"Death Among the Ruins"

New from Severn House: Death Among the Ruins by Susanna Calkins.

About the book, from the publisher:

Midnight assignations, dresses fit to meet the queen . . . and murder most horrid! Printer’s apprentice Lucy Campion investigates a puzzling death in this thrilling historical mystery set in seventeenth-century London.

London, 1668. Printer’s apprentice Lucy Campion is suspicious when she meets a young ragpicker who claims to have fine clothes to sell from a lady of quality. Are the garments stolen . . . or a sign of something worse?

Her suspicions are soon realized when the clothes are identified as belonging to a recently deceased elderly aristocrat. Young Mercy Sykes has robbed a grave! Mercy is arrested, and it’s only thanks to Lucy’s intervention that the ragpicker, who’s struggling to support her family, isn’t locked up.

Lucy doesn’t expect to see Mercy again, but their meeting soon has unexpected consequences. For when Mercy finds a dead woman in the ruins of Christchurch, dressed in unexpected finery, it’s to Lucy who she turns for help...

Lucy Campion is a feisty working-class heroine, plying her trade as a printer’s apprentice in Renaissance London. If you’re new to the series (it’s safe to jump right in), we can’t wait for you to meet her in this twisty, puzzle-packed historical mystery, brimming with authenticity!

Learn more about the book and author at Susanna Calkins's website.

The Page 69 Test: A Murder at Rosamund's Gate.

The Page 69 Test: The Masque of a Murderer.

The Page 69 Test: A Death Along the River Fleet.

The Page 69 Test: Murder Knocks Twice.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Entanglement"

Coming soon from Princeton University Press: The Entanglement: How Art and Philosophy Make Us What We Are by Alva Noë.

About the book, from the publisher:

Why human nature is an aesthetic phenomenon―and why we need art and philosophy to understand ourselves

In The Entanglement, philosopher Alva Noë explores the inseparability of life, art, and philosophy, arguing that we have greatly underestimated what this entangled reality means for understanding human nature.

Life supplies art with its raw materials, but art, Noë argues, remakes life by giving us resources to live differently. Our lives are permeated with the aesthetic. Indeed, human nature is an aesthetic phenomenon, and art―our most direct and authentic way of engaging the aesthetic―is the truest way of understanding ourselves. All this suggests that human nature is not a natural phenomenon. Neither biology, cognitive science, nor AI can tell a complete story of us, and we can no more pin ourselves down than we can fix or settle on the meaning of an artwork. Even more, art and philosophy are the means to set ourselves free, at least to some degree, from convention, habit, technology, culture, and even biology. In making these provocative claims, Noë explores examples of entanglement―in artworks and seeing, writing and speech, and choreography and dancing―and examines a range of scientific efforts to explain the human.

Challenging the notions that art is a mere cultural curiosity and that philosophy has been outmoded by science, The Entanglement offers a new way of thinking about human nature, the limits of natural science in understanding the human, and the essential role of art and philosophy in trying to know ourselves.

Visit Alva Noë's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Loot"

New from Knopf: Loot: A Novel by Tania James.

About the book, from the publisher:

Abbas is just seventeen years old when his gifts as a woodcarver come to the attention of Tipu Sultan, and he is drawn into service at the palace in order to build a giant tiger automaton for Tipu’s sons, a gift to commemorate their return from British captivity. His fate—and the fate of the wooden tiger he helps create—will mirror the vicissitudes of nations and dynasties ravaged by war across India and Europe.

Working alongside the legendary French clockmaker Lucien du Leze, Abbas hones his craft, learns French, and meets Jehanne, the daughter of a French expatriate. When Du Leze is finally permitted to return home to Rouen, he invites Abbas to come along as his apprentice. But by the time Abbas travels to Europe, Tipu’s palace has been looted by British forces, and the tiger automaton has disappeared. To prove himself, Abbas must retrieve the tiger from an estate in the English countryside, where it is displayed in a collection of plundered art.

Learn more about the book and author at Tania James's website.

The Page 69 Test: Atlas of Unknowns.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Gas Mask in Interwar Germany"

New from Cambridge University Press: The Gas Mask in Interwar Germany: Visions of Chemical Modernity by Peter Thompson.

About the book, from the publisher:

Exploring the history of the gas mask in Germany from 1915 to the eve of the Second World War, Peter Thompson traces how chemical weapons and protective technologies like the gas mask produced new relationships to danger, risk, management and mastery in the modern age of mass destruction. Recounting the apocalyptic visions of chemical death that circulated in interwar Germany, he argues that while everyday encounters with the gas mask tended to exacerbate fears, the gas mask also came to symbolize debates about the development of military and chemical technologies in the Weimar Republic and the Third Reich. He underscores how the gas mask was tied into the creation of an exclusionary national community under the Nazis and the altered perception of environmental danger in the second half of the twentieth century. As this innovative new history shows, chemical warfare and protection technologies came to represent poignant visions of the German future.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Going Bicoastal"

New from Wednesday Books: Going Bicoastal by Dahlia Adler.

About the book, from the publisher:

A queer Sliding Doors YA rom-com in which a girl must choose between summer in NYC with her dad (and the girl she's always wanted) or LA with her estranged mom (and the guy she never saw coming).

In Dahlia Adler’s Going Bicoastal, there’s more than one path to happily ever after.

Natalya Fox has twenty-four hours to make the biggest choice of her life: stay home in NYC for the summer with her dad (and finally screw up the courage to talk to the girl she's been crushing on), or spend it with her basically estranged mom in LA (knowing this is the best chance she has to fix their relationship, if she even wants to.) (Does she want to?)

How's a girl supposed to choose?

She can't, and so both summers play out in alternating timelines - one in which Natalya explores the city, tries to repair things with her mom, works on figuring out her future, and goes for the girl she's always wanted. And one in which Natalya explores the city, tries to repair things with her mom, works on figuring out her future, and goes for the guy she never saw coming.

Visit Dahlia Adler's website.

The Page 69 Test: Cool for the Summer.

Q&A with Dahlia Adler.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Most Tolerant Little Town"

New from Simon & Schuster: A Most Tolerant Little Town: The Explosive Beginning of School Desegregation by Rachel Louise Martin.

About the book, from the publisher:

An intimate portrait of a small town living through tumultuous times, this propulsive piece of forgotten civil rights history—about the first school to attempt court-ordered desegregation in the wake of Brown v. Board—will forever change how you think of the end of racial segregation in America.

