Whether you were introduced to Jack Handey through Saturday Night Live, his pieces in The New Yorker, Outside and Playboy, or one of his many collected works, including Deep Thoughts, Deeper Thoughts or Deepest Thoughts, his humor, born from Steve Martin's "Jerk Humor," plays the fool again in these longer essays. Essays/bits/theories (I'm not sure WHAT to call them)vary from why your skeleton should be as scary as possible after you die to how he'd film a nature documentary. In addition to the new material, several old facetious favorites from the New Yorker and sketches from Saturday Night Live including "Toonces, the Driving Cat!" complete this wacky work. Handey is the quirkiest, funniest American humorist writing today.

In the title essay, Handey explains his unique approach to diplomacy in the cosmos [as told to the Martians keeping him prisoner]:

You claim there are other intelligent beings in the galaxy besides Earthlings and Martians. Good, then we can attack them together. And after we're through attacking them, we'll attack you. I came here in peace, seeking gold and slaves. But you have treated me like an intruder. Maybe it is not me who is the intruder, but you. No, not me -- you, stupid.

Doug Fine's thoughts and recollections on his first year of sustainable and eco-friendly living, Farewell, My Subaru, is an accessible, funny, sensible foray into environmentally thoughtful living and environmentalism, which I would recommend to anyone. Despite your political affiliations, views on gun control, or religion (unless you bathe in oil and club baby seals before your breakfast of genetically modified food pellets) you will find Fine's treatise on the simple and immensely rewarding joys of sustainable living, growing your own food and connecting to the earth around you a tempting and rational call to a richer way of life.

Not only charming, hilarious and heart-winning, it is peppered with factoids and garnished with mouth watering recipes Fine prepared with his own cultivated and carefully tended fruits of labor. His dedication to his goals and aspirations is inspiring to say the least. I mean, I love ice cream, and I love the homemade variety. But I don't know if I could go so far as to raise, vaccinate and shepherd goats for over a year in order to make it. And yet, when Fine describes it, it doesn't only seem possible, but enviable.

Fine weathers floods, droughts, hail, coyotes, loneliness, bureaucratic paperwork, clogged fuel lines, a runaway car, and all other unimaginable challenges with humor, grace and an indomitable spirit that keeps you cheering him on! While certainly an environmentalist, Fine is not strictly a vegetarian, and even hunts which might put off some hard core Greenies, but is forgivable given his unique attempt at the activity.

I might have been the only hunter in New Mexico history to have his laptop, complete with wireless Internet, with him as he aimed for dinner, and so I sent a lot of colorful e-mails to friends about sunsets ... I had packed local bean burritos for the trip, so Sadie and I ate quite splendidly as well. As we dined, we listened to NPR.

Needless to say, his hunting was unsuccessful. Read, enjoy, then recycle this book by passing it along!

St Radegund is a college in Cambridge that needs help. Money actually. Tons of it. And they have just appointed a former BBC executive, James Rycarte, to their Head of House. An appointment that breaks one hundred and sixty years of tradition in college that only accepts woman students.

Let's pop inside Rycarte's mind with a quote from the book:

Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain ...

"Her imagination has been captured by the idea of studying abroad - and what better place for her than here at St Radegund's?"

... and saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.

Good eh?

And into this the author, Rosy Thornton, adds as if she were stirring in ingredients to her evening supper: Martha the Senior Tutor with her depressed daughter and crumbling marriage. And the Dean to the college, Darren, who the "Tigresses" have targeting for their "snog" initiation.

So is it any good?

Well in despite of the cover and title, yes. Surprisingly so. There is dry humour:

"What's the worst they can do to us?" asked one pragmatist. It was not a rhetorical question: she was reading Law.

And an insight into human behaviour that plays out against the formal setting.

And yet.

Yet ... some of the detail of the college politics could have been pruned back to allow the lives of Martha and Rycarte to take centre stage more. Even the Dean could probably go, especially as the book plays on Rycarte being a man in a woman only college.

It would have been better to just have stuck with Rycarte as the only man and Martha as the lead woman. When Rosy does she is brilliant. The book pulls you in and she has you.

Overall it is like reading an author who is finding her voice whilst the title and cover try to quiet her down with pink bikes and flowers.

