The beat poets pick favorite books

For beginner cooks, the Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook, 11thEdition (Better Homes and Gardens Books, $25.95). This comprehensivereference features more than 1,200 recipes from basic (hard-cookedeggs) to fancy (chocolate truffle cake) as well as thousands ofuseful photos (illustrating beef cuts, pastas, beans and more), plustiming charts, step-by-step pictures of cooking techniques and evenmicrowave tips. The looseleaf-binder format and wipe-clean cover areuser friendly. Like a home ec class on your bookshelf. The Cook's Bible (Little, Brown, $29.95) could be subtitled "thethinking cook's cookbook." Author Christopher Kimball, editor ofCook's Illustrated magazine, approaches cooking as if it were ascience project. In each of 50 fascinating chapters, he experimentsto find the best way to accomplish a task - say, braising meat orbaking the perfect brownie. Readers come away with scores of secretsand an understanding of how real cooks problem-solve in the kitchen.

Two coffee-table luxuries: The Inn at Little Washington Cookbook: AConsuming Passion, by Patrick O'Connell (Random House, $50), providesa lush glimpse of the picture-perfect inn in the foothills of westernVirginia's Blue Ridge Mountains, where former New York Times foodeditor Craig Claiborne ate "the most fantastic meal of my life."Feast for Life, by Chicagoans Linda Bartlett and Gretchen Jordan(HarperCollins, $35), is a collection of more than 100 celebrityrecipes with wild, funky graphics. Its sale benefits the PediatricAIDS Foundation and Design Industries Foundation Fighting AIDSChicago.ALL-TIME FAVORITE: No contest. Perla Meyers' The Seasonal Kitchen:A Return to Fresh Foods (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1973, out ofprint) taught me, a child of the '50s, that not all vegetables comefrozen in neat little boxes. That revelation opened up a world ofjust-picked flavors that has thrilled - and nurtured - me ever since.Barbara Sadek is the Sun-Times food editor.Get a Financial Life by Beth Kobliner (Fireside/Simon & Schuster,$11). If you're in your 20s or 30s and worry that your credit carddebt will always exceed your retirement savings, this is the book foryou. Kobliner, a writer for Money magazine, teaches Generation Xerssimple ways to cut debt, invest in the right mutual funds, findlow-cost mortgages and use tax laws to build a nice nest egg.Lucille's Car Care by Lucille Treganowan with Gina Catanzarite(Hyperion, $19.95). Treganowan was a divorced mother working as abookkeeper at an auto shop in the '60s when she decided to pick up awrench and try it herself. Now she's a cable TV star and self-helpauthor, teaching automotive novices everything from how to diagnose aleaking vacuum hose to how to change a fuel filter. A must forconsumers who don't want to be taken for a ride.Never Pay Retail, edited by Sid Kirchheimer (Rodale Press, $27.95).What's the best time of year to save up to 20 percent on adishwasher? Or the best day of the month for antiques? This bookreveals retailers' marketing methods, price markups and the brandsand models considered the best values. Covers everything fromappliances to groceries and clothing.ALL-TIME FAVORITE: The Consumer Bible by Mark Green (Workman,$14.95). Subtitled "1001 Ways to Shop Smart," Green's 656-page bookhelps consumers navigate pitfalls in transactions ranging from homeimprovements to car leasing. Also featured: How to decide whichinsurance to buy, how to avoid high telephone charges and tips forchoosing the best child care. Includes a directory of state consumeraffairs offices and source list.Stephanie Zimmerman is the Sun-Times consumer reporter.Updated and redesigned for its ninth edition, Ray Riegert's HiddenHawaii (Ulysses Press, $15.95) points travelers off the beaten pathto little-known treasures and local favorites. For the series, healso contributes the excellent Hidden San Francisco and NorthernCalifornia, Hidden Southern California and Hidden Maui. The seriesincludes guides to New England, the Carolinas, Florida, the Rockies,the Southwest, California, the Pacific Northwest and - soon - Tahitiand Fiji.Footprint's