Dean Koontz virtually invented the cross-genre novel, and in One Door Away from Heaven he mixes an action thriller with post-X-Files alien paranoia to remarkable effect. Micky Bellsong is a young woman at a crisis point in her life, using a stay at her Aunt Geneva's to sort things out. Then the precocious and deformed Leilani Klonk walks into her life, telling stories of her stepfather and drugged-up mother, who believe aliens will beam the girl into their mothership and heal her deformities before her 10th birthday. But tales of the stepfather's vicious past, including his hand in several murders, leave Micky believing that a far more terrible fate awaits her friend. So when the parents take off with Leilani, Micky pursues.

As is typical with a Koontz novel, nothing turns out to be what it seems, and the meticulously crafted plot tightens like a noose with every turn of the page. His characters are exceptionally drawn, driving the novel forward with realism and warmth. Micky is one of his more attractive young heroines, but the real star is Leilani, a mature young girl whose plucky nature and sparkling dialogue instantly make her Koontz's most memorable creation. She embodies his belief that despite violence, pain, and suffering, there is always goodness to be found in every person and situation. Koontz has once again proven why he is one of the premier novelists of his generation. --Jonathan Weir, Amazon.co.uk

Koontz's latest is powered by an impassioned stand against utilitarian bioethics, and it's chock-a-block with trademark characters vulnerable kids, nurturing parental substitutes, a dog of above-average intelligence and a villain of insuperable nastiness sure to provoke a pleasurable conditioned response from his readers. The discursive story coalesces from two converging subplots steeped in the weirdness of fringe ufology: in one, loser Michelina Bellsong struggles to save crippled nine-year-old Leilani Klonk from an evil stepdad planning to pass off her imminent disposal as a benevolent alien abduction; in the other, a strange boy who goes by the alias Curtis Hammond is the quarry of two cross-country manhunts, one led by the FBI and the other by mass murderers who, like the messianic Curtis, may not be what they seem. En route to a pyrotechnic finale in rural Idaho, Koontz shoots bull's-eyes at target issues that shape his theme, including assisted suicide, substance abuse, the irresponsibility of the counterculture and the goofiness of true-believer ET enthusiasts. Koontz's once form-fitting style has gotten baggy of late, however, and readers may find themselves wishing he had better filtered the flights of fancy his characters sometimes indulge at chapter length. For all that, the novel is surprisingly focused on its inspirational message "we are the instruments of one another's salvation and only by the hope that we give to others do we lift ourselves out of the darkness into light" and conveys it with such conviction that only the most critical will demur. (Dec. 26)Forecast: A terrific cover, depicting two female figures on a country path beneath a star-filled night sky, will alert browsers to the awe and mystery within the novel; Koontz's name and Bantam's promo machine will do the rest. Koontz could hit #1 with this one.

2. Another Day in the Frontal Lobe: A brain Surgeon Exposes Life on the Inside (Katrina Firlik, M.D.)

From Publishers Weekly

The brain is my business," says Connecticut neurosurgeon Firlik. "Many of the brains I encounter have been pushed around by tumors, blood clots, infections, or strokes that have swollen out of control. Some have been invaded by bullets, nails, or even maggots." In these pages, a carpenter with a nail in his left frontal lobe goes home within a day of surgery; a boy develops a raging bacterial meningitis because his New Age mother gave him herbs instead of antibiotics for a routine ear infection; and an infant with hydranencephaly looks cute despite the absence of brain matter in his skull. Along the way, Firlik muses that a healthy brain has the consistency of soft tofu, and she flies solo in the OR for the first time as she saves an 18-year-old victim of a car accident who didn't buckle up. A woman in a male-dominated specialty, Firlik doesn't get worked up over minor things that can be construed as sexist; she finds that handling a patient's anxiety can be more complicated than the surgery itself, and she expects to be sued someday for malpractice. This witty and lucid first book demythologizes a complex medical specialty for those of us who aren't brain surgeons. (On sale May 2)

Katrina Firlik shatters the myth most of us hold of brain surgeons as superheroes: they're merely masters of the trade. Critics agreed that her engaging, witty insight into the profession, her layperson's explanation of complex medical terms and routine surgeries, and her compelling stories more than overshadowed the blood-and-gore factor. A few critics expressed disappointment that Firlik only touched on her challenges as a woman in the field, particularly as the first woman admitted to University of Pittsburgh Medical Center's neurosurgery residency program. Others noted some self-indulgent tangents, though she amply covers her personal inspirations. Overall, Another Day provides a fascinating look into the oh-so-routine practices brain surgeons face daily.

3. Forbidden Knowledge: From Prometheus to Pornography (Roger Shattuck )

An intellectual tour-de-force, Forbidden Knowledge is a study of the ethics of literary and scientific inquiry. Shattuck first approaches his subject indirectly, conducting an engaging tour of Western literature: Adam and Eve, Prometheus, Milton's Paradise Lost, Goethe's Faust, and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. He then uses these tales to address the moral questions raised by mankind's tendency to search for dangerous knowledge. He contrasts J. Robert Oppenheimer's acceptance of guilt for the atomic bombings with Edward Teller's dismissal of the same. In his own field of literary criticism he argues against the neutral analysis of immoral works as "pure literature," illustrating his point with a critique of the Marquis de Sade. Forbidden Knowledge is a stimulating and forceful intellectual argument against moral relativism, as well as a practical approach to difficult ethical problems, from genetic engineering to pornography.

