Historian Laqueur (The Work of the Dead) traces in this delightful survey the long history of dogs appearing in artworks. After a slow start in which Laqueur painstakingly explains why he chose to focus on dogs rather than cats or horses, which have less “visual intimacy” with humans, the account accelerates into a whirlwind tour through centuries of art history, beginning in 9000 BCE with “massive” Saudi Arabian rock panels featuring dogs hunting alongside humans. He proceeds to spotlight an astonishing diversity of pup portrayals, including mythological mutts like Adonis’s hounds in Titian’s 1553–1554 painting Venus and Adonis; devoted canine companions, whether symbolically “keeping a dejected figure company” in Albrecht Dürer’s 1514 engraving Melancholia or lounging in artists’ studios; and less frequently depicted “bad dogs,” which “are almost always a proxy for bad humans,” as seen in anti-slavery artwork where vicious canines attack enslaved people as proxies for “slave-owning masters.” Drawing from a staggering wealth of examples, the author successfully uncovers the overlapping uses and meanings of dogs in art, while interspersing the account with charming asides about artists’ relationships with the dogs that appear in their work (including Pablo Picasso’s “beloved dachshund Lump”). It’s an eye-catching homage to man’s best friend. (May)

Reviewed on 03/20/2026 | Details & Permalink

Music journalist Walters debuts with an ebullient love letter to LGBTQ+ and “gay friendly” musicians. He begins in the late 1960s, when such artists as the Velvet Underground and Elton John explored themes of “alienation, rejection, melancholy... and uncommon love” in songs whose references were unmistakable to those in the know but subtle enough to fly under the radar (see Lou Reed’s “Candy Says,” which speaks “stirringly” of trans actor Candy Darling but could appeal to anyone who’s “wished they could change something about their body”). In the 1970s, David Bowie’s “audaciously queer” Ziggy Stardust persona popularized “bluntly homoerotic songs” and a glam rock style that “embraced... willful artificiality [and] those who couldn’t conform to what culture dictates as real.” Meanwhile Bette Midler, who got her start performing in the gay bathhouses of New York City, popularized “camp like no one since Liberace.” Also examined are the unique challenges faced by artists like the Jackson Five and Diana Ross in putting out music that brought together racial and sexual minorities. Walters evocatively draws out how LGBTQ+ musicians battled oppression in their work even as they navigated a record industry that sought to silence sexual nonconformity while profiting off styles gay musicians made fashionable. It adds up to an impressive and expansive celebration of a rich chapter of music history. (May)

Reviewed on 03/20/2026 | Details & Permalink

Classicist Venner debuts with a worthwhile account of Pompeii on the day leading up to the devastating eruption of Vesuvius in 79 CE, a catastrophe that left the city of some 20,000 inhabitants buried under a thick layer of ash and pumice. In “an effort to bridge the silences of the historical record,” she offers speculative reconstructions, rooted in archeological evidence, of the lives of seven individuals from different social classes: newly freed slave Petrinus; wealthy businesswoman and property lessor Julia Felix; “the garum ‘fish sauce’ magnate” Aulus Umbricius Scaurus; formerly enslaved shop owner Umbricia Fortunata; innkeeper Euxinus; Amisusius, a priest in the cult of Isis; and politician Gaius Cuspius Pansa. Venner packs her narrative with fascinating details of everyday life and lovingly describes the homes of her protagonists, from the statues and elaborate frescos that graced the walls of the wealthy, to the cramped, shared sleeping quarters designated for the enslaved. Each chapter, labeled with the hour of the day, begins with references to the changes in atmosphere that grow increasingly unsettling as the eruption nears. Venner’s chronicle builds to the chaotic flight from the city by the fortunate few and the varying fates of those who waited too long to leave. Roman history buffs will want to check this out. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 03/20/2026 | Details & Permalink

