PUBLISHERS WEEKLY ■ AUGUST 28, 2017 124
Review_NONFICTION
descriptions of memorable performances,
as when he longs to “relive the glorious
afternoon in 1961 under the Clyde Beatty-Cole Bros. big top at Richmond Virginia,
when Boom Boom Browning led the band
with a jazzy tingle.” The chapters that fulfill the promise of the subtitle shine, as
when Hammarstrom recalls joining the
circus for six grueling weeks one summer,
or in his detailed description of slipping
behind the iron curtain to conduct
research about “the great Moscow Circus.”
Unfortunately, the narrative is frequently
weighed down by the author’s laments
concerning publishing disappointments—which include indifferent agents,
industry feuds that he feels tarnished his
name, shoddy copywriters, and stinging
rejections by editors he often names
alongside their perceived crimes against
him—and an obsession with sales figures
and book reviews. While circus fans will
be thrilled to hear about close encounters
of the Ringling kind, this cross between a
memoir and annotated bibliography juggles many promising themes only to drop
some of the balls. (BookLife)
The Lost Son: A Rock ‘n’ Roll
Road to Redemption (and True
American Parable)
Peter McNeela. No Frills Buffalo, $19.95 trade
paper (372p) ISBN 978-0-692-75234-0
In this melodramatic memoir,
McNeela, a 27-year-old former medical
resident with pervasive suicidal thoughts,
takes a nearly three-week solo cross-country trek in search of his identity and
purpose in life. Beginning with his youth,
McNeela documents his attempts to
become a physician before quitting for
good amid massive debt and despair.
Then, on July 20, 1999, he begins an
“odyssey” by car going from Buffalo,
N. Y., to New Orleans, then west to the
Grand Canyon and Las Vegas, Nev., and
finally ending up in Utah, staying at
campgrounds and hostels along the way.
He punctuates his tale with rock-music
references, but his ever-present fears,
frustrations, and anxieties are the more
memorable takeaways. McNeela is highly
intelligent and ponders profound topics
such as his faith and the destruction of the
environment, but the stilted, overwritten
feel of his prose may create a disconnect
between him and readers (e.g., describing
FICTION
Drinks With Dead Poets Glyn Maxwell.
Pegasus, ISBN 978-1-68177-462-6, Aug.
Map of the Heart Susan Wiggs. Morrow,
ISBN 978-0-06-242548-5, Aug.
The Return Suzanne Woods Fisher. Revell,
ISBN 978-0-8007-2750-5, Aug.
Whispering Pines Scarlett Dunn. Zebra,
ISBN 978-1-4201-4448-2, Aug.
NONFICTION
The Best American Essays 2017 Edited by
Leslie Jamison. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt,
ISBN 978-0-544-81733-3, Oct.
Movies That Mattered: More Reviews from
a Transformative Decade Dave Kehr. Univ. of
Chicago, ISBN 978-0-226-49568-2, Oct.
Why I Am Catholic (And You Should Be Too)
Brandon Vogt. Ave Maria, ISBN 978-1-59471-
767-3, Oct.
Hit Refresh: The Quest to Rediscover
Microsoft’s Soul and Imagine a Better
Future for Everyone Satya Nadella, with Greg
Shaw and Jill Tracie Nichols. Harper Business,
ISBN 978-0-0626-5250-8, Sept.
Stan Lee: The Man Behind Marvel Bob
Batchelor. Rowman and Littlefield, ISBN 978-1-
4422-7781-6, Sept.
The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity
Politics Mark Lilla. Harper, ISBN 978-0-06-
269743-1, Aug.
Sinners in the Hands of a Loving God Brian
Zahnd. Waterbrook, ISBN 978-1-60142-951-3, Aug.
When Women Give Kim King. IVP, ISBN 978-0-
8308-4511-8, Aug.
Into Words: The Selected Writings of Carroll
Dunham Carroll Dunham. Badlands Unlimited
(D.A. P., dist.), ISBN 978-1-943263-08-0, Sept.
Rediscovering Americanism: And the
Tyranny of Progressivism Mark R. Levin.
Threshold, ISBN 978-1-4767-7308-7, June
ONLINE
NOW
book provides a fascinating case study of
the impact of public art on social movements. Color illus. (Sept.)
Are You Brand Dead?
Kimming Yap, Yulia Saksen, and Judy Tham.
Creativeans Pte Ltd, $15.99 trade paper
(142p) ISBN 978-981-11-2233-0
Consultants Yap and Saksen, with help
from copywriter Tham, present a concise,
user-friendly guide to their company’s
approach to branding. Branding, in the
sense of giving your company (or self) an
immediately recognizable identity, is, the
authors say, vitally important for competing in crowded marketplaces. Just as
individuals will head toward the person
they know in a room otherwise full of
strangers, so buyers veer, consciously or
not, toward products or services they recognize. This book provides a simple step-by-step guide to branding, interspersed
with case studies of companies that have
successfully grown their markets through
branding. Topics include building, positioning, systemizing, and nurturing your
business’s identity, along with assessing
your competitors’ success in doing the same
thing. Each chapter includes questions to
help you focus your brand and helpful,
easy-to-understand graphics. The advice
and questions are the strongest part of the
book; the case studies are less so, as they
highlight firms, such as Sakae and AirPlus,
probably unfamiliar to many readers. This
book is aimed at all businesses, but will
probably be most helpful to small concerns
that can’t afford a team of consultants. For
these, the book’s brevity and focus will
make it a valuable read. (BookLife)
Big Top Typewriter: My Inside
Adventures Through the World of
Circus
David Lewis Hammarstrom. CreateSpace,
$14.95 trade paper (264p) ISBN 978-1-5429-
7561-2
In his latest book, Hammarstrom (Inside
the Changing Circus) claims to be “the only
true circus critic in the country—possibly
the world.” As he celebrates the industry’s
achievements (in pages studded with
reproductions of posters and pictures of
famous circus acts) and mourns the loss of
animal performances and live bands,
Hammarstrom’s reverence for the circus
shows itself in ecstatic, often nostalgic,
a dry mouth as “my soundly vanquished
salivary glands, which had long surrendered
their fluid-producing capabilities...”).
There are many educational “lessons,”
opinionated digressions, and “divine interventions” interspersed throughout his
travel diary, and, although he professes to
have gained an inner peace and knowledge
about his place in the world, readers are
left with only a vague understanding of
his new direction. (BookLife)