"Politicizing Business"

New from Cambridge University Press: Politicizing Business: How Firms Are Made to Serve the Party-State in China by Ning Leng.

About the book, from the publisher:

The Chinese state has never granted businesses full autonomy, even amid efforts to establish market-supporting institutions. Instead, the state and its officials view business as primarily political actors, demanding political services from firms to advance political objectives. Politicizing Business demonstrates that the politicization of firms is rooted in authoritarianism, often harming business interests and undermining China's efforts to attract and retain investment. Explaining the seemingly arbitrary state takeover of sectors and firms, this book uncovers previously overlooked forms of politicization and demonstrates how politicizing business often creates conflicts between the state and firms, particularly private firms, leading to a state-dominated market in many sectors. Combining academic rigor with exceptionally rich data and analysis, including hundreds of in-depth interviews with government officials and business leaders, original datasets and case studies, Politicizing Business offers fresh insights into China's political economy model and explores what the Party-state demands from companies, how compliance is enforced, when and where firms are politicized, and its impact on China's development.

Visit Ning Leng's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Dramatic Life of Jonah Penrose"

Coming November 11 from Harper Perennial: The Dramatic Life of Jonah Penrose: A Novel by Robyn Green.

About the book, from the publisher:

Red, White & Royal Blue meets the theater world of London’s dazzling West End in this nuanced, queer debut romance in which a fake dating publicity stunt between rival co-stars results in romantic sparks neither of them expected.

After winning his first Olivier Award for his performance in the West End’s top musical, The Wooden Horse, fabulously talented Jonah Penrose is the new shining star of London’s theatre scene. But Jonah’s success can’t erase the pain of a recent breakup, fix his self-doubt, or remedy his father’s ailing mind.

Enter stage right, Dexter Ellis: the West End’s golden boy, the newest cast member of The Wooden Horse, and someone Jonah finds to be intolerable and arrogant.

Everything about Dexter is infuriatingly perfect, from his dashing looks and casual but cutting notes on Jonah’s performances to his obnoxious sweaters that cost more than Jonah’s rent. Worse yet, while Dexter was supposed to play Jonah’s enemy in the show, his role switches to his love interest after a bout of illness temporarily sidelines half of the cast.

Jonah’s plan to stay as far away from Dexter as possible is thwarted when fans mistake their on-stage tension for romantic chemistry and tickets start selling like hotcakes. With fans desperate to catch a glimpse of the West End’s ‘hottest couple,’ the show’s producer pushes the co-stars to put on a show of their own and convince the world that they are in love.

While pretending to be head over heels for his co-star is the last thing Jonah wants, he reluctantly agrees. Yet as he gets to know Dexter better, he learns there’s more to him than meets the eye. As the lines between fiction and reality begin to blur and Jonah’s feelings become less of an act, he must decide if he’s willing to entrust his heart to someone again.

At turns both passionate and poignant, heartfelt and intimate, The Dramatic Life of Jonah Penrose is a love letter to the theater, to life in your thirties, and to what happens when you throw out the script and improvise the life you want.

Visit Robyn Green's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Damned Whiteness"

New from The University of North Carolina Press: Damned Whiteness: How White Christian Allies Failed the Black Freedom Movement by David F. Evans.

About the book, from the publisher:

The memory of the long civil rights movement often celebrates white men and women who drew on their religious faith to support Black demands for racial justice. However, the visions and actions of these leaders and their organizations often conflicted with those of Black leadership. While Black activists fought for a broad vision of freedom, white allies focused more narrowly on cultivating interracial friendship, marching in parallel to Black movement leaders rather than alongside them.

Damned Whiteness offers an unflinching history of white-led efforts at interracial organizing gone astray. Considering the examples of Dorothy Day, cofounder of the Catholic Worker Movement; Clarence Jordan, spiritual father of Habitat for Humanity; and Ralph Templin, a Christian missionary who studied nonviolence in Gandhi’s India, David F. Evans reveals how religious white progressives inherited strategies that remained disconnected from the ideas and actions of Black communities. These disconnects have often been cloaked as disagreements over religious doctrine and practice, but Evans reveals how they stem from refusals to acknowledge Black leaders' philosophies and freedom dreams. Though these patterns persist, Evans offers a way out of this legacy of white allyship and into a future where freedom is possible.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Crimson Thaw"

Coming soon from Severn River: Crimson Thaw (Detective Justice) by Bruce Robert Coffin.

About the book, from the publisher:

In the unforgiving wilderness of Maine, a disgraced detective must confront his past to solve a chilling murder.

Detective Brock Justice's career is on thin ice. Once the golden boy of Maine State Police, Brock now finds himself exiled to the remote northeastern wilderness, punishment for crossing the thin blue line. Assigned to the Major Crimes Unit—North, he suffers the added indignity of partnering with newly-minted Detective Chloe Wright, a rookie with her own hidden struggles.

The pair’s uneasy alliance is put to the test almost immediately when a routine snowmobile retrieval in the coastal town of Blue Hill unexpectedly escalates into a full-blown murder investigation. Even as the case exposes the darkest corners of the town, their fragile partnership threatens to undermine the investigation at every turn.

Brock and Chloe's hunt draws them into the lives of several intriguing locals: the town doctor, a biker gang involved in drug trafficking, a politically connected sheriff, and Brock’s own father. With each revelation, the line between ally and enemy blurs, compelling Brock and Chloe to question their trust in everyone around them, including each other.

Even as winter's icy grip loosens from Blue Hill, the noose of suspicion tightens. Brock must navigate not only a shaky partnership and a town harboring deadly secrets, but also the shadows of his own past. Can he and Chloe piece together the puzzle before Maine's wilderness swallows them whole?

Retired Detective Sergeant Bruce Robert Coffin delivers a masterful blend of police procedural and small-town intrigue in this page-turning thriller. Perfect for fans of Craig Johnson's Longmire series and C.J. Box's Joe Pickett novels.

Visit Bruce Robert Coffin's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Kigali"

New from the University of California Press: Kigali: A New City for the End of the World by Samuel Shearer.

About the book, from the publisher:

In the first decade of the twenty-first century, the government of Rwanda hired American and Singaporean design firms to transform the image of Kigali from a wounded city into a competitive destination for foreign investment. The firms produced promotional images of a post-conflict tabula rasa waiting to be rebuilt by foreign investors as an urban solution to climate change. However, to make this marketing image real, much of the actual city would need to be destroyed and its residents converted to consumers of green housing and service delivery systems.

