Akron Public Library

"Paul Monette's autobiography - Becoming a Man: Half a Life Story, a searingly honest account of growing up gay in America - won the 1992 National Book Award for Nonfiction. In the year and a half since, even as he battles full-blown AIDS, he has been writing essays on a variety of subjects. A portrait of his dog, as they endure together the losses of friends and then the ravages of the author's own illness. An atheist's appreciation of the saintliness...

The best-selling author and Emmy Award-winning writer and producer hilariously destroys the cultural myths and impossible expectations of modern-day motherhood and explores the humiliations, poignancies, and possibilities of midlife.

From acclaimed author Ursula K. Le Guin, a collection of thoughts—always adroit, often acerbic—on aging, belief, the state of literature, and the state of the nation.
Ursula K. Le Guin on the absurdity of denying your age: "If I'm ninety and believe I'm forty-five, I'm headed for a very bad time trying to get out of the bathtub."
On cultural perceptions of fantasy: "The direction of escape is toward freedom. So...

First published in 1969 and out of print for more than twenty-five years, The Long-Legged House was Wendell Berry's first collection of essays, the inaugural work introducing many of the central issues that have occupied him over the course of his career. Three essays at the heart of this volume-"The Rise," "The Long-Legged House," and "A Native Hill"--Are essays of homecoming and memoir, as the writer finds his home place, his native ground, his...

Changing the world means changing the story, the names, and the language with which we describe it. Calling things by their true names cuts through the lies that excuse, disguise, avoid, or encourage inaction, indifference, obliviousness in the face of injustice and violence. In this powerful and wide-ranging collection, Solnit turns her attention to battles over meaning, place, language, and belonging at the heart of the defining crises of our time....

A collection that includes seven essays and two pieces of short fiction and captures both the small moments of daily existence and times when life and death hang in the balance, including the title work about a searing journey through India.

Isaac Fitzgerald has lived many lives. He's been an altar boy, a bartender, a fat kid, a smuggler, a biker, a prince of New England. But before all that, he was a bomb that exploded his parents' lives--or so he was told. In Dirtbag, Massachusetts, Fitzgerald, with warmth and humor, recounts his ongoing search for forgiveness, a more far-reaching vision of masculinity, and a more expansive definition of family and self. Fitzgerald's memoir-in-essays...

From the wind-swept, snowy ranges of Wyoming to Florida beaches glowing with Christmas lights, All American Christmas traces holiday traditions across the United States. In this beautiful personal keepsake, Rachel Campos-Duffy and Sean Duffy present a dazzling collection of emotional stories, treasured family photographs, and homegrown Christmas recipes from some of Fox News’ most beloved personalities. Dana Perino takes readers out west to the...

"A Lowcountry Heart: Reflections on a Writing Life by Pat Conroy is a new nonfiction collection of letters, interviews, and magazine articles spanning Conroy's long literary career, supplemented by touching pieces from the beloved author's many friends. A Lowcountry Heart collects some of Conroy's most charming pieces of short nonfiction, many of them addressed directly to his readers with his habitual greeting, "Hey, Out There." Ranging across diverse...