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ENTERTAINMENTOne of this summer’s biggest cinematic events, Oppenheimer, brings the story of US scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer to the big screen.One of this summer’s biggest cinematic events, Oppenheimer, brings the story of US scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer to the big screen. Director Christopher Nolan’s film is the latest of many portrayals of the so-called “father of the atomic bomb” on page, stage and screen. Here are six of the most intriguing. 1. The Man Who Would Be God by Haakon Chevalier (1959) This novel is particularly fascinating in that it was written by a friend of Oppenheimer, who played a role in his downfall. In winter 1942-43, Chevalier sounded out Oppenheimer’s stance on passing secrets to the Soviet Union. Oppenheimer’s delay in reporting this conversation to US security services and inconsistencies in his testimony about it, were key – along with his opposition to the hydrogen bomb...

Each month, Boris Kachka offers nonfiction and fiction book recommendations. You should read as many of them as possible.One Man Against the World: The Tragedy of Richard Nixon, by Tim Weiner (Henry Holt, July 21)Using recently declassified tapes and documents, the author of the award-winning CIA exposé Legacy of Ashes buries any dying hope Nixon might have had of rising from the ranks of America’s worst presidents. Even Tricky Dick’s accomplishments are diminished to nothing — or worse — in the full context of his power grabs, secret plots, and cynical political ploys. Bigoted, paranoid, drunk, and dangerous, Nixon was hardly unique in the world, but the fact that he ran the country makes this far more than a personal indictment; the tragedy of the title is ours. Speak, by Louisa Hall (Ecco, July 7)The structure of Hall’s second novel — six narratives scattered across four centuries, from a...