Image sharpness is one of photography's yin/yang propositions. Soft focus can impair a photograph, and just as readily enhance it-in some cases, greatly enhance it. What we perceive as blur, as soft zones in a picture, function in very much the same manner as deep shadows or overexposed highlights. By minimizing or concealing certain details in the image by selectively throwing areas out of focus at will, the photographer can direct a viewer's attention through the image as he or she intends. Like the rest stops in a piece of music, creatively manipulated zones of softness can totally govern.

In the spring of 1934, Hollywood faced what the Los Angeles Times called "the most serious crisis of its history." The film capital was under siege by censorship advocates who launched a boycott, demanding that the film industry enforce the Production Code it had adopted in 1930. For nearly five years, defiant producers had cited artistic freedom and flouted the Code, which forbade vulgarity, profanity, nudity, excessive violence, illegal drugs, adultery, "sex perversion," "white slavery," racial mingling, "lustful kissing," and suggestive dancing. In July 1934, the controversial films were outlawed. Today they are called "pre-Code." Sin in Soft Focus showcases a scintillating era in film history and tells how filmmakers sidestepped the Code. Mark A. Vieira draws on extensive research, interviews, and correspondence in the Production Code Administration files to tell the engaging, suspenseful, and often humorous story of the struggle between Hollywood and its reformers, weaving history, politics, and film into a full-blooded narrative. Illustrated with 275 film stills, many of them rare, the book captures the stunning visual artistry of the era.

With her hallmark blend of sparkling style and wit, intricate suspense, and steamy passion, Jayne Ann Krentz is truly one of a kind. One of today's premier storytellers, she has more than twenty-three million copies of her novels in print. Now the phenomenal New York Times bestselling author spins her latest scintillating tale: a story of two people bound together by that most binding of ties--a business contract. Elizabeth Cabot is all business. She knows how to maximize her investments and cut her losses--in both her career and her personal life. So when she discovers that Jack Fairfax has deceived her, she's determined to end their relationship. Putting a stop to their budding romance is easy. But breaking up their business deal will be more difficult. Despite all her efforts, she has no luck disentangling herself from Jack's client company, Excalibur. But the situation becomes even more strained when a new obstacle emerges: a lethal act of sabotage that could put both of them out of business for good. Elizabeth is no fool. If she can help Jack save Excalibur, she'll recoup her substantial investment plus millions in profit. Putting her emotions aside, she insists on helping him search for the scientist who's disappeared with a valuable new crystal that could revolutionize the high-tech industry. She'll go in, solve the problem--and get out. The trail leads Elizabeth and Jack to a fringe film festival, but their goal is as elusive as the shadowy black-and-white images from classic noir films. Life starts to imitate art, and double-dealing seems to be the name of the game. For these business adversaries turned reluctant partners, keeping an eye on each other--and the lid on a sizzling attraction--seems the only insurance against further treachery. But with millions at stake, trust can turn to betrayal in the blink of an eye.

Poetry. Women's Studies. Light is louche and love is not a natural beauty in Sarah Jean Grimm's disarming and ethereal debut collection of poetry. SOFT FOCUS glares at subjects like internet culture, bodies, beauty products, and American exceptionalism, laying their contents bare. Grimm's poems lift the veil of femininity and the result is brilliant and raw. A true journey through the psychic landscape of today's fixations and phobias. "The speaker of the poems in SOFT FOCUS admires then recoils, looks at you then looks away, flickers on then off--all in an effort to understand and harness her own power. Sometimes that power comes from her body, sometimes it comes from performance, and sometimes it comes simply from defining what she wants, even when it's unattainable. I love the lens Sarah Jean Grimm sees her world through."--Chelsea Hodson