Inspired by the University of Illinois's celebration of the Brown v. Board of Education decision's fiftieth anniversary, this collection addresses the significance of Brown in the contributors' lives or work in education and civil rights. Several authors describe their personal roles in the Brown case or similar cases, while others examine and illustrate events, performances, and exhibitions that were part of the anniversary commemoration. The book not only explo...

The true story of a family's fight for their educational future in "a sure-to-be-classic account of 1960s desegregation" ( Los Angeles Times ).With an Introduction by New York Times –bestselling author Marian Wright Edelman"The most important thing we can give our children is an education." —Mae Bertha CarterIn 1965, the Carters, an Afric...

When Nancy Tucker was eight years old, her class had to write about what they wanted in life. She thought, and thought, and then, though she didn't know why, she wrote: 'I want to be thin.'Over the next twelve years, she developed anorexia nervosa, was hospitalised, and finally swung the other way towards bulimia nervosa. She left school, rejoined school; went in and out of therapy; ebbed in and out of life. From the bleak reality of a body breaking down to the electric mental high...

From the hit podcast and radio show, a collection of soul-bearing stories from The Moth's archives.A wedding toast hone horribly awry. A rapper's obsession with a Sarah McLachlan song. A death-defying stunt in a bullring. The fight to save Mother Teresa's life. These are the spellbinding tales from The Moth's storytellers.Inspired by friends telling stories on a porch, The Moth was born in small-town Georgia, garnered a cult following in New York City, and th...

A young Irish woman discovers her courage and selflessness during wartime in this historical novel of World War II.Abandoned by her father and neglected by her self-centered, unstable mother, Sheila McGee cannot wait to escape the drudgery of her mill village life in Northern Ireland. Her classic Irish beauty helps her win the 1941 Linen Queen competition, and the prize money that goes with it finally gives her the opportunity she's been dreaming of. But Sheila doe...

A sweeping historical novel about a shipwreck off North Carolina’s Outer Banks and the generations of survivors whose lives are shaped by the mystery, violence, and isolation that follow.Michael Parker’s vast and involving novel about pirates and slaves, treason and treasures, madness and devotion, takes place on a tiny island battered by storms and cut off from the world. Inspired by two little-known moments in history, it begins in 1813, when Theodosia Burr, en r...

It is 1943, and Santa Cecilia has become a village of women. All the young men are away at war, except for Vito Leone, his best friend, and the shopkeeper's son. When Vito falls in love with Maddalena Picinelli, the shy and beautiful daughter of the town's most powerful family, a few obstacles appear in his path. Maddalena's sassy, iron-willed sister Carolina thinks he's a penniless fool. Her parents think his crazy mother has turned him into a mammoni, a mama's boy. But Maddalena sees ano...

In Paris for a weekend visit, Elizabeth Bard sat down to lunch with a handsome Frenchman -- and never went home again.Was it love at first sight? Or was it the way her knife slid effortlessly through her pavé au poivre, the steak's pink juices puddling into the buttery pepper sauce? Lunch in Paris is a memoir about a young American woman caught up in two passionate love affairs -- one with her new beau, Gwendal, the other with French cuisine. Packing her bags for a new life...

This devastating tale of love and war is "in Graham Greene territory . . . A solid novel on morality in our not-quite-postcolonial world" ( The Globe and Mail, Toronto).A doctor and a nurse, Paris and Helen, are doing humanitarian work in a nation on the brink of civil war. They have also fallen in love with each other—and Helen is pregnant with their child.Then, a confrontation breaks out and they are swept up by rebel forces and separat...

* NOW WITH A NEW CHAPTER *'A hugely enjoyable romp through the pleasures and pitfalls of setting up home in a foreign land.'- GuardianGiven the opportunity of a new life in rural Jutland, Helen Russell discovered a startling statistic: Denmark, land oflong dark winters, cured herring, Lego and pastries, was the happiest place on earth.Keen to know their secrets, Helen gave herself a year to uncover t...

In The Christmas Letters, three generations of women reveal their stories of love and marriage in the letters they write to family and friends during the holidays. It's a down-home Christmas story about tradition, family, and the shared experiences of women.Here, in a letter of her own, Lee Smith explains how she was inspired to write this celebrated epistolary novel:Dear Friends,Like me, you probably get Christmas letters every year. I read every word and ...

After suffering an unbearable loss, a man takes a road trip in an attempt to find solace and encounters beauty, brutality, and beguiling characters along the way in this darkly thrilling novel. Grieving the deaths of his wife and infant daughter, Nathan Soderquist decides to journey westward across the continent, documenting the ever-changing sky in brief entries of ravishing poetry. Desperately lonely and with nothing left to lose, he drives through vacant landscapes committing acts of vi...