New Hampshire Books

This guide has a lot of info presented very concisely and clearly. Includes: camping info, hike descriptions, suggested snowshoe and ski routes, and close-up maps of many of the most popular hiking trails. Also includes a large fold-out map of entire White Mountains region on waterproof, unrippable stock. Lots of illustrations, and an attractive and useful design.

I found that this book is quite under-rated by local booksellers. This is an excellent book for a casual White Mtns hiker who wants an abridged guide to the more popular day trails, with concise and clear information about each (including trail times, estimated difficulty, and short description of each). This is the guidebook that I use most often for day hikes; and in a lot of cases I find this map more useful than the AMC map series. For example, the colors are much more clear, and numerous scenic points are marked, although water sources are not.

This is great story about a boy in the old days of stagecoach travel in the 1830's in New Hampshire. Daniel Drew an orphan boy ends up working at a Deptford Tavern called the Fox and Stars, and the reader is treated to rich descriptions of what life was like back then before the automobile. Trouble stirs and Dan is involved in a hunt for an evil troop of highwaymen. This book is deep in adventure and I find it amazing that it is out of print. It is one of the best children's books I have ever read.

Great book for any college sports fan, ice hockey or not.

A "must have" for any Hockey fan especially UNH or Hockey East fans.

This book has photos of around 350 wildflowers with a paragraph describing the pertinent details of each. They are arranged by color and are very easy to use. If you are looking for help separating extremely similar species, or want range maps, this is not the book for you, but for putting a name to the flower you just found it is excellent.

Early in the history of this country a few hardy souls set out to establish a town they could call their own. Windsor, CT was first surveyed and then platted to show ownership, and thereby a vested interest in making a "stopping place", their home. The maps included in Volume I give a detailed view of where one family lived in relation to another. Volume II goes into great detail--more than 900 pages, outlining the relationship of one family to another. This volume provides great genealogical information for the more than 200 families who lived, married, and raised families who have since spread throughout the United States. The descendants have since populated many parts of the country and can trace their ancestory back to "The History of Ancient Windsor Connecticut."

This makes a great source of information for those who have an ancestor named in these volumes.

I love reading these type books and hearing these stories, but "The Terrible Hours" was difficult to get thru and was more of a tribute to Swede Momson than the actual rescue of this doomed submarine. I found myself skimming thru pages of technical mumbo jumbo about Momson's experiments in order to read about the actual rescue itself.

And the lack of a few diagrams of the interior and exterior of the Squalus, made the book all the more difficult to really understand and grasp the entire story.

I have been a (US Navy qualified) diver since 1958. Momsen has been a household name for years but I had never heard his story. This book filled that gap. Great story, well told.

I suspect most anyone would find this a good read but divers will find it facinating.

The story if Charles "Swede" Momsen is another one of those that few people know of, but should. This book is really more about the life of Momsen and not just the rescue of the Squalus. Though it was one of the crowning achievments of his extraordinary life, and perhaps his proudest moment, the rescue of the Squalus started well over a decade before the ship was even built. Momsens tenacity in developing diving, and submarine rescue devices for years before the sinking is what made the rescue possible at all. The Terrible Hours does an excellent job at informing you of the history of the development of the tools and techniques that were used by Momsen and his crew to rescue the 33 survivors of the doomed (without Momsen) sub.

Not given near the coverage of Squalus rescue, but propbably an achievment that saved much more than 33 lives, was Momsen's work on torpedo exploders and submarine attack techniques that had to have saved hundreds or thousands of American lives in WWII.

The book is an excellent read and I highly recommended to fans of submarines, diving, and rescue. If those things don't interest you, the humanity of the story will.

May 22, 1939, merely a few months before Germany invaded Poland and the world decried the clarions of war, a submarine named Squalus (pronounced `skwaylus') sunk onto the Atlantic floor during a test dive with 58 crew members on board. 33 people survived and waited in darkness and silence, save for the hammering of morse code to let whoever might be on the surface know that they are alive. Peter Maas tells the story of these terrible hours as only a master storyteller can with such great wielding of the language that everything seems to come alive, the people, the vessels, the ocean. Even the cantankerous pontoons make the central character of the story Charles "Swede" Momsen look like Ahab.

