Off the Shelf

Wrong Place, Wrong Time: Trauma and Violence in the Lives of Young Black Men [5], by John A. Rich, M.P.H. ’90 (Johns Hopkins, $24.95). The author, now a professor at Drexel University School of Public Health, offers a gritty, sobering view—sometimes from the blood-soaked ER—of epidemic shootings, stabbings, and street beatings.

[6]

Paleoclimates: Understanding Climate Change Past and Present [7], by Thomas M. Cronin, Ph.D. ’77 (Columbia, $95). Lest anyone doubt that there is science involved in assessing climate change, the author—a geologist associated with Georgetown University and the U.S. Geological Survey—delivers a dense text on the hard (rock) evidence.

The Ideological Origins of American Federalism [8] by Alison L. LaCroix, Ph.D. ’07 (Harvard, $35). “Federalism is everywhere and nowhere in American legal and political history,” observes the author, a lawyer and historian now professing at University of Chicago Law School. Intrigued, she has sought out the ideas that resulted in a federalist government, before their inclusion in the Constitution.

[9]

A Vision for Venture Capital [10], by Peter A. Brooke ’52, M.B.A. ’54, with Daniel Penrice (University Press of New England, $29.95). A memoir of a life in finance by the founder of TA Associates and Advent International, who has his eye clearly on the economic value of investment, global growth, and a world untainted by excessive debt and quick-buck financial engineering.

[11]

Flawless [12], by Scott Andrew Selby, J.D. ’98, and Greg Campbell (Union Square, $24.95). A breathless “inside,” blow-by-blow, if not actually how-to, account of “the largest diamond heist in history” ($128 million)—in Antwerp, naturally, on Valentine’s Day weekend, of course.

[13]

The Upside of Turbulence [14], by Donald Sull ’85, M.B.A. ’92, D.B.A. ’96 (Harper Business, $27.99). A business-strategy book aimed at “seizing opportunity in an uncertain world” (prospective audience, these days: everyone), by a former Mc- Kinsey consultant, now a professor of strategy at the London Business School.

[15]

The Artist's Eyes: Vision and the History of Art [16], by Michael F. Marmor ’62, M.D. ’66, and James G. Ravin (Abrams, $40). A sort of forensic aesthetics, copiously illustrated, by a retina specialist and an art-minded fellow ophthalmologist, who interpret the eye and vision as seen through the works of, and by their effects on, Seurat, Matisse, Titian, Chuck Close, and others.

[17]

King of the Lobby [18], by Kathryn Allamong Jacob (Johns Hopkins, $40). The curator of manuscripts at Radcliffe’s Schlesinger Library provides a colorful look at Sam Ward, who parlayed good food, fine wine, and dinner conversation into power in Gilded Age Washington, D.C., pioneering the art of lobbying in a scandal-marred era.

[19]

Historic Photos of Harvard University [20], text and captions by Dana Bonstrom ’77 (Turner, $39.95). A gallery of black-and-white archival images, especially of buildings and architecture, from a panorama of pre-Business School Allston to Lowell House under construction to Churchill reviewing cadets in the Yard, and more.