Issue #240
www.ralphmag.org/HN/indexHN.html
Late Summer 2013
Title Author Publisher Subject
J. S. Bach and Wagner
Rockefeller the Titan
This Bloody Life
William Quesenbury
A Defenseless Punching Bag?
The Readers of RALPH [Letters] Correspondence with the Magazine
Concerning Previous
Reviews, Articles,
Poems, Readings, and
Letters to RALPH
Twelve Great Audio BooksThe Editors of RALPH [List] A Dozen Beautiful Books Read Beautifully
Hoosh*
Roast Penguin, Scurvy Day, and
Other Stories of Antarctic Cuisine
Jason C. Anthony (Nebraska) Things Your Would Never Dream of Eating
Served Hot (and Cold) at the South Pole
Revenge
Eleven Dark Tales
Yoko Ogawa (Picador) Spooky Stuff Happening in the Most Unspooky Settings
Mango and Mint
Arabian, Indian, and North African Inspired Cuisine
Nicky Garratt (PM Press) Two hundred recipes including hummus, curry,
pilafs, and a selection of pickles, chutneys, and soups.
The Book of Time
The Secrets of Time,
How It Works, and
How We Measure It
Adam Hart-Davis (Firefly) Everything You Could Ever Never Want to Know about
That Which Is Pushing us Down
That Long Lonely Road
Vanity Fair* William Makepeace Thackeray
Read by Georgina Sutton
(Naxos Audiobooks) A Twenty-Five Disc Romp through Early 19th Century England
(With All Its Rogues, Layabouts, Social Climbers and Innocents)
Karl Bodmer's America Revisited
Landscape Views Across Time
W. Raymond Wood, Robert M Lindholm (Oklahoma) A 3,000 Mile Trip Across Early
19th Century America with
Artist Karl Bodmer and His Patron
New California Writing --- 2013 Gayle Wattawa, Kirk Glaser, Editors (Heyday/Santa Clara University) Over Forty Stories, Poems, Articles and Readings
The Castle[G]
A New Translation
Mark Harman (Schocken) A New (and Even More Tedious)
Rendering of the Master of the Grim
The Death of Jesús C. A. Amantea [Article]Another Story of the Death of One Who (Perhaps)
Should Have Lived Far Longer
A Petition on Behalf of Saddam Hussein C. A. Amantea [Article] A Wry Suggestion on the Reasons
Hussein Might Have Been Spared
In the BakeryYoko Ogawa [Reading] A Snippet from Revenge
Eating Your Transport Jason C. Anthony [Reading] The Unhappy Fates of the Dogs
Who Transport Their Masters So Faithfully
Two Poems of Battle Siegfried Sassoon [Poems] The Real World War One
G = Great Reviews of the Past
* = Books We Believe to be of Special Merit


Issue #241
www.ralphmag.org/HO/indexHO.html
Early Fall 2013
Title Author Publisher Subject
Bach Transcriptions
Karin Fossum
Don't Look Now
Letters We Never Finished Reading
Improving RALPH's Business Image
Mysterious Letters from the East
She Said That You Are Death
The Readers of RALPH [Letters] Correspondence with the Magazine
Concerning Previous
Reviews, Articles,
Poems, Readings, and
Letters to RALPH
Twenty Great Poems The Editors of RALPH [List] Selections from the 600 Poems
Previously Published at RALPH
Equilateral*
A Novel
Ken Kalfus (Bloomsbury) A Famous Astronomer from 100 Years Ago
Tries to Make Contact with the Martians
Miss Lonelyhearts* Nathanael West (New Directions) A New Edition of the Woes of Being
A Columnist for the Lonely and Dispossessed
Vulgar Remedies
Poems
Anna Journey (Louisiana State University) Poems of Folklore, Farming, Dreams with
Three Sonnets to Ambien
Refugee HotelGabriele Stabile
Juliet Linderman
(Voice of Witness/
McSweeney's Books)
150 Photographs Plus Personal Memories of
Arriving in America as a Refugee
People, Parasites,
And Plowshares
Learning from Our Body's
Most Terrifying Invaders
Dickson D. Despommier (Columbia) Tapeworms, Guinea Worms, River Blindness,
Malaria, and Other Dismal Parasites
The Dark Path
A Memoir
David Schickler (Riverhead ) Growing Up as the Man
Who Would Be Priest
The California Driving Handbook
A Novel
Edmund G. Brown, Governor (DMV) A Strange and Moving Tale
Of the Man Who Would Be
The Perfectly Driven Driver
Broken Land [G]
Poems of Brooklyn
Julia Spicher Kasdorf
Michael Tyrell, Editors
(New York University Press) Poems from 1666 to the Present Day
From and About Brooklyn
Studying Russian
Studying Russians
Jane Resh Thomas
Dr. Phage
[Articles] Thoughts on the History of Russia
And the Vagaries of the Russian People
Lie, Lie, Lie [G]
How I Wrote the School
of Beauty and Charm
Melanie Summer [Reading] A Memoir of a Writer
Growing up in Rome, Georgia
The Red Star
The Hot Air Balloon
Ken Kalfus [Readings] Two Selections from Equilateral
Dear Miss Lonelyhearts
Nathanael West [Reading] A Letter from One Enraged
(And Puzzled) by Life
Sea Hag
Carley Moore [Poem] On the Wife Who
"Pecks Your Eyes Out"


