Ciara Lightner

Time is continuing its ever forward march. We have already made it to the half point of January and things really do need to slow down a bit. Take a bit of a break and check out these new poetry books.

“Concentrate” is the debut poetry book by Courtney Faye Taylor. Taylor recounts the events of March 16, 1991, the day that Latasha Harlins, a fifteen-year-old girl, was killed by a convenience store owner. But the work is not just about Latasha’s death, but the all too short life she experienced. Taylor parallels these experiences with her own life and how trauma can permanently alter a person’s trajectory. Taylor shows how society reacted differently to the tragedy, through song lyrics, interviews from those involved in the criminal case, even the locations significant to the event, and Latasha’s legacy. Taylor strives to convey that erasure of an event is not the way to heal, it is through continued conversation and understanding. That solidarity comes from acknowledgement, and while the path to understanding is uncomfortable, it is the only path through.

“The Study of Human Life” by Joshua Bennett takes aspects of life into consideration in his latest work. Beginning with poems working through his own childhood, Bennett perceives the world and how the world perceives Bennett. It shows his coming to terms with his own relationship to his father and how his own expectations of himself did not meet up with the world’s expectations. The work ends in a series of poems focusing on new life and a new role of fatherhood. Bennett works through the conflict with bringing a child into a society full of strife, but also finds the joy in parenthood. Sandwiched between the two current ends of Bennett’s life, lies a work of speculative fiction. It is a what-if world in which Malcolm X returns to life after his assassination. What are the ramifications on a community when a leader who was killed in cold blood, suddenly is resurrected? Living up to its title, Bennett’s work shows that life, though invariably changing and heartbreaking, is worth exploring.

Franny Choi explores generation trauma in her latest work, “The World Keeps Ending, and The World Goes On.” Choi explores the past, focusing on the horrors endured by Korean Comfort Women during WWII, and the scars that are still carried by the community. She reflects on her father’s youth and the anti-police brutality protests he attends. She mirrors this by attending protests for the same reasons but decades later. She postulates what this means and what lessons we are leaving behind. Which relics we will leave to be looked at by school children in museums of the future? Choi explores the societal rifts that have formed between different ethnic communities and, much like Courtney Faye Taylor, imagines a world in which those rifts could be healed through understanding. Choi shows that the end of the world is an everyday occurrence for some and survival is a collective effort.

Check out these books (and more) and enjoy a brief respite.

Science is one of the topics that is ever evolving and infinitely interesting. It also can be a bit intimidating at times. So, what do you do if you want to learn more about science but don’t want to spend your time reading through a 700-page treatise on different moss? (I really do like moss; I just don’t know what a treatise is.) Try some of these more accessible science books. They are written in easily understandable terms while remaining extremely fascinating.

“The Chemistry Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained” walks through the history of chemistry and how we find ourselves in the scientific world we inhabit today. Interestingly, the book is organized not by subject but by time, starting off around 7,000 BCE and the brewing of fermented beverages. By organizing the book by time, the author is able to show how each new discovery is built off of what came before and adds insights into how those discoveries came to be. Walking through the discoveries of soap making, the nuclear age, and all the way until the vaccine for COVID-19, “The Chemistry Book” shows some of the missteps and some of the triumphs of chemistry.

Another book that uses a timeline with great success is “Weather: An Illustrated History” by Andrew Revkin with Lisa Mechaley. Beginning with the creation of the earth and the development of the atmosphere, Revkin and Mechaley show how our world’s weather came in to being and how our own development evolved with it. It, unfortunately, also shows how we have come to influence it. How a snowstorm helped to convince New York City leaders to build the subway system and just how far back scientists knew that the burning of coal changed the climate (they, at first, thought it was a benefit). “Weather” is an intelligent look at how much as a species weather has defined our world and how we as a species have defined the weather.

If ‘identifying’ is something that has piqued your interest, there are two new DK Smithsonian books. “Gemstones” by Cally Hall is an identification book that covers precious metals, gems, and different cut and uncut stones. Hall walks their reader through the different physical properties of stones as well as defining optical properties and facets. They even show where stones are found geographically. If you find fossils interesting, then check out “Fossils” by David J Ward. Cataloging over 500 different fossils, Ward’s book adds annotations such as epoch, region, and likelihood of each fossil. Both books are filled with highly detailed photos to aid in your exploration of the natural world.

Happy Sciencing! (Seriously, what is a treatise?)

New Science Fiction has arrived at A.K. Smiley Public Library. While you stay inside trying to avoid the heat, pick up some new books and think of a not-so-distant future…. fall.

Mosscap and Sibling Dex return in “A Prayer for the Crown-Shy.” In the second novel of Becky Chamber’s Monk and Robot series, Mosscap begins their quest to discover what humans need. But as Mosscap continues their quest amongst the humans, they begin to feel as though they are losing connection with the robot society. As Mosscap wanders the countryside, contemplating the nature of the self, Dex begins to ask introspective questions as well. Dex wrestles with the question of existence without purpose and the need to contribute to society even at great personal harm. Another great and hopeful entry into the science fiction genre, Chambers continues the complex question of what it means to exist in the world and to be human.

