"The Miami Nation"

New from Indiana University Press: The Miami Nation: A Middle Path for Indigenous Nationhood by Aamaawia John Bickers.

About the book, from the publisher:

As the United States sought to expand its territorial holdings at the start of the nineteenth century into what is now Ohio and Indiana, the Indigenous Myaamia (Miami) peoples of the Wabash River Valley came together to form a united front to protect their lands and their people. The Miami National Council was designed by its founders to allow the Myaamia people and their leaders to engage with the federal government and American culture on their own terms.

The Miami Nation tells the fascinating history of both politics and people. Skillfully weaving together oral narratives, archival research, existing published histories, and his own family's recollections and stories, Aamaawia John Bickers illustrates the broader strategies and forces that affected how the Miami Nation responded to American imperial expansion, illuminating the challenges, achievements, and occasional missteps along the way. Bickers begins with the formation of the Miami National Council in the early nineteenth century, following their political development through two forced removals, the American Civil War, allotment and the Dawes Act, and finally the ratification of the constitution of the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma in 1939. But throughout these experiences, the Miami Nation maintained its cultural identity and continued to sustain their community.

As the first academic history of the Myaamia people written by a tribal member, The Miami Nation centers Myaamia voices as it contemplates issues of Indigenous power, settler colonialism, and how a community can charter its own path through history.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Don't Look Away"

New from Scribner: Don't Look Away: A Novel by Daniel Kenitz.

About the novel, from the publisher:

From the author of The Perfect Home comes a harrowing domestic crime thriller where a former defense attorney is forced out of retirement to defend her husband—now the prime suspect in the serial murder case terrorizing Florida’s Gulf Coast.

Leslie Woodhouse’s most exciting days should be behind her. In a past life, she was a defense attorney with a reputation for finding loopholes in high-profile cases. Now, she’s enjoying a modest retirement in Florida in a seaside condo with her mild-mannered husband, Robert. The only things that get her heart rate up now are late-night coffees, playful banter with her beloved older sister, and the news: the serial killer ravaging Florida’s Gulf Coast has just made his first mistake. An eight-year-old girl has seen his face and lived.

To Leslie, the murderer is little more than a morbid fascination—until she comes home to flashing police lights. Robert is arrested, accused of being the Gulf Coast Killer. Leslie is convinced of his innocence, and despite warnings not to represent her husband, she starts work on his defense. But as she unravels the facts, she can’t shake the unanswered questions. What was Robert’s DNA doing at the scene of the crime? And if she’s right to defend Robert, then who is the real Gulf Coast Killer, and why is he framing her husband?

Don’t Look Away is a twisty, compulsively readable thriller that asks: what do we owe one another— and what are the consequences of ignoring the truth?

Visit Daniel Kenitz's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"We the Platform"

New from Columbia University Press: We the Platform: How the Internet Changed Twenty-First-Century Literature by Aarthi Vadde.

About the book, from the publisher:

Web 2.0 gave us the online world as we know it today. Popularized in 2004, it redefined the internet as social, a “platform” for self-expression and data gathering. The ensuing proliferation of user-generated content such as social media posts, fan fiction, self-published novels, and Instagram poetry has spurred a host of anxieties about the end of literature. Yet contemporary literary fiction is deeply indebted to the folk forms that Web 2.0 cultivated, even when it is sharply critical of the platform business models behind them.

We the Platform is a groundbreaking account of mass writing in the twenty-first century, identifying rarely recognized forms of literary possibility amid the profound upheavals in traditional publishing. Aarthi Vadde examines the explosion of textuality across digital platforms: countless writers, diverse publishing formats, and vast communities of readers responding to stories publicly and instantly. Countering ubiquitous decline narratives, she offers powerful examples of literary innovation, adaptation, and survival. Among them are Jonathan Lethem and Lauren Oyler’s challenges to individualist ideas of authorship, the Twitter fiction of Jennifer Egan and Teju Cole, Margaret Atwood and Naomi Alderman’s collaborative writing on Wattpad, conceptual projects like Book from the Ground, and the experimental use of chatbots by authors including Sheila Heti. Through nuanced and illuminating readings, this book shows how platform-based writing has altered cornerstone concepts of authorship, aesthetic form, and craft, delivering a bold new understanding of literature now.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Kill to Keep"

New from Severn House: Kill to Keep (A Sheriff Bet Rivers Mystery, 3) by Elena Taylor.

About the book, from the publisher:

A female sheriff races against time to solve a murder at a carnival that puts her whole town at risk. Thrilling, romantic, and full of suspense!

Sheriff Bet Rivers' inspection of the carnival grounds should have been routine. Murder is certainly the last thing on anyone's mind. Then comes the sound of a gunshot. And a dead body with no signs of trauma, no witnesses and no obvious motive for the killing.

