Opinion

Required reading

Last Man in the Tower

by Aravind Adiga (Knopf)

Despite the title and cover illustration of a falling man, this is not a 9/11 book. But Man Booker Prize-winning author Adiga (“The White Tiger”) does set his sights on something New Yorkers will find familiar — a rich developer trying to buy out renters in order to demolish their building. The building in this case is the once-respectable Vishram Society’s Tower A in the swampy edge of teeming Mumbai. the battle lines are drawn between Dharmen Shah, who hopes to erect an elite new residence, and a retired teacher named Masterji, the final holdout.

Death in the City of Light

The Serial Killer of Nazi-Occupied Paris

by David King (Crown)

They call it the City of Light, but in 1944, Paris had more than one dark side, as a murderer hid in the shadows of Nazi occupation. King, the historian who borught us “Finding Atlantis,” explores the gruesome murders — decapitated heads and other body parts were found in the Seine — that were attributed to Marcel Petiot, a handsome, charismatic physician known for taking care of the poor. Periot was convicted of 27 murders after a circus of a trial. But his motives remained a mystery. Was he Gestapo? Resistance? Or just a psychopath? This book looks at Petiot’s long-classified police file and attempts to unravel the mystery.

Destiny of the Republic

A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President

by Candice Millard (Knopf)

In the summer of 1881, an assassin’s bullet did more than leave President James A. Garfield’s life hanging in the balance. It also left a nation in turmoil. As Millard, author of the Theodore Roosevelt bio “River of Doubt,” explains, the shooting — just four months after Garfield’s inauguration — did not kill the 20th president immediately. Politicians battled to fill the leadership void as he lingered on for more than two months, while doctors and scientists fought to save the commander-in-chief. Even Alexander Graham Bell got involved, trying to invent a device that could find the bullet still lodged in Garfield.

Columbus: The Four Voyages

by Laurence Bergreen (Viking)

There’s more to Columbus than his well-known 1492 trip to the New World — an unexpected detour en route to China. Bergreen, who previously chronicled the adventures of Magellan in “Over the World,” says Columbus was a determined man. The intention of all four of his trips was the same: to prove he could sail to China in just a few weeks, and that he could convert the people there to Christianity. Full of adventure and violence, the voyages display Columbus’ skills as a sailor. But the costs were steep, not only to his finances, but also to his health, psyche and reputation.

Along the Cherry Lane

by Milt Okun and Richard Sparks (Hal Leonard))

Brooklyn-born Milt Okun, 87, is something of a musical Zelig. As a composer, arranger and founder of the publisher Cherry Lane Music, he worked with Harry Belafonte, Peter, Paul and Mary, John Denver and even Elvis. A onetime NYC junior high music teacher, Okun’s tale touches on almost all of modern pop music.