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Imitation and Desire

A peek into B. H. Fairchild's verbal cinema.  Usher: Poems B. H. Fairchild W.W. Norton & Company, 128 pages $24.95B. H. Fairchild is an award-winning American poet whose tremendous narrative...

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The Little Terrorists

Chuck Palahniuk's new novel PYGMY is reviewed. Pygmyby Chuck Palahniuk Doubleday, 256 pages $24.95Sometime in mid 1999 frat boys discovered Fight Club. Ignored at the box office and loathed by critics,...

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Dying for Dummies

The difficulties of dying in America.  A Life Worth LivingRobert MartensenFarrar, Straus and Giroux240 pagesMy best friend's grandmother is in the hospital again. Over the past few years, she has been...

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Nothing to Worry About

An insider’s look at Walter Kirn’s Lost in the Meritocracy. Lost in the Meritocracy: The Undereducation of an OverachieverWalter Kirn Doubleday224 pagesA year or so after my grandfather died, my mother...

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A Matter of Life or Death

You know that the world is going to end. How do you live your life? Everything Matters!: A Novel Ron Currie, Jr. Viking320 pagesOne of the more curious features of Ron Currie Jr.’s apocalyptic debut...

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Youth in Repose

Raymond Zhong looks back on Jim Carroll's Basketball Diaries. The Basketball Diaries by Jim Carroll Penguin, 5th ed., 210 pp.When Jim Carroll slumped over his desk on 11 September of this year, felled...

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Pete’s Path to Literary Fame

I mean seriously, how hard can writing a bestseller really be? Steve Hely shows us in his novel How I Became a Famous Novelist.  How I Became a Famous Novelist Steve Hely Black Cat 322 pp I spent...

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Math for the People

Logicomix turns the quest for Foundational Mathematics into a graphic novel that even you would find interesting.  Logicomix: An Epic Search for TruthApostolos Doxiadis and Christos H....

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Three Movies a Week

David Warren reviews The Film Club by David Gilmour. The Film ClubBy David GilmourTwelveWhen I go home, my father and I watch movies. We aren’t critics by profession—only by habit—and so we pick...

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A City of Big Shoulders

Dominic Pacyga talks with Wunderkammer about his new book, Chicago: A Biography.A City of Big Shoulders and Thick Spines Chicago: A BiographyDominic A. PacygaUniversity Of Chicago PressIn talking with...

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Butchering Love

Dicing up Julie Powell's newest culinary obsession.Butchering Love Cleaving: A Story of Marriage, Meat, and ObsessionBy Julie PowellLittle, Brown and Company288 ppThe operative word being used to...

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Reading Minds

Neuroscience meets linguistics when Stanislas Dehaene studies how our minds decode language. Reading in the Brain: The Science and Evolution of a Human InventionBy Stanislas DehaeneViking, 388...

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Thin Air

Piecing together Nabokov’s 138 handwritten index cards.Thin AirPiecing together Nabokov’s 138 handwritten index cards.  The Original of LauraBy Vladimir NabokovKnopf, 304 pp.November 2009$35.00Vladimir...

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Tammy Wynette Exposed

Someone get Jimmy McDonough a job at US WeeklyTammy Wynette Exposed Someone get Jimmy McDonough a job at US Weekly Tammy Wynette: Tragic Country QueenJimmy McDonoughViking AdultWhen I was four years...

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Consider the Author

David Lipsky's account of a week with David Foster Wallace.Consider the AuthorDavid Lipsky's account of a week with David Foster Wallace.In the wake of Infinite Jest’s publication in 1996, author David...

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Fathers and Sons

Will Leitch loves baseball and men. Are We Winning?: Fathers and Sons in the New Golden Age of BaseballWill LeitchHyperionWill Leitch's new book, Are We Winning? Fathers and Sons in the new Golden Age...

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A Different Kind of Pirates

The intellectual property wars are much older than Napster.  Piracy: The Intellectual Property Wars from Gutenberg to GatesBy Adrian JohnsUniversity of Chicago Press“It is the beginning of a new...

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Design Shall Not Set You Free

A challenging look at Robert Grudin’s treatise on design’s saving powers.  Design and Truthby Robert GrudinYale University Press Design and Truth is a beautiful book. The “Quixotic Plum” (according to...

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The Pain Chronicles

We have not conquered pain...yet. The Pain Chronicles: Cures, Myths, Mysteries, Prayers, Diaries, Brain Scans, Healing, and the Science of SufferingMelanie ThernstromFarrar, Straus and Giroux, 364 pp....

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Long Way to Steinbeck

Driving from New York to San Francisco in search of John Steinbeck's America. Long Way Home: On the Trail of Steinbeck's AmericaBill BarichWalker and Company 240 pages Bill Barich, the author of eight...

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Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom

Enduring epic or just epithetic?Jonathan Franzen’s FreedomEnduring epic or just epithetic?I wonder what Jonathan Franzen thinks of Twitter. The ultimate democratic trinket, it allows absolutely anyone,...

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In the Company of Men

Brett Foster reviews Manthology.In the Company of Men  Manthology: Poems on the Male ExperienceEdited by Craig Crist-Evans, Roger Weingarten, Kate FetherstonUniversity Of Iowa Press200 pages   Remember...

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Body Work

Art and the new V. I. Warshawski novel.  Body WorkSara ParetskyPutnam464 pagesSara Paretsky’s newest mystery, Body Work (V.I. Warshawski Novel),opens with a murder. Tough-as-nails private eye V. I....

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Plenty of Fish in the Sea?

A look at the future of our scaly friends.Plenty of Fish in the Sea—Or Not A look at the future of our scaly friends. Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild FoodPaul GreenbergPenguin Press, 284 pp....

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Juárez According to Bowden

Journalism or comic book? A review of Murder City by Charles Bowden. Murder City: Ciudad Juarez and the Global Economy's New Killing FieldsBy Charles BowdenNation Books 352 pagesMurder City is the...

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A Finite Vision of Infinity

An investigation into Buddhism and race in White Noise.Don DeLillo’s Finite Vision of InfinityAn investigation into Buddhism and race in White NoiseThe Crusades, the Inquisition, jihad, “the events” of...

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This Ringing is Not New

Finding Rob Bell in the reactionary history of evangelicalism.This Ringing is Not NewFinding Rob Bell in the Reactionary History of EvangelicalismWhen a theological discussion within Evangelicalism...

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Difficult Knowledge

Brett Foster reviews Thomas Lynch's new collection of poetry, Walking Papers. Walking PapersBy Thomas LynchW. W. Norton, 88 pages $24.95Last year, the Chicago Humanities Festival concluded its focus on...

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Is boredom good for us?

Peter Toohey thinks so....Is boredom good for us?  Boredom: A Lively HistoryPeter TooheyYale University Press, 224 pages$26.00 In the days and weeks after Steve Jobs died, the Internet was flooded with...

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Beyond the Façade

 Vladimir Putin's Fragile Empire Fragile EmpireBen Judah Yale University Press, 400 pages$30.00As the Olympic festivities wind down in Sochi, western attention on Russia has been at levels unseen since...

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