In this scholarly, provocative and gracefully written study, Shattuck?a distinguished critic (The Banqueting Years) and translator (of Apollinaire)?argues that there are moral taboos (even if they are sometimes unclearly defined) that we dare violate at our peril, that there are indeed limits?both philosophical and physical?to what humankind is meant to know and experience and that from the very beginnings of civilization, a central theme in our thought and literature has been the struggle to understand what those limits are. The book begins in theory and moves to more concrete examples of "forbidden knowledge," from discussions of myths (Prometheus, Orpheus, Adam and Eve), through the Victorians' perplexity over Darwin, to an examination of works of literature (Faust, Paradise Lost, Billy Budd, Frankenstein, Emily Dickinson's poetry, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, The Stranger) that indicate a fascination or concern with those limits. The second half of this study focuses on what Shattuck calls case histories of what can happen when those limits are pushed and include discussions of the Manhattan Project, DNA research, genetic engineering, serial killers (Ted Bundy; the so-called Moors Murderer) and finally?and at great length?the Marquis de Sade. The book might seem but a thoughtful warning about the destructive power of de Sade and what Shattuck considers sadistic pornography, but a concluding essay makes it clear that his subject is really the history of human curiosity and of the glories and dangers inherent in trying to learn more than one is prepared for. First serial to the New York Times Book Review; Reader's Subscription Book Club main selection; BOMC and History Book Club alternates.

4. The God Delusion (Richard Dawkins)

The antireligion wars started by Daniel Dennett and Sam Harris will heat up even more with this salvo from celebrated Oxford biologist Dawkins. For a scientist who criticizes religion for its intolerance, Dawkins has written a surprisingly intolerant book, full of scorn for religion and those who believe. But Dawkins, who gave us the selfish gene, anticipates this criticism. He says it's the scientist and humanist in him that makes him hostile to religions—fundamentalist Christianity and Islam come in for the most opprobrium—that close people's minds to scientific truth, oppress women and abuse children psychologically with the notion of eternal damnation. While Dawkins can be witty, even confirmed atheists who agree with his advocacy of science and vigorous rationalism may have trouble stomaching some of the rhetoric: the biblical Yahweh is "psychotic," Aquinas's proofs of God's existence are "fatuous" and religion generally is "nonsense." The most effective chapters are those in which Dawkins calms down, for instance, drawing on evolution to disprove the ideas behind intelligent design. In other chapters, he attempts to construct a scientific scaffolding for atheism, such as using evolution again to rebut the notion that without God there can be no morality. He insists that religion is a divisive and oppressive force, but he is less convincing in arguing that the world would be better and more peaceful without it. (Oct. 18)

Richard Dawkins, in The God Delusion, tells of his exasperation with colleagues who try to play both sides of the street: looking to science for justification of their religious convictions while evading the most difficult implications—the existence of a prime mover sophisticated enough to create and run the universe, "to say nothing of mind reading millions of humans simultaneously." Such an entity, he argues, would have to be extremely complex, raising the question of how it came into existence, how it communicates —through spiritons!—and where it resides. Dawkins is frequently dismissed as a bully, but he is only putting theological doctrines to the same kind of scrutiny that any scientific theory must withstand. No one who has witnessed the merciless dissection of a new paper in physics would describe the atmosphere as overly polite.
~George Johnson is author of Fire in the Mind: Science, Faith, and the Search for Order and six other books. He resides on the Web at talaya.net

5. The Bible
(yes, the Bible. But Cover to cover, without any help. Just read it all. And don't lie and say you have--most HAVEN'T, especially Christians. For myself, as anyone who knows me understands, my spiritual path was halted by reading the Bible. By the time i got to the end, i was an atheist. Amazing what the clergy will hide form you. It's worth your time to really read it, cover to cover. I don't have any reviews to place below here, as that would be a bit absurd, considering. But a review, of sorts, will be had in my book about this journey, Supernatural Hypocrisy: The Cognitive Dissonance of a God Cosmology, hopefully available by the end of this year).

6. Maximum Ride series (James Patterson) The Angel Experiment, Book 1
*you won't often catch me reading Young Adult fiction at this age...but I'm telling you, I could not resist these. Each one, just as compelling and entertaining as the last.

Themes from Patterson's popular adult titles When the Wind Blows and The Lake House waft through this YA thriller, the author's first in the genre. Wood stars as Maximum Ride, 14-year-old leader of a band of kids who have escaped the lab where they were bred as 98% human and 2% bird (wings being a key component) and developed a variety of other-worldly talents. In Patterson's unusual universe, Max and her young cohorts are soon forced to rescue one of their own—a girl named Angel—from a pack of mutant wolf-humans called Erasers. Wood nails Patterson's often adult-beyond-their-years dialogue with a jaded tone. But the result of this pairing makes Max sound more off-putting than cool or intriguing. The listening experience is stalled in the starting gate, keeping the action-adventure earthbound rather than high-flying. Ages 12-up. (Apr.)

