The backyard beekeeper : an absolute beginner's guide to keeping bees in your yard and garden

 by Kim Flottum. The Backyard Beekeeper , now revised and expanded, makes the time-honored and complex tradition of beekeeping an enjoyable and accessible backyard pastime that will appeal to gardeners, crafters, and cooks everywhere. This expanded edition gives you even more information on "greening" your beekeeping with sustainable practices, pesticide-resistant bees, and urban and suburban beekeeping. More than a guide to beekeeping, it is a handbook for harvesting the products of a beehive and a honey cookbook--all in one lively, beautifully illustrated reference. This complete honey bee resource contains general information on bees; a how-to guide to the art of bee keeping and how to set up, care for, and harvest honey from your own colonies; as well as tons of bee-related facts and projects. You'll learn the best place to locate your new bee colonies for their safety and yours, and you'll study the best organic and nontoxic ways to care for your bees, from providing fresh water and protection from the elements to keeping them healthy, happy, and productive. Recipes of delicious treats, and instructions on how to use honey and beeswax to make candles and beauty treatments are also included. --Summary (Check Catalog)

Threading the needle

 by Marie Bostwick. In alternating chapters that deftly move the story along, Madelyn and Tessa narrate Bostwick's fourth series entry (after A Thread So Thin). Tessa and Madelyn formed an affinity as young girls, but circumstances and time eventually destroyed their bond. Years later they find themselves living in the same small Connecticut town. Madelyn is now disgraced and broke after her husband went to prison for serious financial shenanigans. Tessa and her husband, Lee, struggle with their own financial challenges, including Tessa's herbal shop. Not unexpectedly, the two old friends end up in the same quilting class. Bostwick nicely incorporates characters from the previous novels into this story, and readers who haven't read the previous titles won't be confused. There is a lot here about female friendships, marriage, mistakes, choices, regrets, and forgiveness, but these all fit together nicely as Madelyn and Tessa rediscover the value of their relationship. VERDICT Bostwick's series continues to introduce interesting characters and compelling stories that show an appreciation for female friendship as well as a love for the art of quilting. Readers who have exhausted Jennifer Chiaverini's "Elm Creek Quilt" novels or Clare O'Donohue's "Someday Quilt" mysteries will definitely enjoy Bostwick. --Library Journal (Check Catalog)

Reasonable doubt : the fashion writer, Cape Cod, and the trial of Chris McCowen

 by Peter Manso. In a case that raises questions of racial bias, corruption, and incompetence in the justice system, Manso gives a searing dissection of the 2002 stabbing death of wealthy Cape Cod resident Christa Worthington and the ensuing trial, which Manso (Mailer) convincingly shows was tainted from the start. Early suspicion focused on several local men, including the married father of Worthington's child. But reaching an impasse, DA Michael O'Keefe ordered a legally questionable DNA sweep of men in the area. This led to Christopher McCowen, a black garbage collector with an IQ of 78 who admitted having consensual sex with the white Worthington days before the murder. After a lengthy interrogation, McCowen "confessed" and was tried for rape and murder in 2005. Despite evidence pointing to other men, the untaped confession, and the shaky DNA match, the jury found McCowen guilty. Appeals based on racial bias and prosecutorial misconduct have so far failed. Manso lays out up front which side he is on (and that he himself became a target of the DA), but he skillfully crafts trial transcripts into a gripping narrative of a system that denied justice to both Worthington and McCowen.  --Publishers Weekly (Check Catalog)

Dandelion summer

 by Lisa Wingate. Wingate (Summer Kitchen) roots her tender tale in hope, redemption, and family by following two engaging characters in her latest entry to the Texas-based Blue Sky Hill series. Following the death of his wife, retiree J. Norman Alvord has shut himself off in his big home on the hill. Norman's only daughter thinks a nursing home is best, but Norman, who was on the scientific team involved with the first moon landing, considers himself independent, even virile. So a housekeeper is hired, and offers her mixed-race teenage daughter, Epiphany Jones, as an after-school cook. The friendship that Epiphany and Norman form begins a new chapter for both of them. Wingate's tale, unfolding alternatingly from Norman's and Epiphany's points of view, uncovers a mysterious memory from Norman's youth that eventually reveals siblings that he never knew about. Epiphany finds a mentor in Norman; in turn, she helps him understand the importance of family. Wingate effectively draws us into Norman's mystery, giving voice to elders who wish to be treated as adults as their own kin treat them like children. The early era of space explorationserves as an exciting backdrop to the kitchen sink drama. --Library Journal (Check Catalog)

