News, notes, and Oprah in the Perseus universe

As we all know, it has been an eventful winter-into-spring…but we continue to do what we do. Here’s some encouraging evidence that it’s getting noticed:

Since much or most of this roundup concerns history writing, I suppose I should begin at the beginning – with Justin Marozzi’s The Way of Herodotus (Da Capo, 9780306816215), which has really excited reviewers, historians, and armchair travelers. The LA Times kicked things off, calling it “one of the year’s best and most engaging travel books…. It’s a trip well worth making because the proof of Marozzi's pudding is in the application of the Herodotean spirit to his own journey, which elevates The Way of Herodotus into first-rate travel writing…Marozzi has taken his admiration for history’s father and his own rather formidable skill as a journalist and made a book that does equal justice to the ancient and the contemporary. Herodotus was his guide; fortunate readers will allow Marozzi to be theirs.” Similar praise is to be found in the New York Times Book Review (“Sometimes the trip that starts out on the wrong foot can prove to be the most rewarding….Such is the case in tagging along with the travel writer Justin Marozzi in The Way of Herodotus”) and in the March issue of National Geographic Adventure magazine (“A delightful scrawl…A terrific time…Marozzi’s book is an excellent introduction to [Herodotus] and is great fun in its own right”). And although all of these reviews focus on the travel aspects of the book, I want to point out that Mr. Marozzi has great chops as a proper historian – viz., his earlier book (which still sells, by the way), Tamerlane: Sword of Islam, Conqueror of the World (Da Capo, 9780306815430).


Some of you may recall the intensity with which I spoke of James Palmer’s The Bloody White Baron (Basic, 9780465014484), without doubt one of the most enjoyable, fascinating, horrifying history books I’ve read in quite some time. Had the winds of history blown in a slightly different direction, we might all speak of Baron Ungern von Sternberg as we do of another Auslander Deutsch villain of the 20th century – as Jason Goodwin notes, “Ungern’s contempt for human life, his icy hatred of Jews, his appeal to a monstrous, ill-informed mysticism foreshadowed the foundation of the Third Reich.” That remark is to be found in Mr. Goodwin’s recent review for the New York Times: “Uncomfortable but fascinating reading, it weaves together the weird alliances, murderous dreams and improbable careers that emerged in the aftermath of World War I and the fall of czarist Russia…. What makes The Bloody White Baron so exceptional is Palmer’s lucid scholarship, his ability to make perfect sense of the maelstrom of a forgotten war. This is a brilliant book, and I’m already looking forward to his next.”


(Much as I loved that book, by the way, it has been supplanted in my ravings by another book forthcoming on Basic’s Spring list – The White War, by Mark Thompson (Basic, 9780465013296). I’ll be reporting on this in greater detail later, I am sure, but for a moment let me quote from Hugh McDonald’s review in the Glasgow Herald: “It is impossible not to read Thompson and be moved both in emotion and in thought.” Stay tuned.)


I had not yet gotten to William H. Goetzmann’s new book, Beyond the Revolution: A History of American Thought from Paine to Patriotism (Basic, 9780465004959) – which, as I reflect on it, is odd, considering how much I both respect and enjoy his Pulitzer Prize-wining opus, Exploration and Empire. But Jedediah Purdy has stoked my interest with his recent review (in that very same issue of the New York Times Book Review). Forgive me for quoting at length: “[Goetzmann’s] strange and valuable book…is richly populated with radicals and utopians who, with one eye on the innermost soul and the other on world history, created a tradition of open-ended experiment…. His book, rich in strange detail and vivid speculation, … is a fox dreaming of hedgehogs. So is the America it describes. Indeed, this is an apt book for the opening of the Obama administration. The Declaration of Independence is Obama’s touchstone, as it was Lincoln’s, because it anchors the country to a cosmopolitan vision of openness and equality. It has never been clearer that the country’s best self is a global inheritance, its worst a parochial self-certainty. A book of 19th-century ideas that portrays America as one part Google, one part melting pot and one part utopian dream may just have found its moment at the inauguration, eight years late, of the 21st century.”


