"Justice at the Boundaries"

New from the University of California Press: Justice at the Boundaries: Mediating Reconciliation and Legal Recognition in Taiwan's Indigenous Courts by J. Christopher Upton.

About the book, from the publisher:

Justice at the Boundaries offers a powerful ethnographic account of the transformative potential and structural limitations of Taiwan's system of ad hoc Chambers of Indigenous Courts. Drawing on immersive fieldwork in courtrooms and Indigenous communities, J. Christopher Upton examines how judges, Indigenous litigants, and cultural brokers navigate contested terrains of law, identity, and sovereignty in a legal system shaped by ongoing processes of colonialism and aspirations of multiculturalism. From invocations of Indigenous laws to appeals to international human rights norms, the book reveals how courtroom encounters become sites of cultural negotiation, resistance, and possibility. Upton shows how Taiwan's Indigenous courts and other "boundary institutions" designed to bridge Indigenous and non-Indigenous worlds both challenge and reproduce entrenched hierarchies and power dynamics. The book brings fresh methodological and conceptual tools to the study of legal pluralism, Indigenous courts, Indigenous peoples' rights, and the complex politics of Indigenous recognition in the Asia-Pacific region and beyond.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Museum of Unusual Occurrence"

New from Severn House: The Museum of Unusual Occurrence (A Psychic City Mystery) by Erica Wright.

About the novel, from the publisher:

Welcome to the Museum of Unusual Occurrence―a place full of strange exhibits and even stranger murders. The first in the new Psychic City mystery series by talented author Erica Wright.

“Every small town thinks it’s special―That might be true, but this one actually is.”

Rational and cynical Aly Orlean’s life in her psychic hometown of Wyndale, Florida couldn’t be more hectic. It’s all about running her business, raising a teenage sister, sending out holiday greetings―and her new task: finding a killer.

For her Museum of Unusual Occurrence not only houses odd curiosities but now has a brand-new display: The body of Rose Dempsey, a local twenty-year-old, set up in one of the exhibits as if she has been ritually sacrificed.

With the police clueless, Aly is worried that this is a vicious warning for her and her solitary way of life. Fearing for her sister Merope’s well-being, she’s determined to find out why the killer murdered Rose and how her body was placed in Aly’s museum . . . But might the killer be someone hiding in plain sight?

Visit Erica Wright's website.

My Book, The Movie: Famous in Cedarville.

The Page 99 Test: Snake.

Q&A with Erica Wright.

--Marshal Zeringue

"In Good Faith"

New from Yale University Press: In Good Faith: How the Nature of Belief Shapes the Fate of Societies by Ryan Avent.

About the book, from the publisher:

How a society’s capacity for belief forms the foundation of its success

Do you struggle to find reasons to feel optimistic about the future? Are you trying to understand the creeping institutional dysfunction we see the world over? In this book, Ryan Avent explores how an unswerving confidence in systems of liberal democracy and free market capitalism―which he terms the “Modern Faith”―has left many Western countries struggling to deal with democratic backsliding and social dysfunction. Those seeking the certainty of another technocratic solution, however, are searching in the wrong place. The true foundation of our prosperity, Avent argues, is not in an ability to reason our way to better policies and institutions but rather lies in the nature and distribution of our beliefs.

Drawing from economics, history, philosophy, biology, and much else besides, Avent shows that our capacity for belief is what connects us, guides our behavior moment by moment and year by year, and determines how well we cooperate in the production of social and economic complexity. Far from standing in opposition to science and reason, faith is central to the human endeavor. By understanding the nature of faith and how it forms the fabric of our society, we can better find ways to come together to tackle the global crises of rising authoritarianism and climate change that threaten us all, and find hope within one another.

Visit Ryan Avent's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Livonia Chow Mein"

New from Simon & Schuster: Livonia Chow Mein: A Novel by Abigail Savitch-Lew.

About the novel from the publisher:

In the vein of Happiness Falls and Family Lore, a gripping story of family history and political upheaval centered around a Chinese family-owned restaurant in Brownsville, Brooklyn, and its impact on the neighborhood’s Jewish and Black residents over the course of a century.

In 1978, two tenements on Livonia Avenue in Brownsville burn to the ground, killing one resident and displacing dozens of others. It remains unclear who set the buildings ablaze, but the survivors are convinced the culprit is Mr. Wong.

