Reading
Reading
One More Ace Up His Sleeve
When a publishing empire wasn’t enough, Cardoza tackled fiction with a gambler’s steely focus
December 22nd, 2011
Cardoza Publishing is the world’s largest publisher of gaming books, and the adjacent building, the Gambler’s Book Club, is the world’s largest bookstore devoted to gaming books. But the unassuming compound on Eastern Avenue near the airport reveals none of that. It looks like the converted residence it is. You’ll pass it a hundred times before you notice it once. Read more »
Book Jacket
Exegesis is nothing short of a religious experience—if you can handle it
December 22nd, 2011
I’ll be honest: I’m completely thrilled by the mere existence of The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick, edited by Pamela Jackson and Jonathan Lethem (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $40). It was one of my most highly anticipated reads of the year, and the finished product did not disappoint me. Read more »
The Librarian Loves
The Art of Fielding
Selected by Jeanne Goodrich, executive director for the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District
December 22nd, 2011
’ve heard three people (two men and a woman) strongly recommend The Art of Fielding (Little, Brown & Co., $26) by Chad Harbach in just the last two days. Read more »
Book Jacket
Take a bite out of this epic biography
December 8th, 2011
There’s not a lot of dramatic tension in Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson’s exhaustive, authorized biography of the brilliant Apple visionary, but that’s not Isaacson’s fault. Jobs, who died from complications of pancreatic cancer on Oct. 5, lived a very public life as the face of two hugely successful and profoundly influential companies: Apple and Pixar. Read more »
Librarian Loves
Naked in Death
December 8th, 2011
The holiday season is a good time to indulge in delectable treats, and my secret indulgence is the In Death series by J. D. Robb (the pseudonym for prolific romance writer Nora Roberts). I wouldn’t be caught dead reading a romance novel (not that there’s anything wrong with them), but I’ve become hooked on this futuristic thriller series featuring street-tough police lieutenant Eve Dallas and sexy billionaire businessman Roarke. Read more »
Book Jacket
Will the awful Christmas Wedding break Patterson’s winning streak?
November 10th, 2011
James Patterson’s books have sold more than 230 million copies, and you just don’t post that kind of numbers without striking a real chord with your audience—the man seems to have a genuine knack for turning casual readers into rabid fans. Read more »
Librarian Loves
Brandwashed: Tricks Companies Use to Manipulate Our Minds and Persuade Us to Buy
Selected by Jeanne Goodrich, executive director for the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District.
November 10th, 2011
Believe it or not, cola marketing executives have figured out how many bubbles they need to depict in print and on store displays to get you to crave their soft drink. Read more »
The Cradle of Great Stories
How a book about imaginative writing in Iowa was born in the city of daydreams
November 3rd, 2011
Las Vegas isn’t the sort of town where people make a lot of stuff that can be stamped with a “made in” or “hecho en” and shipped off to somewhere else. Rather it’s the sort of town where people think up things—weird things, grand things, absurd things. Read more »
Reading
Literary Star Power
November 3rd, 2011
The crown jewels of the Vegas Valley Book Festival are its keynote speakers. This year, they couldn’t be more diverse. One’s a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and the other a zombie aficionado. Nonetheless, both share that literary it factor, born from a combination of hard work and talent. Vegas Seven basks in their genius. Read more »
Librarian Loves
In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin
October 27th, 2011
You may remember Erik Larson’s fascinating and disturbing book The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic and Madness at the Fair that Changed America (Vintage, 2004). His latest book, In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin (Crown, $26), is even more astonishing. Read more »
