We love books here at the Editorial Department...even the ones we weren't personally involved with. However, with dozens of newspapers, magazines and websites covering new releases, it can be difficult to keep track of what people are saying about books newly on shelves. To try to resolve that dilemma, we offer our Tuesday Review Wrapup, using the last sentences of prominent book reviews as literary tea leaves to discern the trends guiding our industry. This week, we're looking at Julie Powell's followup to her Julia Child experience, Cleaving.

•  "Part of Julie & Julia's strength was the way in which Child, through her book, absorbed Powell in a subject larger and more interesting than the mundanity of her own life. In Cleaving, almost nothing, be it a hulking cow carcass or a trip to Africa, can wrench Powell's gaze away from herself. Any butcher knows that a dissection calls for a good, sharp knife. The instrument Powell's wielding is depressingly dull. She saws and hacks away, leaving us with a bloody mess."  - Village Voice

•  "No doubt Powell has been as honest as she knows how to be, but she's an unreliable narrator, vain and self-pitying by turns, and lacking necessary perspective. Yes, she can be fearless and provocative, but "Cleaving" -- which has a third meaning: to penetrate -- wants to be wise, as well. Unfortunately, at the end of this book, Powell seems not much closer to piercing insight about anybody's heart, her own least of all."  - Los Angeles Times

•  "This isn't a light read. But if you can sit with some discomfort, you might come to the conclusion, as I did, that for all its charm, "Julie and Julia" was a dessert souffle. Here we have something richer and more satisfying: canvas enough for complexity, for Julie Powell to write about the world she's "managed to crack open for [herself], like a bone saw exposing the marrow."  - Cleveland Plain Dealer

•  "Why did she learn to be a butcher? Performing the job seems to give her a strange sort of pleasure, and it is not unrelated to her genuine culinary passions. But one has to wonder. Her debut book was authentic and disarmingly honest, and it originated in a task that she had assigned herself: Spend a year cooking Julia Child's recipes. "Cleaving" often feels forced, like a chore performed to please an agent, a publisher and maybe a movie studio. Ms. Powell is a wonderful prose writer—here's hoping that her next project makes better use of her skills."  - Wall Street Journal

•  "Like the best elements of the blogosphere, "Cleaving" gives readers an almost tactile sense of its author's vulnerabilities: Powell acknowledges right away that she is "familiar with the landscape of addiction.""Cleaving" also offer less resolution than some readers will want. But Powell's steadfast femininity and confident voice are refreshing." - San Francisco Chronicle