Shelf Life

Bartholomew Sparrow '81 rates the current news media as a political institution in its own right, and not the "fourth estate'" or watchdog of government, in UncertainGuardians (Johns Hopkins University Press). He argues that todays "instantaneous news cycle" dis'courages scrutiny and accuracy, and that the huge, for-profit news conglomerates are too closely tied to economic concerns. The result, he says, is what we all have suspected: The news media of today is constrained by the exact political and economic systems it purports to critique. Sparrow's final chapter suggests reforms: reduce advertising and government subsidies for news agencies, increase the diversity while reducing the size of news organizations, call journalists to higher standards of ethics, enact campaign finance reform and improve the quality of American education.

Reed Browning '60 offers up the full story of baseball great Cy Young in Cy Young: ABaseball Life (University of Massachusetts Press). "It is a well-crafted: and careful study of the great pitcher," says former commissioner of Major League Baseball Fay Vincent. "I loved it and I learned a lot."

Caroline Preston '75 first showed a flair for the humorous yet sophisticated in Jackie by Josie, a New York Times Notable Book of 1997. Preston's new novel Lucy Crocker 2.0 (Scribner) tells a witty and stylish tale of a mom who has had enough of cyberspace and the distance it creates within her family.