Louisiana Books

Essentially, this book is a history of the political relationship between three presidents and the South (FDR, Truman, and LBJ). The book also focuses a great deal of attention on the attitude of each president on civil rights and the plight of black people in the South. Leuchtenburg does a good job of pointing out the ambivalence of each of these presidents towards civil rights juxtaposed against bold actions they took (mostly for political reasons) that ended up helping black people in Southern states and advancing the cause of civil rights. The book is full of fascinating aspects of each president's regional identity, including FDR's second "home" in Warm Springs and the struggle of both Truman and LBJ to truly identify with a particular section of the country (whether it be West, Midwest, or South). The book also serves as a fascinating history of the shift of strength within the Democratic Party away from the Solid South and towards liberals in the North. In all, this is fantastic historical research and writing that I would highly recommend.

William E. Leuchtenburg is the preeminent historian of America in the twentieth century. Based on research in 400 manuscript collections, together with 200 oral histories, his The White House Looks South is both highly original and beautifully written. It ranks with the very best of Leuchtenburg's previous works, yet is different from any of them.
Through incisive biographies, the book establishes the relationship of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry Truman, and Lyndon Johnson to the South of the early-to-mid-twentieth century. Leuchtenburg argues that politics, together with the influence of individual politicians, remains central to an understanding of the broader sweep of American history, and that place and section are central to an understanding of politics. Certain presidents take the helm of change, altering through governmental action the individual lives of millions. Judging from the remarkable popularity of presidential biography, most Americans seem to comprehend at least some of these points, but they have been unfashionable among professional historians for a long generation. The White House Looks South is, in effect, a timely invitation to the historical profession to return to once-established precepts. As if to nail down the point, the book takes as its central theme the three presidents' transformation of civil rights from the 1930s through the 1960s.
Like all of Leuchtenburg's books, The White House Looks South makes splendid reading. Its pages sparkle with anecdotes as well as pithy (and often astonishingly revealing) quotes. Both a master political analyst and a master storyteller, never has Leuchtenburg produced a work so richly combining both.

Sit here and hope trying to cope my friend died it was suicide i said he wouldn't but i knew i couldnt stop him it's his life ended with the cut of a knife i dont no what he resolved but i hope his problem is solved.

It's impossible to do justice to Dave Smith's "The Wick of Memory" in a brief review. In this book he writes as a young boy, a young man, a lover, husband, and father, a poet, and finally as one beginning to experience the deteriorations of aging. But all his poems are firmly grounded in specifics, and contain many startlingly apt similes. Some examples, recalled at random: a bird's eye in the rain "serene as a man ... bent at a radar screen," the sudden stillness as the eye of a hurricane passes over "like a lock with no key," and "can't breathe hardly better than stones made neon in deep space." These jewels, and many, many others, are embedded in poems that explore situations deeply, in concentrated, precise but accessible language. There are no wasted words in these poems.

There is humor in this book, sometimes laugh-out-loud, see "Boys in the Square in Bologna," more often wry or sharp, as in "A Lay of Summer" and "The Mourners' Line." There is pathos ("Floaters"), and perhaps he skirts the fine line between sentiment and sentimentality ("Red Dog") on occasion, but everywhere there is rich, rhythmic, pleasure-giving language. I most highly recommend this book.

Not only should everyone in Louisiana read this book, but everyone in the country should!

This is an anthology with a strange title, inscrutable cover, and some of the best stories I've read. Some oldies but goodies (i.e., "The Convict") and many new-to-me stories. Some are surprisingly dark, but of course Louisiana is the land of mojo, Spanish-moss draped trees along black bayous . . . Well worth the read. These are stories to be read and read over again.

I echo the previous reviewer - this book is great for Louisiana, adjoining areas of Texas and probably other adjoining state to Louisiana. The only complaint I have is that there aren't quite enough flowers for it to be as comprehensive as I wish it were. It would be great if the book were published again with updated photographs - due to film and the technology of the times in which it was published, the images could be better - but they are still very good and it's an excellent reference for this area of the country. If you live in Louisiana particularly or in adjoining states, this is probably a book you want to have.

