It's in her hair, covering the windowsills, coating the animals in the barn, in the corners of her children's dry, cracked lips. It's 1934 and the Bell farm in Mulehead, Oklahoma is struggling as the earliest storms of The Dust Bowl descend. All around them the wheat harvests are drying out and people are packing up their belongings as storms lay waste to the Great Plains. As the Bells wait for the rains to come, Annie and each member of her family are pulled in different directions. Annie's fragile young son, Fred, suffers from dust pneumonia; her headstrong daughter, Birdie, flush with first love, is choosing a dangerous path out of Mulehead; and Samuel, her husband, is plagued by disturbing dreams of rain.As Annie, desperate for an escape of her own, flirts with the affections of an unlikely admirer, she must choose who she is going to become. With her warm storytelling and beautiful prose, Rae Meadows brings to life an unforgettable family that faces hardship with rare grit and determination. Rich in detail and epic in scope, I Will Send Rain is a powerful novel of upheaval and resilience, filled with hope, morality, and love.

    Timothy Egan's critically acclaimed account rescues this iconic chapter of American history from the shadows in a tour de force of historical reportage. Following a dozen families and their communities through the rise and fall of the region, Egan tells of their desperate attempts to carry on through blinding black dust blizzards, crop failure, and the death of loved ones. Brilliantly capturing the terrifying drama of catastrophe, Egan does equal justice to the human characters who become his heroes, "the stoic, long suffering men and women whose lives he opens up with urgency and respect" (New York Times).In an era that promises ever-greater natural disasters, The Worst Hard Time is "arguably the best nonfiction book yet" (Austin Statesman Journal) on the greatest environmental disaster ever to be visited upon our land and a powerful cautionary tale about the dangers of trifling with nature.

    Alexandra Stoddard affirms that not only is it possible to choose happiness but that happiness is the best choice we can make. It is the "first principle" of life that unites humankind because it is what we all desire.Happiness lies in the passions we pursue and in the pressures we decline. It is in knowing how to work and when to play. It is in the treasured objects we keep nearby and in the ordinary moments we elevate into small celebrations. It is in the note we write to a friend and the kindness we show a stranger. Happiness is what you make it, where you make it. Happiness is our best choice.

    When Youngwolfe recants his confession, saying he was forced to confess by the authorities, his city condemns him, except for one man—public defender and Creek Indian Elliott Howe. Recognizing in Youngwolfe the life that could have been his if not for a few lucky breaks, Howe risks his career to defend Youngwolfe against the powerful county attorney’s office. Forgotten today, the sensational story of the murder, investigation, and trial made headlines nationwide.Oklahoma’s Atticus is a tale of two cities—oil-rich downtown Tulsa and the dirt-poor slums of north Tulsa; of two newspapers—each taking different sides in the trial; and of two men both born poor Native Americans, but whose lives took drastically different paths. Hunter Howe Cates explores his grandfather’s story, both a true-crime murder mystery and a legal thriller. Oklahoma’s Atticus is full of colorful characters, from the seventy-two-year-old mystic who correctly predicted where the body was buried, to the Kansas City police sergeant who founded one of America’s most advanced forensics labs and pioneered the use of lie detector evidence, to the ambitious assistant county attorney who would rise to become the future governor of Oklahoma. At the same time, it is a story that explores issues that still divide our nation: police brutality and corruption; the effects of poverty, inequality, and racism in criminal justice; the power of the media to drive and shape public opinion; and the primacy of the presumption of innocence. Oklahoma’s Atticus is an inspiring true underdog story of unity, courage, and justice that invites readers to confront their own preconceived notions of guilt and innocence.

    The twisted true story of murderous madman Hayward Bissell, who led a bloody rampage down an Alabama highway - with the mutilated body of his pregnant girlfriend at his side.

    

    Naval history. Not only did several crewmembers survive the sinking - an extremely rare event in World War II submarine warfare - but several were aboard a Japanese aircraft carrier enroute to a POW camp when it was in turn torpedoed and sunk by the Sculpin's sister ship, the USS Sailfish. At the end of World War II, several unlikely survivors would tell a tale of endurance against these amazing reversals of fortune. For one officer in particular, who knew that being captured could have meant losing the war for the allies, his struggle was not in surviving, but in sealing his own fate in a heartbreaking act of heroism which culminated in the nation's highest tribute, the Medal of Honor. Sculpin Lt. Commander John Phillip Cromwell was one of the few who knew that American Naval Intelligence had succeeded in cracking Japan's top-secret codes. Cromwell also knew that if the Japanese confirmed this by torturing him, it would force Naval Intelligence to change their encryption, which would potentially change the course of the war. This is Cromwell's story as well.The incredible interconnection of the Sculpin and the Sailfish has been thoroughly researched by Jonathan McCullough. Through access to the few living survivors, scores of oral histories, never-before translated Japanese war documents, and interviews with Navy veterans, McCullough delivers a gripping and, intimate account for the reader.

