Book Buzz

Looking for a good book? Ask at the Reference Desk for a suggestion or two. Whether you are a reader who likes romance, mystery, fantasy, science fiction or historical books, our librarians can assist you in finding that next great read.

NextReads Subscriber Changes

We have bad news and good news about the NextReads newsletter service you have been enjoying. The bad news is that Beebe Library’s subscription to NextReads will be cancelled as of August 30, 2008. However, the good news is if you wish to continue to receive newsletters from NextReads, you can easily subscribe to the NOBLE (North of Boston Library Exchange) version of NextReads starting September 2, 2008.

What is the difference? NOBLE is now paying for a subscription that will allow anyone in NOBLE to receive the newsletter with NOBLE’s information instead of Wakefield’s Beebe Library’s information. The titles on the newsletters will be linked to the NOBLE catalog—where you will see all the holdings—not just the Beebe Library’s items.

There is no automatic subscription—if you wish to continue receiving any of the newsletters, you must subscribe to NOBLE’s version. We are sorry for any inconvenience this may cause and hope that you have enjoyed this newsletter service and will continue to subscribe through NOBLE. You can subscribe to the NOBLE version on the Beebe Library’s website on and after September 2, 2008.


New Fiction for July 2008

Click on the titles below to search the catalog

Alpert, Mark.
Final theory.
David Swift, a professor at Columbia University, is on the run for his life from the FBI and a ruthless mercenary as he frantically tries to work out an unpublished Einstein theory.
Continue »


NoveList Plus

NoveList Plus is a great way to search for Author Read-alikes, topical lists, Award Winners, Book Discussion Guides, and Recommended Reads and much more for both Fiction and Nonfiction. This databases serves all audiences from adult to teens, older and younger kids. Looking for a new Historical Romance or an engaging narrative nonfiction title to take with you on vacation? This is a great database to explore.


Barry’s The Lace Reader

July 29, 2008
There was an interesting article on Brunonia Barry’s The Lace Reader in The Boston Globe this morning.

It really spotlights Salem (which is very much a character in the novel) and is a unique way to market a book.
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Book Discussion Guides

Resources for Book Discussion Groups

Reading Group Choices

Reading Group Guides.com

LitLovers: LitClub.

Also NoveList Plus has a large variety of thoughtful discussion guides for adult and young adult titles.


Baseball Nonfiction

Yearning for a true tale of those boys of summer…here are a few reading suggestions from one of our staff who loves the game and enjoyed these authors’ stories.
Continue »


Sherlock Holmes by Doyle and Others


There is a rare mystery lover who has not read all of the Sherlock Holmes stories. And for the few readers who have not, the stories have been immortalized on both the movie and the television screens with brilliant and whimsical adaptations. Sherlock Holmes may be the most “borrowed” character in mystery literature—the list of authors who reinvent, parody or pay homage to him continues to grow and is reflected in this list of authors and titles.

The following is a list of titles by Arthur Conan Doyle, then other authors. Continue »


British Procedurals

The Procedural is all about the police work and stresses realism of action. An actual police department is used; however, all the personnel are fictional. Most of the novels in this genre are written in the third person but the tone of the book may not always be objective. Many writers of this genre are policemen (or women) or ex-policemen. The popularity of procedurals has been encouraged by its television equivalent, the police show. Ironically, the best procedurals minimize the police procedure and heighten suspense, character, and surprise–their writers try to write like novelists.
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Supper Sleuths

Mystery Display - June, 2007Supper Sleuths, a mystery discussion group, meets every second Tuesday evening at 6:00pm to discuss mysteries of every genre and type. Feel free to bring your own snack or brown bag lunch with you to the meeting.
Supper Sleuths Discussion takes place September 9, 2008 at 6:00pm to 7:30pm in the Lecture Hall. The group will be discussing the works of Ross Macdonald’s Lew Archer series and Robert B. Parker Spenser series.

For more on this group’s schedule, go to the Supper Sleuths page


20th C. Private Eyes: Macdonald & Parker

Ross Macdonald’s Lew Archer & Robert B. Parker’s Spenser
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Chill with Summer Reading Thrills

Too hot to do anything but swing in a hammock and read? Have we got books for you! Summer paperbacks
Adrenalin junkies have an array of new tales of action-packed adventure and turmoil to entertain and enthrall. Mark Alpert’s Final Theory is by a first-time author in the Michael Crichton vein. A science historian is on the run from the U.S. government and a ruthless assassin as he tries to uncover the meaning of a series of numbers whispered to him by his dying mentor. This “Scientific American” editor executes the action with enthusiasm and lays out the science without overwhelming the reader.
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Books By the Lake September 17, 2008

The next gathering of Beebe Library’s book discussion group, Books By the Lake, is on September 17, 2008 when the book group will discuss Mrs. Kimble and Baker Towers by Jennifer Haigh.
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New Fiction for June 2008

Click on the titles below to search the catalog

Adamson, Gil.
The outlander. [Historical]
Canadian

Aiken, Ginny.
A steal of a deal.
Shop-til-u-drop collection; bk. 2/Smart Funny Women

Alexander, Lawrence.
Rubicon. [Suspense]
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Vocational High School Summer Reading List 2008-2009

Summer reading titles for students from the Northeast Metropolitan Regional Vocational High School. During the summer, students must read one book from the list for their grade.

