Once again, we are excited to share what is sitting on our office bookshelves this summer. While we all arguably have access to more reading opportunities than ever at our fingertips and appreciate all the great content out there, it is still so nice to be able to sit down with a significant hardcover or paperback and dive deep into a topic of interest. We also love supporting our local bookstores and community libraries, which are important third spaces in community for connection and social capital formation. Hope to see you at one this summer!
Managing and Leading Nonprofit Organizations: A Framework for Success
By Paul L. Dann
This past year, a group of UNH Extension staff members used this as a textbook for their own leadership training and continuing education. For professionals and volunteers who currently hold leadership roles or aspire to improve their leadership proficiency, this book offers useful insights for working in teams, navigating organizational structures, and effectively applying one’s own personal strengths. Dr. Dann is faculty in UNH’s Carsey School of Public Policy, where he teaches in the Master’s in Public Administration program.
A Field Guide to American Architecture
By Carole Rifkind
This book, considered a classic by many architecture and preservation enthusiasts, provides illustrations and historical context for a variety of archetypical American buildings, from mills and barns to taverns and townhouses. Whether you’re a history buff or simply curious about your own neighborhood’s background, this book is a useful tool for interpreting and appreciating the built environment of New England and beyond.
Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World
By Henry Grabar
This book, published in May 2023 by Slate staff writer Henry Grabar, takes on the popular land use planning issue of parking and makes the simple yet provocative argument that “parking explains the world”. Grabar weaves together stories and observations to make convincing connections between the prioritization of parking, in both the land use planning decisions and mental pre-occupations of American drivers and policy makers, and societal challenges including housing, transportation, climate change, architecture and design, local government, and civic life. This is an abjectly entertaining and witty book that will captivate readers, from urban planners to urban goers, and merits a spot on the summer reading list of anyone interested in the state of American life and how to enhance our lived and built environments.
To Speak for the Trees: My Life's Journey from Ancient Celtic Wisdom to a Healing Vision of the Forest
By Diana Beresford-Kroger
Recommended by a colleague in the Earth Sciences Department, this beautiful memoir is also a plan for connecting people with nature and trees to address issues of concern in our communities. Dr. Beresford-Kroger mixes Celtic wisdom she learned in her youth in Ireland with modern science to share the many ways we benefit from nature and what can be done to maintain and regrow our forests for well-being and quality of life across the globe.
Paradise Falls: The True Story of an Environmental Catastrophe
By Keith O’Brien
Local author, Keith O’Brien, expertly weaves history and captivating storytelling to share a unique take on the Love Canal disaster. In Paradise Falls we learn about the community directly impacted by Hooker Chemical’s decisions and how local leaders, who were mostly women, rallied together to work with scientists, journalists, and government officials to advocate for their families. This book will be used in a Community Economics class this Fall at UNH as it is a fantastic case study of the many issues at the heart of local community and economic development, including the connections among social, natural, economic, and built capitals.
Review previous years' Summer Reading Round Up title lists here. Do you want to share the title of a great book you've read recently? You can do that here.
