Books

Two recent contributions to the horror genre, Drood and the Twilight saga, have breathed new life into old thrills and chills. Maureen Corrigan has a review.

Maureen Corrigan reviews Brothers, Yu Hua's epic, 600-plus-page comedy that details life in a Chinese village from the early days of the Cultural Revolution to the giddy capitalist present.

Book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews Reborn: Journals & Notebooks, 1947 – 1963, the newly published intimate ruminations of Susan Sontag.

Maureen Corrigan reviews Jayne Anne Phillips' Lark & Termite, a novel that weaves together the story of an American soldier fighting (and dying) in Korea in 1950, with that of his family struggling with their loss nine years later.

You know you have a terrific book in your hands when you encounter language or elegantly presented research that startles you into fresh awareness; you know it when the atmosphere of a novel doesn't leave you for days, or years.

This holiday season, as we stand at the brink of a new administration, there's a thrill of history in the air. These books will help anyone, whatever his or her politics, understand what the nation has come though to reach this moment.

Critic-at-large John Powers salutes the Chilean-born writer and the new literary "It" boy, Roberto Bolano, who died in 2003. Bolano's novel, 2666, is a "massive epic of modernity," says Powers.

Set in the 17th century, Toni Morrison's new novel A Mercy is the story of a slave girl whose mother gives her away to a stranger in a desperate attempt to secure her a better future. Maureen Corrigan hails the book as a prequel (of sorts) to Morrison's earlier novel Beloved.

Once renowned for its artists, Italy seemed to vanish from the world stage in the '80s and '90s. But two new novels, Clash of Civilizations Over an Elevator in Piazza Vittorio and Sicilian Tragedee, show Italian culture enjoying an international comeback.

From The Federalist Papers to The Feminine Mystique, Jay Parini's Promised Land examines 13 books that shaped and changed America. Maureen Corrigan has a review.