Indiana University Press blog

This is INDIANA: New book looks at exciting comeback of Hoosier basketball

In December 2011, Tom Crean led his Hoosier basketball players to an upset win over Kentucky, the #1-ranked basketball team in the nation. In one of the two Wildcats’ losses of the year, Indiana fans rushed the court. Christian Watford's epic game-winning three-pointer has since been viewed over 500,000 times on YouTube. From that moment on, the revival of IU basketball was a reality.

On April 16, This is INDIANA: Tom Crean, the Team, and the Exciting Comeback of Hoosier Basketball will be published by Indiana University Press in partnership with The Herald-Times. The book relives the incredible 2011-12 season—game by game, photo by photo.

Facing many challenges, Coach Crean walked into Indiana's Assembly Hall in 2008, promising a return to glory for Indiana basketball. Four years later, led by Big Ten Freshman of the Year Cody Zeller and the brilliant lineup of Jordan Hulls, Christian Watford, Will Sheehey, Verdell Jones III, and Victor Oladipo, the Hoosiers went 24-7 in a regular season that included upsets over top-ranked teams like Kentucky and Ohio State—quite a difference from the 6-25 program of Crean’s first season. Making it to the NCAA’s Sweet Sixteen, the team once again faced the Wildcats in what proved to be a thrilling season finale.

A New York Times article recently put it this way: “Anything with ice and snow should prominently feature a Norwegian. And Indiana should have a good basketball team. … This is why this season has felt like such a rejuvenation in Bloomington.”

Follow news about the book on Twitter: #thisisindianathebook

BookTV to cover event for 'Richard G. Lugar, Statesman of the Senate'

A booksigning for Richard G. Lugar, Statesman of the Senate with author John T. Shaw will take place Monday, April 2, at 7 p.m. at the Cook Theater in the Indiana Landmarks Center. The event is co-sponsored by Howey Politics Indiana and Bookmamas and is free and open to the public. C-SPAN’s BookTV will cover the event, and Shaw will be speaking, followed by a Q&A session.

As Senator Lugar enters his toughest election battle in years, Shaw examines the two-time chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s approach to lawmaking and diplomacy for what it reveals about the workings of the Senate and changes in that institution. Drawing on access to the senator over several years, and interviews with Lugar and other leading figures in foreign policy, Shaw chronicles Lugar's historic work on nuclear proliferation, arms control, energy, and global food issues, highlighting the senator’s ability to influence American foreign policy in consequential ways.

The book presents Lugar’s career as an example of the role Congress can play in shaping foreign policy in an era of a strong executive branch. It demonstrates the importance of statesmanship in contemporary American political life while acknowledging the limitations of this approach to governance.

About the author:

John T. Shaw has covered Congress since 1991 as a congressional correspondent and vice president with Market News International and as a contributing writer for the Washington Diplomat magazine. He is the author of The Ambassador: Inside the Life of a Working Diplomat and Washington Diplomacy: Profiles of People of World Influence. He has been a Hoover Institution Media Fellow and is a frequent commentator for C-SPAN and public radio.

Related links:

Listen to an IU Press podcast with Shaw
Read Shaw’s opinion piece on the upcoming primaries in the Washington Post Political Bookworm
Read Publishers Weekly's review of the book

Author event: Greg Schwipps to speak at Franklin College

Greg Schwipps, author of What This River Keeps, will speak at Franklin College as part of the Spring Writers Series. His talk takes place March 27 at 3:40 p.m. in Room 103 of the Johnson Center for Fine Arts. For more information, visit the Franklin College website.

'Mammals of Indiana' author to speak at Sassafras Audubon Society meeting

Mammals of Indiana author John O. Whitaker Jr. will be the featured speaker at the Sassafras Audubon Society’s spring meeting and dinner March 25 at Grazie! Italian Eatery in Bloomington.

Whitaker will discuss Indiana bats and the challenges in bat preservation, including white-nose syndrome and wind farms.

The evening begins at 5:30 p.m., with dinner at 6. Reservations are required. To reserve your spot, email Julia Ferguson at fluvialjulia@gmail.com by March 21.

Book review: Heroes and Victims

"Bucur takes the reader on what is effectively a guided tour of a major war-related Romanian lieux de mémoire—some familiar, others quite new to researchers. ... [T]he book can be read as both a monograph with new things to say to specialists and as an introduction for students..." —European History Quarterly

Staff recommendations for 50% off spring book sale

Today is the first day of spring, and we're celebrating with a 50% off book sale! It can be a daunting task to make a selection from our 2,000+ titles, so we surveyed our staff to see which books they recommend to jump-start your spring reading. We hope you find something you like from the list below, which includes a wide range of interests from American History to Women's Studies! Check out the IU Press website for a complete list of books. Our sale ends March 22, so don't delay purchasing your favorite titles at half off!

