Additionally Noted Things

Taking advantage of the hype for Dan Brown's The DaVinci Code, Kathleen McGowan, a 43-year-old, married American mother of three children, and Simon & Schuster will publish her"semi-autobiographical novel" next month. It claims that McGowan is the linear descendant of Jesus and Mary Magdalen. [ed.: Yah, right. Did I tell you the one about my being the fruit of Cleopatra's spontaneous combustion?] Publication rights for The Expected One in 20 languages have already been sold. Simon & Schuster has budgeted $250,000 to promote the book in the United States, where it will have a first-print run of 250,000 copies.

Jonathan Yardley,"The History of the Americas through the Foggy Lens of Alcohol," Washington Post, 23 July, reviews Wayne Curtis, And a Bottle of Rum: A History of the New World in Ten Cocktails. It's been over a year since we last visited the fields of commodity- and micro- history at Cliopatria.

Janet Brown,"Original Spin," Guardian Unlimited, 22 July, is an excerpt from her new book, Darwin's Origin of Species: A Biography.

David Margolick,"Postwar Pogrom," NYTimes, 23 July, reviews Jan T. Gross, Fear: Anti-Semitism in Poland After Auschwitz. An Essay in Historical Interpretation. Thanks to Jonathan Dresner for the tip.

You didn't believe us when Andrew Sullivan and I told you. Would you believe it when William Buckley says:"Bush Not a True Conservative," CBS News, 22 July.