Steven Levy’s The Perfect Thing: How the iPod Shuffles Commerce, Culture, and Coolness looks at the enormous influence of this tiny portable media player.

Alison Larkin’s latest novel explores the rocky boundary between genetic and environmental influences on one’s identity.

A look at Religion in American Politics: A Short History by Frank Lambert.

A woman travels halfway around the world to discover her true identity in Vendela Vida’s Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name.

Anya Ulinich’s Petropolis tells the tale of a Russian immigrant’s coming-of-age journey in America.

Jonathan Mooney chronicles his road trip in his book The Short Bus: A Journey Beyond Normal.

A young woman makes the most of her confusion in Andrea Levy’s Fruit of the Lemon.

Matthew Wray’s Not Quite White traces the history of the term “white trash.”