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Two Trees Make a Forest: Travels Among Taiwan's Mountains & Coasts in Search of My Family's Past
By Jessica J. Lee. 2020
An exhilarating, anti-colonial reclamation of nature writing and memoir, rooted in the forests and flatlands of Taiwan, from the winner…
of the RBC Taylor Prize for Emerging Writers. "Two Trees Make a Forest is a finely faceted meditation on memory, love, landscape--and finding a home in language. Its short, shining sections tilt yearningly toward one another; in form as well as content, this is a beautiful book about the distance between people and between places, and the means of their bridging." --Robert Macfarlane, author of Underland. A chance discovery of letters written by her immigrant grandfather leads Jessica J. Lee to her ancestral homeland, Taiwan. There, she seeks his story while growing closer to the land he knew. Lee hikes mountains home to Formosan flamecrests, birds found nowhere else on earth, and swims in a lake of drowned cedars. She bikes flatlands where spoonbills alight by fish farms, and learns about a tree whose fruit can float in the ocean for years, awaiting landfall. Throughout, Lee unearths surprising parallels between the natural and human stories that have shaped her family and their beloved island. Joyously attentive to the natural world, Lee also turns a critical gaze upon colonialist explorers who mapped the land and named plants, relying on and often effacing the labor and knowledge of local communities.Two Trees Make a Forest is a genre-shattering book encompassing history, travel, nature, and memoir, an extraordinary narrative showing how geographical forces are interlaced with our family stories. Winner of the 2020 Roger’s Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. Canada Reads 2021.Furious hours: murder, fraud, and the last trial of Harper Lee /
By Casey N. Cep. 2019
Reverend Willie Maxwell was a rural preacher accused of murdering five of his family members for insurance money in the…
1970s. With the help of a savvy lawyer, he escaped justice for years until a relative shot him dead at the funeral of his last victim. Despite hundreds of witnesses, Maxwell's murderer was acquitted--thanks to the same attorney who had previously defended the Reverend. Sitting in the audience during the vigilante's trial was Harper Lee, who had traveled from New York City to her native Alabama with the idea of writing her own In Cold Blood, the true-crime classic she had helped her friend Truman Capote research seventeen years earlier. Lee spent a year in town reporting, and many more working on her own version of the case. Now Casey Cep brings this nearly inconceivable story to life, from the shocking murders to the courtroom drama to the racial politics of the Deep South. At the same time, she offers a deeply moving portrait of one of the country's most beloved writers and her struggle with fame, success, and the mystery of artistic creativity. Bestseller. 2019.Marley and me: life and love with the world's worst dog
By John Grogan. 2005
A columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer reminisces about the untrainable Labrador retriever that he and his wife acquired as Florida…
newlyweds. Recalls Marley's hilarious escapades and his capacity for love as the Grogans become the parents of three kids. Bestseller. 2005.High tide in Tucson: essays from now or never
By Barbara Kingsolver. 1995
Autobiographical essays from novelist Kingsolver, "Pigs in Heaven". In the title selection, Kingsolver, returning from an ocean vacation, inadvertently brings…
a hermit crab back to her desert home. After puzzling over his odd behavior, she decides her new pet is reacting to the tides of Tucson! Other selections discuss being a writer, a mother, and a desert dweller. Bestseller. 1995.Three weeks with my brother
By Nicholas Sparks, Micah Sparks. 2004
A memoir chronicling the around-the-world adventure of author Nicholas Sparks and his brother, Micah, in 2003. Leaving wives and families…
at home, the brothers journeyed to Machu Picchu, Peru; India; and the Australian outback, remarking on milestones in their lives, childhood remembrances, and truths about loss and hope. Bestseller. 2004.One soldier's story: a memoir
By Robert J Dole. 2005
Former senator from Kansas describes his enlistment into the elite U.S. Army 10th Mountain Division as a lieutenant during World…
War II. Chronicles the April 14, 1945, battle in Italy that paralyzed him, his long recovery, first marriage, and entry into civilian life and the political sphere. Bestseller. 2005.When a crocodile eats the sun: a memoir
By Peter Godwin. 2006
An unforgettable story of one man's struggle to discover his past and come to terms with his present. The author…
writes with pathos and intimacy about Zimbabwe's spiral into chaos and, along with it, his family's steady collapse. 2006.Where the heart is: a writer in Provence
By Marita Van der Vyver, Annelize Visser. 2006
Van der Vyver, a Capetonian writer, married a Frenchman and moved to the south of France. She continues to write…
her novels there in her home language, therefore valuing her one or two trips a year back to South Africa. But her enjoyment of her adopted home - though its bureaucracy can bring tears - shines through, even as she describes renovations, strikes, and the quest for food colouring. 2006.Two lives
By Vikram Seth. 2005
Author of "A Suitable Boy" writes about his great-uncle, an Indian dentist, and the uncle's German Jewish wife. Portrays the…
