September 2025 list by Donalee Jacobs |
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Along Lake Michigan
by Michael Schumacher
Along Lake Michigan charts the course of shipping disasters great and small on Lake Michigan, home to more shipwrecks than the other four Great Lakes combined. Surveying the wreckage throughout the decades, Michael Schumacher illuminates the details of maritime weather and shipcraft, the lives devoted to and lost on the water, and the mistakes and monumental failures that led to these ships' watery ends.
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Anatomy of a Con Artist
by Johnathan Walton
Victim-turned-investigator Johnathan Walton, host of the Queen of the Con podcast, shares 14 red flags to use to spot con artists, drawing from hundreds of real-life cases and his personal mission to bring scammers to justice.
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Backstage
by Donna Leon
Blending deep research and vivid memories, this memoir from the celebrated author of the bestselling Guido Brunetti series explores the inspirations behind her craft, love for Venice and opera and eclectic teaching experiences from New Jersey to Iran and Switzerland.
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Bad To Blue
by Mike Moy
In this intimate and harrowing memoir, a former Chinese gang member tells the story of how he went from "bad to blue" by leaving the gang behind and becoming a New York City police detective. By donning that blue uniform, he gets the adrenaline-driven lifestyle he craves while staying on the right side of the law. But coming clean is not so easy. Patrolling the streets he once terrorized, he fears the exposure of his secret past. Anyone identifying him as a former gang member could lead to investigations, expulsion from the NYPD, media scandal, and legal charges for past crimes. And what would his former gangmates think if they found out he'd joined "the enemy"? Packed with violence, heartbreak, and love, Mike tells the triumphant story of one man's transformation.
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Between Two Rivers
by Moudhy N. Al-Rashid
Thousands of years ago, in a part of the world we now call ancient Mesopotamia, people began writing things down for the very first time. What they left behind, in a vast region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, preserves leaps in human ingenuity, including the earliest depiction of a wheel and the first approximation of pi, the world's first cities, the first writing system, early seeds of agriculture, and groundbreaking developments in medicine and astronomy.
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Beyond Evolution
by Sy Garte, Phd.
A flash point for much of the science vs. faith divide has been Darwinian evolution. Sharing the same mistaken belief that science contradicts the Bible, especially the Genesis account of creation, many scientists and many Christians have concluded that the worlds of science and religion are at odds. But according to biologist Sy Garte, PhD, evolution is irrelevant to the harmony of faith and science. And revolutionary new developments in biology are providing stronger evidence than ever before of a purposeful creator God.
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Black Moses
by Caleb Gayle
A powerful account of Edward McCabe's bold attempt to establish a Black-governed state in Oklahoma, exploring how racism, political resistance and white greed ultimately derailed his vision of self-determination and opportunity for Black Americans after Reconstruction.
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Buddha, Socrates, and Us
by Stephen Batchelor
A renowned Buddhist teacher explores how the parallel teachings of the Buddha and Socrates—rooted in critical self-inquiry and ethical uncertainty—offer enduring guidance for living a just, courageous and thoughtful life amid modern social and spiritual challenges.
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Changeover
by Giri Nathan
A vivid chronicle of men's tennis in 2024, capturing the end of the Djokovic-Nadal-Federer era and the rise of prodigies Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner as they reshape the sport while the old guard fiercely resists fading away.
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Could Should Might Don't
by Nick Foster
Nick Foster has been guiding the missions of companies such as Sony, Nokia, Dyson and Google, where he was the head of design at Google X. He has been at the forefront of innovation for over twenty-five years, but he's been hidden behind NDAs. Could Should Might Don't is Foster's public debut, where he is now free to share his perspectives and explore how people approach the future. Foster has identified four primary mindsets we all adopt when thinking about what's over the horizon, but he doesn't advocate for any one of them. Instead, he explores how humanity has grappled with the concept of the future throughout history, tracing the emergence of distinct schools of thought and exploring the virtues, blind spots, and inevitable shortcomings of each.
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Deadwood
by Peter Cozzens
Tells the true story of a notorious Black Hills gold rush settlement and its most colorful cast of characters, from Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane to Al Swearingen and Sheriff Seth Bullock.
