Book Description

He walks with me through every day of my life, in that unsteady, faltering gait that so embarrassed me when I was a boy. Always, he is holding fast to the upper part of my right arm . . . As we make our way together, my father—I called him Daddy when I was small, because it sounded American and that is how he so desperately wanted things to seem—is speaking in the idiosyncratic rhythms of a self-constructed English.

So Sherwin Nuland introduces Meyer Nudelman, his father, a man whose presence continues to haunt Nuland to this day. Meyer Nudelman came to America from Russia at the turn of the twentieth century, when he was nineteen. Pursuing the immigrant’s dream of a better life but finding the opposite, he lived an endless round of frustration, despair, anger, and loss: overwhelmed by the premature deaths of his first son and wife; his oldest surviving son disabled by rheumatic fever in his teens; his youngest son, Sherwin, dutiful but defiant, caring for him as his life, beset by illness and fierce bitterness, wound to its unalterable end.

Lost in America, Nuland’s harrowing and empathetic account of his father’s life, is equally revealing about the author himself. We see what it cost him to admit the inextricable ties between father and son and to accept the burden of his father’s legacy.

In Lost in America, Sherwin Nuland has written a memoir at once timeless and universal.


From the Hardcover edition. ... Read more

Reviews (12)

Searing memoir and eulogy of love
Whoa, this is a hard one. Lost in America, written by the gifted Nuland, is an ode to his father, a work of self-therapy for himself, a gift to his readers, and an offering to anyone looking for resolution and understanding of a difficult family situation.
Lost in America begins with the author admitting to coming under the grips of debilitating depression, and the writing of this book seems to have been his way of fighting out of that despair, of coming to terms with some of its causes, and of trying to explain all that went wrong with his father's life as a Jewish immigrant in America - and how those failures impacted Sherwin Nuland. The turning point comes with Nuland's discovery that his father suffered the mental and neurological effects of late-stage syphilis - and with his acceptance that happiness for him would be impossible.
Heartbreaking and oh, so beautifully written. But also difficult (on an emotional level) to read; you may find yourself putting it aside for a few days before wanting to continue. But persevere and read to the end. You won't regret it.

Moving, sensitive, beautifully written
I love this book. Dr. Nuland takes you on a journey with him to his past and his family, in particular his relationship with his father. He tells his story in a manner that is simple, clear, yet deeply moving. His characters are real people who I really cared about while I was reading. I've read his previous books and was very impressed; this one is even better. His description of his severe depression was gripping. How I wish I could describe mine as well. Thank you, Dr. Nuland for a heart-warming book.

Something was missing
I started reading the book and was thrilled by the content and writing style. It started out very strongly talking about his adult mental illness and then went back to his childhood dominated by loss. I could vividly picture Jewish New york for those in poverty. Although the childhood story was powerful and beautifully written, I was shocked that at the end it left too many unanswered questions about his life.

A Blessing
I had read How We Die, so I was anxious to read another book by this author. I tried reading this a few months ago and found it too bleak. Yet I picked it up again, and understood finally why it seemed bleak. It is a true story of life for an immigrant who suffers tragedies and losses and yet perseveres to eventually show love to his son and pride in his accomplishments. I almost cried at the end, even though I knew his father would die at the end of the book. It's a book of struggle to find one's own way. And it says a great deal about family influences. Well worth reading.

Long Day's Journey into Light
Great drama has character development, change, and carries the viewer to a climax where struggles come to some kind of resolution. One of the amazing properties of this book is how well the structure of drama is played out. Appreciation of sunlit heights is sweeter after slogging through enough rock strewn trenches. The attentive reader will be rewarded. In fact the cinematic climax would be hard to accept without a realization this is not fiction but fact. The drama here is not contrived, invented, or imagined - it arises naturally from the complexities of life. How nice for the author that subsequent chapters, unwritten, came out so fine! ... Read more

Reviews (7)

The Wild Muir
This book is a total bore. The flowery description is beautiful for the first three sentences, but then it becomes a tranparent cover-up for a book with no plot! Even I could write a more interesting book, and I failed high school english! Muir was a great person, but he sould have stayed where he was better aquianted: the woods! Anyone who enjoys this book obviously has never seen a tree before. A whole book dedicated to them is ironic and lame.

Muir is crazy!
This book tells of several adventures that John Muir had in his life. It confirms that the guy was a bit of a lunatic, but it makes for enjoyable reading. Some of the stories are better than others, but at least they are short and easy to read.

Adventuresome and just plain fun
This is a delightful book and will be enjoyed by adults as well as children. John Muir was a remarkable man and I was surprised that he was also a truly gifted writer. Muir writes in a fun, infectious style similar to Mark Twain. He infuses all of his tales with vivid descriptive words and a dose of humor. It's a pure joy to read and shows what an incredibly courageous, physically fit man he was. I decided to buy this book because for years I have hiked larged sections of the famous John Muir Trail in California. The scenic beauty is so overwhelming that it stimulated my interest in the man for whom the trail was named. All I knew was that Muir was a Scottish-born enviromentalist who had lost his sight and then miraculously regained it. But there is so much more to his story than this.

This book will fill you in on many of the adventures Muir experienced. It's amazing that he was able to forge trails and do the things he did in an era when convenience was unheard of. He mapped out the wilderness with nothing more than a compass, a hard set of leg muscles, basic clothing and no comforts. Muir didn't rely on sunglasses, sunscreen, maps, granola bars or cell phones, he was the "real deal" and my respect for him is endless. I can't recommend this book highly enough, it's a joy to read and to learn about this magnificent and underrated man.

Like being caught in a wind storm
There is one, though certainly not the only, thing that sets Muir apart from other naturalist writers in my mind... adjectives. You will not find minimalist prose in any of the condensed tales found in this beautifully bound book. However, you will find wonderfully descriptive passages that engage the senses and provoke imagination. The Wild Muir is a great introduction to Muir's exploits and beyond that to the creative non-fiction field in general. This book will provide a wonderful escape for adults and children alike.

Essential Muir!
This absolutely wonderful volume distills some of John Muir's more memorable wilderness adventures into an absorbing, thrilling read. Lee Stetson, who for years has brought the spirit of John Muir alive to audiences in Yosemite and elsewhere, has assembled some of Muir's most hair-raising stories of mountain exploits into this single volume. Fiona King provides delightful illustrations that effectively compliment the narrative.

John Muir was many remarkable things: Explorer, adventurer, environmentalist, inventor, and much, much, more. This volume shows off two of his most prodigious talents: His literally stunning writing ability (as fresh and delightful today as it was when it was written a century ago) and his penchant for daredevil adventures. Muir's boundless, heartwarming enthusiam for the wilderness and all its wonders somtimes led him into truly precarious situations, which will both amaze and fascinate the reader. Of course he escaped them all with nary a scratch, as if guided by a divine hand, and went on to proselytize his message of conservation to a waiting world. Muir's entire life is the stuff of legend, these true-life stories transform it into a mythic adventure.

