To highlight the wide range of publications reviewed in Choice, each month Choice editors feature some noteworthy reviews from the current issue.

Bessen, James.  Patent failure: how judges, bureaucrats, and lawyers put innovators at risk, by James Bessen and Michael J. Meurer.  Princeton, 2008. 331p bibl index afp; ISBN 9780691134918, $29.95.
46-3523 KF3114 2007-48854 CIP

Bessen (Boston Univ. School of Law) and Meurer (law, Boston Univ.) provide the first comprehensive review of the patent system in more than a generation, bringing together a survey of the available empirical data and a clear statement of the usefulness of and limits to the patents as property model. They find that, whatever its other merits, the patent system does not perform well outside the pharmaceutical and chemical industries, and in the important sector of software development the patent system is especially ineffective. Nor are these inefficiencies compensated for by a healthy bias in favor of the small inventor. The survey of empirical research around which the argument is built suggests that the costs of patent litigation, which exploded in the 1990s, now outweigh the incentives to innovate and invest in most industries. The central problem seems to be that of patent notice. Because it is often unclear what a patent covers and does not cover, patents are not like most forms of property. And since the boundaries of patents are established by litigation, and litigation outcomes are increasingly uncertain, failure of the notice function means failure of the system as a whole. The authors conclude with proposals for reform. Summing Up: Essential. All readership levels. — T. L. Craig, Michigan State University

Carroll, Paul B.  Billion-dollar lessons: what you can learn from the most inexcusable business failures of the last 25 years, by Paul B. Carroll and Chunka Mui.  Portfolio, 2008.  310p bibl index; ISBN 9781591842194, $25.95.
46-3338 HG3761  MARC

Carroll (financial journalist; Big Blues, 1993) and Mui (strategy consultant; coauthor with Larry Downes, Unleashing the Killer App, CH, Jan’99, 36-2841) provide unique insight into the causes of business debacles and the impact of executive decision making on organizational success. The book’s readable chapters are divided into two sections: “Failure Patterns” and “Avoiding the Same Mistakes.” Based on their research between 1981 and 2006 on more than 750 companies, the authors found that whether an accounting write-off, bankruptcy, or the dissolution of operations, business failures overwhelmingly were the result of errors in strategic planning, e.g., faulty financial engineering, illusions of synergy, deflated rollups, staying the course, misjudged adjacencies, fumbling technology, and consolidations. They assert this is in contrast to what most people would attribute the failures to–a lack of leadership, inept implementation, or even bad luck. The book includes numerous examples (e.g., Xerox, Avon, Ames) and concludes with an excellent suggested reading list and a tabulation categorizing the strategic failures of the studied organizations into bankruptcies, write-offs, and discontinued operations. Although oriented toward business professionals, this book would be a timely, useful addition to comprehensive academic business and leadership studies collections. Summing Up: Highly recommended. General readers, all levels of undergraduate students, and professionals. — S. R. Kahn, University of Cincinnati

Durham, M. Gigi.  The Lolita effect: the media sexualization of young girls and what we can do about it.  Overlook Press, 2008.  286p index; ISBN 9781590200636, $24.95.
46-3074 HQ1229  MARC

Durham (media studies, Univ. of Iowa), a respected scholar of girl and ethnic studies, offers a welcome addition to a literature that is too often mired in conservative approaches to sexuality and/or outlandish claims insufficiently substantiated by research. The author begins with the basic statement that children are sexual beings, and she argues that to deny this gets one into unhealthy territory. This said, Durham acknowledges the overt sexualization of girls in contemporary mainstream media. After analysis of some of the major myths circulating in popular culture about sex, beauty, violence, and boys, the author suggests forms of activism and resistance designed to support girls in becoming happy adults with a healthy approach to sexuality. Taking a realist approach, she points out that mass media are not going away, and that girls can develop critical skills and carve out a strategy for a healthy life. Based on a rigorous review of the research literature yet written in accessible language, this book will useful to an audience ranging from seasoned scholars to general readers. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers, all levels. — A. N. Valdivia, University of Illinois at Urbana

