The Bookmaker
A Memoir of Money, Luck,
and Family from the Utopian Outskirts of New York City
by Michael J. Agovino (Harper)
A fascinating coming-of-age story, not only of the author and his Italian-American family, but of New York City in the ’70s-’90s. We get insight into the “melting pot” of Co-op City in The Bronx – the title’s utopia – and a compelling story of a dad who had a city job, but also worked as a bookie.
The Highly Effective Detective Goes to the Dogs
by Richard Yancey (St. Martin’s Minotaur)
In the second entry of Yancey’s “Highly Effective Detective” series, the state of Tennessee shuts down P.I. Teddy Ruzak’s business after he fails his detective-license test. But he’s forced onto a case, anyway, when a homeless man he befriends winds up dead. Add a kooky cast of characters, including a beagle named Archie, and the result is delightful and easygoing whodunit.
Leningrad: State of Siege
by Michael Jones (Basic Books)
While Russian leaders roll into Georgia, they’d do well to remember the hell of war, on display in all its horrors in this eye-opener on the ruthless, 900-day Nazi siege of Leningrad, in which more than a million residents died. Relying on newly uncovered eyewitness accounts and diaries, Jones tells of the awful (cannibalism) and the uplifting (musicians trapped in a shelter, perform, attempting to drown out to noise of bullets and bombs).
We Are Soldiers Still
A Journey Back to the Battlefields of Vietnam
by Lt. Gen. Harold G. Moore and
Joseph L. Galloway (Harper)
An emotional follow-up to military lifer Moore and reporter Galloway’s intense 1992 telling of the Vietnam War’s first major battle between American and North Vietnamese troops. This time, the two, along with other American survivors of the fight, revisit the Ia Drang Valley, scene of the bloody 1965 battle – accompanied by the Communist commanders and soldiers who were trying to kill them.
The Wild West Catalog
by Bruce Wexler (Running Press)
With heavily illustrated chapters in this large-format book covering Cowboys, Native Americans, the Old West in Popular Culture and much more, Required Reading gravitated toward the Chuckwagon section. We particularly like the coffee recipe: “Take two pounds of good strong ground coffee. Put in enough water to wet it down, Boil it for two hours, then toss in a horseshoe. If the horseshoe sinks, it ain’t ready.”