Wild Forest Home: Stories of Conservation in the Pacific Northwest
Betsy L. Howell ’87 Wildlife Mgmt.
The University of Utah Press: 2024
Drawing extensively from her own experiences as a wildlife biologist in Washington and Oregon from 1986 to 2020, Betsy L. Howell explores her professional calling in these 25 personal essays. She describes people and policies as well as field study, such as searching the woods for spotted owls, marbled murrelets, Pacific martens, and more. Since 2004, Howell has worked in Washington state’s Olympic National Forest. Her collection melds evolving technology with scientific inquiry and contemporary conservation challenges, particularly loss of old-growth forests.
Read more: At home in the Pacific Northwest woods—Q&A with Betsy Howell
In Fraud We Trust: How Leaders in Politics, Business, and Media Profit from Lies—and How to Stop Them
Wes Henricksen ’03 Busi.
University Press of Kansas: 2024
Defraud an individual, and you could end up in prison. Defraud the masses, in what Wes Henricksen, an associate professor of law at Florida’s Barry University, dubs “fraud on the public,” and you might end up rich or powerful or even elected president. In a twisted sense, the bigger the fraud, the more likely it’s protected by the First Amendment, observes Henricksen, who examines how the law doesn’t treat equally all types of fraud, the deliberate deception or misrepresentation for material gain or profit. His book offers examples of large-scale fraud that go beyond financial profit, including political gain, prevention of justice, and falsification of history. He proposes to “de-weaponize” the First Amendment and enact new laws to protect the public.
Settle Down
Ben Graves ’96 MA Music
Little Firecracker Music: 2024
Singer and guitarist Ben Graves worked with “a dream team” on his groovy new pop-rock record featuring six original tracks, plus two covers: “My Ideal” and “God Bless the Child.” The LP features Matt Rollings on keys, Viktor Krauss on bass, and Jano Rix of the Wood Brothers on drums. The result: a smooth, jazzy, rootsy, soulful sound endorsed by the legendary Lyle Lovett: “Sounds great, Ben!” Graves is an associate professor of music at Volunteer State Community College in Gallatin, Tennessee, and gigs regularly at local venues.
Where Heaven Meets Cheyenne
Charles MacDuff Westerman ’12 Comm.
Atmosphere Press: 2024
This debut novel, a work of autobiographical Christian fiction, explores grief, loss, and strength of faith in the face of hardship and death. It’s told through the perspectives of five main characters with intertwined fates, including a minister based on the author’s late father who’s confronting a brain tumor. Another is battling breast cancer. Still another is fighting to regain independence after becoming quadriplegic. Chapters are based on stories the author heard growing up in Chugwater, Wyoming, one of the settings of the novel, which leaps from the 1970s to the 1990s, and bounces between Wyoming, Wisconsin, Colorado, and beyond.
Celebrating Palouse Country: A History of the Landscape in Text and Images
Richard D. Scheuerman ’72 History and John Clement
Basalt Books: 2024
Longtime friends who view the Palouse as the Promised Land present this newly updated ode to the region’s rolling hills, natural beauty, and people. Part history book, part coffee table book, the enhanced 30-year anniversary edition comprises eight chapters and more than 70 breath-taking color images. It was originally published in 1994 as Palouse Country: A Land and Its People.
Passing Notes to Strangers: Crafting Messages that Connect, in Business and in Life
David Flynn ’03 Busi.
2024
David Flynn covers what he calls the four C’s—collecting, connecting, crafting, caring—in this slim volume of approachable advice aimed at professionals in sales and marketing. Each short, conversational piece stretches about two pages. Most are adapted from blog posts—Flynn has been blogging since 2022 at winwithflynn.com—and many discuss the tried-and-true AIDA messaging framework: attention, interest, desire, action.
Getting Smarter with Dr. Margaret Vaughn
Margaret Vaughn
Podcast: 2024
Margaret Vaughn, a language, literacy, and technology WSU professor, interviews the top minds in literacy education in the first and second seasons of her podcast. She joined the College of Education in 2021. “My aim is for policy makers, literacy scholars, and educators to listen to the podcast and find their own entry point into thinking about how they too can make an impact in their community,” she says. “The scholars I have the privilege of interviewing, have spent their careers making conditions better for children and communities. We can listen to their stories and use their knowledge to make a difference around us.”
The Critical Path Career: How to Advance in Construction Scheduling
Greg Lawton and Micah Piippo ’08 Busi.
Beyond Deadlines: 2024
The pair behind the Beyond Deadlines podcast have written a book of actionable strategies for earning raises, securing promotions, and excelling in interviews in the field of construction scheduling. Greg Lawton leads an AI schedule management company. Micah Piippo has led projects at Google and Intel. Like the book, their podcast features industry experts and everyday construction-scheduling career tactics.
Health Extension: Community-Based Healthcare and the Future of Cooperative Extension
Elizabeth Weybright
Michigan State University Press: 2024
Is the nationwide university Cooperative Extension system poised for a seismic shift that supports community-based health care? Elizabeth Weybright, associate professor of human development and adolescent Extension specialist at WSU, answers that question and provides a road map for local health care engagement by Extension.