Envy: theory and research, ed. by Richard H. Smith.  Oxford, 2008.  372p bibl index afp; ISBN 9780195327953, $59.95.
46-3541 BF575  2008-4245 CIP

This book provides what Christine Harris and Peter Salovey accurately describe in the concluding chapter as “the broadest and most intriguing selection of scholarly research focused on envy published to date.” The collection comprises 18 chapters organized into five discipline-defined sections. The first section looks at the philosophical, theological, and evolutionary foundations of envy. The next three cover, respectively, social psychological perspectives; organizational psychology, economics, consumer psychology, anthropology, and neuroscience; and health. The final section offers a summation and conclusion. Although social psychologists are the largest group of contributors, the chapters span an unusual and impressive breadth of scholarship. This is probably not a book many will want to read word for word from beginning to end, but it is certainly a necessary and provocative resource on an intriguing topic. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty and professionals. — R. Levine, California State University—Fresno

Fisman, Raymond.  Economic gangsters: corruption, violence, and the poverty of nations, by Raymond Fisman and Edward Miguel.  Princeton, 2008.  240p bibl index afp; ISBN 9780691134543, $24.95.
46-3354 HV6768 2008-25208 CIP

This book deserves a wide readership. Some readers will come for the clever title and the cover’s provocative silhouette of a machine-gun-wielding gangster. More, hopefully, will be drawn to the book by reviews like this one and the authors’ important message. Economic Gangsters is topical and lively, as its cover suggests, but it is also deadly serious and deeply engrossing. Fisman (Columbia Business School) and Miguel (Univ. of California, Berkeley) study perhaps the most important question of our day–why some countries grow and prosper while others are trapped in self-reinforcing cycles of violence, corruption, and poverty. Economic incentives help create these problems, the authors argue, and policies that alter economic incentives can help eliminate them. The book features the sort of clear thinking, crisp economic analysis, and creative empirical detective work that fans of Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner’s Freakonomics (CH, Nov’05, 43-1689) will recognize and appreciate. Six major case studies and many smaller examples provide evidence to support the book’s arguments. The authors conclude with a discussion of how cleverly designed program evaluation techniques can help uncover policies to escape the violence-corruption poverty trap. Bravo! Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels. — M. Veseth, University of Puget Sound

Gazzaniga, Michael S.  Human: the science behind what makes us unique. Ecco, 2008.  447p index; ISBN 9780060892883, $27.50.
46-3227 QP360  MARC

Gazzaniga (Univ. of California, Santa Barbara) focuses on what it means to be human from the perspective of cognitive neuroscience, and what differentiates human brains and minds from those of other species. In his earlier work The Ethical Brain (CH, Oct’05, 43-0920), Gazzaniga examined what brain science can tell us about questions of morality; this new volume covers a more expansive array of topics. The book skillfully weaves together contemporary research findings in psychology, cognitive science, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence to explore social organization, artistic expression, consciousness, and other topics. Are abilities such as language unique to humans? What is the nature of self-awareness? Is there a distinction between mind and body? These are clearly “big questions,” and the book communicates the complexity involved in tackling them without overwhelming the reader. Gazzaniga provides a masterful overview of relevant scientific findings, and includes a multitude of references to original research. His style is engaging and personal, making the work a remarkably entertaining, informative, and mind-expanding read. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All undergraduate students and general readers. — S. C. Baker, James Madison University

If we must die: African American voices on war and peace, ed. by Karin L. Stanford.  Rowman & Littlefield, 2008.  373p bibl index afp ISBN 0-7425-4113-4, $59.95; ISBN 0742541142 pbk, $29.95; ISBN 9780742541139,
$59.95; ISBN 9780742541146 pbk, $29.95.
46-3446 E181  2007-46310 CIP

