South Carolina Books

This is a story that children of school age can identify with. It touches on recent history, family values, and the importance of the lighthouses along our coasts. A lovely book to share with "landlocked" friends as well as those who are fortunate enough to live along coastal areas.

In the sea of books that detail the locations of the best restaurants, souvenir stores, waterslides, amusement parks, and putt-putt that humans have to offer - this book and the other seasonal guide books float on their own - and tell readers where they can find the best that Mother Nature has to offer.

The greatest threat to American liberty, prosperity, and national security today comes not from outside our borders but from within; it is our own ignorance of the ideas that made our country great. In Federalist No. 51, Madison warned us "a dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government." While our Founders framed our Constitution that pit the several branches of government, both state and federal, against each other to limit the concentration of power, they knew that these paper chains could only restrain the ambition of our governors as long as common people understood, and stood up for, the rights the Constitution was designed to protect. Today, we have slid so far that the words of the Constitution are often twisted to reach exactly the opposite result they were designed to achieve. The only way to know this is to examine the original intent of the Founders as expressed in their own speeches and writing. The Federalist Papers are, of course, the primary source for understanding the Constitution. But these works, written to persuade our forefathers of the sensibleness of the Constitutional design, could not anticipate the subtle arguments that real world greed and ambition would devise against the Constitution's plain language. This is where Hyneman's A Second Federalist fills the gap. No sooner than the Constitutional plan was put into action did controversies arise over the powers granted to both state and federal governments. A Second Federalist presents these challenges in the words in which they were framed, and the responses of America's great early statemen, many of them signers of the Constitution themselves. A single example is all that is necessary to prove the worth of the book. Today, big government politicians regularly justify our massive welfare state and the process of wealth redistribution - using the law to steal - with the "general welfare" clause of the Constitution's preamble. Madison himself answered this trick when it was tried in 1792, and Hyneman presents the text of Mr. Madison's floor speech in the House of Representatives refuting the claim the federal government had power to redistribute wealth. Unfortunately for America, the ideas of Mr. Madison, the Father of the Constitution, have lost the debate today. But if we are ever to return to the understanding of the Constitution possessed by the men who wrote it, it will only be because of excellent books like Mr. Hyneman's A Second Federalist. Buy two copies of this book and give one to a friend.

THIS WONDERFUL BOOK GIVES THE READER A GOOD LOOK AT THE WORKINGS OF THE ANTEBELLUM SOUTH AND ITS PUBLIC AND PRIVATE LIFE. AS GOVERNOR OF SOUTH CAROLINA WE SEE HAMMOND ADVISING HIS MASSACHUESETTS FRIEND IN CHARLSESTON FOR FACT FINDING TO LEAVE THE STATE BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE. THE GOV. IS UNABLE TO PROTECT HIS LIFE IF HE REMAINS. HAMMOND COMPLAINS THAT HIS WIFE DOESN'T UNDERSTAND HIS INVOLVEMENT WITH A SLAVE IN THE HOUSEHOLD AND HIS SEXUAL RELATIONS WITH HER TWELVE YEAR OLD DAUGHTER. WE SEE THE SELF-JUSTIFICATION OF THIS MORAL, CHRISTIAN MAN WHO SUPPORTS ENSLAVEMENT OF THE INFERIOR RACE.

This work is an outstanding example of a marriage of adventure and history in a work of fiction. Tallent combines all the necessary elements to keep all readers interested. The book, while juvenile in nature, has a sufficently entertaining plot and keen characterization. I live in the area in which the story is set (Allendale County, SC), and the description of the landscape is also fairly accurate. As a history buff who is always up for a good mystery, I enjoyed this book immensely. Alex Cone

"Today, the garden has something in bloom all year-round: roses and sasanquas at Christmas; pansies and snaps in winter; jasmine, bulbs, and alyssum in the spring; geraniums, phlox, petunias, and impatiens in the summer. Window boxes spill periwinkle, violas, verbenas, and ferns."

