"Frivolity: A Defense"

New from Columbia University Press: Frivolity: A Defense by Jehanne Dubrow.

About the book, from the publisher:

Why must everything be so important―so dour and solemn, so grim and austere? How about a feather boa, some frilly lace, and a bright splash of pink? In Frivolity, Jehanne Dubrow stands up for the seemingly shallow and trifling, calling for a reconsideration of what we find worthy and what we dismiss.

This book is a provocation. It offers a defense of the pursuits, objects, and people denigrated as frivolous, asking why we so readily scorn them and why, in particular, the label is so often tied to femininity and queerness. Its 101 sections move lightly across literature, art, and popular culture, from Susan Sontag, Sei Shōnagon, Jane Austen, and Mozart to Barbie, Nora Ephron rom-coms, exclamation points, and Dubrow’s own “Year of Perfect Skin.” Written in a lyrical style, this book takes both an intimate and a rigorous approach to thinking about the frivolous, blending personal essay with scholarship.

For Dubrow, frivolity is a way of affirming the importance of joy and silliness. And don’t we need a little more of both these things in an era made all too serious by autocracy and terror?

Learn more about the book and author at Jehanne Dubrow's website.

Writers Read: Jehanne Dubrow (April 2010).

Writers Read: Jehanne Dubrow (November 2012).

Coffee with a Canine: Jehanne Dubrow and Argos.

Coffee with a Canine: Jehanne Dubrow & Lola and Bandit.

Writers Read: Jehanne Dubrow (August 2022).

The Page 99 Test: Taste: A Book of Small Bites.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Dance of Burning Blades"

New from S&S/Saga Press: A Dance of Burning Blades (Invoker Trilogy) by M.H. Ayinde.

About the novel, from the publisher:

War rages on in the second heart-pounding novel in M. H. Ayinde’s relentless epic fantasy series The Invoker Trilogy, a sweeping epic of revenge and rebellion set in a richly drawn world of warring clans and ancestor magic.

A DANCE OF RAGE. A DANCE OF RUIN. A DANCE OF BURNING BLADES.

Tension simmers across the Nine Lands. In the capital, the people of Lordsgrave seethe with resentment after the horrors of the greyblood attack. Clan Adatali is in open rebellion against the king, and as war in the Feverlands rages on, a humble tree feller—who looks a lot like missing invoker Jinao Mizito—has not forgotten the promise he made to avenge his brother.

Meanwhile, in the shadows, the king’s daughter Lyela continues to move her pieces across the board. Can the people of the Nine Lands reclaim their stolen history and unlock the secrets that have been kept from them for centuries?

Visit M. H. Ayinde's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"On the Mark"

New from Basic Books: On the Mark: From Periods to Interrobangs, How Punctuation Remade the World by Florence Hazrat.

About the book, from the publisher:

A lively history of punctuation, from ancient times to the age of the emoji.

You know the lively exclamation mark, the controversial semicolon, and the often-omitted apostrophe, but would you recognize a percontation point? How about an obelus? In this irreverent and delightfully intellectual book, Florence Hazrat argues that all punctuation marks, from the most forgotten to the most ubiquitous, are worthy of our attention. After all, the history of punctuation is the history of humankind.

The first punctuation mark was a triangular symbol pressed into clay somewhere in Mesopotamia. Spaces between words were unknown for millennia, until a group of Irish monks pioneered them in the eighth century. Across ages and cultures, amid technological revolutions and radical changes in communication, these dots and dashes have reshaped the societies that created them. From the papyruses of the ancient world to our sprawling internet ecosystem, one thing has remained constant: Punctuation is powerful. These tiny marks can move markets, shift elections, topple political systems, and decide the fate of a precious human life on death row.

Weaving together anthropology, the history of writing, the philosophy of language, psychology, literature, and more, On the Mark masterfully proves that punctuation is at the heart of human communication.

Visit Florence Hazrat's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Shadows That Listen"

Coming August 18 from Orbit: The Shadows That Listen (Angel Ruin, 1) by Louisa Carmody.

About the book, from the publisher:

Angels and daemons are at war, and humanity is caught in the middle. The shadows lengthen, and they listen. Who will survive the night?

From debut author Louisa Carmody comes an unputdownable dystopian romantasy with slow-burn romance and shocking twists, perfect for fans of Crescent City and Shadowhunters.

