Deep Dives (DDL Summer 2026)

Updated May 17, 2026
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Air-borne : the hidden history of the life we breathe
Zimmer, Carl
Paper Book
One of Smithsonian Magazine's Ten Best Science Books of 2025 The fascinating, untold story of the air we breathe, the hidden life it contains, and invisible dangers that can turn the world upside down Every day we draw in two thousand gallons of air-...
At home a short history of private life
Bryson, Bill.
Paper Book
From one of the most beloved authors of our  time--more than six million copies of his books have been sold in this country alone--a fascinating excursion into the history behind the place we call home. "Houses aren't refuges from history. They are where history ends up."  ...
Black in blues : how a color tells the story of my people
Perry, Imani
Paper Book
A "vast, multifaceted and enchanting" (Minneapolis Star-Tribune) meditation on the color blue and its fascinating role in Black history and culture, from National Book Award winner Imani Perry, "the most important interpreter of Black life in our time" (Eddie S. Glaude, Jr.) Throughout...
Blood : the science, medicine, and mythology of menstruation
Gunter, Jen
Paper Book
"This book is the brilliant and long needed corrective that we have waited for, since the first time we stuffed a box of pads into a three-ply paper bag and slunk out of a pharmacy. Never again." --Samantha Bee New York Times bestselling author of The...
The bookshop : a history of the American bookstore
Friss, Evan
Paper Book
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER Goodreads Choice Award Winner in History & Biography One of Time's 100 Must-Read Books of 2024 "A spirited defense of this important, odd and odds-defying American retail category." --The New York Times...
Breath : the new science of a lost art
Nestor, James
Paper Book
AN UPDATED EDITION OF THE PHENOMOENAL INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER There is nothing more essential to our health and wellbeing than breathing- take air in, let it out, repeat 25,000 times a day. Yet, as a species, humans have lost the ability to breathe correctly, with grave...
The breath of the gods : the history and future of the wind
Winchester, Simon
Paper Book
Sunday Times bestselling author Simon Winchester returns with a thought-provoking history of the wind, written in his edifying and entertaining style. What is going on with our atmosphere? The headlines are filled with news of devastating hurricanes, murderous tornadoes, and...
Butts : a backstory
Radke, Heather
Paper Book
"Lively and thorough, Butts is the best kind of nonfiction." --Esquire A "carefully researched and reported work of cultural history" (The New York Times) that explores how one body part has influenced the female--and human--experience for centuries, and...
Challenger : a true story of heroism and disaster on the edge of space
Higginbotham, Adam
Paper Book
On January 28, 1986, the space shuttle Challenger broke apart over the Atlantic Ocean, killing all seven people on board. Like disaster is a defining moment in twentieth-century history - yet the full story of what happened, and why, has never been told. It's a compelling tale of ambition and...
Cue the sun : the invention of reality TV
Nussbaum, Emily
Paper Book
The rollicking saga of reality television, a "sweeping" (The Washington Post) cultural history of America's most influential, most divisive artistic phenomenon, from the Pulitzer Prize-winning New Yorker writer--"a must-read for anyone interested in television or popular culture"...
The devil reached toward the sky : the making & unleashing of the atomic bomb by the people who were there
Graff, Garrett M.
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER THE 'MASTERPIECE' COMPLETE ORAL HISTORY OF THE ATOMIC BOMB - BY A PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST 'Magisterial...A stunning account that brings to the fore the nuclear saga's surreal combination of...
Empire of pain : the secret history of the Sackler dynasty
Keefe, Patrick Radden
Paper Book
NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE NOMINEE * A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR * NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER * A grand, devastating portrait of three generations of the Sackler family, famed for their philanthropy, whose fortune was built by Valium and whose reputation...
Entangled life : how fungi make our worlds, change our minds and shape our futures
Sheldrake, Merlin
Paper Book
A mind-altering adventure through the world of fungi for readers of Robert Macfarlane and Other Minds *THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER* 'A dazzling, vibrant, vision-changing book. I ended it wonderstruck at the fungal world. A remarkable work by a...
Everything is tuberculosis : the history and persistence of our deadliest infection
Green, John
Paper Book
#1 New York Times bestseller * #1 Washington Post bestseller * #1 Indie Bestseller * USA Today Bestseller John Green, award-winning author and passionate advocate for global healthcare reform, tells a deeply human story illuminating the fight against the world's...
