Top 10

Blessings and Disasters: A Story of Alabama

Alexis Okeowo. Holt, Jan. 21 ($26.99, ISBN 978-1-250-20622-0)

New Yorker staff writer Okeowo reflects on the complexities of Alabama history beyond slavery and the Confederacy. 75,000-copy announced first printing.

Clown World: Four Years Inside Andrew Tate’s Manosphere

Jamie Tahsin and Matt Shea. Mobius, Oct. 8 ($28, ISBN 978-1-5294-3782-9)

The filmmakers examine how a documentary they made about influencer and self-proclaimed misogynist Andrew Tate resulted in accusations of sex-trafficking that led to his arrest.

Foreign Agents: How American Lobbyists and Lawmakers Threaten Democracy Around the World

Casey Michel. St. Martin’s, Aug. 27 ($30, ISBN 978-1-250-28605-5)

U.S. lobbyists are attempting to overthrow American democracy, not just influence it, contends journalist Michel in this history of the industry’s efforts on behalf of foreign autocrats.

Homeland: The War on Terror in American Life

Richard Beck. Crown, Sept. 3 ($35, ISBN 978-0-593-24022-9)

The war on terror had a transformative effect on American culture and society, and created the conditions for the rise of Donald Trump, according to n+1 editor Beck.

The Indian Card: Who Gets to Be Native in America

Carrie Lowry Schuettpelz. Flatiron, Oct. 29 ($29.99, ISBN 978-1-250-90316-7)

Schuettpelz surveys the current state of the tribal enrollment system for Native Americans, which she argues impedes Natives’ ability to determine the makeup of their own communities.

Magically Black and Other Essays

Jerald Walker. Amistad, Sept. 10 ($29.99, ISBN 978-0-06-316107-8)

National Book Award finalist Walker examines modern-day Black life, musing on topics ranging from mass incarceration to home renovation, and reflecting on how generations of struggle have shaped African American culture.

Overshoot: How the World Surrendered to Climate Breakdown

Wim Carton and Andreas Malm. Verso, Oct. 1 ($29.95, ISBN 978-1-80429-398-0)

The author of How to Blow Up a Pipeline criticizes the notion—currently gaining traction among U.S. policymakers—that it’s wise to surpass carbon emissions targets with the expectation that carbon removal technologies will be perfected later.

Recognizing the Stranger: On Palestine and Narrative

Isabella Hammad. Black Cat, Sept. 24 ($18 trade paper, ISBN 978-0-8021-6392-9)

In a speech delivered nine days before the Hamas-led October 7 terror attack on Israel, novelist Hammad argues for Palestinian freedom.

Tablets Shattered: The End of an American Jewish Century and the Future of Jewish Life

Joshua Leifer. Dutton, Aug. 20 ($32, ISBN 978-0-593-18718-0)

Jewish Currents contributing editor Leifer argues that Jewish American self-definition—built on the triple pillars of Americanism, liberalism, and Zionism—has reached a tipping point, as segments of the community evolve in different political directions.

V13: Chronicle of a Trial

Emmanuel Carrère, trans. by John Lambert. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Nov. 19
($29, ISBN 978-0-374-61570-3)

In this report on the 10-month trial of 20 men accused of involvement in the November 2015 Paris attacks, Carrère centers the community that sprang up around the proceedings.

Politics & Current Events longlist

Abrams Press

American Teenager: How Trans Kids Are Surviving Hate and Finding Joy in a Turbulent Era by Nico Lang (Oct. 8, $30, ISBN 978-1-4197-7382-2) profiles eight trans and nonbinary teenagers and their families in an effort to cut through controversial headlines and see beyond two-dimensional caricatures.

Amistad

If We Are Brave: Essays from Black Americana by Theodore Johnson (Oct. 1, $30, ISBN 978-0-06-334645-1). The Washington Post columnist explores how today’s political polarization is linked to Americans’ divergent ideas about the country’s founding principles.

Liberating Abortion: Claiming Our History, Sharing Our Stories, and Building the Reproductive Future We Deserve by Renee Bracey Sherman and Regina Mahone (Oct. 1, $29.99, ISBN 978-0-06-322815-3) reflects
on Black women’s experiences with abortion in America, emphasizing
how stigma and systemic inequities
continue to affect their thinking about reproductive health.

Arsenal Pulp

Finding Otipemisiwak: The People Who Own Themselves by Andrea Currie (Oct. 8, $21.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-55152-955-4). A survivor of the Sixties Scoop—the Canadian government’s mass removal of Indigenous
children from their communities for adoption by white families in the mid–20th century—probes the wounds of alienation that have never fully healed.

