In Paradise: A Novel by Peter Matthiessen. (Riverhead Books, 272 pp. $16 paper) Three weeks after 86-year-old Peter Matthiessen died on April 5, 2014, what he

The Bridal Chair: A Novel by Gloria Goldreich. (Sourcebooks Landmark, 496 pp. $14.99 paper) Thirty years ago, the world lost a great artist, Moishe Shagal, better

Although the family depicted in David Laskin’s impressively researched and absorbing narrative is his, it is compelling as both memoir and history. It recounts the