Title List - Book Group Title List Continued

These ten short stories offer a poignant glimpse of people traumatized by the terrible physical and mental aftereffects of World War II. Each story is written from a pre or post war standpoint and explores the effects of poverty, the ruination of love and the dark side of human nature when people are pushed beyond their limits. Boll’s use of language makes human sorrow palpable, and he is considered one of the most important writers of the postwar period. The German author received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1972. Call Number: BG Boll

An 88-year-old woman, somewhat deaf, awakens one night to the sound of music from her childhood playing loudly. The songs don’t come from any radio but play loudly and repeatedly in her head. Her ENT and psychiatrist can’t find anything wrong, but her neurologist, Dr. Oliver Sacks, eventually figures out what’s causing the music: a small stroke in the woman’s temporal lobe. That’s just one of the stories Dr. Sacks writes about in this collection of neurological case studies. Published both in medical and literary journals, Sacks’ studies present the intricacies of the human brain and its workings along with the resilience of the human spirit. Interesting, informative, and illuminating, this work will make you think about what it means to be human. Call Number: BG 616.8 Sa14

This novel, like all of Jane Austen’s work, is filled with witty dialogue and stinging social criticism. The plot revolves around the shy and sweet-tempered Fanny Price. Taken in by the Bertram’s, rich relatives, Fanny finds herself as an afterthought in the family’s busy world. Over time her compassion and ethics unveil her true worth, value recognized by two very different suitors. Confusion and love result in another magnificent Austen piece. Call Number: BG Austen

Alice Goodwin is watching her neighbor’s daughter when she accidentally drowns on their Midwestern dairy farm. Following a series of events that lead to Alice’s imprisonment, the Goodwins struggle to keep their family together during this time of suffering. Call Number: BG Hamilton

Louisa May Alcott’s classic Little Women is re-imagined in this novel by Brooks. In the original, the girls wait anxiously for letters from their father, off fighting in the Civil Warwhile in Brooks’ novel, we see the harsh reality of the actual life he leads. Based loosely on Alcott’s real father, March is a minister influenced by Emerson and Thoreau (both family friends) and struggles to maintain his faith and idealism in the face of racism and mercenary behavior from both sides of the conflict. His wife, Marmee, waiting at home with the girls, will uncover uncomfortable truths of her own when her husband ends sick and wounded at Washington Hospital. A unique look at what remains one of the most important periods, and books, in American history. Call Number: BG Brooks

Will plans to return to the small town of Medicine River, just outside a reservation in Alberta, Canada, simply for his mother’s funeral. His friend Harlen Bigbear (who is, according to Will, “like the prairie wind. You never knew when he was coming or when he was going to leave”) has other plans. The town needs a photographer, and Will is just the man for the job. He’s got other plans for Will, too, involving a single mother. Harlen and Will are the connecting threads in the novel’s narrative, which moves back and forth through the history of their friendship. A simple, gentle read, Medicine River will make you laugh as you consider your ideas about Native Americans. Call Number: BG King

In 1830, Rutherford Calhoun, an educated freed slave, accidentally boards a slave ship leaving New Orleans to capture the mysterious Allmuseri tribe in Africa. Aboard the ship, Calhoun witnesses the horrors of slavery while serving the tyrannical, scholarly captain and riotous crew. The expedition changes his life. The novel won the 1990 National Book Award. Call Number: BG Johnson

Dorothea Brooke longs to do something with her life to enrich humanity, but is limited by the boundaries placed on her by Victorian society. Dorothea struggles to find purpose through marriage and love in hopes of reaching her potential to do good. Call Number: BG Eliot

Connie Danforth narrates the story of her mother, Sibyl—a rural Vermont midwife, who was tried for murder for performing an emergency Caesarean section on a woman that may have still been alive. Sibyl must not only face the charges laid against her but the hostility of traditional doctors and the community. In time the truth of what really happened comes to light. Call Number: BG Bohjalion