Kigali is an ethnography of a city that is being destroyed so that it can be rebuilt for the end of the world. Drawing on years of ethnographic fieldwork with Kigali residents as they navigate the catastrophes induced by sustainable urbanism, this book offers a searing critique of capitalist solutions to climate change and an account of the city’s popular alternatives to sustainable urbanism.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Moorwitch"

New from 47North: The Moorwitch by Jessica Khoury.

About the book, from the publisher:

In this sweeping romantic fantasy from bestselling author Jessica Khoury, a young witch caught in a twisted bargain with the fae must disguise herself as a governess and uncover the gateway to the realm of faerie in order to save her dying magic and escape the clutches of her controlling fae handler―even as she finds herself falling for her new employer, an enigmatic young Scottish laird and the owner of a crumbling estate brimming with secrets.

Rose Pryor has sacrificed everything for magic. As a Weaver skilled in the craft of spinning spells with thread and needle, she’s always chosen magic over love, and it was magic that brought her to Lachlan, the fae with whom Rose once struck a sinister deal in order to escape her abusive home. After years of running from her past, Rose has finally managed to build a new life for herself as a teacher in a school for young Weavers. But Rose has a secret: Her magic is waning, and every spell she weaves to train her students is slowly killing her.

When Lachlan returns to collect the debt Rose owes him, she finds herself on a perilous journey to the Scottish moors where she must find him an ancient gateway to the realm of the fae, lest her precious magic be forfeit. But when her quest pits her against Conrad, a young laird with a soul as lonely as her own who hires Rose to work as a governess for his rebellious young sister, Rose finds herself torn between her promise to Lachlan and her budding feelings for her new employer as her search for the gateway puts both her magic and her heart at stake.

Visit Jessica Khoury's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"All Things Act"

New from Oxford University Press: All Things Act by Mercedes Valmisa.

About the book, from the publisher:

In All Things Act, Mercedes Valmisa argues that there is no such thing as an individual action and that all actions are constituted and performed by a diverse array of entities. Examining the collective character of action, this book rejects the view of agency as a capacity--especially one limited to humans--and redefines agency as an umbrella term for the concrete sociomaterial processes that emerge from the collaborative efforts of multiple entities acting together. Agency is not the faculty of an individual entity or self; it is always the function of a network or assembly of actors. The book also considers the significant role of nonhuman actors in these processes--things without intentions, will, or even awareness. This relational and collective approach shifts the focus away from mental states, emphasizing instead how humans and nonhumans alike participate in, contribute to, and shape the unfolding of events.

This expanded conception of agency draws on Classical Chinese philosophy, analytic metaphysics on powers and emergence, scientific literature on self-organization, and insights from sociology, anthropology, and art to co-create a groundbreaking framework for understanding agency, with profound sociopolitical implications for contemporary life.

If our actions are not simply the product of individual intentional selves but are instead constituted through dynamic interactions with a vibrant array of nonhuman actors, we are invited--and compelled--to rethink our identities, intentions, powers, emotions, responsibilities, institutions, policies, and values in ways that are less individualistic and more relational and interdependent.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Daughters"

Coming November 11 from Little A: Daughters: A Novel by Corinne Demas.

About the book, from the publisher:

From award-winning author Corinne Demas comes a moving story about the sometimes volatile but ultimately unbreakable bonds between mothers and daughters.

When Meredith flies home to New England, daughter Eloise in tow, she leaves her husband and a life back in LA. A heartbreaking loss is killing their marriage. So she looks to her mother and siblings for the support she desperately needs, and the love her daughter surely deserves―two things her husband can’t seem to provide.

Meredith’s mother, Delia, is thrilled by their sudden arrival at the family farm. But her husband braces for the chaos his stepdaughter and granddaughter will surely bring. Meredith’s announcement that she’s moved home for good takes the whole family by surprise and turns everything upside down.

While wrestling with her future, artist Meredith is forced to confront her past―and the disappointment she believes her mother, a violin teacher, felt when musically gifted Meredith abandoned the violin.

As Meredith works to repair relationships with members of her family, an old flame turns up and further complicates her life.

Delia, in a desperate attempt to rescue her daughter’s marriage, does something unforgivable, and Meredith has to decide if she should uproot Eloise and take off. When Eloise goes missing, help arrives from an unexpected quarter.

Visit Corinne Demas's website.

Q&A with Corinne Demas.

The Page 69 Test: The Road Towards Home.

My Book, The Movie: The Road Towards Home.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Mission Unaccomplished"

New from the University of Texas Press: Mission Unaccomplished: American War Films in the Twenty-First Century by Alan Nadel.

About the book, from the publisher:

An analysis of how post-9/11 war movies changed from following soldiers on specific missions to chronicling war as a day-to-day occupation.

In 2003, the United States began a war in Iraq without a mission. Instead of fighting to restore peace—the traditional objective of warfare—servicemembers faced the grim reality that there was no goal. Lacking even certainty as to who was the enemy, soldiers discovered that their task was simply to survive.

Mission Unaccomplished explores how Hollywood grasped the experience of Iraq from the perspective of US soldiers, reinventing the war film in the process. Historically, films such as Saving Private Ryan valorized the goals of war by chronicling missions that unambiguously contribute to the defeat of the enemy and the restoration of peace. But in The Hurt Locker, American Sniper, Green Zone, and other recent dramas, soldiers just try to outlast the chaos. Dramatizing the aimlessness of the war, events occur in random order, and soldiers have no sense of how their actions contribute to victory or peace. Looking to recent WWII movies such as Dunkirk and Hacksaw Ridge, which use this same cinematic vocabulary to position soldiering as merely a deadly job to be endured, Alan Nadel argues that the disillusionment of Iraq has influenced cinema broadly, inspiring a newly critical war film genre.

--Marshal Zeringue

"When We Talk to the Dead"

New from Crooked Lane Books: When We Talk to the Dead: A Novel by Ian Chorao.

About the book, from the publisher:

The island was abandoned years ago–but something dark was left behind, and it’s waiting for those bold enough to return.

Perfect for fans of Iain Reid, this slow-burning horror novel will sweep you out, and like a churning ocean, before you realize, it will pull you under its turbulent spell.

A remote deserted island off the coast of Maine holds dark memories and disturbing secrets for the family who once lived on its rocky shores. Though nineteen-year-old Sally de Gama remembers nothing about the accident that took place on Captain’s Island and destroyed her family when she was a little girl, she suffers from intense anxiety, pervasive bouts of dissociation, and gruesome nightmares.

