"Samantha Spük: Paranormal Wedding Planner"

New from S&S/Saga Press: Samantha Spük: Paranormal Wedding Planner by Aleese Lin.

About the book, from the publisher:

Aleese Lin’s delightful, spooky—or Spük-y?—contemporary romance debut is perfect for fans of Legends & Lattes and Netflix’s Wednesday.

Samantha Spük is your go-to wedding planner, be it for werewolf, vampire, or fae!

...even if that's the last thing she would’ve imagined. Samantha “Sabby” Spük has spent her life trying to escape her family’s legacy of supernatural chaos. She’s finally graduated and landed a nice, normal 9–5 at a New York accounting firm. But then she gets the call: Grandma Rose is gone, and Sabby has been named executor of her (ahem, magically binding) will.

Now Sabby is stuck in her dreaded hometown of Salem, Massachusetts, taking on odd jobs—some very odd, like wedding planning for not-so-human locals—until she can sell the family home. At least this means a date with Hanry, the mysterious hottie Sabby meets in the neighborhood graveyard. With help from Hanry, a talking-head sidekick, and a manic pixie assistant, Sabby might pull these weddings off in time to salvage her accounting career…but is she ready to say goodbye to her paranormal one?

Visit Aleese Lin's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Fear of Queer Taiwan"

New from NYU Press: Fear of Queer Taiwan: Anti-LGBTQ Movements Between Taiwan and the U.S. Religious Right by Ying-Chao Kao.

About the book, from the publisher:

Traces the development of new anti-LGBTQ movements in Taiwan and their interactions with the US Religious Right

In 2019, global media celebrated Taiwan as the first Asian country to legalize same-sex marriage. However, the pursuit of this human rights milestone spurred waves of opposition to LGBTQ rights that have fundamentally shaped the nation’s democracy and its relationship with the United States. This book examines Taiwan’s anti-LGBTQ movements, analyzes their rise and fall, and reveals their surprising links with American religious conservatism.

Given that Christianity is a minority religion in Taiwan and East Asia, the book seeks to answer how and why Christian-led anti-LGBTQ sentiments became so powerful in Taiwan, and how they have built transnational connections with American and other international counterparts.

Drawing on more than 100 in-depth interviews with leading figures across a wide political spectrum, and two years of cumulative ethnographic observation in both Taiwan and the United States, Kao reveals that moral conservatism has been flowing across borders and adapting to contemporary socio-political institutions as it seeks to protect its moral territories and expand its ideological power. Exploring the transnational ebbs and flows of moral conservatism as a direct response to rising pro-LGBTQ liberalism and queer radicalism, Fear of Queer Taiwan offers a groundbreaking theoretical framework to understand conservatism’s fluidity in today’s ever-evolving global landscape of gender and sexual politics.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Windsor Affair"

New from Delacorte Press: The Windsor Affair: A Novel by Melanie Benjamin.

About the book, from the publisher:

A scandalous affair. A power struggle for the throne. A sensational rivalry between an English queen and an American social climber. In this electrifying novel, the New York Times bestselling author of The Swans of Fifth Avenue tells the story of the Abdication of Edward VIII—and the two women at the center of it all.

Feuding Windsor brothers and their wives—some things, it seems, never change. The Windsor Affair recreates the cataclysmic events that nearly toppled the monarchy and incited the power struggle between Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon and Wallis Simpson. Told from the perspective of both women, the novel propels readers into the fabulous world of the debonair Prince of Wales, café society of the 1930s, and the glittering private lives of the Windsors. The first novel to be dedicated to this infamous rivalry, The Windsor Affair brings us all the gossip and intrigue between the two very different—yet perhaps more similar than they would admit—wives of royals.

As Queen, Elizabeth would become the symbol of British pluck and courage during World War II and remain a British institution the rest of her long life. Wallis would be forever forced to enact the World’s Greatest Love Story even after it sours, as she goes from being admired to vilified and, ultimately, pitied. Against the backdrop of the Abdication Crisis, World War II, coronations, funerals, births, and deaths, these two women maintain a biting, sharp-tongued feud—until age and the long arm of history bring about a kind of understanding. For the last communication between these bitter rivals was a simple, surprising message: “In friendship, Elizabeth.”

Visit Melanie Benjamin's website.

The Page 69 Test: Alice I Have Been.

The Page 69 Test: The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb.

My Book, The Movie: The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb.

The Page 69 Test: The Aviator's Wife.

The Page 69 Test: The Swans of Fifth Avenue.

The Page 69 Test: The Girls in the Picture.

Writers Read: Melanie Benjamin (May 2019).

Q&A with Melanie Benjamin.

The Page 69 Test: The Children's Blizzard.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Dream Road to Pan America"

New from the University of California Press: Dream Road to Pan America: A Century in Pursuit of the World's Longest Highway by Shawn William Miller.

About the book, from the publisher:

An expansive and subversive history of the Pan-American Highway.

A century after the Pan-American Highway was first conceived, its story remains largely unknown—even to the hundreds of motorists who annually attempt the 30,000-kilometer drive from far northern Alaska to the tip of Tierra del Fuego. There is more to the highway, however, than the persistent allure of the open road. In Dream Road to Pan America, historian Shawn William Miller unveils a larger tale of lofty ideals and bedrock greed, romantic adventure and pragmatic diplomacy, immigrant desperation and Indigenous resistance.

This book journeys to the early 1920s when everyday Americans invented the idea of a road that would spread fraternity, democracy, and prosperity across the hemisphere. It looks at the commercial and geopolitical interests that shaped the highway—often with little concern for those living along its margins—and explains why the road became an escape route for millions of migrants rather than a corridor for tourists. Miller contends that the highway’s troubled past points to an unresolved future, offering insights into the growing costs of continuing down well-worn paths.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Sublimation"

New from Tor Books: Sublimation by Isabel J. Kim.

About the book, from the publisher:

Doppelgängers, corporate intrigue, heartbreak, betrayal, and the harsh permanence of the border: Sublimation is a thrilling and provocative debut for fans of Severance that asks what you'd sacrifice for a different life from award-winning author Isabel J. Kim.

The border cuts you in two.

When you immigrate, you leave a copy of yourself behind, an instance. One person enters their new country; the other stays trapped at home.

Some instances keep in touch, call each other daily, keep their lives and minds in sync in the hopes of reintegrating and resuming a life as one person. Others, like Soyoung Rose Kang, leave home at ten years old and never speak to their other selves again. Rose, in America, never imagined going back to Korea until her grandfather died and her Korean instance called her home for the funeral.