 Vanderpool’s Newbery-winning novel is set in the town of Manifest Kansas, “a place too far away to ever get back to, a place too good to be real. A place one was proud to call home” during the 1930’s. It tells the story of Abilene Tucker, whose father Gideon has sent her back to live in Manifest for the summer, thinking she’ll be safer there than living a drifter lifestyle with him. Abilene discovers the decades-old mystery of The Rattler along with new friends and a boxful of old objects that lead her to Gideon’s history. Weaving the history of prohibition, orphan trains, Spanish influenza, coal mining and World War One with the lifestyle of a small Midwestern town, the story reads like an instant classic. It manages to combine what is endearing about childhood—mystery, adventure, the power in an object, the pull of story and that deep-seated need for affection and a place to call your own—into a sweet and satisfying experience.  Call number:  BG Vanderpool

The book is the true story of Dr. Paul Farmer, a renowned infectious-disease specialist. In his quest to diagnose and cure diseases, Farmer traveled to Haiti, Peru, Cuba, and Russia to bring the lifesaving tools of modern medicine to those who need them most. Farmer dedicated his life to combating disease and poverty. Many of his ideas are considered innovative solutions to worldwide cycles of suffering. Call Number: BG 921 Farmer

Mrs. Mike is the true story of Katherine Mary O'Fallon, a young Irish girl from Boston, who marries Canadian Mountie Sergeant Mike Flannigan, who is priest, doctor and magistrate to all in the wilderness of the North Woods of Canada. Extremely popular, the novel has won the hearts of millions for its depiction of a young love’s journey to maturity. Call Number: BG Freedman

Willa Cather published her masterpiece My Antonia in 1918 to critical acclaim. Narrator Jim Burden tells the story beginning when, as a small boy, he left his life in civilized Virginia and traveled to the edge of the Nebraska frontier. Jim remembers his childhood friend - the vivacious and spirited Antonia, an immigrant child from Bohemia, and how their own lives, families, and friends were shaped by the beauty and cruelty of the Great Plains. Universal themes of death, youth, and friendship have enthralled readers for the 90 years this novel has now been in print. My Antonia captures the settling of the American frontier as no other work of fiction ever has. Call Number: BG Cather

First published in 1901, Miles Franklin's My Brilliant Career remains a remarkable portrait of a sixteen-year-old girl who dreams of becoming a renowned author. Sybylla Melvyn, Franklin’s semi-autobiographical narrator, must struggle against drought and isolation in the Australian outback if she wants to realize her ambitions. Sybylla's description of life on small hardscrabble farms contrasts sharply with the idealized vision of pioneer and farm life so prevalent today, and her resolve to make a career despite the odds seems especially remarkable in this harsh environment. A marriage with wealthy neighbor Harry Beecham presents a possible escape from poverty and toil for Sybylla, and the resultant love story, combined with Sybylla's unique voice, has continued to intrigue readers for more than a century. Call Number: BG Franklin

In My Grandfather's Blessings, author Rachel Remen proves that it is possible to embrace spirituality even as a doctor continually facing the realities of life and death. Having grown up emotionally divided between the religious devoutness of her rabbi grandfather and the academic world of her parents, Remen shares with her readers the lessons she learned as she consolidated these two views and embraced healing. Call Number: BG 296.72 R282

This short story by Guy de Maupassant tells of a poor woman named Mathilde who wishes passionately for money, splendid clothes, and beautiful jewelry. When her husband receives an invitation to an important ball, Mathilde is frustrated by the fact that she has nothing to wear. She decides to ask a rich friend to loan her a diamond necklace so that she will not look out of place amid so many rich and fancy people. However, the night takes a turn for Mathilde and her husband when they suddenly realize that she has lost the necklace and must find a way to make it up to her friend. Call Number: BG Maupassant

A Catholic Trappist monk from Kentucky, Thomas Merton became recognized worldwide for his insightful view of human spirituality. Author of over fifty books and numerous essays, Merton is loved for his insight into the human condition. No Man is an Island contains sixteen of Merton’s essays on human spirituality and is recommended for anyone looking to enrich their lives. Call Number: BG 284.482 M558