Issue #242
www.ralphmag.org/HP/indexHP.html
Mid-Fall 2013
Title Author Publisher Subject
Equilateral
The Collyer Brothers
Letters We Never Finished Reading
Barging a Message
(In Your Mailbox)
The Readers of RALPH [Letters] Correspondence with the Magazine
Concerning Previous
Reviews, Articles,
Poems, Readings, and
Letters to RALPH
Youthful Folly
(A Dozen Great Novels)
The Editors of RALPH [List] Some of Our Favorites
From Five Years Ago
Somehow*
Living on Uganda Time
Douglas Cruickshank (Verflectin Media) Three Hundred Great Photos ---
With Commentary ---
On Modern Uganda Village Life
Levels of Life* Julian Barnes (Alfred A Knopf)A Meditation on Hot-Air Balloons ---
And the Death of a Dear One
Madame Bovary*
Provincial Morals
Gustave Flaubert
Adam Thorpe, Translator
(Modern Library)A New Translation of the Classic
She Loves Him She Bores Him Novel
Heading Out To Wonderful* Robert Goolrick
Norman Dietz, Reader
(HighBridge Audio) Another Classic Love Triangle Story
Superbly (and Deliciously) Read
Burying the Typewriter
A Memoir
Carmen Bugan (Graywolf) Growing Up in Romania as the Child
Of a Troublemaking Dissident Father
Upton Sinclair
California Socialist,
Celebrity Intellectual
Lauren Coodley (University of Nebraska Press) A Short Life of the Radical
Who Almost Became Governor
Stealing Sugar from the Castle
Selected and New Poems
1950 - 2013
Robert Bly (Norton) Three Hundred Poems from
The Author of Iron John
Monologue Of a Dog [G] Wislawa Szymborska
Clare Cavanagh
Stanislaw Baranczak
Translators
(Harcourt) Some Great Poems from
The Nobel Prize Winner
Under the Skin [G] Michael Faber (Harcourt) The Alien Invasion (of Scotland!)
Soon to Be a Major Motion Picture
The Seal Hotel Jon Gallant [Article] Dreaming of Japanese City Planes
And Seals Running a Hotel
Animal Quackers L. W. Milam [Article] Growing Up with Giant
Indian Runner Ducks
Dying, Death, Grief Julian Barnes [Reading]The Death of One
Very Near and Dear
A Man and His Daughter Robert Goolrick [Reading] Selling Your Daughter
To the Highest Bidder
"Saltpetre and Robert Frost"
"Cartalk"
Jack McCarthy [Poetry] Two by the Beat Poet
Of New England
[G] Great Reviews (or Articles) from the Past
*A Book that the Editors Believe Merits Your Attention


Issue #243
www.ralphmag.org/HQ/indexHQ.html
Late Fall 2013
Title Author Publisher Subject
Scabies Baby
On The Essence And
Matrix Of The Universe-Life
5ft bah tubs
The Readers of RALPH [Letters] Correspondence with the Magazine
Concerning Previous
Reviews, Articles,
Poems, Readings, and
Letters to RALPH
Fifteen Hits The Editors of RALPH[List] Reviews, Readings and Poems
That Get the Greatest Number of
Hits Each Month
Glittering Images
A Journey through Art
From Egypt to Star Wars
Camille Paglia (Vintage) Almost Thirty Artists
Illustrated and Described
Mommyblogs*
And the Changing Face
of Motherhood

