Booklist articles from February 2003

Booklist archives from February 2003

Alterman, Eric. What Liberal Media? The Truth about Bias and the News.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 310p. index. Basic, $25 (0-465-00176-9). 306.44. Conventional wisdom: the media tilts (sometimes tips over) to the Left. The truth, as Alterman lays it out, is quite the opposite. He walks readers through the reasons righties...

Harrison, Kathryn. Seeking Rapture: Scenes from a Life.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... May 2003. 208p. Random, $23.95 (0-375-50558-X). 813. Diabolically compelling, Harrison holds readers' attention even when they find her fascination with obsession and pain more morbid than illuminating. In her fiction, which includes The...

O'Connor, Sandra Day. The Majesty of the Law: Reflections of a Supreme Court Justice.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 336p. index. Random, $24.95 (0-375-50925-9). 347.73. O'Connor, the first female Supreme Court Justice, offers a broad-ranging look at the most revered and enigmatic institution of the federal government, from the day-to-day...

Sontag, Susan. Regarding the Pain of Others.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 240p. Farrar, $23 (0-374-24858-3). 814. Sontag, one of our most perceptive and valiant thinkers, offered a seminal critique of camera-mediated images in On Photography. Now, 25 years later, photographs and video of the bloody...

Theroux, Paul. Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Cape Town.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 496p. Houghton, $28 (0-618-13424-7). 916.04. Theroux returns to East Africa--he taught in Uganda and Malawi in the 1960s--both because he wants to see if there is hope behind the horrific headlines and because he wants to drop...

Vidal, Gore. Dreaming War: Blood for Oil and the Cheney-Bush Junta.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 160p. Thunder's Mouth/Nation, paper, $11.95 (1-56025-502-1). 327.73. We've all heard 9/11 compared to Pearl Harbor, but in one of the essays in this provocative and thoughtful collection, America's great literary dissenter finds...

Buckley Jr., William F. Getting it Right.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 342p. Regnery, $24.95 (0-89526-138-3). It's become a truism that the groundwork for GOP success since 1980 was laid in the 1950s and in the 1964 Goldwater presidential campaign. Buckley himself was a player then--part of what...

Godwin, Gail. Evenings at Five.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 114p. illus. Ballantine, $14.95 (0-345-46102-9). She's a writer. He's a composer. Married for many years, they've forged a passionate and mutually inspiring intimacy, spending their days working at opposite ends of the house...

Winchester, Simon. Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... August 27, 1883. Apr. 2003.432p. illus, index. HarperCollins, $25.95 (0-06-621285-5). 551.21. Winchester is a teacher to the world. Among his previous books are the best-selling The Professor and the Madman (1998) and The Map That Changed...

Johansen, Iris. Dead Aim.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 327p. Bantam, $25.95 (0-553-80246-1). Post-9/11 security is put to the test in Johansen's latest thriller. Photographer Alex Graham has worked hand-in-hand at disaster sites with search-and-rescue teams, and the tragedy in...

Mitchard, Jacqueline. Twelve Times Blessed.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 544p. HarperCollins, $25.95 (0-06-621475-0). True Dickinson has everything: a loving 10-year-old son, Guy; a successful business; and a cadre of friends who mostly fill the empty places in her life--until she falls for Hank...

Patterson, James and Gross, Andrew. The Jester.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 464p. Little, Brown, $27.95 (0-316-60205-1). Patterson takes a break from his two police-thriller series to tell the story of a very different character: Hugh De Luc, a common man who goes to fight in the Crusades in 1096. Hoping...

Peters, Elizabeth. Children of the Storm.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 416p. Morrow, $25.95 (0-06-621476-9). Egyptian nationalism is on the rise in the early twentieth century; Amelia Peabody Emerson and her volatile husband are grandparents; and a new season of archaeological exploration has begun...

Shreve, Anita. All He ever Wanted.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 288p. Sourcebooks/ Landmark, $22 (1-4022-0041-2). Boldly plotted and inventively told, Shreve's latest novel is further proof that she is a natural-born storyteller with a shrewd sense of how to shape her material to best appeal...

Stone, Robert. Bay of Souls.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 256p. Houghton, $25 (0-395-96349-4). Stone's seven novels seem very different on the surface, but they share a common theme: characters losing hold of their moorings. It may happen in Jerusalem (Damascus Gate), or on the open sea...

