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History and Current Events April 2025 |
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| Waste Wars: The Wild Afterlife of Your Trash by Alexander ClappWhat it is: Journalist Alexander Clapp's disturbing and well-researched debut explores the history of the global trash trade.
Further reading: Wasteland: The Secret World of Waste and the Urgent Search for a Cleaner Future by Oliver Franklin-Wallis. |
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| The Lost and the Found: A True Story of Homelessness, Found Family, and Second... by Kevin FaganWhat it's about: Award-winning San Francisco Chronicle reporter Kevin Fagan's moving and intimate social history explores homelessness through the experiences of a pair of individuals trying to get by in San Francisco, California.
Further reading: Seeking Shelter: A Working Mother, Her Children, and a Story of Homelessness in America by Jeff Hobbs. |
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Crooked Smile: What It Took to Escape a Decade of Homelessness, Addiction, & Crime
by Jared Klickstein
What it is: Jared Klickstein, the child of two heroin addicts who eventually became addicted himself, takes readers on a raw and personal journey from his unsettling and secretive childhood in the suburbs to the slums of Skid Row.
Read it for: Crooked Smile's recounting of one man's escape from a hellish life--and showing a valuable path for others.
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| Propaganda Girls: The Secret War of the Women in the OSS by Lisa RogakWhat it is: Bestselling biographer Lisa Rogak's evocative blend of history and collective biography chronicles the courageous exploits of four women who worked for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War II: American reporter Betty MacDonald, Czech polyglot Zuzka Lauwers, American navy wife Jane Smith-Hutton, and German American film star Marlene Dietrich.
For fans of: Book and Dagger: How Scholars and Librarians Became the Unlikely Spies of World War II by Elyse Graham. |
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Homeland: The War on Terror in American life
by Richard Beck
What it is: An exploration of how the protracted war on terror reshaped nearly every facet of American life and changed peoples' attitudes of themselves and their neighbors and even affected our choice of cars and popular entertainment.
Reviewers say: “Provocative . . . an exhilaratingly fresh take on what ails America.” (Publishers Weekly)
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On Freedom
by Timothy Snyder
What it is: An acclaimed Yale historian, drawing on the work of philosophers and political dissidents, conversations with contemporary thinkers and his own experiences, explores freedom, identifying the practices and attitudes that will allow us to design a government in which we and future generations can flourish.
Reviewers say: “Ambitious . . . An incisive, urgently relevant analysis of—and call to action on—America’s foundational ideal.” (Kirkus Reviews)
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| American Poison: A Deadly Invention and the Woman Who Battled for Environmental Justice by Daniel StoneWhat it is: In this lively and unputdownable account, science writer Daniel Stone (Sinkable) spotlights physician and researcher Alice Hamilton's courageous but ultimately doomed efforts to ban leaded gasoline in the 1920s, a battle that pitted her against the booming automotive industry.
Try this next: The Cancer Factory: Industrial Chemicals, Corporate Deception, and the Hidden Deaths of American Workers by Jim Morris. |
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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