BUSING BREWSTER: By Richard Michelson, illustrated by R.G. Roth, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, N.Y. 2010. $16.99, hardcover.
By ROB HAMMETT
Book reviews
2011
February 3, 2011
HIGH ON THE HOG: A Culinary Journey from Africa to America. By Jessica B. Harris. Bloomsbury, January 2011. 304 pages, photographs. $26, hardcover.
It amazes new students of ar chaeology that the most essential insights into a bygone community may be found in the humble section of rubble called the kitchen midden. It’s here that broken plate ware is examined, along with iron pots and pans and broken ceramic jars containing trace elements of oil from which experts reassemble the daily fabric of a past society’s life.
February 3, 2011
By LIZ DURKEE
WALKINGS TRAIL OF MARTHA’S VINEYARD: The Comprehensive Pocket Guide to Island Trails, William Flender, Fourth Edition, Vineyard Conservation Society, Martha’s Vineyard, MA, 2010, $14.95, 117 PAGES.
A weatherproof, pocket-sized, fully-loaded guide to the Island’s walking trails. What a concept! It is such a good idea that the Vineyard Conservation Society has just published its fourth edition of Walking Trails of Martha’s Vineyard by William Flender.
2010
December 30, 2010
If you look up libraries on Wikipedia, you’ll learn that a golden age arose from 1600 to 1700 when cities all over the world had to erect a big, baroque building for books. If there’s ever been a new claim for a golden age, it’s right here, right now, involving our Island libraries, all of them, where circulation is up as never before (25 per cent at the Edgartown library alone), and community participation is off the charts.
December 23, 2010
Atlantic: Great Sea Battles, Heroic Discoveries, Titanic Storms, and a Vast Ocean of a Million Stories, by Simon Winchester, HarperCollins Publishers, 496 pages, illustrated. $27.99.
It would be hard to live on the Vineyard and not have an interest in the Atlantic Ocean. So much of the Island has been colored and shaped by the sea. You can smell the ocean here and feel it all around you.
A new book, Atlantic, is a biography of the ocean. What is most striking about this long book is its scope.
October 28, 2010
It must be tough to pick a name for your second solo cookbook when the first one refers to raising the bar, as in Catherine Walthers's 2007 book, Raising the Salad Bar.
