Selected New Books in Ekstrom Library: November 2017

Poetry. Art. FINELY TUNED STATIC by Charles Borkhuis, with paintings by John McCluskey, is a distinctively braided venture: a series of calls and responses between word and image that pairs poet Charles Borkhuis' glyphic, micro- narratives with painter John McCluskey's collaged, abstract surfaces constructed from vinyl paint, torn paper and board and represented in FINELY TUNED STATIC in 12 full- color plates. Charles Borkhuis, author of nine books of poetry and a playwright, engages with painter John McCluskey's scissored abstractions as mirrored planes that calls out the splinters that poetry makes of a tale. The resultant collaboration is a dyad consisting of centrifugal impulses arrayed in language along the torn shards of McCluskey's colors and form: The "...crimson field trembling." Borkhuis declares early on and "the sentence broken off at the lip" which puts the reader/viewer on alert that this is syntax of another order. Its inscribed articulation has arisen so as to "listen for your voice in the static." What proceeds from their discourse is not a set of parallel codes but an exchange of "song of the scissors...across the jagged chasm." The poem observes "tremulous detail" within ".a wound in the pigment." FINELY TUNED STATIC offers a dynamic force and counterforce of evinced vocabularies, each rearing towards a truth, a "body held together by a thousand cuts."

Stephen is sometimes Stephanie and sometimes wonders how his past and her past are their own collective memory Advice from the Lights is a brilliant and candid exploration of gender and identity and a series of looks at a formative past. It's part nostalgia, part confusion, and part an ongoing wondering: How do any of us achieve adulthood? And why would we want to, if we had the choice? This collection is woven from and interrupted by extraordinary sequences, including Stephanie poems about Stephen's female self; poems on particular years of the poet's early life, each with its own memories, desires, insecurities, and pop songs; and versions of poems by the Greek poet Callimachus, whose present-day incarnation worries (who doesn't?) about mortality, the favor of the gods, and the career of Taylor Swift. The collection also includes poems on politics, location, and parenthood. Taken all together, this is Stephen Burt's most personal and most accomplished collection, an essential work that asks who we are, how we become ourselves, and why we make art.

Poetry. About McGriff's BLACK POSTCARDS, poet John Witte writes "these poems transpire in moonlight, bending but not breaking. Rarely has a writer so thoroughly described the abrasion of his spirit. Childhood, the homeplace, even the lover's body are drawn relentlessly into a maelstrom of injury and loss. And yet the poet is paradoxically astonished by the beauty and grandeur of this damaging life. Verging on dream, McGriff's poems in BLACK POSTCARDS achieve an authentic rural American Surrealism."

"Olstein places the mystical next to the mundane. . . . She explodes theories of cause and effect and expands our notions of logic, symbolism, and the territory between dreams and waking experience." --The Growler Poetry Review In her fourth book--a gorgeous call-to-arms in the face of our current social and political conditions--Lisa Olstein employs her signature wit, wordplay, candor, and absurdity in poems that are her most personal--and political--to date. Like a brilliant dinner conversation that ranges from animated discussions of politics, philosophy, and religion to intimate considerations of motherhood, friendship, and eros, Olstein's voice is immediately approachable yet uncomfortably at home in theAmerican empire. From "Essay Means to Try": Already during these two weeks of crying I've purchased seven books each of which felt important to own and taken one hundred and forty vitamins and filled three prescriptions, none to help with the crying. I've waited patiently or impatiently in countless lines, Whistle, sometimes crying . . . Crying is how we enter the world, Whistle. We all come by sea, we all come by storm, we all tear apart and are torn. Lisa Olstein is the author of four books of poetry and earned an MFA at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. She teaches at the Michener Center at the University of Texas and lives in Austin, Texas.

Art can't shield our bodies or stabilize the earth's climate, but Evie Shockley's semiautomatic insists that it can feed the spirit and reawaken the imagination. The volume responds primarily to the twenty-first century's inescapable evidence of the terms of black life--not so much new as newly visible. The poems trace a whole web of connections between the kinds of violence that affect people across the racial, ethnic, gender, class, sexual, national, and linguistic boundaries that do and do not divide us. How do we protect our humanity, our ability to feel deeply and think freely, in the face of a seemingly endless onslaught of physical, social, and environmental abuses? Where do we find language to describe, process, and check the attacks and injuries we see and suffer? What actions can break us out of the soul-numbing cycle of emotions, moving through outrage, mourning, and despair, again and again? In poems that span fragment to narrative and quiz to constraint, from procedure to prose and sequence to song, semiautomatic culls past and present for guides to a hoped-for future. Hardcover is un-jacketed.