Books for incoming freshmen:
Bad by Jean Ferris
Hoops by Walter Dean Myers
Detour for Emmy by Marilyn Reynolds
Eleven seconds by Travis Roy

Books for incoming sophomores:
The Endurance : Shackleton’s legendary Antarctic expedition by Caroline Alexander
The cage by Ruth Minsky Sender
Warriors don’t cry by Melba Patillo Beals
Far North by Will Hobbs

Books for incoming juniors:
When I was Puerto Rican by Esmeralda Santiago
The alchemist by Paulo Coelho
Breathing underwater by Alex Flinn
Too soon for Jeff by Marilyn Reynolds

Books for incoming seniors:
Chocolat by Joanne Harris
Stormbreaker by Anthony Horowitz
Lone survivor : the eyewitness account of of Operation Redwing and the lost heroes of SEAL Team 10 by Marcus Luttrell
The bean trees by Barbara Kingsolver


New Fiction for February 2008

Click on the titles below to search the catalog

My Big fat supernatural honeymoon. [Fantasy]
ed. by P.N. Elrod

Agee, Jonis.
The river wife. [Historical]

Ahern, Cecelia.
There’s no place like here.
Smart Funny Women

Alexander, Hannah.
Double blind.
Hideaway Series/Romantic Suspense

Anam, Tahmima.
A golden age.
Bangladesh

Attenberg, Jami.
The kept man.

Barker, Pat.
Life class.
WWI perspective

Bennett, Alan.
The uncommon reader.
Queen Elizabeth II

Bernhardt, William.
Capitol conspiracy. [Suspense]
Ben Kincaid series

Berry, Steve.
The Venetian betrayal. [Suspense]
Cotton Malone investigates Alexander the Great

Bock, Charles.
Beautiful children.
Las Vegas Psychological
Continue »


New Fiction for March 2008

Click on the titles below to search the catalog

Andrews, Mary Kay.
Deep dish.
Romance is cooking!

Archer, Jeffrey.
A prisoner of birth. [Suspense]
Revenge

Bacon, Charlotte.
Split estate.
Loss
Continue »


Edible Fiction

Click here for a list of Thanksgiving Fiction.

* notes a title owned by the Wakefield Library.

Adapted from “What’s on the Menu?” from Halinet Library Network, CA., as well as suggestions from NoveList and FictionL.


Agatha & Dorothy

In what is known as the Golden Age of detective fiction (1920-1939), women writers took the spotlight. The quintet of Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Josephine Tey, Margery Allingham, and Ngaio Marsh starred brightly during this era. The novelist focuses on a crime (typically a murder) and criminal, a victim, and a detective who resolves the crime through deduction, an examination of clues, and in some cases, a reconstruction of the crime itself. These mysteries have been called classical, traditional, or cozy, as well as village mystery, domestic malice, or Golden Age mystery.
Continue »


Historical Novels by Era and Place

Multiple Time Periods

Ackroyd, Peter. Chatterton (London, 18th & 19th centuries).

Aiken, Joan. The Haunting of Lamb House (18th century & modern).

Andric, Ivo. The Bridge on the Drina (Bosnia, 1516 - WWI).

Brown, Linda Beatrice. Crossing Over Jordan (Civil War to 21st century). NOBLE
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Bibliomysteries

What do libraries, booksellers, and authors have in common? Books, books, books. This category may possibly burst our bindings; however, we are trying to limit this list to sleuths who are librarians, booksellers, and authors who solve the crime. Librarians just can’t help themselves as they investigate the clues that perplex them, and booksellers are another form of librarian that potentially makes oodles more money. Authors are included (although they would make a nifty category all on their own) because they write the books librarians loan and booksellers vend. Many of these mysteries take place in the libraries, the bookstores, and authors’ habitats; however, the crime can occur anywhere that these lovers of the written word (publication, work, writing; scroll; booklet, brochure, folder, leaflet, magazine, pamphlet; compendium, handbook, manual, monograph, textbook, tract, treatise; codex; novel; Merriam-Webster Thesaurus) happen to exist. Most of these mysteries easily fall into the Cozy category with very few exceptions.
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Forensic Detectives

Forensic detectives analyze anthropological or archaeological remains; use modern scientific tests, and/or psychological or psychiatric analysis to solve their crimes. Forensic mysteries take us through a world of evidence collection and analysis.

Forensic mysteries usually have a moderate to extreme gore factor, with or without much actual violence. Those with weak stomachs should be careful. Ask us to recommend something not too difficult on the stomach. One other word of warning: These mysteries are rarely light or humorous in tone. Many forensic stories are cross-listed in the Thriller, Police procedural, or Serial killer categories.
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Art Mysteries

There is something inherently fascinating about the theft of a great work of art or priceless jewels. The intricate planning by the thieves and the relentless search to bring them to justice make such tales compelling. — Dorothy Broderick, Contributing Editor, Mysteries and Thrillers, NoveList.
How did they do it? That is the question the mystery reader needs answered. And a good Art Theft mystery immerses the reader in the journey as the plot and its solution unfold. So the mysteries for this month have to do with art, art museums, art dealers, forgery, theft, and murder. Many of them are historical, some are procedurals, and in most of them, the art itself is a character. There are a few series (Nicholas Kilmer, John Malcolm, Iain Pears), but mostly the novels are stand-alones or individual books with the art theme from a series.
Continue »


Historical Mysteries

Historicals obviously take place in the past and are usually set in an era substantially prior to the date when the book was published. These novels often feature real historical figures or events and can vary widely in tone, style and theme. Known for their strong plots, the settings in these books play an integral role, rather than serving as a backdrop. Although, many Historical Mysteries are series with evocative settings and compelling characters, historical authenticity is not always the ultimate goal.
Continue »