Grade 7 Up–A group of genetically enhanced kids who can fly and have other unique talents are on the run from part-human, part-wolf predators called Erasers in this exciting SF thriller that's not wholly original but is still a compelling read. Max, 14, and her adopted family–Fang and Iggy, both 13, Nudge, 11, Gazzy, 8, and Angel, 6–were all created as experiments in a lab called the School. Jeb, a sympathetic scientist, helped them escape and, since then, they've been living on their own. The Erasers have orders to kill them so the world will never find out they exist. Max's old childhood friend, Ari, now an Eraser leader, tracks them down, kidnaps Angel, and transports her back to the School to live like a lab rat again. The youngsters are forced to use their special talents to rescue her as they attempt to learn about their pasts and their destinies. The novel ends with the promise that this journey will continue in the sequel. As with Patterson's adult mystery thrillers, in-depth characterization is secondary to the fast-moving plot. The narrative alternates between Max's first-person point-of-view and that of the others in the third person, but readers don't get to know Max very well. The only major flaw is that the children sound like adults most of the time. This novel is reminiscent of David Lubar's Hidden Talents (Tor, 1999) and Ann Halam's Dr. Franklin's Island (Random, 2002).–Sharon Rawlins, Piscataway Public Library, NJ

*we interrupt this booklist for an important announcement. I thought the above byline was from Pissedaway Public Library. Until i looked at it again. I'm sure i Pissed Away many hours at the libray in my lifetime. Okay, not Pissed away. It was time well spent.

We now return to your regularly scheduled Booklist, already in progress....

7. The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy by James Trefil, Joseph F. Kett, and E. D. Hirsch

This book belongs in high-school libraries, if only because of the tremendous amount of publicity and controversy surrounding its compilation. It has large gaps in minority literature and history, but in other areas it is fascinating in its coverage. Adults will enjoy browsing to find what is included and what's not, while students will appreciate the quick reference.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

A National bestseller, The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy has been widely acclaimed for identifying and defining the core body of knowledge that no literare American should be without. Now in this newly revised and updated edition, the authors provice a comprehensive look at cultural literacy for the nineties. New entries reflect suggestions from hundreds of readers. The dictionary takes into account the growing consensus over the specifics of multiculturalism, the political and geographic changes in the world, and the new ideas and terms that flow constantly from scientific research and technological development. The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy challenges us to find out more about what we know and helps us make sense of what we read, hear, and learn. It is a "must have" book for every home.

8. Everything You Know About God Is Wrong: The Disinformation Guide to Religion (Russ Kick, Neil Gaiman, and Richard Dawkins)

In the new mega-anthology from best-selling editor Russ Kick, more than fifty writers, reporters, and researchers invade the inner sanctum for an unrestrained look at the wild and woolly world of organized belief.

Richard Dawkins shows us the strange, scary properties of religion; Neil Gaiman turns a biblical atrocity story into a comic (that almost sent a publisher to prison); Erik Davis looks at what happens when religion and California collide; Mike Dash eyes stigmatics; Douglas Rushkoff exposes the trouble with Judaism; Paul Krassner reveals his "Confessions of an Atheist"; and best-selling lexicographer Jonathon Green interprets the language of religious prejudice.

Among the dozens of other articles and essays, you'll find: a sweeping look at classical composers and Great American Songbook writers who were unbelievers, such as Irving Berlin, creator of "God Bless America"; the definitive explanation of why America is not a Christian nation; the bizarre, Catholic-fundamentalist books by Mel Gibson's father; eye-popping photos of bizarre religious objects and ceremonies, including snake-handlers and pot-smoking children; the thinly veiled anti-Semitism in the Left Behind novels; an extract from the rare, suppressed book The Sex Life of Brigham Young; and rarely seen anti-religious writings from Mark Twain and H.G. Wells.

Further topics include exorcisms, religious curses, Wicca, the Church of John Coltrane, crimes by clergy, death without God, Christian sex manuals, the "ex-gay" movement, failed prophecies, bizarre theology, religious bowling, atheist rock and roll, "how to be a good Christian," an entertaining look at the best (and worst) books on religion, and much more.

Russ Kick is the all-star editor of five previous Disinformation Guides and three Disinformation books. He has been labeled as an "information archaeologist" by the New York Times in a major profile. He runs the popular blog TheMemoryHole.org and is well known for his intelligent and successful FOIA requests and unveilings.

9. Letter to a Christian Nation (Sam Harris)

“A breath of fresh fire.”–Wall Street Journal

"This combination of ruthless argument with polemic designed to provoke (he describes the Catholic Church as the “institution that has produced and sheltered an elite army of child-molesters") will further delight Harris’ supporters and infuriate his critics.” – San Francisco Chronicle

“Harris has consolidated his disdain for religion in a withering attack on Christianity, delivered in the form of an open letter. . . . Mr. Harris wants to grab your lapels and give you a good shake. . . [he] makes a good case for a new and intellectually honest conversation about morality and human suffering.”–NY Observer

“As infidels go, Harris is an astonishingly successful one. . . Letter is a readable, exhortatory screed.”–Newsweek

“Bracing.”–The Nation

“[Letter to a Christian Nation] crackles with a focused, potent energy. . . . [Harris’] arguments resonate with a satisfying common sense.”–Contra Costa Times

“Sam Harris’s elegant little book is most refreshing and a wonderful source of ammunition for those who, like me, hold to no religious doctrine. Yet I have some sympathy also with those who might be worried by his uncompromising stance. Read it and from your own view, but do not ignore its message.”
–Sir Roger Penrose, emeritus professor of mathematics, Oxford University, author of The Road to Reality

“Reading Harris’ Letter to a Christian Nation was like sitting ring side, cheering the champion, yelling ‘Yes!’ at every jab. For those of us who feel depressed by this country’s ever increasing unification of church and state, and the ever decreasing support for the sciences that deliver knowledge and reduce ignorance …

