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History and Current Events April 2021
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| Guilty Admissions: The Bribes, Favors, and Phonies Behind the College Cheating Scandal by Nicole LaPorteWhat it is: a gossipy exposé of Operation Varsity Blues, the 2019 college admissions scandal that resulted in the arrest of actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Laughlin.
Read it for: a well-researched indictment of the toxic (and systemic) competition among the wealthy and privileged.
Try this next: Unacceptable: Privilege, Deceit & the Making of the College Admissions Scandal by Melissa Korn and Jennifer Levitz. |
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| The Daughters of Kobani: A Story of Rebellion, Courage, and Justice by Gayle Tzemach LemmonWhat it's about: the Kurdish Women's Protection Units (YPJ), an all-female militia established in 2013 to combat the Islamic State in Syria.
Don't miss: a pulse-pounding account of the Siege of Kobani; profiles of four YPJ fighters instrumental in retaking the city.
Reviewers say: "A well-told story of contemporary female warriors and the complex geopolitical realities behind their battles" (Kirkus Reviews). |
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| The Ravine: A Family, a Photograph, a Holocaust Massacre Revealed by Wendy LowerHow it began: In 2009, historian Wendy Lower saw a World War II-era photograph capturing the execution of a Ukrainian Jewish family.
What happened next: Lower spent years researching the photograph's origins and the identities of the victims, perpetrators, and photographer, constructing a compelling narrative of what happened that day.
Further reading: For another heartwrenching investigation of the atrocities committed against Ukrainian Jews during the Holocaust, check out Esther Safran Foer's memoir I Want You to Know We're Still Here. |
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Fifth Sun: a New History of the Aztecs
by Camilla Townsend
"Five hundred years ago, in November1519, Hernando Cortés walked along a causeway leading to the capital of the Aztec kingdom and came face to face with Moctezuma. That story--and the story of what happened afterwards--has been told many times, but always from the point of view of the Europeans. After all, we have been taught, it was the Europeans who held the pens. But the Native Americans were more intrigued by the Roman alphabet than the Spaniards ever knew. Unbeknownst to the newcomers, the Aztecs took it home and used it to write detailed histories in their own language of Nahuatl."--Provided by publisher
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Unscripted America: Indigenous Languages and the Origins of a Literary Nation
by Sarah Rivett
"Unscripted America is a study of how colonists in North America struggled to understand, translate, and interpret Native American languages, and the significance of these languages for theological and cosmological issues such as the origins of Amerindian populations, their relationship to Eurasian and Biblical peoples, and the origins of language itself."
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The Mysterious World of the Human Genome
by Frank Ryan
A physician, evolutionary biologist and best-selling author describes the exciting new discoveries in human genome research and explains how understanding how DNA and chemical compounds work together in our bodies can lead to a healthier future.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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