I purchased this book from Lee Stetson himself, at his performance in Yosemite Valley. See him there if you can, but if you can't, buy his book here. I guaranteee that Muir's words will never disappoint. This book makes a fabulous gift for kids as well...but you'll be reading it as much as they do! ... Read more

Reviews (5)

Read It!
We own the Legacy Ranch high in the mountains of Northeastern Utah. For years we have loved the beauty of the unspoiled wilderness. Nursing newborn elk calves, watching Canadian Lynx outside their lairs, and many other adventures have cast us in the mold of lovers of the wilderness. To read the adventures of true cowboys, who started with nothing else but their "grit" and ended up with lives spent plumbing the depths of fun and hard work was one of the top literary experiences of our lives. This book, far better than the sequels, will be part o four Christmas giving this year.

Nothing To It!
Nothing to reading it, that is. This is one of the first nonfictions books I've read that I have ever liked. I got interested in it when I saw the TV show 'Nothing Too Good For A Cowboy' and had to read the books. This book made me laugh and almost made me cry. The characters are too funny and very heart-warming.

This is a book that has no comparison and no equal.
Outstanding! This book was an absolute, heart pounding thrill to read. An epic illustration of the unstopable drive of the human heart and the unyeilding will of man to print his own name across the pages of time. Men and women of a class that survives now, only in the memories or our lost heritage. People with unconquerable spirit and no notion of the impossible. If comparison were possible, this book would be the Bendigo Shafter of non-fiction but even the endless imagination of the great Louis L'Amour could not stand against the unforgiving truth of a land not tamed by man. The writing is clear and descriptive, showing the obvious education and experience of it's author, a man who chose ranching by choice rather than out of necessity. As the pages turn, the reader gets a look into the lives of these mountain men and without effort, we learn to understand each and every character, almost to the point of friendship. Quite an accomplishment in a fast-paced 250 page book. The pride, drive, knowledge, and respect of these men for the world they lived in is unparelleled. Though I was forced to perform certain daily activities, my mind never left the book until I could complete it's last inspiring page and sit breathlesly paralized in awe and admiration of this newly created dream world. This is the greatest book that I have ever been given the pleasure to read and I don't hesitate to say that the next two books I read will be the conclusion to it's sequence.

Hobson gives an excellent account of the way it really is.
This book debunks the cowboy myth and shows the life of a rancher the way it really is. Well written, with tragedy and humor on every page, this book also shows the relationship between man and horse the way it should be. If I hadn't already been there, I'd go looking for a cowboy job now.

Great Canadian History - Simple Elegant Writing
There was a time, that can be recalled by just a few who are still alive, when northern British Columbia Canada was much like the American West. This book describes the adventures involved in surviving and prospering in cattle country. When you are done with the book you will feel that you have learned enough to lead a winter cattle drive through unknown country. As Pan says in the book, "Nothin' to it, nothin at all. ... Read more

Reviews (6)

A Childhood: The Biography of a Place
I would suggest this book to anyone who has ever read anything published by Harry Crews; specifically to those who haven't read anything by him, but who are interested in this magnificent author. After reading it, I found myself wondering how Crews was able to escape childhood, much less become of the the greatest Southern authors since Faulkner. Truly a fantastic book that will stand the test of time and inevitably cast Crews as one of the greatest authors of the 20th century!

A must read for Yankees and children of the south alike
I was assigned this book in a tutorial class on the "mind of the south" by a professor during my senior year of college. I was immediately drawn to the author's experiences with tenant farming; being the son of a mother whose own father was a farmer that oversaw several tenents to his own farming operation prior to, and shortly after WWII. Crew's accurate depection of tenant farmer life was valididated, to this reader at least, by his portrayal of an agricultural system that was difficult to not only rural agricultural African Americans, but their white supervisors. Crews has done a wonderful job of incorporating the distinctly southern phrases and dialogue of the rural, agrarian south. I though my own mother was the only person who pronounced "hurricane" as "harrakin". Charachters such as Willalee Bookatee and his family were strikingly similar to those poor blacks, and whites, described in my mother's stories of working in the tobacco fields of rural NC. This book will shed some much needed light on the fact that the hard-core, rural south is not so far removed from the remodeled "New South".

Harry Crews' Materpiece
Although this book is not a typical work by the literate master of the hard South, it is a testament to his talent. This book made me see and feel the life of a 6 year old dirt farmer in Bacon Co, Georgia, and also give some insight into the basis of characters in Crews' fictional works. This is one of the best quasi-memoirs ever written, and even has a slight belief in human goodness not seen in his other work. Mr. Crews' more typical works (such as Feast of Snakes or All We Need of Hell) are very good novels in their own right, yet Childhood stands apart and above all of his other books combined. If you read nothing else by Harry Crews (which is not a good idea--you should read many of his books), this is the one to choose.

Another Bacon County native here.
Several associations, as I was born in Bacon County in the unincorporated community of ScuffleTown.I have never written A review of a book before. I really enjoyed the book because of all the associations of the area of my birth. My qeestion in my review would be. "How does one get from Bacon County to becoming A Professor at the UF?"

I felt l had gone home again when I read A Biography.
I own and have read this fellow Bacon County, Georgia writer's work. Not only is it well written, but he portrays the Bacon County and its people lovingly and wonderfully. Harry Crews is a gifted writer and deserves many accolades from not only his birth place, but the state and country as well. Joan Bryant Quijano ... Read more

Book Description

Bruce Edward Hall may have an English name and a Connecticut upbringing, but for him a trip to Chinatown, New York, is a visit to the ghosts of his Chinese Ancestors -- Ancestors who helped create the neighborhood that is really as much a transplanted Cantonese village as it is a part of a great American city. Among these Ancestors are missionaries and reprobates, businessmen and scholars. There is the patriarch with three wives (two in China, one in New York), who arrived in Chinatown just as it was beginning to take shape, and who eventually became a key player in the infamous Tong Wars that ravaged the neighborhood at the turn of the century. There is the grandfather, whose nickname, Hock Shop, bespoke his reputation as Chinatown's favorite bookie. There is the dashing aviator whose dogfight in the skies over Brooklyn made him Chinatown's first hero in the way against Japan, and the matriarch who was purchased as a bride for $1,200 when the ratio of Chinese men to women was two hundred to one. And all of them shared the experience of the great-aunt who emigrated to New York at the age of eight months, but lived in fear of deportation for the next fifty years because this country refused to allow Chinese to become American citizens.

