Speak English! The Rise of Latinos in Baseball chronicles how much— and how little—has changed since the first Latino played in the big leagues in the nineteenth century. By the middle of the next century, the Alous, Vic Power, and Rico Carty worked to earn their place in the game amid taunts and ridicule. Today, even established players and stars may be told to speak English in clubhouses—eliciting cringes or shrugs from individuals who are seemingly still hurting.

Winner of the 2013 Stan and Tom Wick Poetry Prize
Mark Doty, Judge

“It’s a joy. . .to come nearer to a realm of experience little explored in American poetry, the lives of those who are engaged in the complex project of transforming their own gender… Oliver Bendorf writes from a paradoxical, new-world position: the adult voice of a man who has just appeared in the world. A man emergent, a man in love, alive in the fluid instability of any category.”

—Mark Doty, from the Foreword

Samuel Shem’s classic novel about medical internship, The House of God, is required reading in medical schools throughout the world and is celebrated for its authentic description of medical training and practice, for its Rabelaisian comedy, and for its humanism and vision. His new novel, and most ambitious work yet, The Spirit of the Place, tells the story of an expatriate doctor called home to Columbia, New York, in the early 1980s to face his own history and that of the place. It is a novel of love and death, mothers and sons, ghosts and bullies, doctors and patients, illness and healing.

Verlyn Flieger’s expanded and updated edition of Splintered Light, a classic study of Tolkien’s fiction first published in 1983, examines The Silmarillion and The Lord of the Rings in light of Owen Barfield’s linguistic theory of the fragmentation of meaning. Flieger demonstrates Tolkien’s use of Barfield’s concept throughout his fiction, showing how his central image of primary light splintered and refracted acts as a metaphor for the languages, peoples, and history of Middle-earth.

In Spoilsmen in a “Flowery Fairyland,” Jack L. Hammersmith examines in detail the first eleven American ministers to Japan, exploring the information, expectations, and values they took with them and how they shaped U.S. diplomacy with Japan in the late nineteenth century. Of particular interest, he shows that the issue of trade, a dominant contemporary concern, was an ongoing nineteenth-century problem as well.

When he retired in 2006, Bob Dolgan had been a sportswriter for forty-five years at the Cleveland Plain Dealer. Known for his unique perspectives on sports figures, Dolgan’s style, instincts, and experience as a reporter were evident in his columns that were beloved by his readers and admired by his colleagues.

“No star-struck lover or dark mistress inhabits these lively sonnets but a flesh-and-blood, poker-playing Texan with a cell phone, an agent, an anxious mother, and a load of her own worries as she tries to make it in the music business. From the Star Spangled Banner at a racetrack to the warm-up for B. B. King, Spotlit Girl is a nimble character study that captures both the craziness of a performer’s life and the time-stopping intimacy between a vocalist and her audience. The singer’s in the spotlight, and Kevin Oberlin has the focus and the dazzle to make her shine.”—Don Bogen

This collection of correspondence, many letters previously unpublished, stresses familial relationships, the daughters’ education, and the role of women in nineteenth-century America. “Spur Up Your Pegasus” provides important insights into the personal lives and private thoughts of a prominent political family.

Perhaps the most easily recognized military helmet of the 20th century is the German Stahlhel. In the revised and expanded edition of this classic, Floyd R. Tubbs and Robert w. Clawson identify and classify the Stahlhelm and relate its history, designs, features, and uses. As the only book on the German combat helmet currently in print, this edition, with its detailed drawings and illustrative photographs, will appeal to the collector as well as the military historian.

Selected from the LTV Steel Collection donated to the Western Reserve Historical Society in Cleveland, Ohio, after LTV’s bankruptcy in 2000, photographs were chosen for their artistic quality, their importance in explaining industrial processes, and for their human interest. In preserving historical images from independent companies later purchased or taken over by LTV, the collection also provides a striking visual genealogy for LTV Steel. Photographers and those interested in the history of the steel industry will find this book an invaluable addition to their collections.