Category: Books

Barry Pearce (BSJ1991)

The Plan of Chicago: A City in Stories has an unusual structure – 9 linked stories set in 9 Chicago neighborhoods – and unusual range.

The characters – half men, half women – include immigrants from Poland, Mexico, Ireland, and Somalia. They work as housepainters, taxi drivers, sketch artists, and scam artists – exploited by or exploiting others to make it in an unforgiving city. Chicago features heavily in their plans, though the plan of Chicago – shaped by divisions of race, class, gender, violence – often forces them apart. Despite that division, incongruous lives intersect here in unexpected ways. An Irish tradesman in a changing neighborhood struggles with the complications of befriending an African American coworker. His boss’s self-absorbed wife, a Polish immigrant, learns to count people in new ways working for the Census. A Romanian boy who helps his father fake accidents tests the limits of filial loyalty, and the claims adjustor investigating his case confronts dark baggage when his partner works with rape victims.

Through these varied characters – Black and White, straight and gay, wealthy and working-class – Pearce captures the breadth and depth of the city that sits dead center in America and better than any other, reveal its promise and flaws.

Chris Serb (MSJ95)

“Eckie: Walter Eckersall and the Rise of Chicago Sports” is part biography, part social history about Walter Eckersall, a three-sport champion in the early years of formal high school competition in Chicago and the best football player to ever compete at University of Chicago. Eckersall went on to become the Chicago Tribune’s lead sportswriter, creating the role of sports-star-turned-sports-journalist. His primary focus was football, but he also advocated the re-establishment of boxing in Chicago and the growing Olympic movement. He was also a champion of equal opportunity for Black athletes when they desperately needed allies.

But Eckie was no saint! A terrible student who never graduated high school and rarely went to class in college, Eckie got expelled a month after his eligibility expired. He was arrested for theft, got a woman pregnant out of wedlock, hastily married her in a shotgun wedding, then quickly abandoned his young family. He also struggled with a drinking problem, exposed during divorce proceedings but quickly buried by complicit media peers. A cautionary tale, and one that echoes with the college athletic experience today.

“Eckie” brings this long-forgotten figure back into the spotlight he deserves, in the larger context of the growth of Chicago sports, and sports journalism in general.

Frank DeCaro (BSJ84)

Half a century after the drug-fueled, DJ-driven, glamour-drenched musical phenomenon of disco was born at a New York City loft party, disco’s musical and fashion influences live on in popular culture. “Disco: Music, Movies, and Mania under the Mirror Ball” (Rizzoli New York) is an entertaining, yet serious tribute to a musical genre that has never been given its proper due, nor taken its true place in the historic struggle for LGBTQ+, gender, and racial equality.

Painting a vivid portrait of this provocative era – with photos from disco’s heyday up through today – DeCaro explores the cultural importance of disco and how the music and dance of queer Black and Latin clubs became a mainstream phenomenon.

Through personal interviews with disco’s biggest stars including Gloria Gaynor, Thelma Houston, Village People, and a never-before-published sit-down with Donna Summer, the book champions the diverse origins of disco while celebrating its influence on today’s groundbreaking artists such as Lady Gaga, Duo Lipa, and Miley Cyrus. It’s a must for all lovers of Seventies music, movies, television, fashion, and pop culture.

Ekta Garg (MSJ2002)

Have you ever wondered why Jack and Jill needed that pail of water in the first place? Or how Sleeping Beauty managed to prick her finger despite a royal order to destroy every spindle in the kingdom?

Fairy tales and nursery rhymes have given us some of the most iconic characters and images in storytelling; think Cinderella’s glass slipper or Jack’s oversized beanstalk. But what about the in-between moments? The ones that never made it to the page?

In this enchanting micro-collection of short stories, award-winning author Ekta R. Garg explores the untold scenes between the lines of some of our most loved tales. Find out what the Wicked Witch of the East was doing in the road before Dorothy’s house fell on her. Learn where Goldilocks came from. Meet the conmen who convinced the emperor he had new clothes and more.

Rediscover the wit, heart, and magic of the classics, and see them as you’ve never seen them before in “The Witch’s Apprentice and Other Stories.”

Rick Rockwell (BSJ79)

From the deserts of northern Mexico to as far south as the Rio Plata in Argentina, this book from Routledge traces the history of journalism in Latin America from its earliest roots and examines how it relates to the modern importance of media in the twenty-first century.

By exploring mestizo roots, “The History of Journalism in Latin America” examines Indigenous foundations, pre-colonial methods, and post-colonial systems of communication to show how earlier publications became instrumental to regional nineteenth-century independence movements throughout Latin America. Although the history of communication in the region is characterized by the control and censorship of empires, be they Indigenous or European, this study argues that modern journalism at its core is the story of crusading for freedom and independence. Through a country-by-country approach, this book explores key themes such as family media empires in Mexico, newspaper competition in Brazil, the dissemination of political agendas in Colombia’s El Espectador, and conservative media outlets in Argentina and Chile. It demonstrates the varied roles of media: businesses, societal forces, and institutions of governmental change.

