Art collector Campolucci-Bordi debuts with a straightforward study of the printed works of street artist Banksy. Known primarily for his graffiti, Banksy began churning out screen prints in the early aughts, and the cheaply sold reproductions (that now command exorbitant prices) opened up his work “to a wider audience.” Focusing mostly on the early and mid-aughts, the book highlights his signature themes—childhood, hope, critiques of consumerism and capitalism——in screen prints, some of which feature images initially displayed elsewhere, like Girl with Balloon, Banksy’s “most iconic image,” which first appeared on a London wall in 2002 and depicts a child reaching into the wind for a heart-shaped balloon. Works first released as screen prints include 2006’s Sale Ends, which critiques the ironies of consumerism in a parodied crucifixion scene where figures bow “before a bright-red sign that reads ‘Sale Ends Today,’ ” and 2002’s Rude Copper, in which a policeman gives the viewer the middle finger. The author provides minimal analysis and only basic details about the original medium and distribution of each work, mostly allowing the striking art to speak for itself. The result is a worthwhile survey of a lesser-known element of the enigmatic artist’s oeuvre. (Nov.)

Reviewed on 09/19/2025 | Details & Permalink

Diversity, equity, and inclusion consultant Malhotra (Inclusion on Purpose) challenges the idea that competition is necessary for success in this enlightening, if overly broad, manifesto. The constant struggle to be number one at work or in life ends in isolation and anxiety, Malhotra argues, while cooperation for the greater good results in joy, peace, and community. Drawing on data, interviews with business leaders, and her own personal and professional experiences, Malhotra lays out a framework for unlearning competition and embracing an abundance mindset. She demonstrates how collaboration—collectively pooling resources and working together—benefits everyone, pointing to how the U.S. women’s soccer team came together in recent years to successfully demand pay equality with the men’s team. Elsewhere, she encourages reframing the tendency to compare oneself to others by recognizing that others are worthy and deserving of success; and pushes readers to embrace the idea that happiness is not proportional to how much they achieve in life, among other practices. Her perspective is novel and eye-opening, but at times she overreaches and loses focus, presenting her noncompetitive philosophy as a cure-all for the world’s problems. Still, this will help readers rethink the idea that life is a zero-sum game. (Nov.)

Reviewed on 09/19/2025 | Details & Permalink

Journalist and birder Goldberg debuts with a vivid account of New York City’s vast and diverse bird population. Noting that around 430 bird species have been found in New York, more than a third of the species found in the entire country, Goldberg writes, “They’re packed in just like us, shoulder to shoulder, fighting for their place here.” Over the course of four seasons, he journeys through the five boroughs to examine rare and common birds, learning how and why they make the concrete jungle their home. He details how peregrine falcons, once endangered, were bred in captivity and reintroduced to New York City in the 1980s, where they easily adapted, needing only “a tray of sand and gravel on a skyscraper ledge” to build a nest, and chronicles the story of Flaco, the Eurasian eagle-owl who fled the Central Park Zoo in 2023 and made Manhattan his home, inspiring a fandom in the process. Throughout, Goldberg captures in spirited prose the thrill of spotting a species for the first time and the dedication of volunteers who advocated for bird-safe glass in new buildings; it’s estimated that more than 230,000 birds die each year from crashing into the city’s windows. New Yorkers will be awed to learn of the wildlife that surrounds them. (Nov.)

Reviewed on 09/19/2025 | Details & Permalink

In this satisfactory true crime memoir, Sacramento District Attorney Ho recalls the search for and trial of serial killer Joseph James DeAngelo Jr. Between 1974 and 1986, DeAngelo killed at least 13 people and committed a handful of rapes and burglaries across California. Ho recounts well-known details of DeAngelo’s crimes and covers the decades-long assumption they were committed by multiple suspects, but his account foregrounds the legal proceedings, explaining the DNA technology that helped Ho and his colleagues catch DeAngelo (using samples from a 1986 rape that investigators neglected to throw out) and the logistical challenges of holding the trial during the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic. Most affecting are Ho’s interviews with DeAngelo’s surviving victims, who starkly recount their kidnappings and assaults. The autobiographical sections in which Ho discusses his path from Vietnamese war refugee to Northern California prosecutor are inspiring, but they don’t always braid together neatly with the main narrative—though his firsthand memories of ’70s and ’80s California help anchor his journalistic accounts of DeAngelo’s crimes and law enforcement’s fruitless searches for the culprit. It’s a worthwhile account of a well-covered case. (Nov.)

