Booklist articles from October 2008

Booklist archives from October 2008

Prince of Stories: The Many Worlds of Neil Gaiman.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Prince of Stories: The Many Worlds of Neil Gaiman By Hank Wagner and others. Nov. 2008. 560p. illus. St. Martin's, $29.95 (9780312387655). 823. Fans' guidebooks have been done for many a genre fiction star, most notably Stephen...

Looking for Lincoln: The Making of an American Icon.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... * Looking for Lincoln: The Making of an American Icon. By Philip B. Kunhardt III and others. Nov. 2008. 512p. illus. Knopf, $50 (9780307267139). 973.7. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Emulating the format of the Kunhardts' Lincoln: An...

Ender in Exile.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Ender in Exile. By Orson Scott Card. Nov. 2008.384p.Tor, $25.95 (9780765304964). SF/Fantasy. Card's latest addition to the Ender Wiggins canon nicely dovetails with Ender's Game (1977) and Ender's Shadow(1999), which it parallels...

Last of the Old Guard.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Last of the Old Guard. By Louis Auchincloss. Dec. 2008. 192p. Houghton, $24 (9780547152752). General Fiction. In his eighties, Adrian Suydam is putting together a private memoir that he hopes will help shed light en the character...

Lethal Legacy.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Lethal Legacy. By Linda Fairstein. Jan. 2009.416p. Doubleday, $26 (9780385523998). Crime Fiction. Readers need not be familiar with previous Alexandra Cooper thrillers to appreciate this one. They will, however, need a deep...

A Lion among Men: Volume Three in the Wicked Years.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... A Lion among Men: Volume Three in the Wicked Years. By Gregory Maguire. Oct. 2008. 336p. Morrow, $26.95 (9780060548926). SF/Fantasy. Maguire, author of runaway best-sellers Wicked (1995) and Son of a Witch (2005), has se richly...

Show No Fear.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Show No Fear. By Perri O'Shaughnessy. Dec. 2008. 339p. Pocket, $25 (9781416544395). Crime Fiction. There's a lot going on in the new Nina Reilly thriller (which takes us back to 1990, and the beginning of her career). Nina's...

Three Weeks to Say Goodbye.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Three Weeks to Say Goodbye. By C. J. Box. Jan. 2009. 352p. St. Martin's/Minotaur, $24.95 (9780312365721). Crime Fiction. Box made his name with his superlative series about Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett. In January, he published...

The Treasure.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... The Treasure. By Iris Johansen. Dec. 2008. 368p. Bantam, $25 (9780553807318). Crime Fiction. Once Kadar Ben Arnaud was the most dangerous killer in the world, but he has given up the assassination business for a new life in...

Divine Justice.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... * Divine Justice. By David Baldacci. Nov. 2008. 392p. Grand Central, $27.99 (9780446195508). Crime Fiction. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Readers who have been holding their breath since the end of Stone Cold (2007), the previous...

Natalie Scott: A Magnificent Life.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Natalie Scott: A Magnificent Life. By John W. Scott. Oct. 2008. 496p. illus. Pelican, $24.95 (9781589805804). 070.92. History professor Scott presents a comprehensive biography of his extraordinary aunt, Natalie Scott, a writer,...

No Time to Think: The Menace of Media Speed and the 24-Hour News Cycle.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... * No Time to Think: The Menace of Media Speed and the 24-Hour News Cycle. By Howard Rosenberg and Charles S. Feldman. Oct. 2008. 256p. Continuum, $24.95 (9780826429315). 071. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The breezy style of this...

This I Believe II: More Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... This I Believe II: More Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women. Ed. by Jay Allison and Dan Gediman. Oct. 2008. 288p. Holt, $23 (9780805087680). 170. In the second collection derived from the extraordinarily popular and...

Dream in Color: How the Sanchez Sisters Are Making History in Congress.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Dream in Color: How the Sanchez Sisters Are Making History in Congress. by Linda Sanchez and Loretta Sanchez. 2008. 255p. Grand Central, paper, $12.99 (9780446508049). 328.092. Linda and Loretta Sanchez, the first sisters to serve...

Editor's note.(death of Dennis Dodge)(Obituary)(Brief article)
October 1, 2008... I received an e-mail the other day from my friend Dennis Dodge, who has been reviewing mysteries and horse-racing books for Booklist for the last 25 years, noting that a book I had sent him about yet another underdog horse who won the big race...