Comic Capers

Humor is, by nature, subjective. Some books in this genre make you laugh out loud and hold your sides; others evince an ear-to-ear grin, a simple smile, or even an eye crinkle. If you find yourself exhibiting any of these behaviors, then the mystery you are reading falls in the Comic Caper genre.
Most often the sillier and lighter comedy is part of the Cozy genre. Examples of authors who do the gentle or silly humor well are M.C.Beaton, Jill Churchill, and Joan Hess. Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum series is a good example of a series that straddles the line between light and dark humor.
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Culinary Mysteries

Culinary mysteries are usually Cozies that prominently feature food and or cooking - sometimes with the recipes included. And like a Cozy, the body is often offstage, and most of the time, the author does not explicitly describe the death or any other violence. The sleuths are almost always amateurs who have sniffed out a murder or crime that needs to be solved. The detective may dine well, or may run a catering service, restaurant, or bakery. The sleuth is usually, but not always a woman, who solves the mystery through intuition and her knowledge of human nature. Small-town settings and gossip are integral parts of these savory stews of murder and mayhem.
Continue »


Native American Mysteries

Most Native American mysteries combine a number of elements found in historical mysteries: exquisite sense of place, detailed investigation that includes myths, legends, and superstitions, and character-driven writing that defines cultural and religious structures and beliefs. The detective’s gender, race, and ethnicity play a major role in how the detective relates to the crime to be solved, as well as the world in general.
Continue »


Cozy Mysteries

In the Cozy, the body is often offstage; and most of the time, the author does not explicitly describe death or any other violence. The sleuths are almost always amateurs who have stumbled on a murder or crime that needs to be solved. Continue »


True Crime

For a change of pace, Supper Sleuths investigated the mystifying and scary world of true crime. All the books on this list are non-fiction—either accounts of true crimes or investigative reports that have been published in book form. Some crimes are capers and frauds, but most books on this list are about murders that happened to real people who left real survivors and sometimes went unsolved.
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Page-Turners for the Non-Fiction Soul

Riveting reading for non-fiction lovers.

Berkeley, Ellen.
At Grandmother’s Table: Women Write about Food, Life, and
the Enduring Bond Beween Grandmothers and Granddaughters. (2000).

Best American Travel Writing, 2000. Edited by Biill Bryson. (2000)
Continue »


Holiday Mysteries

The titles that fit into this category are from a variety of genres. It is not a definitive list, and often Holiday mysteries share other genre characteristics like the Cozy, the Historical and the Police Procedural mystery. The Holiday portion of the mystery is usually the catchy title or the use of the holiday for setting. They are often part of a series; however, some do stand alone. Included in the list are any mysteries that surround the Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s holidays. The search for Chanukkah, Kwanzaa and other appropriate holidays is an on-going quest, and suggestions are very much welcomed.
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Thanksgiving Fiction

* notes a title owned by the Wakefield Library.

Berne, Suzanne. Ghost at the Table*
Thanksgiving at the New England home of the second of three sisters marks a reunion between the three Fiske sisters–including Cynthia, the youngest, an author writing a book about Mark Twain’s daughters–and their long-estranged father, in a portrait of the unraveling of a family, set against the famous nineteenth-century author’s own family dysfunction.

Bittle, Camilla. Dear Family
In this Massachusetts setting, Ed Beane loses his job in 1935, his wife, two children, and widowed mother must go to live with Dorothy’s mother on her farm, where they continue to support each other through a series of family celebrations.
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Holiday Fiction

Alcott, Louisa May.
A Quiet Little Woman (1999) .

Alan, Theresa. Dangers of Mistletoe. (2006)
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Female Private Investigators

The women in these private investigator stories are independent and self-reliant but still feminine. The stories tend to be fast-paced, harder edged, and told in the first person narrative.
Continue »


Halloween Fiction

Allan, Barbara. Antiques Maul: A Trash ‘N Treasure Mystery.

Amis, Kingsley. The Green Man.

Anson,Jay. Amityville Horror.
Non-Fiction that’s really scary.

Anthony, Piers. Shade of the Tree.
Continue »


If You Liked “The Red Tent” by Anita Diamant…

It is very difficult to match this stellar novel exactly–there are so many possibilities that may appeal to the reader. Is it the sisterhood of women? The healing and midwifery aspect? The goddess religion? The biblical characters? This list suggests a few books from each category.
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If You Liked “The Da Vinci Code”, by Dan Brown…

It is very difficult to match this complex thriller exactly–there are so many possibilities that may appeal to the reader. Is it the religious conspiracy? The historical aspect? The divine feminine? The espionage? The heart-pounding suspense and action? This list suggests a few books from each category.
Continue »


Readalikes for Possession by A.S. Byatt

If the many-layered story of A.S. Byatt’s Possession is a favorite of yours because of the quality of the writing, the intertwining story lines and the different historical periods, then the following novels may be for you. Continue »


True Spy Stories from WWII

These books chronicle real life spy stories that match and surpass fictional thrillers for their tense, moment-by-moment narrative. True dramas of World War II are interlaced with biography to create exciting page turners.
Continue »


Digging Death: Archaeological Mysteries

Supper Sleuths

This list has archaeologists, forensic archaeologists, geologists
and detectives that use their knowledge of ancient (or not so ancient) times to solve a crime or find clues on the way to a satisfactory explanation. In some cases, the main character is professionally an archaeologist but his/her field of expertise is just for background as a crime is committed and solved by them or with his/her help. The dictionary definition of archaeology is the scientific study of material remains (as fossil relics, artifacts, and monuments) of past human life and activities, and or the remains of the culture of a people. This list endeavors to give you an array of choices while “Digging Death.” Continue »


New Fiction for April 2008

Click on the titles below to search the catalog

New Fiction for May 2008

Click on the titles below to search the catalog

Mysteries On Fire: Arson & Firefighters

Supper Sleuths

There is something mesmerizing about fires—setting them, watching them, fighting them. This mystery list includes many different cases of arson and many different kinds of detectives. In many cases, arson investigation is done by the fire department in conjunction with the detective or sleuth in the series. In all of the books, firefighting and catching arsonists play a role. Settle down for some blazing, hot, mystery reading in these tales of brave flame fighters. Continue »


The National Book Award for Fiction

The National Book awards have been given since 1950 in the categories of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and children’s literature. They are awarded by the National Book Foundation.