In graduate school, Rachel Martin volunteered with a Southern oral history project. One day, she was sent to a small town in Tennessee, in the foothills of the Appalachians, where locals wanted to build a museum to commemorate the events of September 1956, when Clinton High School became the first school in the former Confederacy to undergo court-mandated desegregation.

But not everyone wanted to talk. As one founder of the Tennessee White Youth told her, “Honey, there was a lot of ugliness down at the school that year; best we just move on and forget it.”

For years, Martin wondered what it was some white residents of Clinton didn’t want remembered. So she went back, eventually interviewing over sixty townsfolk—including nearly a dozen of the first students to desegregate Clinton High—to piece together what happened back in 1956: the death threats and beatings, picket lines and cross burnings, neighbors turned on neighbors and preachers for the first time at a loss for words. The national guard rushed to town, along with national journalists like Edward Morrow and even evangelist Billy Graham. But that wasn’t the most explosive secret Martin learned….

In A Most Tolerant Little Town, Rachel Martin weaves together over a dozen perspectives in a kaleidoscopic portrait of a small town living through a tumultuous turning point for America. The result is a spellbinding mystery, a riveting piece of forgotten civil rights history, and a poignant reminder of the toll on those who stand on the frontlines of social change.

You may never before have heard of Clinton, Tennessee—but you won’t be forgetting the town anytime soon.

Visit Rachel Louise Martin's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Spectacular"

New from Dutton: The Spectacular: A Novel by Fiona Davis.

About the book, from the publisher:

From the New York Times Bestselling Author of The Magnolia Palace: A thrilling story about love, sacrifice, and the pursuit of dreams, set amidst the glamour and glitz of Radio City Music Hall in its mid-century heyday.

New York City, 1956: Nineteen-year-old Marion Brooks knows she should be happy. Her high school sweetheart is about to propose and sweep her off to the life everyone has always expected they’d have together: a quiet house in the suburbs, Marion staying home to raise their future children. But instead, Marion finds herself feeling trapped. So when she comes across an opportunity to audition for the famous Radio City Rockettes—the glamorous precision-dancing troupe—she jumps at the chance to exchange her predictable future for the dazzling life of a performer.

Meanwhile, the city is reeling from a string of bombings orchestrated by a person the press has nicknamed the “Big Apple Bomber,” who has been terrorizing the citizens of New York for sixteen years by planting bombs in popular, crowded spaces. With the public in an uproar over the lack of any real leads after a yearslong manhunt, the police turn in desperation to Peter Griggs, a young doctor at a local mental hospital who espouses a radical new technique: psychological profiling.

As both Marion and Peter find themselves unexpectedly pulled in to the police search for the bomber, Marion realizes that as much as she’s been training herself to blend in—performing in perfect unison with all the other identical Rockettes—if she hopes to catch the bomber, she’ll need to stand out and take a terrifying risk. In doing so, she may be forced to sacrifice everything she’s worked for, as well as the people she loves the most.

Visit Fiona Davis's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Address.

My Book, The Movie: The Masterpiece.

My Book, The Movie: The Chelsea Girls.

The Page 69 Test: The Chelsea Girls.

My Book, The Movie: The Lions of Fifth Avenue.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Russia in Africa"

New from Oxford University Press: Russia in Africa: Resurgent Great Power or Bellicose Pretender? by Samuel Ramani.

About the book, from the publisher:

Three decades after the Soviet Union's collapse, Russia has transformed from a fringe player to a resurgent great power in Africa. The October 2019 Russia-Africa Summit in Sochi highlighted the appeal of Russia's normative agenda, the ubiquity of Russian military technology, and the breadth of Moscow's presence on the continent. Beneath the pageantry, a darker side of Russia's African resurgence looms large. From Libya to Madagascar, Russia has used sinister tactics to expand its influence, such as private military contractors, shadowy mining and energy deals with authoritarian regimes, and election interference campaigns.

This book presents a chronological examination of Russia's post-Cold War foreign policy towards Africa, and outlines the factors that have enabled and impeded the growth of its influence. It pays special attention to the non-material factors behind this rising power; the domestic drivers of Russian decision-making; Moscow's relationships with fellow external powers; and African perspectives on Russia's geopolitical role. Samuel Ramani's analysis cites extensively both Russian-language media and academic sources, and his own interviews with Russian and African elites. His fascinating study challenges popular depictions of Russia as an opportunistic anti-Western actor, instead emphasizing Moscow's strategic commitment to Africa and the endurance of historical memory.

Follow Samuel Ramani on Twitter.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Return to Valetto"

New from Farrar, Straus and Giroux: Return to Valetto: A Novel by Dominic Smith.

About the book, from the publisher:

From the bestselling author of The Last Painting of Sara de Vos, Dominic Smith’s Return to Valetto tells of a nearly abandoned Italian village, the family that stayed, and long-buried secrets from World War II.

On a hilltop in Umbria sits Valetto. Once a thriving village—and a hub of resistance and refuge during World War II—centuries of earthquakes, landslides, and the lure of a better life have left it neglected. Only ten residents remain, including the widows Serafino—three eccentric sisters and their steely centenarian mother—who live quietly in their medieval villa. Then their nephew and grandson, Hugh, a historian, returns.

But someone else has arrived before him, laying claim to the cottage where Hugh spent his childhood summers. The unwelcome guest is the captivating and no-nonsense Elisa Tomassi, who asserts that the family patriarch, Aldo Serafino, a resistance fighter whom her own family harbored, gave the cottage to them in gratitude. But like so many threads of history, this revelation unravels a secret—a betrayal, a disappearance, and an unspeakable act of violence—that has impacted Valetto across generations. Who will answer for the crimes of the past?

Dominic Smith’s Return to Valetto is a riveting journey into one family’s dark history, a page-turning excavation of the ruins of history and our commitment to justice in a fragile world. For fans of Amor Towles, Anthony Doerr, and Jess Walter, it is a deeply human and transporting testament to the possibility of love and understanding across gaps of all kinds—even time.

Visit Dominic Smith's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Mercury Visions of Louis Daguerre.

The Page 69 Test: Bright and Distant Shores.

The Page 69 Test: The Electric Hotel.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Digitizing Diagnosis"

Coming July 25 from Johns Hopkins University Press: Digitizing Diagnosis: Medicine, Minds, and Machines in Twentieth-Century America by Andrew S. Lea.

About the book, from the publisher:

A fascinating history of the first attempts to computerize medical diagnosis.

