Consider this a call to action: Blame it on working parents who are too tired. Or on the potent tug of TV and computer. Whatever the cause, it seems the bedtime story — and the ritual of parents reading to their children regardless of the hour — may be losing its hold on American family life. If so, it’s more than just the loss of a quaint custom. Researchers and child-development specialists say reduced rates […]
Everyone at January Magazine would like to wish you and yours the very best of the season. If you’re looking for the January Magazine Holiday Gift Guide, it’s here. The Best Books of 2007 feature is here. Here’s wishing you and yours a joyous season. May your heart be strong and may all your dreams come true. All the best from the whole gang at January Magazine. The photo illustration is by David Middleton and […]
After a week of rolling it out, all of January Magazine’s Best Books of 2007 feature is now in place and collected here. We had a lot of fun putting this feature together for you, but now we are tired and we’re glad we don’t have to think of the best of anything again for another 11 months or so! We review from almost all branches of the book industry and, as a result, our […]
Lost Echoes by Joe R. Lansdale (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard) 352 pagesAs a child, Harry Wilkes suffered a mysterious ear infection that seemed to go away as fast and suddenly as it came. But it left him with the ability not only to see dead people but to hear violent occurrences from the past. Now he has to be careful in his surroundings, and map out specific routes whenever he goes somewhere, because at the slightest […]
Most of us love lists. Sometimes we even love looking at lists when they don’t make a lot of sense to us and their methodology has not been explained. Here’s a list of the best places to live. The hottest spots to vacation. The best schools. The top breeds of dog. The best restaurants. The hippest place to get a fish taco. The… well, you get the idea. Most of us love lists. I’m not […]
An Accidental American by Alex Carr (Random House Mortalis) 240 pagesThis novel introduces Nicole Blake, an ex-con living a carefully compacted life in France. The daughter of an American grifter and a Lebanese mother, Nicole is a forger by trade, living in the shelter of the Pyrenees after a six-year stretch in a Marseilles prison. But when John Valsamis, a CIA officer, locates Nicole, the bottom drops out of her peaceful existence. He’s determined to […]
A Miracle of Catfish by Larry Brown (Algonquin Books) 335 pagesFor me, there was no doubt that Larry Brown’s final, unfinished novel is the one that still burns bright. Brown died of a heart attack the day before Thanksgiving in 2004 and this year his long-time publisher delivered the author’s Southern-fried magnum opus. Set in rural Mississippi, A Miracle of Catfish sprawls across a year in the life of about a dozen characters, including 72-year-old […]
America, 1908: The Dawn of Flight, the Race to the Pole, the Invention of the Model T and the Making of a Modern Nation by Jim Rasenberger (Scribner) 320 pagesWe think of our own times as being the fastest-paced, most astonishing in American history. But people living in 1908, the subject of ex-Vanity Fair editor Rasenberger’s delightful new book, must have felt the same. Packed into that single 12-month period were Henry Ford’s introduction of […]
Architectural Inspiration: Styles, Details, Sources by Richard Skinulis and Peter Christopher (The Boston Mills Press) 528 pagesIn a world gone mad with home renovations and new construction, Architectural Inspiration is the ultimate design and wish book. This is the go-to-guide for the homeowner facing rethinking their existing home — or designing a new one — helping filling in the blanks that would-be designers without an actual design background will encounter. Are you dealing with double […]
The Alphabet from A to Y With Bonus Letter Z by Steve Martin and Roz Chast (Flying Dolphin Press/Doubleday) 64 pagesIt’s no secret that celebrity names sell books. In the last few years, we’ve seen children’s books from Madonna, Jamie Lee Curtis, Billy Crystal, Bill Cosby, Maria Shriver, Jerry Seinfeld and many others. In some ways, it’s not right to lump Steve Martin in with these others. While Martin is an actor, he’s also recognized […]
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