2007
WINNER - Tree of smoke, by Denis Johnson
FINALIST - Fieldwork, by Mischa Berlinski
FINALIST - Varieties of disturbance : stories, by Lydia Davis
FINALIST - Then we came to the end, by Joshua Ferris
FINALIST - Like you’d understand, anyway, by Jim Shepard

2006
WINNER - The echo maker, by Richard Powers
FINALIST - Only revolutions, by Mark Z. Danielewski
FINALIST - A disorder peculiar to the country, by Ken Kalfus
FINALIST - Eat the document, by Dana Spiotta
FINALIST - The zero, by Jess Walter

2005
WINNER - Europe central, by William T. Vollman
FINALIST - The march, by E.L. Doctorow
FINALIST - Veronica, by Mary Gaitskill
FINALIST - Trance, by Christopher Sorrentino
FINALIST - Holy skirts, by Renh Steinke

2004
WINNER - News from Paraguay, by Lily Tuck
FINALIST - Madeleine is sleeping, by Sarah Shun-lien Bynum
FINALIST - Florida, by Christine Schutt
FINALIST - Ideas of heaven : a ring of stories, by Joan Silber
FINALIST - Our kind, by Kate Walbert

2003
WINNER - The great fire, by Shirley Hazzard
FINALIST - Drop city, by T.C. Boyle
FINALIST - The known world, by Edward P. Jones
FINALIST - A ship made of paper, by Scott Spencer
FINALIST - Evidence of things unseen, by Marianne Wiggins

2002
WINNER - Three Junes, by Julia Glass
FINALIST - Big if, by Mark Costello
FINALIST - You are not a stranger here, by Adam Haslett
FINALIST - Gorgeous lies, by Martha McPhee
FINALIST - The heaven of Mercury, by Brad Watson

2001
WINNER - The Corrections, by Jonathan Franzen
FINALIST - Among the missing, by Dan Chaon
FINALIST - Look at me : a novel, by Jennifer Egan
FINALIST - The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse, by Louise Erdrich
FINALIST - Highwire moon : a novel, by Susan Straight

2000
WINNER - In America : a novel, by Susan Sontag
FINALIST - The feast of love, by Charles Baxter
FINALIST - The diagnosis, by Alan Lightman
FINALIST - Blonde : a novel, Joyce Carol Oates
FINALIST - Blue angel : a novel, by Francine Prose

1999
WINNER - Waiting, by Ha Jin
FINALIST - House of sand and fog, by Andre Dubus III
FINALIST - Plainsong, by Kent Haruf
FINALIST - Hummingbird house, Patricia Henley
FINALIST - Who do you love : stories , by Jean Thompson

1998
WINNER - Charming Billy, by Alice McDermott
FINALIST - Kaaterskill Falls, by Allegra Goodman
FINALIST - The healing, by Gayl Jones
FINALIST - The Damascus gate, by Robert Stone
FINALIST - A man in full , by Tom Wolfe

1997
WINNER - Cold mountain, by Charles Frazier
FINALIST - Echo house, by Ward Just
FINALIST - The Puttermesser papers, by Cynthia Ozick
FINALIST - Le divorce, by Diane Johnson
FINALIST - Underworld , by Don DeLillo

1996
WINNER - Ship fever and other stories, by Andrea Barrett
FINALIST - Atticus : a novel, by Ron Hansen
FINALIST - The giant’s house : a romance, by Elizabeth McCracken
FINALIST - Martin Dressler : the tale of an American dreamer r, by Steven Millhauser
FINALIST - The river beyond the world , by Janet Peery

1995
WINNER - Sabbath’s theater, by Philip Roth
FINALIST - All soul’s rising, by Madison Smartt Bell
FINALIST - krik? krak!, by Edwidge Danticat
FINALIST - Interstate, by Stephen Dixon
FINALIST - The house on the lagoon , by Rosario Ferre

1994
WINNER - A frolic of his own, by William Gaddis
FINALIST - Moses supposes, by Ellen Currie
FINALIST - White man’s grave, by Richard Dooling
FINALIST - The bird artist, by Howard Norman
FINALIST - The collected stories , by Grace Paley

1993
WINNER - The shipping news, by E. Annie Proulx
FINALIST - Come to me : stories, by Amy Bloom
FINALIST - The pugilist at rest : stories, by Thom Jones
FINALIST - Operation wandering soul, by Richard Powers
FINALIST - Swimming in the volcano : a novel , by Bob Shacochis

1992
WINNER - All the pretty horses, by Cormac McCarthy
FINALIST - Bastard out of Carolina, by Dorothy Allison
FINALIST - Dreaming in Cuban, by Cristina Garcia
FINALIST - Lost in the city : stories, by Edward P. Jones
FINALIST - Outerbridge reach , by Robert Stone

