A historical novel situated in Mexico and the USA, Barbara Kingsolver's seventh work of fiction and 13^th book won the Orange Prize honoring women fiction writers and is a New York Times bestseller. The acclaim is well deserved.

Patricia V. Davis, a fifty-something woman with two failed marriages, conflict with her parents, and issues with her sibs and sons, blogged as the Expert at Failed Relationships. In her interaction with readers and other bloggers she was struck by how the lack of self-esteem led women to make wacky decisions.

Andy Warhol, observer, recorder, and preserver of the everyday, would have appreciated Greenberg and Jordan's careful and non-judgmental account of his life and work. More than a factual recounting of his story, this slim volume is filled with anecdotes, quotes, and memories from Warhol and his friends and family.

As the exciting events in Egypt unfolded over the past three weeks, I re-read the novel Palace Walk, the first volume of Nobel Prize winner Naguib Mahfouz's Cairo Trilogy, a multi-generational saga of the middle-class Sawad family from World War I to World War II.  It is a rich portrayal of culture and politics during the period when Egyptian revolutionaries were trying to rid their country of British occupation. 

People have complained about the next generation not getting its act together since the beginning of recorded history. And it's true, each generation faces different challenges than the ones that came before. Whether social, technological or financial, the changes allow kids to tell their parents that they just don't understand.

Do you recall how Johnson & Johnson handled the poison scare after seven Chicago-area residents died due to cyanide-laced Tylenol in 1982?

Did you realize that "Colonel Sanders", founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken, only had a 6th grade education?