If you think of the ratio between the length of the submarine and the depth of Ocean it sunk under was like walking in the swimming pool with water coming up to your chest. But if humans had left the submarine, it would look like ants trying to crawl up from your toes. Humans aren't nearly as lucky as ants in such circumstance due to the nature of our respiratory systems, as well as the chemicals that sustain are being. They all go haywire, so we learn from Maas, and most likely die. Unless we have help from people like Momsen and live.

I picked up Maas' book primarily because the awe and respect it kept mentioning toward a single person, Momsen, in its back cover (how's that for judging the book? ;) and of course because of all the favorable reviews in Amazon on its behalf. Being a student of people I wanted to know more about Momsen and I was not disappointed with his character and everything he did so well: He saved lives. He saved lives while constantly fighting off bureaucratic intransigence. He is one of those few people you meet in life who seem to do well anything they work on; one of those few people you can depend on. These people are not without failure but with abundant perseverance: Learning to overcome failure with an open mind and science, which opens the mind--success awaits to achieve whatever goal. This has been the main theme of all great people of the past, present, and the future.

To have a little bit more appreciation for Momsen's work, I learned that Germany lost 1000 lives (peace and war time combined) in submarines since 1774. In contrast, the United States lost 75 sailors. After having read Maas' book I can safely say this is largely due to Momsen because the number one reason for submarine accidents is due to poor design. Incidentally Squalus's sinking was precisely due to the design of levers and their placement. The very nature of this problem is not far off from modern software problems with poor GUI design. And Momsen's single greatest reason for success was testing, testing, and more testing.

You may ask why I related Momsen to Franklin in my title. Because aside from the scientific, military, political acumen this great man had, he even fixed the Navy's postal service.

This is the story of the rescue of The Squallus in 1939, near NH. I of course have heard of the Squallus, and though I worked at Bupers for almost 10 year, I had never heard of "Swede" Momsen, who headed up the rescue. This is compelling reading. My Aunt felt this book was better than the "Perfect Storm" (At least the ending was happier). This is very compelling reading.

I didn't expect to buy this book. I hadn't heard about it. I wasn't even familiar with the author. But after just a quick scan of the first chapter, I was fully engrossed in the story of Christopher Hogwood. I couldn't put it down. The author skillfully integrates personal details of her own life into the story which no good animal story would be without. It is listed as a "biography, non-fiction" book so if you are looking for specific information on pigs, this probably isn't the right reference book for you. This is the story not so much of a very lucky pig who was saved/adopted by a human couple but more the story of several lucky human beings who were inspired/enlightened/befriended by one very talented pig. Anyone who has been around pigs can test to their intelligence and Chris is no exception..yet his particular talent seems to be his ability to bring out the best in any human who meets him. An entertaining quick read..perfect for a longer plane ride or a rainy day on the couch!

The author being a self-described "naturalist," I thought this book would have some sort of insight into the nature of pigs. Nope. Mostly a lot of boring, self-indulgent tripe about how the author and her husband overfed this runt pig, whom they named Christopher Hogwood (how cute! -- NOT!), and Hogwood grew into something Montgomery calls "beautiful" but would more appropriately be called "grotesque." (She even admits letting him eat ice cream until he can barely move and becomes overweight). The author is what she calls "child free" (which one can fully support) but fails to see how her many animals are in fact substitute children. In one stunningly ignorant passage, she claims that the pig Hogwood is an "adult" and therefore her relationship to him is not one of adult to child. Hullo? It's a PIG for cryin' out loud. You can't converse with it, plan an event with it and (yes, just like a baby) you have to make sure all its poop is cleaned up and that it's taken care of.

I lost count of the boring passages in the book about how Hogwood made the author closer to her neighbors and taught her how to "play with children" (gag). If you enjoy that type of sentimental fluff, this book is for you. Personally, I was very sad at the end. Not because Hogwood died, but at the waste of perfectly good meat! (they buried him...sob!)

This book was given to me by a friend as a birthday present.
She gave it to me because I have a pig as a pet and she knew that I could probably relate to it.

She was right. The Good, Good Pig is a very touching story. It made me laugh and it made me cry.

My only criticism would be that Sy Montgomery got a little lenghthy on some explanations but I would still recommend this story to anyone who is an animal lover or especially to anyone who has a pig.

