To find these selections and many other new titles, see the NMC library catalog.
NEW NON-FICTION
Civic Literacy in Schools and Communities: Teaching and Organizing for a Revitalized Democracy by Brian Charest
Because many schools fail to address the health and well-being of both students and their communities, teachers and teacher educators are in need of a revised vision — one that is committed to civic and community engagement where we see school and community-building as reciprocal, not separate, projects. This vision of schooling sees partnership and collaboration with communities and democratic revitalization as a central goal of education.
The Library: A Fragile History by Andrew Pettegree & Arthur Der Weduwen
Famed across the world, guarded by private collectors, built up over centuries, destroyed in a single day, ornamented by frescoes or filled with bean bags and children’s drawings — the history of the library is rich. In the first major history of its kind, the authors explore the history of the library, from famous collections of the ancient world to the embattled public resources of today. Along the way, they introduce us to the philanthropists who shaped the world’s great collections and reveal the high crimes and misdemeanors committed in pursuit of rare and valuable manuscripts.
Traditional Ecological Knowledge: Learning from Indigenous Practices for Environmental Sustainability edited by Melissa K. Nelson & Dan Shilling
This book examines the importance of Traditional Ecological Knowledge and how it can provide models for a time-tested form of sustainability needed in the world today. The essays, written by a team of scholars from diverse disciplinary backgrounds, explore cases of environmental sustainability from multiple tribal and geographic locations in North America and beyond. It includes a holistic and broad disciplinary approach to sustainability, including language, art, and ceremony, as critical ways to maintain healthy human-environment relations.
System Error: Where Big Tech Went Wrong and How We Can Reboot by Rob Reich, Mehran Sahami & Jeremy M. Weinstein
System Error exposes the root of our current predicament: how big tech’s relentless focus on optimization is driving a future that reinforces discrimination, erodes privacy, displaces workers, and pollutes the information we get. Armed with an understanding of how technologists think and exercise their power, three Stanford professors share their provocative insights and concrete solutions to help everyone understand what is happening, what is at stake, and what we can do to control technology instead of letting it control us.
1000 Years of Joys and Sorrows: A Memoir by Ai Weiwei
Ai Weiwei has written a sweeping memoir that presents a remarkable history of China while also illuminating his artistic process. Ai Weiwei recounts his childhood in exile, and his difficult decision to leave his family to study art in America. With candor and wit, he details his return to China and his rise from artistic unknown to art world superstar and international human rights activist. Ai Weiwei’s architectural achievements include helping to design the iconic Bird’s Nest Olympic Stadium in Beijing. His political activism has long made him a target of the Chinese authorities, which culminated in months of secret detention without charge in 2011.
Preparing a Workforce for the New Blue Economy edited by Liesl Hotaling & Richard Spinrad
The book considers the use of big data, key skill sets, training undergraduate and graduate students, the Transition Assistance Program (TAP) in the United States, economic opportunities in African coastal countries, governmental agencies, nonprofits and NGOs. A broad range of case studies are provided, covering oil spills, commercial fishing, data protection and harvesting, sustainability and weather forecasting. The authors highlight the educational requirements of the workforce and potential economic opportunities.
NEW FICTION
Babysitter by Joyce Carol Oates
In the waning days of the 1970s, the lives of several residents of Detroit and its affluent white suburbs are drawn together following the disappearance of yet another child. The child serial killer known as Babysitter has always been impossible to identify and immune to retribution. As Babysitter continues to strike – sending the city and its surroundings into pandemonium – the characters intersect, jeopardize one another, and are pushed to their limits. Suspenseful, brilliant, and wholly engrossing, Babysitter asks what we would risk for a chance at a new life.
Brown Girls by Daphne Palasi Andreades
This remarkable, deeply moving story brings you deep into the hearts and souls of a tight-knit group of friends growing up in Queens, where the streets sprawl for miles and echo with voices from all over the world. Here Nadira, Mae, Trish, and Aisha become friends for life–or so they vow. But as the years go by, and their own adulthood nears, choices must be made about their futures. Cracks and fissures form as some find themselves drawn to the allure of other skylines, beckoned by lovers and jobs. Some become mothers to a new generation of brown girls; while others journey back to the countries their parents fled for the ‘better life’ in America.
Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel
The award-winning, best-selling author of Station Eleven and The Glass Hotel returns with a novel of art, time travel, love, and plague that takes the reader from Vancouver Island in 1912 to a dark colony on the moon five hundred years later, unfurling a story of humanity across centuries and space. A virtuoso performance that is as human and tender as it is intellectually playful, Sea of Tranquility is a novel of time travel and metaphysics that precisely captures the reality of our current moment.
Medusa by Jessie Burton; illustrated by Olivia Lomenech Gill
Exiled to a far-flung island, Medusa has little company except for the snakes adorning her head instead of hair until a boy named Perseus arrives, disrupting her lonely existence. With stunning, full-color illustrations and a first person narrative illuminating the fierce, vulnerable, determined girl behind the Greek myth, this lyrical YA retelling is perfect for readers of Circe, and brings the story of Medusa to life for a new generation.Young Adult fiction.
The Good Left Undone by Adriana Trigiani
Matelda, the Cabrelli family’s matriarch, has always been brusque and opinionated. Now, as she faces the end of her life, she is determined to share the secret of her own mother’s great love story with the father Matelda never knew. In the halcyon past, Domenica Cabrelli thrives in the Italian town of Viareggio until the brink of World War II. A hundred years later, her daughter Matelda faces the same big questions about the family’s legacy and what is worth fighting for. The two timelines intersect and weave together in unexpected and heartbreaking ways that lead the family to shocking revelations and, ultimately, redemption.
Summaries and images adapted from publishers.