1991
WINNER - Mating, by Norman Rush
FINALIST - Wartime lies, by Louis Begley
FINALIST - Frog, by Stephen Dixon
FINALIST - The MacGuffin, by Stanley Elkin
FINALIST - Beyond deserving : a novel , by Sandra Scofield

1990
WINNER - Middle passage, by Charles Johnson
FINALIST - Chromos, by Felipe Alfau
FINALIST - Paradise, by Elena Castedo
FINALIST - Dogeaters, by Jessica Hagedorn
FINALIST - Because it is bitter, and because it is my heart , by Joyce Carol Oates

1989
WINNER - Spartina, by John Casey
FINALIST - Billy Bathgate, by E.L. Doctorow
FINALIST - Geek love, by Katherine Dunn
FINALIST - The mambo kings play songs of love, by Oscar Hijuelos
FINALIST - The joy luck club , by Amy Tan


The National Book Award for Non-Fiction

The National Book awards have been given since 1950 in the categories of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and children’s literature. They are awarded by the National Book Foundation.

2007
WINNER - Legacy of ashes : the history of the CIA , by Tim Weiner
FINALIST - Brother, I’m dying , by Edwidge Danticat
FINALIST - God is not great : how religion poisons everything , by Christopher Hitchens
FINALIST - Unruly Americans and the origins of the Constitution , by Woody Holton
FINALIST - Ralph Ellison : a biography , by Arnold Rampersad

2006
WINNER - The worst hard time : the untold story of those who survived the great American dust bowl , by Timothy Egan
FINALIST - At Canaan’s edge : America in the King years, 1965-68 , by Taylor Branch
FINALIST - Imperial life in the emerald city : inside Iraq’s green zone, by Rajiv Chandrasekaran
FINALIST - Oracle bones : a journey between China’s past and present, by Peter Hessler
FINALIST - The looming tower : Al-Qaeda and the road to 9/11, by Lawrence Wright

2005
WINNER - The year of magical thinking, by Joan Didion
FINALIST - Out of eden : an odyssey of ecological invasion, by Alan Burdick
FINALIST - Jean-Jacques Rousseau : restless genius, by Leo Damrosch
FINALIST - 102 Minutes : the untold story of the fight to survive inside the twin towers, by Jim Dwyer and Kevin Flynn
FINALIST - Bury the chains : prophets and rebels in the fight to free an empire’s slaves, by Adam Hochschild

2004
WINNER - Arc of justice : a saga of race, civil rights, and murder in the Jazz Age , by Kevin Boyle
FINALIST - Washington’s crossing , by David Hackett Fischer
FINALIST - Life on the outside : the prison odyssey of Elaine Bartlett , by Jennifer Gonnerman
FINALIST - Will in the world : how Shakespeare became Shakespeare , by Stephen Greenblatt
FINALIST - The 9/11 Commission report : final report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States. , by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States.

2003
WINNER - Waiting for snow in Havana : confessions of a Cuban boy , by Carlose Eire
FINALIST - Gulag : a history , by Anne Applebaum
FINALIST - The big house : a century of life of an American summer home , by George Howe Colt
FINALIST - Lost prophet : the life and times of Bayard Rustin , by John D’Emilio
FINALIST - The devil in the white city : murder, magic, and madness at the fair that changed America , by Erik Larson

2002
WINNER - Master of the senate : the years of Lyndon Johnson , by Robert A. Caro
FINALIST - When smoke ran like water : tales of environmental deception and the battle against pollution
, by Devra Davis
FINALIST - The last American man , by Elizabeth Gilbert
FINALIST - Complications : a surgeon’s notes on an imperfect science , by Atul Gawande
FINALIST - Mapping human history: discovering the past through our genes, by Steve Olson

2001
WINNER - The noonday demon: an atlas of depression , by Andrew Solomon
FINALIST - American chica: two worlds, one childhood , by Marie Arana
FINALIST - The lost children of Wilder: the epic struggle to change foster care , by Nina Bernstein
FINALIST - My story as told by water : confessions, Druidic rants, reflections, bird-watchings, fish-stalkings, visions, songs and prayers refracting light, from living rivers, in the age of the industrial dark , by David James Duncan
FINALIST - Neighbors: the destruction of the Jewish community in Jedwabne, Poland , by Jan T. Gross

2000
WINNER - In the heart of the sea : the tragedy of the whaleship Essex , by Nathaniel Philbrick
FINALIST - From dawn to decadence : 500 years of Western cultural life, 1500 to the present, by Jacques Barzun
FINALIST - The collaborator : the trial and execution of Robert Brasillach, by Alice Kaplan
FINALIST - W.E.B. Du Bois : the fight for equality and the American century, 1919 - 1963, by David Levering Lewis
FINALIST - Darkness in El Dorado : how scientists and journalists devastated the Amazon, by Patrick Tierney

1999
WINNER - Embracing defeat : Japan in the wake of World War II, by John W. Dower
FINALIST - Woman : an intimate geography, by Natalie Angier
FINALIST - Black Hawk down : a story of modern war, by Mark Bowden
FINALIST - Places left unfinished at the time of the creation, by John Phillip Santos
FINALIST - Secrets of the flesh : a life of Colette , by Judith Thurman

1998
WINNER - Slaves in the family, by Edward Ball
FINALIST - Shakespeare : the invention of the human, by Harold Bloom
FINALIST - There once was a world : a 900-year chronicle of the shtetl of Eishyshok, by Yaffa Eliach
FINALIST - A slant of sun : one child’s courage, by Beth Kephart
FINALIST - All on fire : William Lloyd Garrison and the abolition of slavery , by Henry Mayer