But solving the unexplained death is only part of the challenge. Bet is still grappling with her on-off relationship with town owner Rob Collier, while dealing with her feelings about her late father, the beloved town sheriff she had to replace.

As Bet launches her homicide investigation, she soon discovers the carnival is a place of whispers, rumours, resentments and lie after lie. And as the stakes build, it quickly becomes clear that protecting a deadly secret is something that someone is willing to kill to keep.

Fans of Julia Keller and Sheena Kamal will love this riveting suspense.

Visit Elena Taylor's website.

Q&A with Elena Taylor.

The Page 69 Test: A Cold, Cold World.

My Book, The Movie: A Cold, Cold World.

Writers Read: Elena Taylor (December 2025).

My Book, The Movie: The Haunting of Emily Grace.

--Marshal Zeringue

"In Contagion's Wake"

New from the University of Massachusetts Press: In Contagion's Wake: Black Writers and the Development of Modern Outbreak Narratives by Kelly L. Bezio.

About the book, from the publisher:

An examination of early American literature that highlights how racial divides exacerbated—and were exacerbated by—the spread of infection

In April of 1721, the HMS Seahorse arrived in Boston from the West Indies, causing a smallpox epidemic that would plague the city for the next year. Of its 12,000 inhabitants, nearly fifty percent were infected, and 900 people died. Like the coronavirus pandemic that began in 2020, the outbreak also brought to the surface deep divides in the social fabric of colonial New England and laid the groundwork for racialized political inequities that we continue to grapple with today.

In Contagion’s Wake examines a range of American outbreak narratives, both historical and fictional, written between the early 1700s and the early 1900s—from the rise of inoculation through the advent of germ theory. Author Kelly L. Bezio argues that during this period, literature about communicable disease was dominated by white authors, such as Cotton Mather and Edgar Allen Poe, who tended to privilege white suffering and survival while obscuring Black suffering and vulnerability. Black authors, however, such as Olaudah Equiano and Frances E.W. Harper, developed variations on plot structures, metaphors, and imagery that drew upon contagion to represent racial injustice and further the cause of Black liberation.

The diverse texts Bezio analyzes vary extensively in genre and geographical location, and in the illnesses that feature in their pages. Significant disorders from the era, including yellow fever, smallpox, consumption, and cholera, make frequent appearances, as do less culturally dominant diseases such as St. Anthony’s Fire. In Contagion’s Wake contends that representations of communicable disease should not be understood only as within their own historical moment; rather, they function more like a DNA code for our present time.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Forest Becomes Her"

New from St. Martin's Press: The Forest Becomes Her: A Novel by Julie Carrick Dalton.

About the novel, from the publisher:

The perfect choice for your next book club: Julie Carrick Dalton's The Forest Becomes Her is a timely, unforgettable novel about three women from different generations navigating the complexities of family, grief, the impacts of our choices, and our deep connections to the natural world beneath our feet.

In historic, bucolic Concord, Massachusetts, a centuries-old forest has been removed to make way for a new, eco-friendly housing development. The locals are upset by the destruction, but out-of-towners like Hazel Stoddard are flocking to put down roots in their new guilt-free dream homes.

Soon a tragedy leaves Hazel unmoored in her new life, and she begins to feel the pull of the absent forest. Hazel is not alone―her neighbors, real estate agent Stella Flint and teenage environmentalist Polly Bauer, each have their own trauma and relationship to the land. The three women are drawn together to save the last remaining oak tree, or they risk losing themselves to lingering shadows that only they can see.

In The Forest Becomes Her, Julie Carrick Dalton evocatively explores the power of multigenerational female relationships, the ever-evolving female form, humanity’s connection to our changing world, and the unexpected mysteries of nature.

Visit Julie Carrick Dalton's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Mary Wollstonecraft Against Modernity"

New from Stanford University Press: Mary Wollstonecraft Against Modernity by Julie Murray.

About the book, from the publisher:

For many, Mary Wollstonecraft functions as Western feminism's indisputable origin point and anchor. Once scorned as scandalous, later rehabilitated by the Victorians as a figure of hardworking traditional femininity, Wollstonecraft is today incorporated into a story of feminism as the West's cherished export to the rest of the world.

With Wollstonecraft as its guide, this book argues that Western feminism and global modernity are not the natural intellectual and political allies they have long been made out to be, but have in fact been at odds for over two centuries. Julie Murray explores those aspects of Wollstonecraft's work that call us to understand modernity, and the form of white womanhood it celebrates, as a problem with which feminism must contend.