She doesn’t know that Soyoung plans to steal her body and her life.

How far would you go to live the choice you didn’t make?

Visit Isabel J. Kim's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Against Heritage"

New from The University of North Carolina Press: Against Heritage: The Reinvention of Traditional Foods by Lily Kelting.

About the book, from the publisher:

The rise of “heritage” foods—that is, the reinvention of traditional foods—has enjoyed a high profile thanks to the oft-praised efforts of chefs such as Sean Brock and René Redzepi. But Lily Kelting observes the popularity of heritage foods as something more: a global movement in response to climate catastrophe and the rise of right-wing, populist movements that center a return to the past as part of their ideology.

Weaving ethnography, discourse analysis, critical theory, and sensory, embodied critique, Kelting tracks and critiques the boom of traditional food revival movements in the American South, Denmark, and India. Ultimately, Kelting argues that the heritage culinary professionals wish to revive is equal parts nostalgia and invention: They engage, subvert, and ignore food histories in their creation of new food movements. As Kelting documents our contemporary moment, she shows how the conversations surrounding these new food movements leave out people already keeping their traditions alive. Against Heritage, then, serves as a reparative revaluation of the work of the cooks largely excluded from the contemporary media conversation about heritage revival.

Visit Lily Kelting's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Behind White Picket Fences"

New from Lake Union: Behind White Picket Fences: A Novel by Christine Gunderson.

About the book, from the publisher:

Fusing page-turning suspense with keenly observed humor, this homage to female friendship explores the hamster wheel of modern motherhood, and the consequences for jumping off.

Kiersten Cleaver feels like she’s flunking Motherhood 101. Exhausted by travel sports, homework, and her son’s dyslexia, she joins forces with her neighbors, Rosamund and Piper, to drop out of the scholastic rat race for one year.

Together, they start the Beaverbrook Academy for Inquiring Minds in Kiersten’s kitchen, embarking on a journey back to the idyllic life they experienced as children, when phones were attached to the wall and kids played outside until the streetlights came on at dusk.

But the women quickly realize fractions aren’t their only problem. A sixty-year-old diary discovered in Kiersten’s basement raises unsettling questions about their neighborhood, their safety, and the seemingly simpler past.

Their picture-perfect suburb disguises deadly secrets―and someone wants to keep them hidden. As unsettling events rattle their fragile utopia, Kiersten, Rosamund, and Piper face an impossible choice. And if they expose the truth, they put everything at risk: their children, their friendship, and their newfound community.

Visit Christine Gunderson's website.

Q&A with Christine Gunderson.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Artificially Yours"

New from Princeton University Press: Artificially Yours: Real Friendship in a World of Chatbots by Valerie Tiberius.

About the book, from the publisher:

A human perspective on the nature of friendship in the age of artificial intelligence

Is friendship with a chatbot as good as friendship with an actual person? Is there something about human friendships that eludes simulation? If so, what? And how much will the answers to questions like these change as AI develops and becomes more convincingly like us? Artificially Yours explains what friendship is and why it’s valuable—and why there is no perfect substitute for human friends.

Blending insights from philosophy, psychology, and her own entertaining experiences with chatbots, Valerie Tiberius addresses a subject at the heart of our growing reliance on AI companions. She defines the ideal friendship as an enjoyable, close relationship built on shared activities between people who care about each other for their own sake. But few things in life are ever ideal, including friendship. Tiberius demonstrates how different kinds of friendships can be valuable in different ways: they can be pleasurable or useful, they can shape who we are and how we see ourselves, and the best ones are good for their own sakes. Using each of these values as her guide, Tiberius finds that relationships with chatbots do in fact exhibit some of the characteristics of friendship—but cautions that even future relationships with advanced AI are highly unlikely to be good in all the ways human friendships are.

A vital contribution to our ongoing conversation about human-AI relationships, Artificially Yours weighs the ethical risks before us as we look to a future with intelligent machines and affirms the value of human connections.

Visit Valerie Tiberius's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Cupido Cupido"

New from Texas Tech University Press: Cupido Cupido: A Novel by Emily Grandy.

About the book, from the publisher:

When sixteen-year-old Ignatius “Egg” Girard is told he’ll be spending the next three months on his estranged grandfather’s failing farm in Hale Creek, Kentucky, getting the place ready to sell, he foresees chores, isolation, and the erosion of everything he’d planned for his summer vacation.

At first, Egg is resolved simply to endure: the scorching, tedious days; his grandfather’s silences punctuated by harsh outbursts. But then Egg makes two bewildering discoveries. Hidden away in his mother’s childhood bedroom, he unearths a bundle of decades-old letters written in a language he cannot decipher. When he shows them to his grandfather, the reaction is immediate and unsettling: the letters are thrown away without explanation. Then there’s the startling encounter with a secretive ground-dwelling bird thought to have gone extinct in the 1930s, drawing a biologist and her team to the property just as it’s about to be put up for sale.

Blending dry humor with emotional depth, Cupido Cupido navigates family estrangement, cultural inheritance, and the complex act of growing up. As Egg wrestles with questions of identity and legacy, the farm becomes a place of unlikely discoveries—about the people who raised him, the profound weight of their shared histories, and the unspoken ways love persists through distance and time.

Likely to appeal to readers of Ann Patchett, Celeste Ng, and Kazuo Ishiguro, Emily Grandy’s Cupido Cupido is a quietly powerful exploration of memory, belonging, and the fine line between what is lost and what might yet be found.

Visit Emily Grandy's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Resurgence and Revolution"

New from NYU Press: Resurgence and Revolution: The PKK and the Kurdish Fight in Turkey and Syria by Aliza Marcus.

About the book, from the publisher:

A riveting current history of the Kurdish rebel PKK group

Aliza Marcus’ new book tells the remarkable story of Kurdish revolution in the Middle East led by the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party)―the rebel group whose insurgency in Turkey has impacted countries, conflicts, and Kurdish demands throughout the region.

Combining reportage and scholarship, Resurgence and Revolution explores the PKK’s resurgence from the brink of defeat after the capture of its leader, Abdullah Ocalan, in 1999, and the brutal internal split that followed. The book tells the story of how Ocalan―operating from prison―reshaped the PKK to extend the group’s influence beyond Turkey’s borders, setting the stage for the group’s dominance of northeastern Syria and the unlikely partnership between its allied forces and the U.S. in the fight against ISIS. Based on interviews with PKK fighters, their supporters, and opponents in Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Europe, Marcus traces the group’s ability to maintain power in Turkey and extend its activities across borders, using PKK rebels’ own voices to show why young people join and fight for the group and its affiliates in Syria and Iran.

