Steven Levingston reviews Paul Strathern's The Artist, the Philosopher, and the Warrior: The Intersecting Lives of da Vinci, Machiavelli, and Borgia and the World They Shaped for the Washington Post, 31 January.

Caleb Crain,"Beer Buddies," BookForum, February/March, reviews Richard Stott's Jolly Fellows: Male Milieus in Nineteenth-Century America.

Douglas Whynott,"A legacy of life," Boston Globe, 31 January, and Eric Roston for the Washington Post, 31 January, review Rebecca Skloot's The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. This appears to be an extra-ordinary story and a major book. Popular Science's headline,"Five Reasons Henrietta Lacks is the Most Important Woman in Medical History", probably exaggerates, but you get the point.

William H. Chafe,"A protest that changed history," AJC, 29 January, celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Greensboro, North Carolina, sit-ins.

Chris Clarke's"This is the title of a typical incendiary blog post," Coyote Crossing, 24 January, is a tour de force.

Finally, on a day when the world bid farewell to both J. D. Salinger and Howard Zinn, Rob MacDougall found a fitting tribute to both of them: Hilobrow's"Holden's History of the United States," Hilowbrow, 29 January.