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Archive for the ‘Essays’ Category

State by State: A Panoramic Portrait of America, edited by Matt Weiland and Sean Wilsey

Posted in Books, Essays, Neil's Picks, Nonfiction, Readers' advisory, Sense of place on September 24, 2009 | 2 Comments »

Road trip! Well, the literary kind, anyway.
Editors for the Paris Review and McSweeney’s have assembled the usual suspects and then some for this interesting assortment of essays about the fifty states and District of Columbia. The goal is an homage to the New Deal’s Federal Writers Project, a WPA program that created an even wider [...]

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Mason Dixon Knitting: The Curious Knitters Guide—Stories, Patterns, Advice, Opinions, Questions, Answers, Jokes and Pictures, by Kay Gardiner and Ann Shayne

Posted in Abby's Picks, Books, Essays, How-to, Humor, Nonfiction, Readers' advisory on February 20, 2009 | 2 Comments »

Mason Dixon Knitting is another book born out of a blog. The two authors met on a chat group for Rowan yarns and developed a friendship, despite living on opposite ends of the U.S. The friendship blossomed into daily emails and eventually into a shared blog, Mason Dixon Knitting. As you might imagine, they do [...]

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Things I Learned from Knitting…whether I wanted to or not, by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, the Yarn Harlot

Posted in Abby's Picks, Books, Essays, Humor, Nonfiction, Quick read, Readers' advisory on February 18, 2009 | Leave a Comment »

Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, otherwise known as the Yarn Harlot, is well-known in the world of Knitters. She started with a blog, the Yarn Harlot, which features her tongue-in-cheek musings about knitting, marriage, parenting, and life in general. Pearl-McPhee has written several books like this one, with short snippets on knitting and life. Her tireless efforts to [...]

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I Feel Bad About My Neck, by Nora Ephron

Posted in Books, Essays, Jessica's Picks, Nonfiction, Quick read, Readers' advisory, Women's Nonfiction on November 13, 2008 | Leave a Comment »

I am not old. I am furthermore not interested in reading thoughtful contemplative pieces on age and aging. Besides, I am inevitably suspicious of people who write about how darn great it is to be old. I’m pretty sure they’re lying.
Thing is, Nora Ephron agrees with me:
“Every so often I read a book about age, [...]

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Me Talk Pretty One Day, by David Sedaris

Posted in Audiobook, Books, Characters, Dark humor, Essays, Humor, Jessica's Picks, Nonfiction, Quirky characters, Readers' advisory on November 11, 2008 | Leave a Comment »

I don’t watch television. I don’t watch movies. I don’t listen to audiobooks. In related news, I don’t get invited to parties.
Lo these many years ago, however, when I was still living at home, I was in the car with my mother when she was listening to NPR. That’s how I got snookered into listening [...]

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