Jay Gesin
Reservation Blues
by Sherman Alexie
Destined to be the greatest novel ever written about a Native American Catholic rock band. Sherman Alexie turns his sharp wit to brilliantly rework a common American rite of passage -- the garage band -- into a soul-searching journey for Indian identity. Blending Native American mythology, Mississippi Delta blues legends, and "Spinal Tap," Reservation Blues is a terrific example of the humor and pathos found in all of Alexie's books. I particularly enjoyed the scathing and hilarious critique of white groupies and the music industry. Alexie is honest in his stories and rapidly becoming a strong voice in contemporary American literature. Also check out his short story collection, The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven, and Alexie's screen adaptation of that book into the movie "Smoke Signals."

Gavin J. Grant
The Mystery of Meteors
by Eleanor Lerman
I like poetry that tells stories, that's intimate, warm, yet -- and therein lies one of many rubs -- original and different. I've read thousands of poems and can't remember most (neither poet or poem). Eleanor Lerman's poetry fits my criteria for good poetry, even as it expands and stretches them. Her poetry grabs me, and damned if I can pinpoint why. Poetry sometimes seems to slip right by our conscious selves and lodge inside us, which is what these meteors falling on us from another's sky do.

Scott Nafz
Sarum
by Edward Rutherfurd
If you enjoy fiction entwined with the rich history of the British Isles, then Sarum is just the book for you. Historical fiction at its best, Rutherfurd paints the life and times of Great Britain, from its very inception at the hands of geological forces, to the building of Stonehenge, to the fall of the Roman Empire all the way up to the mid-20th century. I would even recommend this title to students of European History, since Rutherfurd goes to great lengths to describe the social climate, the reasons for it, and how it effects his characters of different classes, at every step. You may not, now, think much on the struggle of the Roundheads or their Cavalier opposition at the time of Charles II, but you will once you decide to wrap yourself up in this enormously satisfying saga.

Len Vlahos
Berlitz Basic Spanish
Liz, my better half, and I, have been contemplating a trip to Cost Rica, so I thought I should learn some Spanish. I studied the language for three years in high school, and remember, well, none of it. With that in mind, I picked up a copy of Berlitz Basic Spanish -- a study guide and three cassettes. Wow!! A few minutes with the cassettes in my car each day, and a few minutes with the book at home each night, and I feel positively multi-lingual! The scenes acted out on the tape give context to the language -- there is no English spoken on the tapes -- and the book ties it all together. Now, I just need to find a good intermediate study guide! Yo he aprendido mucho!!

John Son
The Body Artist
by Don DeLillo
From one of my favorite authors, this is an extraordinary work of concentrated beauty, by a writer best known for his erudite, precise, and dryly humorous novels about life in a world besieged by hidden conspiracies, media culture, terrorism, and technological dominance. That said, The Body Artist is a complete departure in style and tone, focusing instead on the universal themes of time, love, memory, and perception. In a kind of incantatory prose, DeLillo effortlessly submerges the reader into the life of Lauren Hartke, a performance artist living a solitary existence on a lonely coast in a rented house. One day a strange, ageless man, who possesses an uncanny knowledge of her life, as well as the life she shared with her deceased husband, appears out of nowhere, and through their chance encounter, Lauren discovers a deeper, contextual sense of who she is. At 124 pages The Body Artist is more a novella than novel, but then not exactly. It could just as easily be a prose poem, a parable, or a prayer, because its power lies not so much in its printed words but where the words take you, begging the question of who the body artist really is -- Lauren Hartke, DeLillo, or you.