Silent Winds, Dry Seas: A Novel
By Vinod Busjeet (DBA 1980)
Doubleday
In the 1950s, Vishnu Bhushan was a young boy who had yet to learn the truth behind his family’s fractured history—the result, said his mother, of an alliance between two bankrupt families. In evocative chapters, the first two decades of Vishnu’s life in Mauritius unfold with heart-wrenching detail as he battles to experience the world beyond, as well as to overcome the cultural, political, and familial turmoil that continues to grip him.

Through precise language, Silent Winds, Dry Seas conjures the spirit and rich life of Mauritius, even as its diverse peoples live under colonial rule. Weaving together the soaring hopes, fierce love, and heartbreaking tragedies of Vishnu’s proud Mauritian family, along with his country’s turbulent path to gain independence, Busjeet evokes the epic sweep of history in the intimate moments of a boy’s life. Silent Winds, Dry Seas is a poetic, powerful, and universal novel of identity and place, of the legacies of colonialism, tradition, modernity, and emigration, and of what a family will sacrifice for its children to thrive.

Direct Selling: A Global and Social Business Model
By Victoria Crittenden (DBA 1989) and William Crittenden
Business Expert Press
Direct selling is not an industry, per se, nor is it merely a go-to-market business model or channel to reach consumers. It is bigger than any of that: Direct selling is people. The ability of people with entrepreneurial spirit to build a successful business, whether it be from the ground up or by representing a company’s product, is at the heart of direct selling; and it is people who have made—and continue to make—direct selling the successful marketplace that it is today. Possibly one of the most prominent of these entrepreneurs is Mary Kay Ash, a legend as a glass-ceiling breaker and a woman who built a very successful business with a go-to-market strategy of direct selling.

Unlike Mary Kay Ash, however, not all aspiring business owners are willing or able to invest their savings and time on a startup business. These micro-entrepreneurs desire to have the economic and social benefits of managing their own business but do not want the startup costs or demands associated with traditional business planning. As such, becoming a direct-selling distributor offers a low-risk, low-cost pathway to micro-entrepreneurship. Framed within the context of entrepreneurship and a historical overview of the long-term sustainability of this business model, this book is intended for practitioners who want to better understand the breadth and depth of direct selling.

Workparent: The Complete Guide to Succeeding on the Job, Staying True to Yourself, and Raising Happy Kids
By Daisy Dowling (MBA 2002)
Harvard Business Review Press
Sure, there are plenty of parenting books out there. But as working moms and dads, we’ve never had a trusted, go-to guide all our own—one that coaches us on how to do well at work, be the loving and engaged parents we want to be, and remain true to ourselves in the process. Whether you’re planning a family, pushing for promotion during your kids’ teenage years, or at any phase in between, Workparent provides all the advice and assurance you’ll need to combine children and career in your own, authentic way. Whatever your field or family structure, you will learn to cope with transitions at home and at work, deal with guilt and worry, negotiate for advancement and flexibility, and much more. Written by Daisy Dowling, a top executive coach, talent expert, and working mom, Workparent answers all your questions and has the feel of a good talk with your favorite mentor. Finally, the handbook you need to thrive as a working parent.

Pivot for Success: Hone Your Vision, Shift Your Energy, Make Your Move
By Amy S. Hilliard (MBA 1978)
Wiley
Pivot for Success tells business leader and entrepreneur Amy Hilliard’s stories of success, struggle, and sustainability, to inspire you to become resilient. Hilliard offers her hard-won perspective on what it takes to “make it” in American business and in life. She talks about the tough stuff, the stuff that most people who rise to her level of accomplishment aren’t eager for others to know. Few women, and few women of color, have created multimillion-dollar brands in senior corporate positions, legendary entrepreneurial environments, and startups. Hilliard’s fearless honesty in revealing her experience can help you find your way forward, even if you face obstacles in today’s business environment.

While Hilliard is a Harvard Business School graduate, Pivot for Success contains lessons not taught in school. In this book, you will learn the 10 pivot points that have led Hilliard to where she is today, including purpose, passion, perseverance, positivity, priorities, and more. The 10 pivot points have been tried and tested, and even endorsed by Michelle Obama. No matter who you are, or where you are in your life’s journey, you’ll need to gain vision, shift your energy, and make moves in order to get where you’re going. Through Pivot for Success, you’ll find that you can succeed, even when you think you’ve lost it all.

Probiotic Beverages
Edited by Sandeep K. Panda, Julie Kellershohn (MBA 2002), and Inge Russell
Academic Press
Probiotic Beverages is an essential reference guide to traditional, emerging, and unique probiotic beverage products throughout different regions of the world. The book includes in-depth knowledge of local authors on indigenous and commercially produced probiotic beverages and related products. Examining current advancements in probiotic beverages and consumer health relationships, with a focus on large-scale beverage technology, sections cover starter cultures, regulatory challenges, genetic engineering, quality, and safety. From practical issues of developing probiotic beverages, to the marketing of these drinks to the consumer, the full product life cycle of a probiotic beverage is discussed.

