History and Current Events June 2026 |
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| Vengeance: The Last Stands of Custer, Crazy Horse, and Sitting Bull by Tom ClavinHistorian Tom Clavin's (Running Deep: Bravery, Survival, and the True Story of the Deadliest Submarine in World War II) gruesome and cinematic latest chronicles the Battle of the Little Bighorn, published in time to mark the 150th anniversary of the event. Further reading: The Earth Is All That Lasts: Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull, and the Last Stand of the Great Sioux Nation by Mark L. Gardner. |
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| Inside the Box: How Constraints Make Us Better by David EpsteinFeaturing notable case studies throughout history, journalist David Epstein's well-researched exploration of how limitations foster creativity is "a game changer" (Publishers Weekly) that's "for anyone who has ever been overwhelmed in a grocery aisle" (Booklist). Try this next: The Elements of Choice: Why the Way We Decide Matters by Eric J. Johnson. |
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| American Rambler: Walking the Trail of Johnny Appleseed by Isaac FitzgeraldIn his reflective and engaging travelogue, New York Times bestselling memoirist Isaac Fitzgerald (Dirtbag, Massachusetts) spends a year retracing 18th-century gardener John Chapman's (aka Johnny Appleseed) trail from Massachusetts to Indiana, sharing insights on American history and Chapman's role in it. For fans of: Blue Highways: A Journey into America by William Least Heat-Moon; This Land Is Your Land: A Road Trip Through U.S. History by Beverly Gage. |
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The Kennedys and the Windsors: The Story of Two Dynasties, One Born, One Made
by Caroline Hallemann
For nearly a century, two families an ocean apart have captured the world's collective imagination: the British Windsors and the American Kennedys. Much ink has been spilled on their individual trysts, tragedies, and triumphs over the years, but no one has examined their powerful and intertwined legacies. Until now. In The Kennedys and the Windsors, acclaimed journalist Caroline Hallemann unearths the story of two iconic families whose lives, ambitions, and respective reigns have mirrored each other in surprising ways. Through rich archival research and fresh interviews from insiders on both sides of the Atlantic, Hallemann reveals how an upstart Irish Catholic family with little access into elite New England society came to host dinner parties for a King and Queen, and forge an eventual path to the White House. In the process, she draws out some startling parallels between the two families: the style icons Princess Diana and Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy (both tragically gone too soon), the frustrated second sisters Princess Margaret and Lee Radziwill, the scandal-plagued next generation of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the man formerly known as Prince Andrew, and the current generation's shared struggle to figure out what a monarchy (actual or imagined) means in the twenty-first century. From Queen Elizabeth's coronation to President Kennedy's historic London visit, from JFK Jr.'s shocking death to Prince Harry's decisive break with his family, Hallemann traces the key moments in the lives of these two dynasties through a fresh and fascinating lens, showing how they have intersected over the generations in ways that not only shaped their images and legacies, but history itself.
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The Hardest, Longest Race: Henry Ford and the Cross-Country Contest That Changed America
by Eric Moskowitz
In 1909, America was home to 253 automakers, a landscape of visionaries, schemers, and would-be barons of the new century. But when playboy millionaire M. Robert Guggenheim announced an audacious Ocean to Ocean contest from New York City to the Seattle World's Fair, only three companies were brassy enough to show up at the starting line: Acme, Ford, and Shawmut. Oddsmakers favored the Acme and Itala, a pricy import also joining the race, while dismissing the pint-sized Ford -- a homely little number called the Model T-- and the long-shot Shawmut, struggling to survive after a factory fire. In fact, many didn't believe any of the cars would reach Seattle at all, as they would need to forge a 4,106-mile course of mountain ranges, mud bogs, washed-out wagon bridges, and harrowing canyon trails, long before the era of asphalt highways, seatbelts, and service stations. But Henry Ford was intent on proving that the Model T could go the distance and beat out the muscular luxury cars---and he didn't plan to leave it to chance. Indeed, a little over three weeks after the race began, a Ford crossed the line hours ahead of the Shawmut. Except that victory was a fraud. The Hardest, Longest Race is a colorful tale of ambition and subterfuge, but it is also a love letter to America at the turn of the Twentieth Century. As a seeming people's champion--a car for the masses--traverses the vast nation, Moskowitz brings to vivid life the diverse populace and landscape that it would soon transform.
