Stephen Budiansky’s new biography, ‘Oliver Wendell Holmes: A Life in War, Law, and Ideas,’ has new perspectives to offer but fails to excuse the more damning aspects of the famed jurist’s legacy.

Famed director and cinematographer Barry Sonnenfeld’s new memoir dishes the Hollywood dirt and recounts his terrible childhood, but it quickly devolves into an unpleasant assemblage of insults and score-settling.