Beginning in the 1950s, interdisciplinary teams of physicians, engineers, mathematicians, and philosophers began to explore the possible application of a new digital technology to one of the most central, and vexed, tasks of medicine: diagnosis. In Digitizing Diagnosis, Andrew Lea examines these efforts—and the larger questions, debates, and transformations that emerged in their wake.

While surveying the continuities spanning the analog and digital worlds of medicine, Lea uncovers how the introduction of the computer to medical diagnosis reconfigured the identities of patients, diseases, and physicians. Debates about how and whether to apply computers to the problem of diagnosis, he demonstrates, were animated by larger concerns about the nature of medical reasoning, the definitions of disease, and the authority and identity of physicians and patients.

In their attempts to digitize diagnosis, these interdisciplinary groups of researchers repeatedly came up against fundamental moral and philosophical questions. How should doctors classify diseases? Could humans understand, and come to trust, the opaque decision-making processes of machines? And how might computerized systems circumvent—or calcify—bias? As medical algorithms become more deeply integrated into clinical care, researchers, clinicians, and caregivers continue to grapple with these questions today.

Follow Andrew Lea on Twitter and visit his website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Lady Tan's Circle of Women"

New from Scribner: Lady Tan's Circle of Women by Lisa See.

About the book, from the publisher:

The latest historical novel from New York Times bestselling author Lisa See, inspired by the true story of a woman physician from 15th-century China—perfect for fans of See’s classic Snowflower and the Secret Fan and The Island of Sea Women.

According to Confucius, “an educated woman is a worthless woman,” but Tan Yunxian—born into an elite family, yet haunted by death, separations, and loneliness—is being raised by her grandparents to be of use. Her grandmother is one of only a handful of female doctors in China, and she teaches Yunxian the pillars of Chinese medicine, the Four Examinations—looking, listening, touching, and asking—something a man can never do with a female patient.

From a young age, Yunxian learns about women’s illnesses, many of which relate to childbearing, alongside a young midwife-in-training, Meiling. The two girls find fast friendship and a mutual purpose—despite the prohibition that a doctor should never touch blood while a midwife comes in frequent contact with it—and they vow to be forever friends, sharing in each other’s joys and struggles. No mud, no lotus, they tell themselves: from adversity beauty can bloom.

But when Yunxian is sent into an arranged marriage, her mother-in-law forbids her from seeing Meiling and from helping the women and girls in the household. Yunxian is to act like a proper wife—embroider bound-foot slippers, pluck instruments, recite poetry, give birth to sons, and stay forever within the walls of the family compound, the Garden of Fragrant Delights.

How might a woman like Yunxian break free of these traditions, go on to treat women and girls from every level of society, and lead a life of such importance that many of her remedies are still used five centuries later? How might the power of friendship support or complicate these efforts? Lady Tan’s Circle of Women is a captivating story of women helping other women. It is also a triumphant reimagining of the life of a woman who was remarkable in the Ming dynasty and would be considered remarkable today.

Visit Lisa See's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The First Atomic Bomb"

New from the University of Nebraska Press: The First Atomic Bomb: The Trinity Site in New Mexico by Janet Farrell Brodie.

About the book, from the publisher:

On July 16, 1945, just weeks before the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that brought about the surrender of Japan and the end of World War II, the United States unleashed the world’s first atomic bomb at the Trinity testing site located in the remote Tularosa Valley in south-central New Mexico. Immensely more powerful than any weapon the world had seen, the bomb’s effects on the surrounding and downwind communities of plants, animals, birds, and humans have lasted decades.

In The First Atomic Bomb Janet Farrell Brodie explores the history of the Trinity test and those whose contributions have rarely, if ever, been discussed—the men and women who constructed, served, and witnessed the first test—as well as the downwinders who suffered the consequences of the radiation. Concentrating on these ordinary people, laborers, ranchers, and Indigenous peoples who lived in the region and participated in the testing, Brodie corrects the lack of coverage in existing scholarship on the essential details and everyday experiences of this globally significant event. The First Atomic Bomb also covers the environmental preservation of the Trinity test site and compares it with the wide range of atomic sites now preserved independently or as part of the new Manhattan Project National Historical Park. Although the Trinity site became a significant node for testing the new weapons of the postwar United States, it is known today as an officially designated National Historic Landmark. Brodie presents a timely, important, and innovative study of an explosion that carries special historical weight in American memory.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Love Betrayal Murder"

New from Blackstone Publishing: Love Betrayal Murder by Adam Mitzner.

About the book, from the publisher:

From the bestselling author of Dead Certain and The Perfect Marriage comes a smart and twisty legal thriller about love, life, and truth that careens to a shocking conclusion you won’t soon forget…

Matthew Brooks and Vanessa Lyons are a perfect love match, both attorneys at a powerful New York City law firm. But there’s a hitch: Matt just made partner, and Vanessa is coming up for partner next year. And Vanessa’s husband has his suspicions.

Vanessa is assigned to the biggest case at the firm, the one that will determine her future. Unfortunately, Matt has been working the case for years, leaving him no choice but to supervise his lover in violation of firm policy. When Vanessa is denied her partnership, despite assurances to the contrary, she can only assume that her affair with Matt was the reason.

Then, on a crowded Manhattan street corner, a knife flashes in the midday sun, leaving behind a scene of horror. But with so many having been betrayed, and no one telling the truth, will the murderer be brought to justice? Even after hearing the gripping courtroom testimony, readers will be unsure who is the betrayed and who is the betrayer, right up until the culminating jaw-dropping reveal.

Learn more about the book and author at Adam Mitzner's website.

The Page 69 Test: A Conflict of Interest.

My Book, The Movie: A Conflict of Interest.

The Page 69 Test: A Case of Redemption.

My Book, The Movie: A Case of Redemption.

The Page 69 Test: Losing Faith.

My Book, The Movie: Losing Faith.

The Page 69 Test: A Matter of Will.

Writers Read: Adam Mitzner (July 2019).

My Book, the Movie: A Matter of Will.

My Book, The Movie: The Perfect Marriage.

The Page 69 Test: The Perfect Marriage.

Q&A with Adam Mitzner.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Supermajority"

New from Simon & Schuster: The Supermajority: How the Supreme Court Divided America by Michael Waldman.

About the book, from the publisher:

An incisive analysis of how the Supreme Court’s new conservative supermajority is overturning decades of law and leading the country in a dangerous political direction.