Finding a home for Moby Dick.(The Manley Arts)
October 1, 2008... This past year I sold the house I had inhabited for 25 years. Although I loved that house and had always planned to die there, it was not a difficult place to leave. It had a swimming pool that no one used any more. I was tired of cleaning it....

Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China. By Leslie T. Chang. Oct. 2008. 432p. Spiegel & Grau, $26 (9780385520171). 331.40951. To American girls, the term "going out" means dating; to their Chinese counterparts,...

Girl Boy Girl: How I Became JT Leroy.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Girl Boy Girl: How I Became JT Leroy. By Savannah Knoop. Oct. 2008. 256p. illus. Seven Stories, paper, $17.95 (9781583228517). 306.09. When is an HIV-positive, transgender, extruck-stop-prostitute turned pseudo-celebrity novelist...

Mom Said Kill.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Mom Said Kill. By Burl Barer. Oct. 2008. 320p. illus. Kensington, paper, $6.99 (9780786019090). 364. 1. Barbara Opel, divorced mother of three whose past brimmed with bizarre and aggressive behavior, became the live-in health-care...

Tomorrow You Go Home.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Tomorrow You Go Home. By Tig Hague. Oct. 2008. 320p. Gotham, $26 (9781592403752). 365. Hague's memoir depicts his incarceration in Russian prisons from July 2003 to April 2005. A derivatives broker in London, Hague had flown to...

Walter White: The Dilemma of Black Identity in America.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Walter White: The Dilemma of Black Identity in America. By Thomas Dyja. Nov. 2008. 224p. illus. Ivan R. Dee, $26 (9781566637664). 323.092. Walter White, once known as Mr. NAACP, and unarguably the most influential black man in...

What Blood Won't Tell: A History of Race on Trial in America.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... What Blood Won't Tell: A History of Race on Trial in America. By Ariela Gross. Oct. 2008. 384p. Harvard, $29.95 (9780674031302). 305.800973. Challenging the presumption of many scholars of the dominance of the "one-drop" rule in...

Cathedrals of Science: The Personalities and Rivalries That Made Modern Chemistry.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Cathedrals of Science: The Personalities and Rivalries That Made Modern Chemistry. By Patrick Coffey. 2008. 416p. illus. Oxford, $29.95 (9780195321340). 540. Surveying the history of chemistry from 1883 to 1953, Coffey combines...

The Unfinished Game: Pascal, Fermat, and the Seventeenth-Century Letter That Made the World Modern.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... The Unfinished Game: Pascal, Fermat, and the Seventeenth-Century Letter That Made the World Modern. By Keith Devlin. Oct. 2008. 208p. Basic, $24.95 (9780465009107). 519.2. A professor, author of popular math histories (The...

Wild Blue: A Natural History of the World's Largest Animal.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Wild Blue: A Natural History of the World's Largest Animal. By Dan Bortolotti. Oct. 2008. 336p. St. Martin's/Thomas Dunne, $24.95 (9780312383879). 599.5. In this elegant blend of science and history, Bortolotti provides the most...

Beef: The Untold Story of How Milk, Meat, and Muscle Shaped the World.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Beef: The Untold Story of How Milk, Meat, and Muscle Shaped the World. By Andrew Rimas and Evan D. G. Fraser. Oct. 2008. 256p. illus. Morrow, $25.95 (9780061353840). 636.2. Distinctive among the many titles currently assessing the...

Old Farm.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Old Farm. By Jerry Apps. Oct. 2008. 240p. illus. Wisconsin Historical Society, $29.95 (9780870204067). 636.7. Apps, author of numerous books about rural life and history, teams up with his photographer son to document the history...

The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... * The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters. By Rose George. Oct. 2008.272p. illus. Metropolitan, $26 (9780805082715). 576.8. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] What could be more urgent, as the human...

Cooking with Les Dames D'Escoffier: At Home with the Women Who Shape the Way We Eat and Drink.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Cooking with Les games D'Escoffier: At Home with the Women Who Shape the Way We Eat and Drink. By Marcella Rosene and Pat Mozersky. Illus. by Tracey Maurer. Oct. 2008. 368p. illus. Sasquatch, $35 (9781570615306). 641.5. The women...

