Chicagoan Leslie Goldman spent five years interviewing women in towels for Locker Room Diaries (Da Capo Lifelong; $23), an unflinching look at how women perceive-and try to “shape”-their bodies.
In Barrio (Univ. of Chicago Press; $35), Columbia College photography prof Paul D’Amato compiles his photos revealing daily life in Pilsen and Little Village.
Between the Lines (Ivan R. Dee; $35) tells the literary history of Chicago-based Poetry magazine through a collection of writers’ correspondence, compiled by former editors Joseph Parisi and Stephen Young.
In The Division Street Princess, Elaine Soloway (the mother of Tiny Ladies in Shiny Pants author Jill Soloway) recalls her childhood growing up above her family’s grocery store in Humboldt Park (Syren Book Company; $15.95).
In Julius Rosenwald (Indiana Univ. Press; $35), Chicagoan Peter M. Ascoli writes about his philanthropic grandfather, a businessman who turned Sears, Roebuck and Company into the largest mail-order outfit in the world and started the Museum of Science and Industry.
In Chicago Blues (U. of Ill. Press; $20), David G. Whiteis profiles Bonnie Lee, Billy Branch, Lurrie Bell, Jody Williams, Junior Wells, and other influential but under-appreciated artists and venues.
Chicago Tribune reporter James Janega compiles obituaries of some of the city’s most fascinating public figures and private citizens in Chicago Lives (Triumph Books; $16.95).