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Chapel Hill isn't rolling right along
Akron City Council OKs higher speed on I-77
Suitcase causes bomb scare at Akron bus terminal
New eateries expand menu of options
Patrick McManamon: Here's what the Browns should try the rest of the season
Man says he was punched, robbed by 3 people in parking lot
Motorcyclist killed, wife injured in Stark County crash
Blogs:
Pets:
First Person: Inside St. Louis Pit Bull Shelter
The Heldenfiles:
Tuesday Notebook
Patrick McManamon:
An interesting thought from a reader
Akron Zips:
Akron vs. Mount Union — Liveblog
Tribe Matters:
Indians announce spring dates
Cleveland Browns:
Mangini doesn't name a quarterback
Kent State Sports:
Flashes interested in another Cincinnati player
Cleveland Cavaliers:
Cavs: Yeah, on That Issue of Privacy
Buckeye Blogging:
Buckeyes Roll 100-60 / Season Outlook
Varsity Letters:
Report: Walsh baseball player commits
All Da King's Men:
More On The Fort Hood Jihadist
Blog of Mass Destruction:
Simply Incapable of Telling The Truth
Akron Law Café:
Health Care Financing Reform: (63) Commonwealth Fund Report on Primary Care
See Jane Style:
Muffle Your Muffler
Car Chase:
Clock Tender- Extending the Life of Collector Car Clocks
Let's Talk Real Estate:
Rumors: Akron Starbucks Closing
Ohio Travels with Betty:
Jack is looking for a trip to Southern Ohio the week of November 16.
Sound Check:
Aeromsith looking for new singer as Steven Tyler contemplates solo career
HRLite House:
Personal Rant – Why People Do Not Live in Northeast Ohio
Akron Gamer:
Video: 'Modern Warfare 2' hits the streets
By Barbara McIntyre
Special to the Beacon Journal
Published on Sunday, Dec 30, 2007
Authors with area connections came through with fine work this year. Here's a look at some of the best.
Former Akronite Renee Rosen succeeds brilliantly in re-creating a 1960s family with her novel Every Crooked Pot. Her narrator, Nina, has a troublesome facial birthmark and a father with a desperate need for attention. This marvelous book is designated by its publisher as teen fiction, but adult readers will be captivated by Rosen's flair for observation and character.
Cynthia Mills of Mentor concluded her Upper Marstone trilogy with Bind Up Your Broken Hearts. The finale takes amnesiac soldier Robert Morne and his devoted nurse Louise Whiting from the end of World War I to 1936, when the veterans' hospital is closing and Robbie must find a home. When his brother, who's been married to Robbie's former sweetheart all this time, finds out, he goes to great lengths to prevent Robbie from knowing the truth . . . and ends up dead for his trouble. A fine Georgian romance.
Creston Mapes, an alumnus of Revere High School, took a temporary departure from his ''Rock Star Chronicles'' series for Nobody, the compelling tale of a detached Las Vegas reporter who discovers a murder victim at a bus stop, and becomes drawn to the story of the man's life and faith.
Thrity Umrigar, a former Beacon Journal reporter, has a clear winner in If Today Be Sweet, about a Bombay widow who comes to visit her son and his family in a Cleveland suburb and must decide whether to stay permanently. Her late husband is present only as an apparition, but his character is so magnetic that it fills the narrative. The reader misses him as a family member.
In nonfiction, Growing Season: The Life of a Migrant Community gives readers a look at neighbors they see but don't know — the agricultural workers who spend about five months a year at a family farm in Hartville. Kent State University staffers Gary Harwood, the photographer, and David Hassler, who wrote the text, provide a rich portrait of community.
Joe Mackall, a West Salem writer, is a friend of the Shetler family, who belong to the strict Swartzentruber Amish sect, but he writes with objectivity about his relationship with them in Plain Secrets: An Outsider Among the Amish. Daniel Shetler, his devout neighbor, has unwavering faith and took a chance in allowing Mackall to write about his family (though his name has been changed).
Cuyahoga Falls photographer Jim Roetzel's outstanding Birds of North America has little text, and needs little — the pictures are all that are needed for, in Roetzel's words, ''communicating the joy of birds.'' From a drab winter wren to an exotic pink flamingo, these birds are well represented.
When you think of Eric Nuzum, you'll think of bloodsucking creeps. Not that Nuzum isn't a nice guy — he is, and he's from Canton — but his book, The Dead Travel Fast: Stalking Vampires From Nosferatu to Count Chocula, will so immerse you in his fascination with the evil fiends that you, too, will want to visit Dracula's castle and watch sleazy horror films. It's both funny and enlightening.
In the same vein, Youngstown native Bill Keaggy has fun with other people's shopping in Milk Eggs Vodka: Grocery Lists Lost and Found, in which he finds discarded lists and comments on them. He's ruled that the food item most misspelled by Americans is ''banana,'' and now the cashiers at his neighborhood grocers save lists left in carts for him.
Former Beacon Journal sportswriter Michael Weinreb covers a whole new game in The Kings of New York: A Year Among the Geeks, Oddballs, and Geniuses Who Make Up America's Top High School Chess Team, a book that will intrigue even readers who aren't chess-savvy. Weinreb is sensitive to the students' many problems, but reports impartially on their failings. (The newly released paperback edition carries the title Game of Kings.)
In children's literature, the delightful Me and the Pumpkin Queen by Wooster author Marlane Kennedy will have young readers eager to grow giant vegetables in their yards, like the book's narrator Mildred does. Her late mother, a former Pumpkin Queen at the Circleville Pumpkin Show, has inspired Mildred to enter the weigh-off.
Cinda Williams Chima of Strongsville follows up The Warrior Heir with The Wizard Heir, introducing a teen wizard who needs to learn how to channel his powers and avoid being a pawn in a magical war. Chima's gift for realistic characters and dialogue makes this series one for parents to enjoy as much as their kids do.
Signing
Terry Pluto, sports columnist for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, will sign The Franchise: LeBron James and the Remaking of the Cleveland Cavaliers, co-authored with Brian Windhorst, at 7 p.m. Wednesday at Barnes & Noble, 4015 Medina Road, Bath Township, and at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Learned Owl, 204 N. Main Street, Hudson, where refreshments will be served.
Send information about books of local interest to Lynne Sherwin, Features Department, Akron Beacon Journal, P.O. Box 640, Akron, OH 44309 or lsherwin@thebeaconjournal.com. Event notices should be sent at least two weeks in advance.
Authors with area connections came through with fine work this year. Here's a look at some of the best.
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