistency or charm until its closing chapters.

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GOLIATH

Woodring, Susan St. Martin’s (320 pp.) $24.99 | Apr. 24, 2012 978-0-312-67501-1 A factory owner’s suicide hastens the decline of a small town.

Woodring (Springtime on Mars, 2008, etc.) doesn’t specify the state, but her fictional Goliath is clearly in the South, and the fact that the on-the-brink-ofbankruptcy factory makes furniture suggests her native North Carolina. It’s a mild October day when teenaged Vincent Bailey finds the crushed body of Percy Harding on the railroad tracks, but cold weather and hard times are coming. Percy’s death has changed Goliath’s zeitgeist, thinks police chief Clyde Winston: “It was as if every person in town had put their own bodies in way of the train and were all broken now, spiritless.” Mood-directing statements like this dot the narrative, which swoops in and out of many lives. Central among them is Rosamond Rogers, who was Percy’s secretary and has become a reluctant repository of her neighbors’ confidences about everything from stealing candy to deliberately pricking babies with diaper pins. None of the confidences seem to justify the book’s lugubrious atmosphere, nor does the main action, which shows Rosamond and her daughter Agnes groping for love with Clyde and his son Ray, county groundskeeper and freelance preacher. (Rosamond’s traveling-salesman husband left years ago; Agnes has dropped out of college and a sort-of marriage to return to Goliath, though she’s not quite sure why.) A more baroque plotline follows Vincent, radically unsettled by his discovery of Percy’s corpse, in his reckless friendship with the equally troubled Cassie, who incites the boy to eat increasingly dangerous objects (culminating in a live mouse) and to rob houses with her. These stories, and many other subordinate ones, develop very slowly, and Woodring’s tone adds to the sense of stasis—she mistakes portentousness for seriousness and proclamations for insights. The climax, complete with a parade, a baseball game and a cataclysmic fire, is much too obviously designed to ensure “that Goliath should end in devastation and miracle.”

Woodring’s ambitions exceed her accomplishments here. (Agent: Peter Steinberg)

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“As usual, the solid mystery is supplemented with herbal wisdom and local Texas recipes.” from cat’s claw

m ys t e r y CAT’S CLAW

Albert, Susan Wittig Berkley Prime Crime (320 pp.) $25.95 | Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-425-24527-9 A police chief and an amateur sleuth combine their talents to solve a series of crimes.

At first, computer expert Larry Kirk’s shooting appears to be suicide. It turns out, however, that he had already been involved in a crime when his shop was broken into. Police Chief Sheila Dawson, who’s handling the case, is fighting the good old boy network in Pecan Springs, Texas, but her friend, defense attorney–turned-herbalist China Bayles, doesn’t call her “smart cookie” for nothing. There’s little mystery about who broke into the computer store: It was local big shot George Timms. Though he was supposed to surrender to police, he vanished instead, making him suspect number one when evidence proves Kirk was murdered. China’s partner in several enterprises lives on the same street as Kirk, and her visiting sister found the body. On a hunch, China visits Timms’ cabin. There she finds evidence of wild parties, child porn and more murder when she stumbles over Timms’ body, who was killed by a mountain lion. Sheila and her staff hunt down clues while China sifts through local gossip the police chief never hears. Once they’ve dug up motives for any number of people, they have to figure out which of them is the guilty party. Sheila walks off with top honors in China’s latest (Mourning Gloria, 2011, etc.).

As usual, the solid mystery is supplemented with herbal wisdom and local Texas recipes.

JUSTICE DEFERRED

Ashford, Jeffrey (192 pp.) $27.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7278-8100-7

Was sorely used Elaine Cane behind her unmourned husband’s fatal fall from an internal balcony?

No one but the CID would blame her if she was. An aneurism had turned John Cane into an abusive drinker, and a threatened lawsuit had brought his security-systems company to the brink of collapse. If it hadn’t been for a fat life-insurance policy, the much younger wife he’d tussled with physically hours before his death would have been left destitute. But at least she wouldn’t have been alone—not if it had been up to Mike Linton, the painter Cane had hired to create a portrait of his wife. The whole setup looks too convenient to DS Bill Hopkins, DC Brian |

Morgan and Constable Tristram Lewis, and after several rounds of increasingly pointed questioning, Elaine is arrested for manslaughter. Although it’s clear that she and Linton are indeed in love, both the widow and the painter, who specializes in gamey nudes commissioned by men’s magazines, swear that nothing improper has passed between them. As the net tightens around Elaine anyway, Linton, frantic to help her, hatches the 11thhour idea of providing her with an alibi, setting up a courtroom showdown and an ethical dilemma for an unexpected character.

Suspenseful but slender work from veteran Ashford (Criminal Innocence, 2010, etc.) that could pass for an episode of Law & Order: Surbiton.

NO COOPERATION FROM THE CAT

Babson, Marian Minotaur (288 pp.) $24.99 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-312-33240-2

This character-rich cozy gathers a cast of faded theater types who must protect their home from unwelcome drama.

Gracefully aging actresses Evangeline and Trixie have opened their home, and their kitchen, to Trixie’s daughter Martha and Martha’s editor Jocasta as the two put the finishing touches on Martha’s cookbook. When manly explorer Banquo comes stomping into the house with his sidekicks Tom and Mick, Jocasta is horrified to see him. While he was on his latest adventure, Banquo’s wife Melisande, the original designated author of the cookbook, met an untimely end during one of her cooking demonstrations. Not only does the suspicion of foul play make Jocasta, Melisande’s former assistant, a primary suspect, but it also derails the romance Jocasta hoped might develop between her and the rogue adventurer. Worse still, no one has had the good grace to tell poor Banquo about Melisande’s demise. Now Evangeline and Trixie’s home is invaded not only by these guests, invited and not, but also by Banquo’s trio of sinister aunts, who think that it’s Jocasta’s job to bear the bad news to their nephew.

Added to the mix is the hapless Teddy, who’s always ready to visit his beloved Cho-Cho-San, the clever bobtail cat he had to give to Evangeline and Trixie. The actresses must do what it takes to reclaim their home, and possibly their careers, as the mystery threatens to engulf them.

Though Babson (Only the Cat Knows, 2007, etc.) provides a title that’s a bit of a misnomer, the charming heroines’ adventures are satisfying if a bit overstuffed.

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THE COP WITH THE PINK PISTOL

Basnight, Gray Ransom Note (225 pp.) $14.95 paperback | Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-9773787-8-4 Consigned to detective hell—desk duty with an occasional robbery squeal— for unspecified departmental infractions, NYPD’s Donna Prima seeks redemption with help from a daytime drama star.

Even though he’s the second lead on TV’s top-rated Vampire Love Nest, right now Conner Anderson is just one more pissed off New Yorker. He wants the scumbag who broke into his Greenwich Village walk-up and stole his late father’s Ole Miss class ring publicly guillotined in Times Square. And even though Donna Prima thinks burglaries are a pain in the ass, she sees that Conner is kind of cute, in a drawly Southern way. So after work she goes back to his apartment and lets him show her the strange doings at O’Toole’s, the pub across the street. And damned if the guy isn’t as right as he’s good-looking. First, a black guy pulls up in a Rolls-Royce, wearing a full-length fox coat in the August heat. Then he goes into O’Toole’s. Then he emerges, not from the bar, but from the liquor store next door. When their surveillance is interrupted by shouts and shots, the detective and her amateur sidekick go into high gear (or as high as his Smart Car will let them). Pretty soon, they’ve drawn a bead on Fibonacci Brothers, trash haulers upstate in Port Juttistown, which is deliciously near the Dutch Point nuclear facility, a reactor losing track of uranium at an alarming rate according to two feds named Wilson and Holm. Figuring out what’s going down at Fibonacci Brothers just might be Donna’s ticket back to homicide—as long as she doesn’t have to use her pink snub-nosed .38 to find out.

Fast-paced and hilarious, Basnight’s debut makes the most of its offbeat crew and a New York locale as American as falafel.

HUSH NOW, DON’T YOU CRY

Bowen, Rhys Minotaur (288 pp.) $24.99 | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-312-62811-6 A police captain and his sleuthing spouse investigate a murder while on their honeymoon in early-20th-century Newport.

Molly Murphy and Daniel Sullivan had to give up their planned honeymoon when Daniel was called upon to investigate a fatal accident due to a collapse at a subway construction project. Now powerful Alderman Brian Hannan, part owner of the construction company, has offered them the use of a cottage on his Rhode Island estate. Perhaps he has an ulterior motive, for he tells Daniel that 346

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he thought he had got something wrong. Arriving late and soaking wet on a stormy night, Molly is sure she sees the face of a child in a tower of the main house. When Hannan’s extended family arrives the next day, they’re put out by his command to visit in the unfashionable off-season. They’re surprised when Hannan fails to show up and even more surprised when his body is found at the base of a cliff. The local police are eager to write it off as an accident, but Molly and Daniel are not so sure, and an autopsy proves he died from cyanide poisoning. Though the relatives are eager to see the sleuthing couple depart, Daniel is kept in place by pneumonia. Despite her agreement with Daniel to give up investigating, Molly can’t ignore the murder, especially when she learns that Hannan’s granddaughter died in a fall in the same spot.

The loving family members seem the most likely candidates for murderer, but which relative actually did the deed?

The latest addition to Molly’s case files (Bless the Bride, 2011, etc.) offers a charming combination of history, mystery and romance.

FORCE OF NATURE

Box, C.J. Putnam (352 pp.) $25.95 | Mar. 20, 2012 978-0-399-15826-1

The dark past from which Nate Romanowski’s hidden for so long and so successfully finally catches up with him and his friend, Wyoming Fish and Game Warden Joe Pickett (Cold Wind, 2011, etc.).

“The Five. They’ve deployed,” Nate’s pal Large Merle tells him with his dying breath. As soon as he hears the news, Nate knows that his years of living off the grid in Wyoming’s Twelve Sleep County—no job, no bank account, no Social Security number—haven’t buried him deep enough.

Setting his beloved falcon free and abandoning or destroying most of his meager belongings, he high-tails it out, pausing only to shoot three locals who draw on him first. Joe Pickett, tangling once more with Ten Sleep County Sheriff Kyle McLanahan over his responsibilities as government official, witness and friend of the fugitive Nate, is pulled so completely into the triple murder investigation that at one point Luke Brueggemann, his new trainee, asks him, “Does that mean we’re going to get to do real game warden stuff?” Nate, meanwhile, makes the rounds of all his closest friends and relations from his days in Special Forces and finds that those who haven’t recently died are in serious danger of getting killed before his eyes. Clearly John Nemecek, the master falconer from Special Forces who taught Nate everything he knows before sucking him into an improbable intrigue that led to a catastrophic screw-up for the federal government, is determined to keep his secret at all costs.

The secret is preposterous but serviceable, and the strenuously unnuanced story moves like greased lightning.

Box has done much better work, but this high-casualty actioner is just fine.

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TILL DEATH DO US PURL

Canadeo, Anne Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster (288 pp.) $15.00 paperback | Mar. 6, 2012 978-1-4391-9140-8 A knitting group takes on a wedding gown and a murder.

Maggie Messina owns the Black Sheep Knitting Shop, and she and her four likeminded friends, Lucy, Dana, Suzanne and Phoebe, are no strangers to sleuthing (A Stitch Before Dying, 2010, etc.). Maggie volunteers them to help finish a knitted wedding gown when the wedding date is suddenly changed. Nora Bailey and her daughter Rebecca are desperate for help, and Maggie and her pals are pleased to pitch in. The groom is Jeremy Lassiter, a brilliant scientist who works for his family’s company, in a race to get a patent on a new wonder glue. The gown is done on time, the wedding is lovely despite the animosity between Jeremy’s father, his divorced wife, a former business partner and Jeremy’s twin, who does not speak to his tyrannical father.

The knitters are all shocked to hear that there was a fatal explosion at the lab the night before the newlyweds were leaving for their honeymoon. The police begin to suspect Rebecca.

The knitters, sure she is innocent, go into sleuthing mode.

There are plenty of likely suspects and motives, they just have to figure out who committed a crime.

The fourth in the series provides an entertaining mystery along with knitting instructions and tasty recipes.

STAY CLOSE

Coben, Harlan Dutton (384 pp.) $27.95 | Mar. 20, 2012 978-0-525-95227-5 The past comes knocking for a former stripper who thought she’d said goodbye to all that in an altogether less-successful distaff reworking of The Innocent (2005).

In some ways, the life Megan Pierce left behind when she stopped giving lap dances and calling herself Cassie was perfect: exciting, glamorous and anything but routine. If only her abusive client Stewart Green hadn’t vanished under circumstances that strongly suggested a violent end, Megan would never have taken a powder, ultimately trading Atlantic City’s La Crème nightclub for the American dream with a lawyer husband, two perfect children and every appliance of the upscale suburban lifestyle. One day, however, Megan—motivated solely, it seems, by the need to kick-start the plot—decides to drop in at La Crème. Her sudden reappearance, together with her old colleague Lorraine Griggs’ sighting of somebody who looks a lot like Stewart and the remarkably similar disappearance exactly 17 years later of construction heir Carlton Flynn, sets in motion a new chain |

of violence and threatens to reveal all of Megan’s carefully hidden secrets. Eventually she reconnects with her old flame Ray Levine, a photographer who has hit the skids big time, and tells what she knows to Det. Broome of Atlantic City Homicide. But both men’s most protective instincts are challenged by a pair of wholesome killers calling themselves Barbie and Ken—and by the fact that Broome’s own boss is working against him.

A proficient but routine thriller in which you can tell for miles in advance who’s disposable and who’s slated for survival, marked by the virtual absence of the baroque plot twists fans of Coben (Live Wire, 2011, etc.) expect as their due.

GUILTY CONSCIENCES

Edwards, Martin--Ed. Severn House (240 pp.) $28.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7278-8024-6

Seventeen mostly new, and veddy British, stories from the Crime Writers’ Association (Original Sins, 2011, etc.).

Brevity is not only the soul of wit but the heart of this otherwise rather heartless collection. Four entries ring down the curtain in seven pages or less. Peter James reveals the downside of online romance; Claire Seeber shows a wifely worm turning; L.C. Tyler’s con-man bridegroom meets his match; Dan Waddell’s feverish monologue presents an abortive connubial reunion. The best of the longer (but not much longer) stories, Yvonne Walus’ World Cup serial killer and editor Edwards’ creepy adventures of a ventriloquist’s dummy, compress plots that could have been drawn out to much greater length, making their economy still another virtue. Susan Moody provides a malicious antidote to the obligatory Christmas visit to mother, and Robert Barnard uses a former foster child’s visit to his foster home as the basis for a scenario as bizarre as it is breathless. Amy Myers and Alanna Knight recount cases for signature detectives Jack Colby and Inspector Jeremy Faro.

Trickery and double meanings lurk in the clever titles chosen by Bernie Crosthwaite (“The Golden Hour”), Sarah Rayne (“The Unknown Crime”) and H.R.F. Keating (“The Visitor”—the one reprint here, but an unexpectedly haunting Inspector Ghote rarity abundantly worth a long second look). The roster of usual suspects is complemented by Ann Cleeves, Judith Cutler, Carol Anne Davis and Jane Finnis—some of them merely going through their accustomed paces, but never with less than a high professional finish.

The one cavil: very few guilty consciences on display here. Ah, that’s England.

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“A search for a last will and testament takes a sinister turn.” from the ely testament

THE MEMORY OF BLOOD

Fowler, Christopher Bantam (352 pp.) $25.00 | $12.99 e-book | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-345-52863-6 978-0-345-53213-8 e-book The Peculiar Crimes Unit (Bryant & May Off the Rails, 2010, etc.) celebrates its new digs in Caledonian Road by investigating a murder whose leading suspect is Mr. Punch, of Punch and Judy fame.

The party to celebrate the opening of Ray Pryce’s The Two Murderers, critically panned but highly commercial, comes to a crashing end with the news that theater owner Robert Kramer’s 1-year-old son Noah has been hurled from his nursery window.

Marks from the hands of a life-size puppet of Punch lying nearby are around the infant’s neck; the nursery door is locked from the inside; and the window is utterly inaccessible from the outside.

If the puppet didn’t throttle and shake the baby to death, who did, and how did he or she make his escape? Called to the scene by the bizarre nature of the crime, Arthur Bryant and John May find many outsized egos—including handsome leading man Marcus Sigler, flamboyant assistant stage manager Gail Strong and snarky reviewer Alex Lansdale, all hiding guilty secrets—but no answers to the obvious questions. To make matters worse, Anna Marquand, the freelance transcriber to whom Bryant has been dictating his memoirs, dies shortly after being mugged outside the door of her flat. Nor is the killer of Noah Kramer content to call it a day. Three more partygoers will die, winnowing the list of suspects without casting any more illumination, before a final brainwave at a reprise of the fatal party leads to an arrest.

Though no single element stands out, Fowler achieves a fine balance between the impossible crime, the juggling of suspects and motives, Mr. Bryant’s flights of recondite erudition, the planting and decoding of clues and the obligatory plots to discredit and disband the PCU. (Agent: Howard Morhaim)

BLOODLAND

Glynn, Alan Picador (352 pp.) $16.00 paperback | Feb. 1, 2012 978-0-312-62128-5 A plot-twisting, page-turning humdinger in which collateral damage gets a murderous spin.

Alive, actress/model Susie Monaghan snagged her allotted 15 minutes of fame and then some. Dead, she became an absolute sensation. She was gorgeous, yes. Talented, maybe. A head case, no question: a beautiful, outrageous flake who did drugs unabashedly and went through boyfriends carnivorously. A fatal helicopter crash off the coast of Ireland rocketed her to the top of the A-list, where she hovered indefinitely like some headline-hungry ghost.

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young Dublin journalist. Jimmy Gilroy, recently downsized, has received an unexpected and most welcome book deal. He’s charged with immortalizing Susie Monaghan, an assignment he’s prepared to take very seriously given his straitened circumstances, plus the attractive added inducement of Susie’s lovely sister, whose input he deems integral to the project. But then the worrisome phone calls from longtime friend and benefactor Phil Sweeney commence, suggesting ever more forcefully that he back off. Other voices join in. It’s from an obviously unnerved and deeply depressed former prime minister of Ireland, however, that he hears the phrase “collateral damage” applied to Susie. Five others died when the helicopter went down. Jimmy knew that, of course, but now he gets his first sulfuric whiff of something rotten being covered up.

His prose spare but spirited, Glynn (Winterland, 2011, etc.) spins an all-too-likely tale of secrets, lies and power corrupted. Chilling.

THE ELY TESTAMENT

Gooden, Philip Severn House (240 pp.) $28.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7278-8103-8

A search for a last will and testament takes a sinister turn.

It would prove a major embarrassment to the venerable law firm of Scott, Lye & Mackenzie if old Alexander Lye died intestate. A cursory search of the London home Lye shared with his sister discloses no will among the stacks of paperwork. So after the wake Tom Ansell, an associate in the firm, and his writer wife Helen are packed off to the family home near Ely to see if the document can be found there. Helen, an unusually independent Victorian woman, has a commission from a new publication to write about Cambridge.

When they go to Ely to join Mr. and Mrs. Ernest Lye for supper, they chance upon a crowd gathered around a dead body whom Tom recognizes as Mrs. Lye’s cousin Charles Tomlinson. The police arrest Ernest, but further investigation convinces them that he’s innocent, and finding other suspects is no very hard job. Tomlinson had recently returned from many years abroad after leaving university under a cloud. His charm has made him many friends who quickly turn to enemies when they realize he was just using them to pursue his nefarious schemes. Tom and Helen lend their experience with murder in cathedral towns (The Durham Deception, 2011, etc.) to help solve the case.

Interesting information on Victorian funerary customs doesn’t quite make up for a meandering mystery.

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KILL MY DARLING

Harrod-Eagles, Cynthia Severn House (272 pp.) $28.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7278-8137-3

If everyone so loved Melanie, how come she’s lying dead in the park?

Everyone who knew Melanie admired her, at least until DI Bill Slider began asking around. Then it turns out that her mum’s recent relationship with her had turned tetchy. Her stepdad may have slapped her around. Her live-in boyfriend was furious that she kept refusing his marriage proposals. And her downstairs neighbor, prickly Mr. Fitton, declines to comment on drinking with her at the pub. Was he obsessed with her and guilty of murdering her, just as he killed his own wife for her sexual misconduct? Slider and his coppers at London’s Shepherd’s Bush nick can’t puzzle out why Melanie left her house with only her keys and a Chinese takeaway and wound up dead shortly thereafter. The stepdad, the boyfriend and the neighbor all have alibis that eventually explode. Slider, left to dig into Melanie’s past for old traumas, learns that she never recovered from her father’s death in a major train collision years before. Putting the pieces of Melanie’s life back together brings another suspect to the surface, but a false confession will have to be debunked, a bit of insurance fraud uncovered and a bit of white dog hair used as evidence to reveal what turned poor Melanie into a victim. If you’re unlucky enough to be murdered, pray that DI Slider (Body Line, 2011, etc.) is handed your case.

And if he ever comes on the marriage market again, get in line for a chance at him.

THE STOLEN BRIDE

Hays, Tony Forge (352 pp.) $25.99 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-7653-2629-4

King Arthur’s counselor must wear many hats, including a deerstalker.

Malgwyn ap Cuneglas is awaiting the arrival of his child when Arthur, High King of the Britons, calls upon him to broker a peace among several warring tribes. Together they travel to the kingdom of Doged, a wise man who’s recently married a young woman in a final effort to secure an heir for his throne. On the way, they come upon a village sacked by unknown raiders where only one young girl survives. When they arrive, Doged announces his willingness to sign over the rights to gold and other minerals recently found in his kingdom to the consilium to be used for the good of the entire kingdom. Because Arthur must go to Tyntagel to see his ailing mother, it’s up to Malgwyn (The Beloved Dead, 2011, etc.) to sort things out. Soon after the arrival of Arthur’s troops, Doged is murdered and Mordred is suspected of the crime. |

Although Malgwyn hates Mordred, he does not think him guilty of this murder. Doged’s bride first claims, then denies, that she’s pregnant, leaving a group of ambitious and warring enemies to claim Doged’s kingdom. The presence of a Saxon delegation and the arrival of several of Arthur’s counsel members, all eager to usurp the king’s position, make matters ever more dangerous for Malgwyn, who must be both brave and clever to keep alive Arthur’s dream of a law-abiding kingdom.

A realistic portrait of post-Roman Britain as no Camelot but a down-and-dirty home to warring factions—complex, exciting and well worth your time.

POISON AT THE PUEBLO

Heald, Tim Creme de la Crime (208 pp.) $28.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-78029-010-2

A knighthood does nothing to moderate Simon Bognor’s preference for literate japery over honest sleuthing.

As head of the Special Investigation Division for the Board of Trade, Sir Simon (Death in the Opening Chapter, 2011, etc.) can pretty much manage his own portfolio. The latest case he fancies is gangster Jimmy Trubshawe’s death by mushroom. Since escaping from Scrubs five years ago, Jimmy’s mostly been lying low in sunny Spain, and he ended his days as a conversationalist at the English Experience, a total-immersion school-cum-resort for Spanish business types. When the same Prime Minster who elevated Simon to a knighthood makes it clear that he wants Simon to stay far away from the case, it’s like waving a red flag in front of a not very smart bull. So nothing daunted, Simon, with his wife Lady Monica and his dogsbody Harvey Contractor, heads off to the English Experience, whose current residents and staff seem to revel in their connections to the late Jimmy. All three of the native English speakers—Tracey, George and Camilla—have roots in Essex, Jimmy’s stomping ground. Camilla, who tells Simon that she and her SIS mates had a hand in Princess Diana’s death, blandly assures Simon that she’s equally involved in Jimmy’s death. George may be Jimmy’s brother, and Lola, a superstar Franciscan nun, may have been his mistress. Fans of retro British puzzlers will doubtless wait eagerly for the climactic revelations.

Readers will be disappointed by the non-solution, which Simon has the nerve to blame on 10 Downing Street instead of the author, only if they’ve made the mistake of taking the mystery any more seriously than the characters’ endless chatter about prawns, poison and themselves.

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MIDNIGHT GUARDIANS

King, Jonathon Severn House (224 pp.) $28.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7278-8105-2

Broward County private eye Max Freeman finds out once more—will he ever stop finding out?—that the Florida Everglades are just as dangerous as the streets he once patrolled as a Philadelphia cop.

Stuttering attorney Billy Manchester, Max’s best friend and employer, is on the trail of a conspiracy to bilk Medicare out of millions. He wants Max to meet with his informant, Luz Carmen, an associate nurse for Mediwheels and Prosthetics, to find out more. Max swiftly sees a problem: Luz’s kid brother Andrés is delivering information to the swindlers.

But only the violent developments waiting down the road will tell him just how deeply Andrés is involved. Meanwhile, Det. Sgt. Sherry Richards, Max’s girlfriend, has been assigned to help her Broward County colleague Marty Booker adjust to his new status after a hit-and-run driver puts a twist on a routine traffic stop that costs Marty both his legs. It’s an obvious choice, since Sherry lost a leg of her own in one of Max’s earlier adventures. Max can’t believe that the return of Carlyle Carter, the Fort Lauderdale drug dealer known as the Brown Man, to his turf is coincidental.

He’s right about that, of course, but the Brown Man’s exact place in the current mess is the closest thing to a surprise here.

Fifth and slightest of Max’s cases (Shadow Man, 2004, etc.), though the bleak South Florida backgrounds still provide a welcome counterpoint to Carl Hiaasen’s zanies.

GROUNDS FOR APPEAL

Knight, Bernard Severn House (224 pp.) $28.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7278-8107-6

A Home Office pathologist continues to expand the boundaries of his practice in postwar Wales.

Richard Pryor and his forensic biologist partner Angela Bray (According to the Evidence, 2011, etc.) are growing the practice they started in the Wye Valley after his return from Singapore in 1955. During the weeks Angela spends tending to her sick mother, Richard is joined by Priscilla Chambers, whose passion for anthropology is put to use by the case of the possible ancient bog body. When the body is dug out of the bog, hands tied and headless, they quickly realize that this is a much more recent case of murder. Their only clue is a Batman tattoo. While the police are busy trying to establish the identity of the dead man, the group gets another interesting case. They are called in to review the evidence and possibly testify at the appeal of a woman serving a life sentence for murder on slim evidence.

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very short time period, the only interval that evening when the woman had no alibi. The police get a break on Richard’s first case when they hunt down a head a Birmingham gangster has used as a warning to those who might be tempted to cross him, and Richard identifies the head as belonging to the body in the bog. But he is less successful in the other case, which brings him up against the hidebound traditions of British justice.

No thrills or chills here, but a solid look at the pathologist’s work along with evocative period details of a country slowly recovering from war.

THE COLD ROOM

Knightly, Robert Severn House (256 pp.) $28.95 | Feb. 1, 2012 978-0-7278-8085-7 A disgraced cop seizes an unexpected opportunity to redeem his reputation.

Hardboiled narrator Harry Corbin catches the case of a dead Jane Doe found along the East River by a beat cop. Noting that rigor mortis has not yet set in and that the victim has been gutted, Harry takes some photos and concludes that the woman was killed elsewhere and dumped here. Clyde Kelly, an elderly ex-con with a prosthetic leg whom Harry finds near the scene, nervously protests his innocence while describing a 50ish thug with “eyes like slits.” Harry sees an opportunity for much-needed redemption in this crime. He’s been a pariah ever since blowing the whistle on a clutch of dirty cops in his department. While trying to clear Harry’s name, his partner Adele Bentibi, who is also his live-in lover, was beaten by a bad cop named Linus Potter, though she managed to put him away. Now working as an investigator for the Queens DA, she’s the ideal sidekick for Harry in the case—and he badly needs her help, since he’s iced out of murder investigations by the department. Brooklyn’s large immigrant community and a charismatic Catholic priest called Father Stan, who feels a duty to protect them, figure prominently in Harry’s probe, which proceeds piece by (initially) baffling piece. As the picture becomes clearer, so does the danger to Harry.

Knightly’s gritty prose is sometimes marred by an awkward formality, but his second Harry Corbin novel (Bodies in Winter, 2009) moves with dark deliberation and feels authentic in every detail.

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“A spare but otherwise routine two rounds of larceny and betrayal...” from the thief

THE CHILD WHO

Lelic, Simon Penguin (256 pp.) $15.00 paperback | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-14-312091-9 Who deserves your sympathy most: the 11-year-old victim, the 12-year-old who killed her or the lawyer handling the case?

Felicity was a bright, bouncy, muchliked preteen. Adults doted on her, schoolmates clustered around her, and her future seemed unlimited—until Daniel Blake, barely a year older, assaulted her, tortured her, bound her hands with wire and left her to drown. County solicitor Leo Curtice happens to answer the phone call requesting representation for Daniel. From the moment he agrees, his life spirals out of control. The public is incensed that he’d defend the evil child. His own wife and teenage daughter beg him not to. But Leo needs to understand why Daniel became Daniel. The boy has nothing to say. His mum defers to his stepdad, who just wants Daniel to admit guilt, take his punishment and keep the matter from going to trial. But Leo keeps asking why: why did this happen, what’s in Daniel’s past?

When menacing letters arrive threatening Leo’s family, he downplays the danger. But his wife spots a loiterer at their window, and they’re followed and photographed during a day at the beach.

Then Leo’s daughter goes missing, and he and his wife suffer the anguish of Felicity’s family. Did the letter writer abduct her? No one can be sure. His marriage disintegrates. Should he have abandoned Daniel and protected his family? It will take 10 years and even more tragedy before he gets answers to any of these questions. Jarring, disturbing and not for the emotionally squeamish.

Lelic (A Thousand Cuts, 2010, etc.) faces thorny issues of guilt and responsibility head on, and no one comes out unscathed.

THE THIEF

Nakamura, Fuminori Soho Crime (224 pp.) $23.00 | Mar. 20, 2012 978-1-61695-021-7 Nakamura’s first English translation takes a Tokyo pickpocket out way past his depth and makes him squirm.

Nishimura lives by his wits and other people’s money. He has eyes that can spot the wealthiest person in a crowd and fingers that can swipe a wallet without raising an eyebrow.

As for nerves, he seems to thrive on the rush he gets every single time he breaks the law. All that changes when he lets Ishikawa, his former partner and mentor, rope him into a very different kind of criminal enterprise. Together with his sometime colleague Tachibana, they’re hired, or rather forced, by a big fish named Kizaki to accompany some of Kizaki’s regulars on a robbery. The job is routine, Kizaki blandly insists: All they have to do is tie up a rich man’s mistress and keep her quiet while |

the regulars force the man to give up the combination to his safe. Nishimura, who’s evidently led a sheltered life that hasn’t included the reading of much crime fiction, is amazed to learn that after he and his mates left the house, the regulars killed their victim, a prominent politician, igniting a string of consequences that won’t be over until Kizaki lures Nishimura into his net for another job. Nishimura never wonders how this second caper will turn out, and neither will most readers.

A spare but otherwise routine two rounds of larceny and betrayal fleshed out by the narrator’s reflections on the Zen of picking pockets.

THE TRUTH OF ALL THINGS

Shields, Kieran (416 pp.) $25.00 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-307-72027-6 1892. A Deputy Marshal, a criminalist, a library researcher and a doctor combine their talents to search for an elusive serial killer.

The mayor of Portland, Maine, is doing his best to hide the facts of a gruesome murder. Prostitute Maggie Keene has been found dead in a machine shop. The floorboards are ripped up, a cryptic message is chalked on a wall and she is pinned to the dirt with a pitchfork through the neck, candles at her feet, missing a hand and tongue, with a cross cut into her chest. The coroner, Dr. Steig, has already sent for the man he thinks might help. Perceval Grey, half Native American, was raised and well educated by his wealthy grandfather after his father died in an apparently accidental drowning. A former Pinkerton agent, he now conducts private investigations. Deputy Marshal Lean is not sure what to expect from Grey but quickly learns his skills will be needed in this outré case. Although the scrawled message was a bad translation of the Lord’s Prayer into Abenaki, the authorities soon receive a letter assuring them the killer is not an Indian but a servant of the devil. Grey’s investigations persuade him that Maggie’s was the second death in a series that will continue unless they can find the killer. With help from Steig’s niece, Helen Prescott, a researcher at the town library, he finds a pattern that leads back to the Salem Witch Trials. More deaths will follow before the investigators can unravel what appear to be the ravings of a madman.

Both the detailed historical information and the intricate mystery hold your attention to the last page in Shields’ startling debut. (Author events in Portland, Maine. Agent: Suzanne Gluck)

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CRYING OUT LOUD

Staincliffe, Cath Severn House (176 pp.) $27.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7278-8020-8

How can you solve a murder if the baby needs changing?

Manchester private eye Sal Kilkenny, a single mother living with her young daughter and Ray, a roommate-turnedlover, and his young son, isn’t at all sure she wants to take on the job of proving that Damien, who confessed to murdering Charles Carter, is really innocent. Damien’s sister thinks so, Charlie’s mistress Libby isn’t sure, and now Damien himself has recanted his confession. Sal barely has time to set up a prison visit with Damien, though, because someone has left a baby on her doorstep with a note promising to explain matters later. Ray wants the baby turned over to Social Services, the kids think of the tot as a new toy, and Sal broods and labors to fit nappy changes in between murder enquiries and vice versa.

Damien, his memory fogged by drugs, is little help in recounting what put him in jail. Before Sal makes any headway, he hangs himself in his cell. Painstakingly, she reviews the alibis of everyone from Charlie’s betrayed wife to his emotionally bereft teenage son to his mistress, now the mother of his other child. His ex–business partner, a con man, appears and attacks Sal. Is the foundling on her doorstep a by-blow of Ray’s? He’s gone incommunicado and can’t be asked. The kids and relationship tension take up much of Sal’s time, but detailed scrutiny of the murder timetable upends several alibis and seems to vindicate Damien, leaving Sal free to connect with the baby’s mum.

Emotionally gritty, though it’s hard to admire Sal’s taste in men or her pedestrian investigative methods (Missing, 2007, etc.).

HELSINKI WHITE

Thompson, James Putnam (304 pp.) $25.95 | Mar. 15, 2012 978-0-399-15832-2

Finland’s top cop gets to run his very own black-ops unit—and rue the day he ever took what looked like a dream job.

Desperate to hide the ultra-compromising video Inspector Kari Vaara has of him, Jyri Ivalo, Finland’s national chief of police, offers him a free hand assembling a dream team, financed by whatever it can steal from the bad guys, to go after international traffickers in human flesh. Determined “to help people” now that he’s a new father, Kari (Lucifer’s Tears, 2011, etc.) brings in his loose-cannon partner Milo Nieminien and his protégé Sulo (Sweetness) Polvinen and hits the bricks. Their first few forays, informed by intel from Ivalo, net them some fast cash, some sweet bonuses and the opportunity to mingle with 352

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some highly placed politicians and financiers. Despite the sweet smell of success, however, Kari and his mates, dirty cops in all but name, are already getting sucked into a cesspool of corruption. Ironically, the tipping point comes with the order to close a pair of high-profile cases that even the cleanest cops would be proud to investigate: the recent beheading of pro-immigration activist Lisbet Söderlund and the year-old kidnapping of Antti and Kaarina Saukko, son and daughter of megalomaniac industrialist Veikko Saukko, and Kaarina’s murder three days after she was ransomed and returned unharmed. Joining forces with highly questionable French police officer Adrien Moreau to turn over the appropriate rocks, Kari finds himself swiftly borne into the heart of anti-immigration darkness and unable to recognize or accept the person he’s turning into.

Enough violent felonies for a Sunday newspaper—and, as a depressingly informative epilogue intimates, that’s exactly where they’ve come from.

SO PRETTY IT HURTS

White, Kate Harper/HarperCollins (336 pp.) $24.99 | Mar. 20, 2012 978-0-06-157660-7 Celebrity-crime writer Bailey Weggins (Over Her Dead Body, 2005, etc.) returns for another round of crime in which she gets a mite too close to the celebrities.

When her current Mr. Right, Beau Regan, announces that maybe he’ll be back from his documentary shoot by Saturday night and maybe he won’t, Bailey’s miffed enough for some gentle retaliation: She’ll accept her best bud Jessie Pendergrass’ invitation to join her at record producer Scott Cohen’s bucolic upstate place for the weekend. Bad move. A combination of winter weather and a power outage strands the B-list guests in the converted barn; Scott whispers to Jessie that he’d love to try a threesome with Bailey; and, oh yeah, the headline guest, veteran model Devon Barr, dies of an unexplained heart attack. Since it’s Bailey’s job to explain the inexplicable for Buzz, she’s quizzing Devon’s agent Cap Darby, his wife Whitney, Devon’s booker Christian Hayes, Devon’s model friend Tory Hart and Tory’s rocker boyfriend Tommy Quinn about what they saw and heard and know even before the lights come back on and the party can return to the Big Apple, where secrets will be disclosed and tension will fizzle—or rather be recalled to its roots. Instead of asking which bland celebrity fed anorexic Devon the diuretic that killed her, fans can noodle over the larger questions of whether a blackmail accusation will get Bailey sacked from Buzz and whether she and her Beau really have what it takes for the long haul.

Half And Then There Were None, and half relationship primer. (Author appearances in New York)

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DARKER THAN ANY SHADOW

Whittle, Tina Poisoned Pen (306 pp.) $24.95 | paper $14.95 | Lg. Prt. $22.95 Mar. 6, 2012 978-1-59058-546-7 978-1-59058-548-1 paperback 978-1-59058-547-4 Lg. Prt. Money under the mattress, a kitchen full of knives and a bathroom littered

with a corpse.

Is this any way to run a poetry slam? Gearing up for the Performance Poetry Internationals, Atlanta’s Spoken Word Poetry team decides to oust Lex, reinstate Vigil and debut Rico as their newest member at a splashy dinner event. Rico, however, is scared Vigil will come after him, gun blazing, over a slight misunderstanding involving a switchblade and a run-in with cops. So he asks his best friend Tai’s boyfriend Trey, former cop and SWAT

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stalwart now rehabbing from a car accident that rearranged his right frontal lobe and rewired him into a human lie detector, to keep an eye open for trouble. Tai, who’s been immersed in trouble ever since inheriting her uncle’s gun shop (The Dangerous Edge of Things, 2011), tags along to the party, only to overhear a threat about missing money, then getting soaked to her undies by a faulty sprinkler system, and worst of all, discovering Lex dead on the floor of the bathroom. Naturally, Tai, who has the gumption and nosiness of Stephanie Plum, snoops enough to unearth blackmail, suspiciously placed clues, many mentions of a snake and the second dead body she’s come across in a week, this one belonging to Debbie, a poetry team gofer. Garritty, Trey’s former APD partner, tries to help out, but Tai still winds up facing a perp with a gun and needing to trust Trey’s ex-girlfriend.

A must-read if you dote on romance with a touch of wry and mystery with enough suspects to fill a football stadium.

(Author tour to Phoenix; Reno; Sacramento; Charleston, SC; Oakmont, PA; Winston Salem, NC. Regional author appearances in Georgia.)

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“An open-and-shut case of murder in a coastal Oregon resort town can’t be closed...” from death of an artist

DEATH OF AN ARTIST

Wilhelm, Kate Minotaur (304 pp.) $24.99 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-312-65861-8

An open-and-shut case of murder in a coastal Oregon resort town can’t be closed even though everyone concerned knows perfectly well who’s responsible.

Stefany Markov, whose peaceful canvases belie her turbulent spirit, has never shown her husbands much patience. So when she learns that spouse #4, Dale Oliver, has put price tags on the paintings she was exhibiting at the Silver Bay gallery he owned with Freddi Wordling, no one’s surprised when she screams that he’s through. The surprise is the contract she signs authorizing him to exhibit and even sell work she’s been hoarding for 30 years. An even bigger surprise is the news that she signed the contract with Dale “Stephanie Markoff,” presumably intending that the misspellings of both her first and last names would void the contract and torment Dale. Sadly, this last revelation comes only after Stef has taken a fatal tumble down the stairs in her home and Dale indicates his intention of enforcing the contract. Stef’s mother Marnie and her daughter Van, both convinced that Dale pushed her to her death before she could shove him out of her life, ask Tony Mauricio, a New York cop sent into disability retirement by a hail of bullets, to prove that Dale killed Stef. The more closely Tony looks into the case, the less confident he is that there’s any evidence against Dale that rises to the level of legal proof. But even if Tony can’t send Dale to prison, he has a much better chance of killing him.

The creator of attorney Barbara Holloway (Heaven Is High, 2011, etc.) forgoes hot-button legal issues for a case that provides no mystery and little suspense but delivers the expected pleasures of the Howcatchem.

ELEGY FOR EDDIE

Winspear, Jacqueline Harper/HarperCollins (352 pp.) $25.99 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-06-204957-5 A determined psychologist and private investigator looks into the death of Eddie, a gentle man who seemed to have no enemies, certainly not among the horses he charmed.

Education and inheritance have raised Maisie Dobbs (A Lesson in Secrets, 2011, etc.) to loftier heights in the hidebound British class system of the 1930s.

But she can never forget the poor neigh borhood in which she was raised. So she doesn’t hesitate when the costermongers of Covent Garden ask her to investigate Eddie’s death after he’s crushed by a roll of paper at the factory of wealthy Canadian newspaper baron John Otterburn. The more Maisie finds out, the more she’s convinced that Otterburn is using his considerable influence to steer Britain toward a confrontation with a 354

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resurgent Germany led by Hitler. After one of her employees is badly beaten and a newspaperman who was using the childlike Eddie to gather information apparently takes his own life, Maisie uses the connections of her wealthy lover James Compton to learn more about Otterburn’s influence. Despite mounting danger, she continues to investigate while trying to put her own life in order. In the midst of a difficult case, she must examine her life and decide whether she loves James enough to marry him. Certainly not Winspear’s strongest mystery.

But newcomers will enjoy the exploration of class-bound Britain between the wars, and fans will relish the continued development of Maisie’s complicated character. (Author tour to Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Portland, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington, D.C. Agent: Amy Rennert)

science fiction and fantasy BLUE MAGIC

Dellamonica, A.M. Tor (352 pp.) $14.99 paperback | Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-7653-1948-7 Sequel to Indigo Springs (2009), where magic, driven into the “unreal” in the 17th century by witch-burning Fyremen, is returning, setting off power struggles and war.

In the unreal, magic (a blue substance called vitagua) is frozen into glaciers and as it melts it trickles back into our world. The process can be gradual or explosive. Astrid Lethewood, a “chanter” (she crafts magical objects using vitagua), fears chaos and violence and seeks a gradual course. There are dreadful complications, however. Former police negotiator Will Forest, once Astrid’s interrogator, has joined Astrid as her backup. Astrid’s old friend Sahara Knax, now brimming with vitagua, has made herself the center of a cult, the Alchemites, who worship Sahara as a goddess. Problem is, though the Alchemites think they’re saving the environment, Sahara’s only interested in power and will sacrifice anybody to keep it.

After the Alchemites sank an aircraft carrier, the army captured Sahara but can only keep her confined with the help of Gilead Landon, the chief Fyreman, whose followers also maintain the curse that taints the vitagua as it gushes out. And Astrid’s mother now calls herself Everett, having transformed into a man. Pressure continues to build; violence, once sporadic, increases; and the “grumbles,” voices from—somewhere—that Astrid hears, predict Astrid’s death, but also a happy ending. Previously charming and intimate, the narrative’s now become a seething fireball

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of ideas, actions and plots, complicated by GBLT and environmental agendas and a cast of thousands. Undeniably, something changed when the story jumped from local to global, and readers must judge for themselves which approach they prefer.

Far from disappointing but not quite what the first volume seemed to promise.

SECRETS OF THE FIRE SEA

Hunt, Stephen Tor (464 pp.) $27.99 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-7653-2767-3

Another entry in Hunt’s steampunk/ what-all series (The Rise of the Iron Moon, 2011, etc.).

Ice-covered and only marginally habitable, surrounded by a magma sea, the island continent of Jago is the only place

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where electricity works. Emigration is forbidden and most of Jago’s underground cities are abandoned. When young Hannah Conquest, a Jackelian by birth, was orphaned, Archbishop Alice Gray of the Circlist Church—another Jackelian exile—took her as a ward. But even Alice is helpless when the Guild of Valvemen’s evil leader, Vardan Flail, conscripts Hannah. Despite their skill with electricity and computing, valvemen rapidly develop hideous deformities due to radiation. Worse, when Alice is brutally and mysteriously murdered in her own cathedral, somebody also tries to kill Hannah, evidently in an attempt to suppress a secret kept by the archbishop and presumably passed to Hannah. Perhaps the death of Hannah’s archaeologist parents shortly after her birth was not accidental. Meanwhile, in the Kingdom of Jackals, Jethro Daunt, a defrocked Circlist parson turned private investigator, and his sidekick, a sentient-robot steamman named Boxiron, accepts the Circlist Inquisition’s request (read demand) to investigate the murder of the archbishop. This relatively sedate beginning swiftly accelerates into typically frenzied action and mind-boggling invention involving duels, gods, assassinations, battles, intrigue, cryptography

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“A solid if bland techno-thriller, which hums along nicely until an absurd mystical finale.” from triggers

SHADOW’S MASTER

and dangerous secrets: Hunt sets no limits on anything, which is both the attraction and the problem.

A slow-starting murder mystery that rapidly turns hyper-complicated and explosive, though for many readers the series remains very much an acquired taste.

TRIGGERS

Sawyer, Robert J. Ace/Berkley (336 pp.) $25.95 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-1-937007-16-4 Sci-fi veteran Sawyer (WWW: Wonder, 2011, etc.) turns in a solid if bland technothriller, which hums along nicely until an absurd mystical finale.

A few years in the future, America is under siege from terrorist attacks, which have struck major cities including Chicago, San Francisco and Philadelphia. As the president prepares to address the nation from the Lincoln Memorial, a would-be assassin strikes, and the president is rushed to the hospital with life-threatening injuries.

While surgeons work to save the president’s life, a research scientist in the same building conducts memory experiments on a soldier with post-traumatic stress disorder using a radical new technique. These two events become intertwined when a bomb goes off at the White House, sending out an electromagnetic pulse that amplifies the scientist’s equipment and creates mental linkages among 20 people in the hospital. Each person can now access the memories of one other person, and the Secret Service must protect national security by discovering who is linked to the president. That quest takes up most of the first half of the book, with breaks to examine how the memory linkages have affected various other characters. The eventual answer is a little predictable and anticlimactic, however, and the book’s political-thriller aspects are unexceptional. Sawyer’s writing is functional and colorless, but his characters are engaging enough that seeing how they deal with their newfound memories is engrossing. The story barrels forward quickly with a number of mini-cliffhangers, but by the end Sawyer drops almost all of the lingering plot questions in favor of a rushed, preachy resolution. It negates pretty much all of the interesting scientific concepts he’s raised, substituting in a pseudo-religious awakening that magically solves all of the characters’ problems (as well as humanity’s).

Readers hooked by the futuristic excitement may be disappointed in the lack of follow-through.

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Sprunk, Jon Pyr/Prometheus Books (318 pp.) $17.95 paperback | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-61614-605-4 Third in the series (Shadow’s Lure, 2011, etc.) in which knife-wielding, magic-powered assassin Caim Du’Vartha tries to figure out what’s going on.

Caim’s magic derives from his control over mysterious shadow-entities that crawl all over everything; sometimes they heal him, sometimes they kill people (or wait for Caim to do the job) and drink their blood. He sets off to the north, along with some warrior friends, following a psychic lure that he hopes will bring him to the secret behind his mother’s disappearance and his power over the shadows. He leaves Josey, his lover, now Empress of the Nimean Empire and pregnant, to consolidate her power—but instead she faces a new invasion from the north by barbarian warriors who vastly outnumber her own forces. Caim is also accompanied, or haunted, by a disembodied sprit, Kit, who turns out to be an immortal Fae and more often an annoyance than a help; how she manages to float around like a ghost remains unexplained.

