Papa's Back-Road Short Stories


Book Description

Papa's Back-Road Short Stories by Sam Cross Old highways and back roads seem less traveled, as many people would rather be on main highways to save travel time. Sam "Papa Smurf" Cross is different. This biker prefers to start his adventures in the old highways and back roads leading to old bait houses and old stores, where he might chance upon friendly strangers willing to share wonderful stories, stories he finds worthy of retelling. This treasure of compelling and inspiring stories of ordinary people whose simple acts of kindness brought happiness and hope to families and individuals who survived life's trials, even gaining a new lease on life, are immortalized in Papa's Back-Road Short Stories. A widower opens his life and home to a cat, who, in turn, shares his unconditional love to the widower and later to a cancer stricken girl in need of a friend in "Henry." A lasting friendship that follows after are retold in "Cindy and Henry," "Randy," and "Gunner." A person's worth is more than his or her appearance as the story of a homeless man living his life digging trash cans imparts in "Silver Star." God moves in mysterious ways and nobody would suspect that his help would come from unexpected people, like when two young troublemakers decide to help a widow in need during the time of the Great Depression, in an untitled humorous story that would never get old. Stories like this encourage positivity and belief in God much needed in these times of troubles and deserves a place in anyone's bookshelf.




Roxbury Place-Name Stories


Book Description

Every place on earth has a name. Never noticed the place-names in your town? Then take a look at these tales; you'll learn some things about where you live. These stories are about a rural Connecticut town settled in the 1700s. Place-names are everywhere on rivers, roads, brooks, hills, buildings, parks, cemeteries, nature preserves, even rocks. The names are from Englishmen, Indians, plants, animals, battles, the Bible, hell, heroes, celebrities, and just plain folks. Place-names are strange creatures, but they all reveal the history, culture, and eccentricities of people who passed through even in your town. Rummage around these tales if you're a librarian, historian, geographer, genealogist, traveler, or resident of this planet. Advance Praise from Roxbury, Conn. Notables lasting treasure for our community insights into nuggets of Roxbury's heritage quick and pleasurable read Barbara Henry, First Selectman extraordinary vade mecum informs and amuses paints a living portrait of Roxbury Steven Schinke, President, Roxbury Land Trust exhaustive research into town records, printed sources, unpublished manuscripts and the memories of older residents clear panorama of where white settlers first arrived in the 18th century Timothy Field Beard, FASG, Town Historian important local history and delightful read Valerie G. Annis, Director, Minor Memorial Library.




Romance of the Road


Book Description

"Americans have treated the highway as sacred space," says Primeau (English, Central Michigan U.) introducing the rich tradition of prose and non-fiction road narratives that include On the Road, Grapes of Wrath, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, and the Journals of Lewis and Clark. Primeau critically examines these and other works from the position of travel as pilgrimage resulting in identifiable themes of protest, self discovery, picaresque parody, and myth making. Paper edition (unseen), $17.95. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR




Roads of Her Own


Book Description

Reading Jack Kerouac’s classic On the Road through Virginia Woolf’s canonical A Room of One’s Own, the author of this book examines a genre in North American literature which, despite its popularity, has received little attention in literary and cultural criticism: women’s road narratives. The study shows how women’s literature has inscribed itself into the American discourse of the Whitmanesque “open road”, or, more generally, the “freedom of the road”. Women writers have participated in this powerful American myth, yet at the same time also have rejected that myth as fundamentally based on gendered and racial/ethnic hierarchies and power structures, and modified it in the process of writing back to it. The book analyzes stories about female runaways, outlaws, questers, adventurers, kidnappees, biker chicks, travelling saleswomen, and picaras and makes theoretical observations on the debates regarding discourses of spatiality and mobility—debates which have defined the so-called spatial turn in the humanities. The analytical concept of transdifference is introduced to theorize the dissonant plurality of social and cultural affiliations as well as the narrative tensions produced by such pluralities in order to better understand the textual worlds of women’s multiple belongings as they are present in these writings. Roads of Her Own is thus not only situated in the broader context of a constructivist cultural studies, but also, by discussing narrative mobility under the sign of gender, combines insights from social theory and philosophy, feminist cultural geography, and literary studies. Key names and concepts: Doreen Massey – Rosi Braidotti – Literary Studies – Spatial Turn – Gendered Space and Mobility – Nomadism – Road writing – Transdifference – American Culture – Popular Culture – Women’s Literature after the Second Wave – Quest – Picara.