All Sally knows is that her mother hasn’t spoken since the accident that took the life of Sally’s twin sister. Following the tragedy, her family fled and never looked back.

When her mother suddenly dies, Sally and three college friends travel to the island–for her friends it’s an adventure to a strange, abandoned place. For Sally, it’s a desperate bid to recover some of her memories and understand what really happened to her family. But when memories begin to return, Sally is overcome by grief and rage that threaten to plunge her into madness–a madness that is fed by a malevolent presence stalking them on the island.

Follow Ian Chorao on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Life in Sync"

New from Princeton University Press: Life in Sync: The Science of Internal Clocks and How We’re Disrupting Them by Philippa Gander.

About the book, from the publisher:

Why we need to reconnect with nature’s biological rhythms—and rediscover the benefits of a good night’s sleep

All of life is profoundly shaped by the daily, monthly, and yearly cycles of our planet, and all creatures have internal timekeeping systems that rely on cues from the surrounding environment. With modern technology, we are changing our environments—and by proxy, the ecosystems around us—to override these innate rhythms of life. But at what cost? Life in Sync reveals how Earth’s rotations shape our biology, what human sleep cycles looked like before the advent of artificial light, and why technology can’t free us from the constraints of our circadian clocks.

Philippa Gander explores the science behind the biological rhythms that animate us and our world, blending captivating storytelling with illuminating examples ranging from migratory birds and hibernating squirrels to jet-lagged pilots and astronauts in space. She shows how genetic circadian clocks are an ancient evolutionary adaptation that we share with all life on the planet, and how our rapidly expanding use of artificial light at night disrupts the time cues for entire ecosystems. Gander explains why cutting back on sleep adversely affects our well-being, safety, and longevity, and how breakthroughs in sleep science offer solutions to bring our lives more in harmony with nature’s rhythms.

An astonishing journey of scientific discovery, Life in Sync unlocks the mysteries of biological time—and offers new perspectives for anyone who has ever given up a good night’s sleep for the sake of their hectic waking hours.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Lie She Wears"

Coming November 18 from Thomas & Mercer: The Lie She Wears by Elle Marr.

About the book, from the publisher:

A daughter inherits her mother’s deadly secrets in a chilling novel of psychological suspense by Elle Marr, the #1 Amazon Charts bestselling author of The Alone Time.

Museum curator Pearl Davis always had a strained relationship with her mother, Sally. Growing up, she rarely felt her mother’s love. So many things about her mother’s behavior never added up. But when Sally dies unexpectedly, she leaves Pearl a letter from the grave…confessing to murder.

Suddenly, Pearl has even more questions than she has answers. She suspects the letter is just a sign of her mother’s diminished state of mind―until she finds human remains in Sally’s garden. With the help of a friend, Pearl begins searching for the truth of her mother’s actions―and as she does, more cryptic notes emerge. But these letters aren’t just clues behind a confession. They’re a warning. Sally was terrified of something.

When more remains are discovered, it’s clear whatever secrets Sally died with are now Pearl’s to bear. And as darkness closes in, Pearl fears that her mother’s past could be the death of her.

Visit Elle Marr's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Missing Sister.

The Page 69 Test: Lies We Bury.

--Marshal Zeringue

"An Independent Man"

New from the University of California Press: An Independent Man: Ed Roberts and the Fight for Disability Rights by Scot Danforth.

About the book, from the publisher:

The first biography of one of the founders of the disability rights movement, An Independent Man chronicles the life of an activist who reimagined the meaning of equality and inspired generations of reformers.

Before Jonas Salk's vaccine, polio was a social death sentence. The disabled were expected to disappear into their limitations, pitied by those around them. This might have been the story of Ed Roberts, paralyzed and consigned to sleep in an iron lung. But Roberts insisted on what all people deserve: a full life.

Scot Danforth deftly captures Roberts's adventurous personality and radical vision, chronicling his life from his student activist days at the University of California, Berkeley, in the early 1960s to his career highlights of establishing the pioneering Center for Independent Living and directing California's Department of Rehabilitation. By insisting that disabled persons are valuable members of society, and by translating his ideas into action, Roberts laid the ground for the Americans with Disabilities Act and the ongoing movement for equality.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Long Way Down"

New from Crooked Lane Books: Long Way Down: A Thriller by Lisa Kusel.

About the book, from the publisher:

She thinks she’s marrying the perfect man. But nothing is as it seems.

Perfect for fans of Rachel Hawkins and Darby Kane, this suspense-packed novel entangles readers in family lies and shocking secrets that will leave you breathless.

Deni Rydell believes her life is finally about to change for the better just as soon as she marries Cal Cooper Jr., heir to a massive California mining fortune.

When Cal and his parents perish in a plane crash, Deni’s dreams are shattered. She’s hoping to find solace with Cal’s brother Grant, who only recently returned to the small town of Gold Hills after a year’s stay in rehab. Too bad Grant is caught up trying to please Erika, the mysterious woman he brought home with him.

Meanwhile, Gold Hills detective Robyn Torres is assigned to investigate a vicious murder which she assumes to be a drug robbery that turned deadly. The deeper she digs, though, the clearer it is that she couldn’t be further from the truth. Soon enough, Torres begins to uncover a series of disturbing family secrets and dark lies connected to the Cooper family that threaten to destroy everything Deni knew to be true.

Visit Lisa Kusel's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Robert H. Jackson"

New from Oxford University Press: Robert H. Jackson: A Life in Judgment by G. Edward White.

About the book, from the publisher:

Discover the meteoric rise of one of the most extraordinary and singular figures in American jurisprudence, Robert H. Jackson, from self-trained lawyer to influential Supreme Court Justice and chief U.S. prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials, in this compelling new biography.

Until he joined the U.S. government in 1934, Robert H. Jackson had been a lawyer in private practice in Upstate New York who was admitted to the bar without going to college and after completing only one year of law school. Once part of FDR's administration, Jackson became, in rapid succession, United States Solicitor General and United States Attorney General, where he successfully defended New Deal programs before the Supreme Court, including the legality of Lend Lease, which helped the U.S. give war supplies to England in exchange for grants of territory and harbors. Jackson played a central role in formulating the arguments justifying a number of initiatives on constitutional grounds and in drafting the policy statements that accompanied them. In 1941, FDR nominated him to be Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, on which he served until his death in 1954, only months after his adding his vote to the unanimous decision in Brown V. Board of Education.

