Reading

Best known for writing suspenseful spy novels, Ken Follett changed direction in The Pillars of the Earth (William Morrow, 1989), a massive piece of fiction set in early 12th-century England. The novel is a masterful weaving together of history, individual personalities, and the engineering and construction feats required to plan and build a medieval cathedral.

• RECONSTITUTED NERD (CoveredBlog.blogspot.com)
• SHOT TO THE HEART AND YOU’RE TO BLAME (TypeTrigger.com)
• HARDER, BETTER, FASTER, STRONGER (iFeelUnmotivated.com)

Fool Me Once: Hustlers, Hookers, Headliners, and How Not to Get Screwed in Vegas (St. Martin’s Griffin, $16) by Rick Lax isn’t exactly what it appears to be. And that’s both good and bad, maybe even a little ironic. Out-of-towners might pick up the book thinking it’s a guide for surviving Sin City. Instead, Lax, a staff writer at Las Vegas Weekly, has delivered a memoir that chronicles his move to Las Vegas and his obsession with avoiding deception.

It’s the second week of January and already an unusual—nay, outré—literary event is scheduled to take place. On Jan. 12, human rights activist and author Aaron Cohen, 45, will be giving a talk and signing copies of his best-selling book Slave Hunter: One Man’s Global Quest to Free Victims of Human Trafficking (Simon Spotlight, 2009).