PARIS, Oct 13, 2007 (AFP) - One of the two most wanted Nazi war criminals still at large, former death camp doctor Aribert Heim, was in fact hunted down and assassinated in 1982, a book to be published next week claims.

Author Danny Baz, a former Israeli air force colonel, provides no proof for his assertion in the book, written in French and entitled 'Ni oubli, ni pardon. Au coeur de la traque du dernier nazi' ('Not forgotten or forgiven -- on the trail of the last Nazi.')

A leading French Nazi-hunter called the book 'total fantasy' on Saturday.

ROME, Oct 11, 2007 (AFP) - Italy's presidency spends four times more than Buckingham Palace and senators retire at age 42: the country's summer best-seller is neither a thriller nor a love-story but an angry tirade against the Italian political class.

With more than a million copies sold, almost unheard of for non-fiction, 'The Caste', written by two journalists from the leading daily Corriere della Sera, remains on the best-seller lists more than five months after its publication.

ROME, Oct 9, 2007 (AFP) - The best-selling Sicilian writer Andrea Camilleri has based his latest book, published Wednesday, on the hand-written notes with which top Mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano communicated during his 43 years on the run.

It is the first time that Camilleri, one of Italy's most popular authors for his detective creation Montalbano, has delved into the world of the Mafia.

The title of the book is 'You Don't Know: Friends, enemies, the Mafia -- the world of the 'pizzini' of Bernardo Provenzano'.

LOS ANGELES, Oct 5, 2007 (AFP) - The release of the film 'The Kite Runner,' which chronicles the lives of two children in war-wracked Afghanistan, has been delayed by six weeks due to concerns over its young Afghan stars' safety.

Paramount Vantage studio announced Friday that the film, based on the best-selling book by the same name, would hit theaters after Afghanistan's school year at the request of the two actors' school principal.

PARIS, Oct 3, 2007 (AFP) - When Isabelle Dinoire received the world's first face transplant two years ago, doctors warned she might never be able to kiss again.

Now the 40-year-old Frenchwoman can eat, speak and smile normally, according to 'Isabelle's Kiss,' a book on her odyssey released this week.

But the surgeons who conducted the pioneering operation to replace her mouth, nose and chin, warned Dinoire the transformation only would be truly complete when she managed to pull her facial muscles into the shape of a kiss.

WARSAW, Oct 2, 2007 (AFP) - Lech Walesa, the former Solidarity union leader who became Poland's first post-communist president, hit back at the country's current leaders, the Kaczynski twins in a book released Tuesday.

The publication of Walesa's 'My Third Republic' comes amid a tense election campaign in which the conservative Kaczynskis -- Lech, Poland's president, and Jaroslaw, the prime minister -- have revived previous attacks against the alleged failings of their predecessors.

Walesa said it was time to hit back.

PARIS, Oct 1, 2007 (AFP) - France's top-selling spy writer has some trenchant advice for Western forces fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan: get out while you can.

'The Taliban have perfected a system,' says Gerard de Villiers. 'They launch an attack from a village, the allies send in the planes, and inevitably there's a big civilian body-count. Then the Taliban come back for the orphans -- and train them up to be suicide-bombers.

LONDON, Sept 30, 2007 (AFP) - Former British prime minister Tony Blair is 'extremely concerned' over the impact his wife's upcoming book will have on his relationship with his successor Gordon Brown, The Sunday Telegraph reported.

Cherie Blair's publisher said earlier this month that she had struck a deal to publish 'a warm, intimate and often very funny portrait of a family living in extraordinary circumstances.'

HAVANA, Sept 27, 2007 (AFP) - A book on Ernesto 'Che' Guevara's home life written by his widow will be published in Cuba in March 2008, Cuban publishing officials said Thursday.

The book, titled 'Evocations,' was written by Aleida March, the 71 year-old widow of the iconic Argentine-born leftist revolutionary.

'I feel satisfied, and when my final cycle (in life) approaches, I would like to say like Che said: 'think about me every so often,'' March said in excerpts from the book shown on a government-run website.

PARIS, Sept 27, 2007 (AFP) - A retired top French diplomat is calling for a fresh inquest into the 1961 death in Congo of Swedish UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold, to examine evidence that his plane was shot down unintentionally by Belgian mercenaries.

Claude de Kemoularia, 85, who was Hammarskjold's close aide, recounts in a new book of memoirs how several years after the death he was approached by three Belgians who said they accidentally shot down the secretary-general's aircraft.

BAGHDAD, Sept 27, 2007 (AFP) - Sons are sometimes known to pursue the dreams of their fathers, but in an unlikely role reversal Darrell Griffin is risking his life in Iraq to try and fulfil those of his son.

The chartered accountant is touring with the US military to write the book that his son, Darrell Griffin Jr, planned to pen before he was killed in action.

