Dispatches from Berlin: Wall and Secrets is a historical thriller by Carol J. Williams, the second novel in the Iron Curtain Chronicles. On the night the Berlin Wall opens in November 1989, veteran foreign correspondent Natalie Chester expects the story of a lifetime. Instead her editor pairs her with a gifted but guarded American photographer; and when a name in an East German guidebook turns the assignment personal, neither are prepared for what happens next.

As mass deportations and escalating “border security” budgets dominate the headlines, Reconstructing Immigration: How to Rebuild America’s Economic Advantage, shows why America cannot remain a global economic leader without a modern, lawful way to attract, legalize, and retain the workers it clearly needs. It connects the dots between immigration reform, productivity, entrepreneurship, and regional development, giving readers a coherent plan for how the United States can turn a chronic political crisis into a durable competitive advantage. Drawing on construction, agriculture, healthcare, and technology, Steffy makes the case that an enforcement-first system has disadvantaged legitimate workers and honest employers while rewarding the people who exploit it.

Deconstructed: An Insider’s View of Illegal Immigration and the Building Trades is Loren C. Steffy and Stan Marek’s best-selling account of illegal immigration inside the American construction industry. Marek runs one of the largest specialty subcontracting firms in the country and has watched, over forty years, construction work go from a middle-class career to something that traps undocumented workers without overtime or healthcare.

The Real World of Texas Politics argues that the state runs two political systems — one for the privileged and one for everyone else. Its authors are a political scientist, a union leader, and a former state representative, and they hold leaders in both parties responsible. The analysis builds on the work of political scientist James Lamare.