Stealing Rembrandts : the untold stories of notorious art heists

 by Anthony M. Amore. From How To Steal a Million to The Thomas Crown Affair, film audiences have been fascinated by the romance of brilliant art heists. But the reality is somewhat different. Amore was hired as security director by the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston 15 years after several Rembrandts had been stolen from it and immediately set about to become an expert on art thefts and on Rembrandt, whose works are stolen at an astonishingly high rate. In this book, he and journalist Mashberg generously share their research, tracing a number of Rembrandt heists, both elegant and slapdash, and revealing how the thieves were captured and the works recovered (or not). Interviews with criminals and insights from dedicated law-enforcement personnel draw the reader into this rarified world. In addition, the authors provide history on Rembrandt and his world and on the stolen works themselves. VERDICT Art history buffs and fans of the classic caper alike will enjoy this look at the great artist and those who would possess him. --Library Journal (Check Catalog)

State of wonder

 by Ann Patchett. Marina Singh gave up a career as a doctor after botching an emergency delivery as an intern, opting instead for the more orderly world of research for a pharmaceutical company. When office colleague Anders Eckman, sent to the Amazon to check on the work of a field team, is reported dead, Marina is asked by her company's CEO to complete Anders' task and to locate his body. What Marina finds in the sweltering, insect-infested jungles of the Amazon shakes her to her core. For the team is headed by esteemed scientist Annick Swenson, the woman who oversaw Marina's residency and who is now intent on keeping the team's progress on a miracle drug completely under wraps. Marina's jungle odyssey includes exotic encounters with cannibals and snakes, a knotty ethical dilemma about the basic tenets of scientific research, and joyous interactions with the exuberant people of the Lakashi tribe, who live on the compound. In fluid and remarkably atmospheric prose, Patchett captures not only the sights and sounds of the chaotic jungle environment but also the struggle and sacrifice of dedicated scientists. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: The award-winning, New York Times best-selling author's latest novel is being supported with an author tour, a national advertising campaign, blogger outreach, and a reading-group guide. --Booklist (Check Catalog)

Ten discoveries that rewrote history

 by Patrick Hunt. An outgrowth of decades of travel and research by Hunt (classics, Stanford Univ.; Alpine Archaeology) and a popular class he teaches, this book allots one chapter to each of ten key discoveries: the Rosetta stone, Troy, the Assyrian Library at Nineveh, Tutankhamen's Tomb, Machu Picchu, Pompeii, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Akrotiri on Thera, the Olduvai Gorge, and the Tomb of 10,000 Warriors. These discoveries are examined "in the context of the evolving discipline of archaeology since the eighteenth century." Hunt writes colorfully and enthusiastically about each discovery and the importance of material finds, not texts alone, in reconstructing history. He gives full credit to archaeologists-great names such as Ninevah's Layard, King Tut's Carter, the Leakeys of Olduvai Gorge, and even Troy's much-maligned Heinrich Schliemann-for their unique accomplishments. The bibliography includes sources for each chapter, but footnotes would have benefited readers amid the broad sweep of time and space covered. Scholars will undoubtedly disagree over the relative importance of these discoveries and whether some should have been selected at all, but for lay readers and beginning students in archaeology and ancient history, this book will serve as an enjoyable, wide-ranging introduction to the importance of archaeology in writing-or rewriting-history. --Library Journal (Check Catalog)

Iron house

 by John Hart. *Starred Review* It isn't as if Hart's career needed jump-starting. His first three stand-alone thrillers have been greeted by an ever-growing crescendo of praise, including two Edgar Awards. Definitely not the kind of writer who needs a breakthrough book. And, yet, Iron House lifts Hart to an altogether new level of excellence. Its premise is reminiscent of the author's second book, Down River (2007) North Carolina man returns home after years in New York to settle scores but here the stakes are so much higher. Brothers Michael and Julian spent the formative years of their childhood in a Dickensian orphanage in North Carolina called Iron House; the experience made Michael strong and Julian weak, utterly dependent on his brother, but that all changes in a moment: suddenly Michael is on the run, and Julian is adopted by a wealthy woman. In New York, Michael becomes a stone-cold Mob hit man; Julian, on the other hand, turns his nightmares into best-selling children's books but remains haunted by demons. The brothers' lives come together when Mob rivals threaten to use Julian to get to Michael. The present-time plot disaffected Mob hit man on the run, trying to carve a new life without endangering those he loves makes a superb thriller on its own (steadily building tension, magnificently choreographed fight scenes, including a High Noon-like finale), but it's what Hart does with the backstory that gives the novel its beyond-genre depth. Like the great Peter Høeg in Borderliners (1994), Hart uses the familiar story of mistreatment in an orphanage as a way into the inner lives of his characters, and the blind fear, abject confusion, and yearning for love he finds there are both heartbreaking and curiously hopeful, in an almost postapocalyptic way. An unforgettable novel from a master of popular fiction. --Booklist (Check Catalog)