We had a tremendous launch week for The Great Decision by Clifford Sloan and David McKean (PublicAffairs, 9781586484262), including an appearance on Colbert and a feature in Newsweek. But it’s not just publicity we’re getting; check out some of the praise the book has received: “Whoever thought that Marbury v Madison could be a page turner? Landmark constitutional law, yes, but a nail-biting drama crafted in dimly lit hotel rooms in Washington? Filled with memorable players such as ‘Old Bacon Face’ Justice Samuel Chase and a slovenly Thomas Jefferson? Cliff Sloan and David McKean’s new book, The Great Decision, tells a wonderful tale of how the decision – which established that the Supreme Court had the power to declare an act of Congress unconstitutional – came to be. To produce this impressive and gripping narrative, they culled newspaper accounts and diaries and conducted a wide-ranging array of interviews, including with Justice John Paul Stevens, who went back and analyzed his law school notes – which he apparently has kept all these years.” So writes Jan Crawford Greenburg on the ABC News legal blog. Nice. The subject matter isn’t as narrow as it might seem – especially with a Constitutional lawyer in the White House – and it truly is a terrific read.


Yesterday in the Washington Post, Jonathan Yardley wrote a belated valentine to one of the books we’re most proud of this season, Paule Marshall’s elliptical memoir, Triangular Road (Basic Civitas, 9780465013593): “Paule Marshall is a singularly accomplished novelist, soon to turn 80 years old, whose work is not as well-known as it deserves to be…But though fiction may have pride of place in her heart, Triangular Road reveals a strong gift for self-scrutiny made all the more revealing by quiet humor and what appears to be complete honesty. Paule Marshall has lived a full life, has accomplished much, and we can only hope to have more from her as she heads, confidently and enthusiastically, into her ninth decade.” Those of you who had the pleasure of meeting her at the Winter Institute will surely agree.


We have just learned that next Sunday (3/8) the LA Times will review Jo Marchant’s Decoding the Heavens: A 2,000-Year-old Computer, and the Century-Long Search to Discover its Secrets (Da Capo, 9780306817427). Expect it to be a rave. Kirkus gave it a starred review: “The book’s early sections … read almost like a sea-adventure story. The dives were treacherous; one man died, and two more were paralyzed during the salvage effort. The most engaging chapters, however, portray the many brilliant minds in many scientific fields that have applied their expertise to the task of solving the Antikythera mystery. Physicists used X-rays and CT scans to find out more about the fragments, while engineers puzzled over its function. It is now thought to have been as an astronomical calculator. The curator of the London Science Museum spent 20 years, using only ancient Greek tools, trying to reconstruct the device. Even celebrities like marine researcher Jacques Cousteau and author Arthur C. Clarke were intrigued. Marchant does not shy away from the science involved—astronomy, mathematics, engineering and radiology—but the material is consistently accessible. A valuable, fast-moving look at the history – and mystery – of the world’s first analog computer.” And PW? You know it – also a starred review: “this globe-trotting, era-spanning mystery should absorb armchair scientists of all kinds.”


A quick note of congratulations to Oscar winners Dustin Lance Black and Simon Beaufoy, who won for their respective screenplays Milk and Slumdog Millionaire. The shooting scripts for both movies, of course, are available from Newmarket Press (9781557048271 and 9781557048363). Additionally, BBC Audiobooks America has the audio version of Q&A, the novel on which Slumdog Millionaire is based. You can get it under its original title (9781572704879) or under the new one (9781602834668).


Okay, I know I’ve made you wait a long time for it, and I apologize, but here, at last, is the Oprah news: yesterday, Oprah finally aired the episode she taped last October featuring Dr. Bruce Perry and his work with traumatized children. Dr. Perry is the author of The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog: What Traumatized Children can Teach Us about Love, Loss, and Healing (Basic, 9780465056538). Apparently, when the abuse scandal broke at Oprah’s school in South Africa, she contacted Dr. Perry, as the “foremost expert” on childhood trauma. The show is engineered to showcase his book and his research. It looks like the wholesalers are well stocked…so be ready.


This time around, though, I think I might have something to top Oprah – and (no surprise) it concerns the Skinny Bitch empire (Running Press, 9780762424931…et al.). Last month, authors Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin visited with Tyra Banks, and they brought with them to the program a cavalcade of testimonials worthy of a revival meeting: it started with a woman named Lisa who had lost roughly 180 pounds following the Skinny Bitch plan. Lisa then introduced everyone to her father; he was supposed to undergo heart surgery, but when he saw his daughter’s weight loss, he too went on the diet and lost 80 pounds himself and avoided the surgery. (Keep that in mind this April, by the way, when we release the next in the series, Skinny Bastard, 9780762435401.) And as if that weren’t enough, Lisa has two daughters with special needs, one of whom could only speak a couple words at a time … until they put her on the Skinny Bitch diet, too. Now she’s speaking in complete sentences. Glory be. But that’s still not all! The really big news is that the book is going to get a push on, of all things, The Office! Look for it in the hands of branch manager Michael Scott. (I’ll say again: Skinny Bastard!)