For the more than 30 million Kurds in Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Syria―and for the leaders of these countries―the PKK is a force that cannot be ignored. Understanding the PKK and what drives its supporters is crucial for understanding Kurdish demands and potential solutions.

The fall of the Assad regime, and a new peace process between Turkey and the PKK has changed the dynamics for Kurdish demands and their control over territory in Syria. Resurgence and Revolution is a compelling and necessary read for understanding the impact of a resurgent PKK, the future of the Middle East, and the enduring struggle of the Kurds to rule themselves.

Visit Aliza Marcus's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Sometime This Century"

Coming soon from Harper Perennial: Sometime This Century: A Regency Rom-Com by Samantha Silva.

About the novel, from the publisher:

A riotous rom-com meets a swoon-worthy Regency comedy of manners in this heartfelt time-travel story about sisters, love, identity—and how Jane Austen just might change your life.

Annabel Blake was born in the wrong century. An Austen-loving book nerd, she dreams of being a writer herself, with a just-penned Regency novel to prove it. Her hopes sink when her hot author crush rejects her: The novel reads like she’s never been in love. Ouch.

Annabel sees a chance to rewrite it when her ex-pat boss sends her to England to sort out her family’s “crumbling old pile” of a country house. Tempted by an invitation tucked in an antique writing desk and a “period” coachman at her door, Annabel’s whisked away to a local Regency Society ball—cue candlelight, costumes, dancing—that might be just the inspiration she needs. There’s even the achingly perfect—and wildly out of her league—Henry Leighton D’Evercy.

When Annabel’s audacious influencer sister crashes the party with her super-chill ex-boyfriend, the unlikely trio wake to find themselves trapped in the actual Regency era. No Wi-Fi, lattes, cellphones—just a world where manners, money, and marriage rule.

As Annabel falls deeply for D’Evercy, she must decide: write her perfect love story…or live it.

Visit Samantha Silva's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Shakespeare's Scholars"

New from Princeton University Press: Shakespeare's Scholars: Three Lessons from the Liberal Arts by Sean Keilen.

About the book, from the publisher:

What Love’s Labor’s Lost, Hamlet, and The Tempest can teach us about discovery, growth, and change

Shakespeare was a keen and discerning reader who was mocked by writers who, unlike him, had been to university—so it’s not surprising that his portrait of scholarly life is critical. As Sean Keilen shows in this engaging book, Shakespeare’s scholars lack humility, shun wisdom, underestimate people who are not scholars, and, by keeping aloof from society, fail to see themselves clearly. In examining Shakespeare’s scholars, Keilen finds parallels in the modern academy.

Keilen examines three plays with scholars as protagonists, tracing these characters’ arduous paths to self-knowledge and meaningful connection with others. In Love’s Labor’s Lost, four noblemen, seeking fame for knowledge and virtue, establish an academy—but the real purpose of their studies is to exclude women, scorn men of inferior standing, and treat each other with hostility. In Hamlet, the prodigiously intelligent Prince of Denmark retreats to the solitude of his own thoughts, with unfortunate results. And in The Tempest, Prospero abandons his duty to others for the rapture of secret studies, a choice that leads him to seek the false consolation of self-protective bitterness. In each play, Keilen finds important lessons about humility, wisdom, and self-knowledge. Inspired by these, he argues for a new approach to teaching literature—one that views literary education not as an esoteric discipline but as the renewal of an intellectual heritage all readers hold in common.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Confession Artist"

New from Thomas & Mercer: The Confession Artist: A Thriller by Christine Carbo.

About the novel, from the publisher:

A Montana ex-cop becomes the target of a vengeful killer’s viral guessing game in a propulsive novel of suspense by a bestselling and award-winning author.

A killer dubbed the Confession Artist is posting sketches of potential victims on social media. And paranoia spreads as strangers across the nation admit to their sins―fearing the consequences: You have six days to confess or die.

Then former cop and first-year PI Crosbie Mitchell sees a sketch that bears a striking resemblance to her. How can that be? She’s a nobody from Flathead Valley, Montana. Crosbie dismisses it as an unnerving coincidence. If not for one unmistakable detail that makes the threat hard to ignore. When the FBI is contacted, they are convinced that Crosbie is the next target. So is she.

Crosbie has six days left to fess up online to something plaguing her conscience. But even if she wanted to play the killer’s game, she has more than one secret. And if she ever dares to expose them for the world to see, the truth will destroy her. That’s exactly what the Confession Artist wants.

Visit Christine Carbo's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Becoming Boundless"

New from Stanford University Press: Becoming Boundless: Indian Transnational Entrepreneurs in the Global Economy by Manashi Ray.

About the book, from the publisher:

How do Indian men and women migrant entrepreneurs play a part in repositioning India as a pivotal actor in the twenty-first century's multipolar world order? In Becoming Boundless, Manashi Ray draws on ethnographic and archival research to uncover how they create and participate in transnational networks, and how these networks in turn drive the growth of global capitalism. Ray pays particular attention to the expansive global networks of transnational Indian entrepreneurs between the United States and India and across several other nations.

Covering a 10-year period in India's post-reform era, Ray deftly highlights complex connections between the social and spatial mobility of this diverse, bi-cultural population, and uniquely theorizes the intersection of class, caste, and gender. She questions whether migration reinforces dominant forms of social inequality or transforms it through the redistribution of valued goods and life chances, especially for women in male-dominated sectors. The book therefore recasts contemporary migration as a crucial part of the emergence of transnational economic spaces, and analyzes the ways that these spaces are fragmented and hierarchical.

Visit Manashi Ray's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"We Want So Much to Be Ourselves"

Coming June 9 from Bellevue Literary Press: We Want So Much to Be Ourselves by Stephen O'Connor.

About the novel, from the publisher:

A German psychoanalyst, his Jewish wife, and their young daughter are swept up in the rising tide of fascism

Günter Zeitz, psychoanalyst-in-training and the son of a Catholic country doctor, and Josine Rosen, Sigmund Freud’s patient and the daughter of a Jewish shipping magnate, first meet in 1924, in Freud’s Viennese waiting room. As their intense affair develops, Freud arranges for Günter’s appointment to the newly created Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute. Shortly after the move, their daughter Hannah is born. But less than a decade later, all their hopes and ideals are profoundly challenged by political realities so horrific that they are, initially, beyond comprehension.

