This Month

If you look closely, you'll find wrath, lust, envy, gluttony, pride, sloth, or greed at the root of nearly every great story. To ring in 2007, we bring you a selection of seven tomes — one for each vice. Cormac McCarthy's latest blood-bath envisions survival after nuclear war, while comics auteur Alan Moore tests the limits of eroticism with Lost Girls. Michael Pollan asks you to think before you eat, Tom Lutz proposes a history of American slackers, and Phaidon offers a primer on graphic commodity fetishism. A book of interviews with infamous dictators showcases the heights of hubris, while the collected Mr. Ripley novels are a stylish introduction to the green-eyed monster. Speaking of envy, we close with a feature on recent outbreaks of plagiarism — that most literary sin.
- Toby Warner, Managing Editor