Wiggs, Susan. Home before Dark.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 384p. MIRA, $24.95 (1-55166-673-1). In this fairly typical romance novel, we meet free-spirited Jessie Ryder, a beautiful, independent, strong-willed woman who has traveled the world working as a photojournalist and living life...

Cole, Harriette. Choosing Truth: Living an Authentic Life.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 304p. index. Simon & Schuster, $22 (0-684-87311-7). 158.1. Using her personal stories and those of others, Cole explores how people can cope with the difficult issues in their lives and undertake personal missions to find peace....

Dinter, Paul E. The Other Side of the Altar.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 240p. Farrar, $23 (0-374-29966-8). 282. In September 1964 Dinter entered a seminary. Like many fellow students, he was excited about the future of the Roman Catholic Church, seemingly emerging from a long, medieval slumber. Three...

* Damasio, Antonio. Looking for Spinoza: Joy, Sorrow, and the Feeling Brain.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 352p. illus, index. Harcourt, $28 (0-15-100557-5). 152.4. Damasio continues his electrifying inquiry into the neurobiology of feelings and how they shape human life in the third installment in a fascinating and groundbreaking...

Freely, John. The Lost Messiah: in Search of the Mystical Rabbi Sabbatai Sevi.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 275p. illus, index. Overlook, $26.95 (1-58567-318-8). 296.8. Levine, Robert N. There Is No Messiah and You're It: The Stunning Transformation of Judaism's Most Provocative Idea. Feb. 2003. 176p. Jewish Lights, $21.95...

Citizen Carter. (The Manley Arts).(Critical Essay)
February 1, 2003... I was quite sorry to see the announcement that former president Jimmy Carter was chosen as this year's Nobel Peace Prize winner. Carter is a big hero of mine. He's a good and honest man who continually restores my faith in American politics and...

Jacobsen, Eric O. Sidewalks in the Kingdom: New Urbanism and the Christian Faith.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... May 2003. 176p. Baker/Brazos, paper, $16.99 (1-58743-048-7). 261.1. Like Jane Jacobs, James Howard Kunstler, Ray Oldenburg, and other urban visionaries, Jacobsen sees the city as a hopeful place, where community, tradition, and beauty come...

Kriwaczek, Paul. In Search of Zarathustra.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 256p. illus, index. Knopf, $25 (0-375-41528-9). 295. The ancient prophet Zarathustra, founder of Zoroastrianism, was a "deeply radical figure" who believed in "one true God," saw the world as a "battlefield between good and...

Barr, Stephen M. Modern Physics and Ancient Faith.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 312p. index. Univ. of Notre Dame, $30 (0-268-03471-0). 291.1. Often invoked as justification for unbelief, modern science here provides the basis for an unusual and provocative affirmation of religious faith. A physicist at the...

McLaren, Brian and Campolo, Tony. Adventures in Missing the Point: How the Culture-Controlled Church Neutered the Gospel.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 256p. NavPress/ EmergentYS, $24.99 (1-57683-405-0). 239. Liberal evangelicals McLaren and Campolo share chapters on topics related to, as the three section titles indicate, "God" (religious philosophy), "World" (society), and...

Brimelow, Peter. The Worm in the Apple: How the Teacher Unions Are Destroying American Education.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 336p. index. HarperCollins, $24.95 (0-06-009661-6). 331.88. Brimelow's Alien Nation (1995), decrying massive immigration to the U.S., made all the multiculturalists diss him, and now he lambastes the National Education...

* Kagan, Robert. Of Paradise and Power: America and Europe in the New World Order.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 112p. Knopf, $18 (1-4000-4093-0). 327. Cogent and important best describe this slim book, its lack of vast pages belying the weightiness of its message. This is an expanded version of an essay originally published as "Power and...

Dyson, Michael Eric. Why I Love Black Women.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 304p. Basic/Civitas, $23 (0-465-01763-0). 305. Dyson draws on his personal life, marriages, and history to praise and celebrate black women. He starts with the women (mother, teachers, writers) who put his feet on the path from...

Evans, Sara M. Tidal Wave: How Women Changed America at Century's End.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 320p. Free Press, $26 (0-02-909912-9). 305.42. Astronauts and senators, CEOs and surgeons: the roles for women in society today are impressive and, perhaps in certain quarters, taken for granted. Evans is here to remind us that...

