Animal Photography
Dogs and cats—and llamas, sheep, and even pigeons—make for endearing subjects.
Cats of the World
Hannah Shaw and Andrew Marttila (Plume) $32
Shaw, an animal welfare advocate known to 1.3 million Instagram followers as Kitten Lady, and her husband, photographer Marttila, share snapshots of feline-human interactions across the globe. On the Kenyan island of Lamu, families of cats patrol the shoreline, “eagerly awaiting their portion of the fishermen’s catch.” In Pokhara, Nepal, a Hindu festival traditionally honoring dogs has expanded to embrace cats, too. “The connection we share knows no bounds and no borders,” the authors write.
Cone of Shame
Winnie Au, designs by Marie-Yan Morvan (Union Square) $25
The post-surgery protective cone becomes a glorious crown in the hands of photographer Au and designer Morvan, who outfits dogs in custom-made creations. Leica, a black and white boxer mix, sports a variety of mod plexiglass shapes in primary colors; Blue, a French bulldog, is encircled by an autumnal arrangement of silk leaves and flowers; and Finlay, a Papillon, is appropriately adorned with a fascinator constructed from artificial butterflies. Simple backgrounds in complementary hues complete the runway-ready looks.
Farm Life
Randal Ford (Rizzoli) $40
More than 150 animal portraits shot against neutral backgrounds highlight their subjects’ personalities, whether it’s the skeptical expression shared on facing pages by Hawk, a llama, and Octavius, a Barbados blackbelly sheep, or the tough-guy mien of flamboyantly feathered Blaze, a buff laced Polish rooster. Name-and-species captions accompany the images; in the index, Ford expands on his experiences with each animal. (He writes of border collie Gunner: “His senses were sharp, his focus was intent, and his drive to fly from his seat was constant.”)
Gray Malin: Dogs
Gray Malin (Abrams) $45
Are canine-fluencers a thing? Malin’s aspirational, retro-inspired lifestyle images depict dalmatians dotting a snowy Aspen mountaintop, a beret- and lunettes de soleil–wearing golden retriever enjoying croissants with an Eiffel Tower view at the Hôtel Plaza Athénée, a multi-breed game of croquet at the sun-soaked Parker Palm Springs, and many more pampered pups at glamorous locales. It’s Slim Aarons x some very good boys and girls.
The New York Pigeon
Andrew Garn (PowerHouse) $39.95
Native New Yorker and fine art photographer Garn captures the unexpected beauty of the ubiquitous and much maligned bird through studio portraiture of rescued creatures, many of them rehabbed by the Wild Bird Fund, where Garn is a longtime volunteer. This new edition of his 2018 book includes an essay from WBF’s Catherine Paloma-Quayle and many previously unpublished photos; readers will never look at the humble Columba livia the same way again.
Armchair Travel
Home for the holidays? Each of these photo-rich books is a colorful, virtual trip.
Accidentally Wes Anderson: Adventures (deluxe ed.)
Wally and Amanda Koval (Voracious) $125
The second collection based on the Kovals’ popular Instagram account is available in a highly giftable slipcased edition with stained edges, bound in vegan leather and including stickers, two postcards, and other extras. The standard edition, with fewer bells and whistles, retails for $45. Key contents are the same in either version: color-saturated photos and charming, brief histories of oddball sites on every continent that recall the film director’s singular aesthetic.
Alpine Style
Kathryn O’Shea-Evans (Gibbs Smith) $40
This ode to mountain living from design and travel writer O’Shea-Evans focuses on rustic-luxe details: hand-carved Tyrolean chairs at the Hotel Le Coucou in the French Alps; a soaking tub with sweeping Montana mountain views; a cleverly appointed Berkshires mudroom, complete with a refurbished orange ski-lift chair. Fireplaces and cozy throws abound, and a handful of recipes, including one for fondue from the Kulm Hotel in St. Moritz, Switzerland, offer readers an at-home taste of the lifestyle.
Hidden Libraries
D.C. Helmuth (Lonely Planet) $24.99
Helmuth celebrates unorthodox, out-of-the-way, and lesser-known places around the world where books are stored and shared. Vivid photographs bring the sites to life, including the cabinet-size Little Free Library at the South Pole, a bright speck amid hundreds of miles of snow; Ethiopia’s mobile Horse Library, named not for its books’ subject matter but for their method of delivery; and the Kurkku Fields Underground Library in Japan, a hobbit-y dream of 6,000 lantern-lit volumes.
