Adventures of a plucky girl

The Stranger Within Sarah SteinBy Thane Rosenbaum (Texas Tech University Press)Young adult novelists are increasingly tackling darker subjects: kidnappings, drugs, rape. But few have delved into so many dark subjects as novelist Thane Rosenbaum, who ventures into YA territory with his latest, “The Stranger Within Sarah Stein,” a novel revolving around divorce, Sept. 11, homelessness and the Holocaust.What might be most odd about this combination of subjects is that the book isn’t glum at all. To

March 30, 2012

‘The False Prince’: A medieval con man seeks impostor for missing royal

Most children want to be recognized as someone special. In “The False Prince,” Jennifer A. Nielsen takes that desire to an extreme with a romp of a medieval-themed, middle-grade novel. This kickoff to her new “Ascendance Trilogy” is a swashbuckling origin story about orphans forced to compete with one another for a chance to take the crown.The book opens with a boy running through the streets being chased by a cleaver-wielding butcher hoping to retrieve a stolen roast. The thief is Sage, a misch

March 30, 2012

Chicago physicist takes people back to vanished life of postwar Europe

“Lately I have been overcome by an urge to put my affairs in order,” Peter Freund read, and within moments another world began to materialize in Sandmeyer’s Bookstore.It was postwar Europe, a place of deception and danger for a Romanian Jewish couple masquerading as Catholics in the German town of Dachau.In this and in Freund’s other stories, people try to glue together the shards of shattered worlds and lives. They fight for lost fortunes, outwit Swiss bankers, encounter spies and betrayers, ar

March 30, 2012

Taking a bite out of reality TV

Chomp: A NovelBy Carl Hiaasen, Alfred A. (Knopf)South Florida is known for many things: Alligators, orange groves and the writer who spins the area’s most sensational attributes into even more sensational story lines, Carl Hiaasen. In his many best-sellers for adults and kids, Hiaasen has demonstrated a unique gift for wrapping real environmental issues into apocryphal, bust-a-gut books that parody pop culture ― a talent he furthers in his most recent middle-school novel, “Chomp.”In a crossover

March 23, 2012

From quiet domesticity to sheer terror

Stay CloseBy Harlan Coben (Dutton) A hallmark of Harlan Coben’s best-sellers has been his precise look at ordinary people caught up in extraordinary situations, forced to deal with violence and the seamy side of life. These “family thrillers” are hauntingly realistic, showing how characters who could be our neighbors ― or ourselves ― discover an inner resolve.Coben’s 22nd novel spins a new approach to his family thrillers. In the excellent “Stay Close,” Coben shows us three people who know too w

March 23, 2012

Magazine dedicates an issue to late POSCO founder

The Quarterly Asia: Park Tae-joon: A Memorial Issue(ASIA Publishers) ASIA, a bilingual quarterly which mainly features works of Asian literature, has dedicated its latest issue to the late POSCO founder Park Tae-joon. Park, who died of complications of lung disease last year, is considered one of the pioneers behind Korea’s post-war economic growth. The former general who participated in the Korean War (1950-1953) founded POSCO in 1968, which was then called Pohang Iron and Steel Company, and tu

March 23, 2012

Jesmyn Ward writes on Hurricane Katrina

Another hot, drippy August envelopes the Batiste family and their tumbledown property in coastal Mississippi, but there’s an excited air surrounding what’s about to happen in the shed.Their crystal-white pit bull, China, tenderly cared for by 16-year-old Skeetah, is ready to give birth to her first litter. In the novel “Salvage the Bones,” author Jesmyn Ward explores that day and the next 11 in the lives of this Southern black family of five. All are struggling to find and fill their roles in th

March 23, 2012

Leading economist to publish new book on welfare state

Universal welfare, as well as more regulations on the free market and chaebol reform are crucial in contemporary Korean economy, according to Chang Ha-joon, one of the leading heterodox economists in Korea. He spoke at a news conference held Monday to promote his upcoming book.The new book, “What to Choose: Cutting the Gordian Knot -- An Analysis of the Korean Economy,” co-authored by Chang, Lee Jong-tae and Jeong Seung-il, is an extension of the trio’s 2005 book “Cutting the Gordian Knot -- An

March 19, 2012

Satisfying update on “Jane Eyre”

The Flight of Gemma HardyBy Margot Livesey(Harper)Scottish-born author Margot Livesey brings the country of her birth to blazing life in the thoroughly winning “The Flight of Gemma Hardy.”A delicious updating of “Jane Eyre” to the mid-20th century, the book shares many elements with Charlotte Bronte’s 1847 classic: an intelligent, plain-featured heroine who’s emotionally and physically abused by her aunts and cousins after being orphaned; privation and hardship as a “working student” at a boardi

March 16, 2012

Restless civilian-turned-dedicated killer

American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military HistoryBy Chris Kyle with Scott McEwen and Jim DeFelice(William Morrow)This is the season of celebrity for the Navy SEALs.The takedown of Osama bin Laden at his hideout in Pakistan thrust the institutionally secretive SEALs into the modern-media spotlight. Soon the SEALs seemed to become America’s favorite warriors: silent, deadly, mysterious.There have been innumerable news stories about SEAL Team Six, which killed bi

March 16, 2012

Glimpse into natural materials of Korean architecture

Stone, Walls and PathsBy Yim Seock-jaeTranslated by Lee Jean-young(Ewha Womans University Press)Anyone who has been to a hanok, or traditional Korean house, will have noticed its exquisite use of stone and wood, and how it naturally blends into its surroundings. Wood and stone are the most representative natural materials used in Korea’s traditional architecture, serving both practical and aesthetic purposes.Scholar Yim Seock-jae’s English-translated book, “Stone, Walls and Paths,” is an insight

March 16, 2012

Hollywood actors join audiobook projects

LOS ANGELES ― When it came to reading a book out loud, Dustin Hoffman was a bit rusty. The last time he had done something similar was in New York City in the late 1960s, right after filming “The Graduate.” A local radio station had recruited 30 or so people, including Hoffman, to read “War and Peace” on air, around the clock, until it was done.“That was the only other time I had done something like that, and it was wonderful,” recalls Hoffman, explaining why he recently agreed to perform the no

March 16, 2012