1997
WINNER - American sphinx : the character of Thomas Jefferson, by Joseph Ellis
FINALIST - The kidnapping of Edgardo Montara, by David Kertzer
FINALIST - My brother, by Jamaica Kincaid
FINALIST - The undertaking : life studies from the dismal trade, by Thomas Lynch
FINALIST - Whittaker Chambers , by Sam Tanenhaus

1996
WINNER - An American requiem, by James Carroll
FINALIST - The temple bombing, by Melissa Fay Greene
FINALIST - The living and the dead, by Paul Hendrickson
FINALIST - The life of Nelson A. Rockefeller, by Cary Reich
FINALIST - Fruitful : a real mother in the modern world , by Anne Roiphe

1995

WINNER - The haunted land : facing Europe’s ghosts after communism, by Tina Rosenberg
FINALIST - Salvation on Sand Mountain : snake handling and redemption in southern Appalachia, by Dennis Covington
FINALIST - Darwin’s dangerous idea : evolution and the meanings of life, by Daniel C. Dennett
FINALIST - A civil action, by Jonathan Harr
FINALIST - Ghosts of Mississippi : the murder of Medgar Evers, the trials of Byron de la Beckwith, and the haunting of the new South, by Maryanne Vollers

1994
WINNER - How we die : reflections on life’s final chapter, by Sherwin B. Nuland
FINALIST - The unredeemed captive : a family story from early America, by John Demos
FINALIST - Strange justice : the selling of Clarence Thomas, by Jane Meyer and Jill Abramson
FINALIST - Fatheralong : a meditation on fathers and sons, race and society, by John Edgar Wideman
FINALIST - In Pharaoh’s army : memories of the lost war, by Tobias Wolff

1993
WINNER - United States: essays: 1952-1992, by Gore Vidal
FINALIST - Land of desire : merchants, power, and the rise of a new American culture, by William Leach
FINALIST - W.E.B. Du Bois : biography of a race, 1868-1919, by David Levering Lewis
FINALIST - Gunfighter nation : the myth of the frontier in twentieth-century America, by Richard Slotkin
FINALIST - Battlefield : farming a Civil War battleground, by Peter Svenson

1992

WINNER - Becoming a man : half a life story, by Paul Monette
FINALIST - The promise of the New South : life after Reconstruction , by Edward L. Ayers
FINALIST - Genius : the life and science of Richard Feynman, by James Gleick
FINALIST - Truman, by David McCullough
FINALIST - Lincoln at Gettysburg : the words that remade America, by Garry Wills

1991
WINNER - Freedom, by Orlando Patterson
FINALIST - Why American hate politics , by E.J. Dionne, Jr.
FINALIST - Praying for sheetrock : a work of nonfiction, by Melissa Fay Greene
FINALIST - The Jameses : a family narrative, by R.W.B. Lewis
FINALIST - Anne Sexton : a biography, by Diane Wood Middlebrook

1990
WINNER - The house of Morgan : an American banking dynasty and the rise of modern finance, by Ron Chernow
FINALIST - Small victories : the real world of a teacher, her students, and their high school , by Samuel G. Freedom
FINALIST - Richard Milhous Nixon : the rise of an American politician , by Roger Morris
FINALIST - Jackson Pollock : an American saga, by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith

FINALIST - Righteous pilgrim : the life and times of Harold L. Ickes, 1874-1952, by T.H.Watkins

1989
WINNER - From Beirut to Jerusalem, by Thomas L. Friedman
FINALIST - Parting the waters : America in the King years, 1954-1963, by Taylor Branch
FINALIST - Danger and survival : choices about the bomb in the first fifty years , by McCeorge Bundy
FINALIST - Barbarian sentiments : how the American century ends, by William Pfaff FINALIST - Mother country, by Marilynne Robinson


The Massachusetts Book Awards

The Massachusetts Book Awards have been given since 2001 in the categories of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and children’s/young adult literature. They are awarded by the Massachusetts Center for the Book.

2007 (honoring books published in 2006)
FICTION - The emperor’s children, by Claire Messud
NONFICTION - Mayflower : a story of courage, community, and war, by Nathaniel Philbrick
POETRY - Averno, by Louise Glück
CHILDREN’S/YOUNG ADULT - Incantation, by Alice Hoffman

2006 (honoring books published in 2005)
FICTION - The Season of open water, by Dawn Clifton Tripp
NONFICTION - The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism , by Megan Marshall
POETRY - Zeppo’s first wife : new and selected poems, by Gail Mazur
CHILDREN’S/YOUNG ADULT - Where the Great Hawk Flies, by Liza Ketchum

2005 (honoring books published in 2004)
FICTION - Project X, by Jim Shepard
NONFICTION - Outwitting history, by Aaron Lansky
POETRY - Trouble in mind, by Lucie Brock-Broido
CHILDREN’S/YOUNG ADULT - My light, by Molly Bang

2004 (honoring books published in 2003)
FICTION - A kiss from Maddalena, by Christopher Castellani
NONFICTION - Patriots : the Vietnam War remembered from all sides, by Christian G. Appy
POETRY - Middle earth, by Henry Cole
CHILDREN’S/YOUNG ADULT - Silent boy, by Lois Lowry

2003 (honoring books published in 2002)
FICTION - Sea room, by Norman G. Gautreau, Wakefield author!
NONFICTION - Revere beach elegy, by Roland Merullo
POETRY - Never, by Jorie Graham
CHILDREN’S/YOUNG ADULT - Hole in my life, by Jack Gantos
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD - Eric Carle, children’s author and illustrator

