"The First King of England"

New from Princeton University Press: The First King of England: Æthelstan and the Birth of a Kingdom by David Woodman.

About the book, from the publisher:

From one of today’s leading historians of the early medieval period, an enthralling chronicle of Æthelstan, England’s founder king whose achievements of 927 rival the Norman Conquest of 1066 in shaping Britain as we know it

The First King of England is a foundational biography of Æthelstan (d. 939), the early medieval king whose territorial conquests and shrewd statesmanship united the peoples, languages, and cultures that would come to be known as the “kingdom of the English.” In this panoramic work, David Woodman blends masterful storytelling with the latest scholarship to paint a multifaceted portrait of this immensely important but neglected figure, a man celebrated in his day as much for his benevolence, piety, and love of learning as he was for his ambitious reign.

Set against the backdrop of warring powers in early medieval Europe, The First King of England sheds new light on Æthelstan’s early life, his spectacular military victories and the innovative way he governed his kingdom, his fostering of the church, the deft political alliances he forged with Europe’s royal houses, and his death and enduring legacy. It begins with the reigns of Alfred the Great and Edward the Elder, Æthelstan’s grandfather and father, describing how they consolidated and expanded the “kingdom of the Anglo-Saxons.” But it was Æthelstan who would declare himself the first king of all England when, in 927, he conquered the viking kingdom at York, required the submission of a Scottish king, and secured an annual tribute from the Welsh kings.

Beautifully illustrated and breathtaking in scope, The First King of England is the most comprehensive, up-to-date biography of Æthelstan available, bringing a magisterial richness of detail to the life of a consequential British monarch whose strategic and political sophistication was unprecedented for his time.

Visit David Woodman's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Whatever Happened to Lori Lovely?"

New from William Morrow: Whatever Happened to Lori Lovely?: A Novel by Sarah McCoy.

About the book, from the publisher:

From New York Times bestselling author Sarah McCoy—a spellbinding novel based on a true story: a beautiful young movie star of Hollywood’s Golden Age gives up her bright career to become a nun.

In 1969, twenty-three-year-old starlet Lori Lovely, the apple of Hollywood’s eye, shocks the world by ditching a promising film career to take vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience as a Benedictine nun. Gossip columnists and scandal sheets can’t get enough of the story. Why would such a beautiful girl take the veil? Was she hiding from someone? Did it have anything to do with the tragic death of her costar, heartthrob singer Lucas Wesley?

In 1990, Lu Tibbott is under the gun to complete her senior thesis in modern American history. Instead of spending weeks in dusty archives, Lu decides to dig into a true twentieth-century mystery and write about her aunt Lori, now the Mother Abbess at a cloistered convent in rural New England. Biographers, bloggers, and media types have long speculated about her aunt Lori’s sudden departure from Hollywood. Mother Lori, however, has refused all requests for interviews—until Lu arrives at the abbey with a tape recorder in hand. To her delight, Mother Lori announces she’s finally ready to talk...but only if Lu is truly ready to listen.

Lu is shocked to discover that the story of Lori Lovely’s rise in Hollywood was far more tumultuous than she’d ever expected, a fairy tale twisting with ambition, unforeseen alliances, forbidden love, and secrets. What began as a history thesis now threatens to upend all their lives with its unexpected truths, especially as the media gets wind of Lu’s project and begins to ask…

Whatever happened to Lori Lovely?

Learn more about the book and author at Sarah McCoy’s website, on Facebook, and on Instagram and Threads.

The Page 69 Test: The Time It Snowed in Puerto Rico.

The Page 69 Test: The Baker's Daughter.

Coffee with a Canine: Sarah McCoy and Gilbert.

The Page 69 Test: The Mapmaker's Children.

My Book, The Movie: The Mapmaker’s Children.

The Page 69 Test: Marilla of Green Gables.

Writers Read: Sarah McCoy (October 2018).

The Page 69 Test: Mustique Island.

Q&A with Sarah McCoy.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Provincial Metropolis"

New from Cambridge University Press: Provincial Metropolis: Intellectuals and the Hinterland in Colonial India by David Boyk.

About the book, from the publisher:

This book tells the story of Patna, in the north Indian region of Bihar, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. A century and more earlier, Patna had been an important and populous city, but it came to be seen by many-and is still seen today-as merely part of the mofussil, the provincial hinterland. Despite Patna's real decline, it continued to nurture a vibrant intellectual culture that linked it with cities and towns across northern India and beyond. Urdu literary gatherings and other Islamicate traditions inherited from Mughal times helped animate the networks sustaining institutions like scholarly libraries and satirical newspapers. Meanwhile, English-educated lawyers sought to bring new prominence to their city and region by making Patna the capital of a new province. They succeeded, but as Patna's political influence grew, its distinctive character was diminished. Ultimately, Provincial Metropolis shows, Patna's intellectual and cultural life thrived not despite its provinciality but because of it.

Visit David Boyk's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Scar the Sky"

New from Crooked Lane Books: Scar the Sky: A Novel by J. Todd Scott.

About the book, from the publisher:

Lightning never strikes twice —until it does.

A killer is hunting down survivors of lightning strikes in this dark and twisting thriller, perfect for fans of J. H. Markert and Richard Chizmar.

Everything changed for Andi Ellis when she was struck by lightning and her heart stopped. Andi was resuscitated, but she was never the same—electronics strangely malfunction in her presence: clocks can’t keep time; batteries swiftly die. And while many lightning strike victims are left with temporary "lightning tree" markings, on her they are permanent scars.

Years later Andi, her eight-year-old daughter, and a fellow lightning strike survivor have fled Texas and Andi’s dangerous ex to go off the grid in a strange and secluded desert community.

Meanwhile, two private investigators pursue a US senator's missing daughter who they find too late. When searching for information on the strange lightning scars on the girl's body, they find themselves pulled into an FBI investigation—people who have been struck by lightning are being murdered.

As the death toll mounts, the task force traces the killer farther west—closer and closer to Andi Ellis and her daughter, and the haven she's carefully created.

Thriller and horror readers will be enthralled by the dark turns in Scar the Sky.

Visit J. Todd Scott's website.

The Page 69 Test: High White Sun.

My Book, The Movie: High White Sun.

My Book, The Movie: This Side of Night.

The Page 69 Test: This Side of Night.

Q&A with J. Todd Scott.

The Page 69 Test: Lost River.

