The library has purchased many new books so far this year. You can view a handful here along with descriptions or go here to see the full listing. These books are on display in the library’s lobby.

Title: Turnip Greens & Tortillas
Author: Eddie Hernandez and Susan Puckett

USA Today called Taqueria del Sol “a runaway success.” Bon Appétit wrote: “Move over, Chipotle!” The fast-casual food of Eddie Hernandez, the James Beard-nominated chef/co-owner of the restaurant, lands on the commonalities of Southern and Mexican food, with dishes like Memphis barbecue pork tacos, chicken pot pie served in a “bowl” of a puffed tortilla, turnip greens in “pot likker” spiked with chiles, or the “Eddie Palmer,” sweet tea with a jab of tequila. Eddie never hesitates to break with purists to make food taste better, adding sugar to creamy grits to balance the jalapeños, or substituting tomatillos in fried green tomatoes for a more delicate texture. Throughout, “Eddie’s Way” sidebars show how to make each dish even more special.

Title: Speaking for the River
Author: James V. Hillegas-Elting

Since the late 1960s, Oregon has been at the forefront of environmental protection in the United States. The state generally, and Portland in particular, continue to have strong “green” credentials well into the twenty-first century. Within this forty year period of progress, however, the health of the Willamette River has been a consistent blot on the record. Willamette River water pollution has not gone away—the problem has, in fact, gotten much more complex. James Hillegas-Elting’s book, Speaking for the River, provides a historical look at this dilemma.

Title: The Boy Crisis
Author: Warren Farrell, PhD and Johy Gray, PhD

What is the boy crisis?
It’s a crisis of education. Worldwide, boys are 50 percent less likely than girls to meet basic proficiency in reading, math, and science.
It’s a crisis of mental health. ADHD is on the rise. And as boys become young men, their suicide rates go from equal to girls to six times that of young women.
It’s a crisis of fathering. Boys are growing up with less-involved fathers and are more likely to drop out of school, drink, do drugs, become delinquent, and end up in prison.
It’s a crisis of purpose. Boys’ old sense of purpose—being a warrior, a leader, or a sole breadwinner—are fading. Many bright boys are experiencing a “purpose void,” feeling alienated, withdrawn, and addicted to immediate gratification
So, what is The Boy Crisis? A comprehensive blueprint for what parents, teachers, and policymakers can do to help our sons become happier, healthier men, and fathers and leaders worthy of our respect.

Title: Poached: Inside the Dark World of Wildlife Trafficking
Author: Rachel Love Nuwer

Journalist Rachel Nuwer plunges the reader into the underground of global wildlife trafficking, a topic she has been investigating for nearly a decade. Our insatiable demand for animals–for jewelry, pets, medicine, meat, trophies, and fur–is driving a worldwide poaching epidemic, threatening the continued existence of countless species. Illegal wildlife trade now ranks among the largest contraband industries in the world, yet compared to drug, arms, or human trafficking, the wildlife crisis has received scant attention and support, leaving it up to passionate individuals fighting on the ground to try to ensure that elephants, tigers, rhinos, and more are still around for future generations.

Title: Hotel
Author: Karen Tei Yamashita

Dazzling and ambitious, this hip, multi-voiced fusion of prose, playwriting, graphic art, and philosophy spins an epic tale of America’s struggle for civil rights as it played out in San Francisco’s Chinatown. Divided into ten novellas, one for each year, I Hotel begins in 1968, when Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy were assassinated, students took to the streets, the Vietnam War raged, and cities burned.

Title: Politics and Film: the Political Culture of Television and Movies
Author: Daniel P. Franklin

Politics and Film examines popular movies and television shows as indicators of social and political trends to explore the political culture of the United States. Updated to include the popular and controversial movies and shows American Sniper, House of Cards, Orange Is the New Black, and Twelve Years a Slave, the second edition investigates popular conceptions of government, the military, intelligence and terrorism, punishment and policing, and recognizes mistakes or dark times in our shared history.

Title: Who We Are and How We got Here
Author: David Reich

In Who We Are and How We Got Here, Reich allows readers to discover how the human genome provides not only all the information a human embryo needs to develop but also the hidden story of our species. Reich delves into how the genomic revolution is transforming our understanding of modern humans and how DNA studies reveal deep inequalities among different populations, between the sexes, and among individuals. Provocatively, Reich’s book suggests that there might very well be biological differences among human populations but that these differences are unlikely to conform to common stereotypes.

Title: Gardening Under Lights: the Complete Guide for Indoor Growers
Author: Leslie F. Halleck

Gardening Under Lights details everything a gardener or hobbyist needs to know to garden indoors. Part One starts with the basics of photosynthesis, the science of light, and how to accurately measure how much light a plant needs. Part Two provides an overview of the most up-to-date tools and gear available. Parts Three and Four offer tips and techniques for growing popular ornamental plants (orchids, succulents, bonsai, and more) and edible plants (arugula, cannabis, oregano, tomatoes, and more) independent of the constraints of volatile outdoor conditions. Gardening Under Lights is a highly-detailed, accessible guide for seed starters, plant collectors, and anyone who wants to successfully garden indoors.

Title: Memes to Movements: How the World’s Most Viral Media is Changing Social Protest and Power
Author: An Xiao Mina

Memes are the street art of the social web. Using social media–driven movements as her guide, technologist and digital media scholar An Xiao Mina unpacks the mechanics of memes and how they operate to reinforce, amplify, and shape today’s politics. She finds that the “silly” stuff of meme culture—the photo remixes, the selfies, the YouTube songs, and the pun-tastic hashtags—are fundamentally intertwined with how we find and affirm one another, direct attention to human rights and social justice issues, build narratives, and make culture. Mina finds parallels, for example, between a photo of Black Lives Matter protestors in Ferguson, Missouri, raising their hands in a gesture of resistance and one from eight thousand miles away, in Hong Kong, of Umbrella Movement activists raising yellow umbrellas as they fight for voting rights. She shows how a viral video of then presidential nominee Donald Trump laid the groundwork for pink pussyhats, a meme come to life as the widely recognized symbol for the international Women’s March.

Title: Stormtroopers
Author: Daniel Siemens

Germany’s Stormtroopers engaged in a vicious siege of violence that propelled the National Socialists to power in the 1930s. Known also as the SA or Brownshirts, these “ordinary” men waged a loosely structured campaign of intimidation and savagery across the nation from the 1920s to the “Night of the Long Knives” in 1934, when Chief of Staff Ernst Röhm and many other SA leaders were assassinated on Hitler’s orders.