In 1965 Phoebe Snetsinger was 34 and her life was half over. She was married and had four small children and was living in a little three bedroom, one bath house in rural Minnesota. On a spring day she went to visit her friend Elizabeth. She handed Phoebe a pair of binoculars and pointed toward …
Category Archives: book reviews
Brief book review: When the Killing’s Done
Alma and Dave hate each other. Alma is an environmentalist in charge of a project to restore the native habitat and wildlife of the Channel Islands National Park. Dave is the founder of an animal rights group who often seems to love animals more than he loves people. The Channel Islands are a group of …
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Brief book review — 1861
The Civil War Awakening By Adam Goodheart I’ve never been a Civil War buff. Â My eyes just blur over when I see the lists of battles and dates and the numbers killed in each battle. But last year I got hooked on the “Disunion” blog in the New York Times, which follows the Civil War …
Brief book review: Hellhound on his trail
The subtitle of this book by Hampton Sides is “The Stalking of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the International Hunt for His Assassin” Â which pretty much sums up the action. This is a suspense thriller which also happens to be a true story. Â In 1968 the escaped convict and assassin James Earl Ray managed …
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Brief book review: Just Kids
Just Kids by Patti Smith is a love story, a rags-to-riches tale and a memoir of a certain time and place all rolled into one. When Patti Smith got off the bus in New York City almost the first person she met was a beautiful boy with a mass of curls. Â Not long afterward she …
New books on religion and the bible
Just in time for the holidays the library has received several new books on Christianity and the Bible. The Woman Who Wrote the Bible is a first novel by Mary Burns which imagines a rich and captivating life for the woman scholar J who lived in the Solomonic Courts. In this novel J becomes the …
Brief book review: “One Who Walked Alone”
One Who Walked Alone by Novalyne Price Ellis This is a true story of a tragic love affair which took place just a few miles from us in the small town of Cross Plains in the 1930’s. Robert Howard was a successful author of the popular Conan the Barbarian stories who attracted the attention of …
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Brief book review: “Together, Alone”
Together, Alone: A Memoir of Marriage and Place by Susan Wittig Albert If you are a mystery reader, you already are familiar with the name Susan Wittig Albert. She is the author of the popular China Bayles series, as well as many other books. In this volume she lets us in on some of her …
Brief book review: “Never in a Hurry”
Never in a Hurry: Essays on People and Places by Naomi Shihab Nye You think you know all about Texas, but here is another perspective . “Never in a Hurry” is not a new book – it was publlished in 1996 – but it is one of the new acquisitions the library has been receiving …