The God of Animals

Author: Kyle, Aryn.
Publication info: New York : Scribner, c2007.
ISBN: 9781416533245
ISBN: 1416533249
Description: 305 p. ; 24 cm.
Subject: Ranches--Fiction.
Subject: Colorado--Fiction.
Genre term: Bildungsromans.
"When her older sister runs away to marry a rodeo cowboy, Alice Winston is left to bear the brunt of her family's troubles - a depressed, bedridden mother; a reticent, overworked father; and a run-down horse ranch. As the hottest summer in fifteen years unfolds and bills pile up, Alice is torn between dreams of escaping the loneliness of her duty-filled life and a longing to help her father mend their family and the ranch." "To make ends meet, the Winston's board the pampered horses of rich neighbors, and for the first time Alice confronts the power and security that class and wealth provide. As her family and their well-being become intertwined with the lives of their clients, Alice is drawn into an adult world of secrets and hard truths, and soon discovers that people - including herself - can be cruel, can lie and cheat, and every once in awhile, can do something heartbreaking and selfless. Ultimately, Alice and her family must weather a devastating betrayal and a shocking, violent series of events that will test their love and prove the power of forgiveness."--BOOK JACKET.

Dream When You're Feeling Blue

Author: Berg, Elizabeth.
Edition: 1st ed.
Publication info: New York : Random House, 2007.
ISBN: 1400065100 (alk. paper)
Description: 276 p. 25 cm.
Subject: Sisters--Fiction.
Subject: World War, 1939-1945--United States--Fiction.
"Author Elizabeth Berg takes us to Chicago at the time of World War II in this story about three sisters, their lively Irish family, and the men they love." "As the novel opens, Kitty and Louise Heaney say good-bye to their boyfriends Julian and Michael, who are going to fight overseas. On the domestic front, meat is rationed, children participate in metal drives, and Tommy Dorsey and Glenn Miller play music that offers hope and lifts spirits. And the Heaney sisters sit at their kitchen table every evening to write letters - Louise to her fiance, Kitty to the man she wishes fervently would propose, and the third Heaney girl, Tish, to an ever changing group of men she meets at USO dances. In the letters the sisters send and receive are intimate glimpses of life both on the battlefront and at home. For Kitty, a confident, headstrong young woman, the departure of her boyfriend and the lessons she learns about love, resilience, and war will bring a surprise and uncover a secret, and will lead her to a radical action on behalf of those she loves that will change the Heaney family forever. The lifelong consequences of the choices the sisters make are at the heart of this superb novel about the power of love and the enduring strength of family."--BOOK JACKET.

Once A Runner

Author: Parker, John L., Jr.
Edition: Author's rev. ed.
Publication info: Tallahassee, Fla. : Cedarwinds Pub. Co., c1990 (2002 printing).
ISBN: 0915297019
ISBN: 9780915297016
Description: 248 p. ; 22 cm.
Subject: Running--Fiction.

Once a Runner is the best running book I have ever read. Unlike training guides or running stories that spend far too much time explaining the beauty of running and trying to introduce people to the wonders of jogging around, Once A Runner really goes into the life and mind of a runner (though the book uses fictional characters, they are easily recognizable and realistic). It describes the dedication, hard work, and goofiness that is required to be successful and what makes runners a very unique, though cetainly interesting breed. The story itself, of a young college-aged runner and his quest to run the fastest mile he could while in school and after he got kicked out, is extremely well paced and smootly written, just as a good race. It is a fantastic book and I would highly recommend it for beginners, enthusiasts, or someone who just needs a little motivation.