“A breath of fresh fire.” —Wall Street Journal

“I dare you to read this book…it will not leave you unchanged. Read it if it is the last thing you do.” —Richard Dawkins, author of The Selfish Gene and The God Delusion

“It’s a shame that not everyone in this country will read Sam Harris’ marvelous little book Letter to a Christian Nation. They won’t but they should.” —Leonard Susskind, Felix Bloch Professor in theoretical physics, Stanford University

10. Atheism: The Case against God (George H. Smith)

With this intriguing introduction, George H Smith sets out to demolish what he considers the most widespread and destructive of all the myths devised by man – the concept of a supreme being. With painstaking scholarship and rigorous arguments, Mr. Smith examines, dissects, and refutes the myriad “proofs” offered by theists – the defenses of sophisticated, professional theologians, as well as the average religious layman. He explores the historical and psychological havoc wrought by religion in general – and concludes that religious belief cannot have any place in the life of modern, rational man.

Is theism a reasonable and rational position, or can a better case be made for atheism and against faith in the existence of gods? The goal of George Smith’s books is to demonstrate that irrational beliefs are in fact harmful and that theism and religion are prime examples of irrationality. The conclusion, then, is that both must be abandoned and new ways of thinking about the world adopted in their place.

The first place he starts is, naturally enough, to define what atheism is. This he does well, explaining the difference between “weak” atheism, which is simply the lack of belief in any gods, and “strong” atheism, which is the outright denial that any gods exist (he uses the less common terms “implicit” and “explicit”). This is the definition which most atheists today understand, which atheists have been using for the past couple of hundred years, and which is attested to in most major, unabridged dictionaries.

But the heart of Smith’s book is his discussion about reason vs. faith. According to Smith, reason and faith are two ways of thinking which are diametrically opposed to each other. His explanation of the nature of “reasonable” thinking is very good, and something which most people should read.

Reason isn’t simply one “mode” of thinking, or one possible choice out of a variety of equally valid options. Reason is, instead, our very ability to think in abstract, complex ways. Similarly, rational demonstration is not simply one way to demonstrate something, but rather it is the ability to demonstrate anything at all. The denial of reason is thus the denial of our basic ability to think coherently about our lives.

This in turn is contrasted with faith – but here his argument breaks down somewhat. The perception is given that he is making an argument which is valid against all forms of faith and thus all forms of theism, but this is mistaken on two accounts.

First, what he says does not apply to all the ways in which people – even religious people – understand the nature of faith. It is true that it is valid against the usual way in which you will see a religious person using it, and particularly in the way which Christians use it. Because of this, his discussion will be very useful on a practical level, and what he says, when limited properly, is very accurate: “Insofar as faith is possible, it is irrational; insofar as faith is rational, it is impossible.”

It is undeniable that a defense of reason is probably the best argument against the “faith” many religionists promote; but in not making it clear that this is one of many ways to understand “faith,” he makes an error similar to that of religionists who claim that if the atheist has “faith” in a spouse or in the sun rising tomorrow, then that is equivalent to the theist’s faith in their god.

A second error is in the premise that all forms of theism are equivalent – further compounded by the exclusive use of Christianity as the theistic foil for his arguments. Not all theists necessarily resort to “faith” in the way he describes – some refuse to use it at all and insist that their beliefs can be defended with reason alone. They may be mistaken in their belief that they would be successful, but that doesn’t change the fact that an assault on one type of faith is not the same as an assault on all forms of faith and all forms of theism.

To a degree, Smith seems to understand this, because he devotes a significant portion of the book to refutations of common attempts to provide rational arguments for the existence of gods. Although these rebuttals are limited because they do not take into account more recent formulations, they do provide a clear, understandable introduction to them and how to go about dealing with them.

All of the book’s problems stem, I think, from the question of theory vs. practice. In practice, most atheists will encounter Christians making the sort of faith-based arguments Smith describes and refutes. Because of this, his book is very good and very useful. But in theory, an atheist could easily encounter theists and religions who make different arguments, and the atheist will look foolish trying to formulate rebuttals to positions which the theist does not hold.

Unfortunately, this isn’t just speculation – I see it happen all the time that atheists essentially construct straw man arguments against principles which are associated with Christianity and particular ideas of faith, only based on learning that a person is a theist or is a Christian. The chief reason is, I am sure, because they don’t often encounter different sorts of theists and because they are most familiar with Christianity. Even worse, some atheist books contribute to the problem when they could be working to eliminate it.

And Smith’s book isn’t alone in this – not by a long shot. Most of the atheist books out there may start out with a more general discussion about the nature of atheism and broad considerations about general beliefs in the existence of gods, but few stick with just those arguments. Most end up attacking Christianity in the end – understandable, for the practical reasons I describe above, but ultimately problematic.

Too many atheists are simply ignorant of the variety of ways in which theists defend their beliefs, and while educating them about Christian arguments is a good idea, it is self-defeating to only focus on Christianity. It is also self-defeating to mix up anti-Christian arguments with anti-theism arguments, without making the clear distinction between the two. A true “Case Against God” book would not spend much time on Christianity-only arguments, but instead would have left that to a second volume entitled “The Case Against Christianity.”

