Interestingly, the NY Times over a year ago decided to not to waste any more valuable space on such high-falutin heady stuff as fiction in its coverage of literature. This, uh, feuilleton tells you more:

Well, if you write non-fiction, review non-fiction, or prefer to read non-fiction, break out the champagne. "The most compelling ideas tend to be in the non-fiction world," Keller says. "Because we are a newspaper, we should be more skewed toward non-fiction." [...]
What's more, if you're perplexed or simply bored with what passes for smart fiction these days, the Times feels your pain. More attention will be paid to the potboilers, we're told. After all, says Keller, somebody's got to tell you what book to choose at the airport.

So that's what things like The New York Times Book Review are for. Sort of a Consumer's Guide. After all, you might go and buy the less trashy of several trashy novels when you're finally forced to do some reading—stuck in the airport, or the toilet.

Savour it again! "The most compelling ideas tend to be in the non-fiction world." This from someone who I presume attended school at some point in order to reach his current position.