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in the spotlight (she contended with
anorexia); and the trauma that came after
her dance partner dropped her during a
rehearsal, an accident that resulted in a
fractured spine. The book’s second half—
about the author trying to find a new
calling after injury and rehab—is less
gripping. Whittet discusses going to
graduate school for writing, seeing a
therapist to help her get over a fear of
snakes, and falling in love with her hus-
band. Those looking for a memoir about
ballet may feel short changed, as much of
this book is not about dancing but rejecting
the role of a “quiet, acquiescent ballerina”
who claims a “new voice” as a writer.
While Whittet’s memoir doesn’t fully
satisfy, it certainly entices. (Apr.)★ The Back Roads to March:
The Unsung, Unheralded, and
Unknown Heroes of a College
Basketball Season
John Feinstein. Doubleday, $28.95 (416p)
ISBN 978-0-385-54448-1
Sportswriter Feinstein (A Season on the
Brink) takes a look at lesser-known college
basketball teams in this fascinating history.
In order to explore the “real joys of college
basketball,” Feinstein eschews the big
money and future NBA stars of cele-
brated universities to focus on the sheer
love of the
game that
characterizes
smaller schools,
covering the
2018 basketball
season from
November to
the March
playoffs. He
describes his
travels in vivid
detail, showing readers the smaller arenas
and atmospheres where the schools play,
as in his description of University of
Maryland–Baltimore County’s 90–85,
double-overtime victory over Hartford in
the America East tournament, a game
“Very few people around the country would
even notice” but that “for those who were
there, it was a night to be remembered and
savored for a long, long time.” Most memo-
rable, though, is Feinstein’s eye and ear for
the little-known coaches who aren’t fending
off NBA offers, such as Rick Byrd, who hadof sources in the U.S. and the Middle East.
Espionage fans will savor this detailed and
immersive account. (Apr.)Sing Backwards and Weep:
A Memoir
Mark Lanegan. Da Capo, $28 (352p)
ISBN 978-0-306-92280-0
This overwrought debut memoir from
the frontman of the proto-grunge band
Screaming Trees is packed with rage, guilt,
and the seamy details of a life nearly flushed
down the drain. Hating his dead-end
upbringing in a Washington logging town,
Lanegan became a high school alcoholic
with a rock-star attitude who cared only
about baseball, punk rock, and “getting
loaded and laid.” His band Screaming
Trees gained some success in the Pacific
Northwest scene of the late 1980s, gar-
nering accolades from Lanegan’s friends
(Kurt Cobain among them), and scoring
success with singles including “Nearly
Lost You” as the grunge scene exploded.
Nevertheless, Lanegan hated being in the
band—calling the group “sick, violent,
depressing, destructive, and dangerous.”
After a few years clean he fell into a spiral
of drinking, drug use, and violence. Even
while Lanegan’s raspy, soulful, Tom
Waits–like solo output, as in Whiskey for
the Holy Ghost, racked up acclaim, he was
too busy shooting up, he writes, to enjoy
it, and by the mid-1990s, he was dealing
heroin and crack to support his growing
habits. This dark and engaging epic of
destruction is at times undone by Lanegan’s
obnoxious cockiness, yet it does serve as a
raw look at the grunge music scene.
Lanegan’s fans will wince and delight in
this gritty narrative. (Apr.)What You Become in Flight:
A Memoir
Ellen O’Connell Whittet. Melville House, $17.99
trade paper (240p) ISBN 978-1-61219-832-3
In this somber debut memoir, former
ballet dancer Whittet reflects on her days
as a young ballerina in California, the
spinal injury that snuffed out her career
prospects at 19, and her new life as a writer.
Ballet had consumed Whittet from child-
hood: “As soon as I was walking I was
dancing,” she writes. The book’s first half
details her rigorous classical dance training;
the pain she routinely battled from sprains
and tears; the psychological toll of beinggolden-age Hollywood as less an “extended
family,” as described by one of her peers,
than as a “big extended factory.” John
Lennon, just three days before his murder,
tells Cott about the pitfalls of fame and
myriad failings of music critics. Cott sets
the scene for his 1973 interview with
Henry Miller by describing the author’s
hilarious bathroom, featuring statues of
Buddha, a portrait of Hermann Hesse,
and pornography. Cott’s interviews are
notable for their famous subjects, but also
for his remarkable skill and ingenuity; he’s
clearly researched each interviewee
exhaustively and knows just what to ask.
The author’s rare conversational gift ele-
vates this collection to must-read status for
fans of any of Cott’s subjects. Agent: Michael
Mungiello, InkWell Management (Apr.)
No Shadows in the Desert:
Murder, Vengeance, and
Espionage in the War Against ISIS
Samuel M. Katz. Hanover Square, $27.99
(304p) ISBN 978-1-335-01383-5
Middle East security expert Katz (The
Ghost Warrior) delivers a dramatic account
of the secret mission by U.S. and Jordanian
intelligence agents to avenge the “capture,
torture, and immolation” of Royal
Jordanian Air Force pilot Moaz al-Kasasbeh
by ISIS fighters in Syria. After the engine
in Moaz’s plane caught fire on Dec. 24,
2014, he parachuted into the Euphrates
River near Raqqa and was captured. He
was likely killed on January 3, though
ISIS maintained that he was alive until
February, when they released horrific video
footage of his death. According to Katz,
ISIS spokesman Abu Mohammed al-
Adnani (who is believed to have partici-
pated in the killing) hoped to break
Jordan’s resolve to be part of the interna-
tional coalition fighting against the
Caliphate; instead, the video had the
opposite effect. Katz chronicles the mul-
tinational effort—led by the GID,
Jordan’s intelligence agency—to locate
the five terrorists responsible for Moaz’s
death and design and implement missions
to execute them. Against the backdrop of
this spy tale, Katz briskly untangles the
history of the Syrian civil war and the
campaign against ISIS. Though Katz’s
staccato prose can be clunky, he packs a
wealth of information into the book and
skillfully draws on an extensive network