"A Voice in the Dark"

New from Thomas & Mercer: A Voice in the Dark (Benedict Hoffman and Helen Belle) by Barbara Nickless.

About the book, from the publisher:

An online manipulator with a deadly hold on his followers challenges an FBI agent to stop him in a gripping novel of psychological suspense by a Wall Street Journal bestselling author.

When a husband, wife, and son are murdered in their Denver home and the family’s teenage twins vanish, the case draws the attention of FBI profilers Helen Belle and Benedict Hoffman. It triggers more than professional alarm. It mirrors a horrific case they investigated five years ago, when a boy slaughtered his family and went mute after speaking only a handful of haunting words. Among them: Midnight Man.

Then, nearly thirteen hundred miles away, one of the twins is found dead in a snowy Ohio field, and the parallels between the past and present cases grow more disturbing. Identical suicide notes. The same symbolic blood imagery. And a shared obsession with an online fantasy game. Its mastermind is an influencer who manipulates his most vulnerable and alienated players into killing the people they love most.

The Midnight Man is back.

Helen and Benedict must hunt the darkest corners of the internet to find him before someone else falls prey to an insidious evil that, for now, is in total control of the game.

Visit Barbara Nickless's website.

The Page 69 Test: At First Light.

Q&A with Barbara Nickless.

The Page 69 Test: Play of Shadows.

Writers Read: Barbara Nickless (February 2025).

The Page 69 Test: The Drowning Game.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Films That Explode Like Grenades"

New from the University of Chicago Press: Films That Explode Like Grenades: Robert Kramer and the Search for a Radical Cinema by Whitney Strub.

About the book, from the publisher:

The definitive portrait of independent filmmaker Robert Kramer that traces the revolutionary dreams of the Left from the 1960s through the end of the twentieth century.

Robert Kramer (1939–99) was the emblematic filmmaker of the late-1960s New Left in the United States. Yet because most of his three dozen films have been out of circulation for decades, he has long been neglected by film historians and the Left. Kramer was the cofounder of the leftist documentary collective Newsreel and the director of underground films such as Ice (1970), Milestones (1975), and Route One/USA (1989). His films provide distinctive insights into how America’s political terrain has changed over time, capturing each era’s revolutionary ethos and its contradictions. Whitney Strub’s Films That Explode Like Grenades tracks the histories of leftist film and global revolutionary movements via Kramer’s life and travels. Moving among New York City, Chicago, North Vietnam, Paris, Portugal, Angola, and other crucial flashpoints, Kramer left a major and influential body of work in his wake that has fundamentally shaped the work of radical filmmakers across the globe.

For Strub, Kramer’s career is a key thread in an intimate history of the 1960s New Left, one that emphasizes the complexities of the movement’s internal tensions and its legacies. Drawing on visual analysis, extensive archival research across the United States and France, and myriad interviews with Kramer contemporaries, including Bernardine Dohrn, Tom Hayden, Jonas Mekas, and Kramer’s relatives, Strub transforms Kramer’s life story into a dynamic and engaging social history of 1960s radicalism and its generational legacies.

With detailed mapping of Robert Kramer’s many social and artistic contexts, Films That Explode Like Grenades restores him to a place of global importance in leftist cinema.

The Page 99 Test: Porno Chic and the Sex Wars.

Writers Read: Whitney Strub (August 2017).

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Knocking"

New from Little A: The Knocking: A Novel by Laura Lee Bahr.

About the novel, from the publisher:

In a house this haunted, both the living and the dead pose dangers to a female journalist in nineteenth-century New York in a chilling historical gothic by the author of Who Is the Liar.

It’s 1850 when intrepid journalist and women’s-rights advocate Edith Ann, “E. A.,” Howe arrives at the home of iconic newspaper founder Horace Greeley. Her assignment is to chronicle the uncanny gifts of Cathie Fox, an eleven-year-old medium in Horace’s charge. Mysterious knocking sounds follow Cathie as she channels the restless spirit of the Greeleys’ deceased son, Pickie―a ghostly consolation to Horace’s profoundly unwell and grieving wife. As her condition worsens, E. A. suspects foul play.

Something is very wrong in this house. Sharp-tongued housekeepers warn her to steer clear of the attic. Pickie’s alleged messages from beyond are more disturbing than comforting. And the seemingly guileless Cathie claims that the house is eating her alive. All the while Cathie’s beautiful English governess is awakening something restless in E. A.

As she wrestles with her own childhood terrors, E. A. must investigate the story of the spirit-knockings and reveal whether the greatest threats are coming from the living or the dead.

Visit Laura Lee Bahr's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Good Sediment"

New from the University of Washington Press: Good Sediment: Black Ecologies and the Politics of Restoration in Coastal Louisiana by Monica Patrice Barra.