The Page 69 Test: The Flock.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Work of Reform"

New from Cornell University Press: The Work of Reform: Literature and Political Ecology from Langland to Spenser by William Rhodes.

About the book, from the publisher:

The Work of Reform interweaves literary, economic, and environmental history to trace the influence that William Langland's harsh vision of enforced agrarian labor in Piers Plowman had on later medieval and early modern thinking about land and improvement in Britain and Ireland, culminating with Edmund Spenser's colonial writing. William Rhodes brings together a rich poetic archive with agrarian husbandry manuals, prose polemics, and imperial tracts to connect conflicts over land and labor on the English manor to those of Tudor Ireland, offering a new eco-Marxist literary history of ecological transformation across the medieval-modern divide.

In the aftermath of the Black Death, the depopulation of the countryside, and the beginnings of the Enclosure Movement, English poets imagined enforced labor as a panacea for social unrest precipitated by environmental catastrophe. Arguing that Piers Plowman established how poetry could envision religious and economic transformation based on agrarian production, The Work of Reform reveals that the Piers Plowman tradition's valorization of agrarian toil was open to appropriation by later writers developing totalizing, top-down colonialist projects.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Fairest"

New from Thomas & Mercer: The Fairest (Book 2 of 2: Arles Shepherd Thriller) by Jenny Milchman.

About the book, from the publisher:

When a young girl seeks out sanctuary with a total stranger, a nightmare follows in this riveting novel of suspense by Jenny Milchman, the USA Today bestselling author of The Usual Silence.

Author Kara Parsons is at a book signing in the town where she was raised. Before it’s over, a young girl approaches with a copy of Kara’s book containing a handwritten inscription: I am a missing child.

Most people would alert the police, but Kara knows what happens to the young and vulnerable when the system fails them. She turns to her former therapist, Arles Shepherd, who’s recovering from injuries and staying off the grid. But even Arles, who’s seen everything, finds something off about this girl who refuses to reveal her own name. What is she running from? And how much of what she says can be believed?

When a man with a gun manages to locate Arles’s remote wilderness home, the true threat is revealed, and Arles and Kara go on the run. But fleeing only gets them so far. To save this child, Arles must allow her to be found. And that’s when the real danger begins.

Learn more about the book and author at Jenny Milchman's website.

My Book, The Movie: Cover of Snow.

The Page 69 Test: Cover of Snow.

The Page 69 Test: Ruin Falls.

My Book, The Movie: Ruin Falls.

My Book, The Movie: The Second Mother.

The Page 69 Test: The Second Mother.

Q&A with Jenny Milchman.

My Book, The Movie: The Usual Silence.

The Page 69 Test: The Usual Silence.

Writers Read: Jenny Milchman (October 2024).

--Marshal Zeringue

"Strategies for Approval"

New from Yale University Press: Strategies for Approval: Building Support for Military Intervention at the UN Security Council by Stefano Recchia.

About the book, from the publisher:

A thoughtful analysis of how major powers can obtain UN Security Council approval for military intervention

Powerful states often seek UN Security Council approval for their military interventions to enhance legitimacy, but how can they secure this approval when veto-wielding permanent members have grave misgivings? In this groundbreaking study of UNSC diplomacy, Stefano Recchia tackles this question by drawing on hundreds of declassified documents and interviews that he conducted with top diplomats from multiple countries.

Recchia demonstrates that since the early 1990s, powerful states facing significant opposition at the UNSC have not been able to rely solely on economic and political leverage to obtain a resolution of approval. Instead, they have had to combine exertions of leverage with credible signals that they would act with restraint and in line with core international norms. This often required that they agree to incorporate costly limitations on the use of force, such as time limits and multilateral oversight, into the requested resolution. Recchia argues that for better or worse accepting such constraints will be critical in the future if powerful countries, including the United States, are to secure UN approval in an increasingly competitive international environment.

Visit Stefano Recchia's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"House of Dusk"

New from DAW: House of Dusk by Deva Fagan.

About the book, from the publisher:

A romantic epic fantasy featuring a fire-wielding nun grappling with her dark past and a young spy caught between her mission and a growing attraction to an enemy princess

With complex relationships, a rich and mythic world, and brisk pacing, this standalone novel is perfect for fans of Tasha Suri, Samantha Shannon, and Shannon Chakraborty

Ten years ago, Sephre left behind her life as a war hero and took holy vows to seek redemption for her crimes, wielding the flames of the Phoenix to purify the dead. But as corpses rise, a long-dead god stirs, and shadowy serpents creep from the underworld, she has no choice but to draw on the very past she's been trying so hard to forget.

Orphaned by the same war Sephre helped win, Yeneris has trained half her life to be the perfect spy, a blade slipped deep into the palace of her enemies. Undercover as bodyguard to Sinoe, a princess whose tears unleash prophecy, Yeneris is searching for the stolen bones of a saint. Her growing attraction to the princess, however, is proving dangerous, and Yeneris struggles to balance her feelings for Sinoe with her duty to her people.

As gods are reborn and spirits destroyed, the world trembles on the edge of a second cataclysm. Sephre must decide whether to be bound by her past or to forge a better future, even if it means renouncing her vows and accepting a new and terrible power. Meanwhile, when the real enemy makes their bid for power, Yeneris must find a way to remain true to her full self and save both her mission and her heart.

As dead gods rise and corruption creeps across the world, this sweeping standalone fantasy tale of forbidden sapphic love and dark betrayal will set your heart ablaze.

Visit Deva Fagan's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Trust and Cooperation"

New from Oxford University Press: Trust and Cooperation by Paul Faulkner.

About the book, from the publisher:

Trust is a cooperating enabling attitude. We cooperate both practically and epistemically: we coordinate our actions and share what we know, and in both cases, trust enables this cooperation. By virtue of trusting, it is rational to rely on others. When this is taken to be the function of trust, two distinct attitudes emerge as trusting. One is situated within an objective view of the world and constitutes a prediction of behaviour, which in the interpersonal case amounts to some calculation of interest from sanctions and rewards. The other can only be interpersonal and requires these interactions be approached from the participant stance.

