REVIEWS BY JULIE HALE

The Final Solution
The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay returns with an old-fashioned whodunit inspired by the work of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Indeed, Chabon's book features a retired detective—referred to throughout as "the old man"—who bears more than a passing resemblance to Sherlock Holmes and whom the reader must assume is none other than the sleuth himself. Now 89, Holmes has removed himself from the bustle of London and taken up residence in the Sussex countryside, where he keeps bees. The story begins in the summer of 1944, when Holmes crosses paths with Linus Steinman, a young boy who has escaped from Nazi Germany and lives with an English couple in their boarding house. Linus does not talk, but his pet parrot Bruno compensates for his silence, reciting poetry and songs in German, as well as sequences of numbers. When a resident of the boarding house is murdered and Bruno is kidnapped, the local authorities enlist Holmes to help solve the crime. Thus, the detective embarks on his final case, an adventure involving European politics, international intrigue and more. With this brief book, Chabon has contributed an admirable new chapter to the life of the famous crime fighter, proving himself a master of the mystery genre. A reading group guide is available in print and online at www.harperperennial.com.

The Final Solution
By Michael Chabon
Perennial, $12.95,
144 pages
ISBN 0060777109

His Excellency
Ellis is a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and the author of the best-selling books Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation and American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson. His latest volume chronicles the life of America's first president, shedding new light on the background of the great leader and his contributions to the incipient republic. Writing with his usual aplomb, Ellis traces the remarkable man's ascension to commander-in-chief: we see Washington fighting in the French and Indian War, running his Virginia plantation with his wife Martha, acting as head of the Continental Army and assuming the presidency after the defeat of the British forces. Washington led the country for eight years, during which he instituted the federal government as we know it and established the nation's capital city. In addition to an overview of his many accomplishments, Ellis also explores the president's viewpoints on slavery and the rights of Native Americans. He goes beyond the facts to provide a colorful and well-rounded portrait of a remarkable man—a political innovator who was aloof but kind, distant yet compassionate. Washington's image is one of the most ubiquitous in our culture, and now, thanks to Ellis, we have an even clearer picture of this founding father. A reading group guide is available in print and online at www.readinggroupcenter.com.

His Excellency
By Joseph J. Ellis
Vintage, $15
352 pages
ISBN 1400032539

Prep
Lee Fiora is a teen from South Bend, Indiana, attending the high-status Ault School on scholarship. Ault's well-heeled student body includes some familiar figures—a Barbie-ish blonde (named, affluently enough, Aspeth Montgomery), a hunky basketball star and a lonely gay student—but Sittenfeld's novel is more than a collection of stereotypes. With this unique and powerful coming-of-age novel, she tells the tale of an outsider who learns as she goes along how to cope in an unfamiliar world. Lee's decidedly middle-class upbringing is revealed when her mother and father arrive at the school for Parents' Weekend in their shabby old Datsun. The weekend proves a catastrophic one for the humiliated Lee, providing her with a new perspective on the way families work. When she becomes involved with basketball hero Cross Sugarman, the experience is not quite as grand as Lee imagined. The growing pains set in as—through various friendships and romances—Lee comes into her own. As a narrator, she is endearing and awkward, with her own idiosyncrasies and obsessions, and the reader is drawn to her—a loner in a world of wealth and social status. Sittenfeld's portrayal of this sensitive, tormented youth has won her comparisons to J.D. Salinger. Prep is a witty and wise debut novel that perfectly captures the essence of adolescence, but goes beyond the teen experience to encompass larger themes like identity and family. A reading group guide is available online at www.randomhouse.com.

Prep
By Curtis Sittenfeld
Random House, $13.95
448 pages
ISBN 081297235X