[It’s been a while since I shared a series on scholarly books I’ve had the pleasure of checking out recently, and for this latest iteration I wanted to highlight recent reads that have offered inspiration in these very tough times!]
I really enjoyed and was glad to be able to share each of the books I’ve highlighted in this week’s series, but I can’t lie, there’s no competition with how excited I am to share the forthcoming book with which I’m ending the series: my wife Vaughn Joy’s Selling Out Santa: Hollywood Christmas Films in the Age of McCarthy (2025). Due out in just under two months (November 17th, if you want to mark your calendars as you damn well should) and available for pre-order at that hyperlink and wherever you buy your books (if you can’t wait until November, as you damn well shouldn’t), Vaughn’s readable and rigorous, historical and timely, vital work offers equally compelling and crucial lenses on an easily dismissed cultural genre, mid-20th century American culture and society and politics, and some of the most fraught trends and debates in our own 21st century moment. It’s also an incredibly well-written and engaging book, one that is as fun to read as the ending of It’s a Wonderful Life is to watch—but also as bracing and thought-provoking as, y’know, much of the rest of Capra’s film. I hope you’ll get your own copy and that you’ll share your responses here and everywhere else when you do—and you know you’ll be hearing a lot more about it, and all of Vaughn’s exceptional work, in this space!
September Recap this weekend,
Ben
PS. What do you think? Recent reads you’d share?
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