The Latest

SCIENCE FICTION

MYSTERIES & THRILLERS

A Tang Dynasty judge solves a string of baffling murders

A Tang Dynasty judge solves a string of baffling murders

For readers in the USA or Europe, it can be a challenge to understand law enforcement policies and procedures in countries grounded in non-Western values and assumptions. In China, for example. The Inspector Chen novels of the Chinese expatriate author Qiu Xiaolong show just...

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NONFICTION

A soldier helped build America’s Empire. Then he spoke out.

A soldier helped build America’s Empire. Then he spoke out.

Few know his name today. But over a 34-year military career, Marine officer Smedley Butler (1881-1940) was for long America's most famous soldier. He fought in the Philippine–American War, the Boxer Rebellion, the Mexican Revolution, World War I, and all of the USA's imperial...

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Popular Fiction

Laughs in sci-fi? P. G. Wodehouse did humor better.

Laughs in sci-fi? P. G. Wodehouse did humor better.

The legendary English humorist Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse (1881-1975), known to readers as P. G., wrote about 100 books in a career that spanned much of the 20th century. His output included 71 novels, 24 collections of short stories, 42 plays, three memoirs, and a lot...

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Explore My “BEST OF the category” selections

WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE BOOK?

When people ask me that question, I never know what to say. In a lifetime of reading, I’ve read many thousands of books. And I’ve reviewed well over 2,000 of them on this site. Picking just one as a “favorite,” or even a handful of them, makes no sense to me.

The problem is, I read for many different reasons. Perhaps you do, too. And I read many different sorts of books. Mysteries and thrillers. Popular fiction, especially historical fiction. Science fiction. And nonfiction, history in particular. You’ll find hundreds of reviews in every one of those categories on this site.

Check out our rotating random selection here, culled from throughout this site.

Happy reading!

 

Cover image of "Rogue Lawyer" by John Grisham, a novel about American police

American police come off badly in John Grisham’s latest novel

It seems that John Grisham doesn't much like police or prosecutors, and that he's not wild about judges in general, either. As he writes in his latest courtroom drama, Rogue Lawyer, "The road to justice is filled with barriers and land mines, most of them created by men and women who claim to be...
Cover image of "And So It Goes," a Kurt Vonnegut biography

And so it goes: The sad life of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

The face that peers out at you from the cover is immeasurably sad. It's the face of a man in middle age weighed down by lifetimes of tragedy. The man -- one of the most remarkable novelists of the 20th century -- is Kurt Vonnegut, known throughout much of his adult life as Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. In...
Cover image of "Paranoia" by Joseph Finder, a devilishly clever tale

In “Paranoia,” Joseph Finder spins a devilishly clever tale

In Paranoia by Joseph Finder, a devilishly clever tale, young Adam Cassidy works in a low-level job at the huge high tech firm Wyatt Technologies. When he decides to game the system and transfer company funds to pay for a retirement party for a man in the shipping department, his troubles begin....
Israeli corruption lies at the heart of Murder Under the Bridge.

A young Palestinian cop confronts Israeli corruption

Israeli corruption is at the core of this murder mystery set in the West Bank. I first became aware of the world around me when Harry Truman recognized the newly independent State of Israel 70 years ago. Practically all my life, then, I've known what it is to be Jewish and find myself alternately...
Cover image of "Cracking the Nazi Code," a book about the origins of the Holocaust

He predicted the Holocaust—in 1919 and again in 1939

Common-sense observers, most historians included, assert that the roots of World War II lay in the rubble of the Great War a quarter-century earlier. Most ascribe the fault to the draconian Treaty of Versailles that imposed such harsh terms on Germany, and that seems indisputable. But few find the...
Cover image of "Double Agent,"

Upheaval in MI6—and a prime minister who may be a traitor

At the conclusion of Secret Service, the first novel in Tom Bradby's new thriller series, Kate Henderson's life lay shattered. Her loving husband, Stuart, had surfaced as an agent for the SVR, the KGB's successor, and defected to Moscow. Now, in the opening of the sequel, Double Agent, Kate's...
Cover image of "The Pictures," one of the great novels about Hollywood

Great mysteries about Hollywood

Since at least the 1930s, the Hollywood-based film industry has been capturing the world’s imagination. Films such as Gone with the Wind and Citizen Kane represent America in general and California in particular as surely as any legion of diplomats. And writers have noticed....
Cover image of "Sucker," novel about a Silicon Valley scandal

A comic send-up of a Silicon Valley scandal

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes Humor is a funny thing. What you find hilarious might leave me cold or even offend me deeply. And my own sense of humor, which some have found quirky, can make me laugh when no one else does. So, I'm prepared to believe that you'll think Daniel Hornsby's Sucker, a...
Cover image of "The Mitford Affair," a novel about the Mitford sisters

Blundering through the 1930s with the notorious Mitford sisters

Scandalous. Notorious. Brilliant. But always entertaining. They were the Mitford sisters, and you could hardly pick up a newspaper in England in the 1930s without coming across them. Still, it was just three of the six who drew the most attention, and the most rumors. Unity, Adolf Hitler's...
Cover image of "Asian American Histories of the United States," an Asian American history book

An Asian American history book focused on the present

Since the middle of the nineteenth century, people we now call Asian Americans have made major contributions to American society. You have only to look around you in a hospital, where Philippine American nurses work in huge numbers. Or to glance at the headlines about the CEOs of high-tech...

My Most Popular Reviews

Weekly Reviews Delivered to You!

Mal Warwick - Book Reviews

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Mal Warwick

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