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New & Noteworthy
New this week:
POSSESSED BY MEMORY: The Inward Light of Criticism, by Harold Bloom. (Knopf, $35.) In which the great critic revisits the literature that has meant most to him. Bloom also continues his series of Shakespeare studies with “Macbeth: A Dagger of the Mind” (Scribner, $24).
TIM COOK: The Genius Who Took Apple to the Next Level, by Leander Kahney. (Portfolio/Penguin, $27.) When Steve Jobs died, in 2011, Apple faced an uncertain future. Yet Kahney (an unabashed Mac fan who has previously written about other company insiders) notes that under Tim Cook its stock has nearly tripled.
QUEEN BEY: A Celebration of the Power and Creativity of Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, edited by Veronica Chambers. (St. Martin’s, $27.99.) This collection of critical appreciations, compiled by a Times editor, assesses its superstar subject on the basis of her music, fashion, feminism, business skills and more.
UNGOVERNABLE: The Victorian Parent’s Guide to Raising Flawless Children, by Therese Oneill. (Little, Brown, $25.) Structured as a Q. & A. between a modern mother and an expert on Victorian mores, this book suggests that earlier parents were every bit as neurotic as today’s.
TRAGEDY, THE GREEKS, AND US, by Simon Critchley. (Pantheon, $26.95.) Critchley, a philosopher at the New School, argues that classic Greek tragedy distills the human condition, with philosophy key to understanding the links.
What we’re reading:
New York may be the city that never sleeps, but it is the city that waits — for the bus, for the train, for the doctor, for food. So I am never without a book. Recently I ventured to the Bronx for tamales, but I had to wait 63 minutes for them to finish cooking. While my body was hungry in the Bronx, my mind was solidly in Kansas, the setting for the novel I’m reading, KILL CREEK. Scott Thomas, the book’s author, has four horror writers spend Halloween night in a haunted house near Lawrence, Kan., as a publicity stunt for a horror website. The writers deal in darkness (to varying degrees), so how scared could they be, right? But they seem to wake a sleeping evil that follows them home. I started reading this book on vacation in a hotel that some say is haunted, and I’ve only dared to read it in the daylight.
— Kaly Soto, deputy weekend editor
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