The sun's heartbeat : and other stories from the life of the star that powers our planet

 by Bob Berman.  A veteran author of popular astronomy books presents the flaming orb above us to readers aware it's there but knowing little else about it. Whether the topic is the distance between earth and sun, sunspots, sunburn, or solar eclipses, Berman couches scientific data in stories that are sometimes historical, sometimes journalistic, and always include wisecracks. His method banishes blithe indifference toward the sun, replacing it with appreciation for the nearest star's profound influence on terrestrial phenomena, from radiating the energy that powers life to possibly extinguishing it some billion years hence. Besides playing up health reasons for learning about the sun, such as its role in skin cancer, Berman highlights solar physics that affect modern civilization; for instance, magnetic storms can disrupt electricity grids, and the sunspot cycle influences climate. Readers remaining blase should finally be converted when Berman extols the sun's aesthetic effects most spectacular of them, the total solar eclipse, rivaled, perhaps, by the northern lights, with rainbows as second bananas. An engaging consciousness-raiser that entertains as it informs about our neighborhood nuclear furnace. --Booklist (Check Catalog)

Emus loose in Egnar : big stories from small towns

 by Judy Muller. Unlike in larger metropolitan areas, newspapers in small towns and rural America remain robust, quirky, central resources of information. With solid reporting and an engaging and humorous writing style, Emmy and Peabody Award-winning journalist Muller (communication & journalism, Univ. of Southern California; Now This: Radio, Television.and the Real World) presents perspectives from publishers and editors of weekly newspapers from small towns across America, including Norwood, CO, where she currently resides. The interviews reveal how these hardworking editors provide a voice for the community, while at the same time often dealing with the isolation and social ostracism that come with covering news about their neighbors and friends. Muller also spent time with the townspeople to find out what their paper meant to them and their community. VERDICT These accounts of small-town journalism and small-town life will delight armchair travelers and give hope to journalism students and newspaper aficionados alike. --Library Journal (Check Catalog)

Someday this will be funny

 by Lynne Tillman. We humans are the narrating animal, a fact of infinite implication that Tillman explores with wit and sagacity in her new, uncanny short-story collection. An adventurous and artistic fiction writer (American Genius, 2006) and essayist, Tillman mesmerizes us with sly characters busy assessing perplexing predicaments, luring our awareness away from language. Yet somehow she also draws our attention to the glimmering power of words as her reflective and drolly funny narrators tell their surprising, many-layered tales. One is fascinated by a pair of nesting mourning doves. Another, in a wickedly funny take on the irony of psychotherapy, declares tha. her imagination was her best feature. Tillman celebrates ambivalence and marriage i. Chartreus. and dissects inheritance i. But There's a Family Resemblance. She portrays with unique insight Clarence Thomas and Marvin Gaye in concentrated yet profoundly revealing tales, and in the rhapsodic and mischievou. Love Sentence. she considers how we talk of love. Delectably intricate and incisive, comedic and empathic, Tillman's push-and-pull stories traverse the paradoxes of body and mind and beautifully affirm the necessity and largesse of stories. --Booklist (Check Catalog)

