great depression

Forced to read To Kill a Mockingbird in high school, I simply didn’t appreciate the exceptional quality of this book at the time.  After a second reading…Oh, how I appreciate it now! The character development is phenomenal. Ms. Lee superbly describes the maturation of two children, Jem and Scout, as they discover that the world is full of injustice. Her exquisite sense of humor is perfectly paired with the seriousness of the storyline. This book portrays small town life in Alabama during the 1930s, focusing on Jem and Scout as they spend their summers trying to catch a glimpse of their

Weather—a fact of nature we all live with. The extremes of this past winter are a hot topic from the news to neighborly conversations. But rarely does weather become such a dominating life force as it did for almost a decade from 1931 to 1939 in the southwest plains—the Dust Bowl. In The Worst Hard Time Pulitzer Prize winner Timothy Egan takes us back to a time we think we know and delves so deeply that we come away with a new respect for the people who lived through the “dirty thirties.”

He begins with a history of the area that covers the Texas and Oklahoma panhandles, western Colorado and

Twelve year old Deza Malone in Christopher Paul Curtis’ The Mighty Miss Malone is exactly what the title of the book implies—she is mighty! The daughter of two proud and honorable black parents living in Gary, Indiana during the Great Depression, Deza is the smartest girl in her class, receiving special lessons from her beloved teacher who has pegged her for greatness. When her beloved father loses his job he secretly slips away to seek employment outside of Gary. Deza, her older yet much smaller brother, Jimmie, and her mother leave Gary to look for him. Throughout the book, Deza and her

Wow--this was a kick!  My favorite area of the country--Southwest--combined with horses, intestinal fortitude, common sense and family history--it doesn't get much better than this.  Jeannette Walls fleshes out the story of her grandmother, a resourceful  and self-reliant individual who at the age of fifteen traveled alone 500 miles on her pony to teach in a one-room school house on the frontier.  She ranched with her husband Jim, drove cars, flew planes, and raised two children through the Depression, droughts, and floods, imbueing them with her own forthright and singular outlook on life.