Maine Books

Carlos Martinez's "Meanwhile Back in Kansas," is a must read. The poems are so engaging and well crafted it is hard to put down. This is one of those books you will continue to go back to, and each time you will see details he's slipped in that you missed in previous readings. His poetry is easy to connect to because of thematic universals, a man's struggles with age and family. His language is beautiful, an auditory delight. These poems are not just for men but for all people of every ethnicity. He most eloquently takes us back to what it means to be human in a contemporary world.

Allie isn't looking forward to her summer: her isolated Maine community offers few friends and her father has injured his back, so the family has to pitch in and start a new business to help out. When she meets a summer girl whose family is staying at an elegant home they inherited, she forms an uncertain friendship with a girl who has everything monetarily, but lacks family support. Their friendship will change both their worlds in this moving story of conflict and discovery.

This book is a wonderful read for not only bottle lovers but for anyone. Heartfelt and amusing observations about family and life. The author shares interesting and entertaining facts about bottles and his own adventures. The book goes deeper than just insights about the world of bottle digging. Makes you step back and think about your own life and how much you appreciate the gifts God has given us. I think this book will be of interest to many people. Highly recommended..Makes you want to go and dig up a bottle!

This is an incredible book. Tremendous photographs documenting old-Maine. And as well terribly interesting text from the artist's granddaughter. The photographer was the wife of a vice-presidential candidate and yet virtually nothing is known of her life. The commentary and deductions are really interesting and moving. Highly recommended. I really enjoyed reading and studying this. I really appreciate Ms Sewall's efforts in saving and disseminating these photos!

I read a review for A Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood that called it a "woman's novel", and I bristled instinctively at the use of gender labeling on a work of art. But on reading Atwood's work, I had to admit that it was an accurate assessment. Her imagery sank deeply into that illusive yet definitive part of me that is woman, not man. Jan's poetry affected me in much the same way. There were times when that assessment narrowed even more to that instinctual yet learned essence that is mother. As I read, I felt the tell-tale closing tension of my throat, followed by the creeping heat of societal shame at mid-day tears on a cleaning afternoon. Four words and an image so strong, so clear, so real, that she took me years away from my chair. Jan's poetry needs to be appreciated as much for their line-by-line beauty as for their totality; and while even a man may see the beauty, a woman will feel it. A mother will relive it.

Do you ever go into a shop or library and by sheer chance find the answer to some question you're just putting into words? That happened to me last week, when I found the perfect partner for my love affair with Maine literary experience.

The preface of The Mirror of Maine explains that it is "an annotated and illustrated bibliography [tracing] the State's literary and cultural development..." One hundred books were selected, spanning the period between 1613 and 1999. Among the stated criteria, the most interesting is "books that have endured." The book's launch was heralded by a school reading competition, a library reading and discussion series, and an exhibition. For each book there is a page of text describing its impact.

This grant-funded project involved years of extensive consultation throughout the state. No more than one book was selected from any writer; and anthologies, compilations and encyclopedias were excluded. In the end the selection committee had to make their best informed decisions. They received a lot of advice, some discouraging, some bracing. In the latter category: "Include as many books as possible on this great list, lob it into the culture crowd, and run like h***." In the end, what else could they do but that?

Maine became a state in 1820, having been a part of Massachusetts until that year. The first ten books have to do with the exploration and development of the area that became Maine; many or most of these are not available but reprints are hoped for.

Item 11: in 1825 the state legislature paid for ten thousand copies of the Constitutions of Maine and the U.S., bound together, to be distributed to schoolchildren. Brilliant!

While reading, I marked the books I wanted to mention in my review; photography, children's literature, poetry, fiction, essays, journals, history, biology. Nearly half a hundred! Impossible to mention them all. My own painful selection process led to a very short list of my personal favorites to mention here. While I couldn't find a website for the book, an internet search turned up a city library site listing the 100 selections, so I encourage you to read the entire list that way if you are interested.

Charlotte's Web (1952). E.B. White's children's classic is a lifelong favorite of mine. If I tell one of you that you are "a true friend and a good writer," know that for me the words are nearly sacramental.

An Island Garden by Celia Thaxter, illustrated by Childe Hassam (1894). The beauty and charm of this perfect book say at least as much about the gardener as the garden.