May Friedman (University of Toronto Press)Four Huge Blogs and
Thousands of Smaller Ones
Are Changing Love (and Hate) in Motherhood
The Old Priest*
Stories
Anthony Wallace (University of Pittsburgh) Nine Often Very Funny
Stories about Blackjack Dealers
And Old Gay Priests (and Dinosaurs)
The Roy Stories* Barry Gifford (Seven Stories Press) Dozens and Dozens of Stories about
Growing up in Chicago
Nuts on the Streets and
A Loving but Absent Mother
My Life as a Silent Movie
A Novel
Jesse Lee Kercheval (Break Away Books) Ivan Mosjoukine, the Great Russian Silent Screen
Movie Star, Sprinkled His Children around like
Seeds on the Steppes
So They Come Back and Haunt Him
Thirteen Cents K. Sello Duiker (Ohio University Press) Duiker Is Showed to Be
A Great but Largely Unknown
South African Author
Astronomical Enigmas [G]
Life on Mars,
The Star of Bethlehem &
Other Milky Way Mysteries
Mark Kidger (Johns Hopkins) Scores of Strange and Wonderful Facts
About Our Own Milky Way
State Houses: [G]
America's 50 State Houses
Susan Thrane
Tom Patterson,
Photographer
(Boston Mills Press) All of Them Are Shown
And Our Reviewer Reviews
Them All
Pistol Packin' Momma L. W. Milam [Article] Some Thoughts on Childish Hi-Jinx and
The Second World War
Poisoning the Neighbor's Dogs Anthony Wallace [Reading] Getting Rid of Those Barks at Night
Blue People Barry Gifford [Reading] A Shaggy-Dog Story
About How to Dye Your Clothes
(and You) Blue
Night Owl Barry Gifford [Reading] Another Story from
The Roy Stories
A Tonight's Lecture
The McPoem
Ronald Wallace [Poems] Two Great Old Poems
From the RALPH Vaults
[G] Great Reviews (or Articles) from the Past
*A Book that the Editors Believe Merits Your Attention


Issue #244
www.ralphmag.org/HR/indexHR.html
Early Winter 2013
Title Author Publisher Subject
The New Folio
Getting Locked in the Looney Ward
STOP CONTACTING THOSE PEOPLE
There'll Always Be an England
Cat-on-Shoulder Division
The Readers of RALPH [Letters] Correspondence with the Magazine
Concerning Previous
Reviews, Articles,
Poems, Readings, and
Letters to RALPH
Fifteen Stars The Editors of RALPH [List] The Best of Novels, Non-Fiction, and Poetry Books
Received and Reviewed during 2013
Wm & H'ry
Literature, Love, and the Letters
Between William and Henry James
J. C. Hallman (University of Iowa Press) Thoughts about the Correspondence
Between the James Brothers
Civil Wars*
Poems
David Slavitt (Louisiana State University Press) Poems about turtles, civil wars, combs,
spies, harmonicas, baseball, dancing bears,
insomnia, and revolving doors.
Lines in Long Array
A Civil War Commemoration
David C. Ward
Frank H. Goodyear, Editors
(National Portrait Gallery
Smithsonian Books)
Twelve Poems from Now,
and Twelve from back Then
With Appropriate Pictures
The Science of Herself* Karen Joy Fowler(PM Press) Several Essays along with an
Interview of the Outspoken Fowler
The Faithful Scribe
A Story of Islam,
Pakistan, Family, and War
Shahan Mufti (Other Press) Born and Education in the U.S. and In Pakistan
Mufti Tries to Heal the Split
Into the Night*
Tales of Nocturnal
Wildlife Expeditions
Rick A. Adams, Editor (University Press of Colorado) Very Funny Real Life Stories of
Tracking Fruitbats, Mountain Chickiens, and
Walking Batfish
Three Women in a Mirror Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt (Europa Editions) A Sixteenth Century Saint Who
Inspired Followers from the 20th and 21st Centuries
In the Pleasure Groove
Love, Death & Duran Duran
John Taylor (Plume) One of the Bands Founders
Confesses All
Shooting Under Fire[G]
The World of the
War Photographer
Peter Howe (Artisan) Over a Hundred Horrific Photographs
From the Killing Fields
The English Is Coming![G]
How One Language Is
Sweeping the World
Leslie Dunton-Downer(Touchstone) Facts of the Language that
Is Taking Over the World
The Evening the World Ended Dr. Phage [Article] A Typical Night at the AA Meeting
God Vs. Gawd[G]A. W. Allworthy [Article] How the Two Gods Are
Taking over the United States
The House Is Sleeping
A Dying Wife
Angel Igov [Readings] Two Readings from the Superb Novel
A Short Tale of Shame
Salida de Emergencia
Raimon de Roussilon
David R. Slavitt [Poems] Two from Civil Wars
[G] Great Reviews (or Articles) from the Past
*A Book that the Editors Believe Merits Your Attention


