Prepub Alert

By Barbara Hoffert -- Library Journal, 5/15/2007

Fiction | Nonfiction

Fiction

Auchincloss, Louis. The Headmaster's Dilemma. Houghton. Sept. 2007. 224p. ISBN 978-0-618-88342-4. $25.
At 90, Auchincloss revisits the exclusive prep school featured in his 1964 novel, The Rector of Justin.

Cobb, James. Robert Ludlum's ™ The Arctic Event: A Covert One Novel. Grand Central. Sept. 2007. 400p. ISBN 978-0-446-69907-5. pap. $16.99. CD: Hachette Audio.
The Covert One team battles nasties on an island off Canada's north coast.

Delson, Rudolph. Maynard and Jennica. Houghton. Sept. 2007. 304p. ISBN 978-0-618-83448-8. $24.
Not a legal thriller, though Delson quit his law firm to write this debut. Antisocial Maynard films fashion mistakes on the New York City subway, where he meets the equally quirky Jennica. With a seven-city tour, plus advertising on the IRT.

Ellis, Warren. Crooked Little Vein. Morrow. Aug. 2007. 304p. ISBN 978-0-06-072393-4. $21.95.
A debut from the man who gave us two huge DC Comics series: a washed-up P.I. must find a version of the Constitution that includes some invisible amendments the Founders thought we might need.

Faber, Michel. Vanilla Bright Like Eminem. Harcourt. Sept. 2007. 240p. ISBN 978-0-15-101314-2. $23.
The author of the best-selling The Crimson Petal and the White also writes great short fiction, as evidenced by The Courage Consort. Here are 16 new pieces.

Hunter, Stephen. The 47th Samurai: A Bob Lee Swagger Novel. S. & S. Sept. 2007. 480p. ISBN 978-0-7432-3809-0. $26.
Bob Lee Swagger retrieves a lost military sword for Japanese veteran Philip Yato, then goes after the self-proclaimed samurai who murders Yato for the weapon. With a six-city tour.

Johnson, Denis. Tree of Smoke. Farrar. Sept. 2007. 672p. ISBN 978-0-374-27912-7. $27.50. CD: Audio Renaissance.
Nascent spy Skip Sands gears up to battle the Vietcong even as two brothers lose their grip on reality in the Arizona desert. Johnson's first novel in nearly a decade; with a national tour.

Keillor, Garrison. Pontoon. Viking. Sept. 2007. 304p. ISBN 978-0-670-06356-7. $25.95.
When devout Evelyn dies, daughter Barbara discovers she had a secret wild streak and decides to follow her lead. Keillor revisits Lake Wobegon; with a six-city tour.

Kerouac, Jack. On the Road: The Original Scroll. Viking. Sept. 2007. 352p. ISBN 978-0-670-06355-0. $25.95.
Kerouac wrote his classic on a 120' scroll of taped-together sheets. Reproduced here in book form, the scroll version differs in interesting ways from the final 1957 edition.

Kuipers, Alice. Life on the Refrigerator Door: Notes Between a Mother and a Daughter. HarperCollins. Sept. 2007. 224p. ISBN 978-0-06-137049-6. $19.95. CD: HarperAudio.
The fraying of a mother–daughter bond, told through notes left on their large kitchen appliance. This debut boasts a ten-city tour.

Liebman, Ron. Death by Rodrigo. S. & S. Sept. 2007. 320p. ISBN 978-1-4165-3527-0. $24.
From the author of Grand Jury: a fiction (and series) debut about two cops-turned-attorneys Jersey boys confronting an impossible demand from their new crime-boss client.

Mailman, Erika. The Witch's Trinity. Crown. Sept. 2007. 288p. ISBN 978-0-307-35152-4. $23.95.
Revisiting a witch hunt in 16th-century Germany; from a first novelist descended from a woman tried as a witch in Colonial Massachusetts. Reading group guide.

Martin, Valerie. Trespass. Doubleday. Sept. 2007. 304p. ISBN 978-0-385-51545-0. $25.
Contented Chloe starts losing her cool when her college-age son becomes dangerously involved with sharp but volatile Croatian refugee Salome. Reading group guide.

Patterson, James & Howard Roughan. You've Been Warned. Little, Brown. Sept. 2007. 400p. ISBN 978-0-316-01450-2. $27.99; lrg. prnt. $29.99. Cassette/CD: Hachette Audio.
All's right with soon-to-be-wed Kristin until she starts having murderous nightmares. There's a screenplay in the works.

