Describes the author's three month canoe adventure, which started at Duluth, Minnesota and ended at York Factory on the shores of Hudson Bay.

    They brutally murdered their hosts. Dr. Charles Scudder and companion Joey Odom built the "castle in the woods" in the Trion forest after Scudder left his position as professor at Loyola. He brought with him twelve thousand doses of LSD. Rumors of drug use and Satanism swirled around the two men. Scudder even claimed to have summoned a demon to protect the estate. The murders set the stage for a trial vibrant with local lore.

    “Marry me,” he’d said. “We’ll run these vineyards together.” But now he is gone. There is no one to share the taste of the first fruit of the harvest. And her troubles are hers alone…In sleepy little Reims, France, grieving Nicole Clicquot watches her daughter play amongst the vines under the golden sun and makes a promise to herself. Her gossiping neighbours insist that the rolling fields of chalk soil are no place for a woman, but she is determined to make a success of the winery. It’s the only chance she has to keep a roof over her head and provide a future for her little girl.But as the seasons change, bringing a spoiled harvest and bitter grapes, the vineyards are on the brink of collapse. Without her husband’s oldest friend, travelling merchant Louis, she’d truly be lost. No one else would stay up all night to help count endless rows of green bottles deep in the cellars, or spread word far and wide that Nicole makes the finest champagne he’s ever tasted. One magical night, as a shooting star illuminates their way under a velvet sky, Nicole gazes up at his warm smile and wonders if perhaps she doesn’t need to be quite so alone…But when Louis shrinks from her touch after returning from a long trip abroad, Nicole fears something is terribly wrong. And as an old secret about her husband – that only Louis knew – spreads from the cobbled village streets all the way to the Paris salons, her heart and fragile reputation are shattered. Was she wrong to put her trust in another man? And with Napoleon’s wars looming on the horizon, can she find a way to save her vineyards, and her daughter, from ruin?Fans of Chocolat, Carnegie’s Maid, Dinah Jeffries and anyone longing to sip champagne under the stars will adore this stunning historical read, inspired by the true story of how Nicole Clicquot blazed her own path to build the world’s greatest champagne house: Veuve Clicquot.Previously titled: The Champagne Widow

    With a new introduction by celebrated baseball writer Roger Kahn and a new afterword by the author, updating John Henry's first year of ownership after nearly six decades of the Yawkey dynasty, the legacy of the late Will McDonough, and the author's return to his native Boston after a seventeen-year absence, Shut Out has reopened the discussion of baseball, race, and Boston with a new candor.

    Focusing on the qualities that never made it into White House press releases, the authors look at their sexual misdeeds and strange family relationships, scandals that engulfed administrations, fights with enemies, and questionable money matters. Dip into these pages to find out: Which president was famous for being the richest man alive because of all his brilliant real estate deals? Which president was born in Canada, and was ineligible to hold the office of president? Which president caused some problems by trying to grow “strange herbs” in the White House garden? Which president often ordered White House staff to rub Vaseline into his scalp while he ate breakfast in bed? Which president often called his deputy chief of staff “Turd Blossom”?Updated with new material about many presidents including George W. Bush and Barack Obama, White House Confidential will have you laughing (and sometimes cursing!) as you take a second look at the next occupant of the Oval Office.

    From the moment the federal government moved to the District of Columbia in December 1800, Washington has been central to American identity and life. Shaped by politics and intrigue, poverty and largess, contradictions and compromises, Washington has been, from its beginnings, the stage on which our national dramas have played out. In Washington, the historian Tom Lewis paints a sweeping portrait of the capital city whose internal conflicts and promise have mirrored those of America writ large. Breathing life into the men and women who struggled to help the city realize its full potential, he introduces us to the mercurial French artist who created an ornate plan for the city "en grande" members of the nearly forgotten anti-Catholic political party who halted construction of the Washington monument for a quarter century; and the cadre of congressmen who maintained segregation and blocked the city's progress for decades. In the twentieth century Washington's Mall and streets would witness a Ku Klux Klan march, the violent end to the encampment of World War I "Bonus Army" veterans, the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, and the painful rebuilding of the city in the wake of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination. "It is our national center," Frederick Douglass once said of Washington, DC; "it belongs to us, and whether it is mean or majestic, whether arrayed in glory or covered in shame, we cannot but share its character and its destiny." Interweaving the story of the city's physical transformation with a nuanced account of its political, economic, and social evolution, Lewis tells the powerful history of Washington, DC " the site of our nation's highest ideals and some of our deepest failures.

    You will learn all about his struggles on this journey and of course about the good life in La Douce France.

    LeBlanc's discovery that he could trace his family all the way to the time of the Acadian Expulsion and beyond forms the basis of this compelling account of Le Grand D?rangement.Piecing together his family history through archival documents, Tyler LeBlanc tells the story of Joseph LeBlanc (his great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather), Joseph's ten siblings, and their families. With descendants scattered across modern-day Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, the LeBlancs provide a window into the diverse fates that awaited the Acadians when they were expelled from their homeland. Some escaped the deportation and were able to retreat into the wilderness. Others found their way back to Acadie. But many were exiled to Britain, France, or the future United States, where they faced suspicion and prejudice and struggled to settle into new lives.A unique biographical approach to the history of the Expulsion, Acadian Driftwood is a vivid insight into one family's experience of this traumatic event.

