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Reviews

Reviews

by Heidi Julavits - Fiction

Julia Severn is a student at an elite institute for psychics. Her mentor, Madame Ackermann, afflicted by jealousy, refuses to pass the torch to her young disciple. Instead, she subjects Julia to the humiliation of reliving her mother's suicide when Julia was an infant. As the two lock horns, Madame Ackermann launches a desperate psychic attack that leaves Julia the victim of a crippling ailment.

by Hilma Wolitzer - Fiction

When Edward Schuyler, a modest 62-year-old science teacher, is widowed, he finds himself ambushed by female attention. Edward is still in mourning, but when his stepchildren place a personal ad in the newspaper for him, he is torn between his loyalty to Bee’s memory and his growing longing for connection.

by Pico Iyer - Nonfiction

Pico Iyer sets out to unravel the mysterious closeness he has always felt with English writer Graham Greene. He investigates all he has in common with Greene, and the deeper he delves, the more he begins to wonder if the man within his head is not Greene but his own father --- or even himself.

written by Hunter S. Thompson, edited by Jann S. Wenner - Essays, Nonfiction

This is a definitive, hand-picked selection of Hunter S. Thompson's finest pieces ever published in Rolling Stone --- the magazine that helped to put him on the map in the 1970s. 

by William Gibson - Essays, Nonfiction, Popular Culture

Though best known for his fiction, William Gibson is as much in demand for his cutting-edge observations on the world we live in now. Originally printed in publications as varied as Wired, the New York Times and the Observer, these articles and essays cover 30 years of thoughtful, observant life, and are reported in the wry, humane voice that lovers of Gibson have come to crave.

by Charles J. Shields - Biography, Nonfiction

AND SO IT GOES is the culmination of five years of research and writing --- the first-ever biography of the life of Kurt Vonnegut Jr., a writer who changed the conversation of American literature.

by Walter Isaacson - Biography, Nonfiction

Based on more than 40 interviews with Apple cofounder Steve Jobs conducted over two years --- as well as interviews with more than a hundred family members, friends, adversaries, competitors and colleagues --- Walter Isaacson has written a riveting story of the rollercoaster life and searingly intense personality of a creative entrepreneur whose passion for perfection and ferocious drive revolutionized six industries: personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing and digital publishing. Driven by demons, Jobs could drive those around him to fury and despair. But his personality and products were interrelated, just as Apple’s hardware and software tended to be, as if part of an integrated system.

by Joan Didion - Nonfiction

In her first book since THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING, Joan Didion has now written with stunning frankness about her daughter, Quintana Roo, as well as thoughts and fears about having children and about growing old.

by Michael Ondaatje - Fiction, Literary Fiction

Many stories have been written about journeys at sea, but it is less common to see such a journey combined with a coming-of-age tale. This is exactly what Michael Ondaatje has done in his latest book, THE CAT'S TABLE. This story, though fictional --- and very imaginative--- is drawn from Ondaatje’s own life; he took the very same voyage at the same age. Through a number of characters that our reviewer Harvey Freedenberg calls “colorful and enigmatic,” Mynah begins to learn about how the adult world works. Harvey says the book “is a tale Michael Ondaatje someday was destined to tell. It’s a pleasure for us, his readers, to share in that telling.”

by Justin Torres - Fiction

Three brothers grow up in a frenzied and dysfunctional family filled with chaos, heartbreak and, ultimately, intense unconditional love.