“Planets are born from the chaos of countless collisions,” Simone Marchi writes in "Colliding Worlds", which cites everything from lunar craters to gold seams as evidence of interplanetary impacts. Space rocks have not existed from... Read More

Discussions about, and popular understandings of, American Jews often belie the true diversity of the US’s community, as is evinced in "Once We Were Slaves". Laura Arnold Leibman’s biography traces a preeminent American Jewish family... Read More

Tom Nichols examines the current state and possible future of liberal democracy in "Our Own Worst Enemy". In decades past, Nichols says, democratic nations had to protect themselves from external, physical threats. But countries around... Read More

Blake Scott Ball charts the impact of the classic comic strip Peanuts on American culture, and vice versa, in Charlie Brown’s America. Peanuts is a cultural icon, but even with its sly humor inspired by changes in society, such as... Read More

Ira Nadel’s Philip Roth: A Counterlife is an intense and illuminating study of the life, times, and work of the Jewish man from Newark who became one of America’s most original and provocative writers. Nadel brings meticulous... Read More

Thomas C. Holt’s civil rights history text, "The Movement", takes care to include Black women leaders alongside its more familiar names. Beginning with 1930s and 1940s political strategizing, this book covers familiar civil rights... Read More

Discussing both problems with American health care and potential solutions, Abdul El-Sayed and Micah Johnson’s "Medicare for All" acknowledges that “health insurance doesn’t make health care affordable, and it doesn’t protect you... Read More

Of the many positive things to say about Buddhism, the most meaningful may be that Buddhists readily admit that life is very, very hard. By facing that fact head on, rather than denying or ignoring it, Buddhists can quickly get on with... Read More