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"From the nineteenth century German immigrants who settled on a small Midwestern farm, to the proud and upright aunts and uncles with whom Sandlin spent the summers of his youth, a whole history of quiet ambition and stoic pride—of successes, failures, and above all endurance—leaps off the page in a sweeping American family epic. Touching on The Great Depression, WWII, and the American immigrant experience, The Distancers is a beautiful and stark...
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The gripping story of an epic prairie snowstorm that killed hundreds of newly arrived settlers and cast a shadow on the promise of the American frontier. January 12, 1888, began as an unseasonably warm morning across Nebraska, the Dakotas, and Minnesota, the weather so mild that children walked to school without coats and gloves. But that afternoon, without warning, the atmosphere suddenly, violently changed. One moment the air was calm; the next...
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"A searing memoir about one woman's road through heartbreak to hope following the death of her troubled brother, told through the series of cars that accompanied her. Growing up in a blue-collar family in the Midwest, Melissa Stephenson--a dreamer and budding writer born with an innate wanderlust--longed for escape, and she found in automobiles the promise of a future beyond Indiana state lines. From a lineage of secondhand family cars of the late...
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"From the New York Times bestselling author of Le Divorce, a dazzling meditation on the mysteries of the "wispy but material" family ghosts who shape us. Growing up in the small river town of Moline, Illinois, Diane Johnson always dreamed of floating down the Mississippi and off to see the world. Years later, at home in France, a French friend teases her: 'Indifference to history--that's why you Americans seem so naive and don't really know where...
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A deeply researched account of Depression-era criminals who roamed the Midwest.
John Dillinger and his compatriots' crime spree lasted a little over a year in the 1930s and left a trail of bodies in its wake. Dillinger's bank robberies, and his ability to elude both a half-dozen state police forces and the FBI, kept Americans riveted during this bleak economic period.
In this book, the author of the classic “The Rising Sun” chronicles Dillinger's...
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"In this intrepid collection of essays, Melissa Faliveno traverses the liminal spaces of her childhood in working-class Wisconsin and the paths she's traveled since, compelled by questions of girlhood and womanhood, queerness and class, and how the lands of our upbringing both define and complicate us even long after we've left."--back cover.
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Bill Cook epitomizes the American success story. His business ventures in medical devices, pharmaceuticals, genetics, real estate, retail management, and travel services have made him a billionaire. Yet, Cook continues to lead a modest life, involving himself in a variety of philanthropic activities that have included historic preservation and even a marching band. This riveting story is the first-ever biography of the entrepreneur who, working from...
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"Near the end of her life, Mina Anderson wrote a lively, intimate memoir, a piece so interesting and informative that renowned Swedish novelist Vilhelm Moberg used it to shape the central female character of his beloved emigrant novels. But Moberg's archetypical Swedish settler "Kristina" is lonely and depressed, constantly yearning for her homeland." "Mina's story was quite different." "Showcasing this previously untranslated memoir, I Go to America...
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The FBI's first "Public Enemy, " Dillinger was dubbed "The Jackrabbit" because of the way he leaped over bank cages and railings. His bank-robbing gang cut a criminal swath yet to be equaled. They became so famous in the 1930s that throngs of excited spectators would block the route to their getaway cars. When caught, Dillinger staged the most harrowing prison escapes imaginable, only to finally be betrayed by the infamous "Lady in Red." Biographer...
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"A biography of Laura Ingalls Wilder focusing on the role of Christian faith in her life"--
"The beloved Little House books by Laura Ingalls Wilder have sold over 60 million copies since their publication in the first half of the twentieth century. Even her unpolished memoir, Pioneer Girl, which tells the true story behind the children's books, was widely embraced upon its release in 2014. Despite Wilder's enduring popularity, few fans know much...
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This haunting and propulsive debut follows a journalist's years-long investigation into his father's old classmate: former high school valedictorian Paul Volkman, who once seemed destined for greatness after earning his MD and his PhD from the prestigious University of Chicago, but is now serving four consecutive life sentences at a federal prison in Arizona. Volkman was the central figure in a massive "pill mill" scheme in southern Ohio. His pain...
15) Public enemy #1
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Chronicles the life of John Dillinger, from his first youthful brush with the law to his death a decade later in a hail of bullets. It explores how, at a time of great hardship, Americans felt more admiration for a daring criminal than their seemingly ineffectual institutions of government.