Tulip Fever
by Deborah Moggach
I love stories of romantic intrigue, and this novel is about adulterous goings-on in Amsterdam in the 1600s, at the height of the tulip bulb mania. The heroine is the frustrated young wife of an aging burgher and her lover is the passionate young artist who's hired to paint their marital portrait. Moggach colorfully brings the period out of the dusty pages of history and her story is full of dark and unpredictable, yet emotionally satisfying, twists and turns.
----------------- David Talbot
Lloyd: What Happened
by Stanley Bing
I just finished the Vintage paperback of this novel. I'd wanted to get it in hardcover when it came out in '98, but forgot about it. Bing is a pseudonym for this guy who has been writing a column about the horrors of modern office life for about a decade (first for Esquire and now for Fortune). I think it's a much better book (in a funnier, savage sense) about the subject than, say, "A Man in Full" or "Turn of the Century." Bing has a great ear for vernacular absurdity in the boardroom -- sort of like DeLillo in a cubicle.
----------------- Andrew Essex
Recent books praised by Salon's critics
What to read: The best of July's fiction
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By Salon's critics
[07/24/00]
Herman Melville by Elizabeth Hardwick
A great critic takes on a great novelist, finding agony, homoeroticism and, ultimately, mystery.
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Assassination by Miles Hudson
A historian coolly assesses whether killing a leader is a useful political tactic.
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The author of "The Girl in the Flammable Skirt" creates a heroine with violent dreams, a passion for numbers and some problems with sex.
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[07/20/00]
Little Saint: The Hours of Saint Foy by Hannah Green
On the trail of a French martyr beheaded by her father for embracing Christianity instead of the goddess Diana.
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Collapse: When Buildings Fall Down by Phillip Wearne
Read the hair-raising details of how and why man-made structures come tumbling to earth!
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The Language War by Robin Tolmach Lakoff
From hate-speech laws to the battle over Native American sports team names, a linguist shows why we're so worked up about the power of words.
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Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling
The plot deepens as the fourth Harry Potter book takes Rowling's young hero to his darkest adventure yet.
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A strangely powerful first novel about spelling, mysticism and finding God in the details.
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[07/05/00]
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A fact-crammed history of the "Rocky and Bullwinkle" show and its gleefully prankish creators.
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[06/30/00]
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Vertigo by W.G. Sebald
The tale of a strange quest, haunted by the ghost of Kafka, from one of the oddest great writers around.
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From the author of "Nobody's Girl," a dazzling novel about a lovably screwed-up family reunited under one roof.
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[06/20/00]
Bodies in Motion and at Rest by Thomas Lynch
The popular literary undertaker takes on some tough life issues: Divorce, abortion and putting a hated cat to sleep.
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Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
In another sidesplitting collection, the author writes about his foulmouthed brother, his hopeless French and his brief career as a speed-freak performance artist.
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The Angel on the Roof by Russell Banks
In stories from nearly four decades, the writer demonstrates an astonishing range, a wonderful eye and a finely tuned talent for breaking hearts.
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[06/08/00]
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[06/02/00]
Experience: A Memoir by Martin Amis
The renowned novelist opens up on the subject of his famously vile father, Sir Kingsley, and the $30,000 fortune he spent repairing his own famously vile teeth.
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[05/26/00]
Of Two Minds: The Growing Disorder in American Psychiatry by T.M. Luhrmann
A subtle study of the conflict between talk-oriented and drug-oriented psychotherapy -- and a frightening demonstration of how medical budget cutters are betraying the mentally ill and putting the rest of us at risk.
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[05/25/00]
Plowing the Dark by Richard Powers
A riveting novel conjures up the bygone days of virtual reality and the promise of the unreal world that might have been.
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[05/24/00]
Chang and Eng by Darin Strauss
A daring first novel probes the psychological -- and sexual -- lives of the celebrated Siamese twins.
Reviewed by Jonathan Miles
[05/22/00]
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