Basic

Land Power: Who Has It, Who Doesn’t, and How That Determines the Fate of Societies by Michael Albertus (Jan. 14, $30, ISBN 978-1-5416-0481-0). Drawing on examples from medieval feudalism to 20th-century communism, political scientist Albertus posits that a society’s allocation of land is the key factor in determining its future.

Beacon

Transfarmation: The Movement to Free Us from Factory Farming by Leah Garcés (Sept. 17, $28.95, ISBN 978-0-8070-1490-5) spotlights ways in which regular people in rural communities
are standing up to big corporations, including farmers transitioning away from factory farming to more humane and sustainable methods.

Bison

Dodge County, Incorporated: Big AG and the Undoing of Rural America by Sonja Trom Eayrs (Nov. 1, $24.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-4962-3499-5) recalls the author’s efforts to prevent a cancer-causing industrial hog operation from being built near her family farm in Dodge County, Minn.

Bloomsbury

You Must Stand Up: The Fight for Abortion Rights in Post-Dobbs America by Amanda Becker (Sept. 10, $29.99, ISBN 978-1-63973-186-2) tracks leaders of the abortion rights movement
in the aftermath of the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade as they scrambled to respond to shifting state legislation and fight back in court. 65,000-copy announced first printing.

Bold Type

From the Ashes: Grief and Revolution in a World on Fire by Sarah Jaffe (Sept. 10, $30, ISBN 978-1-5417-0349-0) interweaves reporting and memoir to argue that grief, especially public memorialization, is a radical political act in an age of planetary disaster.

Broadleaf

The Violent Take It by Force:
The Christian Movement That Is Threatening Our Democracy by Matthew D. Taylor (Sept. 24, $32.99, ISBN 978-1-5064-9778-5) sheds light on the role a radical evangelical sect, the New Apostolic Reformation, played in the January 6 Capitol attack.

Columbia Global Reports

Climate Radicals: Why Our Environmental Politics Isn’t Working by Cameron Abadi (Sept. 10, $18 trade paper, ISBN 979-8-9870536-4-5) reflects on the inadequacy of a political system built on compromise to deal
with scientific certainties, and tracks
politicians’ and activists’ increasingly
disparate—and sometimes desperate—attempts to rally support for decarbonization.

Counterpoint

Rethinking Rescue: Dog Lady and the Story of America’s Forgotten People and Pets by Carol Mithers (Aug. 20, $28, ISBN 978-1-64009-598-4) examines the classist assumptions undergirding today’s animal rescue movement with a profile of Lori Weise, a longtime advocate for keeping homeless people united with their pets.

Crown

Abortion: Our Bodies, Their Lies, and the Truths We Use to Win by Jessica Valenti (Oct. 1, $25, ISBN 978-0-593-80023-2) compiles examples of conservative assaults on women’s rights that Valenti has been reporting in her newsletter Abortion, Every Day and offers a handbook for activists hoping to fight back.

On Freedom by Timothy Snyder (Sept. 17, $32, ISBN 978-0-593-72872-7). The author of On Tyranny argues that the best way to fight authoritarianism is to embrace a definition of freedom that promotes not just liberty, but also opportunity.

Doubleday

Framed: Astonishing True Stories of Wrongful Convictions by John Grisham and Jim McCloskey (Oct. 8, $30, ISBN 978-0-385-55044-4). Bestseller Grisham spotlights 10 men’s wrongful convictions and their arduous legal battles to be exonerated. 1,500,000-copy announced first printing.

Dutton

The Highest Law in the Land: How the Unchecked Power of Sheriffs Threatens Democracy by Jessica Pishko (Sept. 17, $32, ISBN 978-0-593-47131-9) investigates the largely unaccountable role sheriffs hold in the U.S. justice system and their growing involvement, as elected officials who campaign for their positions, in the
country’s rightward political drift.

ECW

Underwater: The Greed-Soaked Tale of Sexual Abuse in USA Swimming and Around the Globe by Irvin Muchnick (Sept. 10, $26.95, ISBN 978-1-77041-775-5) reveals that the trial of Larry Nassar for sexual abuse of gymnasts led the FBI to uncover an even bigger abuse network in Olympic swimming.

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Salvage: Readings from the Wreck by Dionne Brand (Oct. 1, $27, ISBN 978-0-374-61484-3) posits that colonialist and imperialist themes in English-language classics like Robinson Crusoe and Mansfield Park have subtly shaped the self-perceptions of people today.

