Prospect Heights Public Library Staff Picks

Blank Spots on the Map

by Trevor Paglen

In this book, author Trevor Paglen, a professor of geography at UC Berkeley, traces the outlines of U.S. government secrecy since World War II. Ranging from the top-secret airplane test site at Groom Lake, Nevada to the notorious Salt Pit prison outside Kabul, Afghanistan, his narrative systematically reveals a disturbing history of secret operations supported by taxpayer funding of at least $60 billion/year and accountable to virtually no one. With so-called "black ops" increasingly contracted to private security companies like Blackwater, the boundaries between legal and illegal operations become entirely blurred, leading to the worst kind of human rights abuses. With the immediacy and fascination of a real-life spy story, Paglen's provocative book should be read by every American concerned for the country's future.

Bill McCully, Administration

Super Freakonomics

By Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

It took four years for the authors of Freakonomics to answer the complaint that their first book did not solve all the world's problems.  Enjoy their humorous scientific approach to increasing organ donations, identifying terrorists, slowing the spread of AIDS, reversing global warming, producing rain in Africa deserts while reducing hurricane storm damage, and a host of other Noble prize  qualifying ideas.

Maria S. Ampulski - Information Desk

Dirty Diplomacy

by Craig Murray

Craig Murray served as British Ambassador to the Central Asian Republic of Uzbekistan from 2002-2005. He was an activist ambassador, seeking out British companies and European businessmen active in Uzbekistan to try to smooth their way with bureaucratic and corrupt officials. But it was his stand with hard- pressed local opposition leaders against Islam Karimov's tyrannical government known for its human rights violations, that got him into trouble. The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office was eager to please its American ally in the War on Terror, and Uzbekistan, with its border on Afghanistan, was a key ally in this struggle. So Murray's activities directed to improving the human rights of local residents were extremely unwelcome to his superiors and eventually cost him his job. Murray is candid about his own personal indiscretions as well as the bleak existence of the local population. His account of dealing with a regime which routinely employed rape and torture of its own population is eye-opening. Yet it is the accommodation of the United States, which used Uzbekistan for “extraordinary rendition” of terror suspects, and other NATO nations with Karimov's regime that truly makes the reader question the methods of the War on Terror. Murray’'s autobiographical account of his service in Tashkent reads more like a James Bond novel than a diplomatic memoir.

Bill McCully, Executive Director