Fiction. Literary Nonfiction. Hybrid Genre. THE NUT FILE captures a world desperately trying to make sense of itself, the frantic regions of lives lived, including that of the author, whose portrait is drawn by the selection and composition of the assembled stories. Comprised of original as well as appropriated material -- obituaries, academic emails, private notes, micro-fictions, literary excerpts, weird memos, police logs, hard news, dear Johns and autobiographical confessions -- the entries range from the absurd to the grave, from the ambiguous to the bombastic, from the ironic to the tragi-comic. Patti Smith at Allen Ginsberg's deathbed, a portrait of the founder of One Finger Zen, a Joyce scholar gone mad, tabloid headlines announcing the deaths of Papa Wallenda and Brendan Behan, Chinese proverbs, stories of escaped murderers, cruel nuns and customer experiences at the Cuddle and Bubble spa on Valentine's Day are all glimpsed in THE NUT FILE. Many voices speak throughout this collection: those of friends, relatives and strangers. Some stories and anecdotes come directly from Jimmy Cannon, Truman Capote, Harold Clurman, Isaac Dinesan, Jim Harrison, Vladimir Nabokov, Georges Perec, and Mary Heaton Vorse, among others.

Miriam Makeba, a Grammy Award-winning South African singer, rose to fame in the hearts of her people at the pinnacle of apartheid--a brutal system of segregation similar to American Jim Crow laws. Mama Africa, as they called her, raised her voice to help combat these injustices at jazz clubs in Johannesburg; in exile, at a rally beside Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.; and before the United Nations. Set defiantly in the present tense, this biography offers readers an intimate view of Makeba's fight for equality. Kathryn Erskine's call-and-response style text and Charly Palmer's bold illustrations come together in a raw, riveting duet of protest song and praise poem. A testament to how a single voice helped to shake up the world--and can continue to do so.

"Dream Variation," one of Langston Hughes's most celebrated poems, about the dream of a world free of discrimination and racial prejudice, is now a picture book stunningly illustrated by Daniel Miyares, the acclaimed creator of Float. To fling my arms wide In some place of the sun, To whirl and to dance Till the white day is done.... Langston Hughes's inspiring and timeless message of pride, joy, and the dream of a better life is brilliantly and beautifully interpreted in Daniel Miyares's gorgeous artwork.   Follow one African-American boy through the course of his day as the harsh reality of segregation and racial prejudice comes into vivid focus. But the boy dreams of a different life--one full of freedom, hope, and wild possibility, where he can fling his arms wide in the face of the sun. Hughes's powerful vision, brought joyously to life by Daniel Miyares, is as relevant--and necessary--today as when it was first written.

Beautifully illustrated and told by debut author Julie Kim, this picture book in a graphic-novel style follows a young Korean girl and boy whose search for their missing grandmother leads them into a world inspired by Korean folklore, complete with mischievous goblins (dokkebi), a greedy tiger, a clever rabbit, and a wily fox.   Two young children pay a visit to Halmoni (grandmother in Korean), only to discover she's not home. As they search for her, noticing animal tracks covering the floor, they discover a window, slightly ajar, new to their grandmother's home.  Their curiosity gets the best of them, and they crawl through and discover an unfamiliar fantastical world, and their adventure begins.  As they continue to search for their grandmother and solve the mystery of the tracks, they go deeper into a world of Korean folklore, meeting a number of characters who speak in Korean along the way, and learn more about their cultural heritage.    This beautifully illustrated graphic picture book is filled with a number of Easter eggs for readers of all ages to discover, and is inspired by the Korean folktales that author and illustrator Julie Kim heard while growing up. Translations to Korean text in the story and more about the folktale-inspired characters are included at the end.

