A multi-generational memoir tracing Sarah M. Broom's family and the life of their home in New Orleans East, culminating in the loss of that house after Hurricane Katrina.

This book looks closely at how people behave in major disasters, arguing against the idea that chaos and panic are the default. Using historical episodes and reporting, it shows recurring patterns of spontaneous cooperation, improvisation, and mutual aid that form temporary communities in the wake of catastrophe.

A first-person account of growing up between Chinese folktales and American life, where family history and mythic stories intertwine with recollections of childhood.

A book-length series of linked essays that record extended, close observations of the natural world around a creek and turn those observations into philosophical and lyrical reflections on life, perception, and the human place in nature.

An ethnographic study of matsutake mushrooms and the people and places shaped by their global trade. The author follows harvesters, middlemen, buyers, and landscapes to show how a single wild commodity links local ecological disturbance, precarious livelihoods, and transnational markets.

A critique of prevailing mid-20th-century urban planning that argues neighborhoods thrive when everyday street life, local commerce, and diverse uses are preserved.

A Room of One's Own argues that women need literal and financial autonomy—a private room and independent income—to write and participate fully in literary culture.

A character-driven reconstruction of the three days around the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863, told through the perspectives of historical military figures from both the Union and the Confederacy.

A first-person account of the year after Joan Didion's husband died, recording the small, persistent thoughts and rituals that accompany sudden bereavement. The narrative tracks how memory, habit, and formal thinking shape a surviving spouse’s attempt to understand loss and the quotidian aftermath of grief.