LETTERS AT 3 AM: Reports on Endarkment...

LETTERS AT 3 AM: Reports on Endarkment by Michael Ventura (Spring: $16.50; 247 pp., paperback original). Ventura offers his reflections on life in contemporary America in these intelligent, often provocative essays from the L.A. Weekly. He looks beyond the superficial vulgarity of Las Vegas to examine its underlying ethos, and rails at the willingness of American voters to accept censored and even falsified government reports during the Gulf War. But Ventura is at his best when he grapples with the qualities that distinguish life in Los Angeles. He contemplates the sprawling city with anger, delight, despair and impatience, concluding, “Its suffering is real enough, God knows. But its beauty is the beauty of letting go: letting go of where you came from; letting go of old lessons; letting go of what you want for what you are, or what you are for what you want; letting go of so much and that is a hard beauty to love.”