This small volume of 4 short stories, the whole of which can be read in one sitting, takes the reader on what the author hopes will prove a fascinating journey. In the first story, from which the book takes its name, The Interrogation of Ephraim Sparkman, we travel, by the magic of words, through time and space to Mars in the distant future. In The Buddha's Smile we find ourselves in a small Kalmyk village seized by the German SS deep inside the Soviet Union during World War 11. Next, comes The Blame Game. It's 1975 and we are standing with the accused in the dock at the Old Bailey criminal court in London charged with assault with a deadly weapon. The last story, The Rabbi, follows the destiny of a young man from Berlin in 1938 to the battle of Stalingrad in 1943.

"How to connect to the past, imagined, researched, and lived? This is the question that Kwon Dobbs asks in her haunting new book.

For most of the twentieth century, considered opinion in the United States regarding Palestine has favored the inherent right of Jews to exist in the Holy Land. That Palestinians, as a native population, could claim the same right has been largely ignored. Kathleen Christison's controversial new book shows how the endurance of such assumptions, along with America's singular focus on Israel and general ignorance of the Palestinian point of view, has impeded a resolution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Christison begins with the derogatory images of Arabs purveyed by Western travelers to the Middle East in the nineteenth century, including Mark Twain, who wrote that Palestine's inhabitants were "abject beggars by nature, instinct, and education." She demonstrates other elements that have influenced U.S. policymakers: American religious attitudes toward the Holy Land that legitimize the Jewish presence; sympathy for Jews derived from the Holocaust; a sense of cultural identity wherein Israelis are "like us" and Arabs distant aliens. She makes a forceful case that decades of negative portrayals of Palestinians have distorted U.S. policy, making it virtually impossible to promote resolutions based on equality and reciprocity between Palestinians and Israelis. Christison also challenges prevalent media images and emphasizes the importance of terminology: Two examples are the designation of who is a "terrorist" and the imposition of place names (which can pass judgment on ownership). Christison's thoughtful book raises a final disturbing question: If a broader frame of reference on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict had been employed, allowing a less warped public discourse, might not years of warfare have been avoided and steps toward peace achieved much earlier?

A collection of articles by 178 contributors on such topics as abortion, capital punishment, interest groups, the Iran-Contra Affair, line item veto, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and more. Bibliog.

"Dobbs is an astonishing poet. The poetry in Paper Pavilion is by turns lyric and incisive, operatic and sweeping. There is a resonant passion that fills every page. With this heartbreaking and exhilarating debut, Dobbs has established herself as one of the most compelling and important poets of her generation."--David St. John Paper Pavilion captures the theme of transnational adoption and a powerful search for a personal history and identity from Korea to America. Jennifer Kwon Dobbs is currently an Edwin Mem fellow in literature and creative writing at the University of Southern California.

In a tumultuous era of Atlantic revolutions, a remarkable group of African-born and African-descended individuals transformed themselves from slaves into active agents of their lives and times. Through prodigious archival research, Landers alters our vision of the breadth and extent of the Age of Revolution, and our understanding of its actors.

Celebrating the centenary of the Los Angeles Times, the second-largest U.S. newspaper, Berges presents a candid story of its growth and development, along with portraits of its owners, publishers, editors and other personnel. Beginning with the pioneering days of founder Harrison Gray Otis who began the Times in a tiny printing shop, he describes how under the Chandlers it evolved from a provincial newspaper into an award-winning publication. Member of the current staff of the Times, the author describes the diverse workings of a modern newspaper and how stories and journalists are made, and conveys how staff members like Robert Scheer, book review editor Art Seidenbaum, cartoonist Paul Conrad, and columnist Jack Smith work. ISBN 0-689-11427-3 : $17.95.

The book, written by an ordinary member of the public, argues that, in spite of concerted efforts to derail his presidency, Donald Trump, through his life experience, embodies many of the attributes of a great president. What is so remarkable is not that he was elected against all expectations but that his presidency has proved to be so successful. The media has portrayed Trump in the most negative terms possible to a degree that would have destroyed a lesser man. The book demonstrates that this picture is almost entirely false. Trump is president at a historic moment when the nation is polarized between radical progressives striving for fundamental change and conservatives who stand by traditional values. Trump is not an ideologue but a pragmatist resisting social experimentation with the potential to be one of the greatest presidents in the history of the republic.