It's been five years since the world was brought to its knees by an immortal war. Daemons crawled from the depths of hell and the sky bled gold as the angels arrived. Humanity thought it was saved, but the angels did not come to protect us.

Amara is a human warrior working for the Angel Intelligence Agency. She spends her days searching for those who don't make it home after curfew. But when her boyfriend Jeremy goes missing, she decides to venture into the shadows to bring him back. Even if it means death.

Nathaniel is an archangel tasked with leading the destruction of humanity, for which he cares little. He doesn't have time to protect little humans running around in the dark, especially those who stab him in the stomach.

But Nathaniel and Amara will soon realise they share a foe, one that lurks in the shadows and stalks them from the skies. She might long to kill him, but Amara knows that having an angel at her side is the only way she'll survive.

Visit Louisa Carmody's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Remembering the Wars of Religion"

New from Oxford University Press: Remembering the Wars of Religion: Conflict and Coexistence in Early Modern France by David van der Linden.

About the book, from the publisher:

In the aftermath of civil war, often the most daunting task is to reconcile former opponents who continue to demand justice--or even vengeance--for wartime suffering. Remembering the Wars of Religion offers a historical perspective on the painful legacy of civil war by focusing on memories of violence and victimhood after the French Wars of Religion. Officially, these wars ended in 1598, when the Edict of Nantes proclaimed peaceful coexistence between Catholics and Protestants, and ordered them to bury the memory of the troubles that had begun in 1562. Below the surface, however, the conflict would simmer for generations, as neither side was able to forgive and forget the violence they had suffered.

Moving away from the corridors of state power in Paris to the cities of Lyon, Montpellier, and La Rochelle, Remembering the Wars of Religion examines the local memory wars between Catholics and Protestants as they resurfaced throughout the seventeenth century. David van der Linden shows that the Wars of Religion left behind a kingdom divided by memory: Catholics and Protestants developed sectarian narratives of the troubles, victimizing their own community while assigning blame to the other. The massacres, looting, material losses, and forced displacement that had punctuated the wars proved impossible to forget, let alone forgive, as vindictive memories were continuously reconstructed by later generations. This constant weaponizing of the past undermined the state-led process of peacebuilding and the practice of toleration in France's biconfessional communities. Ultimately, these memories of victimhood fed a new cycle of violence during the reign of Louis XIV, who in 1685 revoked the Edict of Nantes and forced his Protestant subjects to convert to Catholicism.

Remembering the Wars of Religion thus offers a fresh perspective on the challenge of religious coexistence and reconciliation, both past and present. It shows that besides state policies of intolerance and ideological differences rooted in the Reformation, it was the manipulation of wartime memories by subsequent generations that fuelled long-term animosity.

Visit David van der Linden's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Responsible Party"

Coming August 11 from Henry Holt and Co.: The Responsible Party: A Novel by Claire Carusillo.

About the novel, from the publisher:

A rollicking, "unsinkable," (Sam Lipsyte) and hilarious debut novel about a family of unforgettable women obsessed with securing their legacy, for fans of Geek Love

Claire grew up with the legend of the Unsinkable Mounsey Women. Her great-great-grandmother Fanny made headlines in 1915 for washing ashore in England nearly a year after her ship sank. Fanny’s daughter Sarah went to collect her mother on the equally ill-fated Lusitania―whose sinking she, too, survived. Their improbable endurance led to regional stardom on the Midwestern vaudeville circuit. But Claire never knew the full story―until now.

Listless, jobless, and recently canceled for extolling skin-care advice online that sent a reader to the hospital, Claire is surprised when a knock at the door turns out to be the police, looking for answers about a murder from the 1970s they suspect her mother, Kath, may know something about. As the cops zero in, Claire demands answers from her mother.

Kath’s comically long response, which blossoms into the story of the Mounseys and their descendants writ large, moves from a Liverpudlian poorhouse at the onset of World War I to a Lake Michigan lighthouse in 1971 (when sex was freer and McDonald’s fried their potatoes with beef tallow) to present-day Chicagoland; along the way, it offers Claire a richer understanding of what she inherited from the complicated, resilient women she descends from.