Who exactly is Mr. Wong, and what allegedly drove him to this extraordinary act of violence, is the question that consumes this novel as it plunges into four generations of Wong family history. First is Koon Lai, an immigrant who runs a Chinese restaurant on Livonia Avenue; second, his son Richard, a man desperate for his own chance at the American Dream; and third, Jason, a poet who seeks his escape in the bohemian counterculture of the 1970s, but finds himself an unwitting participant in Brooklyn’s gentrification. In the 21st century, Jason’s daughter Sadie returns to Brownsville as a journalist, determined to unravel the mystery of what happened decades earlier on the night the buildings blazed.

Joining together the present and the past is the community organizer Lina Rodriguez Armstrong, who was also displaced by that fire and who has spent the intervening years fighting for the rights of Brownsville’s residents and organizing a Livonia Avenue community land trust.

A stunning debut from a new talent, Livonia Chow Mein contemplates how the American pursuit of freedom relies on a collective amnesia and challenges us to consider what it would take for us to truly live in harmony.

Visit Abigail Savitch-Lew's website.

--Mrshal Zeringue

"Black Arts, Black Muslims"

New from Columbia University Press: Black Arts, Black Muslims: Islam in the Black Freedom Struggle by Ellen McLarney.

About the book, from the publisher:

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, prominent figures in the Black Arts Movement (BAM) converted to Islam and took new names. Poets such as Amiri Baraka, Sonia Sanchez, Askia Muhammad Touré, and Marvin X incorporated Islamic words and expressions, references to the Qur’an, and Arabic script, as well as symbols like the crescent star and depictions of Islamic architecture and clothing. They connected places like Harlem, Chicago, Newark, and Oakland to locales in the Muslim world such as Timbuktu, Songhai, and Mecca. These artists also played a pivotal role in developing Black studies and creating alternatives to the Eurocentrism of the American educational system.

Ellen McLarney explores how BAM writers identified with Islam as integral to the African American cultural, spiritual, and intellectual heritage. Examining poetry, visual art, music, drama, and mixed-media collaborations, she traces the emergence of a new kind of Islamic art rooted in the African American experience. Their works protested scientific racism, police brutality, colonial domination, and economic oppression while resurrecting a suppressed Islamic past and sharing spiritual visions of a new kind of future. Based on interviews, fieldwork, archival research, and close analysis of key works, this book reveals how BAM redefined Black art, Islamic poetics, and Black Muslim aesthetics in the struggle for racial justice.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Murder, Local Style"

New from Severn House: Murder, Local Style (An Orchid Isle Mystery, 3) by Leslie Karst.

About the book, from the publisher:

Retired caterer Valerie Corbin investigates a suspicious poisoning in this Orchid Isle cozy culinary mystery, featuring a feisty queer couple who swap surfing lessons for sleuthing sessions in tropical Hilo, Hawai‘i.

A dinner to die for!

It’s been an eventful transition, but retired caterer Valerie Corbin and her wife Kristen are finally settling into life on the Big Island of Hawai’i. Val’s even joined the neighborhood orchid society to make some new friends. So when she’s asked to step in to cater their latest social event, as the newbie of the group she can’t exactly say no.

But what should have been a straightforward gig is soon a dining disaster when the food from th

e event poisons and kills the society president. As Val herself becomes a suspect in the murder investigation, she’s determined to uncover the truth. Who would want to kill the mild-mannered president of the orchid society?

Turns out the list is longer than a celebrity chef's tasting menu. Apparently some of the residents did not

"love thy neighbor." Can she reveal the killer’s identity before they strike again?

This mouthwatering cozy mystery is perfect for fans of Ellen Byron, Jennifer J Chow, Lucy Burdette, and Raquel V Re

yes, and includes a selection of delicious Hawaiian recipes to cook at home.

Visit Leslie Karst’s website.

Coffee with a Canine: Leslie Karst & Ziggy.

My Book, The Movie: The Fragrance of Death.

Q&A with Leslie Karst.

The Page 69 Test: Waters of Destruction.

My Book, The Movie: Waters of Destruction.

Writers Read: Leslie Karst (April 2025).

--Marshal Zeringue

"Smog and Sunshine"

New from the University of California Press: Smog and Sunshine: The Surprising Story of How Los Angeles Cleaned Up Its Air by Ann Carlson.

