 Lake Superior: Story and Spirit
John and Ann Mahan
Nature/Photography
Sweetwater Visions
Large Format Hardcover - 288 Pages
$44.95
This is the absolute best of both worlds - incomparable photography coupled with an arresting narrative on the Lake Superior ecosystem! The deep, detailed text is illustrated by 140 stunning color photographs of what the Mahans call their "sacred place". The book takes us from the geological origins of the lake right up to the present threats to the ecological balance of the "Shining Big Sea Water".
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 Ladybug Girl at the Beach
David Soman & Jacky Davis
Children
Dial Books
Hardcover
$16.99
Lulu (aka Ladybug Girl) is afraid to go into the water! She does fine with sand castles, kites and ice cream cones, but won't go near the rough and noisy surf! With Bingo at her side, Lulu (who as Ladybug Girl can do anything!) conquers her fear and has a great day at the beach. Beautifully illustrated!
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 Angle of Repose
Wallace Stegner
Fiction
Penguin Books
Softcover, 569 Pages
$16.00
The title describes the angle at which soil finally settles after, for example, being dumped from a mine as tailings. It similarly describes the Ward family's settling out from the hard life of mining and construction engineering in the American west as narrated by their grandson Lyman Ward. Stegner said of the book, "It's perfectly clear that if every writer is born to write one story, that's my story."
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 Listening Point
by Sigurd Olson
Nature
U. of Minn Press
Softcover, 243 Pages
$15.95
We dropped our 12-year-old grandson at Burntside Lake near Ely last Friday for a two-week adventure in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area. This, of course, is the site of Sigurd Olson's Listening Point - one of the earliest and still compelling contribitions to conservation and environmental literature. "Why wilderness", asks Olson and he proceeds to address that question with poetic meditations from his cabin in the Quetico-Superior country of northern Minnesota.
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 Burn
Nevada Barr
Recent Release - Fiction
Minotaur Books
Hardcover, 378 Pages
$25.95
After the traumas of the past couple of wilderness-based Nevada Barr novels, National Park Service Ranger Anna Pigeon has gone to New Orleans to rest and recover. Not so fast! A gruesomely killed pigeon marked with runic symbols portends evil doings in the Big Easy. You'll love her new partner-in-crime-busting, Claire Sullivan, who shares top billing in this dark, fast-paced urban mystery.
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 Into the Story: A Writer's Journey through Life, Politics, Sports and Loss
by David Maraniss
Non-Fiction/Journalism/Personal Memoir
Simon & Schuster, 2010
Hardcover, 283 pgs
$26.00
Journalism par excellence presented as an anthology spanning the breadth of the Maraniss oeuvre from the intensely personal to the world of sports and from politics to biography. From his small-town Wisconsin roots he has ranged from the Rome Olympics to Vietnam and from Newt Gingrich to Vince Lombardi.
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 Sacred Hunger
by Barry Unsworth
Historical Fiction
W.W. Norton, 1993
Paperpack, 629 pgs
$14.95
Winner of the 1992 Booker Prize, this is a riveting historical novel set in the Atlantic slave trade of the mid-18th Century. The action unfolds aboard the Liverpool Merchant as it plies its triangular route from England to West Africa to the New World. Notwithstanding that the central themes are greed and violence, Unsworth relates them with compelling beauty and grace.
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 Jewels on the Water: Lake Superior's Apostle Islands
Text by Jeff Rennicke, Photographs by Layne Kennedy
Photo/Large format
Friends of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore
Hardcover, 128 pgs
$35.00
Published by The Friends of the Apostle Islands, this book is the definitive introduction to the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore and the Gaylord A. Nelson National Wilderness Area. Superb photography and an excellent historical narrative make this an ideal accent for your coffee table, desk, waiting room or lobby.
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 My Garden
by Kevin Henkes
Children’s – Kindergarten, Age 5-6
Green Willow, 2010
Hardcover, 40 pgs
$17.99
It’s Springtime in the North Country and our minds turn from touring skis to the garden. This luminous gem sows the imagination of a little girl in a straw hat and harvests a cornucopia of chocolate rabbits, beachball tomatoes and invisible carrots. A visual delight to stimulate every child’s imagination and maybe even lead them into the garden!
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 The Four Hills of Life: Ojibwe Wisdom
by Thomas Peacock and Marlene Wisuri
Young reader/Teen
Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2009
Hardcover, 119 pgs
$24.00
Beautiful illustrations combined with wise and engaging text tell the story of the climb through the seasons of life from the Ojibwe perspective. A variety of activities lead young readers to and through the challenges and responsibilities of the path of life. Of interest for all ages.
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 Imperfect Birds
by Anne Lamott
Fiction
Riverhead , 2010
Hardcover, 278 pgs
$25.95
Rosie Ferguson moves into later adolescence and those of us who have raised daughters are on the edges of our seats. Mother Elizabeth and step-father James try to navigate these perilous shores seeking to understand and deal with this budding Ivy League physics whiz and the sex, drugs and rock n’ roll vortex that swirls around her.
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