For more titles by Big Red authors, peruse our previous round-ups<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Have you published a book you’d like to submit? Scroll down for details!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n And did you know that Cornell has an online book club? Check it out!<\/a> <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Alejandro Varela \u201901<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe novel explores the beautiful complexity of unorthodox, progressive family dynamics with tenderness and humor in equal measure,\u201d says Kirkus<\/em>, calling Varela\u2019s work<\/a> a \u201ctouching yet provocative queer love story about defying societal expectations.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The story unfolds as a series of letters from a heartbroken man to the former lover who recently dumped him. As the reader soon realizes, the narrator\u2019s situation defies assumptions: he\u2019s married to a loving husband, has two children, and enjoys vibrant social and professional lives.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n But he\u2019s been devastated by the end of a polyamorous relationship with a younger man, and is penning the letters as a coping mechanism at the behest of his therapist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis isn\u2019t the sort of connection easily erased in anything less than an indefinite period of time,\u201d he writes to his ex. \u201cI don\u2019t foresee a shortcut to forgetting you, and I don\u2019t know how to begin again without first forgetting you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Varela\u2019s<\/a> debut novel, The Town of Babylon<\/em>, was a finalist for the National Book Award; Publishers Weekly<\/em> named his short story collection, The People Who Report More Stress<\/em>, one of 2023\u2019s top works of fiction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Linda Rhodes, PhD \u201988<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn the late 1970s the golden valley between Utah\u2019s Wasatch Mountains was home to some of the best dairies in the country,\u201d states the publisher, the University of Nevada Press. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat was also where Linda Rhodes, a newly minted large-animal veterinarian, had to prove that a woman could do what the Mormon dairymen were sure was a man\u2019s job. She was often scared that they were right.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Rhodes\u2019s memoir<\/a> recalls her barrier-breaking career as a female vet in what was then a heavily male profession. <\/p>\n<\/div> The book received a blurb from Dr. Katherine Houpt, a professor emerita in CVM, who calls it a \u201cfascinating account\u201d of Rhodes\u2019s early trials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cCattle medicine is difficult because the animals are large, not always cooperative, and given to calving in the middle of the night,\u201d Houpt observes. \u201cStruggling with cold, exhaustion, and the hostility of the farmers was a challenge\u2014but a challenge Dr. Linda Rhodes was up to.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n In addition to her PhD in physiology from CVM, Rhodes holds<\/a> a veterinary degree from Penn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Will Dickerson \u201980, PhD \u201992<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Dickerson\u2014who earned a master\u2019s of divinity degree from Princeton as well as a doctorate in medieval history from Cornell\u2014is a pastor<\/a> who spent more than three decades with One Mission Hungary, a nonprofit based in Budapest, where he also taught English at a secondary school.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He previously penned The Fingerprint of God: Reflections on Love and Its Practice<\/em>. His latest work<\/a> is described as \u201cnot a self-help book\u201d in the struggle against the anxiety of the modern age, but rather a guidebook toward shalom<\/em>, the Hebrew word for peace.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cPeople spend their lives serving various idols, the most popular of which is Mammon [material wealth],\u201d says the publisher, Wipf and Stock.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey nurture their grudges, refuse to forgive, and live in the rubble of broken relationships. Some of those who consider themselves Christians, instead of serving as ministers of reconciliation, enlist as soldiers in the culture wars and end up fighting the wrong battles with the wrong weapons. Many people, therefore, live in a state of war.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jennifer Ng Chow \u201901<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The mystery novel is the third entry<\/a> in Chow\u2019s series about a woman named Felicity, who runs a magical bakery whose products have fantastical properties. This time, a woman visiting a local inn with a reunion group of high school friends drowns after eating one of Felicity\u2019s enchanted almond cookies, one of her new recipes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Is it somehow her fault? Or can she\u2014with the help of her boyfriend and a magical bunny named Whiskers\u2014solve the case and discover who\u2019s really to blame?<\/p>\n\n\n\n The \u201cMagical Fortune Cookie\u201d series is Chow\u2019s third in the cozy mystery genre featuring Asian cultural themes and protagonists.<\/p>\n<\/div> The CALS alum<\/a> has also penned the \u201cSassy Cat\u201d series, featuring heroine Mimi Lee and her talking kitty, and the \u201cL.A. Night Market\u201d series, about two cousins who solve crimes while running a food stall. Her other work includes YA novels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Shirley Samuels<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Samuels is the Litwin Professor of American Studies<\/a> on the Hill. Her latest nonfiction book<\/a>, from Princeton University Press, is subtitled Cultural Testimony in the Nineteenth-Century United States<\/em>. In it, she studies the work of the era\u2019s leading authors, artists, and others to explore why the Civil War continues to haunt America.