In Trust and Cooperation, Paul Faulkner considers how these two distinct attitudes of trust--predictive and affective--support cooperation and how the two perspectives on our interpersonal life within which each is embedded engage with each other. Affective trust is a response to another's commitment, which sees the commitment itself as constituting a reason to believe and places on the trusted an expectation of this commitment being fulfilled. It is a commitment indexed expectation. In being optimistically held, trust in this sense constitutes a form of recognition and respect. So we can wrong others in relying only on calculation of the probability of outcome. But our actual engagements can be messy; as well as being an interpersonal act, cooperation can equally be calculated coordination.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Murder Your Darlings"

Coming January 13 from Harper: Murder Your Darlings: A Novel by Jenna Blum.

About the book, from the publisher:

For every woman who’s ever fallen for a bad man comes a hilarious and eviscerating tale of love, loss, and deadlines from New York Times bestselling author Jenna Blum.

Known for such brilliant historical novels as Those Who Save Us and The Lost Family, A Mighty Blaze co-founder and New York Times bestselling author Jenna Blum now offers a contemporary, suspenseful novel about love, loss, and revenge in the world of books.

Simone “Sam” Vetiver is a mid-career novelist finishing a lukewarm publicity tour while facing a deadline for a new book on which she’s totally blocked. Recently divorced, Sam is worrying where her life is going when she receives glowing fan mail from stratospherically successful author William Corwyn, renowned for his female-centric novels. When William and Sam meet and his literary sympathy is as intense as their chemistry, both writers think they’ve found The One.

But as in their own novels, things between Sam and William are not what they seem. William has multiple stalkers, including a scarily persistent one named The Rabbit. He lives on a remote Maine island, where his writer life resembles The Shining. And when writers turn up dead, including from The Darlings support group William runs, Sam has to ask: Is it The Rabbit—William’s #1 Stalker? Another woman scorned? Can William be everything he seems?

Narrated by Sam, William, and The Rabbit, Murder Your Darlings is a wickedly witty look at today’s literary landscape and down-the-rabbit-hole tale of how far people will go for love.

Visit Jenna Blum's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Lost Family.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Illegality and the Production of Affluence"

New from the University of California Press: Illegality and the Production of Affluence: Undocumented Labor and Gentrification in Rural America by Lise Nelson.

About the book, from the publisher:

Over several decades, the influx of wealthy, white "lifestyle" migrants has transformed the economic, social, and ecological fabric of many rural communities across the United States—from alpine towns of the Rockies to forest and lake communities of the Southeast—in a process akin to urban gentrification. Illegality and the Production of Affluence explores an underappreciated dimension of this process: its dependence on low-wage Latine immigrant workers, many undocumented, who build and maintain gentrified landscapes and lifestyles. Drawing on fine-grained qualitative data, Lise Nelson explores how employers recruited an unfamiliar workforce to places "off the map" of immigrant settlement. The book also reveals insights into how business practices and profitability shifted through the use of racialized, "illegal," and highly precarious labor. Finally, the book investigates the disjuncture between Latine immigrants' vital role in rural gentrifying economies and their social, civic, and racialized exclusion in the spaces of everyday life.

--Marshal Zeringue

"I Killed the King"

New from Storytide: I Killed the King by Rebecca Mix and Andrea Hannah.

About the book, from the publisher:

One of Us Is Lying meets Knives Out—with beasts, murder, and magic—in this first book in a thrilling locked-room whodunnit YA fantasy duology by Andrea Hannah and New York Times bestseller Rebecca Mix.

After a decade of war, the kingdoms of Avendell and Istellia have finally agreed to peace. As nobles and magic wielders from both countries arrive at remote Castle Avendell for a historic all-night masquerade to celebrate, King Costis summons an unlikely group to his chambers: the crown prince, his Istellian bride-to-be, his personal guard, a wild beast tamer, and the palace’s questionable new healer. But before Costis can reveal why he has gathered them, the castle goes dark.

When the lights come back, the king is dead—murdered with the princess’s knife, in a weak spot only his guard knew of, and with venom from one of the beast tamer’s monsters lacing the blade.

With no clear killer—and everyone a suspect—they make a risky pact: Tell no one until the treaty is signed. But when a winter storm seals everyone inside and someone aware of the king's untimely death begins to pick off guests one by one, the six suspects must work together to discover who killed the king . . . before one of them is next.

Visit Rebecca Mix's website and Andrea Hannah's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"On the Move"

New from Stanford University Press: On the Move: Migration Policies in Latin America and the Caribbean by Andrew Dan Selee, Valerie Lacarte, Ariel G. Ruiz Soto, and Diego Chaves-González.

About the book, from the publisher:

The Americas is a region on the move and is both the source and recipient of some of the largest migrations in the world today. While much scholarship and public commentary focus on the considerable movement of people northward toward the United States, most of the millions of migrants from the Americas are in fact, the authors reveal, staying within other countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. Through a combination of engaging narratives and evidence-based analysis, On the Move tells a story of both triumph and tragedy. The authors explore the complex composition of migration flows and the varied and uneven ways in which host countries in the region have responded. This book takes readers beyond the typical debates on US immigration policy and represents the first comprehensive look at how countries in Latin America and the Caribbean are reacting to an unprecedented wave of people around the world who choose—or are forced—to move across borders.

--Marshal Zeringue

"If Looks Could Kill"

New from Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers: If Looks Could Kill by Julie Berry.

About the book, from the publisher:

From Printz Honor–winning and New York Times bestselling author Julie Berry, a true-crime-nail-biter-turned-mythic-odyssey pitting Jack the Ripper against Medusa. A defiant love song to sisterhood, a survivors’ battle cry, and a romantic literary tour de force laced with humor.

It’s autumn 1888, and Jack the Ripper is on the run. As London police close in, he flees England for New York City seeking new victims. But a primal force of female vengeance has had enough. With serpents for hair and a fearsome gaze, an awakened Medusa is hunting for one thing: Jack.

And other dangers lurk in Manhattan’s Bowery. Salvation Army volunteers Tabitha and Pearl discover that a girl they once helped has been forced to work in a local brothel. Tabitha’s an upstate city girl with a wry humor and a thirst for adventure, while farmgirl Pearl takes everything with stone-cold seriousness. Their brittle partnership is tested as they team up with an aspiring girl reporter and a handsome Irish bartender to mount a rescue effort, only to find their fates entwine with Medusa’s and Jack’s.

Visit Julie Berry's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Memory of Violence"

New from the University of California Press: A Memory of Violence: Syriac Christianity and the Radicalization of Religious Difference in Late Antiquity by Christine Shepardson.