In Tea That Burns, Bruce Edward Hall uses the stories of these and others to tell the history of Chinatown, starting with the tumultuous journey from an ancient empire ruled by the nine dragons of the universe to a bewildering land of elevated trains, solitary labor, and violent discrimination. The world they constructed was built of backbreaking labor and poetry contests; gambling dens and Cantonese opera; Tong Wars, festivals, firecrackers, incense, and food -- always food, to celebrate every conceivable occasion and to confound the ever-meddlesome "White Devils" as they attempt to master the mysteries of chop sticks and stir-fry. A vivid and tactile story, rich with the sights, sounds, and sensations of Chinatown then and now, Tea That Burns reads like a novel, but is history at its best. ... Read more

Reviews (6)

Tea That Refreshes
Tea That Burns was an unexpected pleasure to read. Not only is the writing fresh and engrossing, but the overall account of his family history back several generations is fascinating and rings of authencity. I have read numerous interesting Chinese-American memoirs, and what makes this one especially unique, is the ability of the author to connect the events occurring in U. S. History with concurrent events in China's history. This interweaving informs the reader in ways that are absent when the China context is not provided.
As a second generation Chinese whose father was a paper son, and whose parents had an arranged marriage, I already knew many of the factual aspects of the book. However, I never could entirely understand the 'process' underlying the facts until I read Tea That Burns. The author filled in many of these gaps with his eye for detail. The documentation at the back of the book reveals that the author knows his Chinese immigration history thoroughly, but fortunately he does not bog the reader down by inserting an abundance of citations within the body of the text.
I felt invigorated and refreshed after reading this excellent book.

Tea That Burns
Yes, it is a great book! I finish in one afternoon. I couldn't down the book once I started reading.... Mr. Hall provides a very rich history of the Chinatown in New York City during the mid-1800s period. He is succeeded to "enable the reader to smell history." In the book, Mr. Hall describes his father "denied" his identity of Chinese which shows the typical dilemma of the new generation of Chinese immigrants in the United States. However, I was "confused" by the subtitle, "a family memoir of chinatwon". I expect that the book mainly describes the author's family history, rather than concerns on the hisotry of Chinatown history.

More descendents of Chinese immigrants should share stories.
My mother grew up in the mining camps at the turn of the century, (1900) - it would be wonderful if more of the Chinese descendents would write their stories - it was surely a life of great hardship, and a history that needs to be shared. This is a wonderful story of family and life, societal views, prejudice and pain. Many expressions I heard throughout my childhood referred to the Chinese..."...didn't have a Chinaman's chance."..."...the rule was that the sun was not to set on any Chinese in town..." - what torment these people had to endure - yet we have very little literature on this subject. Mr. Hall has provided us with a wonderful, informative read and some true-life views that U.S.History certainly needs.

"Tea that Burns": After an hour you're hungry again.
I read Mr. Hall's narration and found it simultaneously interesting and dissapointing. Interesting because he cleverly portrayed the historical side of the story from an angle I could relate to, with credible detail that in and of itself made for the price of the book (Great Photos!). Disappointing because the individuals contained within were only briefly portrayed and therefore the personal aspect, that in my respectful opinion lends dimension to all historical fact, was somewhat disjointed. I look forward to Mr. Hall's next work to fill in the gaps and continue what he began.

An appreciation for individual lineage.
Tea That Burns reaffirms my belief that despite the overwheming "homogenization" of our human culture, individuals everywhere cherish what makes them distinctly unique and continue to save it from permanent loss of memory.

Bruce Edward Hall is an immensely accessible writer for people from all backgrounds. He allows readers their ignorance without castigating us for not knowing "all the facts" of our American Heritage.

His descriptions of Chinatown and its founding members are incredibly vivid as if they jump out from the page and challenge you to a game of mahjong while sipping Tea That Burns.

His sensitive approach to his realitives' eventual and unavoidable assimilation into American culture reveals the struggles of most of our ancestors. Tea That Burns does answer in a way the question: "How does one keep the torch of our lineage lit while playing the new game in the new world?" By embracing both cultures. The hodge-podge of Chinese-American life as lived in Hall's Chinatown and beyond of course...they get out as all groups flee their early roosting grounds...is one that all children of America can relate to...like the Chinese families that keep a kitchen shrine to Taoist gods, the Italian family serves the Canneloni next to the Turkey at Thanksgiving, the West Indian family serves the Roti and Goat at the Christmas table, the Puerto Rican mother teaches the song "El Coqui" to her child who insists on learning the english version as well.

Thank you Bruce Edward Hall for a positive view of the life of Immigrant America...which is after all the life of ALL American's with the exception of the tribes that resided here when the big ships arrived. And even that is up for conjecture I read these days. "Who really owns the land under one's feet...focus on the realm of your heart." ... Read more

Amazon.com

In the mid-1960s, as mechanization and the forests' depletion drove many loggers into the cities,Kim Barnes's parents turned to fundamentalism to sustain their increasingly difficult life. The author struggled to live by this religion's exacting tenets, but her chilling descriptions of the harsh punishments meted out for lapses make us understand why she ultimately had to leave it behind. Yet she conveys understanding and love for the rigid yet secure world of her youth in this haunting memoir of faith and loss in the Idaho woods. ... Read more

Reviews (10)

Honest and True
The reviewer from Lewiston, Idaho, Kim Barnes' home town, wants to suggest that there are things in IN THE WILDERNESS that didn't happen. What I can't figure out is how anyone could know that. The book is a memoir. It is told from the point of view of the writer, and Barnes early on tells us that she understands the faultiness of memory. How did this person manage to get inside the author's head?

Answer: she/he didn't. Read the book and see. This is a book that bends over backwards to be fair and honest and true. The Lewiston reviewer's motives have more to do with something else--spite, maybe, or jealousy, who knows? IN THE WILDERNESS is a book that changes readers' lives. It's filled with the kind of grace we should all be envious of. It never, ever means to hurt, but to speak clearly and beautifully and, most of all, honestly. The same cannot be said of many books, nor of some reviews.

Little House on the Prairie meets Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
That Kim Barnes is a poet is clear from her prose: the sensory details of "In the Wilderness" transport the reader not just to Central Idaho in the 1960s and 70s, but inside the skin of a girl living there.

The book functions on several levels. It elaborates the beauty and danger of living in the wilderness. It documents the erosion of that wilderness, from the perspective of someone who originated there. It investigates the comfort and terror fundamentalist Christian theology can inspire. And it tells the story of girl finding her place within and without her family.

I haven't read Laura Ingalls Wilder's "Little House" books in more than 20 years, but the first part of "In the Wilderness" brought back the sense of adventure I felt reading them as a child. "In the Wilderness", however, is written for adults. The last part of the book includes reflection on the significance of events in Barnes' childhood and the roles those events played in making her the woman she's become.

