An odyssey, a secret and the American empire

The New Odyssey

The Story of the Twenty-First Century Refugee Crisis Patrick Kingsley Liveright, $26.95

Seventeen countries on three continents: Kingsley is the Guardian’s first migration correspondent, and he drew on his years of reporting to write this eye-opening survey of the current refugee crisis. Kingsley follows the migrant trail as untold numbers of refugees journey by land and sea to safety, or at least toward it. He chronicles in close-up detail characters like Hashem AlSouki, a Syrian determined to make a better life in Sweden, and also charts the arduous and dangerous journeys migrants undertake from Afghanistan, Libya and Eritrea. The book shines a light on both those who provide refuge and those who turn a blind eye.

Rumi’s Secret

The Life of the Sufi Poet of Love Brad Gooch (Harper, $28.99)

In this vivid, fascinating biography, Gooch recovers the life of 13th century Persian mystic and poet Rumi, best known in the West for such inspirational concepts as “let the beauty of what you love be what you do.” Gooch brings to this book the talents that made his earlier literary biographies — “City Poet: The Life and Times of Frank O’Hara” and “Flannery: A Life of Flannery O’Connor” — such pleasurable reading. Gooch set out to inhabit Rumi’s journey fully, following his footprints from Central Asia to Turkey, where the poet’s family migrated when it was displaced by the Mongol reign of terror. Gooch, who learned Persian, illuminates an array of important influences, such as the iconoclastic mystic Shams of Tabriz, to move beyond the cliches surrounding Rumi and reveal a complex and interesting figure.

The True Flag

Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of American Empire Stephen Kinzer Henry Holt, $28

Kinzer, a former New York Times bureau chief in Turkey, Germany and Nicaragua, as well as the author of a number of books about American imperialism, takes on the Spanish-American War in this fascinating and timely new book. As in previous books like “Overthrow: America’s Century of Regime Change From Hawaii to Iraq,” Kinzer shows a keen interest in, and insight into, the national debate over whether America should plant its flag and exert its influence in other lands. He has a stellar cast of characters to work with in this story, as famous Americans like Theodore Roosevelt, William Randolph Hearst and Mark Twain all weighed in on the war — with Twain emerging as an especially ardent and eloquent foe of empire-building.

The National Book Review is an independent online book review founded by Adam Cohen and Elizabeth Taylor.