Yesterday I Was the Moon


Noor Unnahar - 2017
    it contains black & white photographs paired with poetry pieces; giving it a photo diary feels.

Writing Gordon Lightfoot: The Man, the Music, and the World in 1972


Dave Bidini - 2011
    As musicians across Canada prepare for the nation's biggest folk festival, held on Toronto Island, a series of events unfold that will transform the country politically, psychologically--and musically. As Bidini explores the remarkable week leading up to Mariposa, he also explores the life and times of one of the most enigmatic figures in Canadian music: Gordon Lightfoot, the reigning king of folk at the height of his career. Through a series of letters, Bidini addresses Lightfoot directly, questioning him, imagining his life, and weaving together a fascinating, highly original look at a musician at the top of his game. By the end of the week, the country is on the verge of massive change and the '72 Mariposa folk fest--complete with surprise appearances by Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, and yes, Lightfoot--is on its way to becoming legendary.

My Mother's Secret


J.L. Witterick - 2013
     Based on a true story, MY MOTHER'S SECRET is a profound, captivating, and ultimately uplifting tale intertwining the lives of two Jewish families in hiding from the Nazis, a fleeing German soldier, and the clever and "righteous" mother and daughter who teamed up to save them. Franciszka and her daughter, Helena, are unlikely heroines. They are simple people who mind their own business and don't stand out from the crowd. Until 1939, when crisis strikes. The Nazis have invaded Poland and they are starting to persecute the Jews. Providing shelter to a Jew has become a death sentence. And yet, Franciszka and Helena decide to do just that. In their tiny, two-bedroom home in Sokal, Poland, they cleverly hide a Jewish family of two brothers and their wives in their pigsty out back, a Jewish doctor with his wife and son in a makeshift cellar under the kitchen floorboards, and a defecting German soldier in the attic--each group completely unbeknownst to the others. For everyone to survive, Franciszka will have to outsmart her neighbors and the German commanders standing guard right outside her yard. Told simply and succinctly from four different perspectives, MY MOTHER'S SECRET is a reminder that there are, in fact, no profiles of courage and each individual's character is a personal choice. This book was inspired by the true story of Franciszka Halamajowa, who, with her daughter, saved the lives of fifteen Jews in Poland during the Second World War. She also hid a young German soldier in her attic at the same time. Before the war, there were six thousand Jews in Sokal, Poland. Only thirty survived the war and half of those did so because of Franciszka.

It's All Downhill from Here: On the Road with Project 86


Andrew Schwab - 2004
    His guitarist is trying to get them all killed. Fans are stealing his things. Mechanics are rebuking his lifestyle. Even his own fragile, uptight psyche is antagonizing him. But despite having every odd stacked against him, Project 86's frontman is living the dream and loving it. In It's All Downhill From Here, Andrew Schwab chronicles the highs and lows, the struggles and triumphs of this underground, independent rock band's rocky road to stardom. From a hostage situation on their first day on the road, to a drummer's crushed hand, a haunting female fan and an '80s rocker's halitosis problem, Schwab tells it like it is, with biting wit and rock star charm. This insider's look at the real life of a rock band not only reaffirms that everyone's human, but makes you hungry for a dream of your own to chase after.

Bum Rush the Page: A Def Poetry Jam


Tony Medina - 2001
    This is our mouth on paper, our hearts on our sleeves, our refusal to shut up and swallow our silence. These poems are tough, honest, astute, perceptive, lyrical, blunt, sad, funny, heartbreaking, and true. They shout, they curse, they whisper, and sing. But most of all, they tell it like it is.” –Tony Medina, from the Introduction

The Wheeling Year: A Poet's Field Book


Ted Kooser - 2014
    Because those wobbly stones are only inches above the quotidian rush, what’s jotted there has an immediacy that is intimate and close to life. Kooser, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and a former U.S. poet laureate, has filled scores of workbooks. The Wheeling Year offers a sequence of contemplative prose observations about nature, place, and time arranged according to the calendar year. Written by one of America’s most beloved poets, this book is published in the year in which Kooser turns seventy-five, with sixty years of workbooks stretching behind him.

Runnin' Down a Dream: Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers


Tom Petty - 2007
    He has sold more than 50 million albums worldwide. His music has been the soundtrack to the lives of millions of people who grew up in the '70s, '80s and '90s. This celebratory, personal volume includes hundreds of photographsmany never-before-publishedas well as a selection of memorabilia from Petty's personal archives, all of which help to illustrate the songwriter's own description of his amazing life and career. Publication of this book coincides with the theatrical release of a Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers film documentary by Peter Bogdanovich and a four disc DVD/CD set. The fall of 2007 belongs to Tom Petty.

Americans' Favorite Poems: The Favorite Poem Project Anthology


Robert Pinsky - 1999
    Some poems are memories treasured in the mind since childhood; some crystallize the passion of love or recall the trail of loss and sorrow. The poems and poets in this anthology—from Sappho to Lorca, from Shakespeare and Chaucer to Gwendolyn Brooks, Louise Bluck, and Allen Ginsberg—are poems to be read aloud and memorized, poems to be celebrated as part of our nation's cultural inheritance. Accompanying the poems are comments by people who speak not as professional critics but as passionate readers of various ages, professions and regions. This anthology, in a manner unlike any other, discloses the rich and vigorous presence of poetry in American life at the millennium and provides a portrait of the United States through the lens of poetry.