Like Annie Dillard, Barnes interweaves religion and nature. If you enjoyed "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek" you'll find something to like in this book--just don't expect "An American Childhood."

"In the Wilderness" has a lot to say about nature, family, and religion, but not at the expense of telling a story. I was surprised at some of the turns the story took because Barnes is careful to present each part of the story from the age perspective appropriate for who she was at that point in the narrative. I read the whole thing in less than two days.

wonderful book!
Incredibly moving and beautifully written.One of the best books I've read recently.

terrific
This book was heart-warming and enjoyable. I sent it to all my sisters. Thank-you to the author.

lyrical
I read this book as I hiked through the Sierras, and the effect was sublime. Barnes is a master story teller and wordsmith. The book plops the reader into the hardscrabble life of a girl growing up in logging camps amid colorful cast of characters. Her descriptions of nature - fish "fatter than a baby's leg" - and carefully plucked words are a joy to read. I can't believe no one else has reviewed this book! It soars above the current crop of mangy memoirs that fill books with words, but fail to get to the soul of the matter. ... Read more

Book Description

Jean Laffite, famous for aiding Andrew Jackson during the Battle of New Orleans, is largely a man of mystery before and after that event.His recollections of a raider's life before the War of 1812 and his adventures after his expulsion from Galveston, Texas,are now recounted in this English translation from the original French of the words of an old man living with his new, young family in St. Louis, Missouri, in the 1840's. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Memoirs of a Crackpot
Assuming that the text is authentically the work of Jean Laffite, then this is a great case study of how people resort to denial and self-delusion on a fantastic scale if they are engaged in crime. I understand the criticisms of the text based on handwriting analyses and so forth, but handwriting samples of a given person can change at different times over a person's life and to me the criticism voiced in other reviews here of this text are inconclusive.

The thing that makes the text ring true as the voice of Jean Laffite here is the identification of the pirates' brother Pierre as the illustrious Dominique You. This has never been corroborated, but the claim makes sense.

So, if this is Jean Laffite, then the fellow was a certifiable, vainglorious crackpot of a headcase. The author expresses throughout an irrational condemnation of the British and Spanish, whom he lumps together and condemns as the neferious villains he fought against all his life, as a "privateer" first in the service of revolutionary France and then the adolescent United States. He seems blissfully unaware that when he claims he began attacking and robbing Spanish ships in 1801 the French government he claimed then to be in the service of was at that time an ally of Spain! He denigrates the Spanish nation further throughout the book, villafying them as the arch enemy of freedom and liberty, but seems oblivious to the fact the from 1820 to 1823 Spain founded, and attempted to make a go of it as a republic. Laffite's (or the author's) ignorance is even more astonishing when one considers that this "First Spanish Republic" of the 1820s was destroyed by a military invasion from Laffite's beloved holy-land: France!

Laffite, (or the author makes the claim for him) also seems to take credit for saving the United States (from which he claims bitter dishonor due to lack of compensation from said government) from British aggression at the Battle of New Orleans. Yes, we are given to understand ol' Jean and Pierre (as Dominique You) and their band of "privateers" saved the fate of the U.S. from destruction at the hands of the British at N.O. that day in January 1815! Never mind that what the Laffite's actually contributed was but a minor fraction of the total manpower and arms supply of Jackson's forces! Laffite saved the day, and the U.S. has him to thank for it, and according to him that thanks never came (at least not in the form he wanted it in, cold hard cash or silver or gold or, yes indeed - slaves!)

That brings me to the next thing- while Laffite cries melodramatically throughout on the oppression of poor peoples everywhere by evil powers like Britain and Spain, he casually admits, as if all about it were normal and acceptable, that he often stole slaves- Africans- from British and Spanish slave ships and sold said slaves to customers of his own choosing and pocketed the cash! LAffite exhibits no problem of conscience whatsoever when he says this.

Laffite also denies vehemantly that he was a "pirate." He insists on calling himself "privateer." He claims he always carried registration papers from the French government or some lesser organization of doubtfull validity varifying his status as a professional privateer. Never mind that his claim of privateer in the service of France while he was attacking Spain, an ally of France by Treaty of San Ildefonso in the early 1800s would seem to suggest he, at the very least, tended to abuse his privateer status.

Whether the text is authentic or not, it is a fascinating confession (or conscienable evasion) of a scoundrel!

Also, be aware, the syntax of this translation is atrocious. Given that it was translated from the French by a university professor (who himself, in a disclaimer at the front of the book, acknowledges the constant non-sequiturs and general non-sensicals of many passages in the original) an added conclusion can be made: that Laffite (or his hoaxer) was an illiterate!

Don't Be Fooled
I first read this piece of rubbish at a local library several years ago. It was purported to be the "real diary" of the notorious pirate Jean Laffite. But, several experts in handwriting and historical documents pronounced it a fake. (I too had examined the "real diary" first hand.) Back many years ago, John Laflin was passing himself off as a direct descendant of the "Terror of the Gulf" but it turns out he was a notorious forger. He forged this item and a handful of photographs as well. He managed to make a nice sum selling this trash. What's even more amusing is how Price Daniel Sr. the former governor and a collector of Texana was duped into buying this hoax. Now my dear reader, I just hope YOU won't be duped into buying this nonsense. ... Read more

Book Description

From an American Book Award-winning author comes a pungent and poignant masterpiece of recollection that ushers readers into a now-vanished "colored" world and extends and deepens our sense of African-American history, even as it entrances us with its bravura storytelling. ... Read more

Reviews (7)

ANOTHER PIEDMONTER'S VIEW
I was fortunate enough to be born and grow up in Piedmont, WV. I was also in the same class as author Henry Louis (we called him "Skip") Gates. I was the 1968 Piedmont High Class Salutatorian and he was the Valdectorian.

Despite what Mr. Gates projects in his book, Piedmont was a "wonderful" place to grow up. I adamantly dispute his connotation of any racism in this town. In 1968, the citizens of Piedmont, although a very small town of 2,500 were very progressive. The fact that the foundation he received in Piedmont growing up which propelled him to the Director of Afro-American studies at Harvard should speak something of the childhood rearing and education he received in Piedmont.

I am not aware of any restaurant or establishment that denied service to anyone of color. I personally entered many establishments with him and never once saw him denied service of any kind.

Mr. Gates grossly misrepresents what was truly a great town to grow up in. I was very offended with his use of my name in the book without obtaining my permission and most importantly he greatly distorts a very close and loving relationship that I had with my Italian father. I felt that he mentioned several personal things about me and my family of which he had NO direct knowledge.

