Oedipus Complex
Inside the mind of Thomas Gilbert Jr., the Upper East Side golden boy who killed his own father
The Money Shot
Scottish photographer Albert Watson reveals the stories behind his best work
It’s Complicated
The revolutionary filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl won the hearts of everyone from Andy Warhol and Mick Jagger to Joseph Goebbels and Roger Ailes
Short List
What to read in the coming weeks, from memoirs exploring masculinity and the cutthroat world of ballet to a look at the history and future of motion
WASP’s Nest
Terrified by the distinctly WASP-ish hell of lacking a life’s purpose, Cold War columnist Joe Alsop created a setting for his self-protective, civic-humanist fantasy
Safe Mode
The authors of a new book on the history of quarantines think they’re here to stay
Here Is New York
Douglas Corrance’s colorful photographs recall summers in 1970s and 1980s New York
Comstock’s Ghost
Anthony Comstock spent his life trying to curb women’s rights. His traumatic history makes his mission all the more bizarre—and perverse
Short List
What to read this week, including books on J. Edgar Hoover, Joe McCarthy, and Roy Cohn; the virtues of forgetting; and the life of Rob Sedgwick
Good-bye, Blake Bailey
Book-industry insiders are coming down on both sides of the Blake Bailey–Philip Roth controversy, which resulted in the pulping of Bailey’s Roth bio
Drama Queen
Over a decade-long career at HBO, Miranda Cowley Heller worked on The Sopranos and The Wire. Her debut novel is as fun as the best TV shows
There’s Something About Serena
What is it about Serena Williams that brings the world’s best tennis players to their knees?
When David Met Carmen
An alluring new book explores the relationship between two fashion luminaries
Bret Easton Ellis’s Rules of Attraction
The shock jock of American letters is back with a serialized audiobook that eschews the culture wars for something closer to home
Love at First Letter
Inside the bizarre world of dating, sex, and marriage in America’s prisons
Short List
Books to read this week, including a memoir from Rachel Johnson, sister of Boris; an inside look at the Secret Service; the true story of a Montauk shipwreck; and a colorful history of spas