Written as a serialized novel in Charles Dickens' Household Words in 1855, Gaskell's classic novel North and South explores issues of industrialization, social injustice, and poverty in northern England. When Margaret Hale's father gives up his role as a priest in the Church of England after doubting its leadership, the family leaves the pastoral, southern town of Helstone for the industrialized, northern town of Milton. Here Margaret discovers a sharp contrast to her previous experiences, caused by the poverty and difficult working conditions of the factory laborers. She also meets John Thornton, the powerful owner of a cotton mill.  Thorton's mill is facing a striking labor force, while Margaret's family is also in upheaval caused by her mother's illness and her brother Fredrick's legal troubles brought on by a mutiny.  The developing romance between Margaret and John, full of antagonism and misunderstanding, binds the story's varying topics into a cohesive whole.  Call number: BG Gaskell

In a distinctly opinionated voice, ninety-five-year-old Lucy Marsden narrates the story of her life in the novel The Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All. At the age of fifteen, Lucy marries a fifty-year-old Civil War captain who still suffers from war related trauma. Her story is interlaced with vignettes about her childhood, parents, and best friend, a slave named Castalia. She addresses the major issues which confronted the South of her generation including slavery, the position of women in society, and the effects of war on the United States. Call Number: BG Gurganus

They began almost immediately, just after the attack on Pearl Harbor: the people of a tiny town in Nebraska started feeding the soldiers who came through North Platte by the trainful. A small canteen sprang up at the train depot where the soldiers briefly stopped - for ten or fifteen minutes, they were treated to food, hot coffee, cake, fruit, and hospitality. The community around North Platte joined in the project, and volunteers made sure that the soldiers on every train, from 5:00 a.m. until midnight, were greeted, fed, and encouraged. "I would say that the majority of men on the battlefields knew exactly what North Platte was," one soldier explains. "They would talk about it like it was a dream." Chicago Times columnist Bob Greene explores this little-known story from World War II, showing how the kindness of strangers changed lives. This touching read will remind you of the goodness that's inherent in people and the comfort in good food and a smile. Call Number: BG 978.282 G8303

Written during the height of the Cold War, Nevil Shute’s On the Beach is a haunting reflection on the end of humanity. In the wake of a colossal nuclear war, Australia is still alive, but slowly anticipating the arrival of radioactive fallout from the Northern hemisphere. Still, life must go on much as before – babies must be cared for, people fall in love, and everyone makes their own choices about the coming end. On the Beach changed how the world thought about the threat of nuclear war, and would eventually be made into an award-winning film starring Gregory Peck: the first American movie to premiere in the Soviet Union. Call Number: BG Shute

Falsely accused of being a spy for the Germans during World War II, Ivan Denisovich Shukhov is sentenced to serve time in the Soviet gulag system. As the title indicates, the book describes a typical day experienced by Ivan in his work camp. Working in temperatures well below freezing, the inmates struggle to stay warm, dream of being released, and always seem to hunger for a scrap of bread to eat or a cigarette to smoke. In simple prose, the author (who himself served time in Stalin's labor camps before going on to win the Nobel Prize for Literature) graphically describes what it was like to try to maintain one's dignity in the face of communist oppression. Call Number: BG Solzhenitsyn

The Optimist's Daughter begins when seventy-one-year-old Judge McKelva goes to the hospital complaining of a problem with his vision. His daughter, Laurel, becomes anxious about her father's health and hurries to his side. Upon her arrival in New Orleans, Laurel must deal with her father's new wife, Fay, who contributes to Judge McKelva's lack of recovery and eventual death. As she buries her father, Laurel is forced to consider the weighty topics of life and death, in addition to the balance between the past, present, and future. Call Number: BG Welty

From 1914 to 1931, Danish aristocrat Baroness Karen Blixen owned and operated a coffee plantation in Kenya. After the plantation failed, she returned to Europe and began to write under the pen name Isak Dinesen. Out of Africa reads like a collection of stories in which she adheres to no strict chronology, gives no explanation of the facts of her life, and apologizes for nothing. Call Number: BG 967.62 D612

After years of work with Minnesota Public Radio, storyteller Leif Enger weaves together a beautiful expression of love. The novel follows a young family in a heroic trek to find their fugitive brother. Although none of the family finds what they expected, Enger blends faith and hope in a story of family, sacrifice, and religion. The writing is delightful and the story meaningful. Call Number: BG Enger

