An insightful, valuable resource for mastering higher-education texts.
A trio of English-language educators offer college students a modern guide to the art of reading.
While working on their seventh edition of The Broadview Guide to Writing (2022), authors LePan, Frost, and Okun considered adding a new chapter on reading at the college level; as English-language educators, they have experienced firsthand the declining reading skills of incoming students. Unable to condense the topic into a single chapter, they wrote this book-length guide to help post-secondary students develop the reading, comprehension, and critical thinking skills necessary for a successful academic journey. The work begins at the most fundamental level as the authors urge readers to evaluate their “Reading Environment” before delving into extended passages. This environment includes physical considerations, like lighting and scheduling brief interludes for stretching, in addition to a discussion about the ways in which our brains read printed material differently than text on a digital screen (per the authors, while screens subliminally encourage multitasking, “reading printed material is associated with fuller comprehension and seems to facilitate extended concentration”). Other chapters proffer practical advice on reading antiquated language in pre-20th-century literature, navigating academic jargon and complex sentence structures, and strategically and effectively using the skills of scanning and skimming when appropriate. One chapter provides examples of common words and phrases to pay close attention to when reading college-level nonfiction—the authors note the scholarly tendency to use literary cues (“a pattern with a purpose”). Recognizing the unique demands of 21st-century learning, the authors discuss the responsible use of AI to aid in the reading of complex passages, critically listening to audiobooks, and reading visual materials (this chapter is offered on a companion website linked via QR code). This profoundly relevant and accessible volume for college freshmen concludes with “Following Up” questions posed by the authors’ students and includes reproductions of long passages for practice as readers apply the book’s advice.
An insightful, valuable resource for mastering higher-education texts.Pub Date: July 31, 2026
ISBN: 9781554817528
Page Count: 252
Publisher: Broadview Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A football star’s bracing account of his battle for racial equality—and how powerful forces arrayed against him.
A principled athlete strives for social justice.
Kaepernick forthrightly details the activism that earned him global renown but cost him his NFL career. In 2016, the San Francisco 49ers quarterback “was filled with disgust” after police shootings of fellow Black men in several American cities. Before a preseason game, he made a spontaneous decision: “It hit me in that moment that I should find a seat” during the national anthem. He did the same at two more games before reporters noticed. Kaepernick will forever be associated with “taking a knee” during the anthem, but he credits Eric Reid—a teammate who agreed with Kaepernick’s message—for suggesting that they kneel together during subsequent anthems. The protest changed everything for Kaepernick. President Trump vilified him. Kaepernick and his wife received death threats. And though he’d taken the 49ers to a Super Bowl, no teams would sign him. He will likely make news for his take on Jay-Z, whose lucrative partnership with the NFL was criticized as an attempt to launder the league’s reputation. Visiting Africa, where Kaepernick learns about “African leaders who willingly sold their own people to the enslavers,” he “couldn’t help but to think about Jay-Z and the NFL.” In opening chapters, Kaepernick recalls suffering traumatic racial abuse as a child. Being in “white spaces”—he was adopted by white parents—placed him “under a microscope every minute of every day.” He isn’t always nuanced, depicting some people he disagrees with as cartoonishly clueless. But his writing about how college and pro teams “lied” to him about injuries underlines his “feeling of being a disposable commodity.” A decade has passed since Kaepernick played in the NFL, but he stays fit in case “a team needing a QB” calls.
A football star’s bracing account of his battle for racial equality—and how powerful forces arrayed against him.Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2026
ISBN: 9781538777879
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Legacy Lit/Hachette
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
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