A heartrending story of love in a time of hatred, an absorbing investigation into the Nazis’ exploitation of psychoanalysis, and a cautionary tale about self-deception and the failures of a people to recognize the lies of their charismatic leader, We Want So Much to Be Ourselves examines the ways science can be corrupted and one’s very identity transformed by historical circumstance.

Visit Stephen O'Connor's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Cultivated: Plants, Hair, and the Aesthetic of Control"

New from Yale University Press: Cultivated: Plants, Hair, and the Aesthetic of Control by Jeffrey Hoelle.

About the book, from the publisher:

An exploration of the concept of cultivation, as conducted on both the land and the body, which expands our understanding of it as practice, aesthetic, and ideology. In this book, Jeffrey Hoelle traces the imprint of cultivation across the naturally growing covers of the land and body—plants and hair. The book builds from research in the agricultural fields and cattle pastures at the edge of the Amazon rainforest to domestic landscapes and hair salons and shops in the frontier cities of Brazil and beyond. In spaces where the tangled forest once stood, clean pastures and ordered rows of crops now sit on properties with geometric edges. From rural spaces to immaculate lawns and cemeteries in the city, the imprint leads to the body, where hair, like plant growth, is cut, trimmed, and otherwise managed. Seemingly separate domains of agriculture, landscaping, and personal grooming are governed by a similar aesthetic of control. This unique pairing of land and body expands our understanding of cultivation as a practice and as an ideology that operates in frontier Amazonia—but also closer to home, influencing how we conceptualize and interpret the covers that grow on and around us, and our imagined relations with nature in the future. Hoelle argues that we must understand this system of thought and the overlooked role it plays in environmental destruction and social inequality.

Visit the Hoelle Lab website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Pollock's Last Lover"

New from William Morrow: Pollock's Last Lover: A Novel of Art and Deception by Stephen P. Kiernan.

About the novel, from the publisher:

Set in New York City in alternating time periods—the 1950s and the early 2000s—Pollock’s Last Lover is the engrossing tale of two women whose lives collide as they contend with the art and legacy of the brilliant, tragic painter Jackson Pollock.

In 2006, Sotheby’s sells a painting by Jackson Pollock for $140 million—the highest sum ever paid for a work of art. Two weeks later, an older woman named Ruth Kligman, in high heels and a dusty fascinator, contacts a smaller, less prominent auction house to announce that she was Pollock’s lover, and that he gave her his last painting. She declares that it was selfish to keep it in her apartment for fifty years, and that people should see this masterpiece in galleries and museums the world over. The bidding will start at $50 million.

Gwen, an up-and-coming associate at the firm, is assigned the task of verifying the painting’s authenticity. For Gwen, an ambitious woman in a field often dominated by men, it is her biggest project yet. And the company must have absolute certainty. Yet each step of the investigation raises larger questions—about Ruth’s cunning climb in the art world, and even about what caused Pollock’s sudden and violent death.

What follows, in alternating chapters and time periods, is a multigenerational portrait of women’s ambition set against the life and work of Jackson Pollock. From smoky Greenwich Village dive bars to glitzy art auctions, from the empty studio of a man once known for his artistic stamina to the fine museums where his works hang, Ruth’s controversial painting provides a window into two eras—and the ongoing struggle of women to develop power and freedom on their own terms.

Visit Stephen Kiernan's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Curiosity.

The Page 69 Test: The Curiosity.

Writers Read: Stephen P. Kiernan (April 2017).

My Book, The Movie: The Baker's Secret.

The Page 69 Test: The Baker's Secret.

My Book, The Movie: The Glass Château.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Beyond Squid Game"

New from the University of Texas Press: Beyond Squid Game: Korean Media and the Netflix Paradigm by Benjamin M. Han.

About the book, from the publisher:

Examining Netflix’s global influence through its complex global-local dynamics in Korean media.

Korea is a global entertainment powerhouse, thanks in no small part to Netflix. Analyzing the artistry and industry behind Netflix-produced Korean hits like Squid Game, The Glory, and Narco-Saints, Benjamin Han argues that Korea is ground zero for an emerging “Netflix Paradigm.” The US-based streaming platform generates massive profits by erasing boundaries of foreign and domestic production, even as it underscores the resilience of the national media within global popular culture.

Beyond Squid Game breaks down the intricate and often ambivalent relationship between Netflix and the Korean media business, drawing on interviews with creative workers navigating the streaming giant’s ever-increasing economic and cultural power. Challenging narratives that present Netflix as a revolutionary disruptor, Han shows how the company has replicated abroad the precarious labor conditions and tensions over intellectual property from which US studios have long benefited. At the same time, Beyond Squid Game underscores the complex dynamics of a globalized media industry in which cultural imperialism thrives on localization and perceived authenticity.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Night Objects"

New from Grand Central Publishing: Night Objects: A Novel by Eli Raphael.

About the novel, from the publisher:

This suspenseful novel transports readers to the windswept coast of Washington State and a boarding school steeped in privilege and deadly secrets—a remarkable story of grief, power, and the dangerous price of belonging.

It is true that I wished him dead dozens of times. Hundreds, even. But I, Lenny Winter, did not kill that boy.

Lenny Winter is fifteen years-old when she moves with her parents to an aging houseboat off the rugged coast of Washington. She imagines a quiet life spent charting constellations and chasing her dream of becoming an astronomer. Instead, a sudden tragedy shatters her world and catapults her to Blanchard, a renowned boarding school for the Pacific Northwest's elite, where wealth and tradition rule.

Blanchard is dazzling, insular—and haunted by its own legends. At its heart lurks the Pascalianum Club, a secret society known to shape the school's greatest and most notorious students, and whose influence stretches far beyond campus walls. Hungry to belong, Lenny is drawn into its orbit, even as she senses that the club feeds on the very vulnerabilities she is desperate to hide.

As privilege collides with grief and loyalty warps into obsession, Lenny’s choices will lead to an unforgettable reckoning—and a murder investigation that will test every story she tells herself about guilt, power, hope, and who she is becoming.

Sweeping, thrilling, and deeply moving, Night Objects is both a gripping mystery and a profound coming-of-age story—asking what we risk, what we become, and who we hold dear when the need to belong eclipses everything else.

