Alumni Bookshelf
City
in Amber
by Jay Atkinson, M.A., English, 1982.
Atkinson has created a compelling story of Lawrence, Massachusetts, a planned industrial city built around the cloth and garment industry, moving from the city's founding before the American Civil War to the sporadic conflagrations that plagued it in the 1990's.
The writing is so fine that even downright evil characters manage to eke out a moment of sympathy from the reader, not to mention the laughter and sadness his other characters evoke. As the amber metaphor in the title indicates, the reader is constantly pleased and surprised to pick up certain nearly mystical threads from generation to generation: Ah, that's what happened to those solid gold cufflinks! Ah, that's where that poor man's tooth wound up! City in Amber offers an amazing cast of characters and plots, just as it offers an entirely pleasurable and leisurely read.
Nobody’s Perfect! A Critique of Modern American Society
by Richard W. Glukstad, B.A., History, 1971.
If you are a red blooded American who really loves and wants to help your country, then this book is a must read for you! It gives Americans of all walks of life the chance to sit down and calmly look at themselves with the hope that they will take to heart the author’s analysis and common sense suggestions.
The book is not intended to be a complete makeover of America, but rather a way to save what’s great and improve what may be in the way of our survival as the world’s greatest superpower in history. Remember, nobody is perfect!
Structures
of Image Collections: From Chauvet-Pont-d’Arc
to Flickr
by Howard Greisdorf, B.S., Psychology, 1963.
Human beings have always had a penchant for collecting images. The challenge today is that almost anything and everything in the world is available as a viewable image. Consequently, say O'Connor and Greisdorf, image collections can no longer be the result of ad hoc processes rooted in antiquated methodologies. To this end, they present the reader with an interdisciplinary approach to the principles, practices and belief systems underlying categorization and image management. The book is divided into three parts: defining the nature of images; describing how images are used; and explaining how and why images are collected (including the mechanics of storage and accessibility). Individual chapters contain a historical perspective on the subject matter and supporting research. Liberally enhanced with illustrations from the authors' own collections. For anyone who cognitively engages with image collections either vocationally or avocationally.
My Mother Wears Combat Boots: A Parenting Guide for the Rest of Us
by Jessica Mills, B.A., English, 1992.
A parenting guide like no other! Jessica Mills, a touring punk musician, artist, and political activist, gives readers a delightful, information-packed guide to having and raising kids without giving up your politics, art, or life.
Disappointed by run-of-the-mill parenting books that didn't speak to her experience, Jessica set out to write a book tackling the issues faced by a new generation of moms and dads. The result is a parenting guide like no other. Written with humor, extensive research, and much trial and error, My Mother Wears Combat Boots delivers sound advice for parents of all stripes. Amid stories of bringing kids (and grandparents) to women's rights demonstrations, taking baby on tour with her band, and organizing cooperative childcare, Jessica gives detailed nuts-and-bolts information about weaning, cloth vs. disposable diapers, the psychological effects of co-sleeping, and even how to get free infant gear. This book provides a clever, hip, and entertaining mix of advice, anecdotes, political analysis, and factual sidebars that will help parents as they navigate the first years of their child's life.
Sporting Lives: Metaphor and Myth
in American Sports
by James W. Pipkin, Jr., B.A., English, 1966.
This first book to examine the two popular realms of sports and autobiography looks at recurring patterns found in athletes' accounts of their lives and sporting experiences, examining language, metaphor, and other rhetorical strategies to analyze sports from the inside out. Drawing on the life stories of well-known athletes, Pipkin follows players from the echoing green of eternal youth to the sometimes cultlike and isolated status of fame, interpreting recurring patterns both in the living of their lives and in the telling of them. He sheds light on athletes' common obsession with youth and body image; explores their descriptions of being in a zone; and considers the time that all athletes dread, when their bodies begin to betray them . . . and the cheering stops.
Then Sings My Soul: The Scott Kelly Story
by Dorothy W. Smiljanich, B.A. & M.A., English, 1969 & 1971
In this exciting book part political history, part travelogue Dorothy Smiljanich sheds light on 1960s Florida with her vivid portrayal of one of Florida s most colorful political figures, Scott Kelly. Mayor of Lakeland at 28 and legislative power broker in his 30s, Kelly strode a wide path in the swirling political cauldron of 1960s Florida. Kelly twice came within an eyelash of being governor. This vivid portrayal of Kelly s life begins in the Old Florida of tobacco and turpentine, and concludes with the New Florida of huge housing developments and super expressways, a Florida Kelly helped create.