Calling In: How to Start Making Change with Those You’d Rather Cancel

In this bracing blend of memoir and manifesto, activist Ross (Radical Reproductive Justice) details her decades of fighting for reproductive rights and calls for her fellow organizers to “build bridges instead of burning them down.” The narrative hinges on Ross’s work for organizations including the D.C. Rape Crisis Center, the National Organization for Women, and the Center for Democratic Renewal, focusing especially on the lessons she learned from collaborating with difficult colleagues, including former hate group members and violent criminals. With straightforward language and insightful anecdotes, Ross illuminates the concrete value of bridging divides, detailing the professional successes and personal growth she’s been able to achieve by remaining open to input from “spheres of influence” she’d initially dismissed. She backs up her prescriptive advice (“Value growth over punishment”) with writings by psychologists and thinkers including Audre Lorde and Martin Luther King Jr. Practical without being preachy, this is an invaluable road map for navigating tricky political waters. Agent: David Kuhn, Aevitas Creative Management. (Feb.)