BOOK

David R. Dow, The Autobiography of an Execution (Twelve, $24.99). An astonishingly well-written memoir by Texas’ best-known death-row lawyer in which he describes the nuts and bolts of how his clients make their (usually inevitable) way to the grave. No matter how you feel about capital punishment–and especially if you support it, whether staunchly or uneasily–this book will bring you face to face with the arbitrary, often capricious way in which the death penalty really works. It’s the most sobering book that I read in 2010 (TT).