Hollywood Gives Book Early Push

The Labor of Living

In "The Company Town," Hardy Green surveys towns from Hershey, Pa., to Gary, Ind., where a single business or industry once controlled nearly every aspect of life—sometimes to the good, sometimes not. Bill Kauffman reviews.

Bookshelf: Reading, Writing, Radical Change

In "Crisis on Campus," Mark C. Taylor urges bold reforms for universities—for example, eliminating tenure. Naomi Schaefer Riley reviews.

When the Killing Stopped

In "The Great Silence," Juliet Nicolson describes how the British tried to reorient themselves and start again after the carnage of World War I. Elizabeth Lowry reviews.

The Sincerest Form of Ridicule

"Beowulf," Raymond Chandler, Henry James—they've all suffered the satirist's needle. John Gross compiles some of the best examples in "The Oxford Book of Parodies."

• Read an excerpt of 'The Oxford Book of Parodies'

The Lost Art of Real Cooking

In "The Lost Art of Real Cooking," Ken Albala and Rosanna Nafziger champion the pleasures of "traditional food." Aram Bakshian Jr. reviews.

Mockingjay

Suzanne Collins ends her Hunger Games trilogy with "Mockingjay," a novel eagerly awaited by fans of the futuristic saga about young rebels fighting against an evil government. Meghan Cox Gurdon reviews.

Contemplating Death From Above

In World War I, it was the trenches that captured the imagination of poets. In World War II, it was aerial combat. A review of Daniel Swift's "Bomber County."

• Read an excerpt of 'Bomber County'

Bush Returns to Arena With Memoir

After remaining mostly out of view and silent on policy debates since leaving office, George W. Bush is about to promote his memoir, to be published a week after the Nov. 2 elections.

• News Hub: Bush Returns to Arena
• Readers React: Bravo for Dubya and Laura'

John O. McGinnis: When Justice Comes Naturally

Whenever the Senate must consider a Supreme Court nominee, originalists and believers in the "living Constitution" vie for supremacy. In "Constitutional Illusions & Anchoring Truths," Hadley Arkes suggests a third way—letting natural law guide the members of either camp

The ABCs of E-Reading

Book lovers have long worried that technology would lead to the demise of long-form reading. But research shows that owners of e-readers may be reading more than ever before.

• Readers React: 'I read much faster on e-reader'
• E-Readers Crowd Market

Black Voices From the Pulpit

"Preaching With Sacred Fire," edited by Martha Simmons and Frank A. Thomas, presents an anthology of African-American sermons, from the slave era to the modern day. Eric J. Sundquist reviews.

Oxford Readies Giant Chinese-English Dictionary

Five years, 300,000 words, 370,000 translations: It all adds up to the largest single volume English-Chinese, Chinese-English dictionary ever put together.

Adoption Dispatches

In "Baby, We Were Meant for Each Other," Scott Simons writes about a process that is expensive, baffling, arduous—and miraculous.