August Roundup: News, Events, Reviews

The beginning of Fall semester always brings a flurry of exciting news and publicity. This month, Theodore Roosevelt’s Ghost by Michael Patrick Cullinane won the Theodore Roosevelt Association Book Prize! And Cityscapes of New Orleans by Richard Campanella was listed as a best geography book of all time. In other news, Inman Majors, author of Penelope Lemon: Game On!, wrote an article for LitHubSouthern Decadence in New Orleans by Howard Philips Smith and Frank Perez was featured in Gambit and in Louisiana Book NewsRichard S. Hopkins, author of Planning the Greenspaces of Nineteenth-Century Paris, was featured on a podcast in the New Books Network. And The Daily Reveille wrote a piece about the Yellow Shoe Fiction Series.

On the LSU Press Blog, Howard Philips Smith and Frank Perez recommend top books on New Orleans’ LGBTQ+ History and Culture; Doug Ramspeck explains how his concept of ‘fictional memory’ influences his poetry; and Wayne Wiegand reveals how the American Library Association honors African-American activists with their new resolution.

At LSU Press, we are privileged to work with some of the best professionals in the industry and right now we are looking for a Sales and Marketing Manager to establish the strategic direction and vision for all marketing and sales aspects of the LSU Press and The Southern Review publishing programs. Interested? Click here for further information.

Below you’ll find a list of our September titles, additional upcoming events with our authors, and some recent publicity and reviews of our books. If you want to keep up with the press in real time, follow us on TwitterInstagram, and Facebook!


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Selected Publicity and Praise

Precious Perversions by Tison Pugh

“Pugh challenges readers and scholars, urging them to question the southern literary canon and why more comic authors of gay and lesbian literature, particularly women, have largely been excluded. Pugh’s Precious Perversions argues persuasively for a reevaluation of its construction, adding an important new layer of insight through his study of humor, region, and sexuality in the southern literary tradition.”—Studies in American Humor

The Cemeteries of New Orleans by Peter B. Dedek

 “Altogether, The Cemeteries of New Orleans represents a significant contribution to scholarship on cemeteries, grave marker studies, architectural history, and the social and cultural history of New Orleans.”—Journal of Southern History

 The Slaveholding Crisis: Fear of Insurrection and the Coming of the Civil War by Carl L. Paulus

 “Through its nuanced analysis, The Slaveholding Crisis: Fear of Insurrection and the Coming of the Civil War ably shows how fears of enslaved peoples violently claiming their freedom ultimately led slaveholders to a version of ‘American exceptionalism’ that demanded the Union be destroyed so that America could be saved.”—Journal of Southern History

Theodore Roosevelt’s Ghost by Michael Patrick Cullinane

 “Considering the ferocity with which Woodrow Wilson’s legacy is currently being debated, it is merely a matter of time before such a contest for interpretative hegemony reexamines the divisive and contradictory dimensions of Theodore Roosevelt’s life and presidency. Michael Patrick Cullinane’s book will be a solid guide to contextualize this next chapter in the long history of an American icon.”—Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era

New Orleans Carnival Balls by Jennifer Atkins

 “Jennifer Atkins concludes, many of the rules, traditions, and codes she has described still apply today and whoever has attended one of the modern krewes’ Carnival balls will recognize much of the choreography of today’s balls. This makes her book an important tool in understanding New Orleans’s contemporary society.”—Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era

Penelope Lemon: Game On! by Inman Majors

 Penelope Lemon: Game On! moves at a zany, Wodehousian clip, the entertaining set pieces interspersed with zippy dialogue. . . . It’s a short novel, saucy and profane and funny on every page.”—Chapter 16

 American Sectionalism in the British Mind by Peter O’Connor

 “O’Connor’s comprehensive presentation of British attitudes towards the United States over the antebellum period is a valuable contribution to our understanding of the nineteenth-century transatlantic connection and the history of foreign relations during the Civil War. The depth of O’Connor’s scholarship is impressive and its grasp of complexity remarkable.”—Civil War Book Review

Southern Decadence in New Orleans by Howard Philips Smith and Frank Perez

 “Going beyond artistic and literary associations, Southern Decadence in New Orleans is a social history, scrutinizing the complex social, racial, and sexual history of a city already known for its social, racial, and sexual anomalies, and continually turning up new revelations.”—New York Journal of Books

The 13th Sunday after Pentecost By Joseph Bathanti:

 “How lucky we all are that Bathanti chose words as the tools that would have in turn surrendered themselves in continued service to him”—Presence: A Journal of Catholic Poetry

 Designing Gotham by Jon Scott Logel was reviewed in the Military Review:

 “Logel’s unique analysis provides a refreshing new perspective on how a few academy-trained engineers had a lasting impact upon one of the world’s great metropolises.”—Military Review

 Lela F. Kerley’s Uncovering Paris: Scandals and Nude Spectacles in the Belle Époque was reviewed by Nineteenth-Century French Studies:

 “If the amount of highlighting made by a reader correlates to scholarly import, this book must be very important, indeed. Kerley showcases the role that women and the arts played in changing the public’s attitude toward nudity in the years preceding World War I, looking closely at the ways la femme nue challenged conventional understandings of femininity, the nude, and art.”—Nineteenth-Century French Studies