King, Rachel. Don't Kill in our Names: Families of Murder Victims Speak Out against the Death Penalty.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 304p. illus, index. Rutgers, $27 (0-8135-3182-9). 364.66. King, a lawyer and anti-death-penalty lobbyist, spent more than a year interviewing people who lost family members to murder but managed to forgive the killers and oppose...

McLain, Paula. Like Family: Growing Up in Other People's Houses.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 256p. Little, Brown, $23.95 (0-316-59742-2). 362.73. McLain was only four when her mother left to go to the movies with her boyfriend and never came back. McLarin and her two sisters, Theresa and Penny, moved from their...

Mending the World: Stories of Family by Contemporary Black Writers.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Ed. by Rosemarie Robotham. Feb. 2003. 304p. illus. Basic/Civitas, $25 (0-465-07062-0). 305.896. This collection of fiction and nonfiction selections is meant to counterbalance images of black families as troubled harbors of all manner of...

Prados, John. Lost Crusade: the Secret Wars of CIA Director William Colby.(Book Review)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 464p. illus, index; Oxford, $35 (0-19-512847-8). 327.1273. Less a biography than a comprehensive dossier on the espionage career of William Colby, this copiously detailed work comes from an author highly regarded as an...

Weiss, John. The Politics of Hate: Anti-Semitism, History, and the Holocaust in Modern Europe.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 246p. Ivan R. Dee, $26 (1-56663-492-X). 305.892. Why did Germany initiate the Holocaust, when rabid anti-Semites could be found nearly everywhere in Europe, often in proportionally greater numbers than within the Reich? Why was...

Barletta, Martha. Marketing to Women: How to Understand, Reach, and Increase Your Share of the Largest Market Segment.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 272p. index. Dearborn, $23 (0-7931-5963-6). 658.8. "Women are the world's most powerful consumers." So begins Barletta as she presents her thesis that men's marketing doesn't work for women. We learn that in comparison to men,...

Huffington, Arianna. Pigs at the Trough: How Corporate Greed and Political Corruption Are Undermining America.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 240p. Crown, $22 (1-4000-4771-4). 338.9. Huffington, political commentator and columnist, provides a scathing indictment of corporate America's CEOs, the current president and vice-president, Democrats and Republicans, lobbyists,...

Kaufman, Murray S. Reefs and Rain Forests: the Natural Heritage of Malaysian Borneo.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... 2002. 240p. illus. Reefs and Rain Forests Publications, $49.95 (0-9710655-0-0). 577.7. The reefs and rain forests of Borneo are considered to be the oldest on the planet, with the reefs declared by Jacques Cousteau to be an untouched piece...

Wallerstein, Judith S. and Blakeslee, Sandra. What about the Kids? Raising Your Children before, during, and after Divorce.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 400p. Hyperion, $23.95 (0-7868-6865-1). 306.89 Wallerstein, author of The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce (2000), and Blakeslee, a science writer, draw on more than 30 years of research to provide advice and assistance to parents...

Bainbridge, David. The X in Sex: How the X Chromosome Controls Our Lives.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 224p. illus. Harvard, $22.95 (0-674-01028-0). 611. To appreciate the genetic lottery that divides us into boys and girls, one has a reliable odds-maker in Bainbridge, author of Making Babies: The Science of Pregnancy (2001)....

Bakalar, Nicholas. Where the Germs Are: a Scientific Safari.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 272p. illus. index. Wiley, $24.95 (0-471-15589-6). 616.014. Germs are everywhere, and for most readers, longtime science writer Bakalar's intriguing, solidly based safari through the world of germs will introduce striking...

Holman, Virginia. Rescuing Patty Hearst: Memories from a Decade Gone Mad.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 256p. Simon & Schuster, $23 (0-7432-2285-7). 616.89. In this searing memoir of her mother's psychotic unraveling and her family's struggle to survive it, Holman draws parallels between the uncertainty and craziness of the times...

Chatto, Beth. Beth Chatto's Woodland Garden: Shade-Loving Plants for Year-Round Interest.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... 2003. 224p. illus, index. Cassell; dist. by Sterling, $34.95 (0-304-36366-9). 635.9. For plant lovers who lament, "I can't have a garden, I have too much shade," Chatto casts welcome light on one of garden design's best-kept secrets: the...

Glattstein, Judy. Consider the Leaf: Foliage in Garden Design.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 308p. illus. index. Timber, $24.95 (0-88192-571-3). 635.9. Whether ruffled, woolly, with a metallic sheen, or filigreed like lace, leaves are among the most significant elements to be considered when planning and planting...

