Wherever you are in the world and whatever you’re interested in, our ‘Books of the month’ features a broad sample of different recent releases authored by University of Liverpool staff. From architecture to business, photography to tourism, there’s something for everyone.
The University’s Library has curated a reading list for Book of the Month which is available and searchable for staff and students. The newest titles are added at the top of the list for visibility, and further information can be found in the notes area.
If you are a member of staff and would like your new or recent (2024, 2025 & 2026) publication to be featured, please email the details to the Research Communications Team at rescomms@liverpool.ac.uk.
A Dirty History of Photography
Author: Michelle Henning
Published: 2025
An environmental history of chemical photography through the lens of its deep connections to empire and industry.
Dependent on the extractive practices of fossil-fuelled industrial capitalism, chemical photography’s emulsions and films were highly sensitive to polluted atmospheres, and photographic companies had to work hard to control this sensitivity. Drawing on histories of empire, coal, and chemistry and from the archives of British photographic manufacturer Ilford Limited, Michelle Henning exposes the ways photography shaped how we see and understand the atmosphere while leaving its toxic residues in the air, soil, and water.
Structured as thirty-six short chapters and with over seventy illustrations, this innovative book begins in interwar London, follows the supply of Ilford products to photographers on the West African coast, and considers photography as a military technology linked to the development of chemical warfare. Combining close readings of photographs with discussions of low-light, tropical, and aerial photography, Henning examines the extraction and development of photographic materials, their role in the current environmental crisis, and how they have shaped experiences of time and the environment.
Professor Michelle Henning is Chair in Photography and Media, in Communication and Media, Part of School of the Arts at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences.
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Community and the Problem of Crime
Author: Karen Evans
Published: 2023
This book offers a useful theoretical overview of key approaches to the subject of crime and community and considers the ways in which these have been applied in more practical settings. Written by an expert in the field and drawing on a range of international case studies from Europe, North America, Australia and Asia, this book explores both why and how crime and community have been linked and the implications of their relationship within criminology and crime prevention policy.
Topics covered in the book include:
- the different crime prevention paradigms which have been utilized in the ‘fight against crime’
- the turn to community in crime prevention policy, which took place during the 1980s in the UK and US, and its subsequent development
- the theoretical and ideological underpinnings to crime prevention work in and with different communities
- the significance and impact of fear of crime-on-crime prevention policy
- different institutional responses to working with community in crime prevention and community safety
- the ways in which the experiences of the UK and US have been translated into the European context
- a comparison between traditional western responses to the growing interest in restorative and community-based approaches in other regions.
The new edition has been fully revised and updated to include discussion of the rise of populist politics and the centrality of ‘crime’ and ‘disorder’ as a divisive element used in populist political rhetoric; the politics of austerity and the management of crises – economic, environmental and COVID-19 and the subsequent lockdowns; the impact of Black Lives Matter, MeToo and Extinction Rebellion; the significance of social media and virtual community; the further erosion of civil liberties and the right to protest; and racialized US policing practices and police-related deaths. This book offers essential reading for students taking courses on crime and community, crime prevention and community safety and community corrections.
Karen Evans is Honorary Senior Research Fellow, Sociology, Social Policy and Criminology, in School of Law and Social Justice at Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Liverpool.
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Clinical Insights for Image-Guided Radiotherapy Prostate
Authors: Mike Kirby, Kerrie-Anne Calder
Published: 2024
This book provides a clinical insight into image-guided radiation therapy (IGRT) for prostate cancer. It starts by setting the clinical scene, discussing immobilisation and standard IGRT practice and then considering important developments like IGRT with non-ionising radiation, adaptive radiotherapy, particle therapy, margins, hypofractionation, clinical outcomes, AI and training.
Good IGRT requires both technical and clinical focus. So, in complement to our first study guide on IGRT, this book now brings together key, clinical insights into IGRT for Prostate Cancer patients, with a view to helping the professional learn more about ‘how-to’ undertake IGRT for these patients more accurately, effectively and safely, throughout the whole course of a patient’s treatment with radiation.
This clinical insight guide will be of interest to newly qualified radiation therapists, therapeutic radiographers, medical dosimetrists, medical physicists, radiotherapy physicists and clinical oncologists. It will also be of use for trainees and can be used alongside continuing competency and clinical training within real clinical departments and radiation therapy centres worldwide.
This is the first in a forthcoming series of clinical insights, each tackling a different treatment area. Further areas in the series will be: Head and Neck; Thorax; Breast; Pelvis; and the Brain.
Key Features:
- Internationally applicable, clinically focused, up-to-date and evidence based.
- Accompanied by suitable electronic multimedia resources.
- Authored by experts with decades of experience of pioneering electronic portal imaging and IGRT in clinical practice, pedagogic research and substantial experience of teaching/supervising students, trainees and qualified therapists/medical physicists at bachelors, postgraduate and doctoral levels.
Mike Kirby is Honorary Lecturer (Radiotherapy Physics) in School of AHPs and Nursing, at the Institute of Population Health in Faculty of Health and Life Sciences at University of Liverpool.
Kerrie-Anne Calder is in the School of AHPs and Nursing,
Institute of Population Health, Faculty of Health and Life Sciences at University of Liverpool.