I hope that Rosy throws the chick lit wrappings into the bin for her next book. I'd like to see what she can really do when let loose inside her characters heads with the setting an open stage instead of a closed curtain that they have to fight through.

Following her success with Stiff and Spook, Mary Roach triumphantly continues with Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex. Far and away funnier than I anticipated, this titillating foray into sexual research, diagnosis and treatment is not for the squeamish or faint of heart. It is a rare book indeed that can convey scholarly and incredibly thorough research in a hip and hilarious manner that is both factual and fascinating.

In one of my favorite passages in the book, as part of her initiation into this research, she and her hoodwinked husband travel to London to take place in coital imaging (i.e. having an x-ray taken while in the act). Pre-scan, the technician hands her husband an erotic magazine and the author quips “The implication being, I suppose, that the sight of one’s wife in a baggy knee-length hospital johnny and threadbare socks is not [erotic].”

The most horrifying of the passages generally deal with the historical accounts of what was once accepted medicine, which can have the unnerving affect of having your naughty bits cringe. Anecdotal and conversational, this book is for anyone, from scientists to nymphos and all us regular folk in between.

This book is one of those rare things, a book I had to read for work that was worth every minute I invested in it. I can read crime fiction till the cows come home, but I never go near true crime, and I'd have steered clear of a book obviously about Myra Hindley (clue's on the cover, though she's never named); but I had to pick something to read from the World Book Day top ten, and they were all about death anyway, so I thought what the hell. Better than the book about the teenager dying of cancer, which made me cry on the train when I tried to read it.

The story centres on the policeman given the unenviable job of guarding Myra Hindley's body the night before her funeral, and the thought processes he goes through during the hours he spends there. He has plenty of time to think about his relationship with his wife, his struggles with being a dad to a downs syndrome daughter, and his own past. He is even visited by Hindley's ghost, and has conversations with her.

I don't remember much of what I learned during my English degree, but I do remember being told that detective novels give comfort to people, because they take evil and embody it in one person; then they catch that person, lock them up, and the reader feels safer. Evil has been explained, contained. None of this happens on a conscious level, but it makes perfect sense to me, and gives me an answer when I'm asked on occasion, how can you read books about murder for relaxation? I bring this up, because this book does the opposite. The author bravely takes on a figure that so many of us, for generations, have associated with the nature of evil, not wanting to think that there's anything remotely human about her, or that she might have anything in common with us. Rupert Thomson does not for a moment lessen the horror of what Hindley did, or dodge any difficult questions, so I don't believe anyone should be offended by his treatment of the subject. He will make you think, but as any good writer should, does not impose his views on you.

I picked up this book with great interest. I remember, twenty years ago, reading “The Naked Ape” by Desmond Morris and “The Territorial Imperative” by Konrad Lorenx. Both books were well written and made a profound impact on my view of human nature. Will “The Upright Ape” make a similar impact?

The author, Dr. Aaron G. Filler certainly has the qualifications to write on this subject. He is highly qualified in both anthropology and in medicine, earning his MA in anthropology in 1979, his MD degree in 1986 and also his PhD in 1986. Besides his training in anthropology and evolutionary theory, he is also a world famous neurosurgeon for his skill treating spinal disorders. As an expert in both fields, he has much insight into what kind of spinal structure is needed to support upright verses horizontal posture. Through the years, he has advised some of his fellow anthropologists by examining their fossil finds and their professional papers.

The stimulus for his book and his choice of title “The Upright Ape” began in 1981 when a fellow anthropologist placed in his hands a seemingly inexplicable twenty-one-million-year-old fossil. “The bone had the totally unique features found in humans, but it was from a creature that lived fifteen million years too soon.” After studying this fossil, Filler believed that it can be explained, but Darwin’s Theory, as it presently stood, could not explain it. Filler realized that a broader, more general theory of evolution would be required, one that incorporates the phenomenal growth of scientific knowledge gained over the past twenty-five years.

The fossil given him had its origin in a volcanic region along the Uganda-Kenya border that was studded with numerous twenty-two-million-year-old mammalian fossils from the Miocene era. The most surprising fossil was a nearly complete mid lumbar vertebra that was assigned to the species Proconsul Major. I think this is the fossil Filler examined in 1981. Based on his expertise in medicine as well as anthropology, especially his skill in spinal disorders, Filler claims this fossil is the defining proof of a revolutionary new idea. It is proof that the common ancestor of humans and apes probably already had an upright stance, bipedal locomotion, and did not require the use of arms and hands for locomotion.