Hot Springs
Greta Rybus (Ten Speed) $30
Ferrying readers across six continents, photojournalist Rybus stops at the thermal pools of Mount Sajama in Bolivia, an oasis at 21,000 feet; Italy’s Bormio thermal baths, a tourist destination since Pliny the Elder visited in the first century; and the hot water temples of Himachal Pradesh, India, sites of prayer as well as personal hygiene. Striking photos and dreamy prose reveal how soaking can inspire self-reflection, hold spiritual significance, and connect bathers to the earth.
Life on Svalbard
Cecilia Blomdahl (DK) $32
Some 2.8 million TikTokkers follow Swedish expat Blomdahl, who lives with her partner and her Finnish Lapphund in Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago close to the North Pole. Here, through conversational prose, awe-inspiring landscape photography, and intimate portraiture, she introduces readers to a year’s worth of seasons in her remote adopted home, from the beauty and challenges of the monthslong polar night and polar day to the gentler pleasures in between.
Artistic Visions
Singular points of view animate these engaging expressions of creativity.
Anastasia Samoylova
Edited by David Campany (Thames & Hudson) $60
Russian-born American artist Samoylova moved to Miami in 2016 and draws ongoing inspiration from her adopted home state. Her photo series FloodZone, which captures Florida’s surreal beauty, economic precarity, and environmental vulnerability, is one of six diverse bodies of work represented in this monograph; others include paintings, collages, and the Breakfasts still life photos, each of which pairs the work of a different artist (Berenice Abbott, Edward Hopper, et al.) with a sun-drenched spread anchored by tropical fruit and café con leche.
Arielle Bobb-Willis: Keep the Kid Alive
Arielle Bobb-Willis (Aperture) $60
Bobb-Willis, whose editorial work has appeared in the New York Times, Vanity Fair, and other outlets, was featured in Aperture’s New Black Vanguard exhibition of young Black artists who blur the lines between art and fashion photography. Her kinetic subjects twist their bodies, arch their backs, duck into their collars, and let their hair fall in their faces. Taken in the context of the conversations in the book—“How do you keep your inner kid alive?”—these movements are playful expressions of joy.
Camo
Thandiwe Muriu (Chronicle Chroma) $40
Kenyan artist Muriu captures in her photos bright colors, patterned West African ankara fabric, and avant-garde eyewear made of rotary phone cords, hair rollers, and other reclaimed paraphernalia. Subjects are draped in the same vibrant fabric as their background, reflecting the ways in which “society can make a woman feel invisible.” Yet the women, boldly accessorized and powerfully posed, refuse to disappear, embodying a tension between the traditional and the transgressive, the old and the new.
Firelei Báez
Edited by Eva Respini (DelMonico and Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston) $59.95
This catalog, tied to the first North American museum survey dedicated to the Dominican-born New Yorker, highlights the painter’s complex use of pattern, texture, and symbols rooted in Caribbean culture. Her mainly female figures return the viewer’s gaze, whether from under elaborate headdresses or behind layers of paint, and anticolonial expressions like the oil and acrylic Untitled (A Map of the British Empire in America) seem to leap off the canvas.
The Universe in Verse
Maria Popova, illus. by Ofra Amit (Storey) $22
Longtime Marginalian (formerly Brain Pickings) blogger Popova pairs 15 brief writings on scientific exploration with poetry that mines similar territory; a pensive illustration by Amit opens each chapter. Popova’s elegiac essay “Dark Matter and Our Yearning for Light,” for instance, traces a lineage of pioneering women astronomers up to Rebecca Elson, who “filled notebooks with poetic questions and experiments in verse” after a terminal cancer diagnosis at age 29; Elson’s poem “Let There Always Be Light (Searching for Dark Matter)” concludes the section. Like the phenomena described, this slender volume is a wonder.
Graphics & Design
Vivid colors and pleasing composition highlight the artistry of work that’s commercial, political, or somewhere in between.
