Memoir: 'cures For Hunger'

Nearly 25 years have passed since Roy Orbison last prowled the Earth in one of his signature jet-black ensembles, with those trademark sunglasses perched on the bridge of his nose. The rock pioneer responsible for the lascivious growl of “Oh, Pretty Woman,” the swoony high notes of “Crying” and a personal style best described as geek-noir chic died of a heart attack in 1988, which means he’s now been gone for almost as much time as he spent recording albums.

In “The Watch Tower,” Elizabeth Harrower lives up to her last name. This is a harrowing novel, relentless in its depiction of marital enslavement, spiritual self-destruction and the exploited condition of women in a masculinist society. It reminded me of Zola in its unflinching depiction of two sisters entangled with a moody, violent man, one of them being gradually crushed into subservience, the other struggling desperately to save her own soul.

“The Son” spans 200 years, six generations and a great many downfalls in one proudly purebred American family, the McCulloughs of Texas.

Vintage is releasing a 20th-anniversary edition of 'Dead Man Walking' with a new subtitle.

On the face of it, science fiction has little time for religion. But scratch a little deeper and you’ll find a world rife with religious and mythological tropes. Even when overt faith is absent, a kind of piety looms large in the genre’s worship of science and the cult of rationality.