American History

• Defeating Lee
  Dave Hulsey, Director of Sales and Marketing
• The Darkest Dawn
  Rich Pierce, Systems Analyst/Programmer
• Somebody’s Darling
  Bernie Zoss, Production Director
• Dillinger: The Untold Story
  Rhonda Vander Dussen, Sales and Marketing Assistant
• A Life is More Than a Moment
  Mary Lou Shelly, Senior Customer Service Representative

Anthropology

• Connected in Cairo
  Angela Burton, Managing Editor
• The Art of Loving Krishna
  Marvin Keenan, Project Manager

Art & Photography

• Contemporary Quilt Art
  Linda Bannister, Journals Marketing Manager
• Saving the Big Cats
  Kate Matthen, Marketing and Sales Coordinator
• Real Stories of Big Cat Rescues
  Mary Beth Haas, Sales Manager

Education

• Searching for Hope
  Mandy Clarke, Trade Marketing and Publicity Manager
• Conversations with Great Teachers
  Rebecca Tolen, Sponsoring Editor

Film & Media

• The Year's Work in Lebowski Studies
  Dan Pyle, Production Coordinator and Vendor Liaison
• The Magazine Article
  Joy Andreakis, Electronic and Serials Publishing Manager

Literature & Essays

• Earth Works
  Laura Baich, Electronic Marketing Manager
• Rural Free
  Jennifer Witzke, Marketing Designer
• Petersburg
  Peter Froehlich, Rights Manager

Books from the Global African Voices series:

• Little Mother
  Dee Mortensen, Senior Sponsoring Editor
• Life and a Half
  June Silay, Project Manager
• Murambi, The Book of Bones
  Jennifer Coyle, Customer Service Representative

Book from the Break Away Books series:

• The Glimpse Traveler
  Sarah Jacobi, Assistant Sponsoring Editor

Book from the Library of Indiana Classics series:

• A Girl of the Limberlost
  Kathy Stout, Accounting Associate

Music

• Debussy Redux
  Raina Polivka, Sponsoring Editor
• Beethoven in America
  Pam Rude, Senior Book Designer

Nature

• Wildflowers and Ferns of Indiana Forests
  Linda Oblack, Sponsoring Editor
• 101 Trees of Indiana
  Nancy Lightfoot, Project Manager
• Fishes of Indiana
  Steve Carter, Warehouse Manager
• Mammals of Indiana
  Laura Hohman, Production Assistant
• Perennials Short and Tall
  Dan Nichols, Operations Director
• The Natural Heritage of Indiana
  Tony Brewer, Composition Coordinator

Politics

• Richard G. Lugar, Statesman of the Senate
  Janet Rabinowitch, Director

Railroads

• Moonlight in Duneland
  Mary Blizzard, Book Designer
• The Indiana Rail Road Company
  Jamison Cockerham, Book Designer

Science

• Dinosaurs of Eastern Iberia
  Bob Sloan, Editorial Director
• Why You Can Never Get to the End of the Rainbow And Other Moments of Science
  Ted Boardman, Technology Director

Women’s Studies

• A Home of Her Own
  Judith Caldwell, Journals Production Manager
• To Write Like a Woman
  Darja Malcolm-Clarke, Project Manager

World History

• Last Folio
  Mollie Ables, Marketing Services Coordinator
• The Style of Paris
  Theresa Halter, Publicity Coordinator

Book review: Defeating Lee

"[T]he author is to be commended for staying focused on the organization rather than its most famous commander, [although] Hancock understandably occupies center stage at key moments." —Civil War Book Review

Book review: Everyday Life in Central Asia

"Everyday life in Central Asia is ... a textbook for area studies courses and has much to teach such students, as well as those in political science." —Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute

New IUP book coincides with 90th anniversary of first American bat mitzvah

On March 18, 1922, the first American bat mitzvah was celebrated in New York City. While the idea may have been slow to catch on at first, in the 21st century, Jewish girls in North America alone will celebrate some 40,000 bat mitzvahs each year, and the number is growing because every sub-group of Judaism, including Orthodox, recognizes some form of bat mitzvah ceremony.

Today I Am a Woman: Stories of Bat Mitzvah around the World is an ideal gift book for Jewish girls to commemorate the 90th anniversary of the first American bat mitzvah and to discover different Jewish communities around the world. The book offers several fascinating stories that uncover how this milestone is celebrated on six different continents.

Narrations of the first bat mitzvah at the only synagogue in Indonesia, a moving bat mitzvah memory of World War II Italy, and an American bat mitzvah shared with girls in a Ukrainian orphanage are a few of the rich testimonies from both the past and present in this collection.

In celebration of the 90th anniversary of the bat mitzvah, you can save 40% off Today I Am a Woman. Use code BDAY40 at checkout. Hurry, offer valid today only! Shop now

Book review: Corsican Fragments

"There is much to unpack in Candea’s Corsican Fragments; that is both the virtue and difficulty of this book, which asks very big questions both ethnographic and theoretical in nature." —Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale