Category Archives: Reviews

Covers: New York Review Of Books – October 6, 2022

New York Review October 6, 2022 cover

The October 6 issue is online now, with Bill McKibben on the climate refugee crisis, Hermione Lee on Joseph Roth’s violently mixed feelings, Linda Greenhouse on Justice Breyer’s most powerful dissent, Jerome Groopman on diabetes, Leslie T. Chang on narrative nonfiction in China, Ange Mlinko on H.D., David S. Reynolds on séances in the Lincoln White House, Verlyn Klinkenborg on the Beach Boys’ moment in the sun, Erin Maglaque on the pope’s astronomer, Mark Danner on the long, slow Trump coup, a poem by Vona Groarke, and much more.

Where Will We Live?

Three books on the movement, of both humans and wildlife, spurred by climate change illustrate the magnitude of the challenge before us.

Nowhere Left to Go: How Climate Change Is Driving Species to the Ends of the Earth – by Benjamin von Brackel, translated from the German by Ayça Türkoğlu

Nomad Century: How Climate Migration Will Reshape Our World – by Gaia Vince

Border and Rule: Global Migration, Capitalism, and the Rise of Racist Nationalism – by Harsha Walia

Poet of the Dispossessed

Joseph Roth was unwavering in his passion for the vanished Austro-Hungarian Empire, which inspired his greatest novel, his hatred of nationalism, and his prophetic and courageous loathing for the Nazis. About everything else, as a new biography shows, he had violently mixed feelings.

Endless Flight: The Life of Joseph Roth – by Keiron Pim

Research Preview: Nature Magazine – Sept 15, 2022

Volume 609 Issue 7927

Monkeypox, COVID-19, AIDS: have we progressed so little?

Deaths and sufferings are not a failure of technology or knowledge, but a failure of will.

The world’s reservoirs are ageing — and belching out more methane

But carbon dioxide emissions resulting from the global reservoir-building spree in the 1960s and 1970s are falling.

The Jurassic vomit that stood the test of time

A fossilized pile of small bones is probably a meal that an animal heaved up 150 million years ago.

Rarest of elements yield their secrets with help from mighty metals

Surrounding an ion of curium with radiation-resistant clusters of other ions allows scientists to study the scarce substance.

Why some female hummingbirds mimic males: it’s all about nectar

Some female white-necked jacobins nab good feeding spots by adopting the flashy plumage of their bigger, brasher male counterparts.

A sugary diet wrecks gut microbes — and their anti-obesity efforts

A high-sugar diet unbalances the microbiome, so the body makes fewer of the gut immune cells that help to prevent metabolic disorders.

Design: Architect Reviews Batman’s ‘Wayne Manor’

Michael Wyetzner of Michielli + Wyetzner Architects returns to AD, this time breaking down details from the many on-screen depictions of Wayne Manor – home to mysterious playboy millionaire Bruce Wayne and (more importantly) the headquarters for Batman. From the more humble depictions in comics and on television to the cosmopolitan high rise seen in 2022’s “The Batman,” see how the hero Gotham deserves has lived from the 1930’s to now.

Tech Reviews: The iPhone 14 + Dynamic Island (2022)

Apple’s iPhone 14 Pros have a new multitasking feature called the “dynamic island.” WSJ’s Joanna Stern went out to a real island to test the Pros’ new always-on screen cameras, including the new 48-megapixel main camera and the new action mode.

She also compares them to the more affordable iPhone 14. 0:00 Welcome to Joanna’s dynamic island 1:07 iPhone 14 screen size and tests: always-on and dynamic island 3:41 iPhone 14 camera specs and tests 4:58 iPhone 14 action mode tests 5:35 Emergency SOS and crash detection: the iPhone 14 features Joanna couldn’t test

Preview: Times Literary Supplement – Sept 16, 2022

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This week’s @TheTLS , featuring @motionandrew, Claire Lowdon and Jane Ridley on Elizabeth II; @MirandaFrance1 on motherhood; @lindseyhilsum on the US’s catastrophic withdrawal from Afghanistan; @15thcgossipgirl on sex in the Middle Ages – and more.