Life in the small town of Holt, Colorado, rings true in this rich, unsentimental novel that explores both the complexities of the natural world and human interaction. The novel's characters struggle with realistic problems in a compassionate ode to the beauty of imperfect humanity. A high school teacher struggles to raise his two boys and deal with his disintegrating marriage. His wife struggles with depression and the guilt she feels as she faces a future that might not include her husband and children. The boys try to understand the pain and violence that accompanies their coming of age in the world. Two brothers live a solitary existence on their ranch, feeling more comfortable with cattle than people. Eventually, the struggles of a young pregnant teenager bring their stories together and testify of the power of community and human decency. Call Number: BG Haruf

Among the greatest American novels, James’ Portrait of a Lady details the fictional Isabel Archer’s life and choices: her fight to retain intellectual freedom, and her search for fulfillment and purpose in an age when women seldom searched for any of those things. Independent and unconventional, the American-born Isabel has grown up haphazardly: left to read, think, and become what she pleases, a unique upbringing for a girl at the end of the 1800s. Unlike the majority of her compatriots, she chooses a trip to Europe and a tour of great art and countries with her wealthy aunt over an attractive marriage proposal. While in Europe, the alluring Gilbert Osmond (who seems Isabel’s perfect match), the mysterious and elegant Madame Merle, and the convent-schooled girl Pansy will all alter her life and change her dreams and desires. A fascinating portrait of one of literature’s most memorable heroines. Call Number: BG James

Who would have thought that a madman in an insane asylum would have been one of the greatest contributors to the Oxford English Dictionary? Although it sounds like fiction, the book it is a true story of the collaboration between the OED scholar James Murray and the incarcerated Dr. Minor (an American Civil War surgeon). This amazing story is both tragic and inspirational—a tribute to the human spirit. Call Number: BG 423 W7217

When she arrives at Manderley, the second Mrs. Maxim de Winter discovers not all is how she expected. Her husband's first wife, the seemingly-brilliant, talented, and beautiful Rebecca, haunts both the house itself and its occupants. Attempting to establish her marriage and her place within the house, Mrs. de Winter is challenged at every turn by the sinister housekeeper, Mrs. Danvers. Only when Maxim is able to tell his second wife the truths about his first can this gothic story come to its chilling fruition.  Call number: BG du Maurier

During two decades — 1940-1960—the U.S. government conducted secret nuclear experiments in the Nevada deserts that caused a series of cancer clusters in Nevada, Arizona, and Utah in the 1980’s. Williams’ family was all affected, leaving her “the family matriarch at age 34.” In Refuge she draws connections between her mother’s death and the flooding of the Great Salt Lake. Her writing is moving, powerful, and lyrical; it will leave you both heartsore and hopeful.  Call number: BG 917.9242 W6758

This quietly magnificent novel tells the story of Stevens, a Victorian butler born into the wrong era. The perfect gentlemen, Stevens is an ideal butler to his employer Lord Darlington just prior to and during World War II. But politics and people stand between Stevens and his ideals of keeping the perfect home: the Nazis are gaining power, domestic staff is harder to find, and the new housekeeper, Miss Kenton, is a strong woman who threatens Stevens’ tidy world and reined-in emotions. As Salman Rushdie comments, The Remains of the Day is “a story both beautiful and cruel.” A modern masterpiece of love and regret. Call Number: BG Ishiguro

Winner of the 2004 Scott O'Dell Award for historical fiction, A River Between Us is a masterful tale of mystery and war. 1861 brings changes for young Tilly Pruitt. The nation stands at the brink of war and the only boy in the family, Tilly’s brother Noah, wants to join the fight. That leaves Tilly with her mother and sister struggling to make ends meet. That is, until the elegant Delphine and her dark traveling companion arrive on a steamboat. Rumors fly throughout the town about the odd couple, wondering if the companion is a slave and if the beautiful Delphine could be a Southern spy. The Pruits become entangled in the suspicion when they take the pair into their home. The result is a marvelous novel about the lasting influence one person can have on another. Call Number: BG Peck

