Your source for information on the latest and greatest in reading arts and entertainment!

Monday, June 28, 2010

Stuart Woods.... Lucid Intervals




Stone Barrington continues to enjoy good food, good drink, and good sex provided by an eager succession of beautiful women in bestseller Woods's smooth 18th novel to feature the New York City attorney (after Kisser). Unstable ex-wife Dolce Bianci once again menaces Stone; walking catastrophe Herbie Fisher pays Stone a $1 million retainer to keep him, Herbie, out of trouble; and attractive British intelligence officer Felicity Devonshire hires Stone to find Stanley Whitestone, an ex-agent still wanted by her superiors after 12 years and recently spotted in New York. Stone walks a tricky ethical line by agreeing to work for Jim Hackett, who owns a large private security firm, and who may in fact be Whitestone. Stone's powerful cop friend, Dino Bacchetti, is ready to do favors or share a Knob Creek bourbon at Elaine's. Woods mixes danger and humor into a racy concoction that will leave readers thirsty for more.

New Audiobooks!


When he is ambushed in Indonesia, Bourne fakes his death in an attempt to discover his enemy's true identity. Meanwhile, an American jet is shot down over Egypt, apparently by an Iranian missile. Soraya Moore is tasked with handling the situation. However, when Bourne's search coincides with Moore's mission, they team up to take down a common enemy.



After crushing his enemies and wedding the Queen Sharleyan, Cayleb Ahrmahk transforms the Charisian Empire into Safehold's greatest naval power. However, when the Church of God Awaiting decrees that Charis be destroyed for heresy, Cayleb must call on his friend, warrior-monk Merlin Athrawes, to help him face an impossible battle.





Account of wrongful acts and on-going cover-ups, Jesse Ventura takes a systematic look at the wide gap between what the American government knows and what it reveals to the American people. Topics discussed range from the murder of Abraham Lincoln and the assassinations of the Kennedys and Martin Luther King to today's bailout plan by the Federal Reserve.



Here, an American art historian turned Army sleuth races to stay one step ahead of Nazi thugs who have absconded with the sacred Crown Jewels of the Holy Roman Empire and their plot to create a Fourth Reich.








In 13 Bankers, prominent economist Simon Johnson and James Kwak show why our future is imperiled by the ideology of finance and by Wall Street's political control of government policy pertaining to it. Johnson and Kwak examine not only how Wall Street's ideology, wealth, and political power among policy makers in Washington led to the financial debacle of 2008, but also what the lessons learned portend for the future. To restore health and balance to our economy, Johnson and Kwak make a radical yet feasible and focused proposal: reconfigure the megabanks to be 'small enought to fail'.

Friday, June 25, 2010

Mission of Honor. Book Signing.


Book Revue in Huntington is hosting a series of book signings this summer; starting with David Weber.

Thursday, July 1st, 7pm

Bestselling science fiction and fantasy author DAVID WEBER will speak
about and sign the latest installment in his Honor Harrington series,
Mission of Honor.

The Star Kingdom of Manticore and the Republic of Haven have been
enemies for Honor Harrington's entire life, and she has paid a price
for the victories she's achieved in that conflict. And now the
unstoppable juggernaut of the mighty Solarian League is on a collision
course with Manticore. The millions who have already died may have
been only a foretaste of the billions of casualties just over the
horizon, and Honor sees it coming.

She's prepared to do anything, risk anything, to stop it, and she has
a plan that may finally bring an end to the Havenite Wars and give
even the Solarian League pause. But there are things not even Honor
knows about. There are forces in play, hidden enemies in motion, all
converging on the Star Kingdom of Manticore to crush the very life out
of it, and Honor's worst nightmares fall short of the oncoming
reality.

But Manticore's enemies may not have thought of everything after all.
Because if everything Honor Harrington loves is going down to
destruction, it won't be going alone.

Thursday, June 24, 2010

New York Times Literary Treat of the Week......


Ward, Vicky. The Devil's Casino: Friendship, Betrayal and the High Stakes Games Played Inside Lehman Brothers.

The aftermath to the collapse of the 158-year-old Wall Street firm is still being played out in today's headlines nearly two years after the event. Ward, a Vanity Fair contributing editor and CNBC commentator, provides perspective going back over a quarter-century to chronicle what led to this fallout. She is able to do so in a fast-moving 270 pages due to choosing not to explain the global banking collapse but instead tell about the Lehman executives who contributed to it. Chief executive Richard Fuld is depicted as creating an environment addicted to money. Second in command T. Christopher Petit tried to turn the destructive tide but also fell prey to the lure of success before dying in 1997. Many in "The Devil's Casino" are pictured as deniers of coming realities which are still coming to light on the evening news.