In The Supermajority, Michael Waldman explores the tumultuous 2021­–2022 Supreme Court term. He draws deeply on history to examine other times the Court veered from the popular will, provoking controversy and backlash. And he analyzes the most important new rulings and their implications for the law and for American society. Waldman asks: What can we do when the Supreme Court challenges the country?

Over three days in June 2022, the conservative supermajority overturned the constitutional right to abortion, possibly opening the door to reconsider other major privacy rights, as Justice Clarence Thomas urged. The Court sharply limited the authority of the EPA, reducing the prospects for combatting climate change. It radically loosened curbs on guns amid an epidemic of mass shootings. It fully embraced legal theories such as “originalism” that will affect thousands of cases throughout the country.

These major decisions—and the next wave to come—will have enormous ramifications for every American.

It was the most turbulent term in memory—with the leak of the opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, the first Black woman justice sworn in, and the justices turning on each other in public, Waldman previews the 2022–2023 term and how the brewing fights over the Supreme Court and its role that already have begun to reshape politics.

The Supermajority is a revelatory examination of the Supreme Court at a time when its dysfunction—and the demand for reform—are at the center of public debate.

Follow Michael Waldman on Twitter.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Disappearance in Fiji"

New from Soho Crime: A Disappearance in Fiji by Nilima Rao.

About the book, from the publisher:

A charming and atmospheric debut mystery featuring a 25-year-old Indian police sergeant investigating a missing persons case in colonial Fiji

1914, Fiji: Akal Singh, 25, would rather be anywhere but this tropical paradise—or, as he calls it, “this godforsaken island.” After a promising start to his police career in Hong Kong, Akal has been sent to Fiji as punishment for a humiliating professional mistake. Lonely and grumpy, Akal plods through his work and dreams of getting back to Hong Kong or his native India.

When an indentured Indian woman goes missing from a sugarcane plantation and Fiji’s newspapers scream “kidnapping,” the inspector-general reluctantly assigns Akal the case. Akal, eager to achieve redemption, agrees—but soon finds himself far more invested than he could have expected.

Now not only is he investigating a disappearance, but also confronting the brutal realities of the indentured workers’ existence and the racism of the British colonizers in Fiji—along with his own thorny notions of personhood and caste. Early interrogations of the white plantation owners, Indian indentured laborers, and native Fijians yield only one conclusion: there is far more to this case than meets the eye.

Nilima Rao’s sparkling debut mystery offers an unflinching look at the evils of colonialism, even as it brims with wit, vibrant characters, and fascinating historical detail.

Follow Nilima Rao on Facebook.

--Marshal Zeringue

"I Feel Love"

New from Bloomsbury: I Feel Love: MDMA and the Quest for Connection in a Fractured World by Rachel Nuwer.

About the book, from the publisher:

The unlikely story of how the psychedelic drug MDMA emerged from the shadows to the forefront of a medical revolution--and the potential it may hold to help us thrive.

Few drugs in history have generated as much controversy as MDMA--or held as much promise. Once vilified as a Schedule I substance that would supposedly eat holes in users' brains, MDMA (also known as Molly or Ecstasy) is now being hailed as a therapeutic agent that could transform the field of mental health and outpace psilocybin and ketamine as the first psychedelic approved for widespread clinical use. In I Feel Love, science journalist Rachel Nuwer separates fact from fantasy, hope from hype, in the drug's contested history and still-evolving future. Evidence from scientific trials suggests MDMA, properly administered, can be startlingly effective at relieving the effects of trauma. Results from other studies point to its usefulness for individual and couples therapy; for treating depression, alcohol addiction, and eating disorders; and for cultivating personal growth. Yet scientists are still racing to discover how MDMA achieves these outcomes, a mystery that is taking them into the inner recesses of the brain and the deep history of evolution. With its power to dismantle psychological defenses and induce feelings of empathy, self-compassion, and love, MDMA may answer profound questions about how we became human, and how to heal our broken social bonds.

From cutting-edge labs to pulsing club floors to the intimacy of the therapist's couch, Nuwer guides readers through a cultural and scientific upheaval that is rewriting our understanding of our brains, our selves, and the space between.

Visit Rachel Nuwer's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Ride or Die"

New from Soho Teen: Ride or Die by Gail-Agnes Musikavanhu.

About the book, from the publisher:

Gail-Agnes Musikavanhu’s adrenaline-packed joyride of a debut is an ode to Gen Z and chaotic teens—perfect for fans of Grace D. Li, Ebony Ladelle, and Baby Driver.

Best friends Loli Crawford and Ryan Pope have earned their nickname, the “Bonnie and Clyde of Woolridge High.” From illegal snack swapping in kindergarten to reckless car surfing in high school, they have been causing trouble in their uptight California town forever. But everyone knows that the mischief starts with Loli; when it comes to chasing thrills, drama, and adventure, no one is on her level.

At least until Loli throws the wildest party Woolridge High has ever seen and meets X, a strange, unidentified boy in the coat closet, who challenges her to a game she can’t refuse—one that promises to put her love of danger to the ultimate test.

Loli and X begin an anonymous correspondence, exchanging increasingly risky missions. Loli’s fun has always been free and easy, but things spin out of control as she attempts to one-up X’s every move. As Loli risks losing everything—including her oldest friend—she’ll face the most dangerous thing of all: falling for someone she shouldn’t.

Visit Gail-Agnes Musikavanhu's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"On Taking Offence"

New from Oxford University Press: On Taking Offence by Emily McTernan.

About the book, from the publisher:

Someone fails to shake your outstretched hand, puts you down in front of others, or makes a joke in poor taste. Should we take offence? Wouldn't it be better if we didn't? In the face of popular criticism of people taking offence too easily, and the social problems that creates, Emily McTernan defends taking offence as often morally appropriate and socially valuable. Within societies marred by inequality, taking offence can resist the day-to-day patterning of social hierarchies.

This book defends the significance of details of our social interactions. Cumulatively, small acts, and the social norms underlying these, can express and reinforce social hierarchies. But by taking offence, we mark an act as an affront to our social standing. We also often communicate our rejection of that affront to others. At times, taking offence can be a way to renegotiate the shared social norms around what counts as respectful treatment. Rather than a mere expression of hurt feelings then, to take offence can be to stand up for one's standing.

When taken by those deemed to have less social standing, to take offence can be a direct act of insubordination against a social hierarchy. Taking offence can resist everyday inequalities. In unequal societies, the inclination to take offence at the right things, and to the right degree, may even be a civic virtue. These right things at which to take offence include many of the very instances that the opponents of a culture of taking offence find most objectionable: apparently trivial and small-scale details of our social interactions.

