By Nora Levine
Nora Levine can be reached at .

STARDUST
by Joseph Kanon
It is a noir plot taking place in the film industry in Los Angeles at the end of World War II. The hero is a returned American G.I. born in Germany. His brother is a film maker in America, who grew up in Germany. The G.I. arrives in Los Angeles days after his brother's mysterious death. The plot involves the European émigré community, secrets from the war, a McCarthy like communist hearing, the new film industry in CA. It›s a fascinating portrayal of California during a complex time.
Cynthia Berglez
Ropes & Gray

POISONED: THE TRUE STORY OF THE DEADLY E. COLI OUTBREAK THAT CHANGED THE WAY AMERICANS EAT
by Jeff Benedict (Inspire Books, 2011)
I love a big juicy rare hamburger with lettuce, tomatoes, mayonnaise, mustard, pickles and onions. It has to be encased in one of those mushy hamburger buns from the grocery store. A hamburger, in fact, much like the one pictured on the front cover of Poisoned. I could have been the little girl on the cover – when I was a kid, a hamburger was a treat and it still is for many young (and not so young) children today.

In 1993, that happy treat became a nightmare for children who ate hamburgers from Jack in the Box restaurants. In only a few weeks, an outbreak of deadly E. Coli attacks spread to 700 victims, at least four of whom died. The effects of E. Coli attacks are extremely painful, gruesome and traumatizing, psychologically as well as physically. One victim was described as looking "like a mummy".

Poisoned interweaves the medical, legal, insurance, corporate governance and state and federal government roles in this terrifying epidemic.

The cast of characters include Brianne Kiner, one of the first victims. Represented by attorney Bill Marler, Brianne eventually received an award of $15.6 million, a record award at the time. Bob Piper, an established Seattle lawyer, represented Jack in the Box. Jack in the Box's president, Robert Nugent, Vice President of Quality Assurance, Ken Dunkley, and others including the families of those involved are all portrayed in a humane and personal light. Their foibles and character traits are pictured convincingly. Bob Piper is a colorful character prone to wearing suspenders featuring naked women, partying and cigar smoking wherever inappropriate. However, he proved to be astute, fair and practical. Bob Nugent is depicted as an honest, direct person whose driving goal, besides saving his company, was the fair treatment of the victims. The only true villain in the book is the E. Coli bacteria itself.

Bill Marler, Suzanne Kiner, Brianne's mother, and others have continued to work to improve food safety standards of all kinds and have achieved a significant reforms in all aspects of food production, including stricter federal regulations, stricter inspections, better procedures and documentation of food handling processes. After the 1993 outbreak, strong federally mandated rules and standards were put in to place. Poisoned has been used as a textbook for these kinds of cases in several law schools.

However, there isn't a perfectly happy ending. Recently there has been a string of reports of food poisoning from lettuce to bean sprouts. Congress has not provided the funding to implement many of the reforms passed. While this outbreak has not completely "changed the way Americans eat," it certainly has made many more people aware of food choices. And the book is an absorbing, compelling and yes, even, entertaining read.
Claudia Cook
Alameda County Law Library

IS EVERYONE HANGING OUT WITHOUT ME
by Mindy Kaling
I am currently reading (on the Kindle!) "Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?" by Mindy Kaling, who writes and acts on The Office. So far it is filled with a combination of cringes and laughs, as I found common ground in her recollections of her youth (bad haircuts, embarrassing crushes, and hanging out with a clique of "popular" girls you later find you don't have anything in common with) and early career mistake. Mindy writes of being "famously one of the worst interns that Late Night With Conan O'Brien had ever seen." I just substituted "Carl's Jr. Employee" in my mind for the Conan gig. Her writing is sharp and witty and just a little bit rueful as she acknowledges her many (mostly funny) faults.
Teresa Dippery
Bingham

BLACK CHRISTMAS
by Lewis Black
I happen to have just finished comedian/ranter Lewis Black's latest book entitled Black Christmas.

It was just the antidote I needed to combat the X-mas (not Christmas) overkill. The media is pushing so hard, it hurts. We are well past the last boundary of "no Christmas adverts until the day after Thanksgiving" rule.

I know why it's called X-mas now: the main event is focused on amassing more crap.

His perspective is that of a middle-aged secular Jew who is not married and has no kids and who visits with his NYC friends who are married with kids.

This is written like a journal of what happened to him and what thoughts rumbled through his mind during his Christmas Day activities last year.

Not for the timid, but a balm for those of us who might feel the fellowship of the season is sorely lacking.
Kathleen O'Connor
Lake County Law Library

FARM CITY
by Novella Carpenter
A friend loaned me her copy of Farm City, the Education of an Urban Farmer, because we share the delight in gardening and in particular, growing vegetables. If you are a gardener or if you have ever fantasized about raising chickens or other farm animals, you will love this book as you read about her experiences. It is both hilarious and charming at the same time.

This is a memoir by freelance journalist Novella Carpenter, a daughter of two back-to-the-land hippies. Torn between her love of the culture, crowds and energy of cities and her love of nature, she settles with her boyfriend in a run-down house with a backyard and a nearby abandoned lot in an inner-city neighborhood of Oakland called Ghosttown to see if she can have it both ways. Here she transforms the weed-choked lot into a productive vegetable garden, but she doesn't stop there, and soon bee hives, egg-laying chickens, turkeys, geese, ducks, rabbits and two pigs join her urban farm spread between her backyard and nearby lot. These are not pets, these are animals being raised for dinner and Novella brings us in to watch their care and ultimately, their demise. We are also introduced to Novella's neighborhood characters, Bobby, the homeless man who lives in an abandoned car on the street outside of the garden, the Buddhist monks across the street, Lana ("anal" spelled backwards) who runs a speakeasy across the street, the Chinese landlord and the random foragers who help themselves to Novella's garden.

STILL LIFE (The Inspector Gamache series)
by Louise Penny
Another friend introduced me to the Inspector Gamache mystery series of books this summer and I quickly read the whole series of eight, sometimes completing a book in two days simply because I couldn't put the books down. If you like mysteries in the style of Agatha Christie, you will enjoy this series. Still Life, the first book of the series, introduces us to Chief Inspector Armand Gamache of the Surete du Quebec and his team of investigators who are called to the scene of a suspicious death in a charming rural hamlet south of Montreal and north of the U.S. border, called Three Pines. Inspector Gamache is the series hero and Three Pines, a small artist colony, is the setting of all of the subsequent books along with its interesting inhabitants.

Since it is hunting season, the police don't know if the death was accidental or deliberate, but Gamache senses something isn't quite right and through his team's investigation learns the death had something more sinister at its core.
Kerry Shoji
Holland & Knight

WHEN WE WERE STRANGERS
by Pamela Schoenewaldt
The Harper Collins' blurb aptly describes one of the very best novels, indeed exquisitely written, I've ever read.

"A moving, powerful, and evocative debut novel, When We Were Strangers by Pamela Schoenewaldt heralds the arrival of superb new voice in American fiction. A tale rich in color, character, and vivid historical detail, it chronicles the tumultuous life journey of a young immigrant seamstress, as she travels from her isolated Italian mountain village through the dark corners of late nineteenth century America. A historical novel that readers of Geraldine Brooks, Nancy Turner, Frances de Pontes Peebles, and Debra Dean will most certainly cherish, When We Were Strangers will live in the mind and the heart long after its last page is turned."
Jill Woolums
UC Berkeley School of Law