Editors' Fall Picks

Ah, fall, that time of amethyst mists and a cascade of great new books. From fiction set in Colonial America to this feature's first audio, these picks are not the usual suspects but titles we know you'll want to rake in.

Politics and Ecstasy

The Wasted Vigil by Nadeem Aslam. Knopf. Sept. ISBN 978-0-307-26842-6. $25.

“Just a few black lines made as though by ink-dipped twigs”—how deftly Nadeem Aslam depicts a small, anomalous community brought together by the coruscating violence of the world beyond. Aslam sets his latest novel, The Wasted Vigil (LJ 8/08), in contemporary Afghanistan, and those lines appear on a bit of broken plaster from a house whose gorgeously painted walls have been smeared with mud for fear of the Taliban.

The house belongs to English-born doctor Marcus Caldwell, who has already lost his Afghan wife and daughter to the unending chaos. There he shelters Russian seeker Lara; erstwhile CIA spy David; Casa, who is hiding his terrorist connections; and Dunia, a young woman fleeing fundamentalist threats. Has Aslam gathered these characters together to lecture us about Middle East politics? Absolutely not. “There is no message in the book,” affirms Aslam, “My writing is an exploration of my own life.”

Aslam's writing is guided by the conviction that “there is nothing unique about me; if it's true about me, it will be true of other people.” And right now the Pakistan-born author, who came to England as a teenager, is genuinely confused about the current East-West tangle over Islamic terrorism. To sum up his confusion—and ours—he points to a crucial torture scene toward the end of his book that, he tells LJ, echoes Gloucester's blinding by King Lear. “A case can be made that Gloucester was guilty of a crime, but the blinding is so severe, so malicious, that we immediately lose sympathy with it,” he explains. Similarly, “No matter what the West did, we were sickened by 9/11—and by the response.”

Aslam may be confounded by contemporary world politics, but there's fearsome clarity in his rendering of various extreme viewpoints, from the terrorists' hatred of the West to the CIA's rigid politicking to the Afghan warlord's amoral conniving. He so startles us with his sure take on the unthinkable that his book could be called an antipolemic polemic if his own writing weren't so scrupulous—and so piercingly beautiful. From the first page, where a mirror is seen as large enough that “if it was water [Lara] could dive and disappear into it,” Aslam crafts such steadfastly evocative lines that one imagines they might violate Islam's strictures regarding imagery.

Exquisite prose comes naturally to Aslam, who loves writers who love language, though he puts it more elegantly—“It's the sky under which I move.” His writing inevitably reflects his own interests—“Whatever comes in to your mind comes out of your hand in the writing”—so The Wasted Vigil also embodies his passion for jazz and Islamic art and his curiosity about perfume making. As a result, it required little research, though he did travel to the fabled perfume-making town of Kalar Kahar, deep in Afghanistan, compelling his mother to ask neighbors to pray at the local mosque for his safety.

Boldly enfolding his interests, Aslam's narrative proves his assertion that “I am happiest when I am writing something political and also something ecstatically pleasing. I hope I got the right mix,” he adds earnestly. Indeed, he did. The novel was conceived 15 years ago, but Aslam instead pursued an idea that became the Kiriyama Prize–winning Maps for Lost Lovers. When he returned to this novel, he found that “85 percent of the story was already there,” with the forces shaping early 1990s Afghanistan still in play. As Aslam advises, “We can't play geopolitical games in other parts of the world; there are consequences.” What we can do, though, is try to understand what's happening. For that, read The Wasted Vigil; there's no better guide.—Barbara Hoffert

Real Heroics

War Is Beautiful: An American Ambulance Driver in the Spanish Civil War by James Neugass. New Press. Nov. ed. by Peter N. Carroll & Peter Glazer. ISBN 978-1-59558-427-4. $26.95.

“If it were not for my eyes, I might be in the infantry,” wrote James Neugass in the journal that became War Is Beautiful: An American Ambulance Driver in the Spanish Civil War. In late 1937, Neugass began serving in Spain with the American Medical Bureau, which operated light maneuverable hospital units built to serve the International Brigade's forces supporting the Loyalist cause against Franco's fascist Nationalist rebels. “I'm still ashamed of driving an ambulance,” he continued. “I don't like the literary, intellectual, here-to-be-revolted-by-the-horror-of-war, later-to-write-a-book...mock heroism tradition that lies behind my job.”