Alexander Girard: Let the Sun In
Todd Oldham and Kiera Coffee (Phaidon) $125
Girard (1907–1993) was a giant of midcentury design whose bold, folk art–influenced aesthetic touched a variety of disciplines, from furniture and textiles to typography, graphics, and beyond. Previously unpublished illustrations and examples of his most well-known work are among the more than 800 images here (including the buoyant nose-to-tail rebranding of Braniff International Airways—luggage tags, airport lounge chairs, Emilio Pucci–designed flight attendant uniforms, and even airsick bags).
Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr.: Citizen Printer
Amos Paul Kennedy Jr. (Letterform Archive) $60
At age 40, Kennedy discovered letterpress printing, and it’s been his life’s work for the nearly four decades since. Working out of his Detroit studio, he creates typographically bold images with political astuteness, linguistic forthrightness, a keen sense of humor, and strong community spirit. “Black printing helped the civil rights movement to flourish,” he writes. “I go back to that legacy.” The 800 reproductions here hint at the breadth of his output and include engaging photos of the master printer at work.
The Art of the Literary Poster
Allison Rudnick (Metropolitan Museum of Art) $50
Bookworms and graphic design fans alike will delight in this collection, published in conjunction with an exhibition curated by Rudnick at the Met. In the late 19th century, at the peak of the art nouveau aesthetic, publishers commissioned leading poster artists to create advertisements that appeared in Harper’s, Lippincott’s, and other taste-making publications. Rudnick quotes a critic for The Publishers’ Weekly, who observed in 1894, “The advertising poster is fast becoming a work of art.”
Color Charts
Anne Varichon, trans. from the French by Kate Deimling (Princeton Univ.) $55
Anthropologist Varichon surveys the tools used over the centuries to produce and deploy color. A dyer’s swatch notebook from 18th-century Languedoc includes formulas for achieving hues popular in the Levant—parrot green, autumn leaf, spiny lobster. By the late 19th century, sales reps brought tactile color charts into haberdasheries and department stores to demonstrate how well their dyes took to goose feathers and silk flowers. Full-page images and spreads showcase these utilitarian items as works of art.
Wonder City of the World
Nicholas D. Lowry (Cernunnos) $50
This compilation, which ties into an exhibit Lowry curated at the Poster House museum in New York City, tracks more than a century of illustrated print advertisements promoting travel to the metropolis. The journey is as prominent as the destination, whether via transatlantic ocean liner, steam-powered locomotive, or, circa 1951, a Swissair Douglas DC-6B aircraft, advertised with an archetypical photomontage design. The World’s Fairs get their own chapter, and Lady Liberty is prominent throughout.
Nostalgia Trips
These books on favorite pastimes and enthusiasms take readers on sentimental journeys.
Bowlarama
Chris Nichols, with Adriene Biondo (Angel City) $40
Historic preservationist and Los Angeles Magazine senior editor Nichols delves into the midcentury heyday of bowling, including the 1951 advent of the first fully automated pin-setting machine, at the Bowl-O-Drome in Mount Clemens, Mich.; the widespread embrace of Jetsons-esque Googie architecture; and the glam lounges with cocktail waitresses, steak dinners, and live music. As well, he tracks the factors that led to the pastime’s decline, lending additional heft to the meticulously sourced, evocative vintage photography.
Giant Robot
Eric Nakamura (Drawn & Quarterly) $49.95
This exuberant retrospective captures the passionate, DIY ethos of the zine Nakamura and fellow UCLA student Martin Wong cofounded in 1994. Starting with a focus on “stuff we liked”—indie rock, Hello Kitty, kung fu movies—Giant Robot expanded its purview to include taste tests of Asian food, interviews with film stars and musicians, and commentaries on Asian American history and identity, finding success by refusing to pander to mainstream culture.
Portables
Eilon Paz and Dan Epstein (Dust & Grooves) $89
At 470 pages and five pounds, this survey of 222 portable record players is heftier than some of the vintage turntables it showcases, such as the Emide Phoni, produced in Germany circa 1960; housed in a picnic basket–like enclosure and containing a single monophonic speaker, it weighs just under three pounds. Mark Cruz, a DJ and one of five collectors at the heart of the book, explains the format’s appeal: “Each portable is a time capsule that holds a unique story.”
