Laurie Muchnick

Gift books for adults include swinging London, NYC neon, ‘Star Trek’

NEW YORK — The Rolling Stones, colorful as peacocks with cigarettes in hand, walk through gray, hazy St. James Park.

A fresh-faced Marianne Faithfull wearing a tiny miniskirt and knee socks, leans against a tufted banquette in the high-Victorian Salisbury Arms pub.

You’ll find evocative images like these throughout “London: Portrait of a City” by Reuel Golden (Taschen, $69.99), a massive visual love letter to the British capital.

ANDREW MONTGOMERY/Wall to Wall Media Ltd.
J. K. Rowling, author of “The Casual Vacancy,” poses for a portrait.

J.K. Rowling tries swearing, sex in unmagical novel

“THE CASUAL VACANCY.” By J.K. Rowling. Little, Brown. $35.

Imagine “Harry Potter” with nothing but Muggles — mean, graceless people without a trace of magic. It would be a dull book indeed.

That, unfortunately, is “The Casual Vacancy,” J.K. Rowling’s first novel for adults.

The setting is Pagford, a small town in England’s West Country. Barry Fairbrother, a member of the town council, drops dead in a parking lot on his way to dinner with his wife.

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