The celebrity memoir. The decision to read one is subject to a big-time conditional: the celebrity in question. Fairly obvious condition, I know. Until recently, I don’t believe I had read a single celebrity memoir, deeming them somewhat akin to “royal watching,” a waste of one’s fine time. This opinion, however, evidenced my own limited […]
We arrive, fellow citizens, at the fleeting moments of a presidential campaign. Soon (hopefully) we’ll know whether it’s Kamala Harris or Donald Trump who will become the next commander in chief of the U.S. armed forces. Of all the enumerated powers under Article II of the U.S. Constitution, “commander in chief” is probably the weightiest. […]
Have you ever thought about hopping into the Grand Canyon and hiking its entire length? Neither have I. Not only did Kevin Fedarko, author of A Walk in the Park: The True Story of a Spectacular Misadventure in the Grand Canyon, think about it, he actually did it. The subtitle of this compelling and thoughtful […]
If you’re still on the prowl for this summer’s beach read, Fareed Zakaria has your back with his latest book, Age of Revolutions: Progress and Backlash from 1600 to the Present. It’s a book for those with, shall we say, divergent beach-reading preferences. Using his Harvard-trained political scientist background along with his current role as […]
Hernán Cortés meeting Moctezuma in 1519 holds some space in our North American imagination. Two trajectories of human development—long separated by time and distance—crossed in Tenochtitlan, modern-day Mexico City. For many, it symbolizes the beginning of the end, the Old World commencing its dominion in the New World. Imagine the meeting: European steel and gunpowder […]
In Crook Manifesto, the always excellent Colson Whitehead takes us back to the world he devised in his previous novel, Harlem Shuffle. Ray Carney still has his Harlem furniture store. Becoming more prosperous, he and his family have settled into an apartment on the coveted Strivers’ Row. We’re in the 1970s, where “the flamboyant quotient […]
Just when you think you’ve already heard the most daring of castaway sea voyages from the historical record, comes now author David Grann to regale us with a remarkable chronicle of woe. In The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder, Grann weaves together a myriad of sources, recounting events with such vibrant prose […]
We meet “the girl” as she runs through a land that’s “innocent of story.” She thinks not of what‘s being left behind, lest she “die of grief.” She’s fleeing a settlement where even the good have become awful. Through snow and ice she runs, “speed and fear” constituting her sails. We never learn of the […]
Word association with “airship” probably yields responses ranging from “Goodyear Blimp” to “Hindenburg.” Perhaps there’s also a vague sense that airships had their greatest run in popularity during the early 20th century, transatlantic crossings and all. In His Majesty’s Airship: The Life and Tragic Death of the World’s Largest Flying Machine, S.C. Gwynne unfurls this […]
How vast individual wealth is amassed often hits its mark in biographies. We know the usual suspects: Carnegie, Rockefeller, Jobs. Within each is a story of a commodity or a manufactured good, something tangible for the mind’s eye. Concentrated wealth by way of finance capital is a more nebulous biographic endeavor. Rarer still are novelizations […]
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