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The Killer and Frank Lloyd Wright: The True Story of Mass Murder in Paradise
by Casey Sherman
Frank Lloyd Wright was more than the mind behind America's most iconic buildings--he was a man whose turbulent private life captivated a nation. The famous architect's stormy marriage to Kitty Wright and his infamous affair with another woman, Mamah Borthwick, ignited one of the country's first celebrity scandals, splashed across headlines from coast to coast.Then, in August 1914, scandal turned to horror. A tragedy at Taliesin, the Wisconsin home Wright built as a monument to love, shook the very foundation of Wright's life--and catapulted him back to the front pages of newspapers across the country as readers clamored for glimpses of his very darkest moments. In The Killer and Frank Lloyd Wright, New York Times bestselling author Casey Sherman delves beyond the myth of Wright's genius to reveal a man of relentless ambition, consuming passion, and devastating loss. With haunting intimacy and propulsive storytelling, Sherman delivers a portrait of an artist who could not escape the shadows of his own making--and who rose, again and again, from the ashes.
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Girls(r): Generation Z and the Commodification of Everything
by Freya India
GIRLS(R) Generation Z and the Commodification of Everything is a passionate, provocative, and deeply personal journey into the pressures shaping young lives today. Freya India shows that age-old anxieties of girlhood are now being amplified by modern life and exploited like never before. While previous generations of women were relentlessly sold products and procedures, girls today have become the product, displaying their lives on Instagram, advertising themselves on dating apps, and packaging themselves into personal brands, making anxiety feel overwhelming and unmanageable. As a society, we have transformed girls into GIRLS(R), from people into products. Each chapter of GIRLS(R) focuses on a common anxiety in adolescent girls' lives, from insecurities about our faces and bodies, to our reputation and social status, to our friendships and romantic relationships. Along the way, India traces how rapidly culture and technology have evolved over the past decade. This isn't just a book for girls. For young women, it offers a nostalgic, if unsettling, reflection on the world they've grown up in and reassurance that they're not alone in their struggles. For younger girls, it provides context for where these challenges began and warns where they might be headed. And, for parents, teachers, and older generations, it serves as a reminder that these issues have never been so intense. GIRLS(R) concludes with a message of hope, reminding readers how to reclaim their privacy, defend their dignity, and, above all, return to being people instead of products.
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Selling Opportunity: The Story of Mary Kay
by Mary Lisa Gavenas
Growing up in Depression-era Texas, Mary Kathlyn Wagner is a dutiful daughter and diligent student with ambition aplenty and no place to use it. Married at sixteen, she is a grandmother at thirty-four. When she is not cooking or cleaning or taking care of the kids, she peddles cleaning products to other housewives. The work has no salary and no security but she sticks with it, sure that direct selling will make her dreams come true. In 1963, after she has been divorced three times and widowed twice, she sets up her own company, selling second chance and self-invention for the price of a skin care showcase. Soon millions know her as the little lady in the big wig who gives away pink Cadillacs. From its unpromising start in a 500-square-foot Dallas storefront, Mary Kay Inc. grows into a global phenomenon with 3.5 million reps in over 35 countries. She becomes the most famous saleswoman in the world. Maybe the most famous ever. Based on fifteen years of research, Selling Opportunity gives us a page-turning rags-to-riches story set against the background of direct selling in all its overstated, over-the-top glory. Here, for the first time, is the definitive history of a peculiarly American industry and a mid-century mindset that ennobled extreme self-reliance, sticking to your guns, and blind faith in the American dream.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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