Latest DVDs, CDs, books: Jan. 31

A look at some of the DVDs, CDs and books hitting stores this week.

DVDS

"Drive" (R): Stuntman by day, wheelman by night, a loner (Ryan Gosling) rides to the rescue of a winsome neighbor (Carey Mulligan) and her son, becoming embroiled with unsavory types (including an Oscar-caliber Albert Brooks) in a stylish, noir-tinged thriller.

Other thrillers dominate today's DVD list. The futuristic one, "In Time" (PG-13), casts Justin Timberlake as a frequently shirtless fugitive in a dystopian world where everyone stops aging at 25. The spooky one, "Dream House" (PG-13), follows a New York couple (Daniel Craig, Rachel Weisz) to a New England abode, the site of a brutal murder that comes back to haunt them -- and their young daughters. The creature-feature one, "The Thing" (R), takes a paleontologist (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) and a scientist (Ulrich Thomsen) to Antarctica, where they detect something -- or some thing -- under the ice. And the fact-based one, "Texas Killing Fields" (R), finds a small-town detective (Sam Worthington) and his partner (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), a New York City transplant, on the trail of a sadistic serial killer. After all that, a comedy seems especially welcome, even if it's the big-screen bomb "The Big Year" (PG), in which a retiring executive (Steve Martin) and a divorced cubicle dweller (Jack Black) team up to try to dethrone the cutthroat reigning champ (Owen Wilson) in a prestigious competition to spot North America's rarest birds .

CDS

Leonard Cohen, "Old Ideas": This is perhaps the only way the great Leonard Cohen could ever grow "Old."

Seriously, who could ever tire of hearing from a man whose voice is practically delivered from up on high?

This is Cohen's first new album in eight years, following a highly successful two-year tour that seems to have rejuvenated the once reclusive singer-songwriter.

Plenty of the songs here are sad, but still, it's hard not to be happy in the presence of Cohen's return.

Also in stores: Authority Zero, "Less Rhythm More Booze"; Lana Del Rey, "Born to Die"; Candy Dulfer, "Crazy"; The Fresh Beat Band, "The Fresh Beat Band: Music From the Hit TV Show"; Imperial Teen, "Feel the Sound"; The Internet, "Purple Naked Ladies"; One Model Nation, "Total Werks Vol. 1 (1969-1977)"; and Ringo Starr, "Ringo 2012."

BOOKS

"Home Front" by Kristin Hannah: Michael and Jolene Zarkades already have a troubled marriage, but when Jolene, a soldier, is deployed and defense attorney Michael faces being a single parent to their children, they'll both find themselves fighting for their family.

In teen fiction, author P.C. Cast explores the past of the House of Night's powerful horse mistress in "Lenobia's Vow: A House of Night Novella."

Also hitting shelves this week: "Black Site" by Dalton Fury; "The Boy on Cinnamon Street" by Phoebe Stone; "Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010" by Charles Murray; "Defending Jacob" by William Landay; "The Fear Index" by Robert Harris; "How to Be Black" by Baratunde Thurston; "Incarnate" by Jodi Meadows; "Midnight in Austenland" by Shannon Hale; "Nixon's Darkest Secrets: The Inside Story of America's Most Troubled President" by Don Fulsom; "A Single Roll of the Dice: Obama's Diplomacy with Iran" by Trita Parsi; and "Wings of the Wicked" by Courtney Allison Moulton.