Petina Gappah’s novel “Out of Darkness, Shining Light” is narrated by the Africans who carried the explorer’s corpse to the coast, a journey of 1,500 miles.
“The Meritocracy Trap,” by the Yale Law School professor Daniel Markovits, argues that far from being fair or merit-based, our social system perpetuates inequality.
Mary M. Lane’s “Hitler’s Last Hostages” reports on an art collection, including work by Picasso, Matisse and Degas, that the Nazis had seized from their victims.
In “How to Fight Anti-Semitism,” Bari Weiss examines the various abuses Jews have suffered simply for being Jews, including a recent flaring on the left.
Stephen Kinzer’s “Poisoner in Chief” describes the C.I.A. in the Cold War years, when it was testing LSD and other drugs on citizens, often without their knowledge.
“The Penguin Book of Migration Literature,” edited by Dohra Ahmad, is designed to tell a more sophisticated version of the subject than the linear narrative of departure, arrival and assimilation.