Romano-Lax, Andromeda. The Spanish Bow. Harcourt. Sept. 2007. 560p. ISBN 978-0-15-101542-9. $25.
Bequeathed a cello bow, young Catalan Feliu Delargo becomes a musician, hooks up with piano prodigy Justo, and storms through the early 20th century encountering love, war, and beautiful music. A big debut; with a West Coast tour.

Schatzing, Frank. Death and the Devil. Morrow. Sept. 2007. 416p. ISBN 978-0-06-134948-5. $25.95.
Murder interrupts the building of Cologne's great cathedral; an international best seller.

Sparks, Nicholas. The Choice. Grand Central. Sept. 2007. 224p. ISBN 978-0-446-57992-6. $24.99; lrg. prnt. $26.99. Cassette/CD: Hachette Audio.
Travis Parker doesn't want a relationship to get in the way of having a good time. But then a formidable redhead moves in next door. With a ten-city tour.

Theroux, Paul. The Elephanta Suite: Three Novellas. Houghton. Sept. 2007. 256p. ISBN 978-0-618-94332-6. $25.
In three novellas, Theroux's hapless characters encounter India, which is fast becoming everyone's favorite literary destination.

Tsukiyama, Gail. The Street of a Thousand Blossoms. St. Martin's. Sept. 2007. 416p. ISBN 978-0-312-27482-5. $24.95.
In 1939 Japan, war disrupts the dreams of two orphaned brothers. With a national tour; reading group guide.

Vachss, Andrew. Terminal: A Burke Novel. Pantheon. Sept. 2007. 256p. ISBN 978-0-375-42508-0. $24.95.
An imprisoned white supremacist wants big money for treatment that might save his life, so he lets Burke and company know about a 13-year-old's rape/murder by some rich men decades ago. With a four-city tour.

White, Edmund. Hotel de Dream: A New York Novel. Ecco: HarperCollins. Sept. 2007. 320p. ISBN 978-0-06-085225-2. $23.95.
Reimagining the final moments of Stephen Crane.

White, Michael. Soul Catcher. Morrow. Sept. 2007. 384p. ISBN 978-0-06-134072-7. $24.95.
Augustus Cain is, literally, a “soul catcher”; to discharge a debt, he agrees to track down runaway slave Rosetta. Reading group guide.

Nonfiction

Berger, John. Hold Everything Dear: Dispatches on Survival and Resistance. Pantheon. Sept. 2007. 160p. ISBN 978-0-375-42509-7. $21.
Litterature engagée: Berger on a world changed by 9/11.

Bettis, Jerome with Gene Wojciechowski. The Bus: My Life in and out of a Helmet. Doubleday. Sept. 2007. 224p. ISBN 978-0-385-52061-4. $23.95.
A six-time pro bowler on life before, during, and after football.

Chait, Jonathan. The Big Con: The True Story of How Washington Got Hoodwinked and Hijacked by Crackpot Economists. Houghton. Sept. 2007. 256p. ISBN 978-0-618-68540-0. $25.
Senior editor at the New Republic, Chait argues that the supply-side economics embraced by Washington is simply crazy, with no support among leading economists.

Church, Forrest. So Help Me God: Presidential Faith, Pulpit Politics, and the First Great Battle To Save America's Soul. Harcourt. Sept. 2007. 512p. ISBN 978-0-15-101185-8. $28.
The well-regarded Manhattan minister returns to the dawn of the republic to show that tensions about the church/state divide are nothing new.

Crew, Rudy with Thomas Dyja. Only Connect: The Way To Save Our Schools. Sarah Crichton Bks: Farrar. Sept. 2007. 240p. ISBN 978-0-374-29401-4. $23.
The former chancellor of New York's gargantuan school system, now running Florida's Miami–Dade County public schools, Crew suggests how to remake U.S. education for the 21st century.

D'Antonio, Michael. A Ball, a Dog, and a Monkey: How the Space Race Began. S. & S. Sept. 2007. 320p. ISBN 978-0-7432-9431-7. $26.
The consequences of Sputnik for America; from a Pulitzer Prize winner. With a four-city tour.

Dean, John W. Broken Government: How Republican Rule Destroyed the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial Branches. Viking. Sept. 2007. 288p. ISBN 978-0-670-01820-8. $25.95. CD: Penguin Audio.
Dean continues to speak out on the dangers of Far Right Republicanism, here focusing on process. With a 12-city tour.