About the book, from the publisher:

When saving wetlands imperils Black futures, restoration demands reimagination

Coastal Louisiana is losing land at an unprecedented rate, and in response, scientists and policymakers have turned to massive restoration projects to slow the erosion. Good Sediment enters this charged landscape, where the promise of ecological renewal collides with the lived realities of Black coastal communities in Plaquemines Parish.

At the center of the book is the Mid-Barataria Sediment Diversion, the state’s most ambitious and controversial project: a $2 billion engineering feat that would redirect the Mississippi River’s mud and silt into disappearing wetlands. For policymakers, the river’s sediment is salvation. For the Parish’s multigenerational Black communities, however, this “good sediment” carries profound risks, including flooding homes and undermining fishing livelihoods.

Through ethnographic research, Monica Patrice Barra traces the multiple meanings of restoration as scientists, engineers, and Afro-descendant communities wrestle with what it means to “work with nature” in the shadow of climate change. She reveals how technical claims of environmental progress often sidestep questions of environmental racism, and how Black communities press instead for restoration that sustains culture, dignity, and intergenerational survival.

Unsettling the assumption that restoration is inherently benevolent, Good Sediment reframes ecological repair as a political and cultural practice―one that must grapple with the racial histories embedded in the land. This vital work bridges environmental anthropology, political ecology, and Black studies to imagine restoration otherwise: as a project oriented toward protecting Black life.

Visit Monica Patrice Barra's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Chosen Family"

New from Mariner Books: Chosen Family: A Novel by Madeleine Gray.

About the novel, from the publisher:

An exuberant and irreverently funny novel about one gorgeously messy friendship-feud-unrequited-love-affair set in Sydney across eighteen years.

Nell Argall and Eve Bowman are both brilliant, odd, and friendless. When they meet on the brutal battlefield that is their posh all girls’ high school during their first year there, both their lives are changed forever. From school, to university, to careers, Nell and Eve’s relationship is a life raft that is also a poison apple that is also a Medusan stare, frozen in time.

When the passion, guilt, shame, and joy that perpetually twists and turns between them finally implodes, Nell abruptly walks away, leaving Eve alone at the helm of the gloriously unorthodox family they’ve built with their seven-year-old daughter, Lake. Eve finds herself left wondering: Can the wounds of adolescent betrayal ever really heal? Can we ever really understand what’s going on in someone else’s head? And what’s love got to do, got to do with it?

Written with Gray’s characteristic big-heartedness and dark wit, Chosen Family is a queer modern classic that reminds us again and again that sometimes the most fulfilling and life-saving relationships are the ones that are the hardest to define.

Visit Madeleine Gray's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Theatrical Afterlives"

New from Oxford University Press: Theatrical Afterlives: Nineteenth-Century Women's Novels on the Stage by Marina Cano.

About the book, from the publisher:

This is the first in-depth study of the theatrical afterlives of nineteenth-century women novelists. Whereas previous scholarship has shown a strong bias towards male writers, especially Charles Dickens, this book innovatively brings woman-authored novels centre stage--literally and metaphorically. Theatrical Afterlives: Nineteenth-Century Women's Novels on the Stage examines the dramatic offspring of Jane Austen, the Brontës, Elizabeth Gaskell, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Ellen Wood, and George Eliot, through particular, and sometimes unexpected, theatrical lenses (e.g., prison drama, Irish theatre, suffrage drama). It prioritises the performance event--what actually happens onstage--through attention to a series of theatre ephemera, unpublished manuscript material, and specially commissioned interviews with practitioners. The book argues that the theatrical afterlives allegorize key socio-political debates and tensions of the past two hundred years, including the woman question, the Irish question, colonial legacies, and the #MeToo era.

All these foci allow Marina Cano to investigate the dramatizations as expressions and affirmation of identities that have at one point been marginalized, while also enabling creative interconnections to emerge through the juxtaposition of novelists, plays, historical movements, and locations. The dramatizations, the book concludes, matter, not only for what they tell us about how woman-authored novels have been utilised, but also because these plays provide a fresh methodology to access and reread the novels themselves, and read them anew.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Single Captive Spark"

New from 47North: A Single Captive Spark (Rise of the Firebird) by Emberly Ash.

About the novel, from the publisher:

In the brutal aftermath of a human-changeling war, a twist of fate throws two enemies together to fight for their love and survival in a sweeping dark fantasy of betrayal, magic, and romance.

In the centuries-long battle between humans and changelings, those who are taken by the changelings do not live. They do not return. They are simply gone. And for the humans left behind, there is only the brutal reign of the Irskan king.

Having spent her life in the castle, Fionna has protected herself and her younger sister by securing a position as a servant. But when the rebels mistake Fionna for the Irskan princess, she becomes a hostage of Helio, the cruel changeling leader whose mismatched eyes haunt her dreams. Drawn to Helio even as she attempts to escape the rebels, Fionna finds herself questioning everything she once believed about his cause.