Growing up Amish : a memoir

 by Ira Wagler. *Starred Review* Like many other memoirs, this is the record of an unhappy youth. It reports no physical or mental cruelty, however, other than a four-year-old's overly candid remark and commonplace, though still sickening, schoolyard bullying. What readers may see as cultural cruelty the doctrinaire social archaism of the Amish Wagler probably doesn't and never did. Yet he rebelled against his upbringing because he wanted to live in a wider world. As a young teenager, he and five buddies conspired to smoke and drink. When he was 16, he sneaked away from home in the night, leaving a note under his pillow. He worked on a cattle ranch for several months, then went back home.It was the first of many departures and returns, until he met a very rare person, a convert to the Amish (who as, Wagler says, have been vanishingly few) who made him confident in his Christianity, thereby enabling him not to come back but to leave permanently. Wagler grinds no axes; this is not an argumentative or polemical book. Chaste in vocabulary, limpid in exposition, masterfully but never self-importantly focused on its author's experience and reflection, it is a fine literary achievement as well as a calming reassurance that Christianity is a religion, not an institution. --Booklist (Check Catalog)

Maine : a novel

 by J. Courtney Sullivan. Sullivan's follow-up to Commencement (2009) introduces, as it did, four female characters, this time bound by the serpentine tangle of family. At the beginning of summer, three generations of Kelleher women descend on the family's beach home in Maine, as they have for half a century already. Changing point-of-view from one to another of the four protagonists, Sullivan creates deeply observed and believable, if not altogether sympathetic, characters, and as much is learned about one woman through the eyes of the three others as from her own perspective. Moody matriarch Alice, her uninvolved hippie daughter Kathleen, brown-nosing daughter-in-law Mary Ann, and newly-single, thirtysomething granddaughter Maggie each has a simmering-below-the surface inner-monologue that lights a spark, and Sullivan makes sure we can only anticipate an explosion. Sullivan gracefully meets the challenge of crafting a cast clearly pulled from the same DNA soup, without a clunk or hitch in the machinery. Expect interest from book clubs and fans of its popular predecessor. --Booklist (Check Catalog)

The story of Charlotte's Web : E. B. White's eccentric life in nature and the birth of an American classic

 by Michael Sims. Sims (Adam's Navel: A Natural and Cultural History of the Human Form), as a droll observer of the natural world and editor of the annotated edition of one of E.B. White's formative influences, Don Marquis's Archy and Mehitabel, is uniquely qualified to write what is a biography of Charlotte's Web as much as it's a biography of White. White's childhood fascination with the world's smaller denizens and his literary career, including his storied history at The New Yorker, are traced by Sims to their climax in the germination of the plot for Charlotte's Web. Like Beatrix Potter, whose children's stories about anthropomorphized animals were written a half-century before, White consciously avoided moralizing and instead attempted naturalistic faithfulness. Although his children's books were extremely successful and tourists flocked unbidden to his Maine farm each year for his birthday, he longed for solitude throughout his life and felt the greatest connection with animals; Sims successfully argues that Charlotte's Web unintentionally became a "summary of what it felt like to be E.B. White." VERDICT Scholars of children's literature as well as fans-child and grown-up alike-of either White generally or Charlotte's Web in particular will enjoy this biblio-biography. --Library Journal (Check Catalog)

Save me

 by Lisa Scottoline. Suburban mom Susan Pressman is forced to make a split-second decision after an explosion goes off in the school cafeteria in which she volunteers. Should she rescue her own daughter, Melly, trapped in the bathroom, or lead the girls standing in front of her, who constantly bully her daughter, to safety? Her choice reverberates throughout the little town of Reesburgh, Pennsylvania, as she is cast as the villain by the local news anchor, parents, and the school. While her attorney and husband construct a defense plan that includes filing a lawsuit against the school, Susan sets out to seek the truth behind this mysterious, accidental fire. With the help of a construction worker who may know the cause of the explosion as well as an incognito visit to a local factory, Susan slowly unravels the truth and along with it some hidden secrets in Reesburgh's dark past, including one horrifying buried memory of her own. At the quick pace of a thriller, Scottoline masterfully fits every detail into a tight plot chock-full of real characters, real issues, and real thrills. A story anchored by the impenetrable power of a mother's love, it begs the question, just how far would you go to save your child? --Booklist (Check Catalog)

