Wednesday, December 31, 2003

Enigma Variations

Enigma Variations

Enigma Variations

Nobel Prize-winning author Abel Znorko lives as a recluse on a remote island in the Norwegian Seas. For fifteen years, his one friend and soulmate has been Helen, from whom he has been physically separated for the majority of their affair. Journalist Erik Larsen arrives to interview Znorko about his latest book, which is, in fact, a transcript of correspondence between the author and Helen. As Larsen seeks to unmask the identity of Helen, Znorko becomes infuriated. Evasions and lies twist into increasingly complex puzzles. Is Larsen really a journalist? Is it possible that both Znorko and Larsen love the same woman? Is Helen still alive? Slowly the barriers between the two men begin to fall as the profound mysteries of intimacy rise in their place.

ISBN: 0822218100
Author: Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service
Rating: 3.90

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Thursday, October 23, 2003

Before the Mayflower: A History of Black America

Before the Mayflower: A History of Black America

Before the Mayflower: A History of Black America

ISBN: 0874850916
Author: Lerone Bennett Jr.
Publisher: Johnson Publishing Company (IL)
Rating: 4.38

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Wednesday, October 1, 2003

Mayflower 1620: A New Look at a Pilgrim Voyage

Mayflower 1620: A New Look at a Pilgrim Voyage

Mayflower 1620: A New Look at a Pilgrim Voyage

Plimoth Plantation and the National Geographic Society come together to tell the true story behind the legendary voyage of the Mayflower. A meticulously researched work, Mayflower 1620 offers children a compelling, fresh account of this much-told story.

Vibrant photography of a rare reenactment using the Mayflower II leads readers imaginatively into the narrative. The vivid and informative text explores the story behind the exhibits at the living-history museum in Plymouth, Massachusetts. Primary sources record what the voyagers wore, what they ate, and telling details of their journey. First-person accounts reveal the hopes and dreams they carried. Readers share in the long hours at sea, and in the dangers faced after landfall. Extensive end notes, a map, a detailed chronology, and a bibliography round out the full story of the Mayflower.

Readers experience a new look at this seminal historical event through the eyes of those who now regularly inhabit the world of the pilgrims—the actors who interpret the Pilgrim Voyage. This eye-opening book teaches children the value of closely reexamining everything we think we know.

ISBN: 0792261429
Author: Plimoth Plantation
Publisher: National Geographic Children's Books
Rating: 4.00

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1421, El año que China descubrio el mundo

1421, El año que China descubrio el mundo

1421, El año que China descubrio el mundo

On 3/8/1421, the largest fleet the world had ever seen set sail from China. Its mission was "to proceed all the way to the ends of the earth to collect tribute from the barbarians beyond the seas" & unite the whole world in Confucian harmony. When it returned in 10/1423, the emperor had fallen, leaving China in political & economic chaos. The great ships were left to rot at their moorings. Most records of their journeys were destroyed. Lost in China's long, self-imposed isolation that followed was the knowledge that Chinese ships had reached America 70 years before Columbus & had circumnavigated the globe a century before Magellan. Also concealed was how the Chinese colonized America before the Europeans & transplanted in America & other countries the principal economic crops that have fed & clothed the world.
Unveiling incontrovertible evidence of these astonishing voyages, "1421" rewrites our understanding of history. Our knowledge of world exploration as it's been commonly accepted for centuries must now be reconceived due to this landmark work of historical investigation.

ISBN: 1400084628
Author: Gavin Menzies
Publisher: Grijalbo
Rating: 3.57

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Monday, September 1, 2003

The Jaguar Smile: A Nicaraguan Journey

The Jaguar Smile: A Nicaraguan Journey

The Jaguar Smile: A Nicaraguan Journey

In this brilliantly focused and haunting portrait of the people, the politics, the land, and the poetry of Nicaragua, Salman Rushdie brings to the forefront the palpable human facts of a country in the midst of a revolution.

Rushdie went to Nicaragua in 1986, harboring no preconceptions of what he might find. What he discovered was overwhelming: a culture of heroes who had turned into inanimate objects and of politicians and warriors who were poets; a land of difficult, often beautiful contradictions. His perceptions always heightened by his special sensitivity to “the views from underneath,” Rushdie reveals a land resounding with the clashes between history and morality, government and individuals. With a new preface by the author.

ISBN: 0312422784
Author: Salman Rushdie
Publisher: Picador
Rating: 3.53

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Latitude and Longitude

Latitude and Longitude

Latitude and Longitude

All it takes are a few coordinates to locate Bear Cave, the international Date Line, and the equator in this lively introduction to the lines that run up and down and across on a map or a globe--latitude and longitude.