Visit Emily McTernan's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Drowning Woman"

Coming June 13 from Grand Central Publishing: The Drowning Woman by Robyn Harding.

About the book, from the publisher:

Lee Gulliver never thought she’d find herself living on the streets—no one ever does—but when her restaurant fails, and she falls deeper into debt, she leaves her old life behind with nothing but her clothes and her Toyota Corolla. In Seattle, she parks in a secluded spot by the beach to lay low and plan her next move—until early one morning, she sees a sobbing woman throw herself into the ocean. Lee hauls the woman back to the surface, but instead of appreciation, she is met with fury. The drowning woman, Hazel, tells her that she wanted to die, that she’s trapped in a toxic, abusive marriage, that she’s a prisoner in her own home. Lee has thwarted her one chance to escape her life.

Out of options, Hazel retreats to her gilded cage, and Lee thinks she’s seen the last of her, until her unexpected return the next morning. Bonded by disparate but difficult circumstances, the women soon strike up a close and unlikely friendship. And then one day, Hazel makes a shocking request: she wants Lee to help her disappear. It’ll be easy, Hazel assures her, but Lee soon learns that nothing is as it seems, and that Hazel may not be the friend Lee thought she was.

Visit Robyn Harding's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Robyn Harding & Ozzie.

The Page 69 Test: The Arrangement.

My Book, The Movie: The Swap.

The Page 69 Test: The Perfect Family.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Graphic Literature"

Coming in July: The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Graphic Literature: Artists and Writers on Creating Graphic Narratives, Poetry Comics, and Literary Collage, edited by Kelcey Ervick and Tom Hart.

About the book, from the publisher:

FEATURING ESSAYS AND GRAPHIC LITERATURE WORK FROM: Justine Mara Andersen • Oliver Baez Bendorf • Leonie Brialey • Thi Bui • Sharon Lee De La Cruz • David Dodd Lee • Arwen Donahue • Trinidad Escobar • Naoko Fujimoto • Marnie Galloway • Lauren Haldeman • Tom Hart • Mira Jacob • Keith Knight • Aidan Koch • Matt Madden • Mita Mahato • Deborah A. Miranda • Josh Neufeld • Dustin Parsons • Zeke Peña • Nick Francis Potter • Kristen Radtke • Scott Roberts • Alexander Rothman • Eleni Sikelianos • Bianca Stone • Lawrence Sutin

The fourth volume in the immensely popular Field Guide series, The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Graphic Literature gives readers unprecedented insight into the techniques of 28 of today’s most innovative creators of poetry comics, graphic narratives, and image-text hybrids. With original craft essays, corresponding exercises, and full-color examples of their work, each contributor offers reflection and instruction informed by their own methods and processes. From mark-making and page composition to deeper renderings of place, character, and voice, this much-needed guide to the field illuminates and demystifies the process of creating image+text work. Editors Kelcey Ervick and Tom Hart also provide a historical introduction that links today’s graphic literature to visual storytelling of the past and helpful pedagogical resources to round out the volume. This is a book for writers who want to make graphic narratives and literary collage, illustrators and comics artists exploring new approaches to storytelling, teachers encouraging their students to work with image and text, and anyone curious about what one contributor calls “comics magic.”

--Marshal Zeringue

"Crow Mary"

New from Atria Books: Crow Mary: A Novel by Kathleen Grissom.

About the book, from the publisher:

The New York Times bestselling author of the “touching” (The Boston Globe) book club classics The Kitchen House and the “emotionally rewarding” (Booklist) Glory Over Everything returns with a sweeping saga inspired by the true story of Crow Mary—an indigenous woman torn between two worlds in 19th-century North America.

In 1872, sixteen-year-old Goes First, a Crow Native woman, marries Abe Farwell, a white fur trader. He gives her the name Mary, and they set off on the long trip to his trading post in the Cypress Hills of Saskatchewan, Canada. Along the way, she finds a fast friend in a Métis named Jeannie; makes a lifelong enemy in a wolfer named Stiller; and despite learning a dark secret of Farwell’s past, falls in love with her husband.

The winter trading season passes peacefully. Then, on the eve of their return to Montana, a group of drunken whiskey traders slaughters forty Nakota—despite Farwell’s efforts to stop them. Mary, hiding from the hail of bullets, sees the murderers, including Stiller, take five Nakota women back to their fort. She begs Farwell to save them, and when he refuses, Mary takes two guns, creeps into the fort, and saves the women from certain death. Thus, she sets off a whirlwind of colliding cultures that brings out the worst and best in the cast of unforgettable characters and pushes the love between Farwell and Crow Mary to the breaking point.

From an author with a “stirring and uplifting” (David R. Gillham, New York Times bestselling author) voice, Crow Mary sweeps across decades and the landscape of the upper West and Canada, showcasing the beauty of the natural world, while at the same time probing the intimacies of a marriage and one woman’s heart.

Visit Kathleen Grissom's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Neuroethics: Agency in the Age of Brain Science"

New from Oxford University Press: Neuroethics: Agency in the Age of Brain Science by Joshua May.

About the book, from the publisher:

Is free will an illusion? Is addiction a brain disease? Should we enhance our brains beyond normal? Neuroethics blends philosophical analysis with modern brain science to address these and other critical questions through captivating cases. The result is a nuanced view of human agency as surprisingly diverse and flexible. With a lively and accessible writing style, Neuroethics is an indispensable resource for students and scholars in both the sciences and humanities.

Visit Josh May's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Killingly"

New from Soho Press: Killingly by Katharine Beutner.

About the book, from the publisher:

Based on the unsolved real-life disappearance of a Mount Holyoke student in 1897—a haunting novel of intrigue, longing, and terror, perfect for fans of Donna Tartt and Sarah Waters

Massachusetts, 1897: Bertha Mellish, “the most peculiar, quiet, reserved girl” at Mount Holyoke College, is missing.

As a search team dredges the pond where Bertha might have drowned, her panicked father and sister arrive desperate to find some clue to her fate or state of mind. Bertha’s best friend, Agnes, a scholarly loner studying medicine, might know the truth, but she is being unhelpfully tightlipped, inciting the suspicions of Bertha’s family, her classmates, and the private investigator hired by the Mellish family doctor. As secrets from Agnes’s and Bertha’s lives come to light, so do the competing agendas driving each person who is searching for Bertha.

