- Table View
- List View
Dare to Repair: A Do-It-Herself Guide to Fixing (Almost) Anything In The Home
by Julie Sussman Stephanie Glakas-TenetA repair guide written especially for women.
A Different Face: The Life of Mary Wollstonecraft
by Emily W. SunsteinMary Wollstonecraft, author of the eighteenth-century classic, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, is a fascinating subject for biography. She did not march through life toward specific goals of feminism, but fought her way to personal independence with a passionate, stubborn intensity at a time when women--presumed inferior--were narrowly circumscribed by law, custom and religious belief. She demanded also a ration of happiness and sexual fulfillment, refusing to conform to the model of a submissive, decorative, domestically useful woman. Possessed of great intellectual ambitions, and largely self-educated, Mary Wollstonecraft rebelled against injustice everywhere she perceived it, and gradually became a political radical. Without money or family support, she yet refused to marry for security. In 1787 she went to live in London, where she supported herself by her writing, at thirty-three composing her great work and finding herself a famous and controversial figure. In private life she had never been able to find satisfaction, however; she desperately sought affection. After two disastrous infatuations, an illegitimate child, and two attempts at suicide, she fell in love with William Godwin, finally securing the domestic tranquillity and love she yearned for, tragically dying in childbirth a few months after her marriage. The question Mary Wollstonecraft's life poses is one of great interest today: What kind of life should a woman ask for herself? Mary Wollstonecraft wanted it all--career and family, independence and attachment, intellectual achievement and love. In A Different Face the complexities and contradictions of a remarkable woman are examined as the author, drawing extensively from Mary Wollstonecraft's own writings, endows the biography with the living voice of Mary Wollstonecraft herself. Excellently researched, it is a dramatic and readable biography, consistently fair to the courageous, exasperating and vivid personality of one of England's most extraordinary women.
The Pillsburys of Minnesota
by Lori Sturdevant George S. PillsburyThe Pillsburys of Minnesota "Pillsbury" is a household word in many parts of the world, but in Minnesota it has carried a special import ever since the arrival of John S. Pillsbury, his brother George, and nephews Charles and Fred at the Falls of st. Anthony in the mid-nineteenth century. Here Star Tribune columnist Lori Sturdevant chronicles the family's pioneering role in making Minneapolis the milling capitol of the world. she explores the career of Minnesota governor "Honest John "Pillsbury, and also highlights the instrumental part he played in the growth of the University of Minnesota. Alfred Pillsbury's impact on the Minneapolis Institue of Arts, Philip's remarkable success at reviving a moribund milling giant through the introduction of new food products and George's efforts to fashion a more inclusive Republican Party, are only a few of the many strands woven into the Pillsbury story. From mining camps and insurance companies to arts organizations and charitable concerns, the family's imprint on Minnesota runs deep and wide. Book jacket.
The Fainting Room
by Sarah Pemberton StrongRay Shepard is a wealthy architect who has mystified his friends by marrying Evelyn, a woman who works at a nail salon. Evelyn, in turn, hides a secret past about her former life in the circus, her ex-husband's mysterious death, and the colorful tattoos she carefully conceals under her clothes. When Evelyn starts to cave under the pressure of living in Ray's rarified world, she suggests they take in Ingrid, a sixteen-year-old girl with blue hair, a pet iguana, and no place to stay for the summer. As Evelyn and Ray both make her their confidante, drawing her into the heart of what threatens their marriage, Ingrid increasingly adopts the noir alter ego of "detective Slade"--fedora and all--in order to solve the mysteries that engulf all three characters.
Fat Girl Dances With Rocks
by Susan StinsonIt's the summer of drinking and driving, disco and diets, fake IDs and geology, and fat 17-year-old Char is wondering if she is animal, vegetable, or mineral. What does it mean when your best friend French-braids your hair, kisses you on the lips, and leaves town? Char gets a summer job in a nursing home, and meets people with bodies and abilities as various as the textures of the rocks her friend Felice collects. Fat Girl Dances with Rocks is a novel about the many shapes of beauty: the fold of a belly, the green swelling of seedlings, the sharp edges of granite, obsidian, and flint. Fat Girl Dances with Rocks is a coming of age story. It is a coming out story, and for Char, it is a story of coming into her own body - all the way to the edges of her skin.
