UNP staff members are always reading new books, both within our list and outside of what we publish. Here are some of the titles where our noses have been buried.

“This month I’ve been reading Colson Whitehead’s Harlem Shuffle and Crook Manifesto, which follows Ray Carney, an upstanding salesman, as he navigates a double life set in Harlem in the 1960s and 70s. I highly recommend!” -Sarah Kee

“I have been reading Bunny by Mona Awad, which was lent to me by Sarah Kee. Bunny is a story of in-groups, hive-minds, Frankenstein’s creature, and making friends in adulthood. I’m in the last quarter of the book and have been compelled along by both the cult-like “Bunnies” – the all-woman graduate writing cohort of main character, Samantha – Samantha’s desperate need to belong, even with people that she does not like, and the mysterious and occult rituals the Bunnies do in their simultaneously dangerous and idyllic college town.” -Taylor Martin

“I just finished Sociopath: A Memoir by Patric Gagne, PhD. Nathan brought this book to my attention when commenting on how much he liked the cover design. This memoir follows the author from her first childhood inklings that something is different about her through her adulthood where she’s made it her life’s work to help others with sociopathic tendencies. Throughout her life she struggles to strike a balance between presenting herself authentically and being accepted by others.” -Lacey Losh

“I’m reading My Vietnam, Your Vietnam. This is a dual memoir by Christina Vo and Nghia M. Vo that unpacks challenges the authors have faced as father and daughter trying to understand each other’s unique relationships with Vietnam. Nghia Vo fled Saigon following its defeat by North Vietnam in 1975, leaving his family behind and immigrating by boat to the U.S. A distant relationship with her father at best, Christina Vo travels to Northern Ha Noi to better understand her father’s past, as well as her own relationship with her Vietnamese American heritage. I was book shopping in New York and the cover is what initially caught my eye. I also have adopted cousins from Vietnam and have always been fascinated by the country and culture. It’s a leisurely but heartening read!” -Taylor Gilreath

“I began reading Erasure by Percival Everett after I watched the film-adaptation American Fiction. Now that I have learned of Everett’s connection to Ben Grossberg, the author of The Spring Before Obergefell, I also am reading a bit of this book now and look forward to completing it after it is designed, bound, and delivered! I just finished Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own (Mariner Classic), and am nearly done with Visual Thinking: The Hidden Gifts of People Who Think in Pictures, Patterns, and Abstractions by Temple Grandin and found it to be enlightening. To definitely finish this year is The Physicist and the Philosopher: Einstein, Bergson, and the Debate That Changed Our Understanding of Time by Jimena Canales, which has been a favorite read but takes effort in this densely philosophical work. A final quick plug for the three finalists that were selected for One Book One Lincoln: The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters, North Woods by Daniel Mason, and A Little Devil in America by Hanif Abdurraqib, which I read a little bit of already the day it was announced and if this is finalist-worthy … well, find me on Goodreads, or Beanstack if you participate in the summer reading program with the Lincoln City Libraries. Goodbye, for now, I won’t be a stranger.” -Nathan Putens