I love my pig. My pig is a pot bellied pig. She is such a character. She inspired me to write my own story. Unlike Sy Montgomerys story, my book is fiction. A children's picture book entitled "Bubbles the Little Pig."

Since becoming a pet pig owner, pigs have become very near and dear to me. They will always have a special place in my heart.

this book was an easy read with lots of laughing throughout. I enjoyed the information peppered throughout as well from Sy's background information and experiences as well as the associations her premise for the book was. I disagree that the pig was 'nothing special' as some poor reviews stated because it wasn't really about the pig but rather about the pig as part of a larger phenomenon.

This book was an absolutely disappointing read and it took everything I had to keep going in hopes that something would improve. The characters were never developed nor was the writing very descriptive. The author could have written everything she wanted to say in one or two pages. This might be somewhat interesting to a reader who never raised farm animals that escaped periodically or never had neighborhood kids come by to visit them, but for those readers who have grown up in the country around animals, this book is review of the ordinary. The author is far too self-aggrandizing and proud of herself for her chosen lifestyle, which is actually not that unusual or extraordinary. What I found particularly frustrating about this read was the author's blindness to the fact that Chris, though he is a pig, is just a beloved pet like your dog or my donkey. He is not extraordinary, nor was his life. It reminded me of parents who gloat about their child as though s/he is actually better than everyone else's child. I personally am very contrite and apologetic when my donkey escapes; I do not think it is cute at all, nor do the police. I was really hoping for a book with some insight or humor, but found neither here.

I can only conclude after finishing `Affliction' that Russell Banks is our greatest American author. Those were my feelings after reading this for the first time, but after my second time through the book my feelings are confirmed. I remember reading `The Sweet Hereafter' (probably Banks' finest novel) and feeling this overwhelming connection to the material, the characters and the author himself, but `Affliction' takes you even deeper into Banks' soul and offers a disturbing glimpse into the haunting reality of abuse, neglect and dire frustration.

`Affliction' tells the story of Wade Whitehouse; narrated by Wade's younger, more educated brother Rolfe. The Whitehouse family was one of violence and pain, of dread and tears, yelling and screaming and this environment molded Wade into the man he now stands to be. Wade is a broken man, wearing his anguish on his worn face. He has suffered at the hands of an abusive father, a frail mother, a childish wife and now a confused daughter. He struggles to remain stable in a town he loathes around people he doesn't understand and amidst a face that is growing all too familiar. Wade is becoming a man he vowed never to become; but fact remains that he has been this man all along.

The novel's main focal point of action has to do with the accidental (or is it) hunting death of Evan Twombley. When Wade begins to dissect the events surrounding this death he concocts a story in his head he presumes fact and begins to act on his story, alienating him from the rest of the town.

Of course `Affliction' is not a story about a hunting accident; it is a story about the deterioration (the gradual deterioration) of a single mans sanity. `Affliction' follows Whitehouse as he slips further under the covers of frustration and desperation; whether he's fighting for custody of his daughter or trying to uncover what he suspects is murder. Wade is obviously a troubled man, there is no denying that fact, but `Affliction' doesn't just merely tell us his troubles but it fleshes them out, making them real and honest and in the end making them our problems. When we begin to understand Wade's childhood, his pain and suffering and confusion, then we begin to understand his adulthood. We begin to sympathize with Wade and grieve for him.

One reviewer stated that none of the male characters are likable here, but I disagree. Wade is a tormented man who has no one to support him. His father is an abusive wreck; his sister is a religious fanatic who believes that Wade is going strait to Hades; his brother is a reclusive outsider who has pretty much shut him off and takes minimal interest in his life; his ex-wife is harsh and judgmental; his daughter is conditioned and confused; his boss is hardheaded and manipulative. Wade has no one, and this leaves him to wallow in his own misery and thus formulate the violence that corrupts his soul. In fact, the only person in Wade's life that seems to care is Margie Fogg, his girlfriend, but she could never, nor would ever want to, understand all that makes Wade who he is.