Another science fiction entry, but much darker, Christopher Rowe shows the world after a sentient AI war has come to pass in the “These Prisoning Hills.” Athena Parthenus, an AI, started a war and began to take over humans and nature through nanotechnology. One day she disappears and leaves behind an infected and corrupted landscape in the American Southeast. This is where Marcia, a veteran of the AI war must travel at the behest of the remaining federal government. On a rescue mission Marcia must reacquaint herself with the horrors she faced in the war and what new horrors may await her. Rowe’s novel shows us a world in which the AI war has begun and no clear victor has been declared.

“January Fifteenth,” by Rachel Swirsky, is the date when U.S. citizens receive their UBI. UBI stands for universal basic income, a set amount of money that will ideally cover a person’s basic needs for the year. For some of the characters in Swirsky’s work, this is their only means of survival. For others, it is money to be wasted in ever increasingly eccentric ways. And for certain groups, it is a way for the government to control its citizens. Following these characters throughout the day, the novel explores the nature of government assistance programs in order to understand the pitfalls as well as the successes. Swirsky’s speculative work shows that no matter the time, humanity is complex and there are no easy solutions to its problems.

Explore these books and more the next time you visit the Library.

Summer is fully upon us, making leaving the air-conditioned comfort of the indoors harder to extricate ourselves from. But what to do with all that time indoors while the sun cooks everything in sight to a crisp? Books of course! Here are some new poetry books to help you while away the bright summer months.

Award winning author Jennifer Huang’s debut work “Return Flight” connects the past to the present through an examination of the self. Generational trauma and the concepts of home are interspersed throughout, working to understand their impact on the human psyche. Through their work, Huang uses images of intimacy to aid in the defining of a person. All these memories are not just seen with sadness, there is joy as well. Huang shows us that both sorrow and joy can exist in the same realm.

Nicky Beer explores the joy of artifice in her latest work “Real Phonies and Genuine Fakes.” Beer explores the concepts of imitation and what it means when the fake is more real than the original. She shows how imitation is an art form in its own right such as through the art of drag. She references many other pop culture representations of illusion as well, such as Marlene Dietrich and Batman, to get at the heart of the question, what is truth? Beer’s poetry uses redaction and the concept of stereoscopes to invite the reader to see that the truth can look very different depending on which way you are looking at it.

Shane McCrae, in his latest work, “Cain Named the Animal” explores the idea of what it means to exist. Having undergone an unusual and traumatic upbringing, he questions how different circumstances might have led to a different existence. McCrae turns back time, and postulates how an imperfect god might result in a flawed world. He also uses the idea of cyclical time to explore the ability to look inwards. By creating a world that circles back on itself, McCrae shows how such a thing would allow for reflection and new revelations.

Enjoy these books and try to stay cool this summer!

Writers are always looking ahead at what might next impact us as a species. As the world undergoes climate changes, authors have begun to look at what the world may look like to those who survive those events. These three works focus on our world sometime in the near future, dictated by different occurrences of disasters, but connected by one theme: familial ties.

“Milk Teeth” by Helene Bukowski is the story of outsiders clinging to each other in a world that grows hotter every day. Skalde and her mother, Edith, are barely tolerated in their territory, a community of farms that is isolated by a thick fog from the rest of the world. Edith is from outside and as such is seen as an intruder and this distinction extends to Skalde. One day the fog dissipates and an ever-increasing heat replaces it. As conditions worsen and food becomes scarce and paranoia increases, Meisis, a young child, appears seemingly from thin air. Skalde takes Meisis in and faces an ever increasingly hostile community. Exploring family, community, and identity, “Milk Teeth” is a look at what happens when the rest of the world disappears and family is all you have left.

Premee Mohamed tackles generational trauma and climate disaster in her latest work entitled, “The Annual Migration of Clouds.” The survivors of a world, in which climate disasters such as earthquakes and dust storms have wreaked havoc, find themselves facing a new component. Cad, a parasitic fungus, begins to infect what remains of the human population. Able to alter the minds of its victims, Cad is passed genetically, from parent to child. Reid, a child born with Cad, ruminates on her future and the future of her community. She earns a spot in one of the last remaining bastions of modern human society, but is scared of what her leaving will mean for her and for her mother, a carrier of Cad as well. Relying on the kindness of the community, Reid must decide if the unknown is worth it. Hopeful even in the darkest moments, Mohamed’s latest work speaks to the family we carry with us always.

“The High House” by Jessie Greengrass take place during a time when water has overrun the land. The story oscillates between Caro, stepdaughter to Francesca, the owner of the High House, and Sal, the granddaughter of Grandy, its caretaker. Both Caro and Sal see the house as interruption to their everyday lives, but miss the truth of it. The High House is essentially an ark, built and fortified by Francesca, a climate scientist, in order to protect the survivors of the coming climate disaster. When the disaster comes, Sal and Caro are thrown together and must navigate the remains of the world together while caring for those left behind. Greengrass shows us what remains when the rest of the world is washed away.

Even though these books represent some of the worst-case scenarios for our world, each is hopeful that we will make the most out of what is left.