Books

Book critic John Leonard reviews "Open Letters," the new collection of writings by the playwright and former President of Czechoslovakia.

Perl's new book, "Gallery Going," is a collection of essays about the art world of the late 80s and 90s. He says that museums are succumbing to new pressures to generate income, which is affecting the kind of art curators choose to feature.

For more than a decade, Sciolino has been reporting on the Middle East. She was one of the few American journalists who recognized the danger of Saddam Hussein before the invasion of Kuwait. She currently is a diplomatic correspondent covering U.S. foreign policy and national security issues for the New York Times. Her new book is "The Outlaw State: Saddam Hussein's Quest for Power and the Gulf Crisis."

The travel writer has a new book called "Wall to Wall: From Beijing to Berlin by Rail." She took the trip five years ago as reforms were beginning to be implemented in the Soviet Union, and before the government crackdown in Tiananmen Square and the Eastern European revolutions. She's particularly interested in what it's like to travel abroad as a woman alone.

Millman's latest book, "Warm Hearts & Cold Cash: The Intimate Dynamics of Families and Money," is about how people use money as a tool of power and a symbol for certain emotions in family relationships. Millman is professor and chair of sociology at the University of California at Santa Cruz.

Author and professor Padraig O'Malley's most recent books is called "Biting At the Grave," about the IRA hunger strikes in 1981 that ended in 10 deaths. O'Malley challenges conventional wisdom on each side of the conflict. Formal talks between Protestant and Catholic political leaders over the future of Northern Ireland are to begin next Monday.

Critic Maureen Corrigan reviews the book "It Happened in the Catskills," an oral history of the resorts that made up what was known as the Borsht Belt.

Book critic John Leonard reviews a biography of Paul Scott, who wrote the Raj Quartet, which includes the Jewel in the Crown. The book is written by Hilary Spurling. Leonard knew Scott personally, and says the book does justice to his tragic life.

Book critic John Leonard reviews the latest novel by Czechoslovakian writer Milan Kundera. He's the author of "The Unbearable Lightness of Being," and "The Book of Laughter & Forgetting."

Journalist Gerald Posner's new book, "Hitler's Children," examines the lives of the sons and daughters of leaders of the Third Reich. It includes the accounts from the children of Dr. Joesph Mengele, Rudolf Hess, and Karl Saur--whose son joins the interview.