Nevertheless, this book still provides a sound introduction to atheism – what it is, what it is not, and how it can be effectively defended against the most common critiques. It also provides a basis for atheists to critique religious faith and common theistic arguments, so long as they keep in mind the limitations described above. ~Austin Cline, Guide at atheism.about.com

10. God Game (Andrew M. Greeley)

This is the dilemma that faces our hero, who quickly finds that being given the kingdom, the power, and the glory is dangerous–but addictive. The troubles of the people he sees flashing on his computer screen are all too real–and his troubles are just beginning. . .

A native of Chicago, Reverend Andrew M. Greeley, is a priest, distinguished sociologist and bestselling author. He is professor of social sciences at the University of Chicago and the University of Arizona, as well as Research Associate at the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago. His current sociological research focuses on current issues facing the Catholic Church-including celibacy of priests, ordination of women, religious imagination, and sexual behavior of Catholics.

Father Greeley received the S.T.L. in 1954 from St. Mary of Lake Seminary. His graduate work was done at the University of Chicago, where he received the M.A. Degree in 1961 and the Ph.D. in 1962.

Father Greeley has written scores of books and hundreds of popular and scholarly articles on a variety of issues in sociology, education and religion. His column on political, church and social issues is carried by the carried by the Chicago Sun Times and may other newspapers. He stimulates discussion of neglected issues and often anticipates sociological trends. He is the author of more than thirty bestselling novels and an autobiography, Furthermore!: Confessions of a Parish Priest.

11. That’s Not in My American History Book: A Compilation of Little-Known Events & Forgotten Heroes (Thomas Ayres)

12. The Greatest Stories Never Told: 100 Tales from History to Astonish, Bewilder, and Stupefy (Rick Beyer)

“Full of tasty morsels.A delightful book to arm one for the next dull cocktail party.” (Chicago Tribune )

“History like you’ve never read it before.Amusing.” (The Tennessean )

“100 stories you haven’t heard will delight in knowing..Lively, offbeat and surprising in quick-hit snippets.” (Denver Rocky Mountain News )

“Surprising.the essentials of fascinating stories are here.” (Dallas Morning News )

History isn’t always made by great armies colliding or by great civilizations rising or falling. Sometimes it’s made when a chauffeur takes a wrong turn, a scientist forgets to clean up his lab, or a drunken soldier gets a bit rowdy. That’s the kind of history you’ll find in The Greatest Stories Never Told.

This is history candy — the good stuff. Here are 100 tales to astonish, bewilder, and stupefy: more than two thousand years of history filled with courage, cowardice, hope, triumph, sex, intrigue, folly, humor, and ambition. It’s a historical delight and a visual feast with hundreds of photographs, drawings, and maps that bring each story to life. A new discovery waits on every page: stories that changed the course of history and stories that affected what you had for breakfast this morning.

Consider:

* The Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock because they ran out of beer
* Some Roman officials were so corrupt that they actually stole time itself
* Three cigars changed the course of the Civil War
* The Scottish kilt was invented by an Englishman

Based on the popular Timelab 2000® history minutes hosted by Sam Waterston on The History Channel®, this collection of fascinating historical tidbits will have you shaking your head in wonder and disbelief. But they’re all true. And you’ll soon find yourself telling them to your friends.

13. Borrowed Lives (Laramie Dunaway) first published in the UK as “Wicked Women”

Written in a frisky, wisecracking style, Dunaway’s second novel (after Hungry Women ) kicks off smartly when good friends Luna Devon (a timid, lackluster graduate student) and Wren Caldwell (a clever, outspoken, gorgeous budding writer) both get shot by a crazed, suicidal pal. Only Luna survives. with a bullet hole in her chest. Boldly deciding to change her ho-hum life, Luna gathers Wren’s brilliant literary efforts, responds to Wren’s job offers and reinvents herself as a brainy journalist for a trendy California magazine. As Wren, she finds that the sassier her act, the bigger the payoff. Assigned to interview jailed husband-killer Season Dougherty, she becomes Season’s ally and lands a fat contract to script her story for Hollywood. Playing on her borrowed name and credentials, she breezes into an affair with the amiable Davis Richard, himself a chaser of filmworthy stories. As her adventures as Wren hilariously pile up, Luna begins to see her criminally scripted double life as the stuff of movies, especially when she gets the surprise package of her pilfered identity–the arrival of dead Wren’s shady, handsome ex-con husband, Byron, who is all too ready to go along with the scam. Blending a wealth of entertaining, good-humored tough talk with a rugged and ready sexuality, Dunaway keeps this romp of a novel moving with dexterity and panache. A snappy denouement shows Luna, having played Wren to the hilt, now primed to reenter her own life bolder and wiser. This is the first title in Warner’s new Fresh Voices Program, which aims to publish quality fiction by unsung writers. Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club alternates.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. –This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Luna Devon is at a crossroads in her life when she and her good friend Wren Caldwell—a clever, outspoken, gorgeous, budding writer—are shot by a crazed, suicidal pal. When Wren perishes, the timid, lackluster, graduate student Luna survives with a hole in her heart and decides to reinvent herself . . . as Wren. Luna thinks she has it made after taking the job her friend has landed sight unseen at a hot new California magazine; yet if Wren’s life offers a bed of roses, it certainly has its thorns. With moxie, pizzazz, gutsiness, and fingers crossed, Luna will try her best, even if it means pursuing her happiness with a group of ecological terrorists, a floating high-stakes chess game run by a hoodlum named Grudge, her anthropologist father who has taken a preteen Indian medicine woman for his new wife, and a man who wants what may be impossible—for Wren to be herself.