Cantwell, David and Friskics-Warren, Bill. Heartaches by the Number: Country Music's 500 Greatest Singles.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 320p. index. Vanderbilt Univ. and Country Music Foundation, $59.95 (0-8265-1423-5); paper, $27.95 (0-8265-1424-3). 781.642. Cantwell and Friskics-Warren's ambitious ranking of great country singles is insightful--and baffling....

Corbett, Patricia. Verdura: the Life and Work of a Master Jeweler.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... 2002. 224p. illus. index. Abrams, $55 (0-8109-3529-5). 739.270. Every twentieth-century society name, from Coco Chanel to Babe Paley, is mentioned at least once in this meticulous biography of Sicilian jeweler Fulco Santostefano della...

Gaines, Donna. A Misfit's Manifesto: the Spiritual Journey of a Rock & Roll Heart.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 384p. illus. Villard, $24.95 (0-679-46327-5). 781.66. Perhaps what America needs in the Age of Ashcroft is a sex-and-drugs-and-rock-and-roll autobio from a rootin', tootin' Republican from deep in the heart of Ramonesville...

Lanza, Joseph and Penna, Dennis. Russ Columbo and the Crooner Mystique.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 280p. illus, index. Feral House, paper, $18.95 (0-922915-80-6). 782.421. A dashing Hollywood figure rather resembling Rudolph Valentino, crooner Russ Columbo once rivaled Bing Crosby. But he was killed by a tragic, accidental...

Rensin, David. The Mailroom: Hollywood History from the Bottom Up.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 464p. Ballantine, $24.95 (0-345-44234-2). 791.43. Rensin's upward-mobility saga suggests that aspiring Hollywood conquistadors should start in the mailroom of a talent agency instead of hanging around soda fountains in tight...

Sidran, Ben. Ben Sidran: a Life in the Music.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 340p. illus, index. Rowman & Littlefield/Cooper Square, $24.95 (0-87833-291-X). 786.2. Pianist Sidran describes playing in front of 12,000 "drunk, screaming teenagers" with his ear monitors turned off so that he hears neither...

Webster, Jason. Duende: a Journey into the Heart of Flamenco.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 256p. Broadway, $23.95 (0-7679-1166-0). 781.62. Webster was born near San Francisco; lived in England, Germany, and Egypt; and was educated at prestigious Oxford University--but why be a dreary academic when in your soul you...

Hockey Dynasties: Blue Lines and Bloodlines.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Ed. by Lance Hornby. Feb. 2003. 256p. illus, index. Firefly, $40 (1-55297-676-9). 796.962. Hockey fans old and new will enjoy this lavish display of notable hockey families. From the Richards to the Hulls and Espositos, brothers and...

Evenson, Brian. Understanding Robert Coover.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 301p. index. Univ. of South Carolina, $29.95 (1-57003-482-6). 813. The volumes of the Understanding Contemporary American Literature series are intended as "guides or companions for students as well as good academic readers."...

Latin American Writers at Work.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Ed. by George Plimpton. Mar. 2003. 320p. illus. Modern Library, paper, $13.95 (0-679-77349-5). 809. Borges, Neruda, Paz, Garcia Marquez, Fuentes, Vargas Llosa--immortals here descend from the firmament of Latin American literature to...

Steavenson, Wendell. Stories I Stole.(Book Review)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 240p. Grove, $24 (0-8021-1737-6). 813. In 1998, bored with her life in London, Steavenson, a journalist whose CV lists Time magazine in her credits, set out for Tbilisi, the capital of the former Soviet republic of Georgia, where...

Kinzie, Mary. Drift.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 96p. Knopf, $23 (0-375-41463-0). 811. The quiet but striking poems in Kinzie's newest collection, her first since Ghost Ship (1996), appear taut and spare. They span the page like spinal cords, or twists of DNA, each word dense...

* Hirsch, Edward. Lay Back the Darkness.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 96p. Knopf, $23 (0-375-41521-1). 811. The opening poem in Hirsch's sixth poetry collection," I Am Going to Start Living like a Mystic," is an artist's vow to pay closer attention to life's myriad forms in the hope of divining...

Baker, Alan. The Knight: a Portrait of Europe's Warrior Elite.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 224p. index. Wiley, $22.95 (0-471-25135-6). 940.1. The life of a medieval knight was shaped by a complex relationship with his liege, a rigid code of honor, and training that began in childhood. The armored knight is, perhaps,...