Visit Eli Raphael's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Under the Guise of Protection"

New from the University of Virginia Press: Under the Guise of Protection: Eugenics and Wayward Girls in Twentieth-Century Virginia by Erin N. Bush.

About the book, from the publisher:

A shocking story of social engineering in the era of Jim Crow

The eugenics movement, in which the state claimed the right to determine who could and who could not have children, was a dark, shameful chapter in American history. Virginia was infamous as an epicenter of eugenic thought; the case of Buck v. Bell, which resulted in one of the Supreme Court’s most notorious decisions, originated there. In Under the Guise of Protection, Erin Bush describes how state programs designed for “delinquent” young women like Carrie Buck―whose sterilization took place while she was an inmate at the Virginia State Colony for Epileptics and Feebleminded―developed in Virginia’s distinctive environment of “progressive” ideology and racial segregation.

Buck was far from alone. Between 1910 and 1942, the commonwealth’s public welfare bureaucrats and charity workers confined more than 2,300 adolescent white and African American girls at juvenile reformatories. By examining the programs developed at these segregated institutions, in both rural and urban areas, this groundbreaking book sheds new light on the connections between juvenile justice, racial politics, and the tendentious use of “science” in the development of social reforms in the early twentieth century.

Visit Erin N. Bush's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Accumulation"

New from G.P. Putnam's Sons: Accumulation by Aimee Pokwatka.

About the novel, from the publisher:

A twisty, searing, conversation-starting novel about a filmmaker-turned-housewife who moves into her dream house and is forced to consider whether it's the house or herself that is haunted.

When documentary filmmaker turned stay-at-home mom Tennessee Cherish moves into the the dream house her husband bought for her, a brighter future seems to be on the horizon. Even if her husband is frustratingly absent due to his new high-paying job. Even if their two young children begin acting out in strange ways. Even if she feels lonelier than ever.

Distracted by the endless details that come with moving into a new town, a new house, and new schools, Tenn doesn’t notice when odd things begin happening at home. The faucet that runs at all hours. The creepy doll that seems to show up in every room. The human tooth they found in the floorboards.

As the kids’ outbursts and the strange events start to escalate, the family finds themselves increasingly caught in loops, repeating everyday actions with dangerous—and then devastating—effects. Tenn realizes she must find the source of what is haunting her family, before it kills them all.

Taut and twisty, scary and searing, Aimee Pokwatka’s Accumulation lays bare the high price women pay for the promises of domesticity and motherhood, and the many ways in which families can be haunted.

Visit Aimee Pokwatka's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Parliament.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Freedom Round the Globe"

New from Doubleday: Freedom Round the Globe: A World History of the American Revolution by Sarah M. S. Pearsall.

About the book, from the publisher:

In a groundbreaking global exploration of the ideas that drove the American Revolution, a prize-winning historian shines a light on the defiance of marginalized peoples all over the world.

In her powerful new history of the American Revolution, Sarah M. S. Pearsall argues that the American Founding Fathers did not have a unique claim on the revolutionary spirit. The thirteen colonies that became the United States, she reminds us, were not even half of the British colonies that existed in the eighteenth century. In her sparkling and original Freedom Round the Globe, Pearsall uncovers the insurgents, freedom lovers, and dreamers in India, West Africa, North America, Europe, China, and West Indian islands who shaped the nature of American rebellion and nationhood.

In each fresh and compelling chapter of Freedom Round the Globe, Pearsall plucks a keyword from the Declaration of Independence—security, happiness, respect– finding its spark in a far-flung place. In an Edinburgh club where women were first invited into philosophical conversations, she explores what the pursuit of happiness meant to women and men of all sorts. She traces how novel forms of slavery provoked a new use of the word liberty in Connecticut petitions as well as in cries of “liberty or death.” On a Kolkata street where Indians protested relentless taxes, Pearsall finds a critique of oppressive imperial government that galvanized Americans in their protests and parties against the tea of the English East India Company. In rural Germany, boy soldiers sent abroad to die for Britain complicate who can lay claim to being civilized in a brutal war.

In telling the extraordinary tales of Friends of Liberty protesting tyranny around the world, Pearsall restores these individuals and movements to their rightful place in the vital story of the American Revolution and the nation it created. The result is a stirring and surprising revisioning of our history.

The Page 99 Test: Polygamy: An Early American History.

--Marshal Zeringue

"No God but Us"

New from Harper: No God but Us: A Novel by Bobuq Sayed.

About the novel, from the publisher:

In this wry, provocative debut, two gay Afghan men—cast out of their respective countries of birth by circumstances beyond their control—collide in Istanbul, a city that will test their willingness to sacrifice everything for the ones they love.

When Delbar—a hapless twenty-something with dreams of becoming a drag queen—is spectacularly outed, he flees the insular immigrant-dense suburbs of Washington, DC to seek refuge with his sympathetic aunt in Istanbul. There, he discovers a vibrant community of dissidents, sex workers, activists, poets, and heretics. Among them are Leif and his boyfriend, Mansur, with whom Delbar quickly develops a blazing fascination.

But Mansur also nurses a wounded heart, having left his own family, and his first love, behind in Iran. This time, Mansur’s learned not to dream bigger than his own survival. He’ll keep a low profile, work hard to send money back, and remain faithful to Leif—at least until his refugee status is granted. When riot police descend on attendees of the annual Istanbul Pride march, Mansur and Delbar are thrust into dangerous proximity. With the country surging into authoritarianism, each person must ask themselves: what constitutes a life well-lived, and how high is the price of freedom?

Told through the alternating viewpoints of Delbar and Mansur, Bobuq Sayed’s debut is a story of borders and boundaries transgressed, and a seductive exploration of what it means to make a home at the margins of society. At once an immigrant family saga, a thwarted love story, and a searing portrait of politics made intimately personal, No God but Us is an ambitious introduction to a bold new voice.

Visit Bobuq Sayed's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Total Black Experience"

New from Rutgers University Press: The Total Black Experience: A History of Television’s Positively Black by Ronald Bishop.