I was disturbed to see that Mr. Gates put such a negative spin on a great place, just to "sell" a book for personal gain and recognition of his college position at Harvard.

Buy it if you want - but buyer beware - this is a college professor who is writing because he is expected to publish or perish. Unfortunately Piedmont, WV happened to be in his sights.

John M. DiPilato (Piedmont High School Class of 1968)

The Book of a Life
Henry Gates is a boy thrown into a life that known would choose but fights to

make it a life that his children would choose. Colored People by Henry Louis

Gates Jr. is a fascinating book that brings you into a life of a boy struggling to be

accepted and understood by the people around him. He is growing up in a racist time and

environment that throws new obstacles at him each day.

What a story. Henry Gates went through a world of racism, hate, and violence. He

was part of a movement that would change a small town forever. The outside world was

fighting for freedom while Piedmont was doing nothing but sitting by and watching. He

saw this and tried to bring it to his town, change his town, make a difference.

I found the writing of the story to be very poor. The memories seemed to be

unconnected; they did not flow well together. The writing never captured me as a reader

but left me with an emptiness when I put the book down. His memories were exciting and

interesting but the writing left you bored and the book seemed unappealing.

This book left me with a feeling of "thank god its over" but a week later I started

to appreciate it more. I thought over each memory and I found a sense of understanding

inside of me. I understood what he was trying to say and how amazing his life was. I

understood why he went into "White only" restaurants, and why he fought so hard for his

cause. I now feel an urge to read the book again and try to understand more of what he

was saying.

Henry Gates Jr. led a life of hardship and pain. He overcame what life through at

him and excelled to become a better person. He struggled through the book to find

acceptance from his father and brother and his peers. He showed you the reader a world

that is unknown to many of us and let you see it first hand.

A Gone Community
Personally, I had a heckuva time keeping track of all the various Gates and Coleman relatives, so I gave up after the first forty pages or so and just appreciated this memoir for what it is -- the story of a community that no longer exists but will be alive for generations through Gates' evocation of it for his children and, vicariously, the readers of this book. As a white age contemporary of Gates, I was impressed by the evenhandedness with which he tells the story of the often grudging desegregation of the late 50s and 60s in West Virginia, and surprised by the extent of black/white interaction -- sometimes positive for Gates -- in this small town, even in the days of segregation. That is obviously a function of small town life, but it struck me as more than in many parts of US life today, leading to the question I wondered about throughout this book -- whether 46 years after Brown vs. Board of Education we are more, not less, isolated by color in our social interactions in the United States. If so, that's a tragedy for all of us.

Being Henry Louis Gates Jr.
This is a great book. No doubt about it. For those who only know Skip Gates from his combatative role in the PBS "Wonders of Africa" series, this book will be a revelation. As a memoir of a young man growing up Black in the segregated south, there are some wonderful epiphanies for people who did not have that experience. As a peice of literary writing, it's a wonderful example of craft and spirit and talent.

I don't always agree with the way in which Prof. Gates places himself in the politics of academia or the pronouncements he sometimes makes about being of color in these United States, but he sure tells a good story. Through sharing his early years, some of the complexities of the man are made understandable. I leave it to others to decide exactly what that means.

Warm and funny and haunting and serious.
So removed from my own experience but a story told with such grace, it will always be one of my favorite books. I read it when it was published some time ago and have not forgotten the real sense of place and people. As a white female wasp from New England, I'm not sure I understand why it affected me so. Lost communities that we gave up in the name of something else. On the one hand, it made me think there will always be a separateness and, on the other hand, that we all want the kind of community and gentle exchange that seemed at the heart of the people in this book. The use of the language is admirable - the writing - but it was what I took away about my own very different life that made the book memorable. It's a scholarly work in its way but simple, clear and classic. ... Read more

Book Description

In the summer of 1968 Peter Matthiessen met Cesar Chavez for the first time. They were the same age: forty-one. Matthiessen lived in New York City while Chavez lived in Sal Si Puedes, the San Jose barrio where his career as a union organizer took off. This book is Matthiessen's panoramic yet finely detailed account of the three years he spent traveling and working with Chavez. In it, Matthiessen provides a candid look into the many sides of this enigmatic and charismatic leader who lived by the laws of nonviolence.

More than thirty years later, Sal Si Puedes is less reportage than living history. A whole era comes alive in its pages: the Chicano, Black Power, and antiwar movements; the browning of the labor movement; Chavez's series of hunger strikes; the nationwide boycott of California grapes. When Chavez died in 1993, thousands gathered at his funeral. It was a clear sign of how beloved he was, how important his life had been.

A new postscript by the author brings the reader up to date as to the events that have unfolded since the writing of Sal Si Puedes. Ilan Stavans's insightful foreword considers the significance of Chavez's legacy for our time. As well as serving as an indispensable guide to the 1960s, this book rejuvenates the extraordinary vitality of Chavez's life and spirit, giving his message a renewed and much-needed urgency. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Do you really want to escape?
Sal Si Puedes, by Peter Matthiessen, is an excellent chronicle of the adult life of the farm workers' revolutionary, Cesar Chavez. This Biography written by Matthiessen is from the day he meets Chavez to the time he passed away in 1992. Chavez was a activist for the rights of all farm workers, and believed that union representation was not only a privilege, but a right of all workers. With the installment of the Bracero program, non American people brought into the united states were allowed to work in the fields, because Lobbyists in Washington were successfully able to determine that no American was willing to do the back breaking manual labor of picking and harvesting the fields in California. This book was simply put, is the best book that I have read in my young adult life.
One thing that I enjoyed in this biography is the use of language. I found the linguistics easy to understand. With the easy language and prose writing, this made the biography an easy read. Because I spent a short time of my later childhood in Delano, Where the book took place, I knew exactly where everything was, and with his descriptive, powerful words, I felt like I was back in Delano. Stepping out of my own skin and looking at the book from a non-Californian's perspective, the description and detail is awesome.
Another thing I liked about the book was the accuracy of the historical fact. Family members of mine lived in the time of the farm workers movement, and after having discussed the biography with them, they, too, agree that the accuracy and detail of events that took place are superior. The chronicling of not only the personal life, but also business life of Chavez was easily understood, and Matthiessen did an excellent job with this Biography.

Sal Si Puedes means Escape If You Can
Am forever indebted to my mentor Bea Brickey for getting me involved with the United Farm Worker union locally, and for instilling in me the importance of getting involved and living by Christ's motto that what you do to the least of them you do to Christ.

The book begins with a reminder form Cesar Chavez himself, who said in 1992 two years before his death that "The rich have money, the poor have time". The reader is reminded that patience was his tool of success.