Hallelujah Junction: Composing an American Life.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Hallelujah Junction: Composing an American Life. By John Adams. Oct. 2008. 320p. Farrar, $25 (9780374281151). 780.92. In his New England childhood, Adams listened to records, learned clarinet, and even conducted small groups. At...

The Hardest Working Man: How James Brown Saved the Soul of America.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... The Hardest Working Man: How James Brown Saved the Soul of America. By James Sullivan. Nov. 2008. 272p. illus. Gotham, $25 (9781592403905). 782.42. Sullivan examines James Brown's role in saving Boston from the fires and riots that...

How to Cook Everything: 2,000 Simple Recipes for Great Food. Rev. ed.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... * How to Cook Everything: 2,000 Simple Recipes for Great Food. Rev. ed. By Mark Bittman. Nov. 2008. 1,056p. illus. Wiley, $35 (9780764578656). 641.5. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Bittman's first edition of How to Cook Everything...

A Devil to Play: One Man's Year-Long Quest to Master the Orchestra's Most Difficult Instrument.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... A Devil to Play: One Man's Year-Long Quest to Master the Orchestra's Most Difficult Instrument. By Jasper Rees. Nov. 2008. 304p. HarperCollins, $23.95 (9780061626616). 788.9. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] After 22 years without...

P.S.: Further Thoughts from a Lifetime of Listening.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... P.S.: Further Thoughts from a Lifetime of Listening. By Studs Terkel. Nov. 2008. 240p. New Press, paper, $16.95 (9781595584236). 791.44. Oral historian, writer of conscience, and raconteur-on-a-mission Terkel follows his vivid and...

When I Grow Up.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... When I Grow Up. By Juliana Hatfield. Oct. 2008. 336p. Wiley, $24.95 (9780470189597). 782.42164092. Musician Hatfield, former member of the Blake Babies, recalls both her 15 minutes of fame in the early 1990s and her current,...

Victoria Flower Style: Arrangements for Every Occasion.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Victoria Flower Style: Arrangements for Every Occasion. By Diane Wagner. 2008. 144p. illus. Sterling/Hearst, paper, $14.95 (9781588166319). 745.92. Flowers can add to your decor with color, texture, and aroma, and the perfect...

Trash Fish.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Trash Fish. By Greg Keeler. Oct. 2008. 176p. Counterpoint, paper, $14.95 (9781582434025). 799.1. Keeler loves to fish, and this interweaving of his life story with interludes with line and pole gallops along from episode to...

George, Being George: George Plimpton's Life as Told, Admired, Deplored, and Envied by 200 Friends, Relatives, Lovers, Aquaintances, Rivals--and a Few Unappreciative Observers.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... George, Being George: George Plimpton's Life as Told, Admired, Deplored, and Envied by 200 Friends, Relatives, Lovers, Aquaintances, Rivals--and a Few Unappreciative Observers. Ed. by Nelson W. Aldrich. Oct. 2008.432p. illus....

Ziegfeld: The Man Who Invented Show Business.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... * Ziegfeld: The Man Who Invented Show Business. By Ethan Mordden. Nov. 2008. 352p. illus. St. Martin's, $29.95 (9780312375430). 792. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Mordden follows his superb series chronicling the rise and stagnation...

Lewis Carroll in Numberland: His Fantastical Mathematical Logical Life.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Lewis Carroll in Numberland: His Fantastical Mathematical Logical Life. By Robin Wilson. Nov. 2008. 208p. illus. Norton, $24.95 (9780393060270). 828. For readers amused by the antics of the Mad Hatter and the riddles of the...

The Lost Art of Walking: The History, Science, and Literature of Pedestrianism.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... The Lost Art of Walking: The History, Science, and Literature of Pedestrianism. By Geoff Nicholson. Nov. 2008. 288p. Riverhead, $24.95 (9781594489983). 800. Nicholson has written one of those charming titles that meanders in and...

Madame de Stael: The First Modern Woman.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Madame de Stael: The First Modern Woman. By Francine du Plessix Gray. Oct. 2008. 256p. Atlas, $24 (9781934633175). 848.6. Intelligent, enthusiastic, and eloquent, Madame de Stael was a legendary conversationalist, brilliant writer,...