`Affliction', much like `The Sweet Hereafter', is a very slowly paced novel. This could turn away some, but that would be unfortunate. What I admire about Banks' writing style is that he uses the effortlessly graceful flow of his words to create a false sense of serenity. His words are beautifully strung together to lead you along as the story unfolds. He brings you into these characters, into their lives, and makes you a part of them. You feel each and every emotion expressed and welcome each and every sequence with open arms. Russell Banks is a flawless writer, an author who knows full well how to work with words. The story as a whole is heartbreaking and at times even frustrating (I found myself anxious, irritated and even angry in parts; which is a true testament to the flawless writing, having the ability to bring the reader that many emotional connectives) but Banks flow is peaceful and inviting.

A stirring and strange tale that turns a philosophial microscope on a troubled man waging battle against his community, his self and his painful past.

This book is spellbinding in its story but also in its character description. It is another father beats son story but its OK because Banks handles the material with such skill and the story is about so much else as well. It is set in northern New Hampshire and the cold, snowy scenery comes alive along with the deer hunters and town folk going no where.

Russell Banks has crafted a strong story about the effects of alcoholism on children. The story follows Wade, a divorced father of a single pre-teen daughter. The mother, however - his high school sweetheart, whom he had married, and divorced, on two separate occasions - has custody and has since moved to another town; Wade only gets to see her once a month, and on Halloween. Wade goes about his life as the local policeman all the while longing for the good old days, and wondering what could have been, and how he can get them back. Eventually, he hatches a scheme, and talks to a lawyer. Slowly, events unfold which shape the future in different ways: a funeral which brings the family together again; the accidental death of a visiting hunter, which Wade thinks is suspicious; a looming marriage which threatens to bring back his old ways; etc. Through everything, the reader is getting a look into Wade's past, the abuse he and his brothers and sister suffered at the hands of their father, and how eerily close Wade seemed to be getting to following in his own father's footsteps.

Affliction is a very strong look at alcoholism and behavioral similarities through generations - the effects which are transmitted from father to son without even realizing it. We do as we have had done to us, not what we wish would have been done to us, or so it seems. The relationship between Wade and his family is clearly defined, and the interactions between them are always revealing, especially when his sister and family comes back for the funeral. The family interaction is some of the best I've read.

There are little trouble points: the novel is long, and several chapters feel unnecessarily slow; the point of view the story is told from (Wade's brother) is awkward at points, especially when he has to explain how he knows things about the story he's telling - it would have been easier just to tell it from a third person point of view; and then ending a little unresolved - I don't know why, but I wanted a little more resolution.

Overall, though, Affliction is still a powerful look at family life and the long-term effects of poor parenting. It's a vicious cycle, but Banks would have us believe there is some hope, as the story is told from the point of view of a brother who continually asks why Wade had to be the failure in the family rather than him. Why had he been able to break the cycle? Why wasn't he in Wade's position, or Wade in his?

The novel offers no clear answers.

Matty J

This is a tough book. It is the last years of a family that has lived in the miseries of violence and addiction. These are always complicated sooner or later by poverty and loss of soul. The very landscape has been beaten up and bought up and drilled to make it little more than a ghost of nature. Twisted and tortuous is the path of the lives and the land. The buildings are erected similarly, no beauty and not much comfort. The people who have the money are not at all nice to the ones who haven't. Corruption, exploitation and every now and then somebody gets brave enough to take off. Wade, our everyman, has a friend who made it, and he wonders after a certain amount of booze, on certain nights, if he might be able to do the same. But he knows he won't. This is a land of trailer parks perched on concrete slabs, where people fight and love in bars, with half working neon signs casting eery shadows over treacherous, icy roads.
Wade Whitehouse is a large man, with strength, sex appeal and a wound racing through him like the Mississippi and all its tributaries. His tale is told through his brother, the questionable survivor, who went to college, got out, has a career, and isn't a blackout drunk. There is the sister turned evangelical Christian, with her own frightening, crazy children. There are the ghosts of the two other brothers, dead together in some offensive in Nam. They too, haunt the bizarre story, a mystery, a murder, and the climax of a legacy.
My friends in Maine were simply out of their minds over Banks, and out of respect from these Chicagoan, Wisconsin transplants whose art awakenings I had shared, I entered into these readings seriously. While I recognize the brilliance, it just isn't my geography, just as I suppose I miss so much in Southern writers, but somehow, I can relate more, I feel, to the Welty's and Faulkners and Flannery O'Connors and so many others.
The symbolism is intense. A mother who is frozen to death and the nagging, break-through pain of a long-decayed tooth. Throbbing, heart breaking and cold.
Check it out, everyone should sample Banks. He is most assuredly, we are told, Wade with a miracle. His talent is indeed miraculous, I just don't worship there.