2002 (honoring books published in 2001)
FICTION - Mystic River, by Dennis Lehane
NONFICTION - The imprisoned guest, by Elisabeth Gitter
POETRY - Poems seven, by Alan Dugan
CHILDREN’S/YOUNG ADULT - Moonpie and Ivy, by Barbara O’Connor
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD - Stanley Kunitz, poet

2001 (honoring books published in 2000)
FICTION - MotherKind, by Jayne Anne Phillips
NONFICTION - Reflections in Bullough’s Pond, by Diana Muir
POETRY - Breathing room, by Peter Davison
CHILDREN’S/YOUNG ADULT - What’s in a name?, by Ellen Witlinger
CHILDREN’S PICTURE BOOK - Henry hikes to Fitchburg, by D.B. Johnson


The Pulitzer Prize for Biography

The Pulitzer Prize, started by New York World publisher Joseph Pulitzer (1847-1911), is awarded each year for books published the previous year. During some years no award was given.

2008 - Eden’s outcasts : the story of Louisa May Alcott and her father , by John Matteson

2007 - The most famous man in America : the biography of Henry Ward Beecher , by Debbie Applegate

2006 - American Prometheus : the triumph and tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer , by Kai Bird

2005 - de Kooning : an American master , by Mark Stevens and Annalyn Swan

2004 - Khrushchev : the man and his era , by William Taubman

2003 - Master of the Senate, by Robert A. Caro

2002 - John Adams, by David McCullough

2001 - W.E.B. Du Bois : the fight for equality and the American century, 1919-1963, by David Levering Lewis

2000 - Vera (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov), by Stacy Schiff

1999 - Lindbergh, by A. Scott Berg

1998 - Personal history, by Katharine Graham

1997 - Angela’s ashes : a memoir, by Frank McCourt

1996 - God : a biography, by Jack Miles

1995 - Harriet Beecher Stowe : a life, by Joan D. Hedrick

1994 - W. E. B. DuBois : biography of a race, 1868-1919, by David L. Lewis

1993 - Truman, by David McCullough

1992 - Fortunate son : the autobiography of Lewis B. Puller, Jr., by Lewis B. Puller, Jr.

1991 - Jackson Pollock : an American saga, by Stephen Naifeh and Gregory White Smith

1990 - Machiavelli in Hell, by Sebastian de Grazia

1989 - Oscar Wilde, by Richard Ellman

1988 - Look homeward : a life of Thomas Wolfe, by David Herbert Donald

1987 - Bearing the cross : Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, by David J. Garrow

1986 - Louise Bogan : a portrait, by Elizabeth Frank

1985 - Life and times of Cotton Mather, by Kenneth Silverman

1984 - Booker T. Washington, by Louis R. Harlan

1983 - Growing up, by Russell Baker

1982 - Grant : a biography, by William S. McFeely

1981 - Peter the Great : his life and world, by Robert K. Massie

1980 - The rise of Theodore Roosevelt, by Edmund Morris

1979 - Days of sorrow and pain : Leo Baeck and the Berlin Jews, by Leonard Baker

1978 - Samuel Johnson, by Walter Jackson Bate

1977 - A prince of our disorder : the life of T. E. Lawrence, by John E. Mack

1976 - Edith Wharton : a biography, by R. W. B. Lewis

1975 - The power broker : Robert Moses and the fall of New York, by Robert A. Caro

1974 - O’Neill, son and artist, by Louis Sheaffer

1973 - Luce and his empire, by W. A. Swanberg

1972 - Eleanor and Franklin, by Joseph P. Lash

1971 - Robert Frost : the years of triumph, 1915-1938, by Lawrence Thompson

1970 - Huey Long, by T. Harry Williams

1969 - The man from New York : John Quinn and his friends, by B. L. Reid

1968 - Memoirs (1925-1950), by George F. Kennan

1967 - Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain, by Justin Kaplan

1966 - A thousand days : John F. Kennedy in the White House, by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.

1965 - Henry Adams, by Ernest Samuels

1964 - John Keats, by Walter Jackson Bate

1963 - Henry James, volumes II and III, by Leon Edel

1962 - No award

1961 - Charles Sumner and the coming of the Civil War, by David Donald

1960 - John Paul Jones, by Samuel Eliot Morison

1959 - Woodrow Wilson : American prophet, by Arthur Walworth

1958 - George Washington, by Douglas Southall Freeman (volumes I-VI) and John Alexander Carroll and Mary Wells Ashworth (volume VII)

1957 - Profiles in courage, by John F. Kennedy

1956 - Benjamin Henry Latrobe, by Talbot F. Hamlin

1955 - The Taft story, by William S. White

1954 - The Spirit of St. Louis, by Charles A. Lindbergh

1953 - Edmund Pendleton, 1721-1803, by David J. Mays

1952 - Charles Evans Hughes, by Merlo J. Pusey

1951 - John C. Calhoun : American portrait, by Margaret Louise Coit

1950 - John Quincy Adams and the foundations of American foreign policy, by Samuel Flagg Bemis

1949 - Roosevelt and Hopkins, an intimate history, by Robert E. Sherwood

1948 - Forgotten first citizen : John Bigelow, by Margaret Clapp

1947 - Autobiography of William Allen White, by William Allen White

1946 - Son of the wilderness : the life of John Muir, by Linny Marsh Wolfe

1945 - George Bancroft : Brahmin rebel, by Russell Blaine Nye

1944 - The American Leonardo : the life of Samuel F. B. Morse, by Carleton Mabee

1943 - Admiral of the ocean sea : a life of Christopher Columbus, by Samuel Eliot Morison

