Members’ New Books

Iris Waichler, MSW
Burned Out
Manhattan Book Group, May 29, 2026
ISBN, 978-1-969572-65-4
burnedoutbook.com
https://www.amazon.com/Burned-Out-Iris-Waichler-Msw/dp/1969572655/

Firefighters, paramedics, and Emergency Medical Technicians (EMTs) are trained to run toward danger-but few are trained to process the repeated trauma they witness every day. Over time, exposure to death, catastrophic injury, violence, and human suffering can lead to cumulative trauma, emotional exhaustion, and symptoms of PTSD that often go unrecognized. In Burned Out, clinical social worker and award-winning author Iris Waichler explores the hidden psychological and physical toll of first responder trauma-and the ripple effect it has on marriages, families, and personal well-being. Through candid interviews with male and female first responders and their loved ones across the country, this powerful nonfiction self-help book answers critical questions, presents resources, and offers coping strategies for them and their families.

Marcia Noe
The Innocent Midwest: Culture, Region, and Identity, 1793-1930
Ohio University Press, February 10, 2026
232 Pages
Hardcover, 9780821426708, $80.00.
eBook, 9780821426715, $79.99
https://www.ohioswallow.com/9780821426708/the-innocent-midwest/

This book asks why the Midwest continues to be seen as a wholesome, virtuous, harmonious region despite much empirical evidence to the contrary. It traces the origin and development of the trope of midwestern innocence in a number of key texts that have inscribed the paradox of the innocent Midwest on the national consciousness. This book argues that the strong grounding of these works in a democratic ideology informed by agrarianism, Christianity, and commitment to education has shaped the notion of the innocent Midwest in the American cultural imaginary and analyzes the persistence of this notion, identifying several factors that explain its resilience.

The Innocent Midwest traces the evolution of this pastoral fallacy, arguing that the Midwest’s innocent image has been carefully cultivated through American popular and high culture. Organized thematically, the book examines early frontier narratives, stories of Midwesterners abroad, Progressive Era ideal of neighborliness, immigrant and migrant experiences, and the eventual unraveling of the Garden of the West mythology. The book discusses both canonical authors like Mark Twain, Sinclair Lewis, Theodore Dreiser, and Willa Cather, as well as lesser-known writers such as Maria Susanna Cummins, Elia W. Peattie, Chief Luther Standing Bear, and Oscar Micheaux.

From literature and film to music and the visual arts, the trope of the innocent Midwest has shaped national perceptions of the region for over a century. This book offers a compelling account of how the Midwest came to symbolize innocence—and why the image continues to resonate in the American imagination.

By the Michigan Civil War Association / Jack Dempsey, editor
Radical of Radicals: Austin Blair—Civil War Governor—In His Own Words
Mission Point Press, September 16, 2025
ISBN: 978-1-965278-54-3, $29.95 (Hardcover)
ISBN: 978-1-965278-55-0, $18.95 (Softcover)
368 pages, 6 x 9 inches, B/W
jackdempseybooks.com.

Today’s divisive climate might lead one to believe that politics has never been so personal—or nicknames more charged. Austin Blair, Republican Party co-founder, legislator, and governor was attacked by opponents as a “radical” because of his views on treason, slavery, and public corruption. This first in a two-volume documentary biography from editor Jack Dempsey and the Michigan Civil War Association (MCWA) presents Blair’s life and political philosophy largely through his speeches, letters, and public remarks in the lead-up to and through the Civil War. Richly annotated, the book offers essential historical context to Blair’s powerful rhetoric and unwavering moral convictions.

Radical of Radicals is the newest title in the MCWA annual series of “untold stories and first-person accounts that have not received their fair due,” according to Dempsey. Blair, a major force in Michigan politics who mobilized Michigan during the Civil War, was a tireless public servant, endearing himself to soldiers and civilians alike and making his name synonymous with the nickname “War Governor.” He has never been given book-length treatment until now. Radical of Radicals portrays a leader far ahead of his time—a tireless advocate for emancipation, civil rights, equal opportunity, justice, and preservation of the Union, and an outspoken opponent to corruption in public office.