Surplus: A Novel
by Sylvia StevensonFirst published in 1924. Relationship between two military women after the first world war.
The Creation of the Media: Political Origins of Modern Communications
by Paul StarrAmerica's leading role in today's information revolution may seem simply to reflect its position as the world's dominant economy and most powerful state. But by the early nineteenth century, when the United States was neither a world power nor a primary center of scientific discovery, it was already a leader in communications-in postal service and newspaper publishing, then in development of the telegraph and telephone networks, later in the whole repertoire of mass communications.<P><P> In this wide-ranging social history of American media, from the first printing press to the early days of radio, Paul Starr shows that the creation of modern communications was as much the result of political choices as of technological invention. His original historical analysis reveals how the decisions that led to a state-run post office and private monopolies on the telegraph and telephone systems affected a developing society. He illuminates contemporary controversies over freedom of information by exploring such crucial formative issues as freedom of the press, intellectual property, privacy, public access to information, and the shaping of specific technologies and institutions. America's critical choices in these areas, Starr argues, affect the long-run path of development in a society and have had wide social, economic, and even military ramifications. The Creation of the Media not only tells the history of the media in a new way; it puts America and its global influence into a new perspective.
The Wisdom of Big Bird (and the Dark Genius of Oscar the Grouch): Lessons From a Life in Feathers
by Caroll Spinney J. MilliganMemoir of the man inside Big Bird from Sesame Street.
Murrow: His Life and Times
by A. M. SperberMurrow is the biography of America's foremost broadcast journalist, Edward R. Murrow. At twenty-nine, he was the prototype of a species new to communications--an eyewitness to history with the power to reach millions. His wartime radio reports from London rooftops brought the world into American homes for the first time. His legendary television documentary "See It Now" exposed us to the scandals and injustices within our own country. Friend of Presidents, conscience of the people, Murrow remained an enigma--idealistic, creative, self-destructive. In this portrait, based on twelve years of research, A. M. Sperber reveals the complexity and achievements of a man whose voice, intelligence, and honesty inspired a nation during its most profound and vulnerable times.
Women of Ideas: And What Men Have Done to Them
by Dale SpenderThis is a classic reference work and, from beginning to end, a provocative and stimulating read. With characteristic energy, humour and learning, Dale Spender has dug into the hidden past and uncovered shining examples of women's creativity and intellectual prowess which had been suppressed or stolen by men. Men have removed women from literary and historical records and deprived women of the knowledge of their intellectual heritage. Now this lost history of women's thought is set out for all to see.
Robin and Ruby
by K. M. SoehnleinIn his award-winning bestseller The World of Normal Boys, K.M. Soehnlein introduced readers to the richly compelling voice of teenager Robin MacKenzie. In Robin and Ruby, he revisits Robin and his younger sister, masterfully depicting the turbulence of the mid-1980s--and that fleeting time between youth and adulthood, when everything we will become can be shaped by one unforgettable weekend. At twenty-years-old, Robin MacKenzie is waiting for his life to start. Waiting until his summer working at a Philly restaurant is over and he's back with his boyfriend Peter. . . until the spring semester when he'll travel to London for an acting program. . . until the moment when the confidence he fakes starts to feel real. Then, one hot June weekend, Robin gets dumped by his boyfriend and quickly hits the road with his best friend George to find his teenaged sister, Ruby, who's vanished from a party at the Jersey Shore. For years, his friendship with George has been the most solid thing in Robin's life. But lately there are glimpses of another George, someone Robin barely knows and can no longer take for granted. Ruby is on an adventure of her own, dressing in black, declaring herself an atheist, pulling away from the boyfriend she doesn't love--not the way she loves the bands whose fractured songs are the soundtrack to her life. Then a chance encounter puts Ruby in pursuit of a seductive but troubled boy who might be the key to her happiness, or a disaster waiting to happen. As their paths converge, Robin and Ruby confront the sadness of their shared past and rebuild the bonds that still run deep. In prose that is lyrical, compulsively readable, and exquisitely honest, K.M. Soehnlein brilliantly captures a family redefining itself and explores those moments common to us all--when freedom bumps up against responsibility, when sex blurs the line between friendship and love, and when what you stand for becomes more important than who you were raised to be.