Reviewed by:Librarian,Bob

Monday, June 21, 2010

New Non-Fiction DVDs


Must See Places of the World - America's National Parks:

Award-winning cinematographers transport viewers on the ultimate escape, a thrilling visual journey to America's most breathtaking national treasures. The National Park System comprises 391 areas covering more than 84 million acres of amazing wildlife and America's most compelling natural landscapes. This set focuses on the grand jewels of the National Parks.

Must See Places of the World - Mystic Places:

With brilliant cinematography, Mystic Lands chronicles a diverse array of sacred sites around the world. The idyllic places where man communes with the sacred are as varied as they are fascinating. Viewers can explore the vibrant mystic traces from ancient cultures, from tantric meditation amidst the Shangri-La beauty of Bhutan, to the never photographed Zoroastrian eternal flame glowing bright for 2,500 years in Iran, and more.

Must See Places of the World:

Viewers can experience a cavalcade of stunning and awe-inspiring sights whenever they want. The Must-See itinerary includes unforgettable visits to Victoria Falls; the Taj Mahal; the Great Wall of China; the Galapagos Islands; the Great Barrier Reef; Serengeti National Park; Angkor Wat; and much More!

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Furious Love




Life outdoes movie melodrama in this raucous, intimate, dual biography of Hollywood's ultimate It Couple. As told by journalist Kashner (Sinatraland) and biographer Schoenberger (Dangerous Muse: The Life of Caroline Blackwood), the romance between the glittering Tinseltown diva and the sonorous, self-loathing Shakespearean reprises their co-starring movie roles: it has the passion of Cleopatra (the Vatican condemned their on-set adultery as erotic vagrancy), the riotous merriment of The Taming of the Shrew, the poisonous marital fights of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and a cast of thousands of paparazzi and shrieking fans. The well-researched narrative—the authors make good use of Burton's engaging love letters and diary entries—offers juicy details of his epic alcoholism and her towering tantrums, and is fascinated with the jewelry pieces, like the Taj Mahal diamond that Taylor famously extracted from Burton as tribute or penance. But from the binges and bling emerges a revealing portrait of the magnetic qualities—her vulgar warmth, his soulful virility—that glued the couple together. Here is that rare love story that holds one's interest beyond the wedding—and a reminder, after the thin gruel of Brangelina, of what a feast celebrity can be.

Thursday, June 17, 2010

New York Times Literary Treat of the Week......




Deaver, Jeffery. The Burning Wire.

“When sorrows come, they come not single spies but in battalions.” Compared to Claudius in Hamlet all that besets Lincoln Rhyme in this latest adventure may not be sorrowful, but they do occur all at once. First, the quadriplegic forensics genius must content with tamperers of New York City’s electrical grid who destroy a bus and create mayhem that could eventually bring the metropolis to a standstill. Second, Rhyme is aiding from afar Mexican police that might apprehend assassin Richard “The Watchmaker” Logan who escaped in Deaver’s Cold Moon. Last, a visit from a fellow wheelchair-bound party holds out hope that Rhyme may one day rise out of his apparatus and the chronic bad health that has accompanied it.

Other "Lincoln Rhyme" books by Jeffery Deaver at Merrick Library:

The Broken Window
The Cold Moon
The Twelfth Card
The Vanished Man
The Stone Monkey
The Empty Chair


reviewed by librarian, Bob.

Monday, June 14, 2010

Lauren Belfer



Saturday, June 19th, 7pm
Bestselling author of City of Light LAUREN BELFER will speak about and
sign her new novel, A Fierce Radiance, at Book Revenue in Huntington.

Lauren Belfer’s debut novel, City of Light, was a New York Times
bestseller, as well as a #1 Book Sense pick, a New York Times Notable
Book, a Library Journal Best Book, and a Main Selection of the
Book-of-the-Month Club. Now she returns with A Fierce Radiance, a
compelling, richly detailed tale of passion and intrigue set in New
York City during the tumultuous early days of World War II.

Uncharted TerriTORI



Tuesday, June 15th, 7pm

Actress and #1 New York Times Bestselling author TORI SPELLING will
sign her new book, uncharted terriTORI at Book Revue in Huntington.


