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The Real Romney – A Biography by Michael Kranish and Scott Helman

On January 16, 2012, in Biographies & Memoirs, Book Reviews, Nonfiction, Political, by Wilfried F. Voss

In The Real Romney, Kranish and Helman delve searchingly into the psyche of a complex man now at his most critical juncture—the private Romney whom few people see.

This Is Not Your City – 11 Stories by Caitlin Horrocks

On August 21, 2011, in Book Reviews, Fiction, by Wilfried F. Voss

Eleven women confront dramas both everyday and outlandish in Caitlin Horrocks’ This Is Not Your City. In stories as darkly comic as they are unflinching, people isolated by geography, emotion, or circumstance cut imperfect paths to peace—they have no other choice.

White Shotgun: An FBI Special Agent Ana Grey Novel by April Smith

On August 1, 2011, in Book Reviews, Fiction, by Wilfried F. Voss

In the language of the mafias, a murder where the body is never found is called lupara bianca, or white shotgun. To disappear with no one knowing how they killed you is a terrible warning, as it haunts the souls of those left behind. April Smith’s White Shotgun will haunt you.

The Sly Company of People Who Care: A Novel by Rahul Bhattacharya

On May 14, 2011, in Book Reviews, by Wilfried F. Voss

The narrator of this debut, an Indian national, is a 22-year-old cricket reporter who has left Bombay to explore Guyana’s exotic landscape and people (“Guyana was elemental, water and earth, mud and fruit, race and crime, innocent and full of scoundrels”), many of whom he befriends. In vigorous yet lyrical prose employing a pungent vernacular, Bhattacharya describes Guyana’s horrid heat and thunderous rain in sensuous detail: the pretentious, decaying buildings of its capital, the unbearable humidity that settles on the men who go “porknocking,” or searching for diamonds in the muddy soil. Violence breaks out easily during nights of drinking, yet people care about strangers.

Half a Life by Darin Strauss

On October 17, 2010, in Book Reviews, Nonfiction, by Wilfried F. Voss

Half a Life is an unusually honest, thoughtful and unsettling memoir, which readers and critics are destined to call ‘brave’—for it is brave. But the book is more than simply brave, it is a searingly self-disciplined work of literature, and of self-examination. Darin Strauss does not permit himself even one sentence, even one moment, of lazy thinking, or mitigating excuses.

Proofiness: The Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception by Charles Seife

On October 12, 2010, in Book Reviews, by Wilfried F. Voss

Following in the footsteps of John Allen Paulos (Innumeracy, 1989) and Michael Shermer (Why People Believe Weird Things, 1997), Seife conducts a thorough investigation into why so many of us find it so easy to believe things that are patently ridiculous. Why, for example, does anyone take seriously the idea that some vaccines can cause autism, or that athletes who wear red have a competitive advantage?

The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks and Giants of the Ocean by Susan Casey

On October 12, 2010, in Book Reviews, by Wilfried F. Voss

Drawing on interviews with mariners, insurers, scientists, and surfers, Casey writes up a fascinating compendium of information about the scientists’ specialties and the global shipping industry’s concern with high-amplitude waves, which apparently sink dozens of vessels annually. But her exciting passages concern the surfers—tow surfers, specifically.

Passionate Lives- Voltaire and du Chatelet and the Enlightenment

On October 4, 2010, in Book Reviews, by Wilfried F. Voss

Passionate Lives by David Bodanis is essential reading for those who care about science, literature and the realities of humanity. This is a tale of one of the greatest women in scientific and mathematical history, coupled with the eternally interesting Voltaire. It’s moving, hilarious, fascinating, and staggering in terms of historical content.

Huck: The Remarkable True Story of How One Lost Puppy Taught a Family–and a Whole Town–About Hope and Happy Endings

On October 3, 2010, in Book Reviews, by Wilfried F. Voss

Janet Elder’s wonderful story of Huck reminds us that the best stories about dogs are really about people or, in this case, community. Few things in America these days can bring people together more than a shared love of dogs. Dogs enter our lives for all kinds of reasons, and Huck entered Janet Elder’s life for one of the most important. This is a wonderful story, gripping and heartwarming. And I can’t say I’ve ever read a dog story with a more meaningful or uplifting ending. You are likely to cry some happy tears.

Origins: How the Nine Months Before Birth Shape the Rest of Our Lives

On October 1, 2010, in Book Reviews, by Wilfried F. Voss

As Annie Murphy Paul writes in her informative and wise new book, “fetal origins research suggests that the lifestyle that influences the development of disease is often not only the one we follow as adults, but the one our mothers practiced when they were pregnant with us as well.” This hypothesis was initially put forth by David Barker, a British physician who in 1989 published data indicating that poor maternal nutrition put offspring at risk for heart disease decades later.