Maura Elizabeth Cunningham

“What do you have in here?” Dad asked as he hefted my bulging suitcase into the back of my parents’ Subaru Outback outside the Richmond, Virginia airport last Sunday.

“Well, you know …” I hedged. “I might have packed a few books.”

(Also way too much clothing, as I vastly over-estimated my level of interest in exercising while on vacation.)

I had to bring those books. They’re all borrowed from the Ann Arbor District Library and were all due (whoops) several weeks ago. I’m tired of getting automated emails with the subject line “Please return your overdue library materials.” I had one week in Williamsburg; I could easily read at least three books in one week. I was, in fact, so confident of my success that I also brought my Kindle. Plus a few magazines for backup, because I really wouldn’t want to be caught without something to read. Right?

Well. Between working half-time, sightseeing, watching the Phillies and HGTV, and so forth … I read one book. But it was a good one: Eight Bears: Mythic Past and Imperiled Future, by Gloria Dickie. From my Goodreads review:

Journalist Gloria Dickie investigates the perils faced by the world’s eight bear species, traveling from South America to Asia to North America and seeking out bears and bear experts along the way. In Eight Bears: Mythic Past and Imperiled Future, she writes of bears affected by environmental decline, bears held captive and routinely drained of their bile for sale as a traditional medicine, and bears forced to dance for public entertainment. Stories of bears breaking into houses or swiping snacks from convenience stores might be entertaining news clips, Dickie notes, but they reflect a far darker struggle among ursine populations that have seen their habitats vanish thanks to human encroachment and climate change. READ MORE

And, hey. I still have today’s trip back to Michigan. I’m sure I can read another whole book before I get home—right?

Recommendations

China Stories
James Carter, “A Young Deng Xiaoping in France”
Katrina Northrop, “Ian Johnson on China’s Voices of Resistance”
Jessie Pang, “Hong Kong court rules that gay couples get equal housing rights”
Ilaria Maria Sala, “Hong Kong Soy Sauce: Mee Chun, or Kowloon Soy Company”
William Sandlund, “We Need to Talk About Country Garden”
Scott Savitt, “Robert Daly on Keeping Close to China”
Alexandra Stevenson, “China Bet It All on Real Estate. Now Its Economy Is Paying the Price.”
Daisuke Wakabayashi, Bhadra Sharma and Claire Fu, “China Got a Big Contract. Nepal Got Debt and a Pricey Airport.”
Irene Zhang, “Tears of Salt”

Wanderings Around the World
Brittany Ghiroli, “Kim Ng was a reluctant trailblazer. Her Marlins exit makes her even more impressive”
Anant Gupta and Gerry Shih, “India uses widespread internet blackouts to mask domestic turmoil”
Jessica Kutz, “This Latinx geologist and TV show host is disrupting stereotypes of who can be a scientist”
Amanda Mull, “Self-Checkout Is a Failed Experiment”
Sarah Schulman, “Explanations Are Not Excuses”
Zachary Small, “Facing Scrutiny, a Museum That Holds 12,000 Human Remains Changes Course”
Joshua Yaffa, “A Russian Journalist’s Pained Love for Her Country”

Standout Story

At Belt magazine, Edward Curtis IV writes of his great-great grandfather’s migration from Lebanon to Cairo, Illinois and his family’s subsequent century-long residence in the Midwest:

Today, when I hear fellow Midwesterners say that racial and ethnic diversity is new to the small-town Midwest, I know in my bones that the region has always been more than a white settlement. Of course, there are new immigrants in the rural Midwest, many of whom stem the tide of depopulation and provide essential labor, especially in agriculture. But the idea that non-white immigrants are, generally speaking, new to the Midwest could not be further from the truth.

Edward Curtis IV, “Moses of Cairo (Illinois)”

Feature photo: Duke of Gloucester Street in Colonial Williamsburg, October 20, 2023.