Where did Bertha go? Who would want to hurt her? And could she still be alive?

Edmund White Award–winning author Katharine Beutner takes a real-life unsolved mystery and crafts it into an unforgettable historical portrait of academia, family trauma, and the risks faced by women who dared to pursue unconventional paths at the end of the 19th century.

Visit Katharine Beutner's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Outrage: The Arts and the Creation of Modernity"

Coming soon from Stanford University Press: Outrage: The Arts and the Creation of Modernity by Katherine Giuffre.

About the book, from the publisher:

A cultural revolution in England, France, and the United States beginning during the time of the industrial and political revolutions helped usher in modernity. This cultural revolution worked alongside the better documented political and economic revolutions to usher in the modern era of continuous revolution. Focusing on the period between 1847 and 1937, the book examines in depth six of the cultural "battles" that were key parts of this revolution: the novels of the Brontë sisters, the paintings of the Impressionists, the poetry of Emily Dickinson, the Ballets Russes production of Le Sacre du printemps, James Joyce's Ulysses, and Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God. Using contemporaneous reviews in the press as well as other historical material, we can see that these now-canonical works provoked outrage at the time of their release because they addressed critical points of social upheaval and transformation in ways that engaged broad audiences with subversive messages. This framework allows us to understand and navigate the cultural debates that play such an important role in 21st century politics.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Traitor Beside Her"

New from Poisoned Pen Press: The Traitor Beside Her: A WWII Mystery by Mary Anna Evans.

About the book, from the publisher:

The Traitor Beside Her is an intricately plotted WWII espionage novel weaving together mystery, action, friendship, and a hint of romance perfect for fans of The Rose Code and Code Name Helene.

Justine Byrne can't trust the people working beside her. Arlington Hall, a former women's college in Virginia has been taken over by the United States Army where hundreds of men and women work to decode countless pieces of communication coming from the Axis powers.

Justine works among them, handling the most sensitive secrets of World War II—but she isn't there to decipher German codes—she's there to find a traitor.

Justine keeps her guard up and her ears open, confiding only in her best friend, Georgette, a fluent speaker of Choctaw who is training to work as a code talker. Justine tries to befriend each suspect, believing that the key to finding the spy lies not in cryptography but in understanding how code breakers tick. When young women begin to go missing at Arlington Hall, her deadline for unraveling the web of secrets becomes urgent and one thing remains clear: a single secret in enemy hands could end thousands of lives.

Learn more about the author and her work at Mary Anna Evans' website.

The Page 69 Test: Floodgates.

Writers Read: Mary Anna Evans (October 2010).

The Page 69 Test: Strangers.

My Book, The Movie: Strangers.

The Page 69 Test: Plunder.

Writers Read: Mary Anna Evans (November 2013).

The Page 69 Test: Rituals.

Q&A with Mary Anna Evans.

My Book, The Movie: The Physicists' Daughter.

The Page 69 Test: The Physicists' Daughter.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Love and Despair"

New from the University of California Press: Love and Despair: How Catholic Activism Shaped Politics and the Counterculture in Modern Mexico by Jaime M. Pensado.

About the book, from the publisher:

Love and Despair explores the multiple and mostly unknown ways progressive and conservative Catholic actors, such as priests, lay activists, journalists, intellectuals, and filmmakers, responded to the significant social and cultural shifts that formed competing notions of modernity in Cold War Mexico. Jaime M. Pensado demonstrates how the Catholic Church as a heterogeneous institution—with key transnational networks in Latin America and Western Europe—was invested in youth activism, state repression, and the counterculture from the postwar period to the more radical Sixties. Similar to their secular counterparts, progressive Catholics often saw themselves as revolutionary actors and nearly always framed their activism as an act of love. When their movements were repressed and their ideas were co-opted, marginalized, and commercialized at the end of the Sixties, the liberating hope of love often turned into a sense of despair.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Death Knells and Wedding Bells"

New from Crooked Lane Books: Death Knells and Wedding Bells by Eva Gates.

About the book, from the publisher:

Librarian Lucy’s wedding is nearly perfect—aside from a missing guest and the strangled body she finds. Now, she must vow to find the killer in this 10th Lighthouse Library mystery.

Lucy and Connor planned for the perfect Outer Banks wedding—and that’s exactly what they got. Aside from typical rumblings of familial tensions, the late spring weather allowed for a beautiful day, the food was delicious, and everyone had a good time, until one of the guests goes missing.

Before Lucy can look forward to the rest of her life in Nags Head and the work she does at the Bodie Island Lighthouse Library, she gets a phone call from her boss, Bertie James. Eddie, Bertie’s friend, never made it back home after the reception. Initially, Lucy doesn’t think anything of it—sometimes wedding guests simply have a little too much fun. But this quickly turns to something darker when she discovers the body of a wedding guest strangled in a locked closet, and the police immediately start asking questions about Eddie. Lucy must figure out if the two are connected before it’s too late—both for Bertie’s friend and the rest of her wedding guests.

With the Classic Novel Reading Club reading the Selected Works of Edgar Allan Poe—Lucy wonders if the master of the macabre can assist her investigation or if the hunt for the killer’s identity will remain as nothing more than an unsolved mystery.

Follow Eva Gates on Twitter and visit Vicki Delany's website.

The Page 69 Test: Death By Beach Read.

Writers Read: Eva Gates.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Kingfish U: Huey Long and LSU"

New from Louisiana State University Press: Kingfish U: Huey Long and LSU by Robert Mann.

About the book, from the publisher:

No political leader is more closely identified with Louisiana State University than the flamboyant governor and U.S. senator Huey P. Long, who devoted his last years to turning a small, undistinguished state school into an academic and football powerhouse. From 1931, when Long declared himself the “official thief” for LSU, to his death in 1935, the school’s budget mushroomed, its physical plant burgeoned, its faculty flourished, and its enrollment tripled.

Along with improving LSU’s academic reputation, Long believed the school’s football program and band were crucial to its success. Taking an intense interest in the team, Long delivered pregame and halftime pep talks, devised plays, stalked the sidelines during games, and fired two coaches. He poured money into a larger, flashier band, supervised the hiring of two directors, and, with the second one, wrote a new fight song, “Touchdown for LSU.”

While he rarely meddled in academic affairs, Long insisted that no faculty member criticize him publicly. When students or faculty from “his school” opposed him, retribution was swift. Long’s support for LSU did not come without consequences. His unrelenting involvement almost cost the university its accreditation. And after his death, several of his allies—including his handpicked university president—went to prison in a scandal that almost destroyed LSU.

