Go to Beijing, Get Naked, Learn a Secret Heresy, Lose Weight

Horror lovers rejoice: Peter Straub has a new novel, A DARK MATTER, about a 60s campus guru whose bizarre ritual for his young acolytes results in death and nightmares for years to come. The novel is narrated by an ideal reader, Robertson Dean, good because he knows how to walk the line above the pit of melodrama while lending a credible, unerring tone of subtlety with his very listenable voice. HERESY is a new historical thriller by S.J. Parris, set within the Catholic church during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. It is narrated by the intriguing John Lee. Frank Delaney's new Irish novel is VENETIA KELLY'S TRAVELING SHOW, about a boy sent to retrieve his father, who's abandoned them to join the circus. (The author narrates.) SECRETS OF EDEN is new from Chris Bohjalian. It is a multi-cast audio production about a minister in a crisis of faith after a girl's suicide. THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS is the true story a tobacco farmer whose cells were kept and used in medical research resulting, later, in untold profits to which her family never shared. The subject here is bioethics, and the reader is actress Cassandra Campbell. STAR WARS--CLONE WARS GAMBIT: STEALTH is the latest of many franchise space opera titles from LucasBooks. Author is Karen Miller, reader is Jeff Gurner, with sound effects. In sharp contrast is THE INFINITIES by prizewinner John Banville. Having nothing to do with outer space, but rather inner space, this is about a dying mathematician whose family must come to terms with their lives after he's gone. What's original about it is that another family, headed by the immortal Zeus, is also "watching." THE MAN FROM BEIJING is a mystery by Henning Mankell, centering on a massacre in a Swedish hamlet with a historical context to the slave trade with China. Actress Rosalyn Landor narrates. Robert B. Parker has authored fifty books, (using the word "said" about a gazillion times) and his latest is SPLIT IMAGE, which starts with an apparent mob hit on Paradise Beach, and features Jesse Stone. GETTING NAKED is one of those business fables that fictionally show concepts in a more entertaining way. The theme here is consulting and client service. Author is Patrick Lencioni, reader Dan Woren. SWITCH has the subtitle "How to Change Things When Change is Hard," and shows how to overcome the conflict in the mind between the rational and emotional sides. Chip & Dan Heath relate their counterintuitive research. Charles Kahlenberg narrates. Marc Cashman reads CHANGE YOUR BRAIN, CHANGE YOUR BODY, a new self help title from Dr. Daniel G. Amen, who is a clinical neuroscientist. The usual areas are covered here, but from the standpoint of how the brain operates: weight loss, skin, stress, willpower, sex, depression, blood pressure, you name it.

What Would Rockford Do?

Back in the day when white collar crime was a bit more quaint, and no one but criminals believed in the fast buck, America had a few more redeeming qualities. Nowadays it seems that everyone wants to get rich quick at the expense of their neighbors, and we've become a nation of whining, accusing paper-pushers. In his first book THE QUANTS, Scott Patterson profiles some of the Wall Street whiz kids who believed they'd created a formula to beat the market by the use of robotic trade computers which automatically calculated the values or potentials of securities, bought and sold them, then deposited the commissions and fees in their own private accounts. So certain were Peter Muller, Ken Griffin, Cliff Asness, and Boaz Weinstein of their business acumen, that they kept their own company stock holdings, along with the requisite toys billionaires buy. So when the Great Collapse came in the Fall of 2008, they were nearly taken out of the business, along with the investors they duped. As their hedge funds bled at the jugular, these poker fans maintained their alpha male stance by denial, and still maintain their innocence, even as the Fed bails out the biggest investment banks with taxpayer funds. Of course, back in the Dark Ages, these guys would have been hung in public, their heads taken off and displayed on posts. Today, we shake our heads and turn the channel. The word "quant" refers to someone who analyzes statistics, especially in the context of using the information for business advantage. So certain were the managers of PDT, CIG, and AQR that they'd created a perpetual motion money machine (which also defied gravity) that they created new financial "instruments" (not a barometer, though) which could leverage risk even higher. The result, when gas ran out, (and the black swan no one expects--but should--flies by), was that God laughed, and they were without wings or a golden parachute. Patterson is staff reporter for the Wall Street Journal, and while he doesn't go into the wider implications for America as I'm doing in this review, he does paint the targets while being informative and entertaining. The audiobook version is narrated by actor Mike Chamberlain.

The Oscars Get Hijacked

 
Are the Academy Awards boring to you? Here's a twist. Oscar's Hijack is from Blackstone Audio; available for download from Audible; a trucker gets hijacked while carrying a load of awards to Hollywood, and while driving there they listen to three mystery stories (by three different authors) on the radio. . . which inspires the driver to do one very crazy thing. Full sound effects.