A conversation with booksellers from three of the most dynamic, exciting, and community-oriented independent bookstores in the country. Lisa Swayze of Buffalo Street Books (Ithaca, NY), Michelle Malonzo of Changing Hands Bookstore (Tempe, AZ), and Alena Jones of Seminary Co-op Bookstores (Chicago, IL) join me and my special co-host, professor Kasia Bartoszynska for a roundup of their favorite books of the year, and a fascinating look into indie bookstores during the pandemic.
Books Recommended in this episode:
Lisa Swayze recommends:
- I will Die in a Foreign Land - Kalani Pickhart
- Fight Night - Miriam Toews
- My Monticello - Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
- The Prophets - Robert Jones Jr.
- The Love Songs of W.E.B. Dubois - Honoree Fanon Jeffers
- Once There Were Wolves - Charlotte McConaghy
- Open Water - Caleb Anelson
- Brother, Sister, Mother, Explorer - Figueroa
- The Sentence - Louise Erdrich
- Matrix - Lauren Groff
- What's Mine and Yours - Naima Coster
- Mystery & Romanticals:
- Arsenic and Adobo - Mia Manansala
- Payback's a Witch - Lana Harper
- One Last Stop - Casey McQuiston
- A Peculiar Combination - Ashley Weaver
- NonFiction:
- Everything I Have is Yours: a Memoir - Eleanor Henderson
- How the Word is Passed - Clint Smith
- Dear Senthuran - Awkweke Emezi
- Empire of Pain - Patrick Radden Keefe
- On Juneteenth - Annette Gordon-Reed
- Kids, Middles, YA:
- This Poison Heart - Kalynn Bayron (YA)
- Firekeeper's Daughter - Angeline Boulley (YA)
- Maya and the Robot - Eve Ewing (Mid)
- Room for Everyone - Khan/Lopez - picture
- Dumpling Day - Sriram, Antunano, Jackson - picture
- Negative Cat - Sophie Blackall – picture
Michelle Malonzo recommends:
- 808s and Otherworlds, Medlin, Sean Avery
- Ghosts, Alderton, Dolly
- Nightbitch, Yoder, Rachel
- Matrix, Groff, Lauren
- Dear Memory, Chang, Victoria
- How the Word Is Passed, Smith, Clint
- Little Devil in America, Abdurraquib, Hanif
- Tastes Like War, Cho, Grace
- My Heart Is a Chainsaw, Jones, Stephen Graham
- Crying in H Mart, Zauner, Michelle
- Dog Flowers, Geller, Danielle
- Aviary, McNamer, Deirdre
- Harlem Shuffle, Whitehead, Colson
- Borealis, Sabatini Sloan, Aisha
- Madder, Wilkinson, Marco
- Yolk, Choi, Mary HK
- Dreaming of You, Lozada-Oliva, Melissa
- Eat the Mouth That Feeds You, Fragoza, Carribean
- Gordo, Cortez, Jaime
- Wild Tongues Can't Be Tamed, Fennell, Saraciea
Alena recommends:
- The Breaks, Julietta Singh
- The Disordered Cosmos: A Journey into Dark Matter, Spacetime, and Dreams Deferred, Chanda Prescod-Weinstein
- Francis Bacon: Revelations, Mark Stevens and Annalyn Swan
- Halfway Home: Race Punishment, and the Afterlife of Mass Incarceration, Reuben Jonathan Miller
- Midnight's Borders: A People's History of Modern India, Suchitra Vijayan
- Ages of American Capitalism: A History of the United States, Jonathan Levy
- The Allure of Matter: Materiality across Chinese Art, ed. Orianna Cacchione and Wei-Cheng Lin
- Complaint!, Sara Ahmed
- Encounters with Euclid: How an Ancient Greek Geometry Text Shaped the World: Benjamin Wardhough
- Fierce Poise: Helen Frankenthaler and 1950s New York, Alexander Nemerov
- Futbol in the Park: Immigrants, Soccer, and the Creation of Social Ties, David Trouille
- The Horde: How the Mongols Changed the World, Marie Favereau
- How I Became a Tree, Sumana Roy
- King Kong Theory, Virginie Despentes
- The Library: A Fragile History, Andrew Pettegree and Arthur der Wedluwen
- Liner Notes for the Revolution: The Intellectual Life of Black Feminist Sound, Daphne A. Brooks
- Making Monsters: The Uncanny Power of Dehumanization, David Livingstone Smith
- The Subversive Simone Weil: A Life in Five Ideas, Robert Zaretsky
- Trans Medicine: The Emergence and Practice of Treating Gender, stef m. shuster
- A User's Guide to Melancholy, Mary Ann Lund
- Vera Rubin: A Life, Jaqueline and Simon Mitton
- William Greaves: Filmmaking as Mission, ed. Scott McDonald and Jacqueline Najuma Stewart
Byline: Chris Holmes is Chair of Literatures in English and Associate Professor at Ithaca College. He writes criticism on contemporary global literatures. His book, Kazuo Ishiguro as World Literature, is under contract with Bloomsbury Publishing. He is the co-director of The New Voices Festival, a celebration of work in poetry, prose, and playwriting by up-and-coming young writers.