391 minute read
FUNNY YOU SHOULD ASK by Elissa Sussman
parlay his team’s success into bigger opportunities at the college level; however, the people of Blue Belle hope that if they tie him down in a happy relationship, he’ll never want to leave. Ronan convinces Nova that fake dating is the answer to both their situations: He’ll hire her as his personal assistant, which will solve her money problems, while her presence will forestall the aggressive matchmakers. The romance is charming and heartfelt. Ronan is afraid to love again after the heartbreaking losses of his past, while Nova believes that love makes all things possible. The lively cast of secondary characters faces problems that feel modern—why are high school teachers vaping in a closet to relieve stress? Why is social media from the rival team so infuriating?—which keeps the small-town setting interesting and fresh.
A sexy, fun romance from an author who always delivers.
and pursue the kind of writing she cares about is touching, too. From LA to New York to Gabe’s cozy hometown in Montana, Gabe and Chani’s love story is a delight to read.
A slow-burn romance full of passion, yearning, and behindthe-scenes Hollywood details.
FUNNY YOU SHOULD ASK
Sussman, Elissa Dell (352 pp.) $17.00 paper | April 12, 2022 978-0-593-35732-3
A journalist and a troubled movie star reconnect after a fateful interview 10 years ago. When journalist Chani Horowitz nabs an interview with actor Gabe Parker, she doesn’t know it’s going to be her big break. She’s jealous that her former MFA classmates are succeeding in the literary world while she’s writing celebrity puff pieces. Gabe may be her No. 1 celebrity crush and the next James Bond, but she doesn’t expect much—that is, until she meets him and they have an instant connection. The interview turns into an invitation to a movie premiere and a party at his house. Her piece on him goes viral, finally earning her fame and a steady career—but right after it comes out, Gabe marries his co-star, and Chani’s left feeling heartbroken and foolish. Ten years later, Chani has the kind of career she could’ve only dreamed about back then. People are clamoring for her next essay collection, but she can’t help feeling like she’s only successful because of Gabe and the fact that everyone wonders if she slept with him during their interview all those years ago. Now, she’s asked to reteam with him for another interview. They’ve both changed—Gabe is divorced and newly sober after nearly throwing away his whole career, and Chani is divorced and unsure about her writing. With 10 years of missteps, learning, and maturity behind them, could this be their chance for a filmworthy happily-ever-after? In her adult debut, Sussman creates a story that’s thrilling wish fulfillment with a dash of wistful melancholy. Chani’s conflict between getting a good story and getting to know Gabe is understandable, and Gabe feels like a real person even though he’s one of the biggest stars in the world. The conversations between Chani and Gabe sparkle with all the charm of The Philadelphia Story, the movie the two of them initially bond over. And although the romance is top-notch, Chani’s struggle to believe in herself
nonfiction
These titles earned the Kirkus Star:
LEVEL UP by Stacey Abrams & Lara Hodgson...................................41 WHERE THE CHILDREN TAKE US by Zain E. Asher......................44 LINEA NIGRA by Jazmina Barrera; trans. by Christina MacSweeney........................................................46 ALSO A POET by Ada Calhoun ..........................................................52
THE HANGMAN AND HIS WIFE by Nancy Dougherty; ed. by Christopher Lehmann-Haupt...................................................56 CALIFORNIA by John Mack Faragher ...............................................58
THE MAN WHO INVENTED MOTION PICTURES by Paul Fischer......................................................................................59 TWO HEADS by Uta Frith & Chris Frith & Alex Frith; illus. by Daniel Locke...........................................................................62 MY FOURTH TIME, WE DROWNED by Sally Hayden .....................65 READING THE WATER by Mark Hume........................................... 66 SOME OF MY BEST FRIENDS by Tajja Isen......................................67 EVERYTHING LEFT TO REMEMBER by Steph Jagger.......................67 I CRIED TO DREAM AGAIN by Sara Kruzan & Cori Thomas........ 68
TRANSLATING MYSELF AND OTHERS by Jhumpa Lahiri ...........69
THE NATION THAT NEVER WAS by Kermit Roosevelt III.............75 BECOMING STORY by Greg Sarris....................................................76 DESPERATE REMEDIES by Andrew Scull.........................................78 HELLO, MOLLY! by Molly Shannon....................................................79 THE BETRAYAL OF ANNE FRANK by Rosemary Sullivan............. 80 WHEN WOMEN KILL by Alia Trabucco Zerán; trans. by Sophie Hughes .......................................................................81 YOU’VE CHANGED by Pyae Moe Thet War ..................................... 82 A SPY IN PLAIN SIGHT by Lis Wiehl................................................83
LEVEL UP Rise Above the Hidden Forces Holding Your Business Back
Abrams, Stacey & Lara Hodgson with Heather Cabot Portfolio (240 pp.) $30.00 | Feb. 22, 2022 978-0-593-53982-8
A fresh take on entrepreneurial endeavors and a love letter to small busi-
nesses everywhere.
Entrepreneurship is not for everyone. But at a time when increasing numbers of workers are reconsidering where they fit in light of the “Great Resignation,” straight talk and advice from anyone who has “been there” is a welcome addition. Using the story of the three businesses that they ran—consulting, bottled water, fintech payment service—Abrams and her business partner, Hodgson, blend their personal narratives with hard facts and lessons to create an easily digestible how-to for running a business. Readers learn about such principles as the Three C’s of Growth (“Consumers + Commerce = Capital) and how that growth can be stymied by not having an adequate plan in place. The end of each chapter contains “Level Up Lessons,” which sum up the key findings and emphasize concepts the authors believe are particularly important, making the narrative accessible to any reader looking for business advice. The authors could have easily taken the safe route by simply sharing the story of how one thing led to another with their businesses or providing a straightforward, chronological account of their success. Instead, they dig deeper and offer candid exploration of nearly every aspect of their businesses, including good, bad, and occasionally devastating outcomes. Throughout, the authors open up in an appealing way, owning up to their mistakes, and they directly address many currently accepted principles that work against small-business owners—e.g., the difficulty gaining access to capital. They also show us how to manage unexpected changes in partnerships, which they navigated during Abrams’ political rise. “With Stacey’s responsibilities at the Capitol heating up,” writes Hodgson, “we approached this new phase of our partnership and personal goals with the same discipline and efficiency we always did. We had a frank discussion about how her expertise served the new company.”
A book packed with insight and inspiration from two successful entrepreneurs.
NONFICTION | Eric Liebetrau
college basketball’s GOAT coach
Leah Overstreet One of my most vivid sports memories ended in a loss. On March 29, 1999, during my freshman year at Duke, I sat in the upper rows of Cameron Indoor Stadium with a few thousand of my fellow students and watched on a giant screen what we thought was impossible: our beloved, seemingly unstoppable Blue Devils, 32-1 on the season, losing another game. This time, it was the national championship game, and Duke fell to Connecticut, 77-74. I attended every game that season, spending many sleepless nights in a sleeping bag outside the arena to get tickets, and while the end was an undeniable disappointment, I will always cherish those memories.
It’s remarkable to think that Mike Krzyzewski, already a legend of the coaching world by that time, would go on to lead the Duke team for another twoplus decades. He is now the winningest coach in NCAA history, with more than 1,100 victories to his name as well as five national championships, 12 Final Fours, and three national coach of the year awards. This season will be Coach K’s last, and I’m excited to watch yet another ubertalented squad compete for a national championship again. (In addition to the back-to-back titles in 1991 and 1992, they won it all in 2001, 2010, and 2015.) To prepare for Coach K’s final chapter, I recently devoured Ian O’Connor’s Coach K: The Rise and Reign of Mike Krzyzewski (Mariner Books, Feb. 22), which our starred review called a “sharpshooting account worthy of a champion.”
O’Connor, a New York Post columnist and longtime ESPN writer, creates a largely chronological, fully fleshed portrait of Krzyzewski (b. 1947): childhood and adolescence in a poor Polish American family in Chicago, where he fell in love with basketball; playing for, and then coaching under, Bobby Knight at Army; enduring angry fans and racist taunts during his first few tumultuous years at Duke; leading USA Basketball to three straight Olympic gold medals; flirting with NBA head coaching positions before eventually signing a lifetime contract at Duke; forging countless strong relationships with players, assistant coaches, administrators, and fans; and, most importantly, maintaining his fierce devotion to family, especially his wife, Mickie, who has been at his side for the entire ride.
This is not to say that Coach K is infallible; like anyone else, he has plenty of flaws. O’Connor, who in previous biographies got under the skin of two other giants of the sporting world, Derek Jeter and Bill Belichick, is highly attuned to the complexities of his subject’s character. As our critic noted, “the author doesn’t shy away from Krzyzewski’s shortcomings: A fiery competitor, he can be petty and temperamental and has difficulty apologizing; as a tactician, he’s not particularly innovative. O’Connor also probes the few occasions that the program has toed the line of impropriety and highlights how Coach K leverages every possible recruiting advantage (perhaps unfairly), such as getting NBA players like LeBron James to sing his praises. He also makes a powerful case for why Krzyzewski has achieved such immense success: He’s an extraordinary communicator and motivator, brilliant organizer, and tireless worker who prioritizes family and team above all else.”
As much as I love sports, I don’t always connect with sports biographies. Coach K is one of the better ones in recent years—and not just because the subject is one of my favorite sports figures of all time.
Eric Liebetrau is the nonfiction editor.
SUPERTALL How the World’s Tallest Buildings Are Reshaping Our Cities and Our Lives
Al, Stefan Norton (320 pp.) $30.00 | April 12, 2022 978-1-324-00641-1
An architect and urban designer reflects on the technological innovations that have enabled the construction of “supertalls” and on the advances in urbanism that help mitigate their environmental shortcomings.
Al, the author of The Strip: Las Vegas and the Architecture of the American Dream, is highly knowledgeable about his subject, even if he is conflicted. He claims that “tall buildings are an integral part of urban living for the future” but describes supertalls— skyscrapers that exceed 300 meters in height—as “gas-guzzling Hummers on steroids” and “makers of increased inequity and societal risk.” While shorter skyscrapers “have significant environmental benefits,” buildings like the Petronas Towers in Malaysia, One57 in New York City, the Shanghai Tower, and the Burj Khalifa in Dubai (the world’s tallest building) mostly create environmental costs and “alienate people from nature.” Ostensibly made necessary by urban densities that send land values soaring, supertalls only became feasible with technological advances in structural material (especially, high-performance concrete); building shapes that dampen sway and lessen the vortexes created by high winds; safer and faster elevators that ease vertical movement; and innovations in air conditioning that compensate for inoperable windows and expansive glass facades. Technology, Al proposes, is also the solution to the environmental and urban problems generated by supertalls. Green infrastructure, mass transit, passive solar design, and zoning that allows for mixed-use districts are just a few of his recommendations. Yet, further expressing his ambivalence, the author writes, “technological progress doesn’t always lead to human progress.” Consequently, when he announces that “we are witnessing another golden age…the era of ‘supertalls,’ ” some readers may be unconvinced. Although he addresses a wide array of topics, Al could have written more about the financial feasibility of supertalls, the architectural design challenges they pose, the experiences of users, and the impacts these buildings have on surrounding residential and office markets.
An informative introduction to supertalls and the global cities where they rise above the skyline.
THE DEEP LIMITLESS AIR A Memoir in Pieces
Allen, Mary Blue Light Press (200 pp.) $20.00 paper | May 10, 2022 978-1-4218-3715-4
A memoir of salient moments. In a narrative constructed as a collage of vignettes, writing coach Allen moves back and forth through time, capturing the elusive, onrushing past. Pain is a throughline, beginning when she was a child, fearful of her mentally ill mother. For many years, she lived with a foster family, sheltered from her mother’s rages. The “suppressed tornado of sadness and shame planted inside me by my mother, perhaps even partly belonging to my mother, her self-hatred transformed into my own through the alchemy of abuse,” she writes. Losses recur: Allen’s sister died of ALS; her mother, of ovarian cancer; her fiance committed suicide. The author chronicled his death
where the children take us
and her search for his “ghost, his spirit, whatever it was that was left of him,” in an earlier memoir, The Rooms of Heaven (1999). In 1991, Allen was working at the University of Iowa when a graduate student, angry because he believed he was being treated unjustly, killed five members of the physics department. Comparing the harrowing experience with how it was later understood by others, the author sees how “truth is subject to shape-shifting and misinterpretation.” Various therapies have alleviated some of Allen’s pain: A hypnotist helped her overcome her fear of flying; and eye movement desensitization and reprocessing therapy proved to be “one of the most magical, otherworldly things I’ve ever been exposed to.” Meditation, too, helped her find her “true self: fearless, steady, unassuming.” Allen pays homage to many friends, notably author William L. Shirer, whom she met when he was 82 and she 26 and working as an editorial assistant at Little, Brown. Though sadness pervades the text, Allen ends on a hopeful note: While on an airplane, “something inside me opens up and a wild sense of freedom rushes in, and I think, not for the first time, of how wide the world is, how full of possibilities.”
Quiet, touching reflections on loss, grief, and self-discovery.
WHERE THE CHILDREN TAKE US How One Family Achieved the Unimaginable
Asher, Zain E. Amistad/HarperCollins (224 pp.) $27.99 | April 26, 2022 978-0-06-304883-6
Homage to an indomitable woman and her remarkable journey. CNN anchor Asher makes her book debut with a vibrant memoir of her “tough-love” immigrant family, headed by her resolute mother—“breadwinner, nurturer, disciplinarian, cook, cleaner”—who instilled in her children a “succeed-at-all-costs” mentality. Obiajulu Ejiofor and her husband, Arinze, moved from Nigeria to London in the 1970s, having survived a brutal civil war and a two-year famine. While Arinze pursued a medical degree, Obiajulu enrolled in the pharmacy program at the University of London. When she
The Classroom of Life.
A book of tools to help overcome the obstacles and adversity of life.
by Dr. Anthony Cedolini
A fifty-year dream to help identify and understand the challenges and
vagaries faced on life’s journey. Everyone will experience pain, stress,
and worry. Every mile will require strategies in dealing with difficult
people, failed relationships, addictions, love, death, and the value of
mentors—the very essence of survival, leading to personal happiness.
This book is the classroom covering all these life experiences.
—Kirkus Reviews
Available at ISBN: 978-1-64184-647-9 (hardback) ISBN: 978-1-64184-648-6 (paperback)
Learn more about Dr. Anthony Cedolini at drtonycedolini.com
graduated, the couple obtained a loan to open their own pharmacy, a business that supported them and their children. In 1988, however, tragedy struck: While Arinze and their 11-year old son, Chiwetel, were visiting Nigeria, they were involved in a horrific automobile accident; Arinze was killed and Chiwetel, severely injured. As an immigrant in South London, with three children and pregnant with a fourth, Obiajulu faced a daunting future. But despite her grief, she made an unwavering commitment to raise her children to become “ambitious, talented, and disciplined.” Chiwetel is an Oscar-nominated actor; the author’s sister is a physician; another brother is a successful businessman. For Obiajulu, education was paramount. To make sure her children were well prepared for their assignments, Obiajulu devoted every evening to study sessions, and she gave the children reading lists and quizzed them on their comprehension. When 9-year-old Asher seemed to be floundering, her mother sent her back to Nigeria for two years, where children showed adults “unquestioned obedience.” She hung photos of famous Nigerians around the house to serve as role models. When the children were distracted by TV, she sliced the cable. To keep them from wasting time on phone calls with friends, she installed a pay phone. Refusing to be undermined by poverty and racism, Obiajulu, writes the author, “fought with every fiber of her being for her family.” Asher delivers a well-written chronicle of absolute determination and familial devotion.
A wholly inspiring portrait of an extraordinary immigrant family.
LINCOLN AND THE FIGHT FOR PEACE
Avlon, John Simon & Schuster (384 pp.) $30.00 | Feb. 15, 2022 978-1-982108-12-0
A solid exploration of Lincoln’s clear intention to create a firm peace after the Civil War. By April 4, 1865, as the president toured the fallen Confederate capital of Richmond, after four years of political, military, and personal crisis, he had a vision for a lasting, nonpunitive peace. “In this twilight between war and peace, the outcome was certain, but the terms were not yet determined,” writes CNN anchor and senior political analyst Avlon. “Lincoln repeated his three ‘indispensable conditions’ for peace: no ceasefire before surrender, the restoration of the Union, and the end of slavery for all time. Everything else was negotiable.” Having just been confidently reelected, Lincoln knew his mission was to turn quickly from war to peace and secure the reattachment of the former Rebel states to the newly affirmed union. The author traces the evolution of Lincoln’s pioneering vision of reconciliation and reconstruction. “Working without a historic parallel to guide him,” writes Avlon, “Lincoln established a new model of leadership.” First and foremost, he insisted on unconditional surrender, followed by the establishment of the rule of law. He sought to rededicate the South to representative democracy and then move the country’s focus to the great Western expanse. The author points out how Ulysses S. Grant’s famously generous terms of surrender to Robert E. Lee at Appomattox were a direct expression of Lincoln’s wishes. Avlon also shows how the president, who was honest, pious, humble, and fond of speaking in parables, modeled his concept of peace on the golden rule. His focus sharpened in the last six weeks of his life, a period that the author examines in fascinating detail. Tough-minded but tender-hearted, Lincoln created a blueprint that has been used in a variety of scenarios since, from the Marshall Plan to the political reconciliation effected in South Africa after the defeat of apartheid.
A rich, readable historical study of Lincoln’s thinking, which remains timely.
linea nigra
LINEA NIGRA An Essay on Pregnancy & Earthquakes
Barrera, Jazmina Trans. by Christina MacSweeney Two Lines Press (184 pp.) $21.95 | May 3, 2022 978-1-949641-30-1
A Mexican writer describes her pregnancy and the first months of her son’s life. When Barrera first found out she was pregnant with her son, Silvestre, her husband suggested that she keep a pregnancy diary. Although she thought the idea of a pregnancy diary was “a little hackneyed,” she admitted that she was writing about her experience, albeit mostly in fragments. As she was adjusting to her changing body, Barrera and her family lived through an earthquake that destroyed the home of the patron who owned a collection of Barrera’s mother’s paintings. The author intertwines her experiences of pregnancy and motherhood—from labor and delivery to breastfeeding to discovering her doctor’s dishonesty—with a catalog of the condition of her mother’s paintings. Throughout the narrative, Barrera includes historical anecdotes and quotes from other women who have written about motherhood, childbirth, and pregnancy—from Mary Shelley and Natalia Ginzburg to Rivka Galchen and Maggie Nelson—and she argues that pregnancy is a fundamentally literary experience. “Pregnancy is transformation in time, it’s a retrospective account and—whether you like it not—there’s a plot, a story,” she writes. At the same time, she laments the fact that women are warned that having children signals the end of their literary careers. Here, she quotes Ursula K. Le Guin: Women “have been told that they ought not to try to be both a mother and a writer because both the kids and the books will pay—because it can’t be done—because it is unnatural.” The story ends in the early months of Silvestre’s life, which coincided with her mother’s treatment for ovarian cancer; this leads the author to examine the cyclical nature of motherhood. Barrera communicates her trenchant observations in gorgeous, highly efficient prose that sharply reflects the fragmented reality of pregnancy and early parenthood. Rather than adhering to a traditional narrative structure, the author follows her trains of thought wherever they take her, and readers will be happy to tag along.
A uniquely lyrical account of early motherhood.
LOVE ME AS I AM
Beauvais, Garcelle with Nicole E. Smith Amistad/HarperCollins (240 pp.) $27.99 | April 12, 2022 978-0-06-309958-6
One of the stars of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills talks about real life. Haitian American actor and podcast host Beauvais (b. 1966), whose TV credits include Housewives, NYPD Blue, Family Matters, and The Mentalist, makes her adult book debut (she has published several children’s books) with a disarmingly candid memoir, co-authored by Smith. Beauvais recalls growing up in a middle-class neighborhood of Portau-Prince, surrounded by warmth, color, family, and friends. Her mother, a nurse, immigrated to the U.S. first, then brought little Garcelle to join her in Massachusetts. Although she knew no English and was the only Black child in her school, she managed to thrive. When she was 17, she was offered modeling jobs in New York City, where she reveled in newfound freedom and independence. Besides working for Eileen Ford, she finagled her way to becoming a Playboy Bunny even though she was underage. Married at 22, she soon became a mother, but by the time her son was 3, the marriage ended. Fortunately, her career took off. Modeling led to acting: In the 1990s, she appeared in Models, Inc. and The Jamie Foxx Show; many other opportunities followed. “I am a woman who is proud of her success but hasn’t completely bought into it,” writes the author, who shares many
juicy backstage tidbits: A weeklong gig on The View proved dismal because of the hostile atmosphere among the women on the show; and her co-stars on Housewives could lash out viciously: “I was caught off guard by how venomous” they could be, she admits. Beauvais is forthright about personal issues, including her first husband’s immaturity; the betrayal that led to her second divorce; her “angst, fear, helplessness, and worry” about her oldest son’s emotional problems and substance abuse; her experience with in vitro fertilization (and the birth of twin sons); beauty; spirituality; the plight of Black actresses; and sex.
Dishy, warm, and entertaining.
THE MIND AND THE MOON My Brother’s Story, the Science of Our Brains, and the Search for Our Psyches
Bergner, Daniel Ecco/HarperCollins (320 pp.) $28.99 | May 17, 2022 978-0-06-300489-4
A personal and studied reckoning with “the cost of our belief in biological psychiatry.”
New York Times Magazine contributing writer Bergner credits his latest book to his younger brother, Bob, whose struggles with mental health led the author to this undertaking. Were it not for Bob, writes the author, “I would never have met the scientists who study our brains with the ultimate hope not only of treating our conditions but of understanding our minds, of crossing that chasm between…what we’re made of and who we are.” Bergner interweaves science—historical and current— with narratives focused on a handful of people, Bob included, all of whom were told they would need psychotropic medications for the rest of their lives; additionally, he adds his own insights and quotes a bevy of sources. Two of his subjects, Caroline and David, reveal their battles with psychosis, depression, anxiety, paranoia, and suicidal ideation as well as their experiences on and off medications, including the side effects and brutal withdrawal symptoms. The author unpacks the history of first- and second-generation psychiatric drugs and some of the financially motivated coverups of their manufacturers, and he reveals studies proving the stunning efficacy of placebos in treating depression. Bergner devotes many pages to conversations with and the work of neuroscientists Eric Nestler and Donald Goff, who are searching for new ways to treat depression and psychotic conditions. In a talk with Goff about Caroline, Bergner notes the doctor’s language: “has she been tried on was certainly a striking construction, distinguishable from has she tried. She was the object, not the subject, of the sentence, the recipient, not the one deciding.” Ultimately, Bergner concludes, “psychiatry cannot fully hear individuality so long as the profession clings to scientific authority. To listen, to truly listen, the profession would have to let go. It would have to embrace the idea of working with patients, of proceeding on footing that is more equal than not, even when with is elusive.”
An inescapably relevant and resonant journey into the impacts of our limited understanding of the mind.
THE CARBON FOOTPRINT OF EVERYTHING
Berners-Lee, Mike Greystone Books (312 pp.) $18.95 paper | April 19, 2022 978-1-77164-576-8
An up-to-date life guide for carbonconscious readers. In this “extensively revised and updated” edition of his 2010 book, How Bad Are Bananas, Berners-Lee offers an easy, often amusing read. Unfortunately, despite the traditional what-we-can-do-to-fix-it final chapter, the end result is not more than mildly encouraging. Since the author wrote Bananas, the global climate crisis has gotten much worse. Temperatures
are rising faster than predicted; weather has deteriorated; trees are flowering sooner than they should; polar ice is melting, and sea levels are rising. The author adds that humans produced 56 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions in 2018, and emissions continue to rise, “as if humans had never noticed climate change.” The average American has an annual carbon footprint of 21 tons, while the global average is just over seven. BernersLee proposes five tons as a sensible goal. This may sound impossible, but he reminds readers that America is a very unequal society, and the extremely wealthy drive the average up by their “carbon-profligate lifestyles.” However, since a single commercial flight from New York City to Seoul burns around 4.7 tons, many readers will remain doubtful. With the unpleasantness out of the way, readers can enjoy the fun (at least at the beginning) as Berners-Lee reveals the carbon footprints of hundreds of elements in our lives, starting small—tap water, email, a paper bag, a diaper; then moving up to a roll of toilet paper, washing dishes, driving a mile, taking a bath, using a smartphone—and ending with the big stuff: making a ton of steel, a plane flight, space travel, wildfires, wars, deforestation. Ending on the traditional positive note, the author shows more good sense than usual. Individual efforts (recycling, bicycling) are trivial, but we should do them to create a new norm. If enough of us live within our carbon budget, wasting it (the norm today) will become uncool.
More bad news about climate change but entertaining and often practical.
GROWING UP BIDEN A Memoir
Biden Owens, Valerie Celadon Books (288 pp.) $28.00 | April 12, 2022 978-1-250-82176-8
A spirited account of life in the Biden crew by the president’s only sister. In this depiction of her life with her older brother, Joe, and their two younger siblings, Biden Owens (b. 1945) offers rosy hindsight that comes from a life well lived. The author’s parents consistently stressed the importance of family from an early age, and it becomes clear that this shared value has been the glue and momentum that has kept their lives whole and moving forward, even in the face of heartbreaking loss. Biden Owens points out that comparing the Irish Catholic Biden family to the Kennedys is low-hanging fruit—“in terms of finances and political clout, we were pretty far from Camelot,” she writes, and her mother once said, “Damn it, we were Bidens before we ever heard of the Kennedys”—but it’s hard not to trace the similarities, particularly the tragedies that both families endured. The author takes us through her peripatetic childhood with her family (including a revolving door of welcomed relatives coming in and out), her school years, Joe’s decision to run for the New Castle County Council in 1970, and his equally important decision to hire sister “Val” as his campaign manager. The narrative gallops along at a decent pace, and we see the White House as the finish line. Throughout, Biden Owens pauses to examine various turning points, including that historic county council race and her involvement with the long-gestating Violence Against Women Act, which was signed into law in 1994, “four years after my brother Joe began his offensive” to pass the legislation. Particularly notable is the author’s examination of her faith. A devout Catholic who nonetheless believes in signs and totems, she is clearly a determined woman who exudes the warmth and capabilities her big brother has always known.
A ringing endorsement of the power of a supportive family, especially for those in the public eye.
the red zone
THE RED ZONE A Love Story
Caldwell, Chloe Soft Skull Press (304 pp.) $16.95 paper | April 19, 2022 978-1-59376-699-3
An essayist discusses menstrual dysfunctions in the context of sexual identity, family, and love. Caldwell’s periods dominated her young adult life. She had heavy, clotted menstrual flows and hormonal acne. As she matured, her symptoms worsened. “Something wasn’t right. Since I’d gotten into my thirties, my periods had become more severe,” she writes. “Why was it heightened? Why was I afraid of it? It was affecting my relationships and my ability to socialize….This didn’t feel like just PMS. It felt different. Dangerous.” Consequently, Caldwell began a frantic search for answers anywhere she could find them. In her second memoir, following I’ll Tell You in Person, Caldwell sets down her journey of discovery. Interviewing female family members and friends, she learned not only about their experiences, but also about the evolution of feminine hygiene products, like sanitary bloomers, sanitary belts, and period protective underwear. Turning to Reddit, the author took comfort in the often hilarious rants of fellow PMS sufferers before trying antidepressants to ease what she realized was premenstrual dysphoric disorder, an extreme form of PMS. Tracking her cycles through online apps helped her predict when she would have the “werewolf” outbursts that strained her relationships with her boyfriend and his young daughter. Yet as much as PMDD often hijacked her life, coming to terms with it within the confines of a loving relationship ultimately strengthened the “connection” she was initially afraid to pursue. Caldwell’s candor about all things menstrual is the greatest strength of this dynamic book. While the graphic physical depictions of menstrual dysfunction many not appeal to all readers, women who suffer from PMDD will take solace in the ups and downs of Caldwell’s journey toward self-acceptance, health, and love. The narrative may also appeal to anyone who
BEHIND THE BOOK black american refugee
After nearly a lifetime in the U.S., Tiffanie Drayton returned to Trinidad. Her new book explains why
BY NIA NORRIS
Chris Wilson
Tiffanie Drayton’s book, Black American Refugee: Escaping the Narcissism of the American Dream (Viking, Feb. 8), is fittingly titled. It compares her own experience of growing up Black in America and ultimately moving to Trinidad to escape American racism with that of a refugee, one who flees their country to escape violence or persecution. Yet it is also a story of finding a sense of home after a lifetime spent searching for a place that fits.
In June 2020, Drayton wrote an op-ed for the New York Times titled “I’m a Black American. I Had To Get Out,” about fleeing the United States due to racism. In her op-ed, she talks about watching the video of George Floyd’s death on TV in Trinidad and points to the 2013 acquittal of George Zimmerman for the murder of Trayvon Martin as the moment of reckoning when she knew that she could no longer live in the United States.
On a recent Zoom call, Drayton says, “This was the defining moment when I knew that I had to write about it. There is no reason that anyone should feel like they have to flee from the richest and most powerful country in the world. That Trayvon Martin moment confirmed what I knew after being gaslit for all this time.”
The response to her op-ed was overwhelming.
And there was. Drayton began collecting essays that she had published over the past six years as a basis for how her book would come together. Black American Refugee tells the story of growing up in America through the stages of a relationship with a narcissistic abuser, treating the move to Trinidad as the emancipatory final stage of breaking up. Drayton initially wrote the story without the points of psychology. The theme revealed itself to her during a conversation with her sister.
Drayton moved to the United States from Trinidad with her mother and her three siblings at age 4, living in five different states including Hawaii. One pervasive theme in the book is Drayton’s crumbling belief that racism would not personally affect her if she did all the right things. As Drayton grew up, she realized that this was not the case, and her book describes each phase of this realization through these stages: love-bombing, devaluing, lethal abuse, and, finally, breakup.
The book carefully details her relationship with the United States, from her childhood experience of being chased by White onlookers from a motel pool in West Virginia and being called racial slurs in an online game to the small glimmer of hope that Barack Obama’s election brought to Black Americans, only to be brought back to reality by the George Zimmerman verdict.
“It’s so interesting because dealing with America is just like dealing with constant multiple personalities of one country, and you never know what side you’re going to get. You go back to that lovebombing [a stage where the abuser inundates the victim with messages of love and affection], and the story that you’re experiencing is not aligning,” Drayton notes, reflecting on how her own belief in meritocracy crumbled with her lived experience of growing up Black in America. “You’re not supposed to internalize all of these messages as the path to your self-actualization and the path to your success.”
Drayton’s final decision to move back to Trinidad was a healing act, allowing her to finally breathe. The book draws parallels between Drayton’s own abuser, the father of her children, and the cycle of violence that Black Americans experience.
However, Drayton emphasized that her book is not just about struggle.
“A big part of my book is about illustrating Black freedom and the freedom to be Black and how important that is,” Drayton adds. “For me, that liberation is going to Carnival and hearing music made by people who look like me, and that beauty is so energizing. No matter how much oppression there is, we still persevere, and we’re still happy.”
Like Carnival, a festival that was initially an act of defiance by former slaves against the British colonial government in Trinidad, Drayton’s move home to Trinidad was an emancipatory act in the face of the disillusionment that came with growing up Black in the United States.
Nia Norris is a Chicago journalist who writes about books and culture. Her work has appeared in Next City and other publications. Black American Refugee was reviewed in the Dec. 1, 2021, issue.
also a poet
suffers frustration and anger in the face of an illness for which they struggle to get an accurate diagnosis, a situation that disproportionately affects women.
Provocatively intimate reading.
ALSO A POET Frank O’Hara, My Father, and Me
Calhoun, Ada Grove (272 pp.) $27.00 | June 14, 2022 978-0-8021-5978-6
Art critic Peter Schjeldahl’s daughter takes a shot at finishing her father’s derailed biography of Frank O’Hara and ends up writing a fascinating memoir.
Calhoun, author of the excellent St. Marks Is Dead, was looking for a childhood toy when she found the cassettes of her father’s interviews with O’Hara’s associates, recorded in preparation for writing an authorized biography in the late 1970s. Due to circumstances revealed gradually, support for the work was withdrawn by Maureen O’Hara, the poet’s sister and executor. Calhoun began blithely, certain she could resurrect the project, but what ensues turns out to be both somewhat less and very much more. As her husband, Neal, puts it in one of many adept formulations, “this is two successive generations of writers trying to say something of value about a wonderful, talented, funny young man who wrote lovely poetry and died in a freak accident. What a series of dying stars all collapsing in on each other: your dad’s book, Maureen’s machinations, your dad’s poetry career, your attempts to win the scenario, your relationship with your dad, your relationship with Maureen.” In Neal’s view, even the difficulties are “amazing and beautiful,” and surprisingly, given the number of resentments and disillusions cataloged here (Larry Rivers, watch out!), he is right. Even the title of the book comes from the off-base headline on O’Hara’s obituary in the New York Times: “EXHIBITIONS AIDE AT MODERN ART DIES—ALSO A POET.” The most powerful of the misapprehensions lies between the author and her father: “Perhaps my role as a writer who is not the best writer in my family is the cost of paying attention to my family,” she submits, a typically loaded remark. One imagines her father, who was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2019 but has lived to read this work, is at last returning the long-withheld favor.
A wonderfully convoluted, catty, candid, and clever piece of work.
TALENT How To Identify Energizers, Creatives, and Winners Around the World
Cowen, Tyler & Daniel Gross St. Martin’s (288 pp.) $28.99 | May 17, 2022 978-1-250-27581-3
Why recruiting creative people is the primary difference between a company that thrives and one that merely survives. Cowen, a professor of economics and bestselling author of The Great Stagnation and other bestsellers, and Gross, a venture capitalist in the tech field, have been consulting on this issue for many years. Establishing the creativity of a job applicant is different than determining technical skills, and the authors provide advice about interview questions. They suggest focusing on what the person does in their nonwork time. Personality, they note, is revealed during weekends. Another good one: “What are the open tabs on your browser right now?” The aim is to assess the applicant’s thought processes and willingness to embrace new thinking. In fact, the interview should be more of a free-flowing discussion then a structured Q&A. In an intriguing chapter on the use of IQ and personality tests, the authors point out that such metrics can be helpful, but their limitations should be understood. Creativity appears in odd places, and
Cowen and Gross advise employers to cast a net wide enough to catch candidates from historically marginalized communities. Some creative people can be cantankerous, even anti-social, so there might be a need to design work-from-home or similar arrangements. Fit the person to the job and sometimes the job to the person. Along the way, the authors offer an interesting exploration of how recruiting talented women differs from recruiting talented men—and how male interviewers should allow for their own biases. In the concluding chapters, the authors deal with the issues of retaining creative people. The key is to keep them stimulated and challenged, with rewards and recognition that are appropriate to each individual. All this takes effort and time for the employer, and recruiting and managing creative people can be more art than science. But in the end, as the authors show, the returns are often well worth the investment.
A useful and entertaining map for companies looking toward a creative future.
RIDING WITH EVIL Taking Down the Notorious Pagan Motorcycle Gang
Croke, Ken & Dave Wedge Morrow/HarperCollins (320 pp.) $28.99 | March 15, 2022 978-0-06-309240-2
The story of an agent of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives who went undercover to bust a disreputable motorcycle gang.
In a book co-authored by former Boston Herald investigative journalist Wedge, Croke chronicles the risky years he spent infiltrating the notorious Pagan Motorcycle Club. In 2009, Croke embarked on an undercover mission with the group, posing as a merciless defender of the club’s upper echelon. No stranger to undercover work—“I had faked doing coke with…MS-13 gangbangers”—he employed all of the manipulative, resourceful survival skills he knew to work his way into the Pagans’ favor. However, his cover became increasingly difficult to maintain, and the situation became life-threatening once he observed the club’s unpredictable inner machinations, which included extreme violence, rape, ubiquitous drugs, extortion, and murder. Though the authors braid Croke’s personal history into the text and how his fascination with “the many ways criminals grifted the system” became his “calling,” his assignment with the Pagans remains the captivating centerpiece. Driven by a combination of justice and adrenaline, Croke became fully ensconced in the group’s clandestine, nefarious world, operating inches away from mercurial members—e.g., Roadblock, Hogman, “a behemoth of a man” and “a disgusting human”; Hellboy, “a former mixed martial arts fighter and big meth tweaker”; and Cano, “one of the only non-white members,” whose rap sheet included “drug and weapons trafficking, robberies, gambling violations, conspiracy, being a fugitive from justice, and several assaults.” Nearing the investigation’s climax, the threat of exposure escalated and compromised the safety of his wife and children. The authors pack the brisk narrative with insider details and compelling action, creating a riveting hybrid of true-crime journalism and intensive memoir. In a revealing, highly personal conclusion, Croke writes about how he tried to put the daunting ordeal behind him, but the psychological fallout forced him to eschew motorcycle riding altogether: “The bike came to symbolize danger and an outlaw lifestyle that kept me from those I loved most.”
A breathless, enthralling thrill ride.
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finding me
GENDER EUPHORIA Stories of Joy From Trans, Non-Binary and Intersex Writers
Ed. by Dale, Laura Kate Unbound (320 pp.) $15.95 paper | April 19, 2022 978-1-80018-056-7
The title of this collection aptly describes its unique contribution to the canon of writing on nonbinary issues.
Editor Dale collects pieces from noncisgender writers who describe only their joyful trans or nonbinary experiences. None of the essays feature the psychological trauma that can accompany gender dysphoria. “I’m not going to pretend that the world isn’t sometimes a bit miserable for non-cisgender people,” writes Dale. However, she continues, this book “is about people doing small actions and grand gestures that made them feel radiantly themselves and wonderfully at peace.” The positive editorial focus works well as the organizing theme. Rather than detailing victimization and suffering, these reflections find the very real delights in nonbinary experiences, as contributors examine how being trans, “enby” (short for nonbinary), or intersex contributes to their bliss. Most of these euphoric moments arise when the writers are finally able to present themselves in public as their true-felt gender (or nongender). Appearance is often important, whether it involves clothing (Jane Aerith Magnet’s “Escaping the Monochrome Closet at Pride”), makeup, tattoos, or body/facial hair. We feel the joy when Oliver Jones, an 18-year-old trans man from England, writes about an unexpected role as prom king or when Miles Nelson, an autistic and trans man, revels in a “gender-affirming wedding.” Dale, the author of Uncomfortable Labels: My Life as a Gay Autistic Trans Woman, writes about when she first noticed that her hormone replacement therapy was working, felt “my new breasts bounce,” and attended her first “girly sleepover.” Parker Armando Deckard, a Filipino American nonbinary trans man, shares his happiness at cutting his hair supershort to look “like a boy,” thus “reclaim[ing] part of myself.” The contributors also demonstrate the importance of other subcultures and practices, including the punk scene, erotic role-playing in online gaming, cosplay at anime conventions, and BDSM sex work for trans and gendernonconforming clients.
A welcome text in which trans, nonbinary, and intersex writers can reveal their true selves.
FINDING ME A Memoir
Davis, Viola HarperOne (304 pp.) $28.99 | April 26, 2022 978-0-06-303732-8
The life story of an actor whose success has been shaped by grit and determination. In a starkly forthright memoir, Oscar and Tony winner Davis reflects on family, love, motherhood, and acting. Born in South Carolina on a plantation where her grandparents had been sharecroppers, she grew up in dire poverty in Central Falls, Rhode Island. Her father was a physically abusive alcoholic, and the family lived in a rat-infested apartment where they often had no heat or hot water. Besides being taunted by her classmates for being Black, she was shunned because she smelled, often of urine. As she writes, she wet the bed until she was 14. “I was an awkward, angry, hurt, traumatized kid,” Davis writes. “I couldn’t articulate what I was feeling and nobody asked. I didn’t believe anybody cared. I was saturated in shame.” Inspired by seeing Cicely Tyson on TV, Davis wanted to become an actor—a goal that seemed far out of reach. But an acting coach in an Upward Bound program encouraged her, and she won a scholarship to Rhode Island College. After graduating with a theater degree, Davis worked tirelessly to hone her craft, both by performing and studying. At Juilliard, she bristled, at first, at their
Eurocentric approach. A trip to Africa, when she was 25, energized her. Early in her career, Davis was discouraged about the stereotypical roles she was offered, most for “drug-addicted mothers.” Later, she writes, “I did a huge slate of what I call ‘best friends to white women’ roles.” For years, money worries dogged her. Even when working in theater, movies, and TV, she needed to supplement her income, and always, her family’s financial straits weighed heavily. Therapy finally helped Davis face the generational trauma that created her sense of “emotional abandonment.” About her professional triumphs, the author is modest: “It’s an eenie, meenie, miny, mo game of luck, relationships, chance, how long you’ve been out there, and sometimes talent.”
An unvarnished chronicle of hard-won, well-earned success.
NAZI BILLIONAIRES The Dark History of Germany’s Wealthiest Dynasties
de Jong, David Mariner Books (400 pp.) $28.00 | April 19, 2022 978-1-328-49788-8
An unflattering investigative history of German big business over the past century.
Financial journalist de Jong reminds us that many of today’s superwealthy Germans are heirs of entrepreneurs whose companies prospered under the Third Reich through use of slave labor and seizure of companies. This is old news, but de Jong explores how all walked free after the war and their heirs do little to acknowledge their ancestors’ crimes. Few entrepreneurs paid attention to Hitler until he grew powerful after 1930. Some became ardent Nazis, but most approved of his hatred
the hangman and his wife
of socialism, worker activism, and democracy. Once Hitler began rearming, they scrambled for contracts, which involved currying favor with Nazi leaders. An enormous source of profit was Jewish businesses, often acquired for a pittance. Readers searching for an industrialist who disapproved will come up empty. As de Jong shows, nearly everyone approved of the methods of the business community. Orders increased, and a flood of slave laborers from the conquered countries poured into the factories. Though most “employees” were treated horribly, few employers objected. During the final year of the war, companies continued to sell their products and overwork their laborers even as the Allies overran Germany. Then they made themselves scarce. Their activities were no secret to Allied intelligence, but the first Nuremberg trial involved major political figures rather than business owners. Later, the trials of businessmen received little publicity and largely flopped, handing out a few short prison sentences and fines. It’s to de Jong’s credit that he brings many of these events back into the historical spotlight. The defendants mostly kept their businesses, handing them on to heirs, who were not inclined to discuss the wartime years. As decades passed, a good deal of dirt turned up, persuading some to apologize and make modest gestures of restitution, but others stonewalled. The author recounts perhaps more details on German business dealings than American readers may seek, but there is enough chicanery to maintain interest.
A sturdy account of the financial side of Nazi evil that resonates today.
THE HANGMAN AND HIS WIFE The Life and Death of Reinhard Heydrich
Dougherty, Nancy Ed. by Christopher Lehmann-Haupt Knopf (704 pp.) $35.00 | May 24, 2022 978-0-394-54341-3
A gripping biography of an irrepressibly evil historical figure.
Reinhard Heydrich (1904-1942) was Heinrich Himmler’s right-hand man, an architect of the Holocaust known as “the Butcher of Prague.” Czech and Slovak resisters killed him in May 1942, and while his personal writing contains few insights, his wife, who survived him by 40 years, spoke freely during numerous interviews with biographer Dougherty, who died in 2013. In the introduction, Lehmann-Haupt writes that his job as editor was “to sharpen and highlight [Dougherty’s] all-but-tragic vision of Heydrich’s descent into profound evil.” The result is an engrossing biography that cuts away regularly to Heydrich’s wife as she delivers her version of events and freely expresses her opinion of her husband’s colleagues and superiors, including Hitler. Loyal to the end, she remained skeptical that he was a war criminal, preferring to see him as an earnest patriot in a dysfunctional system. As a child, Heydrich excelled at school and sports. He joined the navy in 1922 but was cashiered in 1931, apparently for dishonorable behavior. A fervent nationalist, he had joined the Nazi Party months earlier, and SS chief Himmler hired him to develop an intelligence service. At the time, the SS was a minor department that provided security for Hitler, but Heydrich proved a brilliant organizer, and by 1936, the SS controlled all of Germany’s police. Heydrich quickly acquired his fearsome reputation as the consummate Nazi bureaucrat: ruthless and, unlike most, uncorrupt and efficient. He persecuted Jews, organized the Einsatzgruppen that followed German armies invading Poland and Russia to murder hundreds of thousands of civilians, and often (but not always) treated Czechs without mercy as their governor. Nearly 600 pages of cutthroat Nazi political maneuvering added to genuine throat-cutting in Germany and throughout Europe would be excessive in lessskilled hands, but Dougherty, with the assistance of Heydrich’s wife and Lehmann-Haupt, has the right stuff.
A masterful account of the quintessential Nazi.
THE LAST DAYS OF ROGER FEDERER And Other Endings
Dyer, Geoff Farrar, Straus and Giroux (272 pp.) $28.00 | May 3, 2022 978-0-374-60556-8
The prolific, award-winning writer reflects on endings, loose and otherwise. In his latest unique work, Dyer, pondering Federer’s imminent retirement, delves into “things coming to an end, artists’ last works, time running out”—and whatever else strikes his fancy. Now 63, the author’s understated, witty prose, written amid the “interminable Covid moment,” carries him along on a jaunty, wide-ranging, personal stream-of-consciousness rumination as the clock ticks down. Obsessed with the concept of a “magnificent life whatever ruin comes in its wake,” Dyer opines on literature, film, art, philosophy, music, and, of course, tennis in numerous interconnected, journal-like entries. He opens with some riffs on the Doors’ sprawling epic “The End” before moving on to tennis star Andy Murray’s retirement announcement and how it affected him. The author discusses his admiration for Bob Dylan and his voice: “How could it not be shot to hell given what he’s put it through, the unbelievable demands he makes on it”? Then he jumps to Jack Kerouac, Boris Becker, and D.H. Lawrence’s ongoing refusal to confront death; the “dissolution of the physical world” in J.M.W. Turner’s late paintings; and Nietzsche’s life and work. Thinking about how “we love the idea of the last,” Dyer considers how Albert Bierstadt’s painting The Last of the Buffalo led to the end of his career, and a disquisition on attending Burning Man confronts the “indescribable wonders” he experienced. The author worries about going to his grave without ever having read this or that book or seen that film. Then it’s on to writers who wrote one book, found success too soon, or, like athletes, made a late comeback, and John Coltrane’s final phase. Concluding, Dyer turns for help to Louise Glück: “I think here I will leave you. It has come to
california
seem / there is no perfect ending.” Quite true, as the author sometimes loses his way in this maze of wistful meanderings.
A rangy, rambling assemblage that will appeal most to Dyer’s fans.
CALIFORNIA An American History
Faragher, John Mack Yale Univ. (480 pp.) $28.50 | April 19, 2022 978-0-300-22579-2
A sweeping survey of the Golden State over the last 12,000 or so years. It’s not easy to compress the history of Delaware, much less the vast realm of California, in under 500 pages. Yale professor Faragher, author of many books about American history, succeeds admirably. His underlying theme is diversity. California “includes more variation in climate than any other,” and it also encompasses 178 major habitat types, 109 federally recognized Native American tribes and bands, and people from all over the world (for which reason Los Angeles alone, it’s estimated, has more than 500 Salvadoran restaurants). Faragher is quick to add that diversity has not always been positive. Economic inequality is perhaps nowhere more pronounced, at least within the bounds of the U.S., and California has given birth to the most progressive and the most retrograde political traditions, which Faragher illustrates by contrasting Govs. Earl Warren and Ronald Reagan. The author tackles numerous controversial and unpleasant issues head-on, from the dispossession and murder of countless Indigenous people to the long tradition of police brutality symbolized by the vicious 1991 attack on Rodney King and the subsequent realization that “the LAPD was an authority unto itself.” One theme that might have used a few more pages is the profound division—political, economic, and cultural—between rural and urban California, which might as well be separate nations, marked by what the late Joan Didion described as “rancorous differences in attitude and culture.” Wobblies, Black Panthers, Forty-Niners, conquistadors, and Native peoples all appear in Faragher’s vigorous narrative, both a celebration of the state’s wealth and creativity and acknowledgment that so much of its history is marked by “conflict, turmoil, and violence.” Though this book may not supplant Kevin Starr’s multivolume history of California, it makes a valuable complement, highly readable and with a compelling governing argument.
A masterful history of a place that is both reality and ideal, and central to the modern world.
HOW FREE SPEECH SAVED DEMOCRACY The Untold History of How the First Amendment Became an Essential Tool for Securing Liberty and Social Justice
Finan, Christopher M. Truth to Power/Steerforth (288 pp.) $16.95 paper | April 26, 2022 978-1-58642-298-1
A historical demonstration of the indispensability of the First Amendment.
The amendment reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” Who could argue against that? Finan—executive director of the National Coalition Against Censorship and former director of the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression—shows how corrupt politicians, bigots, reactionaries, and educated people who should know better have opposed freedom for those with beliefs they found disagreeable on grounds that those beliefs could cause harm. Finan’s history includes plenty of triumphs but leaves the impression that there is always more work to do. During the 19th century, both abolitionists and women’s rights advocates achieved many of their goals, but freedom for Black Americans and voting for women turned out to be only partial victories. The author devotes much space to the 20th- and 21st-century civil rights and feminist movements, which have endured countless struggles and even violence. Despite impressive achievements, both movements still face significant barriers, particularly from conservative legislators. War has always been a disaster for free speech, but the increase in government surveillance allowed in the Patriot Act following 9/11 is small potatoes compared to the situation during World War II, which featured massive censorship and arrests and the internment of Japanese American citizens. “While we live in a country where injustice persists,” writes Finan, “the [U.S.] is a far more democratic country today than it was two hundred years ago or even sixty years ago.” At the same time, the author discusses how progressives and activists for marginalized communities have taken up the traditional conservative penchant for suppressing opinions they find obnoxious, especially in universities and arts organizations. Randall Kennedy provides the foreword.
An earnest and timely argument for the enduring value of the First Amendment.
THE MAN WHO INVENTED MOTION PICTURES A True Tale of Obsession, Murder, and the Movies
Fischer, Paul Simon & Schuster (416 pp.) $28.99 | April 19, 2022 978-1-982114-82-4
The story of a pioneer in motionpicture making and his mysterious
disappearance.
In this combination of “a ghost story, a family saga, and an unsolved mystery,” Fischer, an author and film producer, introduces us to relatively obscure 19th-century artist and inventor Louis Le Prince, a Frenchman whose career prompted him to relocate to England and the U.S. Fascinated by photography and the manipulation of recorded images, Le Prince made extraordinary advancements in cinematography and is now credited by some historians, including Fischer, as having created the first true motion pictures in the late 1880s. His suspicious disappearance in 1890, shortly before he was to unveil his revolutionary singlelens camera, allowed rival inventions to supersede his invention. This meant that other innovators, such as the brothers Auguste and Louis Lumière, and Thomas Edison, the so-called “Wizard of Menlo Park,” got credit as the most important trailblazers in the field. Fischer’s sketch of the historical context in which Le Prince worked—“at the end of a century when humankind had already domesticated space, light, and time”—is consistently entertaining and illuminating. The author vividly renders the personalities and science involved in the production of early cinema, and he lucidly explains the complex technological challenges and breakthroughs. Particularly insightful are Fischer’s interpretations of the likely motivations of Le Prince and his assistants as they attempted, under frequent financial duress, to complete a workable prototype of their camera and secure international patent protections. Also intriguing is the book’s contribution to the ongoing demythologization of cultural icon Edison, who seems to have routinely schemed his way into taking credit for
of blood and sweat
the work of others. Though Fischer’s ultimate conclusion about the circumstances behind Le Prince’s death remains speculative, he offers and defends a plausible version of events that draws persuasively on extant historical evidence.
