Beverly Hills insider Kavita Amar '95 writes about the struggle between career and love of a twenty-something professional in Los Angeles in her new novel L.A. Style (iUniverse).

The Bancroft Library has released Exploring the Bancroft Library: The Centennial Guide to Its Extraordinary History, Spectacular Special Collections, Research Pleasures, Its Amazing Future, and How It All Works. The book offers an in-depth look at the way archival objects are acquired and conserved (Bancroft Library Signature Books).

Japan experienced an information explosion in the 1600s, and Professor of History Mary Elizabeth Berry examines the social processes that drove the movement in Japan in Print: Information and Nation in the Early Modern Period (University of California Press). Her work provides a fascinating account of how the Japanese public was converted from an object of state surveillance into a subject of self-knowledge.

Psychologist Paul Joannides writes "the only sex manual you'll ever need," with the Guide to Getting It On! (Goofy Foot Press). Joannides covers everything from French kissing to cybersex, complete with illustrations and diagrams for the most curious of minds.

In Diplomacy Lessons: Realism for an Unloved Superpower (Potomac Books), former political counselor of the U.S. Embassy in Athens John Brady Kiesling M.A. '82 calls for realistic foreign policies that would require the United States to critically examine the effective limits of its power.

Inspired by a toxic gas spill in North Dakota where emergency radio bulletins could have saved lives, Eric Klinenberg looks at the loss of local news and the dangers of constantly consolidating media in Fighting For Air: The Battle to Control America's Media (Metropolitan Books).