(Random House, $35)
A very American story lies at the heart of this “lively, engaging” portrait of Great Britain’s first great modern king, said James Norton in CSMonitor.com. For most of his life, the future Edward VII was a punch line: His own mother, Queen Victoria, thought her “Bertie” an ugly baby and feeble-minded youth who eventually launched a long career as a caddish playboy by consorting with an Irish prostitute and thus sending his horrified, upstanding father to an early grave. But Americans never lose faith in the idea that the lowliest among us “can rise through effort, reform, and persistence” to the highest of heights, and that’s precisely what Victoria’s firstborn did. When he finally inherited the throne at 60, he didn’t merely emerge as a competent monarch: He redefined what a constitutional monarch should be.
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“It cannot be said that most people on this side of the pond have been waiting breathlessly for a good biography of Edward VII,” said Michael Korda in TheDailyBeast.com. But “this is that rare book that is at once worthwhile and great fun.” Ridley has re-created a whole age—a time when Britain and the rest of Europe sat at the “lush apogee” of their wealth but on the brink of a paradigm-rattling war. Knowing Europe’s other monarchs as well as he did, Edward “almost single-handedly” coaxed France into an alliance that turned back Germany’s ambitions. For a second-rate son, he turned out to be “a decidedly first-class world figure.”
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Also of interest...in picture books for grown-upsfeature How About Never—Is Never Good for You?; The Undertaking of Lily Chen; Meanwhile, in San Francisco; The Portlandia Activity Book
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Author of the week: Karen Russell
feature Karen Russell could use a rest.
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The Double Life of Paul de Man by Evelyn Barish
feature Evelyn Barish “has an amazing tale to tell” about the Belgian-born intellectual who enthralled a generation of students and academic colleagues.
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Book of the week: Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt by Michael Lewis
feature Michael Lewis's description of how high-frequency traders use lightning-fast computers to their advantage is “guaranteed to make blood boil.”
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Also of interest...in creative rebellion
feature A Man Called Destruction; Rebel Music; American Fun; The Scarlet Sisters
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Author of the week: Susanna Kaysen
feature For a famous memoirist, Susanna Kaysen is highly ambivalent about sharing details about her life.
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You Must Remember This: Life and Style in Hollywood’s Golden Age by Robert Wagner
feature Robert Wagner “seems to have known anybody who was anybody in Hollywood.”
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Book of the week: Astoria: John Jacob Astor and Thomas Jefferson’s Lost Pacific Empire by Peter Stark
feature The tale of Astoria’s rise and fall turns out to be “as exciting as anything in American history.”