Step by Step


Book Description

Step sequencers are a special treat: they offer a simplified approach to composition that can be the basis for fun and creative music-making. Using the Max/MSP visual programming language, Gregory Taylor provides the recipes for over a dozen step sequencers that range from basic to surprisingly deep. In doing so, he also presents Max as the perfect toolkit for creating these addictive devices.




Song of the Trees


Book Description

During the Depression, a rural black family deeply attached to the forest on their land tries to save it from being cut down by an unscrupulous white man.




Darkly


Book Description

A fascinating journey into the dark heart of the American gothic that analyzes its connections to race and racism in 21st-century America Haunted houses, bitter revenants and muffled heartbeats under floorboards—the American gothic is a macabre tale based on a true story. Part memoir and part cultural critique, Darkly explores American culture’s inevitable gothicity in the traces left from chattel slavery. The persistence of white supremacy and the ubiquity of Black death feeds a national culture of terror and a perpetual undercurrent of mourning. If the gothic narrative is metabolized fear, if the goth aesthetic is




All the Days Past, All the Days to Come


Book Description

The saga of the Logan family--made famous in the Newbery Medal-winning Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry--concludes in a deeply fulfilling story, now available in paperback. In her tenth book, Mildred Taylor completes her sweeping saga about the Logan family of Mississippi, which is also the story of the civil rights movement in America of the 20th century. Cassie Logan, first met in Song of the Trees and Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, is a young woman now, searching for her place in the world, a journey that takes her from Toledo to California, to law school in Boston, and, ultimately, in the 60s, home to Mississippi to participate in voter registration. She is witness to the now-historic events of the century: the Great Migration north, the rise of the civil rights movement, preceded and precipitated by the racist society of America, and the often violent confrontations that brought about change. Rich, compelling storytelling is Ms. Taylor's hallmark, and she fulfills expectations as she brings to a close the stirring family story that has absorbed her for over forty years. It is a story she was born to tell.







The Land


Book Description

After the Civil War Paul, the son of a white father and a black mother, finds himself caught between the two worlds of colored folks and white folks as he pursues his dream of owning land of his own.




Shadowghast


Book Description

In the third mysterious tale of Eerie-on-Sea, it’s almost Ghastly Night, and the Shadowghast—an ancient spirit in a lantern—lurks in wait for the power to enslave the town. In this third adventure, shipwrecked orphan Herbert Lemon, Lost-and-Founder at the Grand Nautilus Hotel, must square off with a creature of town lore as he confronts a shadow from his past. While other towns celebrate Halloween, in Eerie-on-Sea it’s Ghastly Night, and a grim spirit in a lantern awaits its moment. Legend has it that if people fail to light manglewick candles on Ghastly Night, and if no showman conjures shadow puppets on the pier as an offering, the insulted Shadowghast will seize and devour the shadows of the living. This year, a professional theater troupe has been summoned, including a raven-haired magician named Caliastra with startling news of Herbie’s origins. No sooner have the players checked into the hotel than townspeople start vanishing into thin air, including the guardian of Herbie’s best friend, Violet Parma. It’s up to Herbie and Violet to separate truth from sleight of hand and solve the mystery of the Shadowghast lantern before darkness swallows them all.




Mildred D. Taylor: The Logan Family Saga Complete Collection


Book Description

This 10-book complete collection includes all the books in Mildred D. Taylor’s award-winning Logan Family Saga! In this digital package you’ll find: 1. Song of the Trees 2. Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry 3. Let the Circle Be Unbroken 4. The Gold Cadillac 5. The Friendship 6. Mississippi Bridge 7. The Road to Memphis 8. The Well 9. The Land 10. All the Days Past, All the Days to Come The Logan Family Saga follows the Logans, a tight-knit family who grapple with living in America during the 20th century. We follow this family as they experience prejudice, racism, and the major events that characterize our modern racial history. From the Great Depression to the Civil Rights movement, this gripping series will both educate and capture the hearts of all readers as they read about how Cassie Logan finds her voice in an era characterized by oppression, and the often violent confrontations that bring about change. AWARDS & ACCOLADES FOR THE LOGAN FAMILY SAGA Ms. Taylor’s first book in The Logan Family Saga, Song of the Trees received The Council on Interracial Books Award; her second, Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry was the winner of the Newbery Medal and a National Book Award finalist. Two other novels about the Logan family followed: Let the Circle Be Unbroken and The Gold Cadillac, as well as a prequel, The Land; all three received The Coretta Scott King Award. Ms. Taylor is also author of The Friendship, her fourth Coretta Scott King Award winner; The Well, The Gold Cadillac, and Mississippi Bridge. In 2020, Ms. Taylor released her tenth and final installment of The Logan Family Saga, All the Days Past, All the Days to Come. In 2020 Ms. Taylor also received the Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement.




The Last Asylum


Book Description

In the late 1970s, Barbara Taylor, then an acclaimed young historian, began to suffer from severe anxiety. In the years that followed, Taylor's world contracted around her illness. Eventually, she was admitted to what had once been England's largest psychiatric institutions, the infamous Friern Mental Hospital in London




A Dragon Used to Live Here


Book Description

Raise the drawbridge for a story-within-a-story melding classic fairy-tale trappings with contemporary, tongue-in-cheek wit, abundantly illustrated in black-and-white—a perfect family read. Noble children Thomas and Emily have always known their mother to be sensible, the lady of the castle—if anything, a bit boring. But then they discover Meg, a cranky scribe who lives in the castle basement, leading a quirky group of artists in producing party invitations and other missives for the nobles above. Meg claims that she was a friend of their mother’s back when the two were kids—even before the dragon lived in the castle. Wait—a dragon? Not sure they can believe Meg’s tales, the kids return again and again to hear the evolving, fantastical story of their mother’s escapades (while putting their fussiest penmanship to work) and get caught up in a quest to reunite the onetime friends. Kidnapping, fighting, a ferocious dragon, loyal elves, and true love . . . coupled with squabbling siblings, archery practice gone amiss, and ill-fated dives into the moat . . . This multilayered story blends adventure and humor, medieval tropes and modern sensibility, in a satisfying read for the whole family.