Another character, Balaam, also a magic-powered assassin but in service to the Dark Lord whom Caim is destined to confront, is beginning to have doubts. Sprunk writes effective action prose and makes worthy efforts to develop his characters, but Josey’s political backdrop is naïve. The evil shadows have some strikingly original touches, yet their motivations could have been wielded much more effectively; instead we end up with a rather trudging showdown, as if Aragorn learned that Sauron was his grandfather and stopped to chat before battling it out. The good news is that Sprunk continues to improve.

Series fans will dive right in; curious newcomers should begin at the beginning and avoid at least some of the confusion.

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nonfiction THE SHADOW CATCHER

ARAB SPRING DREAMS The Next Generation Speaks Out for Freedom and Justice from North Africa to Iran

Acosta, Hipolito with Pulitzer, Lisa Atria (352 pp.) $24.99 | $11.99 e-book | Apr. 17, 2012 978-1-4516-3287-3 978-1-4516-3289-7 e-book Aided ably by freelance journalist Pulitzer (co-author: Mob Daughter, 2012, etc.), an officer with the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service recounts his undercover exploits along the border.

Every time he accepted an assignment, Acosta, who was raised in a poor but striving family on the U.S. side of the border, understood he might never see his wife and children again.

However, fueled by a sense of adventure and an obsession to arrest greedy, heartless criminals, he accepted countless assignments he probably could have turned down based on seniority and already established courage. Like previous books by undercover law-enforcement officers, this one is nearly impossible to verify in every detail. More than other books of the genre, however, it feels authentic, partly because Acosta relies less heavily on made-up names, partly because his welcome modesty frequently trumps macho storytelling. In the opening chapter, Acosta provides a gripping, especially detailed account of his undercover experience as a pollo, or chicken, a derogatory yet descriptive term of poverty-stricken Mexican citizens who pay exploitative smugglers to help with illegal border crossings.

To gather intelligence about a notorious smuggling family, the Medinas, Acosta realized he would need to place his life in danger. While trapped with real-life pollos in the fetid, locked cargo hold of a U-Haul, Acosta began to wonder if they would emerge alive on the other side of the border. The story of how he managed to survive and eventually put members of the Medina enterprise in prison gives the book a potent opening momentum that continues throughout.

A gut-wrenching law-enforcement yarn, simultaneously frightening and uplifting.

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Ahmari, Sohrab and Weddady, Nasser--Eds. Palgrave Macmillan (256 pp.) $17.00 paperback | May 8, 2012 978-0-230-11592-7 Law student Ahmari and Weddady, civil rights outreach director of the American Islamic Congress, present the “most compelling voices” from an essay competition they organized shortly after Lebanon’s Cedar Revolution in 2005.

The online competition was designed to give a means of expression to individuals under the age of 25 looking to find their voices on issues of religious and political freedom and human rights. During a five-year period, the editors received more than 8,000 essays from 22 countries in four languages. Each year the writers were asked to share either an example of the “pain of repression,” or concrete projects designed to strengthen civil rights or dreams of a better future. As a byproduct the process also opened pathways to recruit activists. The editors present the essays under three headings: “Trapped,” “Unequal” and “Breaking Through.” The views expressed by the essayists reflect an impressively diverse cross-section of the Middle Eastern world. From Iran came contributions from the Baha’i and the Sunni religious minorities. The Baha’i are not allowed to participate in Iran’s educational institutions, and Sunni ways of praying are banned in Shia Iran. The appeal for religious freedom also came from Saudi Arabia, where a student explores her process of standing up for herself against a repressive teacher. Also included are horrifying accounts of fundamentalist violence from Algeria and pleas for Western-style freedoms for homosexuals, along with accounts of the persecution of women.

A slim volume that successfully presents “treasures, surprises, and rewards.”

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“A charming, hilarious account of la vie Parisienne as experienced by an observant young American.” from paris, i love you but you ’re bringing me down

THE CAUSE The Fight for American Liberalism from Franklin Roosevelt to Barack Obama

Alterman, Eric and Mattson, Kevin Viking (544 pp.) $29.95 | Apr. 16, 2012 978-0-670-02343-1

A liberal columnist and a professor examine the zigzag route of liberal politics since the New Deal.

Before the book was finished, Mattson (Contemporary History/Ohio Univ.; “What the Heck Are You Up To, Mr. President?”: Jimmy Carter, America’s “Malaise,” and the Speech that Should Have Changed the Country, 2009, etc.) left the partnership with the Nation contributor Alterman (Kabuki Democracy: The System vs.

Barack Obama, 2011, etc.), who wrote the final draft. A chronicle of liberalism’s successes and failures, the text travels the labyrinthine road from the New Deal to the rise (and fall) of unionism, the theorists of the 1940s and ’50s (Dean Acheson, George Kennan), the battle against McCarthyism and the failures of Adlai Stevenson, whom Alterman writes helped create the notion of the effete intellectual. The author then charts the rise of the Kennedys, the tragic assassinations of the ’60s, civil rights and Lyndon Johnson, Betty Friedan and the feminist movement, the campaign and electoral failures of Eugene McCarthy, McGovern, Carter, Dukakis, Gore and Kerry. Alterman pauses often to visit relevant cultural history—the emergence of influential journals, Mailer’s writing, DeVoto’s criticism, Elia Kazan’s films, Cheever’s stories, the various liberal contributions of actor Sidney Poitier, novelist William Styron, filmmaker Oliver Stone and—in a long section—rocker Bruce Springsteen. Alterman points out continually how liberals have often been their own worst enemies—failing to stand up to the violence of the far left in the ’60s, fearing being branded “anti-American” in the face of war (Iraq), failing to confront the Tea Party and the ever-more-rightward GOP. Unfortunately, Alterman too often quotes others and only rarely flashes the scimitar wit he displays in the Nation.

Thorough and thoughtful, but with dense scholarly foliage that needs pruning.

TACO USA How Mexican Food Conquered America

Arellano, Gustavo Scribner (320 pp.) $24.00 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-1-4391-4861-7

An appealing cultural exploration of Mexican food in the United States.

Part history, part social commentary, Arellano’s (Orange County: A Personal History, 2008, etc.) comprehensive narrative will certainly whet the appetite of readers, as he chronicles how Mexican food 358

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products moved across the border and into American homes, restaurants and grocery stores. The author discusses tamales sold on the street corners of Chicago, canned tortillas and the first frozen-margarita machine, now ensconced in the Smithsonian. He examines the advent of the Mexican restaurant and the rise of Taco Bell, Chi-Chi’s and other chains, chili con carne cook-offs and the difference between Tex-Mex and true Mexican food. Arellano explains the history behind bottled salsa and the idea that the product is the “top-selling condiment in this country, even more than ketchup. It’s partly true: salsa does bring in more revenue for companies than ketchup…but [in 2007] ketchup moved more units.” Readers travel along with the author as he explores the rise of Mexican cookbooks, most written by non-Mexicans, the author’s five favorite Mexican meals in the United States and the search for “authentic” Mexican food. Because Mexican food is so ubiquitous—from restaurant menus to grocery-store shelves—Arellano writes, “the purpose of this book is not just to cover a cuisine whose history barely registers into the official American story, but to make ustedes hungry. I want not only to make you desire Mexican food, but also to understand it, to appreciate it further.”

Mission accomplished. Readers will come away not only hungry, but with a deeper understanding of the Mexican people and their cuisine.

PARIS, I LOVE YOU BUT YOU’RE BRINGING ME DOWN

Baldwin, Rosecrans Farrar, Straus and Giroux (304 pp.) $26.00 | May 1, 2012 978-0-374-14668-9

A charming, hilarious account of la vie Parisienne as experienced by an observant young American.

Working for an advertising agency while he wrote his first novel (You Lost Me There, 2010), Baldwin discovered some very French things about office life in Paris: You have to eat lunch, because the company docks a portion of your pay and returns it to you as meal coupons. Aggressively sexual comments and jokes about Jews or blacks are fine, and anyone offended by them is being “pay-say” (PC, the dreaded politically correct). It’s virtually impossible to get fired, even if you rarely show up, do no work and are thoroughly obnoxious. The author also discovered that French banks seem never to have heard of credit cards, and although he and wife qualified as legal residents for health-insurance coverage, the cards permitting them to actually use the insurance didn’t arrive until a month before they left.

Nonetheless, despite tight finances and loud construction work around their apartment, Baldwin fell in love just like everyone else. “Dude, Paris,” said a friend after the author explained that it took him 15 minutes to buy a bottle of water in a café because the woman in front of him in line wanted to know what made the salad taste so good, which required the input of two employees and a phone call to the manager. “Honestly, nothing comes close.”

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As the dude suggests, the author and his friends were not so long out of college—he turned 31 while he was there in the spring of 2008—and still settling into adult life. There were lots of parties, and work at the ad agency apparently consisted mostly of jetting around meeting celebrities for the Louis Vuitton account. Baldwin, a witty and polished writer, never pretends to be doing more than taking snapshots, but his vivid impressions of Paris and its people (expats included) are most engaging.

Great fun and surprisingly touching.

DOSED The Medication Generation Grows Up Barnett, Kaitlin Bell Beacon (256 pp.) $25.95 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-8070-0134-9 978-0-8070-0135-6 e-book

A freelance journalist delves into what has been called a giant uncontrolled experiment using America’s children as guinea pigs.

As a member of this group herself, Barnett explores the issues faced by the first generation of children, now entering adulthood, who were treated with psychopharmaceutical drugs from the time they were youngsters. For the past two decades, American children have been increasingly prescribed psychiatric medications for a rainbow of conditions including depression, attention deficit disorder, bipolar disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder and more general behavioral problems. The author notes most of the drugs “were and still are prescribed to children and teens without official FDA approval for the relevant condition and age group.” Childcare books during this period categorized kids with these issues as difficult or problem children, whose behaviors unsettled not just their family but became “a threat to the entire family dynamic that needed to be addressed and dealt with.” A new class of drugs developed during the 1990s, the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRI) held out the hope of relief, if not a miracle cure. During this period, the FDA allowed pharmaceutical companies direct access to consumers through TV advertising.

Barnett tackles this complex saga by chronicling the stories of five individuals who were medicated as youngsters, weaving their narratives together with a learned discussion of psychiatric treatments, medical models, side effects breakdowns, and the numerous issues faced when medicated children attend school. The author began her research after reading an article about a woman in her 30s, who, having been on medication since she was 14, wondered how drugs “had shaped her psychological development and ultimately her identity.” The woman’s psychiatrist noted that his patient was just one of many who raised this question. Occasionally Barnett, who began taking Prozac when she was 17, adds her point of view to the discussion.

The author’s clear rending of the tough questions surrounding this knotty topic should make it required reading for anyone touched by this issue. |

BORN BELIEVERS The Science of Children’s Religious Belief Barrett, Justin Free Press (336 pp.) $26.00 | Mar. 20, 2012 978-1-4391-9654-0

Belief in a divine power is only human, writes Oxford Centre for Anthropology and Mind senior researcher Barrett (Why Would Anyone Believe in God, 2004).

In the first part of the book, the author looks at cross-cultural studies of children conducted by experts in the “cognitive science of religion.” The studies indicate that, from an early age, humans know the difference between inanimate objects and “agents”— people or forces that can move or make things move. As they develop, children are prone to see agents as powerful forces unlike humans. By four or five, kids see a purpose, not only in objects, but also in creatures, rocks, rivers and mountains. These experiments are intriguing and offer an occasional corrective to the teachings of Jean Piaget, and Barrett makes it clear that children are not gullible and ready to believe anything put forth by their parents—they subscribe to what he calls a “natural religion.” In the second part of the book, the author indicts atheism by arguing that if one accepts natural selection then one cannot reject the natural religiovn of childhood—it must have survival value. But xenophobia has survival value, too, and it is an easily induced trait. While Barrett rightly takes Hitchens, Dawkins et al. to task for their more bombastic arguments, he can be faulted for claiming that atheism may be due to “male-brainedness.” The final chapters are primers on how to encourage children in a religious life, with implications that it will make them healthier and happier than their nonbelieving peers.

Take comfort, then, true believers, but take arms (verbal) all ye atheists and agnostics.

KING PEGGY An American Secretary, Her Royal Destiny, and the Inspiring Story of How She Changed an African Village Bartels, Peggielene; Herman, Eleanor Doubleday (352 pp.) $25.95 | Feb. 21, 2012 978-0-385-53432-1

Bartels was working as a secretary in the Ghanaian Embassy when she received a phone call that would change her life. The king of Otuam, a small coastal town of 7,000 people, had passed away, and the tribal elders had elected her as his replacement.

Thus begins this winning tale of epic proportions, full of intrigue, royal court plotting, cases of mistaken identity and whispered words from beyond the grave. Upon arrival, King Peggy—who left Ghana three decades earlier and has since

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“A psychologically complex, ambitious, illuminating successor to the author’s graphic-memoir masterpiece.” from are you my mother?

become an American citizen—found an uphill battle and vowed to tackle the issues plaguing her community: domestic violence, poverty and lack of access to clean water, health care and education. In doing so, Bartels faced issues of gender discrimination, corruption and inexperience. And of course there was the minor matter of her day job, inconveniently located an ocean away. Surrounded by a Greek chorus of aunties and cousins, Bartels worked to stamp out corruption and improve the lives of townspeople who warily regard her as an interloper.

She invested $30,000 of her own money into renovating the ramshackle palace she inherited and recruited donors to build schools and libraries outfitted with computers. Bartels and Herman (Mistress of the Vatican: The True Story of Olimpia Maidalchini: The Secret Female Pope, 2008, etc.) team up to craft a fast-paced potboiler. Florid description of the landscape, culture and characters work together to fully evoke the rhythms of African life.

Ultimately, readers come away with not only a sense of how King Peggy was able to transform Otuam, but also an understanding of how the town and its inhabitants transformed her. (Author tour to New York, Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Chicago, St. Louis, Dallas, Houston, San Francisco)

ARE YOU MY MOTHER? A Comic Drama

Bechdel, Alison Illus. by Bechdel, Alison Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (224 pp.) $22.00 | May 1, 2012 978-0-618-98250-9

A psychologically complex, ambitious, illuminating successor to the author’s graphic-memoir masterpiece.

Though Bechdel had previously enjoyed a cult following with her longstanding comic strip, Dykes to Watch Out For, she raised the bar for graphic narrative with her book debut, Fun Home (2006). That memoir detailed her childhood in the family’s funeral home, her closeted and emotionally distant father’s bisexuality, his questionable death (an accident that was most likely a suicide) and the author’s own coming to terms with her sexuality. On the surface, this is the “mom book” following the previous “dad book.” Yet it goes more deeply into the author’s own psychology (her therapy, dreams, relationships) and faces a fresh set of challenges. For one thing, the author’s mother is not only still alive, but also had very mixed feelings about how much Bechdel had revealed about the family in the first volume. For another, the author’s relationship with her mother—who withheld verbal expressions of love and told her daughter she was too old to be tucked in and kissed goodnight when she turned seven— is every bit as complicated as the one she detailed with her father.

Thus, Bechdel not only searches for keys to their relationship but perhaps even for surrogate mothers, through therapy, girlfriends and the writing of Virginia Woolf, Adrienne Rich, Alice Miller and others. Yet the primary inspiration in this literary memoir is psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott, whose life and work Bechdel explores along with her own. Incidentally, the narrative also 360

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encompasses the writing of and response to Fun Home, a work that changed the author’s life and elevated her career to a whole new level. She writes that she agonized over the creation of this follow-up for four years. It is a book she had to write, though she struggled mightily to figure out how to write it.

Subtitled “A Comic Drama,” the narrative provides even fewer laughs than its predecessor but deeper introspection.

(Author tour to New York, Boston, Western Mass., Vermont, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Miami, Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Louis, San Francisco, Portland, Seattle)

I HAVE IRAQ IN MY SHOE Misadventures of a Soldier of Fashion

Berg, Gretchen Sourcebooks (400 pp.) $14.99 paperback | May 1, 2012 978-1-4022-6579-2

Surface-level, chick-lit–style memoir about the life of an English-language teacher in a small town in Iraq.

Like many Americans, Berg was laid off during the recession. When a former friend, Warren, offered her a job as a foreign-language teacher in Iraq, she accepted, realizing that she could eliminate her $40,000 credit-card debt while earning an $80,000 tax-free salary. Moving to another country would also give her a shot at finding her soul mate. Early on readers will learn about the author’s obsession with shoes, and eventually the extensive talk about footwear becomes tiresome and irrelevant, as does Berg’s frequent references to Scarlett O’Hara. Life in Erbil, a sleepy town with limited entertainment options, was difficult. Even though the author tried a few local restaurants and shops, she was most happy when drinking Diet Coke and shopping for luxury shoes online. Berg constantly fought to preserve her privacy in her company villa, which was often threatened by visits of higher-ups who needed a place to stay for the night when doing business in Erbil. The author eventually found some happiness when she fell for one of her students, an attractive boy 15 years her junior. However, she became suspicious of his motives when she learned that he wanted to move to America and needed someone to sponsor him. Eventually her employer fell on hard times and Berg was laid off. Around the same time she had the revelation that the only things she liked about Iraq were those that reminded her of the United States. Even though she earned the praise of her students and Warren, the author’s constant discussion of luxury goods overshadows any insights about her work as a teacher.

There are a few funny stories and cultural observations (her discovery of virginity soap in the market), and her plan to repay her debt succeeded, but the shallow narrative could have used more pertinent observations about Iraq.

More about the experience of a single professional American woman than about what life in Iraq has to offer an expat. Not recommended.

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QUEEN OF THE CONQUEROR The Life of Matilda, Wife of William I Borman, Tracy Bantam (320 pp.) $30.00 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-553-80814-8 978-0-553-90825-1 e-book

A British historian brings to life Queen Matilda’s enormous accomplishments in consolidating early Norman rule.

Alongside her warrior husband, William I, Matilda brought legitimacy, a deeper degree of education, diplomatic savvy and artistic and religious flowering to the shared Norman-English throne.

Borman (Elizabeth’s Women: Friends, Rivals, and Foes Who Shaped the Virgin Queen, 2010, etc.) the chief executive of Britain’s Heritage Education Trust, fleshes out the personality of this fascinating woman, who set the steely precedent for subsequent English female sovereigns by displaying great longevity and stamina in a rough, paternalistic time. The daughter of Baldwin V, Count of Flanders, one of the most illustrious houses of Europe, Matilda, apparently diminutive and comely, demonstrated early on her extraordinarily strong will by not only pursuing a suitor on her own, and suffering rejection, but initially rejecting the suit of William of Normandy because he was an illegitimate son of Duke Robert I. Nonetheless, William won her, and their fruitful, long marriage established a powerful, solid dynasty in Normandy before William even cast his eyes covetously across the English Channel. Leaving her as regent to keep Normandy in line—the records show that she was a hands-on, effective ruler— William set out to conquer England. While his methods won few admirers from the English, Matilda proved politically astute, generously endowing monasteries, encouraging cultural integration and ensuring her last son, Henry, was born in England and viewed as its natural heir. Indeed, her fierce loyalty to her sons would prove nettlesome later in the marriage.

A richly layered treatment of the stormy reign that yielded the incomparable Bayeux Tapestry and the Domesday Book.

(One insert; 2 family trees; 2 maps)

THE ART OF THE SALE Learning from the Masters About the Business of Life

Broughton, Philip Delves Penguin Press (320 pp.) $27.95 | Apr. 12, 2012 978-1-59420-332-9

Sales was not part of the curriculum at Harvard Business School. Former Daily Telegraph journalist Broughton (Ahead of the Curve: Two Years At Harvard Business School, 2008) explains why that’s a big problem.

For the author, sales is where the rubber hits the road, where the deals are done. If a business can’t sell its product, of course, |

it won’t survive. More Americans are employed in sales than any other line of work. Not to be confused with marketing, the author’s definition of sales goes from his sons’ lemonade stand to the Dalai Lama representing the Tibetan people against Chinese repression. Broughton has met with top sellers around the world, traveling to Japan, Morocco and the United Kingdom in search of the keys to success in sales. In addition to his interview research, he examines academic studies, history, self-help literature, academic research on the psychology of selling and the character attributes of sales people. He explores the differences in theory and practice, and he draws from the history of the field, by way of P.T. Barnum and Joseph Duveen, who brought fine-art sales to the U.S. Broughton does not exclude the seamy underside— e.g., pharmaceutical companies recruiting college cheerleaders to “sell” their products to the country’s doctors, who “buy more and prescribe more to please ex-cheerleaders than they do for salesmen who look like themselves”—but he supplies plenty of success stories, including Ted Turner, casino magnate Steve Wynn and former AOL executive Ted Leonsis.

Entertaining, balanced and provocative.

DUST TO DUST A Memoir

Busch, Benjamin Ecco/HarperCollins (336 pp.) $25.99 | Mar. 20, 2012 978-0-06-201484-9

One man’s philosophical explorations into the trials of childhood, adulthood and the Marine Corps.

In his debut memoir, actor/writer Busch—son of writer Frederick Busch— proves his own literary talents by delving deep into the memories of his coming-of-age amid war and literature. While his poignant, nostalgia-laced boyhood remembrances provide an occasionally entertaining backdrop, far more interesting are Busch’s experiences serving in Iraq. Yet even the war scenes take on a meditative gloss, replacing the pulse-pounding moments with muted reflections on life, death and the preservation of memory. In one particularly reflective passage, Busch writes, “People die with their stories every day, taking them and leaving a history of gathered objects.” The author seeks to spare himself the same fate, recording the epiphanies and minutiae of his life as if to keep from being forgotten.

What the book lacks in narrative arc it makes up for in organization.

Busch relies not on chronology, but thematic links, connections between his life and the elements with which he surrounds himself: water, metal, soil, bone, wood and others. The author’s ability to reveal beauty in the mundane—the dismantling of a sandbox, the drilling of an ice-fishing hole, the burial of a goat—does much to entice readers, but his somewhat sprawling narrative fails to reach its intended crescendo.

Competently written, though weighed down by a narrative more tenuous than tangible. (Author tour to Ann Arbor, Mich., Baltimore, Chicago, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, New York, Seattle, Washington, D.C., and upon request)

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THE BEST CARE POSSIBLE A Physician’s Quest to Transform Care Through the End of Life

Byock, Ira Avery (336 pp.) $26.00 | Mar. 15, 2012 978-1-58333-459-1

A lucid explanation of palliative care and how it can help people die better.

“Americans are scared to death of dying,” writes Byock (The Four Things That Matter Most: A Book About Living, 2004, etc.), director of Palliative Medicine at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. Because the topic is depressing, politicians often won’t talk about it. Yet the way many Americans die remains a national disgrace, and caring for the coming deluge of aging and chronically Americans will soon pose a crisis. Byock draws on decades of experience to explain how palliative care—designed not to cure but to comfort people with advanced illnesses—helps patients and their families “make the best of what is often the very worst times of life.” Through the stories of patients, from a 72-yearold man with pancreatic cancer to a teenage girl with cystic fibrosis, he details the palliative approach to care, how families and health teams make difficult decisions and how improved quality of life can help patients die well. He shows how palliative physicians get to know their patients, use drugs and other interventions to alleviate pain and encourage patients to live fully and achieve postponed goals in their remaining time. One cancer patient, for instance, worked to resolve issues with his ex-wife and older children. In contrast, most critically ill individuals suffer needlessly, caught in a complex and costly health-care system that focuses on curing illnesses and fails to address personal suffering The author discusses recent research suggesting that palliative care can even help patients live longer. Once restricted to hospices, palliative care programs now exist in most hospitals with 200 beds or more, and studies show that such care can alleviate distressing symptoms among the seriously ill.

Byock calls for an overhaul of national and local health-care systems to bring person- and family-centered care to people in fragile health and help them avoid all-too-frequent complications and crises.

A persuasive argument for compassionate care.

THE DOOMSDAY MACHINE The High Price of Nuclear Energy, the World’s Most Dangerous Fuel Cohen, Martin & McKillop, Andrew Palgrave Macmillan (256 pp.) $27.00 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-230-33834-0

Emerging from its 20-year, postChernobyl recession, the nuclear-power industry is building new plants around the world—a terrible idea according to this angry, intensively researched, unsympathetic analysis.

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For more than 60 years, enthusiasts have asserted that nuclear electricity will be cheap, clean and safe, and they’ve always been wrong. Social scientist Cohen (Mind Games: 31 Ways to Rediscover Your Brain, 2010) and British energy economist McKillop add that current advances show no signs of proving them right. The authors deliver a convincing account of the partnership between industry and government (essential because nuclear plants require massive subsidies) to build wildly expensive generators whose electricity remains uncompetitive without more subsidies.

Technical advances have made nuclear plants even more expensive and marginally safer, but not actually safe. Accidents continue to occur. Disposing of nuclear waste remains an insoluble problem with no solution in sight, so massive collections of poisonous radioactive debris are piling up around us. Most unsettling, poor nations with unimpressive government oversight (Nigeria, Indonesia, Bangladesh) are jumping on the nuclear bandwagon.

Sadly, global warming has split the environmental movement with one faction supporting nuclear power as the only practical way to reduce carbon emissions. Solar and wind power remain hopelessly inefficient; hydroelectric dams often flood valuable land; biofuels convert food to gasoline; fusion power is pie-inthe-sky. The authors show understandable contempt for nuclear proponents who proclaim their green credentials but proceed to alienate their target audience by claiming that global-warming arguments are vastly overblown.

A persuasive if discouraging argument that nuclear power offers different but no less nasty environmental problems than burning hydrocarbons.

THE TASTE OF WAR World War II and the Battle for Food

Collingham, Lizzie Penguin Press (656 pp.) $35.00 | Apr. 2, 2012 978-1-59420-329-9

A comprehensive evaluation of the crucial role of the global food economy in the waging of war.

The starvation policy of the Nazi occupiers and the wartime exigencies that effectively transformed the diet as we know it are only two important aspects to this fascinating, authoritative work on food and war. In order to keep an army running smoothly and the civilian population pacified, writes Collingham (Curry: A Tale of Cooks and Conquerers, 2006, etc.), a government had to control the food supply. This was equally true of Britain, Germany, Japan and the U.S., though it played out very differently during World War II. Creating a National Socialist empire relied on becoming self-sufficient, especially after the legacy of hunger and defeat wrought by World War I. According to Herbert Backe’s Hunger Plan, occupation of the Ukrainian breadbasket would deliver the resources to Germany only if the flow of food could be shut down to Russian cities, thus starving 30 million Soviet citizens (also Jews, indigenous inhabitants and prisoners of war).

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“A moving account of the people who sailed into maritime history on the doomed Titanic.” from voyagers of the titanic

In the throes of an agricultural crisis, Japan was more reliant on imports from its colonies Formosa and Korea and later suffered starvation during the American blockade; moreover, the whiterice–based diet provided insufficient protein for the Japanese troops, and a more Chinese and Western diet was adopted. Britain relied heavily on its colonies to feed the wartime appetite, as well as on U.S. lend-lease supplies, only suffering from want during the winter of 1940–41 because of the U-boat blockade.

Indeed, American farmers supplied the bounty of global wartime needs and also offered ample food at home. Collingham study casts a staggeringly large net. She examines terrible famines in Bengal and Greece, the Soviet ability to withstand starvation, the role of the black market and how nutritional science reshaped the diet of soldiers and civilians.

A definitive work of World War II scholarship.

BURN DOWN THE GROUND A Memoir

Crews, Kambri Villard (352 pp.) $25.00 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-345-51602-2 978-0-345-53220-6 e-book A New York publicist and producer’s unsparing yet compassionate account of her dysfunctional childhood and the father who both charmed and victimized her family.

As the hearing child of two deaf adults, Crews grew up between worlds. Her outsider status increased when she and her parents moved to Boars Head, Texas, a place that “wasn’t even on the map.” At first, their new life, though undeniably difficult, seemed a glorious, backwoods adventure—the perfect tonic for her father’s roving eye and failing marriage. But not long after they moved from their tin-shed shelter into a mobile home, Crews began to see evidence of domestic abuse that took the form of mysterious bruises on her mother’s face and inexplicably cruel behavior in her brother. Her home life continued to show signs of ugly undercurrents, yet only silence prevailed, and the author threw herself into school and a full-time job. Meanwhile, her carpenter father began losing jobs and turning to alcohol and gambling while her mother struggled to support a splintering family. When Crews was 16, she witnessed “by far the most traumatic incident I had ever experienced in my life”: her father destroying the family home and brutalizing her mother. Even after she found success in her career, her past was far from behind her. At age 31, she received the shattering news that her father had stabbed his girlfriend. Rather than blame her father for his actions, however, Crews chose to embrace a more difficult truth.

She, along with her own family—in collusion with a society and criminal-justice system insensitive to the needs of domesticabuse victims—had contributed to what he had become.

Poignant and unsettling.

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VOYAGERS OF THE TITANIC Passengers, Sailors, Shipbuilders, Aristocrats, and the Worlds They Came From

Davenport-Hines, Richard Morrow/HarperCollins (352 pp.) $25.99 | Lg. Prt. $25.99 | Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-06-187684-4 978-0-06-210071-9 e-book 978-0-06-210705-3 Lg. Prt. A moving account of the people who sailed into maritime history on the doomed Titanic.

In this eloquent, meticulously researched biography of the ship’s international “cast of characters,” biographer, historian and journalist Davenport-Hines (Ettie: The Intimate Life and Dauntless Spirit of Lady Desborough, 2008, etc.) commemorates the centenary of the “most terrible wreck in the history of shipping.” Rather than highlight the class divisions and antagonisms that James Cameron brought to the fore in his 1997 film, the author examines what the actual voyage meant to the different people involved with the ship. For some, an “Atlantic crossing was a regular trip they made twice or more often a year.” For others, the trip meant separation from everything they had ever known. However mundane or momentous, a sea voyage was an event that reshaped human relationships on either side of the Atlantic. In his treatment of the voyagers themselves, Davenport-Hines is as democratic as his premise. He devotes one chapter to each type of person on board—sailors, crewmembers, first-, second- and third-class passengers. His stories about such notable figures as Ben Guggenheim, John Jacob Astor and Lady Duff Gordon stand side by side with those of ordinary men and women. Davenport-Hines also offers compelling portraits of the Titanic’s powerful godfathers: “Lord [William James] Pirrie, whose shipyard built it, Bruce Ismay, whose company operated it, and Pierpont Morgan, who owned it.”

The book has all the inevitability and pathos of Greek tragedy, but by maintaining the personal dimension, the author transforms a narrative of monumental hubris meeting human error into a haunting story of real, intersecting lives on a collision course with destiny. (Two 16-page blackand-white photo inserts)

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JUDGMENT BEFORE NUREMBERG The Holocaust in the Ukraine and the First Nazi War Crimes Trial Dawson, Greg Pegasus (336 pp.) $26.95 | Apr. 11, 2012 978-1-60598-290-8

Dawson (Hiding in the Spotlight: A Musical Prodigy’s Story of Survival, 2009) investigates a little-known story of the Holocaust and its aftermath.

The Ukraine is often something of a coda to discussions of the Holocaust and World War II. Despite suffering a death toll in the millions, it has been little studied and understood. Its reoccupation by the Soviet Union following the war hid survivors, textual sources and physical evidence behind the Iron Curtain, and memories receded. During the process of researching his previous book about his mother’s improbable escape from the death camps as a Jewish Ukrainian, Dawson came across a detail so obscure that in the course of more than 100 public readings, he never encountered anyone who was familiar with it. The first war-crimes trial against the Nazis took place not in Nuremberg, but in Kharkov, Ukraine, which was also the site of some of the first systematic killings of the Holocaust. Using these events as bookends, the author presents a personal, moving exploration of the human experience during the Final Solution. The Eastern Front was an area of experimentation, and many methods of killing were used before “Himmler’s dream of an antiseptic Holocaust in which there was no blood and bones” was realized. Less a systematic history than an impressionistic memoir of the author’s family and millions like them, the book is sometimes annoyingly cutesy: “For those who ended up in the dock at Nuremberg, denial was just a river in Egypt.”

Despite some minor flaws, Dawson’s humanist treatment of his chilling subject and illumination of events all but forgotten make it well worth reading. (16 pages of blackand-white photographs)

THE GREAT INVERSION AND THE FUTURE OF THE AMERICAN CITY

Ehrenhalt, Alan Knopf (288 pp.) $26.95 | Apr. 25, 2012 978-0-307-27274-4

A political scientist looks at a possible “demographic inversion” in which America’s cities may follow in the footsteps of late-19th-century European capitals: “affluent and stylish urban core[s] surrounded by poorer people and an immigrant working class on the periphery.”

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professionals, senior citizens and other groups are beginning to find their way back to older central city neighborhoods. Pew Center on the States information director Ehrenhalt’s (Democracy in the Mirror: Politics, Reform and Reality in Grassroots America, 1998, etc.) main examples are Chicago’s Sheffield neighborhood, which has gone from an urban wasteland to one of the city’s most fashionable and desirable locations, and New York City’s financial district, where commercial office buildings have been converted to residential uses and the evening streets are populated by couples with baby carriages. Ehrenhalt finds the historical parallels for this process in the renewal and reconstruction of city centers in 1890s Paris and Vienna. He also discusses cities where he doesn’t think such revivals are possible, including Philadelphia and Baltimore, both of which have locally focused political structures based on privately owned row houses with small lots, and the former industrial wasteland of Detroit. Between these extremes he presents cases like Phoenix, which has tried multiple times to build a center city that never existed, and continues to fail. Ehrenhalt points to Northern Virginia’s Tysons Corner—now the twelfth largest business district in the United States”—as the test case for whether a commercial strip, lacking residential development, can be transformed into a unified city-type center.

The author’s historical perspective helps shape his provocative view, though he doesn’t examine whether the demographic trends will generate either the financing or the wider employment that Paris and Vienna were able to stimulate in their own unique ways. (Author tour to Chicago, New York, Phildelphia, Washington, D.C.)

LETTERS TO KURT

Erlandson, Eric Akashic (170 pp.) $17.95 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-1-61775-083-0 978-1-61775-114-1 e-book Nearly two decades after the death of Kurt Cobain, a friend and fellow musician not only continues to mourn his suicide, but also rages against the culture that he holds responsible.

These 52 “letters”—bursts of anger and sardonic humor, without paragraphing, but tempered by literary aspiration (and a little too much wordplay)—combine the subject matter of the Byrds’ “So You Wanna Be a Rock and Roll Star” with the fury of Allen Ginsberg’s Howl. As Erlandson explains in the introduction, he was the boyfriend and band mate of Courtney Love when they first met Cobain, who would become her husband and a friend of the author, one of the many profoundly affected by the Nirvana front man’s suicide. (Erlandson subsequently had an extended relationship with Drew Barrymore, though it’s hard to find her presence in these pages.) The author writes, “I began writing prose poem letters to Kurt as a way of exploring all I’d been through…My inner demons, personal means of selfsabotage, musings on death, suicide, masculine/feminine roles, food, sex, addiction,” etc. The results read like a journal for a

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“A provocative critique of the power of positive thinking and a solid addition to the behavioral-economics shelf.” from risk intelligence

BANZAI BABE RUTH Baseball, Espionage, and Assassination During the 1934 Tour of Japan

creative-writing course, but the pain is real and powerful. The pieces often cast Cobain as a victim and Love as an occasional villain (the author’s involvement in their band Hole ended in acrimony and legal action), but its major indictment is of a celebrity culture in which “all beauty has poison under its skin, fangs beneath its gums, a bullet with your name on it, in the name of fortune and fame. If the art doesn’t kill you, the fame surely will.”

A catharsis for the writer and perhaps for the reader as well.

A detailed look at the 1934 tour of Japan by an All-Star team of American baseball players including Babe Ruth and

RISK INTELLIGENCE How to Live with Uncertainty

Evans, Dylan Free Press (256 pp.) $26.00 | Apr. 17, 2012 978-1-4516-1090-1 978-1-4516-1092-5 e-book

Risk analyst and popular-science writer Evans (Placebo: Mind Over Matter in Modern Medicine, 2004, etc.) analyzes the fallacy of the quest for certainty in making decisions. [“M]ost of us simply aren’t comfortable with or adept in making judgments in the netherland of uncertainty,” writes the author. We tend to over-react when it comes to assessing uncertainty and ambiguity and when we are faced with daunting challenges. Evans attributes this unwillingness to deal with uncertainty to “our reluctance to gauge the limits of what we know” and make judgments accordingly. Our comfort zone is located at either extreme of the spectrum: overconfidence or the expectation of doom. While the cost of over-optimism has been showcased by the recent financial crisis, we may suffer losses from missed opportunities when we refuse to accept a reasonable amount of risk. Though some of our difficulty in dealing with risk can be attributed to the tendency of our brain to overestimate dramatic events and indulge in wishful thinking, as well as our susceptibility to after-the-fact confirmation bias, these tendencies can be overcome. Evans looks at the improvement in weather forecasting in the past 50 years as a case in point. He suggests that one way to raise our risk intelligence is to carefully assess the limits of what we know, assess the reliability of sources, critically evaluate the accuracy of our estimates and learn the rudiments of probability theory. Financial speculation has become a dirty word, he writes, but in many circumstances it is valuable to make an educated guess.

A provocative critique of the power of positive thinking and a solid addition to the behavioral-economics shelf.

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Fitts, Robert K. Univ. of Nebraska (368 pp.) $34.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-8032-2984-6

Lou Gehrig.

Fitts (Wally Yonamine: The Man Who Changed Japanese Baseball, 2008, etc.) brings an academic’s thoroughness to his topic, with an eye on the gathering storm clouds that would soon lead to war between the two nations. Organized by a Japanese newspaper publisher as a promotional stunt and supported by American and Japanese politicians who hoped to mend increasingly difficult relations, the tour was a rousing success on the first count, and a resounding failure on the second. Fitts provides context on the history of baseball in Japan, as well as on the country’s political situation at the time, with various nationalist groups hoping to restore true power to the imperial throne. Though the information on the coup and assassination attempts by these groups provides insight into the state of Japanese politics and culture, the link between them and the baseball tour is tenuous. The tour itself provides some entertaining culture-clash moments and interesting background on some of the Japanese players, even if the outcome of most of the games is a foregone conclusion. The Babe is, as ever, the star of the show. Reluctant to participate at first, he eventually embraced the experience, helped no doubt by the adulation of a whole new set of fans during the twilight of his career. Perhaps the tour’s most lasting contribution to history is its part in helping create a professional baseball league in Japan, which remains massively popular to this day. Any goodwill engendered by the American players’ 1934 visit quickly vanished into the fog of war, however, with the spectators’ cries of “Banzai Babe Ruth” replaced by Japanese soldiers’ shouts of “To hell with Babe Ruth!” as they rushed American positions during World War II. Occasionally dry but mostly colorful examination of an early meeting of international sports, culture and celebrity.

(35 illustrations; 1 map; 28 tables)

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GOOD GUYS, WISEGUYS, AND PUTTING UP BUILDINGS A Life in Construction

CRUSOE Daniel Defoe, Robert Knox, and the Creation of a Myth

Frank, Katherine Pegasus (368 pp.) $27.95 | Apr. 15, 2012 978-1-60598-334-9

Florman, Samuel C. Dunne/St. Martin’s (352 pp.) $25.99 | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-312-64167-2 978-1-4299-4108-2 e-book

A valedictory account of a life spent in large-building construction in New York City.

In addition to his duties as chairman of Kreisler Borg Florman General Construction Company, Florman (The Aftermath: A Novel of Survival, 2001, etc.) has authored six books and more than 250 articles. Here he combines memoir with an account of the hazards, complexities and joys of his trade. The resulting synthesis is somewhat unwieldy, although Florman’s style is accessible and wry. The author writes that despite the litany of grief associated with the trade, ranging from violent mobsters to risks on the job site, “I look back on this career with relish…because of the challenges met, the rousing adventures encountered.” It seemed an improbable occupation for a bookish Jewish boy in Depression-era New York, but wartime service in the Seabees opened up a fascinating industrial world to him: “Such [broad] experience can’t be bought in engineering school.” After the war, he worked his way up in the trade, first as an estimator, then a project manager; feeling frustrated, he joined a general contracting start-up in 1956, and soon bought in as a partner. KBF went on to have both success and good fortune, moving from school construction in the 1950s into large-scale urban and government projects. Despite Florman’s keen discussions of the complex minutiae of construction firms’ actual operation, his approach is mostly sentimental, with a lot of focus on the characters he’s known (especially at his own firm). The book is organized to highlight certain themes relevant to the industry’s development through the 20th century. Readers may wish the author had dug deeper into his juiciest subtopics, including the legendary corruption of building inspectors, the true degree of Mafia penetration in the industry, the still-contested role of women and the violent struggles for affirmative action on job sites.

Succeeds in demystifying the world of large-scale urban contracting, but will probably have more emotional resonance for older readers, in and out of the field.

Alexander Selkirk’s ordeal as a castaway may have seeded the plot for Robinson Crusoe, but Daniel Defoe’s tale is a clear reflection of his own life’s struggles.

At the end of his life, Defoe labeled Crusoe more of an allegory than a novel, implying a good degree of autobiography at the same time. Biographer Frank (Indira: The Life of Indira Nehru Gandhi, 2002) introduces Robert Knox, once a true captive, who survived on his wits and the English practice of making your environment adapt to your needs rather than adjusting to it. Defoe mined information from a vast library, including The Odyssey, The Tempest, Pilgrim’s Progress and an extensive number of published accounts of castaways. As Defoe cherry-picked incidents from different lives, he adapted them to reflect disasters he had suffered. He also had no compunction about fitting other stories neatly into his own. His Captain Singleton contained blatantly lifted passages from Knox’s published story of his 19-year captivity in Ceylon.

Frank parallels the lives and adventures of Defoe, Knox and Crusoe, illustrating a deep relationship between author and models.

This side-by-side biography of the two men shows similarities between their lives and their attitudes toward disaster, although their personalities and moralities were markedly different. Many have said that Crusoe is much more a self-help book than a novel, while Knox’s story is a treatise rather than a travel book. They both exhibit a similarly distinct philosophy of life. Defoe proselytizes on morals, lessons and their meanings while encouraging his readers to turn the challenges of adversity into advantage. Knox teaches by example.

Frank wisely leaves the minutia of spotting duplication in their works to Defoe scholars while she focuses on the values and beliefs of the two men. Knox came out to be the better of the two, and his little-known story deserves reading. (12 pages of illustrations and map)

THE IDEA FACTORY Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation

Gertner, Jon Penguin Press (416 pp.) $29.95 | Mar. 19, 2012 978-1-59420-328-2

Fast Company editor Gertner traces the history of Bell Labs through more than five decades of brilliant thinking and innovation.

From the transistor to lasers to satellites and cellular technology, Bell Labs and its scientists invented machines and 366

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“A captivating, convincing case for car-free—or at least car-reduced—cities.” from straphanger

techniques that were consistently prescient, and ultimately presaged all of modern communications. Housed first in New York City and then on a sprawling campus in New Jersey, Bell Labs became a haven for creative and technical minds due to a unique culture of encouraged interdisciplinary research, (mostly) friendly competition and inspired leadership. Tremendously complex ideas (information theory) and intensely experimental accomplishments (fiber optics) were possible in part because of the unrivaled freedom, time and funding Bell Labs provided. In addition, pressing social, political and economic issues provided necessary infrastructures for advances in engineering and mechanics. The author describes the atmosphere as welcoming creativity rather than insisting on rigid development; intellectually, there was an indistinct line between art and science. By tracing the history of Bell Labs through the biographies of several of its founding thinkers, including Mervin Kelly, Bill Shockley and Claude Shannon, Gertner reveals the complicated humanity at work behind the scenes and provides unprecedented insight on some of history’s most important scientific and technological advances.

Packed with anecdotes and trivia and written in clear and compelling prose, this story of a cutting-edge and astonishingly robust intellectual era—and one not without its controversies and treachery—is immensely enjoyable.

SOLDIER DOGS The Untold Story of America’s Canine Heroes Goodavage, Maria Dutton (304 pp.) $26.00 | Mar. 15, 2012 978-0-525-95278-7

Dogster.com writer Goodavage profiles an indispensible warrior of the fourlegged variety.

The author investigates how specially trained dog breeds work with American military troops in everything from stress relief to lifesaving bomb detection. They also assisted in the tracking and seizure of Osama bin Laden. The use of military animals dates back to World War I, but trained canines were often left behind or euthanized once combat ceased (they’re now adopted out). These specially trained pups may be whelped as “equipment” for the Department of Defense, but they’re prized as elemental keys to successful armed-forces missions; particularly helpful is their intuitive ability to “normalize” life for soldiers stressed by the relentless threat of enemy violence.

Through interviews with upper-echelon military personnel (most in Afghanistan) and dog handlers, Goodavage uncovers how these dogs are procured and trained to become fieldspecialized, and she impartially addresses the conflicting ethics of employing canines in battle. The author’s dog Jake appears throughout the narrative, yet unlike diminutive Jack Russell terrier Lars, with a nose for explosives, or Buck, a chocolate lab with crippling PTSD, Goodavage offers her faithful companion |

not as “military hero material,” but as an effective contrast to the soldier dogs. The author provides inspiring personal stories of the many canine allies (and their handlers) who have dramatically enhanced military command units and examines how this indelible human-canine bond often transcends the atrocities of wartime violence.

A well-deserved salute to the military’s “paws-on-theground heroes.”

STRAPHANGER Saving Our Cities and Ourselves from the Automobile

Grescoe, Taras Times/Henry Holt (320 pp.) $25.00 | Apr. 24, 2012 978-0-8050-9173-1 A unique look at mass transit in 13 major cities.

In his latest, Grescoe (Bottomfeeder: How to Eat Ethically in a World of Vanishing Seafood, 2008, etc.), who “has never owned a car,” chronicles his global travels as he discusses the evolution and function of mass transit in a wide variety of international cities: his hometown of Montreal, Shanghai, New York, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Paris, Copenhagen, Moscow, Tokyo, Bogotá, Portland, Vancouver and Philadelphia. In each, the author examines the car-vs.–mass transit debate, discussing how culture and history affect the conversation. “Though I grew up with romantic tales of gasoline-fueled escape,” writes the author, “I’m fine with a slower, more rooted life.” Grescoe explores the major problems, mainly inefficiency and overcrowding, faced by each city’s mass-transit experiment.

The book is rife with bits of interesting trivia, and it almost reads like a travelogue as the author revels in the wonders of his diverse destinations. With a smooth, accessible narrative style, Grescoe inserts himself into the story enough to create a narrative thread but not so much that the book becomes about him.

Each chapter is packed with important information, so some readers may find it more appealing to read the book in pieces in order to process the larger implications for each city. “[A] round the world, there is a revolution going on in the way people travel,” writes the author. “It rewrites the DNA of formerly car-centered cities, making the streets better places to be, and restoring something cities sorely need: real public space.”

A captivating, convincing case for car-free—or at least car-reduced—cities.

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MEMOIR OF A DEBULKED WOMAN Enduring Ovarian Cancer

Gubar, Susan Norton (288 pp.) $24.95 | Apr. 9, 2012 978-0-393-07325-6

A brutally honest account of the author’s ovarian cancer treatment and a staunch protest against the state of contemporary approaches to the disease.

