The latest paperbacks reviewed.
Grace and Truth. Jennifer Johnston, Review, £7.99
It's almost impossible to say anything at all about this novel without revealing the devastating plot twist which lies at its centre. So let's just say that it's about a young actress called Sally whose marriage appears to have foundered on the rocks of her psychological hang-ups; raised by a secretive single mother, she is obsessed with the need to find out who her father is. Only her grandfather can tell her: and he's a Church of Ireland bishop who doesn't, it seems, want to know her. The book's title - taken from the opening chapter of the gospel of John, with its subtle meditation on the nature of morality - offers further clues. Enough said? It should also be said that the novel is as compelling as anything Johnston has yet produced, and as seriously discomfiting as anything you'll read on this particular subject. - Arminta Wallace
CS Lewis: The Boy who Chronicled Narnia. Michael White, Abacus, £10.99
Clive Stables Lewis was born in Belfast, to a middle-class family, in 1898. First World War army service interrupted his undergraduate years at Oxford. However, by 1925 he had been elected a Fellow of Magdalen College, quickly gaining a reputation as a medievalist, teacher and scientist of literature. In 1931 he converted to Christianity, becoming its most influential apologist, and an icon to his evangelist admirers. Christianity became a central theme of his writing, including his classic children's fantasy, The Chronicles of Narnia. And it's for the chronicles that Lewis is best remembered, with the film adaptation of the first book in the series, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, now in the cinemas. White unashamedly has an eye for this "new" audience, reaching for the man behind the books rather than the angelic icon. - Martin Noonan
Sidetracks: Explorations of a Romantic Biographer. Richard Holmes, Harper Perennial, £8.99
What's unpleasant about this book, a compilation of literary pieces, radio plays, formal essays, travel and character sketches, is the leather-elbowed-tweed-jacket clubby tone - it's especially heavy in the prologue and introductions to each of the seven sections. What's nice are the unexpected nuggets of apt, diverting, literary commentary. Holmes has written several literary Romantic biographies and is renowned for his particular take on the genre. Although his subjects are all dead, Holmes's style makes them faux contemporary: it's a pleasure to read in one of the Escapes to Paris pieces that, when ambushed in the Plaza Hotel by a young journalist in 1927, Scott Fitzgerald deflected unwanted questions with the words: "The idea that we're the greatest people in the world because we have the most money in the world is ridiculous". - Kate Bateman
The Stories of David Leavitt. David Leavitt, Bloomsbury, £8.99
This collection of Leavitt's powerful, humorous and unique short stories serves as a delightful introduction to the work of one of America's most gifted authors, showcasing his writing from 1983's Family Dancing, through to A Place I've Never Been (1990) and the more recent The Marble Quilt (2001). Moving from San Francisco to Italy and Switzerland, Leavitt's stories consistently hit the right emotional key, dealing as they do with love and loss, friendship, prejudice and death. His passionate, elegant yet detached style serves to highlight the strength of feeling that lurks behind each of his snapshots of human interaction and existence. Indeed, in his portrayal of sexuality and love in the pre- and post-Aids era, Leavitt's writing reaches its high point. This collection serves as a moving and witty take on humanity and its perilous journey through love and life. - Tom Cooney
Media Man: Ted Turner's Improbable Empire. Ken Auletta, Norton £8.99
This is an unusual hagiography that, while never quite settling on its specified subject and spending too much time admiring the Turner myth instead of deconstructing it, is nonetheless an informative read. It captures the shenanigans - prelude, deeds and aftermath - of the AOL and Time Warner merger in January 2000. Though he provides insights into media magnates Bob Pittman, Steve Case, Gerald Levin and Richard Parsons, Auletta's writing serves a folksy Middle American agenda that admires Turner's alter-ego, Captain Courageous, and the numerous other multi-millionaires that populate this mythology. CNN, HBO, Turner Broadcasting System, Jane Fonda, Turner's father's suicide, Cuba and Iraq all get various levels of attention, and overall this book constitutes a good bluffer's guide to American broadcasting. - Paul O'Doherty
Evening in the Palace of Reason. James Gaines. Harper Perennial, £8.99
This book's subtitle, "Bach meets Frederick the Great in the Age of Enlightenment", harbours as much secret potential as the unusual notation and ciphers found on Johann Sebastian Bach's manuscripts. In 1747, the aging composer travelled from Leipzig to Potsdam at the request of King Frederick the Great of Prussia. After Bach's astonishingly successful devising on the spot of a three-part fugue to the fiendishly difficult "the royal theme" given him by Frederick, the latter then asked for a six-part fugue. Gaines explores the history and background to this event, which he uses as an indication of a turning point in European history from religion to Enlightenment, in which mediocrity tries to better genius but gets its wrist slapped. If only Gaines had left himself and his commentary out of it; his exhaustive research - and the subject matter - are fascinating enough. - Christine Madden