A New York Times Book Review Notable Book of 2017 "An addictive, sprawling epic; I wolfed it down." --Miranda July, author of The First Bad Man and It Chooses You  "Easily the funniest book I've read this year." --GQ A portrait of the artist as a young woman. A novel about not just discovering but inventing oneself. The year is 1995, and email is new. Selin, the daughter of Turkish immigrants, arrives for her freshman year at Harvard. She signs up for classes in subjects she has never heard of, befriends her charismatic and worldly Serbian classmate, Svetlana, and, almost by accident, begins corresponding with Ivan, an older mathematics student from Hungary. Selin may have barely spoken to Ivan, but with each email they exchange, the act of writing seems to take on new and increasingly mysterious meanings.    At the end of the school year, Ivan goes to Budapest for the summer, and Selin heads to the Hungarian countryside, to teach English in a program run by one of Ivan's friends. On the way, she spends two weeks visiting Paris with Svetlana. Selin's summer in Europe does not resonate with anything she has previously heard about the typical experiences of American college students, or indeed of any other kinds of people. For Selin, this is a journey further inside herself: a coming to grips with the ineffable and exhilarating confusion of first love, and with the growing consciousness that she is doomed to become a writer. With superlative emotional and intellectual sensitivity, mordant wit, and pitch-perfect style, Batuman dramatizes the uncertainty of life on the cusp of adulthood. Her prose is a rare and inimitable combination of tenderness and wisdom; its logic as natural and inscrutable as that of memory itself. The Idiot is a heroic yet self-effacing reckoning with the terror and joy of becoming a person in a world that is as intoxicating as it is disquieting. Batuman's fiction is unguarded against both life's affronts and its beauty--and has at its command the complete range of thinking and feeling which they entail. The Idiot is the perfect gift for the holidays!

INSTANT #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From the legendary #1 New York Times bestselling author of Plum Island and Night Fall, Nelson DeMille's blistering new novel features an exciting new character--U.S. Army combat veteran Daniel "Mac" MacCormick, now a charter boat captain, who is about to set sail on his most dangerous cruise. Daniel Graham MacCormick--Mac for short--seems to have a pretty good life. At age thirty-five he's living in Key West, owner of a forty-two-foot charter fishing boat, The Maine. Mac served five years in the Army as an infantry officer with two tours in Afghanistan. He returned with the Silver Star, two Purple Hearts, scars that don't tan, and a boat with a big bank loan. Truth be told, Mac's finances are more than a little shaky. One day, Mac is sitting in the famous Green Parrot Bar in Key West, contemplating his life, and waiting for Carlos, a hotshot Miami lawyer heavily involved with anti-Castro groups. Carlos wants to hire Mac and The Maine for a ten-day fishing tournament to Cuba at the standard rate, but Mac suspects there is more to this and turns it down. The price then goes up to two million dollars, and Mac agrees to hear the deal, and meet Carlos's clients--a beautiful Cuban-American woman named Sara Ortega, and a mysterious older Cuban exile, Eduardo Valazquez. What Mac learns is that there is sixty million American dollars hidden in Cuba by Sara's grandfather when he fled Castro's revolution. With the "Cuban Thaw" underway between Havana and Washington, Carlos, Eduardo, and Sara know it's only a matter of time before someone finds the stash--by accident or on purpose. And Mac knows if he accepts this job, he'll walk away rich...or not at all. Brilliantly written, with his signature humor, fascinating authenticity from his research trip to Cuba, and heart-pounding pace, Nelson DeMille is a true master of the genre.

". . .a setting and plot that would make Agatha Christie herself sit up and take notice." --RT Book Reviews A mysterious invitation to spend Christmas at an English manor home may bring danger...and love? England, 1851: When Clara Chapman receives an intriguing invitation to spend Christmas at an English manor home, she is hesitant yet feels compelled to attend--for if she remains the duration of the twelve-day celebration, she is promised a sum of five hundred pounds. But is she walking into danger? It appears so, especially when she comes face to face with one of the other guests--her former fianc#65533;, Benjamin Lane. Imprisoned unjustly, Ben wants revenge on whoever stole his honor. When he's given the chance to gain his freedom, he jumps at it--and is faced with the anger of the woman he stood up at the altar. Brought together under mysterious circumstances, Clara and Ben discover that what they've been striving for isn't what ultimately matters. What matters most is what Christmas is all about . . . love. Pour a cup of tea and settle in for Book 1 of the Once Upon a Dickens Christmas series--a page-turning Victorian-era holiday tale--by Michelle Griep, a reader and critic favorite.

J. P. Beaumont's latest investigation strikes too close to home in this riveting mystery from New York Times bestselling author J. A. Jance. Be careful what you wish for . . . Before he retired, J. P. Beaumont had looked forward to having his days all to himself. But too much free time doesn't suit a man used to brushing close to danger. When his longtime nemesis, retired Seattle crime reporter Maxwell Cole, dies in what's officially deemed to be an accidental fire, Beau is astonished to be dragged into the investigation at the request of none other than the deceased victim himself. In the process Beau learns that just because a long-ago case was solved doesn't mean it's over. Caught up in a situation where old actions and grudges can hold dangerous consequences in the present, Beau is forced to operate outside the familiar world of law enforcement. While seeking justice for his frenemy and healing for a long fractured family, he comes face to face with an implacable enemy who has spent decades hiding in plain sight.