About the book, from the publisher:

Through the fifth and sixth centuries, major divisions rocked Christianity as different factions vied to make their teachings the doctrine of the Roman Empire’s imperial church. In the aftermath of the Council of Chalcedon in 451, miaphysite Christians, often targeted as heretics by the imperial church, confronted periodic violence and persecution. In this book, Christine Shepardson reshapes our understanding of late antiquity by centering Syriac Christianity in these complex and politicized doctrinal conflicts. Drawing on critical studies of violence and memory, she traces narratives of resistance and other rhetorical strategies by which miaphysite leaders radicalized their followers to endure physical deprivation and harm rather than abandon their church community.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Austen Affair"

New from St. Martin's Griffin: The Austen Affair: A Novel by Madeline Bell.

About the book, from the publisher:

Two feuding co-stars in a Jane Austen film adaptation accidentally travel back in time to the Regency Era in this delightfully clever and riotously funny debut

Tess Bright just scored her dream role starring in an adaptation of Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey. It's not just the role of a lifetime, but it’s also her last chance to prove herself as a serious actress (no easy feat after being fired from her last TV gig) and more importantly, it’s her opportunity to honor her mom, who was the biggest fan of Jane Austen ever. But one thing is standing in Tess’s way—well, one very tall, annoyingly handsome person, actually: Hugh Balfour.

A serious British method actor, Hugh wants nothing to do with Tess (whose Teen Choice Awards somehow don’t quite compare to his BAFTA nominations). Hugh is a type-A, no-nonsense, Royal Academy prodigy, whereas Tess is big-hearted, a little reckless, and admittedly, kind of a mess. But the film needs chemistry—and Tess’s career depends on it.

Sparks fly, but not in the way Tess hoped, when an electrical accident sends the two feuding co-stars back in time to Jane Austen’s era. 200 years in the past with only each other to rely on, Tess and Hugh need to ad-lib their way through the Regency period in order to make it back home, and hopefully not screw up history along the way. But if a certain someone looks particularly dashing in those 19th century breeches…well, Tess won’t be complaining.

A wickedly funny, delightfully charming story, The Austen Affair is a tribute to Jane Austen, second chances, and love across the space-time continuum.

Visit Madeline Bell's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Prioritizing Faith"

New from NYU Press: Prioritizing Faith: International Religious Freedom and U.S. Foreign Policy by Ashlyn W. Hand.

About the book, from the publisher:

Uncovers the political, ideological, and bureaucratic forces that shaped the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 and its legacy across the Clinton, Bush, and Obama administrations

The International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 formally established the promotion of religious freedom as a U.S. foreign policy and national security priority. Tracing its origins and passage, Prioritizing Faith shows how the legislation was made possible by the convergence of growing evangelical and Jewish advocacy, the expanding international human rights movement, and a broader search for post–Cold War purpose. Yet implementation across administrations has been uneven, shaped by shifting geopolitical dynamics and internal institutional constraints.

Relying on expert interviews and rich archival analysis, Ashlyn W. Hand traces how Clinton, Bush, and Obama each wove international religious freedom into their foreign policy visions while navigating competing priorities and evolving strategic interests. Through case studies in China, Vietnam, and Saudi Arabia, Hand reveals the inner workings and persistent challenges of American religious freedom policy on the global stage.

Timely, insightful, and deeply researched, Prioritizing Faith offers an incisive assessment of the United States’ efforts to promote religious freedom abroad, highlighting the enduring tensions between normative aspirations and the complexities of foreign policy practice.

Visit Ashlyn W. Hand's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Fiend"

Coming September 16 from G.P. Putnam's Sons: Fiend by Alma Katsu.

About the book, from the publisher:

Historical horror maven Alma Katsu turns her talents to the modern world for the first time, in this terrifying tale about an all-powerful family with an ancient evil under its thumb.

Imagine if the Sackler family had a demon at their beck and call.

The Berisha family runs one of the largest import-export companies in the world, and they’ve always been lucky. Their rivals suffer strokes. Inconvenient buildings catch on fire. Earthquakes swallow up manufacturing plants, destroying harmful evidence. Things always seem to work out for the Berishas. They’re blessed.

At least that is what Zef, the patriarch, has always told his three children. And each of them knows their place in the family—Dardan, as the only male heir, must prepare to take over as keeper of the Berisha secrets, Maris’s most powerful contribution, much to her dismay, will be to marry strategically, and Nora’s job, as the youngest, is to just stay out of the way. But when things stop going as planned, and the family blessing starts looking more like a curse, the Berishas begin to splinter, each hatching their own secret scheme. They didn’t get to be one of the richest families in the world without spilling a little blood, but this time, it might be their own.

Visit Alma Katsu's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Taker.

My Book, The Movie: The Hunger.

The Page 69 Test: The Hunger.

Writers Read: Alma Katsu (March 2020).

The Page 69 Test: The Deep.

The Page 69 Test: Red Widow.

Q&A with Alma Katsu.

The Page 69 Test: The Fervor.

Writers Read: Alma Katsu (April 2022).

My Book, The Movie: Red London.

The Page 69 Test: Red London.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Wildcat of the Streets"

New from the University of Pennsylvania Press: Wildcat of the Streets: Detroit in the Age of Community Policing by Michael Stauch.

About the book, from the publisher:

How Black youth in Detroit made claims for political equality over and against the new order of community policing

The criminalization of Black youth was central to policing in urban America during the civil rights era and continued in Detroit even after the rise of Black political control in the 1970s. Wildcat of the Streets documents how the “community policing” approach of Mayor Coleman Young (1974–1993)―including neighborhood police stations, affirmative action hiring policies, and public participation in law enforcement initiatives―transformed Detroit, long considered the nation’s symbol of racial inequality and urban crisis, into a crucial site of experimentation in policing while continuing to subject many Black Detroiters to police brutality and repression.

In response, young people in the 1970s and 1980s drew on the city’s storied history of labor radicalism as well as contemporary shopfloor struggles to wage a “wildcat of the streets,” consisting of street disturbances, decentralized gang activity, and complex organizations of the informal economy. In this revelatory new history of the social life of cities, Michael Stauch mines a series of evocative interviews conducted with the participants to trace how Black youth made claims for political equality over and against the new order of community policing.

Centering the perspective of criminalized and crime-committing young people, Wildcat of the Streets is an original interpretation of police reform, the long struggle for Black liberation, and the politics of cities in the age of community policing.

