FOR YOUR DESK

The Toothpick: Technology and Culture By Henry Petroski (Knopf, $27.95) This is at once a volume about cultural evolution and commercial acumen. Petroski (The Pencil) looks back at the prehistoric origins of the toothpick; how it became both legend (Emperor Nero apparently fancied silver toothpicks) and a cause of death (author Sherwood Anderson perished after ingesting a toothpick at a party); and the eventual mass production of this culinary accessory. Responsibility for the latter falls on Charles Forster, a Maine manufacturer who in the mid- 1900s devised machines capable of whittling huge tree chunks into convenient dental picks. To stimulate demand, Forster hired Harvard students to dine in restaurants, then insist on being given toothpicks. Before long, Forster's picks were as ubiquitous as saltshakers.

FOR YOUR NIGHTSTAND

Blonde Faith ByWalterMosley (Little, Brown, $25.99) Boosted to widespread renown in the 1990s as one of President Bill Clinton's favorite authors, Mosley has claimed a fecund fictional territory in post- World War II Los Angeles, where his reluctant sleuth, Ezekiel "Easy" Rawlins, struggles with racial animosities and endeavors to keep those he loves from harm. That latter task presents the greatest challenges in this 10th installment of the Rawlins series. Not only is Easy losing the love of his life, Bonnie Shay, to anotherman, but his most casually homicidal crony, Raymond "Mouse" Alexander, is missing and wanted for killing a father of 12. Meanwhile, an ex-Marine compadre has dumped his daughter on Easy's doorstep ? a sure sign that her father is already dead, or soon will be. Raymond Chandler created the bones of L.A. detective fiction; Mosley helps give it flesh and blood, and surprising hope.

Exit Ghost By Philip Roth (HoughtonMifflin, $26) It's been 28 years since he first appeared in The Ghost Writer, and now Roth's alter ego, Nathan Zuckerman, looks to be making his final bow. Now 71, he is coaxed off his New England mountain by a young couple who swap their Manhattan abode for his home (and, in the process, kick-start his lustful urges). Zuckerman reconnects in the city with a woman who'd played muse to his earliest literary hero, E.I. Lonoff, and must deal with Lonoff's would-be biographer, who will do almost anything to discover his subject's "great secret." Naturally, all the feelings of love, hate and anger Zuckerman thought he had left behind come flooding back, threatening to overwhelm Roth's protagonist ... but guaranteeing a fine ride for Zuckerman fans.

I Am America (And So Can You!) By Stephen Colbert (Grand Central Publishing, $26.99) Colbert, the pseudo-right-wing host of Comedy Central's The Colbert Report, turns his satirical eye toward subjects as diverse as sex and religion, courage and hygiene, "why the elderly should be harnessed to millstones" and "why America has lost its balls" (and desperately needs them back). Colbert calls I Am America "a simple book from a simple mind," but it's actually a compendiumof outrageous opinions that eviscerate knee-jerk traditions and societal bigotry with the same devious deliberation that Colbert used in skewering George W. Bush during last year's White House Correspondents' Dinner. Hey, if you can't laugh at politics, what can you laugh at?

 Alice: Alice Roosevelt Longworth, FromWhite House Princess to Washington Power Broker By Stacy A. Cordery (Viking, $32.95) An assiduous rule breaker known for speaking her mind, Alice Longworth, the oldest child of President Theodore Roosevelt, turned a desire for her father's attention into a determination to influence politicians for most of the 20th century. She wed a Republican congressman from Ohio, who went on to become Speaker of the House and cheat on their marriage (as Alice eventually cheated on him); underminedWoodrowWilson's League of Nations and denounced Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal (but later ditched the GOP to vote for John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson); and encouraged Richard Nixon's second bid for the presidency. An inveterate gossip, Alice Longworth was famous for the adage, "If you haven't anything nice to say, come sit by me." Cordery captures her in all her defiant finery.