For Helio, undying loyalty to the rebels saved him from the ravages of war. But his hostage blunder has put his people in peril. He may possess secret magic, but even he is not immune to Fionna’s charms. Uncovering what she knows about the castle may prove to be his most dangerous mission yet.

In this sweeping dark fantasy, a dangerous game of love, loyalty, and betrayal will decide the fate of a nation.

Visit Emberly Ash's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Cutting Life Short"

New from the University of Wyoming Press: Cutting Life Short: A Second Look at Life Sentences by Dan Fetsco.

About the book, from the publisher:

Cutting Life Short challenges the idea that people who commit murder or other serious crimes are incapable of rehabilitation. The book tracks the growing population of people serving life in Wyoming and the US and explores research that indicates that much of the public, including victims of violent crime, support second chances for people who are serving excessive sentences.

Just over 200,000 Americans are now serving life sentences―more than the entire US prison population in 1970―in a cruel and fiscally irresponsible system, even though many inmates have demonstrated sustained rehabilitation over decades. Through individual case studies of Wyoming inmates, ranging from those who deserve release to rare cases like Matthew Shepard’s killer, who should remain imprisoned, the book explores themes of punishment, redemption, and justice reform while examining issues like prosecutorial misconduct, three-strike penalties, and restorative justice programs. Cases include the stories of Darla Rouse (one of Wyoming’s few commutation recipients), Russell Harrison (who claims he had an early release deal), and James Koester (whose investigating detective became his advocate). Drawing from a decade of experience on the Wyoming parole board, where he witnessed hundreds of rehabilitated inmates denied release despite widespread support from corrections officials and sometimes even victims, author Daniel Fetsco advocates creating systematic review processes for lengthy sentences that remove elected officials from clemency decisions, alongside broader reforms like restoring voting rights for former felons and promoting responsible crime reporting over fear-mongering sensationalism.

This forward-looking book argues that most of the people sentenced to life in prison can be, and should have been, safely released into the community and offers recommendations to help alleviate the problems associated with life sentences in Wyoming and across the US criminal justice system. It is of significance to students, scholars, professionals, and the general public invested in law, criminal justice and social justice.

Visit Dan Fetsco's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Farewitch of Foxe Holler"

New from S&S/Saga Press: The Farewitch of Foxe Holler by Ellen Pauley Goff.

About the book, from the publisher:

Steel Magnolias meets Practical Magic in this charming contemporary fantasy about a thirty-something kitchen witch who is recruited to help a reclusive warlock and discovers love on the other side of the next bake.

Honey Frost is Foxe Holler’s dependable Farewitch. With a dash of flour and a pinch of charm, Honey carries on her family’s legacy for healing any ailment with the right recipe. She just didn’t expect to inherit the role twenty years early.

When the Holler’s reclusive Warlock suddenly requests a Farewitch to cure his mysterious illness, Honey’s ordered life turns upside down. Honey is reluctant to help—witches and warlocks do not get along. Then he tempts her with the one thing she can’t resist: access to his infamous library of spellbooks and kitchen grimoires.

Soon, Honey is the newest resident of his moody farmhouse, which has one gorgeous kitchen. And a Warlock that maybe…isn’t so frightful after all. Or old. Or bad looking.

Healing the Warlock would be simple if he weren’t hiding a web of secrets. As Honey works to unravel his illness, a darker threat looms: the Widow Witch, who steals a soul from Foxe Holler every year, is due—and this time, she wants the Warlock.

Visit Ellen Pauley Goff's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Trinity"

New from the University of North Carolina Press: The Trinity: John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, and Civil Rights in African American Memory by Sharron Wilkins Conrad.

About the book, from the publisher:

A striking triptych once displayed in countless African American households, the Trinity typically features Jesus Christ, Martin Luther King Jr., and John F. Kennedy. More than decoration, these portraits were deliberate acts of memory and quiet resistance, a medium through which African Americans asserted their own narratives of hope, leadership, and the fight for justice.

In this provocative history, Sharron Wilkins Conrad traces the Trinity across several decades, showing how African Americans didn’t merely remember the civil rights movement; they shaped its meaning. The Trinity reveals why Kennedy’s image hung beside King and Christ, while Lyndon B. Johnson, despite signing landmark legislation such as the 1964 Civil Rights Act, remained largely unheralded. Kennedy’s charisma, symbolic promise, and perceived martyrdom placed him among sacred icons, while Johnson—seen as transactional and confronted by the era’s growing impatience—never secured the same emotional legacy. In a gripping exploration of memory and meaning-making, Conrad reveals how communities create historical truths by elevating some leaders, sidelining others, and preserving their own visions in defiance of the official record.

Visit Sharron Wilkins Conrad's website.

--Marshal Zeringue