    It was founded in a bizarre but momentous "Land Run" in 1889, when thousands of people lined up along the borders of Oklahoma Territory and rushed in at noon to stake their claims. Since then, it has been a city torn between the wild energy that drives its outsized ambitions, and the forces of order that seek sustainable progress. Nowhere was this dynamic better realized than in the drama of the Oklahoma City Thunder basketball team's 2012-13 season, when the Thunder's brilliant general manager, Sam Presti, ignited a firestorm by trading future superstar James Harden just days before the first game. Presti's all-in gamble on "the Process"—the patient, methodical management style that dictated the trade as the team’s best hope for long-term greatness—kicked off a pivotal year in the city's history, one that would include pitched battles over urban planning, a series of cataclysmic tornadoes, and the frenzied hope that an NBA championship might finally deliver the glory of which the city had always dreamed.Boom Town announces the arrival of an exciting literary voice. Sam Anderson, former book critic for New York magazine and now a staff writer at the New York Times magazine, unfolds an idiosyncratic mix of American history, sports reporting, urban studies, gonzo memoir, and much more to tell the strange but compelling story of an American city whose unique mix of geography and history make it a fascinating microcosm of the democratic experiment. Filled with characters ranging from NBA superstars Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook; to Flaming Lips oddball frontman Wayne Coyne; to legendary Great Plains meteorologist Gary England; to Stanley Draper, Oklahoma City's would-be Robert Moses; to civil rights activist Clara Luper; to the citizens and public servants who survived the notorious 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah federal building, Boom Town offers a remarkable look at the urban tapestry woven from control and chaos, sports and civics.

    An expert in all things extraordinary, she’s approached to lead the formation of a new team into the West Virginia wilderness to evaluate reports of a giant spider, but her quest for answers leads her to the discovery of an eight-legged monstrosity no one could have prepared for. Existing for eons beneath our earth, these aren’t your garden variety spiders. They’re bloodthirsty monsters that will rip apart anything—and anyone—in their path, and while a town fights to survive Emily and her team will have to do everything they can to beat back the terror before there’s a new species at the top of the food chain!

    She tried to forget the time when she was foolish enough to love this handsome aristocrat -- before she came to know the evil that possessed him.But now, in the isolated New England mansion of Penrose, Kate saw that her flight had been in vain. Her whole body seemed to tremble as she stared into Charles Manningham's arrogant, icily smiling face. Only her ears could detect the veiled menace in his ironic voice: "Kate, my love, I have been looking forward to this moment for so long. Let us make sure we never part again...."

    He becomes a vagabond and philosopher, struggling with mortality and meaning.In the basement of a Boston bookstore, Firmin is born in a shredded copy Finnegans Wake, nurtured on a diet of Zane Grey, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, and Jane Eyre (which tastes a lot like lettuce). While his twelve siblings gnaw these books obliviously, for Firmin the words, thoughts, deeds, and hopes—all the literature he consumes—soon consume him. Emboldened by reading, intoxicated by curiosity, foraging for food, Firmin ventures out of his bookstore sanctuary, carrying with him all the yearnings and failings of humanity itself. It’s a lot to ask of a rat—especially when his home is on the verge of annihilation.A novel that is by turns hilarious, tragic, and hopeful, Firmin is a masterpiece of literary imagination. For here, a tender soul, a vagabond and philosopher, struggles with mortality and meaning—in a tale for anyone who has ever feasted on a book…and then had to turn the final page. First published by Coffee House Press in 2006. Republished by Delta, a division of Random House, in 2009.

     Judith Viorst's "decade" books of verse -- including It's Hard to Be Hip Over Thirty, How Did I Get to Be Forty, and Forever Fifty -- have delighted millions of readers worldwide who relish her wit, warmth, and wisdom. Now here she is with Suddenly Sixty, a funny and touching book that speaks directly to the sixty-ish woman, inviting her to laugh about, sigh over, and come to hopeful terms with the complex issues of this decade of life. Among the poems in this charmingly illustrated collection are those exploring the joys -- and strains -- of children and grandchildren, and the intimacy of old friends who've "known each other so long/We knew each other back when we were virgins." There are poems that tip their hat to mortality, wrestle with a husband's retirement -- "He's coming with me when I shop at the supermarket/So I won't have to shop alone. I like alone." -- and acknowledge the fact that at this stage of life we'd "give up a night of wild rapture with Denzel Washington for a nice report on my next bone density test." Offering plenty of laughs, a few tears, and cover-to-cover truths, these are poems for everyone who would "rather say never say die than enough is enough." Every woman who has reached this decade will -- rueful and smiling -- find herself in the pages of this book.

    (Illustrated with "camera studies from life by the author." Publisher's green cloth with paste-on image of a cardinal.)"She had taken possession of the sumac. The location was her selection and he loudly applauded her choice. She placed the first twig, and after examining it carefully, he spent the day carrying her others just as much alike as possible. If she used a dried grass blade, he carried grass blades until she began dropping them on the ground."

    125,000 first printing.

    But the holiday is shattered when Nop fails to return home. Stolen by two hardened criminals who see in the young stock dog a $300 payday, Nop suffers abuse and brutality as he courageously adapts to his new life, which holds no shortage of surprises. At the same time, Lewis refuses to believe that his beloved dog is gone for good. His determination to be reunited with Nop—and Nop’s own unswerving loyalty—reveals the depth and strength of the bond that can exist between humans and dogs.