Literary Nonfiction. This is a book with essays and pictures in it. It's also a way to learn more about: a year long van ride through Africa, ice guiding in Alaska, dancing to Guns n' Roses cover bands in India, drunken bee stings, the snack food known as Uncrustables, the shadow created by shipwrecked cargo ships and other notes on travel, race, heartbreak, movement, stillness.

From the author of the Booker Prize winning Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, a bold, haunting novel about the uncertainty of memory and how we contend with the past. "It's his bravest novel yet; it's also, by far, his best." -- npr.org "The closest thing he's written to a psychological thriller."- The New York Times Book Review Just moved into a new apartment, alone for the first time in years, Victor Forde goes every evening to Donnelly's for a pint, a slow one. One evening his drink is interrupted. A man in shorts and a pink shirt comes over and sits down. He seems to know Victor's name and to remember him from secondary school. His name is Fitzpatrick. Victor dislikes him on sight, dislikes, too, the memories that Fitzpatrick stirs up of five years being taught by the Christian Brothers. He prompts other memories--of Rachel, his beautiful wife who became a celebrity, and of Victor's own small claim to fame, as the man who would say the unsayable on the radio. But it's the memories of school, and of one particular brother, that Victor cannot control and which eventually threaten to destroy his sanity. Smile has all the features for which Roddy Doyle has become famous: the razor-sharp dialogue, the humor, the superb evocation of adolescence, but this is a novel unlike any he has written before. When you finish the last page you will have been challenged to reevaluate everything you think you remember so clearly.

The crucial sequel to theNew York Times bestsellingThe Secret History of Twin Peaks, this novel bridges the two series, and takes you deeper into the mysteries raised by the new series. The return ofTwin Peaks is one of the most anticipated events in the history of television. The subject of endless speculation, shrouded in mystery, fans will come flocking to see Mark Frost and David Lynch's inimitable vision once again grace the screen. Featuring all the characters we know and love from the first series, as well as a list of high-powered actors in new roles, the show will be endlessly debated, discussed, and dissected. WhileThe Secret History of Twin Peaks served to expand the mysteries of the town and place the unexplained phenomena that unfolded there into a vastly layered, wide-ranging history,Twin Peaks: The Final Dossier tells us what happened to key characters in the twenty-five years in between the events of the first series and the second, offering details and insights fans will be clamoring for. The novel also adds context and commentary to the strange and cosmic happenings of the new series. For fans around the world begging for more, Mark Frost's final take laid out in this novel will be required reading.

A hyper-fast quantum computer is the digital equivalent of a nuclear bomb; whoever possesses one will be able to shred any encryption and break any code in existence. The winner of the race to build the world's first quantum machine will attain global dominance for generations to come. The question is, who will cross the finish line first: the U.S. or China?In this gripping cyber thriller, the United States' top-secret quantum research labs are compromised by a suspected Chinese informant, inciting a mole hunt of history-altering proportions. CIA officer Harris Chang leads the charge, pursuing his target from the towering cityscape of Singapore to the lush hills of the Pacific Northwest, the mountains of Mexico, and beyond. The investigation is obsessive, destructive, and--above all--uncertain. Do the leaks expose real secrets, or are they false trails meant to deceive the Chinese? The answer forces Chang to question everything he thought he knew about loyalty, morality, and the primacy of truth.Grounded in the real-world technological arms race, The Quantum Spy presents a sophisticated game of cat and mouse cloaked in an exhilarating and visionary thriller.

