Prioritizing compassion and understanding is the best way to handle these uncertain and upsetting times. Reading fosters empathy, and we hope you find comfort within these books about unity, compassion, and the strength of our communities. Sending peace, hope, and strength to readers everywhere.

The Sky Unwashed by Irene Zabytko

Early on an April Saturday in 1986 in a farm village in Ukraine, widow Marusia Petrenko and her family awake to a day of traditional wedding preparations. Marusia bakes her famous wedding bread-a korovai-in the communal village oven to take to her neighbor’s granddaughter’s reception. Late that night, after all the dancing and drinking, Marusia’s son Yurko leaves for his shift at the nuclear power plant at Chernobyl.

In the morning, the air has a strange metallic taste. The cat is oddly listless. The priest doesn’t show up for services. Yurko doesn’t come home from work. Nobody know what’s happened (and they won’t for many days), but things have changed for the Petrenkos-forever.

Inspired by true events, this unusual, unexpected novel tells how-and why-Marusia defies the Soviet government’s permanent evacuation of her deeply contaminated village and returns to live out her days in the only home she’s ever known. Alone in the deserted town, she struggles up into the church bell tower to ring the bells twice every day just in case someone else has returned. And they have, one by one/ In the end, five intrepid old women-the village babysi-band together for survival and to confront the Soviet officials responsible for their fate. And, in the midst of desolation, a tenacious hold on life chimes forth.

Poignant and truthful and triumphant, this timeless story is about ordinary people who do more than simply “survive.”

What Unites Us by Dan Rather

At a moment of crisis over our national identity, venerated journalist Dan Rather has emerged as a voice of reason and integrity, reflecting on—and writing passionately about—what it means to be an American. Now, with this collection of original essays, he reminds us of the principles upon which the United States was founded. Looking at the freedoms that define us, from the vote to the press; the values that have transformed us, from empathy to inclusion to service; the institutions that sustain us, such as public education; and the traits that helped form our young country, such as the audacity to take on daunting challenges in science and medicine, Rather brings to bear his decades of experience on the frontlines of the world’s biggest stories. As a living witness to historical change, he offers up an intimate view of history, tracing where we have been in order to help us chart a way forward and heal our bitter divisions.

With a fundamental sense of hope, What Unites Us is the book to inspire conversation and listening, and to remind us all how we are, finally, one.

The Book of Delights by Ross Gay

The winner of the NBCC Award for Poetry offers up a spirited collection of short lyrical essays, written daily over a tumultuous year, reminding us of the purpose and pleasure of praising, extolling, and celebrating ordinary wonders.

In The Book of Delights, one of today’s most original literary voices offers up a genre-defying volume of lyric essays written over one tumultuous year. The first nonfiction book from award-winning poet Ross Gay is a record of the small joys we often overlook in our busy lives. Among Gay’s funny, poetic, philosophical delights: a friend’s unabashed use of air quotes, cradling a tomato seedling aboard an airplane, the silent nod of acknowledgment between the only two black people in a room. But Gay never dismisses the complexities, even the terrors, of living in America as a black man or the ecological and psychic violence of our consumer culture or the loss of those he loves. More than anything else, though, Gay celebrates the beauty of the natural world–his garden, the flowers peeking out of the sidewalk, the hypnotic movements of a praying mantis.

The Book of Delights is about our shared bonds, and the rewards that come from a life closely observed. These remarkable pieces serve as a powerful and necessary reminder that we can, and should, stake out a space in our lives for delight.

The Opposite of Hate by Sally Kohn

What is the opposite of hate? As a progressive commentator on Fox News and now CNN, Sally Kohn has made a career out of bridging intractable political differences and learning how to talk respectfully with people whose views she disagrees with passionately. Her viral TED Talk on the need to practice emotional—rather than political—correctness sparked a new way of considering how often we amplify our differences and diminish our connections. But these days even famously “nice” Kohn finds herself wanting to breathe fire at her enemies. It was time, she decided, to look into the epidemic of hate all around us and learn how we can stop it.

In The Opposite of Hate, Kohn talks to leading scientists and researchers and investigates the evolutionary and cultural roots of hate and how incivility can be a gateway to much worse. She travels to Rwanda, the Middle East, and across the United States, introducing us to former terrorists and white supremacists, and even some of her own Twitter trolls, drawing surprising lessons from dramatic and inspiring stories of those who left hate behind. As Kohn confronts her own shameful moments, whether it was back when she bullied a classmate or today when she harbors deep partisan resentment, she discovers, “The opposite of hate is the beautiful and powerful reality of how we are all fundamentally linked and equal as human beings. The opposite of hate is connection.” Sally Kohn’s engaging, fascinating, and often funny book will open your eyes and your heart.