Books
As is the case with effective satirists, Will Self is nothing if not provocative.
Daniel Okrent’s “Art Isn’t Easy” is an engaging if familiar introduction to one of theater’s most complex figures – though seasoned Stephen Sondheim devotees may find themselves wanting more.
I cannot recall reading a more poignant and persuasive description of the inexorable descent of Alzheimer’s disease, certainly not from inside the sufferer’s mind.
“Listening to Prestige” can be read as a kind of post-literate anti-Spotify. And, lo and behold, it’s true jazz history.
Two new biographies spotlight women whose remarkable achievements have enriched our understanding of our world.
An engaging and entertaining mystery, told in an evocative period setting, that deconstructs narrative conventions, analyzes the artifice of identity, and critiques the capitalist patriarchal system.
“Dealing With the Dead” achieves something else no outsider, however gifted or knowledgeable, could pull off: showing how magic, superstition, religious faith and credulity (as in, a hunger to believe) play into the everyday lives of most Pointe-Noireans.
Sliding back and forth between the past and the present, “Eating Ashes” paints a gritty, emotional, and forceful vision of a family traumatized by disconnection.
Gary Lippman’s latest offering is the least classifiable of his books so far. It’s an inventive assemblage of fiction, historical anecdotes, autobiography, authorial meditations (and advice), quotes, song lyrics, and literary allusions.
Stealing the future and concealing the theft — capitalism’s method, which, according to this well-argued book, is incompatible with sustaining the global climate and democracy.
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