books

Bertrand Russell is an unexpected comic book hero, but then, "Logicomix" is full of surprises.

Deborah Heiligman knew it would make a great book: the idea that Charles Darwin's religious wife Emma was terrified that her beloved husband would go to hell for his theory of evolution.

Forget turning lemons into lemonade. I'm beginning to think writer Geoff Johns can turn lemons into fine wine.

Johns has gained a reputation for fixing characters that have become radioactive because various revamps have made their histories too convoluted. He did it with Hawkman, he did it with the 1960s Green Lantern and Flash, and now he's doing it with the Legion of Super-Heroes.

It was 1963, and Norman Bridwell, the father of an infant daughter, was broke and desperately searching for work as a commercial artist in New York City.

Most of us have never wanted to go to Turkmenistan, nor could we find it on a map. But the graphic novel "Joe and Azat" ($10.95, NBM/ComicsLit) depicts it as an awfully interesting place.

Celebrate Halloween with some of these great new children's books:

-- Duck and Goose look everywhere for a pumpkin until their friend Thistle tells them about the local pumpkin patch in "Duck & Goose Find a Pumpkin" (Schwartz & Wade/Random House, $6.99). This board book is the latest in the "Duck and Goose" series by author/illustrator Tad Hills. (Ages birth-2.)

Greg Heffley is a hybrid, and his millions of young fans love it that way.

For those who haven't yet met Greg, he's the hapless star of the best-selling kids'-book series, "Diary of a Wimpy Kid," written and illustrated by Jeff Kinney. Nothing is easy for Greg, a middle-school student with a large ego, small brain and a nose for trouble.

Learning to read should be fun. All too often, however, the books available for beginning readers are simple-minded and boring.

Rabbi David Kahn was a well-respected spiritual and community leader when he died. That's when his wife, three children and synagogue found out he wasn't a rabbi. And he wasn't Jewish. Heck, he wasn't even David Kahn.

He was a con man named Donnie Dobbs, a cheap grifter who fell in love with a Jewish girl and transformed into the good man she thought he was.

Gut instincts can be a reliable guide when falling in love, making friends or deciding whether or not to respect or trust someone. Yet when it comes to making investment decisions, it often pays to have second thoughts about first impressions.