--Marshal Zeringue

"North of the Sunlit River"

New from Lake Union: North of the Sunlit River: A Novel by Jessica Bryant Klagmann.

About the book, from the publisher:

From the author of This Impossible Brightness comes a heartrending trek through grief, hope, and the Alaskan wilderness as a young woman seeks the truth that will heal her.

Eila Jacobsen is adrift, reeling from her father’s recent death and still suffering from the loss of her best friend. When invited to join a research trip to a remote part of Alaska, she takes the chance to refocus her life and perhaps unravel the mystery behind the dwindling caribou population.

But as Eila buries herself in data, she stumbles across something remarkable. Concealed in the pages of her father’s journal is a discovery with life-changing possibilities. So why was it abandoned?

Unable to ignore its potential, Eila ventures deeper into the Alaskan tundra in search of healing and answers. But she’s not the only one in need of a new beginning, and she’s not the only one looking.

Pursued across the landscape and haunted by secrets, Eila presses on, unearthing the regrets of those closest to her, and revealing the joy and forgiveness that bind them together.

Visit Jessica Bryant Klagmann's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Women, Politics, and the Irish Public Sphere in the Age of Revolution"

New from Oxford University Press: Women, Politics, and the Irish Public Sphere in the Age of Revolution by Catriona Kennedy.

About the book, from the publisher:

The late-eighteenth-century 'age of revolutions' has long been identified as a key moment in the gendering of modern democratic politics, one which opened up new debates on the 'rights of women' while often re-affirming the masculinity of the political citizen. In Ireland, the revolutionary era saw the rise of the radical United Irish movement, mass popular mobilisation, and reached a violent dénouement in the 1798 rebellion. But what did Ireland's age of revolution mean for women? Was radical republicanism able to imagine women as political actors? How did Irish women experience and navigate the intense ideological conflicts of the 1790s? Addressing these and related questions, this is the first book-length study of women and Irish politics in the late eighteenth century.

Revising a stubborn tendency to present women's political engagements in this period as largely mediated through men, it stresses instead women's concerns, initiatives, and networks. It reconstructs the distinctively gendered political cultures of Ireland's principal communities–the dynastic politics of the Protestant elite; the dynamic oppositional culture of Belfast Presbyterianism; the urban and agrarian radicalism of unpropertied Catholics–and asks how these shaped the meanings of the 1790s for women. In looking beyond the homosocial spaces of the club, pub, lodge, and corps, it reveals a complexly gendered public sphere in which women were often active participants. As the subjects of United Irish addresses, religious sermons, state surveillance, and post-rebellion commemoration, women emerge as a clear, if overlooked, constituency in Ireland's age of revolution. And it suggests how our understanding of revolution might change when viewed from the perspective of women.

--Marshal Zeringue

"No Rest for the Wicked"

New from Minotaur Books: No Rest for the Wicked: A Novel by Rachel Louise Adams.

About the book, from the publisher:

With an expert hand, Rachel Louise Adams’s debut No Rest for the Wicked reads like an edge of your seat, heart-pounding scary movie.

In one Halloween obsessed Midwestern town, everyone’s on red alert after a local politician goes missing. Little do they know it’s only the beginning.

It’s been close to twenty years since forensic pathologist Dolores Hawthorne left her hometown of Little Horton, Wisconsin. The town is famous for its Halloween celebrations, but also its history of violent deaths linked to the holiday. To Dolores, it’s the place she fled, family, bad memories, and all. Until the FBI calls to tell her that her father--the former mayor turned US Senator--is missing under mysterious circumstances.

Some people count to ten to wake up from a nightmare. Dolores always counts the bones of her head instead: sphenoid, frontal, lacrimal. But no matter how many times she counts them, it doesn’t change the fact that her father is missing, that his final words of warning to her were to trust no one, and that now, the rest of her family is giving Dolores a chilling welcome. With Halloween fast approaching, Dolores must face the past she left behind before it’s too late.

Follow Rachel Louise Adams on Facebook and Instagram.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Stadium City"

Coming September 23 from the University of Illinois Press: Stadium City: Sports and Media Infrastructure in the United States by Helen Morgan Parmett.

About the book, from the publisher:

A new sports stadium has an outsized impact on a city’s landscape and image of itself. Each stadium also plays a central role in media institutions, technologies, and culture as a catalyst for urban change and flashy neighborhood anchor, cornerstone of regional identity and purveyor of multimedia experiences. Helen Morgan Parmett analyzes sports stadiums in Atlanta, Seattle, and Minneapolis to demonstrate the role that media institutions, technologies, and culture play in sports and examine their impact on the urban landscape. These interconnected factors impact struggles over city space, identity, and urban governing. As Morgan Parmett shows, stadiums exist as more than just buildings and sporting places—they are central nodes in the city that connect, disconnect, and distribute resources, people, information, and, ultimately, power. Morgan Parmett demonstrates how the “sportification” of place is influenced by the specific histories, geography, and sporting cultures of a city while explaining their relationship to broader forces at work in media, sport, and urbanism. Original and incisive, Stadium City offers a beyond-the-playing-field analysis of sports stadiums and their impact on our cities and our lives.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Among the Burning Flowers"

New from Bloomsbury USA: Among the Burning Flowers: A Novel by Samantha Shannon.

About the book, from the publisher:

With the awakening of fire-breathing dragons, Among the Burning Flowers sees the first sparks of danger that threaten to consume the world in The Priory of the Orange Tree.

Take your first steps into the epic.

Yscalin, land of sunshine and lavender, will soon be ablaze.

It has been centuries since the Draconic Army took wing, almost extinguishing humankind.

Marosa Vetalda is a prisoner in her own home, controlled by her cold father, King Sigoso. Over the mountains, her betrothed, Aubrecht Lievelyn, rules Mentendon in all but name. Together, they intend to usher in a better world.

A better world seems impossibly distant to Estina Melaugo, who hunts the Draconic beasts that have slept across the world for centuries.

And now the great wyrm Fýredel is stirring, and Yscalin will be the first to fall...

A story of human resilience in the face of dire circumstances, Among the Burning Flowers leads readers through the gripping and tragic events that pave the way for the opening of the million-copy bestseller The Priory of The Orange Tree.

Visit Samantha Shannon's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Intimate Inequalities"

New from Northwestern University Press: Intimate Inequalities: Performing Migrant Domestic Work by Ella Parry-Davies.

