Seattle Staff Faves 2025: Nonfiction
Each year we ask our staff across the library system for their favorite books published in the current year. Enjoy this variety of nonfiction staff favorites, with annotations by staff members or as noted. (created November 2025)
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Born in Flames
In the 1970s, widespread arson in cities from New York to Seattle devastated working class communities of color. Commonly blamed on BIPOC residents themselves as "tenant vandalism", historian Ansfield powerfully writes about the true perpetrators (landlords incentivized by the insurance industry's "brownlining" policies), predatory capitalism, and the tenant-led resistance movements to protect their homes and communities. - Bean
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza
A unique and complex perspective around the past and present of the relationship of Palestine, Israel, and Jews throughout the Diaspora. - Marc
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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A Protest History of the United States
Browne-Marshall ... explores the 400-year history of protest movements and rebellions in the U.S., from the earliest Indigenous resistance to current protests and marches—by considering both the causes and the personalities who participated in them. (Library Journal)
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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Flashes of Brilliance
Freelance photo editor Burgess debuts with a captivating whirlwind tour of photography’s early years. Full of colorful details about the ingenuity of early photographers ... this is a thrilling history of a medium and its seismic impact. (Publishers Weekly)
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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Super Gay Poems
A love letter to queer poetry of the last 6 decades and a wonderful introduction to LGBTQIA+ poets writing in a wide variety of forms. - Abby
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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When the Horses
When the Horses recalls a girlhood spent in the American South; between the domestic and natural worlds, where the symmetry and control of human touch have begun to fall away-these are poems of encounter: with place, self, other, and the uncanny beauty that remains after loss. (Publisher description)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Superbloom
A call to change our relationship with communication technologies. Carr persuasively sounds the alarm about the destructive nature of social media and the corporations that control it. (Kirkus)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Hardly Creatures
The joyfully inventive debut by Colgate honors the disabled community. Complete with an access guide and legend denoting options for the reader to interact with the poems on their own terms, Colgate radically reenvisions how a text might support its reader. Colgate's generous and perceptive poems make an impact. (Publishers Weekly)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Interficial Artelligence
Chuck D presents his encounters with some of his greatest heroes and other public figures. (Publisher description)
Format: Graphic Novel
Availability: Available
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Invisible Differences
Dachez and Caroline explore life with Asperger’s syndrome with candor and compassion ... This soulful and serious look at Asperger’s syndrome brings an informed and optimistic perspective to the fore. (Publishers Weekly)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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