William Kemp, after losing money in cotton speculation, decides he will recoup his loss in the slave trade. The novel then traces the effect of greed, the “sacred hunger,” as it propels the ghastly triangle trade of goods for human cargo. In haunting detail, Unsworth creates the complex intersection of nineteenth-century morality and economy with devastating consequences. Call Number: BG Unsworth

Burnett’s classic is about a young girl who is anything but sweet. When the reader meets Mary, we can be forgiven for describing her as a brat. Tragedy followed by banishment to a neglected English estate does nothing to improve her character. It will take an equally unpleasant cousin, a young laborer, and a hidden garden to help restore the many unhappy characters in this novel, including Mary herself. Another childhood classic that deserves a re-reading by any adult! Call Number: BG Burnett

Ten years after the death of her mother, all14 year-old Lily Owens has left of her is a mysterious picture of a Black Madonna, with the words “Tiburon, South Carolina” written on the back. After a run-in with the law, Lily and her Black nanny Rosaleen must flee the police and Lily’s abusive father to find the answers Lily has been seeking. With the backdrop of Civil Rights transition occurring around them, the greatest change takes place in Lily and Rosaleen as they discover much more than they expected about love, friendship, and family. Call Number: BG Kidd

Taken from a moral allegory published in Latin in the fifteenth century, Porter wrote that the title of her novel symbolizes “the ship of this world on its voyage to eternity” and is an exploration of the darker side of the human condition. The novel is set in the summer of 1931, on board a cruise ship bound for Bremerhaven, Germany. The passengers, a motley crew including a Spanish noblewoman, a drunken German lawyer, an American divorcee, a pair of Mexican Catholic priests, and a myriad of others are forever changed by their experiences on this voyage of passion, treachery and human folly. Call Number: BG Porter

Rachel Carlson was known for writing beautiful nature descriptions until this 1962 novel burst into the national scene. Its powerful scenes exposed the nation to the dangers of DDT, at the time a common form of pesticide. Relentlessly attacked by the chemical industry, Carson was vindicated as her claims stood up to scientific and political scrutiny. In the next few years the novel and the outcry it generated brought about the banning of DDT. The work remains a classic for those interested in ethical stewardship of natural resources. Call Number: BG 623.9 C23

A family reunion on a South Carolina plantation sparked Edward Ball’s interest in his family’s slave holding past. As Ball began to research, he discovered his family owned more than twenty rice plantations in South Carolina. Slaves provided the manpower to run the plantations, including some slaves brought over by successful slave trading Ball ancestor. In an attempt to understand this past, Ball traveled to Bunce Island, a fortress in Sierra Leone where captured slaves were loaded for the journey across the Atlantic, and tracked down some of the seventy-five to a hundred thousand living relatives from mixed Black and White ancestry. Ball’s work adds an interesting modern perspective regarding the effects of a shameful American institution. Call Number: BG 975.7915 B21

Smallpox was a dreaded disease in the early Eighteenth century. For example, an epidemic in Boston from 1721 to 1722 infected 6,000 of the city’s 11,000 inhabitants (about 800 died). Jennifer Carrell, a writer for Smithsonian, creates a fictional rendering of two proponents of vaccination. One, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu takes her cause all the way to King George I. The other, Dr. Zabdiel Bylston, faced public opposition in Boston for his early vaccination work, learned from local slaves. Some outraged citizens even tried to kill him when he continued to work on the disease. However, their work revolutionized medical practices and its effect continues to this day. Read about their courageous efforts in this accessible book. Call Number: BG 614.521 C232

In the small community of Merced, California, reside thousands of Hmong refugees from the highlands of Laos; among them is the Lee family, whose youngest daughter Lia suffers from severe epilepsy. Anne Fadiman attempts to shed light on Hmong culture and understand the seemingly irreconcilable differences between western medicine and the Hmong in this poignant narrative. Call Number: BG 306.461 F126

