Hot Type

Stephen Siff ’94 Acid Hype: American News Media and the Psychedelic Experience, University of Illinois Press, 2015, 246 pp. Following LSD’s journey from Brylcreem and soap to incense and peppermints, Siff reveals how news exposure glorified the drug as a treatment for mental illness and built its reputation as a key to the unconscious mind.

Gregory Gebhart ’76 Favorite Bible Passages, Gregory Howard Gebhart Inc., 2015, 275 pp. Using texts from the King James version of the Bible, Gebhart shares his favorite text passages.

Raghu Karnad ’05 Farthest Afield: An Indian Story of the Second World War, William Collins, 2015, 300 pp. A young family is swept up in the violence of India’s war, in which the largest volunteer army in history fought for the British Empire even as its countrymen fought to be free of it.

Jennifer Besanceney Latham ’94 Scarlett Undercover, Little, Brown and Co., 2015, 310 pp. This debut novel tells the story of a teenager’s adventure as an investigator of what seems like suicide until it begins to look like murder.

Rebecca Louie ’99 Compost City: Practical Composting Know-How for Small-Space Living, Shambhala Publications, 2015, 209 pp. Humorous and informative, this book for the eco-curious advises on composting comfortably and having fun at the same time.

Christopher Lukas ’56 Carrying a Torch And Other Tales of Lust, Love, and Loss, Christopher Lukas, 2014, 223 pp. The author, who is also a television writer and director, offers an array of tales in which moods, genres, and fantasies are laid bare.

Susan Signe Morrison ’81 Grendel’s Mother: The Saga of the Wyrd-Wife, Top Hat Books, 2015, 226 pp. One of world literature’s most fascinating monsters, Grendel’s mother, Brimhild, is brought to life in this story of a misunderstood queen, peace-loving, cultured, victim of sexual and political betrayal, bog dweller, seer, healer, and mother of a monster-child.

Kodo Sawaki, Tonen Andrews O’Connor ’54, tr. Commentary on the Song of Awakening, MerwinAsia, 2015, 365 pp. With a Foreword by Shohaku Okumura, O’Connor’s translation fills a gap in the English-language availability of a 20th-century Japanese Zen master’s teachings.

Tom Owen-Towle ’63 Self: Caring for Our Best Gift, Flaming Chalice Press, 2015, 313 pp. According to the author, a parish minister, nurturing the whole self is all- important. He treats self-care zones in separate chapters, adding quotes and questions for reflection and discussion.

John Pollock ’64 Journalism and Human Rights: How Demographics Drive Media Coverage, Routledge, 2015, 165 pp. This book offers the first collection of original research to explore links between demographics  and media coverage of emerging human rights issues.

Diana Furchtgott-Roth ’79 Disinherited: How Washington Is Betraying America’s Young, Encounter Books, 2015, 152 pp. Using personal stories, the author portrays how U.S. government policy is biased against young people, diminishing their chances of professional success.

Edward Wallach ’54, Esther Eisenberg, Isabel Green, and Stacey Scheib Hysterectomy, Exploring Your Options, Second Edition, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015, 222 pp. Four gynecologists explain reasons for needing the procedure, possible alternative measures, techniques used, details on the surgery, postoperative recovery, and more.

Other media

Phillip Kloekner ’81 Exotic Variations, Raven Recordings, 2014. Performing on Rice University’s Fisk-Rosales Organ, Kloeckner plays ancient and modern compositions by composers Louis Vierne and Samuel Scheidt as well as six variations on a Huguenot psalm.