Books

How do you figure out what comes next after what gave your life meaning is gone?

BookEnds — a workshop established by Susan Scarf Merrell and Meg Wolitzer of Stony Brook Southampton’s M.F.A. program in creative writing.

“Don’t Save Anything” contains a number of James Salter pieces that are indispensable, many of them rescued from boxes stored in places reachable only with a ladder.

The origin story of Lou Reed, from Long Island wiseass to victim of electroshock therapy to tutelage under the poet Delmore Schwartz.

By Bruce Buschel

Some nonfiction gems in an off year for fiction, when current events overshadow everything.

Boy, do we miss Kurt Vonnegut, that shambling, head down, creased-face man in the beat-up raincoat who loved the world, and was broken by the foolish people who were trampling it underfoot.

T.E. McMorrow will sign copies of “The Nutcracker in Harlem,” his new picture book, at two Books of Wonder locations in Manhattan on Sunday.

A brilliant chemist, a president of Harvard, a leader of the Manhattan Project, and a top Cold War diplomat. Meet James B. Conant.

Temporal slippage, a birthmark, and visions of a David ("Cloud Atlas") Mitchell adventure for young readers.

Social observation, city atmosphere, and a highly sexual, white-collar hero: Colin Harrison is back with another New York noir.

One essential aspect of the women’s suffrage movement — the role men played in helping sway history — has been largely overlooked. Not anymore.

Virginia Walker's empathy-themed poetry contest? We have the winners . . .

Paul Moschetta's psychological thriller offers an insider’s knowledge of the abuse that exists in mental institutions.

Sarah Maslin Nir's "Horse Crazy," and a Civil War-era "Because of the Horses"

By Bernard Goldhirsch

Susan Verde and Billy Baldwin look on the brighter side in two new picture books.

Art-inspired writing at the Parrish, Grace Schulman on John Ashbery at Canio's

The visionary of the ages, captured by the man who made Albert Einstein and Steve Jobs relatable.

Justin Spring weaves the lives of his six literary and cultural subjects into a larger, lively narrative of how America was dragged from its culinary provincialism.

A picture of a kooky, crafty, ambitious, hilarious, insecure, sometimes spiteful, always entertaining Nora Ephron as she pursues her brilliant career as a novelist, essayist, script writer, and director.

“Truth reveals itself . . . it’s really that simple.” Such is at the core of Alice McDermott’s extraordinary new novel, “The Ninth Hour,” about several nuns serving an early-20th-century Brooklyn neighborhood.

By Bruce Buschel, a writer, producer, director, and restaurateur who lives in Bridgehampton.

With the syndication of his "Sportlight" column, Grantland Rice became the most famous and highest-paid sportswriter in the country.

With its timely twist and the current sociopolitical climate, "The Nutcracker in Harlem" begs to be on the shelves now rather than later.

Barney Rosset reconsidered, and Martin London's life as a pugnacious lawyer.

Poetry Pairs is back at Guild Hall’s John Drew Theater on Sunday with readings by Stephen Dunn and Jill Bialosky.

In “Liner Notes,” Loudon Wainwright III weaves tales of a meandering career marked by deep ambivalence with candid admissions of personal shortcomings that closely tracked those of his father, the celebrated Life magazine writer.

On the life and excellent enthusiasms of a 19th-century Parisian photographer, writer, illustrator, and balloonist.

Lucas Hunt, in his new book of poems, “Iowa,” engages his subject matter through use of precise evocative imagery.