Book 'em

New Books | Coming Soon | Obituaries | Awards

Book 'em looks at selected books that are on, or have recently been on, the New Book display, as well as other news in the world of books.  A complete list of books (and other materials) cataloged in the past month may be found at http://hiraml.hiram.edu/ftlist.  Book 'em is published monthly from August through May and is distributed to "subscribers" by email notification.  If you would like to become a subscriber or just make a comment, email the editor, David Everett at everettdd@hiram.edu.

Welcome back from Spring Break!  I hope everyone had a safe and relaxing break.  The library staff spent its break continuing to get books out onto the New Book Shelf.  So this list is a bit on the long side! 

New Books

Fiction

Canadian writer Alice Munro is back with The View From Castle Rock: Stories (New York: Knopf, 2006 - call number F M9265v), her latest collection of short stories.

Loud Sparrows: Contemporary Chinese Short-shorts (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006 - call number F L925) is exactly what the subtitle says with the stories selected and translated by Aili Mu, Julie Chiu, and Howard Goldblatt.

First serialized in 1865 in The Christian Recorder and then lost to history, Julia C. Collins's The Curse of Caste, or, The Salve Bride: A Rediscovered African American Novel (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006 - call number F C6845c) is, according to editors William L. Andrews (English, University of North Carolina) and Mitch Kachun (history, Western Michigan University), the first non0biographical novel by an African American woman.  Andrews and Kachun provide a long introduction to the work.

Historian Alison Weir (Eleanor of Aquitaine, War of the Roses, Life of Elizabeth I, among others) tells the story of Lady Jane Grey her first historical novel, Innocent Traitor (London: Hutchinson, 2006 - call number F W4336i).

Keeping with the themes of first novels and historical novels, first-time novelist Janis Cooke Newman tells the story of one of America's most mysterious women, Mary Todd Lincoln, in Mary: A Novel (San Francisco: MacAdam/Cage, 2006 - call number F N4651m).

Continuing the fictionalized biography theme is Sena Jeter Naslund's Abundance: A Novel of Marie Antoinette (New York: William Morrow, 2006 - call number F N178a).

In Bleeding Hearts: A Novel (New York: Little, Brown, 2006 - call number F R167b) Ian Rankin steps outside the Inspector Rebus series for a stand-alone novel originally published in 1994 in Great Britain under the name Jack Harvey.




Non-Fiction

American popular music is the topic of two new books.  In The Songs that Fought the War: Popular Music and the Home Front, 1939-1945 (Waltham, MA: Brandeis University Press, 2006 - call number 782.421599 Jon), John Bush Jones looks at the outpouring of popular music as the brink of America's involvement in World War II and during the war, as well as the effect of the war on popular music.  Which Side Are You On?: An Inside History of the Folk Revival in America (New York: Continuum, 2005 - call number 781.6213 Wei) provides a personal look at American folk music from the 1930s to Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger to Bob Dylan and Joan Baez to today and Bela Fleck, Nickel Creek, and Ani DiFranco.  The author, Dick Weissman was a member of the folk group, The Journeymen, along with John Phillips (who went on to found the Mamas and the Papas) and Scott McKenzie (known, for better or for worse, for the 1960s hit, "San Francisco, Wear Some Flowers in Your Hair").

Math is the subject in Paul J. Nahin's Dr. Euler's Fabulous Formula: Cures Many Mathematical Ills (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006 - call number 512.788 Nah), which looks at the history of the groundbreaking formula, still at the heart of complex number theory, developed by mid-eighteenth century Swiss mathematician Leonhard Euler.  The work is a sequel to Nahin's An Imaginary Tale: The Story of √-1.

Recently there have been a number of new books on anti-Americanism around the world.  Now available is Anti-Americanism in Latin America and the Caribbean (New York: Berghahn, 2006 - call number 327.730729 Ant), a collection of essays edited by Alan McPherson in which each essays deals with anti-Americanism, often in historical context, in one specific country.