Space Posters & Paintings
Bill Schwarz (ACC Art Books) $25
This collection of retrofuturistic artwork dating from the 1960s celebrates space exploration. NASA artist Robert McCall’s paintings imagine solar-powered space sailboats and commemorate achievements including the 1981 launch and landing of the space shuttle Columbia. Pulpy B movie posters produced by NASA’s Exoplanet Exploration Program Office have fun with real phenomena, depicting Gamma Ray Ghouls and warning of “Dark Matter: something else is out there,” while the Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s WPA-esque Visions of the Future series promotes travel to Europa, Kepler-186, and beyond.
Video Games: From Pong to the PS5
Nicolò Mulas Marcello and Alberto Bertolazzi, trans. from the Italian by Jonathan T. Hine (Abbeville) $29.95
Published in conjunction with the Videogame Art Museum in Bologna, Italy, this compendium celebrates half a century of play, from the early consoles (Magnavox Odyssey, Atari 2600) that brought gaming from the arcade to the living room, through Angry Birds, e-sports, and the future of VR. The real joy(stick) here for folks of a certain age, aside from the memory-jogging photos, is the gameplay refreshers, such as the individual characteristics of Pac-Man’s ghosts (Clyde, you sweet summer child).
T-Swift
Think Taylor Swift doesn’t deserve her own category here? You’re on your own, kid.
Into the Taylor-Verse
Satu Hämeenaho-Fox (Simon Element) $22
Haämeenaho-Fox, a culture writer and self-described Fearless-era Swiftie, leads readers from Swift’s “origin story” (her self-titled debut) through the “New York Streets and electric beats” of 1989 to her 10th studio album, Midnights, when “the stars align.” Illustrations lend a warm, folksy appeal: on one early page, Swift sits on her bedroom floor composing songs with a notebook and acoustic guitar; toward the book’s end, linked arms sport rows of friendship bracelets.
Long Live
Nicole Pomarico (Running Press) $26
This illustrated offering from entertainment journalist Pomarico is wide in scope and idiosyncratic in approach, covering everything from the “top 5 track fives” (Swift is known for putting the most heart-rending track in the #5 spot of each album) to the basics on her cats, Meredith Grey, Olivia Benson, and Benjamin Button. Along the way, Pomarico offers fashion tips for each era—“anything sparkly and purple” for Speak Now; French-braided hair for Evermore—and a selection of comebacks for shutting down anti-Swift trolls.
Taylor Swift: The Stories Behind the Songs
Annie Zaleski (Thunder Bay) $29.99
Completists will appreciate the range of material Zaleski, a music journalist, covers. Every album track, bonus track, and “from the vault” track—collaborations Swift released along with her re-recorded “Taylor’s version” albums— is here; even “Three Sad Virgins,” an SNL parody video, gets the once-over. Fun facts add color: e.g., Swift originally wrote “Nothing New,” a 2021 from-the-vault track featuring Phoebe Bridgers, on an Appalachian dulcimer in emulation of Joni Mitchell.
Taylor Swift by the Book
Rachel Feder and Tiffany Tatreau (Quirk) $19.99
Feder, an associate professor of English at the University of Denver, and sister-in-law Tatreau, a musical theater performer and coach, illuminate the literary references and techniques in Swift’s songs. Peppered among the lyric-by-lyric analyses are deeper dives, including profiles of “tortured poets” (think Sappho, Richard Siken, Sylvia Plath), motif playlists (era-spanning songs referencing mythological fate or forbidden love), and album-specific reading lists (recommended for fans of 1989: Frank O’Hara’s Lunch Poems, among others).
Taylor Swift Style
Sarah Chapelle (Griffin) $35
Taking its title from fashion writer Chapelle’s 339,000-follower Instagram account, this compilation of 200 photos delves into the deeper meanings behind Swift’s sartorial choices. Chapelle writes of one of her favorite red carpet looks, a white J. Mendel gown with curved gold insets, “In an era full of in-your-face, stop- sign-obvious red garments everywhere, this to me is a subdued (and painfully chic) reference to Red and its chaotic feelings.” The author also makes room for a handful of fashion don’ts, or “seven times Taylor should’ve said no.”