The big fight : my life in and out of the ring

 by Sugar Ray Leonard. In this moving memoir, boxing legend Leonard tells his story of growing up as a ghetto kid whose athletic skills lifted him into a world of fame for which he was ill-prepared. Born in 1956, Ray Charles Leonard grew up near Washington, D.C., in an African-American suburb.. A shy boy, Ray was goaded by an older brother to enter the ring, where he discovered a talent for the sport. Ray's meteoric rise through the amateur ranks led to a gold medal in the 1976 Olympics. With a flashy style and a media-ready persona, "Sugar Ray" became a big draw as a pro and fought in some of the most lucrative boxing matches of his era. Leonard frames his memoir around the most important event of his career-his middleweight title fight with Marvin Hagler in 1987. Leonard hadn't fought since 1984 yet he managed to win a split decision. The true focus of the book, however, is Leonard's struggles with celebrity. He writes honestly of the many affairs he had while married, as well as his addiction to alcohol and cocaine. Few of our cultural icons look at themselves so clearly, and it's a tribute to Leonard's insightfulness that he makes his story such a gripping one. --Publishers Weekly (Check catalog)

To be sung underwater : a novel

 by Tom McNeal.  *Starred Review* Judith Whitman is deeply dissatisfied with her seemingly glamorous life in California. Her work as a film editor, which once held such joy, now gives her migraines; she suspects that her urbane husband is having an affair; and her beautiful daughter, once so loving, is now revealed as entitled and self-absorbed. Increasingly, her thoughts are drawn to the summers she lived in Nebraska with her father, specifically, the summer she fell in love with Willy Blunt. One phone call to him is all it takes for her to ditch her work and her life and head back to Nebraska. There she comes face to face with the full ramifications of her earlier decision to leave home for Stanford and lose touch with the boy with whom she had been so deeply in love. Their easy familiarity with each other, their special humor, and their physical connection instantly resurface. In this thoughtful and compelling look at the road not taken, McNeal (Goodnight, Nebraska, 1998) calls up the landscape of the Great Plains as a place where it's possible to see that it's the simple things a secluded swimming hole, a cold beer, the laughter of the person you love that are most valuable. --Booklist (Check catalog)

At the devil's table : the untold story of the insider who brought down the Cali Cartel

 by William C. Rempel. In the 1990s, Jorge Salcedo was a Colombian engineer and military reservist proud to be enlisted in an effort to assassinate Pablo Escobar, leader of the Medellin cocaine cartel. His recruiters were Cal. gentlemen. heads of Escobar's rival cocaine cartel. Salcedo admired their sense of family and their restraint, despite their unsavory business dealings. As head of security, he was only tangentially involved, at a distance that allowed him to keep his hands clean and maintain denial. But as he was drawn closer and closer to the family and its business dealings, even after Escobar's death, the Cali clan escalated its level of violence, and he could no longer deny that they were as dangerous and ruthless as Escobar. Salcedo had to find a way out and ended up working with American DEA agents to bring down the syndicate. Investigative reporter Rempel spent 10 years interviewing Salcedo (now in the U.S. witness protection program) to deliver a thrilling inside story of one man's efforts to destroy the cartel and free himself from its murderous grasp. --Booklist (Check Catalog)

The borrower : a novel

 by Rebecca Makkai. *Starred Review* Lucy, a 26-year-old children's librarian, has a favorite patron, a bright, book-loving 10-year-old named Ian. The trouble is, the boy's fundamentalist mother insists he read only books with the breath of God in them. When the parents enroll their son in a behavior-modification program designed to cure him of his nascent homosexuality, the boy runs away, and Lucy decides she must help. Borrowing the boy, Lucy takes Ian two fugitives now on the road. But who is really running away? Is it Ian or is it Lucy, replicating the experience of her emigre parents, who, years before, had run away from their Russian homeland? And is America, as a friend of Lucy's family claims, truly a nation of runaways but with no place left to run? Time (and considerable driving in Lucy's ancient car) may tell. An accomplished short story writer, Makkai has written a splendid first novel that cleverly weaves telling references to children's books into her whimsically patchwork plot. Larger-than-life characters and an element of the picaresque add to the book's delights. Best of all, however, is Lucy's absolutely unshakable faith in the power of books to save. From her lips, readers, to God's ear. --Booklist (Check Catalog)

Half the sky : turning oppression into opportunity for women worldwide

 by Nicholas D. Kristof. Despite an estimated 107 million women and girls missing in the world population due to every form of abuse, from infant neglect to honor killings, gendercide receives none of the coverage and outrage of other human-rights violations, lament these two Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists. The husband-and-wife team chronicles the horrific abuses suffered by girls and women: sold into sex slavery, abused and exploited as workers, beaten and killed to protect male honor, and generally denied education, medical attention, and food reserved for boys and men. The authors focus on sex trafficking, gender-based violence (including honor killings and mass rape), and maternal mortality. They also examine the economic forces at work that promise more opportunities, along with required education and resulting autonomy, for female workers and entrepreneurs as developing countries recognize how they waste this valuable resource. Kristof and WuDunn reinforce the truth behind the terrible statistics with passionately reported personal stories of girls and women (including photographs) and efforts to help them, including a final chapter suggesting how readers can help. --Booklist (Check Catalog)

