“As the wind passes through windows and slips under doors we meet the characters in the book. If any Times readers know which Balzac book this wind is in — please let me know.”
An excerpt from “Black Wave: Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Forty-Year Rivalry That Unraveled Culture, Religion, and Collective Memory in the Middle East,” by Kim Ghattas
In “Friendship: The Evolution, Biology, and Extraordinary Power of Life’s Fundamental Bond,” Lydia Denworth explores the growing, cross-species science of friendships — how they work and why.
In “Invisible Americans,” the veteran journalist Jeff Madrick lays out a simple solution to child poverty, a condition that affects 17.5 percent of this country’s kids.