It takes initiative to research one’s roots. It takes far more drive—and outright courage—to challenge a world-renowned university to establish ownership of images documenting one’s ancestors. That is precisely what Tamara Lanier did in suing Harvard after discovering that the university possessed, in one of its museum’s collections, daguerreotypes of nude enslaved people—including her great-great-great grandfather, Papa Renty, and his daughter, Delia—that had been commissioned to “prove” a prominent scientist’s racist notion that Black people are inferior to whites. Lanier relates her remarkable story in From These Roots: My Fight With Harvard To Reclaim My Legacy (Crown, Jan. 28). Our review calls it “a stirring first-person account of holding powerful institutions responsible for abetting slavery.”
From These Roots is one of many new books about women who have made history—or are in the process of making it—by pressing for change. They’re perfect reading for Women’s History Month.
Another author who has been celebrated for her activism is Catherine Coleman Flowers, the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship. The founder of the Center for Rural Enterprise and Environmental Justice tells her story in Holy Ground: On Activism, Environmental Justice, and Finding Hope (Spiegel & Grau, Jan. 28). “While she is best known for her work to secure safe water and sanitation for people living near toxic conditions,” our starred review said, “Flowers recounts a varied and fascinating career of advocacy for marginalized communities.” The review called her essay collection “a passionate and thoughtful exploration of social injustice.” (Listen to our recent interview with Flowers on the Fully Booked podcast.)
Less known than Flowers’ work is the creation, in the 1970s, of the Women’s Bank of Denver—founded at a time when many women could not establish lines of credit without their husbands being present. Grace L. Williams revives this transformative chapter in Give Her Credit: The Untold Account of a Women’s Bank That Empowered a Generation (Little A, Jan. 1), which our reviewer described as “a fast-paced and riveting read [and] a fascinating history of a feminist triumph.”
Rachel Carson (1907-1964) is justly revered for her role in inspiring the environmental movement of the 1960s and beyond. In Rachel Carson and the Power of Queer Love (Stanford Univ., Jan. 28), Lida Maxwell argues that Carson’s intimate friendship with Dorothy Freeman helped open the author’s eyes to ways of seeing the world that she shared in her groundbreaking book Silent Spring.
Looking back further in time, Suzanne Cope shines a light on brave women who risked their lives, in the shadows, to fight the German occupation of Italy. “An inspiring, illuminating group biography” is how our critic sums up Women of War: The Italian Assassins, Spies, and Couriers Who Fought the Nazis (Dutton, April 29).
War may be eternal, but so, too, is the fight for freedom. In Looking at Women Looking at War: A War and Justice Diary (St. Martin’s, Feb. 18), author and activist Victoria Amelina chronicles her fellow Ukrainians’ resistance to Russia’s invasion. Amelina’s book is posthumous: She died in 2023 of injuries sustained during a Russian missile attack on a restaurant. And yet her bracing account survives, a testament to the power of words.
John McMurtrie is the nonfiction editor.