I loved this book the first time I read it to my three year old son. It is a quality story and the language is wonderful.

It is one we purchased in hardcover because I wanted it to be more durable since we read it several times per week.

This is a wonderful book about earlier and simpler days when a family wasted nothing and supported themselves off the land. Each member of the family contributes and their activities change as the seasons do. It's wonderful!

This is one of my family's all-time favorite children's books, with lovely, quiet pictures and a calm tone in the text. We love the feeling of the "circle of seasons" that it gives, as well as a glimpse back into a simpler era. The story also portrays the ethic of working hard and being rewarded for it. I read it to all five of our children as they were growing up. This Christmas I bought it for our 23 year-old daughter, who had asked for it. She doesn't have children yet; she just loves the book and wanted it for her own library. I was pleased to see Donald Hall's poem, "Ox-Cart Man"-- almost identical to the words in the children's book-- in Garrison Keillor's book called Good Poems, an anthology of poems he selected and arranged.

Gave this account of a year in the life of a farm family to my 2-1/2 year old grandson. Worked, because the first time he asked his father to "read it again." Appealed to me, since it shows a natural cycle of growing/making things, selling them, and starting over. We may not operate quite this way, but it may still provide understanding of the world to a youngster. Appealing pictures, peaceful telling - perhaps the most "exciting" event is the farmer kissing his ox good-bye at market. Maybe a good bedtime story.

This picture book superbly illustrated by Barbara Cooney is 37 pages, of which 22 are illustrations with or without text. The text is provided by Donald Hall and teaches the law of the harvest by showing how a New Englander filled a cart with surplus harvest and handmade items to sell at Portsmouth market, which was a ten-day journey. The reader learns that in March the maples were tapped for their syrup and that in April the sheep were sheared. Their fields and gardens yielded potatoes, turnips, and cabbages, while their orchard gave apples. All these things were put into the ox-cart and taken to market. At market, everything was sold including the cart and the ox.

Then the New Englander went shopping for manufactured goods, some imported from England, as well as for sweets. Carrying everything in a newly-purchased kettle tied to a pole slung over his shoulder, he trekked back to his farm. The family received their practical gifts and went right to work with their new tools by sewing, whittling, cooking, stitching, carving, sawing, splitting, weaving, embroidering, tapping, shearing, and knitting all of winter. When Spring arrived, they planted their fields. By caring for their tools and fields with diligence, the result will no doubt be another bountiful harvest.

Elizabeth Marshall Thomas is not only a genius; she IS the original animal whisperer! An Animal Shaman! Marshall Thomas has taken the reader deep into the minds of the canine companion and showed the reader very openly their emotional relationships with their family counterparts. Marshall Thomas proves there is no divide among species by using her brilliantly insightful observations of our companion friends detailing the secret of their order based on her own interactions and in depth study of her wonderful family---A very large family which includes a cast of character canines who just so happen to love to share a lick at an ice cream cone with the Patriarch of the family. On the humorous side, one gets the sense of a virtual animal soap opera as we read about Marshall Thomas' canines... some of who lost loves, gained friends, were refused entry into the mature girl (dog) clique and who rightfully pouted from a bruised ego over a bowl of popcorn. This part alone will teach the reader to weigh their words and actions when dealing with their companion animals. You will never look at your pet the same way again after reading this delightful book. More importantly, this book will definitely help you to not only better understand your furry friend, but allow them to PROPERLY train YOU! If you want Elizabeth Marshall Thomas to read it to you, try the audio book, too. SUPERB!

Brilliantly insightful and full of wisdom.
Elizabeth Marshall Thomas is the Jane Goodall of dogs.

This is one woman's story of living with (besides her family) a houseful of canines, cats, and other assorted critters and how they managed to co-exist peacefully (most of the time). Basically, it is a series of revealing anecdotes and stories, most of them heartwarming, a few heartbreaking or even astonishing (including two very different accounts of encounters with large wild cats). As with Lorenz's MAN MEETS DOG or Masson's DOGS NEVER LIE ABOUT LOVE, read this for the stories and not the science.

