Nonfiction
Your cabin in the woods
Conrad Meinecke
690.872 /Meinecke
Nonfiction, Home
"If you've ever imagined a cozy home far from the bustle of a hyperconnected life, you have found a soul mate in Conrad Meinecke. His two classic handbooks, Your Cabin in the Woods and Cabin Craft and Outdoor Living, filled with timeless practical advice and thoughtful philosophy, are combined here for the first time in an heirloom edition. From simple shelters to complex dwellings, from expert guidance on location, materials, and tools to hearty meals to cook in your handcrafted fireplace, Your Cabin in the Woods is both a step-by-step guide to realizing your dream and a vintage escape into the great outdoors for the armchair explorer. " -- Page 4 of cover.
The devil and Sherlock Holmes : tales of murder, madness, and obsession
David Grann
364.1 /Grann
Nonfiction, True Crime
Collection of the journalist's articles previously published in varous periodicals.
I love David Grann's long-form writing (Lost City of Z, Killers of the Flower Moon), and the short pieces in this collection are like delicious little snacks to tide me over while waiting for my hold on his newest work (The Wager: A tale of shipwreck, mutiny and murder) to come up. I think a lot of folks who find themselves in the business of libraries are really just interested in a little bit of everything, and Grann shows himself to be of a similar ilk here, chasing down random, elusive, interesting stories that he'd heard about and taken note of. His writing is both detailed and effusive, and of course, well-researched. Reading this book is like being told the best stories from a super-smart, congenial friend! -Candice
Beatles '66 : the revolutionary year
Steve Turner
781.66092 /Beatles
Music, Nonfiction
On the fiftieth anniversary of this seminal year, music journalist and Beatles expert Steve Turner slows down the action to investigate in detail the enormous changes that took place in the Beatles’ lives and work during 1966. He looks at the historical events that had an impact on the group, the music they made that in turn profoundly affected the culture around them, and the vision that allowed four young men from Liverpool to transform popular music and serve as pioneers for artists from Coldplay to David Bowie, Jay-Z to U2.
Since the release of the Get Back series I've been on a Beatles kick. This book covers one of their pivotal years and contains a lot of primary source interview quotes. Turner describes local and global cultural and political landscapes to help ground us in what they were dealing with as artists at the time. -Jason
Empress of the Nile : the daredevil archaeologist who saved Egypt's ancient temples from destruction
Lynne Olson
932 /Olson
Nonfiction, History
"In the 1960s, the world's attention was focused on a nail-biting race against time--an international campaign to save over a dozen ancient Egyptian temples, built during the height of the pharaohs' rule, from drowning in the floodwaters of the gigantic new Aswan High Dam. But the massive press coverage of this unprecedented rescue effort completely overlooked the feisty French archaeologist who made it all happen. Without the intervention of Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, the temples--including the Met Museum's Temple of Dendur--would now be at the bottom of a gigantic reservoir. It was a project of unimaginable size and complexity that required the fragile sandstone temples to be dismantled, stone by stone, and rebuilt on higher ground. A willful, real-life version of Indiana Jones, Desroches-Noblecourt refused to be cowed by anyone or anything. As a brave member of the French Resistance in WWII she had survived imprisonment by the Nazis; in her fight to save the temples she had to face down two of the most daunting leaders of the postwar world, Egyptian President Abdel Nasser and French President Charles de Gaulle. As she told one reporter, "You don't get anywhere without a fight, you know." Yet Desroches-Noblecourt was not the only woman who played a crucial role in the endeavor. The other one was Jacqueline Kennedy, America's new First Lady, who persuaded her husband to call on Congress to help fund the rescue effort. After a century and a half of Western plunder of Egypt's ancient monuments, Desroches-Noblecourt had done the opposite. She had helped preserve a crucial part of its cultural heritage and, just as important, made sure it remained in its homeland"--
An energetic and astute account of someone I'd never heard of before, but who exhibits all the intellect, daring, humanism, and bravery of the heroic Indiana Jones! No doubt, part of the appeal of this story is seeing a woman blaze her path in a man's world, while also leaving that world better than she found it. But there's also the historical intrigue of exploration and discovery, of war-time cunning, of the changing worlds of academia and societal norms. I'll be first in line to admit that it takes a romantic gaze to look back with enjoyment on this time period and it's colonial trappings, but the author is careful to work in acknowledgment alongside a healthy dose of the understandings of historical cultural relativism. Christaine Desroches-Noblecourt's story deserves to be told, and this book does it well. If you like this, you might be interested in reading the very excellent "The Riddle of the Labyrinth" by Margalit Fox, which recounts Alice Kober's work in deciphering the Linear B script that was used in Mycenaean civilization. -Candice