Tori Spelling is an actress whose career spans theater, television,
and film. She's received critical praise for her work in such
independent films as Trick and The House of Yes. She both starred in
and executive produced the comedy series So NoTORIous on VH1 and the
popular reality series Tori & Dean: Inn Love on Oxygen. She lives with
her husband, Dean McDermott, son, Liam, and daughter, Stella, in Los
Angeles.

Shelf Awareness



Shelf Awareness:

Daily Enlightenment for the Book Trade, the free e-mail newsletter is dedicated to helping people in stores, in libraries and on the Web buy, sell and lend books most wisely.


http://www.shelf-awareness.com/index.html

Friday, June 11, 2010

New York Times Literary Treat of the Week...



Philbrick, Nathaniel. The Last Stand: Custer, Sitting Bull and the Battle of the Little Bighorn.

The tragedy that occurred June 25, 1876 has long been the subject of historical reenactments, movies, television programs and even jokes and works of satire. However, they are not based on completely uncontested facts given aftermath evidence and the lack of survivors. Fortunately, Philbrick is both a storyteller and an historian and thus able to mix the true and possible together into a gripping story. Lt. Col. George A. Custer is portrayed as an eccentric social animal who once organized a cavalry regiment according to horse color and was not largely respected by his soldiers contrary to fictional depictions. Custer's discovery of gold in the Black Hills (now South Dakota) was among the chief factors leading to the Little Bighorn confrontation. Philbrick speculates that the drunkenness of one of Custer's officers and the lateness of another well may have contributed to the massacre. A possible irony is that Custer's widow Elizabeth campaigned to clear his name (aided by Buffalo Bill Cody) even though the Colonel probably cheated on her.

Also by Nathaniel Philbrick at Merrick Library:

In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex
Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community and War
Revenge of the Whale: The True Story of the Whaleship Essex (in Young Adult section)


Reviewed by Librarian, Bob.

Thursday, June 10, 2010

The Book Bench from The New Yorker.




The Trouble With Recommending Books:Loose leafs from the New Yorker Books Department.

Posted by Deirdre Foley-Mendelssohn




Read more: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2010/06/the-trouble-with-recommending-books.html#ixzz0qTlrgBML


New Audiobook Arrivals!

Daniel Grey is no ordinary young man. Daniel has "the memory," the ability to recall past lives and recognize the souls of those he's previously known. And he has spent centuries falling in love with the same girl. Life after life, crossing continents and dynasties, he and Lucy (despite her changing name and form) have been drawn together -- and he remembers it all. It is both a gift and a curse. For all the many timesthey have come together throughout history, they have also been torn painfully, fatally, apart.



In 1908, a brilliant American battleship gun designer dies in a sensational apparent suicide. The man's grief-stricken daughter turns to the legendary Van Dorn Detective Agency to clear her father's name. Van Dorn puts his chief investigator on the case, and Isaac Bell soon realizes that the clues point not to suicide but to murder.






When young Waino Mellas, a Bravo Company lieutenant, is unceremoniously dropped into the jungle of Vietnam, he is instantly forced into manhood. Facing the horrors of war in Southeast Asia, Waino and his comrades embark on a long, torturous, bloody adventure, where the Vietnamese wilderness is just as dangerous as the enemy.





Through exhaustive research and extensive interviews, journalist and acclaimed author Guy Walters examines how Nazi war criminals escaped post-war Germany and evaded their pursuers. Some were eventually captured, while others spent the rest of their lives in hiding. However, they were all aided by others, including high-ranking and intellectual Europeans, Argentinean secret agents, or Western intelligence services. Here, Walters unfolds the story of Nazis escapees and their pursuers.

Friday, June 4, 2010

Charles Dickens: The First Great Travel Writer?


Travel Books:
Frank Bures digs into the legendary author's travel writing and finds some surprises.

Visit www.worldhum.com for the full article.

Back when the world wasn’t so known, travel writing wasn’t so much about being entertaining, or about letting the writer’s persona run wild. The point was to describe the world rather than to dance upon its stage. The purpose was to transport people to another part of the world in an edifiying, Victorian kind of way. It was something to make readers who couldn’t see the world become more worldly. It was more education than entertainment or art.

New York Times Literary Treat of the Week....




Gay, Timothy M. Satch, Dizzy and Rapid Robert: The Wild Saga of Interracial Baseball Before Jackie Robinson.