I never thouht I would like a book on dogs but Elizabeth Marshall Thomas is a good writer, a careful observer with intelligent unique views that are entertaining and sometimes heartwarming.

The book centers primarily around Thomas' home, full of dogs, cats, a parrot and macaws, and an amazingly tolerant husband. Her primary method is that of an anthropologist, observing and interpreting her own animals. Whereas some in the scientific community would have problems with her method, we must remember that the great child psychologist, Jean Piaget, developed his theories of child development by carefully watching his own children.

She challenges the scientific dogma against anthropomorphism. This is an interesting argument. Thomas argues that as human beings we interpret through a subjective perspective even though we strive for objectivity. She seems to argue for the need to increase our everyday lived understanding of animals, not obtain perfect scientific understanding of animals. There is a difference.

For anyone considering buying a parrot or other large exotic bird, the chapter on parrots should be required reading. I never realized all the problems and complications of owning a large bird.

Thomas' three most controversial essays in the book involve her belief that most dogs are "slaves"; her stand against euthanasia; and her belief that male dogs should be given a vasectomy rather than castration.

My dog, Jasmine, is in love with the boy dog next door, Walter. Every time we let her out she runs to see if Walter is home and she loves to play with him inside his backyard. When I bring her back home she seems heartbroken, like a teenager in love. I always think of Thomas' assertion that we control our dogs and don't allow them to bond and remain with the other dogs with whom they have fallen in love. (I am a victim of anthropomorphism as you can tell). It makes me sad to think that we deprive dogs of loving relationships with each other to meet our needs.

Another controversial essay is on euthanasia. She tells the story of an aged and sick dog that she euthanized. Later she greatly regrets her actions and comes to the conclusion that if an animal can still eat food they should not be euthanized. I am still not convinced. I think she makes a strong argument that when an animal is in too much pain and agony they will stop eating and naturally die, but the thought of an animal in constant agony is greatly disturbing to me and therefore I am not totally convinced by her concepts.

Her argument that male dogs should be given a vasectomy rather than castration was fascinating. She argues that vasectomy allows the male dog to have adequate testosterone in the bloodstream to allow the dog to adequately compete with other males and to be treated with respect by female and male dogs. I never realized that castration changes the smell of their urine and leaves other dogs perplexed as to the gender of the castrated male. However we also have to remember that humans have dogs castrated to stop aggressive fighting, excessive marking with their urine, neighborhood roaming, and mounting behaviors on other dogs. Vasectomy makes them infertile but does not change any of the male dog behavior patterns.

Finally, I found her essay on the development of dogs from wolves to be very interesting, especially her idea that we can still observe the early man-dog social patterns in remote rural third world villages. In these villages, dogs live on the border/boundaries of the village. They alert the village to intruders. They sometimes accompany a hunt for a large animal. They survive by eating scraps and human feces (which contains undigested protein). This is certainly far from the lives of dogs in the United States with the exceptions of wild or runaway dogs which must revert to these patterns just to survive.

The book is short and can be finished on a plane ride. It is thoughtful entertainment - the best kind.

This is not a book to buy if you want to train a puppy or work out a behavior problem, however, for insights into animal behavior written by an anthropologist, using her training on some of the other sentient species around us, this is a wonderful book. This one is much more "light" and anecdotal than her famous "The Hidden Lives of Dogs". She describes the household full of pets (that is to say, "companion animals") she and her husband live with, from a trained scientistific point of view. All of the behaviors, the jockeying for position in the group, the alpha dog position, pack leader and so on, are explained, and how they got that way, over several years and as the cast of characters changes as different animals come and some go (due to death). Much of it, due to her writing style, is very humorous, some is laugh out loud funny. Some is touching and sad. Thoroughly enjoyable.
The dog Sundog, a major character whom I would have loved to have met, was a throwaway stray, who became the alpha dog in their home. A calm, intelligent leader, who was almost psychic when it comes to his chosen pack leader, Thomas' husband Steve, as several anecdotes show.
Really a good book for any animal lover, or for those whom you wish to try to convince that animals, dogs especially, are more than a bundle of pavlovian responses to the food bowl!