Frostbite : how refrigeration changed our food, our planet, and ourselves
Twilley, Nicola
Paper Book
How often do we open the fridge or peer into the freezer with the expectation that we'll find something fresh and ready to eat? It's an everyday act - but just a century ago, eating food that had been refrigerated was cause for both fear and excitement. The introduction of artificial refrigeration...
The gales of November : the untold story of the Edmund Fitzgerald
Bacon, John U.
Paper Book
For three decades following World War II, the Great Lakes overtook Europe as the epicenter of global economic strength. The region was the beating heart of the world economy, possessing all the power and prestige Silicon Valley does today. And no ship represented the apex of the American Century...
A history of the world in twelve shipwrecks
Gibbins, David
Paper Book
AN ECONOMIST BEST BOOK OF 2024 'Masterful and entrancing - this is big history at its best.' Professor Alice Roberts, author of Ancestors 'A real-life Indiana Jones takes readers on a dive through these underwater museums, revealing the...
The horse : a galloping history of humanity
Winegard, Timothy C.
Paper Book
From New York Times bestselling author of The Mosquito, the incredible story of how the horse shaped human history. The Horse is an epic history that begins more than 5500 years ago on the windswept grasslands of the Eurasian Steppe when the first horse was tamed and an unbreakable bond with humans...
How Flowers Made Our World: The Story of Nature's Revolutionaries
Haskell, David.
Paper Book
In How Flowers Made Our World, biologist David George Haskell redefines our understanding of flowers, casting them as powerful revolutionaries at the heart of Earth's story. Far from being mere ornaments, flowers have shaped the very fabric of life on our planet. Their evolution triggered...
The icepick surgeon : murder, fraud, sabotage, piracy, and other dastardly deeds perpetrated in the name of science
Kean, Sam
Paper Book
From a New York Times bestselling author comes the gripping, untold history of science's darkest secrets.  "A fascinating book [that] deserves a wide audience." --Publishers Weekly, starred review Science is a force for...
The joy of sweat : the strange science of perspiration
Everts, Sarah
Paper Book
Sweating may be one of our weirdest biological functions, but it's also one of our most vital and least understood. In The Joy of Sweat, Sarah Everts delves into its role in the body-and in human history. Why is sweat salty? Why do we sweat when stressed? Why do some people produce...
The library book
Orlean, Susan
Paper Book
A REESE WITHERSPOON x HELLO SUNSHINE BOOK CLUB PICK A WASHINGTON POST TOP 10 BOOK OF THE YEAR * A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER and NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF 2018 "A constant pleasure to read...Everybody who loves books...
London falling : a mysterious death in a gilded city and a family's search for truth
Keefe, Patrick Radden
Paper Book
In 2019, teenager Zac Brettler mysteriously fell to his death from a luxury apartment balcony into the Thames. As his grieving parents began to investigate his final days, they were shocked to learn that he'd been leading a double life, in which he was posing as the son of a wealthy Russian oligarch...
The mosquito : a human history of our deadliest predator
Winegard, Timothy C.
Paper Book
What was George Washington's secret weapon during the American Revolution, and how did it lead to Britain colonising Australia? What protected Popes for centuries? And what does Starbucks have to thank for its global domination? The answer to these questions and many more is: the mosquito. The...
Murderland : crime and bloodlust in the time of serial killers
Fraser, Caroline
Paper Book
An Edgar Award winner for True Crime * A National Bestseller * A Washington Post Notable Book * Named a Best Book of the Year by The New Yorker, Forbes, NPR, Vulture, Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, Slate, Newsweek, New York...
Nexus : a brief history of information networks from the Stone Age to AI
Harari, Yuval N.
Paper Book
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Sapiens comes the groundbreaking story of how information networks have made, and unmade, our world. For the last 100,000 years, we Sapiens have accumulated enormous power. But despite all our discoveries, inventions,...
Our moon : how Earth's celestial companion transformed the planet, guided evolution, and made us who we are
Boyle, Rebecca
Paper Book
LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD * NATIONAL BESTSELLER * "A riveting feat of science writing that recasts that most familiar of celestial objects into something eerily extraordinary, pivotal to our history, and awesome in the original sense of the word."--Ed Yong, New York Times...