A fascinating, informative, skillfully articulated narrative of one of the forgotten figures in cinematic history.
PLAYMAKERS How the NFL Really Works (and Doesn’t)
Florio, Mike PublicAffairs (384 pp.) $29.00 | March 15, 2022 978-1-5417-0018-5
An insider’s guide to the hidden workings of pro football. “The NFL loves to say, ‘Football is family.’ Football isn’t family. Football is business, and it’s good for business to say, ‘Football is family.’ ” So writes sportscaster and journalist Florio, creator and owner of ProFootballTalk.com, in one of a burst of mostly short essays that touch on single points, sometimes in a contrarian manner. Was Deflategate a real thing? Yes and no, writes Florio. Though in an incriminating email a Patriots employee called himself the “deflator,” Florio reveals that about half the footballs measured in pro games in 2015 during an NFL investigation had “air pressures below 12.5 psi at halftime of games played in cold conditions,” which was outside the permitted range. The NFL “gathered and deleted” that information. Why? Because it deflated a satisfying narrative about the Patriots and their iconic quarterback, Tom Brady. The money is huge, especially for owners, though being a billionaire, as Florio archly notes, doesn’t mean one knows anything about the game. The commissioner does, and Commissioner Roger Goodell, he guesses, makes more than $40 million per year. (The New York Times has reported that, including bonuses, Goodell took in almost $64 million each of the past two years.) Throughout, the author’s sympathies are clearly with the players. He writes sympathetically about Colin Kaepernick, whose “role as the robot who made the other robots self-aware turned him into a pariah,” and Tim Tebow, who, though he turned out to be a flash in the pan, at least had his day in the sun. Florio is less kindly disposed toward the money side of the game, with its nepotistic front offices, managerial ineptitude, and coaching jobs that “are filled based on factors other than merit.”
A sometimes ill-tempered and snarky but always entertaining look beyond the gridiron.
OF BLOOD AND SWEAT Black Lives and the Making of White Power and Wealth
Ford, Clyde W. Amistad/HarperCollins (384 pp.) $27.99 | April 5, 2022 978-0-06-303851-6
Humanities scholar Ford looks at the myriad—and uncompensated—contributions African Americans have made to the economies and cultures of the U.S.
and beyond.
The author opens with a little-known court case from Colonial Virginia wherein an indentured Black man sued not just for release from his expired contract, but also for “freedom dues.” Perhaps surprisingly, the court ruled in his favor, voicing “a belief that power and wealth created from the labor of others entitled those who helped create that power and wealth to their fair share.” Unfortunately, the enslaved far outnumbered the indentured and were accorded no such entitlement. As Ford observes, the slave trade by its very nature had ripple effects that enriched societies such as early modern Holland, whose banks financed shipbuilding. For their part, the enslaved afforded not just labor, building such infrastructure as the water system that still fuels Washington, D.C., and, of course, the entire agricultural economy of the American South. Their lack of liberty afforded their owners freedom: If not for the labor of the enslaved, the White farmers of the Colonial South could never have mounted a revolution against Britain—a revolution that helped shore up slavery. Ford writes of the lives of the first enslaved people to arrive in British North America, turning up little-known episodes and figures in American history—e.g., the multiracial Melungeon people of Appalachia and the celebration among Black residents of upstate New York of Emancipation Day: not June 19, Juneteenth, but instead Aug. 1, when slavery was outlawed in the British Empire in 1834, “freeing some 800,000 men and women in the West Indies, South Africa, and Canada.” The book teems with ideas, sometimes in an onrushing embarrassment of riches, and often repeats the inarguable idea that as makers of much of the modern world’s wealth, Black people continue to deserve a share.
A compelling argument for long-overdue reparations— though much more than that alone.
THE WORLD ACCORDING TO COLOR A Cultural History
Fox, James St. Martin’s (320 pp.) $29.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-250-27852-4
The colors that surround us are so ubiquitous that we often fail to see them. But opening our eyes can give us new insights and a different sense of ourselves.
In his first book for a trade audience, academic Fox casts a wide net, aiming to tell the story of humanity through the symbolism of seven colors: black, red, yellow, blue, white, purple, and green. He introduces the subject with chapters on how colors work at a scientific level, examining how the spectrum was slowly defined and understood. This is interesting stuff, but Fox’s real interest is social construction. Much of the meaning of black, associated with evil, stems from biblical references. Red often means blood and violence as well as sexual attractiveness, although the Chinese tie it to prestige and wealth. Yellow is often associated with the sun but also has links to villainy: Think of the yellow cloak of Judas in the famous Giotto fresco. For ages, blue, as an artistic color, was derived from somewhat tame vegetable dyes, but the discovery of Prussian blue, the first synthetic pigment, changed art styles ranging from the impressionists to Japanese woodcuts. White has often meant purity in everything from faith to soap. Purple, long associated with royalty—due to its incredible cost, before synthetic versions— really only came into its own when painters like Monet used it to add depth and texture to landscapes. Green has historically been tied to fertile gardens, which has evolved to its current connection with environment-based political parties and issues. Interestingly, the Quran describes green as the color of paradise. Diving deep into the background, Fox illustrates his points with a wide range of visuals, from the chemical structure of dyes to the pristine-white marble sculptures of Michelangelo. The color story, he notes, shows no sign of ending—as it should be.
Through meticulous research and authoritative writing, Fox helps us to see the world around us in a different light.
two heads
TWO HEADS A Graphic Exploration of How Our Brains Work With Other Brains
Frith, Uta, Chris Frith & Alex Frith Illus. by Daniel Locke Scribner (352 pp.) $30.00 | March 1, 2022 978-1-5011-9407-8
A graphic nonfiction book that neither simplifies nor trivializes the way the human brain works.
Uta and Chris Frith are renowned neuroscientists, and their son Alex is a prolific author of more than 50 children’s books on a vast array of topics. In this dynamic exploration of the immense complexity of the brain, the Friths collaborate with British artist and graphic novelist Locke. In addition to the authors’ knowledgeable tours of the relevant science, the graphic element serves to reinforce the spirit of collaboration, one of the book’s primary themes. Though most studies in neuroscience have focused on a single brain, the Friths have concluded, through their research and their personal experiences, that brains function differently and better in connection with other brains and that collaborations with others usually produce superior results compared to results achieved when working alone. Furthermore, the more diverse the collaborative teams, the better. The authors and illustrator convey a pleasing mix of wonder, genial humor, and humility, as husband and wife banter about their work and their son provides the narrative cohesion and framing. The illustrations vividly capture both the significance of the scientific experiments and the unique familial experiences of the Friths. Locke’s art also helps clarify challenging issues involving, among other topics, autism and schizophrenia; in-groups and out-groups; how the brain can function like a hive of bees; and the deleterious effects of the failure to connect. As do many other books on the brain, this one leaves little doubt that so much of what we think or do is in response to the ways we copy others or anticipate what we think they think. Indeed, the authors begin by sharing a secret: “No one understands how the brain works.” However, by the end of this refreshing journey, readers will be much further down the path toward understanding.
An enlightening, inspirational scientific voyage that highlights the importance of collaboration.
TEN STEPS TO NANETTE A Memoir Situation
Gadsby, Hannah Ballantine (368 pp.) $28.00 | March 29, 2022 978-1-984819-78-9
Debut memoir by the Australian comedian.
Early on, Gadsby delivers a hilarious self-assessment: “For most of my life I have been a financially insecure autistic Australian gender queer vagina-wielding situation who does not have a bird-like skeletal system. I might have had a reasonable shot with only one or two of those ‘quirks,’ but not the whole set, and certainly not with Cate Blanchett already in town hogging all the moody lesbian roles. But, honestly, my biggest impediment is that I’m quite lazy.” The author writes frankly about growing up the youngest of five children in Tasmania, sharing colorful childhood anecdotes about her dogs and her distinct inability to make friends. At 12, she suffered through two years of sexual abuse, followed by high school years as a “fat tomboy” haunted by social anxiety and crushes on other girls. Early in her life, Gadsby was aware of Tasmania’s enduring legacy of criminalizing homosexuality. As she matured and began exploring a natural talent for stand-up comedy, this inspired her to advocate for gay reform measures. She soon became a comedy festival favorite, and in 2018, she found on-screen success with her Netflix special, Nanette. As the memoir progresses, the author’s initially stiff prose brightens as she describes her blossoming as an adult with ADHD and autism. These diagnoses helped explain why she hated small talk, an aversion that manifested in an extremely awkward yet hysterical exchange with Jennifer Aniston at an Emmys party. Consistently self-effacing and contemplative, Gadsby acknowledges that her unique brand of deadpan observational comedy isn’t for everyone, especially since it often skewers “the two most overly sensitive demographics the world has ever known: straight white cis men and self-righteous comedians.” Often portrayed by audiences as a woman workshopping her personal demons on stage, Gadsby agrees, conceding that her platform has allowed her to “playfully interrogate my own story and unravel the immature and sometimes toxic versions of events that my younger, traumatized brain had settled on.”
A witty and provocatively written life story.
SEEK AND HIDE The Tangled History of the Right to Privacy
Gajda, Amy Viking (400 pp.) $30.00 | April 12, 2022 978-1-984880-74-1
The right to privacy is not a given, as this complicated legal history makes clear. As law professor Gajda writes, there has been tension between the right to privacy and the right of the free press to publish news since the Colonial era. Nonetheless, the modern period of privacy law begins, by her account, with a specific incident in the late 19th century when a risqué dancer contested the publication of a photograph of her onstage act. The event coincided with the publication of an article by future Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, whose firm did so brisk a business in privacy-related lawsuits that he felt comfortable turning down one such action by none other than Mark Twain. “The U.S. Supreme Court has never decided precisely when the right to privacy trumps
a freedom to publish a truth,” writes Gajda. Instead, the court has referred the matter to the states, which has resulted in a patchwork of laws that serve to highlight the tension even further: “Society needs [privacy], the law is there on which to build, and the only question is, which way do we as a society want to go, especially when the right to privacy is so often pitted against that other critical right, the freedom of expression?” Just as with the Supreme Court, American society seems torn, and the legal pendulum swings, sometimes weighing heavily in favor of the press (as with, for instance, the publication of the Pentagon Papers) and sometimes siding, by omission or commission, with those who claim the right to privacy—Donald Trump and his taxes, to name just one of the author’s examples. Clearly, she concludes, the matter is legislative as much as judicial, such that Congress must weigh in on what constitutes, as one Supreme Court decision framed it, “a subject of legitimate news interest.”
Educative reading for lawyers, journalists, and others who must balance the right to make known with the right to conceal.
TELL MOTHER I’M IN PARADISE Memoirs of a Political Prisoner in El Salvador
Gasteazoro, Ana Margarita Ed. by Judy Blankenship & Andrew Wilson Univ. of Alabama (280 pp.) $34.95 | April 5, 2022 978-0-8173-2121-5
A wrenching oral history/memoir of a Salvadoran political activist and
revolutionary.
For a few years before her death from cancer in 1993, Gasteazoro recounted her remarkable stories to her friend Blankenship, who worked with Wilson to create this multilayered, affecting first-person narrative of a young woman’s radicalization during a turbulent time of repression by El Salvador’s government and military. The country’s civil war, which lasted from 1979 to 1992, resulted in 75,000 deaths. Sadly, Gasteazoro would
not live to experience her country’s first democratic elections, for which she had fought. Born into a well-connected, Catholic, upper-middle-class Salvadoran family, Gasteazoro, a highly intelligent, savvy young woman with a fierce spirit and strong conscience, was essentially deprived of a university education like her brothers because her parents figured she would just get married anyway. However, as Blankenship writes, “she never married, and she never forgot the injustice of her father’s decision.” In 1977, as she and her friends were becoming increasingly aware of the intensifying political agitation and nurturing their burgeoning activism, they were horrified by the assassination of Padre Rutilio Grande, “the first important religious leader to be murdered” during that tumultuous period. As the author shows, the primary conflict was caused by a government that “accused the reform initiative of being communist inspired and ignored the fact that it mostly affected public lands.” Gasteazoro joined one of the opposition parties, and by 1979, demonstrations by activist organizations and strikes by the trade unions were met with murderous violence by the authorities. Many of her friends were “disappeared,” and Gasteazoro led a dangerous underground life until she was eventually arrested, tortured, and imprisoned for two years in the notorious Ilopango Prison for Women. Here, the details are horrific and visceral. Tragically, Gasteazoro died before she could run for political office in the 1993 elections, but Blankenship and Wilson are commended for bringing her story to light.
A harrowing firsthand look at the Salvadoran civil war and its enormous human toll.
KHABAAR An Immigrant Journey of Food, Memory, and Family
Ghosh, Madhushree Univ. of Iowa (212 pp.) $19.95 paper | April 4, 2022 978-1-60938-823-2
A memoir weaving the author’s personal history with South Asian food and folkways.
“Food comforts a need that connects us across borders,” writes Ghosh in this well-turned collection of essays combining cuisine with social and personal politics. As a child, the author moved with her family from eastern India to Delhi, and the cultural shock—bigger crowds, different flavors than her Bengali upbringing—prompts her fond recall of food-shopping trips with her father and her lifelong efforts to access the foods she loved most growing up. (The book contains a handful of recipes.) But food, she recognizes, is also often a source of rifts, even violence. In one essay, Ghosh pairs a recollection of her favorite Sikh-owned restaurant in her current home, San Diego, with anti-Sikh attacks in America and India. In another, she examines her strained relationship with her ex-husband’s family while reporting on the rivalry between a pair of Indonesian prata restaurants. Throughout, the book is structured to insist that food is inextricable from larger cultural forces. Each essay shifts across experiences (sometimes abruptly), but Ghosh writes especially well through her memories, from tender (as a child shopping for goat with her father in a bustling Delhi market) to terrifying (desperately escaping a hotel room she was accidentally locked in before a job presentation). Breaking through hotel drywall serves as a metaphor for escaping a husband who’s verbally abusive when he’s not neglectful, a story that in turn is interwoven with another about an Indian chef in San Diego who was murdered by her partner. Ghosh clearly sees the downsides of food culture— indentured servitude, racism, oversugared and watered-down variations of her favorite dishes—but her mood is also often celebratory. She concludes by writing about hosting a Diwali party and reconnecting with food during the pandemic: “Roots, if strong, survive many a pause.”
A likable food memoir from a self-aware and culturally astute author.
THE UNCOLLECTED ESSAYS OF ELIZABETH HARDWICK
Hardwick, Elizabeth Ed. by Alex Andriesse New York Review Books (304 pp.) $18.95 paper | May 17, 2022 978-1-68137-623-3
More essays from a master of the form. Hardwick’s essays have been getting a new look thanks to Cathy Curtis’ recent bio, A Splendid Intelligence, so editor Andriesse’s collection of 35 previously uncollected essays—published in Vogue, Vanity Fair, the New York Review of Books, and other publications—is well timed. In the first piece, Hardwick writes that a “collection of essays is a collection of variations,” and these pieces showcase her own range of interests and what Andriesse calls “the poise of her prose.” In the first section, “Places, People, Things,” Hardwick begins with personal reminiscences, writing about her beloved, “graceful” hometown, Lexington, Kentucky, and Maine, one of her favorite summer spots, which always “takes me by surprise.” Then there are profiles, of Balanchine, friends Susan Sontag (“all ideas”) and the “greatly gifted” Katherine Anne Porter, and Faye Dunaway. The section titled “Piety and Politics” shows Hardwick taking on current affairs, including incisive discussions of elections, scandals, the O.J. Simpson trial, the Kennedys, Jimmy Carter, and Bill Clinton (“shallow, reckless”). Particularly scathing is “On Behalf of the Unborn: A Celibacy Amendment,” a brief 1996 essay on Republican politics and abortion. As Andriesse writes, the writing in the section “Feminine Principle” shows that for Hardwick, “if liberation was a sign of social progress, it was also, frequently, a source of personal pain.” In 1971, she looked “at little girls with wonder and with anxiety. I do not know whether they will be free—the only certainty is that many will be adrift.” In “On Reading the Writings of Women,” Hardwick confesses to a “nearly unaccountable attraction and hostility to the work of other women writers,” and she goes on to berate and praise a few. An essay on Southern literature is a tour
my fourth time, we drowned
de force of breadth, economy, and insight. In the miscellaneous “Musings” section, the author’s examination of Leonardo da Vinci thoroughly captivates, while “Grits Soufflé” enchants.
This judicious gathering is a fine place to sample Hardwick’s work.
MY FOURTH TIME, WE DROWNED Seeking Refuge on the World’s Deadliest Migration Route
Hayden, Sally Melville House (400 pp.) $29.99 | March 22, 2022 978-1-61219-945-0
A powerful, horrific account of the rigors that African immigrants face in fleeing their homelands for sanctuary in Europe.
“You become cargo, a piece of meat, a being that loses humanity when you can no longer recognize the humanity of others around you.” So writes Hayden, the Africa correspondent for the Irish Times, regarding the global refugee crisis. The European Union has seemed of two minds about illegal immigration into its domain: Leaders lament the human rights implications the refugees underscore even as they put more effort into blocking the flow. “In 2018,” writes the author, “a study found that almost 1,000 kilometers of border walls had been erected by EU member states and states in the European Schengen travel area since the fall of the Berlin Wall nineteen years before.” Moreover, the EU has contracted with the Libyan government—such as it is in a time of civil war—to intercept refugees crossing the middle Mediterranean and house them in settlements that resemble concentration camps, one even bearing the nickname “Guantánamo.” In some cases, refugees are used as human shields, meant to deter attacks by rival warlords, often to no avail. Worse, many are forced into slavery, either in Libya or delivered into the hands of the Mafia in southern Italy and put to work on farms there. Hayden tells her story through
deep exploration of legal papers, archives, and government data. Even more affective are her personal encounters and interviews with refugees themselves, whose situations, if anything, seem to be worsening. “Between 2014 and 2020,” she writes, “more than twenty thousand men, women, and children would die on the Mediterranean Sea,” while Europeans who try to assist them often became targets of legal prosecution. The narrative is consistently harrowing, revealing the complexities within a global crisis that lacks an easy solution, especially as the numbers of refugees mount.
An important contribution to the literature of forced immigration and humanitarian crisis.
NASTY, BRUTISH, AND SHORT Adventures in Philosophy With My Kids
Hershovitz, Scott Penguin Press (384 pp.) $28.00 | May 3, 2022 978-1-984881-81-6
A professor gets a philosophical assist from his young sons. Most parents are easily impressed with the precociousness of their own children. To listen to them gush, each child is a wise philosopher. Hershovitz, director of the Law and Ethics Program at the University of Michigan, believes they’re right. “Every kid—every single one—is a philosopher,” he writes. “They stop when they grow up. Indeed, it may be that part of what it is to grow up is to stop doing philosophy and to start doing something more practical.” The author uses his kids, Rex and Hank, as evidence of children’s instinct for philosophy. The around-the-house scenes and conversations he presents are equal parts hilarious (for years, Hank kept up a facade of not knowing the alphabet to worry his dad) and profound (4-year-old Rex: “I think that, for real, God is pretend, and for pretend, God is real”). When the author is discussing Rex or Hank, good things happen, but Hershovitz’s real goal is to encourage adult readers to maintain their innate ability to philosophize. So, when one of his kids wonders, for example, if he’s dreaming, it leads to an exposition on epistemology. This is where the book falls a bit flat. There’s nothing wrong with the way Hershovitz presents philosophy; his exposition is clear and lively. But the material consists of the same vogue ideas found in most introductory works of philosophy or, these days, on any podcast with a philosophical bent. If you are already familiar with the trolley problem, philosophical zombies, and the simulation argument, you won’t find anything new in their treatment here. In reading about them, you’ll long for Rex and Hank to return. A philosophical conversation with a child is among life’s great pleasures. If you don’t already know this, Hershovitz’s book will be of assistance.
A playful yet serious introduction to philosophy.
THE NOWHERE OFFICE Reinventing Work and the Workplace of the Future
Hobsbawm, Julia PublicAffairs (208 pp.) $27.00 | April 12, 2022 978-1-541-70193-9
An entrepreneur and business consultant shows how the world of work is being remade—and so rapidly that in some respects it’s unrecognizable.
Even before the pandemic, Hobsbawm observes, transformational shifts were occurring in three areas that had implications for intellectual and office work: politics, “specifically the issues of inequality and sustainability”; society, with the largest cohort of workers being Generation Z but mingling generations on either side; and technology, with a shift to what’s called the metaverse, “where virtual reality becomes far more real in our lives than we ever thought possible.” The pandemic accelerated the recognition that people didn’t need to work in an office on a regular schedule, and that in turn sped up the “increasing backlash against work”—work, that is, that did not have a clear purpose and wasn’t life-enhancing in some way. As Hobsbawm observes, such work is generally simple, at least in its conception: We’re going to fix this problem; we’re going to build this. Yet offices have grown complex, mostly due to the proliferation of complexity-making middle managers who aren’t needed in a world of remote work, wherein “much management energy will need to go into fresh challenges: scheduling hybrid working, reframing the measuring of performance.” In this matter, writes the author, corporations must reframe both their approaches to human resources, returning the “human” to the equation, and their relationships with their employee: “The onus should be less on the employee having their performance evaluated and more about the organization being asked: how are we performing for you?” There may be institutional resistance to such changes, but, Hobsbawm warns, the genie is out of the bottle. Those Gen Z and millennial workers simply aren’t going to show up to places that treat them like cogs in an outdated machine.
An intriguing consideration of this bewildering “liminal in-between time in the history of work.”
READING THE WATER Fly Fishing, Fatherhood, and Finding Strength in Nature
Hume, Mark Greystone Books (288 pp.) $27.95 | May 10, 2022 978-1-77164-569-0
A father shares the joys of fly-fishing with his daughters. In this eloquent memoir, journalist Hume captures his passion for the sport, which he has enjoyed
some of my best friends
for 50 years, and gratification in passing it on to his daughters. Growing up in British Columbia, he was captivated by nature and wildlife, fish in particular. A self-taught fisherman, Hume first caught trout by hand in his “home waters” of Penticton Creek before learning to fish with a rod. Soon, he escaped to the water at every opportunity. As a result of his family’s frequent moves, “I had begun to calibrate my life in relation to my access to water.” Seeking a stronger connection to the natural world led him to fly-fishing, and at the same time, he became aware of the countless dangers facing the natural world. In his attempt to be a better environmental steward, he employed the practice of catch and release, noting the significant moment when he “learned how to let fish go.” Throughout, Hume explores angling history and some of the ethical considerations involved as well as individuals who have guided and inspired him. Eventually, he found a partner who shared his love of the outdoors, and they started a family. As his two daughters grew older, Hume recalls, he was forced to acknowledge his own mortality, and he wanted to make sure he bequeathed his knowledge. “From the start as I guided my daughters toward a fly fishing life,” he writes, “I hoped they would grasp the meditative nature of the sport.” Hume vividly conveys the sensory details of their adventures and the stunning surroundings where his daughters learned the trade, held dragonflies, collected hawk feathers, “watched bears chase spawning salmon” and “loons swim under our canoe, dark, fibrillating shadows suddenly there, then gone in a ripple of water.”
A heartfelt, beautifully written celebration of the wonders of nature and comfort of family.
SOME OF MY BEST FRIENDS Essays on Lip Service
Isen, Tajja One Signal/Atria (240 pp.) $27.00 | April 19, 2022 978-1-982178-42-0
Social justice—or what passes for it—falls under the scrutiny of a Canadian voice actor, cultural critic, and editor-inchief of Catapult magazine.
As a biracial Black performer who has done voice-over work in the U.S. and Canada for two decades, Isen has seen firsthand the many ways in which well-intentioned ideas on race, gender, and culture—whether promoted by liberals or conservatives— can hurt people they aim to help. In the nine essays in this stellar debut collection, the author probes the gap between expectation and reality. Her opening essay, “Hearing Voices,” sets the tone with its wry view of “the authenticity boom” that seeks to have Black animated characters voiced only by Black actors. “What Black characters?” Isen asks, adding that in 2018, only 3% of the lead or co-lead roles in animated films were for women of color and that an insistence on perfect “phenotypic match[ing]” between an actor and character “would shut too many of us out until further notice.” In “Tiny White People,” Isen examines the recent surge in anti-racist books, finding further evidence of Toni Morrison’s view that Black authors’ work gets read “as sociology, as tolerance, but not as a serious and rigorous art form,” and in “Diversity Hire,” she faults diversity initiatives that make companies “look progressive” without ending underlying injustices. Such issues are not solely American, she argues: See “Dead or Canadian,” which deflates the myth that “Canada does not have a racism problem, or an epidemic of police brutality,” or that its “national reverence for diversity is, like the politeness of its citizens, just there, unflappable and eternal.” Isen has a penchant for buzzwords that rob her work of some of its potential elegance, but as a whole, this book shows a bracing willingness to tackle sensitive issues that others often sweep under a rug.
Fresh and intelligent critiques of popular North American ideas about race and gender.
EVERYTHING LEFT TO REMEMBER My Mother, Our Memories, and a Journey Through the Rocky Mountains
Jagger, Steph Flatiron Books (272 pp.) $27.99 | April 26, 2022 978-1-250-26183-0
A memoir of Alzheimer’s and a mother and daughter’s journey across the Rockies and beyond. In this follow-up to Unbound, Jagger chronicles the difficulties of coping with her mother’s Alzheimer’s, with which she was diagnosed in 2015. Growing up, her family members didn’t discuss their feelings. By the time Jagger was a teenager, she writes, “I developed a deep suspicion of emotions….I judged people who displayed them.” The author also contends that her parents treated her and her sister differently than her brothers. “I was handed the idea that my fulfillment, my eventual wholeness, was dependent on finding a nice guy,” she writes. As an adult, Jagger distanced herself from her mother, and for years, they moved in different directions. As a result, “I’d never really seen my mother…in her totality.” Following her mother’s diagnosis, Jagger decided that a trip could help their relationship. “This was not the first time I had run to Mother Nature looking for guidance,” she writes. With keen insight and thoughtful prose that captures both the emotions involved and the significance of the natural world in the author’s life, she recalls their journey across the Rockies, where they shared moments of loss, endured times of frustration, and found genuine joy in nature. Jagger also shares intimate details of the memories that began to surface as well as her reoccurring dreams, which allowed her to begin to make connections between her mother’s life and her own. During the process of trying to learn more about her mother, she realized that “this trip was never about unearthing the mystery living inside my mother, but the one that has been living deep inside of me.” Solemnly, the author acknowledges that, as her mother begins to forget her, she will be allowed
to reclaim herself. “My focus shifted away from the loss,” she writes. “It felt, now, that there was much to be gained.”
A beautiful yet heart-wrenching tribute to the motherdaughter relationship.
THE REVOLUTION THAT WASN’T GameStop, Reddit, and the Fleecing of Small Investors
Jakab, Spencer Portfolio (320 pp.) $28.00 | Feb. 1, 2022 978-0-593-42115-4
There’s a sucker born every minute— and, as the recent GameStop bubble showed, there’s a Wall Street army waiting to take their money.
Financial journalist Jakab, a former stock analyst at Credit Suisse, turns received wisdom on its head. Where the recent GameStop run from nearly worthless paper to vastly inflated stock has been touted as a win for the little guy, the author considers the situation a model of stock market insiders knowing how to play whatever game is on the table. Those who bargained that GameStop was a sure thing didn’t understand the game of selling short, one that requires nerves of steel and, typically, deep pockets. “Wall Street likes volatility,” Jakab writes, again against received wisdom, “and it absolutely loves it when millions of new, inexperienced investors rush in with their savings.” Because those new investors trusted not the insiders but instead the knowledge of a crowd, they were ripe for the plucking, while big investors were also clamoring for a piece of the action. “Suddenly brokers like Robinhood suspended the ability to buy more of the stocks that were on everybody’s lips,” writes the author. “No such restrictions were placed on the fat cats, though. The game was rigged! But it always has been.” Jakab’s account of how Wall Street works requires financial common sense and some numeracy, though it’s quite accessible. He’s also a seasoned journalist who leavens money talk with human interest stories, including some that concern people who couldn’t really afford the loss but who lost on GameStop anyway. This is the valuable part of the book for would-be investors. The author writes that he “has warned against the dangers of free trading and free advice on the internet, both of which spurred mainly young people to be hyperactive trend chasers.” Good advice is available, but it costs—just as it costs time and money to be a conscious investor.
A welcome book that blends financial investigation with useful investment strategies.
ORDINARY EQUALITY The Fearless Women and Queer People Who Shaped the U.S. Constitution and the Equal Rights Amendment
Kelly, Kate Illus. by Nicole LaRue Gibbs Smith (256 pp.) $27.99 | March 1, 2022 978-1-4236-5872-6
Twelve profiles of courageous American women, pre-Revolution to the present.
“We often say that America was founded on July 4, 1776—but, really, 1776 was just the year a bunch of rich white guys wrote a breakup letter to King George, saying his American colonies were tired of being England’s side hustle (the Declaration of Independence),” writes Kelly near the beginning of this book, based on her podcast of the same name. The author collaborates with graphic designer and illustrator LaRue to recount the stories of little-known figures like Molly Brant, a Mohawk leader in British New York; playwright Mercy Otis Warren; and Belinda Sutton, an enslaved woman who successfully petitioned for her own emancipation; as well as more familiar names like Abigail Adams, Phillis Wheatley, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Kelly has an eye for interesting details and a gift for phrasemaking. Who knew that the Fugitive Slave Act has the distinction of being “the first and only time the Founders used the pronoun ‘she’ in the Constitution”? Or that the contribution to women’s suffrage of Matilda Joslyn Gage, who began as a teenage abolitionist, was erased by “Mean Girl” Susan B. Anthony? Kelly also introduces us to Anna Pauline “Pauli” Murray, likely the first trans activist, referred to here with they/them pronouns, “an attempt to avoid misgendering a person who contributed so much to the cause of gender equality.” Sidebars cover key concepts and historical figures, including Gandhi, Title IX, and that ignominious “foot soldier of the patriarchy” Phyllis Schlafly. “Even after all her extensive groundwork building a political network of conservative women and helping to shape the new religious right as a political force,” writes Kelly, “Phyllis was still denied the Cabinet position she expected in the Ronald Reagan Administration.” What a shame.
A fun, vibrant work perfectly suited to its intended audience: a potential new generation of ERA activists.
I CRIED TO DREAM AGAIN Trafficking, Murder, and Deliverance—A Memoir
Kruzan, Sara & Cori Thomas Pantheon (208 pp.) $27.00 | May 10, 2022 978-0-593-31588-0
Kruzan powerfully chronicles the story of how she killed the man who abused and trafficked her during her teen years.
translating myself and others
A testament to both the capricious nature of the American criminal justice system and the power of hope, Kruzan’s book, co-written by Thomas, is a harrowing and eye-opening account of how easily things can go wrong. Because the author’s story is not unique, it’s that much more heartbreaking. Raised by an abusive single mother in decrepit houses and consistently dangerous circumstances, Kruzan describes her life in unflinching but compassionate detail. Having established at the beginning of the text that she killed a man, who called himself GG, we’re swiftly taken back to the makeshift bedroom of a little girl who only ever wanted to make her mother smile and who could be easily won over with ice cream. The narrative moves fast, giving readers a palpable sense of Kruzan’s helplessness to stop what was happening as she was swept up in physical and sexual abuse and groomed by GG to be a trafficked child. By the time she was 16, she writes, “my biggest wish would be to be rescued from him and everything he had introduced me to.” Before the age of 18, Kruzan was convicted of murder and sent to prison for life without parole. Commendably, amid the many dark parts of the book, the author takes time to highlight, with gratitude, the bright spots. Despite all the people who did her wrong, she is diligent about naming the many people who offered assistance, including teachers, neighbors, friends, and friends’ families. Later, Kruzan writes poignantly about the tenderness and sisterhood she discovered in prison. Overwhelmingly, she notes, her fellow incarcerated women were kind and thoughtful, often victims of the same system that caused the author so many years of suffering.
A must-read for parents, civil servants, and activists.
GOING BIG FDR’s Legacy and Biden’s New Deal and the Struggle To Save Democracy
Kuttner, Robert The New Press (240 pp.) $23.99 | April 26, 2022 978-1-62097-727-9
A political autopsy describing how Democratic presidents abandoned the progressive legacy of Franklin Roosevelt and allowed economic inequality to deepen.
Kuttner, co-founder of Economic Policy Institute and The American Prospect, opens with an urgent assessment of our current political landscape: “Joe Biden’s presidency will be either a historic pivot back to New Deal economics and forward to energized democracy, or a heartbreaking interregnum between two bouts of deepening American fascism. We are facing the most momentous threat to the American republic since the Civil War.” The touchstone for his sharp analysis is the New Deal, “a model of progressive policy and politics” that was committed to economic justice. While Harry Truman left FDR’s legacy intact and Lyndon Johnson expanded it with his war on poverty and civil rights legislation that attended to issues FDR had ignored, Jimmy Carter initiated a retreat that has continued for four decades. A quarter-century of prosperity had ended, and the Democratic Party tacked to the right. Following Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama championed economic growth, Wall Street prosperity, and global trade, catering to collegeeducated workers and the wealthy rather than addressing racial and economic equality for the working class. Once again, economic policy was delegated to Wall Street insiders. Given this historical context and Biden’s centrist credentials, his progressivism came as a surprise, and an expansive legislative agenda and revival of the New Deal coalition of labor, the poor, and racial minorities have resurrected values neglected by previous Democratic administrations. Kuttner sees “grounds for hope” that Biden’s presidency can reverse “the hyper-concentration of capital and…the steady weakening of labor” and enable progressivism to triumph. It will do so, however, only when Democrats occupy the White House, gain majorities in Congress, and tightly regulate finance capitalism. Some readers may wish for more discussion of progressivism from below: grassroots organizations, state and local governments, and democratic socialist political movements.
A cogent reminder of the importance of federal policy, presidential leadership, and the elusiveness of economic justice.
TRANSLATING MYSELF AND OTHERS
Lahiri, Jhumpa Princeton Univ. (184 pp.) $21.95 | May 17, 2022 978-0-691-23116-7
The acclaimed author and translator offers thoughts on the latter art and craft. A Pulitzer Prize–winning author of fiction in English, Lahiri moved to Rome in 2012 to immerse herself in Italian. Since then, she has published both a memoir and fiction in Italian and translated several works from Italian to English. This volume collects several pieces written over the past seven years—her translators’ notes to the novels Ties (2017), Trick (2018), and Trust (2021) by Italian writer (and friend) Domenico Starnone; stand-alone essays; and lectures and addresses—as well as an original introduction and afterword. A few themes emerge: Lahiri frequently returns to Ovid and Metamorphoses, most notably in her lecture “In Praise of Echo” and her moving afterword, which recounts her process of translating Ovid as her mother declined and died; metaphors of immigration and migration—Lahiri is both the daughter of Bengali-speaking Indian immigrants and an immigrant herself, twice over— ground other musings. Possibly the most provocative piece is “Where I Find Myself”—on the process of translating her own novel Dove mi trovo, from the original Italian into English as Whereabouts (2021)—an essay that finds her first questioning the ethics of self-translation (probed with a surgical metaphor) and then impelled to make revisions for a second Italian edition. The weakest essay is “Traduzione (stra)ordinaria / (Extra)
ordinary Translation,” an appreciation of Italian revolutionary and thinker Antonio Gramsci, whose Letters From Prison reveal a linguist as ferociously compelled to investigate the process of translation as Lahiri herself. Composed originally as remarks for a panel, it reads like an elegantly annotated list of bullet points that will have readers wishing Lahiri had revised it into a cohesive essay. Readers may also find themselves envious of the author’s students of translation at Princeton, but this sharp collection will have to do. Two essays originally composed in Italian are printed in the original in an appendix.
A scrupulously honest and consistently thoughtful love letter to “the most intense form of reading…there is.”
IN ON THE JOKE The Original Queens of Stand-Up Comedy
Levy, Shawn Doubleday (400 pp.) $30.00 | April 5, 2022 978-0-385-54578-5
A film critic and bestselling author examines the foundational history of women stand-up comedians in American show business.
Women comics faced an uphill battle throughout most of the 20th century. Levy, author of biographies of Jerry Lewis, Paul Newman, Robert De Niro, and others, observes that prior to the feminist movement of the 1960s, women who dared take the stage alone were “expected to be pretty and to sing, maybe dance. If she did comedy at all, it was with a man or as part of an ensemble.” Yet so many of the women he profiles shattered those notions through grit, persistence, and brilliance that could not be denied. Moms Mabley, who began her storied career in the all-Black vaudeville circuit during the years after World War I, broke ground not only by talking frankly about sex and politics, but also for her offstage life as a lesbian. Like Mabley, Jewish comedian Belle Barth also began in vaudeville and built a career around comedic raunchiness. Her unapologetically profane act got her “arrested and fined for public indecency” years before Lenny Bruce became a “First Amendment martyr.” The struggles and triumphs of these early female comedians helped pave the way for later female comedians like Phyllis Diller. The long-suffering wife of a feckless husband, Diller stumbled into stand-up in the 1950s and gradually made a name for herself doing comic takedowns of her own, often troubled, domestic life. Later, she would become the first woman daring enough to breach the male-only precincts of the Friars Club in 1983, dressed as a man, and the first woman to be offered membership in the club three years later. Both thorough and sympathetic, Levy’s work is notable for how it fills gaps in entertainment history, and the author also ably explores social and attitudinal changes that helped women finally be recognized for their contributions to comedy.
A readably informative, well-researched comedic history.
INDELIBLE CITY Dispossession and Defiance in Hong Kong
Lim, Louisa Riverhead (320 pp.) $28.00 | April 19, 2022 978-0-593-19181-1
The latest eye-opening journalistic account of the ongoing tumult in Hong Kong. Journalist Lim, the author of The People’s Republic of Amnesia: Tiananmen Revisited, examines the unrest in terms of dominion, possession, and defiance. “The issue of belonging,” she writes, “has always been a complicated one for me, as a half-English, half-Chinese person who was born in England but brought up in Hong Kong.” Now living and teaching in Melbourne, Lim writes, “my position on the sidelines liberates me to write more openly than others” about the vibrant, defiant spirit of the citizens, especially since the passage of the China-enforced National Security Law. The author’s determined, methodical chronicle captures her growing unease and complex thoughts about joining the ranks of the activists and dissidents. “Overnight,” she writes, “a mostly free society had become an authoritarian one.” With the freedom of the press (and the internet) severely restricted, police are targeting reporters. Lim returns often to the tragic life and exceptional work of Tsang Tsou-choi (1921-2007), a once-homeless Hong Kong artist. Nicknamed “the King of Kowloon,” he would use “misshapen, childlike calligraphy” to create graffiti asserting his grievance that he had been robbed of his ancestral land, and he became famous as a personification of Hong Kong citizens’ sense of dispossession after the handover by Britain in 1997. Throughout this smooth mixture of reportage and memoir, Lim ably captures the increasingly malignant actions by the Communist Party, which have become more alarming by the day. “The days and nights,” she writes, “were melding into a single livestream of tear gas, deployed with horrifying and mesmerizing beauty….By the end of 2019, the police had fired sixteen thousand rounds of tear gas, violating both their own guidelines and the Chemical Weapons Convention.” This book is a good complement to Karen Cheung’s The Impossible City.
An affecting portrayal of the spirited nature of Hong Kong and the many challenges it faces.
THE BETRAYAL The True Story of My Brush With Death in the World of Narcos and Launderers
Mazur, Robert Little A (312 pp.) $24.95 | April 1, 2022 978-1-5420-3297-1
Suspenseful memoir of undercover narcotics work.
benjamin franklin’s last bet
“That motherfucker Baldasare is a fucking DEA agent. I know it, but I can’t say why.” So grumbled a narcotics kingpin in 1993 about the man who laundered his money for five years: Mazur, working in the guise of someone whose name he picked from an Italian American graveyard on Staten Island. The author, working for the Drug Enforcement Agency, had earned certification as a mortgage broker and then made it known to the members of the Colombian cartel that he was open for business. One of his targets, that kingpin, took the bait. His organization, writes Mazur, moved millions of dollars per year in cocaine, laundering the cash by means of an army of “Smurfs” who would fan out across South Florida, New York City, and other venues to buy money orders, traveler’s checks, and the like with increments of cash that never exceeded a few thousand dollars, thereby allowing them to avoid suspicion. A typical bad guy then “had weekly FedEx boxes containing hundreds of these negotiable instruments shipped to me so I could deposit them and then send him the total of each shipment in one wire transfer.” Mazur’s narrative has its longueurs, but it picks up speed and intensity when he becomes increasingly aware that the cartel has figured out who his real boss is—a development made possible largely because a fellow cop went over to the enemy, fully aware that the cartel had posted a $300,000 bounty “to anyone who killed a DEA agent.” The bad cop is now in prison, but, Mazur observes, the drug trade continues unabated. Long since retired, he ventures that cracking down on launderers—most of them otherwise respectable members of the financial community for whom the job is a feature and not a bug—and establishing “zero tolerance for corruption at all levels” would be a start.
An eye-opening insider’s look at the financial aspects of the international drug trade.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN’S LAST BET The Favorite Founder’s Divisive Death, Enduring Afterlife, and Blueprint for American Prosperity
Meyer, Michael Mariner Books (368 pp.) $28.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-328-56889-2
A portrait of the great revolutionary leader as a working-class populist.
Like the other Founding Fathers, writes historian Meyer, Benjamin Franklin was morally compromised: He pledged himself to the cause of liberty, yet he kept slaves throughout his life. That fact has been long known but little publicized. So, too, the subject of this book, namely a fund that Franklin established toward the end of his life that would endow the cities of Philadelphia, where Franklin made his fortune, and Boston, where he studied, with funds that would mature over the centuries, meanwhile providing small loans to working-class people to be repaid with interest over 10-year periods. “Although the term would not be coined for another two centuries,” writes Meyer, “Franklin’s ethical lending scheme can be seen as a forerunner of microfinance.” In addition, thanks to the miracle of compound interest, a portion of the funds—which amounted to a bit under $4,500 in the money of the time but which, properly managed, should have yielded billions today—were also to be distributed to the cities for public works improvements. Franklin made numerous assumptions that didn’t hold, among them that the funds would be competently administered by civic-minded volunteers and repaid on time. Neither happened thanks to various financial crises in the days before central banking. In 1828, Meyer writes, “Philadelphia’s auditor—making a soft approximation—penciled in a balance of $9,919.50, a calamitous 43 percent slide in only four years.” What should have been billions amounted to just a few million two centuries later, and the inequality that Franklin meant to combat by helping workers build businesses and trade education has mounted. Still, as Meyer notes, despite mismanagement and neglect, that there’s any money left at all should count as a plus, as well as the fact that Franklin’s “example of civic virtue has been carried forward, as he had hoped, for two hundred years.”
Meyer’s book sheds fascinating light on an icon who has been reduced to a symbol.
LET ME COUNT THE WAYS
Morín, Tomás Q. Univ. of Nebraska (188 pp.) $19.95 paper | March 1, 2022 978-1-496-22649-5
An impressionistic memoir in essays of a childhood shaped by an addicted parent and a complex set of coping behaviors. Morín takes his title from the sonnet by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, excerpted through the text as part of an ongoing reflection on the experience of love as well as the author’s obsessive-compulsive disorder. At a very young age, Morín began to count things (“books, forks, carpets, shadows, chairs, even people’s feet”), blink his eyes excessively, pick at his skin, suck his shirt collar, and spit. More recently, he’s been troubled by intrusive thoughts (his beloved cat’s head getting smashed in a door, on loop) and has felt “assaulted by invisible lines that extended from the ends of utensils when they were pointed at me.” Though Morín dedicates the book to his mother and grandmother, it is dominated by the men in his life: his alternately gentle and abusive grandfather; his father, whose heroin addiction was an open fact and a family priority; and Jackie, a neighbor, also addicted, whose kindness and affection made him a second father. Though there are many strong passages, the gaps in the storytelling and erratic chronology can be confusing. An extended meditation on childhood in the first half of the book culminates in a vignette in which the author “became one of 8,988 minors arrested for a violent crime in Texas that year….Each of us was between the ages of ten and seventeen. Each of us would answer to the
charge of murder or non-negligent manslaughter or forcible rape or robbery or aggravated assault.” What did he do? What were the consequences? We never find out. The author’s concerns are generally more aesthetic than narrative: “I close my eyes and I am back in that room, watching the dance outside the window, my eyelids, the red of my grandfather’s cigarette. My shallow breath is the first note of a song about heartbreak, the soul, and a dove’s lonely cry.”
Sometimes scattershot but also evocative, lyrical, and brave.
MOTHERCOIN The Stories of Immigrant Nannies
Muñoz, Elizabeth Cummins Beacon Press (280 pp.) $26.95 | April 19, 2022 978-0-8070-5118-4
Moving narratives from women working in “a largely invisible industry.” Muñoz, a scholar of Latin American literature and culture, makes her book debut with a sensitive investigation of the lives and work of immigrant nannies. Identifying herself as “a native Houstonian of European ancestry” who is fluent in Spanish, the author met nannies when she took her children to a local park. Beginning in 2010, she began to interview them, and she also reached out to some of their employers. Those interviews—recorded, transcribed, translated, and edited—form the basis of the text, which Muñoz has interwoven with historical, political, and economic context. In developing countries, migration has become “a particularly feminine survival strategy” and “a singular face of hope” for girls and women who want a better future for themselves and their families. In the U.S., they easily find work as nannies, filling a need for families in which both parents work and women face “impossible expectations” of what motherhood entails. Muñoz exposes the injustices and demands nannies encounter as much as she critiques “the false assumption that our homes and our families are held up by force of love, inexhaustible and economically inconsequential.” As a society, she writes, we “have dismissed our responsibility to raise our children and care for our elderly and infirm. We have feminized this care into triviality, swept it under the rug of visibility, and left the mothers among us with little choice but to struggle and endure—or to outsource the work to marginalized others who must bear our burdens and theirs, alone.” These women’s stories reveal broken and unjust social, health care, and legal systems; a changing landscape of immigration policy and practice; and a feminist movement that has failed to dismantle patriarchy. “When we replace the housewife with a low-wage, publicly invisible muchacha,” writes the author, “we maintain the same system of gender-based power that women have been resisting for ages.”
A perceptive look into a hidden world.
PARADISE FALLS The True Story of an Environmental Catastrophe
O’Brien, Keith Pantheon (480 pp.) $30.00 | April 12, 2022 978-0-593-31843-0
A deeply researched history of a significant 1977 environmental disaster. In this work of investigative reporting, O’Brien narrates a tale of corporate malfeasance and inaction, governmental response (or lack thereof), and, above all, inspiring citizen activism in the face of harrowing circumstances. Underneath the LaSalle neighborhood in suburban Niagara Falls, a company called Hooker Chemical had long filled a forgotten waterway, known as the Love Canal by locals, with chemical waste. By the late 1970s, residents noticed the stench of chemicals, clouds of fumes, gas leaks, spontaneous ignitions, and terrible health repercussions. O’Brien, a longtime NPR contributor, describes the personalities of a large cast of characters, including town officials, company executives, EPA administrators, Al Gore, Gov. Hugh Carey, Jane Fonda, even President Jimmy Carter. Thankfully, the author maintains the focus on the grassroots leaders and bluecollar workers who stood up to Hooker and its negligent corporate overseer, Occidental Petroleum. One government report noted “that a wide range of chemical compounds dumped in this industrial landfill might pose a substantial health hazard” to local residents. Other studies pointed out an “unusually high incidence” of miscarriages, birth defects, and malignancies, as in the tragic death of 6-year-old Jon Allen, a heartbreaking story fully recounted here. Evacuation of homes, relocation of residents, and toxic remediation work all proved daunting, as O’Brien’s patient chronology of the crisis bears out. Part of the solution turned out to be national and sweeping: federal financing to address thousands of poisoned landfills across the country. At the end of the Carter administration, Congress passed the Superfund Act, $1.6 billion funded “almost exclusively” by polluting companies. Unfortunately, in 1995, the Republican-led Congress let the corporate tax component lapse. Citizen activist Lois Gibbs, whose evolution as an organizer and spokesperson runs throughout the narrative, receives the honorary title of “Mother of the Superfund.” Readers who have followed Gibbs through years know that she has earned the laurels.
A thorough retelling of an environmental tragedy and a renewed call for corporate accountability.
the fighting soul
JILL A Biography of the First Lady
Pace, Julie & Darlene Superville Little, Brown (320 pp.) $29.00 | April 19, 2022 978-0-316-37750-8
Becoming Jill Biden. Associated Press reporters Pace and Superville draw on memoirs by Jill, Joe, and Hunter Biden; published interviews, articles, and biographical material; and an interview with Jill herself to create an admiring biography of the first lady. Born in 1951, the eldest of five daughters, Jill Jacobs grew up in the affluent farming town of Hammonton, New Jersey, where she was nurtured by a close-knit family and loving relatives. By her own account, her childhood was “really beautiful, idyllic.” At a junior college, she briefly studied fashion merchandising before enrolling at the University of Delaware, where she changed her focus to English and education. At 18, she married a fellow student, but the marriage floundered; by 1975, she was divorced. Joe Biden pursued her as soon as he was given her phone number by his brother, and he proposed multiple times before she finally accepted. Reluctant because her first marriage had failed, Jill was afraid of hurting Joe’s two little boys in case it didn’t work out. Of course, it worked out splendidly. The authors portray Jill as a devoted, practical, energetic mother and wife, able to juggle family life, public responsibilities, and teaching, to which she is wholly committed. In 2007, she earned a doctorate in educational leadership, and after moving to Washington, D.C., when Joe became vice president, Jill joined the faculty at Northern Virginia Community College, where she continues to teach. For much of her involvement in her husband’s career, bipartisan friendships and cordiality were the norm, vastly different from the rampant polarization that characterizes the current political landscape. In short, brisk chapters, the authors recount Jill’s busy, productive life: engaging in Joe’s presidential runs, supporting military families, and responding to family challenges, including the death of Beau Biden from brain cancer and Hunter’s problems with addiction. Running, the authors discovered, helps Jill get “physical and mental space from daily life.”
A fond portrait of a woman anyone would want as a friend.
SEXUAL REVOLUTION Modern Fascism and the Feminist Fightback
Penny, Laurie Bloomsbury (320 pp.) $17.00 paper | April 12, 2022 978-1-5266-0220-6
An urgent call for systemic change.