Motor Age


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Beyond the Blockbusters


Book Description

Contributions by Megan Brown, Jill Coste, Sara K. Day, Rachel Dean-Ruzicka, Rebekah Fitzsimmons, Amber Gray, Roxanne Harde, Tom Jesse, Heidi Jones, Kaylee Jangula Mootz, Leah Phillips, Rachel L. Rickard Rebellino, S. R. Toliver, Jason Vanfosson, Sarah E. Whitney, and Casey Alane Wilson While critical and popular attention afforded to twenty-first-century young adult literature has exponentially increased in recent years, classroom materials and scholarship have remained static in focus and slight in scope. Twilight, The Hunger Games, The Fault in Our Stars, and The Hate U Give overwhelm conversations among scholars and critics—but these are far from the only texts in need of analysis. Beyond the Blockbusters: Themes and Trends in Contemporary Young Adult Fiction offers a necessary remedy to this limiting perspective, bringing together essays about the many subgenres, themes, and character types that have until now been overlooked. The collection tackles a diverse range of topics—modern updates to the marriage plot; fairy tale retellings in dystopian settings; stories of extrajudicial police killings and racial justice. The approaches are united, though, by a commitment to exploring the large-scale generic and theoretical structures at work in each set of texts. As a collection, Beyond the Blockbusters is an exciting entryway into a field that continues to grow and change even as its works captivate massive audiences. It will prove a crucial addition to the library of any scholar or instructor of young adult literature.




Report


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The Big Christmas Basket: 200+ Christmas Novels, Stories, Poems & Carols (Illustrated)


Book Description

Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle all the way... Christmas is here, and so are we with our biggest ever Christmas basket. There's something for everyone - novels, short stories, poems, and carols - for a cozy and wonderful holiday enjoyment. So grab a cup of coffee and soak into the spirit of festive cheer with our "The Big Christmas Basket": Novels: Life and Adventures of Santa Claus (L. Frank Baum) Little Women (Louisa May Alcott) The Wonderful Wizard of OZ (L. Frank Baum) Little Lord Fauntleroy (Frances Hodgson Burnett) Anne of Green Gables (Lucy Maud Montgomery) Black Beauty (Anna Sewell) Christmas-Tree Land (M.L. Molesworth) Wind in the Willows (Kenneth Grahame) Peter Pan and Wendy (J. M. Barrie) Oliver Twist Pollyanna (Eleanor H. Porter) At the Back of the North Wind (George MacDonald) A Versailles Christmas-Tide (A. S. Boyd) The Man Who Forgot Christmas (Max Brand)... Short Stories: A Merry Christmas & Other Christmas Stories (Louisa May Alcott) The Gift of the Magi (O. Henry) Papa Panov's Special Christmas (Leo Tolstoy) Doctor Marigold's Prescriptions (Charles Dickens) The Tailor of Gloucester (Beatrix Potter) The Tale of Peter Rabbit (Beatrix Potter) The Christmas Guest (Selma Lagerlöf) At Christmas Time (Anton Chekhov) Little Gretchen and the Wooden Shoe Toinette and the Elves (Susan Coolidge) The Heavenly Christmas Tree (Dostoevsky) The Princess and the Goblin The Nutcracker and the Mouse King The Little Match Girl Little Jean (Francois Coppe) How the Fir Tree Became the Christmas Tree The Magi in the West and Their Search for the Christ The Little Shepherd... Poems & Carols: Silent Night The Three Kings (H. W. Longfellow) Christmas Bells (Longfellow) Christmas at Sea (Stevenson) Christmas in the Olden Time (Walter Scott) Old Santa Claus (Clement Clarke Moore) The Twelve Days of Christmas Minstrels (Wordsworth) Ring Out, Wild Bells (Tennyson) Hymn on the Morning of Christ's Nativity (John Milton) A Christmas Carol (Coleridge)...