About the book, from the publisher:

The Total Black Experience is the first book to chronicle the history and social significance of Positively Black, one of the longest-running public affairs shows in the history of television. Spurred on by the findings of the Kerner Commission, executives at WNBC-TV greenlit the show and turned production over to a small but dedicated team of storytellers who quickly made it their mission to carve out a space for serious and nuanced discussion of issues important to the Black community and to celebrate all aspects of Black culture. They believed that accurate representation of their experiences was a right, not a privilege. The show’s first cohosts included the well-known Harlem-based activist Rev. Eugene Callender and Gus Heningburg, activist, successful consultant and mediator, and advocate for organized labor. Callender had founded Harlem Prep to equip young Black people for college, while Heningburg played a key role in stabilizing life in Newark following the rebellion there in the late 1960s. Both were adept at using the media to reach their constituencies. Combining in-depth interviews with painstaking archival research, The Total Black Experience introduces readers to key members of the Positively Black production team and analyzes thematic shifts in the show’s content. The book celebrates Positively Black’s longevity and challenges readers to explore the current state of Black representation on television.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Storm Warning"

New from Minotaur Books: Storm Warning: A Dez Limerick Thriller by James Byrne.

About the book, from the publisher:

Dez Limerick has his considerable skills pushed to the limit when, to rescue a friend, he has to get to—and get into—a state of the art facility on full lockdown, with considerable forces determined to stop him.

Desmond Aloysius Limerick—'Dez' to all who know him—is a man with a shadowy past, certain hard-to-replicate skills, and a reputation as a good man to have when the going gets tough. Dez is doing his best to enjoy his retirement, wandering the country, doing what interests him, and occasionally helping friends when they find themselves needing any of his particular skills—mundane or extraordinary. For Dez was trained as a 'gatekeeper' - someone who can open any door, keep it open, and control who does and does not go through.

It's those skills that are now in demand when the State Department comes calling looking for his help. A multinational scientific research facility on the coast of Newfoundland has gone dark, the facility on full lockdown, and no one can get in or out. No one knows what is going on, but it can't be good. And a close friend of Dez is presumed locked inside the facility along with everyone else.

Even getting to the facility is an insurmountable challenge. The weather has flights grounded, some shadowy group is doing everything they can to impede the rescue team's progress, and hidden enemies are embedded in the rescue team. But anyone who thinks this is more than one man can face has never met Dez Limerick.

Visit James Byrne's website.

Q&A with James Byrne.

The Page 69 Test: Deadlock.

My Book, The Movie: Deadlock.

Writers Read: James Byrne (January 2025).

The Page 69 Test: Chain Reaction.

My Book, The Movie: Chain Reaction.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Womb of One's Own"

New from the University of California Press: A Womb of One's Own: Lost Histories of Childbirth in Ancient Rome by Tara Mulder.

About the book, from the publisher:

A bold new history of women's health, brought to life through ancient women's stories of pregnancy and birth.

In the well-trod history of the Roman Empire, a pivotal moment has long gone unnoticed: It was in ancient Rome that medical men first set their sights on childbirth, the traditional domain of female midwives.

Taking us to the dawn of Western obstetrics, A Womb of One's Own offers a feminist account of how, against a long tradition of midwifery, male doctors began claiming authority in reproductive matters, with an emphasis on theoretical rather than practical knowledge. Their intrusion paved the way for the later criminalization of midwives and the cloaking of childbirth in secrecy and shame.

Yet communities of Roman women continued to help each other through the journey from preconception to postpartum, guided by their own experience and the expertise of midwives. Tara Mulder recovers stories of ancient women living and resisting as they sought autonomy over their bodies and their health. Recounting their experiences in vivid, intimate detail, she reveals how old our modern conflicts about birth truly are.

Visit Tara Mulder's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Ishtar Deception"

New from Baen: The Ishtar Deception by James L. Cambias.

About the novel, from the publisher:

A SPY, A MURDER, AND ONE SARCASTIC AI; MYSTERY, ACTION, AND ADVENTURE FROM THE BILLION WORLDS!

The Billion Worlds’ Greatest Spy Faces His Greatest Challenge

At the end of the Tenth Millennium, Sabbath Okada, agent of a nameless branch of Deimos’ labyrinthine government comes to the vast city of Ishtar on Venus to investigate the suspicious death of an undercover agent. His companion, Daslakh, is an old and cunning AI with its own self-imposed mission: to act as Okada’s conscience.

Searching for the truth takes Sabbath and Daslakh to the glittering towers of Ishtar’s elite, a brutal combat sport arena, and the unforgiving, wind-lashed face the highest peak on Venus. Along the way they face ruthless Lunar Republic spies, double agents, and sadistic Ishtar police, but Sabbath’s greatest challenge comes from Meili Tewa, his deadliest enemy—and his only love.

Each twist in the case reveals a new layer of deception, another betrayal. Hunted and on the run, with no one he can trust and no help from home—it’s time for Sabbath Okada to remind everyone why he’s the greatest spy in the Billion Worlds of the Solar System.

Visit James L. Cambias's website.

My Book, The Movie: A Darkling Sea.

Writers Read: James L. Cambias (January 2019).

My Book, The Movie: Arkad's World.

The Page 69 Test: Arkad's World.

My Book, The Movie: The Godel Operation.

Q&A with James L. Cambias.

The Page 69 Test: The Godel Operation.

The Page 69 Test: The Miranda Conspiracy.

My Book, The Movie: The Miranda Conspiracy.

Writers Read: James L. Cambias (February 2025).

--Marshal Zeringue

"This Is a True War Story"

New from the University of Chicago Press: This Is a True War Story: My Improbable History with Vietnam by Robert K. Brigham.

About the book, from the publisher:

A personal account by a war historian and adoptee who discovers his biological father was a famous Marine combat photographer in Vietnam.

Robert K. Brigham has had a substantial career as a historian of the Vietnam War, with a hand in nine books, a documentary, public history projects, and more. While many a historian has felt compelled at some point to write about a subject close to them personally, Brigham did not think he was doing that. But, at age fifty-eight, Brigham, who had long known he was adopted, discovered that he’d improbably and unknowingly been studying and talking about his biological father for decades. That man, Bruce Atwell, was a Marine Corps photographer who took some of that war’s most indelible and widely reproduced pictures. Brigham had used those images over and over again in decades’ worth of classes and public lectures, never knowing the truth.

Both Brigham and Atwell were products of the American foster care and adoption system, and both were defined professionally by Vietnam. In a story shot through with echoes and shadows, Brigham not only reveals his own history as an adoptee but opens a startlingly fresh vantage on the fragility of American families; the power of social norms and taboos to shape lives; and the forces that inequitably disrupt families, not least of them war. The result is an accessible and moving book that is at once both a powerful personal story and an illuminating social critique.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Diva Hosts a Murderer"

New from Kensington: The Diva Hosts a Murderer by Krista Davis.

