Scott McLemee's"Around the Web," IHE, 5 December, surveys the cognoscenti for the best of the new academic blogs.

Richard Lourie,"Heroes Are People, Too," Washington Post, 2 December, reviews Paul Johnson's Heroes: From Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar to Churchill and De Gaulle.

Focussing on the Newburgh Crisis, William Hogeland,"Inventing Alexander Hamilton: The Troubling Embrace of the Founder of American Finance," Boston Review, November/December, takes on the neo-Hamiltonians – Richard Brookhiser, David Brooks, and Ron Chernow.

Nicholas Delbanco reviews Sheldon Novick's new biography, Henry James: The Mature Master for the LA Times, 2 December.

Simon Callow,"Mad about the beast," Guardian, 1 December, reviews Simon Louvish's new biography, Cecil B. DeMille and the Golden Calf.

Brad deLong,"Creative Destruction's Reconstruction: Joseph Schumpter Revisited," CHE, 7 December, reviews Thomas K. McCraw's Prophet of Innovation: Joseph Schumpeter and Creative Destruction.

Janet Maslin,"Dear Alfred, Gertie and Mummy-snooks: Love, Noelie," NYT, 3 December, reviews Barry Day, ed., The Letters of Noël Coward.