In telling her personal story, feminist scholar Gubar (Judas: A Biography, 2009, etc.) remains the academic, looking for understanding not just in the medical literature but also in Frida Kahlo’s art, Margaret Edson’s drama Wit, Barbara Creaturo’s memoir Courage and other women’s writings, both formal and informal. When the author learned that most ovarian cancers cannot be cured because the disease is rarely diagnosed before it has reached a deadly stage, she made it her goal to help women recognize its early warning signs. A brief, somewhat dry chapter on ovaries and how they have been regarded throughout history precedes her personal account. For her, the treatment began with debulking—a drastic surgical procedure that she calls disemboweling—followed by rounds of debilitating chemotherapy. The surgery launched a cascade of intestinal disasters, including perforation, abscesses, loss of bowel control and an ileostomy. Gubar’s description of these indignities is disturbing and graphic. She blames them not on doctor errors but on “the ruthless instruments, technologies, and formulas of the medical machine.” Doctors, she writes, have no alternatives to the standard treatments now available to ovarian cancer patients. In her case, remission followed, but so did recurrence, and she was faced with the decision of whether to undergo further surgery and chemotherapy that could retard but not halt the spread of cancer or to stop treatment and allow the cancer cells to take over her body. Gubar lets the reader inside her mind as she grapples with this issue.

Not just a grueling memoir of facing a deadly disease but a powerful exposé of the failure of medical science to find better ways to detect and treat it.

WHEN I LEFT HOME My Story

Guy, Buddy with Ritz, David Da Capo/Perseus (288 pp.) $26.00 | Jun. 1, 2012 978-0-306-81957-5 One of the last survivors of Chicago blues’ golden age of the 1950s and ’60s, Guy retravels a familiar route in this ingratiating but disappointingly slim as-

told-to autobiography.

The son of rural sharecroppers, he became fixated with playing the guitar after hearing John Lee Hooker’s 1949 hit “Boogie 368

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Chillen.” He caught firsthand glimpses of such Louisiana stars as Lightnin’ Slim and Guitar Slim, the latter of whom supplied the blueprint for Guy’s flamboyant performing style. He lyrically recalls his 1957 train trip to Chicago, a Mecca for émigré musicians from the South. After an arduous period, he began to burn up the South Side’s bars; his local stardom led to record dates at Chess Records, then home to blues giants like Muddy Waters, who encouraged him in his early days, and the forbidding Howlin’ Wolf, who wanted to hire him. (Wary of Wolf ’s harsh treatment of his sidemen, he declined.) Work ultimately became so scarce that Guy drove a tow truck to make ends meet, but he finally found success in the ’60s on the European festival scene and then in the rock ballrooms. Guy has a wealth of entertaining, occasionally raunchy stories about the contemporaries he revered, including Muddy, Wolf, Hooker, Sonny Boy Williamson, Little Walter, Jimmy Reed, Big Mama Thornton and B.B King. Sometimes he takes a jab: Songwriter Willie Dixon was stingy about sharing credit, guitarist Albert King was a tightwad, label owner Leonard Chess never paid royalties or recorded him at his extroverted best. He has fonder memories of the young white performers—especially Brits like Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and the Rolling Stones—who helped shine a spotlight on his work. He saves his best stuff for longtime musical partner Junior Wells, the pugnacious, oft-incarcerated harmonica ace. At most junctures, the material about Guy’s fellow bluesmen is so choice it pushes the book’s purported subject into the background. And there’s little about the major renewal of Guy’s career after the 1991 release of his Grammy-winning Damn Right, I’ve Got the Blues.

Tasty as a Buddy Guy guitar lick, but seldom revelatory. (16 pages of black-and-white photographs. Author tour to New York and Chicago)

BLOOM Finding Beauty in the Unexpected—a Memoir

Hampton, Kelle Morrow/HarperCollins (288 pp.) $24.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-06-204503-4 978-0-06-204505-8 e-book A mother’s optimistic account of the first year of life with her daughter, Nella, who was born with Down syndrome.

Photographer writer Hampton is the author of a popular blog, Enjoying the Small Things. The Florida-based mother of two has received national recognition and media attention for her blog’s personal writing and, reflected in it, her perpetually glass-half-full disposition. In her debut, she provides expanded versions of stories from her blog and other details about her life, marriage and parenthood. In 2009, the 31-year-old author and her husband, Brett, already parents of a two-year-old girl, Lainey, welcomed their second daughter, Nella. Hampton describes her immediate shock and distress at Nella’s diagnosis, but those feelings were quickly replaced by an overwhelming sense of

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“A report of a fascinating new theory on the Earth’s origins written in a sparkling style with many personal touches.” from the story of earth

gratitude. “I feel there is a plan so beautiful in store…and we get to live it,” she writes. “Wow.” The author’s positive attitude and enthusiasm remain unchanged throughout the book, which may illicit admiration in some readers and mild irritation in others—Hampton rarely reveals her own vulnerability. The author’s descriptions of people and events are clear and easy to follow, but it’s her beautiful photographs that bring them to life.

A few of Hampton’s summations—e.g., “I not only hugged Fear and Sadness that night at the computer, but I let them unpack their bags and stay awhile—come across as slightly disingenuous, if not simplistic. However, the author’s mostly appealing optimism will make this book a comfort to other parents facing difficult circumstances.

Sunny and inspiring. (Color photos throughout. Author appearances in Detroit, Fort Myers, Miami, New York)

THE STORY OF EARTH The First 4.5 Billion Years, from Stardust to Living Planet

Hazen, Robert M. Viking (300 pp.) $27.95 | May 1, 2012 978-0-670-02355-4

Hazen (Earth Science/George Mason Univ.; Genesis: The Scientific Quest for Life’s Origins, 2005, etc.) offers startling evidence that “Earth’s living and nonliving spheres” have co-evolved over the past four billion years.

To support his persuasive though controversial views, the author updates evidence collected by mineralogists over the last two centuries. Describing the “discoveries of organisms in places long considered inhospitable [to life] – in superheated volcanic vents, acidic pools, Arctic ice and stratospheric dust,” he argues for the dating of the origin of life more than a billion years earlier than estimates based on Nobel Prize winner Harold Urey’s groundbreaking experiments. These appeared to support the view that life originated 2.5 billion years ago in an oceanic environment with the creation of organic molecules.

Hazen explains how Urey and his associates were able to re-create “primordial soup” in a simulation, which produced “a suite of biomolecules stunningly similar to what life actually uses.”

That theory has been challenged in the last two decades, based on the discovery that life “fueled by chemical [rather than solar] energy” exists in extreme environments in astonishing abundance. Hazen and colleagues at the Carnegie Institution’s Geophysical Laboratory (with support from NASA) have succeeded in simulating conditions that would have existed on Earth as early as 4.5 billion years ago, while producing biomolecules that are today the building blocks of life. The author situates this latest experimental evidence in a series of discoveries about the earth’s geological evolution, sparked by analysis of moon rocks brought back by Apollo astronauts.

A report of a fascinating new theory on the Earth’s origins written in a sparkling style with many personal touches. |

BUNCH OF AMATEURS A Search for the American Character

Hitt, Jack Crown (288 pp.) $26.00 | CD $20.00 | May 15, 2012 978-0-307-39375-3 978-0-307-95518-0 e-book 978-0-307-99033-4 CD

A guide through the sometimes-consequential, sometimes-zany realm of amateurs.

Veteran journalist Hitt (Off the Road: A Modern-Day Walk Down the Pilgrim’s Route into Spain, 2005, etc.) posits that various brands of amateurism conceived in the interest of advancing knowledge offer meaningful insights into a uniquely American character. The narrative thread holds together nicely through chapters focusing on the legendary amateurism of Benjamin Franklin, birdwatchers seeking the ivory-billed woodpecker, inventors of various gadgets, genealogists, archaeologists, astronomers and linguists. Hitt wisely concedes that other nations harbor amateurs, as well, but he maintains that American amateurs are notable for their comfort with exploration and with rebelling against authority. Elsewhere in the world, where socioeconomic status is often hardwired at birth, the word “amateur” suggests class warfare. In the United States, the word often carries a hint of adventure. Searching for lasting answers, Hitt studies business theory, providing a serious explanation that outsiders are often not hidebound by the curse of knowledge. In other words, when it comes to reconceiving a workplace, an industry, a charitable endeavor or some other institution, perhaps ignorance sometimes can be considered bliss. Knowing almost nothing about something can become the catalyst driving breakthrough discoveries. When talented amateurs receive positive recognition for their accomplishments, such as the “genius grants” provided annually by the MacArthur Foundation, the white heat of innovation might be kindled further. Hitt inserts himself into the narrative as he meets with living amateurs and discovers newly released material about deceased amateurs. The first-person approach is usually effective because it generates passion about the possibilities of the intellect.

A quirky approach to a fresh way of looking at the human animal. (7 black-and-white line drawings)

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AMERICAN ICON Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company

OCCUPY WORLD STREET A Global Roadmap for Radical Economic and Political Reform

Hoffman, Bryce G. Crown Business (432 pp.) $26.00 | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-307-88605-7 978-0-307-88607-1 e-book

Jackson, Ross Chelsea Green (320 pp.) $19.95 paperback | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-60358-388-6

A Detroit News journalist’s in-theroom account of the resurrection of America’s most storied car company.

In 2006, Bill Ford Jr., the founder’s great-grandson, put aside the very real possibility of merger, even bankruptcy, and resolved instead to replace himself as CEO to try to save Ford Motor Company. He turned to a Detroit outsider, Alan Mulally, credited already with the post-9/11 resuscitation of Boeing and lured to Ford by the prospect of saving an “American and global icon.” How Mulally engineered Ford’s historic turnaround, transforming it into the world’s most profitable car company by 2011, will, no doubt, become the stuff of businessschool case studies. Hoffman’s account will likely serve as the central text, but this is no dry classroom tome. As his paper’s Ford beat reporter, Hoffman covered the automaker’s unfolding story, conducting hundreds of interviews with major players and knowledgeable observers and then hundreds more to prepare this book. He opens with a quick and dirty history of the company and moves swiftly to Bill Ford’s courting of Mulally and the challenges facing the new CEO. Mulally immediately changed the company’s hidebound culture, insisting on teamwork, developing a recovery plan and working that plan relentlessly, surveying the entire business weekly to measure progress.

By winning over the Ford family, the country’s “last great industrial dynasty,” by securing a crucial loan just prior to the credit crisis, reducing the number of brands, matching production to customer demand, investing in advanced technologies, improving fuel efficiency, reaching a groundbreaking agreement with the UAW to reduce labor costs, fending off corporate raiders, and convincing the public to buy what Ford was selling—a task made easier by the company’s well-publicized refusal to accept the government bailout GM and Chrysler required to survive— Mulally triumphed. With colorful anecdotes, sharp character sketches, telling details and a firm understanding of the industry, Hoffman fleshes out every aspect of this tale, reminding us of the hard work, tension and high-stakes drama that preceded the successful result.

A valentine, yes, but a thoroughly deserved one for Mulally and Ford. (8-page photo insert)

The Club of Rome’s The Limits to Growth comes in for a four-decades-later brushing up, and things don’t look good.

Canadian think-tanker and philanthropist Jackson (Shaker of the Spear: The Francis Bacon Story, 2005, etc.) has a similarly pessimistic view, though he mixes in New Agey sentiments (“I call the result of this restructuring effort the Gaian World Order to reflect the focus on the oneness of all planetary life in the emerging holistic worldview”) thick enough to make a climate denier long for the homespun wisdom of Al Gore. Jackson opens with catastrophic prophecy, but nothing that we haven’t heard before: We’re past the point of abundant and cheap oil, and all that depends on it, including much of global agriculture, will suffer accordingly. Moreover, there is danger of falling into a “fatal energy trap” whereby fossil fuel is no longer available to manufacture renewable energy mechanisms—wind towers, solar panels and the like. Jackson does not, strictly speaking, restate the Club of Rome conclusions of yore, but the approach is much the same, including abundant graphs and charts, a broad-ranging survey of ecological and political crises to come and a rather scattershot approach, with raw notes poured into paragraph form to resemble narrative. It is widely argued that the U.S. government has propped up bad-guy regimes around the world—so much a given that Jackson’s paragraph-long list of instances seems a species of overkill. Rhetorically, there are some questionable moments, too: Can NGOs really reflect “an expression of the dissatisfaction of citizens across the world with the way their governments have operated”? That would seem arguable, though this is not a book to be argued; instead, it seems destined for a pulpit before an audience of the faithful, and no one else.

Policy wonks will want a more disciplined argument, even if the “Gaian League” will probably have a cool flag.

NEW YORK AT WAR Four Centuries of Combat, Fear, and Intrigue in Gotham

Jaffe, Steven H. Basic (432 pp.) $29.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-465-03642-4

Military history of America’s greatest city.

Jaffe (Who Were the Founding Fathers?: Two Hundred Years of Reinventing American History, 1996), a historian attached to the South Street Seaport Museum and the 370

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“An honest, conflicted glimpse of a country ‘still sorting through the contradictions of a rapid, and inevitably messy, transformation.’ ” from india becoming

New-York Historical Society, begins his study at the earliest point of which we have records: Henry Hudson’s entry into what is now New York Harbor in 1609. Hudson and his men encountered a group of Indians, and a skirmish broke out, leaving one of Hudson’s men dead. The incident set a pattern that dogged the Dutch colony that grew up on Manhattan Island and spread fingers along the coast and up the Hudson; only in the 1640s was a solid peace with the native peoples concluded.

By then, the British were a greater threat, and the city became a British stronghold for more than a century. From there, troops went forth to fight the French and their Indian allies, and there the main force of British power remained during the Revolution. After Washington’s troops were driven away in 1776, the redcoats had Manhattan to themselves. Washington managed to exploit the city’s vulnerability by threatening attacks against it, keeping troops bottled up to defend it while he won battles elsewhere. In the early days of the Republic, the city became a center for privateers preying on British merchantmen, then suffered blockades by the British fleet that all but stifled its mercantile might. Jaffe moves on to more familiar territory with the draft riots of the Civil War. World War I saw anti-German fervor and U-boat raids on ships leaving the harbor. In the final chapters, the author looks at the Cold War and other late-20thcentury events, culminating in 9/11 and the aftermath.

Well-researched, with a flair for the dramatic, and full of unexpected tidbits. Military buffs and New Yorkers will especially love it. (34 black-and-white illustrations; 3 maps)

INDIA BECOMING A Portrait of Life in Modern India Kapur, Akash Riverhead (304 pp.) $26.95 | Mar. 15, 2012 978-1-59448-819-1

Lively, anecdotal look at the people who have been vastly changed by the entrepreneurial explosion in India.

In 2003, Kapur, a half-American, half-Indian journalist, moved back to India, where he had been raised, after more than a decade in America. The country he left as a teenager was still stifled by “fatalism and bureaucracy,” where people were heavily burdened by the rigid social order and tradition. India had enthusiastically embraced globalization, the modern trappings in evidence by ATMs, software parks, cell phones and tractors having replaced bullock carts. On one hand, Kapur saw new Indians who dared to imagine for themselves a different kind of future; on the other, he found that development had taken a terrible toll on the environment, law and order and wealth distribution. The author returned to his home state, yet he traveled widely to meet people and witnessed a “great transformation unfold, unfurl like a heavy, crushing carpet over fragile societies and cultures”—e.g., in the crumbling of the old feudal order, as explained by his new friend Sathy, from a once-powerful noble family accustomed to deference from its inhabitants, especially |

Dalits. Now Sathy only encountered disrespect and resentment, as new money eroded loyalties and even obedience to law. Kapur talked to many people: a young homosexual, resistant to his parents’ traditional matchmaking but riven by ambivalence; a sex therapist overwhelmed by demands of patients exploring their sexuality for the first time; the acquisitive new urban entrepreneurs both male and female who dated and traveled freely; cow brokers at the shandies in Brahmadesan; scavengers of the landfill outside Pondicherry, which was poisoning the atmosphere.

The author finds a nation gripped by an illusory sense of itself and in the throes of wrenching change.

An honest, conflicted glimpse of a country “still sorting through the contradictions of a rapid, and inevitably messy, transformation.”

THE END OF LEADERSHIP

Kellerman, Barbara Harper Business (256 pp.) $27.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-06-206916-0

A highly critical assessment of the state of American leadership and the “leadership industry” that helps produce it.

After 30 years in the leadership-training field, Kellerman (Public Leadership/Harvard Univ.; Leadership: Essential Selections on Power Authority, and Influence, 2010, etc.) writes, “we don’t know if learning how to lead wisely and well can be taught.” Yet the $50-billion leadership industry has exploded in recent decades and become “self-satisfied, self-perpetuating, and poorly policed,” while producing scant evidence of success. Instead, many business and government leaders “seem inept or corrupt” and either unable or unwilling to lead. In this valuable book, she details vast societal changes that have demeaned and downgraded leaders and altered the relationship between leaders and followers.

The Internet and other advances in communication technology brought more information, encouraged greater self-expression and expanded connection. With information available instantly to everyone, followers (citizens, employees, stockholders) learned of their leaders’ faults and began questioning their authority. Information about priestly abuse, for example, has led to diminution in the Catholic Church’s institutional power, and news of business scandals has prompted distrust of corporate leaders. At the same time, followers are demanding more, emboldened by the spread of democracy, the rhetoric of empowerment and the practice of participation. To keep pace with a networked, interdependent and transnational world in which leaders are weaker and followers stronger, the leadership industry must overcome its myopia, analyze itself critically and catch up with a rapidly changing society.

Kellerman’s honest and astute critique makes it clear that the gurus in her own field have work to do if they want to remain relevant.

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k i r ku s q & a w i t h m a g g i e a n d e r s on In a social and economic experiment as bold as it was challenging, Maggie and John Anderson pledged to spend a year buying only from black-owned businesses in their home town of Chicago. In Our Black Year, Maggie and co-author Ted Gregory chronicle the results of the couple’s experience, balancing the harsh realities of the business world with an inspiring story of a couple’s real investment in their community.

We talked to Maggie Anderson about her year, but readers can visit EEforTomorrow.com (www.

EEforTomorrow.com) for more information on this game-changing proposal.

Our Black Year

Maggie Anderson with Ted Gregory PublicAffairs (320 pp.) $25.99 Feb. 14, 2012 978-1-61039-024-8

Q: What was the initial rationale behind the Empowerment Experiment?

A: It was our wholehearted belief that nothing was going to change in the African-American community—in terms of countering the social crises that disproportionately impact us—unless there was a concerted push to focus on our economic empowerment. We knew economic empowerment could not come about until more Americans, especially African-Americans with money, like John and I, do more to seek and support our businesses. We wanted to get that message out in a way that was smart, scientific and therefore irrefutable.

We felt a need to inspire a sense of activism and unity, which we felt was lost within our community, especially among the middle and upper-class folks—the highly educated, the professionals and suburbanites. While we would never claim to be Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King, we did want to do something that reminded our people of the importance and value of taking a stand.

Q: How does Our Black Year show that self-help economics improves the African-American community?

A: The study that resulted from our experiment proves that the community would improve if more consumers were to just make a small, incremental increase in the money they spend with our businesses. Phenomenal job growth, less poverty, enhanced tax bases would result in poor neighborhoods, which leads to better-funded schools. That would be a huge improvement!

The experiment was meant to be inspirational, something that makes people think about things, like where their money goes and what it can do to help struggling communities. The study actually proves what can happen—in terms of job creation, entrepreneurship growth and successful businesses—when we do just a little bit of what my family did.

A: They were all different. Most were humble and hopeful.

All were hard-working, of course, and very intelligent. All 372

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Q: The book shows that self empowerment isn’t always easy. What were some of the harder days you experienced during this year?

A: There weren’t many easy days. But the worst days were those days looking for businesses on the West Side. It’s tough, seeing the awful stereotypes and horrific statistics played out and up close. Being there was so depressing and maddening, most times, it did not inspire me to keep the fight alive.

Q: What was it like having this experience in the media spotlight?

A: The media was wonderful because it helped us touch millions with our story. It made everyday folks proud, to see a professional, articulate, young family taking a stand in honor of those communities and small businesses that no one seems to care about. Seeing a normal black family, doing something positive just to help people gave a lot of people hope.

Q: What was the most important idea for you to communicate through Our Black Year?

A: It’s the fact that we already have everything we need to make our communities better – we just have to believe in and support each other. We did it before and we can do it again. There are so many fantastic businesses—black and not —that could radically change the path of the African-American community and truly benefit society as a whole.

Things can be so different, if we just try.

Q: How can readers continue supporting the Empowerment Experiment?

A: This book is the key to EE’s future, funding the project and maintaining the message in the media and the academic community. It keeps the conversation alive. We need people to register on our website, as business owners and as consumers, and tell their friends to do the same.

—By Clayton Moore |

p h oto © RA N DY F L IN G

Q: What qualities did you find in the men and women who own the businesses you frequented?

of them feel like being a business owner is an honor and duty, not just a career. They felt like if they failed, they would let all of us down.

Most of them were pretty frustrated by the inequities they experience. They were tired of having to jump through hoops to get the meetings that their white and Asian counterparts got so easily. They were furious about how they could not depend on their own people to support and promote them—the way Jewish and Hispanic business owners could.

Another sentiment I sensed from many was shame.

They were proud to be black business owners, but they knew that in America, that was not something to be proud of. It is something to be pitied.

THE REAL ROMNEY

Kranish, Michael & Helman, Scott Harper/HarperCollins (400 pp.) $27.99 | Jan. 17, 2012 978-0-06-212327-5 Boston Globe scribes Kranish (Flight from Monticello: Thomas Jefferson at War, 2010, etc.) and Helman attempt to animate the famously wooden presidential candidate.

The authors retrace the Romney lineage to the earliest days of the nascent Mormon Church, a time when the practice of polygamy forced his great-grandfather Miles Park Romney to flee to Mexico ahead of pursuing U.S. marshals. Such sharply drawn historical forays provide keen context to Mitt Romney’s personal trajectory. As a result, two things about him become readily apparent: He is a man profoundly enmeshed in his family’s religion, and, like his father George Romney, he really wants to be president of the United States. Beyond that, however, there is little here to explain what might be lurking behind the candidate’s photogenic good looks. The fault almost certainly does not belong to Kranish and Helman, who provide plenty of evidence of careful research. The simple fact may be that the real Romney is as shallow and inscrutable as he is depicted here. Revelations are few and far between—the most damning being a report that a disapproving Romney once pressured an unmarried member of his church to give up her baby for adoption. The authors dutifully chronicle Romney’s many career accomplishments as a venture capitalist, but most of these can be summarized in one sentence: He made a lot of money for people who already had a lot of money. In the end, the authors should be congratulated for making the TV-ready Romney more human; however, that alone does not make the “Mitt-bot” more fathomable or presidential.

A good-faith effort to profile a notoriously hard-todefine candidate.

THE GREAT ANIMAL ORCHESTRA Finding the Origins of Music in the World’s Wild Places

Krause, Bernie Little, Brown (288 pp.) $26.99 | Mar. 19, 2012 978-0-316-08687-5

Krause (Wild Soundscapes: Discovering the Voice of the Natural World, 2002, etc.) chronicles his experiences with “[n]atural soundscapes…the voices of whole ecological systems.”

A professional musician since 1964, the author became fascinated with the possibilities created by modular synthesizers. He moved to California where he conducted workshops in electronic music and worked as a sound engineer for film studies, providing sound background for Rosemary’s Baby, Apocalypse Now |

and other films. He also recorded In a Wild Sanctuary, “the earliest musical piece to use long segments of wild sound as components of orchestration, and also the first to feature ecology as its theme.” Krause learned to use stereo headphones, microphones and a portable recording system to record natural scenes, and he often recorded scenes at varying distances, tuning to different acoustic levels and frequencies to re-create an auditory image of a scene without the aid of visual cues, which ordinarily assist our hearing by screening out certain sounds while focusing on others. In this way he created a “soundscape” of a particular location.

He captured the organ-like sounds of reeds and wind in northern Oregon, and his first scientific commission, after he received a doctorate in bio-acoustics, was the sound background for an exhibit of a waterhole in Kenya. In the years since, Krause’s study of different habitats has led him to conclude that “creatures vocalize in distinctive kinship with another,” each establishing its own sound niche and creating the rhythms of “the natural world.”

An imaginative introduction to a new dimension of the natural world. (25 black-and-white photographs)

CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE Sportswriters and the Long Campaign to Desegregate Baseball

Lamb, Chris Univ. of Nebraska (408 pp.) $39.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-8032-1076-9

The author of Blackout: The Story of Jackie Robinson’s First Spring Training (2004) returns with a comprehensive account of how journalists—black and white—covered the emerging story of the integration of Major League Baseball.

Lamb (Media Studies/Coll. of Charleston) brings all his scholarly tools to the project—most notably, a fierce desire to locate every source, document every significant utterance by a baseball official, player, writer, editor and remain as disinterested as possible in a discussion of a time that reeked with racism and moral cowardice. Emerging as heroes are the black press and the American Communists, whose Daily Worker worked tirelessly to end baseball’s apartheid. As Lamb notes, there had been black players in professional baseball in the late 19th century, but that soon ended. Owners drew a color line in the sand (there was no written proscription), then spent decades denying there was such a line, spewing out disingenuous excuses about the abilities of blacks, the fear of race riots and the problem of having black players train in the Jim Crow South. Consequently, black stars like Josh Gibson, Satchel Paige and countless others labored in obscurity virtually their entire careers. Lamb begins in 1933 at baseball’s winter meetings—and with the minstrel show that was part of their entertainment. Near the end is an account of another owners’ meeting in 1946—after the signing of Jackie Robinson—and again the entertainment included racist skits. The author’s narrative includes numerous bad guys: owners Clark Griffith, Tom

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“...a beautifully written memoir driven by both the writer’s passion for living and his memories of lost friends.” from the patagonian hare

Yawkey and Larry MacPhail, and a laundry list of white journalists, most ignoble of whom was Alfred Henry Spink, who, via his Sporting News, lobbied hard against integration—then picked Robinson as the Rookie of the Year.

Although the paragraphs are sometimes thick with detail, the author has documented a story of immense cultural importance.

SOME ASSEMBLY REQUIRED A Journal of My Son’s First Son Lamott, Anne with Lamott, Sam Riverhead (288 pp.) $26.95 | Mar. 20, 2012 978-1-59448-841-2

Being a grandparent is harder than it looks.

Such is Lamott’s (Imperfect Birds, 2010, etc.) message in this angst-ridden, occasionally neurotic diary of her grandson’s first year. After gaining a large audience for Operating Instructions (1993), which chronicled her son Sam’s first year of life, the author sets out to do the same after Sam became a father at age 19. Sam and erstwhile girlfriend Amy are parents to a healthy baby boy named Jax. In nearly daily entries, Lamott shares details of her life beginning with Jax’s first full day after birth. Filled with a variety of characters—Sam, the young father in over his head; Amy, the beautiful mother whose strength Lamott seems to envy; Jax, the almost-perfect baby; various friends and family—the book is mostly about the author and her seething river of insecurities and anxieties. At nearly every turn, Lamott comes up with some new thing to worry about, a new facet of herself to loathe or a new characteristic of those close to her to deride and belittle. She struggles constantly with boundaries as a grandmother, and she bemoans her lack of control over situations. Another source of near-constant anxiety is the prospect of Amy moving away with Jax. Other fears are less grounded in reality: “I have these morbid, terrifying fantasies— but I had the same ones before Jax was born, that the baby would die and Sam would commit suicide.” Eventually readers will grow tired of the author’s angst, self-doubt and general negativity.

A pale companion piece to Operation Instructions.

THE PATAGONIAN HARE A Memoir

Lanzmann, Claude Translated by Wynne, Frank Farrar, Straus and Giroux (496 pp.) $35.00 | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-374-23004-3 Love and death go hand in hand in the life of journalist and filmmaker Lanzmann, who at 84 delivers his first book

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(originally published in France in 2009): a beautifully written memoir driven by both the writer’s passion for living and his memories of lost friends.

Raised as a secular Jew in a family with deep communist sympathies—and an unusual parental arrangement that included his mother’s lover—the author served in the French Resistance and narrowly missed capture by the Nazis. As an adult, he went where the action is, culturally and romantically.

He became editor of Jean-Paul Sartre’s journal Le Temps Modernes (a position he still holds more than 50 years later) and had an intense seven-year affair with Sartre’s lover, Simone de Beauvoir, who was happy to take him on as her “sixth man.” Faithfulness wasn’t anyone’s game then, and Lanzmann seemed to seduce nearly every woman he ever met. He also became deeply immersed in his own Jewish heritage and documentary filmmaking, ultimately resulting in his nine-hour magnum opus Shoah. Readers who have seen that great film will be especially interested in the last 100 pages, where he describes the making of it in exciting detail. Lanzmann is hardly a modest witness to his life, variously describing himself as a man of “phenomenal” endurance, a “fearless skier” and a “visionary,” but he’s equally generous to the memory of others. He renders beautiful if often painful memories of the departed: his beautiful and troubled sister, actress Evelyne Rey (one of Sartre’s many conquests), philosopher Gilles Deleuze, radical Frantz Fanon and his wife Josie (all but Fanon, who died of leukemia, committed suicide).

Lanzmann’s life has been a precarious balance between rich and poor, right and left, joy and fragility.

“I am neither indifferent to, nor weary of, this world; had I a hundred lives, I know I would not tire of it,” he writes.

Intelligent readers will find it hard to argue.

CASTRO’S SECRETS The CIA and Cuba’s Intelligence Machine Latell, Brian Palgrave Macmillan (288 pp.) $27.00 | Apr. 24, 2012 978-0-230-62123-7

An analysis of Fidel Castro focusing on Cuban spy activity, by a retired CIA officer who specialized in tracking the Castro brothers.

Latell (After Fidel: The Inside Story of Castro’s Regime and Cuba’s Next Leader, 2005) was bound by his employment contract to submit this book to CIA censors, and he claims they asked for only a few minor changes. Many of the fresh allegations about Castro, his crackerjack spy agency and U.S. efforts to undermine him are based on conversations between the author and Florentino Aspillaga Lombard, “the most knowledgeable Cuban defector ever to change sides.” That means the credibility of many of these allegations depend heavily on Aspillaga’s credibility, though Latell states that he has no doubt about Aspillaga’s memory or the purity of his motives. Perhaps the most dramatic revelation is that Fidel Castro, and presumably

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his brother, a key member of the Cuban revolutionary autocracy, knew ahead of time that Lee Harvey Oswald would assassinate President Kennedy in Dallas. Latell does not sugarcoat the reasons for the anger of the Castro brothers aimed at Kennedy; rather, the author offers considerable information about how the U.S. government tried continually to overthrow the Castro regime, including plans that could have led to the assassination of one or both Castro brothers. In addition to information about assassination plots, Latell explains how a small island nation built an impressive spy agency. Though the author does not find the CIA wanting, he acknowledges that sometimes the information gathered turned out to be outdated or incorrect.

An insider’s account that by definition is difficult for outsiders to evaluate because the author and many of his key sources are trained dissemblers.

TANGLES A Story About Alzheimer’s, My Mother, and Me

Leavitt, Sarah Illus. by Leavitt, Sarah Skyhorse Publishing (128 pp.) $14.95 paperback | May 1, 2012 978-1-61608-639-8

The power of this graphic memoir is not that its story about a family dealing with Alzheimer’s is so extraordinary, but that it has become so ordinary.

In her first book, Canadian writer and cartoonist Leavitt shows her mother agreeing to have her experiences with the disease documented because “[m]aybe this will help other families!” And likely it will, letting those experiencing the dementia of someone they love know what to expect, and to reassure that the tangled emotions they feel in response—anger, frustration, devotion, humor—are inevitable. Though this is primarily an account of the author’s experiences as her mother becomes all but emotionally unrecognizable, it is also a narrative spanning two three generations of complicated family dynamics. Leavitt illustrates significant differences between her mother’s closeness with her sisters and how the disease affects those relationships, and the contrasting tension between the author and her sister. It shows the strains that Alzheimer’s puts on everything— from the sufferer’s well being and sense of purpose to a loving marriage to the physical demands of caring for someone who can no longer care for herself. The narrative is human, honest, loving and occasionally even funny. “I created this book,” Leavitt writes in the introduction, “to remember her as she was before she got sick, but also to remember her as she was during her illness, the ways in which she was transformed and the ways in which parts of her endured. As my mother changed, I changed too, forced to reconsider my own identity as a daughter and as an adult and to recreate my relationship with my mother.”

Not simply the story of a disease, but of the flawed, complex, intelligent people whose lives it transformed.

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DARWIN’S DEVICES What Evolving Robots Can Teach Us About the History of Life and the Future of Technology

Long, John Basic (288 pp.) $26.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-465-02141-3

Long (Cognitive Science and Biology/Vassar Coll.) traces his path from a doctoral student studying the evolution of fish vertebrae to his present position as director Vassar’s Interdisciplinary Robotics Laboratory.

Although biologists depend on computer modeling to study neural networks, predator/prey relations and virus interactions, the author is frequently asked, “What do robots have to do with biology?” His short answer is that autonomous robots— even the simplest propeller-driven designs with an embedded computer and a sensor—have agency and can move around and interact with their environment. Long explains how a blunder in an early version of his doctoral thesis led to his later work with robots. His hypothesis was that vertebrae strength and flexibility evolved because it enhanced a fish’s ability to compete for food. He developed a computer model to correlate the relationship between the elasticity and flexibility of a marlin backbone to its swimming speed, but was dismayed to realize that he had inadvertently violated the laws of physics. His simplified assumptions had transformed the would-be marlin into a perpetual-motion machine. With a two-dimensional computer model, such an error was possible, but not a three-dimensional one that actually moved. Long’s first self-propelled robot had a fairly simple design—an embedded minicomputer, one light sensor and a backbone built to mimic varying structural aspects of a marlin vertebrae. Natural selection would be modeled on the ability of a robot to reach a target first in a competition of six robots. His first model failed because his rules deducted points when the robot wobbled, which was accounted as an energy loss. In fact, as Long learned, wobble gave the robot greater flexibility in reaching a target and was a survival advantage. More complex robots allowed him to model predator/ prey relationships and target acquisition more realistically, and he was able to consider broader issues such as the relationship between goal-directed behavior and animal intelligence.

Lively and intriguing.

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“An erudite discussion both profoundly sympathetic and richly analytical.” from when god talks back

ILLEGAL PROCEDURE A Sports Agent Comes Clean on the Dirty Business of College Football Luchs, Josh & Dale, James Bloomsbury (240 pp.) $25.00 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-1-60819-720-0

Former sports agent Luchs uncovers the thinly veiled corruption within bigtime college football, as agents do whatever it takes to get stars to the NFL. In the multibillion-dollar college-sports industry, the agent who is able to befriend the star player, become his “confidant, advisor, and shrink,” will probably end up his agent when he turns pro. This is what Luchs accomplished fairly well for 18 years.

Contacting a player early in his college career is illegal, as is paying him money, providing him a car or a condo, paying for vacation trips and covering up his transgressions. As a player neared the NFL draft, Luchs would cook the data on his strength and conditioning, provide him with answers to the Wonderlic IQ test and hire NFL coaches to privately train the young player. The author contends that the majority of sports agents are in on it.

College coaches funnel their players to their own agents, sports gurus tout particular players for particular agents and governing agencies like the NCAA and the NFL Players Association turn a blind eye to the corruption all around them. Many of Luchs’ claims will be familiar to sports aficionados, but his book is unique in two ways: He names names, and he writes (assisted by co-author Dale) with humor, honesty and, for a sports agent, a reasonable amount of humility. He changed from a young boy fascinated by sports to a hustler without rules, and in the end found it all “soul-eating”—so he eventually got out. Can big-time sports, especially football, be reformed? Luchs says it can, but not easily. Fundamental changes must occur, including sharing with the players the billions that colleges make off them.

A troubling, entertaining indictment of the hypocrisy of big-time sports.

WHEN GOD TALKS BACK Understanding the American Evangelical Relationship with God Luhrmann, T.M. Knopf (448 pp.) $27.95 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-307-26479-4

A simultaneously scholarly and deeply personal analysis of evangelical communi-

ties in America.

Luhrmann (Anthropology/Stanford Univ.; Of Two Minds: An Anthropologist Looks at American Psychiatry, 2000) entered 376

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the Vineyard Christian Fellowship openly—declaring herself an anthropologist who wanted to understand the evangelical way and mind—and she was both welcome and eventually somewhat transformed. Near the end Lurhmann writes that although she’s not sure she’d call herself a Christian, she has “come to know God.” She begins by describing the current evangelical movement—how widespread it is, how God has become an intimate friend rather than a harsh judge and how evangelicals largely avoid theodicy. She sketches the history of the Vineyard and attributes to the 1960s counterculture some of the spiritual energy that animates the evangelical movement. As the title suggests, the author devotes much of her discussion to the conversation between believers and their God, a conversation facilitated by specific techniques of prayer.

She spends many pages talking about the problem of hearing God’s voice, and attempts to cover all bases. For example, she includes major passages about the long history of the phenomenon, schizophreniaand skeptics’ reservations and disdain. Lurhmann underwent extensive prayer training, and her research is substantial—years of commitment, countless interviews, extensive endnotes and a vast bibliography. She accords deep respect for those whose religious experiences are scientifically unverifiable, and she concludes that evangelicals have, to a great extent, reprogrammed their brains and that they and skeptics live in alternate universes. One topic she does not raise: the economics of the movement. Who’s getting rich in the evangelical world? Does it matter?

An erudite discussion both profoundly sympathetic and richly analytical.

CONNIE MACK The Turbulent and Triumphant Years, 1915-1931

Macht, Norman L. Univ. of Nebraska (664 pp.) $39.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-8032-2039-3

The second volume of the author’s massive biography of legendary baseball manager Connie Mack (1862–1956).

Macht’s first volume (Connie Mack and the Early Years of Baseball, 2007) covered the Hall of Famer’s life up to age 52, a period during which his team, the Philadelphia Athletics, won six pennants and three World Series titles. The current volume covers some wilderness and some promised-land years. His team had aged, so he decided to rebuild, a decision that cost him seven straight last-place finishes between 1915 and 1921. Mack eventually gave up his plan of building from the farm system and began buying players and trading. Between 1929 and 1931, the A’s won three consecutive pennants and two World Series with the sterling efforts of such iconic stars as Lefty Grove, Al Simmons, Mickey Cochrane and Jimmy Dykes. The aging Tris Speaker and Ty Cobb even played for Mack at the ends of their careers. Crusty Cobb, it seems, revered his manager. Appearing throughout the

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text are some of the greatest names in baseball—Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Eddie Collins, Walter Johnson and countless others.

Moreover, Macht has done such meticulous research that readers will discover the precise layout of Mack’s office at Shibe Park as well as his home. The author combed period newspapers for stories about Mack, quotes extensively from personal letters of the principals, reproduces numerous encomiums to the manager offered by family, players, fans and competitors, describes exciting game action and political battles and rule changes and charts the surfaces of Mack’s diamond-keen baseball sense. In 650 pages he has no ill word for Mack and continually reminds us of his greatness. He was a respected husband, father, leader, role model and humanitarian—maybe even a hero.

Definitive and exhaustive, animated by a profound respect and admiration.

CROSSING THE BORDERS OF TIME A True Story of War, Exile, and a Love Reclaimed

Maitland, Leslie Other Press (544 pp.) $29.95 | Apr. 17, 2012 978-1-59051-496-2

Love lost in Alsace during World War II, rediscovered 50 years later in New Jersey.

A former New York Times journalist, Maitland has seized on her family’s far-flung tale of fleeing the Nazis in Europe and energetically made it her own. Having grown up under her mother’s heavy emotional baggage, the author came to share the sense of shame and sadness that her mother carried with her as an immigrant to the United States in 1943, a refugee of Nazi Germany. Maitland’s mother Janine, along with her German-speaking parents, sister and brother, originally fled in 1938 from Freiburg, having lost everything they owned. From Mulhouse, France, where the teenagers hastily learned French, they moved to Gray, where the family eventually got transit papers to pass through to the Free Zone.

The family then landed in Lyon, where Janine, now a young woman, reignited a friendship with a dashing Catholic law student, Roland Arcieri. After falling in love during their brief time together, Janine was yanked away again with her family—to Cuba and then America. Soon married to a successful salesman, Janine did not stop grieving for her first love, and Arcieri apparently tried to find her. However, Janine’s father, who wanted her to have a fresh start in America, intercepted his letters. In 1989, Maitland organized a trip back to Freiberg and to Mulhouse with her family. Once her father died, she tracked down Arcieri, who was then living in Montreal. Though the details of the courtship are a little bizarre, especially since the author re-creates her mother’s bold seduction of Arcieri, who was married, this is a touching story about the odd collision of fate and will.

A poignantly rendered, impeccably researched tale of a rupture healed by time. (Author appearances in New York, Washington, D.C., Miami, Chicago) |

WHAT TEACHERS MAKE In Praise of the Greatest Job in the World

Mali, Taylor Putnam (160 pp.) $19.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-399-15854-4

A longtime educational advocate and public speaker praises the noble art of teaching.

Incensed by a flippant remark from a young attorney at a party, teacher and poetry scholar Mali channeled his anger into a poem on the virtuosity of teachers. He posted it on his website, and the verse has been circulating ever since. The author has become a renowned public speaker in recent years with podcasts, a blog and a flashy website. He also undertook an unprecedented journey from standardized classroom instruction to launch his ambitious “New Teacher Project,” an initiative seeking to direct 1,000 people into becoming teachers. In channeling their ability to “see a child’s potential objectively, untainted by family history and parental expectations,” Mali believes teachers energize their students to excel beyond what’s routinely called for; starting this reinforcement process at a young age is imperative, he writes. Obviously passionate about his career as an educator, the author extols the importance of routine calls to parents when children shine. He also encourages a “question authority” mindset in his students while personally remaining humble and progressive with electronic grade books. Through anecdotes, poetry and classroom examples, Mali proves himself a dedicated, caring teacher within what he considers a hobbled American education system. The author’s slim, appealing book delivers a powerfully positive message, but it’s also a valentine to teachers everywhere, as well as a healthy dose of reality to parents who may misguidedly consider their child’s teachers as little more than educational stepping stones.

Big, bright life lessons in a pocket-sized package.

MY HAPPY DAYS IN HOLLYWOOD A Memoir

Marshall, Garry Crown Archetype (288 pp.) $25.00 | Lg. Prt. $25.00 | CD $35.00 Apr. 24, 2012 978-0-307-88500-5 978-0-307-88502-9 e-book 978-0-7393-7849-6 Lg. Prt. 978-0-307-97048-0 CD Happy days are here again, in the autobiography of a director who “always wanted to be remembered as the Norman Rockwell of television.”

As the producer, writer and/or director of Happy Days, The Odd Couple and Laverne & Shirley on TV, and the director of hit movies including Pretty Woman, Runaway Bride and The Princess Diaries, Marshall seems like a nice guy for a man who has enjoyed

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“A rarefied glimpse at bizarre brilliance.” from simon

such Hollywood success, and a loving family man (married once, now with six grandchildren) within an industry not generally known for such stability. Unfortunately, for a writer whose previous book was titled Wake Me When It’s Funny: How to Break Into Show Business and Stay There (1995) and who got his start writing jokes for comedians, he isn’t very funny. Or at least this book isn’t. Nor is it serious, mean, scandalous or particularly revelatory.

It’s just nice. Marshall has gotten along fine with some difficult actors—including his sister, Penny, and the beleaguered Lindsay Lohan—and has apparently remained friends with everyone with whom he has ever worked. He rarely asserts his ego and occasionally takes less credit than he might be due. He knows that Julia Roberts did more for him than he did for her; he writes of Pretty Woman, “If a movie can change a man’s life, this would be that movie for me.” Marshall also knows that such hits couldn’t inoculate him against a series of stiffs, and he gives nearly every project (long-forgotten movies as well as recent bombs such as New Year’s Eve) equal space in its own chapter. His philosophy might best be expressed in his remarks on the generally dismissed Raising Helen: “It was never going to be the kind of picture that made big money or took home prizes, but it would turn out to make audiences smile, and I like making audiences smile.”

Marshall writes that he combats stress with an “icecream sandwich or a Fudgsicle.” This is a Fudgsicle of a showbiz memoir.

SIMON The Genius in My Basement Masters, Alexander Delacorte (368 pp.) $25.00 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-385-34108-0 978-0-345-53221-3 e-book

The breezy biography of a highly eccentric mathematician.

Masters (Stuart: A Life Backwards, 2006) does a solid job of portraying Simon Phillips Norton as a peculiar, once-reputable math prodigy with immense intelligence who devolved into a disheveled recluse­— and the author’s live-in landlord. With droll undertones, Masters depicts Norton as a brilliant child who amazed educators with a 178 IQ, penned a sonata at age 10 and excelled as a teenager in the development of mathematical group theory at Eton College in the 1960s and then at Trinity College. After co-authoring a seminal text, The Atlas of Finite Groups, Norton botched a mathematical equation in the presence of peers, and a systematic collapse of genius ensued from which he never quite recovered. Years later, the author found himself a tenant sharing physical space in Cambridge with Norton, who shuffled around in a cavernous basement flat cluttered with garbage and transit timetables. This residential arrangement afforded Masters copious face time with the cosseted mathematician and his lifestyle oddities, including a penchant for odorous canned kippers, grunting communication and a scruffy, unkempt appearance—much akin to Russian math genius Grigori Perelman.

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amalgam of comical drawings, complex numerical calculations, photographs, articles and letters, all contributing, in one quirky way or another, to the elevation of Norton’s hyperactive intellect.

A rarefied glimpse at bizarre brilliance.

WAKING THE GIANT How a Changing Climate Triggers Earthquakes, Tsunamis, and Volcanoes McGuire, Bill Oxford Univ. (320 pp.) $29.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-19-959226-5

Volcanoes can affect our climate, but can our rapidly changing climate trigger volcanic eruptions and destabilize the

Earth’s crust?

McGuire (Geophysical and Climate Hazards/University College London; Global Catastrophes: A Very Short Introduction, 2009, etc.) looks back through geologic time to find correlations between climate change and the frequency of geophysical hazards such as volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, landslides and tsunamis. After tracking millions of years of geologic history, McGuire outlines how volcanic eruptions and collapses are stimulated by the disappearance of large ice sheets. The ice contained in glaciers redistributes water and its weight throughout the planet, affecting sea level, crust stability and even day length. Isostatic rebound—the Earth “bouncing back” after being buried beneath kilometers of ice—can induce earthquakes in unstable zones. Rising temperatures often translate into increased rainfall, which in turn can increase the incidence of landslides. McGuire’s explanations are dense but mostly conversational, and his examples are clear and easy to follow. He also offers understandable comparisons—e.g., ocean levels being lower by “a whisker less than the height of the London Eye Ferris wheel” during the last glaciation. Though the author notes that any change in climate contributing to the recent intense quakes and tsunamis “seems unlikely in the extreme,” he predicts that we will experience more geophysical hazards as sea levels continue to rise.

McGuire lays a strong foundation for thinking about the impact of global warming on the stability of the Earth’s crust. (30 b/w photos and drawings)

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ROBESPIERRE A Revolutionary Life

McPhee, Peter Yale Univ. (352 pp.) $40.00 | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-300-11811-7

A meticulous but limited treatise on the life of one of France’s most notorious revolutionaries.

Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) was a young provincial lawyer who came |

to Paris as a representative of the Third Estate, and he remained to become a leader of the leftist Jacobins in the revolutionary National Convention. A spellbinding orator, he was immensely controversial, revered by many as “the Incorruptible” genius of the revolution, reviled by others as a would-be tyrant, and his popularity underwent wild swings. Robespierre began his career as an opponent of capital punishment but ended it obsessed with omnipresent treasonous conspiracies and meting out death without trial to perceived enemies of the state, declaring that “the mainspring of popular government… is at once virtue and terror.” He has thus long been popularly execrated as the bloodthirsty architect of the “reign of terror” of 1793–94. McPhee (Living the French Revolution 1789–1799, 2006, etc.) strives to rehabilitate Robespierre somewhat, arguing that the sanguinary excesses of the period were necessary to sustain the revolution against attacks from without and within, and that Robespierre’s role in them was later exaggerated by other deputies seeking to minimize their own culpability. Given Robespierre’s savage rhetoric and his influence at the time, McPhee’s attempts at exoneration are less than thoroughly persuasive. The author also gives more attention to Robespierre’s formative years and pre-revolutionary activities than has been customary in previous biographies. This is a thorough and wellwritten account of Robespierre’s life, but nothing more. It is not a history of the French Revolution, and readers without a general familiarity with the events of that upheaval will have difficulty placing Robespierre’s activities in a larger context.