This slippery account from journalist Trethewey (Mothers of the Mind) seeks to reevaluate Sydney Bowles Mitford, the mother of the six “eccentric” Mitford sisters. Trethewey pushes back against previous depictions—some penned by her own daughters—that cast Sydney (1880–1963) as foolish or cold, while also wrestling with the implications of her lifelong support for Hitler. Beginning with her youth spent in thrall to her “charismatic, self-made” father, Trethewey paints Sydney as stubborn but loving. She tracks Sydney into marriage—to the irascible David “Farve” Mitford—and early motherhood, attempting to show that the Mitford home was mostly happy by favoring the more upbeat recollections of the younger daughters as opposed to elder girls’ discontent, and humanizing the well-heeled family by poking fun at Farve’s poor business insticts. But as WWII looms, the author’s insistent evenhandedness begins to strain—Sydney’s open support for Hitler is chalked up to a fundamental naivete, though elsewhere the author defends her shrewdness. Throughout, this history presupposes a false binary between good parenting and bad politics, and between the readers’ capacity for censure and sympathy. Trethewey’s central argument, that Sydney’s “maverick inheritance” and “genuine devotion” had a powerful effect on her daughters, tracks—but the notion that Sydney herself “had the potential to be a rebel” is not convincing. It’s an uneven attempt at an unnecessary reclamation. (Mar.)

Reviewed on 03/20/2026 | Details & Permalink

Bestseller Mezrich (Breaking Twitter) offers a gripping investigation into a 2022 cheating scandal that stunned the competitive chess world. The book opens with the now infamous upset at America’s “most prestigious” tournament, the Sinquefield Cup, in which 19-year-old “enfant terrible” Hans Niemann beat world champion Magnus Carlsen, leading Carlsen to accuse Niemann of cheating. The author traces the two players’ divergent ascents—Carlsen became the youngest ever grandmaster at age 13 with the support of a committed father; while alienated, struggling Niemann became “notorious for baiting... his opponents.” The author also tracks the growth of Chess.com from an upstart gaming site dismissed by Peter Thiel (“There’s no money in chess”) to a billion-dollar valuation. The two threads combine as Mezrich traces Niemann’s response to the post-Sinquefield fallout, which evolved from public boasts (“It must be embarrassing for the world champion to lose to me”) to defiant paranoia, as he comes to believe Carlsen and Chess.com, who had just struck an $80 million deal, conspired “to destroy him.” While Niemann admitted to cheating in online games—he had once been caught by Chess.com’s algorithm and suspended—he maintained that his over-the-board games were legit. The controversy deliciously spirals to include hotheaded interviews, threats in parking lots, and a staggering $100 million lawsuit. It’s an epic, swirling melodrama of hubris, money, and tech. (June)

Reviewed on 03/20/2026 | Details & Permalink

In this alarming exposé, civil rights attorney Taylor (The Torture Machine) reveals decades of government collusion to hide evidence of racist police violence in Chicago. While digitizing old files related to a civil case he pursued on behalf of Fred Hampton’s family after the activist’s 1969 assassination by Chicago police, the author “realized that numerous instances of blatant... corruption and cover-up... had never been sufficiently recounted.” Taylor undertakes a reexamination of the “breathtaking... manipulation” around the case, along the way drawing connections between Hampton’s murder and Chicago’s subsequent decades of anti-Black police violence. He does so in part by revisiting the plight of another client, Jackie Wilson, whose 1982 confession to killing two police officers was obtained through “electric shock” during the notorious “twenty-year reign of torture” of detective Jon Burge. Recapping the many criminal and civil trials, grand juries, and special prosecutor investigations surrounding both cases, Taylor unearths an extraordinary amount of misconduct, including perjury from police, a “rigged judicial acquittal” meant to influence an upcoming election, and backroom deals between prosecutors and judges seeking to avoid their own indictments. Even amid such jaw-droppingly crooked dealings, some still stand out, such as the continued use of “international con artist” William Coleman as a witness in all three of Wilson’s criminal trials. The result is a painstaking, vital record of institutionalized corruption. (May)