'My son felt strongly about the war regardless of whether we should be here or not,' said Griffin.

MELBOURNE, Sept 25, 2007 (AFP) - As a five-year-old, Alex Kurzem watched Nazi soldiers slaughter members of his Jewish family in 1941, little realising that he would spend the rest of World War II acting as a child mascot for the Latvian SS.

Forced to hide his Jewish background from the terrifying stormtroopers who became his protectors, Kurzem told no one of his wartime experiences for more than 50 years before finally unburdening himself to his son.

NEW DELHI, Sept 21, 2007 (AFP) - Indian police on Friday charged a former top official from the country's external intelligence agency for allegedly disclosing state secrets in a book he wrote after retirement, officials said.

Federal detectives from the Central Bureau of Investigation also raided the home of V.K. Singh after slapping him with charges under India's tough Official Secrets Act, which would carry a minimum prison term of seven years.

NEW DELHI, Sept 21, 2007 (AFP) - Indian police on Friday charged a former top official from the country's external intelligence agency for allegedly disclosing state secrets in a book he wrote after retirement, officials said.

Federal detectives from the Central Bureau of Investigation also raided the home of V.K. Singh after slapping him with charges under India's tough Official Secrets Act, which would carry a minimum prison term of seven years.

LONDON, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - Cherie Blair, the wife of former British prime minister Tony Blair, has struck a deal to publish 'a warm, intimate' and funny memoir of her family's life in politics, her publisher said Wednesday.

Cherie Blair, who uses her maiden name Booth in her career as a human rights lawyer, will see her memoir hit the shelves in October 2008, said publishing house Little, Brown.

PARIS, Sept 14, 2007 (AFP) - French Muslim women wishing to keep in shape during this year's Ramadan can turn for advice to the country's first ever Ramadan diet book.

'If people are not careful, the Ramadan fast can trigger all kinds of health and weight problems,' writes Alain Delabos in 'Chrononutrition Ramadan'.

'If you wolf down highly nutritional food just before going to bed, you are going to get fat. Because when you are resting, your body is storing it up,' he says.

NEW YORK, Sept 5, 2007 (AFP) - Former president Bill Clinton has unveiled a new book on global charity and launched a promotional tour on which he can quietly and regularly sing the praises of his wife, Hillary Clinton, who is seeking to become the first woman US president.

Bill Clinton, who would be the first US 'First Gentleman,' or male presidential spouse, is widely considered more charismatic and a better campaigner than his wife.

He has been careful not to overshadow her trailblazing White House bid, though he is considered a huge campaign asset.

CAMBRIDGE, England, Sept 3, 2007 (AFP) - British astrophysicist Stephen Hawking revealed his desire on Monday to make 'real science as exciting as science fiction' as he publicised a new book for children about the cosmos.

'It is easier to explain things to children because they have open minds and are eager to learn,' he told reporters at the prestigious Cambridge University, where he is a professor.

WASHINGTON, Sept 2, 2007 (AFP) - In her two years as secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice has had limited success in her efforts to fix the US diplomatic setbacks she helped create during President George W. Bush's first term, says a new book on the chief US diplomat.

As Bush's national security advisor during his first term, Rice was at the center of decisions that she has struggled to mend since becoming secretary of state in January 2005, journalist Glenn Kessler writes in 'The Confidante.'

PARIS, Aug 23, 2007 (AFP) - A much-awaited book on Nicolas Sarkozy by one of France's most famous playwrights, Yasmina Reza, goes on sale Friday, offering an up-close and personal view of the new French president.

Reza followed Sarkozy on the campaign trail for a year leading up to his election in May, notebook in hand to jot down his musings about power and politics, the men and women on his team and life in general.

Entitled 'L'aube le soir ou la nuit' (Dawn, Evening or Night), the 185-page book describes Sarkozy as an intense man 'who never stops stirring up life.'

LONDON, Aug 16, 2007 (AFP) - Tony Blair has recruited an American lawyer and put him in charge of brokering a deal for his memoirs, sources close to the former prime minister told Britain's domestic Press Association Thursday.

The lawyer, Robert Barnett, previously negotiated a 12-million-dollar (8.9-million-euro) deal for ex-US president Bill Clinton's autobiography, 'My Life'.

Publishing insiders estimate that an autobiography by Blair, who left Downing Street on June 27 after 10 years in office, would fetch a similar amount.

LONDON, Aug 10, 2007 (AFP) - The brother of the late princess Diana revealed on Thursday that he has considered writing a biography about his sister, in the run-up to the 10-year anniversary of her death.

Speaking to the BBC, Spencer said that he thought many of the books chronicling the divorced royal's life were 'very inaccurate' and thought that a good historian needed to confront the subject.