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Summer’s here, and that means longer days, slower vibes, and hopefully a little extra room to breathe. Around here at Health Forward Foundation, we’ve been swapping book ideas and trading tips on how we’re keeping it together this season. We pulled together a list of reads that have moved us, challenged us, or simply stuck with us over time — all worth adding to your list. Plus, we’re sharing a few of the ways we’re taking care this summer — whether that’s lounging with a good book, getting outside, or just finding small moments of rest. Consider this your invitation to join us in taking it slow and soaking it up.
Black Power Scorecard: Measuring the Racial Gap and What We Can Do to Close It // By Andre M. Perry
Recommended by Angelique Williams, Director of Organizational Learning and Culture
An expansive take on power supported by documentation and data, Black Power Scorecard is a fresh contribution to the country’s reckoning with structural inequality, one that offers a new approach to redressing it.
Coincidentally, Angie shared that one way she is taking care of herself this summer is by reading more.
Forest Bathing: How Trees Can Help You Find Health and Happiness // By Dr. Qing Li
Recommended by Tara Gonzales Hacker, Director of Impact Learning and Evaluation
In this beautiful book Dr. Qing Li, the world’s foremost expert in forest medicine, shows how forest bathing can reduce your stress levels and blood pressure, strengthen your immune and cardiovascular systems, boost your energy, mood, creativity, and concentration, and even help you lose weight and live longer.
Tara is taking care of her mind, body, and soul by reading this book and immersing herself in the practice.
Bone of the Bone: Essays on America by a Daughter of the Working Class // Sarah Smarsh
Recommended by Ross Jensby, Impact Communications Specialist
Sarah Smarsh brings her graceful storytelling and incisive critique to the challenges that define our times — class division, political fissures, gender inequality, environmental crisis, media bias, the rural-urban gulf.
Ross is spending as much time as is possible outdoors with his dog, Tucci.
When the Culture Is Strong, the Movement Is Strong // By Simone John, C. Payal Sharma, Sandra Herrera
Recommended by Brenda Calvin, Chief Operations Officer
“When the music is strong, the movement is strong.” – Harry Belafonte
In these times when justice is under attack, truth feels fragile, and hope can flicker, it’s culture that keeps us rooted and reaching. As Harry Belafonte reminded us, movements aren’t only built in boardrooms or shaped by policy. They’re born in the heartbeat of community, in the songs we sing, the stories we carry, the rituals we repeat.
Secrets of Adulthood: Simple Truths for Our Complex Lives // By Gretchen Rubin
Recommended by Bradford Hart, MBA, Process Innovation Strategist
My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies // By Resmaa Menakem
Recommended by Kelli Doyle, Impact Strategist – People (also recommended to many of us by our friends at ProInspire)
My Grandmother’s Hands is a call to action for all of us to recognize that racism is not only about the head, but about the body, and introduces an alternative view of what we can do to grow beyond our entrenched racialized divide.
Parable of the Sower // By Octavia Butler
Recommended by Nathan Madden, Ph.D., Impact Strategist – Policy
The radically speculative odyssey of a young Black woman in a post-apocalyptic America and the community she cultivates despite the horrors of climate change and social inequality
A bonus short story read from Nate is: The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas by Ursula K. Le Guin.
What It Takes to Heal: How Transforming Ourselves Can Change the World // By Prentis Hemphill
Recommended by John Tramel, MSW, Impact Strategist – Place
In this life-affirming framework for the way forward, Hemphill shows us how to heal our bodies, minds, and souls — to develop the interpersonal skills necessary to break down the doors of disconnection and take the necessary risks to reshape our world toward justice.
A bonus read from John is: The Purpose of Power: How We Come Together When We Fall Apart by Alicia Garza.
The Political Determinants of Health // By Daniel E. Dawes
Recommended by Kael Martin, Impact Strategist – People
Dawes draws on his firsthand experience helping to shape major federal policies, including the Affordable Care Act, to describe the history of efforts to address the political determinants that have resulted in health inequities.
