Recently Mentioned Books

3. Günter Grass, The Tin Drum , new translation by Breon Mitchell.  I've only browsed this, but it appears to be far better than the earlier English-language translation.

2. Richard A. Posner, The Crisis of Capitalist Democracy .  Due out in April, this book is 400 pp.  The press release notes it "presents what Judge Posner has learned about the econom since writing [his last book]…[and he] thinks we're in for a financial aftershock because of the amount of money the government has poured into the economy to save it."

1. David W. Galenson, Conceptual Revolutions in Twentieth-Century Art .  We've covered Galenson in these posts .

That's from my guidebook .  It seemed fine to me.

3. It is easy to fall prey to confirmation bias .

1. Some orderly things are not intended by anyone .

5. Film, set in : Men With Guns , by John Sayles.  I don't love this movie, but what am I to pick?  I found The Mosquito Coast to be excruciating.  Here are other options , none of which I've seen, none of which I want to see.

4. Wavvves is my favorite popular music album this year, except it isn't popular.

The subtitle is What Happens When Other Countries Have the Money and the authors are Stephen S. Cohen and Brad DeLong.  Here is an excerpt:

I've been reading, and putting down, lots of other books.  I've also been reading the complete letters of van Gogh , for a longer review.  They are splendid.

I don't think I can read it through to the end, but still I wish to issue a yelp of approval.  By the way, she kept 300 snails as pets.  Read the first Amazon review.  This biography did cause me to order more of her work, namely the first novel , with the lesbian love story.  Here is an NYT review of the book , which is in any case unique and revelatory.

3. Joan Schenkar, The Talented Miss Highsmith: The Secret Life and Serious Art of Patricia Highsmith .  I can't recall having read a more sprawling, messy, obsessive, and personal biography than this one.  Here's a typical bit: "Still, this fan, who knew all about cats, was allowed to select a seal-point Siamese kitten for Pat, and he and his aunt sometimes looked after Pat's cats on her trips away.  One night — the circumstances were complicated and involved a fight with current lover, Jacqui —...

2. Paul Collier, The Plundered Planet: Why We Must — and How We Can — Manage Nature for Global Prosperity .  The book is not due out until May, yet I have a review copy.  I admired Collier's essay on the ethical dimension of global warming , and I loved his The Bottom Billion , but I struggled to find a meaty part of this book.

1. Identity Economics: How Our Identities Shape our Work, Wages, and Well-Being , by George Akerlof and Rachel Kranton.  There's a general question of how satisfying largely non-empirical treatments of this topic can be, but still the original papers behind this popular book are seminal.

Instead of texting while driving, why not just do your work?  Here is a laptop steering wheel desk .  Some of the Amazon user reviews are funny.

That is from John Majewski's excellent Modernizing a Slave Economy: The Economic Vision of the Confederate Nation .

Walton Francis has a new and very substantive book on health care policy, with the exciting title: Putting Medicare Consumers in Charge: Lessons from the FEHBP .  It starts with a simple premise:

My favorite works of fiction this year were the new Pamuk, Gail Hareven's The Confessions of Noa Weber , and A Happy Marriage , by Rafael Yglesias.

4. David Small, Stitches: A Memoir .

3. Dan Chaon, Await Your Reply: A Novel .

2. Colum McCann, Let the Great World Spin .

1. Lorrie Moore, A Gate at the Stairs .

Here is a YouTube of Tom Palmer presenting his new book , with yours truly commenting, at the Cato Institute.  David Boaz summarizes part of my comment .  Here is my previous post on Tom's new book and the book, Realizing Liberty , is available for purchase on-line ,  Tom points us to this podcast of him criticizing me ; his comment reflects some of the differences in our points of view.

The subtitle is Thinking Big and Thinking Small and the editors are Jessica Cohen and William Easterly.  Usually essay collections are of low value but this is the single best introduction (I know of) to where development economics is at today.  Contributors include Dani Rodrik, Simon Johnson, Michael Kremer, Lant Pritchett, Ricardo Haussmann, and Abhijit Banerjee, among others.  Even better, there are two published (short) comments on each essay, a practice which should be universal in every co...

5. The Arabs , by Eugene Rogan; a superb book which somehow I had forgotten to review this year.  It's especially good for showing how their response to Western imperialism has been conditioned by their Ottoman experiences.