Issue #245
www.ralphmag.org/HS/indexHS.html
Mid-Winter 2013 - 2014
Title Author Publisher Subject
Penguin Aux Gousses D'ail
Pest Control at RALPH
Letters We Never Finished Reading
Your $500,000
The Readers of RALPH [Letters] Correspondence with the Magazine
Concerning Previous
Reviews, Articles,
Poems, Readings, and
Letters to RALPH
Twelve Hit Pix The Editors of RALPH [List] Those Drawings, Pictures and
Photographs that Get the Greatest
Number of Hits Each Month
Firefly* Janette Jenkins(Europa Editions) A Novel about the Last Years of Noël Coward
Allegiance and Betrayal
Stories
Peter Makuck (Syracuse) Twelve Stories about People Floating through Life
With Endless Gin-and-Tonics in their Hands
A Short Tale of Shame* Angel Igov (Open Letter) An Odd Novel about an Odd Trip through Thrace:
An Ex-Rocker and Three College Students
The Round House Louise Erdrich (Harper Perennial) Growing Up and Rape and
Murder in Objibwe Territory
Snow Hunters Paul Yoon (Random House) A Soldier from North Korea
Ends Up in Brazil
Glorious Misadventures
Nikolai Rezanov and
The Dream of Russian America
Owen Matthews (Bloomsbury) Early 19th Century Attempts by
Russia to Conquer Alaska and
The Pacific Northwest
The Story of a New Name
The Neapolitan Novels: Book Two
Elena Ferrante(Europa Editions) Several Neopolitan Families in
Love and Hate (and Seduction)
Five Old New Titles[G] William Carlos Williams,
et al
(New Directions,
University of Oklahoma, etc.)
Five New Titles from 2009 - 2010
Owls[G] Cynthia Berger (Stackpole) Some Fairly Disgusting Insights
Into the Nesting Habits of
Those Lovely Night Birds
Madness[G]
A Bipolar Life
Marya Hornbacher (Mariner) One of Our Earlier Hit Reviews
About Anorexia and Bulemia
Jean-Paul Sartre Dr. Phage / C. A. Amantea [Article] An Improbable Biography of
The Improbable Existentialist
Among Russians
Among Russians II
Colin Thubron [Reading] A Trip through the Last Days
of Stalinist Russia
Two Visits in One Day,
March 16 [1996]
Hal Sirowit
David Lehman
[Poetry] Four Poems from
Word of Mouth


Issue #246
www.ralphmag.org/HT/indexHT.html
Late Winter 2013 - 2014
Title Author Publisher Subject
Blue Days, Black Nights
Love Sweeting Not Sweating
Cryptic Letters of the Month
Now u know the alphabet
The Hospital in Comma
The Readers of RALPH [Letters] Correspondence with the Magazine
Concerning Previous
Reviews, Articles,
Poems, Readings, and
Letters to RALPH
A Heap of Paradoxes The Editors of RALPH [List] A droll statement, an obscure fact, an elusive epigram ---
that should serve to perplex if not enlighten our readers and ourselves.
Monkey Mind*
A Memoir of Anxiety
Daniel Smith (Simon & Schuster Years and years of panic attacks
caused by a vicious rape.
Hawthorn & Child* Keith Ridgway (New Directions) A very odd detective story,
that should end up convicting the killer,
but instead, may convict the detectives.
Going Home
A Novel of Survival
A. American(Plume) A prepper, making his way through Florida
After the American infrastructure has gone AWOL.
Visit Sunny Chernobyl*
And Other Adventures in
The World's Most Polluted Places
Andrew Blackwell (Rodale) Touristy visits to Chernobyl, Alberta,
Port Arthur and four other disastervilles
Capturing the Light
The Birth of Photography,
A True Story of
Genius and Rivalry
Roget Watson, Helen Rappaport (St. Martin's Press) Two rather odd gentlemen,
In 1830s-1840s Europe
Striving to capture an image
Perhaps of themselves.
A Chronicle of Jazz* Mervyn Cooke (Oxford) An extremely detailed and lovely picture
of jazz from the beginning of the 20th Century
until now.
The Best American
Magazine Writing --- 2013
James Bennet, Editor (Columbia) Eighteen essays, articles, stories, and other ephemera
Drawn form the most popular magazines in America
When Cripples Get Arrested Mike Ervin [Article] They don't send in the paddy-wagons
For disabled picketers --- they just
Give them traffic tickets. Here's why.
Working in a Chinese Computer Destruction Factory Andrew Blackwell [Reading] The author visits a home factory for dismantling computers
In one of the most polluted parts of China.
The End of Slavery Charles C. Mann [Reading] One of the great capital-intensive markets
Which was closed down in but five years.
The Decline Of Violence Charles C. Mann [Reading] The coming, scarcely noticed, of the end
Of virulent wars and the random destruction of whole peoples.
When You Return Ellen Bass [Poetry] A poem of love for the missing.
Feldwebel Zorn's Motorcycle Senaden Musabegovic [Poetry] Another poem of love gone missing.
My Mother Wears Combat Boots[G]
A Parenting Guide for the Rest of Us
Jessica Mills (AK) A mother guide for the now generation.
Written Lives[G] Javier Marías (New Directions) Nabokov, Kenneth Rexroth, D. H. Lawrence,
Umberto Eco described, precisely and beautifully
[G] Great Reviews (or Articles) from the Past
*A Book that the Editors Believe Merits Your Attention


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