National Network for Equitable Library Service

The first and definitive biography of one of America's bestselling, notorious, and influential writers of the twentieth century: Iceberg Slim, ne Robert Beck, author of the multimillion-copy memoir Pimp and such equally popular novels as Trick Baby and Mama Black Widow. For a career as a, yes, ruthless pimp in the '40s and '50s, Iceberg Slim refashioned himself as the first and still the greatest of "street lit" masters, whose vivid books have made him an icon to such rappers as Ice-T, Jay-Z, and Snoop Dogg and a presiding spirit of blaxploitation" culture.

The Grateful Dead's long, strange trip has been the subject of countless books- but none like So Many Roads. Drawing on new interviews with surviving members and people in their inner circle along with previously unknown details gleaned from the group's extensive archives, David Browne, acclaimed music journalist and contributing editor at Rolling Stone, lends the Dead's epic story the vivid feel of a novel. He sheds new light on the bands beginnings, music, dynamics, and struggles since Jerry Garcias death in 1995.

When a storyteller loses his voice, he believes he's lost everything. In fact, he's been given a great gift. Once upon a time, a successful storyteller lost his voice to throat cancer. Deprived of the instrument of his art and his livelihood, he retreated into dark, sullen silence and depression. While searching for a spiritual explanation, he encountered his former mentor, a cantankerous and often drunk old man.

The story of enigmantic scientist-turned-priest, Nicholas Steno, who first proposed that the shell-shaped rocks commonly found on Italian mountaintops actually were fossils--a notion completely antithetical to the 17th century theological and scientific world view, which maintained that the earth was only 6000 years old.

Presents a biography of the peerless warrior who defeated the U.S. Army at the Battle of Little Bighorn. To his fellow Lakota Indians, Crazy Horse was a dutiful son and humble fighting man who, with valor, spirit, respect, and unparalleled leadership, fought for his people's land, livelihood, and honor.

Ruby Swanson's memoir about her son coming out as gay at the age of sixteen, how she responded, how she learned to accept and celebrate her son's sexuality, and how she became a public advocate for equality and acceptance of the LGBT community.

Born into a working-class family in 1921, Celia Franca, though a capable dancer, was an unlikely candidate for ballet greatness. But Celia possessed a drive that was almost unrivalled, and went on to become one of the most important figures inCanadian ballet in the twentieth century.

As a teenager, legendary Canadian poet George Bowering lived the life of an ordinary boy. He loved baseball, read Westerns, held a part-time job, and fantasized about girls and women. George was due for a sexual awakening, which arrived when he was fifteen. But what took place was anything but ordinary when George found himself vying for the affections of three very different women: his first love, the girl from the wrong side of the tracks, and one of his high school teachers.

"Canada's first woman trained for combat, a decorated officer in the "Van Doos" the legendary Royal 22nd Regiment, comes up against a system of institutional sexism. Throughout her training, Sandra Perron was repeatedly identified as top of her class, but was also subject to "pranks" that included stripping her uniform of insignia (which is a not-so-subtle way of informing her that her platoon did not have her back). The lessons she learned, however, weren't all negative - through several deployments, including Bosnia and Croatia, she forged lasting friendships with men and women.

When Glenn Dixon is spurned by love, he packs his bags for Verona, Italy. Once there, he volunteers to answer the thousands of letters that arrive addressed to Juliet. When Glenn returns home to Canada and resumes his duties as an English teacher, he undertakes a lively reading of Romeo and Juliet with his students, engaging them in passions past and present. But in an intriguing reversal of fate and fortune, his students--along with an old friend--instruct the teacher on the true meaning of love, loss, and moving on.