Other books that might interest you

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  Uptown Downtown in Old...

  Louis D. Rubin

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  A series of semi-autobiographical sketches and stories detailing life in Charleston, South Carolina, in the 1930s and ‘40s. 
   
  Growing up in Charleston in the 1930s and 1940s, accomplished storyteller Louis Rubin witnessed the subtle gradations of caste and class among neighborhoods, from south of Broad Street where established families and traditional mores held sway, to the various enclaves of Uptown, in which middle-class and blue-collar families went about their own diverse lives and routines.  
   
  In Uptown/Downtown in Old Charleston, Rubin draws on autobiography and imagination in briskly paced renderings of his native Charleston that capture the atmosphere of the Holy City during an era when the population had not yet swelled above sixty-five thousand. Rubin’s wide-eyed narrator takes readers on excursions to Adger’s Wharf, the Battery, Union Terminal, the shops of King Street, the Majestic Theater, the College of Charleston, and other recognizable landmarks. With youthful glee he watches the barges and shrimp trawlers along the waterfront, rides streetcars down Rutledge Avenue and trains to Savannah and Richmond, paddles the Ashley River in a leaky homemade boat, pitches left-handed for the youngest team in the Twilight Baseball League, ponders the curious chanting coming from the Jewish Community Center, and catches magical glimpses of the Morris Island lighthouse from atop the Folly Beach Ferris wheel. His fascination with the gas-electric Boll Weevil train epitomizes his appreciation for the freedom of movement between the worlds of Uptown and Downtown that defines his youth in Charleston. 
   
  This collection ends with a homecoming to Charleston by our narrator, then a young man in his early twenties, as his inbound train is greeted by familiar vistas of the city as well as by views he had never encountered before. This is the city Rubin called home, where there were always surprising discoveries to be found both in the burgeoning newness of Uptown and the storied legacies of Downtown. 
   
  “Uptown/Downtown in Old Charleston is about a city in some ways larger that the state in which it resides. The book is also about memory and boyhood and baseball and boats and trains and family—and it packs a great wallop because it’s written by one of the country’s finest writers. These nine stories are among the best nine innings of history you’ll ever read.” —Clyde Edgerton 
   
  “Louis Rubin brings the city to life with his insider guide to a secret Charleston too often overlooked in the carriage tours and guidebooks of today. Rubin allows you to enter the soul of the real Charleston, revealing its essence and depth. A wonderful, necessary book.” —Pat Conroy, author of South of Broad

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  Fatherland

  Sir Henry Parkes

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  LibriVox volunteers bring you 4 recordings of Fatherland by Sir Henry Parkes. This was the Weekly Poetry project for January 23rd, 2011.Sir Henry Parkes, GCMG (27 May 1815 – 27 April 1896) was an Australian statesman, the "Father of Federation." As the earliest advocate of a Federal Council of the colonies of Australia, a precursor to the Federation of Australia, he is generally considered the most prominent of the Australian Founding Fathers.Parkes was described during his lifetime by The Times as "the most commanding figure in Australian politics". Alfred Deakin described him as "though not rich or versatile, his personality was massive, durable and imposing, resting upon elementary qualities of human nature elevated by a strong mind. He was cast in the mould of a great man and though he suffered from numerous pettinesses, spites and failings, he was in himself a large-brained self-educated Titan whose natural field was found in Parliament and whose resources of character and intellect enabled him in his later years to overshadow all his contemporaries".Parkes's literary work includes six volumes of verse, Stolen Moments (1842), Murmurs of the Stream (1857), Studies in Rhyme (1870), The Beauteous Terrorist and Other Poems (1885), Fragmentary Thoughts (1889), Sonnets and Other Verses (1895). It has been the general practice to laugh at Parkes's poetic efforts, and it is true that his work could sometimes be almost unbelievably bad. Yet though he had no real claims to be a poet he wrote some weak, sincere verse which has occasionally been included in Australian anthologies. (Summary from Wikipedia.)

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  Bitch Baby - A Good Women Story

  Halle Hill

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  In her dynamic debut, Halle Hill’s Good Women delves into the lives of twelve Black women across the Appalachian South. 
   
  A woman boards a Greyhound bus barreling toward Florida to meet her sugar daddy’s mother; a state fair employee considers revenge on a local preacher; a sister struggles with guilt as she helps her brother plan to run away with a man he's seeing in secret; a young woman who works for a scam for-profit college navigates the lies she sells for a living. 
   
