The Little Book
by Selden Edwards (Dutton)
With his debut novel some 30 years in the making, you can’t quite call 67-year-old former teacher and headmaster Edwards an overnight success, but he’ll take it. In his fantastical tale, rock star, philosopher, recluse Harvard baseball hero Wheeler Burton finds himself whisked from 1988 San Francisco to 1897 Vienna. There he falls in love, finds Sigmund Freud as a mentor, meets Mark Twain and his own war-hero father.
The Heirloom Tomato
From Garden to Table
by Amy Goldman, photographs by Victor Schrager (Bloomsbury)
Required Reading is particular about tomatoes, preferring the simplest Jersey tomato right off the vine. But Goldman’s detailed book, which includes 200 varieties (from Abe Hall to Zapotec), complete with histories, recipes, garden tips and seed sources – and sumptuous photographs that are practically porn for tomato lovers – makes us willing to check out heirlooms.
Confessions of a Contractor
by Richard Murphy (Putnam)
Former real-life LA contractor Murphy’s novel takes the idea of TV’s “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” a step further . . . into the bedroom. His veteran LA house renovator Henry Sullivan winds up servicing more than just drywall. Two women, who used to be BFFs, are the beneficiaries of his personal touch. And the race is on to finish the jobs while he unravels the mystery of the women’s estrangement.
Blue Mauritius
The Hunt for the World’s Most Valuable Stamps
by Helen Morgan (Atlantic)
In 1847, the wife of the governor of the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius threw a party. Her invitations went out in envelopes bearing small, colorful squares of paper – among the world’s first postage stamps. Three of the envelopes, each bearing two stamps, survive today, with the path the rare, million-dollar philatelists’ dream recounted by the Aussie author (married to a Mauritian man).
Playing the Enemy
Nelson Mandela and the Game that Made a Nation
by John Carlin (Penguin)
In 1995, South Africa not only participated in the Rugby World Cup for the first time, but it was host to the tourney. It was the first time after 50 years of apartheid that blacks and whites played together.