A look at some noteworthy television this week: History Detectives (Monday, 8:00 p.m., WNET 13) The PBS show where a team of experts look into the history of the objects of ordinary people returns for another season. Shaq's Big Challenge (Tuesday, 9:00 p.m., WABC 7) Yet another fakeality show, this time with Shaquille O'Neal as the star of what can be best described as "The Biggest Looser, for Kids" or let's exploit some fat kids......

We had read about omelet soufflés but never tried one until last night, at Ouest where they serve it truffled, with mousseline sauce. And we finally understand the fascination… stunning on the plate, light as air yet intensely flavorful. They are made by separating the eggs, beating the whites until foamy, then folding in the yolks (and whatever other ingredients you choose to add). Then you bake the mixture until it rises and browns.......

THEATER: At the end of December 2003, with her daughter in an induced-coma brought on by septic shock from a fatal bout with pneumonia, Joan Didion’s husband John Gregory Dunne unexpectedly died during dinner. Her struggle to navigate the subsequent minefields of grief formed the basis for her best-selling memoir, The Year of Magical Thinking. She’s now adapted the book into a one-woman play of the same name, directed by David Hare and starring Vanessa......

MUSIC: Propect Park. TV on the Radio. Matt Pond PA. Voxtrot. Free. Need we say more? Bring a blanket. Friday // 6:30pm // Prospect Park Bandshell // Free READING: On of our favorite New Yorkers, Joan Didion, will be reading from her masterful book, The Year of Magical Thinking, tonight in Central Park. The book, which chronicles the year after Pulitzer-prize-winning Didion lost her husband John Gregory Dunne to a heart attack, was a taut,......

Garrison Keillor noted during his opening speech for last night's National Book Awards that this week is the opening of another Harry Potter film. He said, "Most of us have stood in Barnes & Noble and opened a Harry Potter book, read a few pages and said: 'I could have done that. I could have done that while doing all the other things that I do. Why didn't I?'" An always curmudgeonly and brilliant Norman......

Molly Jong-Fast, author, The Sex Doctors in the Basement...

Above: Don DeLillo, Joan Didion, Kurt Vonnegut, Salman Rushdie, Laurie Anderson. Involver (media and entertainment activist community) and PEN (national organization of writers) present State of Emergency: Unconventional Readings this Wednesday, August 4 at 7:00pm. An incredible lineup of literary legends convene to address contemporary political threats to freedom of expression. Scheduled to apprear: Laurie Anderson, Paul Auster, Russell Banks, Michael Cunningham, Don DeLillo, Joan Didion, Ariel Dorfman, Eve Ensler, Jonathan Safran Foer, Barbara......

Deborah Schoeneman, New York Magazine...