Food Entrepreneurs in Africa: Scaling Resilient Agriculture Businesses
By Ndidi Okonkwo Nwuneli (MBA 1999)
Routledge
Entrepreneurs are the lifeblood of the agriculture and food sector in Africa, which is projected to exceed $1 trillion by 2030. This book is the first practical primer to equip and support entrepreneurs in Africa, through the process of starting and growing successful and resilient agriculture and food businesses that will transform the continent. Through case studies and practical guidance, the book reveals how entrepreneurs can leverage technology and innovation, to leapfrog and adapt to climate change, ensuring that Africa can feed itself and even the world. The book is for aspiring and emerging agribusiness entrepreneurs across Africa as well as agribusiness students globally. It will also inspire policy-makers, researchers, development partners, and investors to create a supportive environment in which African entrepreneurs can thrive.

Why Muslims Lagged Behind and Others Progressed
New translation by Nadeem M. Qureshi (MBA 1982)
Austin Macauley
In the fall of 1928, the imam of Java, Mohammad Basyuni Imran, had a letter delivered to the Lebanese author and scholar, Shakib Arsalan. In his letter, Basyuni Imran requested that Arsalan explain the reasons for the backwardness of Muslims of the time, compared to other nations. Furthermore, Basyuni asked Arsalan to suggest what they needed to do in order to join the ranks of nations that had overtaken them and, in many cases, ruled over them. Arsalan published his response in a series of articles written for the Cairo-based Islamic journal, Al-Manār. Subsequently, these articles were combined and published, in 1930, in a book entitled Why Did Muslims Lag Behind? And Why Did Others Progress?

In his response, Arsalan begins with an analysis of what has gone wrong. He addresses the belief of some that Islam itself is to blame for the backwardness of Muslims. He gives examples of how advanced nations progressed while holding firmly to their religious beliefs. In simple, elegant prose, Nadeem Quresh’s translation takes the reader on a fascinating walk through history. There are references to pre-Islamic times and the early Islamic period, French colonialists in North Africa and their efforts to convert Muslim populations to Christianity, goings-on in the British Houses of Parliament on the issue of transubstantiation, and much more.

It is a measure of the merit and excellence of Arsalan’s words that his book has never been out of print. It remains among Arabic speakers as popular and relevant today as at the time it was first published almost a century ago.

Preventable: The Inside Story of How Leadership Failures, Politics, and Selfishness Doomed the U.S. Coronavirus Response
By Andy Slavitt (MBA 1993)
St. Martin’s Press
From former Biden senior advisor Andy Slavitt, Preventable is the definitive inside account of this country’s failed response to the pandemic. Slavitt chronicles what he saw, and how much could have been prevented, in an unflinching investigation of the cultural, political, and economic drivers that led to unnecessary loss of life. With unparalleled access to key government players on both sides of the aisle, the principal public figures, as well as the people fighting the novel coronavirus on the front lines, Slavitt brings you into the room as fateful decisions are made. The story that emerges is one of a country in which—despite the heroics of many—bad leadership, political and cultural fractures, and an unwillingness to sustain sacrifice, light a fuse that is difficult to extinguish.

Written in the tradition of The Big Short, Slavitt’s Preventable addresses the uncomfortable realities that have brought America to this place, and it puts forth the solutions that will prevent us from being in such a position again, ensuring a better, stronger country for everyone.

Univer-Cities: Reshaping Strategies to Meet Radical Change, Pandemics, and Inequality—Revisiting the Social Compact? Volume IV
Edited by Anthony Soon Chye Teo (MBA 1969)
World Scientific
The Univer-Cities series explores the deep, interconnected social and economic relationship between universities and their host cities. In its fourth installment, editor and Singapore University professor Anthony Soon Chye Teo builds on the success of its predecessor volumes: Strategic Implications for Asia (I); Strategic View of the Future (II); and Strategic Dilemmas of Medical Origins and Selected Modalities (III). This fourth volume—Reshaping Strategies to Meet Radical Change, Pandemics, and Inequality: Revisiting the Social Compact?—is set against a backdrop of continual global economic restructuring, as well as technological, virtual, and social disruption, exacerbated by a pandemic. Amid these disruptions, it is necessary for universities to revisit their roles in serving their cities.

How can universities prepare their graduates to excel in a disrupted world? How can universities contribute to the retraining of a disrupted workforce? How can universities help cities grow sustainably? How can universities be promoters of social inclusion, rather than being inadvertent bastions of exclusive elitism? With contributions from senior-level academic, government, and industry leaders around the world, this book addresses these questions and more, as well as illuminates their insights, experience, and aspirations on the symbiotic role of universities and cities in a disrupted world.

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