Hot Type

Robert Harris'sDictator (Knopf)—the final volume of his Cicero trilogy—sees Rome toppled by the rapacious ambition of politicians, poisonous selfinterests, and foreign wars. Hmmm, how timely... Geoffrey Cowan shoots a hole in the campaign behind rowdy Teddy Roosevelt's rallying cry for political primaries—Let the People Rule (Norton). Ethan Michaeli headlines the vital role the legendary black newspaper The Defender (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) plays on the front lines of social justice. With My Name Is Lucy Barton (Random House), the miraculous Elizabeth Strout, patron saint of the repressed and full of rage, reveals again the ways families mess each other up and forgive.

Finally, memoirists tell the truth and expose their beating black hearts in Why We Write About Ourselves (Plume), edited by Meredith Maran.

ELISSA SCHAPPELL

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