All Book Reviews
'Everybody's Fool' revisits Sully Sullivan and his crumbling hometownPulitzer Prize winner Russo鈥檚 return to his fictional upstate New York mill town also marks a welcome return to the hard-bitten, hard-drinking, hardscrabble comedy of his first novels.
'Peter Arno' celebrates the iconic, one-of-a-kind New Yorker cartoonistIn Michael Maslin鈥檚 dazzling, well-illustrated biography, Arno鈥檚 story is told with skill and flair.
'American Rhapsody' is a dazzling slice of American cultural historyFrom Edith Wharton to Nina Simone, New Yorker writer Claudia Roth Pierpont brings 20th-century America alive.
'Valiant Ambition' offers a more nuanced history of Benedict ArnoldNathaniel Philbrick shows that while a major gulf of character did separate Arnold and Washington, the former was more sympathetic and the latter more flawed than the popular mythology suggests.
'A Self-Made Man' follows Abraham Lincoln from youth to political hustlerBlumenthal's new biography of Lincoln 鈥� the first of a multi-volume project 鈥� is engaging, informative, meandering.
'The Noise of Time' blends Shostakovich, Stalin, the meaning of artJulian Barnes weaves his new novel from the true story of Russian composer Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich.
'Booked' asks tweens to consider the idea that being smart could be coolNewbery medal-winner Kwame Alexander brings soccer, poetry, and teen life together in a compelling narrative for middle-grade readers.
'Zero K' is Don DeLillo's spare but bracing assessment of life's later yearsRoss Lockhart, a super-wealthy businessman, has holed up in a facility in the barren chaparral of Kyrgyzstan, hoping to cheat death through cryonic suspension.
'Pumpkinflowers,' a memoir by an Israeli soldier, questions the battleWas a small hilltop in southern Lebanon worth the lives that were lost there?
'The Morning They Came for Us' conveys the grim story of SyriaA journalist refuses to let readers forget Syria.
'Scarlett Epstein Hates It Here' is full of penetrating insights into teens' livesThis debut novel makes important points about poverty, bullying, and popularity.
'Ghetto' tells the 500-year history of the word and the institutionFrom the Venetian Jewish ghetto of the 1500s through Harlem and South Central LA, Princeton professor聽Mitchell Duneier profiles an urban phenomenon.
'Far and Away' lets readers travel the world with Andrew SolomonA lifetime of travel writing by Solomon includes a wide array of adventures, all wonderfully observed.
'Her Again' tells how Meryl Streep became a starEven as a teenager, Meryl Streep was already a standout.
'Free Verse' is the tale of a young girl saved by words and loveWhere 'Free Verse' diverges from the typical words-saved-my-life narrative is in the way it chronicles Sasha鈥檚 development as a writer.
'America's War for the Greater Middle East' surveys decades of failed policyThe note of precisely controlled anger in this book is nothing short of mesmerizing.
'The Lost Book of Moses' is a mystery of biblical proportionsDecades before the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, did a Jerusalem antiquities dealer really find a first draft of the Bible?
'The Summer Before the War' speaks directly to Downton Abbey fansHelen Simonson, author of 'Major Pettigrew's Last Stand,' lovingly recreates the days before World War I, an era about to be obliterated by the twin agents of technology and war.
'Till We Have Built Jerusalem' blends architecture, identity, and historyHoffman鈥檚 engaging book delves into biography, architectural and political history, and reportage in this ancient and troubled city.
'The Fires of Spring' tries to make sense of Arab SpringVeteran Middle East hand Shelly Culbertson weaves history, culture, politics, and economics into a cohesive narrative.