From Phillis Wheatley to Condoleezza Rice, from Martin Delaney to W. E. B. Du Bois, Ralph Bunche, and Huey Newton, this volume collects an impressively diverse array of African American thought and rhetoric on the major wars of the US. Separate chapters include documentary evidence from the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the Civil War, the Spanish-American and Philippines-American wars, World Wars I and II, Korea, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf, and the most recent conflict with Iraq. In 1899, Bishop Henry McNeal Turner wrote, “The Negro has no flag to defend.” Much of this volume explores African American struggles with whether they did have a flag to defend at all, and if so, what that flag meant to them beyond the US history of slavery, segregation, and degradation. The Civil War chapter is not as robust it could have been, but overall, editor Stanford (California State Univ., Northridge) has performed an outstanding service with this volume, which should be owned by all research libraries. Summing Up: Essential. All levels/libraries. — P. Harvey, University of Colorado at Colorado Springs

Kalyvas, Andreas.  Democracy and the politics of the extraordinary: Max Weber, Carl Schmitt, and Hannah Arendt.  Cambridge, 2008.  326p bibl index; ISBN 9780521877688, $85.00.
46-3519 JC421  2007-33617 CIP

Kalyvas (The New School for Social Research) searches the works of Max Weber, Carl Schmitt, and Hannah Arendt for their thoughts on the essence and role of extraordinary politics, which, for the author, are the politics of a break, usually revolutionary, from the practice of ordinary politics that is so severe as to constitute a new political regime. He argues that this phase of politics provides a key to understanding democratic legitimacy and radicalized democracy. In his view, Weber’s analysis of the importance of charismatic leadership in his early religious studies had potential for clarifying extraordinary politics, but Weber later abandoned this socially based view for an individualistic conception. The author believes that Schmitt’s emphasis on popular sovereignty places the phenomenon of extraordinary politics on a more lasting democratic footing by treating the sovereign people as the extralegal, legitimizing, constituting power for democracy. In turn, Arendt is portrayed as using deliberative councils and judicial review as means for carrying the norms and processes of extraordinary politics into the sphere of normal politics. This book is a thorough examination of an important, but rarely analyzed, concept in the thought of three major scholars. Summing Up: Recommended. Graduate and research collections. — R. Heineman, Alfred University

Long, John.  Feathered dinosaurs: the origin of birds, by John Long and Peter Schouten.  CSIRO/Oxford, 2008.  193p bibl index afp; ISBN 9780195372663, $39.95.
46-3247 QE862  2008-1232 CIP

Interest in dinosaurs has never been higher, largely due to the now overwhelming evidence that birds are descended from a group within the theropod dinosaurs. This concise, nontechnical, lavishly illustrated book is an ideal way for general readers and introductory students to learn that many dinosaurs bore feathers of some sort. Paleontologist Long (Museum Victoria, Australia) and wildlife artist Schouten have admirably summarized and illustrated the information thus far accumulated from the fossil record on feathered dinosaurs, including the first birds. The first, brief section of the book provides a very lucid overview of the various groups of feathered dinosaurs. The second, much larger section illustrates and describes 77 species of feathered dinosaurs. Some, like Velociraptor and Archaeopteryx, will be familiar to many readers. Others, like Tyrannosaurus and Albertosaurus, will surprise readers, but these large forms may well have been feathered as juveniles, and the ancestral species within their clade bore feathers. Other recently discovered dinosaurs, such as Heyuannia huangi and Mei long, will likely seem exotic and new. The extraordinarily creative artwork deserves careful scrutiny, as Schouten includes great detailing in his full-color paintings. In the expanding dinosaur literature, this book is a welcome addition and should be in all college libraries. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates and general readers. — J. C. Kricher, Wheaton College (MA)

NetWellness.  Internet Resource.
46-3286
http://www.netwellness.org/

[Visited Nov’08] This reliable, high-quality nonprofit site, designed for the general public, is the product of collaboration by medical and allied health care faculty at the University of Cincinnati, The Ohio State University (OSU), and Case Western Reserve University. The main page has a top toolbar with About, Help, and Feedback options. Basic and advanced searching options are available. Boxes on the right feature Health Topics, Health Centers, Reference Library, and Current Health News. An Ask an Expert service, available on the Health Topics and Health Centers pages, provides individuals with the opportunity to ask questions of the medical experts associated with the site, and it archives previously answered questions. Health Topics features over 100 topics of potential interest, from specific diseases to more general body system disorders. Each Health Topic page is divided into sections that include headings such as Overview, General Information, The Body, Complications, Symptoms and Tests, Treatment, Staying Healthy, and Additional Information.
 