Jae: I have often aspired to produce writing like this in my novels. I can’t say enough about how thoroughly enjoyable and addictive this writing is. I must instead show you by giving you an excerpt from the opening pages…

“When i finally arrived at the police station, Wren was standing on the front steps under a bright light, a pair of blue panties balled up in her right fist. She was waving her fist around as if she was about to do some sort of magic trick with her panties, turn them into a dove or something. At the same time, her flushed face was leaning into some young uniformed cop’s pale face, yelling at him. The top to my Rabbit was down, so i could hear each word as crisp as snapping carrots.

“This is total bullshit!” Wren hollered.

The skinny young cop was leaning as far back as he could without flipping backward over the railing. His eyes were wide and unfocused, as if he’d just been told he was the offspring of incest. Like most men who’ve come face-to-face with Wren’s temper, he looked both a little murderous and a little in love.

I quickly swung the Rabbit to the curb and honked twice.

Wren didn’t take her fierce eyes off the young cop. She continued to glare at him as she backed down the steps toward my car without actually looking where she was going. As if she were guided by some psychic homing device. Anyone else I’d have been worried would trip and fall. But not Wren. She had never done one ungraceful thing in her entire life. She’s probably pirouetted out of her mothers’ womb and did the Maypole dance with the umbilical cord. Finally, Wren turned toward me. This is when i noticed the huge tan bandage the size of a business card angled across her forehead, partially covering her left eyebrow. A moist rusty spot soaked through the center of the bandage. Three drops of blood formed a teardrop constellation on her white T-shirt.

Wren had only descended two steps when she stopped abruptly and pivoted back around toward the cop. Her tennis shoes squealed against the smooth cement. The startled young cop flinched. His hand dropped to his gun.

“And you are an asshole!” Wren proclaimed, pointing her panties at him. “You hear what I’m saying, Officer? Do you?”

She marched toward my car, climbed in, and slammed the door. “Let’s get the fuck out of here before I kill someone else.”

14. Earth Angel (Raymond Obstfeld)
*Not surprisingly, Obstfeld is the real name of Laramie Dunaway, one of my other favorite authors. It’s him, writing under a female pseudonym.

After Dr. Season Gottlieb’s fiance, Tim, goes on a shooting spree and murders five people before being shot by the police, Season feels both grief and guilt. But rather than explore what provoked Tim’s rampage, Season dubs herself Grace Weiss and tries to make amends to the victims’ families. While the heroine’s good intentions are credible, her way of playing “angel” is nonsensical and the plot ridiculously convoluted. One victim’s cousin refuses Season’s no-strings gift of $50,000, then calls the cops; when Season tries to set up another victim’s stepbrother with the woman of his dreams, the woman recognizes her from TV newscasts and blackmails her. And when Season visits a third man linked to Tim’s crime-the ex-husband of a witness who committed suicide-she falls for him. Her benevolent mission ends there; she’s less interested in philanthropy than in concealing her identity from her new lover. As the book drifts into the doldrums, Obstfeld loses all control of his material, allowing a serial-kidnapping subplot to come to the fore. Season, a movie-trivia whiz, is among the few people who can decode the kidnapper’s cryptic clues, and the police force her to help them by threatening to expose her ruse. With each new scenario, Obstfeld shows that no good deed goes unpunished. Unfortunately, such relentlessly zany methods prove dull rather than remotely humorous.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Dr. Season Makenzie, an accomplished thirtysomething physician at a Southern California walk-in clinic, finds her life devastated when her boyfriend visits her at work with a gun and opens fire on her patients.

15. Life 101:Everything We Wish We Had Learned About Life in School–But Didn’t (John-Roger and Peter McWilliams)

From the back cover:
WHEN YOU ARE…
Angry, Depressed, Anxious, Tired, Resentful, Upset, Nervous, Unhappy, confused, Frightened, or in any way not healthy, wealthy and happy, then School is in Session!

But it’s not “school” as you remember it. This is a book about learning, doing and enjoying that’s actually fun. Really.

By the time we graduate form high school, most of us have spent more than 14,500 hours in the classroom. Along the way, we learned (and promptly forgot) several million little facts.

But in all that time, did we learn–or even explore–the meaning of life? Did we learn how to love ourselves? Did we learn the importance of forgiving ourself and others? Did we learn about worthiness (and how to get it), the power of thoughts (and how to use them), or the value of mistakes? Did anyone teach us how to use guilt, resentment, pain and fear for our learning, upliftment and growth? Did we learn our purpose in life?

If not, it’s not too late. You are holding the class you’ve been waiting for in your hands.

16. An Underground Education:The Unauthorized and Outrageous Supplement to Everything You Thought You Knew About Art, Sex, Business, Crime, Science, Medicine, and Other Fields of Human (Richard Zacks)

Forget the history you were taught in school; Richard Zacks’s version is crueler and funnier than anything you might have learned in seventh-grade civics–and much more of a gross-out, too. Described on the book jacket as an “autodidact extraordinaire,” Zacks is also the author of History Laid Bare, making him something of an expert guide through history’s back alleys and side streets. There’s no fact too seamy or perverse for Zacks to drag out into the light of day, from matters scatological and sexual to some of history’s most truly bizarre episodes. Curious about ancient nose-blowing etiquette? What about the sexual proclivities of Catherine the Great? Throughout chapters such as “The Evolution of Underwear” and “Dentistry Before Novocaine,” Zacks proves a tireless debunker of popular myths as well as a muckraker par excellence. –This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Astonishing facts!

