The Treehouse, by Naomi Wolf (Simon & Schuster, May). The author of The Beauty Myth relates the lessons she learned from her father, the noted poet-professor Leonard Wolf.
Biography
109 East Palace : Robert Oppenheimer and the Secret City of Los Alamos, by Jennet Conant (S&S, April); and The Ruin of J. Robert Oppenheimer, by Priscilla J. McMillan (Viking, July). Two on the tormented father of the nuclear bomb.
Alec Guinness, by Piers Paul Read (S&S, July). The Oscar-winning, famously secretive actor had quite a life off-screen.
Becoming Justice Blackmun, by Linda Greenhouse (Times, May). The personal odyssey of the Supreme Court Justice who wrote Roe v. Wade.
Charles W. Colson: A Life Redeemed, by Jonathan Aitken (Doubleday, July). Nixon's former hatchet man sees the light and builds a $50-million-a-year ministry.
The Colonel and Little Missie, by Larry McMurtry (S&S, June). Buffalo Bill meets Annie Oakley.
The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism, by Megan Marshall (Houghton Mifflin, April). They published, befriended and married, respectively, the likes of Emerson, Thoreau and Hawthorne.
The Perfectionist: Life and Death in Haute Cuisine, by Rudolph Chelminski (Gotham, May). A legendary French chef and his intense, fatally toxic milieu.
The Prison Angel, by Mary Jordan and Kevin Sullivan (Penguin, May). Mother Antonia travels from Beverly Hills to the dank jails of Mexico.
The Private Passion of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, by Vicky Moon (Regan, May). Her love affair with horses.
History
1776, by David McCullough (S&S, May). A year in the life of a fledgling nation.
The Boys of Pointe du Hoc, by Douglas Brinkley (Morrow, June). "Rudder's Rangers" and their D-Day exploits on the cliffs of Normandy.
The Confederate Battle Flag, by John M. Coski (Harvard, April). A history of the embattled emblem.
The Gift of Valor, by Michael M. Phillips (Broadway, May). The story of Marine corporal Jason Dunham, the first soldier nominated for a Congressional Medal of Honor in the Iraq War.
A History of the World in 6 Glasses, by Tom Standage (Walker, June). Beer to Coca-Cola, and Stone Age to 21st century.
Current Events
A Hundred & One Days, by Asne Seierstad (Basic, April). By the author of The Bookseller of Kabul, a portrait of Baghdad under siege.
The Vast Left Wing Conspiracy, by Byron York (Crown, April). The Left is on a mission, and it vows to win at any cost.
People and Places
Faith at War: A Journey on the Frontlines of Islam, from Baghdad to Timbuktu, by Yaroslav Trofimov (Holt, May). The region since the start of America's war on terror.
