Pete Souza

Pete Souza took nearly two million photographs of President Barack Obama during his eight-year tenure as the White House’s chief official photographer. The images captured Obama’s levity and gravity in equal measure, from the situation room during the 2011 raid that resulted in the death of Osama Bin Laden to the president playing with children on the floor of the Oval Office. Since departing from his post in January 2017, Souza has taken to Instagram to continue to post photos of Obama, which he frequently captions with subtle yet cutting lines comparing the previous administration to the present one. In his new book, Shade: A Tale of Two Presidents, Souza’s digital sass makes the jump to paper, bolstered by headlines, tweets, and more about Trump and company’s current skullduggery. Buying a book won’t do much to help fight against injustice, but maybe it can at least serve as a slightly happier reminder of times that felt less like a surreal, permanent hellscape. —Allison Hussey