It was a meteoric rise for someone from outside the elite, and essentially self-trained. That didn't stop Jackson from becoming one of the most influential and independent-minded judges of his day, unafraid to question the status quo and leave his mark on a number of landmark cases, including West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnett, which guaranteed First Amendment rights by holding that students in public schools did not have to salute the flag or recite the Pledge of Allegiance. He dissented from the notorious decision in Korematsu v. U.S., which condoned the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War Two. To many, however, Jackson's most significant contribution was as chief U.S. prosecutor at the Nuremberg war trials following the war.

Drawing on Jackson's extensive personal papers in the Library of Congress and the Jackson Center, as well as a substantial oral history, G. Edward White's biography offers the first full-length portrait in decades of this fascinating and seminal figure.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Prince of Mourning"

New from Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers: The Prince of Mourning by Jenn Bennett.

About the book, from the publisher:

Belladonna by Adalyn Grace meets A Study in Drowning in this sizzling gothic romantasy that follows the forbidden romance between a young nurse and a mysterious young man imprisoned by a dangerous occultist.

After receiving a strange summons, eighteen-year-old nursing student Molly O’Rinn finds herself the private live-in nurse for a wealthy young man in his haunting Hudson Valley mansion. But after arriving at his secluded estate, Molly discovers that her handsome employer is not what he seems, and most surprising of all is what rests deep inside the mansion’s walls.

Perhaps not what, but who…

A young man about Molly’s age—at least in appearance—is a prisoner of the estate, locked behind magical barriers. Nin is royalty, the son of a legend. He is not human, not of this world…and not like anyone Molly has ever met.

Molly should stay away from him. But Nin is a terrifying yet strangely attractive being, and soon both Molly and Nin find themselves drawn to each other, sparked by a connection neither of them can deny. But as the two become entangled in a forbidden affair, outside forces start to press in.

Because Nin’s legendary father is looking for his son, and he’s not the only one.

To keep Molly safe, Nin must find a way back to his realm or suffer the consequences. Even if it means choosing his princely duty over love.

Visit Jenn Bennett's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Textual Life"

New from Columbia University Press: Textual Life: Islam, Africa, and the Fate of the Humanities by Wendell Marsh.

About the book, from the publisher:

Textual Life is a groundbreaking book that recasts the role of knowledge in the making of a colonial and postcolonial nation. It makes a case for a new literary and intellectual-historical approach to Islam in Africa.

The Senegalese Muslim scholar Shaykh Musa Kamara (1864–1945) wrote History of the Blacks, a monumental history of West Africa, in a time when colonial discourses asserted that Africans lacked both writing and history. He sought to publish a bilingual Arabic and French edition of the book by working with humanists in colonial institutions, but the project was ultimately undermined by the disregard of the French state.

Textual Life considers Kamara’s story as a parable about the fate of the humanities amid epistemic and technological change. Wendell H. Marsh argues that Kamara’s scholarship reflected what he calls the textual attitude, an orientation to the world mediated by reading. Colonial humanists shared this attitude even while upholding racial and religious hierarchies, and they took an interest in African texts and traditions. The bureaucrats and technocrats who succeeded them, however, disdained such dialogue―for reasons that bear a striking resemblance to the algorithmic antihumanism that is ascendant today.

Drawing on Kamara’s body of work, colonial archival documents, and postcolonial knowledge production within Senegal, Textual Life offers a decolonial vision of the humanities. By engaging with African and Muslim intellectual resources, Marsh shows how thinkers like Kamara who were subjected to colonialism can help us find a future after empire.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Spellbound"

New from Grand Central Publishing: Spellbound by Georgia Leighton.

About the book, from the publisher:

In this “Beautifully written and atmospheric” feminist reimagining of Sleeping Beauty, there’s no prince to save the day and the women at the heart of the story are their own saviors (Sophie Keetch, author of Morgan Is My Name).

In a remote castle perched atop a windswept island, a long-awaited royal heir is born. In accordance with ancient custom, a blessing ceremony takes place to bestow the princess with magical gifts—along with a terrible curse.

Except this is not the love story you may think you know. There is no enchanted sleep for the princess, and no handsome prince to come to her rescue. Just three women, who together concoct a desperate plan of misdirect that changes the course of all their lives.

But dark magic cannot be tricked, and as the end of the curse edges closer, Violanna, Meredyth and Sel have a choice to make. They can wait to find out if the worst will happen, or they can turn to face the coming storm . . .

Visit Georgia Leighton's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Hitchcock and Herrmann"

New from Oxford University Press: Hitchcock and Herrmann: The Friendship and Film Scores that Changed Cinema by Steven C. Smith.

About the book, from the publisher:

This is the story of the game-changing collaboration between director Alfred Hitchcock and composer Bernard Herrmann, who channelled their inner fears and desires into films that would become the nightmarish narratives and soundtracks of our lives.

The 11-year collaboration between Alfred Hitchcock and Bernard Herrmann is often called the greatest director-composer partnership in cinema history. Their eight films together include such classic thrillers as Vertigo, The Man Who Knew Too Much, North by Northwest, Psycho, and The Birds. In Hitchcock and Herrmann: The Friendship and Film Scores that Changed Cinema, Steven C. Smith delivers an intimate account of how the reserved, but deeply anxious, Hitchcock found his ideal creative partner in the cantankerous, but deeply romantic, Herrmann. Smith draws on four decades of research, including previously unpublished documents and new interviews, to deliver a riveting account of what made the teaming of "Benny and Hitch" so memorable and influential -- and why it came to a bitter end.

Their story involves the tumultuous changes in Hollywood from the mid-1950s to mid-1960s, as the collapsing studio system gave way to independent, counterculture filmmaking. It also involves the key figures in Hitchcock and Herrmann's inner circle including the director's gifted wife and most valued critic, Alma Reville; Herrmann's beautiful, put-upon spouse, Lucy Anderson; and talent agent-turned-studio mogul Lew Wasserman. Wasserman's negotiations made Hitchcock's greatest filmmaking period possible, but over time Lew's commercial instincts as head of Universal Studios clashed with Herrmann's pure artistic vision.

Hitchcock and Herrmann is both a deeply researched historical study and a fast-moving, cinematic narrative -- one that puts readers on the film sets and scoring stages of Hitchcock masterworks. Their collaboration ended in a bitter break; but today Herrmann's pulse-quickening music has become the soundtrack of our own anxious times. The music from their movies is more popular than ever, heard in Quentin Tarantino blockbusters and Lady Gaga music videos. In Smith's expert telling, readers get an an intimate look at two legendary creators who, despite seemingly opposite personalities, found in each other artistic completion.

