South of Superior


Book Description

A novel full of heart, in which love, friendship, and charity teach a young woman to live a bigger life. When Madeline Stone walks away from Chicago and moves five hundred miles north to the coast of Lake Superior, in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, she isn't prepared for how much her life will change. Charged with caring for an aging family friend, Madeline finds herself in the middle of beautiful nowhere with Gladys and Arbutus, two octogenarian sisters-one sharp and stubborn, the other sweeter than sunshine. As Madeline begins to experience the ways of the small, tight-knit town, she is drawn into the lives and dramas of its residents. It's a place where times are tough and debts run deep, but friendship, community, and compassion run deeper. As the story hurtles along-featuring a lost child, a dashed love, a car accident, a wedding, a fire, and a romantic reunion-Gladys, Arbutus, and the rest of the town teach Madeline more about life, love, and goodwill than she's learned in a lifetime. A heartwarming novel, South of Superior explores the deep reward in caring for others, and shows how one who is poor in pocket can be rich in so many other ways, and how little it often takes to make someone happy.




Out of the Darkness


Book Description

In 1874, an amazing event took place--the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) initiated the rescue of a severely abused child named Mary Ellen Wilson. Her rescue initiated the beginning of true child protection in this country, and eventually, the first child protection agency in America was formed.




Victory Over Japan


Book Description

Originally published in 1984, this collection of 14 short stories set in Arkansas and Mississippi went on to win that year’s National Book Award for fiction, confirming Ellen Gilchrist’s place as one of the preeminent literary talents of her generation. Victory Over Japan takes us into the lives of an unforgettable group of Southern women — beautiful, complicated, enchanting, and sometimes dangerous — in and out of bars, marriages, divorces, lovers' arms, and even earthquakes, in an attempt to find happiness, or at least some satisfaction. Throughout these stories, one hears echoes of Flannery O'Connor and Eudora Welty, but Ms. Gilchrist has her own unique literary voice, and it is outrageously funny, moving, tragic, and always appealing. PRAISE: “To say that Ellen Gilchrist can write is to say that Placido Domingo can sing. All you need to do is listen.” —Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post “She is what they call a natural, writing with passion, authority and a noticeable lack of the self-consciousness that weighs down much of contemporary fiction.” —San Francisco Examiner-Chronicle “Ellen Gilchrist’s achievement is to create lives which refuse to be bound on the page by words and sentences . . . the writing is full of understanding that doesn’t advertise itself as perception or insight.” —London Daily Telegraph




Person/a


Book Description

Fiction. A novel/"autofiction" about the complexities of being a woman, an artist, a mother, and a wife; a novel about persona and obsession and loyalty and repression; an exorcism. Told in four volumes over seven years, with emails, g-chats, and an "interview" with Lydia Davis (and a nod to Ms. Davis's "The End of the Story"), the style of PERSON/A is often experimental, pushing the boundaries between fiction and nonfiction, obsession and mental instability, female independence and a loyalty to current and former lovers, but with the ultimate loyalty being to oneself or one's writing, and is there a difference? and should we be ashamed?




Fallout


Book Description

Written in free verse, explores how three teenagers try to cope with the consequences of their mother's addiction to crystal meth and its effects on their lives.




Tricks


Book Description

Five troubled teenagers fall into prostitution as they search for freedom, safety, community, family, and love in this #1 New York Times bestselling novel from Ellen Hopkins. When all choice is taken from you, life becomes a game of survival. Five teenagers from different parts of the country. Three girls. Two guys. Four straight. One gay. Some rich. Some poor. Some from great families. Some with no one at all. All living their lives as best they can, but all searching…for freedom, safety, community, family, love. What they don’t expect, though, is all that can happen when those powerful little words “I love you” are said for all the wrong reasons. Five moving stories remain separate at first, then interweave to tell a larger, powerful story—a story about making choices, taking leaps of faith, falling down, and growing up. A story about kids figuring out what sex and love are all about, at all costs, while asking themselves, “Can I ever feel okay about myself?” A brilliant achievement from New York Times bestselling author Ellen Hopkins—who has been called “the bestselling living poet in the country” by Mediabistro.com—Tricks is a book that turns you on and repels you at the same time. Just like so much of life.