Similarly, while Robespierre’s every political shift and maneuver is set forth in careful detail, no other leaders or personalities stand out in this narrative; even giants like Georges Jacques Danton and Jean-Paul Marat have only walk-on roles.

A solid contribution to the scholarship of this key figure of the French Revolution.

THE GREAT DIVERGENCE America’s Growing Inequality Crisis and What We Can Do About It Noah, Timothy Bloomsbury (272 pp.) $27.00 | May 1, 2012 978-1-60819-633-3

In his debut, New Republic columnist Noah takes on the political dimensions of the outrageous disparity in incomes that has developed since 1979.

This inequality, writes the author, is worse than it has been in any other period of American history, and it is completely out of line with America’s trading partners and allies. Noah shows that this trend is not directly related to the usual political suspects—black-white disparity, the treatment of women, etc.—and their correlatives in the economy and employment, but is in a class by itself, a result of contextual developments broader than particular laws or taxes enacted by Congress.

The author examines the research of Princeton and Vanderbilt |

public policy professor Larry Bartels, whose message in his 2008 book Unequal Democracy “boiled down to a bluntly partisan message. You don’t like income inequality? Then don’t vote Republican.” Noah discusses the rise and fall of the tradeunion movement and demonstrates that turning points in that movement were also turning points in the growth of income inequality. While after the end of World War II it was normal for the president to sit down with labor and business officials to discuss the economy, it no longer is. The author indicates that when anti-labor legislation (e.g., the Taft-Hartley Act) was combined with corporate lobbying, the institutions underpinning ideas of what was acceptable where income was concerned were undermined. Noah also calls out financial deregulation as a major offender, and he lists measures that he believes can help the situation, such as soaking the rich (think higher taxes and fees for wealthy individuals), fattening government payrolls and attracting more skilled immigrants.

Essential background reading for the coming elections.

FIND, FIX, FINISH Inside the Counterterrorism Campaigns that Killed Bin Laden and Devastated al-Qaeda

Peritz, Aki & Rosenbach, Eric PublicAffairs (320 pp.) $27.99 | Mar. 13, 2012 978-1-61039-128-3

International terrorists rarely make headlines today, write the authors, but senior national security advisor Peritz and Defense Department counterterrorism expert Rosenbach emphasize that this success required much pain, and the end is not in sight.

Post–World War II Islamic terrorism worried U.S. leaders but produced no coherent policy. Burned by the failed 1980 Iranian hostage rescue and 1993 Black Hawk Down massacre, military leaders insisted their forces not be involved. Budget cuts, little capacity for paramilitary action and unimaginative leadership hampered the CIA. Ironically, solving the 1993 World Trade Center bombing persuaded the FBI that its lowpriority counterterrorism system was working. The events of 9/11 produced an avalanche of money and action, which have chipped away at terrorist networks, forcing them to concentrate on smaller, less-risky local attacks, locally planned, mostly by disaffected individuals. The authors provide step-by-step accounts of the capture or killing of dozens of terrorists, almost always in cooperation with other nations, principally Pakistan.

America’s problems with Pakistan arise from its support of the Taliban, a local movement with no interest in international terrorism. The authors temper these successes with some unsettling reminders. We invaded Afghanistan to root out al-Qaeda but ended up fighting the Taliban. A sideshow, the Iraq War consumed enormous resources to no good purpose. Targeted assassination, torture, prisoner rendering, indefinite detention and vastly expanded surveillance within America provide

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“Raphael’s exceptional history of the beginning years of the United States should be required reading, especially in an election year.” from mr. president

PAKISTAN ON THE BRINK The Future of America, Pakistan, and Afghanistan

short-term satisfaction but store up strategic, diplomatic and moral quandaries which we are now experiencing.

A skillful combination of antiterrorism fireworks with perceptive analysis of our strategies, many of which remain inappropriate, wasteful and positively Orwellian.

MR. PRESIDENT How and Why the Founders Created a Chief Executive

Raphael, Ray Knopf (336 pp.) $27.95 | Mar. 6, 2012 978-0-307-59527-0

Renowned historian Raphael (Revolutionary Founders: Rebels, Radicals, and Reformers in the Making of the Nation, 2011, etc.) delivers an authoritative biography of the Constitutional Convention and the herculean task faced by the representatives.

The author paints a picture of heroes—Edmund Randolph, George Mason, James Wilson and James Madison, among others—noting that the founders developed a government presupposing that George Washington would be the first chief executive. They believed Washington would set a nonpartisan tone and establish precedents for the office. Knowing the first man at the helm would be a good one, they then had to imagine successors who might not be quite as upright and accommodating. In order to show how their views evolved as they toiled, Raphael explores the founders’ writings in chronological order.

The office developed slowly and with fervent discussions, and many wished the executive branch to be a committee out of fear of another monarchy like the one they had just rejected. They struggled with questions of popular or legislative election, term of office and re-eligibility before they ever began to worry about the powers the executive would wield. The question of direct election by the people was rejected out of hand, and selection by the senate would inextricably tie the executive to it. The electoral system involved the legislators while successively filtering the people’s wishes. The fear of a strong executive played equally against the notion that the aristocratic senate would overpower the government as they debated the division of powers. Remarkably, by the fall of 1787 two branches of the government were up and running, only awaiting the appointment of judges to complete the third.

Raphael’s exceptional history of the beginning years of the United States should be required reading, especially in an election year.

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Rashid, Ahmed Viking (256 pp.) $26.95 | Mar. 19, 2012 978-0-670-02346-2

In this grim but insightful sequel to Descent into Chaos (2008), veteran Pakistani journalist Rashid’s outlook is perfectly expressed by the title of that earlier overview.

Not yet a failed state like Somalia, Pakistan is inching perilously close. The irresponsible elite class pays little taxes to an incompetent government whose citizens, long among Asia’s most impoverished, are growing poorer. The army rules; civilian leaders defer to the military, handing over a lion’s share of the budget which it devotes to high-tech arms, including a nuclear arsenal, directed at India. Hatred of India is a national obsession. Preparations for the inevitable war require a compliant Afghanistan on its opposite border, so Pakistan has always supported the Taliban, whose fanatic Islam seems more anti-India than the traditional, easygoing Afghan version. No fan of international terrorism, Pakistan happily accepted the avalanche of American money that followed 9/11 and provided valuable aid in tracking down al-Qaeda militants even within its borders. Although no secret, its continued support of the Taliban seemed a mystery to the Bush administration for years, and Pakistan remains impervious to American hectoring and threats to cut off aid. President Obama took office promising to fix matters, but he has proved a disappointment. Supporting the Taliban has brought Pakistan few benefits. Perhaps most disturbingly, a separate Taliban faction has started to unleash a vicious, destabilizing terrorist campaign.

Rashid’s concluding advice, although reasonable, requires too many leaders to come to their senses, but readers will welcome this insider’s lucid, expert account of a disaster in the making.

OPEN HEART, OPEN MIND A Guide to Inner Transformation

Rinpoche III, Tsoknyi with Swanson, Eric Crown Archetype (288 pp.) $24.00 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-307-88820-4

Zen life and the art of mindfulness.

A well-respected teacher of Tibetan Buddhism, Rinpoche is recognized by many as a spiritual leader imparting a progressive combination of old Tibetan wisdom and 21st-century practicality. Richard Gere considers himself a student of the author, writing in the introduction that Rinpoche encourages followers to “discover, then rest in, the open truth of our natural essence, our original beingness.” This quote illustrates

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both the book’s pros and cons: Rinpoche’s insights will be a boon for veteran Buddhists, while uninitiated readers may be lost among the navel-gazing. To his credit, the author’s approach is both practical and philosophical as he dispenses transcendent guidance to those in what he terms as modern-day “bondage” to informational overload, job stress and complex agendas. Chapters on the author’s Nepalese upbringing and lineage set the appropriate foundation for the good work that’s been his calling since the age of eight. Rinpoche details a rich history of worldwide travel spent apprenticing with an array of Tibetan gurus and a rewarding lifetime enjoying the presence of followers eager to absorb the tenets of his self-nurturing belief systems. Proverbs, Tibetan interpretations, sage wisdom and anecdotes further exemplify the author’s themes of blissfulness and the unconditional inherence of “essence love.” Though best appreciated by the spiritually sophisticated, Rinpoche’s infectious spiritual energy, enthusiasm and insight will still prove relevant for anyone with an open mind and a willingness to project peace and goodness inward and outward.

Centered serenity from one of the greats.

THE MAN WHO PLANTED TREES Lost Groves, Champion Trees, and an Urgent Plan to Save the Planet Robbins, Jim Spiegel & Grau (240 pp.) $25.00 | Apr. 17, 2012 978-1-4000-6906-4

A serious investigation into the importance of trees as the “earth’s filter.”

New York Times contributor Robbins spent more than 10 years following the efforts of David Milarch and his Champion Tree Project. “A ‘champion’ is a tree that has the highest combined score of three measurements: height, crown size, and diameter at breast height.” The project’s goal “was to clone the champion of each of the 826 species of trees in the United States, make hundreds or thousands of copies, and plant the offspring in ‘living archival libraries’ around the country to preserve the trees’ DNA.” Robbins was at first skeptical, unconvinced of Milarch’s belief that the welfare of the entire planet lies within the old-growth trees that have lived for thousands of years.

The author was especially dubious when Milarch discussed his near-death experience and a visitation by “light beings” who instructed him to begin the cloning project. However, Robbins’ thoughts changed as he followed Milarch from one giant tree to another: sequoias on the coast of California, white oaks in Maryland, bristlecone pines in Colorado, a rare forest of dawn redwoods in China, stinking cedars in Florida and ancient yews in Europe. The sheer size of these trees brought awe; coupled with extensive research and interviews with leading environmental scientists, Robbins soon came to appreciate Milarch’s view.” Because trees create oxygen, filter water and also can cleanse the atmosphere of large amounts of pollutants, the |

planting of trees “may be the single most important ecotechnology that we have to put the broken pieces of our planet back together.” The book contains drawings of the various trees, but many readers may wish for photographs.

A rousing call-to-action to plant trees to save the environment.

FINANCIAL TURMOIL IN EUROPE AND THE UNITED STATES Essays

Soros, George PublicAffairs (172 pp.) $19.99 | Jan. 24, 2012 978-1-61039-152-8

The European economy seems to be sliding from bad to worse, and with it the planet’s markets. Soros (The New Paradigm for Financial Markets: The Credit Crisis of 2008 and What It Means, 2008, etc.), maven of the tickertape, ventures persuasive reasons why.

First, the buried lede, which comes late in the book: The European economy is pegged to the euro, and “the euro is a patently flawed construct.” It is flawed, writes the author, because its architects had not yet formed the perfect—or even an imperfect—financial union sufficient to back the unified currency, expecting its flaws to be corrected, “if and when they became acute, by the same process that brought the European Union into existence.” That process was a frankensteining of different national agendas, a process that, in large part, was engineered by Germany so that Europe would sign off on its reunification. Gathering articles written for the Financial Times and New York Review of Books, among other journals, indulges in some interesting speculative exercises: What would happen, for instance, if Germany withdrew from the euro and went back to the mark? The answer might be an instant enrichment of Germans and immiseration of everyone else—so why haven’t the Germans done so? Soros’ explorations of the European (and, to a somewhat lesser extent, American) market ought to send readers running for their economics dictionaries, since some terms are not quite completely defined or spelled out: Why is government involvement in mortgage insurance a good thing? What is the Danish model? What is the difference between fiscal policy and monetary policy? Soros is someone who has made his billions knowing those things and anticipating the reaction of markets to ordinary realities, pleasant and otherwise—so it’s well worth paying attention to his views on the world’s financial systems.

Not for the faint of heart or the innumerate. For policy and financial wonks, a bracing read.

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“First volume of an intimate, vivid biography of the ever-evolving English artist.” from david hockney

A CENTURY OF WISDOM Lessons from the Life of Alice Herz-Sommer, the World’s Oldest Living Holocaust Survivor

Stoessinger, Caroline Spiegel & Grau (224 pp.) $23.00 | Mar. 20, 2012 978-0-8129-9281-6 978-0-679-64401-9 e-book

A survivor of Theresienstadt and a world-class Czech pianist shares her amazing story of survival and triumph.

Now living in London since she relocated from Jerusalem to be closer to her only son (now deceased), Herz-Sommer is shortly turning 108, still playing the piano, disciplined and abstemious in her daily habits and fairly active, as Stoessinger records over interviews with her between 2004 and 2011. These are short segments that amplify important aspects of her life, such as her acquaintanceship as a young girl in Prague with Franz Kafka and his circle, her happy though too-brief marriage and successful early career as a concert pianist and teacher, the birth of her son in 1937 just as the Nazis were exerting their terror over the Jewish community in Prague and their abrupt deportation to Theresienstadt in 1943. Much of her biography is accessible from Melissa Müller’s Alice’s Piano (2012). However, what Stoessinger’s work reveals startlingly and firsthand are details of life in the concentration camp, especially how the musicians coped with the horrible conditions and even formed a vibrant community.

Herz-Sommer held many concerts—this is no doubt what kept her from being deported to Auschwitz, as her husband was—and astoundingly, she had to play mostly from memory, like all the musicians. “Every concert played there,” Stoessinger writes, “became a moral victory against the enemy.” The making of the propaganda film The Fuhrer Gives the Jews a City reveals the sadistic cynicism of the Nazis, who had promised the prisoner filmmaker leniency to make the film, then promptly deported him to Auschwitz when it was completed. Rounding out this work are memories from HerzSommer’s students and friends, reflections on favorite authors such as Spinoza, Rilke and Zweig and even recipes.

A sweetly affecting collection that will supplement more substantive biographies.

DAVID HOCKNEY The Biography

Sykes, Christopher Simon Talese/Doubleday (352 pp.) $35.00 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-385-53144-3

First volume of an intimate, vivid biography of the ever-evolving English artist.

Now in his mid-70s, Hockney is still reinventing himself, most recently with his use of the iPhone. A friend of the artist, photographer Sykes (The Big House, 2004, etc.) provides an excellent sense of what 382

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has fed the artist’s fertile, restless imagination. Born in 1937 to an antiwar couple in the Yorkshire industrial city of Bradford, Hockney became a scholarship boy who excelled at art but little else. His attendance at the Royal College of Art in London in 1959 drew out the tremendous talents of this awkward provincial kid, exposing him to modern art for the first time, especially currents from America (e.g., Jackson Pollock), and shaping his sense as a gay artist. Pop art exploded, depicting the everyday objects of modern life, and Hockney dallied briefly, such as in the use of graffiti (Doll Boy). Before even graduating, several events proved decisive to the shaping of his career. His work attracted the attention of hot young London dealer John Kasmin, and he visited New York City and resolved to go blonde after watching a TV commercial. He also won the RCA’s gold medal, started selling paintings, thanks to Kasmin’s relentless promotion, and moved into a large flat in the then-slummy Notting Hill, which would be his base for the next fruitful decade. Considered bright, witty and inventive, Hockney spent the transformative years of 1963-5 in Los Angeles, creating his early iconic work. Teaching at UCLA in 1966, Hockney met Peter Schlesinger, who became an important lover and muse. Experimenting with photography, etching, portraiture and theater and working between London, Paris and L.A., Hockney has never ceased questing. A personal, lively look at this extraordinary artist’s career.

Readers will eagerly await the second volume.

SUMMER OF ’68 The Season that Changed Baseball— and America—Forever

Wendel, Tim Da Capo/Perseus (256 pp.) $25.00 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-306-82018-2 978-0-306-82105-9 e-book

During one of the most tumultuous years in our history, a remarkable baseball season unfolded.

In 1968, most baseball players had to work a second job to make ends meet. There were no wild-card teams or division winners. That year the Detroit Tigers became only the third club in history to rally from a 3-1 deficit to defeat the powerful St. Louis Cardinals in the Fall Classic. Showcasing this looming match-up, Wendel (Writing/Johns Hopkins Univ.; High Heat: The Secret History of the Fastball and the Improbable Search for the Fastest Pitcher of All Time, 2010, etc.) foreshortens the season by focusing on the stories of individual Tigers Gates Brown, Willie Horton, Dick McAuliffe and, especially, pitchers Denny McLain, who won an astonishing 31 games, and Mickey Lolich, the Series MVP. The author also looks at Cardinal stars Lou Brock, Curt Flood, Tim McCarver, Orlando Cepeda and especially pitcher Bob Gibson, among the game’s all-time greatest. He charts the thrilling Series game by game. More intriguing, though, is the season’s unique backdrop: the “Year of the Pitcher” in baseball and the national turmoil surrounding the sports world. In addition to McLain and Gibson’s heroics (both won the Cy Young

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“Never shy about tackling big questions, veteran evolutionary biologist Wilson delivers his thoughtful if contentious explanation of why humans rule the Earth.” from the social conquest of earth

and MVP awards), the season saw five no-hitters (including a perfect game by Catfish Hunter), a consecutive game strikeout record by Luis Tiant and an unprecedented scoreless innings streak by Don Drysdale. Meanwhile, the country was falling apart. Urban riots and massive antiwar demonstrations helped persuade LBJ not to run again. By the time the Chicago Democratic Convention exploded in the streets, Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert Kennedy had already been assassinated. Wendel touches briefly on how the year agitated other sports, but he focuses on the baseball story and the athletes accustomed to ignoring the outside world. They found that impossible to do in the chaotic year of ’68.

An appealing mix of baseball and cultural history.

ALI IN WONDERLAND and Other Tall Tales

Wentworth, Ali Harper/HarperCollins (272 pp.) $25.99 | Feb. 7, 2012 978-0-06-199857-7 Comedienne Wentworth revisits her privileged and precocious early years.

In this satirical dissection of class and privilege, the author, daughter of President Ronald Reagan’s social secretary Muffie Cabot, mines a childhood spent among America’s elite. By the time she landed a role on the sketch show In Living Color, Wentworth had already put on vaudevillian after-dinner performances for Henry Kissinger. As a socialite in training, she keyed into a number of important life lessons—e.g., “There’s a fine line between WASP victuals and white-trash cuisine.” Wentworth’s glib take on America’s social hierarchy might initially seem like a blue blood’s guide to slumming it, but her savvy understanding of what she’s been given versus what she’s earned makes for a sharp critique of class and power. She probes her marriage to former political operative and current TV newsman George Stephanopoulos for insights about pregnancy, childrearing and compromise. Her understated prose and deadpan humor go a long way toward making this account of life among the one-percenters easy to swallow. If readers aren’t taken with her charm, they’d be well advised to follow her mother’s catchall advice: “Just go to the Four Seasons.” Nothing’s better than blocking out the world behind silk curtains, sinking into crisp linen sheets and ringing for tea and crumpets. Wentworth would likely suggest the same remedy to readers who aren’t immediately enamored with her collection of vignettes. She’d be winking slyly as she did, though.

A smart, often-funny memoir. (Author appearances in Los Angeles, New York, Washington, D.C.)

THE ELIZABETHANS

Wilson, A.N. Farrar, Straus and Giroux (448 pp.) $30.00 | May 1, 2012 978-0-374-14744-0 Vivid, opinionated overview of 16thcentury Britain by prolific novelist/historian/biographer Wilson (Dante in Love, 2011, etc.). “[M]odern history began with the Elizabethans,” writes the author, “not simply modern English history, but the modern world as we know it today.” This is rather overstated: While their accomplishments are indeed remarkable, from Francis Drake’s circumnavigation of the globe to the glories of English poetry and prose in the age of Spenser and Shakespeare, they were rooted in the Renaissance cultural explosion across Europe, as Wilson acknowledges. His readable, well-informed survey is strikingly ambivalent. On one hand, he depicts Queen Elizabeth as a political genius who transformed a weak, religiously divided nation into a world power; on the other, he dwells obsessively on her parsimony and indecisiveness. Similarly, Wilson spends inordinate amounts of time arguing with contemporary historians whom he claims have lost sight of the era’s magnificent achievements as they berate the Elizabethans for racism, imperialism, cruelty and oppression of Ireland. General readers are unlikely to know what Wilson is talking about, particularly since he gives few specific examples to justify his sweeping generalizations about political correctness.

Fortunately, as has been the case in some of his earlier nonfiction works, the gratuitous editorializing doesn’t really detract from a colorful narrative packed with great stories and shrewd insights.

Wilson’s examination of the Elizabethan religious compromise sympathetically depicts a national church trying to make room for everyone from covert Catholics to extreme Puritans. He also does well in reminding us that Elizabethan humanists believed they were rediscovering the wisdom of antiquity, not inventing something new. Nonetheless, his vigorous chronicle shows new energies erupting everywhere. Wilson makes a strong case for his underlying principle: that the English national identity, notable for its paradoxical blend of proud insularity and globetrotting adventurism, was formed by the Elizabethans.

Great fun, despite some unnecessary argumentativeness.

THE SOCIAL CONQUEST OF EARTH

Wilson, Edward O. Liveright/Norton (352 pp.) $27.95 | Apr. 9, 2012 978-0-87140-413-8

Never shy about tackling big questions, veteran evolutionary biologist Wilson (The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth, 2006, etc.) delivers his thoughtful if contentious explanation of why humans rule the Earth. |

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After a respectful nod to the old favorites (big brains, tools, language, fire), the author maintains that these merely provide the background to our overpowering “eusociality”; we are the world’s most intensely social creatures, living in complex societies of mutually dependent individuals. Wilson adds that another eusocial organism, the ant, dominated terrestrial life for 50 million years before humans appeared; it remains a close second.

The author provides a provocative comparison of how this powerful but rare evolutionary strategy vaulted two wildly different species to the top of the heap. Both originated with individuals cooperating and behaving altruistically, often sacrificing themselves, to protect a defensible nest. For humans this crucial step began when extended families of our Homo erectus ancestors gathered around campfires over one million years ago. Gradually members of multiple generations divided labor and specialized.

Natural selection worked to expand this eusociality, and Wilson emphasizes that it was the group that evolved. Whether they were genetically related or not mattered little. Group selection— as opposed to kin selection, i.e., the “selfish gene” à la Richard Dawkins—is the author’s big idea. Few lay readers will disagree, but Wilson’s fellow biologists are not so sure; kin versus group selection remains a subject of fierce debate.

Wilson succeeds in explaining his complex ideas, so attentive readers will receive a deeply satisfying exposure to a major scientific controversy. (90 illustrations. Author tour to Chicago, Boston, New York, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, Seattle, Birmingham)

THE GOLDEN HAT Talking Back to Autism

Winslet, Kate with Thorsteinsson, Keli and Ericsdottir, Margret Simon & Schuster (256 pp.) $29.95 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-1-4516-4543-9 978-1-4516-4545-3 e-book

Hollywood rallies for a unique charitable venture.

In 2010, award-winning actress Winslet narrated the documentary A Mother’s Courage about the plight of Margret Ericsdottir, loving mother to teenaged son Keli, who was stricken with nonverbal autism. The film drew widespread attention for its stark depiction of a child silenced by the ailment, able to communicate with only pen and paper, and of the lack of support and resources available to families surviving with it. Ericsdottir and Winslet remained close, yet as a mother of two “verbal, expressive, affectionate children,” Winslet continued to be moved by Keli’s poetry and creative writing, along with the stories Margret shared by email. In a particularly heart-rending section, Ericsdottir shares her heartbreaking story of love and devotion to a son struggling to communicate everything from food choices to nagging physical pain from osteoporosis. The humanitarian actress soon resolved to do something beneficial for the cause. She began sending around an old tattered hat to celebrities, requesting they photograph themselves wearing it along with a witty, personally worded expression. The photographs—ranging from the humorous (Conan O’Brien, Steven 384

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Soderbergh) to the heartfelt (Reese Witherspoon, Oprah Winfrey) to the bizarre (Woody Allen, Edward Burns)—are all prefaced by the powerfully poignant “first words” of ten pictured individuals with nonverbal autism. Many pronouncements overshadow their accompanying photographs. Kylie Minogue offers, “I can still hear you, even though the show has finished. Can you hear me?”; both South African designer Albertus Swanepoel and Jodie Foster plead, “Don’t give up on me.” The book’s proceeds fund “The Golden Hat Foundation” to create autistic awareness and assisted-living campuses for those affected.

A moving, sanguine labor of love.

BAD ANIMALS A Father’s Accidental Education in Autism

Yanofsky, Joel Arcade (288 pp.) $24.95 | May 1, 2012 978-1-61145-414-7

With self-deprecating humor and searing honesty, Montreal-based feature writer and book reviewer Yanofsky (Mordecai and Me: An Appreciation of a Kind, 2003, etc.) reveals the painful frustration and the powerful bond of love between him, his wife and their 11-year-old autistic son, Jonah.

The author explains why he decided to add his family’s story to the massive collection of books already available on the subject: “The uninspiring everydayness of living with autism, its routine weirdness, its unbearable bearableness, its incremental ups and downs, is what so often gets unstated.” He writes of the pain of “coping and not coping at the same time,” and watching people, including himself, undervalue his son. Yanofsky relates the difficulty of knowing which experts to consult, whether to pursue dietary cures or behavioral therapy, even whether to consider the autistic spectrum as a disability or merely a different way of perceiving the world. At age 4, Jonah was diagnosed at the high end of the spectrum, and Yanofsky and his wife chose applied behavioral analysis therapy, an exacting discipline that requires parents to participate along with a therapy team. Stories about bad animals—the inspiration for the title—became metaphors shared by Jonah and his father as they discussed his behavior and the ups and downs of their relationship with each other. By the end of the book, Jonah has decided to rename the animals: “Worst-Monkey-Ever” became “Jumpy the Monkey,” and the monkey’s father, formerly “Worst-Daddy-Ever,” became “Grumpy the Daddy.”

An eloquent memoir of Jonah’s sometimes-almostimperceptible growth, increasing social skills and developing self-awareness that also addresses the broader issues involved with parenthood.

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children & teens BUSTLE IN THE BUSHES

Andreae, Giles Illus. by Wojtowycz, David Tiger Tales (32 pp.) $16.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-58925-109-0

Underdeveloped rhymes describe the “minibeasts” that live in a garden.

These cheery critters, mostly insects and uniformly smiling, present themselves to readers with a few brief lines apiece. There are the usual suspects (ladybug, butterfly) as well as a few unusual choices (earwig and stick insect). The chatty remarks fail to distinguish one voice from another, though their goodwill is undeniable. “Hello, / I’m the centipede, / how do you do? / I’m as friendly as friendly can be. / Now, which of my hands would you / most like to shake? / I’ve got at least 30, you see!” The verses’ rhymes tend toward the obvious, pairing “tummy” with “yummy,” for instance, as the worm describes the joys of devouring mud. Onomatopoeic sound effects complement the rhymes and add an ear-pleasing note, from ants’ “pitterpatter” to the caterpillar’s “crunch” of a leafy snack. Patterned elements within the illustrations (the snail’s kaleidoscopic stripes and the dragonfly’s iridescent, lacy wings) bring a little sparkle to this primary-and-pastel landscape. An imposing spider web on the endpapers contrasts refreshingly with the busyness of the interior illustrations.

With little specific factual information provided or individual personality developed, there is nothing here to separate one backyard inhabitant from the next. (Picture book. 3-5)

ME AND EARL AND THE DYING GIRL

Andrews, Jesse Amulet/Abrams (304 pp.) $16.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-4197-0176-4

A frequently hysterical confessional from a teen narrator who won’t be able to convince readers he’s as unlikable as he wants them to believe.

“I have no idea how to write this stupid book,” narrator Greg begins. Without answering the obvious question—just why is he writing” this stupid book”?—Greg lets readers in on plenty else. His filmmaking ambitions. His unlikely friendship with the unfortunately short, chain-smoking, foulmouthed, African-American Earl of the title. And his unlikelier |

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friendship with Rachel, the titular “dying girl.” Punctuating his aggressively self-hating account with film scripts and digressions, he chronicles his senior year, in which his mother guilt-trips him into hanging out with Rachel, who has acute myelogenous leukemia. Almost professionally socially awkward, Greg navigates his unwanted relationship with Rachel by showing her the films he’s made with Earl, an oeuvre begun in fifth grade with their remake of Aguirre, Wrath of God. Greg’s uber-snarky narration is self-conscious in the extreme, resulting in lines like, “This entire paragraph is a moron.” Debut novelist Andrews succeeds brilliantly in painting a portrait of a kid whose responses to emotional duress are entirely believable and sympathetic, however fiercely he professes his essential crappiness as a human being.

Though this novel begs inevitable thematic comparisons to John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars (2011), it stands on its own in inventiveness, humor and heart. (Fiction. 14 & up)

COCK-A-DOODLE DOO, CREAK, POP-POP, MOO

Aylesworth, Jim Illus. by Sneed, Brad Holiday House (32 pp.) $16.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-8234-2356-9

What can you hear on a farm?

The titular “cock-a-doodle-doo, creak, pop-pop, and moo,” just to start. Crisp, clear lines rich in onomatopoeia describe a day from morning to night in this nostalgic paean to life on a farm, while stylized, retro watercolors provide a humorous look at the farm’s residents, both animal and human. From start (“Rooster crows, / Cock-a-doodle-doo. / Wake up, girls, / And little boys, too”) to finish (“Owl calls out / Hoo, hoo, hoo, hoo. / Goodnight, boys, / And little girls, too”), this agreeable selection delivers the sounds, look and atmosphere of an old-time farm.

Young children will enjoy the strong rhymes and catchy beat, which beckon them to join in, and appreciate the introduction to some of the specifics of the world of a farm, including cooking, chores and the rhythm of nature. Sneed’s characters, both animal and human, and backgrounds are rendered with curving, sometimes off-kilter lines, constantly evoking motion and complementing the rhythmic text. In composition and perspective, they echo the heroic murals of the Works Progress Administration. He fills the pages with details (a swallow feeds its babies at its nest under the eaves) and humor (a pig squints lazily up from its bed in the mud).

A snapshot of country life full of sounds and sentiment.

(Picture book. 2-5) |

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PEACEWEAVER

Barnhouse, Rebecca Random House (336 pp.) $16.99 | $10.99 e-book | PLB $19.99 Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-375-86766-8 978-0-375-89848-8 e-book 978-0-375-96766-5 PLB The author of the Beowulf-inspired The Coming of the Dragon (2010) returns to sixth-century Scandinavia to tell the story of one of its minor characters.

At the end of the first book, unlikely hero Rune met his bride-to-be, Hild, a peace offering from the warring Shylfings, on the eve of his coronation. In this companion, Barnhouse goes back in time to tell Hild’s story. Niece of the king of the prosperous Shylfings, she is about to take the position of meadserver and hopes to use the ceremonial authority to “weave peace.” Her dreams are dashed when, shortly after her first passing of the mead, she has a vision of an assassination attempt on her royal cousin’s life—and promptly acts on it, killing a man who has made no hostile move. Disgraced, she becomes her uncle’s pawn, shipped off to the lowly Geats to marry their new king. A specialist in Anglo-Saxon literature, the author braids in her knowledge of daily life in the Dark Ages effortlessly, reveling in homely detail. Hild is a satisfyingly complex character, both committed to peace and desperate to avoid exile (and probably death) among the Geats, bewildered, terrified and exalted by her visions.

Although it depends not a whit on the previous book, it may well drive new readers to it, so they can spend more time in this fascinating, distant place. (Historical fantasy. 12-16)

THE GREEN MAN

Bedard, Michael Tundra (312 pp.) $19.95 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-1-77049-285-1

Fifteen-year-old Ophelia, known as O, encounters the unexpected when she spends a transformative summer with her aunt, a poet and the proprietor of a secondhand bookshop called the Green Man, “where extraordinary things [happen].”

After receiving a summer grant to study in Italy, O’s father sends her to stay with his older sister Emily, “one of the finest poets of her generation.” Though “always a poet, always a little odd,” Emily’s recent heart attack has left her even more “offcenter.” Emily’s eccentricity concerns O, who has recently starting writing poetry. Arriving at the Green Man, O finds Emily frail and distracted. Suffering from debilitating angina and disturbing childhood dreams of an evil magician, Emily has clearly neglected everything. As O tries to restore order to Emily’s disintegrating life and business, she falls under the Green Man’s 386

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spell and is drawn irrevocably into the dark mystery threatening her aunt. United by poetry, O and Emily bond, and, by summer’s end, O “joins the ranks of those crazy people who call themselves poets.” This atmospheric exploration of what it means to be a poet offers memorable corporal and incorporeal characters, a realistic intergenerational relationship and a deeply rooted mystery connecting past and present.

Ideal for those with a penchant for magic, mystery and poetry. (Fantasy. 10-14)

MOLE’S BABIES

Bedford, David Illus. by Beardshaw, Rosalind Tiger Tales (32 pp.) $12.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-58925-108-3 Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery for this nervous first-time dad.

Expectant parents Mini and Morris Mole prepare for the blessed event. Mini knits while Morris anxiously studies the happy babes in the barnyard, hoping he can replicate their daddies’ natural behaviors. His attempt to hop like a bunny catapults him one-pawed over the toadstool, and he falls flat on his snout—and so on. Unable to copy any animal, Morris appears to be a natural klutz. Repeatedly, Mini gently redirects Morris after confirming that he is uninjured. “Good,… because our babies are on their way!” Morris’ final fall is greeted with silence, and upon investigating he finds Mini cuddling their three new family additions. Morris’ earnestness is endearing. Varied typography highlights word choices; decorative hearts surround “hand-lettered” verbs like “flapping” and “splashing.” Panels reveal shifts in time and movement. There’s an unforced fluidity in the parents’ nonverbal communication. Unfortunately, the couple’s good intentions are undermined by the simplistic slant. “Our babies only need love,” the proud mom explains.

Morris is one well-intentioned papa, though this sentimental message would be better served by a subtler storyline. (Picture book. 2-5)

STEVE JOBS The Man Who Thought Different

Blumenthal, Karen Feiwel & Friends (256 pp.) $8.99 paperback | Feb. 14, 2012 978-1-250-01445-0

An admiring though not entirely adulatory view of our era’s greatest technology celebrity, rightly dubbed (by U2’s Bono) “the hardware software Elvis.”

Blumenthal weaves her portrait on the thematic frame used

by Jobs himself in his autobiographical 2005 Stanford commencement address. She “connects the dots” that led him from kirkusreviews.com

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“The line work is crayon bold, and the color so saturated it is thick as fudge.” from henry in a jam

his adoption as an infant through his “phone phreaking” days to a spectacular rise and just as meteoric fall from corporate grace in the 1980s. Following a decade of diminished fortunes and largely self-inflicted complications in personal relationships, he returned to Apple for a spectacular second act that also turned out to be his final one. Despite getting bogged down occasionally in detail, the author tells a cohesive tale, infused with dry wit (“He also considered going into politics, but he had never actually voted, which would have been a drawback”) The book is thoroughly researched and clear on the subject’s foibles as well as his genius.

A perceptive, well-wrought picture of an iconic figure well worth admiring—from a distance. (endnotes, photos, time line) (Biography. 11-14)

OLLIE THE ELEPHANT

Bos, Burny Illus. by de Beer, Hans NorthSouth (28 pp.) $6.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-7358-4075-1 Series: Tuff Books,

Ollie, pining for a baby brother, goes on a walkabout to find one or become someone else’s.

Ollie had high hopes of getting a baby brother for his birthday, but when that doesn’t pan out—”You don’t get little children for your birthday,” his mother rather unsympathetically tells him—he straps on his roller skates and heads out the door to see what he might find. When no baby elephants materialize, Ollie asks a number of other creatures if he can join their clans— a stag, a frog, a bat—but since he isn’t one of them (he hasn’t got the stag’s horns, for instance, though he does tie a chair on his head in a heartbreaking attempt), nothing really works out.

He gets lost, he breaks his and he gets found. His mother tells him, “your father and I plan to have more children,” still rather unsympathetically, like she’s going to get an oil change or something. Bos’ narrative is verbose, practically swamping de Beer’s delicate but comic pen-and-ink illustrations, and remarkably unmusical (though perhaps that’s the translation). Its punchy directness has an undeniable clarity and a measure of drama.

But really, Ollie’s gone for four days and all Mother can say is “we’ve been so worried about you”?

Of course Ollie wants a brother…for a little familial warmth and dependability. (Picture book. 3-6)

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HENRY IN A JAM

Bourne, B.B. Illus. by Abbott, Simon Harper/HarperCollins (32 pp.) $16.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-06-195819-9 Series: Everything Goes A genial elementary reader that taps into the electricity generated by Brian Biggs’ Everything Goes: On Land (2011).

This book has been designed to share with very beginning readers, as Bourne’s text amply illustrates in its simple repetitions: “ ‘Woof, woof, woof.’…The dog wags his tail. The dog does not want to stop. The dog wants to see.”

Then there is the truck honking—“Honk, honk, honk!”—at the tree that has fallen across the road, causing the traffic jam that is the story’s pivot. Though the text can feel overly purposedriven, and the words more to be absorbed than befriended, such is not the case with Abbott’s artwork—“in the style of Brian Biggs,” according to the title page—which is amiability itself. The line work is crayon bold, and the color so saturated it is thick as fudge. But there is something else lurking in the illustrations, something Claymation-tangible, which may arouse the urge to bring them home and introduce them to mother. If one of the objects of an early-early reader is to keep the reader focused, this artwork immeasurably helps.

Traffic jams, it turns out, can be good fun, and children might even learn a word or two. (Early reader. 3-5)

SCARY MARY

Bowles, Paula Illus. by Bowles, Paula Tiger Tales (24 pp.) $12.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-58925-110-6 Animals fly the coop when Scary Mary ruffles her feathers.

Though small in stature, this diva proves she is the bossiest chicken around. She squawks with a vengeance, hoards sunflower seeds and padlocks the gate. Her makeshift signs pull no punches (“Go Away”; “Keep Out”). Though her neighbors invite her to join them, Mary has no interest in playing nice.

Her feather-flapping tantrums succeed in preserving her solitude—but at a cost. Her futile attempts at self-entertainment (checkers is not a solitary game) leave her contrite, and she pursues rapprochement with her neighbors. Dialogue bubbles interspersed with descriptive phrases carry the story along in jolly style, though the playful tone turns sour with a final didactic statement: “Because it was much more fun to do things … / together!” Bowles’ dynamic portrayal of this fowl with a temper makes Mary an engaging queen of the barn. Splashes of golden feathers dance with robust red accents. Scraggly chickenscratches define each defiant cluck. Mary throws herself into each fit with abandon (complete with wattle-shaking screams) |

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“…the painted art’s visual rhythms match the text for quirky energy. Mutual adoration between mother and child shines out in a final cozy cuddle.” from peter and the moon

and then looks for a reaction. When the gang disappears, Mary throws her beak between her legs in search of an audience.

The glib ending notwithstanding, Mary’s humorous tactics make her one of the more appealing barnyard brats around. (Picture book. 2-5)

PETER AND THE MOON

Brière-Haquet, Alice Illus. by Chauffrey, Célia Auzou Publishing (40 pp.) $14.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-2-7338-1940-1

Ball, but the lights lead in succession (with the “ten friends” line repeated each time) to two doves, three snails and four worms.

The narrator abruptly concludes that Ball can live its own life, because with ten newfound buddies “everything is alright [sic]. / Zebedee is no longer afraid of the night.”

Some readers may be weirded out by the art; more will find Zebedee’s sudden change of heart forced and artificial.

(Picture book. 5-7)

SEED MAGIC

A lad bent on giving his mother the Moon discovers that it’s hard—but not impossible—to reach.

Brière-Haquet begins by noting with unassailable logic that “[b]ecause he is small, [Peter] is not very tall.” She stands him atop a rising pyramid of his father, his friends, helpful local people and more—to all of whom he promises a piece of the moon once he reaches it. Eventually, frustrated and thinking that the widespread distribution wouldn’t leave much to give his mother anyway, he stalks around the world to cool off and then decides to give it one more try.

Success! And the Moon turns out to be much bigger than he had supposed. The narrative is written in free verse laced with internal and partial rhymes. It floats over rolling, canted crowd scenes of stylized babushkas and others in baggy, patterned clothing, who lean into one another and reach upward to help Peter on his way. If the print is a bit hard to make out on darker spreads and Chauffrey’s Moon resembles a roast wrapped in brown paper and string netting, still the painted art’s visual rhythms match the text for quirky energy. Mutual adoration between mother and child shines out in a final cozy cuddle. “[W]e have only one mother,” the author concludes (true in most cases, at least). “The moon is the very least that we can offer her!” (Picture book. 5-8)

Buchanan, Jane Illus. by Riley-Webb, Charlotte Peachtree (32 pp.) $16.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-1-56145-622-2 A tale about the quest for magic and beauty struggles to bring its various parts together, leaving only an impression of what the story might have been.

Crazy old Birdman is an iconic figure in his urban neighborhood, sitting in his wheelchair and feeding pigeons. The neighborhood children, including Toby and Rose, wonder how Birdman could possibly find joy in the filthy birds. Rose is astonished when Birdman tells her he finds the birds beautiful. Rose insists that true beauty comes from flowers and gardens, like those in her library books. “Birds not beautiful,” she says. So when Birdman gives her a handful of seeds and tells her to place them on her windowsill, she is skeptical—though hopeful. The ungrammatical speech patterns come across as uneducated rather than childlike, giving the book the tone and feel of something from decades past. The artwork, on the other hand, appears energetic on the verge of frenetic, and the slow-moving language and rip-roaring swirls of color collide without joy or magic.

In the end, good intentions, bright colors, a gentle voice and an agreeable theme do not jell into a successful book.

(Picture book. 4-8)

ZEBEDEE’S BALLOON

RENEGADE MAGIC

Brière-Haquet, Alice Illus. by Philipponneau, Olivier Auzou Publishing (40 pp.) $9.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-2-7338-1942-5

Burgis, Stephanie Atheneum (336 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-1-4169-9449-7 Series: Kat, Incorrigible, 2

Heavy contrivance and clumsy language sink this French tale of a small, indeterminate animal searching for a lost toy.

Frightened and desolate after the prized red balloon he calls “Ball” sails off into the night, Zebedee gets help tracking it down from an owl. He predicts that, “as we search hard for Ball, / You will make not one but ten friends in all!” In Philipponneau’s informally carved wood engravings the dark forest is anything but comforting, being eerily lit first by the owl’s huge red eyes, then by a similarly glowing thicket of red flowers, a bunch of wild strawberries and the apples in a tree. None turns out to be 388

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Kat Stephenson, incorrigible as ever, returns to sow more magical chaos in a Regency England where families tainted by witchcraft are shunned in polite Society.

With good marriages arranged for Kat’s sisters, her family’s place in Society seems assured until, at Elissa’s wedding, Angeline is publicly outed as a witch. To find Angeline a husband before the scandal breaks, Stepmama engineers a hasty expedition to fashionable Bath. It doesn’t go well: Their hosts, the Wingates, treat the Stephensons with sneering kirkusreviews.com

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condescension, heartbroken Angeline refuses to cooperate with Stepmama’s plans, brother Charles disappears into the gaming rooms and Papa buries himself in his studies. Worst of all, Kat is expelled from the Order of the Guardians, the elite whose role is to ensure that magic-working remains in the “right” hands.

Exploring the baths, Kat and Lucy Wingate stumble upon a group of young men—including Charles—invoking an ancient Roman goddess. The wild magic unleashed possesses Lucy and nearly overpowers Kat. Yes, the setting’s authentic (mostly)— from the springs of the ancient Roman spa to the stinky waters elegant Regency matrons sip in the Pump Room—but this rollicking tale is neither historical fiction nor literary retread.

Recommended for readers who like their fantasy seasoned with feisty characters and nonstop action. Roll over, Jane Austen! (author’s note) (Historical fantasy. 10 & up)

HEROES OF THE SURF

Carbone, Elisa Illus. by Carpenter, Nancy Viking (40 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-670-06312-3

Based on a true story of shipwreck and rescue, Carbone’s tale is leavened with narration by Anthony, a venturesome lad whose penchant for playing pirates helps him through the harrowing event.

It’s 1882, and the steamship Pliny, bound for New York City from Brazil, founders in a storm off New Jersey. Anthony and his friend Pedro run onto the deck to gauge whether New York is near. Instead, they face life-threatening conditions, as towering waves splinter lifeboats and the engines die. In the gray dawn, the boys see land, men and—a cannon. Before there’s much time to ponder pirates, a rescue line is launched from shore to ship, followed by the breeches buoy: “It comes swinging toward us hanging from the rope: a life preserver with a pair of short pants attached.” One by one, passengers are hauled along the line to safety ashore at Deal Beach. Carbone’s text conveys a compelling “you are there” tone as Anthony prepares to ride the breeches buoy: “I swing out into open space. Below me, waves crash and twist like angry snakes. Will the ropes hold?” Carpenter’s pictures beautifully capture both historical detail and the event’s inherent drama. A seagoing palette of blue, gray, brown and ochre, crosshatched in black, thoroughly suits the period.

Riveting reading, well-timed for the centennial of the Titanic’s sinking. (afterword) (Picture book. 4-8)

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GET DRESSED!

Chwast, Seymour Illus. by Chwast, Seymour abramsappleseed (18 pp.) $12.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-1-4197-0107-8 A fashion lookbook for the preschool set—including a soup pot and a skirt made of envelopes?

Influential artist Chwast eschews the normal “getting dressed” picture-book theme in favor of a much more creative ploy. Socks, shirts, pants and underwear all make an appearance, but so do funnels, paintbrushes and feather dusters. Instead of telling youngsters how to get dressed, Chwast encourages them to think about the adventures the outfit could inspire. Why, for instance, would one wear a floral jumpsuit, sunglasses and a fan? Flip open the gatefold to reveal a girl blending into a leopard-inhabited garden, with the sage advice: “Get dressed to hide.” Or the outfit made up of a bath towel, rubber gloves, boxer shorts and rain boots? Lift the flap to find a boy flying, with a towel cape around his neck. The accompanying text: “Get dressed to make believe.” Chwast’s wacky (and yet some, quite normal) combinations are sure to encourage young fashionistas to be comfortable with their own personal style. Even the cover, designed as a suit jacket that fastens with a magnetic snap, invites readers to open a world of possibilities. Sturdy, card-stock pages stand a good chance of making it through multiple reads.

A clever, dapper package. (Picture book. 2-6)

AUNT ANT LEAVES THROUGH THE LEAVES A Story with Homophones and Homonyms Coffelt, Nancy Illus. by Coffelt, Nancy Holiday House (32 pp.) $16.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-8234-2353-8

Coffelt masterfully weaves a lesson in words around a familiar “Little Red Hen” moral, making this one entertaining teaching tool.

Monkey needs help transporting his bananas home so he can make banana cream pie. But Ant is a new aunt anxious to see her niece, Bee has too much to do, with a honey shipment due, and Bear must wash the fir sap off his fur. Gnu, Ewe, Horse and Deer also find more pressing matters, and each leaves through the leaves without helping. Just when Monkey is about to do it all himself, Ant comes back to pitch in. They make the pies and share the tasty results. Predictably, the other animals want some pie, too, but Monkey only provides after they all help in the cleaning up. The five homonym pairs and 29 homophone combinations are bolded within the text, making them easy to spot. Coffelt keeps her textured oil pastel illustrations simple, so as not to detract from the wordplay, but what they |

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may lack in detail they more than make up in rich, vibrant color and visual humor. Aunt Ant directs her little army from underneath a purple foreman’s cap. Backmatter defines homophones and homonyms and addresses the regional pronunciations that can affect whether or not two words sound the same.

Fun on many levels, this has a sure spot in classrooms and storytimes as fable, grammar lesson and wordplay all rolled into one. (Picture book. 4-8)

REVENGE

Cooper, Mark A. Sourcebooks (240 pp.) $7.99 paperback | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-4022-6429-0 Series: Jason Steed, 2 Jason Steed, an 11-year-old Brit who appears to be the next James Bond in the making, returns for his second book (The Fledgling, 2010).