British journalist and New Statesman contributing editor Penny, who identifies as a genderqueer feminist, mounts an impassioned critique of White capitalist patriarchy and neoliberalism, which have generated “a paradigm shift in power relations between the genders” and a form of modern fascism that fosters the abuse, exploitation, and degradation of women, LGBTQ+ people, ethnic minorities, and people of color. Drawing on scholarly studies, popular media, and her own experiences—including anorexia, an obsession with “unavailable men,” and virulent online abuse—Penny exposes an endemic “rape culture” in which men assume that sex is something they “have a right to, and something that women give away in exchange for security, or protection, or love.” This coercion plays out in many areas of a woman’s life: oppressive standards of beauty (“a set of rules stamped on your body without your consent”); workplace sexual harassment; the burden of housework; and vulnerability to “forced-birth extremism.” As the author astutely notes, “there is little moral difference between a man forcing a woman to have sex against her will and the state—or a controlling partner—forcing her to be pregnant against her will.” Patriarchy wants women sequestered at home, caring for husband and children; women’s accomplishments are seen as “meaningless if she does not also secure her own sweetly devoted Prince Charming.” Although focusing most extensively on women, Penny argues that men, too, are violated by a culture that privileges greed and power. “Modern masculinity is a cage,” writes the author, and those trapped inside are convinced “that feminism, anti-racism and liberalism are a threat to the very soul of White Western manhood.” That fear, in turn, generates “racist, sexist, revenge fantasies.” Feminists’ resistance must begin in the heart and mind: “When a woman behaves as if her life matters, and her happiness counts, a tiny revolution takes place”—portending a fairer, more equitable, more just society.
A shrewd, justifiably angry polemic.
THE FIGHTING SOUL On the Road With Bernie Sanders
Rabin-Havt, Ari Liveright/Norton (336 pp.) $26.95 | April 26, 2022 978-1-63149-879-4
The deputy campaign manager for Bernie Sanders tells war stories from the 2020 presidential run. “Could Bernie Sanders have won the presidency?” asks Rabin-Havt toward the end of this eventful account. Though Donald Trump was a distant target, Sanders did note that “at its most basic, this election is about preserving democracy.” His real opponents were the members of the Democratic establishment. “The Democratic Party is a disorganized institution,” writes the author, “but it would organize against Bernie Sanders in a way they had not against any candidate—Democratic or Republican. Bernie’s premonition that the establishment would never let us win was coming to pass.” Granted, Sanders called himself a socialist and challenged the Democrats on numerous matters of principle and practice.
Rabin-Havt portrays Sanders as alternately genially irreverent (“That, Ari, is a giant motherfucking windmill,” he noted while passing by a wind farm) and singularly focused, micromanagerial down to the details of a campaign bumper sticker and insistent on staying in small hotel rooms—not out of any political symbolism but because he likes to sleep in cold rooms, and big rooms take too long to cool down. More to the point, Sanders had unyielding views, among them that “his own words [are] sacrosanct,” meaning every word of every speech and bill went under his pen; and that government, particularly at a local level, can be an instrument for change for the good. RabinHavt delivers an admirable portrait of his candidate, but of more interest to students of applied politics are the numerous episodes in which he explores the art of political calculus: how Sanders decided, for instance, to attack Pete Buttigieg among the field of candidates in the Iowa caucuses as “the candidate of the wealthy elite,” along with the horse trading involved in Sanders’ “Medicare for All” plan.
Among the better campaign confessionals and just the thing for presidential-politics wonks.
THE AGE OF THE STRONGMAN How the Cult of the Leader Threatens Democracy Around the World
Rachman, Gideon Other Press (336 pp.) $27.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-63542-280-1
An examination of the modern rise of authoritarianism. Vladimir Putin was first to the gate, writes Rachman, chief foreign affairs commentator for the Financial Times. Taking power in 2000, he set about reversing democratic gains won since the fall of the Soviet Union, crushing political opposition, and sweeping aside institutions obstructing his absolutist rule. Xi Jinping, “clearly nostalgic for some of the Maoist themes of his youth,” followed suit in China. The nub, writes the author, is that neither Russia nor China is a superpower as such—not yet, anyway—meaning that their authoritarian power does not yet extend far beyond their borders. Not so with the U.S. under Donald Trump, who clearly studied Putin and other dictators, trading in all the hallmarks of strongman rule: a disdain for the courts and other democratic institutions, a strongly enforced cult of personality, nationalism and anti-globalism, a base that is uneducated and rural, and the insistence that American greatness is undermined by the machinations of the “deep state” and Jewish financier George Soros. Interestingly, writes Rachman, that notion of the deep state is borrowed from the authoritarian regime in Turkey, while the Soros meme is widespread among rightists and antisemites across the world. Just as interestingly, he observes, the intellectual basis for the new authoritarianism is international, linking enough suspect characters to justify a conspiracy theory: Trump confidant Steve Bannon, say, hangs out with Italian fascists and Putin associates and reads the work of Carl Schmitt, the nowrehabilitated Nazi legal philosopher. “Trump’s defeat in 2020 does not mean that the danger has passed,” writes the author. However, by way of small comfort, he also observes that even the longest-lived authoritarian regimes have shelf lives, hastened by the general incompetence of their leaders in the face of such things as the pandemic.
An illuminating blend of dark warnings about the present and optimism that strongman rule can never prevail in the long term.
AMERICAN SEOUL A Memoir
Rho, Helena Little A (248 pp.) $24.95 | May 1, 2022 978-1-5420-3557-6
A cross-continental memoir captures the author’s “journey to self-discovery.” In Korean culture, the word jeong is significant. Meaning bond, obligation, or responsibility, it is usually a positive concept of attachment, but it can easily turn into a tool for manipulation and abuse. This duality lies at the heart of Rho’s compelling memoir, an exploration—occasionally harrowing— of finding a way to balance the expectations of others with obligations to oneself. The author, who moved with her family from Seoul to the U.S. when she was 6, built a life that seemed perfect. She graduated as a doctor when it was not easy for a woman to do so, and she became an assistant professor of pediatrics at three different prestigious children’s hospitals. Within her family, she was umchin tdal: the chosen one, the prettiest sister, the model that others were supposed to emulate. But behind the success were pain and difficulty, especially the unrelenting parental pressure to be the best at everything, as well as a protracted, bitter divorce. Rho also discovered that she was not suited to a medical career: She worried constantly about making the wrong decision, and she realized that she was an introvert wearing “the persona of an exuberant extrovert.” A traumatic car accident set in motion a change of thinking, and at the age of 40, she left medicine to become a writer. Even more, she sought to rediscover her Korean roots, learning the language and returning to Seoul, reinvigorating links with her extended family. These chapters form the emotional core of the book and the essence of Rho’s journey, and she ably conveys the complexity of being in a society although not really of it. She concludes that there are ways to claim two cultures as home—and love both. Rho’s story reveals the importance of resilience, strength, and human connections in choosing what sort of life to live.
A poignant, personal, sometimes painful chronicle of selfawareness and understanding.
the nation that never was
Roosevelt III, Kermit Univ. of Chicago (256 pp.) $25.00 | April 22, 2022 978-0-226-81761-3
A searching history of the legal and ideological basis of American identity. Americans love to tell comforting stories about our foundational documents, writes Roosevelt, a Penn law professor and great-great-grandson of Theodore Roosevelt. The Declaration of Independence, for instance, purportedly enshrines the notion that all men are created equal; of course, that’s not true. Although Thomas Jefferson included a clause condemning slavery—though owning enslaved people himself—the Declaration means all White men are created equal. “Segregation and denying Blacks the vote are perfectly consistent with the Declaration of Independence,” writes the author. The nub of the Declaration, he adds, is that when supposedly free people are oppressed, it is incumbent upon them to rebel. With the arrival of the Civil War, the South was able to invoke that notion as a cause for separation. The result was not just a second revolution, but also a second Constitution, one that in important ways undid the slavery-supporting first Constitution. “We tell ourselves a story that links us to a past political regime—Founding America, the America of the Declaration of Independence and the Founders’ Constitution—to which we are not the heirs,” writes Roosevelt, provocatively. “We are more properly the heirs of the people who destroyed that regime” and who moreover “defeated it by force of arms.” But this second Constitution is contingent and incomplete, allowing for neo-Confederate revivals (Reagan, Trump) thanks to relics such as the Electoral College, “a legacy of slavery, which seems increasingly likely to stop a majority of Americans from electing the candidate of their choice.” Roosevelt proposes that we do away with that institution and attempt a national enterprise to atone for our original sin through targeted investment in Black and other marginalized communities, which “offers the possibility of a real transformation.” His argument is sometimes repetitive but compelling and well worth consideration.
A novel way of reading our founding documents and revising them as both law- and nation-building myths.
THERE ARE PLACES IN THE WORLD WHERE RULES ARE LESS IMPORTANT THAN KINDNESS And Other Thoughts on Physics, Philosophy and the World
Rovelli, Carlo Trans. by Erica Segre & Simon Carnell Riverhead (272 pp.) $26.00 | May 10, 2022 978-0-593-19215-3
A collection of short essays from one of the most prominent science writers of our time.
Rovelli is well known for writing small books on big subjects. Seven Brief Lessons on Physics and The Order of Time earned a devoted audience through their accessible and elegant communication of the findings of modern physics. Though his latest book extends his brand, it differs crucially from its predecessors. While exhibiting his concise prose and easy erudition, this one lacks the sense of unity of previous works. Such is often the nature of collections of previously published pieces, yet even in that context, the text is scattershot. Intermixed with the author’s trademark astute scientific and philosophical writing are reminiscences, travelogues, and opinion pieces, some of which are mere filler. Even some of the science writing doesn’t hold up. But at his best—and there are plenty of sections that spotlight his best—Rovelli delights. His facility with science and philosophy is exemplary. In a defense of Aristotle’s physics, he writes, “the bad reputation of Aristotle’s physics is also due to the silly gulf that has opened up between scientific culture and humanist philosophical discourse. Those who study Aristotle generally know little about physics, and those who are engaged in physics have little interest in Aristotle.” He offers not just a defense of Aristotle’s physics, but a defense of his physics on the grounds of scientific provincialism. While many scientists write as if their specific expertise earns them general expertise, Rovelli knows enough to know what he doesn’t know. How beautiful and inspiring is his humility when he assesses his own interpretation of black holes: “Is this really the case? I don’t know for sure. I think it might well be. The alternatives seem less plausible to me. But I could be wrong. Trying to figure it out, still, is such a joy.”
A book so worthy in its heights that it compensates for its lows.
CORPORATE ROCK SUCKS The Rise and Fall of SST Records
Ruland, Jim Hachette (432 pp.) $30.00 | April 12, 2022 978-0-306-92548-1
A pointed history of the rise and fall of one of the earliest alt-rock record labels. All labels have problems, as any musician will tell you, no matter what their good intentions. In the U.K., the case in point is Factory Records. In the U.S., it’s SST, the subject of journalist and aficionado Ruland’s dig into the archives. Greg Ginn founded SST Records as a preteen in the exurbs of Los Angeles County, locked in his bedroom as a hamradio geek selling hard-to-find electronic parts. He found his way to a guitar, drifted from heavy metal to punk, and founded the iconic band Black Flag. SST, along with a few other indie labels, “bolstered the fractious scene and proved that punk rock was more than fucked-up kids with blue hair playing dress-up.” In a Southern California scene that featured bands like Black Flag, the Germs, the Weirdos, and the Minutemen, Ruland notes two constants: SST’s business and accounting methods were as anarchic as the music, and if homogenizing corporate radio was an enemy, a worse one was the LAPD, which declared open war on the unruly kids. SST signed now-legendary bands such as the Meat Puppets, Hüsker Dü, Soundgarden, and Sonic Youth, but the business practices worsened. Lawsuits mounted, bands defected, royalties went astray, and, ultimately, writes Ruland, many of the label’s contracts were flat-out illegal, commingling publishing and recording contracts. More than four decades later, the label still exists, though it’s been quiet for a decade. The author closes by noting that while die-hards wonder why SST hasn’t cashed in on the remaster, deluxe-edition craze, the answer is simple: Many masters have gone missing, and “the vast majority of these records were produced for very little money during a short period of time in studios rented by the hour,” with iffy sound quality.
An entertaining celebration of punk rock’s golden age and a cautionary tale about overreach and excess.
CALL ME CHEF, DAMMIT! A Veteran’s Journey From the Rural South to the White House
Rush, Andre Harper Horizon (240 pp.) $27.99 | April 19, 2022 978-0-7852-4945-0
A Black chef’s journey from poverty to the kitchens of the White House. Rush grew up poor in Mississippi, playing sports, lifting weights, and cooking. As “an extremely quiet kid,” he was an easy target for bullying and racism. Feeling helpless, his frustration and rage began to grow. In search of a better life, he joined the Army, where he became a cook. After demonstrating a gift for ice sculpting, Rush was asked to be on the culinary team and began competing in events. Soon he was assigned to the Pentagon to work for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In addition to his other duties, Rush began taking culinary classes and working catering jobs on the side, which led to an assignment at West Point. Despite his continued career advancements, the Army was hardly immune to prejudice: “Racism reared its ugly head time and time again.” With raw emotion and increasing profanity, Rush describes his difficult times in the military, often unapologetically responding to racist behavior and possible physical violence with his own threats. After one altercation, the author admits wondering if something may be wrong with him, so he began attending therapy for PTSD. However, he writes, “they were overmedicating me and everybody else.” So Rush flushed his meds and turned to cooking as a coping mechanism, and he also discussed with other soldiers the power of cooking to ameliorate PTSD. The author went on to work under four different presidents at the White House, and he earned moderate celebrity status in 2018 when a journalist took a photograph of his massive biceps, which he honed through decades of work “lifting 700 pounds out of anger, performing 2,222 push-ups every day to help those who gave up, who think about giving up, and who need help.” This notoriety, he writes, has helped him in his quest to assist wounded soldiers and provide direction for underprivileged kids.
Some readers may balk at the language, but this is an undeniably inspiring story.
BECOMING STORY A Journey Among Seasons, Places, Trees, and Ancestors
Sarris, Greg Heyday (224 pp.) $25.00 | April 5, 2022 978-1-59714-567-1
A Coast Miwok leader narrates his life through essays focusing on his connection to the natural world and his ancestors. Now in his 15th term as chairman of the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria, Sarris divides the book into four sections: “Seasons,” “Places,” “Trees,” and “Ancestors.” The author writes about how he was adopted and didn’t know his true heritage until his late 20s, explores significant moments in his childhood and teen years, and reminisces about Sonoma County, where he grew up and still lives. Moving through time, Sarris often breaks from the narrative to give further personal context about a certain experience—e.g., “That was so long ago. A million stories ago. Of course, I found out who my father was, and now I can look back and understand things I hadn’t the faintest idea of before”—and most of the essays subtly echo each other.
Regarding the progression from winter to spring, Sarris writes, “New growth, blossoms, sedge sprouting on creek banks—when, after winter, it is no longer safe to tell stories, not only because you must pay attention to where you are going, watchful for snakes and such, but because you too are coming out, becoming story.” In a standout piece, the author examines the Hetch Hetchy Valley and his vision of how it could look at certain points in the future if properly cared for—but as he notes, “Nature’s strange dynamism is beyond our control.” Although not a traditional memoir, the stories mostly build on each other to create a coherent portrait of the author and his culture. “History, it’s no less tangible, palpable, than that grandmother under whose care you found yourself,” he writes. “In a kitchen you have known all your life, with its familiar smells and colors, this grandmother sets a plate of warm tortillas on the table with a bowl of chicken soup and says, ‘Eat.’ ”
A fascinating and evocative memoir in essays.
PAY UP The Future of Women and Work (and Why It’s Different Than You Think)
Saujani, Reshma One Signal/Atria (224 pp.) $27.00 | March 15, 2022 978-1-982191-57-3
The founder of Girls Who Code calls for a “radical reinvention” of the American workplace in ways that would help mothers and other women.
Saujani writes that when she wrote Brave, Not Perfect (2019), she “was still in the throes of promoting the feminist propaganda of having it all via leaning in.” Her view changed during the pandemic—which exposed social and emotional fault lines in her life and others’ and which forced 12 million women from the labor force—and here, she adjusts her course. Expanding an essay for The Hill that called for a “Marshall Plan for Moms,” the author proposes a sweeping array of solutions in an uninspired book comprised of part rant, part self-help, and part “call to action” rooted in three “critical public policies”: affordable child care, paid parental leave, and cash payments to parents. Many ideas appear on bulleted lists called a “Playbook for Employers” and “What Women Can Do,” and while some are worthy, too many are overfamiliar, underdeveloped, or unimaginative. (Managers should “Lead by example,” and women should “Get enough sleep,” an idea that may seem ludicrously impractical to any mother of a 6-month-old.) The writing is merely serviceable, and many of Saujani’s ideas are surprisingly conservative or tame. She never suggests, for example, that working mothers might benefit from joining a labor union or pushing for a higher minimum wage. Worse, while Saujani pays lip service to second-wave feminists’ efforts, she slights them in subtle and seemingly ill-informed ways. For example, she writes that feminists “forgot” to work for “equality in the home via compensation for the unpaid labor we do.” In fact, they fought for it on many fronts, including, among numerous other examples, the Wages for Housework campaign. Saujani mentions her important work with Girls Who Code only briefly; a more enlightening book would have more deeply explored what that experience taught her.
A disappointing take on what America’s working women need.
THE ELEPHANT IN THE UNIVERSE Our Hundred-Year Search for Dark Matter
Schilling, Govert Belknap/Harvard Univ. (336 pp.) $29.95 | May 1, 2022 978-0-674-24899-1
A veteran science journalist delves into one of astronomy’s greatest mysteries. Stars and other visible objects make up about 15% of solid matter in the universe; the other 85% is invisible. Astronomers have known this since 1932, but only recently has the hunt for dark matter taken off. Schilling begins with a disclaimer of sorts: “Despite decades of speculation, searching, studies, and simulations, dark matter remains one of the biggest enigmas of modern science.” Rather than follow the traditional format by beginning with the history (and easy concepts) and proceeding toward more complex ideas, the author offers a series of interesting chapters, many of which could stand alone. He chronicles his interviews with scientists around the world and often rewinds the clock to earlier discoveries that foreshadow today’s massive but still frustrating efforts. Early in the last century, astronomers discovered that stars were moving too fast. Just as planets circle the sun, stars circle their galaxies. Since gravity diminishes with distance, outlying planets move more slowly, but this wasn’t true in galaxies. Outlying stars were not slowing. Gravity controls movements, so galaxies had to be much heavier than predicted. At first, astronomers assumed that gas, dust, and small solid bodies made up the difference, but these were never found. By the 1980s, scientists concluded that this “missing mass” represented particles unknown to science. They’re still unknown, but researchers keep searching. Curious, indefatigable, and a fine writer, Schilling clearly relays the work of astrophysicists, some of whom denigrate the work of colleagues. Great telescopes and other instruments on Earth and in space work their magic, but they reveal only hints of dark matter. The discovery of dark energy created yet another significant enigma. “Over the past two decades,” writes the author, “the pie diagram of the composition of the universe—68.5 percent dark energy, 26.6 percent dark matter, and 4.9 percent familiar stuff—has become an iconic representation of our cosmic ignorance.”
An entertaining account of a scientific quest that has failed—so far.
desperate remedies
THE FOREVER PRISONER The Full and Searing Account of the CIA’s Most Controversial Covert Program
Scott-Clark, Cathy & Adrian Levy Atlantic Monthly (464 pp.) $28.00 | April 12, 2022 978-0-8021-5892-5
British journalists Scott-Clark and Levy team up again to take a hard look at the CIA’s program of rendition and torture after 9/11.
Six months after the twin towers fell, CIA and FBI agents captured a Saudi Arabian man named Abu Zubaydah, whom they believed to be third in command of al-Qaida. Rather than place him under military custody in accordance with international law, the CIA packed him off to secret “black sites” in Thailand, Poland, and elsewhere, where he underwent what is euphemistically called “enhanced interrogation”—i.e., torture. But as Scott-Clark and Levy write, the CIA never proved that Zubaydah was a terrorist leader, to say nothing of their attribution of his silence to advanced anti-torture training instead of the possibility that he didn’t know anything. As the authors observe, much of the work of torture was in the hands of people who continue their work today, most now working for private companies formed by CIA retirees with fat government contracts. Remarked one, “We had to pay our senior security guys the same as Blackwater—$250 an hour, or $2000 a day— that was common, they were in a combat zone, all jocked up.” Regardless of the inability to establish Zubaydah’s involvement beyond reasonable doubt, the CIA nonetheless secured authorization to imprison him “for the rest of his life, irrespective of his level of guilt,” considered an “unlawful enemy combatant” forevermore, or at least until the so-called war on terror is declared over. For that reason, after enduring waterboarding and other illegal methods of interrogation, Zubaydah was sent to Guantánamo, a place whose former commander called a warehouse for “Mickey Mouse detainees” of no real value to the government. There he remains even though a 2014 Senate investigation concluded that “the case against him had been largely fabricated.” Building on The Exile, the authors deliver an impressively researched investigation of government malfeasance and ineptitude.
A forceful book that demands greater oversight of the nation’s intelligence services and justice for the wrongly imprisoned.
DESPERATE REMEDIES Psychiatry’s Turbulent Quest To Cure Mental Illness
Scull, Andrew Belknap/Harvard Univ. (496 pp.) $35.00 | April 19, 2022 978-0-674-26510-3
A comprehensive history of American psychiatry. A longtime professor of sociology, Scull brings a lifetime of scholarship to bear on this authoritative and sobering book. Characteristically critical but nevertheless decently evenhanded, he tells the long story of usually failed efforts to deal with mental illness in the U.S. since the end of the Civil War. In the author’s telling, that reality seems to have brought out the worst in too many of those who thought they held the keys to ending the suffering of those with mental health disorders. Their approaches—among them asylums and then release to the streets with no further assistance; crackpot “medical” remedies like tooth-pulling and inoculation with malaria and insulin; lobotomies; electric shock treatment—were often repugnant and morally indefensible, and most of them applied disproportionately and involuntarily to women, the poor, and African Americans. Many “experts” who claimed to know how to treat the “baffling collection of disorders” that constitute mental illness were amateurs, scoundrels, and con artists who often talked about their patients as biologically degenerate and inferior. When, following Freud, more serious practitioners came on the scene, they also often acted in bad faith. Scull, who pulls no punches in his often muckraking account, can be accused of excessive harshness toward only a small number of his cast of characters; few deserve to emerge intact from his evidence-based lashings. Yet he also lays out the obstacles that all practitioners in the field have faced as successive methods of treatments—Freudian analysis, talk therapy, and medication—have come into vogue and then retreated. Most importantly, the author omits nothing related to his subject: Medicare and Medicaid, insurance companies, psychopharmacology, big pharma, financial and economic considerations, and, in a particularly brilliant section, the battle over diagnostic precision. Because Scull’s crisis-to-crisis history is so impeccable, it’s also deeply troubling.
A magisterial tale of the always frustrating yet sometimes well-intentioned efforts to aid desperate people.
THE SEX LIVES OF AFRICAN WOMEN Self-Discovery, Freedom, and Healing
Sekyiamah, Nana Darkoa Astra House (304 pp.) $28.00 | March 1, 2022 978-1-66265-081-9
In this sweeping study of love, sex, identity, and desire, Ghanaian feminist writer and blogger Sekyiamah explores the lives of remarkable Black and Afro-descendant women.
Developed from her blog, Adventures From the Bedrooms of African Women, and based on “in-depth interviews I conducted between 2015 and 2020, with women between the ages of twenty-one to seventy-one, from thirty-one countries across the globe,” the book uses memoirlike interludes of the author’s romantic history to frame these 32 stories. Throughout, the women present intimate, confessional material, and the text shows a diverse spectrum of life experiences: straight, queer, cis, trans, Christian, Muslim, monogamous, polyamorous, wealthy, and poor. Readers follow along as the women experience empowerment, heartache, pleasure, desire, abuse, and love, moving across the African continent and throughout the diaspora. With Sekyiamah as our guide, we fly around the world experiencing an appropriately varied selection of intimate stories, expanding our hearts and minds. Among others, we meet Nura, who was planning to move into a house “where her husband lived with his other wives. She was keen to build a healthy relationship with the other women her husband was married to”; Helen, who describes herself as “a married polyamorous pansexual African woman”; Salma, “a well-known poet, writer, and media personality with roots from Egypt and Ireland” who acknowledges “how being in a bad relationship robbed her of her voice for far too long”; and Alexis, an Afro-Caribbean “Black queer feminist” who shares the joys of “finding love in her sixties, the importance of self-pleasure, and the role that the erotic, and a love of food, plays in her love life with her partner.” The author allows each woman to speak for herself, an approach that captures the immediacy of the experiences but occasionally makes the book feel like a collection of testimonies. Nonetheless, Sekyiamah highlights a dynamic chorus of voices that often go unheard.
An ambitious, moving account of women controlling their bodies and their destinies.
HELLO, MOLLY! A Memoir
Shannon, Molly with Sean Wilsey Ecco/HarperCollins (304 pp.) $27.99 | April 12, 2022 978-0-06-305623-7
The TV and film star shares stories from her childhood in Cleveland, her career, and her relationship with her father. In her debut book, Shannon begins with the loss of her mother and sister in a car accident when she was 4 and being raised, along with her younger sister, by their father, who had been at the wheel. She continues through her rise to stardom on Saturday Night Live and work afterward. While dealing with his own grief, her father, whom she describes as “the Mama Rose to my Gypsy Rose,” raised Molly and her sister in an exceptionally permissive household, and the author describes how she acted out, including the time she stowed away on a flight to New York City when she was 13. Chronicling the love of performing she discovered at an early age and the improvisation games she played with her father, who “encouraged mischief,” Shannon explores the development of her performance style, her work with other performers, and her views on a variety of topics. From adolescent hijinks to a deeper understanding of comedy she learned at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Shannon knew she “could make people really laugh.” Gradually, she writes, “I learned to trust myself. That somewhere deep in my gut I knew not to overrehearse but to just let it rip. Know the basic beats but then let yourself be free within those parameters, which is what I ended up doing years later on SNL.” Throughout the book, the author gives advice on performance and relates the highs and lows of being a cast member on SNL for six seasons. Fans will be satisfied with the behind-the-scenes look at the germinations of her most famous characters, especially Mary Katherine Gallagher, but the standout sections focus on her relationship with her father and the self-awareness and drive that led to her success.
Equal parts funny and touching, a cut above most celebrity memoirs.
HEAVEN IS A PLACE ON EARTH Searching for an American Utopia
Shirk, Adrian Counterpoint (352 pp.) $26.00 | March 15, 2022 978-1-64009-330-0
Ambitious jeremiad about the contrarian past and present-day tendency for idealistic outsiders to gather in flawed utopias. “I grew up taking for granted that utopian visions were possible,” writes Shirk in this sprawling synthesis of memoir and social history. The book, she explains, coalesced as a different
the betrayal of anne frank
project to develop a DIY artistic commune was thwarted by both personal and social frustrations. Shirk yearned for an alternative to late-stage capitalism’s oppressive effects, which past “shared-purse” communal efforts offered. “The way toward lower overhead, toward less reliance on wage-earning, is it seems through collectivity,” she writes. Simultaneously, her long-term relationship was in decline, partly due to caretaking of her partner’s ailing father, leading her to consider alternatives to such difficult domestic arrangements. She began to unpack how communities have been created in response to these issues, starting with the historical narrative: “I had been dimly aware for some time that I was writing about American utopian communities.” Shirk delves into the twisting paths of such groups in the 19th century as well as the 1960s, but she also considers contemporary grassroots examples of communal living, ranging from the historically rooted Bruderhof and Camphill movements to Philadelphia’s Simple Houses to newer attempts centered around indie culture in the Catskills. The author does not ignore the privilege involved in such contemporary movements, noting of her own youthful efforts, “Our mission was absent of any real ethical content. Looked at another way, we were just a bunch of privileged assholes in Brooklyn in the early twenty-first century.” Shirk writes deftly and in depth. She is well-attuned to her topic’s threads of historical and spiritual complexity as well as her own feelings about relationships, sexuality, and community. Some readers may find that her interweaving of personal tensions with contemporary and historical narratives, and social definitions of heaven, occasionally leads to a disjointed narrative, but it’s a story worth contemplating.
Rigorous, personalized argument for the continued relevance of an old idea.
THE BETRAYAL OF ANNE FRANK A Cold Case Investigation
Sullivan, Rosemary Harper/HarperCollins (400 pp.) $29.99 | Jan. 18, 2022 978-0-062-89235-5
An extraordinary tale of modern science and old-fashioned gumshoe work applied to a world-renowned crime 80
years after the fact.
On Aug. 4, 1944, a German “Jew-hunting unit” searched an Amsterdam warehouse and discovered the family of young Anne Frank in a hidden apartment. The Franks had been sheltering there for more than two years, shielded by paterfamilias Otto’s workers. He alone survived the death camps. Hauntingly, as Sullivan writes, the last sighting of Anne was at Auschwitz, where, “delirious with typhus,” she was “naked except for a blanket covering her shoulders.” The officer who led that German squad wound up as an inspector in the Austrian police, while Otto spent his life overseeing Anne’s memory through the publication of her diary. But who exposed the Franks’ hiding place to the Nazis? That was the question some 50 data scientists, historians, forensic scientists, and other researchers, mostly Dutch, had before them, and it’s the overarching question of this book. With the aid of retired FBI special agent Vince Pankoke, the team used artificial intelligence, behavioral psychology, and other modern methods to find out, examining numerous possible suspects. Only one met the familiar categories of knowledge, motive, and opportunity. The investigative team determined that he was a Jewish notary who used the Franks’ sanctum as a bargaining chip to save his own family. On returning to Amsterdam, Otto received an anonymous note revealing his betrayer’s identity. He did not broadcast it because, the investigators conclude, Frank may have recognized the man’s desperate situation as he made that fateful decision to collaborate. Sullivan’s narrative, full of twists and turns and dead-end leads, commands attention at every page, dramatic without being sensational. She writes, memorably, of Otto’s work after the death of their Judas: “He wanted [everyone] to know that fascism builds slowly and then one day it is an iron wall that looms and cannot be circumvented.”
Every reader of Anne Frank’s Diary will want to have this
superbly rendered tale of scholarly detection at hand.
PARENT NATION Unlocking Every Child’s Potential, Fulfilling Society’s Promise
Suskind, Dana with Lydia Denworth Dutton (320 pp.) $28.00 | April 26, 2022 978-0-593-18560-5
A well-known pediatric otolaryngologist advocates for large-scale changes to American social policy as it pertains
to children.
Suskind founded the Thirty Million Words Initiative in the wake of a research study that revealed that during early childhood, children living in disadvantaged circumstances are exposed to 30 million fewer words than their more privileged peers. The research confirmed what the author observed in her hearingimpaired patients, who, after receiving cochlear implants, varied widely in their ability to learn speech. “My team and I developed evidence-based strategies to show parents the importance of talking to babies and young children,” writes the author. “Those strategies became the theme of TMW: Tune In, Talk More, and Take Turns, or what we call the 3Ts.” In this book, co-written with Scientific American contributing editor Denworth, Suskind makes a sensible case for the necessity of strengthening social services and for making pediatricians’ offices hubs where families can easily access these services, particularly when they are in distress. According to Suskind, these changes must be implemented so parents can take responsibility for their children. “Parent and caregiver talk and interaction is the key to building strong cognitive abilities,” she writes. That claim represents the book’s primary contradiction and main weakness: While Suskind convincingly argues for widespread societal change, her vision for
equity rests on individual responsibility. Furthermore, the author fails to note the contributions of educators who have made these same arguments before, most notably the late Jean Anyon, author of Ghetto Schooling, Radical Possibilities, and other books; and the researchers behind the community schools movement. Suskind’s consistent surprise that America is not, in fact, a meritocracy— a fact that marginalized Americans know all too well—and her blithe dismissal of the exclusionary foundations of the American school system may not sit well with many educators.
An individualistic, ultimately myopic vision for parentcentered structural change.
WHEN WOMEN KILL Four Crimes Retold
Trabucco Zerán, Alia Trans. by Sophie Hughes Coffee House (240 pp.) $16.95 paper | April 5, 2022 978-1-56689-633-7
A Chilean author reconstructs the details of four significant 20th-century murders orchestrated by Chilean women. Trabucco Zerán begins with the case of Corina Rojas, an upper-class housewife who hired a man named Alberto Duarte to kill her husband, David Díaz Muñoz, to escape a “loveless marriage” in which she felt like the “victim of a miserly and unfaithful husband.” The author continues with the case of news vendor Rosa Faúndez Cavieres, who murdered her husband, Efraín Santander, and then carved his corpse into multiple pieces in a futile attempt to hide the body. Next is María Carolina Geel, who shot her lover in broad daylight at the Hotel Crillón. Trabucco Zerán ends with María Teresa Alfaro, a live-in nanny who murdered her employer’s children and mother. The cases occurred in 1916, 1923, 1955, and 1963, respectively, spanning the 20th century. Rather than further sensationalizing these crimes, the author uses these women’s action—and, perhaps more importantly, the public reaction to their stories—to reflect on society’s shifting attitudes about gender, anger, violence, and the law. “Their crimes, while disturbing, are a privileged window from which to observe how the very meaning of womanhood has changed over time,” she writes. “Their contradictions and failures act as a mirror, reflecting back typically ‘un-feminine’ emotions.” Interspersed with cogent feminist analyses of the crimes and the public and media reactions of the time, Trabucco Zerán includes diary entries describing her personal experience with the research, infusing the book with a fascinating memoirlike quality and rendering the narrative voice both personal and relatable: “I had to doubt the word of lawyers and doctors, question the sensationalism of reporters, take novel plots with a pinch of salt, and slowly learn that a question is often a veiled accusation.” Throughout, the language is both precise and evocative, and the author’s evaluation of the various circumstances is readable, trenchant, and intersectional.
A formally inventive, lyrical, feminist analysis of Chile’s famous female murderers.
GATHERING BLOSSOMS UNDER FIRE The Journals of Alice Walker, 1965-2000
Walker, Alice Ed. by Valerie Boyd Simon & Schuster (560 pp.) $37.50 | April 12, 2022 978-1-4767-7315-5
A self-portrait culled from the Pulitzer Prize winner’s journals.
From her 65 journals and notebooks deposited at Emory University, unavailable to researchers until 2040, Walker (b. 1944) has selected entries from 1965 to 2000, documenting her rise as one of the most celebrated writers of her time, winner of the 1983 Pulitzer and National Book Award for The Color Purple, among many other awards. Introduced and annotated by critic and biographer Boyd, the volume chronicles Walker’s civil rights activism, marriage to a White Jewish lawyer, motherhood, divorce, affairs with men and women, blossoming sexuality, religion, money troubles, real estate ventures, and, not least, her writing career. At 21, a student at Sarah Lawrence, Walker wondered, “What am I really? And what do I want to do with me? Somehow,” she mused, “I know I shall never feel settled with myself and life until I have a profession I can love.” That profession became poet, novelist, and essayist. In 1968, her first poetry collection appeared, and two years later, a novel, The Third Life of Grange Copeland. She became a soughtafter speaker and teacher—“In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens,” the title essay of her collection of Womanist Prose, was first delivered as a talk. “My God, what do black women writers want?” she was often asked. “We want freedom. Freedom to be ourselves. To write the unwritable. To say the unsayable. To think the unthinkable.” Sadly, Walker realized that to be in the public eye meant being vulnerable to attack, smarting under vehement criticism of some fictional portrayals. One story, “Roselily,” was removed from a 10th grade standardized test in California, “considered anti-religious by the Coalition for Traditional Values, or some such….This is all so ignorant it’s hard to focus on it. Yet it’s tiring, too.” The well-populated volume features many of Walker’s notable friends, including Gloria Steinem and Angela Davis, and lovers who brought delight and, sometimes, despair. Readers will look forward to the planned second volume.
An intimate glimpse into an important writer’s life.
you’ve changed
YOU’VE CHANGED Fake Accents, Feminism, and Other Comedies From Myanmar
War, Pyae Moe Thet Catapult (224 pp.) $26.00 | May 3, 2022 978-1-64622-107-3
In this debut essay collection, a writer from Myanmar explores topics ranging from baking to laundry through the lenses of race and immigration.
In two of the essays, War—who was born and raised in Yangon and now lives there after graduate work in England—relates the history of her relationship with her legal name, Moe Thet War, and her nickname, Pyae Pyae. Specifically, she recounts how Westerners, including her boyfriend, “Toothpick,” mispronounce her name and how she unknowingly began to mispronounce it herself. Writing about baking, War frankly discusses how the societal expectation that she should cook Myanmar food—which she doesn’t—complicates her positive and intuitive relationship with baking, which the author associates with White culture. “My top two baking recipe sites…are run by beaming white women who obviously also own KitchenAid mixers and who have baking in their blood,” she writes. In an essay on laundry, the author vividly describes her complex feelings about washing her clothes alongside her boyfriend’s clothes; she cites a belief in Myanmar of a “mystical power that men supposedly possess that is believed to be sapped if men’s clothes come in contact with women’s.” Exploring Myanmar’s obsession with rice, War reveals her struggle with years of being fat-shamed. The author’s voice balances humor and insight, and her views on race and identity are well reasoned, vulnerable, and unique. Particularly brilliant is her candid discussion of her conflicted feelings about writing about her heritage, which, at times, feels like a trap. “As a young teen artist whose Brownness seemed to follow me around like a second shadow,” she writes, “being the Myanmar writer who voluntarily wrote a novel set in Myanmar and featuring Myanmar characters seemed to me like an act of self-sabotage.” Like much of the book, this observation is intelligent, thought-provoking, poignant, and a delight to read.
A refreshingly honest, original exploration of personal identity and a culture that may be unfamiliar to American readers.
THE SONG OF OUR SCARS The Untold Story of Pain
Warraich, Haider Basic Books (320 pp.) $30.00 | April 19, 2022 978-1-5416-7530-8
An investigation of a little-understood sensation. After suffering a back injury at his gym in 2008, physician Warraich became one of an estimated 1.5 billion people affected by chronic pain. In a wide-ranging overview, the author draws on scientific and medical studies, his work at the Pain Management Center of Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and his clinical practice to examine the history, physiology, biology, and treatment of pain. Acute and chronic pain, he asserts, are “entirely distinct phenomena, and there is no justification for treating them the same way.” Acute pain, incited by a physical trauma, ascends up the spinal cord to the brain, whereas chronic pain “descends down from the brain, often with no need for an incitation from below.” Recurrent and invisible, chronic pain frustrates physicians. “If doctors didn’t learn about it in medical school or cannot make it go away,” writes Warraich, “it must not be real.” Patients, forced to doubt themselves, become frustrated as well, and “their lack of conformity to the rules of medicine can turn the healthcare system into an agent of persecution rather than therapy.” In the U.S., medical response to chronic pain has resulted in an opioid epidemic “carefully orchestrated [and] intentionally designed” by the Sackler family, which developed OxyContin through their company Purdue Pharma. A physician who had worked in advertising, Arthur Sackler brought his expertise to pharmaceuticals, redefining the patient as a consumer. From their use in alleviating the pain of dying patients, opioids, Sackler saw, could be sold to customers who would be alive longer and who could be convinced that they could live without pain. Coming from medical training in Pakistan, Warraich was shocked at American patients’ demands for opioids and doctors’ complicity in prescribing a medicine proven ineffective against chronic pain. He has been shocked, too, at the underlying racism, sexism, and ageism that affects how the medical community treats patients in pain.
A clear and timely examination of the complexities of pain.
TALKING ZEN Reflections on Mind, Myth, and the Magic of Life
Watts, Alan Ed. by Mark Watts Shambhala (256 pp.) $19.95 paper | June 21, 2022 978-1-64547-096-0
A collection of Zen lectures spanning the career of the great Western communicator of Eastern wisdom.
In assembling this book, an expansion of a 1994 edition, Alan’s son Mark selected lectures “that embodied the spontaneous and uncontrolled aspect of Zen most fully, and which left me with a compelling feeling that something extraordinary had happened.” That standard alone could have produced a much longer book, since it’s rare that one of the philosopher’s lectures failed to transmit spontaneous wonder. But keeping it short is much more in the spirit of the enterprise. Watts’ aim was always to dazzle more than to inform. In one lecture, he told his audience, “I am not a guru.” He referred to himself as “an entertainer,” adding, “I approach you in the same spirit as a musician with her piano, or violinist with his violin: I just want you to enjoy a point of view that I enjoy.” Regardless, he was an inspired performer, and while most of these talks were given extemporaneously, they hold up remarkably well on the page (credit is due to Mark). Even from the earliest lecture included here, given when he was just a teenager, Watts was both profound and witty. Anyone discovering Watts for the first time in these pages will be incredulous to learn that in the middle of the 20th century, there existed a Westerner who was not only fluent in Eastern philosophy, but who embodied the best of its wisdom so fully. No one since Watts has been able to articulate the paradoxes of spiritual life with more clarity or panache. He might celebrate nonsense, but in so doing he makes immense sense, the kind for which we seem always to be longing. To take but one example, the rousing conclusion to “Zen Bones” will snap readers into sharp clarity, if not satori.
Further confirmation that the Watts well won’t run dry.
A SPY IN PLAIN SIGHT The Inside Story of the FBI and Robert Hanssen―America’s Most Damaging Russian Spy
Wiehl, Lis Pegasus (336 pp.) $27.95 | May 3, 2022 978-1-63936-171-7
Perhaps the best of the many books on Robert Hanssen (b. 1944), the agent who, for more than 20 years, sold American secrets to Russia.
The daughter of an FBI agent, Wiehl, a former federal prosecutor and legal analyst for a variety of networks, delivers a fine account that will make readers squirm but not put it down. Most Americans associate espionage with the CIA, but the FBI is responsible for intelligence within the U.S. and has a considerable presence abroad. Burned repeatedly, the CIA had tightened security by the end of the 20th century, but as the author shows, “the FBI—one of the world’s most honored and famous investigative bodies—has almost no capacity to investigate itself.” Hired in 1976, Hanssen was first posted to Indianapolis and then to New York City. FBI agents are not highly paid, and, of course, the cost of living in NYC is far higher than in Indiana. Soon after being assigned to Soviet counterintelligence in 1979, Hanssen, married with three children, walked into a local Soviet office and offered to sell his services. Not a field agent but a computer specialist, he took advantage of access to the FBI’s electronic record system as well as its far-too-trusting culture. Until his arrest in 2001, he handed over a steady stream of secrets that crippled U.S. intelligence and resulted in the deaths of many American assets behind the Iron Curtain. An exhaustive researcher, Wiehl seems to have interviewed everyone in Hanssen’s family and his professional life, and she contributes her own expertise to deliver a fascinating, detailed chronicle of her subject’s crimes and personality. The author does not take the easy route by assuming that the FBI was staffed by dimwits, and her unnerving final chapter concludes that, despite some reforms, other Hanssens are not only possible; they’re probably already at work.
A superb account of a long-running intelligence disaster.
THE GREAT STEWARDESS REBELLION How Women Launched a Workplace Revolution at 30,000 Feet
Wulfhart, Nell McShane Doubleday (320 pp.) $30.00 | April 19, 2022 978-0-385-54645-4
A New York Times contributor examines how airline stewardesses stood up to their misogynist industry.
When 19-year-old Patt Gibbs interviewed to become a stewardess in 1961, she had no fondness for the “high heels, makeup, [and] girdles” or expectations for “Barbie-slim[ness]” she associated with the job. What she did have was youth and status as an unmarried woman at a time when airlines pushed stewardesses into retirement once they reached their 30s or married. Wulfhart, a seasoned travel reporter who has also written for Travel + Leisure, Bon Appétit, and other publications, interweaves Gibbs’ personal story with a larger narrative of how female flight attendants struggled to build long-term careers built on benefits and good wages rather than the promise of glamour and adventure. Like her future colleagues, Gibbs’ professional journey began at “the charm farm,” a stewardess college that trained women in emergency procedures, personal stylishness, and what the promotional material called “the gracious art of making people
break the internet
happy.” Yet Gibbs, who was “coming into her own as a lesbian” though not “out,” was disciplined almost immediately for violating sexist airline rules like not wearing white gloves at all times and riding a motorcycle to work. Drafted into a weak stewardess union, Gibbs went from reluctant member to one of its leading spokespeople. Over the next several years, she and her union colleagues struggled against dress codes that forced stewardesses into miniskirts, flimsy paper dresses, and go-go boots. Gibbs led the fight to join with the then-male dominated Transport Workers Union for expansion of flight attendant rights and then spearheaded a new, woman-led Association of Professional Flight Attendants in the 1970s when the TWU faltered in its promises to help the stewardesses reach their goals. Accompanied by occasional black-and-white images, this engaging narrative offers a fascinating look at how the intersection of the women’s and labor movements helped a little-discussed, female-dominated profession achieve viability and respect.
An informatively readable combination of cultural and feminist history.
BREAK THE INTERNET The Truth About Influencers
Yallop, Olivia Scribe (288 pp.) $20.00 paper | May 3, 2022 978-1-950354-87-0
A digital strategist and tech commentator dives into the world of social media influencers. Combining commercial savvy, tech skills, and ruthless self-promotion, influencers have become a driving force of our current internet landscape, which has become a morass of opinion, fraud, narcissism, and rampant capitalism. This, writes Yallop, is where influencers entered the picture, and some of them have made staggering fortunes by talking about the products they like, the activities they enjoy, and, most of all, themselves. The most popular influencers, who have millions of followers, are usually in the fields of fashion, cosmetics, and gaming. Ryan Kaji, a 10-year-old “kidfluencer” who mostly discusses toys, earned nearly $30 million in 2020 from advertising and $200 million from his own merchandise line, and Kylie Jenner, “the highest earning influencer on Instagram, is reportedly paid around $1.2 million per post.” Yallop, who dabbled in influencing before moving to an agency that works in the online space, has plenty of stories involving fantastic numbers, and she writes with clarity and a certain amount of tongue-in-cheek humor. She notes that the big money goes to the top tier, with a vast underclass of wannabes who scrape by and a large middle class in areas such as travel, religion, pets, politics, and faith. YouTube and Instagram have been the primary vehicles for social influencers, but TikTok is coming up fast, and there are plenty of contenders waiting for their big break. It’s a dynamic, chaotic, and thoroughly unreliable world, powered by hidden algorithms and shady deals. Yallop believes that the pandemic might fundamentally change the social media landscape, bringing in armies of “lockdown influencers.” Another factor is the exponential growth in the number of influencers who are primarily concerned with attacking other influencers—or anyone they don’t like. The whole business is changing from interactive fun into an ongoing battlefield. Nevertheless, influencers seem to be here to stay, for better or worse.
A capable guide takes us on an entertaining, authoritative, and sometimes scary journey.
ALL IS NOT LOST 20 Ways To Revolutionize Disaster
Zamalin, Alex Beacon Press (164 pp.) $12.95 paper | April 12, 2022 978-0-8070-0608-5
An earnest effort to inspire progressives to regain the political initiative now apparently firmly in conservative hands. “Counterintuitive as it may seem, disaster creates unprecedented opportunity to change our world. When all is broken, disoriented, and rearranged…we can transform society.” So writes Zamalin, a political science and African American studies professor and author of Against Civility: The Hidden Racism in Our Obsession With Civility. He looks back fondly to the 1950s and ’60s, when movements for civil rights and against the Vietnam War genuinely influenced U.S. leaders, and then to the 1980s, when AIDS activists instigated real change. Nowadays, noisy crowds are likely to be harassing an abortion clinic or denouncing mask mandates. In 20 short, fiery chapters, Zamalin stresses the importance of nonviolent street action, political art, participatory democracy, radical environmentalism, reproductive freedom, and a “counterculture opposed to what’s corrosive in the mainstream.” At the same time, he denounces authoritarianism, jingoism, racism, and the American obsession with “national security” and worship of the free market. Zamalin emphasizes—and few readers will deny—that the unemployed, low-wage workers, and lesseducated Americans suffer more in the capitalism system. In the past, they voted for left-leaning politicians, while right-leaning candidates, dominated by the middle class and financed by the wealthy, opposed them through legislation, court action, or even violence. As the middle class has hollowed out and wages have stagnated, many Americans have gotten restless and angry. Having received the short end of the stick from democracy, they show it little respect. Consequently, political candidates with autocratic tendencies have gained favor even as they seek to dismantle civil rights. Zamalin correctly points out that the wealthy have given a great deal of money to Donald Trump and similar figures, but he doesn’t adequately explore how the middle-class and less-educated sectors elected him. Still, activists will find useful pointers in this earnest manifesto.
Impassioned advice for reformers.
THE LIFE AND DEATH OF A MINKE WHALE IN THE AMAZON AND OTHER STORIES OF THE BRAZILIAN RAINFOREST
Zuker, Fábio Illus. by Gustavo Caboco Trans. by Ezra E. Fitz Milkweed (240 pp.) $18.00 paper | May 10, 2022 978-1-57131-181-8
A collection of essays exploring issues faced by Indigenous peoples of the Amazon.
While researching, journalist Zuker traveled the region, getting to know and interviewing many of the local residents and leaders, offering an up-close and personal view of their struggles. “The Indigenous struggle,” he writes, “is not merely for existence but for a different existence: not to let themselves be absorbed into an all-encompassing white culture.” As these essays demonstrate, the Indigenous residents feel that they are being forced to integrate into modern society. Additionally, many rightfully fear that they will be expelled from their land—as has happened repeatedly in the past due to the Brazilian government’s financial interests. Zuker shows how the traditional communities are consistently threatened by mining, deforestation, industrial agriculture, and the government’s unwillingness to protect ancestral lands. “What corporate soybeans operations call development means ruin for small, local farmers,” writes the author, noting how the Indigenous farmers are suffering from the widespread use of pesticides, which degrade the adjacent lands and water sources that are necessary for them to support themselves and their families and remain healthy. Some teachers in the region have mounted grievances about how the pesticides are being sprayed on fields close to schools even when children are present. Zuker also explores how modern medicine fails to take into account centuries-old Indigenous knowledge. As one researcher in the area points out, “technically there’s a proposal for integration, but [Indigenous] wisdom and experience ends up being disqualified in favor of biomedicine.” Thanks to Zuker’s essays, neglected voices from a remote part of the world receive much-needed attention. “It is my attempt to bring out not only a sense of the conflicts and fear,” he writes, “but also of the resistance exhibited by the Amazonian peoples’ joyous fight for life, which is so often and so easily dismissed.”
