Deeply distraught over the recent deaths of his wife and two children in a plane crash, Prof. David Zimmer turns on the TV one night and laughs at a movie clip starring silent screen actor Hector Mann, who disappeared in 1929. Writing a book on Mann's films lifts Zimmer's spirits, but after it is published the academic is shocked to receive a letter saying Mann is alive, has read the book and wants to meet Zimmer. Their relationship develops into a labyrinthine tale. Auster, author of the 1999 bestseller Timbuktu, is a maze master with an exceptional eye. Of Mann's mustache, he observes, "Even though it speaks a language without words, its wriggles and flutters are as clear and comprehensible as a message tapped out in Morse code." That controlled prose perfectly matches the mood of emotionally damaged characters feeling their way toward stability. (Holt, $24)
Bottom Line: Pure magic
By Tom Shales and James Andrew Miller
No one will be surprised to learn that John Belushi was high on something other than ground-beef fumes while frying up every cheeseburger! cheeseburger! in the early days of Saturday Night Live. But this behind-the-scenes history of the late-night show—told almost entirely through the voices of the performers, writers and guests—isn't just about substance abuse and backstage flings. (Okay, it's mostly about them, at least until you get to the mid-'90s: Recent casts have been either more chaste or more tight-lipped.) The most surprising details to emerge from this perfectly woven memoir is that the gifted people involved in creating the comedy institution were often not laughing themselves. Long hours and lack of peer support made Cheri Oteri shed tears and Conan O'Brien call his gig as a staff writer more nerve-racking than replacing David Letterman. One unidentified recent cast member became so depressed that he took to self-mutilation. Some tragic figures, though, trigger the funniest anecdotes: Gilda Radner's wide-eyed giddiness, for instance, or Chris Farley's penchant for wandering naked into writers' meetings. You'll have as much fun as Wayne and Garth at an Alice Cooper concert. (Little, Brown, $25.95)
Bottom Line: Mahvelous
By Alan Gumming
Cumming, as many Americans know from Spy Kids, is a gifted actor imported from the United Kingdom. He can project a boyish whimsy even as something more decadent glints in the back of his eyes. One imagines him keeping both the Marquis de Sade and The Little Prince on his nightstand. In fact, his first novel reads like a combination of the two. That is not good.
Tommy is a bisexual photographer's assistant who spends his waking hours—most of them nocturnal—pursuing men and women in and out of bathroom stalls in London clubs while downing Ecstasy and inhaling coke. Tommy relates these adventures in gritty detail yet with a grating tone of chatty, nutty, innocent adorableness. It's as if Trainspotting were narrated on tape by Liza Minnelli. But Tommy, approaching 30 and from time to time bottoming out from all his partying, has outbreaks of weepy sentimentality: He wants a child. Readers may just want out, but Cumming spends 264 pages charting this man-child's ups and downs before washing his hands of it all with an abrupt, unearned, happy epilogue. (ReganBooks, $24.95)
Bottom Line: Breathless and pointless
By Nora Roberts (writing as J.D. Robb)
Page-tuner of the week
Apparently having seven novels top the bestseller lists earlier this year wasn't enough for Nora Roberts. The ever-prolific former legal secretary is already back, this time as the pseudonymous J.D. Robb with the latest installment in her futuristic In Death series of paperback thrillers. Set in 2059, the new book finds New York City police lieutenant Eve Dallas on the trail of a group of high-tech vigilantes who are targeting pedophiles, drug dealers and other miscreants. Their weapon: a deadly, computer-generated virus that attacks the brain of anyone who reads an infected file. As always, Eve's fabulously rich and hunky one-named husband, Roarke, a successful electronics mogul, is on hand to provide technical expertise—not to mention plenty of TLC in the bedroom.
Purity isn't perfect: The juxtaposition of tough police talk and romance-novel cooings can be a bit awkward. And newcomers to the In Death series may need a scorecard to keep up with I the dozen or so supporting characters. Still, Roberts "hasn't sold over 145 million books for nothing: From the opening-scene mayhem to the surprise-packed climax, she spins Purity into a satisfying potboiler. (Berkley, $7.99)
Bottom Line: Fast-paced fun
By Cornelia Funke
With its magnificent architecture and cozy canals, Venice has always captured the romantic imagination. But how does the city of St. Mark look through a kid's eyes? Children's author Funke gives us an idea in this fantasy novel: "There were so many hiding places," observes Victor, a detective searching the storied Adriatic port for two orphaned brothers named Prosper and Bo. "The whole city was a huge invitation to play hide-and-seek."
Fleeing a rich aunt who wants to separate them, the boys join a band of young thieves led by Scipio, a 13-year-old burglar who calls himself the Thief Lord. With the sympathetic Victor hot on their trail, the gang agrees to steal for sinister Count Valaresso—an assignment that takes them from Venice's cobbled streets to the realm of the supernatural. A European bestseller, the book doesn't have the lively spark of the J.K. Rowling books, at least in its translation from the German. But Funke's deft exploration of a timeless theme-the longing of kids to grow up and of grown-ups to relive their youth-should engage both young and old. (The Chicken House, $16.95)
Bottom Line: Fine way to pass the time waiting for the next Harry Potter
- Contributors:
- Annette Gallagher Weisman,
- Jennifer Wulff,
- Tom Gliatto,
- Cynthia Sanz,
- J.D. Heyman.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