The 32-year-old native of New Orleans had led a privileged life, followed, after the stock market crash, by work that included selling shoes, union organizing, and teaching fencing, as well as some early success as a poet. In Spain he soon came to recognize his value as a driver. He called his car “my sweetheart.” It accepted olive oil for its motor and dirt for camouflage, with only a foot diameter of the windshield left clear. For men like Neugass, road conditions delivered the pulse of the war better than any bulletin.

In his journal, Neugass explained grim realities—“No sense sewing up a guy's chest if there's a hole in the liver. Since livers will hold no stitches, almost all boys nicked in this organ die”—and memorialized the dead. Of a former Child's Restaurant counterman he wrote, “Some of him lies buried in the grave dug free of charge by a fascist bomb.” Within a mere five months, he ceased referring to “the World War” that was behind and wondered about the one to come. Ever a self-conscious writer, he repeatedly asked himself “Why did I come to Spain?”

Neugass returned home in April 1938, the leather journal with him. He married, had two sons, and lived in New York, working chiefly as a cabinetmaker (though he had declared in his diary, “When I get back...I'm going to drive a taxi or a carriage. I'll wait...in front of the Metropolitan Opera House and drive society couples slowly through Central Park on spring nights”). He wrote some short stories and spent years on his first novel, Rain of Ashes, published in 1949. That year he suffered a heart attack and died.

Over 50 years later, Neugass's typescript was discovered among what were likely the papers of socialist critic Max Eastman—evidently Neugass's submission to consider for publication. Save for a couple of excerpts that appeared in a 1938 pamphlet on the Spanish Civil War, Neugass's journal is now published for the first time.

Since the Spanish conflict included relatively few Americans, we now pay it little mind compared with the larger one that followed. But the pulse of war delivered by Spain's roads to Neugass is here delivered to us. His narrative conveys the awful alchemy of war—as he put it, “something big and something terribly human. Pity and terror, mercy and pain, all between drawn lips”—yet also speaks of the writer himself and his own powers of alchemy. There was no “mock heroism” in his work in aid of the anti-Fascist cause, nor in his faith in himself as a writer.

One day, near the front at Teruel, Neugass was “filling in a shell hole [when] a small limousine came tearing down the road.... 'That's Hemingway,' said someone pointing at the vanishing cloud of dust.... 'He's a writer and I'm a writer,' I thought, and went back to work.” Did Hemingway really leave James Neugass in the dust? Don't be so sure.—Margaret Heilbrun

Beyond Walden

Autumnal Tints by Henry David Thoreau. 1 CD. unabridged. 72 min. Silver Hollow Audio. Sept. ISBN 978-0-9793115-2-9. $8.95; digital download. ISBN 978-0-9793115-3-6. $8.95.

This month, Silver Hollow Audio brings to audio one of Henry David Thoreau's best-known essays, “Autumnal Tints,” originally delivered as an 1859 lecture and published posthumously in the Atlantic Monthly in 1862.

In it, Thoreau marvels over the changing foliage of a New England fall, from August's “purple grasses” to November's “liquid-green” pines. He writes in turn as a scientist, an aesthete, and a poet. After explaining the phenomenon of brightening leaves from a physiologist's perspective, for instance, he admits that he is personally “more interested in the rosy cheek than I am to know what particular diet the maiden fed on,” then offers an infinitely more poetic explanation of the phenomenon: “The very forest and herbage, the pellicle of the earth, must acquire a bright color, an evidence of its ripeness,” he writes, “as if the globe itself were a fruit on its stem, with ever a cheek toward the sun.”

Longtime voice-over artist and narrator Brett Barry's (www.brettsvoice.com) crisp, well-paced reading free of theatrics allows the author's words to resonate. Listeners will get the sense of walking alongside Thoreau as he leads them—half authoritative teacher, half marveling student—on a tour of the evocative landscape. (Hear a clip at www.silverhollowaudio.com.)