Replete with inappropriately old boyfriends, dubious medical professionals, and more than a few boats, The Responsible Party is the story of several women, in several different timelines, trying to stay afloat.

Follow Claire Carusillo on Instagram.

--Marsal Zeringue

"Ladies of Little Rock"

New from ⁠the University of Georgia Press: Ladies of Little Rock: Black Femininity and Respectability Politics in the Fight to Desegregate Central High School by Misti Nicole Harper.

About the book, from the publisher:

Ladies of Little Rock explores the agency and activism of middle-class Black women and girls who led the movement to desegregate Little Rock Central High School. Misti Nicole Harper argues that these ladies assumed this responsibility as part of a broader legacy of middle-class Black women who wielded respectability politics as social justice strategy. Black women such as Daisy Bates, president of the Arkansas state chapter of the NAACP, and the six Black girls of the “Little Rock Nine” proved their politically savvy and imminent respectability in Little Rock and on the international stage. Black ladies threatened the precarious social position of working-class white women and girls whose lone claim to social privilege was their whiteness and who spearheaded massive resistance as a direct reaction to the challenge that middle-class Black ladies posed.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Something like Desire"

New from Blackstone Publishing: Something like Desire by Marie Hoy-Kenny.

About the book, from the publisher:

The debut adult novel from the author of The Girls from Hush Cabin, Something Like Desire is a hilarious, romantic story of family, loyalty, and finding love in the most unlikely of places.

Lexi Callen’s world is turned upside down when her mother announces she’s leaving her father because she’s having an affair. With her sister’s wedding just weeks away, Lexi vows to put an end to the fling before it tears the family apart.

But her plan takes an unexpected turn when she crosses paths with Zach, the son of her mother’s lover, who seems equally determined to break up the relationship. What begins as a blame game and clashing opinions quickly shifts into something more complicated. The more time Lexi spends with Zach, the harder it is to deny the magnetism between them.

As the wedding date looms closer, Lexi is forced to confront more than just her mother’s scandal. Questions about her own future, and her long-term boyfriend, Jayden, begin to surface. Caught between loyalty, desire, and the life she thought she wanted, Lexi must decide how much she’s willing to risk in order to follow her heart.

Visit Marie Hoy-Kenny's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Dependency Politics"

New from Cambridge University Press: Dependency Politics: How Foreign Aid Shapes Electoral Behavior by Ryan Jablonski.

About the book, from the publisher:

Ryan Jablonski's Dependency Politics examines how democracy works in aid-dependent countries. He draws on over six years of fieldwork to investigate relationships between donors and politicians, showing how politicians make policy and how aid dependency changes voters' assessments of politician performance. He reveals that voters don't simply reward politicians for aid, rather they condition their votes on beliefs about how politicians influence aid delivery. This leads to a 'visibility-uncertainty' paradox where aid can either enhance or erode democratic accountability. Revisiting assumptions about the effects of foreign aid on political behavior, he also explains how aid can cause citizens to vote against their interests and sometimes benefit opposition candidates over incumbents. Drawing on surveys, interviews, focus groups, and field experiments, Jablonski challenges conventional wisdom about foreign aid and offers lessons for balancing trade-offs over aid effectiveness, political capture and capacity-building.

Visit Ryan Jablonski's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Etna"

New from Scribner: Etna: A Novel by Paul Yoon.

About the novel, from the publisher:

Beloved author and winner of The Story Prize, Paul Yoon, is back with the unforgettable story of a working dog, Etna, who, after a devastating war, embarks on an odyssey in the hopes of returning home.

Set in a fictional country in the present day, this is a story told through the eyes of an ex-military dog, Etna. After surviving years of a devastating war, Etna decides one night to leave the men he has fought alongside for years and return home—to the place where he was taken from when he was young, in the thin but persistent hope that if a home exists for him, it might be there.

Thus begins an exhilarating odyssey told through the eyes of a dog as he traverses across ruined landscapes and fights to survive in a world that, even in peacetime, proves to be just as precarious. Along the way, he encounters other animals and humans who are attempting to figure out how to start again. What makes a life when there is no home to go back to? How do we begin to trust each other again after such profound loss?

This is a novel about the power of an idea, about never giving up, and ultimately a novel about finding hope in the most dire of times.

Visit Paul Yoon's website.

--Marshal Zeringue