Jason continues his independent role as a secret asset for Scotland Yard, this time going up against the lethal Triads, who are bilking millions of pounds out of an unsuspecting British public. The Triads want to overthrow the Chinese government and take control of the largest nation in the world, just the first step toward eventual global domination. It’s up to Jason to infiltrate the Triads by befriending the criminal son of one of its leaders, which leads him down a path of murder and mayhem he may not be able to pull back from.

When his own government betrays him, he’s on the run across Europe, dodging assassins from all sides while trying to save the life of a Chinese girl who could be the key to it all. While this sequel is jam-packed with one action sequence after another (to the detriment of clarity), it has lost the balance of its predecessor. Jason is asked to kill at will, taking out the innocent as well as the guilty with apparently no compunction. The novel takes place in 1974, and it is unlikely that today’s young readers will understand references to Mao or Chinese population control.

Breathless pace can’t compensate for murky plotting and uneasy moral underpinnings. (Adventure. 9-11)

THE SECRET CHICKEN SOCIETY

Cox, Judy Illus. by Haley, Amanda Holiday House (96 pp.) $15.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-8234-2372-9

will get to bring one of the chicks home, even though his mother has declared, “No more animals!” He ends up with five chicks, and the challenges begin. First, his neighbor, former principal Mr. Grafalo, dislikes the chicks, while Mrs. Grafalo, who loves them, has to move to a nursing home. Then there are the challenges of building a coop and keeping the chicks safe from dogs and coyotes. And when Peepers, Daniel’s favorite chick, grows up to be a rooster, Daniel breaks the local ordinance forbidding roosters.

A quick, kid-friendly plot, amusing black-and-white illustrations and lots of interesting chicken facts make this a great choice for animal-loving chapter-book readers. Children who hatch classroom chicks will nod in recognition every step of the way. Many municipalities are now allowing backyard chickens; this story will help explain poultry keeping. It’s nice, too, to read about a mom who works outside the home and a father who works at home, taking care of day-to-day life.

Chickens and children are lucky to live in this family.

(Fiction. 6-10)

KILL ME SOFTLY

Cross, Sarah Egmont USA (320 pp.) $17.99 | $17.99 e-book | Apr. 10, 2012 978-1-60684-323-9 978-1-60684-324-6 e-book A girl struggles to escape her fairytale fate in this suspenseful fantasy.

Mira will turn 16 in a few days.

Though she loves her godmothers, she wants to return to the city of her birth and find her parents’ graves, one of the many things that her godmothers forbid. She runs away and travels to Beau Rivage, not knowing that the town is magical and that she risks death by returning. She quickly meets a boy she instantly dislikes, Blue, who has blue, spiked hair and seems to enjoy insulting her.

But Blue’s older brother Felix charms her and gives her a free luxury room in the family’s casino hotel. Mira can’t understand why everyone warns her not to spend time with Felix, and she quickly falls in love with him. Finally, Mira learns that she, with the other teens in the story, is cursed to live out fairy tales. She finds herself caught in not just one foretold fate that threatens her, but two—and the second could kill her. Cross, who knows her fairy tales, weaves a number of them into her story, giving them interesting twists as she applies them to her vulnerable and rebellious teen characters. Earnest Freddie, cynical Viv and captivating Felix all stand out as the archetypes they’re supposed to embody, and as individuals as well.

Clever fun. (Fantasy. 14 & up)

Daniel, who loves all animals, learns a lot about chickens when he takes five chicks home.

When Mrs. Lopez announces that her third-grade class is going to hatch eggs, Daniel can hardly contain his enthusiasm. Daniel hopes a lot of eggs will hatch and that he 390

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“While Davies’ text gently informs, Rubbino’s mixed-media illustrations, done in a subdued palette of watery greens, grays and browns, truly impress.” from just ducks

CROAK

Damico, Gina Graphia (320 pp.)

Mar. 20, 2012 978-0-547-60832-7 A teen hellion realizes her calling as a grim reaper in this derivative but enjoyable novel set in an unusual town in upstate New York.

Previously perfectly well adjusted, Lex has spent the last couple of years hitting, spitting, swearing and acting out violent urges that she herself doesn’t understand. Her parents decide to ship her off to her Uncle Mort in Croak, hoping that hard farm labor will jog sense into her. Little do they know that Mort is the mayor of a community whose inhabitants are all involved in ensuring the humane transference of the dead into the next realm. Mort pairs her with cute but antagonistic Driggs, and the two grapple comically with their growing feelings for one another throughout. Many of the details here have a distinctly Potteresque feel—Lex is the most powerful Grim in a millennia, but bears similarity to a legendarily terrible villain. However, the central mystery is genuinely puzzling, and Lex’s narrative voice is funny and fresh—”Maybe this was one of those things that people should keep to themselves, like a hatred of baby pandas or a passion for polka music.” An unexpectedly (and frustratingly) abrupt conclusion leaves no doubt that there will be a sequel.

Fantasy fans who like their tales gritty and filled with irreverent humor will be eager for the follow-up. (Paranormal comedy. 13-18)

JUST DUCKS!

Davies, Nicola Illus. by Rubbino, Salvatore Candlewick (32 pp.) $15.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7636-5936-3

Mallard ducks catch the attention of an observant young narrator. Join in on her day’s travels to learn a lot about these quacking creatures.

Quacks appear in graduated type from large to small to begin this informational gem. The daily activities of a young girl propel the easy-flowing language full of ducky details. Perfectly placed additional facts in smaller and similar-in-tone text are included on each spread. These seamless complements serve to explain unfamiliar terms such as “preening,” “dabbling” and “upending.” While Davies’ text gently informs, Rubbino’s mixed-media illustrations, done in a subdued palette of watery greens, grays and browns, truly impress. Mama ducks, drakes and ducklings alike hold the focus as they nest, search for food, swim, splash and sleep. The loose and childlike pictures capture essential details: the “secret patch of blue on each wing” and the “cute little curl on their tails.” At the end of the day (and book), readers find “The bridge is quiet, and there’s just the sound of |

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rushing water and the stillness of the night.” But the page turn reveals another morning of “ducks—just ducks, down on the river that flows through the town.”

An ideal introduction to this familiar waterfowl—readers will enjoy diving right in. (index, note) (Informational picture book. 4-7)

A HEN FOR IZZY PIPPIK

Davis, Aubrey Illus. by Lafrance, Marie Kids Can (32 pp.) $18.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-55453-243-8

When Shaina discovers an unusual hen sporting “emerald green feathers with golden speckles,” she strives to find its rightful owner.

Although her hungry family wants to make chicken soup, Shaina insists they restore the newfound hen to Izzy Pippik, who has left town. By the time he returns, the hen has given birth to a multiplying flock of chickens. The chickens have overrun the town, and people are mad, but then the merchants realize that the freely ranging chickens have brought prosperity back because everyone wants to visit. Shaina is overjoyed when Pippik shows up. She tries to return Yevka, the original hen, and the whole flock, but Izzy matches her honesty with his generosity by allowing all to stay. Shocked, Shaina tells him he can’t. “If they’re mine to have,” he says, “they’re mine to give,” and the poverty-stricken townspeople have been saved by an upright girl and an altruistic gentleman. Retro, droll pencil illustrations colored in Photoshop show a European town in the 1930s.

Shaina and Yevka echo each other as they walk along, with red bow and comb, black braid and tail feather bouncing in the breeze, green-and-white pinafore dress and feathers. Although no specific sources are stated, the author/storyteller has drawn upon Talmudic and Islamic folklore.

Steadfast and quietly amusing, Shaina is a girl to admire.

(Picture book. 5-8)

OBI: GERBIL ON A MISSION

Delaney, M. C. Illus. by Delaney, M. C. Dial (224 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 12, 2012 978-0-8037-3727-3 Series: Obi, 2

Obi the gerbil (Obi: Gerbil on the Loose, 2008) is back in action in this simple story about dealing with perceived rejection and making room in one’s heart for new friends.

Obi is a blissfully happy gerbil who basks in her owner Rachel’s affection. Until, that is, the day that Obi witnesses Rachel receive as a birthday present a golden retriever puppy she dubs Kenobi. Rachel begins to lavish attention on her |

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“In a lovely, lilting Irish dialect, [Doyle] deftly explores the common threads of [his characters’] lives through story and memory, from family-owned racing greyhounds to the traumatic dropping of an egg.” from a greyhound of a girl

puppy, and Kenobi usurps Obi’s position in Rachel’s lap during her very favorite pastime—watching Star Wars movies. What’s a lonely, rejected gerbil to do? Obi gets some bad advice from a crotchety mouse called Mr. Durkins and tricks Kenobi into running outside and getting lost. Once this plan actually works, Obi is filled with remorse and hatches a plan to find Kenobi and bring him home—but she will have to venture into the great outdoors if this mission is to be successful. Is she brave enough?

Is she smart and strong enough to bring Kenobi home? And if she does, will things with Rachel ever be like they were before Kenobi arrived? These animal characters share recognizable foibles with their human readers, revealed in both humorous dialogue and flawed actions.

Fast-paced and funny, this installment will bring Obi new fans. (Animal fantasy. 8-11)

THE OBSTINATE PEN

Dormer, Frank W. Illus. by Dormer, Frank W. Henry Holt (32 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-8050-9295-0

A pen speaks the truth to a series of self-involved townsfolk in this pleasingly eccentric treat from Dormer.

A new pen arrives at Uncle Flood’s house. “Uncle Flood shivered with delight.” Uncle Flood likes pens. But when Uncle Flood takes pen in hand and starts to write, “The following story is all true,” the pen writes, “You have a BIG nose.” This impertinence goes on long enough that Uncle Flood chucks the pen out the window, whereupon it starts its journey through the hands of an irascible policeman and a dinner party of snobs, correcting them as it goes. Not all of its jibes are especially constructive, though one certainly is: “Kiss that girl!” The pen finally lands in the mitts of a boy who knows how to tame the beast through a little honest drawing. The story is amusing and straightforward enough, and the language is a great deal of fun to roll around in your mouth: Wonkle and Weeble, Mrs. Norkham Pigeon-Smythe (aka Mrs. Floofy Pants), the Great King of Farflungdom. The artwork takes the cake, however, with its quivery line work, muted washes of color and Old World finesse.

Is the pen obstinate or obstreperous? A book as much fun to engage as it is simply to follow. (Picture book. 4-8)

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A GREYHOUND OF A GIRL

Doyle, Roddy Amulet/Abrams (208 pp.) $16.95 | May 1, 2012 978-1-4197-0168-9 Twelve-year-old Mary O’Hara is surrounded by good-humored women… her mum at home, her mum’s mum, who is dying in Dublin’s Sacred Heart Hospital, and her mum’s mum’s mum, who has just materialized as a ghost on her street.

That’s four generations of Irish women, all whirling about in some state of consciousness or another, and it’s enough to make Mary dizzy. Mary is a cheeky girl, like many almost-teenagers, but she’s level-headed enough to embrace the ghostly visits from her great-grandmother Tansey, who looks young but “talks old” because she died at age 25 in 1928. Tansey’s spirit is sticking around for her dying daughter, Mary’s granny, to reassure her “it’ll all be grand” in the great beyond and, as it turns out, to join her family for one last tearful, mirthful midnight road trip. Doyle divides up the novel by character, giving readers first-hand glimpses into the nature of each woman through time. In a lovely, lilting Irish dialect, he deftly explores the common threads of their lives through story and memory, from family-owned racing greyhounds to the traumatic dropping of an egg. On the subject of mortality, Mary says, “…it just seems mean.” Her mother agrees. “It does seem mean. Especially when it’s someone you love.” Indeed.

A warm, witty, exquisitely nuanced multigenerational story. (Fiction. 10-14)

THE ACADÉMIE

Dunlap, Susanne Bloomsbury (320 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-1-59990-586-8 This peculiar hybrid of fact-checked historical fiction and breathless bodiceripper chronicles the romantic flings of four teens in 1799 France.

Eliza Monroe, daughter of future U.S. president James Monroe, arrives at a Paris finishing school where she’s befriended by fellow pupils Hortense de Beauharnais (daughter of Joséphine, stepdaughter of Napoleon Bonaparte) and Caroline Bonaparte (sister of Napoleon): beautiful, scheming frenemies. This promising, frothy-but-fun scenario is overshadowed by a less-successful melodrama. Madeleine de Pourtant, secretly engaged to Hortense’s brother, is the daughter of Gloriande, a star of the Comédie Française. Formerly enslaved in Martinique, Gloriande—drug-addicted, abusive, mentally unstable, a sexual omnivore discarded by her white aristocratic husband—resurrects the toxic “tragic mulatto” stereotype, as does Madeleine herself. The plot veers unsteadily from accounts of student entertainments, girlish crushes and romantic kirkusreviews.com

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intrigues to Gloriande’s depraved brutality and Madeleine’s misery. Throughout, narrators Hortense, Eliza and Madeleine keep the emotional temperature constant, reacting to overheard gossip, the discovery of admirers and General Bonaparte’s power plays with the same feverish excitement. Dunlap has clearly done her history homework, but characterization is sketchy and the noisy plot not always credible. Annemarie Selinko’s classic historical romance Désirée (1953) offers what’s missing: compelling characters who made, and were made by, the world they lived in.

Pass. (Historical romance. 12 & up)

BOY + BOT

Dyckman, Ame Illus. by Yaccarino, Dan Knopf (32 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-375-86756-9

a good marriage to a kindly elderly man, although her stepsons now intend to steal her dowry and even her wedding ring, through violence if necessary. Meanwhile, Jane secretly loves James Lacey, brother of the earl she was supposed to marry in the series’ first installment. Now a lady-in-waiting to the Queen, Jane spends time with her old friend Milly, who runs a successful business as a seamstress. When her father tries to force her into another unwanted marriage, Jane looks to James for salvation, but he has embarked on Sir Walter Raleigh’s first expedition to America. Can Jane save herself? Can Milly marry Diego, James’ black servant, whom she has loved since childhood? Yes, it’s all quite a soap opera. Edwards manages the historical setting fairly well, having clearly done her homework on the period.

While the romance and characterizations remain standard stuff, the history might appeal to some readers. Spiced up with a few sword fights and dastardly attacks on innocent damsels, this fits the bill for historical romance.

Pleasant for romance fans. (Historical romance. 12 & up)

Dyckman’s debut offers pitch-perfect pacing and gentle humor in a sweet story about a friendship that prevails

over confusion.

Boy and Bot immediately hit it off and play together until Bot’s power switch gets bumped. Instead of realizing the problem, Boy thinks something is wrong with his new friend, so he brings him home and unsuccessfully tries to rouse Bot with applesauce and books. While Boy is asleep that night, Bot’s power switch gets bumped again, and he thinks there’s something wrong with Boy. With pleasing parallel structure, Bot brings Boy home and tries to revive him with oil and by reading aloud an instruction manual. He wonders if putting a new battery into Boy will solve the problem, but an inventor suddenly appears and shouts, “Stop! That is a boy!”

The shouting awakens Boy, and then the inventor drives him home.

Throughout, Yaccarino’s stylized gouache paintings heighten the text’s humor, but their greatest contributions come in the final, nearly wordless spreads depicting the two wide-awake friends’ happy, ongoing companionship.

Perhaps these closing scenes anticipate more stories to come about these friends, since, as Boy and Bot would say, it’s “affirmative” that this book will be a hit. (Picture book. 3-6)

THE QUEEN’S LADY

Edwards, Eve Delacorte (336 pp.) $17.99 | $10.99 e-book | PLB $20.99 Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-385-74091-3 978-0-375-98338-2 e-book 978-0-375-98975-9 PLB Series: The Lacey Chronicles, 2 A 17-year-old widow struggles to find happiness in Elizabeth I’s court in 1584.

This second installment of The Lacey Chronicles (The Other Countess, 2011) stands on its own nicely. Lady Jane has survived |

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THE TRAVELING RESTAURANT Jasper’s Voyage in Three Parts Else, Barbara Gecko Press (304 pp.) $17.95 | Jan. 1, 2012 978-1-8775-7903-5

A seemingly ordinary lad boards a seagoing eatery and is swept up in a series of flights and pursuits that lead him to a higher destiny than he expects (or even wants, particularly).

Having banished all magic (even mention of the word) from the realm of Fontania, evil Lady Gall is on her way to removing the “Provisional” from her title of “Provisional Monarch.” Her attempt to poison Jasper’s beloved little sister Sibilla pitches his secretive extended family into hurried flight. Outraged and confused, Jasper is somehow left behind—but wangles a berth aboard the Traveling Restaurant, a floating diner painted like a circus wagon, and sets out to catch up. Else arranges her narrative into short chapters with titles like “This Is When It Becomes Fraught” and strews it with pirates, wild waters, sudden twists of fortune, family revelations and scrumptious tucker (Jasper finds a snatched chunk of salami “a farmyard of deliciousness in one mouthful”). She sets her quick-witted protagonist on a course that not only sharpens his already-considerable culinary skills but gives him a central role in rescuing his shipwrecked family, decisively scotching Lady Gall’s schemes and restoring magic to the land. Jasper does this with help from a supporting cast stocked with likable enemies, sometimes-unlikable allies and one particularly perspicuous toddler.

A heaping plateful of adventure, spiced to perfection with dangers, deft humor and silly bits. (Fantasy. 10-12)

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FIRE! FUEGO! BRAVE BOMBEROS

Elya, Susan Middleton Illus. by Santat, Dan Bloomsbury (40 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 24, 2012 978-1-59990-461-0

Elya has proven herself a master at painlessly weaving Spanish vocabulary into her stories, and this latest is no exception.

Four bomberos and el capitán race to gear up and get to the fire after the alarm sounds. As humo fills the sky, they work together to aim the hose and douse las flamas. Firefighting is a perennially popular topic, and while the actual story here is rather unexceptional, Elya makes this book stand out in other ways.

Yes, there are Dalmatians in the station and a fire pole to slide down. There is danger and the rescue of a cat. But there is also a woman on this firefighting team, and as always, Elya’s rhyming couplets are a joy to read aloud. Context clues as well as words that are close to English make most of the Spanish vocabulary easy to decode. A glossary helps readers with any they may be unsure of and provides pronunciation help. Santat’s illustrations also help to set this firefighter book apart. From the first page, he thrusts readers into the action with up-close views created with colored pencil, water on ink print, fire and Photoshop.

His firefighters are real people with needs, interests and fears, who sweat and get dirty.

This winner is sure to find a spot on shelves, although it won’t stay there long. (Picture book. 3-7)

DAISY’S PERFECT WORD

Feder, Sandra V. Illus. by Mitchell, Susan Kids Can (88 pp.) $15.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-55453-645-0

Daisy, a collector of admirable words, wants to find the perfect word to give her teacher as a gift.

An early-grade primary-school student, Daisy has lots of favorite words she collects in her notebook. After the children find out their gentle teacher is getting married, they all want to bring her gifts. Daisy’s pleasure in her search, though, is complicated by Samantha, her nextdoor neighbor and classmate she finds annoying. An otherwise congenial child, Daisy does whatever she can to avoid Samantha—including cutting through shrubbery to meet her friend Emma and pulling up her hood and singing as she hurries by Samantha’s house. All of this carefully planned avoidance of Samantha seems to be leading up to Daisy’s recognition of her own subtle bullying and perhaps her selection of a perfect word like “friend” that represents this understanding. Instead, her frequently depicted problems with Samantha are never directly addressed. The perfect word Daisy finally chooses, “giggle,” 394

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does elicit a pleasing compliment from Samantha that may hint at an improvement in their relationship. Simple, charming illustrations appear on almost every spread; pages feature wide spacing and limited text, an inviting presentation for very young independent readers.

An early chapter book with a pleasantly recognizable cast of characters that, disappointingly, misses the opportunity to gently address a pertinent issue. (Fiction. 5-7)

AT THE BOARDWALK

Fineman, Kelly Ramsdell Illus. by Armiño, Mónica Tiger Tales (32 pp.) $12.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-58925-104-5

A celebration of the senses on the sand and by the shore.

The oceanside boardwalk bustles from dawn’s first light until night’s starry skies. Families and friends relax and play, leisurely enjoying a stroll or dancing at dusk. The outdoor setting offers an array of activities. Even a passing storm only temporarily deters beachgoers, though a small group of children jumps in the downpour. The consequences of too much fun in the sun (an exhausted child nestles on his daddy’s shoulder, his balloon trailing from his fist) serve as a quiet counterpart to the earlier excitement. The boardwalk’s employees are visibly part of the activity. The ice-cream vendor hurries to keep up with orders; a man sweeps the boards at day’s end, a stray cat his only companion. Rhyming quatrains evoke the ebb and flow of the ocean’s waves, beginning and ending with the same phrase. “At the boardwalk / jumbled joys / Hermit crabs and pirate toys / Arcade games make lots of noise / At the boardwalk / jumbled joys.” Shaded, intricate illustrations depict each individual plank on the pier. The rising and setting sun, in a vivid assortment of hazy hues, marks the passage of the day.

This sunny selection beckons. (Picture book. 2-5)

THE DUNDERHEADS BEHIND BARS

Fleischman, Paul Illus. by Roberts, David Candlewick (48 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-7636-4543-4 Series: The Dunderheads, 2 The Dunderheads are back in another amusing caper that’s sure to please fans of their earlier exploits (The Dunderheads, 2009).

Once again, Einstein narrates with tongue-in-cheek, deadpan humor. Along with his friends, he expects the last day of school to mean that they are rid of their nemesis/teacher, the evil Miss Breakbone. Sadly, they are wrong. Children and teacher alike try out for roles as extras in a film and find themselves together again. Worse, Miss Breakbone fingers Spider as kirkusreviews.com

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“Foley tightly weaves the outlandish threads into a rich, unforgettable story that’s quite simply—amazing.” from remarkable

a thief when a cat burglar strikes. Einstein, of course, comes up with the perfect plan to capture the real thief, capitalizing as before on his friends’ varied interests and abilities. Unfortunately, his plan falls through, and all of the kids wind up in the poky. How they succeed in solving the crimes and turning the tables on their arch enemy, Miss Breakbone, strains credibility but entertains all the same. It’s not as though credibility is the point, after all. At least half the fun comes from Roberts’ clever illustrations, created in watercolor, pen and ink. As before, each Dunderhead’s appearance reveals his or her individuality; new characters are equally clearly limned. Some sly references might go over the heads of the intended audience (don’t miss Liza as Sally Bowles in the line-up of aspiring extras), but readers of all ages will enjoy poring over the pages to find the hidden humor.

Delightfully smart and deliciously funny—don’t miss it.

(Fiction. 7-9)

REMARKABLE

Foley, Lizzie K. Dial (336 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 12, 2012 978-0-8037-3706-8 The title of this debut says it all.

In the town of Remarkable, so named for its abundance of talented citizens, everyone lives up to its reputation. Well, almost everyone. With a famous architect mother, an award-winning–novelist father, a photorealistic-portrait–painter older brother and a math-genius younger sister, Jane should be just as remarkable. Instead, this average 10-year-old girl is usually overlooked. With clever wordplay, the third-person account paints a humorous and vivid depiction of this unusual community. While the rest of the town’s children attend Remarkable’s School for the Remarkably Gifted, Jane spends monotonous days as the public school’s only attendee. Excitement suddenly enters her life when the mischievous Grimlet twins get expelled from the gifted school and sent to public school, not one but four pirates enter town and a search ensues for a missing composer. Mix in a rival town’s dispute over jelly, hints of a Loch Ness Monster–like creature and a psychic pizzeria owner who sees the future in her reflective pizza pans, and this uproarious mystery becomes—if even possible—a whole lot funnier. With the help of her quiet Grandpa John, who’s also forgotten most of the time, Jane learns to be true to herself and celebrate the ordinary in life.

Foley tightly weaves the outlandish threads into a rich, unforgettable story that’s quite simply—amazing. (Fiction. 8-12)

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GRANDPA’S GARDEN

Fry, Stella Illus. by Moxley, Sheila Barefoot (40 pp.) $16.99 | paper $7.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-84686-053-9 978-1-84686-809-2 paperback A two-part home-garden manual for British and like climes, with a thin fictive overlay on the first half.

Young Billy recounts the pleasures of working with his grandpa in a “vegetable patch at the garden’s end” from late winter through fall. His gee-whiz narration often waxes pedantic: “I spy slimy slugs and snails. Caterpillars too! And I see aphids and blackflies, feasting on young, frail leaves.” Once the patch is put to sleep, Fry drops the perfunctory plot completely and goes on to recap, season by season, general gardening agendas for adults and for children on facing pages. In Moxley’s similarly stiff art, generic figures with, generally, fixed expressions pose amid sharply regimented rows of growing but thinly planted veggies. (Despite several references to flowers there are none to be seen, except for a spindly row of daffodils.) Aside from not using mulch, Grandpa gardens organically. Readers may well find themselves confused. Not only does the garden in the first part not match the suggested plan in the second, the author mentions crops that Grandpa doesn’t happen to grow, like raspberries and sweetcorn. Furthermore, the instructions to plant broad beans in the fall (only possible where winters are mild, and for a fall crop, which she doesn’t mention) and to check for hedgehogs before lighting bonfires aren’t the only ones not suitable for most North American gardens.

The strain of trying to cover too much territory shows in this patchwork import. (Instructional picture book. 6-9)

REVENGE OF THE DINOTRUX

Gall, Chris Illus. by Gall, Chris Little, Brown (32 pp.) $16.99 | May 1, 2012 978-0-316-13288-6

The prehistoric metal monsters dug up and introduced in Dinotrux! (2009) break out—twice!—in this smashing (crashing, roaring, grinding) sequel.

Exploding through the dino-museum’s wall in the wake of a particularly stressful Kindergarten Day, enraged Tyrannosaurus Trux rolls off to climb a skyscraper. Meanwhile, hungry Garbageadon chows down on local traffic, a pair of Velocitractors plow up Main Street and Cementosaurus dumps a heaping “present” in the town square. Enough! declares the mayor, firmly dispatching the miscreant mega vehicles to school to learn better behavior. Further chaos threatens when they burst out again, though, taking along the children who have introduced them to the wonders of (truck) books and other reading. Towering massively atop heavy-duty tires, with wide, headlight eyes and |

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“Unfolding in short, crisp sentences, the events come quickly and inspire giggles: The bus breaks down, the tent poles break and underwear spills from packs.” from bears beware

BEARS BEWARE

toothy maws agape, Gall’s brawny beasts make modern construction vehicles look like jumped-up SmartCars. But even the most brutish dinotrux can find a place in today’s world, as the final playground scene suggests.

Young fans of all things big and noisy will make trax for this dynamic dino-diversion. (Picture book. 6-8)

Giff, Patricia Reilly Illus. by Bright, Alasdair Wendy Lamb/Random (80 pp.) $12.99 | paper $4.99 | $4.99 e-book PLB $15.99 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-385-73889-7 978-0-375-85913-7 paperback 978-0-375-89639-2 e-book 978-0-385-90756-9 PLB Series: Zigzag Kids, 5

KATANA

Gibsen, Cole Flux (384 pp.) $9.95 paperback | Mar. 8, 2012 978-0-7387-3040-0 An ordinary St. Louis teen finds that she has a distinctly un-ordinary legacy when she’s attacked in a shopping-mall parking lot.

Until the assault that wakens a terrifying internal voice and preternatural martial-arts abilities, Rileigh has spent her time hanging with her gay BFF Quentin and mooning over hottie Whitley. Now she finds herself coping with the unwanted attention of the mysterious, sandalwood-scented hottie Kim, who insists that she take up training in his dojo. It seems he thinks that she is the reincarnation of his 15th-century lover; the two were samurai who died at the hands of an evil ninja. Now Kim wants to “awaken” her past self using the titular katana she wielded in her earlier life. She wants none of this, but does she have a choice?

Is the reincarnation of the evil ninja behind the continuing attacks? Nothing about this debut surprises, from the stock characters to the turgid action scenes. Gibsen laces her narrative with holes: If Kim and Rileigh have been reincarnated multiple times and repeatedly drawn together by psychic destiny, why is there no hint of other past lives? And the writing is frequently downright amateurish, turning out ridiculous similes— ”My heart spun in my chest, as if it were the wheel of a gerbil hopped up on Pixy Stix”—when it’s not indulging in cliché— ”With breakneck speed, I darted to the window and flattened myself against the wall.”

Pass. (Paranormal romance. 12-16)

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Mitchell thinks he isn’t brave, so an overnight camping trip fills him with worry—and, besides, he doesn’t want to celebrate his birthday in the woods.

Decorated with cheerful sketches, each slender volume of the Zigzag Kids series highlights one of the children attending the titular afterschool program. In this fifth installment, Mitchell is the focus, surrounded by the familiar cast of characters.

Unfolding in short, crisp sentences, the events come quickly and inspire giggles: The bus breaks down, the tent poles break and underwear spills from packs. The Nature Center is rich with flora, but Mitchell is sure that killer animals are lurking.

Mitchell may not be bold, but he likes writing stories, so he imagines a character named Gary Bopper, and when he needs a boost of courage, does his best to assume Gary’s bravado.

Events reach a zenith for Mitchell when he finds himself alone during the scavenger hunt and comes face-to-face with nature’s wild beasties. Mitchell realizes that his fancy is more frightening than reality, and the frosting on the cake comes by way of a delicious surprise from his friends.

Young readers transitioning to chapter books will find themselves laughing while they empathize. (Fiction. 6-9)

INVISIBLE SUN

Gill, David Macinnis Greenwillow/HarperCollins (384 pp.) $17.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-06-207332-7 Danger! Romance! Library ambushes!

On the heels of their last adventure (Black Hole Sun, 2010), Martian freedom fighters Durango and Vienne infiltrate an evil government compound in search of missing data they hope will render the planet safe from future harm. This companion novel is packed with Gill’s slick, snappy trademark dialogue; the two heroes and Durango’s artificial intelligence advisor who’s cloned in his brain speak mostly in well-wrought, Han Solo–like wisecracks.

There’s also plenty of action, including death-defying escapes, ambushes and hair-raising shootouts. Amazingly enough, the body count, however, is much lower than in the first novel.

Where humans dropped liked flies (and were, on occasion, eaten) in the first installment, here romance replaces a considerable chunk of the action. Most notably, there is a long-winded, kirkusreviews.com

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meandering visit to Vienne’s monastery home, where bees are tended and tea leaves are read (and Vienne and Durango realize their romantic destiny). Not soon enough, the enemy attacks and Durango and Vienne are off to fight, again. The plot goes haywire from here, and Gill apparently throws in just about every plot device and twist he can think of to get to the end.

A weirdly tepid, stop-and-start mess of a sci-fi thriller.

(Science fiction. 13 & up)

SOCIAL SUICIDE

Halliday, Gemma HarperTeen (288 pp.) $8.99 paperback | Apr. 24, 2012 978-0-06-200322-4 Series: Deadly Cool, 2 In a follow-up to Deadly Cool (2011), Hartley Featherstone returns to romp through another murder mystery.

Hartley has joined the Herbert Hoover High online-newspaper staff, working for her intriguing, black-clad friend, Chase, the editor. She’s set to interview Sydney, caught cheating on strict Mr. Tipkins’ math test. Hartley arrives for the interview only to find Sydney face down in her pool, electrocuted by her laptop, an apparent victim of “Twittercide.” Hartley again meets the annoying Detective Raley, who can’t really do his job because Hartley won’t tell him what she knows. Raley thinks Sydney committed suicide, but Hartley convinces herself that it had to be murder and sets out to catch the culprit. Again, she puts herself in danger, sneaking off at night to dark parks and breaking into her school, trying to investigate how the test answers might have been stolen. She winds up at the homecoming dance with Chase, a welcome development, but her investigation may have worried the murderer, who now targets Hartley. Will she survive? And what’s Detective Raley doing with Hartley’s mom? Halliday again balances the comedy and suspense notes well, keeping her characters intriguing and her narrative bright. Hartley has enough smarts combined with obvious foibles to make her a likable heroine. Meanwhile, the mystery bubbles along.

Suspenseful fun. (Mystery. 12 & up)

RADIANT DAYS

Hand, Elizabeth Viking (272 pp.) $17.99 | Apr. 2, 2012 978-0-670-01135-3

eye of drawing instructor Clea, who initiates a romantic relationship with Merle. Overwhelmed by the sophisticated urban art scene, Merle drifts out of school. When Clea drops her, a homeless Merle desperately spray-paints her signature sun-eye graffiti across the city until she encounters a mercurial tramp who mystically connects her with the visionary Rimbaud, in the bloom of his artistic powers at age 16. Incredulous over their stunning time travel, Merle and Rimbaud recognize they are kindred spirits who live to create. Hand deftly alternates between Merle’s first-person, past-tense story and a third-person account of Rimbaud during the Franco-Prussian War of 1871-72, laced with excerpts from his poems and letters.

Suffused with powerful images of light, this intensely lyrical portrait of two androgynous young artists who magically traverse a century to briefly escape their equally disturbing worlds expands the themes of artistic isolation and passion Hand first introduced in Illyria (2010).

An impressive blend of biography and magical realism. (author’s notes; select bibliography) (Fantasy. 14 & up)

PUZZLED BY PINK

Hardy, Sarah Frances Illus. by Hardy, Sarah Frances Viking (32 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 12, 2012 978-0-670-01320-3 Lacking in focus and a sense of purpose, Hardy’s initially promising story of a sisterly squabble ultimately disappoints.

It’s Rose’s birthday, and she is hosting a fairy and princess party in which all guests must don pink wings and a tutu. Her somber sister Izzy refuses and decides to set up a spooky tea party of her own in the attic. She decorates with dead roses and spiders, invites her imaginary friend V and delights in the absolute un-pinkness of it all. Then Rose drops by to deliver some pink cupcakes, which Izzy rejects, and accidentally sits on V. The sisters get into a skirmish—Rose proclaiming that Izzy’s party is not a real tea party and Izzy insisting that Rose is not a real fairy.

During a tussle over Rose’s magic wand, Izzy’s cat is turned into a pink dragon. Inexplicably, the sisters join forces at this point and decide to go down to Rose’s party after all, and it looks like the pink dragon will be joining them. The appealing illustrations, which successfully dramatize the sisters’ strikingly different tastes and personalities, may draw some readers to the story.

Unfortunately, the plot will only leave them wondering at the point of it all. (Picture book. 3-5)

A 20th-century teen artist and 19thcentury French poet Arthur Rimbaud transcend time and place in this luminous paean to the transformative power of art.

In September 1977, 18-year-old Merle leaves rural Virginia to attend the Corcoran School of Art in Washington, D.C. Her drawings catch the |

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172 HOURS ON THE MOON

Harstad, Johan Translated by Chace, Tara F. Little, Brown (368 pp.) $17.99 | Apr. 17, 2012 978-0-316-18288-1

Three teenagers join an expedition to the Moon in 2019 and find horror there.

This imaginative Norwegian sciencefiction novel places more emphasis on the fiction than on the science. America finally decides to return to the Moon, but to get publicity NASA holds a worldwide lottery for three teenagers to accompany the astronauts. Mia, a Norwegian punk rocker, Midori, a Japanese girl rebelling against her restrictive culture, and Antoine, a French boy devastated by a broken romance, win. The group intends to shelter for a week in a previously secret lab that NASA had established on the Moon in the 1970s. As soon as the group arrives, however, things start to go horribly wrong.

Harstad keeps the focus mostly on Mia, seemingly the only participant strong enough to keep fighting against the evil forces they encounter on the Moon. Few of the astronauts cope well, with one even resorting to drugging herself to escape emotionally. The “science” comes across with about as much plausibility as the premise of the teenagers joining the mission, but the fiction features some well-crafted suspense, and even a touch of romance. A nifty surprise ending will get readers’ attention.

Interesting and original. (Science fiction. 12 & up)

ALICE-MIRANDA ON VACATION

Harvey, Jacqueline Delacorte (288 pp.) $14.99 | $9.99 e-book | PLB $17.99 Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-385-73995-5 978-0-375-89859-4 e-book 978-0-385-90812-2 PLB Series: Alice-Miranda, 2 The dauntless Alice-Miranda returns in a sequel fraught with mystery (Alice-Miranda at School, 2011).

Having resolved the problems at her boarding school, AliceMiranda is looking forward to her school holiday. However, with a penchant for seeking out mysteries, the plucky sleuth is soon surrounded by intrigue. With a cast of both familiar and new characters, Harvey moves the action to the bucolic estate of Alice-Miranda’s family. Accompanied by her school friend Jacinta, Alice-Miranda soon uncovers several puzzling scenarios: A famous movie star is staying with Alice-Miranda’s family, an enigmatic driver of an unknown car secretly visits Granny Bert, Daisy the maid spends her days crying and a new bully is on the scene. The forthright Jacinta provides a nice foil for Alice-Miranda’s unwavering sweetness. A dash of corporate espionage involving a top-secret formula and a royal abduction make for thrilling 398

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adventures for the duo. Harvey provides ample clues for the clever Alice-Miranda—and perceptive readers—as she unravels the tangled plots surrounding her family and friends. With her trademark aplomb, Alice-Miranda successfully routs bumbling criminals without ever compromising her impeccable manners.

This dashing adventure is a satisfying addition to this lively series. (Mystery. 7-11)

OH NO, GEORGE!

Haughton, Chris Illus. by Haughton, Chris Candlewick (32 pp.) $15.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7636-5546-4 George is a gigantic, magenta dog with a purple snout and huge, expressive eyes.

He wants to be good and knows the rules of proper behavior, but he can’t quite manage to follow them when left alone in the house.

The individual’s struggle for self-control is subtly conveyed in George’s story, which manages to make old concept fresh thanks to George’s winning personality and a vibrant, jazzy artistic style. Minimalist illustrations in a combination of pencil and digital media use geometric shapes and a striking palette of bold oranges, red and purples complemented by a contemporary typeface and a large trim. When George’s owner, Harry, leaves George at home, the big pooch eats the cake, chases the cat and digs up the plants in a flurry of misbehavior. George is filled with remorse, and with a teary apology, he offers his favorite toy to his owner in recompense. Later, on a walk with his owner, George is able to control himself and bypass similar temptations, but the open-ended conclusion shows George next to an overflowing trashcan, with a decision to make about his next move.

Young children who struggle to follow the rules will feel a bond with George, and the story’s present-tense narration and repeated refrains make this a natural for reading aloud. (Picture book. 3-6)

THE OBSIDIAN BLADE

Hautman, Pete Candlewick (320 pp.) $16.99 | $16.99 e-book | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-7636-5403-0 978-0-7636-5972-1 e-book Series: The Klaatu Diskos, 1 Vivid imagination and deft storytelling make for refreshing speculative fiction in this time-travel tale.

Tucker Feye is an ordinary teenage boy, leading an ordinary, near-idyllic small-town American life— but that’s before he starts seeing the “disks.” Once the mysterious shimmering phenomena appear, Tucker’s preacher father vanishes, then returns with a strange teenage girl and without his kirkusreviews.com

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“In Annie, readers will find a perfectly imperfect Model Citizen, a loving daughter and good friend—in other words, someone a lot like them.” from letters to leo

faith; Tucker’s mother loses her sanity, and eventually both parents disappear. After moving in with his (previously unknown) Uncle Kosh, the really weird stuff starts happening. However, after a riveting opening scene the narrative seems to slow to a crawl, but the thorough characterization and careful worldbuilding pay off spectacularly once Tucker discovers that the disks are gateways through time and space. Hautman doesn’t make things easy for his readers: As Tucker bounces through historical crisis points past and future, short chapters and steadily ratcheting stakes present life-threatening situations and bizarre personages at a dizzying pace (most of them already-familiar characters with new names or under different guises), That this remains intriguing rather than confusing is a credit to the sure-handed plotting and crisp prose, equally adept with flashes of snarky wit and uncomfortable questions of faith, identity, and destiny. Less satisfying are the climactic cliffhangers, which reveal that the entire story is but a set-up for the rest of the series.

Part science fiction, part adventure, part mystery, but every bit engrossing; be sure to start the hold list for the sequel. (Science fiction. 12 & up)

THE NIGHT SHE DISAPPEARED

Henry, April Christy Ottaviano/Henry Holt (240 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-8050-9262-2 When a popular high-school girl disappears while delivering pizza at her parttime job, her two fellow employees and classmates try to figure out what happened.

Drew Lyle takes the call, Kayla Cutler delivers the pizza, but the man ordering it wants to know if the girl who drives the Mini Cooper—that’s Gabie Klug—will be the delivery girl. When Kayla doesn’t return, Drew calls the police and the mystery kicks in. Who was the man; what happened to Kayla; why did he ask about Gabie; and, as time begins to pass, is Kayla still alive? Neither Drew nor Gabie, who go to the same high school as Kayla but are work rather than social friends, knows anything, but they are determined to find out.

The thriller is narrated using a collage technique. Interspersed with the kids’ and perpetrator’s first-person accounts are police reports, 911 transcripts, webpages, interviews, etc., which add interest and texture to what otherwise would be a straight genre tale. The police seem amazingly obtuse, Gabie’s belief that Kayla is alive is given no realistic, clue-based hook and the third quarter has some pacing problems. Still, Gabie and Drew’s budding relationship is believable, and it has a strong wingding climax followed by a feel-good ending.

Unexceptional but solid. (Mystery. 12 & up)

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LETTERS TO LEO

Hest, Amy Illus. by Denos, Julia Candlewick (160 pp.) $14.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7636-3695-1

Annie introduces new dog Leo to the Rossi household in a letter of welcome and decides to keep writing, and reading, secret letters to him.

Youngsters who first met Annie in Remembering Mrs. Rossi (2007) will see that she is coming to terms with her mother’s death. Episodes throughout her fourth-grade year are recounted in Annie’s infectiously exuberant voice. The letters, interspersed with lists, rules, assignments and plenty of pencil drawings and doodles, will keep children, even reluctant readers, eagerly flipping the pages. Resilient Annie finds comfort with Leo: When she snuggles and reads her letters to him, Annie remembers her mother reading to her. Sometimes, in missives sure to have children giggling, Annie has to instruct Leo on how to be a Model Citizen by minding his elevator manners and not stealing slippers. Mostly, she shares her trials, revealing her annoyance with classmate Edward Noble; tribulations, outlining four school catastrophes in one day; and triumphs, expressing her excitement about favorite teacher Miss Meadows coming to visit the Rossis—after all, Annie’s father needs a new friend…. With that last tidbit dangling, the author leaves readers begging for another installment about the Rossis.

In Annie, readers will find a perfectly imperfect Model Citizen, a loving daughter and good friend—in other words, someone a lot like them. (Fiction. 8-12)

KITE DAY

Hillenbrand, Will Illus. by Hillenbrand, Will Holiday House (32 pp.) $16.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-8234-1603-5 Series: Bear and Mole, In this breezy kite affair, the adorable duo of Bear and Mole is back again, reveling in nature.

Blue sky and a gusty day make for one ebullient Bear. Huffing home he gathers Mole to commence the kite-making. Together they collect, cut, construct—and find success with their kite until dark clouds appear. A broken string and a spool unspun leave the two racing through rain after a rainbow tail. But urgency turns to quiet joy when their loss (a broken kite) becomes a bird family’s gain, as it shelters fledglings from the storm. Simple sentences, often three words or fewer, describe the action, while Hillenbrand’s illustrations wonderfully animate the text. The artwork, digitally manipulated pencil with water-based coloring, has a lovely softness; the characters, with their plumpness and simplicity, are extremely appealing. Sophisticated compositions are cinematic or sequentially kinetic, cleverly matching the author’s |

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“A palette of fresh greens and yellows heralds springtime, while varying frame sizes and perspectives allow readers to view the realistically rendered toad’s cross-country ramble from multiple angles.” from gem

playful use of onomatopoeia. Muted tones that begin the tale give way to darker and more dramatic hues, creating a powerful shift, both visually and emotionally.

This gentle and charming read-aloud will make young audiences “awww” with delight. (Picture book. 3-6)

GEM

Hobbie, Holly Illus. by Hobbie, Holly Little, Brown (32 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-316-20334-0 Hobbie explores the wonders of spring through the eyes of a toad that survives the perils and pleasures of its trek to a country garden, where he encounters the author’s granddaughter, Hope.

Opening with a letter explaining how Hope’s discovery of a toad named Gem inspired her to “tell the story of Gem’s spring journey,” Hobbie wordlessly chronicles this odyssey in luminous watercolor, pen and ink illustrations. A palette of fresh greens and yellows heralds springtime, while varying frame sizes and perspectives allow readers to view the realistically rendered toad’s cross-country ramble from multiple angles. They begin with ground-level snaps of him emerging from beneath dandelions.

Close-ups show a stunned, shaken Gem nearly creamed by a car.

A double-page spread of dandelion-dotted fields reveals Gem’s tiny figure resolutely hopping down a dirt road, while a close-up of Gem wooing a female toad is followed by a spread of Gem surrounded by bouncing baby toads. A harrowing aerial view shows Gem frantically fleeing a swooping hawk; a ground-level shot reveals him hiding in foliage; and a rear close-up spies Gem exiting a birdbath. Eventually, Gem winds up in Hope’s hands for an eye-to-eye look, followed by his release into the insect-filled garden and Hope’s letter thanking Gram for her story.

A stunning gem indeed. (notes about toads) (Picture book. 2-5)

ASCEND

Hocking, Amanda St. Martin’s Griffin (336 pp.) $8.99 paperbackApr. 24, 2012 978-1-250-00633-2 Series: Trylle, 3

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BIG BIRTHDAY

Hosford, Kate Illus. by Clifton-Brown, Holly Carolrhoda (32 pp.) $12.95 e-book | PLB $16.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 Annabelle’s wish for an out-of-thisworld birthday party crash-lands in Hosford’s spirited, if slightly off-meter, book.

What works are the whimsical illustrations. Clifton-Brown depicts Annabelle, her expressive, freckled face, with an ethereal glow that is at once childlike and celestial.

Hosford does a fine job demonstrating Annabelle’s determination to host a celebration that surpasses past parties at the zoo.

However, constant shifts in meter are as jarring as a NASA warning: Reader, we have a problem. Annebelle says, “My birthday is soon. It’s practically here. / I think I’ll have my party on the moon this year,” her words tilting in the meter of “Habenara” from Carmen. But later when the narrator declares, “They hired out an astronaut, experienced and smart, / Who rented them a rocket ship, guaranteed to start. […] / They shot into space with gravity pulling on everyone’s face,” the tempo misfires like opera at a rodeo. Readers will relate to Annabelle’s birthday-bash struggle, and they will find the textural illustrations invigorating. But the clunky rhyme scheme frustrates repeat readings.

While the illustrations maintain a harmonious duet with the story, the language stalls instead of soars. (Picture book. 5-8)

THE ISLAND HORSE

Hocking (Torn, 2011, etc.) saves the best for last in the final installment of the Trylle trilogy.

On the eve of her 18th birthday, Wendy is days away from marrying a man she doesn’t love and becoming queen of Förening. She is also on the brink of war with her father, the evil king of the Vittra. Rest assured, the princess is up for the challenge—each and every one of them.

The Wendy of this novel would barely be recognizable to the girl who first discovered she was the daughter of the king and queen of two feuding troll kingdoms. With her newfound confidence and 400

control over her powers, Princess Wendy has come into her own.

There is also strength in numbers, as Finn, her Tracker, her best friend Willa, her host brother Matt and Tove, her closeted but loyal husband-to-be, stand ready and able to fight by her side. If only she had such command over her own heart. Wendy’s love life continues to be a hot, juicy mess as Loki seeks asylum in Förening and forces Wendy to acknowledge her feelings for him. The push and pull of their undeniable attraction, complicated by the presence of both her husband and her former lover, makes their burgeoning love story all the more delicious.

