New Releases: Balloonmania and Environmentalism

Can you imagine seeing a crowd of people in a field and you ask an excited woman passing by what’s up and she says “it’s a mania! Balloonmania!” Sophie Blanchard was a French balloonist in the early nineteenth century who, you might not be surprised, died in a balloon accident. Learn more of her tale here!

Adams’s book profiles eight young Black women who are “leading, organizing, advocating, and creating.” These include Ssanyu Lukoma, who founded Brown Kids Read when she was thirteen years old and Hannah Lucas, a teenager who co-created a mental health app. What a balance to strike today between praising Gen Z for their excellent work and not making them feel like the weight of the future is on their shoulders! But I do love when we praise them. They are dealing with a lot.

Coast Salish is “a group of ethnically and linguistically related Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast, living in British Columbia, Canada and the U.S. states of Washington and Oregon.” Sasha taqʷšəblu LaPointe blends her Coast Salish heritage with her love of punk culture in her autobiography. LaPointe’s great-grandmother helped preserve the Indigenous language Lushootseed, which is super cool.

Omg yeeeess give me this weird 1970s throwback cover! Thomas highlights the links between environmentalism, racism, and privilege, and how we cannot achieve real environmental progress “without uplifting the voices of its people — especially those most often unheard.” I can’t get over this cover. But also this message is important! Thomas founded the Intersectional Environmentalist platform, a “climate justice community and resource hub centering BIPOC and historically under-amplified voices in the environmental space.” Amazing.