classic South American Handbook (Passport Books,$39.95), in its 73rd edition, has been joined since 1989 by 14titles, from Pakistan to Indonesia, in the Handbook series. Theyrange in price from $21.95 to $39.95. The newest title is SouthAfrica Handbook ($21.95). The light, hardcover guides arestraightforward, detailed and carefully researched. Thirteencountry-specific titles will debut next spring, retailing from $16.95to $19.95.ALL-TIME FAVORITE: HarperPerennial's Access titles. Beautifullysimple, the color-coded entries are set up by region, complete withhelpful maps, rating systems and price guides. Access Atlanta($18.50) is the newest addition to the 32-title series. New for '97will be a cruise guide. The guides range from $13 to $18.50. AccessChicago ($18.50), now in its third edition, is a must-have for newcity residents.Mi-Ai Ahern is the Sun-Times travel editor.The darnedest thing about attending sporting events is that itprevents you from sitting in an easy chair and reading sports books.But between watching Michael Jordan fallaways and Rashaan Salaamgiveaways in 1996, I was able to sqeeze in some sports literaturetime. My favorite read:High Hopes, by Gary Barnett with Vahe Gregorian (Warner Books,$18.95). Like Phil Jackson's Sacred Hoops (with Hugh Delehanty),this is a coaching book with a different spin. Barnett, thearchitect behind Northwestern's amazing football turnaround, says ofhis postgraduate years, "I began wondering whether I should try tofocus on becoming a famous shrink. The exciting thing would havebeen to go on and get a doctorate in clinical psychology."It's nice he strapped on the whistle, instead.ALL-TIME FAVORITE: North Dallas Forty (out of print). Sure it's anovel, but author Peter Gent was a Dallas Cowboy, and Michael Irvinand Leon Lett could step right onto its pages.Rick Telander is a Sun-Times sports columnist.In Waking Up, Fighting Back by Roberta Altman (Little, Brown andCo., $24.95) the author examines the controversy over the mammographydebate and the diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer. Altman, whowrote The Cancer Dictionary, questions why so many women are stillgetting mastectomies when studies show that survival rates are thesame with lumpectomies. Read this book if you're a woman with breastcancer or think your family members are at risk.Science on Trial by Dr. Marcia Angell (W.W. Norton & Co. $27.50).Angell, who is executive editor of the New England Journal ofMedicine, offers scientific evidence that shows silicone breastimplants don't cause illness. But in the highly charged breastimplant lawsuits involving Dow Corning and other breast implantmakers, Angell says public opinion, politics and the law weremanipulated to create what many now consider to be unfounded concernover breast implants. This book is for those who want to get pastthe litigation and the media hype and want to know the scientifictruth.In the lengthy Ashes to Ashes, America's Hundred-Year Cigarette Warby Richard Kluger (Knopf, $35), the author takes on tobacco giantsPhilip Morris, Brown & Williamson and R.J. Reynolds in a 832-pageinvestigation. Kluger reports on the dramatic rise of the tobaccoindustry and its bright financial health despite growing scientificevidence linking its product to disease and damaging evidence inrecent years about the industry from whistleblowers and liabilitylawsuits.The book that made the biggest impression on me in 1996 was FirstComes Love by National Public Radio commentator Marion Winik(Pantheon, $23). She takes the reader on the life journey she hadwith husband Tony, a gay man with AIDS, from their first meeting atMardi Gras in New Orleans through marriage, the birth of their twosons, his AIDS diagnosis, drug addiction and the trying moment whenshe helped him die. This book will unnerve you as much as it willteach you about love, loss and survival.Della De Lafuente is the Sun-Times health care reporter.Bookshelves are sagging with new tomes on such home andfurnishing topics as, well, how to cure sagging bookshelves.Best coffee-table book: Furniture designer David Linley'sExtraordinary Furniture (Abrams, $65) deals with the unattainable,from