  Darkly funny and deeply human, Good Women observes how place, blood ties, generational trauma, obsession, and boundaries―or lack thereof―influence how we navigate our small worlds, and how those worlds so often collide in ways we don’t expect. Through intimate moments of personal choice, Hill carefully shines a light on how these twelve women shape and form themselves through faith and abandon, transgression and conformity, community, caution, and solitude. 
   
  With precision and empathy, Hill captures the mundane in moments of absurdity, and bears witness to both joy and heartbreak, reminding us how the next moment could be life-changing. Vibrant and exacting, Hill is a must-read new voice in literary fiction.

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  Heavenly Date and Other...

  Alexander McCall Smith

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  “A collection of offbeat stories about dating and love” by the New York Times-bestselling author of The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency (Booklist).   
   
  Known for his sharp-witted mysteries set in Botswana and Sweden and numerous other literary works, Alexander McCall Smith here presents an assortment of short fiction revolving around casual dates, romantic encounters, and other human entanglements—which often don’t proceed as expected and may turn shocking, compulsive, complicated, or sometimes, completely disastrous. But when it comes to matters of the heart, we human don’t give up easily… 
   
  “The author's fondness for globetrotting settings is once again in evidence, with the tales taking place in various European countries, Australia, and, of course, southern Africa. Some of the stories are curiously peculiar; some are darkly funny; but all of them remind us of why dating is such a precarious endeavor. Smith's characters possess the quirkiness of Hiaasen creations; just imagine them on an episode of Blind Date. For love stories without the sap, you can't go wrong here.”—Booklist 
   
  “Reminiscent of Roald Dahl in their dark ironies…deftly written and droll.”—Michel Faber, author of The Book of Strange New Things 
   
  “Captivating.”—Publishers Weekly

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  Hook's Tale - Being the Account...

  John Leonard Pielmeier

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  A rollicking debut novel from award-winning playwright and screenwriter John Pielmeier reimagines the childhood of the much maligned Captain Hook: his quest for buried treasure, his friendship with Peter Pan, and the story behind the swashbuckling world of Neverland. 
   
  Long defamed as a vicious pirate, Captain James Cook (a.k.a Hook) was in fact a dazzling wordsmith who left behind a vibrant, wildly entertaining, and entirely truthful memoir. His chronicle offers a counter narrative to the works of J.M. Barrie, a "dour Scotsman" whose spurious accounts got it all wrong. Now, award-winning playwright John Pielmeier is proud to present this crucial historic artifact in its entirety for the first time. 
   
  Cook's story begins in London, where he lives with his widowed mother. At thirteen, he runs away from home, but is kidnapped and pressed into naval service as an unlikely cabin boy. Soon he discovers a treasure map that leads to a mysterious archipelago called the "Never-Isles" from which there appears to be no escape. In the course of his adventures he meets the pirates Smee and Starkey, falls in love with the enchanting Tiger Lily, adopts an oddly affectionate crocodile, and befriends a charming boy named Peter—who teaches him to fly. He battles monsters, fights in mutinies, swims with mermaids, and eventually learns both the sad and terrible tale of his mother's life and the true story of his father's disappearance. 
   
  Like Gregory Maguire's Wicked, Hook's Tale offers a radical new version of a classic story, bringing readers into a much richer, darker, and enchanting version of Neverland than ever before. The characters that our hero meets—including the terrible Doctor Uriah Slinque and a little girl named Wendy—lead him to the most difficult decision of his life: whether to submit to the temptation of eternal youth, or to embrace the responsibilities of maturity and the inevitability of his own mortality. His choice, like his story, is not what you might expect.

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  Mrs Brassington-Claypott's...

  F. Anstey

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  Thomas Anstey Guthrie (1856-1934) was an English novelist and journalist who wrote his comic novels under the pseudonym F. Anstey.'Mrs. Brassington-Claypott's Children's Party' is a humorous tale of a family trying to keep up with their social set in hosting a children's party. Ambitious and snobbish but somewhat restricted financially, Mrs. Brassington-Claypott agrees to her maid's recommendation of a conjurer with whom she is acquainted...and when he agrees to perform unpaid, the hostess jumps at the chance.But the conjurer is not at all like anyone expected...and things quickly get out of control....

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