Reviewed on 09/19/2025 | Details & Permalink

In this edifying family history, Stainton (Staging Ground), a descendant of the Scarlett family of Georgia, examines the myths that evolved to mask the cruelty of slavery. Stainton grew up on stories about grateful servants, handsome beaus, blushing belles, fancy balls, and the unfairness of families like the Scarletts that were “good” to their slaves losing their fortunes after the Civil War. But the truth emerges as Stainton delves into the lives of her Georgia ancestors, comparing them along the way with fictitious Gone With the Wind heroine Scarlett O’Hara (who in the novel is a Scarlett on her mother’s side) and real-life heroine Fanny Kemble, a celebrated British actor who married a prominent Georgia slaveowner and published a scathing insider account of plantation life. Kemble’s diaries, among other sources, spotlight how enslaved people feigned loyalty to survive, while white masters “pretended their enslaved workers were contented” and white women “pretended the mixed-race children” on their plantations “had no connection to their husbands.” Stainton writes that “these fictions masked powerful emotions: for African Americans, rage, terror, and shame; for white Americans, fear and shame,” and she paints the Civil War as the boiling point when these emotions were unmasked. Throughout, Stainton keeps up a tangent on her research journey, including a trip to a Gone with the Wind convention. Such personal moments pull readers gracefully along this deep dive into a grim history. (Nov.)

Reviewed on 09/19/2025 | Details & Permalink

“Over the last fifteen years or so, borders have never been out of the news,” observe Papin, head of Le Monde’s infographics and cartography department, and Tertrais (War Without End), deputy director of the Foundation for Strategic Research, in their introduction to this sobering atlas. Noting that “most often, borders are drawn in blood” with only around 50 countries “created by peaceful secession,” the creatorss focus on highly contentious borders, from Kashmir’s “jigsaw of disputes” to numerous maps related to Israel, Gaza, and the Occupied West Bank. The volume does offer some more lighthearted cartographic curios (the world’s most elevated border is on Mt. Everest, between China and Nepal; for centuries, it was standard to mark a maritime border at “the maximum distance that a cannonball could be fired from the coast”) and spotlights less fraught geopolitical redefinitions (e.g., the evolution of Europe’s Schengen area). Still, it’s best at providing a unique view of current flash points and crises, from Covid and Brexit to Ukraine and Taiwan. One fascinating map spotlights the enormous increase in border walls and fences after the Cold War, from “around fifteen” in the postwar period to “more than seventy” today. This offers fine-grained cartographic context to contemporary conflicts. (Oct.)

Reviewed on 09/19/2025 | Details & Permalink

The British Army’s triumphs—and many failings—on D-Day are reexamined in this elegant account. Historian Hastings (Operation Biting) recaps the British landing at Sword Beach, several miles east of the American landing sites. He highlights some extraordinary successes: glider-borne troops crash-landed their flimsy plywood aircraft right beside key bridges and seized them from astonished Germans; innovative amphibious tanks chugged through the waves and came up shooting on the beach. But Hastings also investigates serious flaws. Commanding general Bernard Montgomery’s objective of taking the city of Caen, nine miles inland, on June 6 was too ambitious, he contends, and the general leading the push, K.P. Smith, was too feckless to carry it out. Traffic jams slowed the movement of men and tanks, and lousy radio communications left them uncertain where to go. British infantry, Hastings observes, often froze and went to ground when fired upon; indeed, he paints the typical soldier as “cautious, hesitant, slow, dilatory, fearful of loss,” and extremely reluctant to follow their officers into an attack. Hastings somewhat lamely excuses this timidity as a virtue of democratic “moderation,” with immoderate courage, daring, and self-sacrifice being too German, the product of “suicidalist” Nazi “fanaticism.” Still, with its clear-eyed eschewal of hero-worship, this makes for a rich exploration of a WWII turning point and of the complex psychology of men in battle. (Nov.)