Recommended for anyone seeking to better understand the often overlooked world of Indigenous Amazonians.
children’s
These titles earned the Kirkus Star:
BECAUSE CLAUDETTE by Tracey Baptiste; illus. by Tonya Engel... 86 CONSIDER THE OCTOPUS by Nora Raleigh Baskin & Gae Polisner..........................................................................................87 LITTLE MONARCHS by Jonathan Case............................................. 89 MOONWALKING by Zetta Elliott & Lyn Miller-Lachmann...........91 ALONE LIKE ME by Rebecca Evans .................................................. 92 A DUET FOR HOME by Karina Yan Glaser ......................................96 BERRY SONG by Michaela Goade .....................................................97 JUST A GIRL by Lia Levi; trans. by Sylvia Notini; illus. by Jess Mason..............................................................................99 DIFFERENT KINDS OF FRUIT by Kyle Lukoff................................100 PEOPLE ARE WILD by Margaux Meganck......................................101 THE PUFFIN KEEPER by Michael Morpurgo; illus. by Benji Davies.........................................................................102 A GIFT FOR NANA by Lane Smith ..................................................105 A BLUE KIND OF DAY by Rachel Tomlinson; illus. by Tori-Jay Mordey ..................................................................107 THE YEAR WE LEARNED TO FLY by Jacqueline Woodson; illus. by Rafael López.........................................................................107
BERRY SONG Goade, Michaela Little, Brown (40 pp.) $18.99 | June 14, 2022 978-0-316-49417-5
WE ARE THE SONG
Bakewell, Catherine Holiday House (304 pp.) $18.99 | April 12, 2022 978-0-8234-4889-0
A young vocalist with a divine gift has a crisis of faith. Elissa, a 12-year-old Singer with a mane of blond curls, has a special ability: She can channel the goddess Caé through song and create miracles. With her Composer, Lucio, she travels through the war-torn lands, helping to repair and heal, all while spreading the love of the Goddess. Only allowed to sing, Elissa secretly begins to compose her own songs and discovers that they hold immense power. When the two warring kingdoms of Basso and Acuto learn of Elissa’s abilities, they each hope to weaponize her talents to ensure their own victories. While Elissa wants the war to end, she knows that Caé wouldn’t want her to use her talents for destructive purposes, leaving her to ruminate over the Goddess’ true intentions for her. Bakewell’s medieval-tinged fantasy draws heavily on religious themes, exploring the struggle of having faith in the unseen. Music factors prominently throughout, with the text relying heavily on musical terminology (even using quarter rests for scene breaks); a glossary may have been helpful for those less acquainted with their meaning. At times, Elissa, with her wide-eyed innocence and Pollyanna-ish spirit, can feel a bit facile and without nuance. Elissa and Lucio are default White; secondary and minor characters are diverse in skin tone and sexuality.
An exploration of devotion and finding one’s voice.
(author’s note) (Fantasy. 9-12)
BECAUSE CLAUDETTE
Baptiste, Tracey Illus. by Tonya Engel Dial Books (32 pp.) $17.99 | Jan. 18, 2022 978-0-593-32640-4
On March 2, 1955, 15-year-old Claudette Colvin stood up to racism and segregation in Montgomery, Alabama. The African American teen’s unwillingness to give up her seat on a bus to a White person, months before Rosa Parks famously did the same, led to her arrest. Her lawyer, Fred Gray, arranged for Parks to meet with Colvin, and
consider the octopus
the two became friends. At Parks’ behest, Colvin joined the NAACP and spent evenings at Parks’ home when the group’s youth meetings ran late. Because they considered her a troublemaker, Colvin’s classmates ostracized her. She was one of five plaintiffs in a federal court case that challenged Montgomery’s discriminatory bus laws and one of the many people who mobilized to demand positive change. The Montgomery Bus Boycott began on Dec. 5, 1955, and by Dec. 21, 1956, anyone could sit wherever they chose on Montgomery’s public buses. This approachable biography of the young activist highlights her bravery, commitment, and vulnerability. Young readers will appreciate learning about a regular kid who did something extraordinary. The acrylic and oil illustrations are vivid and eyecatching, re-creating the period well and capturing its atmosphere. The backmatter includes an author’s note and a brief list of books for further reading. Most characters are Black; a few supporting characters are White. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
An engaging profile of an inspiring civil rights hero whom
readers will enjoy learning about and cheering for. (Picture-book biography. 5-8)
THE UPSIDE DOWN HAT
Barr, Stephen Illus. by Gracey Zhang Chronicle Books (48 pp.) $17.99 | March 22, 2022 978-1-4521-8202-5
A young boy’s versatile hat is the only possession he’s got and the only one he needs.
Sitting on a hill surrounded by palm trees, a “boy who had everything” awakens to find all of his possessions gone, from his sewing needle to his birds to his orange stilts. Even his shoes appear to be missing. All that’s left are the clothes on his body and a green hat next to him in the morning sun. What follows is a journey to find his belongings during which the boy discovers the many uses of the hat—the thing he now values the most—and what’s really important. The unnamed boy takes “a thousand more steps” among “ten thousand strangers” on a quest that tries hard to seem mythical. There is a false note to the dream sequence leading to the muddled ending that leaves the story’s moral unclear. Debut author Barr keeps the language simple and lyrical. Watercolor illustrations vibrating with wobbly lines suggest life and motion in unidentified places that include pillars in ruins and a vibrant outdoor market. The boy, portrayed as having light brown skin and living near a desert, immediately turns to begging with the hat when he can’t find help, which could be viewed as stereotypical. The last doublepage spread, however, depicting the boy on stilts clomping into the distance wearing the hat while his avian friends play in a birdbath, is a joyous conclusion that defies nitpicking. (This book was reviewed digitally).
The boy’s hat is wondrous and needed; the book is good
but not essential. (Picture book. 5-8)
CONSIDER THE OCTOPUS
Baskin, Nora Raleigh & Gae Polisner Godwin Books/Henry Holt (272 pp.) $16.99 | April 5, 2022 978-1-250-79351-5
Sometimes a huge mistake might just help save the world. After his parents’ divorce, seventh grader Jeremy “JB” Barnes finds himself spending the summer with his mom aboard the Oceania II, a scientific research vessel. Homesick and far away from his friends, JB can’t wait for his time at sea to be over. Lonely Sidney Miller plans to spend a quiet summer in Seattle with her grandmother but can’t believe her luck when she receives an invitation to attend a clean water summit focused on bringing attention to the plastic pollution crisis consuming the Earth’s oceans. Sidney quickly realizes that a clerical error is responsible for her invite—the message was intended for adult scientist Dr. Sidney Miller—but decides that a series of meaningful coincidences means that she is fated to board the Oceania II and make an impact. JB’s and Sidney’s paths collide, and they become fast friends and allies. Now, they’ll need to find a way to bring global attention to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and the vital work scientists and environmental activists are doing to solve the problem—before Sidney’s stowaway status is discovered. With heart and humor, JB and Sidney remind readers of the difference young people can make when they take the lead on environmental activism. Superlative writing and character development uplift this timely story. Central characters are assumed White.
An inspiring tale of friendship and conservation. (author’s
note) (Fiction. 9-14)
MY FRIEND BEN AND THE BIG RACE
Beyl, Charles Whitman (32 pp.) $17.99 | March 1, 2022 978-0-8075-5464-7 Series: Chip & Ben
Two beaver friends take on a swimming challenge.
Chip and Ben, young beaver pals featured in two previous books by Beyl, love to swim together, but it’s usually an excuse to dive for rocks and explore the area near each other’s homes. When Catfish urges them to race with him to the far end of Beaver Pond, it’s a huge deal for the youngsters, since they’ve “never swum all the way across the pond.” Readers may detect a contradiction here since the beavers would have had to swim all the way across the pond to get to each other’s homes, but close inspection of the artwork reveals that Ben’s family has a motorboat-style sailing vessel made out of a hollowed tree trunk. Chip, who narrates the book, has qualms about the long swim, but
caribbean and proud: four upcoming titles
There was once a time when I would have flinched from a patriotic slogan like “Caribbean and Proud.” I would’ve found it simplistic, resisted the ideological inconsistency of patriotism, and questioned the practical uses of pride. Now, after knocking about the world quite a bit, I can say readily that I’m proud to be Caribbean. I’ve come to prize Caribbeaness: our deep respect for ritual and tradition; our group-oriented, relationship-centered living; our mastery of nuance and the nonverbal; our flexibility and openness; our shared spirituality that cuts across religions; our innate spirit of hospitality; our common yet cosmopolitan identities. These are things of beauty and sources of great strength.
So it is jarring when, in my line of work, I repeatedly meet young people of Caribbean descent who suffer from low self-worth. Far too many Caribbean kids and teens experience internalized invisibility that makes them vulnerable to dehumanizing stereotypes. Without nearly enough narrative redemption afforded to them in the global tapestry of storytelling that shapes and helps heal us all, Caribbean kids are in danger of forging “an incomplete life narrative, pocked with gaps, ‘dead spots,’ and chronic feelings of alienation and emptiness,” to borrow trauma psychologist Kari A. Gleiser’s words.
The antidote I offer them—one of potentially many— is books and stories. We need an ever expanding passel of books that un-diminish Caribbean kids and their cultures. Books that help give them the audience their voices deserve. Stories that dismantle the internal barriers that can arise when one comes from a small place in a big world. Here at Kirkus, I intend to share as many good ones as I can. For now, here are four:
Sofía Acosta Makes a Scene by Emma Otheguy (Knopf, Jan. 25): Ten-year-old Sofía, born in the U.S. to Cuban immigrants, feels out of place in her predominantly White suburban town; ditto in her family of accomplished ballet dancers. When newly arrived immigrants encounter xenophobia in Sofía’s community, she learns to be an advocate for both them and herself. Illuminations of class and immigration dynamics and insights about the importance of authenticity offer much to preteen readers growing in social, and self-, awareness. A Comb of Wishes by Lisa Stringfellow (Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins, Feb. 8): Set in the Caribbean-inspired fictional island of St. Rita and steeped in Afro-Caribbean folklore, this book dives into the underbelly of grief and the realm of underwater fantasy alike. Black 12-year-old Kela is mourning her dead mother when she strikes upon a magical soul-storing comb in a sea cave. Its owner, the dangerous mermaid Ophidia, promises to bring Kela’s mother back to life in exchange for the comb, but there will be grave consequences in this poignant, gripping contemporary tale of loss and letting go.
Pilar Ramirez and the Escape From Zafa by Julian Randall (Henry Holt, March 1): Randall’s children’s novel debut kicks off his high-octane duology starring an intrepid Afro–Dominican American girl. In her quest to solve the mystery of her cousin’s disappearance half a century ago in the Dominican Republic during the Trujillo dictatorship, 12-year-old Pilar, an aspiring filmmaker with a budding social conscience, finds herself on the supernatural island of Zafa, where she must save her cousin from the mythical demon El Cuco. Singing With Elephants by Margarita Engle (Viking, May 31): In 1946, Chilean author and Nobel laureate Gabriela Mistral moved to Santa Barbara, California. This is the fictional account of Mistral’s friendship with Oriol, a recently immigrated Cuban-born 11-year-old girl (described as “brownish” and “chubby”) who is learning much from the elephants she helps care for in her parents’ veterinary clinic. Readers will witness the power of the pen and intergenerational friendship to help a young person escape the maze of unbelonging.
Summer Edward is a young readers’ editor.
Ben says that “it’ll be an adventure!” With their parents’ permission, the two venture out. Ben speeds ahead, but Chip struggles. “I wish I were pretending and exploring with Ben. This isn’t fun anymore,” he laments. Best friend that he is, Ben slows down to wait for Chip, and the two finish the journey together. This ode to friendship is heartwarming and includes inventive touches like “twig-and-maple-leaf sandwiches.” Beyl’s cartoony illustrations are expressive and engaging throughout; of particular note is a double-page map of the pond and surrounding landscape showing such intriguing landmarks as “Broken Canoe” and “Scary Stumps.” Chip and Ben are a delight, and their modestyet-huge adventure’s a treat. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Nothing heavy here, just good times with good beaver bud-
dies. (Picture book. 4-8)
LITTLE MONARCHS
Case, Jonathan Margaret Ferguson/Holiday House (256 pp.) $22.99 | $14.99 paper | April 5, 2022 978-0-8234-4260-7 978-0-8234-5139-5 paper
A 22nd-century picaresque with nefarious characters, chosen family, unavoidable camping, and lifesaving butterflies.
It’s 2101, and most mammals have died from sun exposure— a fate the few remaining humans suffer if they don’t live underground as Deepers. Some Deepers are friendly; others will take what they can get by any means necessary. Since Elvie’s parents departed for Michoacán, Mexico, 8 years earlier in search of more monarch butterflies, ran into danger, and have not returned, 10-year-old Black science whiz Elvie has been cared for by her guardian, Flora, a White scientist. Flora and Elvie hope to make a vaccine that enables humans to tolerate sunlight. They struggle to find food, and Flora’s awful cooking sometimes makes their foraged food inedible. Elvie’s journals, which contain her homework, science notes, and sketches, trace their journey—including tracking their latitude and longitude daily—as they follow the amazing migration path of the monarchs, whose young have the ingredient necessary for making both the sun sickness antidote and the vaccine. The eclecticism of Case’s lively visuals in this riveting graphic novel will keep readers both enthralled and learning. The book teaches some astronomy, botany, biology, entomology, animal science, knot tying, and more. Elvie’s special relationship with Flora, along with her quick wit, scientific knowledge, and careful observation skills, makes her a character worth following. Yet she’s all kid—and one who badly wants to be reunited with her parents.
Superbly written and illustrated; keeps readers breathless
and guessing until the end. (author’s note) (Graphic fiction. 8-12)
THE LITTLE HOUSE OF HOPE
Catasús Jennings, Terry Illus. by Raúl Colón Neal Porter/Holiday House (32 pp.) $18.99 | May 17, 2022 978-0-8234-4716-9
With hope, love, and hard work, you can make a house a home. Forced to leave their beloved Cuba, a young girl named Esperanza and her family find themselves in a new country, starting over. After searching and searching, they finally find a little house—la casita—to call their own. It smells a bit like “old, wet socks” and has shabby furnishings, but they are safe, together, and happy. Mami and Papi work multiple jobs day and night. Whether it’s doing schoolwork, learning English, or completing chores, the entire family works hard and helps each other. A few months later, Mami’s sister is able to flee Cuba and moves in with them. When Mami meets a woman newly arrived from Mexico with her husband and children, Esperanza’s family makes room for them in la casita even though they have little space. Over time, many immigrants are offered refuge in the house until they are able to gain a footing in their host country and move on to homes of their own, never forgetting la casita that gave them hope when they needed it most. Beautifully illustrated using Colón’s trademark scratched-watercolor technique, this book reflects the stories of many a refugee family and humanizes a group of people often othered. In an ageappropriate way, it touches on the complicated reasons people leave their homes. Spanish words and hints of Cuban culture are scattered throughout. Characters’ skin tones range from pale to light brown. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A little house indeed, but this inspiring tale offers a lot of
hope. (Picture book. 5-8)
LUPE LOPEZ Rock Star Rules!
Charlton-Trujillo, e.E. & Pat Zietlow Miller Illus. by Joe Cepeda Candlewick (32 pp.) $17.99 | June 28, 2022 978-1-5362-0954-9
A future rock star will not be silenced. Brown-skinned Latina Lupe Lopez isn’t just ready to go to kindergarten—she’s ready to be the star of kindergarten. Armed with “drumsticks” (really pencils), she marches into the classroom intent on making a splash, until Ms. Quintanilla tells her that school has rules. Instead of gaining instant celebrity, Lupe becomes the first kid in kindergarten to get in trouble. Not to be deterred, however, she forges ahead with her own rock-star rules, like making noise at lunch with makeshift drums and starting an after-school fan club for herself…whose first meeting nobody attends. Dejected, Lupe spends the second day of kindergarten feeling miserable in her
ordinariness until she finds a happy medium. Spanish-inflected onomatopoeia describing drumbeats jumps out of the text and makes a bold statement, just like Lupe herself. The mostly light brown–skinned students and adults are authentic to the book’s Texas setting, and Spanish words are scattered throughout. Charlton-Trujillo and Miller’s narrative always respects Lupe’s personality, never making her a joke. Cepeda’s full-bleed spreads are immersive and inviting, while cut-out illustrations surrounded by white space convey the sense of isolation Lupe feels when she is made to tone down her antics. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
An instructive story about balancing big dreams with real
life, with a charming heroine to root for. (Picture book. 6-9)
THE KATHA CHEST
Chowdhury, Radhiah Illus. by Lavanya Naidu Salaam Reads/Simon & Schuster (40 pp.) $17.99 | Feb. 15, 2022 978-1-66590-390-5
Brown-skinned, dark-haired Asiya loves her nanu’s (grandmother’s) katha chest and the katha quilts they hold.
The light quilts are made of stitched-together layers of old saris that her nanu, her mother, and her khalas (aunts) don’t wear anymore. Asiya loves hearing the wonderful family stories these heirloom quilts tell; illustrations inspired by Pattachitra and Bengali folk art dramatize the stories in wordless panels on double-page spreads. They recall important times, happy as well as difficult, when the saris were worn by bold women in Asiya’s family. The artwork throughout is vibrant and colorful, with gorgeously patterned quilts, and adds a deeper historical layer to the text. Asiya’s family members have dark hair and skin tones in various shades of brown. As they come together to pore over the quilts, drink tea, and tell family stories, they wear clothing typical of people in the Bengal and Bangladesh regions of India, including headscarves. Some of the vernacular from those regions is used in the text, the words neither italicized nor explained, which may be confusing to some readers but doesn’t other Bengali and Bangladeshi people. In brief notes at the end, Chowdhury and Naidu share about the importance of saris and katha quilts in their lives. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
This warm picture book of familial love and history brings
alive a meaningful Bangladeshi tradition. (Picture book. 4-8)
GRANDMAS ARE LOVELY
Costain, Meredith Illus. by Nicolette Hegyes Henry Holt (32 pp.) $17.99 | March 29, 2022 978-1-250-81653-5
A rhyming picture-book ode to grandmothers. Spreads with ample white space allow illustrations of 10 distinct animal species to pop. The opening page declares “Grandmas are lovely. They’re joyful and sweet. And when you are with them, each day is a treat.” Graphic designer Hegyes’ realistic watercolor artwork depicts each grandmother-grandchild animal pairing in their natural habitat. A bird, a lioness, and a polar bear gaze directly at the reader in an inviting manner. Text that reads “grandmas are chirpy / and cheery and bright” plays into feminine stereotypes; however, qualities like grandmothers’ courageousness, patience, and intelligence are highlighted. The close-up perspectives and focus on just one grandchild and their grandma per double-page spread create a sense of intimacy, and the uncluttered backgrounds amplify the joy shown throughout. Human caregivers may be inspired to spend more one-on-one time with their wards, and grandparents will favor this book for lap readings. It can also be used to help children reflect on a future or past visit with a grandparent. Infused with love, this book invites repeat readings for vocabulary development and family bonding. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Simple and sweet. (Picture book. 2-5)
THIS WILL PASS
Donnini, J. Illus. by Luke Scriven Bushel & Peck Books (40 pp.) $17.99 | March 1, 2022 978-1-63819-089-9
A young boy joins his great-uncle on a marvelous and fraught sailing adventure.
Crue is a little worried. His favorite uncle is taking him on a magical journey to the island of Mashore, but the trip will be long, and so much could go wrong in a boat on the sea. When storms and churning seas toss the pair’s small craft, Crue holds tight to Uncle Ollie, who assures him that the upheaval and fear won’t last forever—“Be calm, it will pass.” Throughout the journey’s ups and downs, dangers and thrills, Uncle Ollie’s refrain helps quell Crue’s fears, especially when Crue must make the return journey on his own. Unlike many picture books that seek to comfort young audiences by assuring them that their apprehensions are unfounded, Donnini’s quiet prose shows readers that worry is a feeling as valid as any other. A thoughtful author’s note offers some anxiety-reduction tips for caregivers. Scriven’s lively illustrations strike an impressive balance between exuberance and softness, rollicking spreads and stark white space, providing a vibrant landscape of imaginative play
moonwalking
as well as very real emotion. Crue and Uncle Ollie have tan skin and straight brown hair, while the small secondary cast has varying skin tones. Readers won’t find depth of plot or a heavy veil of metaphor here; the world is an increasingly worrisome place, and books like this one, that offer simple acknowledgement of this fact, are just as essential as those that offer elaborate escape. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Timely assurance of the impermanence of life’s difficulties.
(Picture book. 2-6)
MOONWALKING
Elliott, Zetta & Lyn Miller-Lachmann Farrar, Straus and Giroux (224 pp.) $16.99 | April 12, 2022 978-0-374-31437-8
Alternating perspectives explore an interracial friendship forged amid family turmoil and societal injustice and tension in pre-gentrification Brooklyn. After Joseph John “JJ” Pankowski’s father is blacklisted for participating in the 1981 air traffic controllers’ strike, his family moves from Long Island to his father’s childhood home in Brooklyn, where his Polish grandmother still lives. They leave behind the Catholic school where JJ was bullied as well as his older sister—rarely mentioned, for reasons that JJ, who is cued as autistic, doesn’t yet understand. One of the few White students at his new middle school, JJ observes: “Things / That / Make / No / Sense. // One out of twenty kids / in the school / but one out of four kids / in honors class.” There he meets Pierre “Pi” Velez, a Puerto Rican and Congolese “genius kid” and graffiti artist who struggles to care for his mother, who has mental illness, and younger half sister in the predominantly Spanish-speaking neighborhood of Los Sures. The boys become friends via their shared love of art: For JJ, it’s music, especially the Clash, and for Pi, it’s artist Jean-Michel Basquiat. An encounter with the police highlights the differences between them, threatening their friendship. The co-authors’ equally strong contributions evocatively bring the characters and setting to life through visual poetry. The even pacing makes for an engrossing read, and the characters’ pain and promise will remain with readers.
A stellar, hauntingly beautiful narrative. (authors’ notes,
sources) (Verse novel. 11-15)
grow up, tahlia wilkins!
GROW UP, TAHLIA WILKINS!
Evans, Karina Little, Brown (304 pp.) $16.99 | April 19, 2022 978-0-316-16875-5
On the last day of seventh grade, right before Noah Campos’ pool party, Tahlia Wilkins worries about a new zit. Last year she wore a practical, sunprotective, but unfashionable outfit and was totally embarrassed to see how fashion-forward the other girls were. Noah is superpopular, and Tahlia is determined to make a good impression this time, but her first period threatens to upend her plans. Tahlia wants to start menstruating, but not right before the party, just after her mom has left on a work retreat. She can’t talk to her socially awkward dad about it and doesn’t have an older sister, just obnoxious 16-year-old twin brothers. She has no pads but finds some in her parents’ bathroom. Luckily, Tahlia’s best friend, Lily Baek, tries to assist, offering good ideas and some scatterbrained solutions. In the 24 hours between the onset of Tahlia’s period and the help that she finally gets from her parents, her first step into womanhood is filled with funny, albeit mortifying, moments that will have readers both laughing and sympathizing. While largely focused on bodily concerns, there are also messages about friendship and family matters. Quickmoving, lighthearted, and ultimately heartwarming, this firstperson narrative will especially be enjoyed by readers awaiting or having recently experienced their first periods. Tahlia’s family is cued White. Lily’s surname points to Korean ancestry, and names indicate some diversity in the supporting cast.
Humorously highlights a meaningful milestone for a
tween: a first period. (Fiction. 8-12)
ALONE LIKE ME
Evans, Rebecca Anne Schwartz/Random (40 pp.) $17.99 | March 1, 2022 978-0-593-18192-8
A picture book set in China shows that loneliness can be overcome.
Liling, a young Chinese girl, and her parents have moved from the country to a busy city. Her mother and father work in a sewing factory and a can-making factory respectively. Without friends or school, Liling is lonely. The artwork’s grayscale palette reflects that bleak reality. Even the marketplace, with its “tables of rainbow fabrics,” is painted in muted blues and grays. The only bright spots in the illustrations are Liling’s red coat and, eventually, the bright yellow coat of Qiqi, a smiling girl whom Liling must devise ingenious methods to befriend since they live in different buildings. The motif of a Chinese dragon, a metaphor for courage, weaves in and out of the artwork and text. The hand-drawn pictures and handwritten notes that the two girls send each other are sparks of joy in Liling’s otherwise dull life. The Chinese hukou system that traps Liling and her family in poverty is explained in a brief glossary and in the pronunciation guide at the beginning of the book, but it is not the focus of the story. An author’s note and a five-item resource list at the back provide details for parents and teachers seeking more information. Inspired by her visit to Shanghai to adopt a child, Evans’ pencil and watercolor paintings of Chinese characters and scenes avoid insensitive stereotypes and respect Chinese culture. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A hopeful, universal story about the power of friendship
to dramatically improve the quality of everyday life. (Picture book. 3-7)
THE MIRRORWOOD
Fagan, Deva Atheneum (304 pp.) $17.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-5344-9714-6
To survive her curse and those who’d punish her for her affliction, a 12-yearold seeks answers in a magical wood while accompanied by her cat. Fable adores her large family, but her mere existence is dangerous to them. Since infancy, she’s been cursed with a blight that comes from the corrupted Mirrorwood. Each blight is different, but Fable’s is horrible: Rather than having a face of her own, she can only steal the face and, along with it, the good health, of someone she touches. Every few days, just to stay alive, Fable must harm someone in her family. And on top of that, her life is constantly in danger from the blighthunters, who seek out the blighted and kill them. Faced with such a hunter, Fable flees with her cat, Moth, into the Mirrorwood, where the godlike Subtle Powers grant her a quest that might offer a cure. In this magical forest she encounters villagers stuck in eerie, seemingly joyful time loops and others whose blights are more grotesque or dangerous than her own. The mashup of fairy-tale tropes and children’s literature references gets unexpectedly dark, but clear coming-ofage arcs (and adventures with “a fox girl, a winged scholar, and a demon prince”) keep the text accessible. Fable and her family read as White; other characters sport a wide variety of skin tones and hair colors. The world features both different-sex and same-sex couples, and Fable has a nonbinary sibling.
Starts as a fairy-tale retelling but goes somewhere cleverly
original once in the enchanted wood. (Fantasy. 9-12)
LULU & ZOEY A Sister Story
Finison, Carrie Illus. by Brittany Jackson Running Press Kids (32 pp.) $17.99 | June 7, 2022 978-0-7624-7398-4
“Sometimes they fight. Sometimes they’re friends. A sister story never ends.” Finison and Jackson take a slice-oflife approach to their portrayal of the ups and downs of almost any sibling bond. Lulu and her older sister, Zoey, have their spats (which sometimes turn into physical fights), as sisters do: They find each other’s games annoying and mess with each other’s stuff. But when there are stories to tell and mermaids to draw, they come together once again…and even share the best cookies. Rhythmic rhyming couplets imbue this story with upbeat energy, which is reflected in the dynamic, vibrantly colored single- and double-page–spread digital illustrations. The sisters’ relationship is refreshingly realistic, from power dynamics arising from their age gap to the way shared creative passions can quell conflict. Readers with siblings will surely find echoes of themselves in both characters and take comfort in the fact that the story ends happily. However much these sisters might disagree or get on each other’s nerves, they will always find room in their hearts for each other. And, just maybe, the story’s ending anticipates, for another sister. Zoey has medium brown skin, and Lulu has light brown skin; their mother is Black, and their dad is White-presenting; all female characters have natural hair. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A simple, heartwarming ode to sisterhood. (Picture book. 4-8)
MINA
Forsythe, Matthew Paula Wiseman/Simon & Schuster (68 pp.) $17.99 | Feb. 1, 2022 978-1-4814-8041-3
Mina, a tiny white mouse, does not know what to think about her father’s unusual houseguests.
Introvert Mina generally isn’t bothered by any of her father’s odd finds, including old tin cans, stamps he displays as fine art, and a troupe of wandering musicians. What finally pulls her nose out of her books are the “squirrels” her father brings home…rather huge, cat-looking ones. Suspecting that the creatures aren’t really squirrels, Mina keeps a wary eye on them for the next few days while her father makes the guests feel at home. When the cats turn against the mice, Mina’s father’s previous adventure in teaching stick insects to read comes in handy, and his refrain that “everything will be fine” proves true. Forsythe manages to convey so much personality in such a small package. Mina’s ability to remain engrossed in her books despite her eccentric father’s whims is amusing. The
WORDS WITH… Carole & Jeffery Boston Weatherford
A mother and son celebrate an unsung hero of the civil rights movement
BY ANJALI ENJETI
Carole Boston Weatherford
Lerner Publishing
Two formative events in Carole Boston Weatherford’s youth set her on the path to penning more than 60 children’s books. The first was her discovery of Countee Cullen’s poem “Incident,” published in his 1925 collection, Color, which tells the story of a young boy whose memories of Baltimore are tarnished when another child calls him the N-word. The second occurred in the eighth grade, when a teacher, after Weatherford had turned in a writing assignment, suggested she lacked the aptitude to compose such a skillful paper on her own.
Weatherford spent the first 20 years of her career at the National Bar Association, where she met Jesse Jackson, Justice Thurgood Marshall, and others engaged in civil rights work. Having children inspired her to try her hand at picture books. To date, she’s published a plethora of biographies on changemakers such as Aretha Franklin, Nancy Pelosi, Fannie Lou Hamer, Gordon Parks, and the Tuskegee Airmen. She has received many accolades for her work, including three Caldecott Honors and two NAACP Image Awards; her picture book with Floyd Cooper was a finalist for the Kirkus Prize last year.
Her newest book, Call Me Miss Hamilton: One Woman’s Case for Equality and Respect (Millbrook, Feb. 1), recounts the life of Mary Hamilton, a Freedom Rider and leader in the Congress of Racial Equality who insisted that she be addressed the same as White people, with her formal title, Miss, instead of her first name. After a White prosecutor refused to use her honorific in court, she sued the state of Alabama for racial discrimination. In 1964, the groundbreaking case went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, where Hamilton won.
I spoke over the phone with Weatherford, who was at home in Baltimore, and the book’s illustrator, her son Jeffery Boston Weatherford, from his home in Highpoint, North Carolina. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
What compelled you to tell the story of Mary Hamilton? Carole: Women of the civil rights movement played a key role but have been given short shrift. They were the backbone. They were on the front lines of marches and pickets, at the lunch counter sit-ins, and on Freedom Rides. Many kids are not familiar with the civil rights movement beyond Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and other men. They usually only hear about Rosa Parks and sometimes Coretta Scott King.
Lerner Publishing
I wanted to shine a light on another woman civil rights activist. Mary Hamilton was unsung. I wanted to lift her up. She was a schoolteacher who quit her job to join the movement. She is a model for commitment, sacrifice, and dignity in the face of struggle and oppression. She practiced civil disobedience and nonviolent resistance. Her courage is inspiring for young people who want to be activists. Jeffery: Mary Hamilton needs to be brought to the forefront. The more heroes available for the youth to pull inspiration from, the better. There are so many more heroes during that time that need to be written about. The more kids learn about them, the more empowered they will be. Books about people like Mary Hamilton will help shape our youth’s sense of justice.
The world has hardened adults, but children are so interested in learning something they don’t understand. We’re seeing all these types of brutality, like police brutality. A picture book is a less stressful way to deliver information to children about the kinds of issues we face and the people involved in the movement.
How does Hamilton’s story highlight the racialized history of naming? Carole: There’s a long history of Black people being called by their first names. At the core of the story is Mary Hamilton’s insistence that she be addressed with dignity.
My dad spent his early years on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, and my mother came from Appalachia. My parents never required me to say ma’am or sir because when my mother was a girl that’s how she had to address White people. She swore when she had her own kids she was not going to require them to say ma’am or sir.
I taught my own children that a name is very precious. When Jeffery was in middle school, at a parent-teacher conference his teacher kept calling him “J.B.” instead of Jeffery. The teacher said there was no room for his first name on the roll with a last name as long as Weatherford. I told Jeffery never to let anyone give him a nickname. The most specific nouns are proper names, and using one’s name properly is a form of respect. We have a right to make demands about the way people address us.
The illustrations are dimensional and have so much movement. What was the approach to creating them? Jeffery: I used scratchboard for many of the images, especially the images of Mary Hamilton herself. Scratchboard is a subtractive form of art. I cover a page with black India ink and then scratch it away with a metal file to reveal the lightness and image. It’s almost the opposite of drawing and produces a graphic quality, like a comic. But with scratchboard there’s no way to correct a mistake. I have to know exactly what I’m doing. Scratchboard also makes the most sense for this time period. It reflects the black-and-white photographs from the civil rights movement. Carole: I’m always blown away and always proud of Jeffery. I marvel at his talent.
Here’s another detail: On each page the text is on a white background. The white background recalls the signs used during that time that enforced segregation and discrimination.
I especially like the fact that Jeffery combined the scratchboard pictures with archival photographs. Children oftentimes can’t fathom the injustices that existed back then. When I visit schools, students often ask why Black people were treated so unfairly by White people. Jeffery’s scratchboard images and these primary source images help provide historical context and remind young readers that these events actually happened. They make that time period and setting more realistic.
What is it like to create books about the history of our racist past at a time when some people have become openly hostile to teaching this history in our schools? Carole: I’ve been doing this for a long time, almost Jeffery’s entire life. He was 6 years old when I published my first book, about Juneteenth. I just do the work, and I know why I’m doing the work. Charles Hamilton Houston, Thurgood Marshall’s attorney and one of the strategists who brought down segregation, called himself a “race man.” I think of myself as a “race woman.” It doesn’t mean I’m against White people. It means I’m for my people.
And my books are for all people and all American children, so that they can learn a complete history of our shared past. We’ve got to make more of these books so we can fill in the gaps and set the record straight. The struggles have continued because the obstacles have persisted. They just change forms. But I know these books will find their ways into the hands of people seeking the truth.
Anjali Enjeti is the author of the essay collection Southbound and a novel, The Parted Earth. She lives near Atlanta. Call Me Miss Hamilton was reviewed in the Feb. 1, 2022, issue.
a duet for home
soft-edged illustrations have the gorgeous warmth and glow of firelight, with a palette dominated by shades of orange, burnt browns, and ranges of yellow with touches of blue. Light and shadow bring the mice’s world to life, providing dimension and movement. One cat is so expertly drawn that a slight shift of its eyes captures its sly intentions. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Captivating illustrations paired with a simple, charming
story. (Picture book. 3-6)
DADDY-DAUGHTER DAY
Freelon, Pierce Illus. by Olivia Duchess Little, Brown (40 pp.) $17.99 | May 3, 2022 978-0-316-05526-0
A father and his daughter share a day full of love, play, and imagination.
The pair, described as the ultimate “daddy-daughter / power-combo superhero team,” do everything together on their special day: sip morning smoothies, play basketball, splash in the rain, and even attend a protest. Readers see a father who isn’t afraid to wear his dreadlocks in a bow, attend a tea party, or pretend to be a princess. He freely follows his daughter’s lead, breaking apart misguided stereotypes of how fathers are supposed to interact with girl children. Duchess’ illustrations center a Black father—who wears a kente shirt—and daughter and include background characters who are racially diverse, including one wearing a hijab and another with skin depigmentation. The closeness and mutual admiration between dad and daughter look and feel realistic, whether it’s the way Dad gazes at his daughter thoughtfully or tucks her gently into bed. One gets the feeling that this dynamic duo is unstoppable, that they can be whomever they want to be, and that their bond is magical. The bright digital artwork buoys the sometimes-rhyming text, which, while sweet, makes for a stilted read-aloud with phrasing that is at times choppy with an uneven cadence. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
The writing isn’t stellar, but the love depicted between the
titular characters sure is. (Picture book. 4-7)
THE RISE (AND FALLS) OF JACKIE CHAN
Giang, Kristen Mai Illus. by Alina Chau Crown (40 pp.) $18.99 | $21.99 PLB | March 29, 2022 978-0-593-12192-4 978-0-593-12193-1 PLB
The story of how globally lauded actor, director, and martial artist Jackie Chan made a name for himself.
Kung fu requires discipline and focus. Young Jackie, this story reveals, had little of either. Instead, he liked making jokes in class and displayed streaks of disobedience. As a boy, Jackie was enrolled in the China Drama Academy, “where poor, unwanted, or unruly children trained for Chinese opera.” The injury-prone curriculum, rigid social hierarchy, and threat of “the sting of Master’s stick” made for a grueling experience. Inspired at first by Chinese opera and, as he grew up, by Hong Kong cinema and Hollywood films, Chan worked hard to forge a career in acting and eventually gained international fame. This picture-book biography stays within the scope of Chan’s schooling and early career moves. From being a nameless stuntman to initially being typecast by the film industry to ultimately, confidently developing his own style, Chan’s action-star trajectory will inspire young readers. Onomatopoeic sound effects will appeal to younger children, while a closing author’s note provides welcome context and additional nuance for older readers. Chau’s watercolor illustrations are lively and fluid, incorporating cultural details and martial arts motifs that enrich the setting. As the stage and screen begin to take precedence in Chan’s life, the artwork incorporates dynamic angles and perspectives, echoing the twists and turns of both his acting stunts and life path. All characters are Chinese or White. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A starter biography of a beloved cinematic figure that underscores the value of hard work and embracing one’s indi-
viduality. (glossary of Chinese characters, bibliography) (Picture-book biography. 4-8)
A DUET FOR HOME
Glaser, Karina Yan Clarion Books (368 pp.) $16.99 | April 5, 2022 978-0-544-87640-8
New York City tweens June and Tyrell bond while living at a family shelter. After the unexpected death of her father, 11-year-old June Yang, her dogobsessed little sister, Maybelle, and their depressed mother are evicted from their Chinatown apartment and relocated to a homeless shelter for women and children in the South Bronx. Sixth grader Tyrell Chee, who has been at Huey House for three years, thinks getting three hot meals a day and living in the same building as his book-loving best friend, Jeremiah, beats the uncertainty of life alone with his unreliable mother. Despite a messy first impression, June and Tyrell become fast friends—especially after they discover a shared love of classical music (she plays the viola, he appreciates their mysterious neighbor’s nightly violin practice). The dual-perspective narrative offers alternating points of view on navigating life in a shelter. Although the author doesn’t shy away from the trauma endured by children in the system and the various mental health, financial, educational, and social challenges the families face, this is a hopeful and inspiring story about the lives of children who are rarely represented in middle-grade fiction. The young people engage in activism that is both thought-provoking and profound. The wonderfully diverse multigenerational cast of characters includes Chinese
American June, Chinese and Black Tyrell, and mostly Black and brown supporting characters.
A powerful, heartwarming, and thoughtful tale of kids cultivating chosen families during challenging circumstances.
(author’s note, music list, note on Cantonese) (Fiction. 9-13)
BERRY SONG
Goade, Michaela Little, Brown (40 pp.) $18.99 | June 14, 2022 978-0-316-49417-5
A magical intergenerational story of gifts and cultural rituals shared between a grandmother and her granddaughter. A Tlingit grandmother takes her young granddaughter to a nearby island for a berry-picking adventure in the forest. To alert the forest bear and the various types of berries that glow “like little jewels” of their presence, the pair sing a harvest song: “Salmonberry, Cloudberry, Blueberry, Nagoonberry. Huckleberry, Soapberry, Strawberry, Crowberry.” Grandma teaches the girl that “we speak to the land…as the land speaks to us,” and “we sing too, so the land knows we are grateful.” As they gather berries in the misty rain, they listen to the sounds of insect wings, inhale the sweet scent of cedar, and feel the soft moss on tree branches. Back at home, “the kitchen glows like a summer sky” as the girl, her grandmother, her father, and her younger sister make syrup, marmalade, jelly, jam, pie, and scones to share. When winter comes, the forest is described as “dreaming, waiting for berry song.” Seasons change, marking the passage of time and leading to a bittersweet, full-circle ending. This beautifully written story by Caldecott medalist/debut author Goade features breathtaking, atmospheric artwork inspired by the wild landscape of her hometown, Sheet’ká, Alaska, and incorporates rich symbolism and imagery from Tlingit culture. A closing author’s note elucidates sacred Tlingit principles mentioned in the story, and dazzling endpapers identify different berry varieties. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A touching story of familial love and of respect and grati-
tude for the bounty of the land. (Picture book. 4-8)
THE TILTERSMITH
Herrick, Amy Algonquin (320 pp.) $17.95 | April 5, 2022 978-1-64375-099-6
Four friends combat climate change in this follow-up to The Time Fetch (2013) that is laden with a history of weatherrelated lore. Edward, Feenix, Danton, and Brigit were Brooklyn eighth graders preventing the unraveling of time when last readers met them. Their save-the-world challenge this round is a winter that won’t end. When a snowstorm marks the first day of spring, science enthusiast Edward finds an odd cocoon that he swipes for research. Much like the Time Fetch stone in Herrick’s earlier volume, each of the four friends happens upon a mysterious talisman, all while trying to understand why the slimy new school superintendent is so darn creepy (those tiny feet of his), where the flocks of robins are coming from, and what haze is keeping them all from remembering just what they’re supposed to be doing. Vacillating between scientific reasoning and lore from worldwide cultures, the descriptions of beautiful legends of seasons and the sobering study of climate change are so rich they nearly overshadow the central characters. Chapters present the rotating third-person perspectives of the quartet, giving each equal airtime. The structure gives readers the pieces to complete thoughts on their own without spoon-feeding them answers. The rich and creepy fantasy element offsets the familiarity of forgetfulness caused by a thick shroud of archaic magic. The protagonists are cued as White, Black, and Latinx.
A chosen-ones fantasy for readers befuddled by climate
change. (Fantasy. 11-14)
SNIFF
Hudson, Lynne Windmill Books (24 pp.) $27.25 | Jan. 15, 2022 978-1-4994-8980-4
Can Scruffy the dog find his missing blanket? Scruffy is a reddish-gold mutt who loves his special blanket with the adoration that many young readers feel for their own special stuffed animals and/or comfort objects. Digital art depicts the pup with an oversized black nose, which he uses to sniff out his blanket when it goes missing. The illustrations use swirls of color to make scents visible on the page as first-person rhyming text tracks the dogged pup’s progress. First, a puce trail of scent leads to a stinky sock, and then golden-brown spirals lead Scruffy to yummy biscuits. When he at last finds the colorful patchwork blanket hanging out to dry on the clothesline, soap bubbles surround it. The bright quilted fabric certainly looks like Scruffy’s lost lovey, but it doesn’t quite smell right. No matter! He will soon solve that problem by rubbing and rolling all over it, undoing the wash perhaps but restoring his cherished blankie to its familiar, preferred state. Hudson’s simple rhymes scan well. The minimalist artwork features just Scruffy and spare details against solid backgrounds. The dog’s personality is brought to life through spot-on facial expressions. Along with the brisk conversational narrative and opportunities for inference, this makes the book well suited for read-alouds. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A picture book not to be sniffed at that will speak to little
ones who miss their own lovies when they go in the wash. (Picture book. 1-4)
HOW TO MAKE A MOUNTAIN from Geologic Formation to Thriving Habitat in Just 9 Simple Steps and Only 100 Million Years!
Huntington, Amy Illus. by Nancy Lemon Chronicle Books (68 pp.) $18.99 | May 17, 2022 978-1-4521-7588-1
From rock to mature mountain in nine steps—and millions of years!
An engaging raccoon narrator, a companion woodpecker, and a girl with medium brown skin and puffy ponytails guide readers on a challenging mountain-making journey. First, readers must find a “supercolossal” rock and push it into another giant rock so that it will “crumple into folds,” as happens in the process known as continental collision. Other steps include carving waterways, creating an alpine glacier that will sculpt the mountain and its valleys, melting the glacier, forming mountain soil, adding plant life, and introducing animals. Object lessons using familiar items and hands-on activities make the narrative accessible. The text uses comparisons to aid comprehension: Tectonic plates “move about as fast as your fingernails grow.” Pencil, gouache, and digital artwork in soft earth and forest tones shows a mountain forming page by page. Some illustrations, like a double-page spread showing how vegetation varies according to altitude, serve as friendly annotated diagrams. Making a mountain is hard work, but the raccoon guide sprinkles topical humor throughout. An unexpected encounter with a crocodile ancestor in the Arctic adds interest. The final step is all about enjoying the mountain and protecting it through stream cleanups, trail maintenance, and hiker education. The backmatter includes a glossary of mountain features. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A useful, engaging, and clearly delineated distillation of a
complex geological process. (afterword) (Informational picture book. 5-8)
THE LUCKY ONES
Jackson, Linda Williams Candlewick (320 pp.) $18.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-5362-2255-5
An 11-year-old and his family struggle to maintain hope as they cope with poverty in an African American community in the Mississippi Delta during the 1960s. Ellis Earl Brown lives with his family of 11 in Wilsonville, Mississippi. His father died in an accident, and although his mother has difficulty providing enough food, sometimes they make room for others in need. His teacher, Mr. Foster, brings lunch for his students as well as offering rides to and from school. School is the place where Ellis Earl is happy. He finds solace in the new book he borrowed from Mr. Foster. His teacher uses Jet magazine to teach the class important things about the larger world that Black kids need to know. Ellis Earl wants to be just like him someday—or perhaps a lawyer like Thurgood Marshall. The family’s fortunes take a turn for the better after Mr. Foster invites Ellis Earl to participate in the Easter program at his church and includes him in a group welcoming Sen. Robert Kennedy to the area. Jackson draws on her personal history to show real people behind Kennedy’s historic visit, which bolstered support for essential social programs. She successfully presents individuals who, despite grinding poverty, nurtured hopes and dreams, and she highlights those like Mr. Foster and his church community who shared what they had with those in need.
Rich in detail; offers readers immediacy and connection.
(author’s notes) (Historical fiction. 8-12)
NAUGHTY BOY A Song About Myself
Keats, John Illus. by Grant Silverstein Paul Dry Books (54 pp.) $16.95 paper | March 15, 2022 978-1-58988-162-4
An adaptation of the well-known John Keats poem endorses youthful
discovery.
There’s really nothing that naughty about the English boy in the Keats poem who “would not be quiet” and “would not stop at home.” The boy is full of energy, ever moving, ever exploring. When he follows his curiosity “to the mountains / and fountains,” then eventually runs away to Scotland, it’s with the intent of finding something new and different. Instead, while there, he realizes that the ground is just “as hard,” a yard just “as long,” and a song just “as merry” as they are in England. Slighter, jollier, and sweeter than much of the Keats corpus, the poem is illustrated with delicate watercolor sketches in green and sepia on white space (these come across as long-cherished memories or dreams) interspersed with full-bleed pages of impressionistic full-color art that introduce each of the poem’s four stanzas. The lively illustrations incorporate vignettes, montages, and continuous narration. One could quibble that they are too itemized, a painted play-by-play of every line of the poem, but given its straightforward nature, this doesn’t feel like a misstep. Silverstein resists the temptation of modernizing the poem for contemporary audiences, instead opting for a timeless aesthetic that recalls European illustration of the golden age of children’s literature. All characters present White. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A fine, child-friendly introduction to Keats by way of one
of his most accessible works. (Picture book. 4-8)
just a girl
THE LAND OF THE TROLLS
Laperla, Artur Graphic Universe (48 pp.) $8.99 paper | March 1, 2022 978-1-72844-866-4 Series: Felix and Calcite, 1
Trolls and good storytelling get short shrift in an unoriginal new early-reader graphic series. A young White redheaded boy named Felix awakes one night to discover a purple troll in his bedroom, but he seems completely unfazed. Having arrived through a toy-box portal, the troll leads Felix back to her realm. The lay of the land is explained with a map and narration by the Ancient Master Troll, who also drops knowledge about giants, ogres, and sea sirens. A witless cave song follows: “We’re trolls! We’re trolls! Trollls!” [sic]. The purple troll, who goes unnamed until the book’s last pages (spoiler alert: Her name is on the book’s cover), is giving Felix a tour when they are attacked by tiny, adorable gnomes, the trolls’ age-old enemies. The gnomes steal the show—not ideal for a book titled The Land of the Trolls. The association of trolls with boogers feels derivative of Harry Potter. The book’s clever illustrations—graphic novel–style panels are supplemented with mazes, seek-and-finds, and a tunnel that requires readers to turn the book sideways—don’t make up for the realization that this book is the setup for a franchise in which worldbuilding takes precedence over narrative and characterization. Indeed, we learn almost nothing about the stars of the story; they are as uninspired and generic as a song about trolls that consists of only two words repeated. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A rocky start to an underwhelming graphic fantasy series.
(Graphic early reader. 7-8)
WOULD YOU RATHER?
Layton, James Illus. by Kat Fox Windmill Books (32 pp.) $27.25 | Jan. 15, 2022 978-1-4994-8968-2
A rhyming rendition of the popular game of preference.
Brown, bug-eyed, furry animals, of indeterminate species and usually wearing clothes, act out each set of choices in this Australian import. Some are silly: “Would you rather…a Shed for a Head / OR a Drum for a Bum?” Some are gross: “Would you rather…Ants in your Pants / OR Poo on your Shoe?” Others are, because of the literalness of the illustrations, a bit disturbing: “Would you rather…Cry your Eyes out / OR Laugh your Head off?” Huge veiny eyeballs and long optic nerves pop out of the animal’s bloody eye sockets. At times the rhymes are internal to the choices, and at other times one set of choices will rhyme with another. The entire text is just a list of either/or options, like those kids might offer each other while playing the game themselves. It ends abruptly without any closure or final gag. The doodlelike artwork isolated against white space looks like something a child might draw. There are better “Would you rather?” picture books out there, but the toilet humor herein might elicit a giggle or two from the right audience. Certainly not a first-choice (or second-choice) purchase. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
You would probably rather choose a different book. (Picture book. 2-7)
JUST A GIRL A True Story of World War II
Levi, Lia Trans. by Sylvia Notini Illus. by Jess Mason HarperCollins (144 pp.) $16.99 | March 22, 2022 978-0-06-306508-6
An autobiographical account of one Jewish girl’s childhood in Fascist Italy
during World War II.