Hocking sure knows how to bring it. (Paranormal romance. 14 & up)

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Hughes, Susan Kids Can (160 pp.) $17.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-55453-592-7

Another misunderstood child. Another friendly stallion.

Young Ellie, still grieving her mother’s death, is unhappy when her father takes a new job on remote Sable Island.

This sand-shifting “Graveyard of the Atlantic,” 25 miles long and one mile wide, causes multiple shipwrecks each year, and Ellie’s father is joining a group of government rescue workers there. Ellie doesn’t want to leave home, but within a few days kirkusreviews.com

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of reaching Sable Island she’s made friends with a wild stallion there. A few days after that, the villagers are holding their annual wild-horse roundup. Terrified that her new friend will be sold, Ellie begs her father for help. He suggests she—at 9 years old—lead the wild stallion to the far end of the island. Ellie does, and the stallion is saved (at least until next year). Hughes does well describing the physical setting but struggles with the temporal aspect. The author’s note says the book takes place in the early 1800s, but the story and characters feel more modern than that. It’s also hard to find the point—that Ellie doesn’t want to leave her home? that the stallion shouldn’t be captured?—and the pacing is far too abrupt for the emotional changes to be believable. It’s too bad, because Sable Island itself is fascinating.

A few shipwrecks and less hand-wringing, and you’d have a good story. (Historical fiction. 7-10)

ICHIRO

Inzana, Ryan Illus. by Inzana, Ryan Houghton Mifflin (288 pp.) $19.99 | Mar. 20, 2012 978-0-547-25269-8 A young American teen, son of a Japanese immigrant and an American soldier killed in combat, goes to Japan with his mother for an extended visit and begins to grapple with sophisticated cultural complexities.

The graphic novel opens with a familiar Japanese legend about a shape-changing tanuki trickster spirit. The story cuts to New York City, where Ichiro and his mother prepare for their trip. Ichiro has been very close to his American grandfather, who has schooled him in the worst kinds of American jingoism. First his mother, then his Japanese grandfather began to share the legends and history of Japan, both positive and negative, with Ichiro. A nighttime pursuit of a persimmon-thieving tanuki turns into a surreal odyssey that takes Ichiro deep into the mythic realm of Japanese folklore. Inzana’s graphic style is, at first glance, far more Western than Japanese-influenced; there is no look of manga in his figures. But his compositions and his brushwork, particularly exquisite transitional spreads between episodes, echo classical Japanese art, and his depiction of the Japanese Otherworld will seem familiar to anyone who has seen a Miyazaki film. Ichiro’s realistic and mythic journeys combine to give both him and readers a better understanding of the importance of both understanding and overcoming history.

Beautiful and thought-provoking; questions unanswered will linger in readers’ minds. (Graphic novel. 12 & up)

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LIFE IS BUT A DREAM

James, Brian Feiwel & Friends (240 pp.) $16.99 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-312-61004-3

A simplistic resolution mars an otherwise reality-bending exploration of schizophrenia.

Sabrina sees things differently from other people. She sees faces in the sky, heaven between ocean waves and, more disturbingly, a sinister static “like a swarm of invisible insects devouring the scenery.” The book opens with Sabrina in a mental-health facility, where she is taking medications and making what the doctors call progress. Then Alec arrives at the Wellness Center, angry, arrogant, charismatic and certain that the medications and treatment are forms of mind control. The narrative perspective is firmly Sabrina’s, and readers experience the joys and horrors of her reality along with her. Flashbacks, interspersed with the present-day story, recall Sabrina’s friendships, boys who took advantage of her and, in a timely and believable touch, an incident on a social-networking website. Alec, in the institution for making violent threats, seems far less trustworthy than Sabrina believes, and yet his argument that the mental-health system works under an unfairly narrow definition of normal is compelling. Unfortunately, a sudden and too-tidy reversal at the end removes the book’s ambiguity and feels untrue to the characters involved.

Provocative questions; too-easy answers. (Fiction. 12 & up)

THE BEETLE BOOK

Jenkins, Steve Illus. by Jenkins, Steve Houghton Mifflin (40 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-547-68084-2 Jenkins’ splendid array of beetles will surely produce at least one budding coleopterist.

The colors and patterns of this ubiquitous insect (one out of four creatures on the planet is a beetle, Jenkins tells readers) are fascinating, as are the details about the various adaptations that beetles have made over millennia in response to their environment, diet, and predators. “Perhaps the innovation that has been most helpful to the beetle is its pair of rigid outer wings.” Beautiful book design and a small but clear freehandstyle type contribute to readers’ appreciation of the elegant structure and variety of these creatures. Deep, bright hues in the torn-and–cut-paper–collage illustrations set each beetle with its own singular pattern and colors against generous white space. Actual-size silhouettes allow the detailed, larger illustrations to be matched with a realistic appraisal of each beetle’s dimensions. A list of the several dozen featured beetles along with their Latin names and their principal geographic locations appears on a two-page opening at the back. Only a couple of |

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k i r ku s q & a w i t h vau n da m i c h e au x n e l s on

No Crystal Stair: A Documentary Novel of the Life and Work of Lewis Michaux, Harlem Bookseller

Vaunda Micheaux Nelson illustrated by R. Gregory Christie Lerner (188 pp.) $17.95 Jan. 28, 2012 9780761361695 (Ages 12-18)

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Q: How did the story develop into its current form?

A: First of all, I didn’t really know the significance of the bookstore till I was in library school. People would see my name and ask me if I was related to the man who owned the bookstore in Harlem.

People kept talking about it, and it dawned on me that it was something pretty important.

So I started just collecting information. I wasn’t thinking about writing a book at the time, I was just curious about my uncle. When I did finally start writing it, I wanted to do a biography.

It wasn’t just the story of the bookstore—it was the story of a man who had a very interesting life.

I wrote a complete draft, but I realized very quickly that there were a lot of holes in it. A lot of the people who had information that I needed were long dead. I realized too, though, that even if I could fill in the gaps, it was dry. It didn’t feel like the story of anyone special. I wasn’t sure that anyone reading it would understand my uncle or the importance of the bookstore.

Around this time, I read Talkin’ About Bessie,

by Nikki Grimes [and illustrated by E.B. Lewis], and then, a little later, I read Carver, by Marilyn Nelson. I was taken with the idea of hearing other people and what they had to say about an individual and how when you put those things together, you got not just what a person accomplished, but the spirit and the humanity of that person. I remember being just completely blown out of the water by that.

I thought about telling Lewis’ story that way, but in prose. And I knew then that doing that would turn it into fiction. I was afraid that doing that would make people take it less seriously, but I realized the only way I could do it, to bring him to life as a person, was to fictionalize it. I realized, too, that I could do a little bit of both, using as much factual information as I could and also doing some speculating and creating some characters

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based on the oral tradition, from stories of people who knew Lewis and the bookstore. That made it a lot more fun.

Q: How does your family feel about it?

A: They are ecstatic. But I have to say the joy of completing this project is a little dimmed, because my brother, Ed, who started this project, passed away in 2009. My mother and my father too, and I’m sad about that. I know they would just be over the moon about this. All I can do is just feel that I did something they would be pleased with, and that has to be enough.

Q: What was it like to do Freedom of Information Act requests for your uncle’s FBI file?

A: I suspected the FBI had files, because of Lewis’ relationship with Malcolm X so I tried to get them.

First I got back letters saying there was nothing.

Then I changed my request, changed the names a little bit, and I didn’t hear back for long time. Then I finally got this package in the mail…

I loved finding out that he was on the “rabblerouser list.”

Q: I’d never heard about Lewis Michaux before reading your book, and now I’m so glad I know him. Are you hoping to reach across the racial barrier with this book and reveal something to everyone about African-American history?

A: I don’t really think about who I’m writing for when I’m telling a story. Obviously, I hope that people will get it and be moved. It’s not just a book for me, but it’s a book for other people to take in, too. But my goal isn’t to cross racial lines. If that happens, I’m thrilled.

I also hope it crosses over to adults.

He was mentioned in so many places. He was in The Autobiography of Malcolm X and in Maya Angelou’s The Heart of a Woman and other places, so he hasn’t been totally forgotten. But there was so much more to him and so much more going on in that store than people realize. It is part of our history. And it’s important to get that out there.

But the main thing that drove me is that it’s a story of an individual who was searching, who had a hard time as a young person. And he learned that reading, and reading about where he came from, was a good thing for him and might be a good thing for other African-Americans, too. That’s what turned his life around. He was saved by reading. And that’s the story I wanted to tell.

–By Vicky Smith

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For the complete interview, visit our website at www. kirkusreviews.com.

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Coretta S cott King Award winner Vaunda Micheaux Nelson didn’t realize until she was an adult that the crowded Harlem bookstore her great uncle owned was one of the centers of the civil rights movement in New York City. Malcolm X., Muhammad Ali and Maya Angelou all visited it.

In No Crystal Stair: A Documentary Novel of the Life and Work of Lewis Michaux, Harlem Bookseller, illustrated by R. Gregory Christie, she delves into her own family’s history, braiding together reminiscences, primary sources and the voices of composite characters to create a three-dimensional image of an extraordinary mover and shaker. Our interview with Nelson kicks off our children’s and teen coverage of African-American History Month.

quibbles: The author’s claim that without the dung beetle “the world’s grasslands would soon be buried in animal droppings” begs for a little further explanation; and the absence of a bibliography seems like an oversight.

Otherwise, distinguished both as natural history and work of art. (Nonfiction. 7-12)

THOU SHALT NOT ROAD TRIP

John, Antony Dial (336 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 12, 2012 978-0-8037-3434-0

Luke Dorsey, the 16-year-old author of bestselling “spiritual chronicle” Hallelujah, goes on a calamitous road trip to promote his book.

Luke’s book tour takes him from Los Angeles to his hometown of St. Louis. Along for the ride are Luke’s older brother Matt and, unexpectedly, Matt’s girlfriend Alex and her younger sister Fran, Luke’s former best friend.

Tension between Luke and Matt and between Luke and Fran is apparent from the beginning, but the back story is filled in slowly enough that some of the significance of what happens between the characters will be lost on readers. On the road, the two sets of siblings experience breathtaking sights, automotive mishaps and dubious detours. As Luke learns the pitfalls of sudden celebrity, he is also forced to face the pain of having lost Fran’s friendship when she started dyeing her hair and getting piercings and tattoos. Despite some engaging interpersonal drama, much of the premise here is hard to swallow: Why would a teenage author famous enough to make national news be sent on tour without parents or handlers? What is Luke’s relationship to Christianity? How did Fran end up on this trip anyway?

Readers who stick around for the back story will be rewarded; many, however, will lose faith. (Fiction. 12 & up)

MAGRITTE’S MARVELOUS HAT

Johnson, D.B. Illus. by Johnson, D.B. Houghton Mifflin (32 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 17, 2012 978-0-547-55864-6 Johnson recasts René Magritte as a dapper, blue-eyed hound and incorporates the painter’s surreal iconography into a visual tour de force.

Magritte encounters a hat that, when donned, “popped up and floated just above his head.” Inspired, he hurries home and paints a self-portrait, “his best picture ever.” The black bowler hat (a familiar, recurrent image in Magritte’s paintings) is characterized as a playful muse, engaging the artist in frisky games on walks. When, absorbed in his work, Magritte ignores it, the |

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indignant chapeau flies away. Nine spreads depict an elaborate chase, Magritte first in pursuit, then reversing: “Bet you can’t find me!” Back in Magritte’s studio, the hat lands atop his head and levitates him. Working every day, never neglecting his inspiring accessory, he paints new pictures “better than his best.” Johnson zealously incorporates surreal elements to tickle both art appreciators and preschoolers. Four see-through acetate pages cleverly transform adjacent spreads. Magritte’s paintings are mined for dozens of images, slyly inserted. During one chase, the hat lands atop a fountain, itself shaped like a giant, water-spewing bowler. On the fountain’s “brim” is inscribed, “This is not a hat”—an allusion to Magritte’s painting of a pipe, famously inscribed “This is not a pipe.” There are levitating baguettes, giant green apples, a monument with Magritte’s birth and death dates reversed—and more.

Arty, amusing and exceedingly clever. (author’s note) (Picture book. 4-8)

FIRE OVER SWALLOWHAVEN

Jones, Allen Illus. by Chalk, Gary Greenwillow/HarperCollins (160 pp.) $15.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-06-200629-5 Series: The Six Crowns, 3 Fighting pirates and waking a phoenix in a volcano are the two primary events in this third installment of a six-part outerspace animal-steampunk adventure.

Hedgehogs Trundle and Esmeralda, with their pal Jack the troubadour squirrel, are bashing around outer space, hunting down six crowns of power. The pirates finally catch up with them, and there’s a swashbuckling battle with various weaponry and explosions. As ever, Jones breezily whips up his own steampunk-flavored natural laws and workings (skyboats are windpowered, and when wind is low, treadles and propellers do the trick; outer space has dawn, dusk and the objective directions “upward” and “downward”). These are leavened with a touch of classic fantasy science (a “powerstone” keeps each vessel afloat).

A long farting scene and a sulfur, treacle and brimstone potion will delight fans of all things stinky. Action moves swiftly, and language is blusterously playful (“Kill ‘em to death, y’ swabs!”).

Readers who enjoy predictable plots and procedure—one crown per book—will be well satisfied. Others will chafe at the slapdash rhymes that resist scansion (“This clue you have found in the phoenix bird’s fire. / You must seek for the Crown of Ice in the land of Spyre!”). Old age, scars, mental illness and ethnicity (Esmeralda is “Roamany”) get cheap stereotyping.

Fast-moving quest fantasy with cool vocabulary and a quickly written vibe. (Animal steampunk. 7-10)

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“They’ll be caught up in the incantatory list of Old Robert’s touchstones: ‘Clean socks / a clock / my ship in the slip at the dock…’ and poring over Jutte’s crisp, comical pictures…. from old robert and the sea-silly cats

OLD ROBERT AND THE SEA-SILLY CATS

Joose, Barbara Illus. by Jutte, Jan Philomel (40 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 12, 2012 978-0-399-25430-7

Appealing illustrations and a cheerful, rhythmic text turn a (potentially) slight oddity into a quirky charmer.

Old Robert is a fan of routine. He sails each day, docks each night, serves himself the same supper each evening and enjoys tallying “the regular things in their regular place.” His apparently mundane world, however, includes animals that wear clothes and talk as well as a few that appear to be simply pets. Old Robert makes the acquaintance of three of the former and one of the latter, all cats. Each approaches him, looking for a place to belong. For some reason, the acquisition of the final feline, a small cat with “sea green eyes” spurs Old Robert to eschew his normal habits and set sail at night, below a full and glowing moon. Most listeners, though, won’t worry too much about the whys or even the whats. They’ll be caught up in the incantatory list of Old Robert’s touchstones: “Clean socks / a clock / my ship in the slip at the dock…” and poring over Jutte’s crisp, comical pictures, created in ink, watercolor and acrylic.

Dream sequences are particularly pleasing, with smiling socks and marching dishes, and the cats are utterly beguiling whether dancing daintily in a pink dress, strumming a ukulele and wearing a green fedora, juggling spoons or simply snuggling.

An entertaining voyage of imagination with engaging, eccentric companions. (Picture book. 3-6)

GO OUT AND PLAY! Favorite Outdoor Games from Kaboom!

KaBOOM! Illus. by Rose, Julianna Candlewick (104 pp.) $11.99 paperback | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-7636-5530-3

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MY MAMA EARTH

Katz, Susan B. Illus. by Launay, Melissa Barefoot (24 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-1-84686-418-6

A small child speaks a hymn to its mama, and mama Earth, in rhymed couplets on a lushly patterned background.

The child could be a girl or boy, with its mop of curls and blueand-white striped shirt. Mama bends around the sun, swims in the river and grows out of a tree trunk, her long hair turning from gold to red to amber as she nestles in meadows or causes the sun to rise and set. The verse is a little clunky and obvious: “My mama hangs the moon for me. / She puts it low so I can see.” The idea of conflating Mother Earth with a child’s own beautiful mother is a lovely one, but the pedestrian rhymes tend to confound that.

The gouache paintings display grass, leaves, flowers and waters in richly colored full-page repetitive patterns, with the text in a pretty typeface (but not so pretty that it’s distracting). Contented-looking animals in pairs, butterflies and the child’s own cat inhabit those patterns, too.

It definitely carries the understated sweetness that is a hallmark of its publisher, even if it does slide slightly over into greeting-card territory. (Picture book. 4-8)

BALLERINA SWAN

Nonprofit organization KaBOOM’s goal is to encourage children to engage in outdoor play, and this collection of 69 group games will give both adults and children a wide variety of answers to the question, “What should we do?”

Organized according to game type, the book focuses on versions of tag, hide-and-seek, ball games, team games, sidewalk games, circle games and races. Those who peruse the pages will find many old favorites here, from flashlight tag and capture the flag to hopscotch and Simon Says. But there are also many that are destined to be newfound favorites. An intriguing summertime one, “drip-drip-drop,” is a variation of duck-duck-goose that uses a bucket and a water source. For the most part, the game rules are well written and easy to understand, encapsulated on one page with a bar at the bottom so readers can tell at a glance the number of players needed, appropriate ages and 404

material and space requirements. Materials are mostly inexpensive things that schools and even many families are likely to already have at hand. Bright patterns, simple drawings and photos of diverse children at play add color and break up the text. Sections at the beginning and end tell adults how to best be partners in children’s play and how to create safe play spaces that will get kids outdoors.

A great resource for organizations that work with children and families alike. (Nonfiction. 5 & up)

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Kent, Allegra Illus. by McCully, Emily Arnold Holiday House (32 pp.) $16.95 | Apr. 15, 2012 978-0-8234-2373-6 A beautiful swan realizes her dream of dancing when cast in Swan Lake.

Sophie is a city swan who watches children in a ballet studio with great longing. She flies in and, after an initial rebuke, summons her courage to return. A new teacher and the students now welcome her as one of their own.

Well almost. Sophie’s long neck gives her a naturally elegant line, but her webbed feet make turnout difficult. Then a choreographer creates a special role for Sophie in an end-of-year student performance, and she literally soars to fame as a swan princess.

Kent was an acclaimed dancer with New York City Ballet, and kirkusreviews.com

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in this, her first book for children, she captures the workings of a ballet class with both authority and tenderness. McCully, a Caldecott medalist, uses watercolors and pen-and-ink for delicate and detailed paintings. Sophie is imbued with a winning personality. In a series of close-ups, she displays her determination to hone her technique and style, a drive matched by that of the students, who show off some of the classic Swan Lake moments to great effect—notably the dance for the four cygnets.

An enchanting tale for all, especially for lovers of ballet.

Read the story, play the music and applaud. (Picture book. 3-8)

THE GOLDFISH IN THE CHANDELIER

Kesterson, Casie Illus. by Hovland, Gary Getty Publications (32 pp.) $17.95 | Mar. 6, 2012 978-1-60606-094-0 The fictionalized story behind the creation of a 19th-century chandelier currently on display in the J. Paul Getty Museum.

In the early 1800s, Louis Alexandre enjoys visiting his Uncle Henri on his expansive estate just outside of Paris. On his latest visit, he finds his artist uncle distraught, unable to conceive a new design for a chandelier, which must incorporate the four classical elements: Earth, Wind, Fire and Water. Several days of collaborative thinking, drawing, designing and building produce the unusual and intriguing light fixture, which includes a blue sphere with stars, griffins and a crystal bowl filled with swimming goldfish. The lengthy narration features the internal recounting of adventurous tales that serve as inspiration for the characters’ creativity. Intricate, darkly tinted ink-and-watercolor paintings depict the well-todo gentleman and his nephew, both in ruffled shirts, imagining, consulting and overseeing the creation of a new masterpiece.

They provide relief from the long-winded text, which, though not without humor, does readers a disservice in its baroque construction. An author’s note provides some clarification but no true investigation of the actual manufacture of the chandelier.

It’s a pity that the real story behind this actual, extraordinary piece of ornate French décor is withheld, leaving readers cheated of a true exploration of art history. (Picture book. 7-9)

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JACK AND THE GIANT BARBECUE

Kimmel, Eric A. Illus. by Manders, John Marshall Cavendish (32 pp.) $17.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7614-6128-9

A Wild West spin on the classic fairy tale.

Little Jack loves barbecue; he’d ride his pony across the West Texas mountains for a taste of fine ribs. He brings his mother to tears when he asks her to make some for him, and she tells Jack the sad tale of his daddy. He made the finest barbecue for miles around until a mean giant came and stole daddy’s recipe book, leaving him so heartbroken that he shriveled up and died. Jack makes a vow on the spot. The next morning, he rides his pony to Mount Pecos and starts his arduous climb. At the top is the giant’s barbecue restaurant, all rundown, dirty and busted-up. The giant sits in a back room, eating his fill of barbecue. Daddy’s book sits in a slot of a magic jukebox, which is hankering to escape. When the giant falls asleep, Jack makes a quick getaway, riding the jukebox like a stallion. Before long, the giant jerks awake and gives chase in his pickup, across the clouds. He’s going so fast that his truck smashes into the mountains, flattening them. It’s been that way ever since. And Jack? He opens a restaurant with Ma, where the jukebox happily plays. Mmm! It’s a rollicking adaptation, with many amusing tall-tale touches. Manders’ illustrations, in gouache and colored pencil, match the energy of the text.

Good fractured fun. (Picture book. 5-8)

HOUSE ON DIRTY-THIRD STREET

Kittinger, Jo S. Illus. by Gonzalez, Thomas Peachtree (32 pp.) $16.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-56145-619-2

A girl and her mother move into an old, run-down house and dare to dream that one day it will become a cozy home.

The story is tinged with an underlying heartache from the very start: “Mom said starting over would be an adventure, so I imagined a tropical island with palm trees and buried treasure. / Not this.” All of the houses on 33rd Street are old, but one in particular is falling apart. The understandably crabby young narrator proclaims it to be “Dirty-third Street.” Mother and daughter set to work cleaning and scrubbing, but there are so many other needed repairs, it seems hopeless. In a poignant example of a child’s quiet strength, the narrator asks for help the next day at church. She wishes to see the house with eyes of faith; she wants to picture the potential instead of disappointment.

Suddenly friends and neighbors start dropping by, each doing a small turn to help out. It’s not “Dirty-third Street” anymore.

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the tide turns, cheeks are flushed and eyes start to sparkle. The sky blazes with a warm sunset on the final full-color spread.

A tale of generosity, faith and friendship. Share it quietly within and with others. (Picture book. 4-8)

THE NIGHTMARE GARDEN

Kittredge, Caitlin Delacorte (304 pp.) $17.99 | PLB $20.99 | Feb. 14, 2012 978-0-385-73831-6 978-0-375-98569-0 e-book 978-0-385-90721-7 PLB Series: The Iron Codex, 2 This second installment in the Iron Codex series is as inventive and as bloated as its predecessor.

Spoiled, inconsistent, often-thoughtless heroine Aoife Grayson nearly destroyed the world when she broke the Lovecraft Engine and sundered the gates between the worlds of human and Fae. But she’s not going to let a little thing like that stop her, so she sets off on an exhausting, somewhat episodic adventure through the steampunk-horror ‘50s nightmare that is her world. She meets Erlkin, spends time with her estranged father, travels in a sub with Russian pirates and tries to play off her many enemies against one another. In so doing, she awakens a much greater threat with little regard to consequences. And she experiences love and loss, but her first-person narration sometimes strains credulity. Aoife states things she cannot know, says contrary things repeatedly (about her own emotions, the behavior of others, even the setting) and provides exposition at moments of high emotional tension, lessening the impact. Secondary characters exist only to move the plot along and then conveniently fade into the background, much like aspects of Aoife’s personality. Even so, the unusual world stands out.

There is a fan base that loved book one and will clamor for more of the same, which this certainly is. The ending promises even bigger adventures to come. (maps) (Steampunk/horror/fantasy. 12 & up)

ENCHANTED

Kontis, Alethea Harcourt (320 pp.) $16.99 | May 8, 2012 978-0-547-65470-4 Readers who get past the generic title and an off-puttingly generic cover will discover a fabulous fairy-tale mashup that deserves hordes of avid readers.

Sunday Woodcutter is the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter, living in the shadow of the memory of her eldest brother, Jack Junior, who disappeared on a cursed quest of his own. Sunday’s siblings each have their own fates and secrets. Her sisters range from 406

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twins Monday and Tuesday (Tuesday was danced to death) to Friday, who works magic with a needle; among her brothers is Trix, who is a changeling. It is Sunday, however, who becomes fast friends with a talking frog, and it is Sunday’s kiss that frees him—except she doesn’t know. Kontis has deeply and vividly woven just about every fairy character tale readers might halfremember into the fabric of her story: the beanstalk, the warrior maiden, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty and some darker ones, too. She does this so seamlessly, and with such energy and good humor, that readers might miss a few references, caught up instead in Sunday’s cheer and vivacity, or in Grumble-theFrog/Rumbold-the-Prince’s intense romantic nature (and his longing for his long-dead mother, the queen).

Absolutely delectable; if it has more fripperies and furbelows than are strictly speaking necessary, it makes up for that in the wizardly grace of its storytelling. (Fantasy. 12-18)

RIVALS

Kunze, Lauren & Onur, Rina Greenwillow/HarperCollins (384 pp.) $17.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-06-196049-9 Series: The Ivy, 3 Callie may be established in Harvard’s culture and social scene, but can she keep it up?

Things are finally going Callie’s way.

She has a great boyfriend, is COMPing—effectively a training audition—for the Harvard Crimson (under a COMP director who, unlike Lexi during Callie’s try-out for Fifteen Minutes, doesn’t hate her), has restored relative peace with her roommates and has full membership in her social society, the Hasty Pudding. But being happily with Clint isn’t enough to squash Callie’s jealousy when ex-crush Gregory starts dating a transfer student. And while Harvard Crimson managing editor Grace Lee also seems to have some past bad blood with Lexi, Lexi’s history as Clint’s friend keeps rearing its ugly head, leaving Callie suspicious. Additionally, Grace introduces a new Web feature for the Crimson, The FlyBy blog, which starts with a bang through anonymous posts by “The Ivy Insider” that reveal dirty secrets from the exclusive social clubs. And being on the other end of the punch proceedings—determining whom to invite to prospective member functions for the Hasty Pudding—gives Callie her own look at some of the society’s nastiness. Overall, Callie is so overwhelmed that she misses big problem signs—unrelated to her—in close friends, and even some of her own non-romantic troubles. The resulting cliffhanger has the highest stakes yet.

Smoothly continuing intrigues from earlier novels, this installment tantalizes with tension and drama. (Fiction. 16 & up)

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“A visual stunner that covers new ground.” from annie sullivan and the trials of helen keller

NO SHELTER HERE Making the World a Kinder Place for Dogs

Laidlaw, Rob Pajama Press (66 pp.) $21.00 | Mar. 15, 2012 978-0-9869495-5-5

An informative and visually varied introduction to problems affecting dogs worldwide.

In a short, colorful volume with sidebars and photographs on nearly every page, professional dog advocate Laidlaw (Wild Animals in Captivity, 2008) presents facts about how dogs live, provides an overview of the cruelty dogs face at the hands of humans and offers profiles of young activists who are working to better dogs’ lives. Readers who know dogs best as pets will find new information here: The author gives as much time to discussions of street dogs in Detroit and India and the working conditions of sled dogs as he does to the more familiar topics of dog adoption and caring for a canine pet. Dogs’ mistreatment in research facilities and at the hands of some pet owners is addressed frankly but gently, and photographs of cramped puppy mills or dogs neglectfully chained outdoors inspire pathos but do not depend on shock value. A few questions raised by the text go unanswered—the author insists that “dogs ... are our friends—not food” but neither extends this claim toward other animals nor explains why dogs, in his view, are different. At just 64 pages, the book does not delve deeply into any individual topic, but a list of animal welfare websites points interested readers toward further information.

A worthy overview that may well inspire readers to become “Dog Champions.” (glossary, index) (Nonfiction. 9-12)

ANNIE SULLIVAN AND THE TRIALS OF HELEN KELLER

Lambert, Joseph Illus. by Lambert, Joseph Disney Hyperion (96 pp.) $17.99 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-1-4231-1336-2 The story of Helen Keller and Annie Sullivan is given new life in an imagina-

tive graphic novel.

This volume from The Center for Cartoon Studies focuses on the trials both Annie and Helen struggle with in their lives.

If Helen was a trial for her family and Annie over the years, she is literally put on trial at the Perkins Institution. The final third of the book is devoted to this “trial,” not nearly as well known as the famous scene at the well, where Helen finally makes the mental connection that water is always water, whether in a cup, in a pitcher or running from a pump. Having gone on to learn to write, she is accused of plagiarizing her story “The Frost King,” which was published in the Perkins Institution’s |

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alumni magazine. Interrogated for two hours, Helen was so devastated that she never wrote fiction again. The incident allows Lambert to go beyond the famous well scene to further explore the nature of words, language and ideas. “If your ideas don’t come from teacher, where do they come from?” Helen’s interrogators ask. It’s a sophisticated, sometimes overly abstract, presentation, but the volume, like its predecessors, is visually appealing and daring. Helen’s perspective is powerfully communicated in dialogue-free black panels in which she is represented as only a gray silhouette.

A visual stunner that covers new ground. (panel discussions, bibliography, suggested reading) (Graphic nonfiction. 10-14)

THE ULTIMATE GUYS’ BODY BOOK Not-So-Stupid Questions About Your Body Larimore, Walt Zonderkidz (192 pp.) $7.99 paperback | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-310-72323-3

“Dr. Walt” offers advice with a Christian perspective for boys wondering about their bodies as they enter puberty.

More specifically, this is a volume aimed at Christian fathers of boys ages 10 to 13, so fathers can be ready with answers to sometimes tricky questions. Topics are covered through 30 questions on how boys’ bodies change, how much sleep is necessary, what if friends try alcohol, how to avoid pornography, what’s wrong with tattoos and body piercings and even three questions about testicles. It’s purportedly information readers can trust, presented “through the lens of a biblical worldview,” all reviewed by the Christian Medical Association. God is the common denominator behind all answers here. Differences in penis size?

It’s “the way God designed each one of us.” Masturbation? “Sexual fantasies are forbidden for Christians.” In Larimore’s perspective, “God invented sex,” but only “to be experienced between a husband and a wife in marriage.” Parents wanting to stay within the confines of Christian doctrine will find this volume informative. Other readers may want to go elsewhere to find a guide more open to a more encompassing worldview.

A useful guide for readers wanting a Christian look at boys’ physical and sexual development. (note to parents, appendices, afterword) (Nonfiction. 10-13)

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“Lee’s childlike watercolors are in sweet harmony with her text, which is both evocative and simple enough for early readers, without a superfluous word.” from when you are camping

GHOSTS OF THE TITANIC

harmony with her text, which is both evocative and simple enough for early readers, without a superfluous word.

Just right. (Picture book. 3-6)

Lawson, Julie Holiday House (176 pp.) $16.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-8234-2423-8

Twelve-year-old Kevin, the class clown, may be fascinated by the Titanic disaster, but he doesn’t expect to go back in time and live through the shipwreck.

Some chapters of this successful introduction to the famous disaster for middle graders take readers to 1912, when 17-year-old Angus Seaton works on a boat out of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Sent to pick up the floating bodies from the Titanic, Angus pulls a dead girl from the water and pockets her little purse. He intends to return it to the body but forgets about it for too long. Later her ghost haunts him, crying for her lost baby. When modern-day Kevin’s family inherits Seaton’s house, Kevin finds the purse and, with it, the ghost. Eventually Kevin finds himself actually on board the sinking Titanic, rushing to find the girl to set her spirit free. Lawson creates a believable class cut-up in Kevin and keeps the narrative moving along whether following Kevin or Angus. Readers see Kevin making poor decisions, but they will also sympathize and like the boy as he chases his obsession with the doomed ocean liner. Although the tone seems light, the events lead to thrilling suspense. Kevin’s trip back to the sinking ship places readers at the scene.

An exciting and capable introduction to the always-fascinating tale. (Paranormal suspense. 8-12)

WHEN YOU ARE CAMPING

Lee, Anne Illus. by Lee, Anne Kane/Miller (32 pp.) $14.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-61067-064-7

So many things to do in the great outdoors!

Even when it rains, Hazel and her sister, Tilly, enjoy camping with Mom and Dad. They can eat marshmallows for breakfast, splash in the puddles and run through the wet grass. Tilly encounters a green frog that apparently has the same idea. They can even get really muddy without getting in trouble. And Hazel does, wearing her red boots and a raincoat decorated with big poppies (Tilly’s is dotted with huge daisies). Tilly watches a caterpillar for a long time, while Hazel chases white moths and sneaks up on a gray rabbit. Dad blows up two yellow tubes so the girls can go swimming in the river. (They can bathe with the fishes!) After dinner, the family takes a walk in the woods, where they spot a very still deer, which might be listening for them. After the sun goes down, there are a million fireflies to see. Before bedtime, Dad makes popcorn and Mom tells a story by the campfire. Dad lights the lantern in Tilly and Hazel’s tent, and crickets sing them to sleep. “Hazel loves camping.

Tilly loves camping.” Lee’s childlike watercolors are in sweet 408

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HEY LITTLE BABY!

Leigh, Heather Illus. by Côté, Geneviève Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster (32 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-1-4169-8979-0 With a melodic and motherly voice, this gentle and captivating picture book welcomes a little baby into the world.

As a tiny infant finds his hands, Leigh’s first picture book captures parental hopes and dreams for their newborn with a simple, repeating form. “What will you make with those hands? / What will you make with those beautiful hands?” The future is unveiled, and Côté’s illustrations show him using his hands to build with blocks, make art, and create a sandcastle with a friend. This cherished little baby goes on to find his “darling” nose, his “delightful” mouth and his “lovely” voice. Simple and spare illustrations with the look of watercolor and ink depict the curious new baby. As the infant discovers each new body part, the illustrations show the smiling, nearly-naked tot. With the turn of a page, the joyful and active years to come are depicted with little white space, full of the adventures of childhood. Each time he explores something new, he grows up a little more in “the future,” eventually giving flowers to the sweet friend from his sandcastle-building days. That she looks just like his mother may confuse some children but emphasizes that the forecasts are his parents’ dreams based on their own recollections.

A lovely choice for new babies and their parents. (Picture book. 2-6)

EDGAR ALLAN POE’S PIE Math Puzzlers in Classic Poems

Lewis, J. Patrick Illus. by Slack, Michael Harcourt (40 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-547-51338-6

Going a step beyond his ArithmeTickle (illustrated by Frank Remkiewicz, 2001), Lewis cleverly combines math and language arts with this collection of humorous poetry parodies that present readers with math word problems to solve.

Fourteen famous poets and some of their more prominent works are the basis for Lewis’ parodies, which are all in good fun and retain the structure, rhyme and rhythm of the originals.

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themselves. Teachers will appreciate the wide array of mathematics required to solve the puzzles. In addition to the four basic operations, the challenges test knowledge of fractions, percentages, decimals, area, perimeter and money. But language arts teachers are not to be left out of the fun. While the original poems are, sadly, not included, backmatter does include a very short bio of each poet. From Lear, Whitman and Dickinson to Hughes, Nash and Silverstein, this is like a who’s who of famous poets. Slack’s digital illustrations match the whimsy and fun of the poems, the tongue-in-cheek humor in full gear. While the illustrations provide no clues as to how to solve the math, the answers are printed upside down on each spread.

Humor, math and poetry—who knew they were such a good combination? (Poetry/math. 8-12)

TAKE TWO! A Celebration of Twins Lewis, J. Patrick & Yolen, Jane Illus. by Blackall, Sophie Candlewick (72 pp.) $17.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7636-3702-6

Veteran poets tap into the neverending interest in twins with a collection of poetry dedicated to twosomes.

Children’s poet laureate Lewis, a twin himself, and prolific children’s poet Yolen, the grandmother of twins, present 44 poems about twins. Readers will have to guess each poem’s originator, however, as none of the poems are signed. Divided into four sections comprising “Twins in the Waiting Womb,” “Twinfants,” “How to Be One” (about childhood with a twin) and “Famous Twins,” the poems explore milestones as twins, the push and pull of twin relationships and the need for individuality.

Although some of the poems just reach mediocre, others are positively endearing (“Good night, / Good night. / The single moon / Shines down. / And soon / One sleep / You’ll share”). Readers will enjoy dipping into the book and savoring a few poems at a time rather than reading the book in its entirety, as taken altogether, the prevailing rhythmic rhyme can become monotonous. Intermittent twin facts run along the bottom, while Blackall, illustrator of another popular pair, Ivy + Bean, enhances the collection with a variety of twin sets in her signature patterned illustrations, rendered in watercolor, pencil and painted paper collage. Children may muse at the twin depictions, but the real consumers will be the proud caregivers of twins.

T-winsome. (authors’ note) (Poetry. 4-8)

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THE CASE OF THE MYSTERY MEAT LOAF

Lewman, David Simon Spotlight (160 pp.) $15.99 | paper $5.99 | Apr. 24, 2012 978-1-4424-4646-5 978-1-4424-3394-6 paperback Series: Club CSI, 1 Inspired by their forensic-science class, middle schoolers Hannah, Ben and Corey start up a CSI club just in time to investigate a mysterious incident of food poisoning in the school cafeteria.

The new science teacher is young and cool—and she doesn’t eat red meat. Grudgingly, Mrs. Collins, the cafeteria manager, agrees to try her recipe for tofu meat loaf. The principal and a number of students get sick. Who’s responsible? Cool Miss Hodges? The grumpy manager or her bullying son, Ricky? The store that provided the tofu? Methodically, the three investigate, just as they’ve been taught: planning ahead; looking carefully at the scene; taking pictures, notes and even samples with Hannah’s cell phone; and interviewing suspects. The straightforward third-person narration moves quickly, with plentiful dialogue and generous portions of information about crimescene investigation, salmonella and safe food handling. Stock characters and a made-for-television ending won’t bother readers who will be drawn in by the familiar setting and fascinating process of crime investigation. Lewman has previously written numerous books starring popular characters such as Sponge Bob and G.I. Joe. With three more titles in this new series scheduled to appear this year, he should have ample opportunity to flesh out Hannah, Ben and Corey a little more.

Sure-fire book bait for middle-grade readers. (Mystery. 8-12)

I HUNT KILLERS

Lyga, Barry Little, Brown (368 pp.) $17.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-316-12584-0 When your father is the most notorious serial killer of the 21st century, having a normal life is a struggle. So is not following in his footsteps.

After witnessing many of the crime scenes of his father’s 123 official kills in ways the police wish they could, 17-year-old Jasper “Jazz” Dent is glad his father’s in prison. Life with crazy Gramma, who raised “Dear Old Dad,” is hard enough, and now it’s in jeopardy thanks to Jazz’s social worker. When police discover a body in a field near town, Jazz becomes certain it’s a new serial killer. In spite of the objections of Lobo’s Nod Sheriff G. William Tanner, Jazz and his best friend, hemophiliac Howie, run their own investigation and uncover a pattern as bodies quickly pile up. Can Jazz help the cops find this new monster without becoming a |

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suspect himself? YA rebel-author Lyga switches from goths and superheroes to serial killers and sociopaths with this grisly teen thriller. Jazz’s heightened self-consciousness is both believable and entirely in tune with regular teens. Readers of Dan Wells’ John Wayne Cleaver novels (I Am Not a Serial Killer, 2010, etc.) will find echoes of them here, though the writing is not as tight and the creep factor is lower. Also, the certain-sequel open ending is a bit of a letdown.

Still there is much to satisfy the blood-and-gore lust of older teen CSI and serial-killer fans. (Thriller. 15 & up)

SHARPSHOOTER

Lynch, Chris Scholastic (192 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-545-27026-7 Series: Vietnam, 2

In the second installment of his Vietnam War series, Lynch follows 18-yearold Ivan Bucyk, one of four friends who pledged to go to war together once one was drafted.

Ivan was the one most excited about going. After all, his dad was in World War II, and Ivan grew up on stories of Patton and North Africa. Trained as an elite sniper, Ivan is special, but, predictably, his experience in Vietnam doesn’t match the stories of heroism he grew up on. Here, it’s not clear who the enemy is.

He had figured this war would be like the American Civil War, with a clear North and South, but in Vietnam the enemy is all around and impossible to identify. Ivan has quickly come to realize he was a stupid kid when he arrived; now, with a war he can’t explain, he lives for a simple purpose: “I shoot people. That’s it.”

And DERUS—”Date Eligible for Return to US”—has become his religion. Since this volume repeats the opening of the first (I Pledge Allegiance, 2011), it easily stands alone, but the series gains richness from the multiple narratives, boding well for the overall story when all four characters have had their say.

The best Vietnam War novels yet for this age range. (Fiction. 9-13)

VIRGINIA WOLF

Maclear, Kyo Illus. by Arsenault, Isabelle Kids Can (32 pp.) $18.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-55453-649-8 In the literary bounty of books about bad moods and bad days, this one goes deeper than most, poignantly showing literal and metaphorical glimpses of real depression.

“One day my sister Virginia woke up feeling wolfish. She made wolf sounds and did strange things,” begins narrator Vanessa. Huddled in bed, only pointy ears showing, is a wolf. Virginia’s unable to bear the bright-yellow gingham of Vanessa’s dress 410

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or the sound of Vanessa brushing her own teeth. This is potent misery: “The whole house sank. Up became down. Bright became dim.” Vanessa creeps into bed to comfort her sister, but what finally helps is painting. At the wolf ’s suggestion, Vanessa paints a whimsical, expanding world called “Bloomsberry,” bursting with blossoms, birds and magic. Arsenault reproduces the earlier “Up became down” spread but inverts its position and hue: Now objects waft upwards and the mood is buoyant.

The wolf—previously a black near-silhouette with snout and tail, wearing a dress—morphs back into a girl. Wolf ears, silhouetted from behind, become a hair bow. Ink, pencil and paint deftly divide color from black-and-white as emotional symbolism. Lettering is carefully handwritten.

Knowledge of Virginia Woolf and her painter-sister Vanessa Bell is unnecessary; this works beautifully as a bad-day/ bad-mood or animal-transformation tale, while readers who know actual depression will find it handled with tenderly forceful aplomb. (Picture book. 5-10)

WRONG WAY

MacLeod, Mark Illus. by Rossell, Judith Kane/Miller (36 pp.) $14.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-61067-077-7 A mother duck’s instructive intentions are interrupted by one of her mischievous ducklings and his wayward ways.

A duck family of four sets out for the pond and a beginning swim lesson. Ducklings Right Way and Your Way follow obediently, while Wrong Way promptly refuses to comply, plopping down in the middle of the path, diving into the bushes to retrieve a juicy snail, splashing through a puddle and otherwise slowing the trip down for all. “At this rate, we’ll never make it to the pond…. I’d better carry you, I suppose” is mother duck’s exasperated response. But when a passing car forces everyone to quickly flap out of its path, Wrong Way, who wasn’t paying attention, is blown, tossed and tumbled onto his back and left behind. Eager to catch up, he rushes right past his family and splashes out into the middle of the pond. Recognizing his unorthodox ways, mother finally acknowledges that her little impish duckling should be renamed My Way. Light charcoal sketches infused with green and yellow muted watercolor washes adroitly depict the humorous scenarios, yet the unfortunate choice of names creates a level of didactic moralizing that spoils the overall theme of individuality in a large family.

A mediocre substitute for the eloquent simplicity of Nancy Tafuri’s definitive Have You Seen My Duckling or even the classic Story About Ping. (Picture book. 3-5)

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“Manning’s expressive and detailed digital pencil, watercolor and pastel drawings depict an unnamed but unmistakable turn-of-the-20th-century New York City.” from laundry day

LAUNDRY DAY

Manning, Maurie J. Illus. by Manning, Maurie J. Clarion (40 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 17, 2012 978-0-547-24196-8 One windy day a young shoeshine boy makes a world of new friends.

Unable to make a sale, he looks up to see a long, bright-red scarf drifting down to him as he sits dejectedly on the curb. The story of his search for the owner is told with dialogue balloons in comicbook style. Text and illustrations are mutually dependent as one panel follows another, moving the story along. The plucky little boy fearlessly climbs fire escapes, walks across clothes lines and shimmies up and down pipes. Chinese, AfricanAmerican, Ukrainian, Italian, Polish, Irish, Jewish and Caribbean Island immigrants all greet him kindly, and he in turn performs small services for them. With each interaction, he is exposed to a bit of their cultures. The dialogue is simple and has the flavor and syntax of each speaker’s homeland with a word from their language nicely incorporated. The scarf is finally returned to its rightful owner, and there’s a surprise reward for the boy. Manning’s expressive and detailed digital pencil, watercolor and pastel drawings depict an unnamed but unmistakable turn-of-the-20th-century New York City. Laundry whips in the wind, and busy people on every floor of the buildings are shown from multiple perspectives.

Everything teems with movement and life—completely beguiling. (foreign word list) (Picture book. 4-9)

GRANDMA ROSE’S MAGIC

Marshall, Linda Elovitz Illus. by Jatkowska, Ag Kar-Ben (24 pp.) $7.95 paperback | PLB $17.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7613-5216-7 978-0-7613-5215-0 PLB Can sewing make magic?

Yes, if it’s done by kind-hearted Grandma Rose. Every day she sews, and every day she saves to buy a beautiful set of dishes, just like the ones her grandmother used on Shabbos.

She sews for everyone: a skirt for Mrs. Feldman, a blue tablecloth for Mrs. Cooper, a hat for Mrs. Segal and a shirt for Mr. Cohen. For each item, she stitches something extra (roseshaped buttons for the skirt, a set of napkins for the tablecloth and so on), as if by magic. When her jar of coins reaches $200, she goes to the store to buy the pretty pink-and-red– rose dishes with blue-and-gold trim. Oh no, the department store does not have them! Sadly, she uses her money to buy food for a special meal and returns home. Surprise! Each of the people for whom she sewed is there, holding a piece of her beloved china. The attractive illustrations (reminiscent |

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of Emma Chichester Clark) add Jewish references to situate the story firmly within its community.

A well-stitched tale about generosity for people of all faiths. (Picture book. 4-7)

LITTLE LAMB, HAVE YOU ANY WOOL?

Martins, Isabel Minhós Translated by de Sousa, Maureen Illus. by Kono, Yara Owlkids Books (28 pp.) $15.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-926973-14-2

What begins as an adaptation of the “Baa Baa Black Sheep” nursery rhyme becomes an exercise in sharing when a small boy asks a lamb to give him enough wool to knit a warm winter wardrobe.

Initially, the boy asks the lamb if it has any wool because he wants to make a sweater for winter. Soon the boy returns, asking for more wool for a hat. Indeed, the boy returns repeatedly for wool to knit a scarf, mittens, socks and, finally, a long coat.

The lamb obliges, telling his friend, “if you’re that cold, I will let you take my wool and you can knit it all up.” In a surprise twist, however, the boy reveals he’s also created a sweater, scarf, socks and a hat to keep his lamb pal warm as well. The simple text relies on repetition to convey its message of sharing, while colorful, whimsical illustrations use flat patterns and lines to showcase both the puffy white lamb and the boy in his expanding winter wardrobe of knit items. A spiraling line linking the lamb to the boy and his ensemble of knitwear proves an appropriate visual device, weaving like an endless piece of yarn or long muffler from page to page.

A charming study in cooperation (but how did this amazing boy learn how to knit so prodigiously?). (Picture book. 3-6)

HELP ME LEARN ADDITION

Marzollo, Jean Photos by Phillips, Chad Holiday House (32 pp.) $15.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-8234-23989 Series: Help Me Learn,

Marzollo’s second Help Me Learn title builds on the first (Help Me Learn Numbers 0-20, 2011) but unfortunately does not fix its rhythm and rhyme flaws.

