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History and Current Events March 2026 |
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| Kings and Pawns: Jackie Robinson and Paul Robeson in America by Howard BryantSports journalist Howard Bryant's affecting history details how trailblazing Black actor Paul Robeson and Major League Baseball player Jackie Robinson's differing political ideologies often put them at odds with each other, culminating in Robinson's 1949 appearance at the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), where he testified against Robeson. For fans of: The Sword and the Shield: The Revolutionary Lives of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. by Peniel E. Joseph. |
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| Everybody Loses: The Tumultuous Rise of American Sports Gambling by Danny FuntWashington Post contributor Danny Funt's illuminating debut chronicles the evolution of legalized sports betting in the United States, detailing the rise of companies like FanDuel and DraftKings and how they prey upon consumers and athletes alike. Further reading: The Bookie: How I Bet It All on Sports Gambling and Watched an Industry Explode by Art Manteris and Matt Birkbeck. |
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| Football by Chuck KlostermanJournalist Chuck Klosterman (The Nineties) ruminates on his lifelong love of football in this funny and wide-ranging cultural history that's "a transcendent appraisal of America's favorite sport" (Publishers Weekly). For fans of: Basketball (and Other Things): A Collection of Questions Asked, Answered, Illustrated by Shea Serrano. |
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| Black Dahlia: Murder, Monsters, and Madness in Midcentury Hollywood by William J. MannBiographer William J. Mann's (Bogie & Bacall) well-researched true crime account offers fresh insights on the 1947 murder of actress Elizabeth Short, who posthumously came to be known by the moniker "Black Dahlia." Further reading: Sisters in Death: The Black Dahlia, the Prairie Heiress, and Their Hunter by Eli Frankel. |
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| Neptune's Fortune: The Billion-Dollar Shipwreck and the Ghosts of the Spanish... by Julian SanctonHistorian Julian Sancton's sweeping maritime saga chronicles how the 2015 discovery of the San José, a Spanish galleon that sank off the coast of Colombia in 1708, was mired by accusations that Roger Dooley, the archaeologist who found the wreckage, was a con artist and grave robber. Featuring interviews with Dooley, this compelling adventure tale will appeal to fans of Susan Orlean's The Orchid Thief. |
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Focus on: Women's History Month
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| The Six: The Extraordinary Story of the Grit and Daring of America's First Women Astronauts by Loren GrushBloomberg News reporter Loren Grush's inspiring history spotlights the first six American women astronauts: Anna Fisher, Shannon Lucid, Judy Resnik, Sally Ride, Rhea Seddon, and Kathy Sullivan. Grush's accessible reportage blends biographical sketches with engrossing accounts of the women's triumphs and trials. Try this next: The New Guys: The Historic Class of Astronauts That Broke Barriers and Changed the Face of Space Travel by Meredith Bagby. |
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| Daughters of Latin America: An International Anthology of Writing by Latine Women by Sandra Guzmán (editor)This thought-provoking collection of works from 140 Latine women writers, scholars, and activists from around the world includes contributions from U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón, Pulitzer prize-winning playwright Quiara Alegría Hudes, and U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Further reading: Speculative Fiction for Dreamers: A Latinx Anthology edited by Alex Hernandez, Matthew David Goodwin, and Sarah Rafael García. |
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Wild for Austen: A Rebellious, Subversive, and Untamed Jane
by Devoney Looser
USA Today Bestseller Incisive, funny, and deeply-researched insights into the life, writing, and legacy of Jane Austen, by the preeminent scholar Devoney Looser. Thieves Spies Abolitionists Ghosts If we ever truly believed Jane Austen to be a quiet spinster, scholar Devoney Looser puts that myth to rest at last in Wild for Austen. These, and many other events and characters, come to life throughout this rollicking book. Austen, we learn, was far wilder in her time than we've given her credit for, and Looser traces the fascinating and fantastical journey her legacy has taken over the past 250 years. All six of Austen's completed novels are examined here, and Looser uncovers striking new gems therein, as well as in Austen's juvenilia, unfinished fiction, and even essays and poetry. Looser also takes on entirely new scholarship, writing about Austen's relationship to the abolitionist movement and women's suffrage. In examining the legacy of Austen's works, Looser reveals the film adaptations that might have changed Hollywood history had they come to fruition, and tells extraordinary stories of ghost-sightings, Austen novels cited in courts of law, and the eclectic members of the Austen extended family whose own outrageous lives seem wilder than fiction. Written with warmth, humor, and remarkable details never before published, Wild for Austen is the ultimate tribute to Jane Austen.
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The Conjuring of America: Mojos, Mermaids, Medicine, and 400 Years of Black Women's Magic
by Lindsey Stewart
Emerging first on plantations in the American South, enslaved conjure women used their magic to treat illnesses. These women combined their ancestral spiritual beliefs from West Africa with local herbal rituals and therapeutic remedies to create conjure, forging a secret well of health and power hidden to their oppressors and many of the modern-day staples we still enjoy. ... Black feminist philosopher Lindsey Stewart exposes this vital contour of American history. In the face of slavery, Negro mammies fashioned a legacy of magic that begat herbal experts, fearsome water bearers, and powerful mojos--roles and traditions that for centuries have been passed down to respond to Black struggles in real time. And when Jim Crow was born, Granny Midwives and textile weavers leveled their techniques to protect our civil and reproductive rights, while Candy Ladies fed a generation of freedom crusaders. ... Above all, The Conjuring of America is a love letter to the magic Black women used to sow messages of rebellion, freedom, and hope--
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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