Short poems that look closely at small moments in a personal history, in art, and in the natural world."A Bird-while. In a natural chronometer, a Bird-while may be admitted as one of the metres, since the space most of the wild birds will allow you to make your observations on them when they alight near you in the woods, is a pretty equal and familiar measure" (Ralph Waldo Emerson's Journal, 1838). Without becoming didactic or pedantic about the spiritual metaphor ...

From a bar hosting its nightly Sad Hour to the moonlit sandbox of a retired army general, Jim Heynen's new collection of micro fiction presents character sketches of strange yet fascinating men and women.Modeled after Theophrastus' Characters—brief, verbal snapshots of people created by the Greek philosopher—Heynen captures not just the quirks and eccentricities of his characters, but also their humanity. Guilty of only ordinary and forgivable sins, these ...

Born in 1793, John Clare lived and worked during the Golden Age of British poetry, the time of Shelley, Byron, Keats, and Coleridge. In the grand tradition of English nature writing, he stands alongside Wordsworth as a poet of extraordinary humanity and great spirit. Clare was 18 years old when the first Luddite riots occurred. He was deeply resistant to the first years of England's Enclosure, and he offers a contemporaneous look at what the world was like for those struggling with the imp...

Essays on life that will resonate deeply as readers discover how universal insights can be found in ordinary events.More than thirty years ago, Robert Fulghum published a simple credo—a credo that became the phenomenal #1 New York Times bestseller All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. Today, after being embraced around the world and selling more than seven million copies, Fulghum’s book retains the potency of a common though no less...

NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD WINNER •NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Geobiologist Hope Jahren has spent her life studying trees, flowers, seeds, and soil. Lab Girl is her revelatory treatise on plant life—but it is also a celebration of the lifelong curiosity, humility, and passion that drive every scientist."Does for botany what Oliver Sacks’s essays did for neurology, what Stephen Jay Gould’s writings did for paleontology.” —The New York Times

With gimleteyed wit and illuminated prose, Augusten shows how the holidays bring out the worst in us and sometimes, just sometimes, the very, very best.You've eaten too much candy at Christmas...but have you ever eaten the face off a six-foot stuffed Santa? You've seen gingerbread houses...but have you ever made your own gingerbread tenement? You've woken up with a hangover...but have you ever woken up next to Kris Kringle himself? Augusten Burroughs has, and in th...

"The best memoir I have ever read. It's sad, terrifying, and scorchingly honest . . . This book is a punch to the heart. Read it." —Stephen KingA Los Angeles Times Favorite Nonfiction Book of the YearA Washington Post Book World Best Book of the YearWhen Abigail Thomas's husband, Rich, was hit by a car, his brain shattered. Sub...

Winner of the 2002 Dorothy Livesay Award for Poetry (BC Book Prizes), shortlisted for the 2002 Griffin Poetry Prize, the 2002 Gerald Lampert Award for first book and longlisted for the 2002 ReLit Awards.Karen Solie takes risks with perception and language, risks that pay off in such startling ways that it's hard to believe this is a first book. Short Haul Engine is one great twist of fate and fury after another. The writing is clear, striking and open to a...

"No other book has made me want to re-read Ovid and retile my bathroom floor, nor given me the conviction that I can do both. I loved it." —Rosie Schaap, author of Drinking with MenA warm and inspiring book for anyone who has ever dreamed of changing tracks, Hammer Head is the story of a young woman who quit her desk job to become a carpenter. Writing with infectious curiosity, Nina MacLaughlin—a Classics major who couldn’t tell a Phillip...

What happens when a city woman takes up rural roots and becomes a shepherd? Journalist and broadcaster Marsha Boulton made the leap that so many urbanites only fanatize about? That is exactly what Letters from the Country: From High Heels to Wellington Boots. A Memoir and Survial Guide answers.More and more people today are choosing country life over city life and Marsha's experiences propel the reader into her world with hilarious consequences that also serve as an instruc...

In this award-winning, true-life tale for gardeners, nature-lovers, and dreamers of all ages, Little Farm in the Foothills follows a midlife couple’s pursuit of the “new” Great American Dream—living closer to the land—as Susan and her husband John start growing their own organic food, living more simply, and transforming an old clearcut into a little homestead.For the fifty-somethings, figuring out how to raise food on their logging slash-covered property seemed like a mod...

The Get-Over-Yourself Self-Help Book and Other Essays presents a collection of vignettes, narratives, and rants that detail the often absurd business of getting on with life. In an attempt to aspire to a so-called higher life, many of us fear both death and youth, reaching for perfection through the latest technical gadgets that encourage us to cling to preconceived notions of ourselves and to define ourselves through a text message. But is that really any way to truly live? Baby boomer co...