Kirkus Star
THE KIRKUS STAR
Awarded to Books of Exceptional Merit

BROWSE BOOK REVIEWS




Best Nonfiction of 2012 (page 16)


Cover art for BEAUTIFUL THING
NONFICTION
Released: March 6, 2012

"Gritty, gripping and often heartbreaking--an impressive piece of narrative nonfiction."
A harsh, cinematic look at the international sex trade. Read full book review >
Cover art for HOUSE OF STONE
NONFICTION
Released: Feb. 28, 2012

"A complicated, elegiac, beautiful attempt to reconcile the physical bayt (home) and the spiritual."
A nostalgic, bittersweet journey back to the Lebanese homestead. Read full book review >
Cover art for SWORD OF THE SPIRIT, SHIELD OF FAITH
NONFICTION
Released: Feb. 28, 2012

"A frank, exhaustive, marvelously readable study."
A sharp, clear, deeply researched examination of the consistent application of the founding religious principles to American foreign policy, from the colonists' sense of a Protestant exceptionalism to President Barack Obama's "Good Niebuhr Policy." Read full book review >
Cover art for RED PLENTY
NONFICTION
Released: Feb. 14, 2012

"A highly creative, illuminating, genre-resisting history."
The strange, sad, hilarious story of the Soviet Union's blind pursuit of a Communist paradise, told through a mix of history and fiction, using both to get to the truth. Read full book review >
Cover art for BEHIND THE BEAUTIFUL FOREVERS
NONFICTION
Released: Feb. 7, 2012

"The best book yet written on India in the throes of a brutal transition."
In her debut, Pulitzer Prize–winning New Yorker staff writer Boo creates an intimate, unforgettable portrait of India's urban poor. Read full book review >
Cover art for THE NEW HATE
NONFICTION
Released: Feb. 7, 2012

"A provocative, intellectually rigorous book written clearly and with an admirable lack of hatred."
A well-reported study of disaffected groups who hate other groups whose members look or think differently than the haters. Read full book review >