One Native Life.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... One Native Life. By Richard Wagamese. Oct. 2008. 272p. Douglas & McIntyre, $32 (9781553653646). 813. Ojibway novelist Wagamese disclosed the details of his childhood abuse and abandonment in an earlier autobiography; here he moves...

A Man and His Shadow.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... A Man and His Shadow. By Affonso Romano de Sant'Anna. Tr. by Fred Ellison. Oct. 2008.97p. Host, paper, $10 (9780924047671). 869.1. Playing with the Jungian psychoanalytic concept of the shadow, Sant'Anna has wry, provocative fun...

Taking the Occasion.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Taking the Occasion. By Daniel Brown. Oct. 2008. 96p. Ivan R. Dee, $22.50 (9781566638012). 811. The New Criterion Poetry Prize, of which this collection is the eighth recipient, has become a more reliable indicator of high...

Where Clouds Are Formed.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Where Clouds Are Formed. By Ofelia Zepeda. Oct. 2008. 96p. Univ. of Arizona, $29.95 (9780816527786). 811. Many of Zepeda's poems are about language, which is no surprise, for she is a distinguished Tohono O'odham ("Papago")...

Blood River: A Journey to Africa's Broken Heart.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Blood River: A Journey to Africa's Broken Heart. By Tim Butcher. Oct. 2008. 384p. Grove, $25 (9780802118776). 916.7510434. A journalist for the UK's Daily Telegraph, Butcher undertook a hazardous African trip in 2004, traveling...

Titanic's Last Secrets: The Further Adventures of Shadow Divers John Chatterton and Richie Kohler.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Titanic's Last Secrets: The Further Adventures of Shadow Divers John Chatterton and Richie Kohler. By Brad Matsen. Oct. 2008. 352p. illus. Twelve, $27.99 (9780446582056). 910.9163. An experienced writer on maritime subjects...

Confessions of a Counterfeit Farm Girl.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Confessions of a Counterfeit Farm Girl. By Susan McCorkindale. Oct. 2008. 368p. NAL, paper, $15 (9780451224934). 975.5. McCorkindale, former marketing director at Family Circle, takes a lighthearted look at the abrupt change in...

Death of a Gunfighter: The Quest for Jack Slade, the West's Most Elusive Legend.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Death of a Gunfighter: The Quest for Jack Slade, the West's Most Elusive Legend. By Dan Rottenberg. Oct. 2008. 448p. illus. Westholme, $29.95 (9781594160707). 973.6. The "West of the Imagination" can be utilized as a process...

Giants: The Parallel Lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Giants: The Parallel Lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln. By John Stauffer. Nov. 2008. 448p. Twelve, $30 (9780446580090). 920.073. Like Paul and Steven Kendrick, authors of the recent Douglass and Lincoln, Stauffer has...

Champlain's Dream.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Champlain's Dream. By David Hackett Fischer. Oct. 2008. 848p. Simon & Schuster, $35 (9781416593324). 971.01. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Samuel de Champlain founded Quebec four centuries ago, and the intervening years have seen his...

Home Fronts: A Wartime America Reader, 1898-2008.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Home Fronts: A Wartime America Reader, 1898-2008. Ed. by Michael S. Foley and Brendan P. O'Malley. Oct. 2008. 656p. New Press, $27.95 (9781595580146). 973.91. Editors Foley and O'Malley write that The Radical Reader: A Documentary...

Jefferson Davis and the Civil War Era.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Jefferson Davis and the Civil War Era. By William J. Cooper. Oct. 2008. 144p. Louisiana State, $24.95 (9780807133712). 973.7. Jefferson Davis is synonymous with the Confederacy, which is synonymous with the Civil War. Even though...

Mud, Blood, and Gold: San Francisco in 1849.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Mud, Blood, and Gold: San Francisco in 1849. By Rand Richards. Oct. 2008. 336p. Heritage, $25.95 (9781879367067). 979.4. At the beginning of 1848, the California village of Yerba Buena had less than 1,000 inhabitants and was...

Radioman: An Eyewitness Account of Pearl Harbor and World War II in the Pacific.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Radioman: An Eyewitness Account of Pearl Harbor and World War II in the Pacific. By Carol Edgemon Hipperson. Oct. 2008. 304p. illus. St. Martin's/Thomas Dunne, $25.95 (9780312386948). 940.54. This worthy addition to the World War...