ISBN: 0516277650
Author: Rebecca Aberg
Publisher: Children's Press(CT)
Rating: 3.73

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The Edmund Fitzgerald: The Song of the Bell

The Edmund Fitzgerald: The Song of the Bell

The Edmund Fitzgerald: The Song of the Bell

Leaving port from Superior, Wisconsin on a sunny November day, the crew of the Edmund Fitzgerald is looking forward to a routine crossing of deep Lake Superior. Heading for a port in Cleveland, the giant transport ship is loaded with ore that will be used to build cars. But disaster is building in the wind as a gale storm begins to track after the great ship. This suspenseful retelling of the last hours of the doomed vessel pays homage to all sailors who traverse deep waters, in fair skies and foul. Atmospheric paintings from award-winning artist Gijsbert van Frankenhuyzen bring the story to life.The author of the best-selling books The Legend of Sleeping Bear and The Legend of Mackinac Island, Kathy-jo Wargin aims to help young readers notice the most intricate details of a story by adding the nuances that create magic and wonder in a good tale. She lives in the woods of northern Michigan with her family. The Edmund Fitzgerald is her 10th book with Sleeping Bear Press. Born in the Netherlands, Gijsbert van Frankenhuyzen, or Nick as he prefers to be known, studied at the Royal Academy of Arts in Holland. He immigrated to the United States in 1976. The Edmund Fitzgerald is Nick's 13th children's book with Sleeping Bear Press. The Legend of Sleeping Bear was Nick's first book and has sold more than 200,000 copies.

ISBN: 1585361267
Author: Kathy-jo Wargin
Publisher: Sleeping Bear Press
Rating: 4.17

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Sunday, August 10, 2003

The Other Side of Paradise

The Other Side of Paradise

The Other Side of Paradise

The island of Bermuda is known for its beauty. Rich blue ocean, pink sandy beaches, pastel-colored houses, immaculate streets and friendly people. However even perfection has its dark sides. "The Other Side of Paradise" evolves around a teenage girl named Sunny who lives in the rough shadowy parts of Bermuda. Her single mother struggles with a drug addiction. Sunny however, is determined to rise above this lifestyle. During Sunny's quest to discover and understand herself, she falls into a tumultuous life altering affair with an older man, a lawyer, who is linked to her mothers past.

"The Other Side of Paradise" explores the sexual and spiritual awakening of a young woman, the strength and determination of breaking social boundaries, and the beautiful but complex web that ties together a mother and daughter.

ISBN: 0595282164
Author: Devi Pearl
Publisher: iUniverse
Rating: 4.00

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Friday, April 25, 2003

The Mayflower Pilgrims

The Mayflower Pilgrims

The Mayflower Pilgrims

The Fascinating account of one of the greatest adventures of all time, recounted here in its entire breadth, from Reformation backgrounds to the nineteenth century.

ISBN: 188989351X
Author: David Beale
Publisher: Emerald House Group
Rating: 3.73

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Wednesday, January 1, 2003

The Illustrated Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time

The Illustrated Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time

The Illustrated Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time

A fully illustrated edition of the international best-seller Longitude.

The Illustrated Longitude recounts in words and images the epic quest to solve the greatest scientific problem of the eighteenth and three prior centuries: determining how a captain could pinpoint his ship's location at sea. All too often throughout the ages of exploration, voyages ended in disaster when crew and cargo were either lost at sea or destroyed upon the rocks of an unexpected landfall. Thousands of lives and the fortunes of nations hung on a resolution to the longitude problem.

To encourage a solution, governments established prizes for anyone whose method or device proved successful. The largest reward of £20,000-- truly a king's ransom-- was offered by Britain's Parliament in 1714. The scientific establishment-- from Galileo to Sir Isaac Newton-- had been certain that a celestial answer would be found and invested untold effort in this pursuit. By contrast, John Harrison imagined and built the unimaginable: a clock that told perfect time at sea, known today as the chronometer. Harrison's trials and tribulations during his forty-year quest to win the prize are the culmination of this remarkable story.

The Illustrated Longitude brings a new and important dimension to Dava Sobel's celebrated story. It contains the entire original narrative of Longitude, redesigned to accompany 183 images chosen by William Andrewes-- from portraints of every important figure in the story to maps and diagrams, scientifc instruments, and John Harrison's remarkable sea clocks themselves. Andrewes's elegant captions and sidebars on scientific and historical events tell their own story of longitude, paralleling and illuminating Sobel's memorable tale.

ISBN: 0802775934
Author: Dava Sobel
Publisher: Walker Books
Rating: 3.93

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The Frequencies

The Frequencies

The Frequencies

Poetry. "Noah Eli Gordon can spin, scratch, sample, and dub to mix a sound all his own. THE FREQUENCIES tunes in desire, poetry, static, and laughter - all the while broadcasting with the intensity and joy of first things"--Peter Gizzi. "This is the new music - listen to it"--Lisa Jarnot.

ISBN: 0974016713
Author: Noah Eli Gordon
Publisher: Tougher Disguises
Rating: 4.36

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