NATIONAL BEST SELLER A stunning, personal memoir from the astronaut and modern-day hero who spent a record-breaking year aboard the International Space Station--a message of hope for the future that will inspire for generations to come. The veteran of four spaceflights and the American record holder for consecutive days spent in space, Scott Kelly has experienced things very few have. Now, he takes us inside a sphere utterly hostile to human life. He describes navigating the extreme challenge of long-term spaceflight, both life-threatening and mundane: the devastating effects on the body; the isolation from everyone he loves and the comforts of Earth; the catastrophic risks of colliding with space junk; and the still more haunting threat of being unable to help should tragedy strike at home--an agonizing situation Kelly faced when, on a previous mission, his twin brother's wife, American Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, was shot while he still had two months in space.      Kelly's humanity, compassion, humor, and determination resonate throughout, as he recalls his rough-and-tumble New Jersey childhood and the youthful inspiration that sparked his astounding career, and as he makes clear his belief that Mars will be the next, ultimately challenging, step in spaceflight.      In Endurance, we see the triumph of the human imagination, the strength of the human will, and the infinite wonder of the galaxy.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER "Prodigiously researched and engrossing."---New York Times Book Review "Fascinating.... Addictively readable."---Boston Globe "Code Girls reveals a hidden army of female cryptographers, whose work played a crucial role in ending World War II.... Mundy has rescued a piece of forgotten history, and given these American heroes the recognition they deserve."---Nathalia Holt, bestselling author of Rise of the Rocket Girls Recruited by the U.S. Army and Navy from small towns and elite colleges, more than ten thousand women served as codebreakers during World War II. While their brothers and boyfriends took up arms, these women moved to Washington and learned the meticulous work of code-breaking. Their efforts shortened the war, saved countless lives, and gave them access to careers previously denied to them. A strict vow of secrecy nearly erased their efforts from history; now, through dazzling research and interviews with surviving code girls, bestselling author Liza Mundy brings to life this riveting and vital story of American courage, service, and scientific accomplishment.

'Tis the season of giving--and with this wonderful book, New York Times bestselling author Anne Perry shares a brand-new holiday mystery filled with bygone relationships and hidden secrets. As Charlotte Pitt's grandmother Mariah Ellison finds herself investigating a long-unsolved slaying, it becomes clear that grappling with intrigue and foul play runs in the family. A festive Christmas package left on Mariah's doorstep contains an ominous present, sparking memories of a twenty-year-old murder that shattered her friendship with the victim's widow. Though the gift is a bitter reminder of that tragic time, in the spirit of the season Mariah travels to Surrey in hopes of reconciling with her estranged friend and solving the crime that drove them apart.  On arrival, Mariah joins forces with the murdered man's grandson, a sleuth in his own right who's discovered promising evidence as well as a suspect. But Surrey's picturesque hills conceal dark doings and shocking revelations that could make the holiday anything but calm and bright. Decked with intrigue and trimmed with Yuletide spirit, A Christmas Return is a holiday treat wrapped in the glorious storytelling talents of the reigning master of Victorian mystery. Praise for A Christmas Return "This compact little gem, [Anne] Perry's fifteenth Christmas novella, demonstrates her proficiency in writing Victorian-set mysteries. . . . The atmosphere of close-knit village life in the 1890s feels pitch-perfect, from the homeliness of residents' holiday decor to the gossip that spreads like a dreadful stain. The characterization is superb, and the work's short length is perfect for the material. The spirit of the Christmas season is cleverly evoked through the underlying theme that it's never too late for reconciliations and second chances."--Historical Novels Review (Editors' Choice)   "Perry's many fans will enjoy another winning Victorian-era mystery set during the holidays."--Library Journal   "Exceptional . . . Perry unobtrusively incorporates insights about the true meaning of the season into the engrossing plot."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Bourbon whiskey is a distinctly American product with its roots planted deep in the limestone-enriched soil of Kentucky. The Kentucky Bourbon Trail is an attraction that celebrates the heritage of Kentucky bourbon, bringing to life the people, places, and events that signify the bourbon industry. Today the Kentucky Bourbon Trail includes eight distilleries in the Bluegrass State, some of whose brands and bourbon-making secrets are more than 200 years old. Along the trail, tour guides and distillery exhibits offer visitors a variety of interesting facts. For examples, a "whiskey thief" is not what it sounds like and a Baptist minister was one of the first people to make bourbon. Collected from the Kentucky Historical Society, various distilleries on the Kentucky Bourbon Trail, and private family collections, the fascinating photographs in Images of America: The Kentucky Bourbon Trail offer readers a look back at the pioneers of bourbon, the legendary distilleries that have come and gone, and the history of those brands that carry on the craft today.