“It's very gratifying to publish something that's never been released as an audiobook before and to expose a whole new audience to [it],” says Brett, who, together with wife Rebecca Rego Barry, a former preservation and archives librarian (Drew Univ.) and public services librarian (Marist Coll.), cofounded Silver Hollow Audio in 2005. It was Rebecca who suggested they produce “Autumnal Tints” in audio form when she came across a paperback reprint of the lecture (Applewood Bks., 1996) in a Concord, MA, museum shop. Silver Hollow being such a small publisher, the Barrys have control over the entire production process, from book selection to recording and editing to package design.

“Caring for the environment and minimizing our impact on it has always been near and dear to [us],” says Brett, which is why the couple decided to package its first coproduced title, Henry Beston's The Outermost House (Best Audio, LJ 1/08), in recyclable paperboard. With Autumnal Tints, they've taken their commitment to environmentally friendly packaging further (it was, after all, Thoreau who once asked, “What's the use of a fine house if you haven't got a tolerable planet to put it on?”). The audiobook packaging features 100 percent green forestry practices–board, a minimum of ten percent postconsumer recycled content, and all vegetable inks and is—besides the shrink wrap—plastic-free and completely recyclable. Further, through the Barrys' partnership with the organization 1% for the Planet (www.onepercentfortheplanet.org/en), one percent of Silver Hollow's gross profits will be donated to a network of environmental nonprofits worldwide, a practice they hope to continue with all future releases.

The Barrys are also considering producing another of Thoreau's posthumously published essays, “Ktaadn,” from The Maine Woods. To reduce their carbon footprint further and remain in the spirit of Thoreau's tenet to “Simplify, simplify,” says Brett, they're thinking they might sell it solely as a digital download.—Raya Kuzyk

The Watchmen Cometh

The movie based on the only graphic novel to rank in Time magazine's list of 100 best English-language novels from 1923 to the present won't premier in theaters until March 2009—but the hype begins now. The core cast of the film showed up at the Watchmen panel at San Diego Comic-Con in July, taking full advantage of the spotlight—the Watchmen tie-in T-shirt was one of the most coveted items on and off the show floor. And although sales of this more than 20-year-old property have been good all year, the book rocketed to the number one spot on BookScan's Top 20 Graphic Novels in July with the release of the film preview accompanying the mega-blockbuster Dark Knight. DC Comics ordered a 300,000-copy reprinting of the paperback edition this summer and is planning to release in November a new printing of Watchmen: The Absolute Edition (2002. ISBN 978-1-4012-1926-0. $39.99).

First published in 1984, Watchmen, written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Dave Gibbons, is set in an alt-1984 United States, where costumed superheroes are part of everyday life and the country teeters on the verge of nuclear war with the Soviet Union. A group of struggling, retired superheroes gets drawn back to the action owing to the murder of one of their own. Although the graphic novel should already be a staple in all libraries, Titan Books is publishing a number of Watchmen-related titles that should generate additional interest. The main event will be the October release of Watching the Watchmen (ISBN 978-1-84856-041-3. $39.95), which is Dave Gibbons's account of the origin of the graphic novel. Designed by Chip Kidd and Mike Essl, this dust-jacketed hardcover details Gibbons's collaboration with Moore and reveals excised pages, early versions of the script, original character designs, page thumbnails, sketches, and more, including posters, covers, and rare portfolio art.

In January 2009, Titan will also release three tie-in books to ramp up the anticipation leading up to the feature film: Watchmen: The Art of the Film (ISBN 978-1-84856-068-0. $39.95) will include scores of production designs, set photos, costume sketches, and storyboards; Watchmen: The Official Film Companion (ISBN 978-1-84856-159-5. $29.95; pap. ISBN 978-1-84856-067-3. $19.95) will offer exclusive interviews with the cast and crew as well as a generous helping of photographs; and Watchmen: The Film Portraits (ISBN 978-1-84856-069-7. $50) will feature black-and-white portrait photos of the lead and supporting characters and extras from the crowd by Clay Enos, the official photographer on the set.

Whether blockbuster or bust, in the upcoming six months, all eyes will be watching the Watchmen.—Ann Kim