Salem's Lot (1975). I'm not sure that I would have chosen this from Stephen King's long list of titles, but the selectors make the case that it exemplifies the remoteness of so many Maine towns -- in King's words, "so isolated that almost anything could happen there."

Evangeline, the 1847 narrative poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. "Fair was she to behold, that maiden of seventeen summers / Black were her eyes as the berry that grows on the thorn by the way-side..." My own French/Quebecoise heritage makes this Acadian love story special to me.

Ravens in Winter (1989). Biologist Bernd Heinrich's book about ravens in the woods of Maine (just a mountain or two away from my home) is filled with the beauty and challenge of the natural world. I'd have been seriously tempted to choose his A YEAR IN THE MAINE WOODS instead, though RAVENS does have the advantage of a scientific study threading through it.

And last, a book I treasure: The House by the Sea: A Journal. Poet, novelist and essayist May Sarton, Belgian-born, moved to the Maine coast at the age of sixty and spent the rest of her life writing, using solitude to find truth within herself. In her "journals of self-discovery" Sarton records "the insights that come with age and solitude."

There, I did it! Six out of a hundred, forcing me to leave out Thoreau and Rachel Carson, among others; how excruciating. My appreciation for this exquisite bibliography grew as I went through my own selection. Kudos to The Baxter Society, the Maine Historical Society, and editor Laura Fecych Sprague, along with everyone else involved.

Yes, I could name some books I'd like to have included -- but that's for another day. The Mirror of Maine deserves absolutely no second-guessing.

Linda Bulger, 2008

Informative, poetic, and visually pleasing story of the island and why it captivated so many outstanding artists and inspired such an incredible variety of wonderful expression.

Truly a model for the art of special places: how the place inspires art, and how art gives insight into the place.

This is a fabulous book. For decades, everyone who loves Monhegan has expressed the wish that there was a good book which they could show friends and neighbors "back in the States" when they rave about this wondrous isle 10 miles off the coast of Maine. But no book, no website ever came close to capturing the magic of Monhegan -- until now. This is the book every Monhegan-oholic has been been waiting for. Even people who think they know everything about Monhegan and who think they have seen everything there is to see on Monhegan will discover new secrets within the pages of this marvelous book. This is THE book.

A beautiful book evoking imagery of a time past that had been very instrumental in inspiring and providing access to America's love and appeciation of nature. In this book we are shown how these roads led us to our collective love of natural beauty in America - literally and metaphorically - in an historically accurate and academic work by the author whose love of these roads in Acadia and of nature's wonders in general are delightfully evident. Exquisite photographs!

Lori A. Gordon lives in Vestal, New York with her family. She is not new to the publishing world, having had several articles published, but Murder in Maine is her first mystery.

Anne Wyndham has had a rough life thus far. Her parents were killed in a car accident which she herself survived, and the nightmares are vivid. In the opening to Murder in Maine, Anne is in bed and realizes her apartment and her landscaping business below are on fire and that the only way she will survive is if she jumps out of her window. But at the last moment she is rescued by tall, dark, and handsome Brock Cameron, who has come to tell her that her beloved uncle has committed suicide. Anne and Brock hurry back to Maine, where strange happenings have been afoot:

"'The accidents started about the time that Mr. Brock came...Mr. Brock promised that he'd get to the bottom of things, but he never did...A few days before your uncle died, he sent for Mr. Brock...they had a terrible fight.' Mrs. Monroe's words echoed in Anne's mind as she sat in the gathering darkness. Could Brock have had anything to do with the accidents? Why? What did he stand to gain?"

Murder in Maine is a delicately written story about the quest for meaning in a world filled with unhappy and bitter events. Anne Wyndham and Brock Cameron are both orphans who are looking for meaning and connection in their lives. The death of Anne's Uncle James brings them together and then threatens to tear them apart. Their characters are both sweet and uncomplicated people who are driven by the need to do the right thing when everything around them is falling apart.

Ms. Gordon writes an inspirational tale, but also does a good job of following the mystery genre in this unusual whodunit. She has a nice grasp of how reality can turn people around to the point where they don't know where to turn, and she offers more than a few biblical quotations as a means of not only redemption, but as a guidebook on how to transcend the problems of the world. Anne and Brock and good people caught in bad circumstances, and Ms. Gordon's loving handling of their situation gives hope and insight into everyday events. A good read.

Shelley Glodowski
Reviewer