Jack Wennerstrom's passionate and abiding interest in the Potomac makes him the ideal guide. In Leaning Sycamores, he invites us to explore the rugged beauty and rich human history of the Potomac's upper reaches. The flow and rush of the current, the leaning bankside trees, the rocks and flowers, the people, places, and wild-life - all are lovingly observed and connected in his warmly personal account. In ten gracefully written chapters, Wennerstrom describes the river's geology and natural history, its long record of human habitation, and the ecology of its plants and animals. He relates memorable encounters with people who live and work along its banks, as well as time spent alone, fishing, rafting, and hiking. He writes of the magic of moving water and its powerful effect on mind and spirit. Drifting downstream or walking the riverbanks, Wennerstrom takes particular pleasure in discovering the Potomac's hidden corners, ghostly legacies, and natural splendors. What began as a weekend diversion twenty years ago, he explains, has become a deep passion that continues to expand and evolve. Leaning Sycamores is his beautifully written account of that journey.

A Southwest Book of the Year "In this masterful performance, Bryn Chancellor explores the loss around which an entire community has calcified with humanity and wisdom. Chancellor digs deep in these pages, unearthing broken hearts, secrets, betrayals, passion and—most impressively—grace. What a joy to find a book that is both propulsive and perfectly composed."—Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney, author of The Nest An award-winning writer makes her debut with this mesmerizing page-turner in the spirit of Everything I Never Told You and Olive Kitteridge. Out for a hike one scorching afternoon in Sycamore, Arizona, a newcomer to town stumbles across what appear to be human remains embedded in the wall of a dry desert ravine. As news of the discovery makes its way around town, Sycamore’s longtime residents fear the bones may belong to Jess Winters, the teenage girl who disappeared suddenly some eighteen years earlier, an unsolved mystery that has soaked into the porous rock of the town and haunted it ever since. In the days it takes the authorities to make an identification, the residents rekindle stories, rumors, and recollections both painful and poignant as they revisit Jess’s troubled history. In resurrecting the past, the people of Sycamore will find clarity, unexpected possibility, and a way forward for their lives. Skillfully interweaving multiple points of view, Bryn Chancellor knowingly maps the bloodlines of a community and the indelible characters at its heart. Evocative and atmospheric, Sycamore is a coming-of-age story, a mystery, and a moving exploration of the elemental forces that drive human nature—desire, loneliness, grief, love, forgiveness, and hope—as witnessed through the inhabitants of one small Arizona town.

The "lost country" is the familiar country of innocence and security known as youth—a country we have all known and which, occasionally, in a book like this one, we are able to rediscover. J. R. Salamanca's The Lost Country is the story of a boy, Jim Blackstarr, who grows up on a farm in Virginia. As a child, he delights in the beauty that surrounds him: the rivers and hills and trees, the seasons of the year, all the shapes and textures and patterns of his world. But, as he grows older, he makes other discoveries. He experiences brutality, passion, fear, and shame. These experiences destroy the simplicity of his early relationships; they complicate and darken his later ones. Ultimately, they drive him—as they drive all men—out of, and away from, the country of his youth.

"The history of Indiana is rich in minor incidents of real interest and of importance; but not in events exclusively its own. . . . The intention of this book is to include in a single volume an account of various phases of the development of the Commonwealth, whose history must be learned from many sources, not always accessible. Many who have not time for research, and others who have no taste for reading history, may take an interest in the romance of foreign dominion on the Wabash, and in the plain tale of the early settlers. Some may have aroused within them a just pride in their State, in reading of Indiana's valiant part in war, the development or her vast natural resources, and the advanced position which she has taken among the states in provisions for universal education, and the enactment of beneficial laws. The author's lifelong familiarity with the scenes, the characters, the movements, and the events mentioned, insures to the reader a sympathetic treatment of the subject. Fireside recitals by aged pioneers, addresses at old settlers' meetings, local historical society papers, reminiscences of early citizens, State records, scholarly monographs and histories have all gone to the making of these pages.--Excerpt from Preface.

When a woman’s whole life falls apart, she finds refuge in the home she left behind in this touching novel in the Tending Roses series from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Book of Lost Friends and Before We Were Yours. Karen Sommerfield has been hiding from the big questions of her life—the emotional distance in her marriage, her inability to have children, and her bout with cancer. Getting lost in her high-powered career provides the sense of purpose she yearns for. Until the day she’s downsized out of her job and the doctor tells her the cancer may be back. It’s a double blow that would send anyone reeling. It sends Karen to Grandma Rose’s old farm, where her sister has made a seemingly perfect life. Opening herself to the unexpected, Karen finds a lonely child in need of nurturing and insights into her family’s past. In the quiet of the Missouri Ozarks, where the sycamore leaves whisper their soft, secret language, she begins to discover answers—and a joy to make her life complete.