About the book, from the publisher:

A stirring account of one of our greatest environmental success stories: cleaning up Southern California's air.

Los Angeles and smog have been synonymous for decades. From the 1940s through the 1980s, children breathed air so heavy with lead that their blood was poisoned with it. In 1970 officials declared smog alerts on 235 days. But the last smog alert happened in 2003, and lead has virtually disappeared from the air. This is the story of how Los Angeles cleaned up its air.

In Smog and Sunshine, environmental law expert and LA native Ann Carlson recounts the dramatic policy fights and the determined scientists, lawyers, and community members who worked alongside public officials to face off against major polluters and save their city. In a time of unprecedented climate change and skepticism about government and science, this book is an inspiring reminder of what concerned residents, individual leaders, and all levels of government can achieve by working together.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Underlake"

New from Doubleday: Underlake: A Novel by Erin L. McCoy.

About the novel, from the publisher:

When a mother claims her missing daughter is alive beneath a lake in a flooded valley, a marine biologist descends into a hidden underwater settlement where those who refused to leave have built a sealed-off world—and where the consequences of that choice are beginning to surface.

Twelve years ago, Otta escaped her small town, determined to become a marine biologist. Now she’s returned, carrying the guilt of a friend’s disappearance during a deep-sea dive and unsure she’ll ever be able to dive again. Then a stranger, May, appears at her door, insisting that her daughter who ran away is under the nearby lake—alive.

It turns out the small-town legend is true: Three decades ago, the entire valley was flooded to build a dam, but the people who lived there refused to leave. These “refugees of a world obsessed with change” now inhabit an underwater realm. To find the missing girl, Otta and May come face-to-face with communities that have lived in isolation for decades, breeding extremes of delusion and nostalgia. As they push their bodies to the mortal limit, the women must confront the fear, control, and suspicion born of the misguided quest to construct a purer world.

Hypnotic and arresting, Underlake brings a poet’s attention to language, evoking the ethereal work of Marilynne Robinson, Lauren Groff, and Emily St. John Mandel and the imaginative brio of Margaret Atwood. In taking her place as a major new voice in American fiction, McCoy shrewdly explores the American obsession with land, inheritance, and race, asking what we cling to when the world changes—and who gets erased in the name of preserving it.

Visit Erin L. McCoy's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Migration and the Origins of American Citizenship"

New from Oxford University Press: Migration and the Origins of American Citizenship: African Americans, Native Americans, and Immigrants by Anna O. Law.

About the book, from the publisher:

Since the late nineteenth century, the US federal government has enjoyed exclusive authority to decide whether someone has the ability to enter and stay in US territory. But freedom of movement was not guaranteed in the British colonies or early US. By contrast, voluntary migrants were met with strict laws and policies created by colonies and states, which denied free mobility and settlement in their territories to unwanted populations.

Migration and the Origins of American Citizenship presents a story of constitutional development that traces the confluence of the logics of slavery and settler colonialism in early legal rulings and public policy about migration and citizenship. The book examines the division of labor between the national and state governments that endured for over a century, reasons why that arrangement changed in the late nineteenth century, and what the transformation meant for people subject to those regimes of control. Drawing into one study the migration policy histories of groups of people that are usually studied separately, and combining the methodologies of political science, history, and law, Anna O. Law reveals the unmistakable effects of slavery and Native American dispossession in modern US immigration policy.

Visit Anna O. Law's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Hold on to Tomorrow"

New from Severn House: Hold on to Tomorrow by M. B. Henry.

About the novel, from the publisher:

A young woman fights to follow her dreams at the start of the 1960s in this gripping, moving, and empowering read.

November 22, 1963. As Jolene Johnson prepares to watch President John F. Kennedy’s parade drive by the Texas School Book Depository in Dallas, she remembers the start of the decade, when the future seemed full of promise and hope.

America was on the brink of change when JFK entered the White House, and Jolene was in college with ambitions of her own. But she had no idea of the struggles that were to come...

As Jolene witnesses the country’s deep political divisions take the darkest of turns on that tragic day, can she somehow find the courage to keep her own dreams alive and follow her heart?

This enthralling, hopeful novel about a young woman's determination to fight for a brighter future against a backdrop of political turmoil and tragedy is a great read for fans of The Women by Kristin Hannah.

Visit M. B. Henry's website.

--Marshal Zeringue