2023 Reviews: Top Electric & Plug-In Hybrid SUVs (CR)

2023 Alfa Romeo Tonale Veloce driving

Alfa Romeo Tonale (2023)

The Tonale rounds out the trio of cars in Alfa Romeo’s small, stylish lineup, bringing small-SUV utility and a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV) powertrain into the fold. Both the PHEV and the more conventional turbocharged, 2.0-liter gasoline versions of the Tonale will be all-wheel drive, showcasing an interior and exterior aesthetic that will be familiar to Alfa aficionados.

2024 Chevrolet Blazer EV

Chevrolet Blazer EV (2023)

The Blazer EV is based on GM’s Ultium platform that underpins the latest automaker’s electric models. This midsized SUV will meet the competition, notably the Ford Mustang Mach-E, Volkswagen ID.4, and Hyundai-Kia pair in terms of price, functionality, and range. It will be offered in several trims, initially starting with the 2LT trim for $47,595 with a 293-mile estimated range. 


2023 Fisker Ocean in desert

Fisker Ocean (2023)

The Fisker Ocean pure-electric SUV features a solar roof and a 17-inch center touchscreen that can be rotated 90 degrees for either a horizontal or vertical display layout. The interior, which features recycled materials throughout, seats five passengers. 

2023 Mercedes-Benz EQS SUV front driving

Mercedes-Benz EQS SUV (2023)

The EQS SUV takes all the opulence and engineering marvel long associated with the Mercedes-Benz EQS sedan and applies these concepts to a large, three-row electric SUV. It comes standard in a rear-drive, one-motor configuration, with the 4Matic upgrade granting it all-wheel and two motors.

Read more reviews at Consumer Reports

Books: The New York Times Book Review – Sept 11, 2022

9 Books to Read About Queen Elizabeth II

Elizabeth, famously reticent during her decades in the public eye, was a source of fascination for many. These books offer a deeper understanding of her life, family and world.

Jennifer Egan and the Goon Squad

The novelist talks about her Pulitzer-winning book, which includes one chapter written as a PowerPoint presentation, and Stephen Fry discusses Greek mythology.

Ling Ma’s Surreal Subversions

The stories in “Bliss Montage” see women — insouciant, detached, mostly Chinese American — making questionable choices.

By LOVIA GYARKYE

A Global History of Gender, in All Its Varieties

Kit Heyam’s “Before We Were Trans” spans continents and millenniums to prove that where there is humanity, there is nonconformity.

By MEREDITH TALUSAN

Reviews: ‘The Week In Art’

This week: is art censorship on the rise? The Art Newspaper’s chief contributing editor, Gareth Harris, joins Ben Luke to discuss his new book, Censored Art Today.

We look at the different ways in which freedom of expression is being curbed across the globe and at the debates around contested history and cancel culture. This episode’s Work of the Week is Diane Arbus’s Puerto Rican woman with a beauty mark, N.Y.C., 1965, one of the 90 images that feature in Diane Arbus: Photographs, 1956-1971, which opens at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Canada, on 15 September. Sophie Hackett, the exhibition’s curator, discusses Arbus’s remarkable eye and technical brilliance.

As the Guggenheim Bilbao celebrates its 25th anniversary, Thomas Krens, the director and chief artistic officer of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation from 1988 to 2008, reflects on the genesis and development of a museum that had a dramatic impact on contemporary art and museums’ role in the cultural regeneration of cities across the world. 

Research Preview: Science Magazine – Sept 9, 2022

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Twisty device explores alternative path to fusion

Revamped German stellarator should run longer, hotter and compete with tokamaks

New tech law offers billions for research

CHIPS act will fund microelectronics innovation and training through large partnerships

Warming of 1.5°C carries risk of crossing climate tipping points

Scientists call for concerted effort to forecast points of no return for ice, weather patterns, and ecosystems

California EV rules jolt battery science

Move to phase out gas-powered cars will force progress toward faster charging batteries

Fauci looks back—and ahead

Loved and hated, NIAID’s chief plots life after government