The Smell of Battle, The Taste of Siege: A Sensory History of the Civil War
by Mark M. SmithHistorical accounts of major events have almost always relied upon what those who were there witnessed. Nowhere is this truer than in the nerve-shattering chaos of warfare, where sight seems to confer objective truth and acts as the basis of reconstruction. In The Smell of Battle, the Taste ofSiege, historian Mark M. Smith considers how all five senses, including sight, shaped the experience of the Civil War and thus its memory, exploring its full sensory impact on everyone from the soldiers on the field to the civilians waiting at home. From the eardrum-shattering barrage of shells announcing the outbreak of war at Fort Sumter; to the stench produced by the corpses lying in the mid-summer sun at Gettysburg; to the siege of Vicksburg, once a center of Southern culinary aesthetics and starved into submission, Smith recreates howCivil War was felt and lived. Relying on first-hand accounts, Smith focuses on specific senses, one for each event, offering a wholly new perspective. At Bull Run, the similarities between the colors of the Union and Confederate uniforms created concern over what later would be called "friendlyfire" and helped decide the outcome of the first major battle, simply because no one was quite sure they could believe their eyes. He evokes what it might have felt like to be in the HL Hunley submarine, in which eight men worked cheek by jowl in near-total darkness in a space 48 inches high, 42inches wide. Often argued to be the first "total war," the Civil War overwhelmed the senses because of its unprecedented nature and scope, rendering sight less reliable and, Smith shows, forcefully engaging the nonvisual senses. Sherman's March was little less than a full-blown assault on Southernsense and sensibility, leaving nothing untouched an no one unaffected. Unique, compelling, and fascinating, The Smell of Battle, The Taste of Siege, offers readers way to experience the Civil War with fresh eyes.
Still Brave: The Evolution Of Black Women's Studies
by Frances Smith Beverly Guy-Sheftall Stanlie M. JamesCheryl Clarke, Angela Davis, bell hooks, June Jordan, Audre Lorde and Alice Walker - from the pioneers of black women's studies comes Still Brave, the definitive collection of race and gender writings today. Including Alice Walker's groundbreaking elucidation of the term 'womanist,' discussions of women's rights as human rights and a piece on the Obama factor, the collection speaks to the ways that feminism has evolved and how black women have confronted racism within it.
Report From Ground Zero: The Story Of The Rescue Efforts At The World Trade Center
by Dennis SmithReport compiled by a practicing NYC fire fighter within three months of September 11.
Art on Fire
by Hilary SloinArt on Fire is the apparent biography of subversive painter Francesca deSilva, the founding foremother of "pseudorealism," who lived hard and died young. But in the tradition of Vladimir Nabokov's acclaimed novel Pale Fire, it's a fiction from start to finish. It opens with Francesca's early life. We learn about her childhood love, the chess genius Lisa Sinsong, as well as her rivalry with her brilliant sister Isabella, who publishes an acclaimed volume of poetry at the age of twelve. She compensates for the failings of her less than attentive parents by turning to her grandmother who is loyal and adoring until she learns Francesca is a lesbian, when she rejects her. Francesca flees to a ramshackle cabin in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, working weekends at the flea market. She breaks into the gloomy basement of a house, where she begins her life as a painter. Much to her confusion and even dismay, fame comes quickly. Interspersed with Francesca's narrative are thirteen critical "essays" on the paintings of Francesca deSilva by critics, academics, and psychologists-essays that are razor-sharp satires on art, lesbian life, and the academic world, puncturing pretentiousness with every paragraph. Art on Fire is a darkly comic, pitch-perfect, and fearless satire on the very art of biography itself. Art on Fire is the latest winner of the Bywater Prize for Fiction and was a finalist for the Heekin Foundation Award, the Dana Awards, and the Story Oaks Prize. It was mistakenly awarded the nonfiction prize in the Amherst Book and Plow Competition.
