This past June, The Slowdown launched our Book of the Month newsletter, for which, at the start of every month, we reviewed a new, compelling book that was capturing our attention and imaginations. We searched far and wide for the texts that best encapsulated our present-day collective consciousness, and that we thought held wisdom that could be digested and spur conversations for years and decades to come. Ranging from writer, historian, and activist Rebecca Solnit and climate activist Thelma Young Lutunatabua’s hopeful climate compendium Not Too Late to Tracy K. Smith’s urgent yet timeless memoir To Free the Captives, here are the books we thought fit the bill.