Silver girl : a novel

 by Elin Hilderbrand. The rug is pulled out from under Meredith Martin Delinn when her husband is accused of operating a Ponzi scheme and sentenced to 150 years in prison, and she is treated as a pariah. With no home, no friends, and no money, she turns to childhood friend Connie Flute. They have not spoken for three years, yet Connie promptly picks Meredith up in Manhattan and takes her to her summer home on Nantucket. Both women have wounds to deal with. Meredith is the object not only of scorn but also of a federal investigation. Connie is coping with the death of her husband and estrangement from her daughter. Meredith's arrival gives Connie the excuse to start living again, but their once golden lives are no more, and now, once someone discovers that Meredith is staying at Connie's place, they even have to face threats and danger. Another winner from Hilderbrand (The Castaways, 2009), who in this sensitive and suspenseful tale succeeds in portraying a seemingly unlikable character, besieged Meredith, and making her human. --Booklist (Check Catalog)

Poetry 180 : a turning back to poetry

 by Billy Collins. A dazzling new anthology of 180 contemporary poems, selected and introduced by America's Poet Laureate, Billy Collins. Inspired by Billy Collins's poem-a-day program with the Library of Congress, Poetry 180 is the perfect anthology for readers who appreciate engaging, thoughtful poems that are an immediate pleasure. A 180-degree turn implies a turning back--in this case, to poetry. A collection of 180 poems by the most exciting poets at work today, Poetry 180 represents the richness and diversity of the form, and is designed to beckon readers with a selection of poems that are impossible not to love at first glance. Open the anthology to any page and discover a new poem to cherish, or savor all the poems, one at a time, to feel the full measure of contemporary poetry's vibrance and abundance. With poems by Catherine Bowman, Lucille Clifton, Billy Collins, Dana Gioia, Edward Hirsch, Galway Kinnell, Kenneth Koch, Philip Levine, Thomas Lux, William Matthews, Frances Mayes, Paul Muldoon, Naomi Shihab Nye, Sharon Olds, Katha Pollitt, Mary Jo Salter, Charles Simic, David Wojahn, Paul Zimmer, and many more. --Summary (Check Catalog)

Folly Beach

 by Dorothea Benton Frank. Frank's latest novel displays a rare talent that fans will welcome. Cate's philandering husband has died, leaving her nothing, and the entire contents of her sizable home have been repossessed. She returns to her relatives in Charleston hoping to get a grip on what has happened and on what comes next. Cate's new life with her firecracker of an aunt in the South is told primarily through hilarious and engaging dialogue with family and friends, with a smattering of seriousness along the way. The recently widowed protagonist's journey to rediscovering joy and love will thrill readers, especially with the addition of a suavely integrated story-within-a-story involving a one-woman play about the lovers who wrote Porgy and Bess. There's a certain authenticity to the lives Frank tells that will resonate with many women. Frank's telling of this tale will help readers celebrate love and sexuality after 60. --Publishers Weekly (Check catalog)

Marshalling justice : the early civil rights letters of Thurgood Marshall

 Readers for whom Marshall is best known for arguing and winning Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka in 1954 and becoming the first African-American Supreme Court Justice in 1967 will find this collection of letters written between 1935 and 1957 thoroughly illuminating. Long's introductions lend a fluidity and coherence to the book; he presents each letter with so much context that the book has elements of a biography of Marshall and a history of the civil rights movement. The letters-which span Marshall's legal career from his first major civil rights case, Murray v. Pearson, in 1936-contain a rich vein of local history as well as correspondence concerning his major cases. Nor does Marshall's major case law focus deter him from attention to media misrepresentation, racial inequities in pay, military racism, or accounts of prison abuse and the persistence of lynching. "At times," Marshall wrote in 1949, "I get a little anxious about people who have no regard whatsoever for the amount of time necessary for lawyers to prepare this involved type of litigation." These letters offer a welcome and readable inner glimpse into that laborious and complex work. --Publishers Weekly (Check catalog)