About the book, from the publisher:

Mobilizing performance to amplify migrant domestic workers’ creative expertise

Intimate inequalities exist where the embodied and the everyday rub up against transnational structures of power. Ella Parry-Davies conducted collaborative research with migrant domestic workers from the Philippines living in the UK and Lebanon, where migration is regulated by employer sponsorship systems, to explore how they negotiate the intimacy of the family home and the attendant inequalities of laboring within it. Intimate Inequalities: Performing Migrant Domestic Work brings these conditions into focus while articulating a methodological inquiry into the dynamics of collaborative performance research. Parry-Davies examines site-specific soundwalks, recorded and coedited with domestic workers, which steer the book between church choirs in Beirut and activist gatherings in London, and from urban performances in Lebanon’s 2019 revolution to mutual aid organizing amid COVID-19 in the UK. Breaking with prevalent depictions of migrant domestic workers as voiceless and victimized, Intimate Inequalities mobilizes performance as both an analytic lens and a practical methodology, amplifying its subjects’ expertise while reckoning with the intimate yet unequal dynamics of research itself.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Killer Motive"

New from MIRA: A Killer Motive: A Novel by Hannah Mary McKinnon.

About the book, from the publisher:

You never know who’s listening.

To Stella Dixon, sneaking her teenage brother out of their parents’ house for a beach party was harmless fun—until Max disappeared without a trace.

Six years later, Stella’s family is still broken, and she can’t let go of her guilt. The only thing that keeps her going is helping other families find closure through A Killer Motive, her true crime podcast.

In a bid to find new sponsors and keep making episodes, Stella goes on a local radio show. But when she says on air that if she had just one clue, she’d find Max and bring whoever hurt him to justice, someone takes it as a challenge.

A mysterious invitation to play a game arrives, with the promise that if Stella wins, she’ll get information about what happened to Max. Stella thinks it’s a sick joke…until Max’s best friend vanishes. And she’s given new instructions: tell nobody or people will die.

Desperate and unable to trust anyone, Stella agrees. But beating a twisted, invisible enemy seems impossible when they make all the rules…

Visit Hannah Mary McKinnon's website.

Q&A with Hannah Mary McKinnon.

The Page 69 Test: Sister Dear.

My Book, The Movie: You Will Remember Me.

The Page 69 Test: You Will Remember Me.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The New Public Safety"

New from the University of California Press: The New Public Safety: Police Reform and the Lurking Threat to Civil Liberties by Shawn E. Fields.

About the book, from the publisher:

Efforts to reduce reliance on police have gained momentum since 2020, driven by a growing recognition that public safety is better served when addressed by experts in medicine, mental health, houselessness, and behavior intervention. But this rush to reimagine public safety carries a serious risk: a long history of abuse exists within social welfare systems, and the laws protecting us from police who perpetrate these types of abuses largely do not apply to EMTs, social workers, and other nonpolice responders. While commending efforts to remove police from places they do not belong, The New Public Safety: Police Reform and the Lurking Threat to Civil Liberties raises the alarm on the dangers these reforms can pose if undertaken without proper restraints and protections and offers practical, achievable solutions to address these threats.

--Marshal Zeringue

"You’ve Goth My Heart"

New from Little, Brown Books for Young Readers: You’ve Goth My Heart by L.C. Rosen.

About the book, from the publisher:

A blood-curdlingly spooky and darkly funny romance about how falling in love is scary AF, perfect for fans of Wednesday and Heartstopper.

When Gray gets a text from a wrong number, he’s pretty sure it’s a serial killer—or worse, his ex—on the other end of the line. But, the anonymous texter shares his same taste in music and movies, and Gray’s bored while stuck at home all summer, so why not respond? Being anonymous actually helps them open up to each other, and Gray finds himself hopeful that this could be his dream goth crush. All they have to do is meet—on Halloween, the night of Sleepy Hollow’s big house-decorating contest, and the perfect opportunity for Gray to show his mystery texter his true feelings.

But between Gray’s closeted ex coming back into the picture, a cute but obnoxious new goth kid vying to win the contest, and a maybe serial killer lurking around and killing local gay teens, Gray’s prospects are looking grim. Come Halloween, he’ll either get his dream guy or die trying…

You’ve Goth My Heart is the romantic and hilarious accidental-connection romance you don’t want to miss!

Visit Lev AC Rosen's website.

The Page 69 Test: Camp.

Writers Read: Lev AC Rosen (November 2022).

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Surgeon's Battle"

New from The University of North Carolina Press: The Surgeon's Battle: How Medicine Won the Vicksburg Campaign and Changed the Civil War by Lindsay Rae Smith Privette.

About the book, from the publisher:

Between May 1 and May 22, 1863, Union soldiers marched nearly 200 miles through the hot, humid countryside to assault and capture the fortified city of Vicksburg, Mississippi. Upon its arrival, the army laid siege to the city for a grueling forty-seven days. Disease and combat casualties threatened to undermine the army’s fighting strength, leaving medical officers to grapple with the battlefield conditions necessary to sustain soldiers' bodies. Medical innovations were vital to the Union victory. When Vicksburg fell on July 4, triumph would have been fleeting if not for the US Army Medical Department and its personnel.

By centering soldiers' health and medical care in the Union army’s fight to take Vicksburg, Lindsay Rae Smith Privette offers a fresh perspective on the environmental threats, logistical challenges, and interpersonal conflicts that shaped the campaign and siege. In doing so, Privette shines new light on the development of the army’s medical systems as officers learned to adapt to their circumstances and prove themselves responsible stewards of soldiers' bodies.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Belles"

New from Atria Books: The Belles: A Novel by Lacey N. Dunham.

About the book, from the publisher:

In this richly atmospheric, dark academia debut novel, a young woman with a secretive past will risk everything—including her life—to fit in.

Belles never tell...

It’s 1951 at the secluded Bellerton College, and Deena Williams is an outsider doing her best to blend in with her wealthy and perfectly groomed peers. Infamous for its strict rules as much as its prestige, attending Bellerton could give Deena the comfortable life she’s always dreamed of.

She quickly forms an alliance with the five other freshmen on her floor, and soon they are singled out by the president’s wife as the most promising girls of their class, who anoints them: The Belles. They walk the college’s halls in menacing unison, matching velvet ribbons in their hair. But no sisterhood comes without secrets, and the Belles are no exception. Playing cruel pranks on their dormitory housemother and embarking on boundary-shattering night games, the Belles test the limits of the campus rules.

