NCW Libraries

First published in 1942, this collection of essays on Maine life has been in print almost without interruption. The author began this collection as a series of pieces for Harper's Magazine when he left New York City and moved to a saltwater farm in Brooklin, Maine. His observations on town meetings, poultry, the weather, songbirds, compost, taxes, war, winter, and much more will resonate just as strongly today, to anyone attuned to Maine life, as...

"From the best-selling, Pulitzer prize-winning author of All Over But the Shoutin' and The Best Cook in the World, a collection of his irresistible columns from Southern Living and Garden & Gun. A collection of wide-ranging and endearingly personal columns by the celebrated author, newspaper columnist, and Pulitzer Prize winner Rick Bragg, culled from his best-loved pieces in Southern Living and Garden & Gun. From his love of Tupperware ("My Affair...

"An enthralling collection of nonfiction essays on a myriad of topics--from art and artists to dreams, myths, and memories--observed in #1 New York Times bestselling author Neil Gaiman's probing, amusing, and distinctive style. An inquisitive observer, thoughtful commentator, and assiduous craftsman, Neil Gaiman has long been celebrated for the sharp intellect and startling imagination that informs his bestselling fiction. Now, The View from the Cheap...

"Catherine Gildiner is nothing short of masterful-as both a therapist and writer. In these pages, she has gorgeously captured both the privilege of being given access to the inner chambers of people's lives, and the meaning that comes from watching them grow into the selves they were meant to be." -Lori Gottlieb, New York Times bestselling author of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone In this fascinating narrative, therapist Catherine Gildiner's presents...

In a series of essays that span her childhood to present, Nora introduces us to her mind and her world while inviting us to more closely observe our own. This collection is a response to a society that tells us to live, laugh, and love. It reminds us that we don't have to be oppressively optimistic or obsessed with self-improvement.

"In an age in which the lack of independent public intellectuals has often been sorely lamented, the historian Tony Judt played a rare and valuable role, bringing together history and current events, Europe and America, what was and what is with what should be. In When the Facts Change, Tony Judt's widow and fellow historian Jennifer Homans has assembled an essential collection of the most important and influential pieces written in the last fifteen...

"Heather Havrilesky attempts to disrupt our cultural delusions and false dichotomies, to unearth moralistic interpretations of mundane human behaviors and interrogate so-called mistakes that we've slowly internalized, and to question the glorification of suffering, dishonesty, romantic fantasy, conquest, predation, and perfectionism. Through her incisive and witty inquiries, Havrilesky urges us to reject the pursuit of a shiny, shallow future that...

"When Phil Klay left the Marines a decade ago, after serving as an officer in Iraq, he found himself part of the community of veterans who have no choice but to grapple with the meaning of their wartime experiences-for themselves and for the country. American identity has always been bound up in war-from the revolutionary war of our founding, to the civil war that ended slavery, to the two world wars that launched America as a superpower. What did...

With full-throttle honesty, Gabourey Sidibe shares her one-of-a-kind life story in a voice as fresh and challenging as many of the unique characters she's played onscreen since her unconventional rise to international fame in Lee Daniels' acclaimed movie Precious. Her memoir hits hard with self-knowing dispatches on friendship, depression, celebrity, haters, fashion, race, and weight. Irreverent, hilarious, and untraditional, Gabby's book will resonate...