Tree, wildflower, and mushroom spotting
Mary Kay Carson
j582.13 Carson
Nonfiction, Nature, Science
"With 448 full-color, highly illustrated pages, Outdoor School is your indispensable tool for the outdoors. This interactive field guide to plant and mushroom spotting includes: immersive activities to get you exploring, write-in sections to journal about experiences, next-level adventures to challenge even seasoned nature lovers. No experience is required--only curiosity and courage. Inside you'll find easy-to-follow instructions on how to: grow mushrooms with cardboard, compare bark types, count tree rings, survey leaf patterns, create fern spore prints, press and preserve wildflowers--and so much more!"--
It's spring! Get out there and look at some flowers! I recommend Turkey Creek Nature Preserve (Bur Oak Land Trust) for bluebells. There's a whole series of these Outdoor School books that are worth your time. -Anne W
Is it okay to pee in the ocean? : the fascinating science of our waste and our world
Ella Schwartz
j612.4 Schwartz
Nonfiction, Science
"Explore the human systems that make pee happen, tackle environmental questions about the impacts of human waste, discover surprising uses of urine throughout history-like in mouthwash and skin creams-and even try out at-home, hands-on experiments (with no bodily fluids required, of course!)"--
Did you know that in ancient Rome, buckets were set up along public streets to collect urine from passersby, to use for laundering clothes? That's right, once enough urine was collected, a person would stand in a giant tub filled with pee and dirty clothes, stomping on them to remove stubborn stains. Maybe next time you spill ketchup down your front, try rubbing a little pee on it. That's just one of the many fascinating facts about #1 you can learn from this new book! I won't spoil it by answering the titular question, but you can read to find out the effects of your waste on various bodies of water, how your body makes and eliminates pee, the scientific makeup of pee, and much, much more. -Anne W
Two color quilts : 8 inspiring designs
746.46 /Two
Nonfiction, Crafts
I want to try making all of these quilts! They're beautiful, simply presented, and easy to follow for semi-experienced and newer quilters like me. If you're in need of some sewing inspiration this might be the book for you! -Casey
When the sky glows
Beckerman, Nell Cross, 1973- author.
j551.565 Beckerman
Picture Books, Nonfiction
"Sunrises and lightning storms, rainbows and volcanoes, meteors and fireflies-these beautiful, and sometimes frightening, events that light up the sky might seem like magic."--
Added by Casey
An assassin in utopia : the true story of a nineteenth-century sex cult and a president's murder
Susan Wels
364.1523/Wels
Nonfiction, History
From 1848 to 1881, a small utopian colony in upstate New York, the Oneida Community, was known for its shocking sexual practices, from open marriage and free love to the sexual training of young boys by older women. And in 1881, a one-time member of the Oneida Community, Charles Julius Guiteau, assassinated President James Garfield in a brutal crime that shook America to its core. This is the first book to weave together these explosive stories in a tale of utopian experiments, political machinations, and murder.
I was excited enough about this book that I went and bought a copy before the library got it...I'm hopeful it won't disappoint! For those of you who read Candice Millard's fantastic book about the assassination of President Garfied--"Destiny of the Republic"--and wondered what the heck his assassin had been getting up to before the event, this book might fill in some of those details for you. Turns out he spent a bit of time in the Oneida community in upstate New York, and if you think that it was all about making silverware, think again! There were a lot of interesting communities around this time, working to turn their ideal ways of life into a reality, and Oneida was one of the most successful. If you're a history buff with a penchant for a little of the weird, this book might be worthwhile. -Candice
The lodge that beaver built
Randi Sonenshine
j599.37 Sonenshine
Nonfiction, Animals, Poetry
"Resourceful Beaver and his family work every day to build the perfect lodge in the pond, made of branches from the shore willow and silty mud from the streambed, in a book that introduces the engineering feat of dam-building and the life cycle of beaver families"--Provided by publisher.
A zen, poetic rendition of the "House that Jack Built" featuring soothing colored pencil imagery of beavers, geese, moose and more. If you can't be in the middle of the calm on a lake in the woods, reading this beautiful nonfiction picture book might be the next best thing. -Mari
The design of this book is pure nostalgia--the sepia pages, hand drawn illustrations, and a classic camping color scheme. It's been a fantasy of mine to live in a mountain cabin the woods since I was in high school, with 5 dogs. That's not likely to happen (expensive real estate! wildfires!! TICKS!!!), but I *can* live that fantasy out by looking through this fabbo cabin building book. This book tells me all I need to build a 12x14' cabin is 14 softwood logs that are 8" thick and 26' long. I will need a draw shave to strip the bark. Nothing to it! Ah, a girl can dream... -Melody