A crash-test dummy. (What happens to a body when it’s in a car crash?) A subject in an Army Ordinance Department experiment. (Just how, exactly, do bomb shells affect human flesh?) An anthropological assistant. (What happens to a body as it decomposes in, say, a block of cement?) Those are just a few examples of how a body can be useful after dying, the main thread in Mary Roach’s book. Sounds a little creepy, but Roach manages to write about all of the post-mortem possibilities with a dry sense of humor that will leave you grinning, not grossed out. Call Number: BG 611 R53

Once labeled the “Prairie Pulitzer,” The Stone Diaries outlines the life of Daisy Fletts Goodwill from conception to death. Daisy finds life, although lacking any extraordinary accomplishment, as a quest for contentment in the face of continual loss. Call Number: BG Shields

Richard and Sarah Everton move to Ibarra, Mexico, with dreams of reopening Richard's grandfather's copper mine. Their idyllic plans to live out their lives surrounded by land and each other are disrupted by neighbors they don’t understand and events they can't control. This classic tale is their beautiful journey to understand and, eventually, embrace both obstacles. Call Number: BG Doerr

Trudi, a dwarf librarian, tells about the lives of citizens in the small German town of Burgdorf from World War I into the 1950s. In doing so, Trudi learns the secret that unites all humans—that of being different. This book is for anyone who has ever felt they don’t fit in. Call Number: BG Hegi

Written by the existentialist philosopher Albert Camus, The Stranger is one of the most widely read short novels of the 20th century. Meursault, a young Algerian, becomes involved in a petty argument between a local pimp and his girlfriend’s family. As a result, he kills a man. Meursault, who doesn’t believe in God, purpose, or an afterlife, has trouble making sense of his trial for murder. The work explores an individual’s relationship to others, social norms, and moral foundations. In doing so, the novel questions how these social influences are created and what responsibility people have to these cultural forces. Call Number: BG Camus

This Pulitzer prize-winning novel explores the psychological effect of changing class structures in Tennessee. Taylor uses his fictional protagonist, editor Philip Carver, as a starting point for this cultural collision involving Old Tennessee and the New South. Carver is drawn back to Memphis from New York by his two sisters attempt to keep their eighty-one-year-old father from marrying another woman. The novel traces the Carver family as they attempt reconciliation with each other and the past that continues to haunt them. Call Number: BG Taylor

In this sequel to Cannery Row, Steinbeck explores the lives of a group of California alcoholics, whores, and idlers as they form bonds of affection among themselves and with a biologist in post-World War II Monterey. As always, Steinbeck, one of America’s great writers, treats his material with a tenderness found in few other authors. Atlantic Monthly called it a “comedy—bawdy, sentimental, and good fun.” Call Number: BG Steinbeck

This beloved work has reemerged as one of the premier books of the twentieth century. Hurston, relying on her background recording folk history, tells the story of Janie Crawford, an articulate African-American woman in the 1930s. The spunky and unforgettable Janie narrates her quest for identity, three marriages (one of which resulted in her being accused of murder), and a journey to her roots.Call Number: BG Hurston

Written as a diary, this novel is Sarah’s story. At 18, in 1881, she leaves her home in New Mexico to begin a new life on the Arizona frontier. Her journal starts out rough—full of misspellings and awkward sentences—but (with the assistance of a pile of books she discovers) becomes smooth, confident, and powerful, illustrating how her experiences change her. Sarah faces down marauding Native Americans, survives a marriage to an abusive husband, experiences flood, heat, drought, and rattlesnakes, and manages to create a strong, good life, nevertheless. Based on the journals of one of the author’s ancestors, the story is continued by Sarah’s Quilt and The Star Garden.  Call number: BG Turner

Set during the 1918 flu epidemic, Maxwell captures the psychological complexity of family relations in a small Midwestern town. Elizabeth Morison is the center of life for her husband James and their two boys, Benny and Robert. Her importance, brought into focus by a sudden tragedy, is compassionately displayed through the view of each of the male figures. Maxwell’s sensitive and delicate prose is a tribute to all mothers. Call Number: BG Maxwell

Chinua Achebe’s masterpiece is considered the first masterpiece written in English by an African author. There are more than eight million copies of the novel in print worldwide. The work explores the cultural collision of Western influences and traditional Nigerian tribal practices. As the story unveils it exposes a shared humanity that transcends national boundaries. Call Number: BG Achebe