Visit Steven C. Smith's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Proving Ground"

New from Little, Brown and Company: The Proving Ground (Lincoln Lawyer Series #8) by Michael Connelly.

About the book, from the publisher:

Mickey Haller takes on artificial intelligence in this eighth installment of the Lincoln Lawyer series. The stakes are high, and danger is looming. Is justice even possible this time?

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Michael Connelly, the Lincoln Lawyer is back with a case against an AI company whose product may have been responsible for the murder of a young girl.

Following his “resurrection walk” and need for a new direction, Mickey Haller turns to public interest litigation, filing a civil lawsuit against an artificial intelligence company whose chatbot told a sixteen-year-old boy that it was okay for him to kill his ex-girlfriend for her disloyalty.

Representing the victim’s family, Mickey’s case explores the mostly unregulated and exploding AI business and the lack of training guardrails. Along the way he joins up with a journalist named Jack McEvoy, who wants to be a fly on the wall during the trial in order to write a book about it. But Mickey puts him to work going through the mountain of printed discovery materials in the case. McEvoy’s digging ultimate delivers the key witness, a whistleblower who has been too afraid to speak up. The case is fraught with danger because billions are at stake.

It is said that machines became smarter than humans on the day in 1997 that IBM’s Deep Blue defeated chess master Garry Kasparov with a gambit called “the knight’s sacrifice.” Haller will take a similar gambit in court to defeat the mega forces of the AI industry lined up against him and his clients.

Visit Michael Connelly's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Galileo's Fame"

New from the University of Pittsburgh Press: Galileo's Fame: Science, Credibility, and Memory in the Seventeenth Century by Anna-Luna Post.

About the book, from the publisher:

From the beginning of Galileo’s career, well before the publication of the Sidereus Nuncius, his contemporaries took pains to shape his reputation and fame. They were fully aware that their efforts would shape the course of his career; they also knew that they would profit from helping him. With this book, Anna-Luna Post offers a welcome new perspective on the volatile dynamic between early modern fame and science in Italy, shifting the focus from the recipient of fame to its brokers. Galileo’s contemporaries knew his rise to fame was not a matter of course. Not only were his discoveries highly contested, he also was not the first to observe Jupiter’s four largest moons. Yet, of the three men who did so between the summer of 1609 and the winter of 1610, Galileo is the only one who achieved both widespread fame and posthumous glory. Post convincingly argues that fame is, rather than the direct result of merit or extraordinary achievements, shaped through human intervention.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Such a Bad Influence"

New from Lake Union: Such a Bad Influence: A Novel by Grace Demyan.

About the book, from the publisher:

In this humorous and heartfelt novel, a blueberry farmer teams up with a teenager in need to start a revenge business. What could possibly go wrong?

In rural Ohio, the last connections lonesome Felicity Lavigne has to her late mom are the blueberry farm she inherited and her mom’s old phone number―which Felicity still calls every day. Until she gets a call back. It’s the number’s new owner, Alex Norse, a surly, homeless teenager who has aged out of the foster care system with no one to turn to except the stranger who’s been leaving rambling voicemails for a dead woman.

Felicity takes Alex in on one condition: She has to help scare off some kids vandalizing the fields. Not only does it work, but news spreads, and soon locals are lining up to solicit justice for their own grievances. Best of all, an unexpected friendship blooms for the two young women, who have found in each other the family they’ve been yearning for.

But revenge has a funny way of getting out of hand, and when things go a bit too far, Felicity and trouble-prone Alex must stick together to confront the heartbreak of their pasts and whatever new calamities may lie ahead.

Visit Grace Demyan's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Interpreters"

New from Manchester University Press: The Interpreters: British Internationalism and Empire in Southeastern Europe, 1870–1930 by Georgios Giannakopoulos.

About the book, from the publisher:

The book offers a new interpretation of the cultural and intellectual exchanges between Britain and southeastern Europe in an age of imperial transformation. It considers systematically the question of the management of ethnic difference in multinational imperial states as diverse as Britain, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire. It traces the regional experiences and impact of British scholars and public intellectuals steering through competing nationalisms and translating regional national questions to British and international audiences. The emphasis on past attempts to reconcile liberal democracy and nationalism with imperial rule continues to resonate in our day as intellectuals confront the challenges presented the rise of ethno-nationalist politics and shifting place of Britain in Europe.

Visit Georgios Giannakopoulos's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Deadly Trade"

New from Kensington: Deadly Trade by Sara Driscoll.

About the book, from the publisher:

FBI K-9 handler Meg Jennings can never walk away from her job, even amid her Hawaiian Islands honeymoon, where she and her search-and-rescue black Lab encounter a double threat from wildlife poachers and Mother Nature.

After a difficult assignment and the excitement of her wedding to firefighter Todd Webb, Meg is more than ready for two weeks of sun, sea, and gorgeous Hawaiian scenery. Her K-9 partner, Hawk, accompanies Meg and Todd to their resort, reveling in his celebrity status with both staff and guests. After a week of relaxation, all three are ready to get out into nature on the Big Island, where Meg and Hawk can practice search strategies.

In the remote fern forest of Pu‘u Maka‘ala Natural Area Reserve, Hawk’s senses are on high alert. When Meg lets him leave the path, they encounter two men trapping bright birds. The poachers escape, leaving their bounty behind, and when agents from the FBI and US Fish and Wildlife arrive, they confirm that the birds are all endangered species near extinction. Super-wealthy collectors acquire them for private zoos, with no regard for the birds’ survival. Alive or dead, these beautiful creatures are merely trophies.

Meg, Todd, and Hawk join an official search using a local conservation dog to pinpoint vulnerable nesting grounds in an attempt to protect trafficked wildlife and to stop the poachers in their tracks. But beyond the threat posed by determined poachers lurks another danger—Mauna Loa, one of the island’s active volcanoes, has been grumbling, and is poised to turn this mission into their most terrifying yet.

Visit Sara Driscoll's website.

The Page 69 Test: Lone Wolf.

The Page 69 Test: Storm Rising.

The Page 69 Test: No Man's Land.

The Page 69 Test: Leave No Trace.

The Page 69 Test: That Others May Live.

The Page 69 Test: Echoes of Memory.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Killing the Messenger"

New from Cambridge University Press: Killing the Messenger: The War on Social Media by Ashutosh Bhagwat.