Reviewed on 03/20/2026 | Details & Permalink

Paule Marshall “set the stage for contemporary black women writers,” contends Washington (The Other Blacklist), a professor emerita of English at the University of Maryland, College Park, in this solid biography. Washington, a friend of Marshall, uses Marshall’s sparse personal archive (she was loathe to share personal details in writing or interviews) to “begin to renovate her neglected reputation.” Born in 1929 to Barbadian immigrants in Brooklyn, Marshall excelled academically and had a rebellious spirit (she changed her name from Pauline to Paule at 13) and dreams of being a writer. After college, she wrote food and fashion stories for the magazine Our World before turning to fiction. Her 1959 debut novel, Brown Girl, Brownstones, drew from the working-class Brooklyn neighborhood of her childhood and features a strong-willed protagonist. Though her penchant for privacy led her to often be overlooked, Marshall’s novels and stories, according to Washington, did what few of her contemporaries had yet attempted: fiercely examined and resisted colonialism, capitalism, racism, and sexism and portrayed Black women as “agents in their own lives.” Washington does an admirable job weaving analysis of Marshall’s works with the story of her life, framing her as a pivotal figure in Black feminist literature. The result is a notable reclamation of a seminal voice in American letters. (Feb.)

Reviewed on 03/20/2026 | Details & Permalink

Poet Gilmore (We Didn’t Know Any Gangsters) delivers a comprehensive history of the Black poetry scene in Washington, D.C., which he says “remains strong and visible and continues to produce outstanding writers of note.” He begins with the arrival of Paul Laurence Dunbar in 1896, calling him “the most important Black poet of his generation.” Dunbar’s magnetic poetry readings and stature as a professional writer brought a burst of literary activity to D.C. The momentum continued into the 1920s, attracting Black writers like Langston Hughes, Georgia Douglas Johnson, Jean Toomer, and William Waring Cuney. Gilmore explores how segregation meant Black poetry developed “in its own space, in its own communities,” but over time pushed into the city’s mainstream institutions, with poets Robert Hayden and Gwendolyn Brooks serving as poetry consultants to the Library of Congress in the 1970s and ’80s (the post today known as the poet laureate of the U.S.). Elsewhere, he chronicles how spoken word and hip-hop energized the poetry community in the 1990s and highlights notable performance spaces such as 8Rock and Busboys and Poets. Rich with D.C. cultural history, this is a well-researched testament to a place that has helped shape American literature. (Feb.)

Reviewed on 03/20/2026 | Details & Permalink

In this spirited debut, Park—better known by his rap moniker Dumbfoundead—charts his evolution from a scrappy teenager in L.A.’s Koreatown to a mainstay of underground battle rap. Structured as a series of vignettes, the account balances humor and pathos as Park revisits a childhood scarred by his father’s alcoholism and abuse, the aftershocks of the 1992 Los Angeles riots, and his restless attempts to reconcile his Korean and American identities. When the action moves to his first dalliances with hip-hop, Park conjures the competitive atmosphere of battle rap with verve, dissecting racially charged taunts lobbed his way and the razor-edged comebacks he delivered in response. (Many pivotal showdowns are rendered in moody comic book panels.) Along the way, Park confronts his addictions to drugs and attention, candidly interrogating the costs of ambition on his mental health. More than a standard rise-to-fame narrative, Park’s account folds his encyclopedic knowledge of hip-hop history and his deep considerations of life in the Korean diaspora into an inspirational catalog of the forces that shaped him. Equal parts energetic and introspective, this buoyant memoir will resonate with hip-hop heads and fans of cultural criticism. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 03/20/2026 | Details & Permalink

Shahs of Sunset star Farahan traces his arc from Iranian émigré to bold public figure in his glittering debut memoir. After moving from Iran to Beverly Hills in the late 1970s, Farahan was isolated within a small Persian community and forced to confront suspicions from his American neighbors that intensified after the Ayatollah’s rise in Iran. Meanwhile, he watched his homeland “turn into a place of terror and oppression” to which he and his family could not return. Under those bleak circumstances, his mother’s exuberant devotion to Farahan and his father’s steady work ethic carved out a safe harbor for him. In college, he came out as gay, embarking on a series of romantic misadventures before settling into a stable long-term partnership. In 2012, Farahan joined the freshman cast of Bravo’s Shahs of Sunset, hoping to “reframe the entire concept of what it meant to be from the Middle East for Americans.” Flamboyant, disarming, and frequently funny, Farahan’s catalog of growing up and embracing the sometimes-contradictory aspects of his identity feels conspiratorial in the best way. Even readers who’ve never seen an episode of Shahs of Sunset will be charmed. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 03/20/2026 | Details & Permalink