    Maddie Ingram, owner of Madison House, and her quirky and endearing boarders find their lives inextricably linked when the city decides to re-grade Denny Hill and the fate of Madison House hangs in the balance. Clyde Hunssler, Maddie’s albino handyman and furtive love interest; James Colter, a muckraking black journalist who owns and publishes the Seattle Sentry newspaper; and Chiridah Simpson, an aspiring stage actress forced into prostitution and morphine addiction while working in the city’s corrupt vaudeville theater, all call Madison House home. Had E.L. Doctorow and Charles Dickens met on the streets of Seattle, they couldn’t have created a better book.

    She speaks with authority because she arrived there as a child in 1892, and with wide-eyed wonder saw the whole place turn to gold.With his divining rod, Mabel's father tapped gold ore on Beacon Hill but missed becoming a millionaire by selling his claim short. Nonetheless, life was rich for young Mabel in a booming town with points of interest like Poverty Gulch, the Continental Hotel, and a fantastic house called Finn's Folly; with characters around like the promoter Windy Joe and (seen from a distance) the madam Pearl De Vere; with something always going on, whether a celebration or a disastrous fire or train wreck or a no-nonsense miners' strike.Mabel Lee's book brings back a time and place with affection. The foreword is by Lowell Thomas, who was her pupil when she was a young schoolmarm in Cripple Creek.

    In Secret Seattle, Ryan explores the weird and wonderful hidden history behind some of the city's most overlooked places, architecture, and infrastructure, from coal chutes in Capitol Hill, to the last remainder of Seattle's original Chinatown in Pioneer Square, to the best places in town to find century-old sidewalks. Discover pocket parks, beautiful boulevards, and great public gardens while learning offbeat facts that will make you see the Emerald City in a whole new way. Perfect for both the local history buff who never leaves a favorite armchair to a walking enthusiast looking for offbeat and off-the-beaten-path scavenger hunts.

    Jules-Émile Planchon, a botanist from Montpellier, was sent to investigate. He discovered that the vine roots were covered in microscopic yellow insects. What they were and where they had come from was a mystery. The infestation advanced with the relentlessness of an invading army and within a few years had spread across Europe, from Portugal to the Crimea. The wine industry was on the brink of disaster. The French government offered a prize of three hundred thousand gold francs for a remedy. Planchon believed he had the answer and set out to prove it. Gripping and intoxicating, The Botanist and the Vintner brings to life one of the most significant, though little-known, events in the history of wine.

    When her absentee ex-husband swoops in and invites their daughter to live with him for the summer, robbing Maddie of possibly their last summer together, she decides to take advantage of the unexpected freedom and accepts the offer of her first solo photography show. Leaving Seattle and the safety of her job, she heads to Washington State’s Majestic Lake. Jake Murphy has been raising his six-year-old daughter in Fortune Bay with the help of his extended family ever since his wife left five years ago. Although he can’t take a chance on a relationship with a woman who is only in Fortune Bay for the summer, he soon finds he’s breaking all of his rules. In a rustic cabin on the lake, Maddie finds the inspiration she needs, sets up her dark room and sets to work on the photographs for show. A traumatic childhood has left her a loner. It’s always been safer that way. But maintaining her distance is almost impossible in a town like Fortune Bay, and slowly she begins to make new friends—her first real friends—and meets the man and family she’s always wished for but never thought she could have. But will the people of Fortune Bay still accept her when they find out who she really is? Welcome to Fortune Bay

    Equal parts memoir/family saga/film book, Growing Up with Manos: The Hands of Fate shares the behind-the-scenes story of the making of Manos: from creator Hal Warren's alleged bet with TV producer Stirling Silliphant that "anyone could make a movie," to the tragic suicide of John Reynolds (Torgo), right up through the newest Manos-related projects that are carrying the film into the digital age. Jackey's stories dispel much of the Manos mythology while crystallizing a unique time and place in America, where a crew of actors with a bad script and a rented camera set out to make a bad movie-and succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. Jackey Neyman Jones is a professional artist living in the Great Northwest. Laura Mazzuca Toops is a writer/editor with more than 30 years' experience in business and fiction writing. She is the author of three historical novels.

    As a young man, that secret took hold of his life, and he left the life and the life's work he had made for himself in Boston, to take up residence among the poor in New York City. Ensconced there, he worked among the poor -- and took to writing tales of their success. His novels captured the imagination of a nation bursting with a new wave of immigrants who'd come to our shores -- come to the very port of New York City that was Alger's new home. He used the wealth that came to him to help the poor folks who he loved, and took his secret to the grave. It escaped from there, of course. You can find it if you look a bit. But for the purpose of this fine novel of the rise to riches, it will remain unstated . . .Alger wrote approximately one hundred thirty-five "dime novels." His forte was rags-to-riches stories, describing how boys might be able to achieve the American Dream of wealth and success through hard work, courage, determination, and concern for others. His characters don't achieve great wealth, but rather stability, security, and a place in society which they earn through their efforts. He is considered significant figure in the history of American cultural and social ideals. Bestsellers in their own time, Alger's books rivaled those of Mark Twain in popularity.Adrift in New York involves the disappearance of a son from the household of his wealthy father, John Linden. The boy has been kidnapped by the villainous Curtis Waring, John Linden's nephew, who hopes to inherit the family fortune. Grown up, the youngster lives a precarious life on the streets of New York. When Linden's ward Florence rejects the unwanted attentions of Waring, she is disinherited, forced to live in a tenement and work in a sweatshop . . . until it is discovered that the young man who befriends her is, in reality, Linden's long-lost son.