Includes Dillard’s classic memoirs A Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, The Writing Life, and An American Childhood. Renowned for her lyrical writing style, and ability to make even abstract topics interesting, these are three of Dillard’s best known works. In Tinker Creek, Dillard examines nature and life in and around her Virginia residence. Her reflection on people and places is a journey of discovery for the reader. An American Childhood is a tribute to her hometown of Pittsburgh, PA and her unforgettable mother, and serves as a celebration of the joy and discovery of childhood. And finally, in The Writing Life, Dillard describes the pain and excitement of creation. Read one or all three of these brilliant books! Call Number: BG 818 D581

A terrible crime splits a Southern community along racial lines. However, Atticus Finch, a courageous white lawyer, refuses to sacrifice his principles to public demand. The consequences of his choice affect both his family and the town. This tale of courage, strength, and love is told through the insightful and charming voice of Atticus’ daughter Scout. The novel is a worldwide classic with more than 30 million copies in print. Call Number: BG Lee

With typical Virginia Woolf genius, this novel focuses on the drama of the everyday and the mysteries of time and human bonds. Woolf poignantly follows the complex lives of an English family and picks them up again after a ten year hiatus in order to explore the effects of time. Call Number: BG Woolf

Sweet, tender, endearing; realistic, compassionate, heartbreaking. There are many words to describe this novel, but they can all be condensed into just two: so good. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is a classic coming-of-age novel, set in New York in the early 1900’s. Francie Nolan is eleven when the novel opens, living in Brooklyn in a tenement house. Her father is an alcoholic but her mother is a strong woman who makes sure her family is provided for. Francie is a quiet, imaginative child, passionate about learning, reading, and writing, but life doesn’t bring her the things she wants. As the story progresses you experience the heartbreaks and triumphs, ambitions and mistakes along with Francie as she, like the Tree of Heaven, flourishes in the world’s stony soil. Call Number: BG Smith

People do not give it credence that a fourteen-year-old girl could leave home and go off in the wintertime to avenge her father’s blood,” begins the novel True Grit; incredible, perhaps, but fourteen-year-old Mattie Ross did just that. When her father is shot down in Fort Smith, Arkansas—his horse and his $150 bank roll stolen as well—she heads out into Indian Territory in the company of the meanest U.S. Ranger she can find, Rooster Cogburn. Her goal, of course, is to find Tom Chaney, the man who shot her father, and make sure he is punished for his deed. The outcome of her adventures is the very definition of “grit.” Mattie’s story is by turns funny, sad, heart-pounding and satisfying, a read you won’t soon forget. Call Number: BG Portis.

This is a simple, well-told story of the sea, and while the plot is about a steamer ship called the Nan-Shan and its encounter with a typhoon in the South China Seas, the heart of the book revolves around its main character Captain McWhirr. His lack of imagination gives him the ability to deal calmly with the crisis and bring the vessel through the typhoon. Conrad continues his tradition of exciting psychological fiction against the backdrop of the raging sea. His characters are described with elegant humor and sharp observation of human nature. Call Number: BG Conrad

Stephen Ambrose, author of Band of Brothers and D-Day, takes on the story of real-life adventurer Meriwether Lewis. Ambrose records Lewis’s friendship with Thomas Jefferson, his interaction with native tribes, the expedition’s battles with the environment and disease, their triumphant return and the aftermath of the journey. Drawing from the journals of members of the “Corps of Discovery” as well as Ambrose’s own experiences following their trail, Undaunted Courage is an entertaining, compelling, and utterly readable account of this epic in American history. Call Number: BG 973.46 AM185

“Every summer Lin Kong returned to Goose Village to divorce his wife, Shuyu.” Thus begins Ha Jin’s National Book Award-winning novel, Waiting, a tale the Chicago Tribune calls “a simple love story that transcends cultural barriers.” Seeking to divorce his wife from an arranged marriage, Lin returns to his village each summer in hopes that he will eventually be able to marry the educated, modern woman he loves. Each summer, however, his wife agrees with the divorce only to back out at the last minute. Call Number: BG Jin

