Inside the Dream Palace

Inside the Dream Palace: The Life and Times of New York's Legendary Chelsea Hotel (2014) by Sherill  Tippins. The Chelsea Hotel was founded by a visionary French architect in 1884. Since then, generations of artists have cohabited and created there, including Thomas Wolfe, Dylan Thomas, Arthur Miller, Allen Ginsberg, Bob Dylan, Janis Joplin, Leonard Cohen, Patti Smith, Robert Mapplethorpe, Andy Warhol and Sam Shepard. Why and how did this hotel become the largest and longest-lived artists' community in the known world? Inside the Dream Palace is the intimate and definitive story. This book starts slowly, as it name-checks some now-obscure 19th-century pioneers who inhabited the Chelsea hotel, but it gathers momentum as it accelerates toward the present, with many famous artists, musicians and other creative people making appearances at one point or another. It is a phenomenal story that grabs the interest and holds it. Grade: B+ 

The Art of Hearing Heartbeats

The Art of Hearing Heartbeats (2002) by Jan-Philipp Sendker. When her father, a successful New York lawyer, disappears without a trace, Julia decides to go in search of him in Burma, the land he came from. She has a clue -- a love letter he wrote decades earlier to a Burmese woman whom he has never mentioned to either Julia or her mother. Julia goes in search of the village where the woman lived and meets U Ba, a man who seems to know the story of Julia's father and his lover. Over the course of the book, U Ba tells Julia the story, and it slowly dawns on her that her father was the protagonist in a great love story -- one that to our ears sounds like a fable. But she listens to the end, and ultimately finds herself forgiving her father and coming to terms with his disappearance. This is a fine, unusual book that will draw you in and hold you in its spell, and ultimately leave you feeling completely satisfied. In its own small way, it's a perfect novel. Grade: A 

I Do and I Don't

I Do and I Don't: A History of Marriage in the Movies (2012) by Jeanine Basinger. This is a thoroughly researched and lavishly illustrated book about marriage as it has been portrayed in American movies. Basinger divides movie history up into chronological eras: The Silent Era, The Studio System, and the Modern Era. Then she slogs through each time period, describing marriage movies that were made during that period and analyzing their artistic and societal relevance. This was a mostly enjoyable book to read, although at times it seemed like it was just one film after another being methodically examined by Basinger, in a workmanlike fashion. Her knowledge of film is encyclopedic, and for this she deserves credit. I just wish her writing showed a little more inspiration. Grade: B 

Monsters

Monsters: The 1985 Chicago Bears and the Wild Heart of Football (2013) by Rich Cohen. This is a great football book, especially if you're a Chicago Bears fan (I'm not). But even though I'm not a Bears fan, I thoroughly enjoyed Cohen's look at the game through a fan's eyes. He doesn't neglect the injury and concussion factor, either; in fact, he delves thoroughly into the fate of the players after their football careers are over, and many of them are severely damaged. More than anything, though, he holds players and coaches up for praise -- especially, of course, those players and coaches who had a hand in the 1985 Chicago Bears. He also explores what happened to the Bears after they won the Super Bowl -- why they swiftly declined and didn't establish a "dynasty," which every indication pointed to. A great sports book. Grade: A-

Command and Control

Command and Control (2013) by Eric Schlosser. The author of Fast Food Nation takes on the scary subject of nuclear weapons and their handling by the government and by the military. The book is basically divided into two parts: a catalog of mistakes, near-disasters and false alarms, any of which could have led to nuclear war, and a detailed description of one accident, The Damascus Accident, in which a Titan II missile in a silo exploded. The subtitle of the book is "Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety." That pretty much tells the story. The fact that no nuclear weapons have accidentally detonated is only luck, he seems to be saying, and some sort of nuclear disaster in almost inevitable. Only time will tell if he is right, but this book is certainly enough to scare you into being a believer. I was appalled but not surprised to learn of the carelessness with which nuclear weapons have been designed and handled since the beginning of the atomic age. A scary, scary book, but a bit overlong. Grade: B 

Tune In

Tune In (2013) by Mark Lewisohn. This is the first volume in a planned trilogy about the lives and careers of the Beatles. The title of the trilogy is The Beatles: All These Years. This volume starts with their early years, from their birth in the 1940s and their awakening in the 1950s, through 1962, when they were just on the cusp of international stardom. One might argue that, at 800 pages, this book contains more about the Beatles' early years than anyone needs or cares to know, but having read it I find that I am glad I did and I am looking forward to Volume 2. I hope I get to read it, but I don't know when it's coming out. For Beatles lovers, this book can't be beat. Grade: A-

Mother. Wife. Sister. Human. Warrior. Falcon. Yardstick. Turban. Cabbage.

Mother. Wife. Sister. Human. Warrior. Falcon. Yardstick. Turban. Cabbage. (2013) by Rob Delaney. Rob Delaney has been named the "Funniest Person on Twitter" by Comedy Central. This book includes a lot of his tweets, which I did not find particularly funny. It also contains a lot of more straightforward prose, which I found more engaging. Delaney goes into a sort of confessional mode, and he doesn't seem to be holding anything back. He writes about his struggles with alcoholism and with depression. He writes about going through rehab at a halfway house. He writes about bungee jumping off the Manhattan Bridge. He writes about spending his junior year of college in France. All in all, he appears to have lived an eventful and interesting life. And he's still young. And he has written an interesting book. Grade: B

Rabbit Redux

Rabbit Redux (1971) by John Updike. The second in the four-part series on Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom is a less-than-stellar entry. While Rabbit's wife Janice leaves him and takes up with one of the salesmen at her father's car dealership, Rabbit opens his home to two house guests: a young white girl named Jill, and an older black man called Skeeter. Skeeter's ramblings take up a lot of the book, and I found Updike's efforts to reproduce negro patois less than convincing. Rabbit is shown to be not an especially nice person, making cutting remarks to everyone and at one point knocking Jill around -- he does not hesitate to use violence. Nevertheless, Updike is a master writer and makes the book hang together so that it makes an interesting read. Grade: B-

Rabbit is Rich

Rabbit is Rich (1981) by John Updike. The third and penultimate book in the saga of Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom is not the best, but it is certainly a good read. The time is 1979: Skylab is falling, gas lines are lengthening, the President collapses while running a marathon, and double-digit inflation is the scourge of the nation. Meanwhile, Rabbit has prospered, having become Chief Sales Representative of Springer Motors, the Toyota dealership in the fictional town of Brewer, Penn. Harry seems poised to enjoy a period of happiness -- until his son returns from college wanting to claim his place at the car lot, and Harry spots a young woman at the Toyota agency whom he suspects may be his daughter by a previous relationship. Though not the best in the series, this is an essential book to read in following the saga of Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom and his uncoordinated search for happiness. Grade: B+

Son of a Gun

Son of a Gun (2013) by Justin St. Germain. In 2001, when he was 20 years old, St. Germain's mother was murdered by her husband (St. Germain's stepfather), who later killed himself. Though St. Germain tried to move on, he found himself inexorably drawn back, to explore the past, to try to figure out the puzzle of his mother's death. In doing so, he tried to gain a better understanding of his mother and the life she had chosen to lead. He also explores the town of Tombstone, around which much of the story revolves, and even gets into the "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral" and the legend of Wyatt Earp. It's a searing, sad, yet informative memoir of a terrible time in St. Germain's life. I found it well worth reading. Grade: B+