New Books Network
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Interviews with Cambridge UP authors about their new books
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Author conversations make scholarly history legible by tracing arguments from specific evidence to larger systems of belief, governance, and power.
Exchanges: A Cambridge UP Podcast turns book-length historical arguments into patient conversations about evidence, concepts, and research choices.
A borrowed birthing chair gets you into history through the questions a book leaves open.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A clear, historically grounded discussion of how political volatility shapes arms control.
Arms control is treated here as a question of political design: how states build agreements when trust is fragile, adversaries may defect, and domestic politics can shift the ground beneath negotiators.
A measured account of Huguenot correspondence, trust, exile, and couriers working under threat of interception.
Penny Roberts's discussion of Huguenot Networks follows the flow of information between France and England during the wars of religion, with a close eye on how official ambassadorial dispatches sat alongside more hidden Protestant correspondence.
The episode presents non-alignment as active mediation shaped by Nehru's anti-imperial thought.
Indian non-alignment comes through as a practical form of mediation, with the United Nations and the state doing much of the work, and with Nehru's political thought tying anti-imperial ideals to diplomatic action.
A clear, measured conversation on American health spending, inequality, and what a society chooses to count.
Stephen Bezruchka's conversation reframes a national health puzzle as a question of social priorities. He moves from his early path as a mathematics graduate student at Harvard to medical school, then to a 1971 Stanford class where he heard that the United States had been one of…
A careful history of medical progress that treats ethics as part of the story.
Vanessa's conversation about Making Medical Progress treats a familiar phrase as a live historical question. It follows postwar medicine as progress starts to feel both real and contested, and it works best when it sits with the tension between open-heart surgery, better…
A careful case for treating multinational history as public history.
Paula de la Cruz Fernandez keeps the discussion focused and readable, and Geoffrey Jones and Sabine Pitteloud make a plain case for why multinationals belong in public history, not just business history.
A serious discussion of Noah as a changing debate over allegory, literal meaning, and science.
Philip C. Almond's discussion of Noah and the Flood treats a familiar biblical story as a long argument about allegory, literal meaning, and the way interpretation shifts over time.
A measured account of comparative religion taking shape in colonial India.
Bose uses Calcutta to show comparative religion being argued over, translated, and remade in India rather than simply imported there. The episode moves through Danish missionary work, early critiques of Hinduism, and Ram Mohan Roy's formation in Arabic and Persian, so it feels…
Phoebe Judge narrates true crime history and interviews the authors who uncovered it.
Dramatized deep dives into American history, from the Galveston hurricane to Harper Lee's Mockingbird.
Dana Schwartz narrates the violent lives of monarchs, warlords, and queens.
Tracy Wilson and Holly Frey narrate overlooked history, from Courbet's realism to IUD regulation.
Mike Duncan narrates Rome's full history solo, from Aeneas to Romulus Augustulus's exile in 476.
This episode segment introduces a conversation with Satya Shikha Chakraborty about her book on the history of ayahs, exploring race, caste, and gender in British India.
Indirect rule starts as a shared working language.
This episode features an interview with Alan McDougall about his book 'Dreams and Songs to Sing: A People's History of Liverpool FC from Shankly to Klopp', discussing the social and historical aspects of the football club.
This episode features an interview with Dr.
This episode introduces Dr.
This episode segment introduces an upcoming interview about how businesses in China are influenced by the state, while also promoting a listener survey for the New Books Network.
This episode segment introduces Ian Smith's book 'Black Shakespeare: Reading and Misreading Race', which argues for developing racial literacy in reading Shakespeare's plays like Othello, The Merchant of Venice, and Hamlet, and critiques how critics have historically evaded racial themes.
This episode introduces an interview with Dr.
The NewBooks Network is conducting a 2026 audience survey to gather listener feedback for improving partnerships and resources, with a chance to win a bookshop.org gift card.
This episode introduces an interview with Dr.
The New Books Network promotes its 2026 audience survey to gather listener feedback for improving the podcast and partnerships.
This episode segment introduces Pierre Schouten's research on roadblocks and their role in the origins of violence in Central Africa, based on his book 'Roadblock Politics'.
Dr.
Philip C.
Peter Lawrenson interviews Daniela Stockman and Ting Luo about Governing Digital China, a study of how the Chinese state, Tencent, Alibaba, and ordinary users shape platform rules.
Pregnancy was uncertain.
Multinationals are not background scenery.
This episode takes comparative religion out of a Europe-only frame.
Dr.
The segment begins with a promotional survey announcement for the NewBooks Network, followed by an introduction to an interview about Nana Osei-Opare's book on Soviet-Ghana relations during the Cold War.
An interview with Professor John Weinman about his new book on arms control and political volatility.
An interview with historian Penny Roberts about her book on espionage and secret networks in 16th-century France and England during the wars of religion.
An interview with author Christian about his new book on Gulf states and global food systems.
An interview with Steven Bezruchka about his book 'Born Sick in the USA' on health inequality.
An interview with Dr.
An interview with Dr.
An interview with Professor Simon Devereaux about his book on the history of execution in England from 1660 to 1900.
An interview with Dr.
An interview with historian Anne Lawrence Mathers about her book on medieval weather forecasting.
An interview with Aaron Hamas about their new book Transgenesis, hosted by Atalia Israelina-Vo on the NewBooks Network.