About the book, from the publisher:

Killing the Messenger is a highly readable survey of the current political and legal wars over social media platforms. The book carefully parses attacks against social media coming from both the political left and right to demonstrate how most of these critiques are overblown or without empirical support. The work analyzes regulations directed at social media in the United States and European Union, including efforts to amend Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. It argues that many of these proposals not only raise serious free-speech concerns, but also likely have unintended and perverse public policy consequences. Killing the Messenger concludes by identifying specific regulations of social media that are justified by serious, demonstrated harms, and that can be implemented without jeopardizing the profoundly democratizing impact social media platforms have had on public discourse.

--Marshal Zeringue

"What Comes Next"

New from Lake Union: What Comes Next: A Novel by Caitlin Forbes.

About the book, from the publisher:

An empowering and heartfelt novel about the complexities of family, the power of sisterhood, and the bravery it takes to choose happiness when all seems lost.

My life is perfectly fine.

Alex has pretended this for years―despite an emotionally absent father, a best friend drifting away, and a floundering dog-training business. At least Alex has her sister, Meredith, a driven polar opposite. But both their lives are upended when their estranged mother dies of a genetic condition that the sisters have a fifty-fifty chance of inheriting. For Alex, a world without her mother is uncomfortable. But a world without Meredith is unthinkable.

Alex suggests a pact to which Meredith tentatively agrees: In three months they’ll get tested. Until then they go after everything they’ve ever wanted. Alex is finally stepping out of her comfort zone and opening herself up to new relationships. Or maybe reconnecting with an old one. Nathan, a boy who once broke her heart, needs a trainer for his mixed-breed rescue. Alex can’t resist.

As sparks rekindle, and time passes much too quickly, Alex discovers more about herself, her sister, and her mother than she ever imagined. And that everything in life―especially happiness―comes with a risk worth taking.

Visit Caitlin Forbes's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Grievous Entanglement"

New from the University of Virginia Press: Grievous Entanglement: Consumption, Connection, and Slavery in the Atlantic World by Erin Pearson.

About the book, from the publisher:

How abolitionists persuaded people of their personal complicity with slavery to advance the cause of freedom

Grievous Entanglement explores the most common way that people in the Atlantic world came to understand their personal connection to, and complicity with, slavery in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries: consumption. Consumption became a formidable trope that tied the evils of chattel slavery to individuals’ behavior through their purchase of slave-produced commodities like cotton or sugar. With her groundbreaking analysis of this dominant conceptual framework, Erin Pearson provides new insight into both the motivation behind and the functioning of antislavery activism.

Unlike sentimental literature, which sought to engender sympathy for the enslaved, consumption-as-connection leveraged aversion to inspire people to sever their ties with an evil institution. Strategic disgust, Pearson shows, proved effective in inciting abolitionist action. It also frequently slipped into nonabolitionist and even proslavery uses by actually fomenting racism, as this book is the first to demonstrate. Examining a wide variety of media, including poetry, political cartoons, blackface minstrelsy, slave narratives, and novels produced from the late eighteenth to mid-nineteenth centuries, this ingeniously interdisciplinary study reveals how aversive consumption powerfully shaped ideas about slavery to both positive and pernicious effect.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Brood"

New from Thomas & Mercer: The Brood: A Novel by Rebecca Baum.

About the novel, from the publisher:

A fascinating blend of horror and magical realism, this spine-tingling thriller explores the complex relationship between women, their bodies, and the natural world.

Cutthroat NYC lawyer Mary Whelton just buried her problematic old mentor. But as she leaves the mourners and protesters behind, the press stays hot on her heels. Desperate to escape, she unwittingly barrels deep into a remote forest in upstate New York. Until a collision―with a buzzing, oozing throng of cicadas―stops her dead in her tracks.

She awakens in a crude cabin, held captive by Girl, a simple, hulking woman who mistakes Mary for her derelict mother and obsesses over a mysterious Brood. While tortured echoes from Mary’s past feed her growing sense of fear, it becomes clear that she’s destined to bear an unthinkable role in the cicadas’ cyclical reemergence. But when Girl’s grisly past comes back to haunt them both, Mary is thrust into a violent battle of wills.

Confoundingly creepy and atmospheric, The Brood peels back the hurt and pain of the female experience, laying bare the messy necessity for transformation and growth.

Visit Rebecca Baum's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Glorious Failure"

New from Oxford University Press: Glorious Failure: The Forgotten History of French Imperialism in India by Robert Ivermee.

About the book, from the publisher:

This is a powerful new account of a chapter in history that is crucial to understand, yet often overlooked. For 150 years, from the reign of Louis XIV to the downfall of Napoleon, France was an aggressive imperial power in South Asia, driven by the pursuit of greatness and riches. Through their East India company and state, the French established a far-reaching empire in India, only to see their dominant position undermined by conflict with Indian rulers, competition from other European nations, and a series of fatal strategic errors.

Exploding the myth of a benign French presence on the subcontinent, Robert Ivermee's extensive research reveals how France's Indian empire relied on war-making, conquest, opportunistic alliances, regime change and slavery to pursue its ambitions. He considers influential French figures' reactions to the collapse of the imperial project, not least their deployment of new ideas, like freedom and the rights of man, to justify fresh ventures of domination--even as colonial authorities failed to acknowledge the equality of French India's diverse indigenous peoples, both before and after the French Revolution.

From great power rivalry to informal empire and entrenched inequalities, Glorious Failure tackles topics that remain vital and urgent in today's world.

--Marshal Zeringue

"K-Jane"

New from Quill Tree/Harper Collins: K-Jane by Lydia Kang.

About the book, from the publisher:

From acclaimed author Lydia Kang comes a funny, moving YA novel following a third-generation Korean American teen who goes to extreme and hilarious lengths to connect more with her Korean heritage, perfect for fans of Maurene Goo and Rachel Lynn Solomon.

Jane Choi is a typical Nebraskan teen—a corn-fed lover of Husker football. But lately, she feels like she’s missing something. Her non-Korean classmates—that’s everyone—are immersed in K-pop, K-dramas, K-beauty . . . basically, K-everything. But for Jane, kimchi? Not a fan. Bibimbap? What is that? Her mom even named her after the very not-Korean Jane Eyre.

Everyone seems to know more about Korean culture than Jane. And she isn’t sure whether she’s more annoyed at them, or herself.