But as Deena begins to piece together the sinister history of Bellerton, her own past threatens to come to light, forcing her to make a dangerous choice. A chilling and seductive coming-of-age story, The Belles is an excavation of the dark side of girlhood, the intricacies of privilege, and the unbridled desire to belong at any cost.

Visit Lacey N. Dunham's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Absence of National Feeling"

New from the University Press of Mississippi: Absence of National Feeling: Education Debates in the Reconstruction Congress by Michael J. Steudeman.

About the book, from the publisher:

Before the start of the Civil War, the US Congress seldom took up the question of education, deferring regularly to a tradition of local control. In the period after the war, however, education became a major concern of the federal government. Many members of Congress espoused the necessity of schooling to transform southern culture and behavior, secure civil rights, and reconstruct the Union. Absence of National Feeling: Education Debates in the Reconstruction Congress analyzes how policymakers cultivated a rhetoric of public education to negotiate conflicts over federalism and civic belonging in the aftermath of the Civil War.

Reconstruction Era advocates embraced education as a way to orchestrate the affective life of Americans. They believed education could marshal feelings of hope, love, shame, and pride to alter Americans’ predispositions toward other citizens. The most assertive educational advocates believed that schools would physically bring together children divided by race or religion, fostering shared affinities and dissolving racial hierarchies. Schooling promised to be an emotional adhesive, holding together the North and South and facilitating US expansion into the West.

Through protracted debates over national education funding, the fate of the Freedmen’s Bureau, and school desegregation, members of Congress negotiated schools’ potential as a vehicle for social change. By Reconstruction’s end, most members of Congress accepted schooling as an element of national reconciliation. To reach this tenuous consensus, though, legislators sacrificed their call for schools to intervene in the feelings of prejudice, resentment, and superiority that sustained the culture of slavery. Rejecting a transformative educational vision, Congress took another tragic step in its abandonment of Reconstruction.

Focusing on the words spoken in the Reconstruction Congress, Absence of National Feeling contends that educational rhetoric appealed to legislators debating whether the federal government could, or even should, alter public feeling. Tracing congressional transcripts between 1865 and 1877, author Michael J. Steudeman illustrates that these debates lastingly helped to both define and delimit the possible trajectories of education policy.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Kaplan's Plot"

New from Flatiron Books: Kaplan's Plot: A Novel by Jason Diamond.

About the book, from the publisher:

Buried secrets. Healing. Reflection. When his business fails, Elijah returns home where past and present collide and a riveting family mystery unravels. Delving into generational trauma and Chicago’s dark history, this is a suspenseful and haunting read.

Elijah Mendes was hoping for a more triumphant return to Chicago. His mother, Eve, is dying of cancer, his business flamed out, and he has nowhere else to go. So he returns to Chicago feeling listless and shattered, worried about how he’s going to help his mother despite their chilly relationship. He finds some inspiration when he discovers that their family owns a Jewish cemetery and that a man he’s never heard of, his great-uncle Solomon Kaplan, is buried in a plot there. With a new sense of purpose—and an excuse to talk more deeply with his mother—Elijah begins pursuing a family mystery of extraordinary proportions.

Elijah discovers his grandfather Yitz, Eve’s father, was a powerful gangster in the 1920s. She was ashamed and never spoke about him to Elijah. As secrets unravel, the past and present become intertwined, and Yitz’s story forces Elijah and Eve to bond in ways they never have before and begin to accept each other, not as who they wish they were but as they both are.

Kaplan’s Plot is an astonishing balancing act between the ruthless and the tender, the superficial and the truth, by a writer with tremendous promise.

Visit Jason Diamond's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Movement's Promise"

New from Stanford University Press: A Movement's Promise: The Making of Contemporary Palestinian Theater by Samer Al-Saber.

About the book, from the publisher:

Starting in the 1970s, Palestinian theater flourished as part of a Palestinian cultural spring. In the absence of local radio, television, and uncensored journalism, theater production became the leading form of artistic expression, and Palestinian theater artists self-identified as a movement. Although resistance was not their sole function, these theater makers contributed to an active cultural resistance front. With this book, Samer Al-Saber tells the story of the Palestinian Theater Movement over nearly three decades, as they created plays and productions that articulated versions of Palestinian identity, critiqued social norms, celebrated and extended Palestinian cultural values, and challenged the power disparity created by the Occupation. The struggles between Palestinian theater artists and Israeli authorities form the central relationships in this history. Al-Saber juxtaposes the agency of Palestinian theater artists, in their determination to perform against immense challenges, with the power of Israeli authorities to grant or deny permission to theatrical productions. The legal structure of institutionalized censorship prevented Palestinian artists from expressing their chosen message, and the theater movement's search for permission to perform illuminates the disparity in power between the occupier and the occupied. In writing the first history of the Palestinian Theater Movement, Al-Saber amplifies necessary voices in this Palestinian cultural history, told from below.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Bees in June"

New from Harper Muse: Bees in June: A hope-filled historical novel set in a 1960s small town and infused with magical realism by Elizabeth Bass Parman.

About the book, from the publisher:

Uncle Dixon always told Rennie to tell the bees everything, but somewhere along the way, Rennie forgot. Now, with her life at its lowest, she begins to see the bees in a new light. Will she believe again in the magic of the hives, and will she listen as the bees try to guide her home? Perfect for fans of Sarah Addison Allen, Margaret Renkl, and Rachel Linden.

It's 1969, and the town of Spark Tennessee, is just as excited about the moon landing as the rest of the country. Rennie Hendricks is grieving and trying to heal from the unimaginable loss of her infant son. She had hoped a child would repair the cracks in her marriage to her husband, Tiny, but the tragedy has only served to illuminate his abusive character. Trying to relieve some of the financial stress that inflames Tiny's anger, Rennie accepts a position cooking at the local diner. Hidden away in a kitchen making delicious food, she rediscovers the joy she finds in cooking for others, and as she spends more time with her new boss, she realizes there are more options for women than she thought possible.

One of the benefits of her new job is that she can bring meals to her beloved Uncle Dixon, the man who practically raised her along with her late Aunt Eugenia, a woman unkindly labeled as a witch by most of the town. What those people didn't understand is that Eugenia was a healer and connected to power they couldn't grasp.

