Xpress Reviews—First Look at New Books
-- Library Journal, 3/15/2006
Child, Julia with Alex Prud'homme. My Life in France. Knopf. Apr. 2006. c.288p. photogs. index. ISBN 1-4000-4346-8. $25.95. COOKERY
Child was a seminal figure in introducing French cuisine to Americans via her award-winning television show The French Chef. Started months before her death in 2004 and completed by her late husband's grandnephew, this memoir captures Child's years in France from 1948 to 1954 as a "six-foot-two-inch, thirty-six-year-old, rather loud and unserious Californian" who fell in love with la belle France. She met her husband Paul during World War II; they married in 1946. Two years later, Paul took a job in France promoting French-American relations, and his wife, wisely, went along. This work recalls her reasons for wanting to learn to cook and details the genesis of her television show. Accessible, passionate, and always touching, this is a sumptuous offering from an immortal chef, a magical woman who feasted on life and found it quite sweet—a recipe for living fully, a lesson to us. Recommended for large and medium collections.—Steven G. Fullwood, Schomburg Ctr. Lib., New York
Grafe, Steven L. Peoples of the Plateau: The Indian Photographs of Lee Moorhouse, 1898–1915. Univ. of Oklahoma. (Western Legacies). 2006. c.224p. photogs. maps. bibliog. index. ISBN 0-8061-3727-4. $39.95; pap. ISBN 0-8061-3742-8. $29.95. ANTHRO
Between 1898 and 1915, businessman and amateur photographer Lee Moorhouse took thousands of photographs of eastern Oregon's Indians. Grafe (curator, Native American collections, National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum) has collected 80 of these images that offer an intimate history of the Umatilla, Cayuse, and Walla Walla Indians who lived on and around the Umatilla Reservation near Pendleton on the Columbia River plateau. They show individuals, street and village scenes, and festivities. Many are staged, with items from Moorhouse's collection of Indian artifacts, but even these are labeled with the names of the people pictured—a rare practice among white photographers of Indians at the time. Grafe provides annotations for each photograph, an introductory essay with a brief history of the Plateau peoples, and a biography of the photographer. Researchers will find the book useful as a window into Indian and Pacific Northwest history; casual readers will appreciate the evocative beauty of the images. Recommended for academic libraries and for any library with a focus on Pacific Northwest or Native American history.—Emily-Jane Dawson, Multnomah Cty. Lib., Portland, OR
Rosenthal, Don & Martha Rosenthal. Learning To Love: From Conflict to Lasting Harmony. Sterling. Mar. 2006. c.224p. ISBN 1-4027-3380-1 [ISBN 978-1-4027-3380-2]. $19.95. PSYCH
The premise of this self-help book on marriage is that all of us struggle to love and trust openly. The Rosenthals, marriage counselors and partners, guide readers through an exploration of this obstacle, the reason it exists, and ways to work through it. Part 1, "Working Together," focuses on marriage problems, from each partner and within the actual partnership. Despite a slight tendency to use psychoanalytic terms and concepts, this section is overflowing with easy-to-understand explanations and simple, practical steps to finding solutions. All spouses, whether their marriage is struggling or thriving, will find extremely relevant material here. Part 2, "Working on Yourself," addresses the reasons a person may not practice open-hearted love, with many practical points that wander into the Eastern philosophical concepts of meditation, yoga, and complete awareness. While some readers may not like the melding of Western and Eastern philosophies, most will find that the discussion of the individual gracefully complements the discussion of the marriage partnership. Recommended wherever self-help books are popular.—Erica L. Foley, Flint P.L., MI
What We Believe but Cannot Prove: Today's Leading Thinkers on Science in the Age of Certainty. HarperPerennial. Mar. 2006. c.288p. ed. by John Brockman. ISBN 0-06-084181-8. pap. $1395. SCI
Compiled by noted science book editor Brockman, this collects responses to a question posted on www.edge.org: "What do you believe is true, even though you cannot prove it?" Answers range from a sentence to a half page to a few pages in length. The 109 respondents include such figures as evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins, psychologist Steven Pinker, planetary scientist Carolyn Porco, novelist Ian McEwan (who wrote the book's introduction), and magazine editor Chris Anderson. Some, like Robert Sapolsky, muse on the existence of God. Others speculate on the nature of consciousness or on the limits of computing power. Presented here are a wide range of ideas entertained by a wide range of people, and taken together, these essays represent a broad spectrum of what contemporary thinkers consider to be challenging questions. Recommended for public and academic library science collections.—Garrett Eastman, Roland Inst. at Harvard Univ., Cambridge, MA
Cataldie, Louis, M.D. Coroner's Journal: Stalking Death in Louisiana. Putnam. Mar. 2006. c.352p. ISBN 0-399-15282-2. $25.95. MED
After ten years in the coroner's office of Baton Rouge, LA, Cataldie became Louisiana medical examiner, charged with investigating more than 1000 deaths attributed to Hurricane Katrina. In the brief opening chapter of this "journal," he talks about the unprecedented challenges of his job since the August 2005 storm, but his pre-Katrina backstory is a riveting tale in itself. The topical narrative, which mines the journals he's kept since beginning his career, recounts his early years in medicine, his formative cases as deputy coroner, the basics of "Forensics 101," and some of his most memorable investigations into suicides, accidents, arsons, and murders. Astonishingly, Cataldie was confronted with four serial killers, including one of the first known homicides by the "Beltway Sniper" duo. Throughout these investigations, he developed a reputation for meticulousness, compassion, and straight talk—qualities that sometimes led to public controversies with politicians and less scrupulous colleagues. With an introduction by novelist Patricia Cornwell, this book is sure to be popular with true crime fans in public libraries.—Kathy Arsenault, Univ. of South Florida at St. Petersburg Lib.
Ellis, Richard. Singing Whales, Flying Squid, and Swimming Cucumbers: The Discovery of Marine Life. Lyons: Globe Pequot. 2006. c.288p. illus. index. ISBN 1-59228-842-1. $24.95. NAT HIST
In his latest book, noted marine writer and artist Ellis (Aquagenesis) entertainingly conveys the complexity and wonder of life underwater, enhanced by his own illustrations. The history of marine biology—"one of the most exciting and rewarding of modern sciences"—is traced by examining the work of the great 19th- and 20th-century scientists. Ellis explores such topics as early submersibles, geological oceanography, and the discovery of hydrothermal vents in 1977, which dramatically challenged the belief that all life ultimately depends on the sun through photosynthesis. Including a 28-page list of references, Ellis's book complements Robert Kunzig's Mapping the Deep, which also gives lay readers an accessible overview of oceanography. For public and academic libraries, as well as high school collections where it may inspire future marine scientists.—Judith B. Barnett, Pell Marine Science Lib., Univ. of Rhode Island, Kingston
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