With a baby brother on the way, Jane is determined to save her new sibling from enduring the same humiliation. Enter: a totally foolproof plan to become the K-Jane of her dreams. What better way than to start a private social media account about all things Korean so her closest cousins can learn from her?

But Korean heritage and identity are more complicated than taste-testing multiple varieties of kimchi in front of a camera. And when online virality crashes into real life, Jane’s plans might just go K-boom in her face.

Visit Lydia Kang's website, and follow her on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.

The Page 69 Test: Control.

The Page 69 Test: Catalyst.

The Page 69 Test: A Beautiful Poison.

The Page 69 Test: Opium and Absinthe.

Q&A with Lydia Kang.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Back-Alley Abortion"

New from Johns Hopkins University Press: Back-Alley Abortion: A Rhetorical History by Emily Winderman.

About the book, from the publisher:

Examines how "back-alley abortion" rhetoric shaped public memory, reproductive politics, and advocacy in the fight for abortion rights.

How did three words come to carry the weight of America's abortion debates? In Back-Alley Abortion, Emily Winderman examines how this phrase shaped American reproductive politics and health care standards across generations. Drawing on extensive archival research, the book traces the unexpected origins of this rhetoric in urban reform movements, showing how early associations of alleys with sanitation, morality, and criminality created lasting impressions that would later influence abortion discourse.

Winderman demonstrates how "back-alley abortion" was always more than just descriptive language—it has shaped perceptions of medical legitimacy and clinical spaces. The book reveals how this phrase emerged from racialized and gendered intersections of urban planning, public health, and social reform movements before becoming a rhetoric that anticipated pre–Roe v. Wade criminalized medical encounters. After Roe, back-alley abortion molded public memory through high-profile cases and later became a weaponized tool of anti-abortion activists to restrict access under the guise of sanitary clinical care.

From nineteenth-century urban reformers to contemporary Supreme Court decisions, this study illuminates how three words came to carry the weight of America's most contentious health care debate. In our post-Dobbs era, as states grapple with new restrictions on reproductive rights, understanding the complex history and rhetorical power of "back-alley abortion" has never been more crucial. Drawing on rhetorical theory, reproductive justice theory, and the history of medicine, Back-Alley Abortion offers vital insights into how rhetoric shapes our understanding of medical legitimacy, clinical standards, and health care justice in the United States.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Soda Lake"

New from Rare Bird Books: Soda Lake: A Novel by John C Hampsey.

About the novel, from the publisher:

Soda Lake opens with an unnamed narrator seeing a man disappear into a lake of white salt. This sets the narrator on a quest of discovery, shaped by a series of stories with interconnected characters who all grapple with threats to their identity. The narrator's suspenseful journey mixes personal and collective human history, and his definition of self mysteriously fades as he gets closer to the elusive and timeless “McCuade,” who may or may not be real.

Shifting from the coastal valley of central California to Chicago, Ireland, Greece, and France, each chapter in the novel presents a protagonist in the midst of a psychological struggle wherein the idea of McCuade becomes stronger than the reality of the characters themselves. With a twenty-first-century nod to works as diverse as Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio and Renata Adler’s Speedboat, Soda Lake blends elements of the archetypal detective quest with stories of the uncanny in order to freshly render the individual human psyche in its struggle to stand up to a progressively transmogrifying world.

Visit John C Hampsey's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Economies of Gender"

New from Rutgers University Press: Economies of Gender: Masculinity, "Mail Order Brides," and Women's Labor by Julia H. Meszaros.

About the book, from the publisher:

Economies of Gender: Masculinity, "Mail Order Brides," and Women's Labor offers a provocative exploration of the international dating industry, challenging simplistic narratives of human trafficking and scams while shedding light on the economic dynamics of gender. Through twelve years of fieldwork, the book delves into the motivations and experiences of men who seek relationships abroad, driven by dissatisfaction with Western women who, they believe, no longer embody traditional femininity. By examining romantic tourism hotspots such as Ukraine, Colombia, and the Philippines, Economies of Gender reveals how these international settings serve as "intimate frontiers," where men seek to extract femininity capital and bolster their status. It illuminates the often-unseen economic underpinnings of relationships and questions how global gender dynamics shape desires, fantasies, and intimate markets. Through its compelling analysis, the book broadens the conversation on gender, power, and the commodification of intimacy in a globalized world.

--Marshal Zeringue

"How to Talk to Your Dog About Murder"

New from Crooked Lane Books: How to Talk to Your Dog About Murder: A Mystery by Emily Soderberg.

About the book, from the publisher:

Dogs are better behaved than people in this new cozy mystery where a pet behaviorist finds herself the prime suspect in an upscale murder, perfect for fans of Eva Gates and Victoria Gilbert.

Nikki Jackson-Ramanathan is struggling to get her pet behaviorist business off the ground, making ends meet as a dog walker while keeping her eyes peeled for greener pastures. An appointment in a rich suburb of Saint Louis seems to be her ticket to success. The wealthy Mrs. Van Meer wants Nikki to help the family’s old hound dog, who is grieving the loss of his owner. But then Mrs. Van Meer turns up dead.

With a multitude of suspects like the sketchy landscaper, the judgy housekeeper, and the rest of Mrs. Van Meer’s money-obsessed family members, Nikki’s happy to sit back and let the police solve the crime. Until she learns that Mrs. Van Meer’s will leaves Nikki in charge of a sizable amount of money and the police start dogging her every step.

Life would be a lot easier if she just had to deal with the animals, but Nikki resolves to catch the real culprit and convince the cops they’re barking up the wrong tree.

Visit Emily Soderberg's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Wake of HMS Challenger"

New from Princeton University Press: The Wake of HMS Challenger: How a Legendary Victorian Voyage Tells the Story of Our Oceans' Decline by Gillen D’Arcy Wood.

About the book, from the publisher:

A scientific adventure story that dramatizes how profoundly our oceans have changed over the past 150 years

In December 1872, HMS Challenger embarked on the first round-the-world oceanographic expedition. Its goal: to shine a light for the first time on the mysteries of the deep sea. For the next four years, Challenger’s naturalists explored the oceans, encountering never-before-seen marvels of marine life. The expedition’s achievements are the stuff of legend. It identified major ocean currents and defining features of the seafloor, including the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and Mariana Trench. It measured worldwide sea temperatures and chemistry, creating baseline data for all ocean research since. And, most spectacularly of all, it collected nearly five thousand sea creatures and plants new to science. In The Wake of HMS Challenger, Gillen D’Arcy Wood looks afresh at this legendary scientific odyssey and shows why, 150 years later, its legacy looms larger than ever.