Refracting the history of feminism through the reception of Wollstonecraft's life and thought by contemporaries such as Mary Hays and Elizabeth Hamilton, as well as by twentieth-century thinkers like Hannah Arendt, Betty Friedan, Ruth Benedict, and Margaret Mead, Murray offers a potent critique of how liberal feminism tells celebratory tales of extraordinary women in part to manage its own contradictions. Reclaiming Wollstonecraft from the genre of female biography, this book ultimately finds her an astute critic of Western feminism itself.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Time Of My Heist"

New from Severn House: The Time Of My Heist by S.K. Golden.

About the novel, from the publsher:

A fast-moving action comedy blending crime and romance, with all the thrills of a blockbuster.

Fake dating can be murder!

All Shepherd wants is to live a quiet life as a single dad and owner of a successful pizza restaurant while managing his ever-present anxiety. But against his better judgment, he's somehow found himself agreeing to become the fake boyfriend of Ginny—the employee he's definitely not in love with—in order to appease her terrifying mother.

When her mother gets kidnapped from a murder scene, Shepherd finds himself in way over his head. Now he must navigate Ginny's massively dysfunctional family, several organized crime syndicates, pull off a heist, and solve the crime—or risk being implicated in a murder he might accidentally have committed.

As the stakes get higher, every clue brings him close to Ginny, and to the truth. But the biggest crime of all might just be the way she is stealing his heart...

The Time of My Heist is perfect for fans of Sara Desai, Janet Evanovich, and Sarah Fox.

Visit S.K. Golden's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

'Indignant Liberalism"

New from the University of Texas Press: Indignant Liberalism: Political Protest and Generational Change in El Salvador by Ellen Moodie.

About the book, from the publisher:

Documenting the rise and disillusionment of El Salvador’s postwar activists in the face of populist authoritarian politics.

The conclusion of El Salvador’s long civil war, in 1992, was supposed to bring about equality and political freedom. Leftist insurgents laid down arms, and the government formally embraced liberal ideals. Yet today, El Salvador is ruled by an authoritarian president who was reelected via unconstitutional means. What went wrong?

Anthropologist and journalist Ellen Moodie embedded with indignados―young middle-class protestors, demanding that the government live up to its liberal commitments―to better understand the course of political change since the civil war. Yet the “post-postwar” generation is only the latest demographic disappointed with liberalism in practice. Moodie examines a nineteenth-century “racial liberalism” that saw descendants of colonists “civilizing” Indigenous people while dispossessing them of lands and mobilizing them for labor. Today, the failure to make good on the promises of postwar liberalism has inspired robust support for strongman Nayib Bukele. Moodie argues that El Salvador’s case, though inflected by local concerns, is not unique. Rather, it is another stark demonstration of how liberalism’s imaginary social contract gives rise to populist authoritarianism.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Fighting Edge"

Coming September 8 from Crooked Lane Books: Fighting Edge: A Timber Creek K-9 Mystery by Margaret Mizushima.

About the book, from the publisher:

Major crimes intersect in this nail-biting installment of the Timber Creek K-9 mysteries by award-winning author Margaret Mizushima.

A routine welfare check becomes a nightmare when Deputy Mattie Walker finds a young mother dead and a hysterical toddler, possibly the only witness to a brutal crime. Before the investigative team can start piecing together what happened, Mattie discovers another criminal act in Timber Creek.

During a traffic stop for speeding, Mattie observes a nervous driver and a teenage passenger frozen with fear. A quick sweep of the car with her K-9 partner, Robo, reveals a dangerous mix of drugs and suspected human trafficking, providing Mattie with grounds to arrest the driver. After she places the teenager in protective custody, the sheriff’s department hands the case over to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.

As the team gathers evidence and information, Mattie’s husband, veterinarian Cole Walker, notices suspicious activity during ambulatory calls at dog kennels, indicating yet a third crime lurking in the shadows. What begins as isolated incidents quickly reveals a chilling truth: Organized crime has infiltrated their rural mountain community.

Every clue leads to more questions, and each answer brings them closer to greater danger. Do Mattie and her law enforcement partners have what it takes to shut down this criminal ring before it claims more victims? And could its next victim be someone Mattie loves?

Visit Margaret Mizushima's website and follow her on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.

Coffee with a Canine: Margaret Mizushima & Hannah, Bertie, Lily and Tess.

Coffee with a Canine: Margaret Mizushima & Hannah.

My Book, The Movie: Burning Ridge.

The Page 69 Test: Burning Ridge.

The Page 69 Test: Tracking Game.

My Book, The Movie: Hanging Falls.

The Page 69 Test: Hanging Falls.

Q&A with Margaret Mizushima.

The Page 69 Test: Striking Range.

The Page 69 Test: Standing Dead.

The Page 69 Test: Gathering Mist.

Writers Read: Margaret Mizushima (October 2024).

The Page 69 Test: Dying Cry.

--Marshal Zeringue