Barred from her Italian school, 6-year-old Lia now goes to a Judaic school. After more antisemitic laws cost her Papa his job, the family moves to Milan and then to Rome, where Lia’s father is forced to work clandestine jobs. Things grow steadily worse as occupying Nazi troops hunt and deport Jews. Lia, her sisters, and their Mama spend the rest of the war hiding out at a convent while Papa is on the run. But there are also moments of laughter and joy, and Lia finds comfort in her parents’ love. Levi narrates using dual perspectives—as the young girl experiencing the war and as an older woman remembering her past. The age-appropriate text is beautifully translated by Notini from the Italian. Lia’s young voice is perceptive and heartbreakingly vulnerable as she recounts her steadfast, even cheerful, acceptance of the changes in her life amid the insanity around her. Levi always makes it known when her older self is at the helm, directly addressing her “dear readers” and interjecting helpful supplementary information. Mason’s black-and-white sketches provide immediacy and added clarity. In a closing letter that gives more insight into Levi’s memories, she requests a moment of silence for the 6 million Jews the Nazis murdered, urges readers to always stand against racism, and expresses eternal gratitude to the American soldiers who “came as saviors” during the war. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A remarkable, powerful young readers’ adaptation of an
award-winning World War II memoir. (Memoir/history. 9-14)
the final cut
DIFFERENT KINDS OF FRUIT
Lukoff, Kyle Dial Books (320 pp.) $17.99 | April 12, 2022 978-0-593-11118-5
A girl on the cusp of middle school searches for understanding about herself, her parents, and the changing world around her. At the start of sixth grade, White cisgender girl Annabelle doesn’t dare hope for surprises from her final year at her private school in the suburbs of Seattle. She itches to escape and discover wonders awaiting her outside the confines of her neighborhood—like drag brunch. However, her expectations for a boring year are turned upside down when Bailey, a White nonbinary student with the coolest rainbow shoes, and a new teacher with exciting plans for the curriculum join Annabelle’s class. Unfamiliar feelings pull Annabelle into a fast friendship with Bailey despite her father’s vocal disapproval and her mother’s discomfort. Confronting her parents about their attitudes uncovers a side of her family history that Annabelle never could have imagined. Annabelle’s first-person narration snaps with vivacious personality and humor. Lively banter and quirky facts contribute levity as Annabelle explores topics that weigh on her like privilege, climate change, privacy, and her own lack of vocabulary to describe her identity. Even adults in the story, particularly Annabelle’s father, face challenges to their beliefs that require them to reflect and grow. Lukoff reflects diversity in the world around Annabelle while also heightening her awareness of spaces that are not as inclusive as they claim to be and exploring what to do with that understanding.
Inquisitive, engaged, and action-seeking. (Fiction. 8-12)
THE FINAL CUT
Markell, Denis Delacorte (304 pp.) $16.99 | April 26, 2022 978-0-593-18066-2
Who could guess that making a 10-minute film would plunge a group of seventh graders into a whirl of dirty politics, in school and beyond? Playing his latest largely for laughs, Markell stocks Saint Anselm’s Academy, a Brooklyn school for gifted students, with an entertaining array of moneyed fashionistas, budding social radicals, and other middle-grade archetypes—including the obsessed gamers from his The Game Masters of Garden Place (2018)—and inserts the customary gags about school lunches and teachers (hip or otherwise) amid plenty of rapid banter. Film studies may be nowhere near Alex Davis’ first choice for an elective, but being grouped with dazzling A-lister Priti Sharma and secretive superhacker Theo Schatten (a creepily pale new kid) to create a video contest entry transforms his dismay into enthusiasm…and then back to dismay when someone makes repeated attempts to destroy their work (a satiric mashup of a school tour and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland). Why? As it turns out, an antagonistic teacher, an unscrupulous real estate tycoon, and a corrupt politician have their reasons. Overall, though the shenanigans add suspense, they play second fiddle to Alex’s experience of filmmaking as a mix of collaboration, compromise, and creativity, not to mention his getting schooled in local politics, cybercrime, and areas related to gender where he could be more self-aware. Alex reads as White; the supporting cast reflects the ethnic diversity of the setting.
A heady romp, fun and scary in turn, with just deserts dealt
all round. (Fiction. 10-14)
THE NOT-SO-UNIFORM LIFE OF HOLLY-MEI
Matula, Christina Illus. by Yao Xiao Inkyard Press (288 pp.) $16.99 | April 5, 2022 978-1-335-42488-4 Series: Holly-Mei, 1
A girl learns to balance fairness with friendship. The novel begins in Toronto as 12-year-old Holly-Mei Jones attempts to mollify teammates who are shunning her for having cost them the win in their field hockey game as well as a class pizza party due to her insistence on doing the right thing and following the rules no matter the consequences. Her problems increase when Mom announces a promotion necessitating their family’s temporary relocation to Hong Kong in two weeks. The plot incorporates expected signals of privilege: a luxurious expatriate life in the former British colony and interactions with Hong Kong’s cosmopolitan elites. Gemma Tsien—queen bee and daughter of the PTA chair at the exclusive private school where Holly-Mei and younger sister Millie enroll—poses the primary challenge to Holly-Mei’s social acceptance. However, a near-fatal accident during Gemma’s birthday party and a group project hiccup become bonding experiences that make both girls sympathetic to each other’s pressures to live up to parental expectations, establish guanxi, or connections, and not do anything to lose face. With a Taiwanese mother and White English father, Holly-Mei’s feeling of connection to Chinese culture grows even as she observes socio-economic polarities in Hong Kong. Through cultivating new friendships, she also succeeds in mending an old one. The aftermatter includes a glossary of Chinese language terms and two recipes. Sweet illustrations enhance the text.
Life upheaval offers a tween lessons on socialization in this
story of personal growth. (Fiction. 9-12)
IMPOSSIBLE MOON
McDaniel, Breanna J. Illus. by Tonya Engel Denene Millner Books/Simon & Schuster (48 pp.) $18.99 | June 14, 2022 978-1-5344-7897-8
If Mable can touch the moon, what else might she be able to do? Mable, presenting as Black with long brown hair, has always loved the stories Grana tells her. However, Grana is now sick, and “it seems impossible she will ever get better.” One day, while Mable pores over her “moon maps,” Grana notes that if human beings can reach the moon, then nothing is impossible. That night, Mable dreams of flying to the moon. She launches from her bed-turned-trampoline and sails through the night sky. There, she sees a drinking gourd, a lion, a giant dog, a set of twins, a man pouring water, an archer who shoots her toward the moon, and a group of seven sisters who comfort her when she just misses it. When she wakes up, Mable tells Grana about her journey. Grana, now sitting up in bed when it was impossible before, tells Mable what a great storyteller she is. Encouraged by Grana’s step toward recovery, Mable goes to bed that night determined to finally touch the moon and perhaps make the impossible possible for Grana. Engel’s vivid, textured illustrations are spectacular. The stunning washes of blue, violet, aqua, pink, and gold play well with the dreamy theme. The backmatter consists of an author’s note about the impetus for the book and a description of the seven constellations depicted therein. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Black girl magic to the moon and back. (author’s note) (Picture book. 5-7)
THE FOG CATCHER’S DAUGHTER
McShane, Marianne Illus. by Alan Marks Candlewick (48 pp.) $18.99 | June 28, 2022 978-1-5362-1130-6
A young girl confronts her worst fears in hopes of saving her father.
Young Eily lives on the Irish coast near the enchanted isle of Lisnashee where the Good People, or fairy folk, dwell. The villagers are careful to stay far away from the island, fearing the consequences of angering the sinister sprites, who have been known to spoil livestock, wreck ships, and steal people away in the night. Despite the danger, Eily’s family members have visited the island for many generations. As fog catchers, they must journey to Lisnashee once a year to gather magical beads of mist that will help grow herbs the local apothecary uses for protection charms, potions, and healing ointments. Fierce winds and dark skies herald a treacherous crossing to Lisnashee for Eily’s father this year. When she discovers his protection charm bracelet, accidentally left behind, she makes the perilous sea voyage to rescue him. Solemnly told and infused with Irish folklore, this atmospheric tale feels familiar yet timeless. Watercolors in pastoral shades of green, blue, and brown ground the rather dreamy story in reality. Menacing, ghostlike fairies and roiling, white-capped waves increase the drama and tension for a satisfying, although somewhat abrupt, conclusion. Eily and her father present as White. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A haunting, lyrical, original tale that leans into the magic
and mystery of the Emerald Isle. (author’s note) (Picture book. 5-9)
PEOPLE ARE WILD
Meganck, Margaux Knopf (40 pp.) $17.99 | March 1, 2022 978-0-593-30194-4
A funny and unique way to impart an important message.
In a rare and fresh perspective, animal children try to convince their mothers that humans are just like animals: cuddly, cute, unique, and interesting to look at. However, the animal mothers tell their young that humans are dangerous. People are loud, messy, and nosy. People are “such strange creatures.” Most importantly, animal families cannot keep people as pets because “people are wild,” and “all wild creatures should be free.” Gorgeous colored pencil and watercolor illustrations feature a diverse cast of humans as well as elephants, frogs, butterflies, and seals, among other animals. The colors are rich and vibrant, and the images will be easy to see from a distance during a readaloud, although there are so many details, points of view, and textures in each illustration that readers will also want to spend some time up close with them. The many landscape-layout double-page spreads show off each animal’s habitat. The endpapers highlight that both animal and human children enjoy many of the same activities. Animal facts in the backmatter encourage readers to explore and research on their own. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Wildly brilliant! (endangered species map) (Informational picture book. 3-6)
ATLANTIS The Brink of War
Mone, Gregory Amulet/Abrams (304 pp.) $17.99 | April 26, 2022 978-1-4197-3855-5 Series: Atlantis, 2
Can a 12-year-old save his world from an impending invasion? Continuing where Atlantis: The Accidental Invasion (2021) left its readers hanging, preteen daydreamer and dance aficionado Meriweather
Lewis Gates (who goes by just Lewis) is back home on dry land with his friends Hanna Barkley, a fellow human, and Kaya, an Atlantean. Frustrated by aboveground cultural differences (and receiving little acknowledgment of her own culture), Kaya is ready to return home. Before long, the trio find themselves on their way back to Atlantis on a multipronged mission: to save both Lewis’ and Kaya’s fathers, carry out a dubious assignment for a suspicious corporate leader who wants to pilfer Atlantean tech for her own exploitation, and stave off a megalomaniac who is threatening war. For much of Mone’s sophomore effort, the action veers heavily toward a cat-and-mouse premise as Lewis, Hanna, and Kaya keep evading nefarious Atlantean pursuers. Eventually, the plot pivots to a series of reveals and twists, stylistically similar to its predecessor. While the ending is tidily wrapped up, the possibility of more adventures is also floated. Differences between Lewis’ and Kaya’s worlds are sharply juxtaposed; both find aspects of the other’s culture distasteful. Largely action-driven, this story offers enough thrilling chases, cool gadgetry, and gotcha moments to keep pages turning. Lewis reads as White; Hanna is described as having brown skin.
A buzzy, fast-paced sequel. (map, scientific explanations)
(Science fiction. 8-12)
THE YOUNGEST SISTER
Moreno, Suniyay Illus. by Mariana Chiesa Trans. by Elisa Amado Greystone Kids (40 pp.) $19.95 | May 10, 2022 978-1-77164-875-2
A young Quechua girl living in a mountain village in Argentina longs to win the coveted flavor bone used to sea-
son her family’s soup.
Picu is the youngest of five sisters, seven cousins, and two more children under her mother’s care. In their thatched-roof hut, preparations for the lunch soup have begun, and Mum assigns each child a job. Picu has the least important task— fetching the flavor bone from a neighbor who lives two hours away, perhaps a little more, perhaps a little less, who knows, for there are no clocks to measure time. As she walks to Doña Ciriaca’s house, Picu gets distracted, as children do: She picks fruit, throws dirt at cacti, and turns her bag into a slingshot. Arriving at Doña Ciriaca’s, she receives a bone that has already been used by several other families. Picu’s family will be the last one to use the bone, and then one child will get to keep it as a toy. Picu needs to get back home before noon; otherwise, she might ruin her chances of winning the flavor bone…alas, she’s running late! Moreno’s narrative paints Picu’s world without spectacle—it will be up to readers to grasp the harshness and poverty of her environment. Like Picu’s life, the accompanying illustrations are rough and many-textured; the strong, sometimes jarring colors are both arresting and slightly unsettling. This English translation retains the idiosyncratic voice of the original Spanish (La Hermana menor). (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A memorable story alive with the voice of an Indigenous
people seldom heard from. (glossary, translator’s note) (Picture book. 6-8)
THE PUFFIN KEEPER
Morpurgo, Michael Illus. by Benji Davies Puffin/Penguin Random House Canada (112 pp.) $17.99 | Feb. 15, 2022 978-0-7352-7180-7
When the ship carrying 5-year-old Allen Williams and his mother founders off Cornwall’s Scilly Isles, lighthouse keeper Benjamin Postlethwaite comes to
the rescue.
Allen’s English father has died, and he and his French mother are going to live with his paternal grandparents on Dartmoor. After sheltering in the lighthouse, whose walls are covered in Benjamin’s paintings of boats, Allen is sent away with the gift of a small work painted on a scrap of wood. This secret treasure and memories of the comfort of that night sustain Allen through his mother’s depression, life with unaffectionate grandparents, and banishment to boarding school. His letters to Benjamin are never answered, but at 17, Allen finds his way back. The lighthouse is no longer in use; however, there is an injured puffin—the first on Puffin Island in over a century. Benjamin and Allen nurse him back to health, the question of the unanswered letters is solved, the puffin returns with friends, and the peaceful idyll is interrupted only by World War II. But happier times are in store. Warmhearted, sincere, and nostalgic but never treacly, the gentle text is elevated by color illustrations showing towheaded Allen growing from boy to man along with irresistibly charming puffins and evocative landscapes. The book is dedicated to Allen Williams Lane, the author’s fatherin-law and founder of Penguin Books; aftermatter describes the Puffin imprint’s history and impact on children’s literature.
A memorable story of the healing powers of art, nature,
and human kindness. (Historical fiction. 7-11)
ALIEN SUMMER
Murray, James S. & Carsen Smith Penguin Workshop (224 pp.) $16.99 | March 15, 2022 978-0-593-22612-4 Series: Area 51 Interns, 1
A young Black girl and her three friends set out to protect Area 51. Vivian Harlow is a 12-year-old on summer vacation—her last one before entering a STEM magnet school. Her mother is the director of future technology at the famed Area 51. While many people consider it a must-see tourist
for the record
destination, Vivian is more interested in spending time with her closest friends, Charlotte and Ray, who are White, and (hopefully) her crush, Elijah, who is Latinx. So Area 51 is the last place Viv wants to be for Take Your Kids to Work Day. At least Charlotte, Ray, and Elijah are there too, shadowing their own parents. Initially, the facility seems perfectly ordinary, contrary to all the rumors and conspiracy theories. That is, until a group of aliens breaks out of their quarters, seemingly bent on revenge after being confined and having something important taken from them. The adults put up a fight, but they are soon bested, and it is up to the four young people to save everyone. As the other kids look to her for leadership, Viv fears she is not up to the task. Murray and Smith begin this story in the middle of a high-stakes scene that sets the stage for an action-packed adventure tale filled with humor and charm. Viv and her companions are sure to win over audiences as they try to survive and turn the tide on this alien invasion.
An exciting series opener. (Science fiction. 8-12)
THE FREETHINKER’S DAUGHTER
O’Neill, Jenny Old Cove Press (216 pp.) $17.95 paper | April 19, 2022 978-1-956855-00-5
A White 13-year-old girl chronicles her life in the 1830s. Calendula “Cal” Farmer lives a simple life in Lexington, Kentucky, with her mother and new baby brother. Her abusive, alcoholic father left to work on the railroads. They don’t have much, but they get by until a flash flood hits the area, bringing about a year of significant changes for Cal. At the church where her family seeks refuge after the flood, she meets wealthy Mrs. Hunt-Adams, who hires her to serve as a tweeny in her home—the first step to being a maid—where she works alongside Mrs. Alice and Cook, two enslaved people. Cal does her best to adjust, knowing her family needs the money, while also maintaining her studies. While working in the HuntAdams household, Cal, who was raised by abolitionist parents, glimpses the abuse of the slaves. Cal is thrust into adulthood after losing her mother and brother to the cholera epidemic that ravages her town. While at the orphanage, the past catches up to the present as Cal decides who she’s going to become. This first-person coming-of-age story feels reminiscent of a journal. Cal’s personal history gives readers a glimpse of life at this time. The characterization is solid, and the tale highlights class and racial disparities; however, the subdued narrative overall feels somewhat flat.
A realistic story for patient readers. (Historical fiction. 10-14)
FOR THE RECORD
Polak, Monique Owlkids Books (256 pp.) $18.95 | March 15, 2022 978-1-77147-437-5
A distraught 12-year-old makes iffy choices in the midst of an ugly custody battle. Justine’s emotional turmoil is understandable as she and her little sister, Bea, shuttle between their fun-loving but careless, twice-divorced dad and hyperanxious, controlling, neat freak mom. It’s the latter’s continual codependent demands that lead Justine to think that she has to choose between the two. She makes lists of her dad’s supposed parenting failures in a notebook to pass on to her mother—and finally, when he barely prevents Bea from running out into traffic by grabbing her hard enough to leave bruises, lies about the circumstances, dubbing it a violent incident. That earns a date in family court, which leads to a confession and, if not a tidy resolution, at least a reasonable compromise. Polak offers carefully nonjudgmental portraits of both parents as flawed in different ways (and profoundly incompatible) but loving; neither is the unalloyed bad or good guy. That leaves room to focus on Justine’s emotional landscape, and it’s charting her dawning realization that it’s not her job to be the grown-up that will give this particular value for readers caught in similar breakups. The author includes a perspicacious child lawyer and equally canny judge (both of whom understand exactly what’s going on and properly prioritize the needs of the children) in her evidently all-White cast. She also closes with resources for both children and adults about parental alienation syndrome.
Sad—but frank, supportive, and properly free of easy
answers. (Fiction. 9-13)
KIND LIKE MARSHA Learning From LGBTQ+ Leaders
Prager, Sarah Illus. by Cheryl “Ras” Thuesday Running Press Kids (32 pp.) $17.99 | May 3, 2022 978-0-7624-7500-1
A colorful, uncomplicated introduction to queer and trans trailblazers.
In this straightforward picture book, Prager and Thuesday outline 14 LGBTQ+ innovators from around the world, though Americans are predominantly featured. Young readers are invited to emulate various character attributes of the profiled luminaries: creativity, boldness, kindness, and so on. Each succinct profile summarizes the contributions of the leader in one or two brief sentences followed by a notable quote. Well-known individuals such as Frida Kahlo and Leonardo da Vinci appear alongside folks who might be new to children, like LGBTQ+
simon b. rhymin’ takes a stand
activist Frank Mugisha of Uganda and gun control advocate X González of the United States. Avoiding any discussion of violence against LGBTQ+ communities and the resulting trauma, this collective biography is a helpful starting point for children who would benefit from a gentler entry point into sensitive histories. Rich with symbols, Thuesday’s cartoony images hint at the context of each biographee’s life and work. For example, Sappho of ancient Greece writes pensively on a scroll flanked by two Ionic marble columns; the writer, teacher, and organizer Audre Lorde’s portrait is bursting with books, a typewriter overflowing with paper, and a blackboard. Older readers may find this survey too simple to be engaging, but caregivers, educators, and librarians can use it to prime younger children for eventual deeper dives into the lives and struggles of LGBTQ+ icons. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A celebratory book that’s useful for teaching young children about diverse historical figures. (author’s note, further
reading) (Collective picture-book biography. 5-9)
BORN HUNGRY Julia Child Becomes “the French Chef”
Prud’homme, Alex Illus. by Sarah Green Calkins Creek/Astra Books for Young Readers (40 pp.) $18.99 | Feb. 8, 2022 978-1-63592-323-0
Julia “The French Chef” Child’s fascinating life, lovingly remembered by her grandnephew.
She stood 6 feet, 2 inches tall and wore size 12 shoes. In other words, Julia Child, nee McWilliams, was hard to miss. During World War II, she worked for the Office of Strategic Services, met her husband, and cooked shark-repellent cakes that protected Allied naval officers working in shark-infested waters. Later, while living in Paris, Julia discovered French food, and the rest is history. Prud’homme successfully drills home the fact that Child did not start out as a great cook but rather came into her talent through hard work and pure doggedness. The book’s unabashed celebration of Child’s love of food and of her pure hunger for knowledge about cooking is joyous. Ample backmatter takes a slightly more in-depth dive into Julia’s life and includes lists of pertinent books, TV shows, podcasts, websites, and exhibits. Caregivers conscious about instilling healthy eating habits in children may appreciate the appended recipe for oeufs brouillés (scrambled eggs), refreshingly different from the sweet snacks that usually constitute picture-book recipes. The colorful digital illustrations work in perfect tandem with the text, lavishly depicting the foods that seduced Child toward a life of cooking. By the story’s end, there is no mystery left as to what made her beloved by so many around the world. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Readers will salivate over this scrumptious and inspiring
picture-book biography. (author’s note, bibliography) (Picturebook biography. 4-7)
SIMON B. RHYMIN’ TAKES A STAND
Reed, Dwayne with Ellien Holi Illus. by Robert Paul Jr. Little, Brown (240 pp.) $16.99 | April 5, 2022 978-0-316-53901-2 Series: Simon B. Rhymin’, 2
An African American tween and his friends rally support to keep budget cuts from ending their after-school activities.
Simon and his best friend, Maria Rivera, are outraged to discover many of their beloved activities are falling victim to Booker T. Washington Elementary School’s lack of funding. The students already cope with a lack of air conditioning, and they are aware of better conditions and equipment in schools in other neighborhoods. When Maria learns that her beloved debate team has been downgraded to a club, with no trips to competitions, she is determined to do something, and she enlists Simon and their friends to help. Simon is skeptical until conversations with his mother and teacher give him hope that a community petition could have an impact. The young people develop a strategy and set about getting signatures. As he becomes more involved in seeking justice, Simon’s raps take on a more activist slant. His brother Aaron considers the effort unlikely to succeed without an infusion of social media attention. When Simon tries to make up for a setback, it appears Aaron may be correct. Once again, readers encounter Simon’s infectious personality, lively raps, warm, loving family, and collection of loyal friends. The connection between the students’ petition and protests in the larger world is seamless and perfectly pitched for a middle-grade audience. Final art not seen.
A timely tale that successfully blends the challenges of
urban communities with hope and optimism. (Fiction. 8-12)
ONCE UPON ANOTHER TIME
Riley, James Aladdin (336 pp.) $18.99 | April 5, 2022 978-1-5344-2587-3 Series: Once Upon Another Time, 1
A young giant has identity issues—no surprise, being as she’s only 5 1/2 feet tall. Disingenuously apologizing to young readers for trying so hard to make them cry (and promising more of the same in future episodes), Riley pits a short-but-mighty giant and an aggrieved preteen genie against an annoyingly clever king who has gone decisively to the dark side. Her fervent hopes of being accepted as a giant met with harsh rejection, Lena flees down from the clouds to seek comfort from the mysterious Last Knight and have her real nature revealed by a drink from exwitch Mrs. Hubbard’s Cauldron of Truth. First, though, she runs into Jin, a thoroughly chapped genie banished into a ring until
he demonstrates humility, who’s currently under the thumb (literally) of fiendish King Midas. Most of the action takes place around the Cursed City, a hidden settlement populated by wellknown figures, from Pinocchio to Humpty Dumpty, that both Midas and the giants have sworn to destroy. After many setbacks and twisty takes on fairy-tale tropes, the end leaves most of the city intact; Jin and Lena, who are plainly made for each other (though neither is anywhere near admitting it yet), freer to act than they were; and larger scale villainy and betrayal afoot. The cast members, or those not made of wood or gingerbread anyway, present White.
A brisk launch well endowed with surprising exploits and
ominous portents. (Fantasy. 9-12)
DOG & HAT AND THE LOST POLKA DOTS
Shuler, Darin Chronicle Books (80 pp.) $14.99 | March 29, 2022 978-1-79720-688-2 Series: Dog & Hat, 1
What would you do if the polka dots on your shirt escaped?
This first book in a new series with eye-popping comic book–style illustrations introduces a yellow anthropomorphic dog and his green talking hat. Dog and Hat have just finished shopping when catastrophe strikes—the red polka dots on Dog’s favorite shirt escape and disappear down a storm drain. To retrieve them, the pals must enter and navigate the city’s underground sewer system. Fortunately, the items in Dog’s shopping bag—an action figure (which he trades for a sewer map), a flashlight, and a toy truck (which he uses to evade a giant alligator)—prove to be everything they need for their mission. The alligator happens to be ill with a “bad case of sneezy spots.” Those spots look familiar! With some quick thinking, Doctor Hat and Nurse Dog diagnose “polka pox” and cure the alligator, but can they trust the hungry creature to not eat them? Luckily, other sewer creatures come to the rescue, and Dog and Hat make their escape. Expect to giggle over the fun facts, puns, jokes in the chapter titles, and asides. A seek-andfind prompt on the endpapers provides extra incentive to pore over the uber-colorful, busy illustrations. A treat for the eyes, this fast-paced adventure with an ever growing group of friends is both wild and witty. All characters are anthropomorphized animals. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A rollicking ride of a story with a wonderfully wacky prem-
ise. (Graphic chapter book. 5-8)
A GIFT FOR NANA
Smith, Lane Random House Studio (40 pp.) $18.99 | March 8, 2022 978-0-593-43033-0
All gifts are perfect when they come
from the heart.
Rabbit goes on a “journey through a green and grand forest” in order to get a gift for his nana even though it is “not even a major hare holiday.” He travels very far in search of the perfect gift and encounters many new friends whom he asks for help. Each of them proffers Rabbit something they can easily make or acquire: The moon offers a “crescent smile,” a whale proposes a glass of water, and so on. Ultimately, Rabbit finds the perfect gift for Nana all on his own, and his nana absolutely adores it. Although the story is a bit predictable, it is amusing— readers will laugh at the anthropomorphic volcano’s explosion and Rabbit’s exhaustion from his journey, among other chucklesome scenes. Smith’s gesso, oil, and cold wax illustrations are exquisite and almost ethereal. The friendly, many-eyed creature referred to as a “stickler” is at once haunting and intriguing. The moon is Tim Burton–esque and seems to glow and pop off the page. Pleased with his choice of gift, Rabbit has the moon’s smile on his face. The predominance of full-bleed double-page spreads accentuates Rabbit’s long quest. The different font sizes, styles, and colors will aid emerging readers with diction when reading aloud but might prove difficult for those with dyslexia. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A cozy story that will transport readers to faraway places.
(Picture book. 4-7)
JUST HELP! How To Build a Better World
Sotomayor, Sonia Illus. by Angela Dominguez Philomel (32 pp.) $17.99 | Jan. 25, 2022 978-0-593-20626-3
Young readers learn the value of being helpful. Every morning, while Sonia (a character who is clearly a young version of Sotomayor herself) eats breakfast, her mother, a nurse, asks “How will you help today?” Sonia, who wants to assist in making her community better and safer, always does her best to have a good answer for Mami. Sonia decides to volunteer to make care packages for American soldiers. She also helps other kids at her school with their various service projects. Readers see how children and adults in Sonia’s neighborhood work together to recycle, clean up a park, donate items to a children’s hospital, and mobilize voters on Election Day. Written by Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor and inspired by her own childhood, this picture book depicting a cooperative, socially conscious, multicultural neighborhood is nice enough but nothing more. The text is perfectly inoffensive, and the artwork is
pleasant, but the narrative never truly inspires or moves beyond a preachy approach that kids will quickly sniff out as patronizing. Well-meaning Democratic voters will purchase this for the children in their lives, who will smile appreciatively before eventually depositing the book in their local Little Free Library six months later. Sonia and Mami are Latinx with light brown skin. Secondary characters are diverse racially and agewise and include wheelchair users and a hijabi girl. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A picture book that at least helps fill the time. (Picture book.
6-8)
THE CALLERS
Thomas, Kiah Chronicle Books (228 pp.) $16.99 | April 5, 2022 978-1-79721-078-0
A boy uncovers deceptions—and truths—about his life. Quintus Octavius, son of the powerful Chief Councilor of the continent of Elipsom, is set to take his Caller test, one that will prove that he can conjure objects out of nothing. Being a Caller is an honored role, since the inhabitants of Elipsom need the Callers’ skills to manifest everyday necessities. But, unlike everyone else in his family, Quin has never been able to Call anything, and he dreads the upcoming test. Meanwhile, his sleep is disturbed nightly by vivid dreams of curling vines and green growth, images that he sketches in a notebook. A few days before the test, Quin blacks out and wakes to find himself in a strange place with Allie, an unfamiliar girl. As Allie shows Quin around the lush, green landscape—so different from the sterile, metallic environment he is familiar with—she explains that he is on the continent of Evantra, on the opposite side of the world from his home. But even as Quin revels in the natural landscape, he notices black lines running through the green, and when he discovers what is causing them, he is horrified. This fantasy keeps the tone nonpreachy, but its themes of environmental crisis, greed, and exploitation are spot-on. The action will keep readers avidly turning pages, though Quin’s character and the themes could have been more developed. Characters seem to default to White.
Overall, a fresh, original, and timely story. (Fantasy. 8-12)
BRIAN THE DANCING LION
Tinn-Disbury, Tom Capstone Editions (32 pp.) $17.99 | Feb. 1, 2022 978-1-68446-424-1
Can someone be brave, strong, fierce, and love to dance? Brian the lion loves to dance. Whenever he hears music (or any sound with a beat) he needs to dance, and it makes him feel good. He worries, however, that since lions are meant to be brave, strong, and fierce, no one will respect a dancing lion. Whenever his friends ask about his social calendar, he equivocates about all of the leonine activities he plans to do, but he really spends his free time dancing in secret. One day, he hears from a couple of gazelles that a big dance competition is in the works. Brian thinks he can prove to everyone that dancing lions can still be courageous and powerful. He practices day and night, plagued by fears of what his friends (an ape, a rhino, and an alligator) would think if they knew about his hidden passion. One day, while the other animals are practicing their dance routines, the music moves Brian so much that he can’t help but dance, much to everyone’s astonishment. Embarrassed, he runs home and hides for days. When his friends come to check on him, they each have a surprising confession…and a plan to prove to the jungle at large that fierce lions can be dancers too. Brit Tinn-Disbury’s winsome tale demolishes gender (and species) stereotypes with gentle humor. The digital illustrations of jungle animals, au naturel, are colorful and appealing. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A fine addition to storytimes on friendship, breaking
norms, and being one’s self. (Picture book. 2-7)
IMAGINE! Rhymes of Hope To Shout Together
Tognolini, Bruno Illus. by Giulia Orecchia Trans. by Denise Muir Red Comet Press (64 pp.) $18.99 | March 22, 2022 978-1-63655-014-5
First published in Italy in 2021, this picture book offers 24 short rhyming passages describing children’s hopes and dreams.
Solid sand-colored backgrounds allow the cheerful, colorful mixed-media paper collage illustrations to take center stage. At each vignette poem’s conclusion, the exclamatory refrain “imagine!” is emphasized in enlarged font and a contrasting color. Children and adults with different skin tones and anthropomorphized animals dramatize the central metaphors of the narrative. Perhaps because of the translation by Muir, some of the verses do not rhyme well: “Give up the guns, all the bombs banished / By a bilingual chorus / Imagine!” Although the book is narrated from the perspective of children, there is still a danger that it oversimplifies solutions to traumatic events and complex issues like mental illness, immigration crises, social divisions, and unemployment. What is most troubling is the inconsistent tone resulting from a haphazard mixing of serious topics with such light fare as wanting calamari for lunch. For example, sandwiched between a poem wishing away traffic noise and another about having pirates over for dinner is a lament about “adult wars” in the Middle East. The abrupt shifts in content may entertain some readers or may be jarring and confusing. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A picture book with a good premise but one whose execu-
tion needs to be reimagined. (Picture book. 3-6)
the year we learned to fly
A BLUE KIND OF DAY
Tomlinson, Rachel Illus. by Tori-Jay Mordey Kokila (32 pp.) $17.99 | March 15, 2022 978-0-593-32401-1
Blue is not just a color. Coen, a young Indigenous Australian boy, is having a difficult day. His body is coiled and tense, his feelings are “a deep, murky kind of blue,” and bed is the only place he finds relief. Mum says that “it can’t be that bad.” Dad thinks fresh air will do the trick. “What’s wrong with you?” his little sister, Junie, innocently demands. Coen feels “like a lost kite: loose in the breeze, with feelings that tangled like string”— and tangled Coen wants to be left alone. His family doesn’t understand. Then, little by little, Coen begins to respond to his parents’ and sibling’s loving patience and their assurance that his blue feelings won’t last forever. Author/psychologist Tomlinson deftly delves into the “muddled-up” moods of childhood depression with sympathy and compassion. With emotive descriptions such as “it was a slumping, sighing, sobbing kind of day,” the text invites readers to empathize rather than advise a child who is very much in pain. Mordey’s illustrations incorporate character design based on her own family, bringing a special warmth to this depiction of a racially-mixed household and their tender interactions. The limited palette of gentle blues, pinks, and apricot allows viewers to focus on the family members’ emotions. The author’s note further encourages families to recognize the different ways children process emotions and provides suggestions for helping children work through these overwhelming feelings. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A loving tribute to the power of loved ones’ support during
trying times. (Picture book. 4-9)
OSMO UNKNOWN AND THE EIGHTPENNY WOODS
Valente, Catherynne M. McElderry (416 pp.) $17.99 | April 26, 2022 978-1-4814-7699-7
A 13-year-old skeptic finds himself traveling in strange realms, including the land of the dead, after his mother kills a magical creature. Promising readers a tale as “grand and strange and wild” as they are, Valente opens with the murder of a supposedly mythical Quidnunk followed by the arrival of a really rude skadgebat (a “badger-wombat-skunk thing”) named Bonk the Cross to collect a human in recompense, pursuant to a long-forgotten treaty between the Valley and the Forest. So it is that Osmo journeys through fungal mycelia to meet a host of chimerical Forest residents—notably a scaly and resolutely solitary pangirlin named Nevermore—on the way to a startling transformation and a forced marriage to the ghost of the murder victim. Along with characteristic fey bits, like inserting unnumbered chapters of authorial commentary and repeatedly swearing her audience to secrecy, the author loses no chance to fold metaphorical over- and undertones into names, events, and themes as she steers her Everytween protagonist through tests of character and cleverness in locales from the city of Quiddity to the Meaningful Desert (“everything here means something else”) and over the River After to a destiny strung out through four post-climactic chapters of conversation, unpacking, and wrap-up. The cast presents as White.
Prime fare for fans of bildungsromans bedecked with sentient mushrooms, tricksy monsters, and allegorical gewgaws.
(map) (Fantasy. 10-13)
THE YEAR WE LEARNED TO FLY
Woodson, Jacqueline Illus. by Rafael López Nancy Paulsen Books (32 pp.) $18.99 | Jan. 4, 2022 978-0-399-54553-5
An intergenerational family story of freedom.
A girl with a big, curly Afro and her little brother, both light brown–skinned, live in a high-rise city apartment building. Because of stormy summer weather, they must stay inside. As a remedy for boredom and bickering, their grandmother advises them to “use those beautiful and brilliant minds of yours.” And they do, throughout all four seasons of the year. Colorful butterflies and a vibrant little bird that often appear flying around the siblings represent their freedom, which is only ever as far away as an open book or the doorways of their imaginations. López illustrates the inside of the family’s apartment with drab, muted colors that emphasize the children’s confinement. In contrast, the outdoor scenes, illustrated primarily in pastels, exude luminosity and convey the youngsters’ exuberance. Rather than being selfish with their ability to fly, the sister and brother share it with the neighborhood kids. The protagonist/narrator shares that her grandmother learned to fly from “the people who came before,” who were “brought here on huge ships, / their wrists and ankles cuffed in iron.” This recalls Virginia Hamilton’s legend of The People Who Could Fly (1985), referenced by López in one illustration and discussed by Woodson in her author’s note. Some readers will notice an intertextual reference to the pair’s previous title, The Day You Begin (2018).The ebullient mixedmedia artwork explodes with color and extends the richness of the text. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
An uplifting story that will inspire kids, especially brown
girls and boys, to dream. (Picture book. 4-8)
winnie zeng unleashes a legend
GOLD MOUNTAIN
Yee, Betty G. Carolrhoda Lab (288 pp.) $18.99 | April 5, 2022 978-1-72841-582-6
A Chinese girl disguises herself as a boy to work on the perilous construction of the transcontinental railroad. It is 1867, and 15-year-old Tam Ling Fan just lost her twin brother, Jing Fan, to an influenza outbreak. Her magistrate father was also recently falsely accused of treason and imprisoned, and her family expects Ling Fan to follow her duties as a young woman. Through an advantageous marriage, the Tams could become allied with a powerful family who might wield their influence to assist Baba. Ling Fan sees another path, however. Disguised as Jing Fan, she boards a ship to California with a prized railroad contract in hand. But railroad work is a dangerous affair—and she might have underestimated how long it would take to collect enough money for a bribe to help free Baba. Yee takes readers on a vivid journey through the pressures testing those joining the race to build the first transcontinental railroad—from physical dangers and mental stress to the lure of vices. Racial tensions and xenophobia are ever present as well. At home in China as well as among her fellow workers, Ling Fan navigates the dynamics of her class privilege and her gender. A degree of impulsivity and naïve trust in others sometimes jeopardizes her already precarious situation, but luck keeps her from harm, and her persistence and perseverance, though tested, are unyielding.
An adventure-filled glimpse into history through the eyes of a determined daughter. (author’s note, discussion ques-
tions) (Historical fiction. 11-16)
THE ANGEL OF SANTO TOMAS The Story of Fe del Mundo
Yee, Tammy Tumblehome Learning (36 pp.) $16.95 | Jan. 31, 2022 978-1-943431-74-8
A picture book highlighting the medical and humanitarian accomplishments of Dr. Fe del Mundo. When her sister passed away in the early 1900s in Manila, Philippines, del Mundo vowed to keep her dream of becoming a doctor alive. At age 15, she enrolled in the University of the Philippines and, a few years later, became the first woman and first person of Asian descent to attend Harvard Medical School. With the outbreak of World War II, del Mundo decided to return to the Philippines, “where she was needed most.” After watching families get torn apart due to prison camps, del Mundo worked with the International Red Cross and local military officials to open a boarding school for sick and recuperating children. The home grew, welcoming more children, providing them with health care, holiday celebrations, and more, which led to del Mundo’s nickname, the Angel of Santo Tomas. This picture-book biography celebrates not only del Mundo’s many accomplishments in medicine, but also her compassion and humanitarianism. The full-color digital illustrations depict details of Filipino culture, like architecture and clothing, while also beautifully capturing del Mundo’s gentleness and her emotions. A timeline in the backmatter provides more information about her accomplishments and life. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A lovely and inspiring biography of a benevolent, innova-
tive female Asian doctor. (map, sources) (Picture-book biography. 5-10)
WINNIE ZENG UNLEASHES A LEGEND
Zhao, Katie Random House (288 pp.) $16.99 | $19.99 PLB | April 26, 2022 978-0-593-42657-9 978-0-593-42658-6 PLB
Already overwhelmed with obligations, an 11-year-old Chinese American girl reluctantly answers the call for a hero. Fueled by parental expectations, Winnie has always strived to be the best. It doesn’t help that her rival, David Zuo, bested her (again) at their last piano competition and has transferred to her public middle school from his fancy private one. As if things couldn’t get worse, Winnie is still grieving the fact that her once-close relationship with her older sister, Lisa, has turned antagonistic. When the sixth grade homerooms hold a bake sale competition, Winnie finds her grandmother’s old cookbook and bakes a batch of mooncakes. Taking a bite, she unwittingly unlocks both her shaman powers and the spirit of Lao Lao, her late maternal grandmother. The jampacked story reveals that Winnie is a descendant of a line of shamans who must train with Lao Lao to capture malevolent spirits before they grow more powerful and wreak chaos in the human world. As Winnie navigates demon-possessed teachers, conflict in family relationships, and academic pressures, Zhao provides space for her to sincerely question whether she can handle it all and to discover nuances within her family dynamics. The exact parameters governing the spirits’ interactions with the human world are highly detailed, but the big picture feels hazy; a hinted sequel may provide more answers.
An ambitious fantasy outing. (recipes) (Fantasy. 9-12)
board & novelty books
WE ARE SHAPES
Beck, Melinda Phaidon (32 pp.) $9.95 | April 20, 2022 978-1-83866-474-9
Six assorted shapes introduce themselves one by one, then come together in this minimalist concept book. First up, a white, polka-dot square points out its four sides. Next, a red rectangle does the same, adding that it can be wide or tall. The green triangle describes itself as “pointy,” while the yellow circle admits it has no sides but can roll. Lumpy, a cloudlike shape, and striped, visaged, ropelike Squiggly model their own less-concrete attributes: Lumpy bounces; Squiggly wiggles and giggles. Together, the cast attempt to form a stack, but this proves challenging. Triangle is too pointy to support its fellow shapes, Circle is inclined to roll, and Squiggly is too unstable. However, persistence pays off, and the now-smiley shapes arrange themselves into a house. Beck is a respected, accomplished graphic artist, but here, the choice of using shapes to convey the welcome, if familiar, message of cooperative endeavor feels incongruously dispassionate and abstract. The book is conceptually inconsistent. Squares, rectangles, triangles, and circles are shapes and nouns with simple, universal specifications easily grasped by small children; but, the adjectives lumpy and squiggly are not shapes and lack straightforward definitions, a discrepancy left unresolved. The text is similarly confusing. The shapes’ conclusion that “together we are a home” is contradicted by the illustration: Circle is a sun, Lumpy is a cloud, while Squiggly’s role (surrogate human?) is unclear. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Executed with more flair than substance, this board book
is a miss. (Board book. 1-3)
ADVENTURE AWAITS
Cole, Henry Little Simon/Simon & Schuster (26 pp.) $9.99 | May 10, 2022 978-1-66590-290-8
A dog and a cat separately awaken to a day full of promise and an interesting
world to explore.
Indoors, a gray dog arises from a purple cushion. Elsewhere, a striped, orange tabby leaves its green cushion, performing a quintessentially catlike stretch. Each creature heads outdoors. The dog pauses to check out a butterfly and a bee, then a squirrel sitting on a fence. The cat’s fancy is caught by a red watering can, then by two blue jays looking on with wary interest. The dog chases the squirrel, and the cat chases the birds up the same large tree with spreading, leafy branches. Stymied, the two pets gaze at a hollow in the trunk that, frightfully, appears occupied. It is! The occupant—an owl—peers after the cat and dog as they flee. Back home, they return to the safety of their cozy cushions. Readers will enjoy the surprising twist ending, and the sight of a raccoon peering through the glass-paned door promises new adventures. Beautifully crafted, this tale leaves space for children to fill in the story and to practice reading others’ emotions and intentions. Are the dog and cat friends? What are they looking for? Do they find it? Did the owl scare them (or vice versa)? Consisting mostly of verbs, the text guides and hints but lets children—like the animal characters—make their own discoveries. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
An engaging romp from start to finish. (Board book. 1-4)
CRINKLE, CRINKLE, LITTLE CAR
Fleck, Jay Chronicle Books (10 pp.) $8.99 | May 10, 2022 978-1-4521-8166-0
A noisy journey through the night-
time firmament.
As the book opens, readers see a little car zooming out of the garage of a house and flying up into the starry sky. Using the familiar singsong rhyming couplets of the widely known early-19th-century English lullaby “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” the text tells of various celestial bodies who are kept awake by the car’s rambunctious flight. The “loud beep” of the airborne car’s horn and the “VROOM VROOMM” of its engine disturb the stars, moon, and even the planet Mars, all of whom are anthropomorphized, just as the car subtly is. Having irked them all, the car eventually tires of its outer-space jaunt and flies back home, where a peaceful night’s sleep awaits. On the cover and throughout the book, the car’s body is made of shiny orange crinkle material that sparkles like the star that is the central image of the original lullaby. This tactile element not only gives the illustrations a more multidimensional look, but also provides an opportunity for tots to expand their senses. The simple digital illustrations are serviceable, with spare details. The book has an invitingly small trim size—smaller than most board books—which suits its little protagonist. Readers can expect the sturdy pages to stand up to wear and tear.
A nice enough reimagining of a popular childhood song.
(Novelty board book. 0-3)
HOORAY FOR SUNNY DAYS!
Kantor, Susan Illus. by Katya Longhi Little Simon/Simon & Schuster (26 pp.) $7.99 | May 10, 2022 978-1-66591-241-9
Revel in the pleasures of summer days. The text’s three rhyming quatrains extol the season’s joys, from “birds in leafy trees” and “happy bees” to “eating berry pie” and “twinkling fireflies.” Cottagedwelling woodland mammals get the full digital cartoon treatment, with giant eyes, exuberantly bushy tails, and bright clothing, hats, and eyewear. Readers see them enjoying a range of outdoor activities, from picnicking and splashing around in a pond to running barefoot in the grass and lounging in a hammock. The adorable diminutive mammals are the stars of the book, but the lively insects and birds make their presences felt too. This simple but sweet addition to the ever expanding bookshelf of estival books for younger children is more about imagery than plot, but that’s OK. The rhymes scan well, and the anaphoric repetition lends itself to read-alouds. The consistently double-page, full-bleed spreads allow readers to sense the scope of summer’s bounty. The artwork’s palette tracks the day’s arc, with morning yellows and greens ceding to violets and blues as twilight falls. Longhi’s illustrations fairly sparkle with light and Lisa Frank–esque colors. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Bright, cheerful, and summery. (Board book. 1-4)
BROWN SUGAR BABY
Lewis, Kevin Illus. by Jestenia Southerland Cottage Door Press (22 pp.) $9.99 | March 15, 2022 978-1-64638-410-5
Brown parents cajole and cuddle
their adored youngster.
This picture book is written as a poem in the casual voice of a parent speaking to a small child, whom they address as “brown sugar baby.” The caregiver alternates between admiring the child—“your smiling swirls, / your chocolate curls, / your blessed bubbling grin”—and assuring the child that they are cared for—“I’ll keep you toasty warm… / all along / where you belong, / near me, safe from harm.” This slight ode is illustrated digitally in a brown, yellow, green, and light blue palette. The artwork shows a brown-skinned mother with a large Afro puff and a father with slightly lighter brown skin, both doing housework while juggling the responsibilities of caring for their round-cheeked, large-eyed tyke. The conversational tone of the text echoes traditional African American poetry in the style of Paul Laurence Dunbar. Despite some inconsistency in the rhythm and cadence of the verses, the story is fun and touching. Well suited for cozy lap readings, this board book will be a welcome addition to many families’ shelves in the early days of child rearing. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Sweet endearments to share with a beloved little one.
(Board book. 0-3)
LITTLE GENIUS WEATHER
Rhatigan, Joe Illus. by Lizzy Doyle Little Genius Books/Simon & Schuster (24 pp.) $8.99 | May 17, 2022 978-1-953344-47-2
A rhyming introduction to a variety
of weather phenomena.
“So how about that weather?” A ubiquitous small-talk topic gets the board-book treatment in this cheerful informational text. Enthusiastic, colorful illustrations are a highlight, and beaming, anthropomorphic kawaii-style weather formations are eye-grabbers. Who doesn’t love a grinning rainbow? Children with various skin tones pictured throughout the book are equally pleasant and include a wheelchair user. If the book is agreeable to look at, it’s less so to listen to. The oft-stilted rhymes aren’t intuitive, and clunkers like “when a cloud gets dark and heavy with rain it’s called a cumulonimbus which is such a funny name” take a few tries to get right when read aloud. Adding insult to injury, the line breaks are sometimes jarring, making the rhyme even more daunting. Most of the main sections contain appropriately digestible bits of introductory information conveyed in a bubbly, enthusiastic tone, with snow described vividly as “raindrops that freeze into crystals.” However, sometimes there is a mismatch between the text and its intended audience. Some topics—seasons, clouds, rain—with their easily visible and experiential elements, seem perfectly suited for toddlers; others, like humidity and hurricanes, are more of a stretch. A “Fun Fact” section discussing matters such as the Earth’s axis and climatology versus meteorology is more appropriate for early-elementary learners. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
There’s charm in this picture book, but it’s a bit of a wash.
(Informational board book. 2-5)
CONSTRUCTION SITE: SPRING DELIGHT An Easter Lift-the-Flap Book
Rinker, Sherri Duskey Illus. by A.G. Ford Chronicle Books (16 pp.) $12.99 | March 15, 2022 978-1-79720-431-4 Series: Goodnight, Goodnight Construction Site
A new addition to the Goodnight, Goodnight Construction Site board-book series celebrates spring’s arrival, and Easter’s too.
me and my mama
As “warm sunshine melts the snow away,” a construction site in what looks to be a remote rural area joyfully comes alive. Seven different occupational trucks begin their work, carrying out their specialized tasks. A concrete mixer pours concrete into a trench to make a foundation for a building, a crane truck lifts a huge wooden crate, a dump truck hauls away dirt, and so on. There are no humans pictured in the artwork; instead, the vehicles, which are anthropomorphically rendered with eyes, noses, and mouths, seem to have wills of their own. Each sturdily constructed double-page spread has a flap that, when lifted, reveals a lovely springtime surprise, from a duck and her ducklings swimming in a nearby lake to blooming tulips springing up from the ground behind the wooden crate. To cap off this engaging exploration of a setting that will be fascinating to many young children, not one, but four flaps on the final double-page spread make for a fun Easter egg hunt. Rinker’s rhyming couplets scan well. The flaps are big enough for little ones still developing motor skills, with notched spaces that make them easy to lift. Ford’s colored pencil and oil pastel illustrations capture the promise of a new season’s—and a new day’s—dawn and persevere in the style Tom Lichtenheld established in the first book of the series.
A winsome board book that highlights both the work of
construction crews and the work of nature. (Novelty board book. 2-5)
THE BIG BIRD SEARCH BOOK
van Bemmel, Erik Clavis (16 pp.) $19.95 | April 26, 2022 978-1-60537-742-1
Originally published in Belgium and the Netherlands, this seek-and-find board book invites children to learn about different bird species and their habitats.
This uncredited translation from the Dutch opens with a two-page annotated illustration presenting disparate facts about birds, such as “robins become aggressive when they see the color red,” and “a stonechat can fly more than 1,000 km (621 miles) a day during migration.” Most of the featured birds are common to Eurasia. Every subsequent double-page spread depicts a different hyperstylized habitat—the woods, the seaside, a marsh, a city, and more—and includes a pictorial legend of birds that appear in the busy illustrations, waiting for readers to find them. The birds in the artwork are the same sizes as their duplicates in the legends—easier to spot perhaps but utterly out of scale with the people, trees, human-made structures, and each other. On every verso page is a smattering of additional avian facts and elusive nonbird elements for kids to find in the crowded landscapes. The illustrations abound with minute details that will pique children’s curiosity, from wind turbines to a blimp. Intended for elementary-aged readers, this title will appeal to kids who enjoy picture puzzles. But the overly rendered digital illustrations fail to integrate the birds naturalistically into the habitats, making the whole enterprise oddly unfulfilling. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Marginal given the Eurocentric fauna and static banality
of the illustrations. (Board book. 4-6)
ME AND MY MAMA
Weatherford, Carole Boston Illus. by Ashleigh Corrin Sourcebooks Jabberwocky (24 pp.) $7.99 | April 5, 2022 978-1-72824-246-0
Rhyming couplets describe the daily life of active, curious young children and their doting mamas.