Health Centers focuses on a specific population group (e.g., Women’s Health) or a specific disease or body site (e.g., Cancer, Dental Center). Options include a choice of relevant articles, information on conditions, and consumer polls. The Reference Library offers links to useful, reliable resources such as the ADAM Health Encyclopedia, MedlinePlus (CH, Jul’06, 43-6562), PubMed (CH, Feb’06, 43-3422), The Merck Manuals (CH, Jul’04, 41-6566), and OSU patient education material. Although this Web site chooses to link out to other reliable medical information sources, overall it still compares favorably with the impressive MayoClinic.com (CH, Oct’07, 45-0912) and the excellent but more commercial WebMD.com. Not surprisingly, all three sites are certified by the Health on the Net Foundation’s HONcode, the oldest and most widely used ethical code for health-related information sites on the Internet. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower-level undergraduates, two-year technical program students, practitioners, and general audience. — L. M. McMain, Sam Houston State University

O’Malley, John W.  What happened at Vatican II.  Belknap, Harvard, 2008. 380p index afp ISBN 0-674-03169-5, $29.95; ISBN 9780674031692, $29.95.
46-3194 BX830 1962  2008-16924 CIP

In this lucid, coherent assessment of the Second Vatican Council, O’Malley (Georgetown) provides background on past general councils and current issues confronting Catholicism; he addresses annual sessions separately, prior to a concluding chapter. O’Malley looks at issues and personalities. Most intriguing is the role of Pope Paul VI, who involved himself in the council’s deliberations but whose interventions were not always easily interpretable. O’Malley addresses both sides of the issues debated in Rome, providing readers with some sense of the minority’s zeal for doctrine and discipline and the majority’s pastoral concerns. He treats the crucial issue of language–not so much Latin versus the vernacular, as dialectical precision displaced in the documents by a pastoral rhetoric rooted in scripture and the fathers of the early Church. No previous council had addressed issues like the role of the laity and the collegial nature of the episcopate, especially in extensive teaching documents. Overall, O’Malley sees the council as achieving much but failing to implement collegiality by restructuring the Roman curia to be more responsive to the episcopate. His most negative prose, however, is reserved for procedural muddles that, as much as debates over issues, help explain the drama of the council as it confronted contemporary challenges. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All libraries. — T. M. Izbicki, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

The Periodic Table of Videos.  Internet Resource.
46-325
http://www.periodicvideos.com/

[Visited Nov’08] Martyn Poliakoff and his colleagues (all, Univ. of Nottingham, UK) have produced a fascinating collection of video clips covering the 118 elements in the periodic table. From hydrogen to ununoctium, each element has its own short video, all recorded and assembled for the site by science journalist Brady Haran. Naturally, the site is designed as periodic table, where each square is identified by the element’s symbol. After clicking on the square, the viewer can see the element’s name, symbol, and atomic number, launch a video, and navigate between two surrounding elements in the periodic row. Each video weaves together portions from an introduction by Poliakoff in his office, where he describes the element, its properties, and usage, and live demonstrations by other chemists in the laboratory, where they show the appearance and chemistry of the element (if possible). While discussing the chemistry, Poliakoff adds many peculiar facts, such as the use of lead compounds in submarine camouflage or Mendeleev’s vodka. Demonstrations of several elements, e.g., hydrogen, potassium, and cesium, involve explosives that could rarely be conducted in schools due to safety concerns.
 