Rick Rockwell is the co-author of the award-winning Media Power in Central America (University of Illinois Press, 2003).

Chris Sweeney (MSJ08)

“The Feather Detective: Mystery, Mayhem, and the Magnificent Life of Roxie Laybourne” tells the fascinating and remarkable true story of the world’s first forensic ornithologist— Roxie Laybourne, who helped solve murders, investigate airplane crashes, and break up international poaching rings using nothing more than a microscope and a few fragments of feathers. Award-winning journalist Chris Sweeney takes readers deep within the vaunted backrooms of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History to tell the story of this burgeoning science and the enigmatic woman who pioneered it.

Once divorced, once widowed, and sometimes surly, Roxie shattered stereotypes and pushed boundaries. Her story is one of persistence and grit, obsession and ingenuity. Drawing on reams of archival material, court documents, and exclusive interviews, Sweeney delivers a moving and amusing portrait of a woman who overcame cultural and scientific obstacles at every turn, forever changing our understanding of birds—and the feathers they leave behind. NPR selected it as one of its most anticipated books of summer, while Publishers Weekly described it as entrancing.

Dave Schechter (MSJ78)

“A Life of the Party” is a work of historical fiction about a Jewish woman who devoted four-plus decades of her life (1920s-50s) to the struggles of working men and women, as a member of the Communist Party. Amy Schechter’s adventures took her twice to Russia and across the United States, from strife in coal fields and textile mills, to docks and shipyards. Her name appeared in newspaper headlines during a textile strike in North Carolina and she chronicled labor issues for Communist Party and other sympathetic publications.

An FBI informant labeled Amy “a regular ten-minute egg” (as in hard-boiled). The New York Times called her “one of the most ardent among the New York radicals.” A Jewish columnist wrote that she was “one of the few genuinely idealistic Communists; she lives up to her ideals in her private life, sharing what she has with others less fortunate.”

Brian Pinkerton (MSJ90)

Everyone loves Alison, the new remote employee at a major energy company. She’s a rising star in the virtual workspace, displaying incredible intelligence and efficiency with digital technology. But Linda, her manager, has growing suspicions that Alison is not the person she claims to be. As Linda probes Alison’s background, Alison fights back through cyber-attacks, ravaging Linda’s work, her family and her safety. Linda must uncover the truth to save herself and discovers Alison’s past history is a lie – in fact, she has none. Is it possible Alison isn’t human at all?

The Perfect Stranger is a science-fiction thriller based on today’s headlines about artificial intelligence, cyberattacks and deepfakes.

Booklist, the magazine of the American Library Association, called The Perfect Stranger “terrifyingly realistic… a fast-paced, near-future, AI-horror nightmare that will chill readers to the core.”

To create a compelling and authentic backdrop, Pinkerton leveraged his experiences in corporate America witnessing the evolution of the virtual workplace and influence of artificial intelligence.

Cindy Handler (BSJ79)

When Prussian soldier Fritz Oppenheimer left the WWI battlefield with two Iron Crosses, he could never have imagined that the pinnacle of his military career would come 27 years later – as U.S. General Eisenhower’s legal aide at the Nazi surrender in Berlin, taking top Nazi leaders into captivity and interrogating Wilhelm Keitel, head of the Wehrmacht.

At a time when authoritarian movements worldwide once again threaten to gain traction, “A German Jew’s Triumph: Fritz Oppenheimer and the Denazification of Germany” is an untold David-and-Goliath story that reminds us how even in the darkest times, one individual’s efforts can help change the course of history and forge a more hopeful future.

Andrea Bartz (BSJ08, MSJ08)

When Abby sets foot on Isla Colel, she isn’t sure what—if anything—she’ll find. She only knows that she needs to see the place where her fiancée, Eszter, died to try and make sense of the tragic accident.

The island is nothing like Abby expected: Though it was once a bustling tourist hub, a hurricane has left it a shell of its former self. There, Abby befriends an alluring group of expats, but her sense of unease surges when one of them says he knows the truth about Eszter’s final days. Before he can tell her more, though, he vanishes from the island. Hours turn to days with no sign of him, and the others are chillingly cavalier about his disappearance.

As her quest for the truth unearths dark secrets, shady pasts, and a web of lies, Abby grows more determined than ever to find out what happened to the love of her life. And the deeper she gets in the close-knit expat community, the more she suspects that one of them is Eszter’s killer—and will do anything to keep the truth buried. But will Abby discover who it is before she becomes the island’s next victim?