Raw dog : the naked truth about hot dogs
Loftus, Jamie
Paper Book
A NEW YORK TIMES AND INDIE BESTSELLER! Part travelogue, part culinary history, all capitalist critique--comedian Jamie Loftus's debut, Raw Dog, will take you on a cross-country road trip in the summer of 2021, and reveal what the creation, culture,...
Replaceable You: Adventures in Human Anatomy
Roach, Mary.
Paper Book
The body is the most complex machine in the world, but what happens when the parts start to fail? Meet the scientists facing the challenge... AN AMAZON AND TIME BOOK OF THE YEAR  Our bodies regenerate at a remarkable rate - our skin replaces itself every month, our...
Scotland Yard : a history of the London police force's most infamous murder cases
Read, Simon
Paper Book
A riveting true-crime history of London's first modern police force as told through its most notorious murder cases. The idea of "Scotland Yard" is steeped in atmospheric stories of foggy London streets, murder by lamplight, and fiendish killers pursued by gentleman detectives....
The secret history of food : strange but true stories about the origins of everything we eat
Siegel, Matt
Paper Book
An irreverent, surprising, and entirely entertaining look at the little-known history surrounding the foods we know and love. Is Italian olive oil really Italian, or are we dipping our bread in lamp oil? Why are we masochistically drawn to foods that can hurt us, like hot peppers?...
Silk : a world history
Prasad, Aarathi
Paper Book
A Smithsonian Magazine Best History Book of 2024 A Library Journal Selection for Best Nonfiction of 2024 A Next Big Idea Book Club Must-Read for April "Aarathi Prasad's Silk: A World History is a love song to this protean material. . . . Beautiful [and] fascinating." --Wall...
Sing like fish : how sound rules life under water
Kingdon, Amorina
Paper Book
A captivating exploration of how underwater animals tap into sound to survive, and a clarion call for humans to address the ways we invade these critical soundscapes -- from an award-winning science writer. For centuries humans ignored sound in the 'silent world' of the ocean, assuming...
Slither : how nature's most maligned creatures illuminate our world
Hall, Stephen S.
Paper Book
In this "wise and wondrous" (David Quammen) exploration, a science writer reintroduces readers to The Snake, encouraging our initial reaction to the slithery creature to be one of awe rather than disgust. For millennia, depictions of snakes as...
Underland : a deep time journey
Macfarlane, Robert
Paper Book
Hailed as "the great nature writer of this generation" (Wall Street Journal), Robert Macfarlane is the celebrated author of books about the intersections of the human and the natural realms. In Underland, he delivers his masterpiece: an epic exploration of the Earth's underworlds as they exist in...
The urge : our history of addiction
Fisher, Carl Erik
Paper Book
Even after a decades-long opioid overdose crisis, intense controversy still rages over the fundamental nature of addiction and the best way to treat it. With uncommon empathy and erudition, Carl Erik Fisher draws on his own experience as a clinician, researcher, and alcoholic in recovery as he...
Waste wars : dirty deals, international rivalries and the scandalous afterlife of rubbish
Clapp, Alexander
Paper Book
'Jaw-dropping' The Economist 'A mind-altering and unforgettable read' Adam Tooze 'If you wish to know how the world really works, read this book' Misha Glenny A globe-trotting investigation into the catastrophic reality...
What the chicken knows : a new appreciation of the world's most familiar bird
Montgomery, Sy
Paper Book
A charming and eye-opening exploration of the special relationship between humans and chickens from Sy Montgomery, "one of our finest chroniclers of the natural world" (The New York Times). For more than two decades, Sy Montgomery--whose The Soul of an...
Why we swim
Tsui, Bonnie
Paper Book
A Time Magazine Must-Read Book of 2020 A Best Book of the Season: BuzzFeed * Bustle * San Francisco Chronicle A Best Book of the Year: NPR's Book Concierge * Washington Independent Review of Books...
A World Appears: A Journey into Consciousness
Pollan, Michael.
Paper Book
From Michael Pollan, author of the #1 New York Times bestselling HOW TO CHANGE YOUR MIND, a dazzling and panoptic exploration of consciousness--what it is, who has it, and why--and a meditation on the limits and bounds of our very humanity When it comes to the phenomenon...

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