About the novel, from the publisher:

Old Town Virginia’s entertaining guru and occasional sleuth Sophie Winston – a young Martha Stewart in the making – juggles Fourth of July fireworks, a houseful of guests, and homicide in the latest Domestic Diva culinary mystery from New York Times bestselling author Krista Davis.

With a big crowd descending on her Northern Virginia home, it’s a good thing event planner Sophie Winston is an expert at entertaining. Whipping up patriotic pastries is as easy as pie for her, though meeting the man her widowed Aunt Melly just impulsively married in Las Vegas is a little more awkward. Especially when Melly’s longtime, now-heartbroken secret admirer is there too, which could lead to some fireworks.

But the house party really gets explosive when Sophie’s favorite tour guide falls victim to a killer—and evidence points to Sophie’s own father. Will DNA really incriminate her dad? And what’s the real story with her new uncle-by-marriage and the mysterious pal he’s brought along with him? Some of the secrets Sophie’s discovering are raising flags—and while the police department casts suspicion on her father, she has to declare her independence as a detective to find the real culprit, and serve justice along with her red, white, and blue cupcakes . . .

Includes delicious recipes, fabulous decorating tips, and easy entertaining hacks!

Visit Krista Davis's website.

Coffee with a canine: Krista Davis & Han, Buttercup, and Queenie.

The Page 69 Test: The Ghost and Mrs. Mewer.

The Page 69 Test: Murder, She Barked.

The Page 69 Test: The Wagtail Murder Club.

Q&A with Krista Davis.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Minutes of Empire"

New from Oxford University Press: Minutes of Empire: Dutch West India Company Politics, 1618–1648 by Alexander B. Bick.

About the book, from the publisher:

In September 1645, the directors of the West India Company gathered to discuss the most important crisis in the company's history, one that would determine the fate of a burgeoning Dutch imperial project in the New World.

In this book, Alexander Bick tells the story of this meeting, applying the tools of microhistory to the boardroom of one of early modern Europe's most enigmatic trading companies. Chartered by the States General in 1621, the West India Companyâs principal aim was to open a new front in the struggle against Habsburg Spain by attacking its colonial revenues at their source. This required close cooperation between the company and the central organs of the Dutch state responsible for military affairs. Unlike the merchant-dominated ventures of popular imagination, the company emerges as an instrument of war in which noblemen, courtiers, and magistrates played a decisive role. Through portraits of figures such as Johannes de Laet and Hendrick van der Capellen, the book reveals how the company and its leaders wrestled with questions of political authority, colonial governance, and the relationship between private enterprise and public power―questions that crystalized in the debate over the future of the lucrative but embattled Dutch sugar colony in northeastern Brazil. While this colony was ultimately lost, the West India Company's contributions to securing a favorable peace with Spain in 1648 would prove more enduring.

Minutes of Empire offers an original perspective on the cosmopolitan politics of overseas trading companies that challenges conventional accounts of how empire helped to forge the Dutch state in the Golden Age.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Foursome"

New from Mariner Books: The Foursome: A Novel by Christina Baker Kline.

About the novel, from the publisher:

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Christina Baker Kline comes a boldly original reimagining of the astonishing true story of two sisters in nineteenth-century North Carolina — Kline’s own distant relatives — who married world-famous conjoined twins from Siam.

When Eng and Chang Bunker arrive in Wilkes County in 1839, they’re not just a curiosity—they’re a sensation. Everyone is eager to learn whether the salacious rumors about them are true. Within months, the twins have opened a general store, bought land, and begun building a plantation. Now, word has it, they’re looking for wives—and in a place that thrives on gossip and legacy, their ambitions set the community on edge.

Sarah and Adelaide Yates, daughters of a once-prominent local family brought low by scandal, are drawn into their orbit. Bold, beautiful Adelaide sees in the twins’ fame a chance to reclaim her future. Sarah, quiet and observant, isn’t so sure. When the twins’ lives become entangled with theirs, they must navigate loyalty, longing, and identity in a world where everything—including race, class, and gender—is rigidly defined.

Spanning five decades and unfolding against the backdrop of a fractured nation hurtling toward war, The Foursome is both intimate and epic: a story of love and constraint, identity and reinvention. With piercing insight and emotional precision, Kline brings to life a forgotten chapter of American history and the complex, boundary-defying marriages at its center.

Visit Christina Baker Kline's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Christina Baker Kline & Lucy.

The Page 69 Test: Bird in Hand.

Writers Read: Christina Baker Kline (March 2017).

--Marshal Zeringue

"I'm Sorry You Feel That Way"

New from Stanford University Press: I'm Sorry You Feel That Way: The New Cultures of Customer Service by Diane Negra.

About the book, from the publisher:

This book is about how twenty-first century capitalism is re-making the roles of customer and customer service provider, shedding light on why consumer capitalism has come to feel so punishing for so many. In call centers, banks, airports, universities, public transport systems, hospitals, and other key sites, the intensification of profit imperatives alongside hyper-technologization has generated an "antagonistic interface" between customers and workers. Consumers widely report feeling trapped in the vise-like grip of frustrating and confounding systems that waste significant amounts of time.

Positioning the poorly served customer as the definitional figure of 21st century commercial relations, Diane Negra articulates a new corporate authoritarianism that allocates a broad range of digital tasks to customers. Essential to this apportionment are technology platforms with high failure rates, corporate devotion to byzantine bureaucratic procedures, and the conspicuous, constant valuing of high-status customers over low-status ones. Compliance with new stripped-down service protocols is enforced not only directly but through powerful norms and customs, and affective culture is notable for converting service encounters into transactions routinely characterized by frustration, impotence, and fury. In analyzing the service ecology and its media representations, I'm Sorry You Feel That Way reveals how the shift to customer work is now both totalized and thoroughly naturalized. As the book maps out, the changing nature of the service encounter in day-to-day life and in the cultural imagination reveal the emergence of corporate emotions seldom recognized as the assault on dignity they constitute.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Murder at the Hotel Orient"

New from Gallery/Scout Press: Murder at the Hotel Orient by Alessandra Ranelli.

About the book, from the publisher:

For fans of The Maid and The Grand Budapest Hotel comes this thrilling (and sexy) debut inspired by a real love hotel, which legend claims has existed forever, luring lovers inside for a night of debauchery...

In modern Vienna, American Sterling Lockwood is the loyal concierge at the infamous Hotel Orient, where cameras are banned, aliases are required, and every guest has something to hide. After the double murder of two guests, including a tech mogul building an Austrian surveillance state, Sterling must turn detective. But finding the truth will require breaking the Orient’s sacred code of secrecy, while keeping a few secrets of her own.

