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DIGGING by Lu Anne Tracey Stewart C’77 (Fat Dog Books, 2020, $16.95.) In this fast-paced novel, a young journalist in a small New England town is covering a mysterious string of textile mill fires when she begins to suspect there is more smoldering beneath the surface—and that discovery puts her life at risk. Buy this book

ANOTHER DAY’S BEGUN: Thornton Wilder’s Our Town in the 21st Century by Howard Sherman C’84 (Methuen Drama/Bloomsbury Publishing, 2021, $26.95.) Through extensive interviews with more than 100 artists about how the play Our Town impacted them professionally and personally—and including background on the play’s early years and its pervasiveness in American culture—this book underscores how this American classic has the power to inspire, heal, and endure. Buy this book

THE (UN)POPULAR VOTE by Jasper Sanchez C’14 (Katherine Tegen Books, 2021, $18.99.) This young adult novel chronicles a transmasculine student’s run for student body president against the wishes of his politician father. With an investigative journalist digging into his past, a father trying to silence him, and a bully front-runner who stands in his way, Mark has to decide which matters most: perception or truth, when both are just as dangerous. Buy this book

HEADED INTO THE ABYSS: The Story of Our Time and the Future We’ll Face by Brian T. Watson C’74 GAr’68 (Anvilside Press, 2019, $13.00.) Written before the COVID-19 pandemic and the police killing of George Floyd, Watson’s book describes the current state of 10 forces—capitalism, technology, the internet, politics, media, education, human nature, the environment, population, and transportation—and how they are driving society in predominantly negative ways. Buy this book


THE MISUNDERSTOOD HISTORY OF GENTRIFICATION: People, Planning, Preservation, and Urban Renewal, 1915–2020 by Dennis E. Gale GCP’71 (Temple University Press, 2021, $32.95.) Using the neighborhoods of Georgetown, Greenwich Village, and Beacon Hill as case studies, Gale, a professor emeritus of public affairs and administration at Rutgers University, argues that gentrification must be understood as an urban phenomenon with historical roots in the very early 20th century, not the 1960s and 1970s. Buy this book

CLIMBING VINES: A Collection of Short Stories edited by Janay Sylvester C’12 (Self-Published, 2020, $10.) The second edition of this book features 20 narratives from 19 Black Penn alumnae and undergraduate women, detailing their experiences at Penn, spanning class years from the 1990s to the 2010s. The book covers topics including sisterhood, self-love, identity and belonging, the importance of diversity in the classroom, mental health and wellness, and healing from sexual assault. Buy this book

SOUTH OF THE BORDER: Women Travelers to Latin America edited by Evelyn M. Cherpak G’65 (Palmetto Publishing, 2020, $17.99.) Courageous and intrepid women made their way to Latin America in the 19th and 20th centuries, some alone and others with their husbands. Encountering a culture and people that were foreign to them, they were inspired to write letters home, keep a diary, or author books about their experiences. These women bring an illuminating perspective to our understanding of Latin America. Buy this book

OPERATION ACHOO! by Maggie Hymowitz C’99 and Samuel Hymowitz (Page Publishing, 2020, $12.95.) This illustrated children’s book tells the story of five devious germs on a mission to get a little boy sick. Throughout, it teaches the importance of handwashing, as well as a catchy song for children to sing while washing their hands. Buy this book

JACOBO’S RAINBOW by Fred Price WG’69 writing as David Hirshberg (Fig Tree Books, 2021, $19.95.) Set primarily in the 1960s during the student protests against the Vietnam War, this historical novel opens on the 15th anniversary of the day Jacobo Toledano was sent to jail. He writes about what happened behind the scenes of the Free Speech Movement, how he was allowed to leave jail under the condition of being drafted, the gruesome fighting he saw in Vietnam, and his eventual return to America to chronicle societal change. Buy this book

A THING WITH FEATHERS by Joe Jablonski C’81 L’87, writing as J. John Nordstrom (The Writing Collective, 2021, $15.86.) Set in northern Virginia in 2005–6, this novel imagines a romance between a Poe-like character who meets his soulmate in a modern-day Emily Dickinson. Buy this book

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