[bookshare-discuss] Submitted: The Big Oyster, and, Brookland
- From: "Brian Miller" <brian-r-miller@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: <bookshare-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2007 19:47:06 -0800
All,
I've just submitted the follow two books:
The Big Oyster: History on the half shell, Mark Kurlansky, Random House, 2007.
From the book jacket:
"A small pearl of a book ... a great tale of the growth of a
modern city as seen through the rise and fall of the lowly oyster."
Rocky Mountain News
Award-winning author Mark Kurlansky tells the remarkable story of New York by
following the trajectory of one of its most fascinating inhabitants the oyster.
For centuries New York was famous for this particular shellfish, which until
the early 1900s played such a dominant role in the city's life that the
abundant bivalves were Gotham's most celebrated export, a staple food for all
classes, and a natural filtration system for the city's congested waterways.
Filled with cultural, historical, and culinary insightsalong with vintage
recipes, maps, drawings, and photosthis dynamic narrative sweeps readers from
the seventeenth-century founding of New York to the death of its oyster beds
and the rise of America's environmentalist movement, from the oyster cellars of
the rough-and-tumble Five Points slum to Manhattan's Gilded Age dining
chambers. With The Big Oyster, Mark Kurlansky serves up history at its most
engrossing, entertaining, and delicious.
"Suffused with [Kurlansky's] pleasure in exploring the city across ground that
hasn't already been covered with other writers' footprints."
***
Brookland, a novel, by Emily Barton, Picador, 2006.
This is a bueaitful novel about a woman living in revolutionary 18th century
Brooklyn who inherits a gin distillery, and dreams of one day building a bridge
to Manahattan. Lots of history, lots of detail, lots of gorgeous prose.
Brian Miller
Other related posts:
- » [bookshare-discuss] Submitted: The Big Oyster, and, Brookland