Rollicking and revealing, Robert Mann’s Kingfish U is the definitive story of Long’s embrace of LSU.

Visit Robert Mann's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Mother Howl"

Coming soon from Datura Books: Mother Howl by Craig Clevenger.

About the book, from the publisher:

Compelling literary crime that follows the son of a serial murderer who changes his identity in a bid to escape his past.

Sixteen-year-old Lyle Edison recognizes the face of a murder victim on the nightly news – the waitress at his local diner. A place he often frequented with his dad. The following day his father is arrested and charged with her murder. And then eight further bodies are discovered.

Following the revelation that his dad is in fact a serial killer, Lyle is outcast and shunned. Forced to abandon his family, illegally obtaining a new identity, he moves away to start all over again.

Some years later, Lyle thinks he has finally moved on. But after several brushes with the law, Lyle’s past eventually catches up to him when a mysterious stranger known only as Icarus shows up and seems to know Lyle’s secret...

Visit Craig Clevenger's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Part-Time for All"

New from Oxford University Press: Part-Time for All: A Care Manifesto by Jennifer Nedelsky and Tom Malleson.

About the book, from the publisher:

An innovative view of how everyone doing part-time work and part-time caregiving would promote flourishing families, free time, equality, and the true value of care.

The way that Western countries approach work and care for others is fundamentally dysfunctional. The amount of time spent at work places unsustainable stress on families, particularly in the face of rising inequality, while those who perform care are underpaid and their labor undervalued.

In Part-Time for All, Jennifer Nedelsky and Tom Malleson propose a plan to radically restructure both work and care. As such, they offer a solution to four pressing problems: the inequality of caregivers; family stress from competing demands of work and care; chronic time scarcity; and policymakers who are ignorant about the care that life requires--the care/policy divide. Nedelsky and Malleson argue that no capable adult should do paid work for more than 30 hours per week, so that they can contribute substantial amounts of time to unpaid care for family, friends, or other "communities of care." While the authors focus primarily on human-to-human care, they also include care for the earth as a vital part of this shift. All of the elements of Nedelsky and Malleson's proposal already exist piecemeal in various countries. What is needed is to integrate the key reforms and scale them up. The result is an actionable plan to motivate widespread take-up of part-time work and part-time care.

Highlighting how these new norms can create synergies of institutional transformation while fostering a cultural shift in the value of care and work, this "care manifesto" identifies the deep changes that are needed and lays out a feasible path forward.

The Page 99 Test: Tom Malleson's Against Inequality.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Blessing of the Lost Girls"

Coming September 19 from William Morrow: Blessing of the Lost Girls: A Brady and Walker Family Novel by J. A. Jance.

About the book, from the publisher:

From J. A. Jance’s New York Times bestselling Brady and Walker novels, federal investigator Dan Pardee, Brandon Walker’s son-in-law, crosses paths with Sheriff Joanna Brady as he traces the bloody path of a merciless serial killer across the Southwest in this intense thriller.

Driven by a compulsion that challenges his self-control, the man calling himself Charles Milton prowls the rodeo circuit, hunting young women. He chooses those he believes are the most vulnerable, wandering alone and distracted, before he strikes. For years, he has been meticulous in his methods, abducting, murdering, and disposing his victims while leaving no evidence of his crimes—or their identities—behind. Indigenous women have become his target of choice, knowing law enforcement’s history of ignoring their disappearances.

A cold case has just been assigned to Dan Pardee, a field officer with the newly formed Missing and Murdered Indigenous People’s Task Force. Rosa Rios, a young woman of Apache descent and one-time rodeo star, vanished three years ago. Human remains, a homicide victim burned beyond recognition, were discovered in Cochise County around the time she went missing. They have finally been confirmed to be Rosa. With Sheriff Joanna Brady’s help, Dan is determined to reopen the case and bring long-awaited justice to Rosa’s family. As the orphaned son of a murdered indigenous woman, he feels an even greater, personal obligation to capture this killer.

Joanna’s daughter Jennifer is also taking a personal interest in this case, having known Rosa from her own amateur rodeo days. Now a criminal justice major, she’s unofficially joining the investigation. And as it becomes clear that Rosa was just one victim of a serial killer, both Jennifer and Dan know they’re running out of time to catch an elusive predator who’s proven capable of getting away with murder.

Visit J.A. Jance's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Ice"

New from G.P. Putnam’s Sons: Ice: From Mixed Drinks to Skating Rinks--a Cool History of a Hot Commodity by Amy Brady.

About the book, from the publisher:

The unexpected and unexplored ways that ice has transformed a nation—from the foods Americans eat, to the sports they play, to the way they live today—and what its future might look like on a swiftly warming planet.

Ice is everywhere: in gas stations, in restaurants, in hospitals, in our homes. Americans think nothing of dropping a few ice cubes into tall glasses of tea to ward off the heat of a hot summer day. Most refrigerators owned by Americans feature automatic ice machines. Ice on-demand has so revolutionized modern life that it’s easy to forget that it wasn’t always this way—and to overlook what aspects of society might just melt away as the planet warms.

In Ice, journalist and historian Amy Brady shares the strange and storied two-hundred-year-old history of ice in America: from the introduction of mixed drinks “on the rocks,” to the nation’s first-ever indoor ice rink, to how delicacies like ice creams and iced tea revolutionized our palates, to the ubiquitous ice machine in every motel across the US. But Ice doesn’t end in the past. Brady also explores the surprising present-day uses of ice in sports, medicine, and sustainable energy—including cutting-edge cryotherapy breast-cancer treatments and new refrigerator technologies that may prove to be more energy efficient—underscoring how precious this commodity is, especially in an age of climate change.

Visit Amy Brady's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Road Towards Home"

New from Lake Union: The Road Towards Home: A Novel by Corinne Demas.

About the book, from the publisher:

In this witty, warm novel by award-winning author Corinne Demas, unexpected changes bring two retirees together on a voyage of self-discovery from past regrets to the true meaning of happily ever after.

Widower Noah Shilling considers Clarion Court to be less an independent living community and more a prison. But there may be hope for the place yet. The newest resident is bold, eccentric, rule-breaking Cassandra Joyce―whom, as it turns out, Noah met long ago in college.