Dodd, Christopher with Larry Bloom. Letters from Nuremberg. Crown. Sept. 2007. 352p. ISBN 978-0-307-38116-3. $25.95.
The Connecticut Senator presents letters his father wrote home while serving as a prosecutor at Nuremberg.
 
Dully, Howard & Charles Fleming. My Lobotomy. Crown. Sept. 2007. 288p. ISBN 978-0-307-38126-9. $24.95.
Dully tries to understand why his family forced him to endure a lobotomy in 1960 at age 12.

Friedman, David M. The Immortalists: Charles Lindbergh, Dr. Alexis Carrel, and Their Daring Quest To Live Forever. Ecco: HarperCollins. Sept. 2007. 352p. ISBN 978-0-06-052815-7. $26.95.
The story of Lindbergh's partnership with Nobel prize winner Carrel in an effort to find a way to subvert death.

Fulghum, Robert. What on Earth Have I Done? St. Martin's. Sept. 2007. 256p. ISBN 978-0-312-36549-3. $22.95. CD: Audio Renaissance.
More kindergarten wisdom: in his first book in a decade, Fulghum encourages us to step back and consider what we've done in our lives.

Goldman, Francisco. The Art of Political Murder: Who Killed the Bishop? Grove. Sept. 2007. 384p. ISBN 978-0-8021-1828-8. $25.
Noteworthy novelist Goldman spent seven years chasing down the story surrounding the 1998 bludgeoning death of Guatemala's Bishop Juan Gerardi shortly after he delivered a major human rights report. With a 12-city tour.

Goldstone, Patricia. Aaronsohn's Maps: The Untold Story of the Man Who Might Have Created Peace in the Middle East. Harcourt. Sept. 2007. 400p. ISBN 978-0-15-101169-9. $26.
Born in Palestine, master spy Aaron Aaronsohn helped the British secure Jerusalem during World War I and proposed an Arab-Jewish partnership in the area that Los Angeles Times reporter Goldstone argues would have obviated much current strife.

Greenspan, Alan. The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World. Penguin Pr: Penguin Group (USA). Sept. 2007. 640p. ISBN 978-1-59420-131-8. $35. CD: Penguin Audio.
Greenspan explains why the market didn't crash after 9/11.

Jones, Abigail & Marissa Miley. Restless Virgins: Love, Sex, and Survival at a New England Prep School. Morrow. Sept. 2007. 304p. ISBN 978-0-06-119205-0. $25.95.
Insight into a sex scandal at prestigious Milton Academy, from which both authors graduated.

Korda, Michael. Ike: An American Hero. HarperCollins. Sept. 2007. 784p. ISBN 978-0-06-075665-9. $34.95.
Why we liked Ike: all in a single volume. With a six-city tour

Liponis, Mark, M.D. Ultralongevity: The Seven-Step Program for a Younger, Healthier You. Little, Brown. Sept. 2007. 304p. ISBN 978-0-316-01728-2. $25.99. CD: Hachette Audio.
The medical director of Canyon Ranch Health Resorts explains how to get your immune system to work for you.

Maske, Mark. War Without Death: A Year of Cutthroat Competition in Pro Football's Most Storied Division. Penguin Pr: Penguin Group (USA). Sept. 2007. 352p. ISBN 978-1-59420-141-7. $25.95.
Visiting the NFL's notorious Eastern division and coming out alive.

Mearsheimer, John J. & Stephen M. Walt. The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy. Farrar. Sept. 2007. 320p. ISBN 978-0-374-17772-0. $25. CD: Audio Renaissance.
If the authors' “The Israel Lobby” provoked lots of controversy when it appeared in the London Review of Books in March 2006, consider what the response will be to this expanded version. With a national tour.

Mother Teresa with Brian Kolodiejchuk. Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the Saint of Calcutta. Doubleday. Sept. 2007. 208p. ISBN 978-0-385-52037-9. $19.95.
Getting to know Mother Teresa through her letters.

Nagorski, Andrew. The Greatest Battle: How Stalin and Hitler's Desperate Fight for Moscow Changed the Course of World War II. S. & S. Sept. 2007. 368p. ISBN 978-0-7432-8110-2. $27.
Newsweek's former bureau chief reconstructs Hitler's first defeat, a battle involving seven million troops that changed the course of World War II.