couple's meeting in Berlin before World War II, their wartime losses and migrations, postwar marriage, and his own years living with them in England in the 1970s. Some descriptions of violence. 2005.The bloody red hand: a journey through truth, myth and terror in Northern Ireland
By Derek Lundy. 2006
Author Derek Lundy, bearing in mind that the name "Lundy" is synonymous with traitor in Ulster, delves into the lives…
of ancestors Robert Lundy, Protestant governor of Derry in 1688, William Steel Dickson, a Protestant preacher of the early 19th century who advocated resisting the English, and Billy Lundy, born in 1890 and the embodiment of what the Ulster Protestants became - a tribe united in their hostility to Catholics and to the prospect of an independent Ireland. 2006.Oh the glory of it all
By Sean Wilsey. 2005
Sean Wilsey's memoir of growing up in 1980s' San Francisco. Despite a privileged background, family neglect supplies him with more…
than his share of neuroses, narcissism, and self-destructive behaviour, which lead him ultimately to a boarding school in Italy, where he turns his life around. Strong language and some descriptions of sex and violence. 2005.The Icarus factor: the rise and fall of Edgar Bronfman Jr
By Rod McQueen. 2004
Between 2000 and 2002, the value of the Bronfman family holdings in Seagram - swapped for shares in French media…
giant Vivendi SA - plummeted from US$8.2 billion to $2.2 billion. Edgar Bronfman Jr., heir to the family business, was spoiled as a child but given little guidance, and saddled with responsibilities not befitting his experience or years. Not surprisingly, his speedy rise to the top of the Bronfman empire was followed by his stunning crack-up as he blundered his way to failure. Some strong language. 2004.Assorted candies (Plateau Mont-Royal Chronicles ; #4)
By Michel Tremblay, Linda Gaboriau. 2006
In Tremblay's autobiographical work, young Michel is trying to understand his world, often observing the other nine members of the…
family from under the dining-room table. His mother Nana dominates these memories, but the cherished moments shared with his father, along with his prickly paternal grandmother and irascible aunt, also shape his views. Neighbours, from whom the family haplessly tries to hide their poverty with dignity, brothers, and an uncle complete the cast of characters. Some strong language. 2006, c2002. (Plateau Mont-Royal Chronicles ; 4) Uniform title: Bonbons assortis.The sleeping buddha: the story of Afghanistan through the eyes of one family
By Hamida Ghafour. 2007
In 2003, journalist Ghafour was sent to Afghanistan, which she had fled in 1981, to cover the country's reconstruction. In…
a place totally changed from the world her parents had described, she discovered a school which teaches women a new kind of independence, her cousin's determined parliamentary campaign, and the archaeologist digging for his country's lost civilization in the form of a giant sleeping Buddha. Some descriptions of violence. 2007.Neither here nor there: travels in Europe
By Bill Bryson. 1991
Bryson retraces his journeys through Europe in 1972 and 1973, when he and a high school buddy backpacked through the…
continent. Bryson revisits many of those places, and describes the changes in the sites and within himself. As the interests of Bryson and his buddy were quite different then, Bryson blends the accounts of the two journeys, offering insight into the various countries as well as his own life. Bestseller. 1991.Aunt Erma's cope book: how to get from Monday to Friday ... in 12 days
By Erma Bombeck. 1979
Comedy of the how-to-self-help mania that zooms in on favourite national pastimes and preoccupations. When Erma finally comes out of…
the kitchen, she no longer feels guilty if the sun sets on an empty crock pot, nor does she care that she flunked her paper towel test. Bestseller. 1979.Trudeau and our times: Volume 1, the magnificent obsession
By Stephen Clarkson, Christina McCall. 1990
Examines the formative influences on Pierre Trudeau's childhood, his knight-errant youth, his charismatic ascent to the Liberal Party leadership, and…
his dramatic first decade as prime minister. Concludes with his bittersweet triumphs in fighting off the separatists in the 1980 referendum campaign and his battle with provincial premiers to patriate the Canadian constitution. Followed by "Trudeau and our times. v. 2: the heroic delusion". Winner of the 1990 Governor General's Award for Non-fiction. Bestseller. 1990.My friend Leonard
By James Frey. 2005
Continues the memoir begun in "A Million Little Pieces" (EB73831). Author Frey describes his emotional instability after being released from…
prison at age twenty-three. Relates seeking help from Leonard, his closest friend, a mobster who calls Frey "my son." Some descriptions of violence and strong language. Bestseller. 2005.The year of magical thinking
By Joan Didion. 2005
Writer reflects on her emotional response to the unexpected death of her husband, John Gregory Dunne, after a visit to…
their comatose daughter. Discusses the shock of suddenly facing a crisis, the memory of their time together as a family, and the meaning of marriage. National Book Award. Bestseller. 2005.We keep a light
By Evelyn M Richardson. 1995
The author describes the life of her family as keepers of a lighthouse on the little island of Bon Portage…
off the coast of Nova Scotia. Though isolated, the family enjoyed the responsibilities and pleasures of island living, and the natural beauty around them. Winner of the 1945 Governor General's Award for Non-fiction. c1945, 1995.