Edward I's 13th century Stone of Scone throne to Frank LloydWright's barrel chairs. But he traces their provenance with humor -an 18th century Italian rococo gilt-and-pearl casket stand is "sooutlandish that it almost defies description - not to mentiongravity." Warning: The dust-jacket photo of the Empress Josephine'sbed at Malmaison will outclass any table on which this volume is set.Best primers: Many renovation books this year were built on thesorry notion that the semi-handy can remake themselves as generalcontractors. John Rusk's breezy On Time and On Budget (Doubleday,$21) instead shows how to work with contractors, borrowing from theGetting to Yes negotiation genre. It's a more realistic approach toa task that consumes energy as well as cash.For home buyers and sellers, Peter G. Miller's authoritiveguides are newly revised, including The Mortgage Hunter (HarperPerennial, $13.50).Best housewarming book: With the step-by-step guide in Reader'sDigest New Fix-It-Yourself Manual (Reader's Digest Association, $35),I'm ready to reglue my creaking dining chairs this winter. Diagramsshow how to take apart (and maybe even reassemble) nearly every knownsmall appliance. A companion to the venerable New Do-It-YourselfManual ($35), my favorite workbench book.Stephen Rynkiewicz is the Sun-Times real estate editor.Mother: Photographs by Judy Olausen (Peguin Studio, $24.95)contains original, downright funny photographs by Minneapolisphotograher Judy Olausen of her 74-year-old mother, Vivian Olausen.Judy posed her as "Domestic Hoofer," "Mother as Roadkill," "Mother asDoormat" to make not-so-subtle statements about the place of women.This affordable book also tells us much about our relationships withour moms.CrazySexyCool by the editors of Us Magazine (Rolling Stone Press,$29.95). They're all here: bold portraits of the craziest, sexiest,coolest cats of the '90s, including Brad Pitt, Elisabeth Shue, KatoKaelin, Cindy Crawford, Samuel L. Jackson and dozens more. Daringblack-and-white and color photos are mixed effectively and almostspill off the pages to create a time capsule of our generation. Astylistic look at this era's stylish people.Glimpses Toward Infinity by Gordon Parks (Little, Brown, $45).Only one modern artist could combine his own photographs with his ownpaintings, sprinkle in his own poetry and come through with acoherent statement. Renaissance man Parks has always been able totake us to higher levels of visual acuity. He has never flown higherthan this sublime journey. The beautiful, profound photos hint atwhat we might see if heaven really waits for us.ALL-TIME FAVORITE: Self-Portrait: U.S.A. by David Douglas Duncan(out of print). This year's Democratic Convention in Chicago broughtback memories of this 1969 book. Photojournalists today may havelonger lenses, faster film and quicker cameras, but Duncan'sportraits of the 1968 conventions still put us to shame. His bookbrings politics to life and show its impact. His emotional,powerful, technically perfect images have stood the test of time.Rich Cahan is the Sun-Times photo editor.The End of Science by John Horgan (Addison Wesley, $24). Afterinterviewing many of the most celebrated names in science, such asphysicist Stephen Hawking, paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould andlinguist Noam Chomsky, John Horgan concludes, "the great era ofscientific discovery (probably) is over. . . . Further research mayyield no more great revelations or revolutions, but only incremental,diminishing returns."Horgan variously describes the leading lights of physics,cosmology, evolutionary biology, social science, neuroscience andchaos theory as arrogant, egotistical, fuzzyheaded, cranky or justplain cranks. It's a refreshing change from the worshipful proseemployed by most science writers.ALL-TIME FAVORITE: The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes(Simon & Schuster, $22.95). This long and engrossing narrative from1986 covers virtually every facet of the bomb, from the innerworkings of the atom to the horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.Rhodes describes how an atomic bomb works, and the enormousindustrial