1942 - Crusader in crinoline, the life of Harriet Beecher Stowe, by Forrest Wilson

1941 - Jonathan Edwards, by Ola Elizabeth Winslow

1940 - Woodrow Wilson, life and letters, by Ray Stannard Baker

1939 - Benjamin Franklin, by Carl Van Doren

1938 - Pedlar’s progress : the life of Bronson Alcott, by Odell Shepard
and Andrew Jackson, by Marquis James

1937 - Hamilton Fish : the inner history of the Grant administration, by Allan Nevins

1936 - The thought and character of William James, by Ralph Barton Perry

1935 - R. E. Lee : a biography, by Douglas Southall Freeman

1934 - John Hay : from poetry to politics, by Tyler Dennett

1933 - Grover Cleveland : a study in courage, by Allan Nevins

1932 - Theodore Roosevelt, by Henry F. Pringle

1931 - Charles W. Eliot, president of Harvard University, 1869-1909, by Henry James

1930 - The raven : a biography of Sam Houston, by Marquis James

1929 - The training of an American : the earlier life and letters of Walter H. Page, by Burton J. Hendrick

1928 - The American orchestra and Theodore Thomas, by Charles Edward Russell

1927 - Whitman : an interpretation in narrative, by Emory Holloway

1926 - The life of Sir William Osler, by Harvey Cushing

1925 - Barrett Wendell and his letters, by M. A. DeWolfe Howe

1924 - From immigrant to inventor, by Michael Pupin

1923 - The life and letters of Walter H. Page, by Burton J. Hendrick

1922 - A daughter of the middle border, by Hamlin Garland

1921 - The Americanization of Edward Bok : the autobiography of a Dutch boy fifty years after, by Edward Bok

1920 - The life of John Marshall, by Albert J. Beveridge

1919 - The education of Henry Adams, by Henry Adams

1918 - Benjamin Franklin, self-revealed, by William Cabell Bruce

1917 - Julia Ward Howe, by Laura E. Richards and Maude Howe Elliott, assisted by Florence Howe Hall


The Pulitzer Prize for History

The Pulitzer Prize, started by New York World publisher Joseph Pulitzer (1847-1911), is awarded each year for books published the previous year. During some years no award was given.

2008 - What hath God wrought : the transformation of America, 1815-1848 , by Daniel Walker Howe

2007 - The race beat : the press, the civil rights struggle, and the awakening of a nation , by Gene Roberts and Hank Klibanoff

2006 - Polio : an American story , by David M. Oshinksy

2005 - Washington’s crossing , by David Hackett Fischer

2004 - A nation under our feet : Black political struggles in the rural South from slavery to the great migration , by Steven Hahn

2003 - An army at dawn : the war in North Africa, 1942-1943 , by Rick Atkinson

2002 - The metaphysical club : a story of ideas in America, by Louis Menand

2001 - Founding brothers : the revolutionary generation, by Joseph J. Ellis

2000 - Freedom from fear : the American people in depression and war, 1929-1945, by David M. Kennedy

1999 - Gotham : a history of New York City to 1898, by Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace

1998 - Summer for the gods : the Scopes trial and America’s continuing debate over science and religion, by Edward J. Larson

1997 - Original meanings : politics and ideas in the making of the Constitution, by Jack N. Rakove

1996 - William Cooper’s town : power and persuasion on the frontier of the early American republic, by Alan Taylor

1995 - No ordinary time : Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt : the home front in World War II, by Doris Kearns Goodwin

1994 - No award

1993 - The radicalism of the American revolution, by Gordon S. Wood

1992 - The fate of liberty : Abraham Lincoln and civil liberties, by Mark E. Neely, Jr.

1991 - A midwife’s tale : the life of Martha Ballard, based on her diary, 1785-1812, by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

1990 - In our image : America’s empire in the Philippines, by Stanley Karnow

1989 - Battle cry of freedom : the Civil War era, by James M. McPherson and Parting the waters : America in the King years, 1954-1963, by Taylor Branch

1988 - The launching of modern American science, 1846-1976, by Robert Bruce

1987 - Voyagers to the West : a passage in the peopling of America on the eve of the Revolution, by Bernard Bailyn

1986 - The heavens and the earth : a political history of the space age, by Walter A. McDougall

1985 - Prophets of regulation : Charles Francis Adams, Louis D. Brandeis, James M. Landis, Alfred E. Kahn, by Thomas K. McCraw

1984 - No award

1983 - The transformation of Virginia, 1740-1790, by Rhys L. Issac

1982 - Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, edited by C. Vann Woodward

1981 - American education : the national experience, 1783-1876, by Lawrence A. Cremin

1980 - Been in the storm so long : the aftermath of slavery, by Leon F. Litwack

1979 - The Dred Scott case : its significance in American law and politics, by Don E. Fehrenbacher

1978 - The visible hand : the managerial revolution in American business, by Alfred D. Chandler, Jr.

1977 - The impending crisis, 1848-1861 /, by David M. Potter

1976 - Lamy of Santa Fe, his life and times, by Paul Horgan

1975 - Jefferson and his time, by Dumas Malone

1974 - The Americans : the democratic experience, by Daniel J. Boorstin

1973 - People of paradox : an inquiry concerning the origins of American civilization, by Michael Kammen

1972 - Neither black nor white : slavery and race relations in Brazil and the United States, by Carl N. Degler

1971 - Roose