Bizarre photographs!

Fascinating & sometimes deeply weird true stories!

Just a small taste of the intellectual smorgasbord contained in this volume.

Did you know:

….that in the original story of Goldilocks the bears torture and kill their impolite visitor?
…that Pope Leo XIII appeared in an advertisement for cocaine-laced wine in the 1880s?
…that people didn’t eat with forks until the 1700s?
…that Sir Isaac Newton’s famous humble-pie quote “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants” was actually written to a dwarf scientist named Robert Hooke and clearly meant as an insult?
…that Thomas Edison secretly helped develop the electric chair in a scheme to have the lethal machine named after his arch-rival, George Westinghouse?
that the first pediatric guide written in the United States recommended that expectant mothers breastfeed puppies?
…that for two centuries French scientists obsessively experimented on freshly decapitated heads in an effort to discover whether the bodiless brain still functioned?
…that Cleopatra was ugly as sin?

17. Everything You Know is Wrong:The Disinformation Guide to Secrets and Lies (Russ Kick)
*in fact, all of these Disinformation Guides are Must-reads. They are a wealth of information not found through normal channels.

From the people who brought us You Are Being Lied To, here is another engrossing and infuriating compilation of muckraking articles, expos s, and provocative claims. Some of the pieces in the book are very timely: an assertion that the government had advance warning of the September 11 terrorist attacks, reports of additional gunmen at Columbine High School, and additional details on Senator Bob Kerrey’s actions in Vietnam. Most of the articles were written for this volume, though some appeared previously in reputable magazines and journals (e.g., the Village Voice, Toronto Globe & Mail, and Journal of Medical Ethics). Not all the pieces deal with political issues; readers will find a wide range of social (“Mad Cow Disease”), financial (“World Bank and the WTO”), and cultural topics. A few familiar names appear among the contributors (Howard Zinn, Paul Krassner), but most are investigative reporters not well known to the public. This contrarian collection will attract a diverse readership from conspiracy nuts to academics and is recommended for most public libraries. Thomas A. Karel, Franklin & Marshall Coll. Lib., Lancaster, PA

“Even if you just check it out from the library, you owe it to yourself to read it.” — Movement (Jacksonville, FL), May 2002

“It’s a great read.” – Jane Magazine, August 2002

“Much of it will shock your sensibilities. It’s mindboggling stuff. But read it you should.” – Discourse & Disclosure, Summer 2002

“The kind of book you want to buy and give to everyone you know” – Rain Taxi Summer 2002

“These stories can be scary” – Seven Magazine, July 2002

“This book could change the way you process information. This book could actually make you smarter.” – Tacoma Reporter, July 25, 2002

“[A] fun and compelling read” -- Enter Stage Right, June 2002

“[A]nother engrossing and infuriating compilation of muckraking articles, exposes, and provocative claims … recommended for most public libraries.” – Library Journal

“a bracing collection of contrarian articles covering a broad spectrum of subjects” – The Guardian, October 5, 2002

“bold and brash and just a little bit frightening, irregardless of which side of the political center readers find themselves” – The Boox Review, July 10, 2002

18. Lessons in Survival (Laramie Dunaway)
*surprise! I really do love “her” writing. Thanks, Raymond.
You might have to find a copy of this in bookstores and libraries–it’ s a little hard to track down sometimes.

Dunaway’s latest (after the beguiling Borrowed Lives ) is an overambitious and bluntly unromantic tale of a mixed-up child- and adulthood. Narrator Blue Erhart, a 32-year-old high school biology teacher, has a notorious past: her parents were hippie bank robbers who followed the Robin Hood ethic and were sent to prison after Blue bought an ice cream cone with a marked bill. Nineteen years later, their sentences are served, and Blue, who stopped visiting them when her mother turned down parole on principle, can no longer fathom the role of daughter. And with good reason. Her folks aren’t just quirky, they’re downright unpleasant. When Blue first catches up with them at a dingy apartment, her mother answers the door stark naked and cracks jokes about homophobia. Besides having to contend with such oddities, Blue also spends time dodging reporters, fending off an aspiring movie producer who wants the rights to her story and pursuing Thomas Q, the messianic subject of her dissertation. That a small-time filmmaker is curious about Blue seems credible, but it’s a stretch to believe that paparazzi spend hours each day monitoring her apartment. Blue is too gruff to win over readers (making love with her ex-husband, biology-minded Blue imagines the dust mites that inhabit the carpet.) Readers are more punished than rewarded for perseverance as Dunaway’s sitcom-ish material slips out of her grasp.

Divorced high school biology teacher Blue Erhart leads a quiet, conventional life until her notorious bank-robbing parents are released from prison. Hounded by the press and TV-movie producers, she goes on the lam, much as she did in her youth with her fugitive Mom and Dad. Led largely by her libido, Blue leaps from Rush, a sometime Hollywood agent, to cult-leader Thomas Q, the subject of her master’s thesis. Her quest for identity and renewed focus gets pretty frenetic, and her parents’ continuing lust for robbing banks doesn’t help. But, just in time, true love finds a way, and Blue and Rush live happily ever after. Not as clever and refreshing as Dunaway’s first book, Borrowed Lives ( LJ 10/15/92), this is nonetheless very innovative, entertaining, and itself a prime candidate for a TV movie. Recommended.

