Later, as Asia's troubles threw this Pacific-coast province into recession, the government launched grand schemes to create forestry jobs, save lumber-mill towns, attract new aluminium smelters, build infrastructure and create a new high-speed ferry industry.

ECONOMIST: Canada

His book is an engaging reminder that, cyber-Utopianism aside, the internet is as much a thing of flesh and steel as any industrial-age lumber mill or factory.

ECONOMIST: How the internet works

His mother worked as a retail clerk and a waitress, and his father, who had ridden the rails during the Dust Bowl days, was a saw filer in a lumber mill, a storyteller, a depressive, and a blackout drunk, who died at fifty-three.

NEWYORKER: Rough Crossings