Did you know that Cornell has an online book club? Check it out!<\/a> <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n And for more books by Big Red authors, peruse our previous round-ups<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Susie Luo, JD \u201914<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Unfolding in New York and China over the course of three decades, Luo\u2019s debut novel<\/a> involves two families whose lives ultimately intertwine after a violent incident.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Told in alternating perspective and starting in 1997, the plot follows three main characters: a Chinese-born engineer who emigrates to the U.S. and takes a job as a doorman at an upscale NYC apartment building; his young daughter, who grows to adulthood as the book unfolds; and a wealthy white lawyer who lives in the building.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Kirkus<\/em> calls the book\u2014which Luo wrote<\/a> at night while working in investment banking\u2014\u201can entertaining and touching debut from a new voice in Chinese American literature,\u201d noting that \u201cthe plot is propulsive, prompting the reader to keep turning the pages, and the novel as a whole is undeniably enjoyable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mari Crabtree, PhD \u201914<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Crabtree\u2019s nonfiction book<\/a> explores the enduring cultural and psychological impacts of historical lynchings on communities in the South.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cShe unearths how African American victims and survivors found ways to live through and beyond the horrors of lynching,\u201d says the publisher, Yale University Press, \u201coffering a theory of African American collective trauma and memory rooted in the ironic spirit of the blues sensibility\u2014a spirit of misdirection and cunning that blends joy and pain.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div> A scholar and essayist who earned a doctorate in history on the Hill, Crabtree is an associate professor<\/a> of African American studies at South Carolina\u2019s College of Charleston.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSurvivors of lynching were often haunted by traumatic memories that, like ghosts, refused to leave them in peace, but they also sometimes passed on stories about the vengeful ghosts of lynching victims to their families and friends,\u201d Crabtree writes in the introduction. \u201cTo express their disgust with members of lynch mobs who evaded legal justice, they spoke of deathbed confessions made by lynchers tormented by their past.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Alejandro Varela \u201901<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n This collection of 13 interconnected stories<\/a>\u2014which the New York Times<\/em> calls a \u201cmaster class in analyzing the unspoken\u201d\u2014comes from the author<\/a> of the critically acclaimed 2022 novel The Town of Babylon<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Publishers Weekly<\/em> lauds the volume as a \u201csearing collection about gentrification, racism, and sexuality\u201d\u2014comprising tales of Latinx characters confronting bias (unconscious and otherwise) in a variety of settings, from therapy to taxi rides to playdates to rapidly changing neighborhoods.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n \u201cAlejandro Varela is a singular voice,\u201d the Chicago Review of Books<\/em> says of the former government major, \u201ca brilliant fiction writer whose work is wholly original, managing to be both important and completely entertaining.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Varela\u2019s The Town of Babylon<\/em> was named to several best-of lists and was a finalist for the National Book Award.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Peter Fortunato \u201972<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Fortunato\u2019s memoir<\/a>, subtitled My Life in Qatar<\/em>, was published by Cayuga Lake Books, a small press based in the Ithaca area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In it, he describes the time he spent in the Persian Gulf nation while teaching English at Weill Cornell Medicine\u2019s then-newly established branch in Doha, just as Qatar was beginning to take a more prominent role on the world stage. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The experience was informed by the fact that Fortunato is a practicing Buddhist, while the emirate is Muslim.<\/p>\n<\/div> \u00a0\u201cThis surely was a transformational time for a traditional Islamic people,\u201d he writes, \u201cand I too was at a crossroads in my life, both personally and professionally.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fortunato\u2014a poet and artist<\/a> who is also a certified hypnotherapist and an ordained minister who practices what he calls \u201c21st-century shamanism\u201d\u2014is also the author of the novel Carnevale<\/em>, set in the Hudson Valley starting in the 1960s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Peter Bamberger \u201982, PhD \u201990<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Published by Oxford University Press, this nonfiction book<\/a> addresses \u201cpay transparency\u201d\u2014the increasingly popular concept that employers and their workers should openly discuss compensation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u00a0\u201cPay equity has become a hot topic in recent years, with pay transparency viewed as an important way to narrow gender and racial pay gaps,\u201d notes the publisher. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHowever, pay transparency policies and practices remain highly controversial, with divergent attitudes based largely on conjecture or anecdote.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Bamberger covers such topics as the history of communication about pay, employee attitudes on the subject, the potential impacts of salary transparency on companies, and how shifting to more transparent practices could affect society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An undergrad and doctoral alum of ILR, Bamberger<\/a> is research director of its Smithers Institute, as well as the Domberger Professor of Management at Tel Aviv University\u2019s Coller School of Management.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thea Brown \u201904<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn Loner Forensics<\/em>, Thea Brown dreams up and dissects a city beset by unexplained disappearances, roving silences, and climate collapse,\u201d says the publisher, Northwestern University Press. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The volume<\/a> is the latest poetry collection from Brown, a former philosophy major on the Hill who\u2019s based in Baltimore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A past Truman Capote Fellow at the Iowa Writers\u2019 Workshop, Brown<\/a> previously published the chapbook We Are Fantastic<\/em> and the poetry collections Think of the Danger<\/em> and Famous Times<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n<\/div> Her third collection, the publisher says, \u201cdraws on parallel universes, 1980s video games, social media pop-speak, and ghost towns to immerse the reader in grief, utopia, disaster\u2014and, ultimately, love.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n As she writes in a poem titled \u201cHead South, Catafalque\u201d: \u201cA bell tower centers the glaring city, \/ beacon for ghosts stirring through. \/ What etiquette, reflection? Some \/ disappearance and the parks grow on, \/ filling skeletal vacants with new \/ cycling sprouts, hopeful in a last \/ warm gasp. All seasons at once, daily, \/ nightly, the silence, the noise.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Nihar Suthar \u201916<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Suthar\u2019s book<\/a> is subtitled How a Group of Young Kenyans Fought to Transform Their Slum and Inspire a Community<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In what Kirkus<\/em> calls an \u201ceye-opening account of undeterred resilience and hard-won triumph,\u201d he chronicles the lives of three people from the desperately poor Korogocho neighborhood of Nairobi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Two are boys who form a group (called the Hope Raisers) to help their peers to aspire to a better life; the third is a girl who rebels against societal pressure to marry young and is determined to pursue her dreams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n \u201cSuthar\u2019s storytelling doesn\u2019t sensationalize poverty, and it highlights the value of change that originates within communities,\u201d says Kirkus<\/em>. \u201cHe clearly respects his subjects.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Suthar\u2014a CALS alum who describes himself as an \u201cinspirational storyteller<\/a>\u201d\u2014previously penned Win No Matter What: A Guide to Hyping Up Your Life<\/em> and The Corridor of Uncertainty: How Cricket Mended a Torn Nation<\/em>. Part of the proceeds from sales of his new book benefit the Hope Raisers group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/paper-names-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>Paper Names<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nMy Soul Is a Witness<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/Crabtree-Book-Cover-Final-A.jpg\")
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\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/more-stress-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>The People Who Report More Stress<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nDesert Wind<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/Desert-Wind-cover-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/Exposing-Pay-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>Exposing Pay<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nLoner Forensics<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/Thea-Brown_Loner-Forensics-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/05\/hope-raisers-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>The Hope Raisers<\/h2>\n\n\n\n