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Biography and Memoir June 2020
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| Officer Clemmons by Dr. François S. ClemmonsWhat it is: a heartwarming memoir from Mister Rogers' Neighborhood cast member François S. Clemmons, who famously broke down racial barriers by sharing a foot bath with Rogers in a 1969 episode.
Topics include: Clemmons' Grammy Award-winning music career, which began at Oberlin College in the 1960s; his life-affirming 30-year friendship with Rogers, which was tested when the latter advised the openly gay Clemmons to repress his sexuality to avoid scandal.
Did you know? Clemmons was the first African American performer to have a recurring role on a children's TV program. |
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| Hollywood Park by Mikel JollettWhat it's about: indie musician Mikel Jollett's traumatic 1970s childhood in the Synanon cult; after escaping, his family battled poverty, mental illness, addiction, and abuse, and Jollett later found solace in music.
Read it for: Jollett's richly detailed account of self-discovery and healing.
For fans of: candid memoirs of surviving cults (like Ruth Wariner's The Sound of Gravel) and family dysfunction (like Tara Westover's Educated). |
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| The Fixed Stars by Molly WizenbergWhat it is: bestselling food writer Molly Wizenberg's thought-provoking journey toward understanding her sexual fluidity.
How it began: Surprised by the revelation that she was attracted to another woman, Wizenberg and her husband Brandon agreed to an open relationship, an arrangement that left Wizenberg confronting what she thought she knew about herself -- and what she wanted from her life.
Reviewers say: "This is a spirited, terrifyingly courageous, and searingly honest memoir of discovering sexual identity and strength" (Booklist). |
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Books You Might Have Missed
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| The Toni Morrison Book Club by Juda Bennett, Winnifred Brown-Glaude, Cassandra Jackson, and Piper Kendrix Williams Starring: a diverse quartet of College of New Jersey English professors who formed a book club to discuss the enduring relevance of beloved novelist Toni Morrison's works.
On the reading list: The Bluest Eye; Song of Solomon; Beloved; A Mercy.
Read it for: the authors' intimate musings on how the themes in Morrison's novels (including racism, xenophobia, police brutality, and the fetishization of black bodies) relate to their own lives. |
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| Becoming a Man: The Story of a Transition by P. CarlWhat it is: an incisive memoir in essays chronicling author P. Carl's midlife gender transition.
What's inside: Carl's conflicted reckoning with the white male privilege he now experiences, as well as how his understanding of toxic masculinity changed post-transition.
Want a taste? "What do I know about America's fraught relationship with gender having inhabited these two bodies?" |
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| American Queenmaker: How Missy Meloney Brought Women Into Politics by Julie Des JardinsWho it's about: influential early 20th-century journalist and social reformer Marie "Missy" Mattingly Meloney, who championed causes that advanced women's roles in society.
What sets it apart: This first-ever biography of Meloney offers an engaging and evenhanded appraisal of an overlooked political powerhouse "who should be a household name" (Kirkus Reviews). |
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Heart Berries
by Terese Marie Mailhot
What it is: a raw and powerfully crafted coming-of-age memoir of life on the Seabird Island Indian Reservation, evocatively told in a series of concise and cogent essays.
Want a taste? "The thing about women from the river is that our currents are endless. We sometimes outrun ourselves."
About the author: First Nation writer Terese Marie Mailhot is a graduate of the Institute of American Indian Arts and is currently the Tecumseh Postdoctoral Fellow at Purdue University.
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Big Sister, Little Sister, Red Sister: Three Women at the Heart of Twentieth-Century China
by Jung Chang
Starring: the well-to-do Soong sisters of Shanghai, whose marriages to powerful figures put them at the forefront of 20th-century China's evolving political scene -- and eventually, at odds with one another.
Don't miss: "Little Sister" May-ling saving her husband Chiang Kai-shek's life by helping to peacefully resolve the 1936 Xi'an Incident.
Reviewers say: "This juicy tale will satisfy readers interested in politics, world affairs, and family dynamics" (Publishers Weekly).
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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New Hanover County Library
201 Chestnut Street Wilmington, North Carolina 28401 910-798-6301 www.nhclibrary.org |
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