Rennie thinks her elderly uncle is confused when he talks about communicating with his bees, but then she starts to see them glow, leading her toward safety time and time again. Could it be that these bees, discovered long ago by her Aunt Eugenia, are magical and trying to tell her something? And what about the new neighbor, Ambrose Beckett, who seems to understand the bees too. Is he being truthful about why he has moved to Spark, or is there more to him than meets the eye?

Hope-filled and infused with magical realism, Bees in June captures Rennie's journey back to her true self, creating a rewarding life that the bees showed her was possible if she only believed in herself and the magic that surrounds her.

Visit Elizabeth Bass Parman's website.

Q&A with Elizabeth Bass Parman.

The Page 69 Test: The Empress of Cooke County.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Red Harbor"

New from the University of Washington Press: Red Harbor: Radical Workers and Community Struggle in the Pacific Northwest by Aaron Goings.

About the book, from the publisher:

Brings to life Grays Harbor's fiery legacy of class conflict

In the early decades of the twentieth century, Grays Harbor was the Lumber Capital of the World. While thousands of lumber and maritime workers fought for higher wages and decent conditions, employers unified to protect their interests, often through violent and corrupt means. They spied on unionists, expelled them from their own towns, vilified them in the press, and physically assaulted labor activists. But with deep roots in their communities, radical workers continued to meet in their halls and immigrant neighborhoods―and to influence the wider labor movement well into the 1930s.

In Red Harbor, Aaron Goings resurrects the forgotten history of lumber workers in a bastion of labor radicalism, examining the conflict as workers faced down an alliance of employers, police, and violent anti-radicals, including the Ku Klux Klan. But he goes beyond these clashes to illuminate the vital roles of families, immigrants, and working-class women in the labor movement, revealing how people fought not only for labor rights but also for the good of their communities. The Industrial Workers of the World (or Wobblies) in particular adopted views and tactics from socialist Finnish immigrants while authoring programs responsive to local needs and supported by the people―radical and otherwise.

Vivid and revealing, Red Harbor shines a light on lumber workers and the pursuit of justice in the Pacific Northwest.

Visit Aaron Goings's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Maiden and Her Monster"

New from Tor Books: The Maiden and Her Monster by Maddie Martinez.

About the book, from the publisher:

The Maiden and Her Monster is a gorgeous, atmospheric debut fantasy rooted in history, folklore, and sapphic romance—perfect for fans of Katherine Arden, Ava Reid, Hannah Whitten, and Naomi Novik.

The forest eats the girls who wander out after dark.

As the healer’s daughter, Malka has seen how the wood’s curse has plagued her village, but the Ozmini Church only comes to collect its tithe, not to protect heretics with false stories of monsters in the trees. So when a clergy girl wanders too close to the forest and Malka’s mother is accused of her murder, Malka strikes an impossible bargain with a zealot Ozmini priest. If she brings the monster out, he will spare her mother from execution.

When she ventures into the shadowed woods, Malka finds a monster, though not the one she expects: an inscrutable, disgraced golem who agrees to implicate herself, but only if Malka helps her fulfill a promise first and free the imprisoned rabbi who created her.

But a deal easily made is not easily kept. And as their bargain begins to unravel a much more sinister threat, protecting her people may force Malka to endanger the one person she left home to save—and face her growing feelings for the very creature she was taught to fear.

Visit Maddie Martinez's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Sisters of the Jungle"

Coming September 23 from Douglas & McIntyre: Sisters of the Jungle: Women Who Shaped the Science of Wild Primates by Keriann McGoogan.

About the book, from the publisher:

Sisters of the Jungle explores the history of primatology, a rare scientific discipline led primarily by women, from pioneers like Jane Goodall and Dian Fossey to author Keriann McGoogan’s own adventurous field studies.

Since the 1970s, the science of primatology has been dominated by women—a unique reversal, as men usually outnumber women in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields.

Today, one of those women is primatologist Keriann McGoogan, who has traveled to the far corners of the earth in search of wild primates. In Sisters of the Jungle, McGoogan combines stories about her own studies of howler monkeys (the loudest living primate) and lemurs (the most endangered group of animals on the planet) with those of the women who paved the way: intrepid scientists like Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, Biruté Galdikas, and Alison Jolly who broke boundaries, made astonishing discoveries and ultimately shaped the trajectory of an entire branch of science.

Visit Keriann McGoogan's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Life, and Death, and Giants"

New from St. Martin's Press: Life, and Death, and Giants: A Novel by Ron Rindo.

About the book, from the publisher:

A heart too big for this world. A life that changes everyone.

Gabriel Fisher was born an orphan, weighing eighteen pounds and measuring twenty-seven inches long. No one in Lakota, Wisconsin, knows what to make of him. He walks at eight months, communicates with animals, and seems to possess extraordinary athletic talent. But when the older brother who has been caring for him dies, Gabriel is taken in by his devout Amish grandparents who disapprove of all the attention and hide him away from the English world.

But it’s hard to hide forever when you’re nearly eight feet tall. At seventeen, Gabriel is spotted working in a hay field by the local football coach. What happens next transforms not only Gabriel’s life but the lives of everyone he meets.

Life, and Death, and Giants is a moving story of faith, family, buried secrets, and everyday miracles.

Visit Ron Rindo's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Just People"

New from Oxford University Press: Just People: Virtue, Equality, and Respect by Mark LeBar.

About the book, from the publisher:

We often think of justice as a virtue that belong to states, societies, and institutions. It has not always been that way. Justice began as something between individual people, and only recently has its application to larger groups become predominant. In Just People, Mark LeBar makes a case for recovering the original priority of justice in and between individual people, as a virtue of character.

The model for this virtue comes from Aristotle, whose own notion of the virtue of justice has notable shortcomings. Just People argues that we should understand justice in people as a matter of recognition of and respect for equal authority to obligate one another. That is, we should see one another as having equal capacity to obligate others through our persons and choices. This is a form of equality that is usually overlooked in discussions of equality, but here it is the cornerstone of justice, vindicating Aristotle's thought that justice is itself a matter of a kind of equality.

LeBar rethinks a number of popular assumptions, including that we can make sense of justice in societies or institutions without thinking of the implications for our aspirations to be just people -- a thought that is long overdue. His book is a reformulation of justice, with the potential to fundamentally change the way we treat one another.

--Marshal Zeringue