Four new books deal with environmental art and artists.  Nature, the End of Art: Environmental Landscapes (New York: D. A. P., 2004 - call number 709.0407 Son), by artist Alan Sonfist, provides an interview with Sonfist, several essays, and lots of illustrations of the artist's work.   The Sculpture of Ursula von Rydingsvard (New York: Hudson Hills Press, 1996 - call number 730.92 Von) provides illustrations of her work, along with three essays about her and her work.  Art critic Hubert Besacier provides color photographs of the work of artist Nils-Udo along with text and commentary in Nils-Udo: Art in Nature ([Paris]: Flammarion, 2002 - call number Q 730.92 Nil-B).  In The Sculpture of David Nash (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1999 - call number Q 730.92 Nas-A), Julian Andrews provides analysis and illustrations of Nash's work.

Water and its use is the topic of Peter Annin's Great Lakes Water Wars (Washington, DC: Island Press, 2006 - call number 333.9163097 Ann), which looks at how the water in the Great Lakes, one of the world's larges reservoirs, is used by more than forty million Americans and Canadians living in the Great Lakes basis and at what the future might hold for those of us living in that area.

How many of us remember summer camp?  In Manufactured Wilderness: Summer Camps and the Shaping of American Youth, 1890-1960 (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006 - call number 796.540973 Van), Abigail A. Van Slyck looks a the landscape and architecture of summer camps, arguing they provided a man-made version of the wilderness shaped by middle-class anxieties.  Van Slyck teachers art history at Connecticut College so there are lots of photographs and illustrations.

Vampires are the topic of Legends of Blood: The Vampire in History and Myth (Westport: CT: Praeger, 2006 - call number 398.21 Bar) in which W. B. Bartlett and Flavia Idriceanu look at the history of the vampire myth from ancient Greece and Egypt to the present.  If you read The Historian: A Novel by Elizabeth Kostova a few years ago and want to know more about the vampire myth, check this one out.

Two new books on writing should appeal to aspiring authors.  Francine Prose's Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them (New York: HarperCollins, 2006 - call number 808.02 Pro 2006) is both a how-to book and a meditation on how careful and slow reading can help lead to good writing.  Robert Olen Butler brings together aspects of his lectures from his writing "boot camp" and his online projects to focus on the emotional aspects of writing rather than the intellectual in From Where You Dream: The Process of Writing Fiction (New York: Grove, 2005 - call number 808.3 But).

Medical history and African American history come together in a new book that has been getting some press notice. While most of us have heard of the Tuskegee experiments, Harriet A. Washington covers far more, as the subtitle suggests, in Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present (New York: Doubleday, 2006 - call number 174.28 Was)

One aspect of Amish culture is the subject of Tom Shachtman's Rumspringa: To Be or Not to Be Amish (New York: North Point Press, 2006 - call number 305.2350882 Sha).  Based largely on his research for the documentary The Devil's Playground (the DVD is on order), filmmaker Shachtman looks at the Amish ritual of Rumspringa (or "running around") when sixteen year old Amish youth are allowed outside the Amish life to experience the world before, it is hoped, committing to a life in the Amish community.

A Month at the Front: The Diary of an Unknown Soldier (Oxford: Bodleian Library, 2006 - call number 940.48141 Mon) looks at one month in the life of a soldier from the 12th East Surrey regiment serving at the front during World War I.  John Pinford's introduction provides an overview of the manuscript and the efforts to identify the author.

Biographies seem to be everywhere this month.  Two more focus on Benjamin Franklin, not surprising since 2006 was the 300th anniversary of his birth.  Joyce E. Chaplin (history, Harvard) provides a biography of Franklin with the emphasis on his work in the sciences, arguing, in The First Scientific American: Benjamin Franklin and the Pursuit of Genius (New York: Basic Books, 2006 - call number 509.2 Fra-C), that it was his genius in science that made him the man and Founding Father we know today.  Stanley Finger (psychology, Washington University) focuses on Franklin's contributions to the medical knowledge of his time in Doctor Franklin's Medicine (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, 2006 - call number 610.92 Fra-F).  Among other contributions, Franklin helped establish the first medical school in the colonies, as well as the first civilian hospital.

Two giants of American business are also the subject of new biographies.  David Nasaw's Andrew Carnegie (New York: Penguin, 2006 - call number 338.47672 Car-N) is the story of the self-made millionaire from his birth in Scotland through his emigration to the United States as a child with his family, his business success, and his philanthropy to his death in 1919.  Mellon: An American Life (New York: Knopf, 2006 - call number 336.73092 Mel-C) is David Cannadine's biography of the Pittsburgh-born business man (mostly in banking), government servant (cabinet member and Ambassador to Great Britain), and philanthropist from his birth in 1855 to his death in 1937.