Each first-person verse is written from a youngster’s perspective. There is no need to announce that the children are loved since their interactions with their mothers firmly establish this fact. Caregivers of tykes will smile at the text’s nod to the relentless nature of parenting: “Mama’s sleeping like a rock, but when I knock, she’s on the clock.” The day unfolds with breakfast, playtime, lunch, reading, a romp in the park, a walk, making pizza, tending boo-boos, bathtime, and a lullaby before “nighty-night.” Always, mother and child are together. Nap time, when mama might get a moment to herself, is the only activity missing. Weatherford’s rhymes work. Her succinct wordplay is child friendly and evocative: “I yawn and ask her one more ‘why.’ ” Corrin’s equally deft and uncluttered illustrations add playful details to the simple stanzas. The children are never identified as male or female, but all are clearly Black. The facial features, body builds, skin tones, and hair textures of each mother-child pair are different, allowing a range of Black readers to find themselves reflected in the joyous pictures. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A lovely celebration of the bond between mother and child.
(Board book. 0-3)
PIGS ARE PREPARED
Wilhelm, Hans Illus. by Erica Salcedo Chronicle Books (14 pp.) $9.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-79720-376-8
Three little pigs have fun adventures, but first they must get ready for them.
The anthropomorphic porcine siblings, who live in a human house, “can’t wait to play,” but play requires planning. When they go riding on their bicycles, they have to make sure they’re wearing helmets and using hand signals for safety. When they want to have a picnic, they first have to pack a basket, a blanket, and their badminton gear. Swimming requires towels, sunscreen, and their “water wings.” Readers follow along as the pigs also prepare for “long hikes,” winter weather, and a frolic in the rain. Salcedo’s digital artwork is lively and colorful and gives each pig a distinct personality and appearance. Children
will enjoy the visual humor of an illustration showing the slim pig who wears eyeglasses running away from a swarm of bees. Wilhelm’s jaunty rhymes roll off the tongue, but the cadence stumbles in some places. Although this is marketed as a novelty board book, the only novelty element is a magnetic closure whose purpose is purely decorative. Nevertheless, caregivers seeking to teach young children organizational skills and good safety habits, particularly with respect to outdoor play, will appreciate this offering.
Preparation matters, and so does this board book. (Novelty board book. 2-5)
THE STORY OF JUNETEENTH
Williamson, Dorena Illus. by Markia Jenai WorthyKids/Ideals (24 pp.) $7.99 | May 3, 2022 978-1-5460-0216-1
A look at the origins and significance of Juneteenth.
In a classroom scene, young Black children led by a Black teacher make red, black, and green popsicle-stick flags as the text introduces Juneteenth as “a special day of freedom.” In a street parade, people in Afrocentric attire carry red, black, and green flags as the first-person plural narrator describes Juneteenth as a day to remember “when the last enslaved Africans in the United States became free.” Subsequent spreads pithily cover the history of slavery, the Civil War, the Emancipation Proclamation declaring enslaved people free as of Jan. 1, 1863, and the joy of the newly freed Africans. Readers learn that it took two more years for the news to reach the enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, delivered to them by an Army contingent on June 19, the day that now marks the anniversary of Juneteenth. Assuming no prior knowledge on readers’ parts, this informative board book strings together facts about Juneteenth for readers unfamiliar with the holiday and its origins. The history is oversimplified and the prose is uninspired but well designed for independent reading. Bright, cartoonlike illustrations featuring Black and White characters with expressive faces support comprehension. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A functional introduction to an important American holi-
day. (Nonfiction board book. 4-9)
NOODLES, PLEASE!
Yau Chepusova, Cheryl Illus. by Rebecca Hollingsworth The Collective Book Studio (28 pp.) $12.95 | April 5, 2022 978-1-951412-36-4 Series: A to Z Foods of the World
Eat your way through the alphabet and learn about 26 varieties of that most kid-friendly of foods—noodles!
Celebrating the versatility, popularity, and ubiquity of noodles, this board book gives hungry readers a delicious tour of pasta dishes from a variety of cultures and countries. There is a dish for each letter of the alphabet. Some of these tasty entrees include “sauteed shellfish and short-noodle” Fideuà from Spain; “steamy, salty” Ramen from Japan; and “sweet milk custard” Vermicelli Kheer from India. Some young foodies might devour every morsel of the meticulous descriptions of the different dishes. Others may tire out before they reach “Zaru soba,” i.e. “chilled soba and shredded nori,” which diners are instructed to dip “from a bamboo basket into a cup of mentsuyu sauce before each bite.” Sixteen of the noodle names are written in both Anglicized form and other languages. The artwork nicely shows the dishes’ garnishes, but the flat digital renditions lack a certain appetizing spark. For instance, Tallarines Verdes (Peruvian Pesto) is described as “bright green pesto,” but the picture of the dish feels dull and lacks the glossy, oily shimmer that makes pesto look so yummy on a plate. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A welcome board-book addition, even if it leaves readers
hungry for a bit more. (Informational board book. 2-8)
young adult
These titles earned the Kirkus Star:
COME OVER COME OVER by Lynda Barry....................................115
CHIARA IN THE DARK by Maya Chhabra......................................117
THE OBSIDIAN BUTTERFLY by Lani Forbes...................................118
THE OBSIDIAN BUTTERFLY Forbes, Lani Blackstone (320 pp.) $20.99 | Feb. 15, 2022 978-1-982546-11-3 Series: Age of the Seventh Sun, 3
CANCEL CULTURE Social Justice or Mob Rule?
Allen, John ReferencePoint Press (64 pp.) $31.95 | March 1, 2022 978-1-67820-234-7
How far is too far? Cancel culture, the act of “punishing individuals, usually by way of social media, for words or actions deemed unacceptable,” is explored in this slim but robust entry. The book’s four chapters—“What Is Cancel Culture?” “The #MeToo Movement,” “Cancel Culture and Political Speech,” and “Reexamining the Past”—do a commendable job of summarizing different examples within each category and providing a basic understanding of the history behind specific headlines, such as the sexual harassment cases against Harvey Weinstein, former President Donald Trump’s Twitter ban, and the renaming of American military bases to remove the names of Confederate generals. The work also explores the origins of the term cancel culture itself as well as popular understanding of what it means in practice, Americans’ perceptions of how serious a problem it is, and how it fits into a longer history of social boycott. The use of endnotes provides readers with uninterrupted text blocks and the ability to seek out additional information.This work does not provide easy answers, challenging readers to consider each point and come to their own conclusions. It discusses the fact that anyone, regardless of race, gender, or political leaning, can be cancelled. This book makes an excellent starting point for research papers on the topic.
A useful guide to a controversial subject. (infographic, fur-
ther research, index, picture credits) (Nonfiction. 12-18)
DREAMS BIGGER THAN HEARTBREAK
Anders, Charlie Jane Tor Teen (320 pp.) $18.99 | April 5, 2022 978-1-250-31739-1 Series: Unstoppable, 2
Tina and friends continue their spacefaring adventures in Anders’ Unstoppable series. In Victories Greater Than Death (2021), alien clone Tina Mains and her wholesome crew from the
YOUNG ADULT | Laura Simeon
romantic reads to lose yourself in
Several articles reporting on the book industry have noted a healthy rise in romance novel sales during the pandemic, observing that during stressful and unpredictable times, a genre that reliably delivers joy has obvious appeal. The following YA titles will bring hours of pleasurable distraction. These books, many of which have crossover adult reader appeal, are intelligently written and skillfully crafted, feeding the mind and lifting the spirit.
One True Loves by Elise Bryant (Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins, Jan. 4): It’s the summer before college, and change is in the air for two Southern California teens. Lenore, who is Black, and Alex, who is Black and Korean, are repeatedly thrown together after their families are assigned to the same dining table during a Mediterranean cruise. They have immediate physical chemistry, but things get off to a bumpy start, and there are hurdles to overcome before love prevails and they can sail happily away into the sunset. When You Get the Chance by Emma Lord (Wednesday Books, Jan. 4): Musical theater fans will eat up this story about New Yorker Millie Price, a White teen who dreams of Broadway. She’s grown up with a single father and no idea who her mother is. The chance online discovery of her dad’s youthful LiveJournal offers three possible candidates for her mother’s identity. Alongside her investigations, there is a charming enemies-to-lovers romance between Millie and Oliver Yang, her school theater’s Chinese American stage manager.
My Fine Fellow by Jennieke Cohen (HarperTeen, Jan. 11): This tribute to My Fair Lady is set in an alternate early-19th–century England ruled by Queen Charlotte and realistically represents London’s ethnic diversity. Snooty Lady Helena Higgins, top student at the royal culinary academy, decides to transform working-class food vendor Elijah Little into a gentleman. Helena’s friend and fellow culinary student Penelope Pickering (who is Filipina and White) and Elijah (who is Jewish) fall for one another in this delightful romp.
Sunny G’s Series of Rash Decisions by Navdeep Singh Dhillon (Dial Books, Feb. 8): Prom is a time when emotions run high—especially for Sunny Gill, a Punjabi teen from California who is grieving his brother’s death. He’s also just revealed startling changes for a young Sikh man: He’s stopped wearing his turban and shaved off his beard. When Sunny and Hmong American classmate Mindii Vang spontaneously take off for an event dedicated to his favorite fantasy series, it leads to love—and deep emotional growth.
No Filter and Other Lies by Crystal Maldonado (Holiday House, Feb. 8): Maldonado’s sophomore novel is another thoughtful and uplifting exploration of what it’s like to be a brown girl inhabiting a body that doesn’t fit oppressive dominant beauty standards. Kat Sanchez leads a double life: Online she’s Max, a thin, blond White girl; in real life, she’s a fat Puerto Rican and White teenager struggling with self-acceptance. An online meeting with body-positive Elena, an exuberant, irresistible, pinkhaired White girl, shakes everything up as Kat must reckon with the high stakes of hiding who she really is.
Ready When You Are by Gary Lonesborough (Scholastic, March 1): Two boys fall in love in a powerful, immersive coming-out story by debut author Lonesborough (Yuin). Jackson and Tomas, two Indigenous Australian teenagers, are coming-of-age in a setting where homophobia is rampant and racism toward Aboriginal people is widespread. Despite these obstacles, a beautiful romance develops that will sweep readers away in this novel set against the well-developed backdrop of a tightknit community and a beautiful natural environment.
Laura Simeon is a young readers’ editor.
come over come over
Indomitable faced immense evil and survived, but not without consequences. Tina’s best friend, Rachael Townsend, was once a talented artist, for example, but after using her mind to control “an ancient super-weapon at the head of a butterfly made of starlit threads,” she’s unable to draw a single image. A mysterious box might very well be the answer to her woes, but how? Meanwhile, Elza Monteiro is in the running to become a princess, but her journey is derailed by a familiar face. Tina, while not the sole protagonist of this installment, still features as she navigates the Royal Space Academy as a budding cadet. Fans of the first entry will certainly enjoy this sequel with its improvements in pacing and characterization and stronger writing; additionally, since she doesn’t need to introduce an entire cast and world, this time around the author can plunge directly into the action. White-presenting (when she appears as a human) Tina is dating Elza, who is Black and travesti, or trans. Queer identity is front and center as before, and a wide variety of life experiences and ethnic backgrounds play into the perspectives of the characters as they try to prioritize joy and growth in the midst of intergalactic war.
A queer space odyssey that avoids the sophomore slump.
(Science fiction. 13-18)
COME OVER COME OVER
Barry, Lynda Drawn & Quarterly (128 pp.) $19.95 | Feb. 8, 2022 978-1-77046-545-9
This reissuing of a beloved collection introduces a new generation to Barry’s comics.
Eighth grader Maybonne (sometimes “helped” by her little sister, Marlys) journals the trials and tribulations of her life. She stays up all night during a sleepover, fights with her mom and her sister over phone privileges, and protects her runaway best friend from nosy parents. In between episodes from Maybonne’s school year (originally published as the weekly newspaper strip “Ernie Pook’s Comeek”), 8-year-old Marlys sometimes invades the journal, writing about “The! Planet! Of! Marlys!!!!!!!” Maybonne expresses her frustration when Marlys spills secrets she’s read in the journal. Maybonne’s emotional reactions are incredibly real; she’ll respond to being grounded by writing “suddenly my whole life got ruined!” but expresses honest, frightened confusion when she witnesses or experiences sexually frightening events. Barry’s trademark chaotic, two-panel style is perfect for portraying the realistic travails of Maybonne’s life, which range from the joyful or funny to the deeply sad. The sisters (light-skinned and absolutely covered in freckles) can be just plain mean to each other but are also there for each other in a pinch. Maybonne’s eighth grade year is best described in her own words: Though it’s her “suckiest year,” she concludes, “P.S. I still think life is magical.”
Unsettling, comedic, and awkward vignettes make readers squirm with uncomfortable self-recognition—and shared
hope. (Graphic fiction. 12-adult)
THE LAND GRAB
Beartrack-Algeo, Alfreda 7th Generation (122 pp.) $9.95 paper | April 26, 2022 978-1-939053-40-4 Series: The Legend of Big Heart, 1
When his people are treated unfairly, a Lakota boy’s determination wins out. In 1929, 11-year-old Alfred Sparrow lives on the Kul Wicasa Lakota Reservation in South Dakota with his mother, younger brother, and grandparents following the disappearance of his father, who left to find work in Wyoming and was never heard from again. The family treasures the tribal allotment land his grandfather has worked so long and hard to sustain. When Mr. O’Neil, the local government agency superintendent, and his cohorts try to swindle Alfred’s grandfather and other Lakota landowners out of their land, Alfred looks to his dreams, then shares what he learns with his friends. Together, they come up with a plan to defeat their enemy and save their homes. Lakota culture and traditions are incorporated throughout the story, for example when Alfred dreams of the golden eagle spirit helper. He remembers his grandfather telling him, “Grandchild, a golden eagle came to your mother when you were born. It will surely watch over you throughout your life.” Alfred later calls on this helper when he and his dog are attacked by wolves after getting too close to a den of wolf cubs. This series opener by Beartrack-Algeo (Lower Brule Lakota Nation) begins slowly, and the quantity of and dense approach to conveying historical information may deter the intended audience of reluctant readers. Things pick up toward the end of the book with several exciting action-packed scenes.
An informative Lakota historical novel heavy on exposi-
tion. (author’s note) (Historical fiction. 12-18)
NO STOPPING US NOW
Bledsoe, Lucy Jane Three Rooms Press (288 pp.) $15.00 paper | April 26, 2022 978-1-953103-20-8
A teenager faces stiff opposition in her campaign to bring girls’ basketball to her school in this novel closely based on Bledsoe’s experiences. It’s 1974, and the best 17-year-old Louisa and four female classmates can do to satisfy their strong desire to play is early morning access to their Portland, Oregon, school’s gym for inexpert scrimmages. Until, that is, Louisa meets Gloria Steinem at a local public event, learns about the recently passed Title IX, and touches off a storm with a letter to her state newspaper protesting the lack of a girls’ sports program in the public schools. Change does come, but it comes hard, with bullying and even a teacher’s physical intimidation to go with a falsified school board
flirting with fate
meeting transcript, oblique threats to her college plans, footdragging pleas for patience from her principal, and new coaches who are incompetent or outright hostile. But support, sometimes from unexpected quarters, not only keeps Louisa motivated, but turns her and a wave of new recruits into a team solid enough to compete for the state championship. Filling in her triumphant tale with expert hoops coaching as well as a period pop-music soundtrack and a flurry of subplots, Bledsoe states in her author’s note that most everything—excepting dialogue and some names—is true. The cast is largely White.
The cause is just, the action absorbing, the sexist flack still
all too familiar. (Fictionalized memoir. 14-18)
YEAR ON FIRE
Buxbaum, Julie Delacorte (336 pp.) $18.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-984893-66-6
Four Los Angeles teens negotiate their relationships. The Gibson twins and their best friend, Paige Cohen-Chen, are a trio: the inseparable, loyal Imogen and Archer balancing out Paige’s alpha-girl attitude. They’ve fit together as a perfect unit, until Immie kissed Paige’s boyfriend, Jackson. But Immie didn’t actually kiss Jackson— Arch did. Arch is gay and hiding it from their abusive father, and his sister has lied for him, straining her friendship with Paige. Now Immie and Paige have their eyes on the same guy, Rohan Singh, a charming transfer student homesick for London despite his crush on Immie keeping him grounded. On top of all that, there’s an arsonist loose at school. Amid these complicated connections, the friends hide their personal pain. Immie’s desire for independence, Paige’s parents’ neglect and her toxic struggle for absolute perfection, Arch’s secret flirtation with Jackson, and Ro’s anger at his father’s affair may burn them all down before anything else does. The quartet of vivid characters—in particular, troubled, fierce Paige—is a strength of the book, and the romances, one straight and one queer, are sweet. But the narrative never quite gels, trying as it does to balance too many plotlines and shifting in tone between melodrama and slice of life rather than blending both into a cohesive whole. Immie, Arch, and Jackson read as White; Paige is Jewish and Chinese American, and British Ro’s name implies Indian descent.
A soap opera with real issues told with earnest heart. (Fiction. 14-18)
OMENS BITE
Cast, P.C. & Kristin Cast Wednesday Books (320 pp.) $18.99 | April 5, 2022 978-1-250-76566-6 Series: Sisters of Salem, 2
The sequel to Spells Trouble (2021) sees twin sisters Hunter and Mercy on separate paths. Since the death of their mother, Abigail, Hunter and Mercy are the latest Goode witches to become the guardians of the earthly gates to the different mythological Underworlds. But following their failed attempt to heal the sacred trees that mark each portal entrance, the sisters start to drift apart. Hunter delves into dangerous blood magic under the patronage of a Greek goddess, while Mercy befriends Khenti, a warrior who introduces her to the Egyptian Land of the Dead. But time is running out: Can the sisters mend what is broken between the worlds—and between themselves—before it is too late? This return to the Sisters of Salem series largely moves away from the previous entry’s shaky worldbuilding and core premise to focus on the complex dynamics between Hunter and Mercy and on their separate journeys. Adrift from each other and struggling with their broken bond, the sisters reckon with grief, guilt, and the development of their powers, each having different experiences that are explored in the story. The unevenly paced narrative drags for the first half, finding a more assured footing toward the ending, when the main plotline also finally moves along. The Goode sisters are White, and Hunter is lesbian.
A middle book that lacks bite. (Fantasy. 14-18)
FLIRTING WITH FATE
Cervantes, J.C. Razorbill/Penguin (384 pp.) $18.99 | April 19, 2022 978-0-593-40445-4
Seventeen, studying journalism, and living with her sisters in the City of Angels, Ava Granados believes only in that which she can see. She’s about to see a lot more. The women of the Granados family have the gift of blessings: Upon her death, a matriarch like Ava’s beloved Nana has the chance to bestow blessings upon her female descendants. When a freak storm keeps Ava from reaching Nana’s bedside in time and disrupts the passage of her blessing before Nana dies, Ava is faced with an unlooked-for challenge, unbelievable new companions, and a boy she has no intention of falling for. Intertwining past and present, stories already told and stories yet to be discovered, debut author Cervantes carries Ava through the tumultuous summer before her senior year of high school with style, charm, and wisdom. This novel will especially resonate with any young person whose formative years have been
paved with stories of fierce and industrious ancestors. The Mexican American Granados sisters sit at the junction of Hollywood affluence and immigrant grit, their perspectives adding a vibrant thread to the contemporary tapestry of Latine fiction. And Los Angeles, a city of bold dreams and glittering destinies, is a character all its own: Each lovingly described neighborhood, canyon, and beach brings new emotion to the narrative.
An original twist on the modern fairy tale amplified by sis-
terly affection and a poignant sense of place. (Fiction. 12-17)
CHIARA IN THE DARK
Chhabra, Maya West 44 Books (200 pp.) $19.95 | April 19, 2022 978-1-9785-9596-5 Series: West 44 YA Verse
An aspiring figure skater is shaken when she begins having violent and unwanted thoughts in this powerful novel in verse for reluctant readers. In many ways, Chiara Benedetti is an ordinary high school senior. She and her best friend, Olivia, spend their free time at the ice skating rink; Chiara dreams of skating at the collegiate level. To earn some money, Chiara begins babysitting for her downstairs neighbors, the Guptas, caring for their adorable toddler, Julie. Everything changes when Chiara suddenly begins to imagine hurting Julie while she’s in her care. Terrified that she’ll get into trouble, Chiara doesn’t know what to do about her intrusive thoughts. It’s not until her parents find her a therapist that what is happening becomes clear: She is struggling with OCD. Chhabra details the extensive and often grueling treatments Chiara goes through with compassion while realistically depicting both Chiara’s pain and her immigrant parents’ struggle to understand why their child’s personality has altered. As readers follow Chiara’s story, which is narrated in clear, direct, first-person poems, they will be heartened to discover that treatment options are out there, and they will be rooting for her as she learns to manage her illness. Chiara’s mother is Indian, and her father is Italian.
A sympathetic and ultimately hopeful story of strength.
(Verse novel. 14-18)
BLAINE FOR THE WIN
Couch, Robbie Simon & Schuster (336 pp.) $19.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-5344-9746-7
Sixteen-year-old Chicago mural artist Blaine is devastated when Joey, his senior-class-president boyfriend, dumps him on their one-year anniversary.
To win Joey back and prove he can be the more serious person Joey wants, junior Blaine gives up his painting job, changes his style, and enters the running for senior class president. With just two days left to gather signatures and prepare a speech—just for a chance to get on the ballot—Blaine recruits his best friend, Trish, as his campaign captain. Also helping are Trish’s girlfriend, Camilla, and student council member Danny. After talking to fellow students, Blaine and his team base their campaign around mental health. It seems like a miracle when Blaine manages to win student council approval and become an official candidate. Something strange is afoot, however, as Zach, Joey’s new boyfriend and Blaine’s election opponent, appoints Joey’s close friend Ashtyn as his campaign captain, and Trish suspects there’s something fishy about the election results. Matters grow ever more complicated as Blaine struggles with his growing feelings for Danny, his desire to return to painting, and the version of himself he thinks Joey wants. A slow start builds up to a fastpaced second half, and Blaine’s conflict between remaining true to himself versus becoming a seemingly more mature, serious person forms a relatable backdrop to the plot. Most central characters default to White; Trish is Black, and Danny is Vietnamese American.
A good read with a clear message about authenticity. (Fiction. 14-18)
SEARCH FOR THE ASTRAL DRAGON
Davis, Bryan Wander (440 pp.) $24.99 | March 8, 2022 978-1-4964-5179-8 Series: Astral Dragon, 1
Set against an interstellar backdrop, this gritty science-fiction thriller explores concepts of humanity and mercy.
When the Willis family is convicted of piracy in an intergalactic court, 12-year-old Megan is branded with the mark of a criminal, made to wear a shock collar, and forced to work on an Alliance spaceship under near-constant surveillance. Unexpected events allow Megan to escape, and she finds herself on a planet known for selling human children into slavery in dangerous mines filled with large, venomous bees. Determined to free the kids, she goes on a crusade to take down the slave trade but learns that its roots may be more insidious than she imagined. Faced with more hardship, Megan implores her deity, the Astral Dragon, for guidance. With the help of other young people—Dirk, Crystal, Oliver, and Zoë—Megan must find a way to expose the traitorous adults. But can she stay true to the merciful ways of her dragon god? Davis’ expansive romp is lushly imagined, filled with talking birds, gruff aliens, perilous planets, and many exciting near misses. However, the plotting is overstuffed, leaving certain threads frustratingly less developed; perhaps future installments will resolve this. Davis does not shy away from the horrors associated with slavery, with gritty, dark twists evincing the physical abuse the children must
endure. Megan, Oliver, and Crystal are White; Dirk and Zoë are cued as Black.
Intense and richly detailed but not without a few stumbles.
(cast of characters) (Science fiction. 12-16)
QUIET FIRE Emily Dickinson’s Life and Poetry
Dommermuth-Costa, Carol & Anna Landsverk Twenty-First Century/Lerner (168 pp.) $37.32 PLB | April 5, 2022 978-1-72841-634-2
Emily Dickinson was unequivocally a literary icon of the 19th century. But who was she really?
Her poetry is world-renowned, yet she remains in many ways a mystery. Dickinson was born in 1830 and spent most of her life in Amherst, Massachusetts. She was a keen reader (something which was looked down upon by her overbearing father), a talented letter writer, and, of course, a brilliant poet who defied the verse forms of her time. Dickinson also made unique use of capitalization, spelling, and punctuation, even going so far as to create new punctuation marks, challenging publishers who print her work. Coupled with her difficult-todecipher handwriting, Dickinson’s writing style has led to much speculation as to her intent. Since her death in 1886, scholars have tried endlessly to interpret her vast body of work; this beautifully designed and visually attractive volume delves into various interpretations, including queer and feminist analyses. Today, Dickinson is most famous for being a reclusive poet, but this biography mines what little information we’re privy to, giving readers a more complete image of her life. While relatively short, the accessible but detailed narrative containing excerpts of her writing provides a great overview of many historians’ theories and is a perfect stand-alone text for casual readers or an excellent jumping-off point for aspiring Dickinson-ian scholars.
A brief yet thorough glimpse into the life of one of the world’s most famous poets. (fact or fiction, endnotes, selected
bibliography, further reading, index, photo credits) (Biography. 12-18)
VEIL
Farrow, Dylan Wednesday Books (400 pp.) $18.99 | April 26, 2022 978-1-250-23593-0 Series: Hush, 2
Shae and her friends seek to overthrow Cathal’s oppressive reign in this duology closer.
Guided by a capriciously behaving torn page from the Book of Days, Shae and companions—prickly former trainer Kennan, best friend Fiona, and former suitor Mads—race across Montane in hopes of reaching safety in Gondal. They succeed, learning lots of backstory in the process about Shae’s mother and the Bard rebellion in general. But Gondal, though quite nifty (and fun to explore through Shae’s unworldly eyes), has problems of its own, resulting in the intense marginalization of Montanian refugees. While the heroes try to figure out whom they can trust and how to improve the lives of their countrymen at home and abroad, there’s a strong theme of speaking up as not being enough; though the explicit calls to action and critiques of ineffective protests can be didactic at times, these moments are justified by how they fit into the plot. Themes aside, the plot’s story beats are familiar enough that some plot twists will be expected. Plenty of action sequences and rising stakes provide incentive to ignore these moments of predictability. In the relationship storylines, Shae’s still reeling and off balance in dealing with her feelings of attraction to and betrayal by Ravod; her friendships are given equal weight, though. Among secondary characters, there’s a girl-girl romance and nonbinary representation. Aside from dark-skinned Kennan, characters default to White.
An easy-to-engage-with slice of escapism that fans of the
first volume will appreciate. (Fantasy. 12-18)
THE OBSIDIAN BUTTERFLY
Forbes, Lani Blackstone (320 pp.) $20.99 | Feb. 15, 2022 978-1-982546-11-3 Series: Age of the Seventh Sun, 3
The next generation of Chicome leaders must unite to determine the fate of the empire in the epic climax of the Age of the Seventh Sun trilogy. If Mayana and Ahkin had hoped their mere survival of the harrowing journey through Xibalba would be enough to guarantee their happily-ever-after, they were sadly mistaken. From the moment they leave the horrors of the underworld, they are thrust into an empire and a world in turmoil. Old friends and new allies from across the kingdoms must lay aside old rivalries and unite against their common foe. Amid the fast-paced adventures, frequent narrow escapes, and heated skirmishes, Forbes takes the time to dive more deeply into the motivations behind each character’s choices. She even turns a sympathetic lens on Metzi, Ahkin’s traitorous twin, whose decisions have been motivated by her own feelings of entrapment by the traditions and expectations of the regime even as she ascends to claim the throne of the Chicome Empire. While an epic battle worthy of the high-fantasy tradition provides the climactic moment, the intergenerational traumas, secrets, and efforts to control through fear that are broken down in the more intimate spaces between the action provide the catalyst for change upon which the fates of the empire and humanity
the enemy delusion
hinge. This is a page-turner from start to finish, with something for all devoted readers of the series to enjoy in its conclusion.
A pulse-quickening, soul-aching, and truly satisfying end
to the cycle. (map, royal families) (Fantasy. 13-18)
UNDER THE HEAVENS
Fox, Ruth CamCat Books (400 pp.) $24.99 | April 12, 2022 978-0-7443-0476-3
It’s 2078, and Hannah Monksman is Caretaker of the ship Seiiki and its precious Ark Project cargo: whales from Earth destined for a new life on the planet New Eden. Connected with the whales via their shared Link, Hannah is responsible not only for maintenance, reports to command, and her popular social media posts, but maintaining a relationship with the whales and ensuring their happiness during their intergalactic trip. As the sole human aboard, Hannah at first believes suspicious happenings are just a side effect of isolation. But soon she worries that her real identity—she’s actually Kim Teng, loyal Crusader for the holy cause against excessive scientific forays—has been exposed. Complicating matters, even she does not know the true details of her mission. The story drags in the beginning as the intricate worldbuilding that provides a glimpse into a speculative future grounded in familiar elements is established. However, themes of colonialism, the impact of technological experimentation, religion, and the nature of humanity are ultimately woven into an intriguing and thrilling mystery. Kim’s solitary strength is balanced by her yearning for a normal life and her relationships with the whales and her Crusader found family. The descriptions of whale-lore shine, as do discussions of fate and selfdetermination. Kim is cued as Chinese; Japanese kanji is the main communication system on the ship, and side characters are ethnically diverse.
A slow-building science-fiction thriller that deserves a
sequel. (discussion questions, author Q&A) (Science fiction. 12-18)
THE ENEMY DELUSION
Gray, Claudia Illus. by Eric Zawadzki DC (208 pp.) $16.99 paper | Jan. 4, 2022 978-1-4012-9608-7 Series: House of El, 2
While Krypton falls further into its catastrophic demise, Zahn and Sera race to discover the truth about their homeworld—and themselves.
Following her genetic modifications at the hands of JorEl and Lara, Sera continues to adjust to her newfound way of
WORDS WITH... Sabaa Tahir
The bestselling fantasy author turns to realistic fiction with an exquisite story set in the Mojave Desert of her childhood
BY LAURA SIMEON
Ayesha Ahmad Photography
Beloved worldwide for her epic Ember in the Ashes fantasy series, Sabaa Tahir’s latest, All My Rage (Razorbill/Penguin, March 1), follows high school seniors Salahudin and Noor, who live in Juniper, a small California desert town. Flashbacks to Lahore, Pakistan, where Salahudin’s mother Misbah’s story began, provide context for his family’s current situation as financially struggling motel owners. The sole survivor of the earthquake that destroyed her village in Pakistan, Noor was brought to Juniper to live with her uncle, who runs a liquor store. Inseparable from childhood, the teens navigate family secrets as well as their currently strained friendship—and the fragile tendrils of something more. College applications and high school social dynamics sit alongside questions of faith, culture, racism, love, abuse, loyalty, betrayal, and more. Grounded in richly evoked settings, the book’s deep emotional honesty will speak to a broad swath of teen and adult readers. The novel is being adapted for television by PICTURESTART, with a script coauthored by Tahir and her brother Amer Saleem. Tahir spoke with us over Zoom; the conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Did you write All My Rage during the pandemic? I actually wrote the book over the course of about 15 years. I edited a great deal during the pandemic. I always say that writing is editing, so it was this very essential part of the creation process. It was difficult; I found I had to be much more flexible, harking back to my early days of writing when my kids weren’t in school. The wonderful thing was, I knew I could do it because I had done it before. I just channeled early-2010 Sabaa to get it all done. I think that my books at their core are very much about hope in dark times because that sustained me through so much of my own life. When I was panicking—I’ve never written a contemporary, I don’t know what I’m doing—I would just tell myself, look, it’s a story. You just have to tell the truth.
The sense of place comes through so strongly. The rural feeling, the smallness of that community, was very important to me, and it was the one constant from that first page written long ago. The desert is this very powerfully beautiful and brutal place. Having lived there for nearly all my childhood, that sense of awe really informed the rest of the story. Growing up at the motel, working at my parents’ gas station, those two things allowed me to be interacting with people constantly. It’s a huge part of why I became a writer—observing people, seeing this contrast between how my parents were versus people from Germany or England or China, [seeing] just how vast the human experience was.
I love how you write about rage. It made me think about the implicit boundaries around who can safely express anger and the social consequences of doing so. I love that that’s how you saw the rage. Years ago, there was this Twitter kerfuffle because of the phrase Muslim rage. Someone had used it on a magazine cover, and all these Muslims were hashtagging it and joking about it— things like, “someone just stole my parking spot at the mosque #MuslimRage” or “I’ve been waiting for my kebabs for an hour #MuslimRage.” I thought, how sad that an emotion as simple as anger, as basic and essential to humanity as anger, cannot be expressed by specific groups without it being a source of fear. If a woman shouts or cries because she’s angry, it’s “oh, she’s out of control.” If a Black man expresses indignation at being slammed to the ground during an arrest, he’s seen as a threat. If a young person, the people I write for, says “hey, that’s wrong,” they’re seen as naïve to the ways of the world. As a result, so many of us hold so much anger inside. That’s such an unjust way of being and such a terrible way of forcing our humanity into a bottle. I can’t change that, so I thought I’d write about it.
Being young is no protection from experiencing trauma in real life. How is writing about raw, difficult subjects for teens different from writing about them for adults? Honesty is really important. Showing the messy reality of these kids’ lives, both in the struggle and in the beauty and the humor—and allowing for a lack of resolution or a resolution that’s ambiguous because, the truth is, trauma does not always leave us. We can heal from it, sometimes we can shed it, but not always. There’s a scene in the book where Salahudin wonders if his trauma is going to be with him forever. As a young person, I found myself asking that—not thinking, I’m gonna survive this! Or, everything’s gonna be OK! But, is it always going to be like this? Sometimes that’s the truth that we have to write. I don’t know if, as adults, we give young people enough credit for being able to live within a question as opposed to having to have a resolution. I think in general we don’t give them enough credit for being able to handle the things they’re given to read and to form their own opinions.
Is it hard to avoid the feeling of writing for an audience, whether that’s insiders with expectations around representation or outsiders who have cultural misconceptions? I think that to some degree this is the benefit of being an older writer: I’m able to say, you, the reader, take the book I have written. Now it is yours. Take it and make of it what you will. That is between you and the book. If you’re angry at me for the way I wrote it? OK, legit, you’re allowed to have an opinion. All My Rage is one story. It is not meant to represent the Muslim community or the Pakistani community or the desert community. No one book can do that. My overlapping communities—Muslim, Pakistani American, trauma survivors, fantasy book lovers, Star Wars fans—all these communities are filled with millions of different experiences. It’s a song with millions of melodies, and this book is just one melody. Just one. It’s just not meant to be more than that. I hope people relate to something within it, but I have absolutely no illusions that it represents the broader Muslim community.
What do you hope readers will take away from this book? In general, when it comes to young people, I never dare to assume they’ll take anything from a book. But what are my hopes? I hope that the people who need to be seen— and they know who they are—feel seen with this book. I just want people to feel less alone. It goes back to that sense of community, what you can do for your community. If it creates any empathy, I would like people to feel like their reality has been witnessed. That’s it.
All My Rage received a starred review in the Jan. 1, 2022, issue. young adult
queen of the tiles
being, questioning the reality of her former existence along with her status as a loyal soldier of Krypton. Her enhanced capabilities don’t escape the attention of her fellow soldiers and her superiors, widening the gap between her previous self and her potential future. Meanwhile, Zahn’s ideals for and views on a better Krypton drive him into more conflict with the preprogrammed shortsighted elitism afflicting his peers in the upper caste. But Krypton’s perilous fate looms despite JorEl’s desperate pleas to the ruling tribune. Hoping to inspire good change before time runs out, Zahn delves deeper into Midnight’s plans to disrupt the tribune’s damaging grip on Krypton, especially when he learns the identity of the rebellious group’s leader. As the truth behind Krypton’s recent turbulence falls into their hands, Zahn and Sera discover the extent of their feelings for one another. A solid improvement over its predecessor, this follow-up to The Shadow Threat (2021) provides a richer peek into Krypton society, aided by intriguing characters and exceptional artwork. The ongoing story’s central conceit—a world fatally blinded by its rulers’ pride—hits the mark in numerous ways, setting up for a finale that’s sure to thrill.
Sensationally absorbing. (Graphic science fiction. 13-17)
QUEEN OF THE TILES
Hanna Alkaf Salaam Reads/Simon & Schuster (304 pp.) $18.99 | April 19, 2022 978-1-5344-9455-8
Returning to the Scrabble tournament where her best friend died a year earlier conjures up lingering trauma for a teen competitor. Sixteen-year-old Najwa Bakri has suffered from panic attacks, memory gaps, intrusive negative thoughts, and an obsession with her late friend Trina Low’s Instagram account. At last year’s Word Warrior Weekend, Trina collapsed and died in a high-stakes game, leaving her opponent, Josh Tan, the tournament winner. Trina, a wealthy, effervescent social media influencer, was dubbed the Queen of the Tiles for her Scrabble skills. Najwa, a short, chubby hijabi from Kuala Lumpur, has a passion for learning the meanings of words rather than just memorizing letter combinations like many contestants. Surrounded by their Scrabble circle—Josh; Mark, Trina’s boyfriend; nonbinary Shuba; Singaporean Ben, who had a crush on Trina; Emily, who was caught cheating during a game; Puteri, Mark’s ex-girlfriend; and Yasmin, Trina’s childhood friend—Najwa remembers her therapist’s advice and struggles to maintain emotional equilibrium. It’s bad enough when Instagram stories appear from Trina’s account containing scrambled letters spelling ominous words like REGICIDE and JANIFORM. But when Najwa starts receiving cryptic, chilling DMs supposedly from Trina, it’s even worse. Mark convinces her to join him in investigating whether Trina was actually murdered. The tense, evenly paced mystery unfolds against the fascinating backdrop of competitive Scrabble with a cast of well-rounded characters who reflect Malaysia’s ethnic diversity. Interesting game trivia and vocabulary add to the originality.
An absorbing mystery that explores friendship, grief, men-
tal health, and wordplay. (Mystery. 12-18)
THE DROWNING SUMMER
Herman, Christine Lynn Little, Brown (384 pp.) $18.99 | April 19, 2022 978-0-7595-5753-6 A young medium and her ex–best friend are haunted by ghosts from their own pasts. Sixteen-year-old Mina Zanetti has finally convinced her mother to fully train her as a medium in the secret family business. But Mina’s first night goes wrong in a way that is deeply tied to her former best friend, Evelyn Mackenzie, and the friendship-ending mistake they made by attempting a summoning together 6 years prior. Pushed by desperation, socio-economically disadvantaged Evelyn’s second summoning unleashes dangerous consequences for both girls. At the heart of their troubles are spirits tied to a scandal that rocked their idyllic Long Island town when they were children: the unsolved murders of three teenagers. Between the mechanics of mediumship and the twists and turns of the mystery of what brought the Cliffside Trio to their bad ends, the bisexual leads’ growing reconnection turns toward mutual romantic feelings. Their relationship reads well because of their respect for one another, shared struggles against isolation, and contrasting personalities (puttogether, controlled Mina designs her own fashion collection, while fiery, environmentally minded Evelyn wants to escape their town to study marine ecology). Side characters broaden the world and mysteries, appearing in ways that never slow the plot (with lovely depictions of female friendships in particular). The descriptions of the magic and hauntings are sensory delights, and the ending leaves plot threads for future books. Main characters are White, and there’s diversity among side characters.
Immersed in multilayered personal relationships and
engrossing mysteries. (Paranormal. 12-18)
MISTER MIRACLE The Great Escape
Johnson, Varian Illus. by Daniel Isles DC (208 pp.) $16.99 paper | Jan. 25, 2022 978-1-77950-125-7
A teenage upstart desperately attempts to escape the hostile planet of Apokolips. Orphaned and with no memories of his parents, Black student Scott Free has no fondness for Apokolips or the Goodness Academy, Granny Goodness’ school where most students end up in military service or, worse, the X-Pit. After surviving the prison maze of beasts and deadly traps, Scott was informally adopted by Himon, a genius Black inventor and the school janitor. Himon’s granddaughter, Bekka, is sick and a cure may be available on Earth if Scott can pull off this escape. Scott’s roommates believe he can help them get out as well, but they are unaware of Himon’s role in the plan. Complicating matters, a new Fury has arrived: Big Barda. The Furies, Granny Goodness’ chosen warriors, are an all-female group of students who keep the peace. As Bekka’s health declines, Scott will need a miracle to escape from Apokolips. Johnson’s sharply observed Mister Miracle origin story flows across each page, enhanced by Isles’ surgically precise linework. Johnson’s characters struggle with decisions and the weight of their consequences. Not one of them gets it right all the time, but through their attempts, readers witness truth, teamwork, and trust. Isles’ future-forward character design and liquid movement reveal in brilliant ways mood, urgency, and the scale of the choices each person makes. This is an exciting read that will leave readers hoping for a continuation of the story.
A slick, funny, and fresh revamp of an old hero. (Graphic science fiction. 14-18)
GETTING OVER MAX COOPER
Karp, Marcelle Putnam (288 pp.) $17.99 | April 19, 2022 978-0-593-32504-9
A story of first love, flawed friendship, and small-town summers. Spending the summer in Fair Harbor on Fire Island has been a long-standing tradition for 16-year-old Jasmine Jacobson and her New York City schoolteacher mom. When Jazz isn’t working on Galentines, her summer photography project, and posting to her Jazzmatazz Instagram and Tumblr accounts, she spends her days scooping ice cream at Crabby’s and riding bikes all over the island with her best friend, Macy Whelan. The freedom of the island provides ample opportunity for frees, or supervision-free parties, and Jazz, Macy, and their close-knit circle of summer friends are often found drinking, smoking weed, and hooking up. Jazz is crushing on Leo “McDimple” Burke, a fellow photographer and a new face in town, and Macy is still obsessing over Max Cooper, last summer’s “non-boyfriend boyfriend.” Macy’s fierce loyalty to those she cares about both impresses and frightens Jazz; Macy’s win-at-all-costs approach, especially when it comes to the unrequited and unwelcome pursuit of a love interest, adds some serious notes to the narrative. All of this plays out against the warm background of a summer at the beach, with sunset gatherings, family hangs, and shared histories. A sense of nostalgia and wistfulness for the innocence of childhood is woven throughout and adds a further dimension to the story. Central characters read as White; there is ethnic diversity in their friend group.
A quintessential beach read. (Romance. 14-18)
READY FOR LAUNCH An Astronaut’s Lessons for Success on Earth
Kelly, Scott Crown (128 pp.) $17.99 | $20.99 PLB | April 12, 2022 978-1-5247-6432-6 978-1-5247-6433-3 PLB
A retired astronaut renowned for having spent a full year on the International Space Station, Kelly offers compelling insights in this work that is part memoir, part how-to guide.
Kelly relates how, when he was 7, his grandmother, a special education teacher, gave up after trying to teach him how to read; she said he was just dumb. This belief informed much of his life going forward, as he took senseless risks and lived fearlessly—and only learned in the military and at NASA how fear can actually be helpful. Because of his childhood struggles, Kelly felt like a failure, but learning when to be comfortable with failure was also important. Readers become acquainted with much of Kelly’s personal life, including how, as a White American, diversity of all kinds has positively impacted his career; he hopes in his lifetime to see a transgender astronaut (his son is transgender). Folded into every anecdote is a life lesson, for example, about the value in admitting one’s errors and the importance of empathy. Kelly does a great job of exploring the arduous aspects of being an astronaut as well as offering a peek behind the curtain at the most thrilling parts of the job. Those with an interest in space exploration will immediately be hooked, but others will also appreciate Kelly’s straightforward approach to topics like conspiracy theories, risk-taking, good leadership, and more. The text is enhanced with photographs.
An inspiring, energizing guide to life illustrated by space
anecdotes. (photo credits) (Nonfiction. 12-18)
SIGN OF THE EIGHT
Lebert, Benjamin Trans. by Oliver Latsch Arctis Books (304 pp.) $17.00 | March 15, 2022 978-1-64690-009-1
The battle of the Eight is about to start, and two old enemies must face off in the final battle between good and evil, life and death. Tristan Nightsworn and Martha von Falkenstein once were warriors, allies, and lovers who fought side by side against a common enemy in the Fifth Crusade, until betrayal tore them apart. Eight hundred years later, they once again come to life, emerging from the depths of Germany’s Black Forest. Now leaders on two different sides of a brewing war, each must co-opt allies to their side—Martha on the side of good, and Tristan on the side of doom. Eight fighters in total must be aligned to fight the final battle to decide the fate of the world. Martha’s chosen warriors are troubled teens, while Tristan is surrounded by a serial killer and a neo-Nazi, among others. But before they can fight, they must find the two fabled swords, Xanas and Aurin, the blades needed to seal the end. Originally published in Germany, this violent, dark stand-alone fantasy features a fast-paced plot with underdeveloped worldbuilding that is vaguely religious. The omniscient narration follows every character, major and minor, with a distance in tone that prevents emotional connection with the protagonists as the story hurriedly builds up to an anticlimactic, unsatisfying ending. Most characters are adults who are assumed White excepting a Black teenage girl from an immigrant family from Mali.
A stand-alone fantasy that fails to engage. (author inter-
view) (Fantasy. 16-adult)
THIS MAY END BADLY
Markum, Samantha Wednesday Books (336 pp.) $18.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-250-79918-0
Senior year at two rival boarding schools finds Doe doing everything she can to protect her school’s legacy, even if it means enlisting a fake boyfriend to help. Dorothy “Doe” Saltpeter and her closest friends are shocked when all-girls Weston School announces a merger with their archrivals, the all-boys Winfield Academy. Their traditional prank war against the boys feels heightened amid the news, in particular increasing the stakes for Doe’s personal feud with Winfield’s wealthy all-star Nathaniel Emeric Wellborn III, aka Three. His cousin Gabriel “Wells” Wellborn shares Doe’s disdain, and together they hatch a plan that involves pretending to be in a relationship and recovering from Three a family heirloom that holds sentimental value for Wells. What starts as a prank spirals into an uncontrollable swirl of emotions, strained friendships, and a struggle for inclusivity inside an elite sisterhood. Markum addresses the characters’ sexuality, including Doe’s bisexual father and her close friend Gemma, who recently came out to her family as lesbian. In addition, there’s a frank conversation about gender identity and the archaic structure of single-gender schools. The main characters are presumed White; the racialized experiences of supporting characters who bring ethnic diversity are developed to some degree. Doe’s evolving relationships with Wells, her friends, her parents, and even herself read realistically, and the mounting tension—both sexual and in the collision of her different worlds—keeps the pages turning.
Lots of fun and romance undergirded by relevant, timely
substance. (Romance. 14-18)
an arrow to the moon
GREAT OR NOTHING
McCullough, Joy, et. al Delacorte (400 pp.) $18.99 | March 8, 2022 978-0-593-37259-3
The March family marches on…in 1942. Taking Beth, Jo, Meg, and Amy as point-of-view characters, the authorial quartet begins this spinoff with Beth dead but contributing free verse observations between chapters and the surviving sisters estranged. In the least developed storyline, Meg stays home, flirting briefly with being unfaithful to absent fellow teacher and beau John. Jo stalks off to work as a riveter in an airplane factory and (confirming the speculations of generations of nuance-sensitive readers) discovers her queerness. True to character, Amy lies about both her age and her admission to art school in Montreal so she can secretly join the Red Cross and is shipped off to London—where she runs into and falls for wounded airman Laurie. Though linked to the original by names, themes (notably the outwardly calm, saintly Marmee’s admission of inner anger, which is reflected here in her daughters), and incidents that are similar in type, there are enough references to period details to establish a weak sense of setting. Giving Meg and Amy chances to reflect on their racial attitudes through the introduction of a Japanese American student and, in a single quick encounter, a Black serviceman feels perfunctory given the otherwise allWhite cast. Jo’s slower ride to self-knowledge, though heavily foreshadowed, comes off as more authentic. If the sisters’ eventual fence-mending is predictable, it’s also refreshingly acerbic.
Not so much one story as three (with a spectral onlooker);
fans of the original may enjoy picking out the tweaks. (Historical fiction. 12-16)
AN ARROW TO THE MOON
Pan, Emily X.R. Little, Brown (400 pp.) $18.99 | April 12, 2022 978-0-316-46405-5
A tale of two star-crossed young lovers that ends with an unexpected twist. When Hunter Yee is expelled from his prep school and transfers to Fairbridge High, he is drawn to Luna Chang, another senior, who was born on the same day as he was 17 years ago. They share more than a birthday; both have overbearing immigrant parents from Taiwan with high expectations of their offspring. In Hunter’s case, it is to be a perfect, trouble-free eldest son, while in Luna’s, it is to get into Stanford. The two fall in love before realizing that their parents have been engaged in a long-standing feud. As Hunter and Luna navigate their illicit relationship, mysteries abound: Why is the earth cracking open so frequently? Why is Luna being followed by fireflies? Why do their parents despise each other so much? And what is it that Hunter’s parents fear so greatly that the entire family must live fearfully, always trying to stay under the radar? Answers come in a reveal that is rooted in Chinese lore. Alternating third-person narration is skillfully deployed throughout the novel, allowing immersion into each protagonist’s painful struggles, such as Hunter’s worries about his family’s financial vulnerability or Luna’s discovery of her mother’s secret. The switch in tone at the book’s end is abrupt, bringing about a surprising and bittersweet (if perhaps too swift) resolution.
A lovely, lyrical exploration of how a poignant Chinese
myth might play out in a contemporary setting. (Fiction. 14-18)
GONE DARK
Panitch, Amanda McElderry (448 pp.) $19.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-5344-6631-9
Teenagers embark on a cross-country trip after all of North America’s electrical grids go down at once. Readers in the mood for a strung-out series of set piece shockers and nods to the Hunger Games are in for a treat as, driven by what looks less like logic than lingering hostage syndrome, Los Angeles teen Zara Ross decides that living through the apocalyptic blackout requires traveling back to the abusive survivalist father in upstate New York who trained her to shoot a crossbow and butcher deer as a child. Seeing leadership qualities in her that may not be evident to readers, several uprooted peers tag along on a state-by-state trek with stops at a Colorado compound (that turns out not to be a safe haven) and a house in Iowa (whose resident makes an extreme request of them). Following these and other team-building adventures, the travelers finally arrive—only to discover that Zara’s dad is even more evil than earlier hints have suggested. Corpses, atrocities, and even basic foraging techniques are more alluded to than described in enough detail to make them seem real. Tellingly, there is a denouement, but minimal speculation about the catastrophe’s causes or culprits render it no more than a MacGuffin. Zara is White; her boyfriend, Gabe Ramirez, and his younger sister, Zara’s best friend Estella, are of Mexican, Honduran, and Italian ancestry.
