Books

Gorgeously illustrated children’s books provide visual worlds to explore, while the books’ hopeful messages will cheer young and old alike.

Sy Montgomery fell in love with the chickens she raised. In “What the Chicken Knows,” she reflects on their sociability and barnyard smarts. 

Mexican author Juan Rulfo helped invent magical realism and influenced a generation of beloved Latin American writers. His novel “Pedro Páramo” just received a twisty adaptation on Netflix.

Immersive books for young readers include Kate DiCamillo’s “The Hotel Balzaar,” Katherine Rundell’s “Imaginary Creatures,” and four others.

David Greenberg’s “John Lewis: A Life” follows the civil rights leader from the Selma march to the halls of Congress. Lewis kept faith with the practice of nonviolence.

Biographer Max Boot charts the course of a politician who was famously affable and pragmatic, but who also resorted to racist dog whistles and played loose with facts. 

America First was a rallying cry of isolationists in the 1930s. Charles Lindbergh, a spokesman for the movement, clashed with President Franklin D. Roosevelt over U.S. involvement.   

In “Bringing Ben Home,” Barbara Bradley Hagerty explores the long road toward exonerating Ben Spencer, a Black man imprisoned for a murder he didn’t commit.

The 10 best books of October 2024 include a thrilling naval adventure, a novel about 19th-century New Orleans, and a history of Handel’s “Messiah.”

In “Love in the Time of Self-Publishing,” researcher Christine Larson explores the strength of Romancelandia, the community of mostly women who write romance novels.