A Short History of the United States.(Young adult review)(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... A Short History of the United States. By Robert V. Remini. Oct. 2008. 368p. illus. HarperCollins, $27.95 (9780060831448). 973. The reigning scholarly biographer of Andrew Jackson, Remini has been a frequent writer of popular works...

Waking Giant: America in the Age of Jackson.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Waking Giant: America in the Age of Jackson. By David S. Reynolds. Oct. 2008.464p. HarperCollins, $29.95 (9780060826567). 973.5. The contrast in American society between 1815 and 1848 is remarkable enough for the period to vie as...

The Great Emergence: How Christianity Is Changing and Why.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... * The Great Emergence: How Christianity Is Changing and Why. By Phyllis Tickle. Oct. 2008. 176p. illus. Baker, $17.99 (9780801013133). 270.8. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Long an astute observer of religion, Tickle examines a...

Ancestral Grace: Meeting God in Our Human Story.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Ancestral Grace: Meeting God in Our Human Story. By Diarmuid O'Murchu. Oct. 2008. 288p. Orbis, paper, $22 (9781570757945). 233. When an Irish Catholic priest sets out to reconcile the theory of evolution and environmental...

Conscience: The Duty to Obey and the Duty to Disobey.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Conscience: The Duty to Obey and the Duty to Disobey. By Harold Schulweis. Nov. 2008. 176p. Jewish Lights, $19.99 (9781580233750). 296.3. The book analyzes the idea of conscience and the role it plays in our relationships to law,...

Doing Jewish Theology: God, Torah & Israel in Modern Judaism.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Doing Jewish Theology: God, Torah & Israel in Modern Judaism. By Neil Gillman. Nov. 2008. 252p. Jewish Lights, $24.99 (9781580233224). 296.3. Gillman, a National Jewish Book Award winner, explores the six basic themes of Judaism:...

Footprints in the Snow: The Autobiography of a Chinese Buddhist Monk.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Footprints in the Snow: The Autobiography of a Chinese Buddhist Monk. By Sheng Yen. Tr. by Kenneth Wapner and Rebecca Li. Oct. 2008. 256p. Doubleday, $21 (9780385528573). 294.3. Chan, or Chinese Buddhism, is not well known in the...

Heretics for Armchair Theologians.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Heretics for Armchair Theologians. By Justo L. Gonzalez and Catherine Gunsalus Gonzalez. Nov. 2008. 170p. illus. Westminster/John Knox, paper, $16.95 (9780664232054). 273. The Gonzalezes point out that heretics aren't necessarily...

Jonathan Edwards for Armchair Theologians.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Jonathan Edwards for Armchair Theologians. By James P. Byrd. Oct. 2008. 204p. illus. Westminster/John Knox, paper, $16.95 (9780664231996). 230. The eldritch imagery of Edwards' famous sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God"...

The Last Superstition: A Refutation of the New Atheism.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... * The Last Superstition: A Refutation of the New Atheism. By Edward Feser. Oct. 2008. 312p. St. Augustine's, $27 (9781587314513). 211. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] New Atheists Richards Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett,...

The Lost History of Christianity: The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... * The Lost History of Christianity: The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia. By Philip Jenkins. Nov. 2008. 304p. illus. HarperOne, $26.95 (9780061472800). 270. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] ...

Prophet's Daughter: My Life with Elizabeth Clare Prophet inside the Church Universal and Triumphant.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Prophet's Daughter: My Life with Elizabeth Clare Prophet inside the Church Universal and Triumphant. By Erin Prophet. Oct. 2008. 304p. Lyons, $24.95 (9781599214252). 299. Before diagnosis with Alzheimer's, a malady that eventually...

Russian Orthodoxy Resurgent: Faith and Power in the New Russia.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Russian Orthodoxy Resurgent: Faith and Power in the New Russia. By John Garrard and Carol Garrard. Oct. 2008. 348p. illus. Princeton, $29.95 (9780691125732). 281.9. Savagely persecuted throughout the existence of the Soviet Union,...

Selected Poems.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Selected Poems. By James Agee. Ed. by Andrew Hudgins. Oct. 2008. 208p. Library of America, $20 (9781598530322). 811. Like so many great stylists, film critic, novelist, and journalist Agee (1909-55) wrote poetry first. Editor...

