Staff Assignments

Not all the new good books showed up on our awards’ list (in this issue). So I asked our staff to come up with a few titles our readers might not otherwise come across:

Wendy Murray Zoba, associate editor: “Barbara Kingsolver’s ‘High Tide in Tucson’ (Harper Collins), while not an outstanding book, comprises a series of personal essays about my favorite author. The surprising strength of her first novel, “The Bean Trees” (HarperCollins, 1989), convinced me that here was a fresh new writer who captured my generation’s ethos, growing up in the world of go-go boots, Barbie, and flower power. I consider Kingsolver a friend: we are the same age, fight the same battles. She documents my domestic life.”

Helen Lee, assistant editor: “My fellow Williams College alum Hedrick Smith has issued ‘Rethinking America’ (Random House), which compares American culture to both Japanese and German cultures, showing where our approaches to such things as education and business differ. The more I see politicking Christians doing all they can for American society and culture, the more I think a book like Smith’s could be of use. There are plenty of paradigms other than American ones to use as we attempt to redeem and reclaim our society.”

Richard A. Kauffman, associate editor: “If you’re concerned about violence in our society, read Fox Butterfield’s ‘All God’s Children: The Bosket Family and the American Tradition of Violence’ (Alfred A. Knopf), which traces an African-American family’s intergenerational sinking into a quagmire of violence. Its story line will grip you, and the sources of their violence will surprise. But be prepared to look elsewhere for the antidotes.”

John Wilson, book review editor (and the one who put this issue together): “One measure of a good book is explanatory power; we read, and suddenly all manner of heretofore unobserved connections are made clear. Barry Sanders’s ‘Sudden Glory: Laughter As Subversive History’ (Beacon) has that sort of power. He doesn’t write about the black teenagers in Oakland who provoked a flurry of op-ed page commentaries when they laughed at a showing of ‘Schindler’s List,’ nor about Don Imus’s now-notorious shock-jock ‘roasting’ of President Clinton, the First Lady, and assembled dignitaries at a Washington dinner, but Sanders provides a context in which these matters and many others, ranging from Nietzschean aphorisms to the explosive mirth of a baby girl, are not mere random happenings but rather part of an intricate network of meaning.”

Carla Sonheim, art director: “The only two books I read in 1995 were ‘What to Expect When You’re Expecting’ (Workman) and ‘Finer Points in the Spacing and Arrangements of Type’ (Hartley & Marks).” Say no more.