Books Archive

My Mrs. Brown - When I met Billy Norwich, all those years ago, I thought: He’s much too nice to be doing that job. I thought that about his next job, and the next,

My Name Is Asher Lev - My name is Asher Lev, the Asher Lev, about whom you have read in newspapers and magazines, about whom you talk so much at your dinner affairs and cocktail parties,

My Name Is Lucy Barton - Laura Linney is doing "Lucy Barton" as a one-woman show in New York. It's a limited run, ending February 29. The New York Times was giddy with praise: "We’re grateful

My Notorious Life: A Novel - “My Notorious Life: A Novel” is everything I say I don't want. 434 pages. Set in the 19th century. Told in the first person, in 19th century speech. Based, in

My novel: Feel me, read me, tell me, heal me - “The most beautiful woman in the world is a woman reading a book.” I wrote that. It’s the first line of my novel, which I’ve been writing as long as I’ve been

My Paris Dream: An Education in Style, Slang, and Seduction in the Great City on the Seine - There is no dream that’s more of a cliché than a young woman’s dream of living in Paris. Wild parties, suave lovers, memorable encounters with giant intellects? She’s blond and

My Road Home: A 13 month journey from Wall Street to behind the walls of a NY State Prison - Amy Winehouse has died. For a smart Guest Butler's assessment of her music, click here. ============ I was really flattered when Gerry Bryne asked me to write the script for a program

My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey - I knew of Jill Bolte Taylor's TED talk in 2008, but as someone who often confuses his brain with his life, I wasn't quick to watch it. I didn't watch

MySpace Unraveled -     MySpace Unraveled:

Nadja on Nadja - Jean Rhys --- the author of the cult favorite, After Leaving Mr. Mackenzie --- died in 1979. But looking deep into the life of a troubled woman didn’t die with

Near Death in the ICU: Stories from Patients Near Death and Why We Should Listen to Them - My 101-year-old mother recently hurt her ankle and was, to her annoyance, bedridden. A few days of this, and she fell into a swoon and had a vision --- she

Nemesis: The True Story of Aristotle Onassis, Jackie O, and the Love Triangle That Brought Down the Kennedys - Do you like conspiracies that involve the Kennedys? In The Tears of Autumn --- a novel by Charles McCarry, who was a deep-cover operative for the CIA for a decade ---

Nerve Damage - “Sometimes the dead live on in your dreams.” A nice start to the first suspense novel I've opened in years. I pressed on. It turns out that Roy

Never Surrender: Winston Churchill and Britain’s Decision to Fight Nazi Germany in the Fateful Summer of 1940 - In the short-form version of Winston Churchill’s life --- I’m thinking of Paul Johnson’s excellent 192-page biography --- we meet the Churchill who’s become legend, a late-life hero who saved

New Year’s Special for Kids and Adults (with NO sports): Matthew McConaughey - As a young actor, Mathew McConaughey had an unusual problem: too handsome. After small parts in comedies, he broke out  as a stripper in "Magic Mike. He won an Academy

Newsroom Confidential: Lessons (and Worries) from an Ink-Stained Life - I thought Life, by Keith Richards (with a lot of help), was the best rock memoir I ever read right up to the minute the Rolling Stones were officially anointed

Night Life - How often do I read thrillers? Rarely. How often do I stay up until 3 AM, manically turning pages so I can see how a thriller ends? Never. And yet reading

Night Watch - HEAD BUTLER'S BUSINESS MODEL: Butler is fueled by Patreon, a click-to-donate site that allows you to make an automatic monthly contribution to Butler. ---- SHOPPING ON AMAZON: You start here, buy

Night Work - READER REVIEW: "Just finished both Taylor books. Only writer to approach Robert Parker, in my view." I don’t read thrillers, and I especially don’t read thrillers with police as square-jawed heroes,

Nina Kaufelt pines for John Prine — and peaches - NINA KAUFELT last wrote, unforgettably, “It was like watching a Hollywood movie in which Gregory Peck straightens everyone out, only it was in my own house, and it was my