A Widow for One Year

Chronicles the thirty-seven years in the life of Ruth Cole, a complex, abrasive woman born in the shadow of her siblings' deaths and her parents' adultery, who only finds love after motherhood and widowhood.
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Old Friends

By Tracy Kidder
"As in his Pulitzer Prize-winning The Soul of a New Machine ( LJ 8/81 ), House ( LJ 1/86), and the best-selling Among Schoolchildren ( LJ 1/90), Kidder reveals his extraordinary talent as a storyteller by taking the potentially unpalatable subject of life in a nursing home and making it into a highly readable, engrossing account. Through the eyes of roommates Lou and Joe, we experience daily life in the Linda Manor Nursing Home in Northampton, Massachusetts. Kidder displays an uncanny ability to reveal glimpses of the residents' former lives and their current hopes and fears without becoming sentimental or maudlin. This is a life that we all hope to avoid, both for ourselves and our loved ones; yet when we see it as it is portrayed in Old Friends it becomes less terrifying."  Check Our Catalog

Postville; A Clash Of Cultures In Heartland America

By Stephen G. Bloom
"Bloom's account of a vicious clash between the residents of a small, intensely Christian town and the group of Lubavitcher Jews who open a highly successful kosher slaughterhouse there is a model of sociological reportage and personal journalism. In 1987, after a Hasidic butcher from Brooklyn bought a slaughterhouse in Postville, Iowa, and began to relocate Jewish and immigrant workers to the area, the town began to change. While some residents were suspicious and anti-Semitic, most were happy to see the town rise above its previous financial destitution. But the Lubavitchers, who traditionally live and work within their own closely knit communities, were not interested in fitting into Postville, and many were dismissive of, or overtly hostile to, its original citizens. After the Lubavitchers started buying real estate and exerting greater influence on the town's finances, longtime Postville residents began to feel marginalized, yet their reactions caused the Jews to become more isolationist. The slaughterhouse also caused problems: workers were paid below minimum wage and were uninsured, women workers were sexually harassed and fighting among the (often illegal) immigrant workers escalated. Finally, the town took legal action to gain more control over the slaughterhouse. Bloom, a professor at the University of Iowa, writes cleanly and with great insight and temperance about these events. As a secular Jew, he also weaves in his own story as he tries to find some common ground with the Lubavitchers. His book proves an illuminating meditation on contemporary U.S. culture and what it means to be an American. "  (PW Reviews)   Check Our Catalog.

The Majic Bus; An American Odyssey

By David Brinkley
"Douglas Brinkley recounts his summer adventure in which a busload of students took to the road for six weeks. They had to read 12 books while visiting 30 states and ten national parks. On the trip, the students learned more than history, and Brinkley learned a great deal about teaching. His ode to great American road tales is a fun and compelling mix of Road Rules and David McCullough-ish stories."  (LJ Reviews)   Check Our Catalog

Blue Latitudes; Boldly Going Where Captain Cook Has Gone Before

By Tony Horowitz
"This salty, swashbuckling, high-seas adventure story from the Pulitzer Prize-winning Horwitz retraces the journeys of English maritime genius James Cook. That intrepid explorer, who mapped nearly a third of the planet during the 18th century, docked at every continent in the world, minus Antarctica. For the globe-trotting author, getting the surveyor's story includes doing nautical duty on the Endeavor, a replica of the listing coal ship Cook himself sailed on. Accompanied by his good-humored, hard-drinking Australian companion Roger Williamson, Horwitz puts in at exotic ports like Tahiti and Bora Bora, following in the captain's footsteps while navigating smoothly between memoir, humor and fact. This rousing yarn from the author of the best-selling book Confederates in the Attic is sure to become a travel-writing classic."  (BookPage Reviews)  Check Our Catalog

Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, And War

A history of the Pilgrim settlement of New England challenges popular misconceptions, discussing such topics as the diseases of European origin suffered by the Wampanoag tribe, the fragile working relationship between the Pilgrims and their Native American neighbors, and the devastating impact of the King Philip's War. By the author of Sea of Glory.
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My Name Is Mary Sutter

Traveling to Civil War-era Washington, D.C. to tend wounded soldiers and pursue her dream of becoming a surgeon, headstrong midwife Mary receives guidance from two smitten doctors and resists her mother's pleas for her to return home.
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