The book is just shy of 400 pages and is a humbling as well as an energizing read. The title Sal Si Puedes is from the San Jose barrio where Chavez' farm workers union work was birthed. The book was begun with a three year stint the author had in the late 70's with Chavez with much appreciated postscript that brings the reader up to date with the events that incurred since the 60's and 70's.

Bea would spend hours passing on the wisdom that Chavez and the other UFW activists had taught her. How she and her husband were often taunted by San Joaquin farmers and called commies and pinkos and how Chavez and the other UFW workers who simply wanted decent working conditions and a living wage were taunted like this as well. How migrant workers were/are exposed to high pesticide levels and that in one breath the farmers denounce the "slave" labour workers for wanting decent housing and wages, while bemoaning the fact that they can't find American who will do the damn stoop labour for slave wages.

This is a book I am passing on to a lot of people, since I believe it is so important that we as citizens, stand up for what is right and that sometimes people have to have their comfort levels challenged. ... Read more

Book Description

The grandson of slaves, born into poverty in 1892 in the Deep South, A. G. Gaston died more than a century later with a fortune worth well over $130 million and a business empire spanning communications, real estate, and insurance. Gaston was, by any measure, a heroic figure whose wealth and influence bore comparison to J. P. Morgan and Andrew Carnegie. Here, for the first time, is the story of the life of this extraordinary pioneer, told by his niece and grandniece, the award-winning television journalist Carol Jenkins and her daughter Elizabeth Gardner Hines.

Born at a time when the bitter legacy of slavery and Reconstruction still poisoned the lives of black Americans, Gaston was determined to make a difference for himself and his people. His first job, after serving in the celebrated all-black regiment during World War I, bound him to the near-slavery of an Alabama coal mine—but even here Gaston saw not only hope but opportunity. He launched a business selling lunches to fellow miners, soon established a rudimentary bank—and from then on there was no stopping him. A kind of black Horatio Alger, Gaston let a single, powerful question be his guide: What do our people need now? His success flowed from an uncanny genius for knowing the answer.

Combining rich family lore with a deep knowledge of American social and economic history, Carol Jenkins and Elizabeth Hines unfold Gaston’s success story against the backdrop of a century of crushing racial hatred and bigotry. Gaston not only survived the hardships of being black during the Depression, he flourished, and by the 1950s he was ruling a Birmingham-based business empire. When the movement for civil rights swept through the South in the late 1950s and early 1960s, Gaston provided critical financial support to many activists.

At the time of his death in 1996, A. G. Gaston was one of the wealthiest black men in America, if not the wealthiest. But his legacy extended far beyond the monetary. He was a man who had proved it was possible to overcome staggering odds and make a place for himself as a leader, a captain of industry, and a far-sighted philanthropist. Writing with grace and power, Jenkins and Hines bring their distinguished ancestor fully to life in the pages of this book. Black Titan is the story of a man who created his own future—and in the process, blazed a future for all black businesspeople in America. ... Read more

Reviews (5)

Story should have focus on AG Gaston
I was interested in the life and times of AG Gaston. AG Gaston laid the foundation for modern day black business people. This book focus on giving black history lessons, devoting inadequate time to Mr. Gaston life and business dealings. I was disappointed - I expected much more out of this book.

The Great Entrepreneur
BLACK TITAN: A.G. GATSON AND THE MAKING OF THE AMERICAN MILLIONAIRE is a profoundly inspiring biography on the life and times of millionaire entrepreneur and philanthropist, A.G. Gaston. Penned by his niece and great niece, the story highlights the accomplishments of this gifted entrepreneur whose extraordinary business acumen took him from being the poverty stricken grandson of a slave to becoming one of the first black millionaires.

The story's theme is one of self sufficiency and fortitude and outlines his life, chronicling the important events as they occur on his route to success. The reader is transported back to a time when harshness was the order of the day and intolerance to the success of people of color was the norm. This well written narrative manages to capture the charismatic persona of this enterprising trailblazer and shares his thoughts on social, economic and civil rights issues. Most importantly it shares his shrewd business practices which were pivotal to his accumulating his great fortune and becoming a model of success for all people.

BLACK TITAN: A.G. GATSON AND THE MAKING OF THE AMERICAN MILLIONAIRE is an unforgettable and enlightening read. The story flows nicely and the lessons to be learnt are endless. This book is a source of inspiration and provides a serious history lesson for everyone.

Reviewed by Autumn
of The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers

Excellent!!
I am definitely going to suggest to my Black Studies teachers that they incorporate this book into their classrooms. A.G. Gaston is the entreprenuers hero! This is a story of an individual who could not and would not stay in the position society told him he was to adhere to. His self determination and self reliance into forging a life and business for himself is enough to make anyone feel ashamed of themselves for suggesting that they cannot become an entreprenuer. I recommend that you purchase this book!

THANK YOU AUTHORS FOR THE INSPIRATION!!!!
This biography of A.G. Gaston has inspired my life and business strategies more than any other book I have ever read!! With the book's vivid format, I could easily envision Gaston's life's experiences, business logic and implementation. Using his life's example of dedication and entrepreneurial genius, in my business I have become more effective in seeking and meeting customer's needs.

Furthermore, I had always wondered where the money came from that fueled the Civil Rights movement. The book shared Gaston's accomplishments despite racial hatred and segregation and how great an impact be had on American history.

I will read it again and continue to encourage others to read it.

Thank God for the Authors!!

Brandon J. Everitt

Great
To say that a black man in one of the most segregated states in the Union,would rise up and become a millionaire during a time when that was not the norm,is in and of itself a miracle. The story of A.G.Gaston is little known outside of Birmingham and Alabama, but every African American should get a copy of this book and read for yourself how this man rose up and became a millionaire during Jim Crow times. Written by his neices,it is tastefully written,and a wonderful addition to anyone's library. ... Read more

Book Description

Mayhayley Lancaster was many things through her interesting life: lawyer, schoolteacher, political activist, fortune teller, numbers runner, and self-proclaimed "oracle of the ages." In this new volume of creative nonfiction, the people who knew her reflect on her personality, her politics, and her passions, offering the reader a chance to delve fully into Mayhayley lore and legend. Oracle offers strange and often hilarious stories of the poor Georgia South in the post-Depression era, and how the eccentric Mayhayley's charisma and mysterious powers cast a spell on all the people who knew--and inevitably misunderstood--her. ... Read more

Reviews (9)

People who are diffrent make a more interesting world.
Meyhaley Lancaster is truly the most weirdly interesting creatures to come along in the 20th century. what makes it more interesting, is that her nephew and i was very good friends .Joe Arrington was the son of Marvin and Mary Arrington ,born about 1927.There was nothing weird about joe but he said years after mehayles passing the locals kids were still finding coins under her cabin.