Filler felt that this was an entirely new genus among the hominoids—basically, an entirely new kind of animal. It was a primate that not only stood erect, but could not walk comfortably in a horizontal position as modern apes do. This revolutionary discovery is the core of Filler’s book. Modern apes evolving from an upright ancestor is not the general consensus of Darwinian Theory, so, based on many new discoveries, Filler felt some updating of the theory is warranted. Sections of his book trace the development of scientific understanding of how new species of animals have changed through time, starting before Darwin’s General Theory of Evolution and continuing to the present. I didn’t know the German poet Goethe was one of the pioneers in this field. Filler provides an interesting history of how the Theory of Evolution was developed and why it is widely accepted by scientists today. He tried not to get too technical. “I propose to make my case by proceeding simultaneously in both the formal academic arena and in the broader sphere of access provided by a book written for the general public.” He succeeds to some extent, but the book is still pretty technical.

Anthropologists who study Australopithecus and Homo are convinced that upright bipedalism must have arisen from a quadruple common ancestor with a chimpanzee. However, there is no definitive fossil evidence at all for this position. All the evidence, which Filler reviews in detail in his book, actually points the other way when it is fully and fairly considered. There are presently four great hominoids on our planet: Orangutan, Chimpanzee, Gorilla, and humans. Only humans have an upright posture. Filler argues that both Sahelanthropus and Orrorin fit the description of being human; both may be reasonable candidates for ancestry of the chimpanzee lineage as well. He goes on to say that if this evidence for an upright bipedal, hominiform lineage is accepted, then either of the two above species can be seen as a human ancestor for the chimpanzee, which would turn Darwin’s theory upside down.

I think Dr. Filler has marred what might have been a very good book on science by crossing over into religion and theology and trying to refute the beliefs of Christianity. He is not an expert in these fields. I think he should have let his sound scientific findings stand on their own merits and state his thoughts about religion in a separate book. In spite of that, however, if you are interested in cutting edge discoveries in anthropology and in a proposed updating of the theory of evolution that accounts for new discoveries, you will find this book very interesting.

I dare you to read the first two pages and not want to finish the rest of the book.

Part Victorian murder mystery, part fantastical alternate history with a liberal dash of lexigraphical acrobatics, The Somnambulist combines a labyrinthine plot with haunting characters and an unreliable narrator which coalesces into an unexpected crescendo no one could anticipate.

The Somnambulist is a bald, mute giant of man who when pierced with swords does not bleed. His almost constant companion is Edward Moon, often referred to as the conjurer, with whom he conducts a magical act and solves the most mysterious of mysteries. When drawn into the enigmatic and horrifying deaths of two lechers, seemingly unconnected except for the implausible nature of their deaths, these crimes, however, and their monstrous solution are just the first strands in unraveling the gordian knot that is threatening the city of London.

At times like taking a midnight stroll through densely fogged streets and hearing ominous footsteps behind you, or standing slack-jawed at a bawdy freak show, or laughing raucously at a local pub Jonathan Barnes' The Somnambulist is reminiscent of authors of such note as Mary Shelley, Neil Gaiman, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Edgar Allen Poe and Michael Chabon.

This books is essential for all you Word Nerds out there as I learned 9 new words during the course of the book! [coruscating, sybaritism, postprandial, risible, penury, cognoscenti, minatory, ratiocination, eldritch] Their inclusion is not abrupt as in a Mad Lib, but fit seamlessly into the otherworldly elegance of the prose.

A solid 4 and a half, with its only caveat being that the end leaves you thinking "What the Deuce?!"

Dead Witch Walking, the first book in the Rachel Morgan/The Hollows series of novels by Kim Harrison, is one of the many urban fantasy books on the market these days. What makes it stand out for me is that Rachel, a witch living in an alternate history version of the world (we never went the the moon and humans are terrified of tomatoes!), isn't the typical bad-ass, smart-ass, know-it-all, uber-sexy heroine that seems to have become the annoying norm in this genre thanks to the likes of a certain un-named vampire hunter. Oh no! Rachel gets her butt kicked (often), hassled (all the time) by her fairy sidekick/partner, Jenks, and it's made quite clear that Rachel isn't always the smartest person in the room.

