Bellow: A Biography
by James Atlas
Hardcover/686pp/Random House
HBS Price: $14.99

National Book Award nominee James Atlas here gives the first definitive account of Nobel laureate Saul Bellow's turbulent personal and professional life, as it unfolded against the background of 20th century events - the Depression, World War II, the upheavals of the sixties - and amid all the complexities of the Jewish-immigrant experience in America, which generated a vibrant new literature. "A biography unlikely to be surpassed for some time." -James Shapiro, The New York Times Book Review

Vaclav Havel: A Political Tragedy in Six Acts
by John Keane
Hardcover/532pp/Basic Books
HBS Price: $13.99

Vaclav Havel is revered as one of the 20th century's great playwrights, a daring dissident, and honest champion of democracy. Yet many episodes of his life remain unknown. In his startling biography of the former leader of the Czech Republic, John Keane reveals the unseen Havel and dramatizes the key moments of joy, misery, triumph and ruin upon which his life has turned. Based on unrestricted access to Havel, his circle of friends, and even his enemies, this authorized biography is the first definitive account of one of the great moral and political leaders of our time.

Soldier: A Poet's Childhood
by June Jordan
Hardcover/261pp/Basic Books
HBS Price: $8.99

From the pen of June Jordan, Professor of African American Studies at Berkeley, "Soldier" is a memoir in prose-poem style, the day-by-day making of a poet and writer during the first twelve years of her life. Through Jordan's unfailing eye and uncanny ear the reader sees and hears how a great talent was forged inside a household both violent and loving, a childhood both idyllic and roiled by turmoil and conflict. "I didn't want to leave her - to let this little soldier go. 'Soldier' is such an intensely perceptive narrative. I am left, breathless, waiting for more." -Toni Morrison