Kirkus Star
THE KIRKUS STAR
Awarded to Books of Exceptional Merit

BROWSE BOOK REVIEWS




Top 25 September Nonfiction


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Cover art for WALKING THE AMAZON
NONFICTION
Released: Sept. 1, 2012

"A gripping celebration of physical and mental endurance."
A memoir of an astonishing trip walking "nine million-odd steps" for more than two years along the Amazon River's course from Peruvian headwaters to Brazilian mouth. Read full book review >
Cover art for A REAL EMOTIONAL GIRL
NONFICTION
Released: Sept. 1, 2012

"A contemplative, profoundly moving meditation on life, love and death."
In her debut, Los Angeles Review poetry and translations editor Chernov probes her grief over losing a much-loved father and the inability of contemporary society to accept profound emotion. Read full book review >
Cover art for THE VOYEURS
NONFICTION
Released: Sept. 4, 2012
by Gabrielle Bell, illustrated by Gabrielle Bell

"Playfully drawn and provocatively written, the memoir reinforces Bell's standing among the first rank of the genre's artists."
"Graphic memoir" only hints at the artistry of a complex, literary-minded author who resists the bare-all confessionalism so common to the genre and blurs the distinction between fiction and factual introspection. Read full book review >
Cover art for HOW CHILDREN SUCCEED
NONFICTION
Released: Sept. 4, 2012

"Well-written and bursting with ideas, this will be essential reading for anyone who cares about childhood in America."
Turning the conventional wisdom about child development on its head, New York Times Magazine editor Tough (Whatever It Takes: Geoffrey Canada's Quest to Change Harlem and America, 2008) argues that non-cognitive skills (persistence, self-control, curiosity, conscientiousness, grit and self-confidence) are the most critical to success in school and life. Read full book review >
Cover art for LINCOLN'S CODE
NONFICTION
Released: Sept. 4, 2012

"Truly remarkable, composed with all the precision and insight you expect from a law professor, marked by all the elegance and sparkling readability you don't."
Artfully mixing law, history and sharp analysis, a Yale law professor examines the persistent struggle to reconcile justice and humanitarianism in America's conduct of war. Read full book review >
Cover art for MORTALITY
NONFICTION
Released: Sept. 4, 2012

"Certainly, Hitchens died too soon. May this moving little visit to his hospital room not be the last word from him."
A jovially combative riposte to anyone who thought that death would silence master controversialist Hitchens (Hitch-22, 2010, etc.). Read full book review >