Huntley, Paula. The Hemingway Book Club of Kosovo.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 256p. Putnam/ Tarcher, $22.95 (1-58542-211-8). 949.71. In August 2002 Huntley made a decision to accompany her husband on an assignment to help build a legal system in war-ravaged Kosovo. In a move that would forever alter the...

James, Lawrence. Warrior Race: a History of the British at War.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 864p. illus. St. Martin's, $35 (0-312-30737-3). 941 James' sweeping survey of two millennia of British martial history is not a dreary litany of battles and bloodshed. Instead, the events of 1066 and all that are briefly...

Kamen, Henry. Empire: How Spain Became a World Power, 1492-1763.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 640p. index. HarperCollins, $34.95 (0-06-019476-6). 946.04. Kamen's rich, lengthy narrative is for serious students of European history, who will be rewarded with an impressive reinterpretation of the nature of the empire Spain...

Kauffman, Bill. Dispatches from the Muckdog Gazette: a Mostly Affectionate Account of a Small Town's Fight to Survive.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 192p. Holt, $23 (0-8050-6854-6). 974.7. As a senatorial flunky on Capitol Hill, the author rued his sense of dislocation and returned to live in his hometown of Batavia, New York. Over the past 15 years, the forty-something...

Megellas, James. All the Way to Berlin: a Paratrooper at War in Europe.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 304p. Ballantine/Presidio, $24.95 (0-89141-784-2). 940.54. Leading his H Company in a victory parade, the author remembers thinking how few of the men marching were with him in combat. Only half survived one of the battles...

Pyle, Richard and Faas, Horst. Lost over Laos: a True Story of Tragedy, Mystery, and Friendship.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003.304p. illus, index. Da Capo, $30 (0-306-81196-0). 959.704 Two journalists who survived their years covering the Vietnam War recount the tragic end of four who did not: Larry Burrows of Life, Henri Huet of the Associated Press,...

Reisner, Marc. A Dangerous Place: California's Unsettling Fate.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 192p. Pantheon, $22 (0-679-42011-8). 9794 California's vulnerability to earthquakes, although internalized by its citizens as a dread of the Big One, seems to be virtually ignored as developers continue to build in all...

Carey, Mike and Bolton, John. The Sandman Presents the Furies.(Book Review)
February 1, 2003... 2002.96p. illus. DC Comics/Vertigo, $24.95 (1-56389-935-3). 741.5. This spin-off from Neil Gaiman's phenomenally durable Sandman series begins with its heroine in custody for assaulting a man she picked up in a bar. No prostitute, she just...

Evanier, Mark. Mad Art: a Visual Celebration of the Art of Mad Magazine and the Idiots Who Create It.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... 2003.304p. illus. Watson-Guptill, paper, $24.95 (0-8230-3080-6). 7416. Kurtzman, Harvey and others. The Mad Archives: v. 1, Issues 1-6. 2002. 220p. illus. DC Comics, $49.95 (1-56389-816-0). 741.5. Mad magazine has been corrupting young...

Griffith, Bill. Zippy Annual 2002.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... 2002. 128p. illus. Fantagraphics, paper, $19.95 (1-56097-505-9). 741.5. "I speak for all abandoned roadside icons when I proclaim, `Pull over, America, & accept your true cultural heritage'!" Thus sayeth Zippy the Pinhead, though why he...

Hall, Jason and Kindt, Matt. Pistolwhip: the Yellow Menace.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 144p. illus. Top Shelf; dist. by Diamond, paper, $14.95 (1-891830-35-X). 741.5. With an "office" in a corner of his uncle's boat repair shop, young Mitch Pistolwhip isn't your hardboiled gumshoe yet. Hired to find a missing...

Herriman, George. Krazy and Ignatz: "Love Letters in Ancient Brick.".(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Ed. by Bill Blackbeard. 2002.120p illus. Fantagraphics, paper, $14.95 (1-56097-507-5). 741.5. It isn't uncommon now for comics to aspire to high-art status, but Herriman's newspaper strip, "Krazy Kat," which debuted in 1913, reached still...

Matt, Joe. Fair Weather.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 120p. illus. Drawn & Quarterly; dist. by Diamond, $26.95 (1-896597-56-4). 741.5. Matt is renowned--some would say notorious--for autobiographical comics portraying himself as a penny-pinching, misanthropic pornophile. In this...