Finally, few quick notes before I sign off about some forthcoming items that I’m particularly excited about – these aren’t out yet, but their advance buzz is so great I want to share it with you:

It’s shaping up to be banner spring for Henning Mankell. Starting in May, PBS’s “Mystery!” series will run three adaptations of Mr. Mankell’s Kurt Wallander mysteries; they ran last year in the UK, to rave reviews (e.g., the Times of London: “One of those superior cop shows in which the character of the detective matters more than the plot”). I’m told that Vintage will be resoliciting the paperbacks of these…but it’s worth remembering that it was The New Press that introduced Mr. Mankell to American readers with their hardcover editions. And this month, The New Press is proud to publish a new novel from Mr. Mankell – not one of his so-called “permafrost procedurals,” but a stand-alone literary novel, Italian Shoes (9781595584366). It has already garnered incredible advance praise, including this starred review in Publishers Weekly: “A tragic operating room error has cost Swedish surgeon Fredrik Welin his career in this moving novel from Mankell, who's best known for his Kurt Wallander mystery series (Firewall, etc.). Welin, 66, lives on a remote island with only his dog and cat for company. His routine is abruptly shattered by the arrival of an elderly woman who proves to be Harriet Hörnfeldt, the youthful love he ditched four decades earlier. Hörnfeldt, who's dying of cancer, has sought out Welin because she wants to share a secret about their relationship. This reintroduction to the world of human emotions and interactions proves to be the first of many, leading the doctor to an awkward attempt to get absolution from the woman whose perfectly healthy arm he mistakenly amputated. Mankell displays his considerable gifts for characterization as he succeeds in making his emotionally limited lead character sympathetic.” Additionally, all three of my colleagues here on the west coast (Cindy Heidemann, Roy Remer, and Andrea Tetrick) have read this and praised it to the skies. (The only reason I haven’t read it yet is that, for some reason, I never got a copy. I’m seeking to remedy that….) We’re hoping that this will be a bit of a breakout novel for him.


Last week also saw a starred PW review for the forthcoming West of the West: Dreamers, Believers, Builders, and Killers in the Golden State by Mark Arax (May 2009, PublicAffairs, 9781586483906). This follows a glowing review in Kirkus – and both of them compare Mr. Arax’s book favorably to Joan Didion, so it’s not just me! Here’s what PW had to say: “These swift, penetrating essays from former Los Angeles Times writer Arax (In My Father’s Name) take the measure of contemporary California with a sure and supple hand, consciously but deservedly taking its place alongside Didion’s and Saroyan’s great social portraits. Expect the unexpected from Arax’s reports up and down the state: on the last of the Okies, the latest migrants from Mexico, the treesitters of Berkeley, Bay Area conspiracy theorists, an Armenian chicken giant’s infamous fall or the mammoth marijuana economy of Humboldt County, among much else. For Arax, a third-generation Californian of Armenian heritage who spent years covering the Central Valley as an investigative reporter, the state’s outré reputation and self-representation are a complex dance of myth and memory that includes his own family lore and personal history. It’s partly this personal connection, running subtly but consistently throughout, that pushes the collection past mere reportage to a high literary enterprise that beautifully integrates the private and idiosyncratic with the sweep of great historical forces.” Please notice, too, that the people in this book all came to California from somewhere else – this is more than a book about a state, it’s about what people seek when they migrate, and what they find. I truly think it should have readers everywhere.


And finally, a word about K Blows Top: A Cold War Comic Interlude by Peter Carlson (PublicAffairs, 9781586484972): as I’ve been telling people, this is just a total hoot. I’ve been pleased to learn that a few people, at least, agree – cocktail conversations at the ABA Winter Institute resulted in a few extra galley requests, which I found highly gratifying. Thanks indeed to those of you buzzing it. But it’s not just booksellers: Christopher Buckley evidently gave it a thumbs up in The Daily Beast, and now we’ve gotten a nice blurb from Steve Coll (author of Ghost Wars and The Bin Ladens: “Any work of history whose chapter titles include ‘It Killed Milton Berle and It Can Kill You Too’ and ‘Chihuahuas For Khrushchev’ deserves to be read. Like the mid-century journalists who chronicled this Strangelovian chapter of the Cold War, Peter Carlson writes with wit, energy, clarity, and delightful skepticism. This book seems to have been a joy to write; it is certainly a joy to read.” This is great fun, and I look forward to the reviews once it’s published in May.

If anything here strikes your fancy, let me know. And if you have any questions, or want to place orders, or have some good gossip, just let me know.

Keep on keepin’ on-