You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
For over a decade, syndicated columnist Rheta Grimsley Johnson has been spending several months a year in Southwest Louisiana, deep in the heart of Cajun Country. Unlike many other writers who have parachuted into the swampy paradise for a few days or weeks, Rheta fell in love with the place, bought a second home and set in planting doomed azaleas and deep roots. She has found an assortment of beautiful people in a homely little town called Henderson, right on the edge of the Atchafalaya Swamp. These days, much is labeled Cajun that is not, and the popularity of the unique culture’s food, songs and dance has been a mixed blessing. The revival of French Louisiana’s traditional music and c...
An American icon, brilliant and notoriously private, Charles Schulz is a fascinating paradox. He owns an ice arena, a plane, and is a regular on Forbes' list of top money makers--yet his roots are firmly planted in the snows of St. Paul and the preachings of the church. This fully authorized portrait explores the Peanuts creator's extraordinary life.
New York Times bestselling author Margaret Peterson Haddix takes readers on a thrilling adventure filled with mysteries and plot twists aplenty in this absorbing series about family and friendships. Perfect for fans of A Wrinkle in Time and The City of Ember! What makes you you? The Greystone kids thought they knew. Chess has always been the protector over his younger siblings, Emma loves math, and Finn does what Finn does best—acting silly and being adored. They’ve been a happy family, just the three of them and their mom. But everything changes when reports of three kidnapped children reach the Greystone kids, and they’re shocked by the startling similarities between themselves and these complete strangers. The other kids share their same first and middle names. They’re the same ages. They even have identical birthdays. Who, exactly, are these strangers? Before Chess, Emma, and Finn can question their mom about it, she takes off on a sudden work trip and leaves them in the care of Ms. Morales and her daughter, Natalie. But puzzling clues left behind lead to complex codes, hidden rooms, and a dangerous secret that will turn their world upside down.
In The Dogs Buried Over the Bridge, nationally syndicated columnist Rheta Grimsley Johnson uses a parade of beloved dogs to take readers on a colorful journey. It's not really a dog book in the Old Yeller sense; it's a personal story that uses dogs as metaphors for love, loss, and life."Working for newspapers ages you exponentially; it's like dog years," Rheta says. Readers follow her as a starry-eyed newlywed starting a weekly newspaper on Georgia's exotic St. Simons Island, through stints at various other Southern newspapers, and finally to her writing life in remote and dog-friendly Fishtrap Hollow, MS. That's the dateline for her long-running column and the place Rheta has called home fo...
Nationally syndicated columnist Rheta Grimsley Johnson, winner of the Ernie Pyle Award for human interest reporting, turns her sharp eye on herself in this frank, exhilarating, wise, poignant, and brave memoir. Her territory ranges from childhood memories of ritual pre-interstate trips in the family station wagon to visit foot-washing Baptist relatives to young-girl fixations on the Barbie dolls of the title, from the simultaneous exuberance and proto-feminist doubts of young marriage to the aches of loves lost through divorce and death. Her memorable journalism career, which began on her college newspaper and rural weeklies and moved on to prestigious big-city dailies, was punctuated by her distinctive writing voice and an unerring knack for revealing her much-loved South through uncommon stories about its common people. This is a big-hearted book that will leave no reader unaffected.
Circling Faith is a collection of essays by southern women that encompasses spirituality and the experience of winding through the religiously charged environment of the American South. Mary Karr, in “Facing Altars,” describes how the consolation she found in poetry directed her to a similar solace in prayer. In “Chiaroscuro: Shimmer and Shadow,” Susan Cushman recounts how her dissatisfaction with a Presbyterian upbringing led her to hold her own worship services at home and eventually to join the Eastern Orthodox Church. “Magic” by Amy Blackmarr depicts a religious practice that occurs wholly outside of any formal setting—she recognizes places, such as a fishing shack in south...
One never knows what the topic of discussion will be when taking a seat with the gentlemen in the Backbooth at Chappy’s Deli in Auburn, Alabama. The topics change daily, often several times within the same sitting. The conversation is broad and knows no bounds. Throughout the day, conservative, liberal, and even some middle-of-the-road friends gather for breakfast to chat about the news of the day or just their thoughts and feelings on certain subjects. Usually, the conversation is cordial and without rancor ... but not always. This book is a collection of the group’s recollections, hopes, and dreams. In addition to football, politics and religion, there are stories of friends and neighbors, and of people the gentlemen know only through the news media—mostly imperfect people in an imperfect world doing the best they can. Filled with Southern charm and keen insights, you’ll finish this humorous book convinced that the world would be better if we as a nation had more conversations like the men at Chappy’s.
'Echoes' of Robert E. Lee High School is an anthology about the first decade of Robert E. Lee High School in Montgomery, Alabama, written and compiled by persons who supplemented their unique personal experiences at the school with research on the same. The "echoes" of the title refers to how life experiences reverberate back to us. Thus, from the beginning, its editors and writers thought of this little book of big memories and lessons of life as a compendium of the strong, positive echoes they recall from Lee and the few negative ones they cannot forget, which seem still to be informing and inspiring the lives of the school's graduates. The audience for Echoes is, of course, all past Lee High alumni, faculty, and staff and all present and prospective Lee students, faculty, and staff, along with any who support or have supported them and/or the school, and any others with sufficient connections to Lee or Lee people to enjoy reading others' recollections of their time there. The book might also be useful to anyone with a general interest in public secondary education in Montgomery County.
This is also the story of the relationship between music and musician, between youth and belonging, between commerce and art, between self-loathing and self-awareness."--BOOK JACKET.