The More I Owe You
by Michael SledgeIn this mesmerizing debut novel, Michael Sledge creates an intimate portrait of the beloved poet Elizabeth Bishop -- of her life in Brazil and her relationship with her lover, the dazzling, aristocratic Lota de Macedo Soares. Sledge artfully draws from Bishop's lifelong correspondences and biography to imagine the poet's intensely private world, revealing the literary genius who lived in conflict with herself both as a writer and as a woman. A seemingly idyllic existence in Soares's glass house in the jungle gives way to the truth of Bishop's lifelong battle with alcoholism, as well as her eventual status as one of modernism's most prominent writers. Though connected to many of the most famous cultural and political figures of the era, Soares too is haunted by her own demons. As their secrets unfold, the sensuous landscape of Rio de Janeiro, the rhythms of the samba and the bossa nova, and the political turmoil of 1950s Brazil envelop Bishop in a world she never expected to inhabit. The More I Owe You is a vivid portrait of two brilliant women whose love for one another pushes them to accomplish enduring works of art.
Damn Straight (Lillian Byrd Crime Story #2)
by Elizabeth SimsWhen a friend in crisis calls from California, Lillian jumps on a plane and wings her way from Detroit to Palm Springs--and danger. It's the long weekend of the Dinah Shore golf tournament, the wildest women's sporting event in the world, when thousands of lesbians descend on the desert community of Rancho Mirage and take over. At a pre-championship party, Lillian leaps into a slippery romance with a top LPGA star. But her superstar athlete has a secret: Someone is quietly terrorizing her. Lillian, eager to help, goes undercover as a high-profile reporter, an unhinged nun, and a professional caddie while uncovering layer after disturbing layer of the golfer's past. Finally, with violence erupting at every turn, Lillian uncovers her lover's ultimate horrifying secret--and it is not at all what she had guessed. With this new book, Elizabeth Sims presents another nail-biting thriller featuring her oh-so-human amateur detective. Damn Straight sizzles and zings and will have you laughing through your shivers.
Easy Street (Lillian Byrd Crime Story #4)
by Elizabeth SimsHer old Caprice is convulsing through the last of its death throes, her pet rabbit and constant companion Todd ails, and as usual, Lillian Byrd is flat broke. For a few extra bucks she agrees to help an old friend renovate her house, but as fans of "Holy Hell", "Damn Straight", and "Lucky Stiff "have come to realize, nothing ever goes smoothly in the life of Lillian Byrd. By the end of the first day on the job there is a partially demolished wall, a mysterious stash of cash, and a dead body. And Lillian's attentions have been diverted by the appearance of a drop-dead gorgeous neighbor. Elizabeth Sims is the author of three previous books in the Lillian Byrd Crime Stories series: "Holy Hell", "Damn Straight", and "Lucky Stiff".
Holy Hell (Lillian Byrd Crime Story #1)
by Elizabeth SimsLillian Byrd is a small-time reporter with a flair for making big-time mistakes--so her investigation into the disappearances of women around the Detroit area might not be the best idea. But when one of the victims turns up dead and Lillian recognizes the curiously mutilated corpse, she is in too deep to get out. After simultaneously blowing the case for the police and revealing herself to the killers, she is completely on her own. Can she catch the murderers before they catch up with her? Elizabeth Sims is a 10-year veteran of bookselling. She was a winner of the 1986 Writer's Digest short fiction contest. A longtime resident of the Detroit area, where Holy Hell is set, Sims now lives in Northern California.
Lucky Stiff (Lillian Byrd Crime Story #3)
by Elizabeth SimsThere is what you believe, and then there is the truth. For Lillian Byrd, a chance encounter with an old friend means that everything she thought she knew about her shattered childhood is about to be revealed as a lie. One summer day when she was 12 years old, her best friend, Duane, left for summer camp. Later that night, flames ripped through the Polka Dot, a bar owned and run by Lillian's parents. Three bodies were found in the ashes: those of her mother, her father and Trix Hawley, a bartender and Lillian's frequent babysitter. Or so she has always thought. But Duane's story reveals something shocking. After summer camp, his father moved him to Florida, telling Duane that his mother had left, and for a short time Trix Hawley lived with them. Now Duane's father has disappeared as well. Who was the third body in the ashes of the Polka Dot? Was the fire an accident or arson? Where is Trix now? And where are Duane's mother and father? Lillian and Duane set out to find the truth about their parents, a truth that has been hidden well by members of both their families. The author of the best--selling mysteries Holy Hell and Damn Straight has crafted another nerve-tingling thriller rich with characterization, humor and humanity. Elizabeth Sims is the author of two previous Lillian Byrd crime stories, Holy Hell and Damn Straight. She lives in Port Angeles, Wash.