An unvarnished addition to shelves already bulging with
more credibly worked out disaster scenarios. (Post-apocalyptic. 13-16)
my sister’s big fat indian wedding
MY SISTER’S BIG FAT INDIAN WEDDING
Patel, Sajni Amulet/Abrams (304 pp.) $18.99 | April 19, 2022 978-1-4197-5453-1
In the boisterous days leading up to her sister’s wedding, an aspiring violinist shoots her shot. After being rejected by Juilliard, her dream school, Zurika Damani worries she’ll never be able to convince her traditional Indian parents that she should be pursuing music instead of pre-law. But she has another chance—there’s a music competition in Atlanta that is being judged by college scouts from top music schools around the country. The problem? It’s happening during her sister’s wedding week, a time that should be spent with family, celebrating and preparing. But as they say in her family, “Damani girls don’t stay down.” With the help of her cousins, Zuri sneaks away to the audition and nearly (literally) runs into Naveen Patel, her soon-to-be-brother-in-law’s annoyingly charming cousin from South Africa. Naveen also happens to be a fellow competitor, a talented singer, and her mom and aunties’ potential match for her. If she’s not careful, she may not only fall for him, but mess up her sister’s big day and disappoint her parents. From prayerful puja to high-energy garba dances, Patel lovingly portrays the rich and vibrant festivities of a Gujarati Hindu wedding celebration. Though Zuri’s modern beliefs often clash with those of her elders (especially her great aunt, whose obvious preference for lighter skin hurts darker-skinned Zuri), she learns to exert her independence while still remaining loyal to her family, whose challenging expectations often come from a place of love.
A sweet and entertaining romp. (Fiction. 13-18)
QUAKE CHASERS 15 Women Rocking Earthquake Science
Polydoros, Lori Chicago Review Press (224 pp.) $16.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-64160-646-2 Series: Women of Power
Each of the women feted here for her trailblazing work in earthquake science has her own profile that interweaves personal history, advice on coping with natural disasters, experiences with gender and racial bias, and related scientific information.
From the introduction onward, the text has a chirpy tone and is prone to overusing such words as amazing and cool. It is an ambitious task to try to inspire young women to pursue STEM studies and careers while also warning them of persistent negative attitudes toward women and people of color in these fields that are dominated by White men. However, this book will succeed in that goal if readers choose to read the biographies in random order rather than straight through from the beginning. By listing her subjects in alphabetical order by surname, the text happens to begin with three women from privileged, supportive families who were precocious young people, acquired advanced degrees and pursued significant careers while confronting misogyny, and who are lauded for their remarkable achievements as mothers as well. This might prove discouraging rather than inspiring to many readers; fortunately, later biographies include women whose backgrounds bring more diversity. The numerous sidebars are the best part of the text, supplementing the cursory details of each individual’s career with scientific terminology and explanations plus historical background. Readers will enjoy each scientist’s top three tips for earthquake preparedness.
Informative but not seismic. (afterword, notes, index)
(Nonfiction. 12-16)
I AM THE GHOST IN YOUR HOUSE
Romasco-Moore, Maria Delacorte (432 pp.) $18.99 | April 19, 2022 978-0-593-17721-1
An invisible teen girl longs to be seen and loved. Pietà, who goes by Pie, was born invisible. She and her mom can see each other, although their skin appears transparent, but they aren’t visible to others. Pie grew up traveling all over the U.S. on trains with her mom, staying in other people’s houses, and using whatever they need. Despite her mom’s advice to never fall in love, Pie did just that two years ago while in Pittsburgh, with disastrous results. Now, they are visiting the area again, staying in a house where teenage cousins Denise and Jules live, and Pie is determined to find her old crush, Tess. As much as Pie tries to be content with her lonely existence, she yearns for more, and true friendships begin to seem possible if she’s willing to take some risks. Although the story sometimes overexplains the rules of invisibility and doesn’t dive deeply enough into the reasons behind its origins—Pie’s mom was born solid but became invisible as a coping mechanism for abuse— the way the present-day narrative and flashbacks are skillfully woven together creates page-turning momentum. Pie’s critical self-talk and longing for connection are excruciatingly realistic and relatable as she navigates complicated relationships with her parents, new friendships, and evolving crushes. Pie’s family members and Tess are assumed White; Denise and Jules are cued as Black. All main teen characters are queer.
Gripping and emotionally charged. (Paranormal. 14-18)
POWER ON!
Ryoo, Jean J. & Jane Margolis Illus. by Charis JB MIT Press (144 pp.) $19.95 paper | April 19, 2022 978-0-262-54325-5
Four racially and ethnically diverse friends confront a variety of obstacles in their freshman year of high school, supporting each other along the way. After having spent the summer learning about racist biases in artificial intelligence, celebrating Juneteenth, and participating in a Black Lives Matter protest, socially aware friends Christine, Taylor, Antonio, and Jon are ready to enter ninth grade at three different high schools. But school presents each of them with situations that color their experiences in both affirming and discouraging ways. The friends strengthen their bonds over a shared interest in technology and a desire to create the change they want to see by learning about and advocating for advances in computer science. Where the graphic novel excels at authentic representation of teenagers navigating hard times, difficult people, and frustrating problems, it stumbles and stalls at illuminating a clear path for readers to follow. This fictional narrative that is peppered with factual interjections attempts to address a broad range of issues, including racism, bullying, homophobia, undocumented immigrant status, school counselors with low expectations, dismissive teachers, and family challenges. The result is that none of these topics is developed in sufficient depth, the narrative is difficult to follow at times, and a sense of resolution is lacking. The color illustrations are vivid, with panels that are easy to follow and characters who are clearly differentiated.
What this story showcases in breadth it unfortunately
loses in focus. (authors’ statement, notes) (Graphic fiction. 12-16)
EBONWILDE
Smith, Crystal Clarion/HarperCollins (352 pp.) $18.99 | April 12, 2022 978-1-328-49632-4 Series: Bloodleaf, 3
Prophecies and romance close out a trilogy. Back in the world of Renalt and Achleva, multiple complex storylines weave together old and new themes. Initial nods at “Snow White” and “Sleeping Beauty” soon fracture into “Now,” with chapter headings counting down the days till Midwinter, and “Then,” the events happening one year, 13 years, or over a century ago. The Circle Midnight, a cultlike group, is implicated in the prophesied catastrophe that familiar characters, royalty and commoners alike, are fighting to prevent. This drawn-out tale lumbers through breathless revelations and twisty-turny character reveals, with formerly dead Aurelia and the noble Dominic Castillion as reincarnations of ancient, magical Queen Vieve and her beloved consort, Adamus. Overly ambitious worldbuilding, including different magical systems and religious groups, bog down the forward motion of the plot. There are a few interesting elements: One-handed Kellan learns to control a prosthetic hand made out of magical quicksilver; young King Conrad (8 years old, though written more like an early adolescent) purposefully drugs himself with memoryerasing frostlace to avoid detection by a charismatic, telepathic leader; and a deadly fever—connected to political machinations—spreads through the populace at a horrifying rate. Skin tones range from pale to dark brown, but racial categories seem to not exist.
A ponderous finale. (map) (Fantasy. 14-18)
JAGGED LITTLE PILL
Smith, Eric with Alanis Morissette, et. al Amulet/Abrams (304 pp.) $19.99 | April 26, 2022 978-1-4197-5798-3
A novelization of the award-winning musical inspired by Morissette’s acclaimed 1995 album. In alternating first-person chapters voiced by teenage Frankie and her brother, Nick, as well as several of their classmates, characters grapple with a host of social issues including addiction, transracial adoption (Frankie is a Black girl in a White family), sexual violence, and gender expression, all set against the backdrop of stifling suburban life. Morissette’s song lyrics are broken up and woven into the story, showing up as poetry penned by Frankie and as exposition and dialogue. Unfortunately, the story is otherwise weighed down by clunky delivery of backstory and reliance on heavy-handed internal monologues. Many passages read as contrived and are not reflective of authentic teen voices. There’s also a lot of intense emotion—fitting, given the intensity of the Jagged Little Pill album. But here it feels forced and out of place, for example, when it is expressed between characters who have just met and whom readers barely know as well. In one instance, Frankie suggests that her poems scare her racist White classmates, but the poem in question is composed of the lyrics to Morissette’s “Ironic,” which have nothing to do with race. Here and elsewhere in the novel, more strategically placed backstory might have provided context for the characters’ reactions. Moments of smart humor unfortunately aren’t enough to offset these narrative problems.
This wannabe-edgy drama falters into melodrama. (Fiction. 14-adult)
ARDEN GREY
Stoeve, Ray Amulet/Abrams (288 pp.) $18.99 | April 26, 2022 978-1-4197-4600-0
Adolescents navigate abuse and asexuality. Seattle high school junior Arden is dealing with a lot. Alongside her father and younger brother, she is struggling with her mother’s decision to leave. Her best friend, Jamie, has started dating Caroline, his first romantic relationship since transitioning. And Arden knows that she doesn’t want to be sexual with anyone, but she still has crushes on girls. This muted novel has a slow start and at first may seem to be a blend of familiar realistic young adult tropes with updated gender identities and sexual orientations, but it relentlessly builds tension as Arden carefully unpicks the realities of both her identity and the common experiences of unhealthy, abusive relationships. Most main characters are White, while new friend Marc, who reads as Black, provides another example of asexuality. Arden’s romantic interest is a pansexual Mexican American girl with precocious communication skills. Refreshingly, all the conflict involves realistic interpersonal dynamics, with transphobia and other oppressions taking a back seat. The patient unraveling of Arden’s friendships and relationships, as well as the neatly wrapped up resolution, feels simultaneously expected and deeply satisfying, and while neither of the abusers is given much complexity, the depictions of the dynamics involved can help readers identify toxic relationships in their own lives.
Quiet and powerful. (author’s note, resources) (Fiction. 14-18)
SOMEDAY WE’LL FIND IT
Wilson, Jennifer HarperTeen (400 pp.) $17.99 | April 26, 2022 978-0-06-304465-4
A high school junior reevaluates her future after her absentee mother returns. It’s been almost 6 years since 17-yearold Bliss Walker’s mother left her with relatives in Illinois for a modeling job in Japan. Since then, Bliss has tried to make the most of her life with her Aunt Trish, Uncle Leo, and 18-yearold cousin, Patsy, but she nevertheless feels like an interloper. Hotheaded boyfriend River promises to bring Bliss along when he leaves behind rural, mostly White Lakeville with its endless fields of corn and beans. Then Mama unexpectedly returns with promises of teaming up as a mother-daughter modeling duo in Eastern Europe. To add more confusion, in comes Blake, a biracial (Chinese and assumed White) Chicago transplant whose family runs an organic farm where Bliss and Patsy have summer jobs. There’s something that keeps pulling Bliss toward Blake, perhaps because he’s the only one who asks her, “What makes you happy?” Wilson unravels how much Bliss’ life revolves around prioritizing other people. Bliss downplays her needs and wants in ways that to her feel reasonable; her empathy and loyalty turn into making excuses for others. The book explores complicated, messy relationships that include elements of rivalry, jealousy, love, and care as well as questions of consent and sexual intimacy. After years of undervaluing herself, it takes some deeply intense moments for Bliss to begin to see how dysfunctional and unbalanced her relationships are.
An intimate story of growth and self-respect. (Fiction. 14-18)
indie
These titles earned the Kirkus Star:
FINANCIAL COLD WAR by James A. Fok....................................... 133
THE REZ DETECTIVES by Steven Paul Judd & Tvli Jacob; illus. by G.M.K. Perker......................................................................136
WINNING AT PERSUASION FOR LAWYERS by Shane Read.......142
BOSCO AND THE BEES by Cat Ritchie ..........................................142
MYSTERY AT THE BLUE SEA COTTAGE by James Stewart...........145
THE LITTLE LION THAT LISTENED by Nicholas Tana; illus. by Jessie Fox & Matthew Molleur............................................145
BOSCO AND THE BEES Ritchie, Cat Atmosphere Press (156 pp.) $16.99 paper | $7.99 e-book Jan. 15, 2021 978-1-64921-929-9
MY GAY CHURCH DAYS Memoir of a Closeted Evangelical Pastor Who Eventually Had Enough
Azar, George Roman Matthews Publishing Company (368 pp.) $22.99 paper | $14.99 e-book Feb. 14, 2022 978-0-578-91334-6
Azar recounts his journey as a closeted, gay Evangelical pastor in this debut memoir.
The author notes early on that he felt like an outsider in elementary school, as he was a “plump, Middle Eastern boy who loved the Spice Girls and Power Rangers.” He wasn’t yet conscious of the fact that he was gay, but bullies tormented him with homophobic taunts and slurs nonetheless, and Azar even took jabs at his own gay older brother. The author had grown up attending a liberal Episcopal church with an openly gay pastor, but Azar’s attitude toward his own sexual orientation drew him to conservative Evangelical Christianity as a teen. There, he found a community that accepted him while also condemning homosexuality, and he quickly began to rise through its ranks: “Where I once was the awkward, gay, fat kid in middle school and freshman in high school,” Azar recalls, “I was fast becoming the boisterous, intelligent, Republican Christian.” However, as he committed himself to his church—attending Bible college and eventually becoming an Evangelical pastor—the lie at the center of his life ultimately became too difficult for him to ignore. Over the course of this memoir, Azar’s prose is well crafted and deeply vulnerable. Even after he left the church, he says, he suffered from depression, night terrors, and panic attacks, and his discussions of the mental health effects of his self-denial are among the most moving sections of the book: “I’m about seven years removed from my faith, but the remnants of my past remain,” he writes in the introduction, adding that “to this day, I battle with the thoughts about myself that are flat-out lies: I’m a horrible sinner, and I was never worthy of true love.” At more than 350 pages, the book feels slightly too lengthy, and there are sections that could certainly have been removed, including a few chapters that read like homilies organized around specific topics. Even so, Azar’s struggles with fear and self-loathing make for an affecting work.
An inspirational, if slightly overlong, account of self-acceptance.
honoring black lives
Indieland celebrates Black voices all year long, but Black History Month gives us a chance to spotlight a trio of recent favorite titles about African American lives. One work chronicles the achievements of influential Black women who shaped the course of American history; a collection of photographs shows the toppling of a racist legacy one statue at a time; and a book of portraits beautifully depicts the maternal bond and is a “tribute to the common spirit of all mothers.”
Trailblazers: Black Women Who Helped Make America Great by Gabrielle David is the first of a must-have six-volume series about influential Black women. Our reviewer notes, “Backed by impressive endnotes and references, each chapter is encyclopedic in breadth while offering fresh analytical insights into Black women who are well covered in the existing literature, like Rosa Parks.” This 700page compendium catalogs Black women’s accomplishments in activism, dance, and sports and includes entries on Clara Day, Josephine Baker, Simone Biles, and many more. Dozens of powerful black-andwhite photographs and portraits accompany the text. In Unsay Their Names, author/photographer Derek Kannemeyer provides a visual record of protests in his home city of Richmond, Virginia. One striking, colorful image shows the facade of the Robert E. Lee monument “covered in inspirational art and messages that offer celebrations of Black Lives Matter and criticisms of policing.” Our reviewer calls Kannemeyer’s starred book “a stirring record of anti-racism in a Southern city.
Through My Mother’s Eyes by Melba T. Binion Sanders Johnson and photographer Moses Mitchell blends photographs and commentary from dozens of sons and daughters to honor mothers, especially Black mothers. “These short entries appear with visually arresting, tender portraits of… matriarchs and their children; closeups become landscapes of cheekbones and eyelashes and coruscating skin and irises.” Our reviewer says, “Johnson and Mitchell have created an ideal and affecting coffee-table book.” WHO KILLED JERUSALEM? A Rollicking Literary Murder Mystery Based on William Blake’s Characters & Ideas Updated to 1970s San Francisco
Brown, George Albert Galbraith Literary Publishers
The killing of a prominent California poet spurs an eccentric insurance investigator into action in Brown’s off-
beat mystery.
The action of the novel begins in 1977 with the sudden death of Ickey Jerusalem, a wealthy, well-known San Francisco–based artist and writer who’s found suffocated in a bathroom cubicle in the first-class cabin of a 747. On the same flight is lonely, divorced Dedalus “Ded” Smith, the adult son of a workaholic accountant and a pious mother, who’s tired of his stagnant career as an insurance claims adjuster in Buffalo, New York. While deplaning, Ded is met by an acquaintance of his: San Francisco Police Detective O’Nadir, who lets him tag along to inspect Ickey’s body. This draws Ded into the homicide case, which is initially ruled a suicide, but as Ded interrogates other passengers—mostly from Ickey’s business entourage—several clues are revealed and several suspects materialize. Among the latter are Ickey’s lawyer, Bacon Urizen; the flight purser; Beulah Vala, Ickey’s sightless, “spooky” personal assistant; plastic surgeon Bromion Ulro; and Ickey’s chauffeur. Most of these people were traveling together for a weeklong event commemorating the publication of Ickey’s poetry anthology. However, as Ded diligently probes the members of the group for hints of delinquency, the novel takes a surreal turn as some interviewees bizarrely metamorphose into insects, goats, and pink cows; in addition, references to Plato’s cave allegory, the philosophies of Socrates, and assorted parables swirl throughout the proceedings.
The story itself eventually morphs into a study of not only Jerusalem’s evocative poetry, but also such topics as existentialism and the cyclical nature of human connection. It’s also kooky and funny; one scene, in which Ded voyeuristically spies on some hotel guests in an adjoining room, is deliciously animated. Complicating the case is Ded’s attraction to Beulah, who’s named the beneficiary of her boss’s $20 million life insurance policy. The trouble multiplies as Brown’s suspenseful and wildly strange mystery unfolds, although the lengthy narrative loses some steam before the culprit is finally revealed. Still, the author’s fusion of colorful murder mystery and philosophical rumination dips into and out of reality with dreamlike ease. As the six-part tale evolves, the investigation into Ickey’s death goes on a number of tangents at a very leisurely pace, delving into such things as the “verbal decoration” of poetry, the “exaggerated importance” of poets, religion, and Ded’s disastrous marriage, as he sifts through the misfit murder suspects. The protagonist’s sleuthing keeps the pages turning, and his intense personality contributes to the narrative’s frenetic, free-falling tone. Overall, it makes for an entertaining and fascinating
reading experience, as Ded is alluring, smart, funny, and has a mind full of colorful notions. Brown, a self-admitted “lifelong devotee of William Blake,” considers his novel a contemporary “riff” on that seminal poet’s oeuvre. Readers who enjoy ruminative mysteries that are as ornately embellished as museum tapestries will enjoy this creative amalgam of art, San Francisco history, and deep suspicion.
A zany, inventive, and multilayered fever dream of murder and mayhem
FROM THE NIGHTLY SHORE
Buechele, Charles Independently Published (345 pp.) $9.99 paper | May 14, 2021 979-8-7120-6737-4
A teen loner discovers a world of magic filled with friends and enemies in this YA fantasy debut. Sixteen-year-old Corbin White is on a train bound for Pennsylvania. His distant but domineering father, a military officer, has pulled him from military school to live with Uncle Jerry in Burke, Pennsylvania. Corbin takes the attic bedroom and resumes having nightmares featuring dark humanoid silhouettes and an “evil presence” dragging him underwater. Later, at a student assembly in school, he sees one of the silhouettes and knows “things are only going to get worse.” Corbin begins taking refuge in the school library. In a copy of Treasure Island, he finds a note from someone named Jacob asking to meet at the tennis courts. Jacob tells Corbin that he saw him choose the book in a dream and that they are members of a special group called “cigans.” They can see and manipulate elemental “mana” in a hidden energy field. Corbin soon joins Jacob’s group and prepares for battle against the shadowy “stalkers” and another group called the “sciran,” who feed on mana. He’s eager to belong, but is the situation as black and white as it seems? Buechele gives his YA debut mystery by framing the book as Corbin’s journal, and several pages have been “ripped out” in key passages. While the narrative establishes magical rules, including that stalkers can’t follow the heroes on roads, such worldbuilding often takes a dramatic back seat to the teenage dynamics of fitting in (or suddenly not) and shaping identity. Joining the wrestling team and caring for the dog Cosmo give Corbin agency. The slow-burning romance with Jamie, Jacob’s sister, takes a unique turn when he reveals, “I know I don’t like guys. But I’ve never been interested in girls either.” An additional mystery gooses the plot’s second half. Corbin’s potential for both good and evil primes fans for a rewarding sequel.
Sharply drawn teen emotions outshine well-trod fantasy elements in this YA debut.
THE VANGUARDS OF HOLOGRAPHY
Christain, Annie Headmistress Press (104 pp.) $15.00 paper | Oct. 1, 2021 978-1-73582-364-5
Christain makes meaning from the fragments of dystopia in her second poetry collection. “Never model a love on the extinction of a species,” cautions one speaker at the end of a poem late in this collection, which finds its vernacular in a world collapsing in a cloud of technology, religion, pop culture, and astrophysics. The poems discover metaphors for love in the imagery of SF, as in the inaugural piece, “Heaven Is a Soundstage Meant To Make Drugged Soldiers More Fearless”: “That’s mine, I scream as a red lever appears under my armpit, and she knows to pull it. / I’d like to think that means my cloned body on another planet actually hooked up with her.” Alienation and queer longing seek articulation in wide-ranging references to cartoons, conspiracy theories, hip-hop, biblical eschatology, cinema, and the occult. The isolation of outer space (and art about this emptiness) reappears again and again, as when Christain invokes the frozen body of an Earth-destroying comet: “Someone could share my same center of mass now without pretensions, but I’m misting out chemicals to hide myself so I won’t have to kill anyone.” Elsewhere, the poet contemplates the iconoclasm of new technology with gleeful disdain: “Though I destroyed the Buddhist ruins, / the 3D light projection replacement / was going to create many jobs, but no one else saw it that way.” Like the points of light that revivify a dead performer in this verse, Christain’s poems find organic life in the clips and blips of the digital present.
Throughout this book, the poet’s works have an unpredictable energy, marrying hyperspecific language with surprising leaps in image and tone. There are misheard lyrics, erasures made from news stories, extensive footnotes, and well-deployed (and often obscure) epigraphs. She’s frequently funny, but the phantasmagoria works better when the underlying emotions are sincere, as here, where the vacuum of space is the void between human bodies: “She said our sun entered into it, its plasma crossing with Saturn’s plasma….The electric discharge became a ladder to Earth, and this, she had to press into me, has everything to do with us now, and how no baby is ever a mistake.” At another point, the now-ancient technology of an instant messenger bridges the same void: “When I was in the tenth grade, / an older woman in a chat room asked, / What do you want to do? / and I wrote Just hold you.” Other standouts in this collection include “Retrieval Structure” (“If you were trying not to stumble into anything too sharp…how did you?”), “Coral Castle: The Tent of Meaning,” “Music Used Against the Enemy,” and “I Need You To Make Me My Own Dinosaur, But It Must Have Feathers,” which yields the quote about extinction noted above. (Needless to say, Christain clearly enjoys wordy titles.) Although these works do not give up their meanings easily, they are messy and intricate in a way that draws the reader deep inside.
An elegantly chaotic collection of Space Age verses.
THE GROTTO
Cooper, Fredrick Wild Rose Press (338 pp.) $17.99 paper | $5.99 e-book | Jan. 5, 2022 978-1-5092-3771-5
In this novel, a teenage girl’s search for her mother leads to a criminal underworld and an unexpected danger. Brooklyn is a 16-year-old girl growing up in the small community of Chatham, Alaska. Raised by her single mother, Flo Whiting, a waitress, the teen learned that her father disappeared before her birth. All she knows about her dad is that his first name is Vince and he is a full-blood Tlingit. One afternoon, Brooklyn returns home to find her mother missing and Flo’s bedroom in disarray. Flo leaves a note for Brooklyn assuring her she is safe, but the teen believes this is out of character for her mother. Brooklyn embarks on an investigation into Flo’s disappearance with the help of a local resident named Bingo Bob and discovers that her mother is helping Vince elude Johnny Kwan, his contact in a scheme to illegally sell otter pelts. While preparing a shipment for Kwan in a place called the Grotto, Vince and his partners were infected with rabies carried by bats and otters in the area. Brooklyn’s search soon becomes a race as Kwan closes in on Vince and Flo and as additional cases of rabies appear in the community. This latest novel from Cooper is a fast-paced mystery that skillfully combines a nuanced coming-of-age story with a tense crime thriller. The narrative is anchored by Brooklyn, a teen who feels like an outsider in her community because she is half White and half Tlingit. She gains a new appreciation for the close-knit community of Chatham and forms an unexpected alliance with Tony Jackson, a classmate who initially taunts her at the local community center. The subplot involving Vince is similarly well developed as he navigates staying one step ahead of Kwan while battling rabies. The author’s prose is confident and assured as the story’s tension builds, particularly in a harrowing scene in which tourists Jim and Donna encounter rabid otters. Cooper’s tale may appeal to fans of Sue Henry and Dana Stabenow.
A satisfying mystery with a strong protagonist.
THE JOURNEYMAN LIFE The Not-So-Perfect Path to a Life Well Lived
Daloisio, Tony C. River Grove Books (234 pp.) $8.99 e-book | Jan. 18, 2022 978-1-63299-474-5
A psychologist focuses his attention squarely on men in society in this guide. Journeyman, a quaint, somewhat archaic word, takes on new meaning in Daloisio’s expansive exploration of the literal journey of a man in the modern world. The author takes a deep dive into his own life; he exposes his feelings and frailties with a genuine candor that is likely intended to get other men to unapologetically admit their vulnerabilities. Daloisio weaves his personal story into chapters that are heavy on psychology but instructive rather than clinical. Beginning with a chapter entitled “The Story of You,” the book opens with a discussion of persona, “the hidden self” and “the unknown self,” transitioning to the “four archetypes of the masculine psyche.” While such jargon may be intimidating to some, the author is careful to define all of these terms in layperson’s language, using solid examples for clarification. In a man’s journey, writes Daloisio, he must cope with his “inner versus outer selves,” both of which are covered in significant detail. Additional concepts that appear with appropriate explanations include “voices of the reactive mindset” and “moments of truth.” Perhaps most important, though, are the author’s prescriptions for personal improvement. For example, he writes insightfully about selfawareness, self-regulation, mindfulness, self-respect, “your inner guidance system,” and the growth mindset. When discussing transformation, Daloisio lays out a helpful 12-step process designed to steer readers through positive change. He also puts forth a unique way of individualizing his counsel, employing a three-part approach to change—a story, a formula, and a framework—“to accommodate varying learning and thinking styles.” The author veers into Buddhist teachings at the end of the book, but not without a purpose, aiming to illustrate a man’s contemporary odyssey via 10 stages defined by a 12th-century Zen master. In closing, Daloisio again references his personal challenges, noting that his transformative experiences formed “the impetus to dig deeper, to learn, to practice, to teach others.” The author’s heartfelt revelations lend a very human aspect to the manual, helping to reassure those men who might find the paths of their own journeys difficult.
Perceptive and wise self-improvement advice.
THE WINDING Time Corrector Series Book 1
Datta, Avi Bublish (322 pp.) $14.99 paper | $4.99 e-book | Dec. 1, 2021 978-1-64704-391-9
In this debut SF novel, an academic/ inventor struggles through decades of losing, regaining, and losing the loves of his life due to a mysterious phenomenon. Datta’s tale envisions an Earth suffering rare but disruptive “time turbulence” events. As a brilliant youngster in 1990s America, Vincent Abajian is orphaned, bullied, and becomes an outcast at school. He finds solace with Akane Egami, a Japanese Dutch classmate and music prodigy. But this incipient love of his life disappears into a sudden time turbulence in 1991. By 2024, still obsessed with Akane and whatifs, Abajian is in the forefront of artificial intelligence and robotics advancements, leading a university research team. He finds patronage in superrich Philip Nardin, who holds the patent for intreton, “an element absent from the periodic table,” which
financial cold war
seems somehow tied to time itself. After the two men bond over a shared fascination with high-end watches, Nardin takes Abajian into his confidence, hiring the scientist to write his biography. Nardin has survived multiple time turbulences, emerging with insights into future and parallel timelines—which is vital, first because corrupt congressmen and military-industrial lobbyists seek to exploit and weaponize intreton. And second, because Abajian meets Emika Amari, a young, postdoctoral scientist and violinist attracted to him. Emika seems a paralleluniverse incarnation of Akane, and, thus, Abajian’s true love and happiness reborn. But Emika can also be petulant, jealous, and flighty. Who is she really, and what is Abajian’s destiny in love and intrigue? Readers may find the leapfrogging, back-andforth narrative chronology a bit turbulent itself. Datta’s formidable mainsprings of deep thought, causality, horology, music, and shameless romanticism help set up this first installment of an SF series. It is not a time-travel novel that trades in pulp thrills and fighting Morlocks (despite political shenanigans). The book is closer to Audrey Niffenegger’s The Time Traveler’s Wife (2003) in dealing with matters of the heart. But just when readers might have the plot strands all decoded, a concluding twist and a surreal-vision finale turn the storyline into a dense, snarled mesh of gears and escapements. The knotty narrative is captivating in stretches, but the engineering of Doctor Who’s Time and Relative Dimensions in Space is more easily grasped.
An engaging SF tale whose cause-effect plotline takes a licking and keeps on ticking.
FINANCIAL COLD WAR A View of Sino-US Relations From the Financial Markets
Fok, James A. Wiley (512 pp.) $24.60 | Dec. 20, 2021 978-1-119-86276-5
China and the United States may be on a collision course provoked by the forces of international finance, accord-
ing to this study.
Fok, an investment banker and former executive at Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing, surveys the intricate interplay of domestic and international economics, government policy, and intense rivalry that shapes the relationship between a United States that sits atop the global finance system and a China with burgeoning fiscal clout. He examines the “geo-economic warfare” between the two powers. This conflict involves the trade war started by then-President Donald Trump, featuring tariffs, sanctions, and bans on Chinese tech companies; the tensions over China’s huge trade surplus with the U.S.; China’s Belt and Road Initiative, which uses foreign investments and aid to draw other countries into its economic orbit; and military confrontations in the South China Sea. But he probes the deeper structural forces beneath the surface clashes. One is the role of the U.S. dollar as the world’s reserve currency, which lets America borrow endlessly from other countries at low interest rates but requires it to run huge balance-of-payments deficits to supply liquidity to the global economy. Meanwhile, the dollar’s structural overvaluation makes U.S. exports and manufacturing uncompetitive. Another factor is China’s investment-led growth model, which causes it to build too much industrial capacity while keeping wages and consumer spending artificially low, exacerbating trade imbalances. And both China and America, the author contends, have followed economic and tax policies that favor wealthy corporate elites. The author’s recommendations include international cooperation in ending the dollar’s position as the global currency and progressive taxes and campaign finance reform in America. China, for its part, could ease off industrial investment, boost wages and consumption, and make governance more transparent.
Fok offers an insightful analysis of the world economy that extracts underlying patterns from the confusion of everyday commerce. He sets it against an intriguing, if meandering, recap of episodes from economic history, covering everything from the Great Recession of 2008 and the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference that launched America to world economic supremacy to the financial governance of medieval Venice and the Ming dynasty’s pullback from maritime exploration in the 15th century. The author makes this potentially dry material colorful and entertaining, with prose that is sophisticated and well informed but also lucid and accessible. His deep knowledge of the Chinese economy and financial system lets him discuss them in detail—“When investors sell their Mainland A-shares, the obligation to deliver back their cash falls on the Hong Kong Securities Clearing Company (HKSCC), a subsidiary of HKEX, which is subject to Hong Kong’s laws and regulations.” But he can also step back for elegant, bigpicture perspectives. (“Far from being the last man standing at the end of history, America has arrived at the end of its unipolar moment a hobbled giant. Its finances overstretched, its military exhausted, its infrastructure crumbling, its society divided, and unpopular overseas, it would not be inapt to paraphrase the term used to describe the Ottoman Empire before WW1 and call the US the ‘Sick Man of North America.’ ”) Both finance professionals and lay readers interested in money, history, and geopolitics will find this a captivating, sweeping, and timely read.
A stimulating look at the tectonic forces impelling China and America toward a financial earthquake.
BEDTIME STORIES To Read to Yourself If You Like Dreaming About Stupid Things
Gerlitz, Joe Harper & Case (190 pp.) $30.99 | Jan. 7, 2022 978-0-578-25706-8
A comedic exploration of everyday oddities and surreal circumstances. In his debut short story collection, Gerlitz expertly walks a line between absurdity and reality, as in a tale of a man who enters a beard growing contest but keeps shaving: “After I got done shaving this morning, I became depressed about how little my beard has grown in.” In another story, a man sends a note to his upcoming first date that he will be wearing a dog cone around his head due to unforeseen events. An old man reflects on his long and eventful life in which he was an airplane, a shark, and a baseball helmet in “Reflections,” and a pillow talks to the man who sleeps on it every night in “Pillow Talk.” It could be argued that comedy and horror have always been mirror images of each other, and Gerlitz often successfully uses the inherent ridiculousness of his situations to bring out their wit. However, in a few cases, the grotesque situations might have worked better as straightforward horror, as when a woman cuts off her leg to lose 20 pounds or a veterinarian cuts off a cat’s leg to distract it from a cold. Another story, about a man’s thoughts before his plane crashes, counts down the number of feet before his impending demise, which ends up feeling more stressful than anything else. The most effective stories reveal intriguing aspects of mundane situations by employing hyperbole. For example, trying to remember a password can be frustrating, but it becomes hilarious in a story in which a character supplies longer and longer stories with each password attempt.
Funny and memorable tales despite occasional struggles with tone.
YOU KNOW WHAT THEY SAY A Memoir Presaging #metoo
Graham, Elizabeth Miles EMG Publishing (174 pp.) $9.99 paper | $4.99 e-book | Feb. 3, 2021 978-1-73602-880-3
In Graham’s debut memoir, she reveals an abusive culture at a Wall Street firm.
In the early 2000s, Graham was living in New York and working her dream job—a trader at one of the city’s major financial institutions. Her first six months on the trading floor involved long hours and high stress, but Graham found the work thrilling. There was no place she wanted to be more. When she got wind of a “reorganization” coming, she wasn’t worried. She had just aced her performance evaluation and received a large bonus, so she knew her work was valued. However, it wasn’t long before Graham realized that the new managers had brought with them a very different office culture than the one she had known. She was soon forced to perform menial tasks, which were more befitting those of a personal assistant than a trader, for Todd, one of her bosses. All the while, Todd started to steal her clients out from under her. Evenings out with clients became nights of partying and excessive drinking, and the frat-boy atmosphere of the office extended to the way Graham’s colleagues began to speak to her. “I was repeatedly subjected to verbal and physical sexual abuse in and out of the office setting. It wasn’t inconceivable to hear Todd tell me gross things like, ‘Isn’t that shirt a little too loose?’ Or ‘Don’t you have too many buttons buttoned?’ ” Unfortunately, things only got worse from there. Todd escalated his behavior beyond what Graham could bear, and she sought legal action against him. Things didn’t go quite as Graham foresaw, however, and the decision to stand up for herself ended up costing her quite a bit more than her job at the firm.
Despite the book’s serious topic, Graham writes with a heaping dose of gallows humor. (She refers to her former employer pseudonymously as “Bigg, Swingin, Johnson and Co.”) The prose isn’t always very detailed, but Graham manages to create urgency with her declarative, engaging voice, as here on the morning after Todd’s assault: “When I reached the trading floor, I noticed that there were more people in at this time than usual and one of them was Todd. Then it hit me. People knew. That’s why Andrea was so nice to me and that’s why Todd was here so early. I panicked. My heart started pounding and I couldn’t catch my breath.” The most fascinating—and tragic—sections of the book are those that deal with what happened after the transgression as the firm bungles the response and Graham’s personal life begins to unravel into addiction and mental health issues. She illustrates with grim specificity the emotional and mental tolls exacted when victimized and gaslit by an employer. The book’s subtitle, “A Memoir Presaging #metoo,” is a fitting description. Readers will recognize the same behaviors documented in the media during the last few years, and Graham demonstrates how the women who came forward in previous decades also risked their own careers and well-being.
A chilling memoir of a woman who spoke out against a predatory office culture.
WHISPERS OF THE SOUL New and Selected Poems
Greer, Patricia Chiron Publications (144 pp.) $29.00 | $14.95 paper | $9.99 e-book Dec. 1, 2021 978-1-63051-993-3 978-1-63051-992-6 paper
A volume of poetry explores a plethora of topics related to the evanescence of life, with a focus on finding happiness, fulfillment, and connectivity.
Much of the power of this wisdom-filled collection comes from the selections that deal with Greer’s battle with breast
squid face girl & a wretched little book of poems
cancer—and the network of women who supported her and helped her heal throughout. But that experience is part of a bigger thematic perspective that examines the author’s struggle to find and occupy her own space, both internally and externally. In “For Elizabeth,” Greer asks the question “Is it only women / who have to go to the far edges of the day / to find a little space? / Should it be this hard?” This question is raised again when, in “Why,” she wonders why a woman needs to wait for an invitation “to claim her space. / To claim her life.” In a sequence from “Reasonable Limits,” the author’s final revelation is glorious: “So what I long for is space, room to dance naked / with no unwanted gaze, time to sit alone / and breathe the silence. / This I have learned from cancer: / I am no longer willing / to be contained / by reasonable limits. / I want the whole house and more.” The idea of finding one’s space—and ultimately one’s self—is continued in “The New Year,” in which Greer luxuriates “in inner spaciousness” and, in the silence, hears “the whispers of the soul.” While some pieces don’t quite fit thematically, others are absolute powerhouses. For example, the last poem, “The Journey,” which offers some rules for a meaningful odyssey, is worth the price of the collection alone.
Deeply contemplative and inspiring poems that will surely resonate with readers ready to “risk life.”
SHADEBRINGER The Land of Irgendwo
Hooper, Grayson W. River Grove Books (300 pp.) $15.95 paper | Jan. 4, 2022 978-1-63299-468-4
An American soldier gets transported from the Vietnam War to a magical realm in this debut fantasy. It’s 1969, and Clyde Robbins is headed for Vietnam. He ships out as a staff sergeant after officer training, ending up at the Long Binh Army base. The horrors of war quickly become real for him when he shoots a 16-year-old Vietnamese girl who sneaks a grenade onto the base. Later, Clyde is haunted by the death of Claude Thibodeaux, a young soldier killed by a napalm strike. Clyde’s own life ends in a firefight with Vietnamese combatants. But he wakes in a place that “tasted like Vietnam with all its shadows” but is somehow different. A woman’s voice in his head says, “Arise. You are not safe here.” Clyde leaves a burial field and proceeds to the nearby woods. He meets a German Luftwaffe pilot named Jens Grüber, who welcomes him to Irgendwo, a place that collects dead warriors throughout history. In the Citadel District of Mora, Clyde is jailed by the Council under the suspicion of being a shadebringer, one capable of breaking the rule of Lord Ek Maraine. Will Clyde help defeat the dark forces of the goddess Mother Daedrina or shrug off yet another war that’s been foisted on him? Hooper, an Iraq War veteran, creates a viscerally absorbing introduction to a fantasy series. While crawling in the Vietnamese jungle, Clyde describes it as wearing “a thick wool blanket dunked in a pond of leeches and duck shit.” The cynicism of the era is also captured when Clyde tells Claude early on: “You’re gonna die here, boy.” The Vietnam narrative is so nightmarish that the subsequent fantasy can’t help but feel like a rollicking adventure by comparison. Irgendwo is filled with soulless Hollow children, necromancers like the alluring Miriam, and a hauntingly familiar man named Do. Despite being sick of fighting other people’s wars, Clyde finds the inspiration to help the people of Junedale, whose slippery morals echo those of the military that trained him. This opening volume ends on a warm note, highlighting an indefatigable optimism.
Scalding prose takes readers from gritty warfare to an engaging fantasy romp.
SQUID FACE GIRL & A WRETCHED LITTLE BOOK OF POEMS
Isom, Allen Self (322 pp.) $2.99 e-book | Dec. 28, 2021
In Isom’s YA horror debut, a unique teen finds a dark book of poetry with a secret. In Hays, Kansas, high school student Kali has no friends and wears a mask almost everywhere. She has to hide the tentacles sprouting from her upper lip, which have earned her the nickname Squid Face Girl. A bully named Brett invites her to a party to make amends, he claims, to everyone he’s tormented. At the party, however, the other teens push Kali into a closet with Stephen Coombs, hoping they’ll make out. When Stephen vomits on Kali, she runs from the party mortified. A few days later, after more bullying in school, she cries in an alley on the way home. She then notices a curio shop, run by an old blind man. He gives her a book called A Wretched Little Book of Poems. It’s full of short horror stories written in verse. At the end, Kali sees several blank pages. She adds her own story about persevering and falls asleep in tears. When she wakes up, she’s apparently entered the book, a violent realm filled with mist and monsters. Kali eventually meets Gary, a seemingly normal young man also looking to escape. Isom’s debut mixes fun and horror while showing teens how to turn their quirks to their advantage. Kali’s adventure unfolds via chapters that play like creature features. She and Gary, after escaping his nightmare of a murdered family, jump from poem to poem and battle zombies, a tentacled “Karen” monster, and a house full of cultists. They also make allies along the way, like the fortuneteller Madam Shirin, who warns them of “the man in the mask.” Some of the best advice Kali receives comes at the start of her adventure, from the blind merchant, who asks, “What kind of world would we be living in if people only did what was required of them and never any little bit more?” A clever, hopeful final scene leaves room for further scares.
A uniquely imaginative YA debut laced with irony and optimism.
THE REZ DETECTIVES
Judd, Steven Paul & Tvli Jacob Illus. by G.M.K. Perker Literati Press Comics and Novels (60 pp.) $12.99 | Dec. 7, 2021 978-1-943988-33-4
Choctaw youngsters and amateur sleuths tackle their first case—missing ice cream—in this irresistible middle-grade graphic novel.
When summer brings the blistering heat, people in a small community on an unnamed reservation scrounge for loose change for frozen treats. This year, however, the ice cream truck is a no-show. Fifth grader Tasembo would prefer staying indoors with video games. But when his crush, Okchanlush, wants to know what happened to the ice cream man, Tasembo sees a chance to prove himself as a card-carrying detective. He doesn’t have much beyond a hand-scrawled card, but he quickly recruits his brainy neighbor, Nuseka, into the Rez Dog Detective Agency. Finding the ice cream man is easy but only deepens the mystery; someone swiped his inventory, leaving Tasembo, Nuseka, and Tasembo’s trusty dog, Billy Jack, to trail a thief. As an investigator, the lovably goofy Tasembo is clueless, but Nuseka has the know-how and the lab (aka her bedroom) to point right to a culprit. Judd and Jacob’s story is endlessly fun and funny. Nuseka gathers legit evidence (e.g., fingerprints) and schools Tasembo on all the gumshoe lingo. While Tasembo seemingly annoys Nuseka, they’re unquestionably good friends. There’s likewise educational value for younger readers, from translated Choctaw words (e.g. keyu, meaning no) to the mild, solvable mystery. The book teems with comedy told through visuals, and illustrator Perker, who’s drawn for Marvel, DC, and the New Yorker, layers details onto every character and colorful backdrop. The ice cream man, for one, looks like an ice cream cone, complete with a perfectly round head like the scoop on top. The writers and the illustrator round out this novel with hilarious faux ads. Includes instructions for making a tin-cup phone and a mini air conditioner.
Unforgettable kid detectives plus dazzling artwork make this book a must-have.
A HEART’S LANDSCAPE An Invitation to the Garden of Moments
Lax, Susan Your Moment Press (226 pp.) $32.95 | Jan. 12, 2022 978-0-578-96294-8
A collection of uplifting pensées featuring reassuring words and captivating images.
Lax, a meditation teacher and spiritual coach, offers a selection from her “Morning Inspiration” email newsletter of daily reflections accompanied by her own photographs. The brief musings, arranged in no particular order, are inspired by everyday encounters and recollections of her life and family. They run the gamut of inspirational themes, including the importance of living in the moment, the pleasures of spontaneity (especially impromptu dancing), the acceptance of one’s faults, and the necessity of offering love and compassion inclusively. She also addresses the beauty of nature in her native Israel and in the United States, where she lives now. Lax’s prose poems offer a variety of moods, the most common being blithe celebration—“today, enjoy a skip around the room; be enthusiastic about yourself.” There are also warmhearted aphorisms: “Gift yourself a moment to smile for no reason; The reasons may grow and grow.” There are playful accounts of humorous moments, as when the author arrived breathlessly from a bathroom pit stop to deliver a lecture only to learn that “my dress had gotten caught up in my leggings and my rear was practically exposed to all.” There’s an occasional tone of sonorous abstraction (“Call upon your inner luminosity to guide you”), but the author also, more effectively, captures human contact with evocative specificity. At her best, Lax deftly conveys subtle but moving emotional crosscurrents, as in a spare portrait of her mother: “She was a survivor, not a fan of tears. Tears were a sign of weakness, showing the absence of courage and bravery. For her, life was about survival. Tears stood in the way of survival.” The accompanying photos are beguiling, with sun-dappled seascapes, forest and mountain scenes, and lots of flowers, all rendered in lush color. Overall, many readers will find this collection to be an energizing daily constitutional for the soul.
Rich words of wisdom on life and happiness.
MAKE YOUR MESS YOUR MESSAGE More Life Lessons From and for My Girlfriends
Leid, Shari Capucia Publishing (350 pp.) $9.99 paper | $7.99 e-book | Aug. 23, 2021 978-1-954920-11-8
In this guide, various women reflect on the key lessons they’ve learned in their lives. Leid interviewed dozens of women in the course of assembling this string of quick, inspirational life stories. As the various women the author profiles in these pages tell their tales, the book’s central question—“What is the mess that became your message?”—emerges as the motif tying the stories together. Whether it’s Angie coping with the sudden loss of her husband, Rob (“He was in the hospital for only a day. Three surgeries were performed, but he never regained consciousness”), or successful entrepreneur and community organizer Linda, who was temporarily sidelined with an aneurysm (“The message was clear: she needed to take better care of herself and put herself first”), a picture of resilience emerges. Each profile ends with a swift summary, a central message, and an “action step” for readers to implement in their own lives (“Take a walk outside or simply sit outside and listen to your
the sweetheart deal
heart”). In this sequel, the combination of these disparate stories makes for an upbeat, wide-ranging narrative intended for female readers. At the beginning of the engrossing book, the author warmly reflects on the problems of gathering the photographs that accompany each profile. The pictures had to be taken during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, when professional photo studios were off-limits and Zoom technology was sometimes the best option available. This course of action— of gamely embracing challenges and rising above them—is the theme Leid skillfully weaves through all of these intriguing profiles. Readers coming from their own difficulties will find a good deal of inspiration in these tales.
An engaging and uplifting collection of personal stories about and for women.
THE SWEETHEART DEAL
Liasson, Miranda Entangled: Amara (330 pp.) $8.99 paper | $5.99 e-book | Jan. 25, 2022 978-1-64937-027-3
Two sworn enemies enter a modernday marriage of convenience. Tessa Montgomery is single, 32 years old, and stuck in her hometown. Despite good grades in high school, she never left Blossom Glen, Indiana, to become a pastry chef and still works in her family’s boulangerie, where her ex-fiance, Sam, visits almost daily to seek guidance about his shiny new relationship. Enter Leo Castorini, now back from a high-powered finance job in New York City to help his father with their failing family restaurant—and who beat out Tessa for a coveted college scholarship when they were teenagers. Tessa never disclosed her secret crush on the handsome, cocky Leo, which was always convenient, as the Montgomery and Castorini families have a long-standing rivalry dating back a hundred years. Leo comes to Tessa with a plan: To save both family businesses, they should tie the knot themselves. Tessa immediately declines until she considers what it could mean for the Montgomery bakery, which is struggling just as much as the Castorini restaurant. Soon, Tessa and Leo are officially married and living together in a charming new house…and learning there’s a lot to love about one another. Meanwhile, Tessa’s YouTube channel takes off, and she gets a promising new opportunity. But Leo wants to stay right where he is, in Blossom Glen. Can the enemies-turned-spouses make it work for real despite their still-squabbling clans? And what secrets are they hiding from each another? Liasson nails small-town romance: Blossom Glen itself comes alive with every endearing description, and Montgomery baked goods and Castorini dishes are presented in mouthwatering detail. The plot is a lovely contemporary take on a tale as old as time, with two equally strong leads and a colorful cast of parents, siblings, aunts, and uncles. Finally, the couple’s chemistry is hot (though the book’s heat level doesn’t go beyond kissing), and their conflicts are realistic and must be resolved through mature communication.
A fun, updated take on Romeo and Juliet with a happy ending.
YOUR JOURNEY BEYOND BREAST CANCER Tools for the Road
Lubin, Louise B. iUniverse (224 pp.) $22.55 | $13.99 paper | $3.99 e-book July 19, 2021 978-1-66320-149-2 978-1-66320-147-8 paper
A debut self-help guide that aims to help women cope with the complex emotions that come with a breast cancer diagnosis.
Lubin draws from lessons learned in her 40 years as a clinical psychologist to create this handy “interactive manual of important life skills” aimed at helping those with breast cancer handle challenging feelings and difficult decisions, care for themselves, and communicate effectively with others. The first chapter deals with uncertainty and anxiety; the next, with feelings of grief and loss. Chapter 3 discusses specific issues that cancer raises for family members and other loved ones, and later chapters provide techniques for staying in the present moment, discuss the fear of death and the importance of communicating one’s needs to others, and present tactics for finding hope and developing resilience. Each section opens with “Lessons Learned From My Patients” and provides up to a dozen tools for the body, mind, and spirit—brief, step-by-step practices, such as breathing, relaxation, and visualization techniques to use as needed. Winding up each chapter is a “Committed Action Contract,” which features simple actions to begin right away. Throughout, the author effectively emphasizes the ways the mind and body affect each other and influence healing, the importance of self-compassion, and the uniqueness of each person’s needs and choices. The topics that the author addresses also range widely, from sexuality and nutrition to mindfulness and ethical wills. Finally, there’s a complete list of “Tools for the Road” by chapter, an extensive list of outside resources, and an index. Over the course of this work, the author’s voice is friendly and empathetic, and the text is clear and matter-of-fact in tone, sprinkled with inspiring quotations, real-life examples, and simple graphics. Many of the ideas are not new, although they are always appropriately credited, and the act of collecting so many well-explained, tried-and-true practices and coping strategies into one short book is a great service to women coping with cancer—and perhaps also to a wider array of people dealing with serious illness, challenging life circumstances, and difficult emotions.
A guide to self-care that offers understanding and a wealth of effective tools for living.
ANIMATION FOR BEGINNERS Getting Started With Animation Filmmaking
Meroz, Morr Bloop Animation Studios (212 pp.) $20.99 paper | $11.99 e-book Oct. 19, 2021 978-1-73787-930-5
A comprehensive, expanded edition of a 2014 how-to guide for readers seeking careers in animation.
Meroz, the creator of the animation training website Bloop Animation, explains that his art form is more than just classic cartoons: “Animation is the art of creating life,” he writes, and that act of creation is more complicated than many would expect. He begins by challenging a commonly held notion: “I always assumed animators had to be amazing fine artists,” he writes. “But there was another way to make movies: 3D animation,” which uses very different skills. Meroz then leads readers through the basic principles of animated works and the different types of animation, from traditional, frame-by-frame cel animation to stop-motion and more. In the book’s second part, Meroz explores his own experiences creating a short film, including the complex process of preproduction and storyboarding, and defines such terms as animatics. Meroz makes it clear that he can’t effectively teach readers everything they need to know about 3-D modeling or cinematography in a single chapter, but he strives to succinctly explain the basic, essential processes involved. He delves into technical aspects, such as rigging and pre-visualization, and artistic considerations, such as choosing a genre and a catchy title. He even provides detailed recommendations on how to cast voice actors and how to create a good first press kit. The author concludes by showing how animators can potentially monetize their art and get freelance work.