The Challenger’s scientists had no way of knowing that the incredible undersea aquarium they were documenting was on the verge of catastrophic change. Off Portugal, they encountered a brilliant starfish now threatened with extinction by microplastics; in St. Thomas, teeming coral habitats that today have been decimated by ocean warming; and at remote Ascension Island, the breeding grounds of the now-endangered green turtle. Lyrical and elegiac, The Wake of HMS Challenger offers a stunning before-and-after picture of our global oceans. It is both a reminder of what we have lost since the Victorian age and an urgent call to preserve what remains of the diverse life and wild beauty of our planet’s final frontier.

The Page 99 Test: Tambora.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Glass Across the Sea"

New from Enclave Escape: Glass Across the Sea: Volume 1 by Sara Ella.

About the book, from the publisher:

Light always finds a way to break free . . .

Noelle Perrault has felt drawn to the tales her glassmaker father told of the four Firefly artisans since she was a child. But when her mother falls under a curse, Noelle suspects the stories are more than mere fables. Their last hope is for her father to embark on a desperate journey to another realm, where he must seek a miracle. Alone but not defenseless, Noelle is forced to navigate battles that rise against her beloved home, while her dearest friend, the prince, vows to help her father.

Dante Marin is a prince prepared to bear the crown. But the king offers an ultimatum: find the fabled Firefly Vestiges, believed to hold the Lamplighter’s ancient power, or forfeit the crown. Only then will Dante be considered worthy of his birthright and given the freedom to choose his bride. But how does one hunt down a legend?

Connected by the past, but forced apart in the present, Noelle and Dante must discover the truth about the Firefly and Vestiges before they lose all hope—and each other—for good. But breaking a curse comes at a great sacrifice—one neither of them predicted. With a mysterious foe rising to power, will they survive, let alone succeed? Or will darkness shroud their future, shattering the light they’ve striven to restore?

Visit Sara Ella's website.

The Page 69 Test: Unblemished.

The Page 69 Test: Unraveling.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Rest Is Silence"

New from Yale University Press: The Rest Is Silence: Enlightenment Philosophers Facing Death by Joanna Stalnaker.

About the book, from the publisher:

A moving, intimate portrait of the Enlightenment philosophers as they faced the end of their lives and their historical moment

What would the Enlightenment look like if we viewed it through the eyes of the philosophers as they were facing death? Joanna Stalnaker turns our usual perspective on the Enlightenment on its head, bringing to light a set of works written at the end of the Old Regime and at the end of their authors’ lives. These works, all written before the French Revolution, cast a retrospective glance over the intellectual movement their authors participated in, and over the authors’ own lives and works. Stalnaker shows that the beauty of these works stems from their authors’ efforts to give literary form to the materiality and fragility of their dying bodies. As they reflected on writing as a means of reaching posterity, Enlightenment philosophers embraced the possibility that neither their names nor their writings would survive long beyond the decomposition of their bodies. They inscribed the silence and nothingness of death into their last works.

Stalnaker’s book unsettles reigning interpretations of the Enlightenment as a precursor to our modernity and shows its protagonists at their moments of fragility and doubt, capturing their sense of an ending rather than the confidence in a glowing future so often attributed to them.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Heart So Haunted"

New from Crooked Lane Books: A Heart So Haunted: A Novel by Hollie Nelson.

About the book, from the publisher:

In this evocative and stunning debut, secrets in the very bones of Harthwait House are disturbed when a new tenant moves in, for fans of Ashley Poston and A House with Good Bones.

Be wary the beds and the space beneath,

the cracks in the floors and the furnace teeth.

Keep your eyes from the shadows and tongue so still.

Because once Harthwait grows dark, the monsters become real.

Landry is ready to clean house—not just Harthwait, but the traumatic memories and family entanglements that haunt her. Left reeling from her aunt’s sudden death, Landry knows she has to restore the old house and sell it for much needed cash. Preferably, before autumn arrives. But as renovations begin on Harthwait, she notices some peculiarities: Motion sensors activate when no one is home, doors slam shut, and every night, at a quarter after midnight, the disembodied crying begins. Then, when she uncovers a hidden door during the renovations, she dares to open it.

Behind the door is a world of nightmares, some of which are hers, while others belong to a monster—who is trapped inside and desperate to get out. Both haunted by their pasts, Landry makes a deal with the monster, but as they develop feelings for each other, she realizes that the thing that looks like a beast may not be the most beastly thing after all.

This rich and spellbinding tale explores the idea of what we call home and who we call family.

Visit Hollie Nelson's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Poetry After Barbarism"

New from Columbia University Press: Poetry After Barbarism: The Invention of Motherless Tongues and Resistance to Fascism by Jennifer Scappettone.

About the book, from the publisher:

Against a backdrop of xenophobic and ethnonationalist fantasies of linguistic purity, Poetry After Barbarism uncovers a stateless, polyglot poetry of resistance―the poetry of motherless tongues. Departing from the national and global paradigms that dominate literary history, Jennifer Scappettone traces the aesthetic and geopolitical resonance of “xenoglossic” poetics: poetry composed in the space of contestation between national languages, concretizing dreams of mending the ruptures traced to the story of Babel. As global migration, aerial bombardment, and the wireless telegraph shrank distances with brute force during the twentieth century, visions of transcultural communication emerged in the hopes of bridging linguistic difference. At the same time, evolving Fascist ideologies denied the reality of cultural admixture and the humanity of the stranger.

Authors who write xenoglossic verse occupy languages without a perceived birthright or sanctioned education; they compose in ecstatic “orphan tongues” that rebuff nationalist ideologies, on the one hand, and globalization, on the other, uprooting notions of belonging ensconced in nativist metaphors of milk, blood, and soil while rendering the reactionary category of the barbarian obsolete. Raised within or in the wake of fascism, these poets practice strategic forms of literary and linguistic barbarism, proposing modes of collectivity that exceed geopolitical definitions. Studying experiments between languages by immigrant, refugee, and otherwise stateless authors―from Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven to Emilio Villa, Amelia Rosselli, Etel Adnan, LaTasha N. Nevada Diggs, Chika Sagawa, and Sawako Nakayasu―this book explores how poetry can both represent and jumpstart metamorphosis of the shape and sound of citizenship, modeling paths toward alternative republics in which poetry might assume a central agency.

--Marshal Zeringue