Places & Travel

Photographer Robert Adams documents the changing landscapes of the West. He says development in the region is slowly but surely overtaking the natural environment.

Novelist Salman Rushdie's new book has been banned in several countries because of what many see as its blasphemous take on Islam. Book critic John Leonard says the novel is indeed blasphemous, but Rushdie directs his ire ecumenically, critiquing Indian culture and Margaret Thatcher as well. The narrative is messy, but it's the messiness that makes it interesting.

Critic Ken Tucker reviews the home video release The Sweet Smell of Success, which he says features gorgeous shots of 1950s New York City, and an unrelenting narrative intensity.

Hernando de Soto says that the inefficient and often corrupt bureaucratic system in Peru makes starting a legal business nearly impossible for most people. As a result, a robust, informal, and technically-illegal market has emerged. De Soto explores this phenomenon -- and similar cases throughout Latin America -- in his new book, The Other Path.

Book critic John Leonard says that V.S. Naipal's book about his travels in the American South reflects a tourist's mindset. The author's sentimental perspective prevents him from seeing the complicated race and class issues that shape the region.

Peter Falk reprises his role of the disheveled detective Columbo, twelve years after the series ended. TV critic David Bianculli says the show meets the high standards of the original, and that Falk is as charming as ever.

Rock historian Ed Ward says the city has long celebrated the holiday with rock music, some of which incorporated Black Indian traditions and style.

Scholar and writer Thomas Schatz has a new book about the studio era of Hollywood. While efficient, the film industry during the first half of the century limited the roles available to actors and actresses, and tightly controlled the content and style of the movies it produced.

Estleman's gritty, Detroit-based mysteries feature the detective Amos Walker. Estleman was a crime reporter before he became a fiction writer. He joins Fresh Air to talk about his hardboiled influences, inside jokes in his books, and getting knocked unconscious.

Benet worked as a longshoreman in San Francisco until gentrification and automation rendered his labor unnecessary. He says he mourns the workers' culture more than the job itself. Benet later went to graduate school and became a novelist and poet. His newest book is called A Short Dance in the Sun.

The British director and screenwriter's latest movie examines the life of London's working class in the age of Margaret Thatcher.

Writer Eva Hoffman moved with her family from Poland to the Canada when she was thirteen. Her new book about assimilating into the culture of her new country is called Lost in Translation. Hoffman is also an editor for the New York Times Book Review.

Rock historian Ed Ward says the 1960s Mod movement started in working-class London, and was rooted more in fashion than rock music. But the amphetimine-fueled subculture was short-lived, and many Mods became hippies. The re-emergence of Mods in the 1970s didn't last long, either.

As a reporter, Ward Just covered the Vietnam War and, later, Washington politics. Now, he devotes himself to fiction writing. While his novels often draw on his knowledge of D.C. culture, Just is careful to invent his own characters, rather than use fictionalized versions of real politicians.

Book critic John Leonard reviews the new detective novel Ratking, by Michael Dibdin. Leonard says the narrative, set in Italy, keeps the mystery genre alive by confronting bourgeois life and corrupt politics.

The British author and travel writer recently passed away. His acclaimed books include Songlines, a semi-fictional account of the myths that structure the lives of Australia's aborigines, and the travel book In Patagonia.

Unlike many young writers, Carpenter avoided the siren call of New York City, instead documenting the life around his hometown of San Francisco. His new novel is called From a Distant Place.

Film critic Stephen Schiff says that the World War II-themed The Dressmaker masterfully follows in the European tradition of what he calls "intimate filmmaking" -- something no American director has yet been able to replicate.

Oklahoma-born Singer writes the Talk of the Town feature for the magazine, as well as profiles of ordinary people in New York. A new book, Mr. Personality, collects the best of his New Yorker pieces.

Susan Brownmiller's book is based on the murder case of Lisa Steinberger, a six-year-old victim of child abuse. The trial is still ongoing. Book critic John Leonard says Waverly Place weaves through New York's Greenwich Village in ways reminiscent of Balzac and Celine.