Relating to the Common Core State Standards in Mathematics for pre-K through first grade, this latest focuses on addition: counting on, skip counting, number sentences, ways to equal 10, tally marks and a few subtraction problems. But clunky verses with words chosen for rhyme rather than meaning (or even rhythm) plague these pages, and affect not just readers’ understanding, but readability as well. “What is the answer / when we add zero? / It’s what we had. / Is that clear-o?” However, |

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“Authenticity supported by her previous juvenile nonfiction works, McArthur has created a believable and fast-paced tale of life in the Kansas Territory.” from a voice for kanzas

the book’s largest problem is a disconnect between content and audience. The rhyming is appropriate for the younger end of the spectrum but may turn off the older kids, and the tally marks and 3- and 4-digit addition sentences are going to be beyond the younger kids, especially since the math is not really explained. Many of the tiny objects from the first book make a reappearance here in Phillips’ photos, but there are some interesting new additions, most notably colorful marbles and some bright and cheerful aliens.

This is not a book that kids could (or would) pick up on their own without guidance, and teachers are likely still to prefer to use old favorites that do it well. (Math picture book. 3-7)

A VOICE FOR KANZAS

McArthur, Debra Kane/Miller (384 pp.) $15.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-61067-044-9

It’s 1855, and 13-year-old budding poet Lucy has no desire to leave the safety of Pennsylvania, her school and her coming cotillion to head out to the dangerous town of Lawrence, Kan. But her father is determined to travel to the lawless new territory to help fight to have it admitted to the Union as a free state and, at the same time, to finally find success running a store. The learning curve is steep for Lucy.

After all her belongings are lost on the journey, she’s forced to wear only her lovely cotillion gown, totally inappropriate for the rough-and-tumble frontier. School is nothing like her genteel education back east, but there she meets classmate Annie, who lives outside of town and whose family secretly helps move slaves north to safety. After Lucy begins to help, inspired by ideals she finds in poetry, suspense rises palpably. Chapters begin with excerpts from period documents, mostly newspapers, ably setting the tone. While some characters seem included merely to demonstrate diversity—especially heroic Native American boy Levi—and a related subplot in which Lucy’s younger brother falling under another boy’s bad influence feels superfluous, the historical accuracy and gritty hazards of tumultuous Kansas keep the tale on track.

Authenticity supported by her previous juvenile nonfiction works, McArthur has created a believable and fast-paced tale of life in the Kansas Territory. (Historical fiction. 10-15)

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THUMPED

McCafferty, Megan Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins (304 pp.) $17.99 | Apr. 24, 2012 978-0-06-196276-9 This breezy and intriguing near-time dystopia concludes with the much-anticipated birth that was bought and paid for in the first installment, Bumped (2011).

After a virus destroyed the ability of anyone over the age of 18 to reproduce, teen pregnancy became big business and major TMZ-style entertainment. Now the whole United States eagerly anticipates the day that twins Melody and Harmony will each give birth to two more sets of twins, but Melody has a secret. She isn’t really pregnant but is faking it with the help of technology that can fool even doctors. Meanwhile, Harmony realizes that her religious cult will take her children from her, so she escapes.

The famous stud Jondoe, who has fallen in love with Harmony, prepares for the birth with gusto, knowing that these are his twins, not Harmony’s husband’s. All the secrets finally explode, but not before readers have plenty of fun in McCafferty’s futuristic world. However, this book, even more strongly than the last, makes the deliberate point that teenage pregnancy and sex without love can seriously damage both the teens and society.

Despite that serious message, the author serves it all up with bubbly banter, full of invented slang (“I’m not pregging!”).

A sparkling, imaginative romp that is nevertheless plenty provocative. (Science fiction. 14 & up)

LAST CHANCE

McClintock, Norah Darby Creek (232 pp.) $8.95 paperback | $20.95 e-book PLB $27.93 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-7613-8529-5 978-0-7613-9071-8 e-book 978-0-7613-8311-6 PLB Series: Robyn Hunter Mysteries, 1 How does a girl who’s terrified of dogs wind up working at an animal shelter?

The dogs aren’t the only thing that scares Robyn. Back in middle school, she turned in a boy for stealing. She hoped she’d never see him again, but there he is, also working at the shelter.

Nick doesn’t seem able to stay out of trouble. Yet both Robyn and Nick are doing community service at the shelter. Robyn, accused of breaking a window during a protest march, still sees herself as superior to Nick, accused of violent crime. When she thinks she sees Nick trying to steal money again, she isn’t sure what she should do. Meanwhile, Robyn learns more about Nick when he’s arrested again. This time she thinks he’s innocent and sets out to prove it. To amp the tension a little bit, add in the fact that a dog Nick has been training may be put down if Nick leaves his rehabilitation program. As the story unfolds, Robyn kirkusreviews.com

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learns more about Nick’s predicament, turning the story into a mystery. McClintock keeps her writing at a level simple and clear enough to attract both middle-school and reluctant highschool readers. She portrays both Robyn and Nick as flawed people, but both learn and grow, finally making both interesting and attractive characters. Volume two in the Robyn Hunter Mysteries series, You Can Run, publishes simultaneously.

Great for dog lovers and young mystery fans. (Mystery. 12-16)

NO BEARS

McKinlay, Meg Illus. by Rudge, Leila Candlewick (32 pp.) $15.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7636-5890-8

prescriptions in the book and offer liberating encouragement.

You don’t have to wear special clothes or be in a special place; you don’t have to kneel or fold your hands (an especial problem for animals); you can shout and laugh in your prayers. The text is purely pedestrian, unfurling line after line of purposive dialogue.

The illustrations are bland cartoons with little to no subtlety in composition, color or expression. The result is a wholly didactic package that delivers a positive and worthwhile message with no art whatsoever.

Skip this treacle and opt for Rachel Rivett and Mique Moriuchi’s I Imagine (2011) or Vaunda Micheaux Nelson and Sean Qualls’ Who Will I Be, Lord? (2009) for more artful treatments of children’s communication with God. (Picture book/religion. 3-5)

ISABELLA’S GARDEN

A storyteller spins a tale of her own devising—while the pictures tell a some-

what different one.

“I’m tired of bears. Every time you read a book, it’s just BEARS BEARS BEARS,” grumps the young narrator. Claiming that you don’t need them, she proceeds to craft a story about a monster who sets out to steal a princess and is ultimately foiled by a fairy godmother. Fair enough—but as is evident from the episode’s first page on, the godmother hovering watchfully just beyond the edges of each scene is unmistakably ursine. Framed as ring-bound notebook pages, Rudge’s pale, fine-lined illustrations feature a comfy royal family and a not-very-scary monster that resembles a misshapen, rubber limbed frog. There are also an owl and a pussycat, three pigs, gingerbread men, a girl in a red hood and assorted other familiar figures looking on with increasing puzzlement as the narrator resolutely ignores the elephant—or in this case, the bear—in the room, even after she reaches a “happy ever after.”

Young fans of David Wiesner’s Three Pigs (2001) and other metafictive romps will be properly amused. (Picture book. 6-8)

EVERY WHICH WAY TO PRAY

Meyer, Joyce Illus. by Sullivan, Mary Zonderkidz (40 pp.) $15.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-310-72317-2 A couple of young hippopotami receive instruction in the ease and pleasure of prayer in this vapid if well-meant outing.

When Harley and Hayley spot a silhouetted pelican sitting on a roof, they think it’s an angel. Upon realizing that Pouch is corporeal, Harley is disappointed. He had momentarily hoped to have a close encounter with heaven, but, “We’ll NEVER get that close to God.” Not so, burbles Pouch. Anyone can be close to God. “That’s what prayer is for!” But Harley’s book, The Rules of Prayer, say that prayer is hard, he protests. Pouch is joined by a group of kibitzing animals who, rule by rule, contradict the |

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Millard, Glenda Illus. by Cool, Rebecca Candlewick (32 pp.) $16.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7636-6016-1

In sonorous cumulative verse, a seasonal round set in a garden rich in color, flowers and children.

Beginning and ending with the soil “all dark and deep,” seeds sprout, rain falls and flowers “waltz with the wind.” A songbird hatches, leaves turn, a mantis vainly prays to the moon “that winter come never or not quite so soon.” Jack Frost dances past, leaving an empty nest and “a handful of seeds for the wild wind to blow. / Enough, just enough, for a garden to grow.” Against backdrops of vibrant greens and blues, Cool poses a group of stylized children with distant eyes widely set in modernist, Picasso-esque faces, dressed in brightly patterned clothing and busily digging, watering, playing and, in season, harvesting. Millard introduces subtle changes in wording to the repeated lines to stave off monotony, and the leaves and patterns in the pictures create a dance of color that rises and falls in energy as the annual cycle turns.

At once stately and soothing—a fine choice for bedtime sharing or for calming ruffled spirits in general. (Picture book. 6-8)

OWLET’S FIRST FLIGHT

Modarressi, Mitra Illus. by Modarressi, Mitra Putnam (32 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 12, 2012 978-0-399-25526-7

Nighttime can be scary, especially for a young owl on his first flight. But as many children learn, most fears are often not what they seem.

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tonight you are ready!” A wordless double-page spread follows, showing an owl-eye view of the dark landscape he is about to explore. Thankfully, frightening shadows are only tree branches, and a popping sound turns out to be acorns falling onto a barn roof. Modarressi’s (Taking Care of Mama, 2010) talent with watercolors elevates this sweet bedtime tale above the many titles of this ilk. Owlet’s eyes convey his every emotion—worry, fear, surprise, relief and joy. Skillful layering of color conveys the bird’s swooping movements, while sharply drawn details of the creatures contrast nicely with the softer natural backgrounds, including the sky that ranges from inky blue to purplish pink.

Preschoolers are sure to enjoy this cozy story and cheer for Owlet when he is finally “Safe with his family, snug in his nest”—which, sweetly, is heart-shaped. (Picture book. 3-5)

TEMPLE GRANDIN How the Girl Who Loved Cows Embraced Autism and Changed the World Montgomery, Sy Houghton Mifflin (160 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-0-547-44315-7

The biography of an exceptional woman who, remarkably, made use of her condition to discover her calling and changed her own and many animals’ lives.

From earliest childhood, Dr. Temple Grandin, professor of animal science at Colorado State University, stood out with her “odd” ways. Her own father wanted to institutionalize his “retarded” child. Luckily Temple had friends who appreciated her creative mind and a mother who steadfastly believed in her and sought out schools, teachers and therapists who began to help develop her many talents, including a fierce intellect. A kindly high-school teacher led her to realize that her career lay in science. Today Grandin is a world authority and consultant on the respectful, humane treatment of animals raised for food and has designed groundbreaking facilities and equipment that protect livestock from fear and suffering—because her autism permits her to think the way animals do. (Animal lovers particularly may find some descriptions of ranching and slaughterhouse practices hard to take.)Montgomery makes a compelling argument that though one never outgrows autism, it doesn’t condemn those who have it to unproductive lives, and an appendix, “Temple’s Advice for Kids on the Spectrum,” provides first-hand wisdom. Photos and diagrams depict Grandin’s work as well as documenting her early life and career.

A well written, admiring and thought-provoking portrait. (foreword by Grandin, index, facts about autism and factory farming) (Nonfiction. 10-13)

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VODNÍK

Moore, Bryce Tu Books (368 pp.) $18.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-60060-852-0 An American teen encounters monsters both fantastical and human in the land of his birth.

After a fire destroys their home, Tomas and his parents move to Slovakia, a country Tomas hasn’t seen since he was 5 years old. He’s unconcerned about the move; scarred from a childhood fire and painfully shy, Tomas hasn’t got any friends to leave behind.

Trencín, at first, seems wonderful. There’s a truly fabulous castle, and he’s made his first real friend: his cousin Katka. But Katka is dangerously ill, and Tomas’ attempts to help are complicated by his first experiences with racism. In the United States, Tomas is white; in Slovakia, the olive skin he inherited from his Roma grandfather marks him as a Gypsy and a valid target for abuse. Nothing can help Tomas—and more importantly, Katka—except the mythical creatures Tomas started seeing almost as soon as he landed in Slovakia. It’s unclear whether he can trust the watery vodník or the fire víla, but they both promised to help. A first encounter with racism blends well with a compelling fantasy adventure (although Tomas’s family, lacking any Romani culture or traditions, reiterates some of racism themselves; his mother explains how they are worthy of praise because they are “not like other Roma”).

A shy boy blossoms in this surprisingly witty debut. (author’s note, further reading) (Fantasy. 11-16)

GONE, GONE, GONE

Moskowitz, Hannah Simon Pulse/Simon & Schuster (272 pp.) $9.99 paperback | Apr. 17, 2012 978-1-4424-0753-4 The Beltway sniper shootings and the attacks of 9/11 become the crucible for this exploration of teenage grief and love.

Thirteen months after the 9/11 attacks, 15-year-old Craig wakes up to find that his menagerie of five cats, four dogs, three rabbits, a bird and a guinea pig have all escaped.

Meanwhile, Lio, also 15, is using his therapy sessions to explore his feelings for Craig instead of dealing with the death of his twin brother from leukemia. Hunting for the animals, the teens end up arguing over the destruction of the World Trade Center, the damage to the Pentagon and the peculiar allocation of the country’s collective grief. Enigmatic characters, emotional manipulation and the convoluted plot keep Moskowitz’s third novel from achieving the impact of her previous works (Invincible Summer, 2011, etc.). Craig is an especially remote character, with somewhat autistic mannerisms, and it’s difficult to relate to him through either inner and or interpersonal dialogue.

His relationship with Lio is not so much developed as forced. kirkusreviews.com

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“Digital layering produces a fantastic fusion of painterly textures, soft patterns and fine outlines, yielding ethereal illustrations with dappled colors that shine like light through a leaf.” from hide & seek

There’s no skill in the treatment of these two high-profile tragedies; they both come across as cheap emotional touchstones rather than opportunities to honestly explore grief, loss and shared sorrow. What with the lost pets, the unclear relationship Craig has with his ex-boyfriend, a suicide hotline and dead siblings, there’s simply too much going on.

A complete miss from an otherwise solid author. (Fiction. 14 & up)

ALL THE RIGHT STUFF

Myers, Walter Dean Amistad/HarperCollins (224 pp.) $17.99 | PLB $18.89 | Apr. 24, 2012 978-0-06-196087-1 978-0-06-196088-8 PLB Until he met Elijah, 16-year-old Paul never considered how one person’s decisions and actions might affect the entire community.

Paul DuPree has taken on two jobs: work in a soup kitchen and the required mentoring of a young basketball player. At the soup kitchen, he meets Elijah Jones, the project’s driving force and resident philosopher. Elijah sees himself as doing more than filling bellies. He believes he is fulfilling the “social contract.”

As Elijah trains Paul, he urges him to consider his ideas. Paul is skeptical but tries to apply the concepts to questions about his recently deceased father and the teen mom he is mentoring.

Paul never had much of a relationship with his father, described as “forty-two-year-old Richard DuPree, underemployed exfelon, ex-drug addict, father of one.” Keisha, high-school dropout and mother of a little girl, needs Paul’s help to fulfill her dream of professional basketball. She resists Elijah’s ideas.

“Because the rules don’t work for everybody, and so they don’t go for everybody.” Myers, the recently named National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, has crafted a provocative exploration of social philosophy and shows how it can resonate in the lives of the young and the disadvantaged. Paul’s quest for understanding seems heartfelt and real, though there are times when the story slows down as characters discuss their views.

A novel that will provide teachers and others a relevant tool for introducing and discussing a complex subject. (Fiction. 14 & up)

HIDE & SEEK

Na, Il Sung Illus. by Na, Il Sung Knopf (32 pp.) $15.99 | May 8, 2012 978-0-375-87078-1 Expert hide-and-seekers will hear the hushed scuttles and feel the quickened pulses as a group of animals plays a rainforest game of hide-and-seek.

Elephant counts while his animal friends scurry. Butterflies flutter around the crouching little elephant, a new one joining |

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in with each page-turn, adding up to a swarm that equals each giddy announcement: 1, 2, 3! Meanwhile, flamingo, chameleon, giraffe, rhino, monkey, tortoise, the starlings and bush babies hasten to get hidden. Momentum mounts as readers alternate between an animal wondering, for example, “Can I hide behind this rock?” (on left-hand pages) and the elephant’s’ escalating counting (on the right). Na also directs readers’ eyes up into the canopy and down into the underbrush, where creatures look for cover, getting them to crane their heads and look at the forest from every angle. Text size swells and reduces, indicating emphasis, and keeps the antsy energy going. Digital layering produces a fantastic fusion of painterly textures, soft patterns and fine outlines, yielding ethereal illustrations with dappled colors that shine like light through a leaf. So many undulating components could easily turn into roiling confusion on the page, but here each element coheres beautifully, rendering a sweetly swirling, tie-dyed rainforest awash in reds, yellows, greens and blues.

Ready or not! Here comes a book worth finding. (Picture book. 2-5)

ANOTHER JEKYLL, ANOTHER HYDE

Nayeri, Dina & Nayeri, Daniel Candlewick (256 pp.) $17.99 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-0-7636-5261-6 Series: Another…, 3 One of the Marlowe students finds his internal conflicts becoming all-too external, Jekyll-and-Hyde style, in the conclusion to the Another… series.

Following his sudden break-up with Belle Faust in Another Faust (2009), Thomas Goodman-Brown hasn’t been the same.

Everyone thinks him constantly intoxicated (without justification; it’s only occasional), but really he’s reeling from the after-effects of the magic the Faust children used on him. A combination of his presumed guilt and the strain of his father’s marriage to the missing Belle’s governess Nicola Vileroy leads to Thomas’ acceptance of a mystery drug at a club. Soon, Thomas is blacking out, students are being attacked and Vileroy drops a bombshell: There’s a new stepbrother for Thomas, apart from her adopted Faust children. With help from briefly returning Another Faust and Another Pan (2010) characters, Thomas slowly pieces together how his troubles tie into Vileroy’s motives.

The prose is peppered with delightfully witty one-liners—the humor goes a long way toward keeping Thomas likable. The narration mostly follows Thomas, creating a focus that both enables his believable disorientation from the drug and allows his personal risks to elevate the story’s tension. The preludes at chapter beginnings complete the story of who and what Vileroy is, building upon each other until questions raised by the previous novels have been answered.

A high-stakes conclusion that satisfies. (Fantasy. 14 & up)

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“Ruthless ambition, fierce action and plotting, complex characters and lots of sword play and hidden passages keep pages flipping.” from the false prince

THE FALSE PRINCE

dog will always mostly be… / my friend Fred.” Fred and Grace’s relationship is endearingly described in Reeve’s pastel-hued illustrations. Appropriately, they are by far the most developed characters, aptly reflecting Grace’s self-centeredness.

It’s a doggone shame that didacticism mars the depiction of a young owner’s relationship with her beloved pup.

(Picture book. 3-7)

Nielsen, Jennifer A. Scholastic (352 pp.) $16.99 | $16.99 e-book | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-545-28413-4 978-0-545-39249-5 e-book Series: The Ascendance Trilogy, 1 A brazen 15-year-old orphan living in the imaginary kingdom of Carthya becomes embroiled in a treasonous power-play to install a false prince on the vacant throne.

For years, Sage has survived by lying and stealing in Mrs. Turbeldy’s Orphanage for Disadvantaged Boys. When scheming Bevin Connor removes him, Sage assumes he will serve Connor, but he quickly discovers he’s one of four orphan boys chosen by Connor for a more dangerous game. Connor plans to secretly transform them into gentlemen and select one to impersonate Prince Jaron, who is missing and presumed dead.

Carthya’s current king, queen and crown prince have been murdered, and war could erupt at any moment. When the regents meet in two weeks, Connor plans to produce long-lost “Prince Jaron,” who will rule as his pawn. Competition becomes fierce as the boys realize the one chosen to play Jaron will be the only survivor. Sage’s disdain, defiance and reckless arrogance mark him for failure, but his boldness, instinct and innate decency indicate there’s more than meets the eye. Could Sage become Prince Jaron? Sage reveals his story in the first person in slowly unfolding layers guaranteed to shock. Ruthless ambition, fierce action and plotting, complex characters and lots of sword play and hidden passages keep pages flipping.

Readers of this multifaceted, well-crafted tale will eagerly await Sage’s further adventures. (map) (Adventure. 8-14)

MY FRIEND FRED

Oram, Hiawyn Illus. by Reeve, Rosie Tiger Tales (32 pp.) $15.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-58925-105-2

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This inspirational story set in the 1960s will resonate with a wide range of readers.

Aislinn O’Neill is expecting big things in the summer before her eighth-grade year. She dreams that her father will quit drinking, that her family will finally own their own home and that a boy named Mike Mancinello will like her. Tall orders all. And it’s not like she gets to devote all of her time to seeing them come true. Aislinn, or A for short, is in charge of her four younger siblings—B, C, D and E—while her parents are at work. Even when her parents are home, she is expected to help with household duties and is forbidden from socializing with her peers by her overprotective, controlling, alcoholic father. Aislinn never loses hope, however, and finally she hits upon an idea that just might work. Everyone needs help to make dreams come true, she reasons, and how can others help if people’s dreams are tucked too deeply inside their hearts to ever be seen by anyone else? Aislinn grabs a label, prints a wish on it, sticks it right on her sleeve and starts a mini-revolution.

While a few passages lean precariously toward the polemical and the resolutions are pretty quick and tidy, readers will be too squarely in A’s court to care. (Historical fiction. 10-14)

MOOSHKA, A QUILT STORY

A young girl shares a special bond with Fred, her family’s pooch.

When Grace’s older sister Sarah has friends over, they want to play with the dog. But Grace insists the dog belongs to her.

After all, Fred’s sniffing locates Grace’s backpack when it’s buried in a mess; he lounges in her bean-bag chair and wakes her with a nudge of a ball. She attempts doggy extortion to distract him with make-believe and stories (“Let’s look at these for hours and hours until all Sarah’s friends go home”), but Fred whimpers at the door. Grace has an epiphany that leads to a dramatic change of heart. Although this shift is praiseworthy and one that many parents will encourage, it is out of sync with Grace’s developmentally realistic attitude that preceded it.

Her final, private thoughts belie her transformation, though: “I know ‘ours’ is only a word and whatever anyone says, really that 416

DREAMSLEEVES

Paratore, Coleen Murtagh Scholastic (288 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-545-31020-8

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Paschkis, Julie Illus. by Paschkis, Julie Peachtree (32 pp.) $16.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-56145-620-8 Like the beautiful quilt showcased on glowing endpapers and throughout this tale, a preschooler’s active imagination (probably) and an exciting (or not) addition are pieced together with family stories to create a new-baby/favorite-blanket story that’s likely to become an old favorite.

Karla loves her quilt, which she calls Mooshka. Mooshka comforts her on cold and scary nights and, at least according to Karla, can talk. Whether Mooshka is actually magical is left open to interpretation. It’s possible, after all, that the vignettes kirkusreviews.com

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of earlier activities (mom’s jump from a cherry tree or an aunt’s turn as a fortune-teller) are actually memories based on conversations with Karla’s grandmother as she sewed the quilt and shared family history. And maybe Mooshka’s fondness for pancakes simply reflects Karla’s early-morning cravings. Bordered in rectangles and triangles of vibrant patterns in a kaleidoscope of colors, both text and illustrations carry Paschkis’ plot.

Indeed, young listeners may be as disconcerted as Karla at the appearance of a baby sister, but careful examination of an earlier picture reveals a hint of things to come. After initial, if mild, hostility, Karla finds it in her heart to comfort little Hannah by sharing both Mooshka and the story of her own contribution.

Vivid artwork, a lively, endearing heroine and a warm, loving look at a pivotal experience give this one classic potential. (Picture book. 3-6)

FASTER! FASTER!

Patricelli, Leslie Illus. by Patricelli, Leslie Candlewick (32 pp.) $15.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-7636-5473-3

The exuberant duo from Higher!

Higher! (2009) is back in Patricelli’s latest, this time imagining all the animals dad could be as his daughter rides on his back. While her younger brother gets pushed on a swing in the background (yelling, “Higher, higher!” of course), the lively girl demands a ride of her dad. Climbing on his back and taking his necktie in her hands like reins, she demands that he go “Faster!

Faster!” until suddenly it is no longer her father she is riding. He becomes first a dog, then a rabbit, an ostrich, a horse, a cheetah, a hawk, a dolphin and a sea turtle—all of which sport Dad’s purple polka-dot tie. Each spread gives a glimpse of the next animal Dad will become, as well as a look back at the exhausted animal he was on the previous page. Motion streaks and clouds of dust give readers clues as to just how fast Dad is… until, as a sea turtle, he finally runs out of steam, and the picture changes back to a young girl atop her tired and sprawled-out father. She gently reassures him, “You’re fast, Daddy!” as they head off for (one hopes) further imaginative play. Patricelli’s acrylics combine bright colors with minimalist details to capture the joy of the young girl and the closeness of their father-daughter bond.

Another imaginative delight…what will this duo dream up next? (Picture book. 3-7)

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BABY BEAR EATS THE NIGHT

Pearson, Anthony Illus. by Leick, Bonnie Marshall Cavendish (32 pp.) $16.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-7614-6103-6 Mixed messages and a main character who comes off as less a frightened youngster than a self-absorbed twit spoil

Pearson’s debut.

The fault lies chiefly (but not wholly) with the illustrations.

Scared by noises in the nighttime woods, Baby Bear slips out of his den. He climbs a tall tree, rips down the starry sky like a curtain and proceeds to eat it. He callously brushes off the protests of a field mouse, a firefly and a bat in his determination to eradicate the night. He loses his fear of the dark when his mother appeals to self-interest by explaining that the dark helps bears survive, too. Despite being capable of pulling down the sky, he is portrayed by Leick not as a powerful figure or, considering his motives, even an anxious one, but as a chubby-cheeked teddy bear who exudes smug self-satisfaction as he continues to chew away despite the pleas of other creatures. Ultimately Baby Bear belches out the sky in what would be a comical climax were it not depicted as a few almost unnoticeable gassy wisps issuing from his mouth and disappearing into the page’s gutter.

Not only is Baby Bear’s loss of fear too sudden to be believable, the art pays no mind to his inner emotional landscape and turns what is essentially a tale of mythic proportions into a cozy bit of feel-good ephemera. (Picture book. 5-7)

THE KEY TO BRAHA

Perro, Bryan Translated by Maudet, Y. Delacorte (192 pp.) $16.99 | $10.99 e-book | PLB $19.99 Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-385-73904-7 978-0-375-89694-1 e-book 978-0-385-90767-5 PLB Series: Amos Daragon, 2 In the second of the series, 12-year-old Amos unwittingly takes on a hazardous mission: He’s killed so he can pass into and fix a netherworld crowded with dead souls who aren’t being permitted to pass on to their appointed fates.

Amos is a clever mask wearer, a sorcerer who ultimately must acquire four masks and the special stones that empower the masks. He still needs three more masks and 15 stones until warrior queen Lolya gives him the mask of fire. But the gift is intended to lure Amos into a quest to the City of the Dead, where the masks are useless, a dangerous place thrown into turmoil by disagreements among various gods. Once there Amos receives aid against numerous enemies from a varied cast of cardboard characters, many of whom are figures from |

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mythology (explained in a lexicon). The translation from the French is sometimes slightly awkward: “His wounded eye bled abundantly.” While Amos and his best friend Beorf, a man-bear, are likable, that doesn’t make up for an excess of telling instead of showing readers the fast-paced, confusing tale.

Perhaps readers of the first in the series will want to continue on, but this effort neither stands alone nor compels. (Fantasy. 10-14)

EREBOS It’s a Game. It Watches You.

Poznanski, Ursula Translated by Pattinson, Judith Annick Press (440 pp.) $29.95 | paper $19.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-55451-373-4 978-1-55451-372-7 paperback

A computer game with a hidden agenda entraps teen users into doing its bidding in this prizewinning import.

Booting up a program that has fellow students stumbling exhaustedly into school or cutting classes altogether, Londoner Nick finds himself in Erebos. This violent realm of swords and sorcery is controlled by a yellow-eyed “messenger” who knows a startling amount about Nick from the outset and offers compelling incentives to keep him riveted to his computer. But along with being totally forbidden to talk about the game, Nick discovers that advancement within it requires him to perform missions in the outside world... increasingly disturbing, even harmful ones. Poznanski tightens the suspense nicely as Nick, refusing at last a command to poison a certain teacher, is permanently ejected from Erebos and then nearly murdered before he discovers the true, ugly purpose of the game.

The mystery is unraveled thanks to a too-obvious clue, but the scary climax, a romantic subplot and plenty of thoroughly credible gaming add proper spark to a pageturner with amps aplenty. (Science fiction/thriller. 12-15)

STARTERS

Price, Lissa Delacorte (352 pp.) $17.99 | $10.99 e-book | PLB $20.99 CD $44.00 | Mar. 13, 2012 978-0-385-74237-5 978-0-307-97523-2 e-book 978-0-375-99060-1 PLB 978-0-307-96834-0 CD In a future in which the elderly hold all of the power, the only things left for them to take are the bodies of the young.

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generation. Those without guardians, like Callie and her baby brother, scavenge and sneak to survive, lest marshals catch and throw them in institutions much like prisons. Desperation leads Callie to Prime Destinations, a body-bank that circumvents laws that prohibit minors from working by allowing them to donate their bodies (to be controlled by an elderly renter through neurochips and a brain-to-computer connection) for a stipend. Only one rental away from having the money to care for her ailing brother, Callie finds her chip drastically malfunctioning during a rental, enabling her to take partial control of her body back from a renter who plans on using her for murder.

In between living the high life as a socialite grandniece and ward of her wealthy renter, Callie learns of plots more dangerous than the renter’s and that only she can stop them. Some exposition is clumsily dropped in through dialogue, and some plot aspects don’t hold up to scrutiny, but the twists and turns come so fast that readers will stay hooked.

Constantly rising stakes keep this debut intense. (Science fiction. 12 & up)

HOW TO BABYSIT A GRANDPA

Reagan, Jean Illus. by Wildish, Lee Knopf (32 pp.) $16.99 | PLB $19.99 | Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-375-86713-2 978-0-375-96713-9 PLB Reagan’s second outing is a tonguein-cheek reversal of roles as a young boy instructs readers on how best to entertain and care for a grandpa while Mom and Dad are away.

First, he instructs them to hide when Grandpa rings the doorbell—resist the wiggles and giggles, and only pop out when he gives up. Then, reassure him that Mom and Dad will be back and distract him with a snack—heavy on the ice cream, cookies, ketchup and olives. Throughout the day, the narrator takes his grandpa for a walk, entertains him, plays with him, puts him down for a nap and encourages him to clean up before Mom and Dad’s return. Lists on almost every spread give readers a range of ideas for things to try, provided their grandfathers are not diabetic or arthritic, or have high blood pressure or a heart condition. These lists also provide Wildish with lots of fodder for his vignette illustrations. His digital artwork definitely focuses on the humor, with laugh-out-loud scenes and funny hidden details. And his characters’ expressive faces also help to fill in the grandfather-grandson relationship that Reagan’s deadpan narrative leaves unstated.

A good choice for just those days when Mom and Dad do go away and leave their children in charge of Grandpa.

(Picture book. 4-8)

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“Next time your child asks to shove a banana down the drain, go for it.” from oliver

LOOKING FOR ME

Rosenthal, Betsy R. Houghton Mifflin (176 pp.) $15.99 | Apr. 17, 2012 978-0-547-61084-9 Rosenthal debuts with a slim, easily readable free-verse novel from the perspective of a girl who feels enveloped but lost in her enormous family.

Eleven-year-old Edith, fourth among her parents’ 12 children, feels that “[i]n my overcrowded family / I’m just another face. / I’m just plain Edith / of no special place.” Old enough to care for siblings and work her parents’ diner until almost two in the morning, young enough to care about a Shirley Temple doll, Edith needs a teacher’s nudge to find an identity. “[T]he Depression + lots of kids = never enough money,” so leaky shoes need cardboard, clothes are “hand-me-down / down / down / down / downs” and the family almost loses their house (but doesn’t). Contemporary, recession-aware readers will relate to Edith’s financial woes and also her realization that other people are even poorer. The author uses her mother’s history of growing up Jewish in Depressionera Baltimore as a basis, describing a certain kind of American Judaism (cheating on kosher rules with crab cakes; celebrating Christmas as Jews “because here in America / we can celebrate / anything we want”) and family tragedy in bare-bones verse so simple that the occasional rhyme is startling.

Less flavorful than its ancestors, Barbara Cohen’s The Carp in the Bathtub (1972) and Sydney Taylor’s All-of-a-Kind Family series, this is still a good companion for them. (author’s note, family photos, glossary) (Free verse/historical fiction. 8-12)

I’LL SAVE YOU BOBO!

Rosenthal, Eileen Illus. by Rosenthal, Marc Atheneum (40 pp.) $14.99 | Apr. 3, 2012 978-1-4424-037-9

Earl the cat is back—hurray!

Willy, the young narrator of I Must Have Bobo! (2011) here puts down the book he’s reading in order to create a more exciting story himself, while his sock monkey Bobo serves as audience for his crayon drawings and narrative about a jungle adventure.

Earl, the cat who also loves Bobo, provides the action in this drama. The (mostly) unruffled feline antagonist does not deliberately interrupt the crayon story but manages to do so just the same in his determination to carry out his own mission: acquiring Bobo. And without Earl, there would be little tension in this simple story. He creeps over the back of the armchair, only to be casually rebuffed by the hero; he reacts, all his fur on end, to the part in the imaginary narrative where a large snake eats the cat; he climbs atop the “tent” Willy assembles with a couple of chairs and a sheet. The cartoon illustrations create a kind of spotlight for the story: boy, drawing table and crayons, armchair, |

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Bobo and cat. Earl, with his small gray body and round eyes remains both steadfastly catlike and slyly, charmingly funny: a constant companion for Willy, even as Bobo is a more favored and predictable one. Both help to circumscribe a childhood in which adventure is appealingly tolerable and safe.

Endearing and inviting. (Picture book. 2-6)

OLIVER

Rossell, Judith Illus. by Rossell, Judith Harper/HarperCollins (32 pp.) $16.99 | May 1, 2012 978-0-06-202210-3 Young Oliver goes down the drain, literally… maybe.

Oliver is a curious soul. He has questions for his mother. If penguins were on vacation, for instance, would they come to stay in his refrigerator? And what, pray tell, lives down the drain and gurgles? “I think it’s HUNGRY,” Oliver suggests. Then he suggests that they feed a banana to whatever it is. “I’m going to poke it down the drain.” Mother: “No, you’re not.” So Oliver builds a submarine and takes it for a ride to see just what the drain is harboring. Here Oliver turns into a kid’s drawing, though handsomely rendered, as is Rossell’s whole book, in watercolor and pencil, with a touch of collage elsewhere; maybe this is all in his head? And what’s down the drain? Penguins, of course. Rossell handles the pacing beautifully, with each new character stage-managed to perfection. The characters themselves are utterly winning. They don’t play to the audience but go about their business with comedic insouciance. And the story does a nice, full circle—when the penguins enter the picture, it’s like having W.C. Fields arrive at your house—though in such a merry, leisurely way it feels serendipitous.

Next time your child asks to shove a banana down the drain, go for it. (Picture book. 3-7)

BAWK & ROLL

Sauer, Tammi Illus. by Santat, Dan Sterling (36 pp.) $14.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-1-4027-7837-7 The further adventures of Elvis Poultry, rooster rock star (Chicken Dance, 2009).

Marge and Lola, Elvis Poultry’s backup Chicken Dancers, wave goodbye to their barnyard buddies from a window of their tour bus. McDoodle’s Barnyard is the first stop on their glamorous multi-farm tour. But the crowd is so big and unfamiliar that the hens faint from nerves. They resolve to do better at their next performance venue, but… Elvis parachutes to the stage, making a spectacular soft landing, followed by the thud of Lola and Marge. What to do? They try painting, hypnosis, meditation... but nothing seems to work. Then it hits them: In order to |

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“In all, lovely, inventive, engrossing and interactive.” from green

solve their problem, they actually cross the road (to a mailbox)!

At the next tour stop, Dale’s Dairy Farm, the crowd looks disgruntled. “We’re going to get mooed off the stage,” Marge predicts. But their entrance is greeted with cheers; all their friends from back on the farm have come out to support them. Elvis is so inspired that he comes up with a brand new song on the spot. His recording of “Blue Moo” shoots to the top of the charts. Can you say superstars? Sauer dispenses her many puns with an appealingly deft touch, offering a genuine lesson on friendship. Santat’s illustrations are similarly droll, featuring several clever and surprising page designs, making the most of the opportunity offered by the contrast between stage and audience.

This flock rocks. (Picture book. 4-7)

WHERE DO DIGGERS SLEEP AT NIGHT?

Sayres, Brianna Caplan Illus. by Slade, Christian Random House (32 pp.) $16.99 | May 22, 2012 978-0-375-86848-1

CHILD OF THE MOUNTAINS

Another good old truck book; they never come amiss.

Newcomer Sayres hits plenty of sweet notes with this tribute to the trucks of our world, singing them off to sleep in comforting couplets. “Where do diggers sleep at night? / Do they dream of holes they dug?” Children’s identification with these beasts of the road and worksite is swift and complete. Dump trucks, fire trucks, car transporters, garbage trucks: “Where do garbage trucks sleep / when they’re done collecting trash? / Do their dads sniff their load and say, / ‘Pee-yew—time to take a bath’?” So there is a touch of low comedy, too, as well as the kind of inclusive generosity that welcomes monster trucks into their midst. Plus a natty tonguetwister to hurry along those nodding off to sleep: “Do their flashing fire-red beacons / make for super-bright night-lights?” Slade’s artwork is dessert rich, with great soupy smiles and droopy eyes, backdrops of small towns here and small cities there, all under blueberry-stained night skies. For all the heavy lifting, this book works well as a lullaby, the illustrations shifting neatly, if predictably, at the end to a little boy’s room and its bevy of toy trucks.

Trucks can be big and noisy and moderately terrifying.

Caught right, as here—what’s not to love? (Picture book. 3-6)

GREEN

Seeger, Laura Vaccaro Illus. by Seeger, Laura Vaccaro Neal Porter/Roaring Brook (40 pp.) $16.99 | Mar. 27, 2012 978-1-59643-397-7 In lush paintings outfitted with cleverly positioned die cuts, Seeger’s latest explores the color green.

In four simple quatrains, two-word lines each suggest a kind of green, introducing a scene that might show natural, domestic or built elements: “forest green / sea green / lime green / pea 420

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green.” Two die-cut leaves on a tree in the forest’s foreground become, with a page turn, two fish swimming in a sea turtle’s wake. At “jungle green,” a tiger crouches, peering from thick undergrowth. The page turn yields “khaki green” and a lizard whose pale, spotted body is camouflaged against similarly speckled and splotched earth. The rectangular die cut shared by the tiger and lizard spreads reveals that the words “jungle” and “khaki” are each embedded in the painted scenes: The die cut facilitates the discovery. “[G]low green” shows twilit children chasing tiny circles—luminescent fireflies—near a deep-red barn; with a page turn, the circles are now apples in a tree. The last quatrain—”all green / never green / no green / forever green” spans spreads that conclude in the orchard, near the red barn, with tiny die-cut leaves: on a new plant; on a mature tree. Seeger’s paintings vary in perspective and even in perspicacity: For example, flowers and trees are stylistically more naïf than animals.

In all, lovely, inventive, engrossing and interactive. (Picture book. 2-6)

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Shank, Marilyn Sue Delacorte (272 pp.) $16.99 | $10.99 e-book | PLB $19.99 Apr. 10, 2012 978-0-385-74079-1 978-0-375-98929-2 e-book 978-0-375-98969-8 PLB While hoping for her jailed, single mother’s appeal in 1953, an Appalachian Mountain girl from West Virginia finds her identity in this promising debut.

“My mama’s in jail. It ain’t right. Leastwise, I don’t think so,” begins sixth-grader Lydia’s spiral notebook, bought to help her sort through recent, tragic events. Her first-person narration, which unfolds in pitch-perfect, regional dialect, alternates present and past. In the former, she lives with her particular aunt and uncle and deals with the bullies at school who call her mother a murderer. In the past, she reveals that her little brother, BJ, has “Sissy Fie Broke It” and recounts both BJ’s special treatments at a research hospital (which claims all rights to him) in Ohio and the family’s decision to “kidnap” BJ to let him die from his cystic fibrosis at home. Complicating Lydia’s already-stressful life are her passage into womanhood and a family secret about her relationship with the mother she’s fighting to free. Her story occasionally makes a didactic dip, especially when relating court terminology and commenting on segregation of the time. Nevertheless, Lydia’s comparisons to spunky Anne of Green Gables, unwavering faith, strong family ties and growing appreciation of her Appalachian heritage will secure middle-grade readers.

For fans of Ruth White’s and Kerry Madden’s Appalachianinspired fiction. (map, author’s note) (Historical fiction. 9- 12)

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LIGHTS OUT SHABBAT

Shulimson, Sarene Illus. by Ebbeler, Jeff Kar-Ben (32 pp.)

PLB $17.95 | Mar. 1, 2012

A surprise snow storm and subsequent power outage make this Shabbat even more special for a little boy visiting his Nana and Papa in their Georgia home.

Shabbat candles already lit, the evening meal of challah and blintzes is topped off with cherry snow cones and Papa’s stories of his childhood. And when the power is still out hours later, morning sunshine brings a new day of gratitude and play in the snow before a Shabbat afternoon nap. Darkness once again descends, leading to the traditional havdalah (end of Shabbat rituals) as the power returns, closing out a day of rest and reflection for all.

Acrylic strokes create detailed scenes of a Southern climate capped with a chilly snowy dusting, extending the warmth of the story.

And despite the visual portrayal of grandparents who seem more Old World than contemporary American in their stereotypically elderly appearance—Nana comfortably chunky with a triple chin and cropped white hair and Papa rail thin with white hair and mustache—it’s an overall convincing image of events and attitudes.

This Shabbat-themed celebration of family love prevailing over a 24-hour period sans electricity smoothly communicates the importance of the weekly observance.

(Picture book. 4-6)

THE KING WHO WOULDN’T SLEEP

Singleton, Debbie Illus. by Swain, Holly Andersen Press USA (32 pp.) $16.95 | $12.95 e-book | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-7613-8997-2 978-0-7613-9002-2 e-book In this clever retelling of a common story, a king is determined to find the perfect prince for his lovely daughter.

So obsessed is the king that he vows to keep watch over the princess day and night—never sleeping—until he locates this perfect prince. Many princes seek the king’s favor, but he turns them all away, finding a fatal flaw in each. Undeterred, the princes try all manner of tricks and techniques to send the king off to dreamland, hoping for a chance to court the princess directly. The king proves impossible to fool, however, until a crafty farm boy enters the scene. He ultimately cons the king into counting 100 sheep, and, finally, the king is out like a light. He wakes to find the princess happy with the farmer, and a lavish wedding follows. Swain’s dynamic and appealing watercolor-and–color-pencil illustrations add charm, whimsy and amusing details to the happily-everafter tale. For all the fun, though, there is also a bit of creepiness here—what with the father determined to watch his daughter every moment of the day until he marries her off and the princess sorely lacking a sense of agency. |

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For pluckier princesses, try Cornelia Funke and Kerstin Meyer’s Princess Pigsty (2007) and Mary Jane and Herman Auch’s The Princess and the Pizza (2008). (Picture book. 3-6)

JONAH’S WHALE Spinelli, Eileen Illus. by Ferri, Giuliano Eerdmans (26 pp.) $16.00 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-8028-5382-0

The familiar biblical story is told from the perspective of the swallowing whale.

God sends a newly created sperm whale a family to ease his loneliness and plenty of fish to assuage his hunger. Whale plays and sings and glides through the sea. There are fishermen about, so humankind has also appeared. One stormy night Whale hears Jonah taking the blame for the storm and begging to be thrown overboard. When he is tossed to the sea, God directs Whale to save him. Not knowing how to accomplish this, he opens his mouth, slurps and swallows Jonah. But, “Now what?” wonders Whale. Whale is reasonably patient, but he begins to feel abandoned and queasy, sympathizing with Jonah, who must be feeling the same way. So he sings to the man, hears God’s response in the music and spits Jonah safely onto land. Employing lovely, descriptive language with contemporary syntax in brief, pointed sentences, Spinelli makes the Bible story accessible for young readers by turning the tale around and focusing not on the human, but on the faithful whale. Whale is grateful, obedient and caring of God’s other creatures, and he shines with goodness. Ferri’s watercolor-and-pencil illustrations glow in blues, greens and yellows that deepen to grays and purples during the storm.

A spiritually satisfying whale of a tale. (Picture book. 4-9)

FAITH Five Religions and What They Share

Steckel, Richard & Steckel, Michele Photos by Steckel, Richard & Steckel, Michele Kids Can (36 pp.) $18.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-1-55453-750-1 To encourage tolerance, the photographer/authors want to help children understand similarities among Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Islam and Judaism.

The authors assume readers will be people of faith, not atheists or agnostics. After short descriptions of each religion, common themes, such as the Golden Rule, spiritual leaders, sacred texts, clothing, symbols, places of worship, worship acts (use of incense, candles, water, and prayer), charity and cherishing children are explored. The text can be very specific, |

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mentioning branches of Judaism (Orthodox, Conservative, Reform and Reconstructionist) without explaining the differences. (Sunni and Shiite Muslims are not delineated.) Activities will help children, teachers and parents think about religion in a comparative manner, although no sources or further reading are provided, which is a glaring omission. The attractive photos are often cropped into circular or curvilinear shapes and presented on brightly colored pages, giving the book the look of a magazine. Identified by religion but not by country, the photos were taken in the United States and eight other nations, including Mexico, Turkey and Vietnam. Interestingly, Israel and India, seemingly obvious choices, are not included. Captions would have been helpful for some photos such as a picture of a Muslim boy in a distinctive white cape and jeweled hat, which remains unexplained in the text.

A useful if occasionally preachy introduction, this book would benefit from the inclusion of more specific details, including holidays and eating customs. (glossary, index) (Nonfiction. 8-11)

TOMO Friendship through Fiction—An Anthology of Japan Teen Stories

Thompson, Holly--Ed. Stone Bridge Press (384 pp.) $14.95 paperback | Mar. 10, 2012 978-1-61172-006-8 A big but consistently engaging pro bono anthology of authors with direct or indirect Japanese “heritage or experience.”

The 36 tales (all but six of which are new) were gathered as contributions to the relief effort for victims of the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. They feature Japanese—or, frequently, haafu, half-Japanese—teenagers engaged in the business of growing up. Two stories are set in the past: a Pearl Harbor episode from Graham Salisbury and Mariko Nagai’s probing freeverse view of the prejudice and internment faced by Japanese Americans shortly thereafter. Otherwise nearly all of the stories have contemporary settings. Only one story refers directly to the 2011 disaster; in the rest, situations and experiences blend familiar tropes with some that may be new to U.S. audiences.

Some concern making or missing friends and coping with bullies or demanding parents. Others find their characters reading absorbing cellphone mini-novels on a long commute to school or finding common ground through dance and kendo as well as baseball. Fantasy also makes a strong showing in tales of dragons and eerie samurai dolls, a supernatural Lost Property Office, a magic toaster that predicts the manner of one’s death and more. The closing capsule bios will be particularly helpful to young readers on this side of the Pacific.

A broadly appealing mix of the tragic and droll, comforting, disturbing, exotic and universal, with nary a clinker in the bunch. (glossary) (Short stories. 11-13)

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MARGARET AND THE MOTH TREE

Trogen, Brit & Trogen, Kari Kids Can (176 pp.) $16.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-1-55453-823-2 A tale that starts badly and ends more or less well, with an underpinning of dubious philosophy and a shrill, “now I shall teach you” voice.