250 Poems: A Portable Anthology


Peter Schakel - 2002
    This well-chosen and comprehensive collection offers a compact and affordable alternative to larger and more expensive anthologies.

Shaken: Discovering Your True Identity in the Midst of Life's Storms


Tim Tebow - 2016
    Then he had a miracle playoff run with the Denver Broncos before being traded to the New York Jets. After one season he was cut by New York. Next he was signed by the New England Patriots then let go after training camp—a scenario that repeated itself the following summer with the Philadelphia Eagles. Tim Tebow has achieved big victories and plunged the depths of failure, all while never letting go of his faith, even in the face of doubt and disappointment. In Shaken he explains why neither the highs nor the lows of his life can define him—and he reveals how you, too, can find confidence in your identity and know who you are. In revealing passages, Tebow pulls back the curtain on his life, sharing the vulnerable moments of his career that have shaken him to his core—while also teaching the biblical principles that will enable you to keep the faith, no matter what comes your way.

The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven


Sherman Alexie - 1993
    These 22 interlinked tales are narrated by characters raised on humiliation and government-issue cheese, and yet are filled with passion and affection, myth and dream. There is Victor, who as a nine-year-old crawled between his unconscious parents hoping that the alcohol seeping through their skins might help him sleep. Thomas Builds-the-Fire, who tells his stories long after people stop listening, and Jimmy Many Horses, dying of cancer, who writes letters on stationary that reads "From the Death Bed of James Many Horses III," even though he actually writes them on his kitchen table. Against a backdrop of alcohol, car accidents, laughter, and basketball, Alexie depicts the distances between Indians and whites, reservation Indians and urban Indians, men and women, and most poetically, between modern Indians and the traditions of the past.

I Feel Great and You Will Too!: An Inspiring Journey of Success with Practical Tips on How to Score Big in Life


Pat Croce - 2000
     A pioneer in the sports physical therapy industry, Pat Croce went from the training room to the boardroom in one of the most unlikely stories in sports history -- a classic rags-to-riches tale made possible by his indestructible positive attitude. With the same unstoppable character that has made him a favorite motivational speaker of Fortune 500 executives, Croce recounts the moments that taught him to strive for and achieve greatness. But I Feel Great and You Will Too! is more than just the story of one man's remarkable journey. Throughout this moving, often hilarious, and always brutally honest book, Croce hits you with pointers on goal setting, communication, creative thinking, desire, dedication, and much more. Croce also includes his "Ten Commandments of Customer Service," the same guidelines he used to become one of the most successful entrepreneurs in the sports industry.

Crazy Making


Justin Furstenfeld - 2009
    This amazing package includes Justin's first book spanning over 100 pages and including all lyrics from The Answers through Approaching Normal, and Justin's own thoughts on the how, why and when many of these songs came to life. The perfect companion piece to listen through all of the albums. This is a high quality hard cover, full color book.

A Little House Sampler: A Collection of Early Stories and Reminiscenses


William Anderson - 1988
    This charming collection of early stories contains many never before published newspaper pieces, stories and essays by Laura Ingalls and Rose Wilder. Inspiring the popular series, these works are a vivid and personal testament to American life and history as seen by two remarkable pioneers.

Bulfinch's Mythology


Thomas Bulfinch - 1855
            The stories are divided into three sections: The Age of Fable or Stories of Gods and Heroes (first published in 1855); The Age of Chivalry (1858), which contains King Arthur and His Knights, The Mabinogeon, and The Knights of English History; and Legends of Charlemagne or Romance of the Middle Ages (1863). For the Greek myths, Bulfinch drew on Ovid and Virgil, and for the sagas of the north, from Mallet's Northern Antiquities. He provides lively versions of the myths of Zeus and Hera, Venus and Adonis, Daphne and Apollo, and their cohorts on Mount Olympus; the love story of Pygmalion and Galatea; the legends of the Trojan War and the epic wanderings of Ulysses and Aeneas; the joys of Valhalla and the furies of Thor; and the tales of Beowulf and Robin Hood. The tales are eminently readable. As Bulfinch wrote, "Without a knowledge of mythology much of the elegant literature of our own language cannot be understood and appreciated. . . . Our book is an attempt to solve this problem, by telling the stories of mythology in such a manner as to make them a source of amusement."Thomas Bulfinch, in his day job, was a clerk in the Merchant's Bank of Boston, an undemanding position that afforded him ample leisure time in which to pursue his other interests. In addition to serving as secretary of the Boston Society of Natural History, he thoroughly researched the myths and legends and copiously cross-referenced them with literature and art. As such, the myths are an indispensable guide to the cultural values of the nineteenth century; however, it is the vigor of the stories themselves that returns generation after generation to Bulfinch.