Fishin’ for Summer 2024 Books to Read?

Zócalo’s Friends and Contributors Have Reeled in Some Fresh Nonfiction for You

A man helps a young girl with her fishing pole, which currently has a large book at the end of the hook.

Once again, Zócalo has cast our net wide, asking friends and contributors to take part in a beloved Public Square tradition: our annual compilation of nonfiction book recommendations for summer. This list eschews the expected beach reads, instead trawling deep waters for stories that lure us to new places, surprise us with fresh perspectives, and catch hold of our imaginations.

The 13 books that made the 2024 Zócalo Summer Reading List all make for excellent bookworm bait. They show us what goes into building cities, and what goes into building the …

June 26, 2024

Where I Go: Reading Among Readers

In India, Weekly Reading Clubs Offer a Sense of Community and Belonging

by Ankush Pal | June 10, 2024

I entered the Lodhi Gardens through Gate 1, as I’d been instructed, and approached the monument. A city park spread over 90 acres in New Delhi, the gardens contain the …

Beyond the ‘Dark Fog of Disdain,’ San Francisco Is Still There

How Revisiting a Children’s Book Helped Me See the City by the Bay, On and Off the Page

by Larry Gordon | December 6, 2023

For a young bookworm like me in 1960s New Jersey, almost nothing was more exciting in elementary school than ordering my own paperbacks from the Scholastic Book catalog. I would …

What Prisons Don’t Want Us to Read

Zócalo Has Partnered With PEN America to Share the Stories of Three Incarcerated Writers for Prison Banned Books Week

October 24, 2023

This Summer, Let’s Screw Book Bans

We Can Use Censorship as an Opportunity to Get People Reading—and Romancing

by Joe Mathews | July 18, 2023

Ban this column! Please!

It might seem strange to call for the cancellation of one’s own newspaper column. Besides, who needs to squelch such a piece when media audiences are declining …

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