Three other biographies are also on the new book shelf.  Godfrey Hodgson's Woodrow Wilson's Right Hand: The Life of Colonel Edward M. House (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2006 - call number 973.913 Hou-H) is a biography of House with an emphasis on House's influence on American foreign policy in the 20th century.

Sports columnist Mike Freeman looks at the life of Jim Brown, football player and activist, and the man many consider to be the best football player ever (as well as the best lacrosse player ever) in Jim Brown: The Fierce Life of an American Hero (New York: William Morrow, 2006 - call number 796.332092 Bro-F).

Dale Peterson's Jane Goodall: The Woman Who Redefined Man (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006 - call number 690.92 Goo-P) is the biography of the woman whose research on chimps changed the way we define man, but who struggled to be taken seriously as a scientist.

At the same time, you might want to check out Women and Science: Social Impact and Interaction (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2006 - call number 305.435 She), in which Suzanne Le-May Sheffield looks at the successes of women scientists and the challenges and barriers they faced from the Scientific Revolution to the present.

This month also highlights a new memoir.  In Behind the Veil: An American Woman's Memoir of the 1979 Hostage Crisis (Akron, OH: University of Akron Press, 2007 - call number 955.054 Joh), Akron native and current English Professor at the University of Akron Wayne College Debra Johanyak tells of her life in Iran as the wife of an Iranian, mother of two, and a teaching assistant at Shiraz University when the American Embassy was captured by militants and the residents taken hostage.  A more standard historical approach to the Hostage Crisis can be found in Guests of the Ayatollah: The First Battle in America's War with Militant Islam, which was mentioned in the September 2006 issue of Book 'em.

Terrorism has not been limited to the Middle East as Gary McGladdery shows by looking at the terror and bombing campaign of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in England, taking the chronology back to 1867 and into 2001 in The Provisional IRA in England: The Bombing Campaign 1973-1997 (Dublin: Irish Academic Press, 2006 - call number 941.085 Mcg).

Finally, there is A Prisoner in the Garden: The Nelson Mandela Foundation (New York: Viking Studio, 2006 - call number 968.05 Man-P), which reprints photographs, letters, and notes from Nelson Mandela's twenty-seven years in prison on Robben Island.



Juvenile

The Higher Power of Lucky (New York: Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2006 - call number JF P276h) by Susan Patron won the 2007 Newbery Medal and has been the subject of controversy.  You will have to read it to find out why!

Jennifer Holm's Penny from Heaven (New York: Random House, 2006 - call number JF H730p) is a Newbery Honor winner, the second for Holm, who also won an honor in 2000 with Our Only May Amelia.

Nobel Peace Prize winner Rigoberto Menchu re-tells stories from her childhood in Guatemala in Girl From Chimel (Toronto: Groundwood, 2000 - call number J 972.8100497 Men).

Grandfather's Dance (New York: Joanna Cotler Books, 2006 - call number JF M220g) by Patricia MacLachan is the fifth and final book in the Wittig family saga that began with Sarah, Plain and Tall.

Jane Yolen re-tells favorite fairy tales and Heidi E. Y. Stemple provides a recipe based on each tale in the charming Fairy Tale Feasts: A Literary Cookbook for Young Readers and Eaters (Northampton, MA: Crocodile Books, 2006 - call number 641.5123 Yol).

In An Apple for Harriet Tubman (Morton Grove, IL: Albert Whitman, 2006 - call number J 973.7115 Tub-T), Glennette Tilley Turner tells how, as a child in slavery, Tubman could only pick and wash the apples, not eat them.  Thus, apples became a symbol of freedom to Tubman, who planted an orchard at her home in upstate New York.

Carole Boston Weatherford's Dear Mr. Rosenwald (New York: Scholastic Press, 2006 - call number JF W3748d) tells the story of a poor African American community's attempt to raise money for a new school.  Based on the true story of the Rosenwald schools (Julius Rosenwald was president of Sears, Roebuck, and Co.) build in the 1920s and 1930s.

In On Top of Spaghetti (New York: Scholastic Press, 2006 - call number JF J6362o), Paul Brett Johnson writes and illustrates the story of the meatball along side Tom Glazer's lyrics that parody "On Top of Old Smoky."
 