As Noah and Cassandra get reacquainted, major changes at Clarion Court force them both to reevaluate their living situation. When Noah invites Cassandra to rough it with him at his Cape Cod cottage, the old friends must decide whether they should risk embarking on the next stage of their journey together.

But moving forward means coming to terms with the past and relying on each other to do so, which is something the stubbornly independent pair may not be ready for. They’ve come this far on their own, and unless they can reconcile a lifetime of emotional baggage, the road they started down together may lead instead to parted ways.

Visit Corinne Demas's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Returns to Power"

New from Oxford University Press: The Returns to Power: A Political Theory of Economic Inequality by Thomas F. Remington.

About the book, from the publisher:

An unconventional perspective on contemporary economic inequality in America and its dangers for democracy, using comparisons with Russia, China and Germany.

Since the economic liberalization wave that began in the late 1970s, inequality around the world has skyrocketed.

In The Returns to Power, Thomas F. Remington examines the rise of extreme economic inequality in the United States since the late 1970s by drawing comparisons to the effects of market reforms in transition countries such as Russia, China, and Germany. Employing an unconventional comparative framework, he brings together the latest scholarship in economics and political science and draws on Russian, Chinese, and German-language sources. As he shows, the US embraced deregulation and market-based solutions around the same time that China and Russia implemented major privatization and liberalization reforms. The long-term result was increasing inequality in all three nations. To illustrate why, Remington contrasts the effects of these policies with the postwar economic recovery program in Germany, which succeeded in protecting market competition within the framework of a social market economy that provides widely shared prosperity, high growth, and robust democracy. The book concludes with an analysis of the political dangers posed by high inequality and calls for a new public philosophy of liberal capitalism and liberal democracy that would restore political equality and inclusive growth by strengthening political and market competition, expanding the provision of public goods, and broadening social insurance protection.

An ambitious account of why political and economic inequality has increased so much in recent times, The Returns to Power's emphasis on policy variation across democracies also reminds us that it did not have to turn out this way.

Visit Thomas F. Remington's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Just Another Missing Person"

Coming August 1 from William Morrow: Just Another Missing Person: A Novel by Gillian McAllister.

About the book, from the publisher:

There’s a man out there. His weapon isn’t a gun, or a knife. It’s a secret.

OLIVIA:

22 years old.

No history of running away.

Last seen on CCTV, entering a dead-end alley.

And not coming back out again.

Missing for one day and counting . . .

JULIA;

The detective heading up the case.

She knows what to expect. A desperate family, a ticking clock, and long hours away from her daughter.

But Julia has no idea how close to home this case is going to get.

Because her family’s safety depends on one thing: Julia must not find out what happened to Olivia and must frame somebody else for her murder . . .

What would you do?

Follow Gillian McAllister on Twitter.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Locusts of Power"

New from Cambridge University Press: Locusts of Power: Borders, Empire, and Environment in the Modern Middle East by Samuel Dolbee.

About the book, from the publisher:

In this highly original environmental history, Samuel Dolbee sheds new light on borders and state formation by following locusts and revealing how they shaped both the environment and people's imaginations from the late Ottoman Empire to the Second World War. Drawing on a wide range of archival research in multiple languages, Dolbee details environmental, political, and spatial transformations in the region's history by tracing the movements of locusts and their intimate relationship to people in motion, including Arab and Kurdish nomads, Armenian deportees, and Assyrian refugees, as well as states of the region. With locusts and moving people at center stage, surprising continuities and ruptures appear in the Jazira, the borderlands of today's Iraq, Syria, and Turkey. Transcending approaches focused on the collapse of the Ottoman Empire or the creation of nation states, Dolbee provides a new perspective on the modern Middle East grounded in environmental change, state violence, and popular resistance.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Paris Deception"

New from MIRA: The Paris Deception: A Novel by Bryn Turnbull.

About the book, from the publisher:

From internationally bestselling author Bryn Turnbull comes a breathtaking novel about art theft and forgery in Nazi-occupied Paris, and two brave women who risk their lives rescuing looted masterpieces from Nazi destruction.

Sophie Dix fled Stuttgart with her brother as the Nazi regime gained power in Germany. Now, with her brother gone and her adopted home city of Paris conquered by the Reich, Sophie reluctantly accepts a position restoring damaged art at the Jeu de Paume museum under the supervision of the ERR—a German art commission using the museum as a repository for art they’ve looted from Jewish families.

Fabienne Brandt was a rising star in the Parisian bohemian arts movement until the Nazis put a stop to so-called “degenerate” modern art. Still mourning the loss of her firebrand husband, she’s resolved to muddle her way through the occupation in whatever way she can—until her estranged sister-in-law, Sophie, arrives at her door with a stolen painting in hand.

Soon the two women embark upon a plan to save Paris’s “degenerates,” working beneath the noses of Germany’s top art connoisseurs to replace the paintings in the Jeu de Paume with skillful forgeries—but how long can Sophie and Fabienne sustain their masterful illusion?

Visit Bryn Turnbull's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Plato of Athens: A Life in Philosophy"

New from Oxford University Press: Plato of Athens: A Life in Philosophy by Robin Waterfield.

About the book, from the publisher:

The first ever biography of the founder of Western philosophy

Considered by many to be the most important philosopher ever, Plato was born into a well-to-do family in wartime Athens at the end of the fifth century BCE. In his teens, he honed his intellect by attending lectures from the many thinkers who passed through Athens and toyed with the idea of writing poetry. He finally decided to go into politics, but became disillusioned, especially after the Athenians condemned his teacher, Socrates, to death. Instead, Plato turned to writing and teaching. He began teaching in his twenties and later founded the Academy, the world's first higher-educational research and teaching establishment. Eventually, he returned to practical politics and spent a considerable amount of time and energy trying to create a constitution for Syracuse in Sicily that would reflect and perpetuate some of his political ideals. The attempts failed, and Plato's disappointment can be traced in some of his later political works.

In his lifetime and after, Plato was considered almost divine. Though a measure of his importance, this led to the invention of many tall tales about him-both by those who adored him and his detractors. In this first ever full-length portrait of Plato, Robin Waterfield steers a judicious course among these stories, debunking some while accepting the kernels of truth in others. He explains why Plato chose to write dialogues rather than treatises and gives an overview of the subject matter of all of Plato's books. Clearly and engagingly written throughout, Plato of Athens is the perfect introduction to the man and his work.

Visit Robin Waterfield's website.

The Page 99 Test: Taken at the Flood.

The Page 99 Test: The Making of a King.

--Marshal Zeringue