Seven Deadly Sins: A Very Partial List.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Seven Deadly Sins: A Very Partial List. By Aviad Kleinberg. Tr. by Susan Emanuel. Oct. 2008.208p. Harvard/Belknap, $22.95 (9780674031418). 241. Kleinberg's Israeli best-selier is a learned, sometimes personal look at sloth, envy,...

A Short Life of Jonathan Edwards.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... A Short Life of Jonathan Edwards. By George M. Marsden. Oct. 2008. 172p. illus. Eerdmans. paper, $15 (9780802802200). 285.8092. The author of the magisterial Jonathan Edwards (2003) has written an entirely new book for Eerdmans'...

Top 10 religion books.(Adult)
October 1, 2008... Booklist's most warmly reviewed books on religion during the last 12 months share one quality. They are, to a title, revelatory.--Ray Olson American Crescent: A Muslim Cleric on the Power of His Faith, the Struggle against Prejudice, and...

The Wordy Shipmates.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... * The Wordy Shipmates. By Sarah Vowell. Oct. 2008. 272p. Riverhead, $24.95 (9781594489990). 974.088. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Although Puritanism is conflated with modern religious fundamentalism and its disregard for any...

Superstition: Belief in the Age of Science.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Superstition: Belief in the Age of Science. By Robert L. Park. Nov. 2008. 240p. Princeton, $24.95 (9780691133553). 215. For Princeton physicist Park, science serves as a rapier for skewering all beliefs not sustained by empirical...

Tell It Slant: A Conversation on the Language of Jesus in His Stories and Prayers.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Tell It Slant: A Conversation on the Language of Jesus in His Stories and Prayers. By Eugene H. Peterson. Oct. 2008. 284p. Eerdmans, $24 (9780802829542). 226. Taking his theme from a famous Dickinson poem, Peterson searches the...

Unholy Business: A True Tale of Faith, Greed, and Forgery in the Holy Land.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Unholy Business: A True Tale of Faith, Greed, and Forgery in the Holy Land. By Nina Burleigh. Oct. 2008. 288p. illus. Smithsonian, $27.50 (9780061458453). 933. Shrewd and piquant journalist Burleigh, whose last book, Mirage...

Your Spirits Walk beside Us: The Politics of Black Religion.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Your Spirits Walk beside Us: The Politics of Black Religion. By Barbara Dianne Savage. Nov. 2008. 298p. Belknap, $27.95 (9780674031777). 277.3. The debate about the role and relevance of religion in the social and political lives...

Best New American Voices, 2009.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Best New American Voices, 2009. Ed. by Mary Gaitskill. 2008. 368p. Harcourt, paper, $14 (9780156034319). In her introduction to the latest volume in this annual series, guest editor Gaitskill writes that, contrary to the visual...

Canvey Island.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Canvey Island. By James Runcie. Nov. 2008. 312p. Other, $13.95 (9781590512937). In 1953 Canvey Island, off the coast of Britain, suffered the iii effects of a storm surge, which flooded the island. In this fictionalized account of...

The Four Seasons: A Novel of Vivaldi's Venice.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... The Four Seasons: A Novel of Vivaldi's Venice. By Laurel Corona. Oct. 2008. 352p. Hyperion, paper, $14.95 (9781401309268). Coronas richly historical novel imagines the lives of two sisters born in eighteenth-century Venice and left...

Ghosts of Chicago.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Ghosts of Chicago. By John McNally. Oct. 2008. 274p. Jefferson, $22.95 (9780980016437). McNally follows two smart and rambunctious novels with a triumphant return to the short story. His second collection (his award-winning debut...

Gone Tomorrow.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... Gone Tomorrow. By P. F. Kluge. Nov. 2008. 288p. Overlook, $24.95 (9781590200902). George Canaris, an aged professor and formerly famed author, turns up dead from a hit-and-run accident in the midwestern college town where he...

The Journey.(Brief article)(Book review)
October 1, 2008... The Journey. By H. G. Adler. Tr. by Peter Filkins. Nov. 2008. 320p. Random, $26 (9781400066735). One of the few German-speaking Jewish novelists to survive the Holocaust, Adler draws on his personal experience for this story of a...