A biography of Laurence Stern; the story of a 14-year-old UFF memeber let loose on America; and a short history of fashion are among some of the the paperbacks currently on release.
Laurence Sterne: A Life by Ian Campbell Ross (Oxford University Press £ 11.99 sterling)
With this life of Laurence Sterne, Ian Ross (an associate professor of English at TCD) has created that rare breed of literary biography, an accessible yet scholarly work that makes the reader want to explore the writings of its subject in more detail. Sterne, a provincial clergyman who spent his early years in Ireland, is best known as the writer of The Life And Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, a comic novel which formed the blueprint for nearly every piece of experimental literary trickery that followed. Ross documents Sterne's struggles with money, madness (his wife believed herself, briefly, to be the Queen of Bohemia, a misapprehension at least partly induced by finding Sterne in bed with the maid), his sexual appetites, and his desire for literary fame with compassion and humour, making this the definitive work on one of the earliest yet, paradoxically, most modern of novelists.
John Connolly
Desert Divers by Sven Lindqvist (Granta, £6.99 sterling)
A well digger in the Sahara goes down 50 to 60 metres, creating a narrow shaft lined with palm trunks before reaching the clear, clean water of an underground aquifer. In this small but perfectly formed, highly literary and political travelogue, Sven Lindqvist, who has dreamt of the desert and sandstorms since childhood, digs deep into the mysteries and cruel histories of the Sahara and its people, to open the clogged channels to his own past. He follows literary explorers, such as Michel Vieuchange, who trekked to the forbidden city of Smara disguised as a woman; Isabelle Eberhardt who, in male clothing, enjoyed the freedoms and vices of Arab men; and Eugène Frometin, who romanticised the slaughter of Algerians by the French in 1852. Beautifully, sparsely written - as if he wants every word to be as meaningful as a drop of water in the desert.
Sarah Marriott
Unreasonable Behaviour: An Autobiography by Don McCullin (Vintage, £8.99 sterling)
This gripping work from one of the most celebrated war photographers was first published 10 years ago, and though there's no obvious reason for this reissue, it is most welcome nonetheless. For a man with little formal education, McCullin's prose is as taut and stark as many a thriller writer's, and his reminiscences from the front lines coldly illuminate Man's most extreme behaviour. McCullin's harsh camera flash is also trained ruthlessly on his private life, and goes some way, if never all the way, to explaining what drives such journalism. A riveting read; pity about the proofreading - it's littered with literals.
Joe Culley
Costume and Fashion: A Concise History by James Laver (Thames and Hudson, £8.95 sterling)
You probably didn't know that one of the greatest technological advances in human history was the invention of the eyed needle - comparable, insists Laver, to the invention of the wheel and the discovery of fire - but without it, all subsequent clothing and fashion development would have been impossible; and this fascinating book illustrates in both words and images just how imaginative, innovative and diverse that history is. From prehistoric pelts, Graeco-Roman draped clothing, the beginnings of "fashion" during the late Middle Ages, the opulence of the ancien regime (for both sexes - men's clothing was frequently more elaborate than women's), through to the wildly changing trends of the 19th and 20th centuries, this book not only details what men and women wore, but also explains the frequent social and political implications of their clothing and accessories. An absorbing and illuminating read, even if you aren't a fashionista.
Christine Madden
Area Code 212 by Tama Janowitz (Bloomsbury £6.99 sterling)
212, 9/11 - is there any other city on the planet so instantly recognisable by a few digits? Tama Janowitz has made a career out of writing about her life in the city in her collection of stories 212, New York Days New York Nights. Over nearly 20 years she has moved from partying with Andy Warhol to the school run in Brooklyn and this collection of stories skips lightly along the years. All the stories have appeared in newspapers or magazines, and stitched together in a book they comprise yet another attempt to produce a zeitgeist barometer of Manhattan in the booming late 1980s, dull 1990s and uncertain first years of the new century. Sometimes Janowitz seems jaded with her iconic status as downtown chronicler and there's an inescapable truth that if something was boring to write it'll also be boring to read. Reading between the lines of the lacklustre prose it seems the author of Slaves of New York has broken free of the city's spell.
Bernice Harrison
The Map That Changed the World. By Simon Winchester (Penguin. £6.99 sterling )
The end of the 18th century in England was a time of great change. The Industrial Revolution hit its stride, the steam engine was invented, Mr Wedgewood opened his famous factory and the people were beginning to question religious dogma. And working away quietly was a William Smith who painstakingly created an entire new science by drawing the first true geological map of anywhere in the world. This allowed others to make huge fortunes in coal, tin and iron while poor William's life was a litany of disasters - he had to constantly fight against class prejudice, penury (he spent much time in the debtors' prison) and was married to a woman who was diagnosed as insane and a nymphomaniac. Only towards the end of his life did he receive due recognition. All of which sounds interesting, at least to genuine geologists. It's a pity for the rest of us that the author takes forever to tell the tale, swamps us in detail and loses us occasionally.
Owen Dawson
The Rainbow Singer by Simon Kerr (Phoenix. £6.99 sterling )
Wil Carson is a 14-year-old member of a UFF Hit Squad living in East Belfast. Blinded by an adolescent hatred of Catholics passed down from his bigoted father, he terrorises his local Catholic neighbours. Obsessed with American movies and heavy metal music, he jumps at the once-in-a-lifetime chance to travel to America on a multi-denominational, church-sponsored "Rainbow" peace project, despite having to share the experience with the enemy - 10 Catholic teenagers. The project begins with a spat on the transatlantic flight and quickly spirals downwards, following increasingly violent and darkly comical incidents between Wil and his "Taig" nemeses. A broken heart becomes the catalyst for a descent into a Hollywood-fuelled American Nightmare peopled by Freddie Kruger, stomach ripping Aliens and the Incredible Hulk. Provoked by his American host and friend, Wil begins to lose control as teenage angst eventually turns to terror and revenge.
Mark McGrath