National Network for Equitable Library Service

In MUSIC IS HISTORY bestselling author and Sundance award-winning director Questlove harnesses his encyclopedic knowledge of popular music and his deep curiosity about history to examine America over the past fifty years. MUSIC IS HISTORY focuses on the years 1971 to the present, not only the country's most complex and rewarding half-century when it comes to the ways that pop culture and culturally diverse history intersect and interact, but also the years that overlap with Questlove's own life.

This program is read by the author, and includes excerpts from Richard Wagner's musical compositions throughout. A New York Times Notable Books of 2020 Alex Ross, renowned New Yorker music critic and author of the international bestseller and Pulitzer Prize finalist The Rest Is Noise, reveals how Richard Wagner became the proving ground for modern art and politics—an aesthetic war zone where the Western world wrestled with its capacity for beauty and violence. For better or worse, Wagner is the most widely influential figure in the history of music.

This program includes introductions read by the authors. "A backstage pass to the wildest and loudest party in rock history—you'll feel like you were right there with us!" —Bret Michaels of Poison Nothin' But a Good Time is the definitive, no-holds-barred oral history of 1980s hard rock and hair metal, told by the musicians and industry insiders who lived it. Hard rock in the 1980s was a hedonistic and often intensely creative wellspring of escapism that perfectly encapsulated—and maybe even helped to define—a spectacularly over-the-top decade.

Tune In is the first volume of All These Years- a highly-anticipated, groundbreaking biographical trilogy by the world's leading Beatles historian. Mark Lewisohn uses his unprecedented archival access and hundreds of new interviews to construct the full story of the lives and work of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr. Ten years in the making, Tune In takes the Beatles from before their childhoods through the final hour of 1962-when, with breakthrough success just days away, they stand on the cusp of a whole new kind of fame and celebrity.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - A celebration of American history through the music that helped to shape a nation, by Pulitzer Prize winner Jon Meacham and music superstar Tim McGraw "Jon Meacham and Tim McGraw form an irresistible duo-connecting us to music as an unsung force in our nation's history."-Doris Kearns Goodwin Through all the years of strife and triumph, America has been shaped not just by our elected leaders and our formal politics but also by our music-by the lyrics, performers, and instrumentals that have helped to carry us through the dark days and to celebrate t

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - The true tale of the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago and the cunning serial killer who used the magic and majesty of the fair to lure his victims to their death. Two men, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen work, embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized America's rush toward the twentieth century.

One of Oprah Daily's 20 Favorite Books of 2021 - Selected as one of Pitchfork 's Best Music Books of the Year " One of the best books of its kind in decades.

A powerful chronicle of the women who used their sewing skills to survive the Holocaust, stitching beautiful clothes at an extraordinary fashion workshop created within one of the most notorious WWII death camps. At the height of the Holocaust twenty-five young inmates of the infamous Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp-mainly Jewish women and girls-were selected to design, cut, and sew beautiful fashions for elite Nazi women in a dedicated salon. It was work that they hoped would spare them from the gas chambers.

For thousands of years, the broad expanse between Sumas and Vedder Mountains east of Vancouver lay under water, forming the bed of Sumas Lake. As recently as a century ago, the lake's shores stood four miles across and six miles long. During yearly high water, the lake spilled onto the surrounding prairies; during high flood years, it reached from Chilliwack into Washington State. Then, through the 1920s, a network of dykes, canals, dams and pumphouses was erected and the lake drained - "reclaimed" in the words of projects supporters.

"Fun and gossipy." — The Wall Street Journal * "A masterful history." — Publishers Weekly (starred review) * "Engaging." — Newsweek A "brisk, insightful, and deliciously detailed take" ( Kirkus Reviews ) on a transformative decade on Broadway, featuring behind-the-scenes accounts of shows such as Rent , Angels in America , Chicago , The Lion King , and The Producers— shows that changed the history of the American theater. The 1990s was a decade of profound change on Broadway.