Robert Loerzel and James A. Pierce
The Uptown: Chicago’s Endangered Movie Palace
CityFiles Press, August 18, 2025
ISBN-13: 978-1-7338690-7-2
Hardcover: 168 pages; $49.95; online price $45.
https://www.cityfilespress.com/books/the-uptown/

Chicago’s Uptown Theatre, one of America’s largest and most lavish movie palaces, has sat vacant for more than 40 years. For decades, few people have been let inside—to experience its grand lobby, its sweeping staircase, or its massive theater auditorium, which once showed Marx Brothers films and played host to Bruce Springsteen concerts. The Uptown: Chicago’s Endangered Movie Palace gathers the work of a dozen contemporary photographers with vintage blueprints, renderings, programs, and classic photographs to tell the story of one of America’s jewels—a theater built “for all time.” Opened a century ago, the Uptown is now in limbo, its beauty hidden behind a plywood barricade. Too costly to tear down and too expensive to restore, the theater faces a precarious future. That’s why this book was created. To document what remains and to call for the protection and preservation of one of America’s sacred places. It’s not too late, as this book shows. Journalists Robert Loerzel and James A. Pierce have been studying the Uptown for decades. They have assembled a detailed documentation, relying on original records and first-hand accounts to tell the story of dreamers, a changing neighborhood and a nation stepping into a new world.

Carla Knorowski
Blessing My Mother’s Rosary: Lourdes. Loss. Love.
ACTA Publications, January 21, 2025
ISBN: hardcover 978-0879467418; paperback 978-079467401
Hardcover $24.95: Paperback $18.95

The death in 2017 of her mother, Mary, resurfaced a poignant memory in her only daughter, Carla. Blessing My Mother’s Rosary: Lourdes. Loss. Love. is the story of Carla, as a young woman of twenty-three in 1982, fulfilling her promise to take her mother’s favorite rosary with her on a backpacking trip through Europe to have it blessed at the Shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes in France. That journey came to full completion only forty years later.

It is the story of a daughter’s inspirational journey beyond grief and loss to acceptance and gratitude. It is an exquisitely touching memoir for those who have lost a parent or loved one, for those who have ever visited Lourdes or other sacred places, for those who have never taken such a pilgrimage, and for all of us who believe in miracles large and small.

Blessing My Mother’s Rosary: Lourdes: Loss. Love. was named Best Travel/Pilgrimage Book of 2025 by the Catholic Media Association. It has been called “a profoundly moving journey into the depths of faith, grief, and devotion” by Psychologist J. Kim Penberthy, “a touching story brimming with love” by Vanity Fair Correspondent Maureen Orth Russert, and “a deeply felt description of experience—where the real meaning of religion can be found” by Peabody and Emmy Award-winning Journalist Bill Kurtis. 

Patricia Clark
O Lucky Day: Poems
Madville Publishing, January 21, 2025
ISBN: paperback 978-1-963695-07-6; ebook 978-1-963695-08-3
Paperback $19.95, ebook $9.99
madvillepublishing.com

Patricia Clark’s latest poetry collection, O Lucky Day, explores her concerns about family and mortality, silence and loneliness, widening to include losses in the natural world. These sorrows often emerge along with an exuberance found in the sensual pleasures of taste and touch. Clark trains herself “to disappear, into the shagbark / hickory, the scarred maple, / the viburnum just about to flower.” She knows that whatever upheaval we bring to the world, and ourselves, “something was broken, then healed, then / transformed.” She advises us to “loaf and ponder,” but also to rise with the rustling grasses in lament of environmental degradation, voicing our insistence for reverence of what remains. These lyric poems of intensity and acute detail render the physical world in its tattered glory.

“O Lucky Day by Patricia Clark makes a reader feel luckier in every possible way. Life feels richer, more available somehow—nearer and dearer in a traumatic time of too many conflicts. We need this wisdom, cheer, and truthful gaze.” —Naomi Shihab Nye, author of Grace Notes: Poems About Families

Sue Harrison
Rescuing Crash, the Good Dog
Modern History Press, February 25, 2025
ISBN hardcover 979-8-89656-016-6; paperback 979-8-89656-015-9
Hardcover cover price $34.95, 136 pages; paperback cover price $18.95, 136 pages; ebook $5.95
https://www.modernhistorypress.com/store/Childrens-Books-c23999133

Britta, an eleven-year-old girl, has lived in soul-deep sorrow since her mother left their family. When Britta’s father forgets her birthday, he decides to give her a dog (although Britta asked for a cell phone). They adopt Crash, an Australian shepherd from their local animal shelter in Sault Ste. Marie, a small city in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, and the adventures begin. Rescuing Crash, the Good Dog is a story about broken hearts-not only Britta’s and her father’s but also a dog’s broken heart-and it is a story about the bonds between daughters and fathers and good dogs and also not-always-so-good cats.