Catch up on the week in book news with these top stories.

The Irresistible Rise of On Tyranny

1.4 million copies sold. A quarter million of those in 2025. Left-leaning people process their political feeling by buying books (1984 & The Handmaid’s Tale in 2016, a mini-course worth of books about racism in the wake of George Floyd). The latest to cash-in is Timothy Snyder’s slender, easy-to-digest On Tyranny. If you have been in an indie bookstore lately, you probably (as Laura Miller wisely observes) have been it near the cash register. An impulse-buy for the doomscrolling set. Unsurprisingly, it has been all over social media, but the harder question to answer is this: did social media make it or is social media just reflecting that people are buying it? The answer is somewhere in the messy middle.

White House to conduct review of Smithsonian museum exhibitions to ensure they fit with Trump’s view of American history

My family had a terrific time touring the Library of Congress and darn near all of the museums of the Smithsonian on a trip this summer. And I had this thought at least a dozen times: do the Trump people know about this? About the statue of Charles Darwin we took a family selfie with? The displays on slavery and Jim Crow in the African American History Museum? The series of maps showing forced removal of tribes from basically day 1 of what would become the United States? And it turns out they do. And like other organs and conduits of anything resembling truth, they are not happy about it. Whoever you are in the bowels of these places that can find any way you can to resist this crap, I am pulling for you.

Associated Press to End Weekly Book Reviews

In a note to reviewers, the AP said that as of September, the AP will no longer be in the regular book review business. The reasoning at this point is both familiar, disheartening, and intransigent: book reviews as a business proposition are extremely tough. This will greatly decrease the number of book reviews across the hundreds of papers the AP services. Celebrity book clubs, book influencers, Goodreads, and a just generally crappy market for traditional media have eroded the attention paid to regular reviews. I would say this is a real loss (and it is) but maybe the more depressing and honest read is that these reviews weren’t being read very much anyone, so maybe not that many will even notice.

Queer Writing Prize Sees Nominated Authors Withdraw From Consideration

Many authors nominated for The Polari Prize have withdrawn their name from consideration in protest of the inclusion of John Boyne among the nominees. Boyne has aligned himself publicly with JK Rowling’s unhinged transphobia. And in what should come as a surprise to absolutely no one, this is not really cool with a bunch of folks. Withdrawing your name from consideration is an underrated mode of resistance, perhaps especially within groups you might feel naturally aligned.

The August Book List Round-Up

Everyone has had their chance to releases their lists of August new book releases, so here is a round-up of what I found out there (and a few in-here at Book Riot).