BOOKSHELF: More Exciting Books for Summer Reading

Compiled by Jamie H. Vaught

Updated August 17, 2025

--Joseph Smith: The Rise and Fall of an American Prophet by John G. Turner (Yale University Press, $35) is a vivid biography about one of the most successful and controversial religious leaders of the 19th-century America. He published the Book of Mormon and established what would become the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Smith built temples, founded a city-state in Illinois, ran for president, and married more than 30 women. This self-made prophet thrilled his followers with his grand vision of peace and unity, but his increasingly grandiose plans tested and sometimes shattered their faith. The author provides fresh insights from newly accessible diaries, church records, and transcripts of sermons to come up with a colorful portrait of Smith.

--In Praise of Good Bookstores  by Jeff Deutsch (Princeton University Press, $16.95) explores why good bookstores matter. The author -- the former director of Chicago’s Seminary Co-op Bookstores, one of the finest bookstores in the world -- pays loving tribute to one of our most important and endangered civic institutions. He considers how qualities like space, time, abundance, and community find expression in a good bookstore. Along the way, he also predicts -- perhaps audaciously -- a future in which the bookstore not only endures, but realizes its highest aspirations. Central among Deutsch’s arguments for the necessity of bookstores is the incalculable value of browsing -- since, when we are deep in the act of looking at the shelves, we move through space as though we are inside the mind itself, immersed in self-reflection.

--Just Good Manners: A Quintessential Guide to Courtesy, Charm, Grace, and Decorum  by William Hanson (Gallery Books, $28.99) is a "must-have" book for anyone who wants to polish up their manners. A trusted authority on etiquette, the author shares his definitive advice on how to behave in every situation, from a night dining out with friends to Netflix at home, as well as celebrates the deep kindness, empathy, and joy that come with good manners. As Hanson makes clear, to care for others is truly about caring and respecting oneself.

--Fight: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes (William Morrow, $32) is an inside look at the Biden, Harris and Trump campaigns during the 2024 battle for the White House, arguably the most consequential contest in American history. The authors give readers their first graphic view of the characters, their motivations, and their innermost thoughts as they battled to claim the ultimate prize and define a political era. Based on real-time interviews with more than 150 insiders—from the Trump, Harris, and Biden inner circles, as well as party leaders and operatives—the hardcover delivers the vivid and stunning tale of an election unlike any other.

--Antisemitism in America: A Warning by Senator Chuck Schumer (Grand Central Publishing, $28) takes readers on a personal journey of how Jewish Americans like him have come to understand their history, their place in America — and why they worry about the future of Jewish life in America. For the first time in generations, antisemitism has become a daily reality in America, and it’s getting worse. The author is the highest-elected Jewish official in the U.S.

--Zbig: The Life of Zbigniew Brzezinski, America's Great Power Prophet by Edward Luce (Avid Reader Press, $35) is an intimate and masterful biography of Brzezinski, who was President Carter’s national security advisor and one of America’s leading geopolitical thinkers. Brzezinski was a key architect of the Soviet Union’s demise, which ended the Cold War. Born in Poland the year that Joseph Stalin consolidated power, and dying a few months into Donald Trump’s first presidency, Brzezinski was shaped by and in turn shaped the global power struggles of the 20th and early 21st centuries. Brzezinski, a key figure in the history of the Cold War, has written several books on the world issues.

--Ghosted: An American Story by Nancy French (Zondervan Books, $29.99) is a fascinating look at a life of poverty, success, and the inner circles of political influence from the foothills of Appalachia all the way to the White House. A bestselling ghostwriter, the author is coming out of the shadows to tell her own incredible story. French's family hails from the foothills of the Appalachians, where life was dominated by coal mining, violence, abuse, and poverty. Longing for an adventure, she married a stranger, moved to New York, and dropped out of college.  In spite of her lack of education, she found success as a ghostwriter for conservative political leaders before her allies turned on her.