It begins with the idea that good people should be beautiful, and bad people should be ugly (“scraggly hair and warty noses”) so the one can be told from the other. Plain, orphaned Margaret has fetched up at the Hopeton orphanage. While the beautiful Miss Switch is all maternal glow when Margaret arrives at what the moths of the titular tree call the “orfallidge,” all the loveliness vanishes as soon as the guests do. The children are tormented and ill-fed, divided into “dregs” and “Pets.” This Dahl-esque scenario gives the omniscient narrator a platform from which to lecture readers about bullies, those who care only for appearances and so on. Margaret, however, used to silence, learns to hear the voices of the moths and learns they love to eat Nimblers, which are the gossamer stuff of dreams. Of course, the current Nimblers are bitter, because the orphans’ dreams are so sad. Margaret and the moths overcome, but not before there are such horrors as a child’s long thick braid being cut off in a fit of Miss Switch’s pique.

While possibly reaching for a bit of Lemony Snicket’s basket of queasy joy, this falls very flat. (Fantasy. 8-12)

THE FINAL FOUR

Volponi, Paul Viking (256 pp.) $16.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-670-01264-0

Volponi’s latest combines in-the-moment action, basketball history and the points of view of four college ballplayers with very different lives.

The frame story here is a white-knuckle NCAA championship game between Michigan State’s Spartans and the underdog Trojans from Troy University.

Television interviews, news articles, radio transcripts and segments narrated from individual players’ perspectives lay out the minuteby-minute action of the game and the context and personal histories surrounding it. Readers meet talented but arrogant Malcolm McBride, who plans to leave Michigan State for the NBA immediately after his freshman year, second-tier player Michael Jordan (MJ), whom Malcolm berates for not living up to his namesake’s prowess, Crispin Rice, who became a viral video sensation when he proposed impulsively to his cheerleader girlfriend after a dramatic play on the court, and Roko Bacic, who lost a journalist uncle to an attack by Zagreb mobsters. No story or character is simple: Malcolm, for instance, is both sympathetic and perilously kirkusreviews.com

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“Wallace’s clean, spacious paper collages offer a representative museum exhibit that showcases the broad variety of materials and styles sculpture encompasses.” from look ! look ! look ! at sculpture

self-centered, and his argument that the NCAA profits unfairly from student athletics will provoke debate among readers. The pace of the game lulls a bit in the middle but picks up again in the tense and unpredictable finale.

Compelling characters and solid sports action. (Fiction. 12 & up)

LOOK! LOOK! LOOK! AT SCULPTURE

Wallace, Nancy Elizabeth & Friedlaender, Linda K. Illus. by Wallace, Nancy Elizabeth Marshall Cavendish (40 pp.) $17.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-7614-6132-6 Three frisky mice, sensibilities honed by an exposure to painting in Look! Look! Look! (2006), give 3-D art a similarly close onceover.

The story is centered on an abstract work in slate by Barbara Hepworth in the Yale Center for British Art (where Friedlaender is a curator), but it features sharp color photos of 20 other sculptures from as many eras and cultures. Wallace’s clean, spacious paper collages offer a representative museum exhibit that showcases the broad variety of materials and styles sculpture encompasses. Her three small but wellequipped visitors take formalized “museum walks” around the Hepworth and utter cogent observations: “I see spaces between the shapes!” “I see spaces in the shapes!” “I see four smooth, shiny, crescent-moon shapes!” They whip out sketch pads and tiles of modeling clay for some playful experimentation with forms, placement and texture before the book closes with a recap gallery and instructions for creating “paper SHAPE sculptures” with cut-out circles and triangles.

A pleasingly high-energy invitation to see, understand and appreciate art… and to make some too. (credits, thumbnail bio of Hepworth) (Informational picture book. 6-9)

FRISKY BRISKY HIPPITY HOP

White, Alexina B. & Lurie, Susan Photos by Head, Murray Holiday House (32 pp.) $16.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 978-0-8234-2410-8 First published in 1871, the poem “Whisky Frisky” is reimagined with additional verses and lively photographic images.

“Frisky brisky / Hippity hop / Up he goes / To the treetop.”

It’s difficult to improve on White’s bright opening (except for switching out the possibly troublesome “whisky,” of course) but the original poem was only a few lines long. Mimicking the simple, deliberately paced text, Lurie effortlessly picks up where White left off. “Scrambly brambly / No time to rest / Making a home / In a leafy nest.” The squirrels scamper up trees, nibble on nuts and evade a hawk, in a very dramatic |

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spread. Photographs dominated by rich greens and browns capture startlingly up-close portraits of these frisky little fellows, which are normally just a blur of tale. Head’s photos freeze the squirrels in mid action, capturing quite often adorable, endearing expressions. Regardless of which came first, the new verses or the photographs, the text and illustrations are inextricably matched. Budding naturalists and park enthusiasts will appreciate this slow-motion peek into a squirrel’s life.

Some may find squirrels to be pesky, but the glee found within these pages is hard to ignore. (author’s, photographer’s notes) (Picture book. 3-5)

THE UNSEEN GUEST

Wood, Maryrose Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins (240 pp.) $15.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0061791185 Series: The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place, 3 Resilient as ever, in the third installment of Wood’s deliciously melodramatic Victorian mystery teenage governess Penelope Lumley takes on threats to her wolfish young charges that include a hustler after the Ashton fortune.

The unexpected sighting of an ostrich among the larks and thrushes in the woods near Ashton Place heralds the arrival of bluff Admiral Albert Faucet (“That’s faw-say, my good man. Not faucet”). Once he meets the three feral children Penelope is charged with training up to be human, Faucet’s scheme to finance the introduction of ostrich racing to the British Isles by marrying the Dowager Lady Ashton is transformed to visions of wolf racing and sideshow exhibitions. Fortunately Penelope, proud graduate of the Swanburne Academy for Poor Bright Females, is not only up to that challenge but numerous others. These range from actually riding the aforementioned ostrich and meeting a pack of oversize, strangely intelligent wolves (if wolves they be) to orchestrating a climactic séance designed to contact the Dowager’s first husband, drowned (purportedly) in the medicinal tar pits at Gooden-Baden. Along with gleefully pitching her plucky protagonist into one crisis after another, punctuated by authorial disquisitions on similes, rhetorical questions, contagious punning and other linguistic follies, the author slips in a few more seemingly significant Clues to the Ashtons’ curious history and Penelope’s apparent involvement in it.

Still howling good fun, though the series’ big Reveal doesn’t seem any closer than before. (Melodrama. 10-12)

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IT’S A BIG WORLD, LITTLE PIG!

the friendly type, adds to the overall feeling of invitation and encouragement. This is a pleasingly uncomplicated introduction to yoga that can also simply be read as an invitation to play.

A celebration of the ways that even young children can experience the wide world through their bodies as well as their minds. (Picture book. 2-7)

Yamaguchi, Kristi Illus. by Bowers, Tim Sourcebooks (32 pp.) $16.99 | Mar. 6, 2012 978-1-4022-6644-7

An invitation to the “World Games” leads to international friendships for the porky little skating star introduced in Dream Big, Little Pig (2011).

Though Paris is far away from New Pork City, little Poppy quickly loses her initial anxiety at being among strangers from many countries. As her BF Emma puts it: “everyone smiles in the same language!” In no time, she’s hooked up with a snowboarder from China (“Ni hao”) and found common ground with an Italian skier in the music of Poochini (“Buona fortuna!”).

She discusses costume design with a fellow skater from Japan (“Ganbatte kudasai”), then gives a nervous Aussie speed skater a pep talk (parting with a “hooroo!”). Promoting the proper air of bright bonhomie, Bowers dresses a diverse cast of happy-looking, big-headed animals in sportswear or casual clothing and leaves the airy backgrounds either blank or lightly traced with arabesques and swooping curves. Finally, having “skated from her heart” in the competition, Poppy joins her proud parents for a week of French food (laying off the charcuterie, one hopes), sightseeing and sending postcards.

It’s another sweet confection, with nary a mention of winning or losing—for those who like their international encounters on the bland side. (Picture book. 6-8)

YOU ARE A LION! And Other Fun Yoga Poses

Yoo, Taeeun Illus. by Yoo, Taeeun Nancy Paulsen Books (40 pp.) $16.99 | Mar. 15, 2012 978-0-399-25602-8

Sometimes a stretch of the imagination is good for the body, as well.

Seven simple yoga poses (lion, butterfly, dog, snake, frog, cat, mountain) and a rest pose are depicted by a rounded and multiethnic group of preschoolers. An opening scene shows six children gathered in a grassy meadow: “When the golden sun rises / Warm rays fill the garden / Children all gather / Namaste to the morning.” Each subsequent pose is shown in a two-page spread in which a different child demonstrates the pose (“Sit on your heels / Hands on our knees / Tongue out! / You are a …”). This is followed by a two-page opening in which the creature joins the child, and the world around becomes its habitat (“…LION / King of the jungle / Roaring so loud / Make the woods rumble”). Yoo’s palette is filled with warm colors, and her block-print and line drawings fill the space without overwhelming it. The generous white space in these openings, along with 424

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THE MERCHANT AND THE THIEF A Folktale from India Zacharias, Ravi Illus. by Fournier, Laure Zonderkidz (32 pp.) $15.99 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-0-310-71636-5

A canny merchant outwits a wouldbe thief trying to steal his jewels, then with help from the Bible gives him a greater treasure.

First issued by a small publisher in 1999 with illustrations

by Lad Odell, the story pairs wealthy Raj, on an annual journey to visit his family, and a light-fingered fruit seller, Mohan, who is bent on stealing his precious cargo. Though Mohan searches Raj’s bags every night along the way, he finds nothing—because, as Raj at last reveals, he had been wise to Mohan’s scheme all along and hid his jewels under Mohan’s own pillow. “When we have our eyes on other people’s treasure, we cannot see how close we are to the greatest treasure there is.” Taking out a New Testament, Raj then explains that giving his life to Jesus will make him God’s child, and the repentant thief returns to his own loving family, resolved to look to God for his future needs. Fournier’s carefully detailed depictions of generic Indian street scenes and benignlooking figures in traditional dress give the explicitly Christian message, which Zacharias has tacked on to what he claims is an old parable, an unlikely but not impossible setting.

Uri Shulevitz’s Caldecott-winning The Treasure presents a more winning take on the original theme, but Christian educators may find a use for this repurposed version. (no source note) (Picture book. 7-10)

A TEMPTATION OF ANGELS

Zink, Michelle Dial (448 pp.) $17.99 | Mar. 20, 2012 978-0-8037-3726-6

Zink heightens the pile of heavenly sagas.

Like most heroines in these stories, Helen loses her parents before they can explain her unique legacy to her. In Helen’s case, however, they prepared her for it throughout her childhood, using games to train her for her calling as an angelic guardian. A council of demons kills without discrimination, on a mission to destroy those like Helen in order to tip the balance of the world toward kirkusreviews.com

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evil. Obeying all the tropes of this genre, Zink allies Helen with male counterparts, two brothers who are also lesser angels and who have also lost their parents. Griffin wins her heart, though Darius conveniently spurns her in what seems to be an attempt to lend additional adversity to Helen’s life, since Helen doesn’t much mourn her parents’ recent deaths. Given how few people share their unique backgrounds, Darius’ scorn doesn’t make sense. A childhood friend whom Helen has not seen in many years presents the only real complexity in the book; once a playmate, he has grown up to perpetrate grave crimes, and yet he holds the keys to thwarting the forces of evil.

A formulaic and slow-paced tale combining too many conventions to excite savvy readers who have likely seen it all before. (Paranormal romance. 12 & up)

LITTLE BIRD

Zullo, Germano Translated by Bedrick, Claudia Zoe Illus. by Albertine Enchanted Lion Books (64 pp.) $16.95 | Apr. 1, 2012 978-1-59270-118-6 Uplifting in more ways than one, this prizewinning import suggests that little things can change lives—and perhaps even the world.

Placing small, uncomplicated shapes against large fields of uniform color to create an aptly simple look, Albertine provides a visual plot for Zullo’s meditative abstractions. Some days “have something a little more,” which is “not made to be noticed” but “there to be discovered.” A man pulls up to a cliff in a truck and opens the back to release a flight of birds. Spotting one small, shy bird remaining, he companionably sits with it, then persuades it to take wing by flapping his arms and falling comically to the ground. Later, though, it returns—leading all the other birds—to carry the man up into the sky so that he can take flight on his own. Drawn with delicate precision, the characters express fear, friendship, yearning and delight through glances, posture and other cues that are not too subtle for observant children to pick up. More than half of the spreads are wordless, and for younger audiences at least, the rest could just as well be too.

Adult explication may be needed for the textual rubric; the visually told story is enthralling all on its own. (Picture book. 6-8, adult)

k i r k u s r o u n d- u p continuing series A PICTURE BOOK OF SAM HOUSTON

DRAGON BOOGIE Stone Rabbit, #7

Adler, David A. & Michael S. Adler Illus. by Matt Collins Holiday House (32 pp.) $17.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-8234-2369-9 (Picture book/biography. 4-8)

Craddock, Erik Illus. by the author Random House (96 pp.)

PLB $12.99 | paper $6.99 Mar. 27, 2012 PLB: 978-0-375-96912-6 paper: 978-0-375-86912-9 (Graphic novel. 7-11)

BISCUIT PLAYS BALL Biscuit

THE SAVAGE GRACE The Dark Divine, #3

Capucilli, Alyssa Satin Illus. by Pat Schories Harper/HarperCollins (32 pp.) $16.99 | Mar. 20, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-06-193503-9 (Early reader. 3-5)

Despain, Bree Egmont USA (416 pp.) $17.99 | Mar. 13, 2012 ISBN: 978-1-60684-221-8 (Paranormal romance. 2-5)

THE WITCHING GAME Deadtime Stories, #2

BALTHAZAR Evernight, #6

Cascone, Annette & Gina Cascone Tor Starscape (192 pp.) $12.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-7653-3046-6 (Horror. 9-11)

Gray, Claudia HarperTeen (384 pp.) $17.99 | Mar. 6, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-06-196118-2 (Paranormal romance. 13 & up)

UNAFRAID Archangel Academy, #3

FEET AND PUPPIES, THIEVES AND GUPPIES: What Are Irregular Plurals? Words Are CATegorical

Griffo, Michael Kensington (352 pp.) paper $9.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-7582-5340-8 (Paranormal romance. 14 & up)

Cleary, Brian P. Illus. by Brian Gable Millbrook (32 pp.) $16.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-7613-4918-1 (Picture book. 5-8)

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THE ASTRO OUTLAW Ballpark Mysteries, #4

Kelly, David A. Illus. by Mark Meyers Random House (112 pp.)

PLB $12.99 | paper $4.99 Feb. 28, 2012 PLB: 978-0-375-96883-9 paper: 978-0-375-86883-2 (Mystery. 6-9) |

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LUNCH LADY AND THE MUTANT MATHLETES Lunch Lady, #7

WHAT AM I? TEXAS What Am I?

Lewis, Anne Margaret Illus. by Tom Mills Whitman (24 pp.) $9.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-8075-8982-3 (Board book. 2-5)

Krosoczka, Jarrett J. Illus. by the author Knopf (96 pp.)

PLB $12.99 | paper $6.99 Mar. 27, 2012 PLB: 978-0-375-97028-3 paper: 978-0-375-87028-6 (Graphic novel. 7-10)

THE JELLYBEANS AND THE BIG ART ADVENTURE The Jellybeans

THE TRAITOR IN THE TUNNEL The Agency, #3

Numeroff, Laura & Nate Evans Illus. by Lynn Munsinger Abrams (32 pp.) $16.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-1-4197-0171-9 (Picture book. 3-7)

Lee, Y. S. Candlewick (384 pp.) $16.99 | Feb. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-7636-5316-3 (Historical mystery. 12 & up)

MAN TRIP Calvin Coconut, #7

WHAT AM I? EASTER What Am I?

Lewis, Anne Margaret Illus. by Tom Mills Whitman (24 pp.) $9.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-8075-8963-2 (Board book. 2-5)

Salisbury, Graham Illus. by Jacqueline Rogers Wendy Lamb (144 pp.) $12.99 | PLB $15.99 Mar. 13, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-385-73964-1 PLB: 978-0-385-90798-9 (Fiction. 8-12)

WHAT AM I? FLORIDA What Am I?

A PLACE FOR BATS A Place for…

Lewis, Anne Margaret Illus. by Tom Mills Whitman (24 pp.) $9.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-8075-89663-3 (Board book. 2-5)

Stewart, Melissa Illus. by Higgins Bond Peachtree (32 pp.) $16.95 | Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-1-56145-624-6 (Informational picture book.

6-10)

WHAT AM I? PASSOVER What Am I?

REVENGE OF THE HORNED BUNNIES Dragonbreath, #6

Lewis, Anne Margaret Illus. by Tom Mills Whitman (24 pp.) $9.99 | Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-8075-8971-7 (Board book. 2-5)

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This Issue’s Contributors #

Vernon, Ursula Illus. by the author Dial (208 pp.) | $12.99 Mar. 1, 2012 ISBN: 978-0-8037-3677-1 (Graphic/hybrid novel. 8-12)

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Kim Becnel • Marcie Bovetz • Kimberly Brubaker Bradley • Timothy Capehart • Ann Childs • Julie Cummins • GraceAnne A. DeCandido • Dave DeChristopher • Elise DeGuiseppi • Lisa Dennis • Brooke Faulkner • Laurie Flynn • Judith Gire • Carol Goldman • Melinda Greenblatt • Megan Honig • Julie Hubble • Shelley Huntington • Kathleen T. Isaacs • Betsy Judkins • Deborah Kaplan • K. Lesley Knieriem • Megan Lambert • Angela Leeper • Peter Lewis • Lori Low • Joan Malewitz • Hillias J. Martin • Jeanne McDermott • Kathie Meizner • Lisa Moore • John Edward Peters • Susan Pine • Rebecca Rabinowitz • Kristy Raffensberger • Shana Raphaeli • Nancy Thalia Reynolds • Lesli Rodgers • Leslie L. Rounds • Ann Marie Sammataro • Mindy Schanback • Dean Schneider • Chris Shoemaker • Karyn N. Silverman • Meg Smith • Robin Smith • Karin Snelson • Rita Soltan • Deborah D. Taylor • Bette Wendell-Branco • S.D. Winston • Monica D. Wyatt • Melissa Yurechko

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kirkus indie Kirkus has been keeping an eye on selfpublishing for years, and we’ve never seen anything like the current boom. With the number of self-published titles now pushing 1 million per year, and independent authors utilizing new technologies to sell tens of thousands of copies of their work, the age of indie has truly arrived. Kirkus Indie brings readers the best works by independent authors, and we bring independent authors the crucial tools to get the word out about their books like no one else. We’ll give your book an unbiased, professional review, and then we’ll push that review into the world via our social-media properties, newsletters, website and expanding content. To learn more about Kirkus Indie and start promoting your title, please visit us online at kirkusreviews.com/indie/about.

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Bannon, James Banco Picante Press (260 pp.) $9.99 paperback | Nov. 27, 2011 978-0983912439 Bannon’s cutting-edge science-fiction and psychological thriller revolves around a terminally ill bio-software scientist’s attempt to upload his mind into the consciousness of an unborn baby to once again be with the woman he loves.

Powered by relentless pacing and jaw-dropping plot twists throughout, Bannon’s debut novel is a science-fiction thriller of the highest order—but it’s ultimately a heartrending romance and a profoundly moving exploration into the frailty and preciousness of human existence. After pioneering neuroscientist Edward Frame realizes that he only has a short time to live, he and his assistant, Samantha—a woman that he has recently realized he is madly in love with—come up with a shocking plan: to impregnate Samantha and upload Frame’s essence into her child.

But something goes horribly wrong: Frame is born again as Adam into a waking nightmare. His mother is his wife, Clara, his siblings are his two children and his new father is a ruthless company rival who has not only taken over Frame’s business but his family as well. Thus begins a downward spiral of an existence for Adam that eventually includes foster homes, illicit sexual encounters, hardcore drug addiction, gambling, murder and, ultimately, salvation. Adam Frame, the baby born with the fully cognizant mind of Edward Frame inside of him, is a simply riveting, unforgettable character—a complex, deeply conflicted person who, as he develops into a young man, becomes “two souls in one body and still only half a man.” Bannon doesn’t pull any punches with this narrative; the character development is intense and the sex and violence is brutal at times, but the result is an utterly readable novel that’s almost impossible to put down.

In a word: mind-blowing.

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RIDING THE ASIAN DRAGON Extraordinary Lives of Ordinary People

Boulet, Isabelle CreateSpace (265 pp.) $12.99 paperback | Nov. 30, 2011 978-1463779764 A female backpacker describes her solo adventures traveling through Asia in this densely packed debut memoir.

While planning a yearlong sabbatical, Boulet was unexpectedly laid off from her job in Great Britain. She decided to skip some of her trip preparations, including learning basic Chinese, so she could start her round-the-world trip less than a week later. After a month in South America, she moved on to Asia, the memoir’s focus. Traveling through Hong Kong, China, Tibet, Mongolia, Nepal, India, Thailand, Cambodia and Laos, Boulet sought out remote areas unspoiled by tourism. To save money she stayed in huts, family homes, hostels and run-down hotels and traveled spontaneously via a mixture of trains, buses and private vehicles. Surprisingly, it was her transportation choices that proved to be the most dangerous aspects of her trip. Throughout the book, Boulet focuses on her connections with fellow travelers and locals. A Tibetan man merits his own chapter, and a few others appear in the epilogue, but most are brief, one-time episodes. Even shocking encounters, such as a monk who asked her to take a 4-year-old to India so he can have an education, merit a single paragraph.

The summarized conversations, along with a penchant for passive voice and a huge volume of detail on every tiny village and temple, make for dense, slow reading. Luckily, Boulet is livelier than her writing. She bravely hiked to the Mount Everest base camp in adverse conditions. She agreed to drive a motorcycle for the first time—at night on Cambodian roads filled with cows, chickens and enormous potholes. She showed ingenuity when she ran short of money in Laos, and compassion when she helped a young postcard vendor.

Despite the exotic setting, the real jewels are the glimpses of a determined narrator who is not afraid to take the lead role in her astonishing adventures.

SINS OF SOUTH BEACH The True Story of Corruption, Violence, Murder, and the Making of Miami Beach Daoud, Alex Pegasus (513 pp.) $35.49 | Nov. 16, 2006 978-1424310784

A young mayor is pivotal in the revival of boomtown Miami Beach in the 1980s, all the while indulging his large appetites for money, power and sex.

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In this compelling, well-written tell-all novel detailing his own political rise and fall, three-time Mayor of Miami Beach Daoud delivers a steamy story that reads like a cross between Hollywood Babylon and All the King’s Men. Undefeated through 12 years of elections in Miami Beach, Daoud became the city’s first mayor to gain re-election in 20 years and then became the city’s first three-term mayor. His job was officially part-time and certainly small potatoes, as he barely earned a five-figure salary for 60-hour weeks. While overseeing the revitalization of South Beach, lawyer Daoud realized that he possessed a couple valuable commodities: his vote and his influence. He began to sell these assets to local bankers, developers and union bosses.

As his first marriage began to dissolve when his wife moved to North Carolina to attend dental school, Daoud discovered that money and power could attract women. Though an adulterer during two marriages, Daoud pushed himself to provide financial support for his mother and his young son. As federal agents closed in on him, he learned that most of his “friends” were only using him, and he eventually faced a 41-count indictment by himself, not wanting to snitch on his co-conspirators. Daoud fought the government in court, where he was ably defended by his attorney, Roy Black. When Daoud could no longer afford the best attorney available, his case began to crumble. Eventually he was found guilty on a handful of counts and sentenced to 63 months in a federal prison, of which he served 18 in various locations due to death threats against him.

This compelling story may remind the reader of a Greek tragedy, as the protagonist’s own vices lead to his demise.

THE IMMORTALISTS

David, Gabriel Lulu (145 pp.) $26.99 | paper $9.99 | Dec. 7, 2011 978-1105119057 978-1105119064 paperback An unapologetic, perverse, yet spiritual first novel that follows one man’s mistakes and triumphs when he learns that he can live forever.

David’s novel follows Israel “Izzy” Stern, a recent Boston University graduate living alone in Providence, R.I. All the family Izzy has is his grandfather’s friend, Uncle Jack, who meets with him at a Starbucks the summer after college to play chess, ogle the busts of coeds from Rhode Island School of Design and Brown, and for Uncle Jack to tell Izzy his secret—he’s immortal. Jack’s wisdom, money and immortality—a gift Izzy learns he shares with Uncle Jack—catapults Izzy from his life of womanizing and grappling with his insecurities to one of wandering, helping and learning. But Izzy’s transformation comes not without him first hitting rock bottom: “He had become a riches-to-rags cliché. Izzy too, like Aqualung had stared at young girls with bad intent. And Izzy, like Mrs. Robinson in the Simon and Garfunkel song, now prayed for a place in heaven with God. His agnosticism was now completely suspended due to his new low standing in the world.” David’s

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“By the time Jake is forced to make a decision that will change his life, readers know enough about him and about his past to know what is at stake—and the resolution doesn’t disappoint.” from run in the fam’ly

writing is punchy and incorporates lyrics to classic songs as well as pop culture and perversity. Although the occasional authorial interruption is distracting, David makes up for it with his honest prose that questions societies’ beliefs about God and discusses the growing problem of militant and persecutory views that jeopardize human lives. In the style of Salman Rushdie—though David is not quite as ambitious—magical realism is used to explore religion, spirituality and the state of our world today. This work should secure David a place within the genre as a writer who will tickle the reader, make her think and then take a hard look at the world around her.

David’s compelling debut successfully incorporates pop culture, profanity and religion into a resonant exploration of existence.

INTERRUPTED LIVES A Holocaust Remembrance

Krulik, Stephanie M. Middle River (129 pp.) $14.95 paperback | Jan. 11, 2011 978-0984607136 Krulik relates the Holocaust story of lovers Gerd and Inge in a compelling, keenly accurate narrative voice.

In this powerful book, we follow Gerd from Germany, where he meets Inge, to the concentration camps where he is separated from her, then back to Berlin where they reunite and then, finally, to America. While the necessity of survival plays a role in the plot, an underlying current of suspense pulsates between Gerd and Inge’s relationship. Though separated, Inge manages to send Gerd letters and she is constantly on his mind. Readers will cheer with Gerd at the story’s conclusion when the pair finally marries after enduring so much pain and violence. Krulik’s pitch-perfect capturing of Gerd’s voice will propel readers to keep the pages turning—the novel opens “I am so tired of that swish-click sound I hear night after night, night after charcoal night, as I double lock our heavy front door”; besides the poetically beautiful assonance present, Krulik also skillfully reproduces the rhythms of speech. Furthermore, readers may be surprised to learn that the book is not a novel but a work of nonfiction based on tape-recorded conversations Krulik had with Gerd and Inge. Krulik masterfully translates these conversations into rich, vivid text. Her elegant descriptions will engage readers; she writes, “[W]e step lightly on the broken bricks, chipped rocks, piles of soot and dust that makes up this Berlin. The roar of machines pushing pieces of buildings into pieces makes us shudder. Still, we walk.” Not only does Krulik gracefully evoke the imagery of a city in rubble, but she captures the perseverance of these survivors who keep walking against all odds.

A graceful meditation on the power of perseverance and triumph of human nature through the darkest times, this story will captivate and inspire readers.

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MY BIG FAKE IRISH LIFE

McKenna, Caitlin CreateSpace (322 pp.) $12.99 paperback | $0.99 e-book Nov. 23, 2011 978-1466331440 McKenna’s chick-lit novel presents a woman who assumes a new identity to follow her dream of becoming an actress.

The storyline follows Linda Symcox, a blonde American actress struggling in Los Angeles as she finds that despite her classical training, she can’t land a job; as her agent, who drops her early on, tells her, she just doesn’t have “it.”

After realizing that a pretty accent could make all the difference in her heretofore floundering career, she takes inspiration from a recent trip to Ireland and reinvents herself as an Irish redhead named Meghan O’Connell and almost immediately gets cast as the female lead in a new television series. Predictably, hijinks ensue. Almost immediately, she falls for her co-star, who had met her before her big transformation, and she is terrified that he will recognize her; she must spend all the time she isn’t training or filming studying Irish culture in order not to be caught unawares by an innocent question from the cast or crew; and as the show becomes more popular, people are desperate for details of “Meghan’s” personal life and Linda finds herself scrambling to fill in the blanks, ultimately piling lie upon ludicrous lie. The story reads easily enough, although there are few surprises in the plot’s twists and turns, but certain aspects fail to ring true. For instance, as exciting as Americans do find accents, particularly those of Great Britain, it seems unlikely that after working together for several months, “Meghan’s” co-workers would continue to ask her nothing but Irish trivia questions.

Also, there is a frustrating inconsistency in McKenna’s description of the scenes from the television series (which, incidentally, often nicely parallel the tension between Linda and Michael); she sometimes refers to the actors by their given (or “given”) names, and sometimes by the names of the characters they play.

Nevertheless, the novel is charming enough and an intriguing window into the tense challenges of maintaining a false identity.

A light, fun romp that may nicely translate to a TV show or movie.

RUN IN THE FAM’LY

McLaughlin, John J. University of Tennessee (292 pp.) $19.95 paperback | Nov. 15, 2007 978-1572336452 In Oakland, a young man struggles to rise out of poverty and take care of his girlfriend and infant son, but his past seems to prevent him from moving forward.

Split into a prologue and three distinct parts, this book belongs to Jake Robertson; his voice is strong as he tells his story, although the

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“Mindful of her civilizing mission, Kathryn hauls an enormous piano along in their mule-drawn wagon.” from the edge of forever

language of the book—full of creative compound phrases, striking imagery and lyrical passages—can be confusing or repetitive, especially during action scenes. The prologue introduces Jake as a child, traveling from Chicago to Oakland with his family. Here readers meet his dad and witness firsthand the troubled relationship that is at the heart of the story. Part One jumps into the current day, where Jake struggles to provide for his girlfriend, Noel, and their potentially asthmatic son, William, despite trouble Jake is having with his caseworker and the man who runs the labor hall on which he relies for work. While this section feels a little drawn out, the book hits its stride in Part Two, which provides insight into the events in Jake’s life that defined him and brought him to where he is now. Jake comes to life as a character here— a flawed, troubled man with good intentions. McLaughlin deftly builds his tale so that, once Part Three begins, readers have a deep understanding of Jake, as well as the central conflict of the tale.

Jake’s father has been released from prison and is looking for his son so that he can include Jake in a scheme that would solve all his problems. However, Jake’s involvement in this plan will force him into a confrontation with his father and bring to light secrets that have been buried for a long time—secrets that have shaped Jake’s identity. The strength of Jake’s character, and the skill with which McLaughlin creates him, makes this a compulsively readable book. By the time Jake is forced to make a decision that will change his life, readers know enough about him and about his past to know what is at stake—and the resolution doesn’t disappoint.

McLaughlin delivers stirring imagery, a deeply moving look at American poverty and, most impressively of all, a realistic, relatable character in Jake Robertson.

THE EDGE OF FOREVER

Morris, Tom CreateSpace (494 pp.) $17.50 paperback | Nov. 1, 2010 978-1451519204 Texan pioneers fight a war of stealth and slaughter against Comanche raiders in this gripping adventure.

With the Confederacy collapsing around them, 14-year-old Tom McKlarren, his mother, Kathryn, and baby sister, Mattie, and their devoted ex-slave, William, set off from Galveston to his Aunt Mollie’s ranch near Waco, hoping for refuge from the anarchy, hyperinflation and bushwhackers that roil the dying rebellion. (Mindful of her civilizing mission, Kathryn hauls an enormous piano along in their mule-drawn wagon.) Alas, the isolated homesteads on the Texas frontier are a source of even greater peril: Comanche Indians—superb horsemen, trackers and guerilla fighters bent on driving the white man from their hunting grounds. When a war party massacres a local family and abducts Kathryn along with Tom’s sweetheart, Sara, he sets out alone on a hopeless quest to rescue the women-folk from a fate worse than death. Fortunately, he meets up with Raifford MacReynolds, a legendary Texas Ranger who comes equipped with decades of Indian-fighting experience, courtly manners and the awesome 430

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firepower of his newfangled Henry repeating rifle and long-range Whitworth sniper’s gun. The author serves up well-crafted prose and sharply etched characters in this frontier yarn, complete with fancy shootin’ and ridin’, colorfully terse palaver, untarnished heroism and a ballast of gritty violence. (He doesn’t shy away from the settlers’ period-authentic hatred of Indians, but balances it with a noble, complex Indian scout.) Morris also delivers an engrossing historical novel that steeps readers in the atmospherics of pioneer life and the details of brush-clearing, livestock-tending, food-frying and store-bartering. It’s a bit of a sprawl, but at its center is a fine action odyssey set in the oceanic plains, where there’s no cover from pitiless eyes and survival is a nerve-wracking chess game that requires subtle strategizing, encyclopedic knowledge of horses, cattle, weather and terrain and the ability to read the slightest ripple of dust on a menacing horizon.

A vivid, rousing, old-school western.

HELIUS LEGACY

O’Keefe, S. Alexander Live Oak (378 pp.) $16.95 paperback | Sep. 2, 2011 978-1936909216 A sensational cat-and-mouse debut thriller from O’Keefe involving the last potential heir to one of the richest oil fields in the world—and the ruthless conglomerate that wants to take him out.

Reporter Richard Steinman discovers an ancient deed in Austin, Texas, that contains a covenant giving the grantor’s descendants the right to reclaim ownership of the property if any future owner violates its restriction against the extraction of mineral wealth from the land. It just so happens that the land the deed covers is one of the richest oil fields in the world, and Helius Energy, the conglomerate that owns it, has no intention of giving up its gold mine to potential heirs. Steinman is soon on the run from a hired team of killers, while a second team descends on California to wipe out the last surviving heir, John Caine. Caine is unaware of his legacy but is quickly drawn into this nightmarish web in a race to stay alive and unravel the mystery that has put him in danger. His one link in the case is beautiful female attorney Andrea Marenna, who was unwittingly involved through her friendship with Steinman. Caine and Marenna desperately try to piece together the centuries-old puzzle as they struggle to outrun a sophisticated team of assassins whose mission is to permanently silence them. Helius Legacy is a first-rate action/adventure thriller that grips the imagination from page one and takes readers on a roller coaster ride with its many twists, remaining exciting and surprising to the last. Caine proves not to be the “soft target” the killers expected, but a formidable adversary with his own secrets, including his involvement in a covert operations unit in the French Foreign Legion. While often reaching deliciously larger-than-life proportions, O’Keefe’s plot is so well-crafted that it always remains plausible, and his experience as an attorney gives authority and credibility to the legalities.

Ultimately not just a great page-turner—a damn good novel.

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STEALING THE BORDERS Rais, Elliot CreateSpace (291 pp.) $15.95 paperback | $2.99 e-book Jan. 1, 2012 978-1467901574

A wry autobiography traces the tragicomic odyssey of a Polish-American Jew whose search for identity equally embraced both self-reliance and absurd humor.

If Rais’ autobiography were adapted for film, Woody Allen would be perfect for the starring role. Like the filmmaker, Rais transforms actual life experiences into poignant comic vignettes that touch on everyday absurdities. Unlike Allen, Rais was born in 1940s Poland, where his family was forced to flee their Eastern Polish homeland for Russia just in advance of Nazi troops. After experiencing political persecution, his family fled Russia, ending up in a DP (displaced persons) camp in Germany. Rais describes the six years he and his family endured the many privations of the DP camp. However, it was in this place where his bountiful ingenuity and sense of offbeat humor began to thrive.

After finally being able to immigrate to America, Rais again used his humor to help him adjust to the savage inequities facing a Jewish youth in the rough-and-tumble atmosphere of blue-collar New York City. Peppering this Jewish Horatio Alger story of a self-educated, strong-willed, high-tech engineer who transitioned to careers in construction entrepreneurship and teaching are clusters of hilarious tales focusing on Rais’ obsessions. He’s constantly delighted and mystified by the sexual wiles of women and consistently skeptical about the reality of a “just God,” and he affirms the healing power of laughter in the face of stress and loss at every eventful turn in his life. His obsessions never become tiresome to read, however, as Rais writes in a folksy, conversational style bordering on inspired comedic improvisation. The author’s odyssey dramatizes his sense of Jewish identity through Jewish culture and ethnic heritage, rather than through any spiritual devotion to Judaism as a religious practice.

Anyone charmed by the humor of Woody Allen or Mel Brooks will be entertained and heartened by Rais’ autobiography.

THE REMAINS OF THE CORPS A United States Marine Family History: A Trilogy: Book I (Prologue & Chapter I): Eagle Remain, Will Thomas W. Hebert (62 pp.) $5.95 paperback | $0.99 e-book Nov. 1, 2011 978-0615530901

Starry-eyed college student who yearns to be a hero rushes headlong into World War I. In this first installment in a promised trilogy, fictional author “Will Remain” is on a quest to pen an epic story of a Marine Corps family—and secure his own sanity. |

A few cryptic journal entries tell us that Remain is a troubled Vietnam veteran who sacrificed a marriage to chronicle the lives of his Marine forefathers. The narrative begins in 1917 with his grandfather, Kenneth Remain, a working-class Harvard student longing for adventure. World War I rages in Europe, and though the United States is not yet in the conflict, many Americans feel a dark inertia propelling them toward the fight. Kenneth enlists in the Marines, and his friend, Lawrence Blakeslee, a child of wealth less committed to the cause as he is to Kenneth, decides to tag along. A letter from a classmate already serving in France shatters the genteel naivety, contrasting the idealism of youth with the horrific reality of war. In a style reminiscent of F. Scott Fitzgerald, the author presents Harvard of the early 20th century as an oak-lined world of social clubs, stained-glass windows and marble plaques honoring alumni who died in battle.

The superbly described setting serves to reinforce Kenneth’s desires, but the author also points out cracks in those ivied walls. Kenneth’s almost visceral need to prove himself may lead to the “good death” found by so many Harvardians before him.

Though the book is a story of a would-be warrior, war itself is not glorified. Kenneth’s zeal finds a perfect counterbalance in Lawrence, who cautions, “The amount of blood that would be shed by American boys should give us all pause. Let’s not be too eager to stick our necks out.” While it is clear that Kenneth is destined to become a hero, the question remains whether he understands the potential price: the loss of innocence.

Velvety description and devil-may-care dialogue paint the tale of a romantic young man eager to test himself amid the blood, mud and barbed wire of the Great War.

THEY CALL ME FERO Reflections and Recollections of An Iranian-Born American Doctor

Sadeghian, F. Fero CreateSpace (279 pp.) $12.00 paperback | $7.00 e-book Oct. 20, 2010 978-1453600047 With this memoir of growing up in Iran and emigrating to the United States in the 1960s, Sadeghian tells of a life of great contradictions.

The memoir can be divided into three natural arcs comprising the author’s childhood and university training in Tehran, his experiences in Britain and the United States as an immigrant physician and a final section on his retirement interest in mountain climbing, including expeditions to Everest. Sadeghian may be an everyday citizen; however, his life is rich with drama, while his writing is accessible and straightforward. Crucially, he provides enough information for those unfamiliar with modern Iran to understand the social and political circumstances leading up to 1979’s Islamic revolution. The child of an upwardly mobile judge, he was a youthful witness to the complexities of life under the Shah, from the growth of the middle-classes to the increasing

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k i r ku s q & a w i t h a n n e h a m b l e t on First-time author and retired amateur steeplechase jockey Anne Hambleton lives on a farm in Vermont where she trains and competes thoroughbred ex-racehorses. In Raja, her novel for young people (and horse lovers of all ages), a thoroughbred with early Kentucky Derby hopes falls victim to injury—and to the dark side of horseracing. Raja tells his own story, cycling through owners and riders, triumphs and tragedies to emerge as a competitor in steeplechase (distance obstacle course racing). The novel mirrors Hambleton’s own work with equine rescues and racetrack retirees.

RAJA: Story of a Racehorse

Hambleton, Anne Illus. by Margaret Kauffman Old Bow (261 pp.) $14.95 paperback December 2011 978-0615540290

K i rk us M e di a L L C # K i rk us M e di a L L C President M A RC W I# NKELMA N President SVP, Finance M A RC W I NH Kull ELMA N J ames SVP,Marketing Finance SVP, J ames ull M ike HH ejny SVP, Marketing SVP, Online M ike H ejny Paul H offman

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A: Absolutely. I loved Black Beauty as a kid and read it over and over. I was one of those horse book junkies. Enid Bagnold’s National Velvet—I was blown away by the descriptions.

A: In the course of writing Raja, I had a number of interesting discussions with horsemen and women at the top of the sport—Olympians, Hall of Famers, etc.—about the books they read as a kid and most of them were avid horse-book readers. I’m convinced that the books they read as kids had a lot to do with the equine career path they chose.

Q: The horses in your novel have distinctive “voices.”

What was it like to imagine them?

A: It was fun. Shaddy and Holzmann are horses that I own. The real Holzmann didn’t go to the Olympics, but I think he could have! Prism, the little pony, is borrowed from a neighbor. I don’t know if she really cracks jokes, but she does have a sense of humor and she takes care of every kid that gets on her.

Q: How did the plot for Raja come about?

Q: You include the dark side of racing: riders’ dirty tricks, horses that are drugged, abused and sold to kill buyers.

A: In Vermont, you spend a lot of time in winter doing your barn, and it occurred to me that the story was sort of staring me in the face. My five horses are all on their third and fourth careers. I was thinking about their lives and how they’d done so many different things and I just thought, someone should do a modern-day Black Beauty about a racehorse. They really were the inspiration for writing this book.

A: They’re big issues in the horse world. You can’t write a book and be true and ignore them. For example, the 1986 Kentucky Derby winner, Ferdinand, was sold for meat. Horses slip through the cracks and there are so many lovely horses that could go on to other jobs and excel at them. That aspect is pretty central to the story: it’s about the resilience and versatility of thoroughbreds.

Q: What was the process like for you?

Q: You include a glossary of terms and some are pretty colorful: “two-minute lick,” “railbird,” “parrot-mouth,” “oxer.”

A: I had the luxury of writing it over two years, so I could sit in the barn and think about what the horses were observing and smelling. I could go to New Holland Auction where horses are sold [many for slaughter]. I could go to MidAtlantic Horse Rescue, which is the thoroughbred rescue facility that I based the one in the book on.

Q: Why did you decide to tell this story as a novel for young people?

A: I really wanted to share the horse world with an insider’s view and depict a “could be true” tale in an engaging, yet informative way, to transport the reader into another world—a real world. When I think back on the books I really loved when I was a kid, those were the ones that stuck—the ones with real places. I still imagine galloping across the English countryside on The Pie in National Velvet, and I still want to go to and see the ponies swimming at the pony penning in Chincoteague [from Marguerite Henry’s book, Misty of Chincoteague]. I would

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A: I remembered how it was when I was a horsecrazy kid. I wanted to suck up every piece of information. I toyed with the idea of defining the words in the text, but I thought, no, that’s not how horse people talk. I wanted it to be educational, informative and authentic—that is important to me—but still a fun read.

Q: Why did you choose to include illustrations?

A: The artist is [Margaret] Peggy Kauffman. She’s a wonderful, award-winning equestrian artist who specializes in sculpture. The book has a sort of oldfashioned feel to it, I think, a bit like books I used to read. I remember some amazing illustrations in Black Beauty.

–By Lynne Heffley

9

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Q: Having Raja tell his own story is reminiscent of Black Beauty, the children’s classic by Anna Sewell.

Was that an inspiration?

love to have Raja speak to kids in the same way that so many great horse books have spoken to me.

oppression and poverty among the majority of the regime’s subjects. As a favorite son, Sadeghian is aware of his relative privilege, compared to his female relatives and friends. He speaks openly of the moral restrictions and unhappy marital choices available to many women, including his sister. This first section is likely to be of greatest interest to most readers. Yet, the author’s observations on the American medical system offer insight into the growth of HMOs and increasingly impersonal medical care. In the final fragmentary sections of the memoir, Sadeghian describes the sometimes horrific results of Tibetan expeditions. It’s difficult not see his concerns with mortality as more personal than professional. At times, his prose grows meditative, musing on the irony of his circumstances; here is a man who learned to climb in the mountainous regions of his homeland, yet Sadeghian’s remembered Iran—of cosmopolitan men and women, striking disparities of wealth and religion, and a complex history—makes the Islamic revolutionary Iran of today alien to him. Instead, he divides his time between a sunny American retirement and some of the most isolated peaks in the world.

Sadeghian’s life of contrasts will interest many readers.

THE CORNERSTONE OF DECEPTION

Simani, Cheryl The Third House (453 pp.) $18.00 paperback | Dec. 7, 2011 978-1461052814 Converting her nonfiction research into historical suspense, first-time novelist Simani challenges the integrity of acclaimed archaeologists Sir Henry Creswicke Rawlinson and George Smith.

In the mid-19th century, archaeologists’ discoveries in the Tigris-Euphrates region altered the biblical timeline.

Taking the reader from Mesopotamia to Paris to London, Simani introduces real-life archaeologists Austen Layard, Jules Oppert, Fulgence Fresnel, Rawlinson and Smith, among many others (as the three-page list of characters will attest), showing how their lives and discoveries were intertwined, and how nearly all were affected by the machinations of Rawlinson. Taking on the uneducated, working-class but gifted Smith as his assistant, Rawlinson schools him in matters both archaeological and unethical. What to do if your dig is not as productive as you had hoped? Buy artifacts on the black market. Having trouble with a translation? Make it up. Research challenged by colleagues? Discredit theirs. As if forgery were not enough, Rawlinson also dabbles in anti-Semitism and racism. While he remains reprehensible, Simani’s exquisite character development imbues Smith, a man of humble origins, with sympathy.

Oppert vacillates from being a main to a secondary character, but he is probably the most fascinating of the long list of them. The novel’s historical elements are well researched, and Simani displays an additional gift for weaving an engrossing love story, as evidenced by the relationship accounts of Layard, Oppert and Smith. The author occasionally allows |

her characters to engage in long, dull conversations, rehashing events that occurred off-screen, but otherwise she manages to create a mainly interesting mystery.

A riveting tale of archaeological intrigue.

SENDERO

Tomlinson, Max Max Tomlinson (344 pp.) $1.99 e-book | Nov. 6, 2011 Tomlinson’s princely, epic debut spans decades in a Peruvian family’s separation and reunion amid political unrest and terrorist atrocities.

In 1987, Peruvian peasant siblings Nina, 12, and Miguel Flores, 16, live on a potato farm raised by proud, hardworking parents. Their homeland is being terrorized by the “Sendero Luminoso” (Shining Path), a Maoist insurgent militia, as locally armed soldiers become outnumbered and more and more of the land is dominated by the violent faction. When their father, Adan, is shot by soldiers and Agustín Malqui, the village pastor, is abducted, Miguel, ever the picture of restless youth, sacrifices himself by joining the Shining Path guerrillas to spare the rest of his family from certain death. Tomlinson masterfully propels his ambitious narrative two decades forward to find Nina, a Cuzco tourism police official in southeastern Peru, miraculously reuniting with a downtrodden, alcoholic Pastor Malqui who’d been isolated for almost a decade in a political prison. Before he disappears again, however, Malqui tells her that Miguel is still alive but ensconced in drug trade narcoterrorism. Nina ignores stern warnings from her lover, Francisco Guislán, a high-ranking anti-terrorist official, and risks her life to first find Malqui again, and then her long-lost brother. These powerful events enable Tomlinson to unfurl a vividly described journey throughout Peru’s underbelly as the narrative gains momentum, hurtling toward a dramatic climax and a surprisingly unconventional conclusion. A lushly atmospheric novel consistently churning with intrinsic familial yearnings and authentic suspense, the author’s story works on a variety of levels. Incorporating Peru’s rich yet turbulent history, high drama amid the villages perched in the expansive Andes mountains, a cast of impressively crafted characters and a cinematic plot that would translate wonderfully to the big screen, Tomlinson’s debut is golden.

Elaborate and robust; a prime example of history and histrionics juggled with equal precision.

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