Coming Soon

The following titles are about to be published, on-order, or are in process.  Keep an eye out for them on the New Book Shelf in the library.

Just in time for the baseball season comes Jim Reisler's Babe Ruth: Launching the Legend. 

Reading the Beatles: Cultural Studies, Literary Criticism, and the Fab Four, edited by Kenneth Womack and Todd F. Davis because, apparently, you cannot have too many books about the Beatles.

The Way We Write: Interviews with Award-Winning Writers, edited by Barbara Baker includes interviews with, among others, Joyce Carol Oates and Michael Bond who wrote the children's series about Paddington.

Christopher Leslie Brown.  Moral Capital: Foundations of British Abolitionism.  If you want to know more than the movie Amazing Grace.

Carol Fisher.  The American Cookbook: A History.  And don't forget to look for the 75th anniversary edition of The Joy of Cooking, which is already on the New Book Shelf.

Obituaries

Nelson W. Polsby on February 6 at age 72.  Polsby, a political scientist, studied and wrote about the Congress and the Presidency in books such as Consequences of Party Reform and Presidential Elections: Strategies of American Electoral Politics.

Fred Mustard Stewart on February 7 at age 74.  Stewart, a writer of popular, best-seller novels including horror, science fiction, and family narratives, is best known for works such as The Mephisto Waltz (his first in 1969, which became a film in 1971 with Alan Alda), Six Weeks (a film in 1982 with Mary Tyler Moore), and Ellis Island (a CBS mini-series)

Elliott Baker on February 9 at age 84.  Baker, a screenwriter and novelist, is probably best known for his first novel, A Fine Madness, which became a film starring Sean Connery and for which Baker also wrote the screenplay. 

Joseph Low on February 12 at age 95.  A illustrator best known for covers of The New Yorker, he also won a Caldecott honor award for his illustration of the children's book Mice Twice.  Among the other children's books Low illustrated are How a Seed Grows and Spider Silk.

Emmett Williams on February 14 at age 81.  A poet, Williams was a founding member of Fluxus, a performance-oriented avant-garde art movement of the 1960s.  He is probably best known for editing The Anthology of Concrete Poetry and his Sweethearts, as well as several collections of his poetry.

Mai Ghoussoub on February 17 at age 54.  Born in Lebanon, Ghoussoub was an author, playwright, journalist, sculptor, and publishers.  Among her most noted works are Leaving Beirut: Women and the Wars Within and Imagined Masculinities: Male Identity and Culture in the Modern Middle East, co-edited with Emma Sinclair-Webb.

Winthrop D. Jordan on February 23 at age 75.  A National Book Award-winning historian, Jordan is probably best known for his works White Over Black: American Attitudes Toward the Negro, 1550-1812, which won both a National Book Award and a Bancroft Prize, and Tumult and Silence at Second Creek: An Inquiry into a Civil War Slave Conspiracy, which won Jordan a second Bancroft Prize.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. on February 28 at age 89.  Schlesinger wrote more than 20 books, served in the administration of John F. Kennedy, and worked on the presidential campaigns of both John and Bobby Kennedy.  The son of another eminent historian, Schlesinger was born in Columbus, Ohio.  Among his books are A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House, Robert Kennedy and His Times, and The Age of Roosevelt, a multivolume history of the New Deal consisting of Crisis of the Old Order, 1919-1933, The Coming of the New Deal, and the Politics of Upheaval.

Henri Troyat on March 4 at age 95.  Although born in Russia, Troyat is known for his work in France that included a number of biographies of Ivan the Terrible, Tolstoy, Chekhov, and many others.  He also wrote novels including The Red and the White.

 

Awards

The Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award, with a prize of $100,000 was awarded to Rodney Jones for his collection Salvation Blues.  The Kate Tufts Discovery Award, with a prize of $10,000 was awarded to Eric McHenry for his book Potscrubber Lullabies.  For more information on these two poetry awards, see http://www.cgu.edu/tufts/.

Frank Bidart won the Bollingen Prize in American Poetry, awarded by the Yale University Library.  The Prize carries a cash award of $100,000 and is awarded every two years to an American poet for the best book published in that time or for lifetime achievement.  Bidart has published four volumes of poetry including In the Western Night: Collected Poems, 1965-90.  More information on the Bollingen Prize in American Poetry can be found at http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/bollingen/