Ellen


Book Description

- How her conservative father turned his back on her when he learned she was gay. - The personal tragedy that became her greatest inspiration. - Her secret life in the gay her scene during her stand-up days. - The women Ellen has loved, including her very public relationship and very painful breakup with actress Anne Hache. - How she pulled her life together after the cancellation of Ellen. - The new romantic interests in her life. - Ellen currently stars in The Ellen DeGeneres Show one of the hottest TV talk shows ever to hit the air. It is the winner of an Emmy Award in 2004 for Outstanding Talk Show. In its first year, the show earned 12 Daytime Emmy nominations, more than any other talk show in the history of the Emmys. - The Ellen DeGeneres Show was the highest-rated freshman talk show of the 2003-2004 season. - The Ellen DeGeneres Show ranked at the top of critics' IIGTS, with People, Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, USA Today and TV Guide, all citing it as one of the best new programs. - The author has been an entertainment journalist for more than twenty years and has written several celebrity biographies and series companions, including the bestselling The Boy Who Would Be King.




Always a Song


Book Description

Always a Song is a collection of stories from singer and songwriter Ellen Harper—folk matriarch and mother to the Grammy-winning musician Ben Harper. Harper shares vivid memories of growing up in Los Angeles through the 1960s among famous and small-town musicians, raising Ben, and the historic Folk Music Center. This beautifully written memoir includes stories of Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Joan Baez, The New Lost City Ramblers, Doc Watson, and many more. • Harper takes readers on an intimate journey through the folk music revival. • The book spans a transformational time in music, history, and American culture. • Covers historical events from the love-ins, women's rights protests, and the assassination of John F. Kennedy to the popularization of the sitar and the ukulele. • Includes full-color photo insert. "Growing up, an endless stream of musicians and artists came from across the country to my family's music store. Bess Lomax Hawes, Joan Baez, Sonny Terry, and Brownie McGee—all the singers, organizers, guitar and banjo pickers and players, songwriters, painters, dancers, their husbands, wives, and children—we were all in it together. And we believed singing could change the world."—Ellen Harper Music lovers and history buffs will enjoy this rare invitation into a world of stories and song that inspired folk music today. • A must-read for lovers of music, history, and those nostalgic for the acoustic echo of the original folk music that influenced a generation • Harper's parents opened the legendary Folk Music Center in Claremont, California, as well as the revered folk music venue The Golden Ring. • A perfect book for people who are obsessed with folk music, all things 1960s, learning about musical movements, or California history • Great for those who loved Small Town Talk: Bob Dylan, The Band, Van Morrison, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and Friends in the Wild Years of Woodstock by Barney Hoskyns; and Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon—and the Journey of a Generation by Sheila Weller.




The Astronaut with a Song for the Stars


Book Description

If you have a mission, a dream to explore, but no one like you has achieved it before... Meet Dr. Ellen Ochoa-a determined space pioneer with a stellar symphony of talents. Growing up in a family of immigrants, Ellen dreamed of becoming a professional flutist, but all of that changed when she discovered engineering in college. Though she was told that field of study wasn't for girls, the bright young scientist refused to give up-ultimately becoming a NASA astronaut who shattered barriers and rocketed to success! The Astronaut With a Song for the Stars: The Story of Dr. Ellen Ochoa is the fourth book in a riveting educational series about the inspiring lives of amazing scientists. In addition to the illustrated rhyming tale, you'll find a complete biography, fun facts, a colorful timeline of events, and even a note from Dr. Ochoa herself!




Ellen's Story


Book Description

Ellen is growing up on an Illinois farm in 1830, and she doesn't realize how much her stepmother has come to mean to her until clashes between Ellen's father and stepbrother threaten to tear the new family apart.