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Homegrown
by Amber O'neal Johnston
A one-stop shop for practical guidance, encouragement, and a variety of perspectives from today's top homeschooling voices to answer your biggest questions and help you kickstart or refine your home education journey.
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In the Absence of the Ordinary
by Francis Weller
In the Absence of the Ordinary frames our current era as a rough initiation—an upending experience of profound trauma and transformation that demands we reorient our ways of thinking, being, and relating. Weller offers clarity and wisdom through essays on how to face the sobering stakes of our time—while offering the nourishment and support we need to embody the new roles this initiation requires.
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Iron Will
by Roderick Sewell
Born without tibias and raised by a devoted mother who sacrificed everything, a young athlete overcomes his disability to discover his passion for sports to becoming the first bilateral above-the-knee amputee to finish and win an IRONMAN.
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Love Your Life (Even When You Don't Like It All the Time)
by Rachel Awtrey
With authenticity and transparency, Rachel debuts with a warm and practical love letter to those of us who've worked really hard to build a beautiful, shiny life...but sometimes still feel a little lackluster. Rachel will help you see that, even in the hardship there are glimmers of joy to be found.
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Not That Wheel, Jesus!
by Mary Katherine Backstrom
Not That Wheel, Jesus! is Mary Katherine's hilarious journey from certainty to doubt to going nuclear on the socials ("it was my heresy era"), and then of slowly and painfully finding her way back to a different, less defined sort faith. It's the heartfelt and achingly honest story of a spirituality that went off the road and crashed and burned in spectacular fashion, right before God and everybody. And then, slowly, through grace and plenty of therapy, grew richer and deeper than she ever could have imagined.
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The Opposite of Settling
by Case Kenny
Offers tools for building empowering relationships, encouraging readers to abandon fear-based habits and societal pressures in favor of connections that foster independence, personal growth, and a deeper sense of clarity and authenticity in love.
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Our Dollar, Your Problem
by Kenneth S. Rogoff
Drawing in part on his own experiences, including with policymakers and world leaders, Kenneth Rogoff animates the remarkable postwar run of the dollar--how it beat out the Japanese yen, the Soviet ruble, and the euro--and the challenges it faces today from crypto and the Chinese yuan, the end of reliably low inflation and interest rates, political instability, and the fracturing of the dollar bloc.
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The Quiet Ear
by Raymond Antrobus
For years, Antrobus lived as a deaf person in the hearing world, before being diagnosed at the age of six. This "in-betweenness" was a space he would occupy in other areas of his life too. The son of a Jamaican father and white British mother, growing up in East London, it was easy for him to fall through the cracks. Growing up, he was told that he wasn't smart enough, wasn't black enough, wasn't deaf enough. The Quiet Ear is an attempt to fill in those missing sounds in Antrobus' life, about finding a path when there are no signs to show the way, and a testament to the people who helped form his language: spoken, written, and signed.
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Rehab
by Shoshana Walter
Tells the stories of four individuals from different backgrounds to expose how America's addiction treatment system often reinforces inequality, neglects science-based care, and profits from suffering—and offers a critique of punitive policies and a call for more equitable, effective paths to recovery.
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The Right of the People
by Osita Nwanevu
Reflects on democratic theory, historical legacy, and rising inequality to argue that American democracy has yet to be fully realized and calls for bold political and economic reforms to transform outdated institutions and fulfill the nation's founding promise for all citizens.
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The Story of CO2 Is the Story of Everything
by Peter Brannen
Traces carbon dioxide's role from the origins of life to today's climate crisis, revealing how it has shaped Earth's habitability, influenced mass extinctions, and impacted human development, while arguing that understanding its deep history is key to confronting our planetary emergency.
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Unbreakable
by Vonda Wright
Stronger muscles and bones, increased mobility, lifelong independence and a new mentality for aging with power—this cutting-edge guide to nutrition, training and lifestyle will optimize a woman's body for longevity, through menopause and beyond.
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When We Ruled
by Paula Akpan
Uncovers the powerful legacies of African queens and warriors such as Njinga Mbande and Nana Yaa Asantewaa, exploring their leadership and influence, while revealing how their reigns challenged gender politics in pre-colonial Africa and beyond.
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