19. The Illustrated Brief History of Time & The Universe in a Nutshell (Stephen Hawking)

Stephen Hawking’s phenomenal, multimillion-copy bestseller, A Brief History of Time, introduced the ideas of this brilliant theoretical physicist to readers all over the world.

Now, in a major publishing event, Hawking returns with a lavishly illustrated sequel that unravels the mysteries of the major breakthroughs that have occurred in the years since the release of his acclaimed first book.

* Quantum mechanics * M-theory * General relativity * 11-dimensional supergravity * 10-dimensional membranes * Superstrings * P-branes * Black holes

One of the most influential thinkers of our time, Stephen Hawking is an intellectual icon, known not only for the adventurousness of his ideas but for the clarity and wit with which he expresses them. In this new book Hawking takes us to the cutting edge of theoretical physics, where truth is often stranger than fiction, to explain in laymen’s terms the principles that control our universe.

Like many in the community of theoretical physicists, Professor Hawking is seeking to uncover the grail of science — the elusive Theory of Everything that lies at the heart of the cosmos. In his accessible and often playful style, he guides us on his search to uncover the secrets of the universe — from supergravity to supersymmetry, from quantum theory to M-theory, from holography to duality.

He takes us to the wild frontiers of science, where superstring theory and p-branes may hold the final clue to the puzzle. And he lets us behind the scenes of one of his most exciting intellectual adventures as he seeks “to combine Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity and Richard Feynman’s idea of multiple histories into one complete unified theory that will describe everything that happens in the universe.”

With characteristic exuberance, Professor Hawking invites us to be fellow travelers on this extraordinary voyage through space-time. Copious four-color illustrations help clarify this journey into a surreal wonderland where particles, sheets, and strings move in eleven dimensions; where black holes evaporate and disappear, taking their secret with them; and where the original cosmic seed from which our own universe sprang was a tiny nut.

The Universe in a Nutshell is essential reading for all of us who want to understand the universe in which we live. Like its companion volume, A Brief History of Time, it conveys the excitement felt within the scientific community as the secrets of the cosmos reveal themselves.

In the years since its publication in 1988, Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time has established itself as a landmark volume in scientific writing. It has also become an international publishing phenomenon, translated into forty languages and selling over nine million copies. The book was on the cutting edge of what was then known about the nature of the universe, but since then there have been extraordinary advances in the technology of observing both the micro- and the macrocosmic world. These observations have confirmed many of Professor Hawking’s theoretical predictions in the first edition of his book, including the recent discoveries of the Cosmic Background Explorer satellite (COBE), which probed back in time to within 300,000 years of the universe’s beginning and revealed the wrinkles in the fabric of space-time that he had projected.

Eager to bring to his original text the new knowledge revealed by these many observations, as well as his most recent research, for this revised and expanded edition Hawking has prepared a new introduction to the book, revised and updated the original chapters throughout, and written an entirely new chapter on the fascinating subject of wormholes and time travel.

In addition, to heighten understanding of complex concepts that readers may have found difficult to grasp despite the clarity and wit of Hawking’s writing, this edition is magnificently enhanced throughout with more than 240 full-color illustrations, including satellite images, photographs made possible by spectacular new technological advances such as the Hubble telescope, and computer- generated images of three- and four-dimensional realities. Detailed captions clarify these illustrations, enabling readers to experience the vastness of intergalactic space, the nature of black holes, and the microcosmic world of particle physics in which matter and antimatter collide.

A classic work that now brings to the reader the latest understanding of cosmology, The Illustrated A Brief History of Time is the story of the ongoing search for the tantalizing secrets at the heart of time and space.

20. Friday -Robert A. Heinlein

“FRIDAY IS A SUPERBEING…Engineered from the finest genes, and trained to be a secret courier in a future world of chaotic ferocity and intrigue, she can think better and make love better than any of the normal people around her”.– The New York Times Book Review

Engineered from the finest genes, and trained to be a secret courier in a future world, Friday operates over a near-future Earth, where chaos reigns. Working at Boss’s whimsical behest she travels from far north to deep south, finding quick, expeditious solutions as one calamity after another threatens to explode in her face….

21. Atheist Universe (David Mills)
* I have to say, this was one of the most clear and helpful books to make the case for atheism. David is a master at explaining it. I am proud to have him as one of my friends on Facebook.

David’s work will be very useful for anyone combating harmful religious beliefs. Honest, frank, and right to the point! — Albert Ellis, Ph.D., father of modern psychotherapy, author of ‘A Guide to Rational Living’ and 54 other books

With impeccable logic, intellectual bravery, and professional clarity Mills points the way past religion. — Dorion Sagan, science writer, son of Carl Sagan

Clear, concise, and persuasive, Atheist Universe details exactly why God is unnecessary to explain the universe and life’s diversity, organization, and beauty. The author thoroughly rebuts every argument that claims to “prove” God’s existence — arguments based on logic, common sense, philosophy, ethics, history and science.
Atheist Universe avoids the esoteric language used by philosophers and presents its scientific evidence in simple lay terms, making it a richly entertaining and easy-to-read introduction to atheism. A comprehensive primer, it addresses all the historical and scientific questions, including: Is there proof that God does not exist? What evidence is there of Jesus’ resurrection? Can creation science reconcile scripture with the latest scientific discoveries?
Atheist Universe also answers ethical issues such as: What is the meaning of life without God? It’s a spellbinding inquiry that ultimately arrives at a controversial and well-documented conclusion.