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Ecologist and "natural security expert" Rafe Sagarin thinks our systems for dealing with natural disasters and terrorist attacks need to be updated. The best place to turn for advice? Other organisms.

When Teddy Roosevelt became a New York police commissioner in 1895, he vowed to clean up the city's endemic vice and corruption. It didn't exactly work out. New Yorkers liked the idea of standing up to corrupt cops, but they rebelled when Roosevelt tried to enforce a ban on Sunday drinking.

In his latest novel, Thomas Mallon takes a fresh look at the scandal that brought down the Nixon administration, re-imagining it through the eyes of the cast of characters involved.

Two young, star-crossed magicians compete against each other in a mysterious, lifelong competition in Erin Morgenstern's sparkling debut novel.

Raymond Gunt is profane, rude, heartless and truly the Worst. Person. Ever. Author Douglas Coupland says he's not exactly sure how the character, with no redeeming qualities, came into his mind.

Salvadoran journalist Oscar Martinez has ridden the train known as "the Beast" eight times, interviewing Central American migrants on their way to the U.S. He shares his experiences in the book The Beast. Alt.Latino asked him about the books he read that inspired him — and what he'd take to read on a desert island.

The New Zealand-born author Adam Christopher has a fascination for America — his latest, Hang Wire, is a decade-jumping, character-crisscrossing urban fantasy set in San Francisco. Reviewer Jason Heller says that with Hang Wire, his fourth novel, Christopher has mastered "geek-centric weirdness and galloping, whiz-bang pace."

Sometimes our eyes are bigger than our baking skills. Reviewer T. Susan Chang recommends three cookbooks with pictures that indulge our senses while sparing our waistlines. Do you have a favorite cookbook? Let us know in the comments.

Four novels for the year's end: a new Raylan Givens adventure from Elmore Leonard, a story of psychology and obsession from Ellen Ullman, Thomas Caplan's latest spy thriller and Alex Gilvarry's debut set in the fashion world and Guantanamo Bay.

Novelists Aatish Taseer and Naomi Benaron portray life amid sectarian violence in Pakistan and Rwanda, respectively, while Glenn Carle reflects on being a CIA interrogator, novelist Jonathan Lethem explores his influences, and David Bellos probes translation's complexity.