National Network for Equitable Library Service

In this Pulitzer Prize-winning tale of China, farmer Wang Lung glories in the soil he works. Nearby, the nobles of the House of Hwang consider themselves above the land and its workers--but they will soon meet their downfall.

In these powerful stories the verandah people are Jonathan Bennett's own compatriots: Australians for whom the ever-present verandah is both stage and shelter, a retreat from hostile bushland or city street and a seductive barrier to participation in the wider world.

Heartbreaking and wicked: a memoir of  stunning beauty and remarkable grace. Improbable friendships and brushes with death. A schoolgirl affecting the course of aboriginal politics. Elvis and cocktails and Catholicism and the secrets buried deep beneath a place that may be another, undiscovered Love Canal – Lewiston, New York. Too Close to the Falls is an exquisite, haunting return, through time and memory, to the heart of Catherine Gildiner’s childhood.

And what a childhood it was …

Escape to Italy with this heartwarming memoir. Every summer Maria and her husband, Bob, went to their little house in the Italian village of Supino, and every year it was a new adventure. Only in Supino would you find a pizzeria in a sheep pasture, a seafood restaurant hidden in the woods, or an electrical cord draped from one balcony to the next so neighbours could share power. In Supino, they celebrate the first figs of the season; host watermelon, azalea, and artichoke festivals; and take pleasure in the magical view of the stars in the summer sky.

A riveting story of talent and the price it exacts, set in a richly imagined Victorian England

Called the most promising artist of his generation, handsome, modest, and affectionate, Richard Dadd rubbed shoulders with the great luminaries of the Victorian Age. He grew up along the Medway with Charles Dickens and studied at the Royal Academy Schools under the brilliant and eccentric J.M.W. Turner.

How I Came to Haunt My Parents is storytelling for parents on the verge of a nervous breakdown. In this beautifully written suite of short fiction Natalee Caple explores fables from the dark side of adulthood and imagines what moral Aesop may have offered to a mother who gave birth to a murderous dictator. Caple's animals and humans are imbued with modern complexity as they confront sex, death, and history, but her stories are as witty as they are profoundly lucid.

A fascinating, non-partisan exploration of an incendiary region

Say the word “Israel” today and it sparks images of walls and rockets and a bloody conflict without end. Yet for decades, the symbol of the Jewish State was the noble pioneer draining the swamps and making the deserts bloom: the legendary kibbutznik. So what ever happened to the pioneers’ dream of founding a socialist utopia in the land called Palestine?

In 1960, Cathy McClure, age 12, is thrown out of Catholic school. Her father’s drugstore, faced with a superhighway and encroaching chain stores, has fallen upon hard times. So the family decides to leave Lewiston, New York, for a fresh start in suburban Buffalo. But even as Cathy embraces the tumultuous sixties and throws herself into a new life as cheerleader, Hojo Hostess, and civil rights advocate, trouble — as usual — isn’t far behind.

“It was a different crow, but the same crow, you understand? Because there is only one Crow. God made them all black and identical-looking because there is no reason for them to be different birds. That’s why you can never kill a crow, because it lives forever. Crow never dies!” — James Itsi For over 50,000 years, the Great Hunt has shaped human existence, creating a vital spiritual reality where people, animals, and the land share intimate bonds. Author Larry Frolick takes the reader deep into one of the last refuges of hunting societies: Canada’s far north.

Cet ouvrage propose une incursion dans le monde de la cour pontificale et des cours cardinalices au XVIe siècle. En quoi consistait ce monde, qui en faisait partie, comment y entrait-on, quels avantages pouvait-on espérer en tirer et pourquoi était-on à ce point attiré par lui? Autant de questions auxquelles l'ouvrage cherche à répondre à partir de nombreux documents d'époque, documents souvent peu connus ou peu exploités : des rôles de cour, des livres de comptes, des registres de salaires, des cérémonials, des correspondances inédites et des traités qui leur sont contemporains.