The Korea Herald

Chicago physicist takes people back to vanished life of postwar Europe

Mar 30, 2012

“Lately I have been overcome by an urge to put my affairs in order,” Peter Freund read, and within moments another world began to materialize in Sandmeyer’s Bookstore.It was postwar Europe, a place of deception and danger for a Romanian Jewish couple masquerading as Catholics in the German town of Dachau.In this and in Freund’s other stories, people try to glue together the shards of shattered worlds and lives. They fight for lost fortunes, outwit Swiss bankers, encounter spies and betrayers, ar
At 98, once-illiterate US lobsterman is an author

Mar 30, 2012

James Arruda Henry had plenty to be proud of as a lobster boat captain who managed to build his own house and raise a family. But he kept a secret into his 90s, one that forced him to bluff his way through life by day and brought tears at night.Henry was illiterate. He couldn't even read restaurant
Adrienne Rich, feminist poet and essayist, dies

Mar 29, 2012

SANTA CRUZ, California (AP) ― Poet Adrienne Rich, whose socially conscious verse influenced a generation of feminist, gay rights and anti-war activists, has died. She was 82.Rich died Tuesday at home from complications from rheumatoid arthritis, said her son, Pablo Conrad. She had lived in Santa Cruz since the 1980s.Through her writing, Rich explored topics such as women’s rights, racism, sexuality, economic justice and love between women.Rich published more than a dozen volumes of poetry and fi
Lebanese author wins prize for Arabic fiction

Mar 28, 2012

ABU DHABI (AP) ― Organizers say a Lebanese author has won the International Prize for Arabic Fiction for his novel depicting life of a Christian egg seller after war, in exile and during imprisonment.The prize is a prestigious Arabic literary award, affiliated with the Booker Prize Foundation in LondonRabee Jaber’s “The Druse of Belgrade’’ is set in Beirut in the 1860s. The protagonist, Hanna Yacoub, has assumed a false identity of a Druse fighter after civil war and is sent into exile. The book
Harry Potter novels available as eBooks

Mar 28, 2012

British author J.K. Rowling's seven Harry Potter books are for the first time available for all types of electronic readers.The eBook versions of the blockbuster fantasy novels can be purchased exclusively at Rowling's Pottermore.com Web site as of Tuesday.More than 450 million hard copies of the se
Leading Italian novelist Antonio Tabucchi dies

Mar 26, 2012

ROME (AFP) ― Antonio Tabucchi, one of Italy’s leading contemporary writers and a ferocious critic of billionaire former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, died in Lisbon on Sunday at the age of 68.Tabucchi died of cancer in the country that had become his second home, according to Italy’s left-leaning newspaper La Repubblica, which worked closely with the author.His funeral will take place on Thursday in the Portuguese capital. “A friend, a fellow traveller, a man who lived with passion and rage,
Hollywood trade magazine Variety up for sale

Mar 25, 2012

LOS ANGELES (AP) ― Variety, a trade magazine that has covered Hollywood for more than 100 years, is up for sale.Its owner, Reed Business Information, announced the decision Friday in a story on Variety’s website.Reed Chief Executive Mark Kelsey says it makes sense to sell the business just as Reed has sold its other U.S. print magazines. He said Reed is increasingly focused on data services.Variety has encountered stiff competition in covering the business of Hollywood from websites such as Dead
Taking a bite out of reality TV

Mar 23, 2012

Chomp: A NovelBy Carl Hiaasen, Alfred A. (Knopf)South Florida is known for many things: Alligators, orange groves and the writer who spins the area’s most sensational attributes into even more sensational story lines, Carl Hiaasen. In his many best-sellers for adults and kids, Hiaasen has demonstrated a unique gift for wrapping real environmental issues into apocryphal, bust-a-gut books that parody pop culture ― a talent he furthers in his most recent middle-school novel, “Chomp.”In a crossover
From quiet domesticity to sheer terror

Mar 23, 2012

Stay CloseBy Harlan Coben (Dutton) A hallmark of Harlan Coben’s best-sellers has been his precise look at ordinary people caught up in extraordinary situations, forced to deal with violence and the seamy side of life. These “family thrillers” are hauntingly realistic, showing how characters who could be our neighbors ― or ourselves ― discover an inner resolve.Coben’s 22nd novel spins a new approach to his family thrillers. In the excellent “Stay Close,” Coben shows us three people who know too w
Magazine dedicates an issue to late POSCO founder

Mar 23, 2012

The Quarterly Asia: Park Tae-joon: A Memorial Issue(ASIA Publishers) ASIA, a bilingual quarterly which mainly features works of Asian literature, has dedicated its latest issue to the late POSCO founder Park Tae-joon. Park, who died of complications of lung disease last year, is considered one of the pioneers behind Korea’s post-war economic growth. The former general who participated in the Korean War (1950-1953) founded POSCO in 1968, which was then called Pohang Iron and Steel Company, and tu
Jesmyn Ward writes on Hurricane Katrina

Mar 23, 2012

Another hot, drippy August envelopes the Batiste family and their tumbledown property in coastal Mississippi, but there’s an excited air surrounding what’s about to happen in the shed.Their crystal-white pit bull, China, tenderly cared for by 16-year-old Skeetah, is ready to give birth to her first litter. In the novel “Salvage the Bones,” author Jesmyn Ward explores that day and the next 11 in the lives of this Southern black family of five. All are struggling to find and fill their roles in th
Dutch author wins Astrid Lindgren award

Mar 21, 2012

STOCKHOLM (AP) ― Dutch writer Guus Kuijer has been named this year’s Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award for children’s literature, honored for his ability to portray life’s big problems with humor and warmth, the prize jury said Tuesday.Kuijer, 69, has written more than 30 books since making his debut in 1975, releasing works such as “The Book of Everything’’ and “Florian Knol’’ ― mainly directed at adolescents entering their teen years.“Respect for children is as self-evident in his works as his re
Leading economist to publish new book on welfare state

Mar 19, 2012

Universal welfare, as well as more regulations on the free market and chaebol reform are crucial in contemporary Korean economy, according to Chang Ha-joon, one of the leading heterodox economists in Korea. He spoke at a news conference held Monday to promote his upcoming book.The new book, “What to Choose: Cutting the Gordian Knot -- An Analysis of the Korean Economy,” co-authored by Chang, Lee Jong-tae and Jeong Seung-il, is an extension of the trio’s 2005 book “Cutting the Gordian Knot -- An
Satisfying update on “Jane Eyre”

Mar 16, 2012

The Flight of Gemma HardyBy Margot Livesey(Harper)Scottish-born author Margot Livesey brings the country of her birth to blazing life in the thoroughly winning “The Flight of Gemma Hardy.”A delicious updating of “Jane Eyre” to the mid-20th century, the book shares many elements with Charlotte Bronte’s 1847 classic: an intelligent, plain-featured heroine who’s emotionally and physically abused by her aunts and cousins after being orphaned; privation and hardship as a “working student” at a boardi
Restless civilian-turned-dedicated killer

Mar 16, 2012

American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military HistoryBy Chris Kyle with Scott McEwen and Jim DeFelice(William Morrow)This is the season of celebrity for the Navy SEALs.The takedown of Osama bin Laden at his hideout in Pakistan thrust the institutionally secretive SEALs into the modern-media spotlight. Soon the SEALs seemed to become America’s favorite warriors: silent, deadly, mysterious.There have been innumerable news stories about SEAL Team Six, which killed bi