Great history book reads like a novel!
ORACLE OF THE AGES, REFLECTIONS ON THE CURIOUS LIFE OF FORTUNE TELLER MAYHAYLEY LANCASTER is a winner! The author, Dot Moore,
went to Savannah, Georgia in April of 2002 to receive the Hawes Award from the Georgia Historical Society. The Award is given each year for the "best book of local history" for the State of Georgia!
I understand that she researched this character and her background in Heard and surrounding Georgia rural counties for more than 20 years.
This book is easy to read. It is fun to read. I highly recommend
this book to anyone who enjoys stories about eccentric charachters and likes a good story.
ORACLE is in its THIRD printing, I hear.
Order it now!

A must-have thriller!
I think that the person who wrote the review from Sharpsbug,Georgia is an absolute priss. He had no right to insult my best friend Dot Moore.If the priss is reading this then
I'm telling him that he is a very impolite young man and I hope he learned a lesson from this. So priss, next time think before you say something in public. By the way I read the book myself and it's a mind boggling thriller.

Stranger than Fiction
If you thought Southern Gothic was dead, forget it. Mayhayley Lancaster (1875-1955)of rural Heard County, Georgia, has got to be one of the weirdest people ever to walk the face of the earth. Despite being born missing an eye and poor as dirt, she strutted her stuff in high (if outlandish)fashion and died rich and notorious. Before it was over she had been a self-styled lawyer, schoolteacher, politician, fortune teller, psychic, and numbers runner. Her fame spread when her testimony in a sensational 1948 murder case led oficials to a body and sent the murderer to the electric chair. Author Dot Moore, herself a native of Heard County who as a child saw Mayhayley and heard some of the stories, has spent twenty years collecting information, examining the records, and interviewing people who knew the oracle of the ages." In straightforward prose, Moore combines fact and legend with invaluable collection of photgraphs to recreate a life that is almost too strange for words. The book is winning well-deserved prizes in history, for it is indeed the story of a time and a place as well as a life.

Mayhayley the Mysterious
Dot Moore has made me think twice about the possiblilty of physic experiences being real. Her personal experience with the wonderfully wierd woman is what I believe motivated the author to gather stories of the legendary figure from true believers in Georgia. Even Mayhayley's relatives were in awe of her, along with the local policeman who seemed to tolerate her oddness and protected her from thief. "A dollar for me, and a dime for the dogs" was her fee, an excellent marketing tool for that extra coin, if you ask me. Her "future telling" proved to be right on the money. I totally enjoyed the country rythmn of speech that shone through the storytelling. ... Read more

Book Description

After his father's death, Dennis Covington plunges into a Florida shootout to claim his only inheritance, two and a half worthless acres of land that his father bought in a real estate scam-but the more determined he becomes to share his father's dream with his own children, the more it seems that his true legacy is bad judgment in real estate. In a tale filled with characters drawn from a Florida like Flannery O'Connor's Georgia, Covington finds his life threatened, his truck torched, and his small cabin shot up and vandalized, but he clings to his inheritance with heartbreaking tenacity. Redneck Riviera is at once a comic and tender celebration of family, a brilliant look at the clash of values tearing much of rural America apart, and a bittersweet comment on our age-old passion to possess and transform the land. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Excellent small book!
Despite its relative lack of heft, this book makes for rich reading.You will learn a lot and think about what Mr. Covington has to say on the subjects of family, land, and place.

Fascinating, in fits and starts
The core of the book, which is the author's wrongheaded and doomed attempt to reclaim his father's land -- now dominated by local hunters, outlaws and vaguely corrupt law enforcement officials -- is fascinating.Covington's attempt to transfer his dream of recapturing his inheritance to the wilds of Idaho is somewhat less interesting.Most dissapointing, though, is the attempt to string together a narrative over what must be about a decade's chronology.All told, a few key days on his father's land makes up the core of the story, and you don't get a sense of how long or how hard Covington's efforts were.

Interestingly, this area in Florida where the book takes place seems to dovetail with the swamps covered in Susan Orlean's "The Orchid Thief," which also gives a brief history of the land scam that sets this book's plot in motion.

I'm glad I read the book, though it's less compelling than "Salvation on Sand Mountain," Covington's earlier book on snake-handling and other religiously-driven fervor. ... Read more

Book Description

This Tradepaper edition is a reprint of the 1st Canadian edition, "As Published in 1883" by Dawson Brothers of Montreal with 54 illustrations. A great gift for any Twain enthusiast. ... Read more

Book Description

With his signature style and grace, Willie Morris, arguably one of this country's finest Southern writers, presents us with an unparalleled memoir of a country in transition and a boy coming of age in a period of tumultuous cultural, social, and political change.

In North Toward Home, Morris vividly recalls the South of his childhood with all of its cruelty, grace, and foibles intact.He chronicles desegregation and the rise of Lyndon Johnson in Texas in the 50s and 60s, and New York in the 1960s, where he became the controversial editor of Harper's magazine.North Toward Home is the perceptive story of the education of an observant and intelligent young man, and a gifted writer's keen observations of a country in transition. It is, as Walker Percy wrote, "a touching, deeply felt and memorable account of one man's pilgrimage." ... Read more

Reviews (8)

If only he had lived to tell us more
Like a lot of other readers, I first became aware of Willie Morris when I read "My Dog Skip." I followed that up with the lesser known, but equally enjoyable, "My Cat Spit McGee" (in which Morris, an avowed dog lover and cat hater, comes to love a cat).

But for me, his most brilliant work has got to be "North Toward Home," which I did not discover until after he died in 1999. What is it about southern writers, particularly those from Mississippi (a state that continues to have one of the highest illiteracy rates in the world), that leads them to be such masterful story tellers?

This book was first published in 1967, but it still resonates beautifully today. Here Morris recounts his childhood in Mississippi, his time at the University of Texas, his days as a writer covering the wild Texas political scene, and his life as a transplanted Southerner adapting to life in New York (where at age 32 he became the editor of "Harper's)."

Morris brilliantly captures the changing environment in the United States as he traces his life in the forties, fifties, and sixties. Its too bad Morris died relatively young at 65, because I would have loved to see what else he had to write had he lived into his eighties or nineties.

This is about as good as an autobiography can get, as Morris examines not only his only personal growth over a thirty some-odd year period, but also reveals much about the changing political and social environment of those times.

A fine modern writer of the South
These days, people are probably more likely to know of Willie Morris as the boy in the movie, "My Dog Skip." So if anything, they know he grew up in a small town in 1940's Mississippi. They mostly wouldn't know that years later, after an education at the University of Texas, he was a Rhodes Scholar in Oxford, a controversial newspaper editor in Texas, and the youngest editor of America's oldest continuously published magazine, Harper's.

