When Spring returns, 2LP has lined up some exciting titles

2Leaf Press is pleased to announce some of its Spring/Summer titles. All titles are available for preorder at University of Chicago Press and other online outlets.

by Laila Halaby
April 2022

Laila Halaby’s second collection of poetry, why an author writes to a guy holding a fish, is a story in verse chronicles the misadventures of a recently divorced Lebanese woman dating in America. This honest, sensual, and often funny series of narrative poems chronicles the author’s decision to leave her two-decades-long relationship with her Palestinian husband. Halaby suddenly finds herself in the world of American dating where she searches for idealized love and genuine connection. Always treated as an “other” and having never dated a white man or an American before, Halaby writes about misadventures and heartbreak amid misread cues and lost nuances. Halaby reassesses her role as a woman, a mother, and a writer, and she learns how to dispense with labels and imagined expectations. In the process, she becomes reacquainted with her womanhood and power. A charming and highly entertaining collection.

by Carolyn L. Baker
May 2022

Carolyn L. Baker publishes her second book with 2Leaf Press, Dispatches, From Racial Divide to the Road of Repair, A Collection of Essays, which investigates White Americans and the complexities of race. In the wake of nationwide Black Lives Matter protests against racial injustice and police brutality, many Americans are taking steps to educate themselves about racism in the United States. Baker provides brief discussions of how racism draws attention to exclusions and inequalities that Black people experience. By drawing on social constructionist ideas, Baker articulates common themes coupled with her personal experiences that relate to being White in America. She also asserts that implicit racial bias harms and debilitates the soul of White people and that it is theirs to dismantle for the sake of their own liberation. The author of An Unintentional Accomplice (2020), Baker continues to argue that instead of waiting on top-down changes, Americans should begin the work of repairing the racial divide in their own communities. With Dispatches, Baker seeks to challenge, inspire, and uplift readers who, like herself, want to create a bottom-up paradigm for building community to drive authentic social change.

by Myrna Nieves
June 2022

Entre el sol y la nieve /Escritos de fin de siglo y después, Between the Sun and Snow/Writing at the End of the Century & Beyond is a collection of selected newspaper articles by writer, cultural activist, and educator Myrna Nieves. The articles in this bilingual collection, which were originally written in Spanish and translated into English by Chris Brandt, first appeared in Nosotros los latinos, a magazine published in New York, between 1992 and 1995. Here, Nieves has brought together articles and new essays in which the author navigates critical viewpoints from a Latino perspective. She addresses a variety of issues including climate change, domestic violence, women’s rights, and trends in literature and the arts. Featuring a generous collection of preeminent photographers Néstor Barreto, Roger Cabán, Betty “BP” Cole, Perla de León, Frank Gimpaya, Nereo López Meza, George Malavé, Hiram Maristany, Eliud Martínez, Marlis Momber, Marina Ortiz, Marwin Schwartz, and Louis Servedio Morales.