And I love that.

There are three main threads woven through the fabric of this story and, despite some problems with language (no one seems to swear except Jenks and he substitutes foul language some times but not others) and pacing, Harrison handles the job well. I'm definitely looking forward to diving into the second book in the series.

I don't remember the title of the first book I read in which nothing happened, but I remember being surprised that 1) Nothing happened and 2) I enjoyed it. It may very well have been an Anne Tyler book.

In Anne Tyler's latest book, Digging to America, nothing happens. Well, that's not entirely true. What I mean is nothing but life happens. There is no mystery, no great climax, no real plot to speak of. And that's ok. Ann Tyler's gift is not necessarily plot heavy books, but books with intricate character studies.

I've been an Anne Tyler fan since I read Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant back in the 1980's and have read 15 of her 17 novels. Although I didn't realize it until today, all of Ms Tyler's books are mostly character studies, and therefore it is the characters I mostly remember from her novels. I loved the way Ms Tyler wrote about quirky characters and I often joked that my in-laws would make great characters in an Anne Tyler novel.

Digging to America is about two very different families that meet at an airport while waiting to meet their adopted daughters from Korea. The story revolves around the two families through the next five years: their evolving friendship, occasional bitterness, a loss, a romance and not a little misunderstanding.

Brad and Bitsy Donaldson are well-meaning, politically correct suburbanites. Sami and Ziba Yazdan are Iranian-Americans, adapting to American culture, while occasionally shaking their heads at Americans' behaviors. Each family has extended families whose characters are as colorful as anyone in real life.

The book alternates between the two families' points of view, each chapter providing a different character to speak, so the reader gets to be "in the head" of several characters in the novel.

If you are looking for a book with an intricate plot, I'd pass this one by, but if you want a cozy book in which the characters are highly developed, give Digging to America a go.

The book’s goal is to explain the unique opportunity that exists in our time: to eliminate extreme poverty in the world. Extreme poverty, in this case, is defined as the 1 billion+ people that live on less than $1 US per day.

Now. The book spends significant time looking into various problems that the poorest countries (mostly in Africa) face, from disease to geographic limitations to Western meddling and all kinds of other things. Aside from looking at the problems, it tries to look at real, practical, possible solutions.

One of the most frustrating, from an American perspective, is described like this:

The problem is the complete disconnect between the extent of the initiative [a 2002 aid program created by the Bush Administration] - $5 billion more per year by the third year - and the needs of the poor countries (on the order of $100 billion more per year between 2006-2015 to meet the Millennium Development Goals) and with the commitment of the United States to make “concrete efforts” to target 0.7 percent of GNP [the amount that has repeatedly been agreed upon as aid needed from developed nations]. The $5 billion represents less than 0.05 percent of U.S. GNP. Even more startling, not a single penny of the Millennium Challenge Account had been disbursed by late 2004.

This quote occurs in the context of a chapter that discusses the unanimous opinion that there is a link between aiding economic growth and U.S. national security. It looks into the pragmatic reasons that it is a good thing for us to give aid to help countries get out of extreme poverty.

Throughout the book, a common theme remains that United States foreign policy in the past couple of decades (both Democratic and Republican administrations) has been very good at talking about foreign aid, and very bad at doing anything about it. As defense budgets have risen, aid budgets have fallen, and it is easy to observe that we are not getting more secure.

Times like ours are contrasted with things like the Marshall Plan, in which our country realized that aiding the recovery of Europe, which included foreign aid over 1.0 percent of GNP. Leaders of our country at the time were well aware that an economically progressing Europe would lead to a more secure United States.

Many of the chapters in this book cover things that (should) evoke brokenness and compassion on the part of people in wealthy countries, and should contribute to action. The Millennium Development Goals can make and are making a difference in the world, as businesses and individuals contribute to the transformation of African villages.

But the saddening part is that governments are not contributing in any meaningful way, especially ours. Statistics and surveys show that we as American citizens believe that our government does far more for the poor in foreign countries than it does, and that we would support even more support than we think there is. It’s mind-boggling. While this is not surprising to learn, it is difficult.