Thus, this resource offers a unique learning opportunity for students to get familiar with real-life chemistry in an online format. The site’s continuous improvement is most beneficial. There are new versions of clips with even more interesting experiments and additional materials such as a special video about gold, silver, and bronze dedicated to the 2008 Olympics and a clip about the use of helium at the large hadron collider. Overall, The Periodic Table of Videos is quite entertaining and useful for stimulating interest in science among all students. The site has already had over 2.5 million views since its launch in July 2008. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Public, undergraduate, and technical program libraries, all levels. — S. Korolev, University Wisconsin—Milwaukee

Poets on Prozac: mental illness, treatment, and the creative process, ed. by Richard M. Berlin.  Johns Hopkins, 2008.  181p afp ISBN 0-8018-8839-5, $21.95; ISBN 9780801888397, $21.95.
46-3549 RC451  2007-37384 CIP

The association between creative writing and mental illness has evoked speculation by individuals as far-flung as Shakespeare, Cesare Lombroso, Nancy Andreasen, and Virginia Woolf, to name just a few. Berlin (Univ. of Massachusetts Medical School and a published poet) has compiled a provocative book that includes first-person accounts by 16 poets, many of them prizewinners and all with a history of medication. For example, Vanessa Haley describes how she was able to use poetry as an adaptive strategy to cope with PTSD, and Ren Powell contrasts the outpouring of work occurring during her manic periods with the craft required to “shape” the material while stable. “Food for Thought,” by Caterina Eppolito, weaves together anorexia nervosa psychotherapy and expressing an “authentic” creative voice. Andrew Hudgins credits Paxil rather than psychotherapy for producing a “chemical Zen” that characterizes his best work. This collection of brilliant essays does not resolve the relative contribution that medication (ranging from SSRIs to orthomolecular treatment) makes to the resolution of a creative person’s fallow periods and blocks. Like the creative process itself, the picture that emerges is idiosyncratic and, perhaps, understood better as appreciation than as analysis. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers, all levels. — S. Krippner, Saybrook Graduate School & Research Center

Saccomanni, Fabrizio.  Managing international financial instability: national tamers versus global tigers.  E. Elgar, 2008.  284p bibl index; ISBN 9781845421427, $135.00.
46-3365 HG3881  MARC

This well-written, interesting volume provides a balanced understanding of how the global financial system works and how to cope with its periodic dysfunctions. The author notes that while financial crises are an age-old phenomenon, the scope, size, and frequency of market turbulence (in exchange and debt markets, global payments imbalances, asset bubbles) over the past 40 years are unprecedented. Drawing on experience at the Banca d’Italia and the IMF, Saccomanni reviews international financial disruptions, analyzes their underlying causes, and advises on how to avoid and deal with these crises. He maintains that a major factor leading to recurring financial crises is the increasingly global nature of financial markets, while economic and financial policies are typically pursued from a national interest context. Saccomanni proposes strengthening and formalizing international cooperation arrangements, with policy makers responding on the basis of previously established rules and granting the IMF authority to coordinate and manage such responses. There is little evidence, however, that national authorities of the major economies are prepared to yield authority to the IMF to manage the international financial system, or that the IMF is up to the task. Nevertheless, this is a timely, thought-provoking volume in view of the current financial crisis. Comprehensive bibliography. Summing Up: Recommended. All levels/collections. — C. J. Siegman, formerly, Federal Reserve Board/International Monetary Fund

Tallis, Raymond.  The kingdom of infinite space: a portrait of your head. Yale, 2008.  324p bibl index afp; ISBN 9780300142228, $28.00.
46-3179 BD418  2008-925426 MARC