Louisa Pringle Carmeron loves gardening and she grew up in the mysterious world of historic gardens in Charleston, South Carolina. She lives in an eighteenth-century house and joins Lauren Preller Chambers in the creation of this beautiful book.

Many of the gardens in this book cannot be seen from the street and are hidden behind ancient walls and are not open to the public. So this book is a taste of the wide variety of hidden paradise. Gardens include a Japanese Garden with delicate ferns, Italian themes with cypress reaching to the pale blue sky, Misty morning gardens near a Marsh, Herb gardens and Formal gardens with gothic style carriage houses.

The quaint house with jasmine growing over the mailbox attached to a white fence reveals a sense of care and beauty. Flowerboxes outside the windows add a sense of nostalgia. The lush foliage speaks of a more humid climate.

As you read this book you can imagine having picnics behind a walled garden or sipping tea on a greenhouse porch. Shaded benches and courtyards are all part of the charm. One of my favorite pictures is the courtyard with cedar trees and a fountain. The paving stones look very natural and you imagine the owners of the home must enjoy sitting out in the cooling shade in the summer.

~The Rebecca Review

Insightful look at the lives of outdoorsmen and the stories they tell about fishing, hunting and the impact of it all upon daily life. Easy and fun to read, you are sure to connect with the stories Dean tells.

`Seizing the New Day' is a wonderful book about enslaved southerners of Charleston, South Carolina freeing themselves. They are 'seizing the new day,' no gifts are discussed here. They are a somewhat surly group, quick to anger, but careful to keep long term goals in mind. They are still a surly group at the book's end, but they have made a lot of progress.

The focus is very narrow, but richly detailed. We only follow the events in Charleston. Who lived next to whom? What church did they go to? What school did they attend? Who did they marry?

This is a story of the `Civil War.' Told from the street level of Charleston between 1850 and 1870, it twists the `accepted story' presented by Hollywood. I'm used to the Civil War starting with the shelling of Fort Sumter and ending with Lee's surrender at Appomattox. This version of the `Civil War' starts with the Nat Turner rebellion and ends with the 15th amendment. Instead of the great establishment leaders like Jefferson Davis and Abraham Lincoln, this war is fought by people that won't abide with bondage. It is a war between slave owners and those they seek to dominate.

There is no talk of a Northern Army `freeing' people, the most prominent army unit mentioned is the 21st United States Colored Troops. The mayor of Charleston surrendered the city to them on February 18, 1865.

The book is organized into 7 chapters. The first two and last are narrative, the war story. Chapters 3 through 6 develop sub themes regarding how the winners of the war (remember, the Mayor surrendered to colored troops) went about establishing economic, educational and community institutions for `the New Day.'

The book is careful to bolster its case by retelling hundreds of stories pulled from contemporary sources; autobiographies, newspapers, government documents, etc. Anyone writing a civil war film script would find this book a welcome source of authentic street scenes.

Despite the bold title, the notion of `seizing liberty' is rather hidden in the multitude of individual stories recounted here. It's easy to read the book as a colorful recap of many small and disconnected efforts. I suspect this reflects the author's desire to maintain academic respectability. The story about Lee and Grant is, after all, the accepted version.

Separate Journeys: Short Stories By Contemporary Indian Women is an anthology of fifteen short stories all by female East Indian authors. The tales are surprisingly diverse, offering a wide variety of regional, linguistic, and class-based perspectives. Edited by the director of Katha, and organization dedicated to storytelling and preserving the role of story-sharing in human culture, Separate Journeys is a remarkable composite literary glimpse into the human psyche.

Too much of a good thing can be just as bad as too much of a bad thing. "The Seven Deadly Virtues And Other Lively Essays" is a compilation of essays, autobiographical in nature. Author Lynn Bloom warns of the seven deadly virtues throughout her life - duty, rationality, conformity, efficiency, order, economy, and punctuality - and that the overuse of any of them can sometimes lead to many of the problems normally associated with the seven deadly sins. Full of wit and wisdom, "The Seven Deadly Virtues" is an entertaining read indeed to anyone aspiring to be a writer or teacher, and especially for anyone who fears they may be trying a bit too hard.