A Time to Be Born
Dawn Powell
The jaded hipsters who prowl Powell's jazzy New
York landscapes make the lounge lizards of '80s fiction look like
ingenues. This novel of a monomaniacal newspaper publisher, his pals,
and their schemes is the most satisfying, storywise, of the recent
Powell reissues. People compare Powell to Dorothy Parker, but there's
more of Hemingway's tough bite in this funny gal's fine lines. A
Crazy Ladies
Michael Lee West
At this
point the idea of another group of Southern belles chattering like
magpies may sound as appealing as a new Crockpot recipe. But West
proves there's still life in the genre. Crazy Ladies works because
the narrative is full and the characters are more than the sum of
their idiosyncrasies; they're grounded in real life like sturdy
garden plants. B+
Chanel: A Woman of Her Own
Axel Madsen
Strictly bargain basement; you could fit the new material on
the legendary couturier in a pillbox. Madsen constructs Chanel's life
out of a closetful of pop clichés (unhappy orphan striver, control
queen, lonely success story). Too bad, as there's enough juice in la
vie de Coco (stars, Nazis, sequins, gossip) to keep Paris burning
indefinitely. Send Madsen back to doing hems. C-
The Sweet Science
A.J. Liebling
This
reissue of Liebling's classic boxing pieces (originally published in
The New Yorker) is a must for fans of pugilism-and knockout prose.
From the tiny neighborhood clubs where young boys lose their sweet
glory dreams to the heinous influences of the burgeoning sports
media, Liebling gives us a grimy, smoky portrait of the '50s boxing
kingdom. All the raging bulls — Sugar Ray, Joe Louis, Marciano — saunter
through. A
Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson
Camille Paglia
Much talked about,
though probably seldom read, this book by a newly minted intellectual
celebrity has found admirers among people who take their version of
feminism from the media. Some see Paglia's analysis of art and
culture as subtly demeaning to the gains and ambitions of women, but
it's nonetheless provocative and imaginative. B-
Berry, Me, and Motown, The Untold Story
Raynoma Gordy Singleton
Readers of Mary Wilson's Dreamgirl or
Nelson George's fine Where Did Our Love Go? already know the rough
outline of the story told here. What the former Mrs. Berry Gordy
adds in this spotty, often bitter, and sometimes self-serving memoir
is an insider's sense of how the rough-and-tumble record business
actually works. C+
The Encyclopedia of Bad Taste
Jane & Michael Stern
The Sterns — those professional purveyors
of American kitsch — aren't indicting bad taste, they're glorifying it.
With typical obsessive detail they examine the history of such tacky
things as fuzzy dice, leisure suits, whoopee cushions, tuna
casserole, and Lava Lites. A