Described as a practicing physician, philosopher, university professor, and prolific writer of books and scientific articles, Tallis (emer., Univ. of Manchester) likely is more widely known in the UK than in the US. Reading him for the first time gave this reviewer the sense of being exposed to a literary genius–literary because of his erudition and eloquent use of language, a genius because he demonstrates extraordinary knowledge and insights. Sprinkled with philosophical musings, the book makes for enjoyable reading about seemingly mundane topics: what is in or on one’s head–the mouth, sweat, hair, makeup, yawning, kissing, balding, becoming old, smiling, thoughts, and more (the list is almost endless)–and how these entities interact, physiologically and cognitively, to determine a person’s self. Between chapters are four short, much more philosophical presentations, accurately titled “Explicitly Philosophical Digressions,” with subtitles such as “Being My Head” and “Having and Using My Head.” Readers may well be tempted to make written notes of the many passages that have the earmarks of profound quotations. Citations and notes make a useful addition to the text. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower-level undergraduates and above; general readers. — R. S. Kowalczyk, formerly, University of Michigan

Thomas, R. Murray.  What schools ban and why.  Praeger, 2008.  282p bibl index afp; ISBN 9780313352980, $49.95.
46-3387 LB3012 2008-13665 CIP

Thomas (emer., Univ. of California, Santa Barbara) presents a compilation of controversies about what is censored in schools in the US. The author notes that controversies often arise when individuals or groups disagree about bans. In addressing each controversy, the author identifies two underlying questions: Why are things banned? And why do people so often disagree about what to ban? Thomas also introduces a framework for interpreting bans, based on seven propositions tied to the ways people may think about banning. These propositions range from the interplay between individuals’ heredity and environment to whether people are tied to a common set of values. The book presents an extensive list of what schools ban. Bans on books, the Internet, movies, speech, garb, music, weapons, drugs, ceremonies, and displays are discussed. This is an excellent book on a very timely topic–censorship in schools today. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readership levels. — J. C. Agnew, Park University

The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database.  Internet Resource.
46-3397
http://www.slavevoyages.org/tast/database/index.faces

[Visited Nov’08] For anyone interested in learning more about the transatlantic slave trade, this database is essential. It contains materials on ships, crews, slaves, and places of embarkation and landing. The database lists the names of ships, captains, number of crew and slaves, place where slaves were taken and landed, where they were sold, and if anything unusual happened during the voyage. It can be searched by just about any variable imaginable, including the number of crew deaths and the outcome of the voyage. It is hard to imagine a more comprehensive database on the subject. Originally distributed on CD-ROM, the database is now readily accessible online. It loads very quickly and is easy to understand. The authors and contributors are recognized authorities, including David Eltis and Herbert Klein (who began to collect the material in the 1960s); therefore, the information can be assumed to be reliable. The site provides links to other relevant sites and lesson plans for secondary school teachers on the slave trade. This is a unique site for its comprehensiveness and search features. Anyone studying slavery, from sixth grade through university instructors, will quickly find this site to be a necessity in their classroom. Undergraduate students will be using this database for a very long time. Summing Up: Essential. All audiences and libraries. — K. L. Gorman, Minnesota State University—Mankato

White, Aaronette M.  Ain’t I a feminist?: African American men speak out on fatherhood, friendship, forgiveness, and freedom.  State University of New York, 2008.  265p bibl index afp; ISBN 9780791475676, $86.50; ISBN 9780791475683 pbk, $28.95.
46-3573 E185  2007-44487 CIP

White (psychology, Univ. of California at Santa Cruz) conducted the first empirical examination of African American male feminism. Her book’s title (taken from Sojourner Truth’s speech “Ain’t I a Woman?”) underscores the dilemma that many male feminists face as members of the patriarchal class who simultaneously have dedicated their lives to working toward gender equality. Basing her work on interviews with 20 African American men who not only identify as feminists but also work actively toward gender equality, White examines their own understandings of feminism, their sense of themselves as actors in the patriarchy, and the turning point that led to their conversion to feminism. The most robust finding of the study was the pivotal role that relationships with feminists, both platonic and romantic, played in pushing these men to evaluate their roles in maintaining the system of gender oppression. The key limitation, acknowledged by White, is the narrow sample of highly educated African American men. Summing Up: Recommended. Library collections serving upper-division undergraduates, graduate students, and above. — A. J. Hattery, Colgate University

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