--Shadow Cell: An Insider Account of America's New Spy War by Andrew Bustamante and Jihi Bustamante (Little, Brown and Company, $32) is a thrilling account by husband-and-wife CIA operatives who, against all odds, triumphed in a deadly cat-and-mouse game against a mole within the agency. The couple met as trainees at Langley (McLean, Virginia), and got married while hunting terrorists across the globe. Then, suddenly, they were assigned to a mission so sensitive and explosive that the CIA still has never acknowledged it. The 262-page hardcover is scheduled for release on Sept. 9.

--My Russia: What I Saw Inside the Kremlin by Jill Dougherty (Lyons Press, $32.95) reveals Russia’s evolution through the eyes of an American reporter with rare insight into Russia, its people, and its leaders. The remarkable hardcover shows the author's transformative journey from a Cold War-era obsession with Russia to witnessing firsthand the rise of Vladimir Putin and the unraveling of a nation she grew to love. At the height of the Cold War, as a high school freshman, CNN’s Dougherty developed an obsession with Russia. Over the next half-century, she studied in Leningrad, traveled across the Soviet Union, lived in Moscow, and reported on the presidencies of Mikhail Gorbachev, Boris Yeltsin, and Putin. Dougherty’s life, and Putin’s, intersected. They studied at the same Russian university; Dougherty was named CNN Moscow Bureau Chief just as Putin began his rise to power. She knew he was a former KGB officer, but she also believed he was an economic reformer. As Putin tightened his grip on the media, she changed her mind. In 2022, reporting from Moscow as Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine, she was convinced the leader with whom she once had sympathized was a tyrant threatening to destroy a country she had come to love.

--Lincoln's Battle With God by Stephen Mansfield (Thomas Nelson, $19.99) is an incredible story of Abraham Lincoln's lifelong spiritual journey. Lincoln is among the most beloved of all U.S. presidents. He helped to abolish slavery, gave the world some of its most memorable speeches, and redefined the meaning of America. He did all of this with endless wisdom, compassion, and wit. Yet, throughout his life, Lincoln fought with God. In his early years in Illinois, he rejected even the existence of God and became the village atheist. In time, this changed but still, he wrestled with the truth of the Bible, preachers, doctrines, the will of God, the providence of God, and then, finally, God's purposes in the Civil War. Still, on the day he was shot, Lincoln said he longed to go to Jerusalem to walk in the Savior's steps. The bestselling author has written numerous books.

--The Colonel and the King: Tom Parker, Elvis Presley, and the Partnership that Rocked the World by Peter Gurainick (Little, Brown and Company, $38) is a dual portrait of the relationship between the iconic artist and his legendary manager—drawing on a wealth of the Colonel's never-before-seen correspondence to reveal that this oft-reviled figure was in fact a confidant, friend, and architect of his client’s success. In early 1955, Colonel Tom Parker—manager of the No. 1 country music star of the day—heard that an unknown teenager from Memphis had just drawn a crowd of more than eight hundred people to a Texas schoolhouse, and headed south to investigate. Within days, Parker was sending out telegrams and letters to promoters and booking agents: “We have a new boy that is absolutely going to be one of the biggest things in the business in a very short time. His name is ELVIS PRESLEY.” Later that year, after signing with RCA, the young man sent a telegram of his own: “Dear Colonel, Words can never tell you how my folks and I appreciate what you did for me.... I love you like a father.” The close personal bond between Elvis and the Colonel has never been fully portrayed before. It was a relationship founded on mutual admiration and support. The author also wrote the prizewinning two-volume biography of Presley.

--On Character: Choices That Define a Life by General Stanley McChrystal (Portfolio/Penguin, $30)

offers an inspiring roadmap for personal growth and integrity — a call to become our best selves, both as individuals and as Americans. How to measure a life? After a career of service, retired four-star General McChrystal had much to contemplate. He pondered his successes and failures, his beliefs and aspirations, and asked himself, Who am I, really? And more importantly, who have I become? When I die, how will I be measured? According to the author, character is not a trait inherited at birth, nor does it automatically come from education, position, or experience. Character, instead, comes down to a succession of choices, most mundane, several momentous, that reveal the deep truth of our capacity for virtue.