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As she puts it in the introduction: \u201cIn other words, why does a series of often inchoate battles fought more than 160 years ago continue to be debated as though the victory or the loss contained something like the soul of the country?\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Samuels mines answers in the works of writers like Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Herman Melville, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman; statesmen including Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass; the paintings of Winslow Homer; early photography; and illustrations in news media of the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Paul Eastwick \u201901<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Subtitled The New Science of Love and Connection<\/em>, this nonfiction work<\/a> by a professor<\/a> at the University of California, Davis, parses psychology research for a general audience, with some self-help lessons woven in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Part of Eastwick\u2019s mission is to challenge decades-old findings in the field of evolutionary psych that cast heterosexual dating and mating in a Darwinian light: that men are from Mars, women are from Venus, and romance is a zero-sum game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n<\/div> Such notions aren\u2019t just unproductive, the Arts & Sciences alum argues<\/a>\u2014they have been hijacked by an incel culture and a \u201cmanosphere\u201d that promotes misogyny and even violence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis book is for anyone who has felt that this popular scientific story of human mating is bleak\u2014that if you look at it too directly or internalize it too deeply, you could become overwhelmed with cynicism and quit the whole gross spectacle,\u201d he writes in the preface.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn fact, the evolutionary psychological narrative is warped and distorted. There is a more optimistic, more interesting, and more accurate relational evolutionary story that connects the scientific facts. The real story is about how people evolved to form emotionally meaningful attachment bonds with each other, and how satisfying relationships stem from close interpersonal attunement and compatibility.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hilary Holbrow, PhD \u201917<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Holbrow, who earned a doctorate in sociology on the Hill, is an assistant professor<\/a> of Japanese politics and society at Indiana University, Bloomington. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Her nonfiction work<\/a> delves into how Japanese companies are coping with the steep decline in the nation\u2019s native-born population, and the impacts of those efforts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She argues that although labor shortages are inducing firms to hire more immigrants and women, not all employees benefit equally from the shift.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cJapanese women\u2019s enduring overrepresentation in low-status clerical roles reinforces gender biases that hold all women back,\u201d says the publisher, Cornell University Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn contrast, the small but growing presence of white-collar Asian immigrant workers weakens the ethnic prejudices of their Japanese colleagues. Despite Japan\u2019s reputation for xenophobia, white-collar immigrant men disproportionally reap the dividends of Japan\u2019s shrinking population.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n To submit your book for consideration, email cornellians@cornell.edu<\/a>. Please note that to be included, books must be recently published by a conventional publisher<\/strong>\u2014not self published, pay-to-publish, publish on demand, partner-published, or similar\u2014and be of interest to a general audience. Books not featured will be forwarded to Class Notes<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Published March 9, 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n This month\u2019s featured titles include novels, a memoir by a pioneering veterinarian, and a Christian work on inner peace<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":68,"featured_media":1318,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"alumni_hub_syml_posts":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[644],"tags":[],"cornell_year_post":[],"post_folder":[],"class_list":["post-68379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/03\/middle-spoon-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>Middle Spoon<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nBreaking the Barnyard Barrier<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/03\/breaking-barnyard-cover-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/03\/SearchforShalom-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>The Search for Shalom<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nTell-Tale Treats<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/03\/telltale-treats-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/03\/haunted-by-civil-war-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>Haunted by the Civil War<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nBonded by Evolution<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/02\/Cover-Image_BONDED-BY-EVOLUTION-A.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/03\/future-is-foreign-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>The Future Is Foreign<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"