New Appalachian Books

Abstract

New Appalachian Books by George Brosi Amphibians andReptiles inWestVirginia. N. BayardGreen andThomas K. Pauley. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: The University of Pittsburgh Press, 1987. 241 pages with color plates, drawings, maps, glossary, bibliography and index. Hardback in dust jacket. $29.95. Mass market paperback. $14.95. A complete guidebook with a color photograph, a map of the habitat, with information on each of eighty-six species and sub-species of snakes, salamanders, turtles, lizards, toads and frogs found in West Virginia. The authors are Marshall University professors. Berry, Wendell. Home Economics: Fourteen Essays. San Francisco: North Point Press, 1987. 192 pages. Hardback in dust jacket. $20.00. Trade paperback. $9.95. Essays on a wide range of topics including the wilderness, higher education, patriotism, agriculture, sexism and community. It would be difficult to find short statements on any of these topics more stimulating, better written or wiser than these. Wendell and Tanya Berry farm organically with draft animals near where the Kentucky River empties into the Ohio. RecollectedEssays: 1965-1980. SanFrancisco: NorthPointPress. The second printing, 1987, of a 1981 release. 340 pages. Trade paperback. $10.95. While Home Economics is a contemporary statement of Wendell Berry's thoughts in the middle of the 1980s, Recollected Essays shows the evolution of his ideas over a fifteen-year period. One previously unpublished essay is included; all of the reprinted essays have been either rewritten or approved by Berry as consistent with his feelings in 1981 when this book was firstpublished. "Berry is probably the closest we have to a modem Thoreau, and in prose as transparent and healing as a clear mountain lake he emerges as a prophetic conscience of the nation. An important, humane book." -Publisher's Weekly. *George Brosi owns and operates the Appalachian Bookstore in Berea and publishes the bimonthly Appalachian Mountain Books. Healso sellsbooks through mailorderstoclients in allparts ofthecountry. Ifreaders need more information about any ofthe above listings, write him at 123 Walnut Street, Berea, Kentucky 40403. 68 __________. Sabbaths. San Francisco: North Point Press, 1987. 96 pages. Hardback in dust jacket. $12.95. Trade paperback. $6.95. Throughoutthis decade Wendell Berry has sought outthe solitude ofhis Kentucky River farm on the Sabbath for meditation-often about his place in Creation. There are Sabbath poems here for every year from 1979 through 1986. Bryant, Carvin. Voice in the Mountains: The Incredible Story ofLloyd C. Kelly. Pineville, Kentucky: Clear Creek Baptist Bible College, 1987. 160 pages with an index. Hardback in dust jacket. $12.95. Trade paperback. $6.95. Lloyd C. Kelly founded the Clear Creek Baptist Bible College in the 1920s near Pineville, Kentucky. It has been a unique mission, very relevant to the needs ofthe region. It has served mostly mid-career people called to preach the gospel, enriching many lives, including that of Carvin Bryant, the biographer, who attended Clear Creek and now teaches there. Illuminates Bell County history. Caudill, Harry M. Slender Is the Thread: Tales From a Country Law Office. Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky, 1987. 173 pages. Hardback in dust jacket. $18.00. Ever since the publication ofNight Comes to the Cumberlands in the 1960s, Harry Caudill has been recognized as one of the foremost writers, historians, and commentators in the Southern Appalachian Mountains. This book of fascinating people-stories focuses on Caudill's native Letcher County, Kentucky, but its wit and wisdom illuminates the mountain region as a whole. Chappell, Fred. IAm One ofYouForever. BatonRouge, Louisiana: Louisiana State University Press. The first paperback appearance, 1987, of a 1985 release. 1 84 pages. Trade paperback. $6.96. "A novel to put onthe shelfwithMarkTwain, William Faulkner, and Eudora Welty." -George Core in the Washington Post Book World. "Anyone who knows anything about Southern writing knows that Fred Chappell is our resident genius, our shining light, the one truly great writer we have among us." -Lee Smith. When I first read this book I kept stopping and rereading passages aloud to my wife. A strikingly beautiful colorcoverusing a quilt block motif is as outstanding as the writing inside. Cunningham, Rodger. Apples on the Flood: The Southern Mountain Experience. Knoxville, Tennessee: The University ofTennessee Press, 1987. 214 pages with an index, bibliography and notes. Hardback in...