The Ultimate Hidden Truth of the World...: Essays by David Graeber, edited by Nika Dubrovsky (Nov. 12, $32, ISBN 978-0-374-61022-7). In these posthumously collected works, Graeber seeks to upend the notion that political change for the better is not possible.

Harper

Unassimilable: An Asian Diasporic Manifesto for the Twenty-First Century by Bianca Mabute-Louie (Jan. 14, $29.99, ISBN 978-0-06-327762-5) examines the evolution of the concept of cultural assimilation among Asian-American immigrant communities since the 19th century and argues against today’s respectability politics.

White Robes and Broken Badges: Infiltrating the KKK and Exposing the Evil Among Us by Joe Moore (Aug. 13, $32, ISBN 978-0-06-337540-6). An FBI informant reveals the KKK’s plan to incite a civil war and its ties with Florida law enforcement. 75,000-copy announced first printing.

Haymarket

Corridors of Contagion: How the Pandemic Exposed the Cruelties of Incarceration by Victoria Law (Sept. 10, $19.95 trade paper, ISBN 979-8-88890-256-1) profiles five Americans incarcerated during the Covid pandemic, using their experiences of increased violence and stress under lockdown as a window onto the punishment-
oriented ethos of America’s justice system.

Visualizing Palestine: A Chronicle of Colonialism and the Struggle for Liberation, edited by Jessica Anderson, Aline Batarseh, and Yosra El Gazzar (Sept. 3, $50, ISBN 979-8-88890-250-9). More than 200 infographics
highlight the imbalance of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by presenting such datasets as the uprooting of Palestinians’ olive trees by Israelis over time.

Island

The Heat and the Fury: On the Frontlines of Climate Violence by Peter Schwartzstein (Sept. 24, $30, ISBN 978-1-64283-301-0) recounts the violence the author has witnessed—and faced—as he reports on global warming’s effects in developing countries, highlighting how rising temperatures are leading to rising tempers around the world.

Knopf

Valley So Low: One Lawyer’s Fight for Justice in the Wake of America’s Great Coal Catastrophe by Jared Sullivan (Oct. 15, $30, ISBN 978-0-593-32111-9). Personal injury lawyer Sullivan reports on how, after an unprecedented 2008 toxic coal sludge leak that engulfed 30 homes in Kingston, Tenn., he sought justice for victims.

Legacy Lit

Wild Faith: How the Christian Right Is Taking Over America by Talia Lavin (Oct. 8, $30, ISBN 978-0-306-82919-2) investigates the rise of the far-right evangelical movement as a powerful force that threatens American democracy, delving into
an authoritarianism-loving subculture teeming with prophets, militias, and
conspiracy theorists.

Mariner

Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past by Steve Benen (Sept. 10, $32.50, ISBN 978-0-06-339367-7) chronicles the Republican Party’s revisionist efforts to rewrite the history of the Trump administration.

New Press

Copaganda: How Police and the Media Manipulate Our News by Alec Karakatsanis (Jan. 14, $27.99, ISBN 978-1-62097-853-5) reveals that propaganda created by police departments is unquestioningly promulgated by media, resulting in distortions in the public’s perception of crime and law enforcement.

Stolen Pride: Loss, Shame, and the Rise of the Right by Arlie Russell Hochschild (Sept. 10, $30.99, ISBN 978-1-62097-646-3). The bestselling author of Strangers in Their Own Land examines the right’s growing appeal in Appalachia through the prism of locals’ response to a 2017 white nationalist march in Pikeville, Ky.

New York Univ.

Corporatocracy: How to Protect Democracy from Dark Money and Corrupt Politicians by Ciara Torres-Spelliscy (Jan. 28, $32, ISBN 978-1-4798-2832-6) explores the role corporations played in laundering the dark money that funded the extremist politicians who instigated the January 6 Capitol attack.

Norton

Offshore: Stealth Wealth and the New Colonialism by Brooke Harrington (Sept. 17, $22, ISBN 978-1-324-06494-7). An offshore wealth manager turned sociologist offers an ethnography of the tax havens that harbor the fortunes of the ultrarich and drain the world’s tax coffers.

One Signal

Erasing History: How Fascists Rewrite the Past to Control the Future by Jason Stanley (Sept. 10, $28.99, ISBN 978-1-6680-5691-2). The author of How Fascism Works issues a dire warning that fascist movements of the 20th century began with challenges in schools, the same place today’s far right is focusing its ire in the U.S. and around the world.

