John Leonard

Book critic John Leonard reviews the memoir of rock musician Frank Zappa.

Book critic John Leonard reviews The Life of Graham Greene, Volume 1, 1904-1939, by Norman Sherry.

Book Critic John Leonard reviews the novel Polar Star by Martin Cruz Smith, his sequel to his 1981 best-seller Gorky Park. Reappearing in Polar Star is Arkady Renko, the intrepid police investigator hero of Gorky Park.

Book Critic John Leonard reviews From Beirut to Jerusalem, Thomas Friedman's account of his ten years covering the Middle East for The New York Times.

Book critic John Leonard reviews the German author's new book, about his travels to Calcutta. Frustrated with the industrial revival of the two Germanies, Grass goes abroad to learn about other models of national identity.

Author Philip Roth was in part responsible for getting the Czech novelists Life with a Star translated into English and published stateside. Book critic John Leonard says it stands out among the myriad, Kafka-esque books about the Holocaust.

Book critic John Leonard says Barry Hannah's southern, hard-drinking life echoes that of William Faulkner. Hannah's novel Boomerang also evokes the author's sometimes scary, creeping spirit.

Baker's new memoir, a sequel to his book Growing Up, chronicles his career as a reporter during his twenties and thirties. Book critic John Leonard says that the story, like Baker's New York Times columns, twists and turns to explore the fraught inner workings of journalism.

Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Halberstam usually covers international affairs. Book critic John Leonard says the writer's new book reveals a boyish fandom for a bygone era of baseball.

John Le Carre's new spy novel is set against the backdrop of the Soviet Union's recent reforms. Book critic John Leonard calls it a "great gray lump" -- The Russia House strains for greatness with big ideas about selfhood, but falls flat with its long sentences and pretensions of literary sophistication.