Throughout his adult life he was a writer. His memoir "North Toward Home" is a recollection of a boyhood in pre-integration Mississippi, the rough and tumble of state politics which he covered for the Texas Observer, and coming to terms as a Southerner with New York City, which he liked to call "the Cave."

As a writer, Morris saw both the humor and sadness in the circumstances of daily life. He was fascinated by people and politics, and deeply committed to social justice. Growing up in the rural South, he also had a strong sense of how people are shaped by their history, traditions, and the terrain of the land they call home.

His many books include an account of school integration in his hometown in 1970, a tribute to his friend James Jones, author of "From Here to Eternity," and an account of the making of "Ghosts of Mississippi," Rob Reiner's film based on the murder trial and conviction of the man who shot Medgar Evers. One of the best introductions to Morris' style and favorite subjects is a collection of essays and exerpts from longer works, "Terrains of the Heart and Other Essays on Home," which was published in his later years and is currently in print.

A great companion volume for "North Towards Home" is "From the Mississippi Delta: A Memoir," by African-American writer Endesha Ida Mae Holland. Her book is a compelling account of growing up poor and black in small-town Mississippi and coming of age during the civil rights struggles of the 1960s. Together, these two books provide a fascinating look at both sides of the racial divide in the Deep South of the mid-20th century.

Brilliant in parts...
Ok, this book is quite eloquent in places and borderline brilliant, especially when writing about Mississippi. The second section of the book focuses on obscure 1960's Texas politics and gets rather dry and stretches on and on and on. The third part of the book focuses on New York and is depressing in that Morris reiterates over and over about how horrid the city is, ie the traffic, the dirt and grittiness, the noise, etc. Then he cuts on surburbanites who decide to commute to the city from farther up in N. England. Later, Morris does the same thing.
I guess my main concern with this book is the fact that Morris was only 30 years when he wrote his autobiography. Who knows enough of the world at age 30 to do such a thing? I question Morris for thinking he has lived some unique life by that age; I know the author passed away and all the reviews and tributes and obits were glowing and nostalgic, but I can't get over the fact that long stretches of this book were agonizing to get through.

Different than I expected. And BETTER
After seeing the movie My Dog Skip, I bought this book to learn about a educated man who grew up in the South. I anticipated a recollection of why the South is great. What I read was a man recalling growing up in the South when it was a lazy, great place to grow up in. The first part of the book covers this and provided a perfect synopsis for the movie, My Dog Skip.

The second part of the book covers his time in Texas where he attended college and stayed to become an editor of a local liberal paper. He also was the school paper editor who became famous for his liberal stances taking on the administration. While this section gets long, it is the most interesting section as Morris is thrown in a foreign environment, becomes quite intimidated as many freshman do, and then grows in the process. This growth culminates in his acceptance as a Rhodes Scholar competing against many Ivy League namedroppers who once again intimidate him. He graduates and eventually writes for a liberal paper in Texas covering politics which allows him to see this magnificent state and challenge the beliefs of politicians and himself as he has grown into a full liberal in a very conservative state. Significant time is spent coloring the political landscape of the time and it's quite interesting to view this from 40 years hence. Anyone remember the John Birch Society?

The final section was an evolution as he moves to New York, goes through the humiliating first job search before he finds a low paying job working for Harpers Magazine. He describes what it's like working in New York, which he calls the "Cave", and living in substandard conditions where the sun never hits his building. He describes his first literary party and the pompous attitude of these intellectuals, particularly about the rest of the country. This becomes the fascinating introspective part of the book as he parallels his life in the South and his existence living in the "Cave".

This book covers the 40's,50's and 60's so clearly race was a central theme as the civil rights movement was in boom causing him to challenge so much of what he knew growing up. I think this culminates when he asks a German woman to leave his apartment after she makes some mild racist Jewish remarks. Morris really struggled reconciling the race issue given his background in Mississippi and at one point when he was introduced, he said he was from North Carolina as he had become embarrassed to mention being from Mississippi.

It's a fascinating story of personal growth that any reader will learn from. The book closes with him moving out of the Cave to a 70 mile, 4 hour commute daily to the city. And the last paragraph states the title "North Toward Home". I think many people will take the close differently but to me he was accepting his new home and turning over the page on the South which he would always appreciate and remember fondly.

This book will be of interest to Southerners looking to learn about their heritage and what living in the South in the segregated 1940's was like. Also, people with interests in journalism and political history will enjoy the book. But this book is also good for anyone looking for personal growth through the writings of others. I recommend books on whether they are entertaining and whether I learn much. I was pleasently entertained and learned a great deal. I strongly recommend this book.

ALMOST one of the best books I've ever read.
This book is comprised of three parts; 1)Morris's growing up in Yazoo, Mississippi 2)His time spent at the University of Texas, and 3) His moving to New York, and becoming an editor at Harpers magazine. The first section is absolutely fantastic. I was drawn in and couldn't put it down. Morris is a great storyteller, and the tales of his growing up are a great look at life in the South in the 1940's. If you enjoyed "My Dog Skip", you would love it. The second section starts out interesting, but then gets bogged down with Texas politics. Interesting,but not exactly a page turner 40 years later. And finally, his time in NYC was interesting, a Southern boy plunked down in the middle of America's biggest city. Many of his concerns of the time we are still wrestling with here in 2000. Our era is not as unique as many would think. I would highly recommend this book, even if you only read part one-it's that good. ... Read more

Book Description

The tranquil life Truman Capote led in the quiet enclave of Brooklyn Heights in the 1950s and 1960s stood in sharp contrast to the glittering scene he adored in Manhattan. Intimate and wry, A House on the Heights vividly evokes the neighborhood that Capote came to know well and described as one of Brooklyn’s “splendid contradictions.” Its denizens, including a celebrated Russian spy, a globe-trotting antiquarian, and a cat-rescuing dowager with a pointed social agenda bring to life the Brooklyn that cast its spell over Capote. In A House on the Heights he meanders through a special time and place still recognizable today. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Another winner by Capote...
I rated this one four stars because I can't help compare it to my two personal favourites, 'Music For Chameleons' and 'In Cold Blood.'
Nonetheless, this book has all the beautiful Capote observations in it as well. Whenever Capote describes something or someone I am completely amazed. The visuals he brings forth in the readers mind are like no other. This one's a quick read. I was a lil' angry it was short because I wanted more beautiful sentences.

classic
Only reason I'm docking it a star is the typically tiresome bloviations of gadabout dilettante Georgie in the introduction. The presence of Georgie between the same covers as Truman might have some value for bulmics, but to me it's just repulsive. Beloved Truman wrote all too little, and Georgie keeps typing, typing, typing! When will it all end? ... Read more