enterprise involved in producing a few pounds of plutoniumand enriched uranium. He explores many related issues, such asHitler's half-hearted attempt to build his own bomb and the savageryof World War II that led to the bomb's use. The first half is heavyon the science of nuclear fission, but you don't need a physicsdegree to understand it. Rhodes leaves it to the reader to decidewhether the United States was justified in using the bomb.Jim Ritter is the Sun-Times science reporter.Ernest Tubb: The Texas Troubadour, by Ronnie Pugh (Duke UniversityPress, $29.95). This is one of the most comprehensive country musicbiographies of recent years. It includes a 70-page discography andcool trivia, like the honky-tonkin' Tubb bragging that he worked forbillionaire Howard Hughes. In 1938 Tubb sold Alamo Beer, which wasbrewed by Hughes' Southern Brewing Co., in the Corpus Christi,Texas, area.Redneck Heaven: Portrait of a Vanishing Culture, by Bethany Bultman(Bantam, $14.95). Bultman doesn't take the typical stereotypicalhillbilly cheap shots. Instead, she has shrewd fun with subjectsthat range from yummy recipes like Spam fritters to redneckgraffiti. Of course, this book isn't available in hardback.Cruising Paradise: Tales, by Sam Shepard (Knopf, $23). My mostmemorable moment of last summer was reading Shepard's cheap hotelessay "Pure Accident" from this collection while staying at theNu-Homa Motel on old Route 66 in Oklahoma City. As I finished thestark story about lumpy motel ceilings and flying mules, a video ofSheryl Crow's "If It Makes You Happy" blared from the cheaptelevision set that was bolted to its stand. True story.ALL-TIME FAVORITE: Remembering America - A Sampler of the WPAAmerican Guide Series, edited by Archie Hobson (Columbia UniversityPress, $24.95). Remembering America collects the best folklore,history and social commentary by the Federal Writers Project(1935-1943), a program of the Works Progress Administration thathelped writers such as Studs Terkel, Saul Bellow and Ralph Ellisonto cut their teeth.Dave Hoekstra is a Sun-Times staff reporter.AIA Guide to Chicago (Harcourt Brace & Co., $22.95). Try readingjust one page. The thick book unmasks Chicago's architecture,covering the city like a blanket. The black and white pictures areclear and well done. There are wonderful essays by AIA executivedirector Alice Sinkevitch, IIT architecture professor KevinHarrington and others.Walter Burley Griffin in America (University of Illinois Press,$40). With Mati Maldre's mesmerizing black and white photography andPaul Kruty's clear text, the book reveals the mastery ofMaywood-born, prairie school architect Walter Griffin, who labored inthe shadow of his boss, Frank Lloyd Wright. It's a greatcoffee-table book.The Sex of Architecture (Harry N. Abrams Publishers, $19.95). Thisbook can be dry, and it does wander pretty far afield sometimes.Still, it's an interesting look, mainly through essays, at the rolewomen have played in architecture, both as architects and as theobjects of men's desire.Lee Bey is the Sun-Times architecture reporter.Cartoonist Scott Adams' The Dilbert Principle (HarperBusiness, $22)is the antidote for an era marked - make that marred - by downsizing,rightsizing, re-engineering and rejiggering the deck chairs on thecorporate Titanic.Through cartoons and accompanying text, Adams and his characterDilbert, the nerdy cubicle denizen, provide readers with laughs ofrecognition at their companies, bosses, co-workers and themselves aswell as voguish business foibles and fads. Adams, a former middlemanager with Pacific Bell, explains business buzzwords such asempowerment, Total Quality Management and change management. And hecuts through the fog of the "great lies of management," such as"Employees are our most valuable asset," "I have an open-door policy"and "The future is bright."The Dilbert Principle will help its readers not only make it tothe next payday, but possibly through the rest of their careers.ALL-TIME FAVORITE: Dilbert, the new champ, takes over fromBarbarians at the Gate, which took a novelistic approach to thegoings-on in the boardroom.Howard Wolinsky is a Sun-Times business reporter.