The author’s perspective in this book, as a recent animation school graduate making his way in the industry, nicely lends itself to concrete and practical advice. He’s clearly thought through every tricky detail that might halt someone’s progress when making a first film. He clearly explains the pros and cons of using YouTube, for example, and clarifies his own “Restriction Method,” which involves setting constraints that can foster creativity. His personal, conversational tone makes much of the text feel like the advice of a good friend. For instance, for those who have no idea where to start with a project, he urges, “Do what I did. Pick the simplest environment and focus on the characters.” Meroz never shies away from the many difficulties that animators face, however, and he honestly notes the large amount of work that one must put in: “If you’re an artist, and you don’t continually work on your art because you’re not inspired, there’s a very simple term for you: amateur.” In the book’s later sections, though, he drifts from how-to into selfhelp, advising readers on how to deal with rejection, waiting on potential jobs, and even talking to loved ones who are less than supportive. These sections may not appeal to those looking for a more technical manual, but Meroz is clearly writing to a very specific audience: people traveling the same career path as he is. For them, he certainly has a lot to say about getting the most out of their chosen art form.
An impressively thorough and well-rounded tour of the animation game.
SNOWLANDS Book One A Blood Moon
Meroz, Morr Illus. by Collin Fogel & Davi Comodo The Snowlands Company (210 pp.) $14.99 e-book | Dec. 7, 2021
A young wolf strikes out on her own in this first installment of a graphicnovel series. Meroz’s work opens with the line, “The Snowlands are a dangerous place for little creatures,” and at its story’s center is a young wolf cub named Feba, who’s unquestionably in danger herself. She’s orphaned soon after her birth and ostracized by most of her pack for her white fur, which wolves see as a bad omen. The harsh winter has resulted in a severe shortage of sheep in the area, which has left the pack hungry and desperate for a scapegoat. Despite appeals to reason from her late mother’s allies, Feba finds herself on the run, cast out of the only home she’s ever known; soon, she’s caught in a double-crossing lynx’s trap alongside a moody snow leopard called Usha and a comical wild cat named Batu (which is also the only word he ever utters). The trio narrowly escapes several harrowing incidents together, largely thanks to Feba’s courage. Despite the fact that Usha insists that “leopards are always alone,” she reluctantly allows Feba and Batu to tag along with her on her personal mission: to find the all-knowing and mysterious Seeress, who she hopes will help her to find her own lost cub. As the unlikely trio make their way through the wintry, mountainous terrain, they encounter bears, pandas, crocodiles, monkeys, and badgers, some of whom are more deadly than others. Meanwhile, Feba’s pack continues to face misfortune as a mysterious force kidnaps their cubs and endangers their best warriors. The two plotlines dovetail in a surprising final conflict in which Feba must prove her worth.
Meroz’s background as an animator shines through in this graphic novel’s page-turning action sequences, and artist Fogel and colorist Comodo use their considerable skills to turn desolate landscapes into rich, engrossing images. The numerous adversaries that the main trio of characters encounter are truly sinister, and they’re just the right amount of scary for middlegrade readers. That said, the youngest of those readers may be frightened by some of the work’s more intense and bloody imagery. As an outsider with outsized courage, Feba is a classic, lovable protagonist, and it’s easy to root for her from the start. In the end, though, it’s Usha, the snow leopard, who has the most moving character arc, as her quest to find her lost son becomes a bittersweet story of accepting the world’s natural order. In the second half of the book, Meroz introduces an element of mysticism and a surprising twist on the order of the food chain, but
the scroll of yeshayahu
he may have bitten off more than these critters can chew over the course of a single story. His ideas are extremely clever, but their ingenuity gets a bit lost in the final act’s rush of reveals, incantations, and explained motivations. Still, Meroz successfully delivers intriguing characters and necessary worldbuilding for a series that promises to be as likable as its lead character.
Sumptuous visuals and intriguing ideas will leave readers hungry for more time in the Snowlands.
HULA GIRLS
Miller, Eric B. Milbrown Press (490 pp.) $19.41 paper | $9.99 e-book | Nov. 18, 2021 978-0-9906893-3-1
A debut novel tracks a brave and resourceful woman from right before the Pearl Harbor attack through the next 30 years. When readers first meet Claudia Wyler in Hawaii in 1941, she seems like a real ditz. Her husband, Navy Lt. Jack Wyler, proves to be a controlling and abusive jerk. Then one day, they hear explosions: The Japanese are bombing Pearl Harbor. The couple survive the assault, but Jack is soon killed in a car accident. Claudia is on her own in Hawaii, getting a slim widow’s pension of two bucks a month. Her life then truly begins. At the start of the story, she is an avid reader of women’s magazines that advise her on how to be a perfect wife. And at the end? Well, the destination, as they say, is not as important as the journey. This woman who was born to East Coast privilege learns to be a remarkably good car mechanic, works as a dishwasher in the Grand Hawaiian Hotel, joins a chorus line, and turns into a superb choreographer. And, after hitting rock bottom, she becomes a sex worker, desperately leading a double life. Along the way, she serves as the de facto mother of Edgar Lee, the son of a deceased friend. To say that Claudia is treated shabbily (and worse) is an understatement, but she comes to embody Nietzsche’s famous dictum: Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. The tale’s point of view is Claudia’s, and Miller loves to play with clichés (“Claudia thought her can of worms was nothing like Annette’s kettle of fish”) and delightful figurative language (at Adm. Harris’ reception and dance, “the presence of a powder room had eddied a flotsam of ladies”). The author also provides nostalgic period touches, like Ipana toothpaste and Chesterfield and Old Gold cigarettes (the players smoke all the time), so that readers get the sense of being enveloped in a long-ago era. There are skillfully drawn characters, some mysterious and scary like Mr. Anthony and others loyal to the end, such as Annette Anisinelli, Claudia’s best friend. Though it covers only three decades, this story has the feel of a saga and is as satisfying as one.
A wonderful evocation of a time and place and a woman’s indomitable spirit.
THE SCROLL OF YESHAYAHU The Unfolding Reflections of the Ancient and Coming Worlds—Judah, Jerusalem, and the Ends of the Earth
Montañez, Xavier Westbow Press (150 pp.) $30.95 | $19.34 paper | $5.99 e-book Aug. 31, 2020 978-1-6642-0194-1 978-1-6642-0192-7 paper
A debut spiritual primer focuses on the book of Isaiah.
Growing up as a devout Christian, Montañez finally realized when he attended a seminar in biblical exegesis as an adult that he had “read and even memorized scriptures devoid of their true context.” Rather than committing himself to an in-depth study of the entire Bible, he has spent nearly a decade researching the book of Isaiah and offers readers in this volume a concise, erudite commentary. Convinced that the writings of “Yeshayahu” (a Hebrew variant of the anglicized name Isaiah) rank with the Egyptian pyramids and Stonehenge as a wonder of the ancient world, the author suggests that despite the book’s sustained popularity among Jews and Christians, it has too often been “misunderstood” by preachers who decontextualize its message. Divided into three parts, Montañez’s overview in the first section provides readers with a structural analysis and historical commentary on Isaiah’s canon as a seminal work in Jewish and Christian Scripture. The next two parts center on a historical and exegetical analysis of the book’s prophesies, arguing that many of Isaiah’s predictions have been fulfilled in subsequent Mesopotamian geopolitical incidents or in the coming of Jesus as the divine Messiah. Ample attention is also given to a rich examination of the Great Isaiah Scroll, one of the seven Dead Sea Scrolls discovered in 1946 and 1947, which represents one of the most “complete ancient writings we have in our possession.” Despite this admiration, the author does not hold back his critiques, such as his acknowledgement of Isaiah’s occasional “logical blunders,” contradictions, and “blatant grammatical errors.” Written from a predominantly Christian viewpoint, Montañez’s study includes sources that reflect a sound grasp of biblical scholarship, particularly from a Protestant, evangelical perspective. Still, the author deliberately includes Jewish contextualization and commentary from writers like Josephus. But Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christians may be dismayed by the work’s description of their sacred biblical texts like the book of Sirach as “apocryphal” and by a lack of engagement with the allegorical interpretation of Isaiah from the perspectives of early church scholars like Augustine.
A well-written introduction to Isaiah that carefully balances accessible writing with nuanced commentary.
BEING SMALL (Isn’t So Bad After All)
Orlinsky, Lori Illus. by Vanessa Alexandre Mascot Books (38 pp.) $14.95 | $2.99 e-book | April 16, 2019 978-1-64307-127-5
A girl and her mother talk about the problems—and benefits—of being the smallest in class in this rhyming, feel-good picture book.
Hayley pretends she’s sick because she doesn’t want to go to school. Mom sees through the complaint and asks for the real problem, and pre-K student Hayley confesses how hard it is to be the shortest. She can’t reach things her classmates can; she’s not good at sports; and she’s always picked last for games. Her mother is quick to respond that being small has good features too. Being short means she has the most legroom on a plane; she can ride in the cart at a grocery store; and she can squeeze into small places others can’t. The chat helps give Hayley, who presents White, the confidence she needs to face the class, which is diverse and inclusive: “I went to school, and I’m happy to report, / As it turns out, I like being short!” Orlinsky’s rhyming couplets flow smoothly from page to page, capturing both the tone of Hayley’s unhappy complaints and her mother’s comforting encouragement. Alexandre’s digital cartoon illustrations reveal numerous situations where being short is a hindrance (on a roller coaster or at the pool) and a help (Hayley happily plays inside a playhouse, but a taller friend is unable to fit).
A sweet mother-daughter story about loving and accepting yourself.
THE GOOD FRIDAY THIEF The Scroll of Ar-Rahman
Othrman, Hasson (168 pp.) $0.99 e-book | March 2, 2014
An Iraqi scholar steals an ancient manuscript just as American forces invade Baghdad in this novella. One day, a scholar named Hasson is astonished to learn that the Scroll of Ar-Rahman has surfaced at the Baghdad museum where he works—Ar-Rahman translates as the Compassionate One and refers to Jesus. The 2,000-year-old document is of extraordinary theological significance since it demonstrates a unity of the Abrahamic religions and explains why Jesus is rightly esteemed by the Prophet Muhammad, a striking hypothesis lucidly described by Othrman. Abudal Yashrin, Hasson’s officious and stupid boss, is indifferent to the scroll’s fate and notes dismissively that it will soon be collected by the Mukhabahrat, the Iraqi secret police. But Hasson cares deeply about the scroll— besides being a devout Muslim, he’s an expert in ancient cultures and languages. As American forces inch closer to Baghdad, he worries that the manuscript will be destroyed and makes a fateful decision that changes his life: “I had no choice, no other solution but to steal that Scroll and run. Run like a thief in the night, leave the country and my family. We had planned on leaving Iraq together in case of an emergency, but I thought it would be a war or a revolution, and we would be together.” After Hasson seizes the scroll and flees, he is doggedly pursued by assassins sent from the Iraqi secret police and the Israeli Mossad, both apparently afraid that such a discovery might bring the Jewish and Muslim nations closer together. The author claims his thrilling story is based on real events, though it all has a dramatically cinematic feel—Hasson, once a famous Olympic wrestler, comes across like an Iraqi James Bond. Nevertheless, this novella—under 170 pages—is both thoughtful and riveting, filled with theological intrigue as well as violent action powerfully depicted: “Two soldiers climbed out of the last Humvee, one of them carrying some sort of high-tech sniper rifle and the other a British made automatic rifle; the man with the sniper rifle was walking around the front of the vehicle when a burst of a gun fire hit him and his chest exploded, blood splattering the Humvee hood.”
A captivating religious thriller about a remarkable scroll.
INHUMAN TRAFFICKING A Legal Thriller
Papantonio, Mike & Alan Russell Skyhorse (312 pp.) $26.79 | $17.99 e-book | Oct. 5, 2021 978-1-5107-6887-1
A legal thriller chronicles one man’s search for his 15-year-old goddaughter in the sordid underworld of human trafficking. Nick “Deke” Deketomis—who is a senior partner in one of the country’s largest plaintiff law firms—is working on a case involving a chain of truck stops supposedly involved in human trafficking throughout the Southeast United States. The case becomes even more significant when Deketomis discovers that his goddaughter, Lily Reyes, has disappeared. With his close-knit team helping him—which includes Air Force pararescueman–turned-lawyer Michael Carey and Carol Morris, one of the firm’s investigative experts—Deketomis begins investigating the dark netherworld of sex trafficking, where those unfortunate enough to be caught up in the vile criminal enterprise go from “slave to grave.” As Deketomis mentors Carey on how to be a successful and ethical lawyer, the two are faced with more than a few morally ambiguous situations during the course of their investigation. A group of Ukrainian women, for example, who were recruited to work hospitality jobs in America are now essentially slaves forced to clean hotel rooms during the day and become sex workers at night. Papantonio and Russell have created an utterly readable thriller. The series opener’s biggest strength is its deep character development. All of the major players—even criminals like sex trafficker Tio Leo and hotel owner Vicky Driscoll—are insightfully and realistically
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portrayed. Additionally, the dynamism and deep connections between many of the characters (for example, Deketomis and Lily; Carey and his wife) make for an emotionally compelling reading experience. As can be expected in any worthy thriller, the action sequences are impressive, and the pacing is relentless throughout. Another plus is the timeliness of the subject matter. (According to the book, every year at least a quarter of a million Americans under the age of 18 are lured into the commercial sex trade.) The one minor criticism is the predictability of the story’s conclusion.
A solid beginning to what could be a wildly entertaining and thematically powerful thriller saga.
TEARS OF FIRE
Patrick, Anthony F. Tears of Fire Publishing (352 pp.) $9.99 paper | $0.99 e-book Sept. 13, 2021 978-0-578-97346-3
An amnesiac man trapped in a brutal landscape of ruin, fire, monsters, and marauders undergoes numerous torments, learning that this nightmarish place is a literal reflection of his own mind.
Patrick’s SF/fantasy debut opens with a nameless, amnesiac protagonist trapped in a hellscape out of Hieronymus Bosch. Human civilization lies in wreckage amid rivers of fire and magma. Barbarians astride giant lizards spread pain and destruction, while all fear the regular, boiling rain that falls from the sky and the strangely sentient green mists that seem to hunt prey with their lightninglike energy bolts. The hero—ultimately called Joseph Morris—has technical expertise and strives to build a “machine” allowing him to escape, but the knowledge and clarity seem to elude him. He is told a way has been prepared by his parents, and the cryptic sage Dr. Alarius Vango is among his allies. Ending the first act is the revelation that Morris was a youth diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder who was institutionalized prior to a semistable adulthood working in IT. This awful setting is in his own mind, and much of the vivid dystopian/fantasy narrative is metaphorical of mental illness (a nepentheesque water, an analog to psychotropic drugs, gives Morris temporary relief from the agony but brings on lassitude and weight gain). There is also a strong infusion of ancient Gnostic philosophy, in that while entombed alive in his terrible, devastated inner world, Roman Catholic–born Morris is practically a god, but a fallen, feckless one, helpless and distant from the real God. A late revelation that Morris has entered his own mind in a radical gambit to help rescue his similarly stricken sister makes this engaging fabulist material weirdly akin to Pat Conroy’s The Prince of Tides. Fans drawn to Stephen King’s Dark Tower cycle will probably be more in tune with the prose than readers with Joanne Greenberg’s I Never Promised You a Rose Garden prominent on their shelves. Patrick has himself wrestled with mental illness and explains that he wrote this novel as his creative alternative to a straightforward sickness/recovery memoir.
An engrossing, apocalyptic fantasy/SF tale that renders mental illness from an insider’s perspective.
BEEBE AND BOSTELMANN A Historical Novel
Politsch, Kent Self (474 pp.) $24.99 | $16.99 paper | $4.49 e-book Dec. 15, 2021 979-8-9854224-0-5 978-0-9858352-8-6 paper
Politsch’s historical novel tracks a renowned naturalist who witnesses undersea wonders.
Dr. William Beebe is a celebrity in the world of explorers, a charismatic scientist and naturalist who was mentored by President Theodore Roosevelt himself. It’s the early 1930s, and he hopes to dive deeper into the ocean than any believe possible and observe deep-sea aquatic life. To do this, he will use a new, pressure-resistant diving sphere invented by Otis Barton that Beebe dubs a bathysphere. The only caveat to using this hollow, round submersible is that the fame-hungry and adventure-seeking Barton will join him in his dives off the coast of Nonsuch Island in Bermuda. But perhaps as important as the difficult Barton and his steel ball is the relatively unknown commercial artist the explorer employs on this journey—German-born American Else Bostelmann. Bostelmann expertly depicts the wild undersea creatures Beebe witnesses, and her work appears in numerous publications, like National Geographic, raising her profile considerably in the arts, sciences, and even the fashion world. But the very shrewdness that makes her such an astute artist also makes her question many things about the doctor— his paradoxical nature as a conservationist who hunts, his fraternizing with eugenicists, his affairs with the younger women who work for him, and, most concerning to her, his apparent addiction to facing danger for his studies. Politsch shows an enthusiasm for his famous characters’ exploits that rivals Beebe’s own excitement over the bioluminescent fish he discovers. Scenes depicting the preparation and testing of the bathysphere are as engaging as when it finally makes its first dive. The claustrophobia of the ball’s 4-foot-6 diameter is palpable; an errant electrical spark or a creaking winch is downright anxiety inducing. The book takes its time, whether capturing little moments of beauty on Nonsuch or fleshing out lesser characters who are a part of Beebe’s team, a nice distraction from the long, sometimes tedious waits between dives.
Submerges the reader in the glorious, riveting details of early aquatic exploration.
WINNING AT PERSUASION FOR LAWYERS The Art and Science of Public Speaking at Hearings and Trials
Read, Shane Westway Publishing (304 pp.) $79.95 | $69.95 paper | $59.95 e-book Nov. 5, 2021 979-8-9851152-1-5 978-0-9850271-6-2 paper
A guide to public speaking in the legal world.
Read starts by acknowledging that just about everyone ranks public speaking as their top fear—above death! He hopes his book will help his readers face and overcome their fear of public speaking, and to that end, he emphasizes the “Rule of Three,” which is “the idea that you will have the most success if you try to persuade your judge or jury with three points.” He stresses throughout that public speakers must avoid mimicry in favor of finding their own voice, and the way to do this is to stick to sincerity—not a word most readers will readily associate with lawyers. His manual comprises three segments: how to persuade, how to organize a presentation, and, finally, a historical section on how great masters of persuasion conducted their cases. At the core of his own presentation is a section on “the seven principles of public speaking,” which includes tips like keeping a journal, speaking from the heart, and addressing the audience. In fact, he believes considering the audience is paramount: “The truth is that your next appearance in court is about the needs of the judge or jury that you are trying to persuade,” Read writes. “Figuring out those desires first, not your client’s or your own, is the key to success.” In all of this, Read exhibits two main strengths: He’s a very engaging writer, and his book is full of well-chosen quotes from a wide variety of writers and public speakers (“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken”—Oscar Wilde). He buttresses these quotes with his own clearly phrased insights (“Never have a argument but instead have a conversation with the judge and deliver a visual presentation to the jury”). Public speakers of all kinds—and especially courtroom lawyers—will find this book invaluable.
A comprehensive, empowering set of strategies for improving public speaking.
BOSCO AND THE BEES
Ritchie, Cat Atmosphere Press (156 pp.) $16.99 paper | $7.99 e-book Jan. 15, 2021 978-1-64921-929-9
Ritchie’s middle-grade debut novel sees a curious young fairy develop an interest in bees, which his people treat as taboo. Nine-year-old Bosco lives in Somewhere, a fairy community in the mountains of North America. Unlike the fairies of Fairy Land, which is kept locked away from the rest of the world behind an energy Barrier, Bosco’s people exist at one with nature. They cooperate with the birds and animals and practice ecologically responsible methods of subsistence. Bosco loves his life and his home, but the Ten-Year Rule hangs over his head—a decree by Queen Madrina that all young fairies must choose a life path by their 10th year or be indentured for five years at the Royal Court. Bosco has a great affinity for flying, so he thinks that perhaps he’ll study birds. However, he finds himself increasingly fascinated by bees; the only problem is that all fairies—even the open-minded folk of Somewhere—deeply dislike his new insect friends. What dark history is there between fairies and bees? And will Bosco be forced to leave his mountain home? Ritchie’s prose style feels every bit as natural as her protagonist’s surroundings. The dialogue is unobtrusive, and the plot unfolds with simple elegance, hinting at dangers but never allowing them to develop too far. Bosco is an inquisitive and likable protagonist who’s principled, positive, and personable. The other fairies of Somewhere are similarly agreeable, and each feels distinct; the fairies from the other side of the Barrier have more edge to them, yet their intrusion into Bosco’s world feels more a clash of cultures than a villainous act. Humankind lurks as a threat, but it, too, isn’t antagonistic; instead, it shows a critical failure to understand the balance of nature. Ritchie makes the ecological underpinnings of Bosco’s discoveries clear throughout. The message, though, is delivered not with a heavy hand but with the straightforwardness of a child’s perspective, unencumbered by adult rationalizations. The result is an easygoing, refreshing adventure that young readers will treasure.
A sweet story of learning about the world and changing it for the better.
breaking why
BREAKING WHY Hacking and Rebuilding Strategic Emotions for Authentic Success
Russo, Frankie Amplify Publishing (168 pp.) $19.95 | $9.99 e-book | Feb. 1, 2022 978-1-64543-823-6
A manual offers an intriguing approach to pursuing purpose by breaking the rules.
On the road to entrepreneurial success, Russo experienced his fair share of business and personal failures, including divorce and struggles with substance abuse. Rising above such challenges made him realize that his first book, The Art of WHY (2016), required reexamination: “I’ve learned our WHY sometimes needs to be broken so that we can grow as we put the pieces back together.” The notion of rule-breaking is not new, but the author’s briskly written guide skillfully details a set of 10 sensible self-improvement steps—five “start-up steps” and five “lifestyle steps.” Step 1, “Break Your Why,” isn’t so much about breaking down as it is about building up, for it starts with the ability to “know our WHY.” Similarly, Step 2, “Make (or Break) a Plan,” can be viewed through two opposing lenses. While this make-or-break language may lead to some confusion, Russo weaves in his own story of regeneration to clarify the text. Steps 3, 4, and 5 seem to refine the concept. Step 4, for example, stresses the importance of building a support team of advisers and mentors to optimize success. The second half of the book concentrates on the five “lifestyle” steps. Here, Russo delivers some valuable counsel about learning patience and persistence, discovering how to accept or adapt, turning “mistakes into opportunities,” celebrating milestones, and recognizing the importance of giving back. In fact, giving back is the author’s overarching message; he poetically proclaims: “I don’t really own anything until I give it away! Think of it as philanthropy of the soul.” Each step constitutes a chapter in the book and is enriched with numerous anecdotes, many from Russo’s own experiences. The most helpful addition to every step is an interactive section at the end of each chapter entitled “Contemplate,” which encourages readers to “formulate” written answers to key questions and “activate” a strategy. The author writes with sincerity and passion, reflecting on his own life with pragmatic maturity while instilling a sense of confidence in readers that success is achievable.
An uplifting and succinct collection of life lessons.
A DIFFERENT PURPOSE A Martin Quint Novel
Senturia, Stephen D. FriesenPress (294 pp.) $29.99 | $19.99 paper | $9.99 e-book Sept. 23, 2021 978-1-03-912358-8 978-1-03-912357-1 paper
A Massachusetts college instructor continues to grapple with a complicated academic life and a messy marriage in
this novel.
This final installment of Senturia’s Martin Quint trilogy finds the professor facing exhausting years at Bottlesworth College after a scandal that forced him to leave Cambridge Technology Institute. Then there is his deteriorating marriage to his wife, Jenny, who, despite her indiscretion with a work subordinate, still feels as “stuck” as she did when their problems began in the author’s series debut, One Man’s Purpose (2015). In an effort to reconnect, the couple have embarked on marriage counseling sessions, which are effectively dispersed throughout the book. As Martin and Jenny work on repairing their marriage, healing distrust, and exploring past triggers, critical outside events complicate things further. When Andrew, Martin’s son from his first marriage, tells him that his soccer buddy, new Black student Lavelle Walton, is being bullied by aggressive, rich White kid Lester Worthington, the professor becomes concerned the harassment is racially motivated. After discovering that Lester is the son of a Maine state government official, Martin and Andrew learn that things are continuing to escalate. A group of students targeting Lavelle and organized by Lester becomes incensed by the athlete’s presence in school and on the soccer field and leaves a threatening noose on his dorm room doorknob. Meanwhile, in an effort to reclaim his lost childhood from a mother who abandoned him, Martin sets out to find her in a journey that becomes surprisingly suspenseful and emotionally moving.
Adding texture to the narrative is Martin’s passionate advocacy for the modernization and advancement of educational philosophies, including the practice of vocal participation and peer-to-peer learning curriculums in the tech classroom. Senturia, a veteran engineering professor, sets his novel in pre–Covid-19 academia where classrooms are still in-person. The exchanges between instructors and students are realistically portrayed, avoiding what the author calls in his introduction “Zoom fatigue.” While Martin’s dialogue periodically gets muddled in the jargon of a seasoned engineering academic eager for new and adventurous avenues of improved learning, he does impart objectives that will make sense to any reader. For example, he encourages new teaching methodologies, asserting that “conversation, two-way conversation, as opposed to just reading, engages one’s entire cognitive structure and opens it up to new ideas in a remarkable way.” Branching outward, the tale also explores the nuances of infidelity and a marriage’s recovery, race-baiting among adolescents, the unique teacherstudent dynamic, and the enduring psychological effects of
child abandonment on an adult. As several story arcs coalesce in the final third, the volume does begin to sag beneath the weight of the pivotal subject matter it addresses. While Senturia effectively touches on several areas of the modern human condition, readers will naturally gravitate back to the core story of Martin and Jenny rebuilding their relationship with the aid of a therapist. The durability of a bruised marriage navigating the emotional fallout of betrayal is the true beating heart of the author’s engrossing trilogy. Though Senturia leaves things on a positive, upbeat note, readers will yearn for more solid conclusions about the fate of this couple on the road to marital recovery.
An immensely satisfying trilogy finale examining marriage, forgiveness, race, youth, and university life.
TOBEY THE BUSINESS MOUSE
Shklaz, Elinor Illus. by C.S. Fritz Albatross Book Co. (34 pp.) $27.29 | Dec. 1, 2021 979-8-9850346-6-0
A business-mouse encourages a human girl to pursue her dreams in this picture-
book pep talk.
Rodent Tobey lives in a dollhouse owned by a nameless young girl, and the pair are best friends. Sometimes the mouse, wearing a tie and carrying a briefcase, goes away on business trips, but he’s always around when the girl needs him. One day, when she confesses how it makes her sad when other kids are mean to her, he encourages her by saying her future is bright, as she can be anything she wants. Tobey shows this by dressing the part for a number of careers, including an astronomer and Supreme Court judge, and he reminds her, “Don’t let anyone make you feel small / (Actually, you’re pretty tall!).” Debut author Shklaz varies the rhyme scheme several times, but the rhymes are solid, and the changing patterns consistently scan well. Some unusual words (Madame, conquering) may encourage newly independent readers to expand their vocabularies, and lap readers will be entertained by Fritz’s colorful cartoon illustrations. Tobey’s expressive features and the wide array of costumes will inspire giggles, and textured backgrounds add depth. Readers looking for another book about exploring careers or ignoring bullies may find this an uplifting addition to those crowded fields.
A pleasant tale for animal lovers looking for a heartening pick-me-up.
CHILDREN OF THE AIR
Smith, Mark Eddy Mottled Speck (226 pp.) $34.99 | $11.99 paper | $4.99 e-book Feb. 2, 2020 978-1-939636-03-4 978-1-939636-04-1 paper
Humans and animals in small-town America unite and diverge in this novel about families and devastating loss. Mary Peabody loves her freethinking 13-year-old daughter, Melissa, but needs a break. Motherhood hasn’t been easy, especially since Lissy’s father abruptly left three years ago. Mary sends Lissy to the teen’s recently widowed grandfather’s farm for the summer. But as Mary spends most of her precious solitude watching TV, will her resultant guilt overwhelm her? Surprisingly, her life parallels Corwynn’s, an eagle nurturing three eggs in her nest in the dense woods not far from Lissy at her grandfather Ed Nowlen’s home. When humans capture the eaglets’ father, Corwynn—worried she won’t be able to care for her babies alone—contemplates abandoning the eggs. Other colorful characters gradually join the story: an injured owl; a high schooler fleeing his “meaningless” life and abusive father; and Ed’s loyal dog, Shep, who, like his owner, shows copious signs of his advancing age. They form a series of fractured families learning to rely on others, though some of them prove selfish or even outright malicious. In this somber tale, Smith writes in a beautifully simple style. This matches the animals’ outlook; they live in the moment, as the narrative focuses on singular tasks, such as Corwynn hunting for food. The animals’ perspectives can also be endearing. Birds, for example, see humans with “malformed wings,” and Shep’s name for Ed is “Good.” But this story is largely humorless, teeming with characters not ready to say goodbye, from Ed still mourning his wife to Lissy viewing high school as the unwanted end of her childhood. Similarly, there’s a sad death or two as well as a violent act with long-lasting repercussions. The novel is not all gloom, though, as these glimpses into varied but comparable lives create a truly rewarding experience.
Indelible characters, two-legged or otherwise, power this superb, melodramatic tale.
THE ORDER OF TIME AND ODIN’S DOOR
Southall, Scott P. Seaview Press Holdings (311 pp.) $6.99 e-book | Jan. 20, 2022
In this YA middle-grade fantasy adventure, two time-traveling twins must help defend Vikings against a fearsome dragon. In this follow-up to The Order of Time (2020), 12-year-old twins Anastasia and Edward Upston and their mentor, Dr. Alfred Gregorian, must answer serious charges from the secret
the little lion that listened
Order of Time, who are time-traveling guardians of history. By preventing Pharaoh Akhenaten’s assassination, the three defendants broke several important rules. A hearing in London goes well; the twins get the chance to be trained and join the Order someday if they pass the entrance exam. A treacherous element in the Order, however, makes the twins’ timetravel test go badly awry, and they find themselves stranded in medieval Denmark. The Vikings they meet, including Erik the Red, explain that they’re in desperate danger from the dragon Nidhogg and his undead army. The only way to defeat them, a shaman says, is to have the broken blade Lykill reforged by its dwarf makers and to reconnoiter the dragon’s lair to discover his weakness; Anastasia joins the first mission and Edward, the second. As the Vikings will face a fierce series of battles, will the travelers complete their tasks in time? In his second series installment, Southall appealingly offers several intriguing elements in addition to the time travel that drives the action. In particular, the secret society with its clandestine procedures, fancy secret locations, centuries-old members, and nifty relics is great fun, as is the school that Anastasia and Edward hope to attend, which offers such fascinating subjects as Preservation of Powerful Artifacts. The twins’ quests are packed with exciting scenes of journeying, discovering, and battling. It should be noted that there’s a fairly significant plot hole involving the twins’ ability to speak and read Norse, but it won’t detract from readers’ enjoyment of the story.
A lively, entertaining time-travel tale that nicely blends history, myth, and adventure.
MYSTERY AT THE BLUE SEA COTTAGE A True Story of Murder in San Diego’s Jazz Age
Stewart, James WildBlue Press (302 pp.) $17.49 paper | $6.99 e-book | Sept. 27, 2021 978-1-952225-78-9
In this debut nonfiction work, Stewart investigates the circumstances surrounding the murder of a 20-year-old dancer in Jazz Age Southern California.
Frieda “Fritzie” Mann didn’t get to experience much of the Roaring ’20s. In January 1923, the 20-year-old dancer was found dead on Torrey Pines State Beach a few miles north of San Diego. The case isn’t as well known as other contemporaneous Hollywood-connected scandals, like silent film star’s Fatty Arbuckle’s arrest. Stewart uses trial transcripts, newspaper articles, and other primary sources to bring Mann—and the rapidly changing times in which she lived—alive in a fast-paced, thoughtful truecrime work that contextualizes the dancer’s demise within the sociocultural climate of Prohibition-era America. “The story of Fritzie’s tragic death was much more than an intriguing Jazz Age murder mystery; in many ways, it defined one of the most fascinating eras in U.S. history,” he writes. At the time, Stewart reports, San Diego was “a backwater and Fritzie Mann wasn’t famous,” but in an age of yellow journalism that would make today’s tabloids blanch, the media pounced on the case. Mann was the “right kind of victim, not just a young white woman, but a beautiful exotic dancer washed up dead in her teddies, who cavorted with Hollywood players and enjoyed assignations at beach cottages and got pregnant out of wedlock.” Louis Jacobs, a physician in the U.S. Public Health Service who had been dating Mann, was charged with the murder. He was acquitted after a trial in which the prosecution theorized that he killed Mann while attempting to perform an abortion on her in a beachside cottage. Stewart ably depicts how the case reflects “the status of women in a changing—and unchanging—society” in which, “despite the apparent wave of liberalism and sexual freedom, the Victorian era moral code and associated laws lingered.” Those laws included an almost complete ban on abortions, driving women to extremes to terminate their pregnancies. As America lurches toward overturning Roe v. Wade, Fritzie Mann’s death carries a haunting resonance.
Effectively shows how the relative liberalism of the Roaring ’20s collided with a lingering Victorian moral code.
THE LITTLE LION THAT LISTENED
Tana, Nicholas Illus. by Jessie Fox & Matthew Molleur New Classics Press (40 pp.) $21.99 | $12.99 paper | $2.99 e-book Aug. 27, 2021 978-1-950033-15-7 978-1-950033-13-3 paper
A lion cub finds a reason to roar in this picture book.
Leo the lion cub doesn’t roar like his brother and sister. “Nobody will ever respect a quiet lion,” his father complains. But Leo’s mother knows he will roar when he’s ready. On the following pages, Leo gets his family out of trouble with his listening skills, helping them evade human hunters and hungry hyenas. But despite Leo’s heroics, when it’s time for the lions’ roaring competition, his father is angry that the cub won’t participate. Ashamed, Leo runs to the top of a hill, where he hears a forest fire. He knows the only way he can warn his family is to finally roar. Leo again saves the day, but even though he has loudly roared, he returns to his quiet, listening self. Tana deftly balances the tale of Leo’s strengths with the need to speak up when it’s important without ever undermining or devaluing the cub’s personality. As with the author’s previous book, Monsters Are Afraid of Babies (2019), the accessible text is characterized by short sentences with a few advanced vocabulary words (stalked, approaching). Debut illustrator Fox’s highly textured, geometric images hint at a papercut tradition, which gives the potent story a folktale flavor. (The story design is by Molleur.) Lap readers are sure to page through the beautiful pictures, which invite kids to sink in and immerse themselves in Leo’s vivid world.
A powerful message about listening and valuing your own abilities, accompanied by gorgeous illustrations.
THE POSEN LIBRARY OF JEWISH CULTURE AND CIVILIZATION Volume One: Ancient Israel, From Its Beginnings Through 332 BCE
Ed. by Tigay, Jeffrey H. & Adele Berlin Yale University Press (600 pp.) $175.00 | March 23, 2021 978-0-300-13550-3
A comprehensive look at Jewish history from the late second millennium up to the fourth century B.C.E.
This series starter from editors Tigay and Berlin begins at the beginning, according to the Jewish faith: when God created the world in the book of Genesis—the first of what the book terms “Long Prose Narratives” from the Bible. The book examines events from Scripture as written works and places them in context by looking at who first wrote them down (and who revised them over centuries). Other biblical material is grouped according to similarity, with sections on poetry, classical prophetic literature, and collections of laws; for the latter, the editors consider such questions as how laws of ancient Israel differed from those of other contemporary groups, such as the Mesopotamians. Later portions explore material beyond the Bible, and this examination takes many different forms, including a contract to rent a house that was drawn up some time during the reign of Persian king Darius I. There are references to the Israelites from outside sources, such as the Egyptian stela of Merneptah from 1208 B.C.E. Overall, the book does an excellent job of drawing together many disparate sources. Although the initial portions on biblical works can prove tedious for nonscholars or redundant for those who know them well, they effectively help to lay groundwork, and these texts come more fully to life with the extrabiblical material that follows it. For instance, letters from the late seventh and early sixth century B.C.E., discovered in the Negev, ably sketch out the provincial administration of the Kingdom of Judah. However, the book doesn’t shy away from occasional items that present questions that are, with current archaeological evidence, unanswered: What of the discrepancy between lamp stands described in the Bible and those that have been excavated? What was the purpose of miniature terra-cotta chairs from the eighth century B.C.E.? Such details create a nuanced, if sometimes-mysterious, image of an ancient culture.
This finely tuned look at ancient Jewish history creates a lasting impression.
This Issue’s Contributors
# ADULT Mark Athitakis • Colette Bancroft • Robert Beauregard • Stephanie Bernhard • Sarah Blackman • Amy Boaz • Jeffrey Burke • Catherine Cardno • Miranda Cooper • Coeur de Lion • Dave DeChristopher Melanie Dragger • Chelsea Ennen • Rosalind Faires • Amanda Faraone • Maura Finkelstein • Jenna Friebel • Roberto Friedman • Michael Griffith • Miriam Grossman • Geoff Hamilton • Janice Harayda Melissa Kravitz Hoeffner • Katrina Niidas Holm • Emily Jaeger • Jessica Jernigan • Rick Lash • Tom Lavoie • Kirk MacLeod • Don McLeese • Gregory McNamee • Leeya Mehta • Laurie Muchnick Jennifer Nabers • Liza Nelson • Mike Newirth • Therese Purcell Nielsen • Sarah Norris • Connie Ogle Mike Oppenheim • Derek Parker • Scott Parker • Ashley Patrick • Elizabeth Paulson • Jim Piechota • Rishi Reddi • Amy Reiter • Bob Sanchez • Polly Shulman • Linda Simon • Wendy Smith • Leena Soman • Margot E. Spangenberg • Mathangi Subramanian • Stephanie Sylverne • Blue Tarpalechee Martha Anne Toll • Francesca Vultaggio • Grace L. Williams • Kerry Winfrey • Marion Winik
CHILDREN’S & TEEN Lucia Acosta • Mahasin Aleem • Autumn Allen • Sandie Angulo Chen • A. Arethna • Elizabeth Bird Ariel Birdoff • Nastassian Brandon • Christopher A. Brown • Jessica Brown • Timothy Capehart Patty Carleton • Ann Childs • Amanda Chuong • Tamar Cimenian • Anastasia M. Collins • Miah Daughtery • Maya Davis • Erin Deedy • Elise DeGuiseppi • Summer Edward • Ilana Epstein Eiyana Favers • Ayn Reyes Frazee • Jenna Friebel • Omar Gallaga • Lakshmi Gandhi • Laurel Gardner Hannah Gomez • Melinda Greenblatt • Ana Grilo • Christine Gross-Loh • Vicky Gudelot • Darlene Sigda Ivy • Deborah Kaplan • Sophie Kenney • Megan Dowd Lambert • Kyle Lukoff • Joan Malewitz Emmett Marshall • Michelle H Martin • Gabriela Martins • J. Alejandro Mazariegos • Sierra McKenzie • Emma K. McNamara • Mary Margaret Mercado • Mya Nunnally • Katrina Nye • Tori Ann Ogawa • Hal Patnott • Deb Paulson • John Edward Peters • Deesha Philyaw • Amy B. Reyes Nancy Thalia Reynolds • Jasmine Riel • Meredith Schorr • John W. Shannon • Laura Simeon • Jennifer Sweeney • Deborah D. Taylor • Wendy Thomas • Jenna Varden • Yung Hsin • Gordon West • Leslie Stall Widener • Angela Wiley • Bean Yogi
INDIE Alana Abbott • Paul Allen • Kent Armstrong • Charles Cassady • Michael Deagler • Stephanie Dobler Cerra • Steve Donoghue • Jacob Edwards • Joshua Farrington • Jean Gazis • Matthew Heller • Justin Hickey • Ivan Kenneally • Mandy Malone • Collin Marchiando • Rhett Morgan • Randall Nichols • Jim Piechota • Sarah Rettger • Jerome Shea • Barry Silverstein • Mo Springer • Lauren Emily Whalen
BRIXTON NIGHTS
Tollyfield, Amy Olympia Publishers 978-1-80074-514-8
An English lesbian struggles with her conflicted love life and fractured family in this coming-of-age novella. Christina is a 35-year-old soft-drink factory worker living in the English town of Hull, where she trolls lesbian bars for short-term hookups and pines for her ex-girlfriend Steph, who left her for a man. Christina’s psychologist encourages her to ask out her fetching, bisexual co-worker Siobhan, who proves ready and willing. But Christina repeatedly pulls back from their make-out sessions because of a mountain of emotional baggage. She unpacks this baggage in alternate chapters looking back on her fraught past, starting as a child living in London’s Brixton slum in the 1990s with her younger brother, Kyle, and her Mum, a charismatic but unstable single woman given to unsavory men, booze, and cocaine binges. Social workers intervene, and Christina and Kyle end up adopted—along with two Black siblings—by Simone, a woman living on her own but supported by her estranged husband, who lives in Norway. Simone is a bundle of contradictions, a compulsively giving woman and a Christian church member who frowns on nonstandard sex lives but gets involved in an extramarital affair. Friction ensues over Simone’s attempts to make over the tomboyish Christina in girly clothes and, later, to derail her budding teenage lesbianism—along with smoking, drinking, and minor delinquency—by way of a Christian therapist. Kyle embarks on major hooliganism, including fire-starting, progressing to serious drug addiction in adolescence. As the present and past storylines head toward a convergence, Christina, now under Covid-19 lockdown, tries to bond with Siobhan and
the medicine mage
reconnect with Simone while ruminating on Steph, Mum, and other lost relationships.
Tollyfield’s melancholy novella delves into families that don’t fit well together—flesh-and-blood ones full of florid problems and, even more, put-together clans whose members chafe but strive to get along as the best option among bad ones. Christina finds herself caught between that yearning for connection and the wariness at the hurt that can flow from it. There’s a kitchen-sink drama vibe to the somewhat shapeless narrative, with characters muddling through as dysfunctions and emotional funks wax and wane amid much therapeutic dialogue. At one point, a therapist advises Christina: “ ‘Family events and the sort of trauma you have been through may never fully heal,’ she counselled…‘learn to channel it appropriately and in the least painful way possible, rather than having the pain channel you.’ ” Fortunately, the author’s prose is evocative and atmospheric in conveying Christina’s life, split between half-desperate pleasures—“Most Saturdays I’d be back in the toilet cubicle of some dirty nightclub, pleasuring a girl against the cubicle door”—and tense alienation. (“He would watch me sometimes, let his eyes bore into me, made sure I registered his disgust. Men would do this often in my life, or else impose themselves in my space so easily and so dominantly that I was forced to acknowledge their presence, forced to accept their physical superiority. It was hard to stomach—men behaving like that around me—but harder still to try to change.”) Christina’s prickly uneasiness in her own skin—and sadness at the gulf that opens between her and others—gives her travails an authenticity and pathos that resonate.
A meandering but often affecting tale of ties that bind— and leave deep marks.
BULLETPROOF DECISIONS How Executives Can Get It Right, Every Time
Ugarte, Ruben Productivity Press (224 pp.) $29.95 paper | $16.17 e-book | Dec. 16, 2021 978-1-032-02825-5
A manual focuses on making wellreasoned decisions in business and personal contexts. In this guide, Ugarte offers readers a framework for making decisions that can be applied to personal choices as well as professional ones, although the book concentrates primarily on the business aspects of the process. The manual urges readers to maintain perspective, delegate appropriately, use relevant data, and develop a rubric for brainstorming and assessing options. The author encourages readers to automate the process where possible (a tactic he calls “the turtleneck principle,” citing Steve Jobs’ daily wearing of the shirts) and to use a framework of outcomes, options, and obstacles (“the 3 Os”) to structure and steer more complicated and high-stakes decisions. The book also explores decision-making from a leadership perspective, with an emphasis on the importance of avoiding micromanagement and allowing subordinates to take ownership of their own assessments. The volume’s final chapter addresses the use of data in decision-making, supplying solutions for feeling overwhelmed by too much information and guidance on when intuition is more important than numbers. The generally solid manual provides actionable insights and workable strategies, although it would have benefited from stronger editing. Ugarte displays a tendency to return to favorite examples repeatedly; for instance, the Chilean economy and the work of author Alan Weiss make multiple appearances in the text. The “behind the decision” case studies that appear throughout the volume often detract from the primary argument by presenting insufficient details and analysis or by engaging superficially with historical events. Ugarte is on much firmer ground discussing the decisions made by technology executives, skillfully using those choices to illustrate the book’s “3 Os.” That framework and other strategies presented in these pages are concrete enough to follow and flexible enough to fit a variety of circumstances, making the manual applicable to a broad audience. By encouraging readers to understand not only what decisions need to be made, but also the sociocultural forces that shape them and why the potential outcomes matter, the work delivers a grounded perspective.
A wide-ranging, helpful guide to formulating effective decisions.
THE MEDICINE MAGE 12 Steps From Depleted Doctor to Magic Healer of the New Earth
Zhong, Xuemei Independently Published (302 pp.) $14.97 paper | $9.99 e-book Oct. 21, 2020 979-8-5510-0812-5
A former immunologist lays the holistic groundwork for what she perceives as imperative changes needed in modern medicine.
In her timely guide, health and wellness coach Zhong, aka Dr. Z, addresses the critical conundrum of burnout affecting medical workers. With the problem amplified by the current pandemic, she recognizes the detrimental effects of chronic stress on the health care community and outlines how beneficial change can occur through her 12-step transformative program. She begins by isolating seven signs associated with burnout, which she likens to a soldier’s PTSD, a “moral injury” where someone’s “core value, identity, purpose, and self-worthiness are jeopardized by loyalty to the institute.” Withdrawal, weakness, and loss of compassion as a frontline worker can become a crisis, the author writes. While she concedes that burnout is an inevitable consequence, Zhong asserts that it allows opportunities for radical, beneficial paradigm shifts in health care systems. These changes include a general revision toward more health-focused approaches, the integration of holistic healing into disease management procedures, and the incorporation of organic learning and unlearning processes into one’s scope of medical practice. The author’s 12-step program for “future
doctors for the new world” forms the book’s core and includes practical guidance on envisioning the future of health care, focusing on personal and professional attention and intention, centering oneself amid a chaotic world, mastering emotions, and finding empowerment. Zhong believes the modern practice of medical care is generally and irrationally grounded in both a fear and an avoidance of death. Her program uniquely encourages an impartiality concerning life and death, as both are “equally beautiful parts of the process.”
To better illustrate and support her methodology in revamping medical practices, Zhong effectively includes aspects of spiritualism, poetry, allegorical storytelling, and personal observations in the manual. A section chronicling her own history growing up in Shanghai alongside her experiences as a biomedical researcher forms the basis of her ideology and affords readers a deeper perspective on the author. Watershed influences like practicing qi gong energy work and meditation became the impetus for Zhong’s eventual career change as she passionately envisioned new directions. The author openly describes her immense passion for creating a sanctuary training center for “soul-crushed and energetically depleted” health care professionals who desire renewed clarity and purpose and, most importantly, to “experience various healing modalities that are not taught in medical school.” Despite the pandemic lockdown, she proceeded with developing the Medicine Mage Academy, a yearlong, intuitive holistic training program conducted in a nature-based setting and encompassing aspects of organic learning and “consciousness downloading.” But in later chapters, the author veers into uncharted territory and the book loses some of its initial focus. Some readers may find her more science-minded inclusion of Taoism, the quantum entanglement phenomenon, interspecies telepathy, and theories on artificial intelligence and superconsciousness overly complex and distracting from her central theme of transformational wellness practices through human interconnectedness. Those able to extract and retain the volume’s central message will find Zhong’s enlightening and liberating suggestions on revamping health care a breath of fresh air.
A timely, profound, multidimensional guide on alternative methods of medical care delivery.
KIRKUS MEDIA LLC
# Chairman HERBERT SIMON
President & Publisher MARC WINKELMAN
Chief Executive Officer MEG LABORDE KUEHN
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When Your Book Has Been Banned in Schools
In mid-May of last year I met a trans boy; I’ll call him Jay. Jay was 9, with a bowl cut and a goofy smile. He waddled like a penguin over to the snack table to fill his pockets with candy, because who doesn’t want to walk like a penguin and have pockets full of candy? I had signed his copy of my book Call Me Max, an early reader introducing a trans boy and his friends. When I handed it back, his dad paused. “I just realized,” he said. “This is the copy he brought in. That started all this.” We were in Utah. I had traveled there to support teachers rallying at the Capitol to protest anti–LGBTQ+ bias in education. As an openly trans author who writes children’s books featuring trans characters, I had played a small role in that mobilization. Jay, this child who loves soccer and was learning to tell time, found the courage to tell his parents that he was trans earlier in 2021. They were immediately supportive, looked Kyle Lukoff up books featuring kids like him, and found my work. Jay wanted to share about himself with his class, so he brought Call Me Max to school and asked his teacher to read it aloud. She did, of course, because that’s what good teachers do, and accidentally put Jay in the middle of a local controversy with national implications.
That was the first time I found out about a school banning my work. A few weeks later, a similar situation erupted in Texas, when a fourth grade teacher read Call Me Max to her class and the district responded as though it was a crisis. In the latter half of 2021, hundreds of other books—mostly, but not exclusively, by authors from marginalized communities— have encountered censorship ranging from subtly pernicious to cartoonishly over-the-top. There are other calamities to attend to (an ongoing pandemic, accelerating climate change), but this one is also deadly.
Common responses to book banning include talking points like “All children deserve to see themselves in literature,” which is true, and “parents shouldn’t decide what other people’s children can read,” which is also true.
It’s also common to talk about how banning books is an attempt to ban people and identities. In the fall of 2021 I watched a YouTube video of a school board meeting in Indiana where Call Me Max was read aloud to jeers of derision. I’ve spoken with embattled educators in southern California and central Pennsylvania, and a wealthy private school near New York City rescinded an invitation to have me speak, citing fears of parental backlash.
When I watch these school board meetings or read the bills introduced to penalize librarians for their collections, I see bloodlust barely disguised as civility. I see the veneer of due process peeling around the edges of genocidal fantasies. I see Jay, and his peers, and his adult counterparts like myself, twisted from human beings into points of rhetoric and symbols of societal degeneracy. And I see allies struggling to engage with the other side on their terms, allowing them to continually move the goal posts of acceptability, dragging the rest of us with them. It’s beyond time to reclaim those goal posts and pull them entirely in our direction, but it’s not too late.
Charles Ludeke
Kyle Lukoff is the author of Call Me Max and other titles for young readers; his novel Too Bright To See was a National Book Award finalist.
