CW staffers pass along the following favorites as recommendations for those in search of a good read.

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Against Empire, Michael Parenti. City Lights Books, 1995. Does the state of our economy concern you? Do you wonder about the real story behind Third World sweat-shops? Are you baffled by and disbelieving of the media? Against Empire clears up the confusing propaganda about U.S. corporate activity in foreign countries and at home. Parenti writes dynamically and pragmatically, uncovering lies, and telling insightful truths. In his easy-to-read, exciting writing style, Parenti systematically shows the flow of money from the poor to the rich, and how the corporate sector has infiltrated all but the smallest nooks of our economy and society. (DN)

&bul; Blacker Than A Thousand Midnights, Susan Straight. Hyperion, 1994. All Darnell wanted to do since he was a little kid growing up in L.A. was be a firefighter. As he struggles with finding a career, avoiding his gangsta friends, and keeping family life peaceful, he slowly realizes what it''s like to be an adult. Straight does a great job developing quirky characters who stealthily inhabit the lower class and working class neighborhoods around L.A. and she uses the slang of the day to flesh out scenes of drug deals and drive-bys, without glamorizing them. Central to the book is the emotional state of Darnell, his girlfriend, his best friend Louis, and various shady friends who try to lure Darnell away from his self-created yardwork business into the lucrative drug world. Subplots easily blend in and make this a fascinating book of urban black life. (CC)

&bul; Bridget Jones'' Diary, Helen Fielding. Viking Penguin, 1998 (First American edition).

There I was, struggling to live on apples and Diet Coke in the big city when it first occurred to me that my childhood Barbies had had a more glamorous life than I was leading. If that kind of revelation sounds familiar, then Bridget Jones is for you. A self-described 30-something British singleton, Bridget is perpetually trying to lose a few pounds, cut back on drinking and smoking, stay away from her overbearing, self-centered mum, and find a decent chap. Naturally, that''s way too much to ask, but the story of a year in her life makes for entertaining reading. Occasionally over-the-top (a la the comic strip "Cathy"), Diary is a fast read, good for a few laughs and a few insights. (JD)

&bul; Memoirs of a Geisha, Arthur S. Golden. Knopf, 1997 (Paperback due out in March, 1999). File this under unlikely settings for great storytelling. A Japanese scholar educated at Harvard and Columbia, Golden has managed to make his area of expertise a fascinating backdrop for a page-turning first novel about a poor fisherman''s daughter sold to work as a lowly servant in a house of geishas, who herself becomes a celebrated geisha in pre-World War II Japan. A riveting saga that comes complete with great details about the culture of old Japan. (JD).

&bul; Mister Sandman, Barbara Gowdy. Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1996. Discovering that her retarded teenage sister is really her mother is the least of the family troubles plaguing Joan, a mute savant dropped on her head at birth. Joan is also the focal point of a Toronto family teetering on the edge of sanity, but the rest of this book''s idiosyncratic characters are almost madcap: Dad''s a second-rate writer mooning over a red-headed guy he meets in a bar, while Mom, lusting after the Avon Lady, concocts a wild story of woe to win "Queen for a Day," and a lifetime supply of beans. Meanwhile, baby Joan grows up silently in a closet, until she learns to communicate via tape recorder, and reveals the family''s darkest secrets. Sound funny yet? It is-- side-splittingly funny, and disturbing at the same time. The New York Times called it a "delightfully quirky novel," while The Washington Post said "brilliantly crafted and flat-out fun to read." (SF)

&bul; The Silent Duchess, Dacia Maraini. The Feminist Press at the City University of New York, 1998 (first U.S. edition). The Feminist Press specializes in publishing obscure books by women authors past and present. This is one of them. Duchess, which won Italy''s Premio Campiello (equivalent of the National Book Award) tells the fictional story of an aristocratic 18th-century Sicilian woman deaf and mute as a result of some mysterious trauma. Tracing her life from early her childhood memoirs, her marriage at 13 to her mother''s brother (who else would want a deaf-mute?) to her own motherhood and widowhood, the Duchess Marianna at last learns the truth about the tragedy of her childhood, and in doing so, finds her (metaphorical) voice at last. (JD)

&bul; The Rapture of Canaan, Sheri Reynolds. Berkeley Books, New York, 1995. Reynolds, a Southern writer quickly rising to the top, gets inside the soul of a young teenage girl to write this disturbing tale of a trapped life in the isolated extended family community of The Church of Fire and Brimstone and God''s Almighty Baptizing Wind. Grandpa Herman founded the church years ago, after catching his wife in flagrante, and his rules--an oddball combo of Southern Baptist teachings and Mennonite rigidity--must be obeyed, as the entire community waits for the Rapture that will bring them bodily to heaven. But young Ninah is tempted by her prayer partner, James, and despite her self-mortification, finds herself pregnant. The book''s denouement will have you riveted. (SF)

&bul; Solo On Her Own Adventure, edited by Susan Fox Rogers. Seal Press, 1996. Solo presents 23 solo adventure stories of women who take you backpacking, hunting, skiing, boogie-boarding, mountaineering, driving cross-country, homesteading, mountain biking, and numerous other expeditions. Many stories thrill the reader with heart-thumping adventure, but others provoke contemplation through accounts of self-exploration. (Laura Waterman''s tale of ice-climbing solo after finding out her main climbing partner is lying comatose in a hospital with brain damage and a broken spine. Or Sharyn Layfield''s story of toiling days digging up boulders from a rock-bed in aims of planting her garden.) For those who think women belong in hiking boots and outside the kitchen, this book will keep you reading as much as any fiction page-turner. (DN)