When the Emancipation Proclamation was signed in 1863, the black community owned less than one percent of the United States' total wealth. More than 150 years later, that number has barely budged. The Color of Money pursues the persistence of this racial wealth gap by focusing on the generators of wealth in the black community: black banks. Studying these institutions over time, Mehrsa Baradaran challenges the myth that black communities could ever accumulate wealth in a segregated economy. Instead, housing segregation, racism, and Jim Crow credit policies created an inescapable, but hard to detect, economic trap for black communities and their banks. The catch-22 of black banking is that the very institutions needed to help communities escape the deep poverty caused by discrimination and segregation inevitably became victims of that same poverty. Not only could black banks not "control the black dollar" due to the dynamics of bank depositing and lending but they drained black capital into white banks, leaving the black economy with the scraps. Baradaran challenges the long-standing notion that black banking and community self-help is the solution to the racial wealth gap. These initiatives have functioned as a potent political decoy to avoid more fundamental reforms and racial redress. Examining the fruits of past policies and the operation of banking in a segregated economy, she makes clear that only bolder, more realistic views of banking's relation to black communities will end the cycle of poverty and promote black wealth.

If the conscious mind--the part you consider to be you--is just the tip of the iceberg, what is the rest doing?   In this sparkling and provocative book, renowned neuroscientist David Eagleman navigates the depths of the subconscious brain to illuminate its surprising mysteries. Why can your foot move halfway to the brake pedal before you become consciously aware of danger ahead? Is there a true Mel Gibson? How is your brain like a conflicted democracy engaged in civil war? What do Odysseus and the subprime mortgage meltdown have in common? Why are people whose names begin with J more like to marry other people whose names begin with J? And why is it so difficult to keep a secret?   Taking in brain damage, plane spotting, dating, drugs, beauty, infidelity, synesthesia, criminal law, artificial intelligence, and visual illusions, Incognito is a thrilling subsurface exploration of the mind and all its contradictions.

Did mushroom tea kick-start ancient Greek philosophy? Was Alice's Adventures in Wonderland a thinly veiled psychedelic mushroom odyssey? Is Santa Claus really a magic mushroom in disguise? The world of the magic mushroom is a place where shamans and hippies rub shoulders with psychiatrists, poets, and international bankers. Since its rediscovery only fifty years ago, this hallucinogenic fungus, once shunned in the West as the most pernicious of poisons, has inspired a plethora of folktales and urban legends. In this timely and definitive study, Andy Letcher chronicles the history of the magic mushroom--from its use by the Aztecs of Central America and the tribes of Siberia through to the present day--stripping away the myths and taking a critical and humorous look at the drug's more recent manifestations. Informative, lively, and impeccably researched, Shroom is a unique and engaging exploration of this most extraordinary of psychedelics.

'As a man loved a woman, that was how I loved...It was good, good, good...' Stephen is an ideal child of aristocratic parents - a fencer, a horse rider and a keen scholar. Stephen grows to be a war hero, a bestselling writer and a loyal, protective lover. But Stephen is a woman, and her lovers are women. As her ambitions drive her, and society confines her, Stephen is forced into desperate actions. The Well of Lonelinesswas banned for obscenity when published in 1928. It became an international bestseller, and for decades was the single most famous lesbian novel. It has influenced how love between women is understood, for the twentieth century and beyond.

For over thirty years, News: The Politics of Illusion has not simply reflected the political communication field--it has played a major role in shaping it. Today, the familiar news organizations of the legacy press are operating in a fragmenting and expanding mediaverse that resembles a big bang of proliferating online competitors that are challenging the very definition of news itself. Audience-powered sites such as the Huffington Post and Vox blend conventional political reporting with opinion blogs, celebrity gossip, and other ephemera aimed at getting clicks and shares. At the same time, the rise of serious investigative organizations such as ProPublica presents yet a different challenge to legacy journalism. Lance Bennett's thoroughly revised tenth edition offers the most up-to-date guide to understanding how and why the media and news landscapes are being transformed. It explains the mix of old and new, and points to possible outcomes. Where areas of change are clearly established, key concepts from earlier editions have been revised. There are new case studies, updates on old favorites, and insightful analyses of how the new media system and novel kinds of information and engagement are affecting our politics. As always, News presents fresh evidence and arguments that invite new ways of thinking about the political information system and its place in democracy.  

Amid the hand-wringing over the death of "true journalism" in the Internet Age-the din of bloggers, the echo chamber of Twitter, the predominance of Wikipedia-veteran journalists and media critics Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel have written a pragmatic guide to navigating the twenty-first century media terrain. Yes, old authorities are being dismantled, new ones created, and the very nature of knowledge has changed. But seeking the truth remains the purpose of journalism. How do we discern what is reliable?Blur provides a road map, or more specifically, reveals the craft that has been used in newsrooms by the very best journalists for getting at the truth. In an age when the line between citizen and journalist is becoming increasingly unclear,Blur is a crucial guide for those who want to know what's true.