Monthly Archives: January 2012
Books of the Month – January 2012
I just loved Just My Type, a thoroughly enjoyable romp through fonts and typefaces. I also liked two family stories: The Boy in the Moon, the true and heartbreaking story of a severely handicapped boy and his dad’s quest to … Continue reading
Filed under New fiction
** The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit by Lucette Lagnado
The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit is the first part of the author’s memoir (the second, The Arrogant Years I read last month). It focuses for the most part on earlier memories and especially on her father, who did … Continue reading
Filed under True story
* Seven Years by Peter Stamm
I have this theory that translated novels must be decent, otherwise why bother translating them in the first place. And this theory has, I’m sorry to say, many exceptions including Seven Years, a depressing novel of a man who married … Continue reading
Filed under New fiction
** Masters of Management by Adrian Wooldridge
Masters of Management: How the Business Gurus and Their Ideas Have Changed the World – for Better and for Worse is an exhaustively researched book not so much about the business gurus of its subtitle but about management theories in … Continue reading
Filed under Non fiction
Toxicology by Jessica Hagedorn
Another adventure in drugged-out New Yorkers and another failure… Toxicology honestly advertises the topic right in the title, and it’s an equal opportunity parade of drugs of all types, for all ages and marital statuses. Inane dialogs and detailed descriptions … Continue reading
Filed under New fiction
* Mr. Fox by Helen Oyeyemi
Mr. Fox is a devilishly clever book that wraps a novel into another, or rather multiple novels into the story of its author and his muse, and it left me absolutely cold. Admiring the craft, perhaps, but at best indifferent … Continue reading
Filed under New fiction
*** Poor Economics by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo
If you are interested in the causes (and remedies!) for poverty, you will want to read Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty, in which the authors suggest that we need to put the assumptions … Continue reading
Filed under Non fiction
* Ten Thousand Saints by Eleanor Henderson
Ten Thousand Saints starts with a teenager’s dying of an overdose and proceeds to a tedious description of how his best friend moves away to live with his drug-dealing father in New York city and the dad’s cocaine-abusing stepdaughter. Unfortunately … Continue reading
Filed under New fiction
*** Just My Type by Simon Garfield
As I gushed about Just My Type: A Book About Fonts to my friends I encountered many blank stares and realized that, just maybe, the topic of typefaces (you know, Times Roman versus Helvetica versus tens of thousands of others) … Continue reading
Filed under Non fiction
*** The Memory Chalet by Tony Judt
The Memory Chalet is a poignant memoir by an erudite historian who, felled by Lou Gehrig’s disease into complete paralysis, lets his sharp mind meander, remember, and ruminate into dazzling essays. The title is a self-deprecating play on words from … Continue reading
Filed under Non fiction