Nichols, David A. A Matter of Justice: Eisenhower and the Beginning of the Civil Rights Revolution. S. & S. Sept. 2007. 288p. ISBN 978-1-4165-4150-9. $27.
On the 50th anniversary of the Little Rock integration crisis, Eisenhower scholar Nichols shows how deeply the President was involved in civil rights issues.

O'Donnell, Rosie. Celebrity Detox. Grand Central. Sept. 2007. 224p. ISBN 978-0-446-58224-7. $23.99. CD: Hachette Audio.
Having decided to seek fame as a child in order to save her dying mother, O'Donnell now sees the desire for celebrity as an addiction.

Pinker, Steven. The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature. Viking. Sept. 2007. 512p. ISBN 978-0-670-06327-7. $29.95. CD: Penguin Audio.
The famed Harvard psychologist and author of The Blank Slate considers the tight weave between our language and ourselves. With a 12-city tour.

Robison, John Elder. Look Me in the Eye: My Life with Asperger's. Crown. Sept. 2007. 288p. ISBN 978-0-307-39598-6. $25.95. CD: Random Audio.
Considered a social deviant as a child, Robison (brother of Augusten Burroughs, famed for Running with Scissors) created KISS's fire-breathing guitars and at age 40 was finally diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome. With a five-city tour; reading group guide.

Rouse, Wade. Of Lattes and Land Rovers: Confessions of a Prep School Mommy Handler. Harmony: Crown. Sept. 2007. 288p. ISBN 978-0-307-38270-2. $23.95.
Rouse recalls life as a “mommy handler” at a fancy East Coast prep school—with names changed to protect the guilty.

Spence, Jonathan D. Return to Dragon Mountain: Memories of a Late Ming Man. Viking. Sept. 2007. 352p. ISBN 978-0-670-06357-4. $24.95.
China historian Spence crafts the biography of Chinese historian Zhang Dai, who flourished during the enlightened Ming dynasty. With a three-city tour.

Stout, Martha. The Paranoia Switch: How Terror Rewires Our Brains and Reshapes Our Behavior—and How We Can Reclaim Our Courage. Sarah Crichton Bks: Farrar. Sept. 2007. 384p. ISBN 978-0-374-22999-3. $26.
How our terror of terrorism (and other 21st-century ills) has adversely affected our brains—and what to do about it. From the former Harvard Medical School professor who wrote The Sociopath Next Door.

Toobin, Jeffrey. The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court. Doubleday. Sept. 2007. 336p. ISBN 978-0-385-51640-2. $27.95. CD: Random Audio.
The best-selling author and CNN legal analyst talks with all the Supreme Court justices.

Tram, Dang Thuy. Last Night I Dreamed of Peace: A Diary of Dang Thuy Tram. Harmony: Crown. Sept. 2007. 224p. ISBN 978-0-307-34737-4. $19.95. CD: Random Audio.
Recovered by American soldiers, this diary was kept by a young woman doctor at a Vietcong hospital who was killed in 1970 at age 27.

Trofimov, Yaroslav. The Siege of Mecca: The Forgotten Uprising in Islam's Holiest Shrine and the Birth of al Qaeda. Doubleday. Sept. 2007. 320p. ISBN 978-0-385-51925-0. $26.
In November 1979, hundreds of gunmen grabbed the Grand Mosque in Mecca; Saudi compromise facilitated the spread of violent Islam. From a Wall Street Journal foreign correspondent.

Waxman, Jonathan. A Great American Cook: Recipes from the Home Kitchen of One of Our Most Influential Chefs. Houghton. Sept. 2007. 304p. ISBN 978-0-618-65852-7. $35.
Great American cooking from the former professional trombonist who served as Chez Panisse's chef before founding a bicoastal restaurant empire. With a six-city tour.

Weidensaul, Scott. Of a Feather: A Brief History of American Birding. Harcourt. Sept. 2007. 320p. ISBN 978-0-15-101247-3. $25.
Birding in America from the arrival of Europeans through Roger Tory Peterson to the millions who bird-watch today.

Winik, Jay. The Great Upheaval: America and the Birth of the Modern World, 1788–1800. HarperCollins. Sept. 2007. 656p. ISBN 978-0-06-008313-7. $29.95. CD: HarperAudio.
Quite an era: America had just been born, France was ready for revolution, and Russia was going imperial. From the author of April 1965.