Reviewed on 09/19/2025 | Details & Permalink

After her 23-year marriage ended, food writer Wilson (The Secret of Cooking) was doing laundry when she knocked to the ground the heart-shaped tin she’d used to bake her wedding cake, sparking her to reflect on the hopeful notion of marriage it had once—but no longer—stood for. Exploring how “kitchen objects can have a life of their own,” the author uses items ranging from a salt shaker to corkscrews to investigate impermanence, loss, and what it means to care for a loved one. In “The Kitchen Table,” Wilson mourns her marriage and the family life she and her ex-husband once shared at the dinner table (“The very wood seemed to be full of him, as if his hands had left traces on the grain”). “My Grandfather’s Teapot” finds Wilson ordering a secondhand teapot that she later discovers was designed by a long-dead grandfather to whom she’s able to feel more connected. The strongest essays center Wilson’s personal history (her divorce, her mother’s death, her children aging); less successful are pieces that revolve around objects that were meaningful to others (a pair of “very old tongs shaped like a pair of clapping hands” prized be a pie maker) or expound more conceptually on the notion of objects having special resonance. Still, this contains plenty of poignant moments. (Nov.)

Reviewed on 09/19/2025 | Details & Permalink

“For many viewers, Caesar was television,” writes The Promise and the Dream author Margolick in this lively biography of comedian Sid Caesar (1922–2014). Caesar grew up in Yonkers, N.Y., where his parents ran a struggling luncheonette and rooming house. After a boarder left behind a saxophone, he learned to play it and began performing, moving into comedy shortly after. He was “the unlikeliest of comics: introverted, ill at ease, tongue-tied,” Margolick explains, but early on, people were eager to see him first at resorts and clubs across the U.S. and then on TV. He had “a sophistication born of native intelligence and curiosity” that struck a chord with audiences, Margolick writes, and shaped a comedic style marked by humorous mannerisms, animated facial expressions, and a unique ability to produce sound effects and mimic foreign languages. In the early days of television in the 1950s, he starred in the variety program Your Show of Shows alongside Imogene Coca. With 20 million viewers tuning in weekly to watch him perform sketches and film spoofs, Caesar became “TV’s initial homegrown star.” He went on to perform in other shows like Caesar’s Hour and Sid Caesar Invites You, but ratings fell as television expanded into new markets and the audience changed. Years of doing live TV also exhausted Caesar, who dealt with alcoholism and a pill addiction. Margolick poignantly assesses the influential comic’s career, noting he was TV’s “first great victim and suffer[ed] its most precipitous fall.” Fans will be riveted. (Nov.)

Reviewed on 09/19/2025 | Details & Permalink

Oscar winner Hopkins reflects on his neuroses, addictions, and dedication to his craft in his elegant debut. After constantly struggling at school in 1940s Wales, Hopkins set out to prove to his disappointed parents that he could succeed at something. Fortunately, he had a formidable stage presence and an unstinting devotion to learning technique. Less useful were his belligerent attitude (“Shove your little play and your precious little tin-pot theater right up your stupid squeaky little crack,” he told one director) and prodigious drinking. A 1970s DUI in California finally got Hopkins into AA, but his insecurities and coldness lingered, informing his portrayals of figures like Richard Nixon and Hannibal Lecter. Hopkins’s reminiscences unfold as a series of dramatic scenes that can feel embroidered given their reliance on his memories of lengthy conversations from 70 years ago. Still, the psychological tensions they convey are convincing. His comments on how he develops roles, meanwhile, are full of astute analysis: “I would play one of the cruelest figures in Shakespeare with no trace of bad intent,” he writes of preparing to audition for the role of Iago. “Not raving but delivering a plan with straightforward logic, bringing each member of the audience, one by one, into your confidence.” The result is a rich portrait of the artist as imperfect truth-seeker. Photos. Agents: Byrd Leavell and Albert Lee, UTA. (Nov.)

Reviewed on 09/19/2025 | Details & Permalink