New Books This Week

Another Tuesday, another list of new books! Check out these three new books publishing today and you can see everything new this month on our Hot Off the Press page. Plus, if you want updates in your inbox every month on new titles and what’s happening at UNC Press, you can sign up for our monthly eNews here.

High Bias: The Distorted History of the Cassette Tape by Marc Masters

“An affectionate ode . . . Masters constructs a lively and detailed case for the cassette as a vital driver of cultural creation. This charming history is sure to please anyone nostalgic for the mixtapes of yesteryear.”—Publishers Weekly

“A thoroughly enjoyable romp . . . With energy, insight, and wit, Masters provides a welcome examination of an often overlooked cultural turning point.”—Kirkus Reviews (STARRED review)

“This accessible primer unravels past and present uses and misuses of cassettes. . . . Masters builds a generous lineage, where it is clear that as much as ‘sounds realign magnetic particles on a tape . . . the tape realigns your brain.'”—The Wire

Buying Time for Heritage: How to Save an Endangered Historic Property, Revised and Expanded Edition by J. Myrick Howard

“Buying Time for Heritage is essential for preservationists and students of preservation around the country to learn how to transform buildings and towns using Preservation North Carolina’s work as a guide.”—Mary Anthony, The 1772 Foundation

“Reusing our older and historic buildings is a prime tenet of both the conservation and preservation movements. Avoiding the usual real estate jargon, Myrick translates the complicated world of real estate development into concepts we can all understand and embrace.”—Paul Edmondson, former president and CEO of the National Trust for Historic Preservation

The Race for America: Black Internationalism in the Age of Manifest Destiny by R. J. Boutelle

“A highly researched and compellingly written study,The Race for America uses a novel approach in examining Black transnationalism across the continent through the prism of Manifest Destiny. Through his analysis of Black literature, newspapers, brochures, correspondence, and the Colored Convention movement, R. J. Boutelle expertly details the intricate history of how Black writers in the United States actively shaped debates on the geopolitical development of the singular idea of America.”—Marlene L. Daut, author of Awakening the Ashes

“The Race for America is a thoroughly compelling project, illuminated by detailed readings of canonical and underread texts as well as a fluid and inventive engagement with theory. With attention to both literary history and a conceptual verve, Boutelle has given us a timely intervention in the debates about the transnational genealogies of Black intellectual and political life of the nineteenth century.”—Ivy G. Wilson, author of Specters of Democracy: Blackness and the Aesthetics of Nationalism