Weaving from Georgia to Maine, the Appalachian Tail (AT) takes hikers through 2,100 miles of mountains and forests, the longest swath of nature in America. Bill Bryson started on the trail at its southern-most point in Georgia with the goal of hiking the entire length. Then he wrote about his adventures on the trail. A travel memoir, a commentary on small-town America, and a detailed observation of nature, man, and how they interact, A Walk in the Woods will also make you laugh. Come along on Bryson’s AT adventures to discover “the amazing complex delicacy of the woods.” Call Number: BG 917.404 B848

Mattie Rigsbee is the spunky center of this funny story. At 78, Mattie wishes for grandchildren, but her kids won’t seem to settle down and deliver the goods. Just as she’s beginning to slow down, teenage delinquent Wesley Benfield enters her life, in need of good cooking and grandmotherly affection. Despite the concern of family and friends, Wesley and Mattie forge a bond in this endearing comic novel. Call Number: BG Edgerton

This classic tale uses the playful, seemingly simple story of a group of Berkshire rabbits as a text to explore human nature. The rabbits are forced to flee when their traditional home is destroyed by development. In the course of their romping adventure, the rabbits skirt danger and become acquainted with a world of myth and culture. The book is written using the dialect and folk history of the English countryside. Published in 1972, the work has been cherished ever since. Call Number: BG Adams

Kenny Watson’s parents are fed up with his older brother Byron, who is running with the wrong crowd and developing a talent for getting in trouble. They pack up Byron, Kenny and little sister Joetta and head to Birmingham, Alabama. Instead of finding the slower pace and quiet lifestyle they had hoped for, the Watsons witness one of the most chilling events of the Civil Rights struggle. Kenny’s narration is both funny and moving as he intertwines his own story of family love and endurance with the tragic 1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist church. Call Number: BG Curtis

As a Creole heiress, Antoinette Cosway lives a life of leisure until she leaves the Caribbean to England. There, she mingles in high society before her marriage leads her to become the crazed Mrs. Rochester. The novel’s question is whether Mr. Rochester from Jane Eyre is the victim or the villain? Read the haunting prequel from Mrs. Bertha Rochester’s point of view. Call Number: BG Rhys

  Ursula K. Le Guin’s classic fantasy masterpiece reveals the land of Earthsea, a landscape made of hundreds of islands. Here, dragons roam and magic is used by wizards to keep good and evil in balance. Like Tolkein’s Middle-earth, Earthsea is built with an ancient, detailed history and unique language that creates an entirely new world for readers to explore. In A Wizard of Earthsea, the first book in the series, you will meet the wizard Ged, who starts the story as an overconfident boy wizard and becomes, as he survives his training and daunting experiences, a master. Call Number: BG LeGuin

Susan Cahill, author of three works of nonfiction, was asked to bring together a sampling of women writing. The result is an anthology that introduces readers to many of the finest women authors of all time. Included in its pages are two Nobel laureates and many of the most beloved Twentieth century female authors. Enjoy Edith Wharton, Emily Dickinson, Sylvia Plath, Zora Neale Hurston, Sandra Cisneros, and a host of others all collected in one book. Call Number: BG 820.8 C1197

Pulitzer-prize winning reporter Timothy Egan won the 2006 National Book Award for this harrowing account of the longest and largest environmental disaster in American history: the Dust Bowl of the Great Depression. Egan's portraits of the families who stayed behind are sobering and far less familiar than those who left for California and the West to escape the devastation. Egan interviews the surviving families to tell of towns depopulated to this day, a mother who watched her baby die of "dust pneumonia," and farmers who gathered tumbleweed as food for their cattle and, eventually, for their children. Call Number: BG 978.032 EG14

On December 30, 2003, essayist Joan Didion’s husband, the writer John Gregory Dunne, died of a massive heart attack. The couple had just returned home from the hospital, where they had been caring for their daughter Quintana who was in a coma. Over the next year, Didion is forced through a series of difficult experiences; some she dealt with calmly and others not as well. This work is a spare, moving, and elegant examination of that year of her life, touching on marriage, parenting, and grief.  Call number: BG 921 Didion