One world

What If We Get It Right: Visions of Climate Futures by Ayana Elizabeth Johnson (Sept. 19, $28, ISBN 978-0-593-22936-1) envisions a future in which climate change is averted, guiding readers through possible solutions and scenarios with a combination of infographics, poetry, and art.

OR Books

Messiah Mode: How the Jewish Far Right Remade the Mainstream in Israel and the U.S. by David Sheen (Nov. 5, $19.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-68219-512-3). An Israeli journalist reports on prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s inclusion in his coalition of the ultranationalist Jewish Power party, founded by extremist American Israeli Meir Kahane.

Pantheon

Defectors: The Rise of the Latino Far Right and What It Means for America by Paola Ramos (Sept. 24, $28, ISBN 978-0-593-70136-2) draws on interviews with dozens of politicians, pastors, and culture warriors across the country to explore how the U.S. Latino community is being radicalized rightward.

Penguin Press

The Myth of American Idealism: How U.S. Foreign Policy Endangers the World by Noam Chomsky and Nathan J. Robinson (Oct. 8, $32, ISBN 978-0-593-65632-7) calls America’s commitment to “spreading democracy” a self-serving myth promulgated by elites who use it as an excuse to wreak havoc abroad.

Princeton Univ.

We Have Never Been Woke: The Cultural Contradictions of a New Elite by Musa al-Gharbi (Oct. 8, $35, ISBN 978-0-691-23260-7) argues that “woke” ideology bolsters the social positions of elites in education, media, and nonprofits at the expense of marginalized people who do not express politically correct views.

Prometheus

End of Immunity: Holding World Leaders Accountable for Aggression, Genocide, War Crimes, and Crimes Against Humanity by Chile Eboe-Osuji (Oct. 15, $34.95, ISBN 978-1-63388-990-3). A former president of the International Criminal Court analyzes gaps in international law that allow heads of state to escape justice for their crimes.

PublicAffairs

The New India: Modi, Nationalism, and the Unmaking of
the World’s Largest Democracy by Rahul Bhatia (Nov. 12, $30, ISBN 978-1-5417-0400-8) draws on the stories of both regular people and major political players to document India’s accelerating slide into authoritarianism and Hindu nationalism.

Repeater

Like Lockdown Never Happened: Music and Culture During Covid by Joy White (Oct. 1, $14.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-914420-09-2) studies how Black music and other cultural products, ranging from director Steve McQueen’s Small Axe anthology to viral TikTok makeup challenges, dominated Britain’s lockdown-era online landscape.

Seven Stories

Titans of Capital: How Concentrated Wealth Threatens Humanity by Peter Phillips (Jan. 7, $18.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-64421-433-6) posits that transnational financial investments belonging to a rapidly evolving international network of elites threaten global democracy and well-being by funding arm sales, private prisons, and fossil fuel infrastructure.

Simon & Schuster

The Crazies: A Cattleman, a Wind Farm, and a 21st Century Range War by Amy Gamerman (Jan. 7, $30.99, ISBN 978-1-9821-5816-3) recounts how a proposed wind farm triggered a range war between a Montana rancher trying to hold onto family land and his billionaire neighbors who thought the turbines would spoil their view.

Soft Skull

Dangerous Fictions: The Fear of Fantasy and the Invention of Reality by Lyta Gold (Oct. 29, $27, ISBN 978-1-59376-770-9) examines deep-rooted assumptions about the power of fiction that undergird current panics and concerns on both the left and the right about the contents of books.

Sourcebooks

I’m Sorry for My Loss: An Urgent Examination of Reproductive Care in America by Rebecca Little and Colleen Long (Oct. 1, $18.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-7282-9278-6) spotlights how the stigmatizing of late-term pregnancy loss and late-term abortion for medical reasons has led to the emotional isolation of women experiencing grief.

Stanford Univ.

The Cancel Culture Panic: How an American Obsession Went Global by Adrian Daub (Sept. 24, $18 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-5036-4084-9) traces the worldwide spread of the idea that cancel culture is running amok, finding that left-leaning media abroad have devoted outsize attention to documenting and denouncing this alleged phenomenon.

Verso

The Killing of Gaza: Reports on a Catastrophe by Gideon Levy (Oct. 1, $24.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-80429-750-6). Documenting the facts behind his longstanding critical perspective on Israel’s policies against Palestinians, Israeli journalist Levy provides historical and political context for the war in Gaza.

This article has been updated with new bibliographic information for the book Visualizing Palestine.

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