Leisure reading

'Gone'

By Jonathan Kellerman

Ballantine, $26.95.

This Alex Delaware novel uses the brain power of that criminal psychologist, along with detective Milo Sturgis, to try to outmaneuver a serial killer.

Dylan Meserve and Michaela Brand, young lovers and fellow students, are abducted and subjected to a harrowing ordeal — but forensic experts soon conclude the carjacking was a hoax. The students are then charged with murder themselves. Then, suddenly, Michaela is murdered and Dylan disappears.

While police concentrate their efforts on apprehending Dylan, other killings are discovered. The crimes test the wits of the psychologist and the detective as they step up their work in an effort to ward off future murders.

This is a suspenseful novel with an intellectual edge. — Dennis Lythgoe

'Who Controls the Internet?'

By Jack Goldsmith and Tim Wu

Oxford, $28.

The authors, experienced Internet analysts, tell the provocative story of the Internet's challenge to governmental rule in the 1990s and its various battles with governments around the world.

They note that Google struggled with the French government and Yahoo capitulated to the Chinese regime. The European Union sets privacy standards on the Net for the entire world.

The authors include many interesting anecdotes. — Dennis Lythgoe

'The Disposable American'

By Louis Uchitelle

Knopf, $25.95.

This book, subtitled "Layoffs and Their Consequences," is written by Louis Uchitelle, a journalist and Columbia University scholar who has spent much time researching labor and economics.

The author argues that the number of layoffs in America in virtually all fields is accelerating at a dramatic rate.

According to Uchitelle, the rise of job security hit a peak in the 1950s and '60s, then made a stunning dive. He details specific skilled people who have been laid off and forced to take lower-level jobs they don't like, in spite of their unusual, needed experience.

Layoffs, he says, are counterproductive and do not promote efficiency or profitability.

The author suggests that the government must institute policies that restrict business layoffs — both for economic reasons and to protect the mental health of Americans. — Dennis Lythgoe