This is a great field guide to wildflowers in Louisiana. The photographs enable the reader to immediately identify the plant that they are trying to discover. I have owned my copy for 30 years and I still use it. Grab a copy if you can find one. I'm never parting with mine!

Oh yes, we all know this man. This Yancey and his limitations. We all find him sometimes despicable and often pathetic. We, from time to time, want to to leave--to put the book down and take a deep breath--but can't. We have to see it through to the end. Too well written. Too unbelievably descriptive. After the last sentence, you close the book and say one word: Damn.

I first read this book, quite by chance, a year or two after I returned from Vietnam. I have read it several times since then; specifically, whenever my memory starts to fail me, and I start to think about how good I had it in the Army.

Like the Army itself, Yancey's War is short on actuall combat scenes and long on abject misery. Although the story takes place during the Second World War, it was just as relivant in 1971 as it was in 1945. And I suspect that a GI reading it today would relate to most, if not all, of the events in the book. No book that I have ever read captures the essense of just how bad it bites to be an enlisted man in the US Army, the way Hoffman did with this book. And it surprises me that it isn't better known than it is.

Beautifully various and distinguished--like a needle in the eye. I adore this book and this poet.

Year of Morphines
Poems
Betsy Brown
The National Poetry Series / Selected by George Garrett
"Allusive, edgy, smart, and utterly relentless, the poems of Year of Morphines move gracefully in the zone between our necessary morphine spells of forgetting and life's implausible reclamations: `. . . all these stories ending with life.'"-George Garrett, from his judge's citation
Betsy Brown is no stranger to loss. Breast cancer runs rampant in her family; both her mother and her thirty-two-year-old sister died of the disease and another sister has been diagnosed with its late stages. Her father also fell victim to cancer, this time pancreatic. The poems in Brown's stunning first book pivot around the mechanisms we use in facing loss and fear-whether those confrontations are as wrenching as a bone marrow transplant or as confused as a brief love.
In lyric verses with a driving narrative force, the poet depicts loved ones coping with illness, sometimes achieving recovery, and reshaping a family. From his hospital bed a father relates "the color of his pain-killers, / the in-and-out narcotic conversations / of the doomed." A woman recalls Baltimore, where her sister received treatment, as "a city of doctors, messy brain scans, / slick cobblestoned lanes thick / with Christmas." She returns to the spot where her sister's cremated remains were scattered, relishing "the secrets of ashes, / the clean wash of lake water / like all the nights we sat / with the little waves lapping."
An unusually intimate collection, Year of Morphines is both a heartbreaking portrait of the process of death and encouraging evidence of life's perseverance.
A native of Oshkosh, Wisconsin, Betsy Brown works in corporate communications in Minneapolis.

I am from New Orleans, and this book was a great reference. You can discover the city, and even learn more about fun things and the historical places to see in New Orleans, and not just the night life! - Which is great, but we have days too and they are worth the time to explore this beautiful city of ours.

The author of this book, Larry McCabe, is re-releasing books that have gone out of print for one reason or another. This particular book is an old friend. After I received it, I went into my library and found a copy. It has been in print in one form or another for 25 years. Most instruction books don't last anywhere near that long. First, this book (as the author warns) is not for beginners. You need to be familiar with the movable blues scales we all use. If you are playing out, and feel comfortable with the whole neck, get this book. The style of lead is closer to Gatemouth Brown and Freddie King than anyone else. If you don't know who these men are, buy their CDs. You are in for a treat. Please read the author's introduction. There is a lot of good info there. The Tab system is the older style. It should take about 30 seconds to adjust. It's actually easier to read than the current form. If you consider yourself a Rock guitarist instead of Blues, you really could use this book. If you use these solos as a "how to", instead of just memorizing them, they will give you some new weapons. You know, for scaring the heck out of other guitarists.

Any serious student of public speaking needs to read it. It's so insightful and easy to read.

Item contains useful information for anyone attempting a genealogical exploration, which might include an ancestor of color who lived in the New Orleans area at post Civil War time. (reviewer's disclosure: the author is my sister)