Recent documentaries about the game would have us believe nearly all ball players had regular jobs in the off season. Yet from the 1930s to the mid-40s many of the best from the majors and Negro Leagues spent their autumns in for-profit exhibition games played in big cities and small towns. Players from both organizations either faced other or were teammates long before Robinson and Dodgers general manager Branch Rickey broke the major league color barrier in 1947. Gay chronicles how during that period of "barnstorming" the lives of three future Hall of Fame pitchers were altered: the seemingly ageless Leroy "Satchel" Paige, the flamboyant Jerome "Dizzy" Dean, and the phenomenal fastballer Bob Feller. Given his touring vantage point, Feller once said Robinson was ill-equipped for the majors in that he could not handle pitches thrown inside. That was interpreted negatively by many, which is ironic when one remembers Paige (who became friends with Dean) and Feller became teammates on the 1948 world champion Cleveland Indians.

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Trouble Maker: Janet Evanovich




Alex Barnaby and Sam Hooker are back together and fighting crime the only way they know how by leaving a trail of chaos, panic, and disorder. Alex, an auto mechanic and spotter for racecar driver Sam Hooker, is drawn to trouble like a giant palmetto bug to a day-old taco. Unfortunately, she's also drawn to Hooker in the same fashion. There's no steering clear of trouble or Hooker when friends Rosa and Felicia call for help. A man has gone missing, and in order to find him Barnaby and Hooker will have to go deep into the underbelly of Miami and south Florida, surviving Petro Voodoo, explosions, gift- wrapped body parts, a deadly swamp chase, and Hooker's mom.

New York Times Literary Treat of the Week....



Orringer, Julie. The Invisible Bridge.

A sometimes overlooked fact about the Holocaust is that over 400,000 Hungarian Jews died at Nazi hands. Orringer, whose short story collection “How to Breathe Underwater” (also at Merrick Library) won two Pushcart Prizes, makes all too real in fiction what was faced by Hungary before and during World War Two. Andras Levy was a future architect studying in late 1930s Paris when his scholarship was cancelled by anti-Jewish laws. Andras does not return home alone. His wife, Klara, a ballet teacher has ties to a wealthy family in Hungary. They are separated when Andras is sent to a war labor camp where he is reunited with brother Tibor and contributes to a “subversive” camp newspaper. Meanwhile, Klara’s family fortune is bled dry by bribes paid to a puppet national government in order to keep a dark secret. An epilogue set in America serves as an effective backdrop to wind up this history-based saga of travail and tragedy.
Reviewed by Librarian, Bob.

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

New Audiobook Arrivals!



Tells the story of Manhattan columnist Carrie Bradshaw's high school years, her relationships with her peers, and how she became a writer.








At a family reunion, Special Agent Pendergast is finally overcoming the loss of his wife, who was mauled to death by a lion during an African safari. However, when Pendergast discovers that his wife's rifle was intentionally loaded with blanks, he is forced to reopen old wounds in an effort to locate those responsible for the violent killing.



Living among rats and roaches in a virtually abandoned unheated apartment building in Brooklyn, NY, 11-year-old Kimberly Chang narrates how, after recently immigrating from Hong Kong, she and her mother strive to eke out a life together working in an illegally run sweat shop. Though she was once the top-ranked pupil in her class in Hong Kong, Kimberly's English skills are so limited that she must struggle to keep up in school while still translating for her mother and attempting to hide the truth of her living situation from her well-to-do classmates.



Rosie Ferguson is seventeen and ready to enjoy the summer before her senior year of high school. But as the school year draws to a close, there are disturbing signs that the life Rosie claims to be leading is a sham, and that Elizabeth's hopes for her daughter to remain immune from the pull of the darker impulses of drugs and alcohol are dashed. Now, Elizabeth is forced to confront the fact that Rosie has been lying to her, and that her deceptions will have profound consequences



Leo Hathaway must marry and produce an heir within a year to save his family home. Catherine Marks is intriguing and infernally tempting but hides a secret that could utterly destroy her. Can two wary lovers find a way to banish the shadows and give into their desires?



Nobel Prize-winning physicist Michael Beard coasts through life, lending his name to scientific institutions, lecturing for a high price, and listlessly participating in the effort to end global warming. But when his fifth wife reveals her infidelities, Michael realizes he's still in love with her even as their relationship collapses. Decidedly taking advantage of an unexpected opportunity, Michael travels to New Mexico, hoping to save his career and marriage by stopping an ecological disaster.