The police struggle when modern investigative technology proves useless at the old—fashioned hotel. Because clients use aliases, pay cash, and stay mere hours, all suspects have vanished. Sterling agrees to assist alongside her best friend and colleague, Fernando, if only to avoid arrest and the suspicion regarding her own movements that night. As enemies close in from all around, she risks everything to solve a case haunted by the past, in a city with a fetish for nostalgia.

Don’t be shy darling, ring the bell...

Visit Alessandra Ranelli's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Environmental Republic"

New from Princeton University Press: The Environmental Republic: Why Citizens Will Save the World by Giulio Boccaletti.

About the book, from the publisher:

A bold new conception of the republic for a planet in crisis

Republicanism is arguably the most powerful political idea in history, an extraordinary feat of human imagination that balances individual liberty with collective responsibility. The Environmental Republic reclaims this idea as the path to sustaining our life together on a changing planet, reframing our relationship to the environment not as a constraint on liberty but as its republican foundation.

Giulio Boccaletti argues that we must renew our commitment to freedom and civic responsibility through popular sovereignty. He presents the environmental republic as a necessary alternative to blind faith in technocratic management, the shallow moralizing and apocalyptic rhetoric of some activists, and the disingenuous skepticism of vested interests. Our environmental challenges are not simply about “agreeing on the facts” or living within technical limitations—they reflect a deeper failure of political institutions. Drawing on the history of ideas and real-world examples, Boccaletti presents a political framework that places our relationship to our surroundings at the heart of how we exercise our voice, coordinate collective action, and define development itself.

Offering hope in an anxious age of rising authoritarianism and widespread pessimism, The Environmental Republic challenges the false choice between environmental protection and human freedom, showing how place-based institutions can deliver both sustainability and human development through true self-governance.

Visit Giulio Boccaletti's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Downloaded 2: Ghosts in the Machine"

Coming soon from Shadowpaw Press: The Downloaded 2: Ghosts in the Machine by Robert J. Sawyer.

About the book, from the publisher:

Finalist, Best Novel, 2026 Aurora Awards

To see yourself as others see you

As an asteroid is about to slam into Earth, ex-convict Roscoe Koudoulian along with Captain Letitia Garvey and her starship crew re-upload their consciousnesses into cyberspace. In that digital realm, Roscoe is confronted by someone he left for dead centuries ago, and the astronauts face younger versions of themselves—ghosts in the machine—whose continued existence could destroy the last survivors of the human race.

Visit Robert J. Sawyer's website.

The Page 69 Test: WWW: Wake.

The Page 69 Test: WWW: Watch.

The Page 69 Test:: WWW: Wonder.

The Page 69 Test: Triggers.

The Page 69 Test: Red Planet Blues.

The Page 69 Test: Quantum Night.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Black Muslim Freedom Dreams"

New from NYU Press: Black Muslim Freedom Dreams: Islamic Education, Pan-Africanism, and Collective Care by Samiha Rahman.

About the book, from the publisher:

Explores three generations of Black American Muslims pursuing education and liberation beyond the borders of the United States

Since the 1970s, hundreds of Black American Muslims in the Tijani Sufi order have sought refuge in a new world that would nurture their racial, religious and gendered identities away from anti-Black and anti-Muslim racism in the United States. This new world is in Medina Baye, a city in Senegal that is the headquarters of a pan-African Sufi movement with tens of millions of members in Africa alone.

Drawing on a decade and a half of ethnographic engagement, Black Muslim Freedom Dreams explores the Islamic educational opportunities created for and by Black American Muslims in Medina Baye, chronicling the dreams, sacrifices, struggles, and joys of young people and parents who live, learn, and strive for liberation between the United States and Senegal. The volume traces their journeys between these two worlds, zooming in to vividly portray everyday Black American and West African religious life, and zooming out to map the sociopolitical landscapes, educational conditions and Islamic and pan-African ideologies that shape believers' perspectives.

Black Muslim Freedom Dreams argues that Black Muslims’ experiences of Islamic education and pan-African exchange are oriented towards collective care – a radical way of being and belonging through which believers journey on the path towards Allah’s love by caring for one another and addressing the material inequities that constrain their communities. This notion disrupts narratives of religion that are limited to systems of personal belief, showcasing instead how their educational experiences foster a collective responsibility and solidarity. The book offers a compelling account of how Black Muslims engage with transnational religious and racial networks to build liberatory communities beyond the United States.

--Marshal Zeringue

"This Isn’t New"

Coming soon from Columbine York: This Isn't New: Women's Historical Stories by Cynthia Swanson.

About the book, from the publisher:

The female leads in these stories have disparate lives but share a singular trait: their sex dictates the expectations stamped onto them. Each woman, in her time, must fight for who she is against the forces working to constrain her.

Visit Cynthia Swanson's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Bookseller.

The Page 69 Test: The Glass Forest.

Writers Read: Cynthia Swanson (February 2018).

Q&A with Cynthia Swanson.

The Page 69 Test: Anyone But Her.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Dogs Save"

New from Columbia University Press: Dogs Save: Stories of Canine Redemption in US Culture by Katharine Mershon.

About the book, from the publisher:

Stories about people and dogs saving one another are everywhere in US culture—on TV, in Hollywood movies, on social media, and even on bumper stickers. Yet these seemingly heartwarming stories of mutual rescue revolve around redemption through suffering, a narrative profoundly interwoven with Christian beliefs, white racial anxieties, and US national myths.

Katharine Mershon examines the unacknowledged religious underpinnings of stories about dogs, revealing deeply rooted cultural assumptions about who can be saved and how redemption ought to occur. She identifies the “canine redemption narrative” as the defining cultural script for the stories people in the United States tell about dogs and, in turn, the nation. Exposing unexamined assumptions about the relationships between people and dogs, Mershon sheds light on the central place of animals and religion in defining racial boundaries.

Dogs Save considers examples including the Michael Vick dogfighting case; Samuel Fuller’s controversial B-movie White Dog; the TV show The Dog Whisperer, from the celebrity dog trainer Cesar Millan; Laurie Anderson’s film Heart of a Dog; and Eileen Myles’s Afterglow (a dog memoir). Bringing together religious studies and animal studies, this book shows that redemption narratives shape who is allowed to survive and thrive in US society.

--Marshal Zeringue