Run

Author: Patchett, Ann.
Edition: 1st ed.
Publication info: New York : HarperCollins Publishers, 2007.
ISBN: 9780061340635 (acid-free paper)

"Since their mother's death, Tip and Teddy Doyle have been raised by their loving, possessive, and ambitious father. As the former mayor of Boston, Bernard Doyle wants to see his sons in politics, a dream the boys have never shared. But when an argument in a blinding New England snowstorm inadvertently causes an accident that involves a stranger and her child, all Bernard Doyle cares about is his ability to keep his children - all his children - safe." "Set over a period of twenty-four hours, Run takes us from the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard to a home for retired Catholic priests in downtown Boston. It shows us how worlds of privilege and poverty can coexist only blocks apart from each other, and how family can include people you've never even met. Ann Patchett illustrates the humanity that connects disparate lives, weaving several stories into one narrative. Run is ultimately a novel about secrets, duty, responsibility, and the lengths we will go to protect our children."--BOOK JACKET.

Once Upon A Time On The Banks

Author: Pelletier, Cathie.
Publication info: New York : Viking, 1989.
ISBN: 0670827762
Description: xvi, 368 p. ; 25 cm.

It is April 1969, in Mattagash, Maine (the setting for Pelletier's first novel, The Funeral Makers ), and the residents of the small, inbred community are slowly emerging from their cabin fever after five months of snow. This irreverent and bawdy novel tracks the town's most boisterous citizens as they become aware of the social event of the year: the unlikely marriage of Amy Joy Lawler, descendant of Mattagash's Protestant founder, to Jean-Claude Cloutier, Catholic, with an unacceptable French Canadian background. The crafty residents of northern Maine approach the wedding with varying goals. To bankrupt (and randy) motel owner Albert Pinkham, it's a chance to fill his cash register. To the Ivy family, wealthy relatives from Portland, it occasions a family reunion and a time to cement strained relationships. To the huge and larcenous Gifford clan, it presents a chance to steal out-of-state hubcaps and filch wedding gifts. On the day of the wedding a volatile mixture of Maine's finest and most tacky families meets in church--with astonishing results. In spite of the novel's raucous tone, it is apparent that Pelletier views her feisty Mainers with deep affection. Copyright 1989 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

After This

Author: McDermott, Alice.
Contributor biographical information 

Publisher description
Edition: 1st ed.
Publication info: New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, c2006.
ISBN: 0374168091 (hardcover)
Description: [8], 279 p. ; 22 cm.

A master at capturing Irish-Catholic American suburban life, particularly in That Night (1987) and the National Book Award winning Charming Billy (1998), McDermott returns for this sixth novel with the Keane family of Long Island, who get swept up in the wake of the Vietnam War. When John and Mary Keane marry shortly after WWII, she's on the verge of spinsterhood, and he's a vet haunted by the death of a young private in his platoon. Jacob, their first-born, is given the dead soldier's name, an omen that will haunt the family when Jacob is killed in Vietnam (hauntingly underplayed by McDermott). In vignette-like chapters, some of which are stunning set pieces, McDermott probes the remaining family's inner lives. Catholic faith and Irish heritage anchor John and Mary's feelings, but their children experience their generation's doubt, rebellion and loss of innocence: next eldest Michael, who had always dominated Jacob, drowns his guilt and regret in sex and drugs; Anne quits college and moves to London with a lover; Clare, a high school senior, gets pregnant. The story of '60s and '70s suburbia has been told before, and McDermott has little to say about the Vietnam War itself. But she flawlessly encapsulates an era in the private moments of one family's life.

On Chesil Beach

Author: McEwan, Ian.
Publication info: New York : Nan A. Talese/Doubleday, 2007.
ISBN: 9780385522403 (alk. paper)
ISBN: 0385522401 (alk. paper)
Description: 203 p. ; 19 cm.

"It is July 1962. Florence is a talented musician who dreams of a career on the concert stage and of the perfect life she will create with Edward, an earnest young history student at University College of London, who unexpectedly wooed and won her heart. Newly married that morning, both virgins, Edward and Florence arrive at a hotel on the Dorset coast. At dinner in their rooms they struggle to suppress their worries about the wedding night to come. Edward, eager for rapture, frets over Florence's response to his advances and nurses a private fear of failure, while Florence's anxieties run deeper: she is overcome by sheer disgust at the idea of physical contact, but dreads disappointing her husband when they finally lie down together in the honeymoon suite."--BOOK JACKET.