Moore, Alan and others. Promethea: Book 3.(Book Review)
February 1, 2003... 2002. 160p. illus. DC Comics/America's Best Comics, $24.95 (1-56389-900-0). 741.5. With his realistic approach to superhero comics, Moore prompted a minor revolution in the 1980s. Of late he has returned to the genre with a line of new...

Ott, Thomas. Dead End.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... 2002. 48p. illus. Fantagraphics, $13.95 (1-56097-509-1). 741.5. Having avoided Europe's wars for centuries, the Swiss would be a happy people, one would think. But the zeitgeist is what it is, and they are as morbid as the rest of us. Case...

Adult graphic novels: a core list. (Spotlight On Graphic Novels).(Bibliography)
February 1, 2003... The graphic novel is a form, not a genre. Essentially it is a matter of pictures and more or fewer or, occasionally, no words propelling a narrative. Here are 19 of the best currently available graphic novels. Briggs, Raymond. Ethel &...

Rodriguez, Spain and Gresham, William Lindsay. Nightmare Alley.(Book Review)(Brief Review)
February 1, 2003... 2003. 136p. illus. Fantagraphics, paper, $14.95 (1-56097-511-3). 741.5. Rodriguez, one of the original alternative comics creators, is best known for tales of his youthful `hood in urban Latino California. Sex and money count in many of...

Sacco, Joe. Notes from a Defeatist.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... 2003. 216p. illus. Fantagraphics, paper, $19.95 (1-56097-510-5). 741.2. Before he received clue acclaim and an American Book Award for his comics-format journalism from Palestine (collected in Palestine, 2001) and Bosnia (Safe Area...

Top 10 adult graphic novels. (Spotlight On Graphic Novels).(Critical Essay)
February 1, 2003... To many, the term adult graphic novels suggests certain things. And they're right, these comics-grown-up often portray sex. But then the novel aspect of the form kicks in, and sex in adult graphic novels, as in prose fiction, is an element, not...

Vaughan, Brian K. and others. Y: the Last Man.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 120p. illus. DC Comics/ Vertigo, paper, $12.95 (1-56389-980-3). 741.5. A mysterious plague has killed every man on earth except Yorick Brown, who was somehow spared. That is the provocative premise of the comics series whose...

Weissman, Steven. White Flower Day.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... 2002. 136p. illus. Fantagraphics, paper, $14.95 (1-56097-514-8). 741.5. From "Peanuts" to South Park, precocious tykes with outsize heads are a comics staple. Weissman's examples are Pullapart Boy, whose father cobbled him together from...

Willingham, Bill and others. Fables: Legends in Exile.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... 2003. 128p. illus. DC Comics/Vertigo, paper, $9.95 (1-56389-942-6). 741.5. Once upon a time--recently--Jack, not that much older looking than when he climbed the beanstalk, rushes breathlessly into the office of Woodland Luxury Apartments...

Brown, Irene Bennett. Reap the South Wind.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 208p. Five Star, $26.95 (0-7862-2817-2). In the fourth in Brown's series about the women settlers of Paragon Springs, Kansas, Lucy Ann Walsh, against her better judgment, follows her loving husband, Admire, to Oklahoma, where he...

Campbell, Drusilla. Wildwood.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Feb. 2003. 288p. Kensington, paper, $15 (0-7582-0293-8). Long-buried memories of a tragedy in their past silently connect three friends and bring an added dimension to the time-tested theme of the power of female friendship in this vibrant...

Connelly, Joe. Crumbtown.(Book Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 256p. Knopf, $23 (0-375-41364-2). Crumbtown is a crime-ridden, blue-collar, postindustrial town in decline. Crumbtown is also a town that is seen by Hollywood big-wigs as more New York than New York, and that's why it has emerged...

Davis, Amanda. Wonder When You'll Miss Me.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Mar. 2003. 272p. Morrow, $24.95 (0-688-16781-0). Davis' stunning first novel expands a short story from her collection Circling the Drain (1999). Lonely for her dead father, an outcast at her high school, Faith Duckle has only one...

Ellis, Jamellah. That Faith, That Trust, That Love.(Book Review)(Young Adult Review)(Brief Article)
February 1, 2003... Apr. 2003. 320p. Villard/Strivers Row, paper, $12.95 (0-8129-6656-2). This faith-based novel, previously self-published, is about nurturing belief in God and building love and trust within your family. Marley Shepard is on the fast track...