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Tag Archives: social conditions

Did Ye Hear Mammy Died? : a Memoir by Séamas O’Reilly 

19 Friday Aug 2022

Posted by Weston Public Library Staff in 20th century, Biography, memoir

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authors, autobiography, biography, childhood and youth, families, Journalists, Northern Ireland, relationships, Seamas O'Reilly, social conditions

This memoir is narrated by Séamas O’Reilly, who was five when his mother died and left behind a husband and eleven children. While this tragic event is the focus of the book, it is also a really funny, uplifting story about how the siblings and their dad carried on, living in Northern Ireland during the Troubles. 

“I laughed out loud reading Did Ye Hear Mammy Died, especially at the bits that recalled for me the way my own family laughs to keep from crying…It’s rare to read about good fathers in memoirs, and O’Reilly’s portrait…is hilarious and moving….It is this thread of refusal to be pitied, to have what happened to his family reduced to ‘a tawdry bit of sentimental fluff for people to tut along to and say how sad,’ that makes Did Ye Hear Mammy Died? so rousing. That it is also deadly funny is an extra treat.”―NPR

“Northern Ireland in the time of the Troubles is often cast into a narrative that doesn’t allow room for joy or delight…O’Reilly’s recollection is a splendid paradox, both cheery and heartbreaking.”―Booklist, Starred

“In this joyous, wildly unconventional memoir, Séamas O’Reilly tells the story of losing his mother as a child and growing up with ten siblings in Northern Ireland during the final years of the Troubles as a raucous comedy, a grand caper that is absolutely bursting with life.”―Patrick Radden Keefe, NYT bestselling author of Say Nothing and Empire of Pain

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Black Walden: Slavery and Its Aftermath in Concord, Massachusetts by Elise Lemire

25 Monday Apr 2022

Posted by Weston Public Library Staff in Non-fiction, United States

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18th century, Concord, enslaved persons, Henry David Thoreau 1817-1862, history, Mass., slavery, social conditions, Walden Pond

Since we live next door to Lincoln, Massachusetts let author Lemire forever change your thoughts about the green space of Walden Pond.  In the 1700’s there was a community of enslaved individuals newly exposed to “freedom” whose stories need to be lifted up and shared.

Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts, is most famous as the place where Henry David Thoreau went to ‘live deliberately’ and subsist on the land. Lemire . . . sets about to resurrect the memory of not only the freedmen and -women who dwelled there but also the history of slavery in Concord. . . . Ultimately, Lemire conveys the idea that before Walden Pond was a ‘green space, ‘ it was, in fact, a ‘black space.’–Library Journal

Lemire has genuinely enriched our understanding not only of the history of Concord but also of the country for which that fabled town still so often stands.–New England Quarterly

Thanks to Lemire’s ingenious research, such valiant figures as Brister Freeman and Cato Ingraham can claim their just place alongside the more famous Minutemen in the town that fired the ‘shot heard ’round the world.’–Robert Gross, author of The Minutemen and Their World

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Honor by Thrity Umrigar

29 Tuesday Mar 2022

Posted by Weston Public Library Staff in 20th century, Fiction

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East Indian American women., honor, India, interfaith marriage, religious aspects, social conditions, women, women journalists

I love this writer’s books about India in all its complexity.  My mother and I must have argued over the meaning of the ending in the The Space Between Us for months. In Honor the lives of two very different women come together after an unspeakable act of violence. I would add this warning:  the subject matter is not for sensitive readers.

In the way A Thousand Splendid Suns told of Afghanistan’s women, Thrity Umrigar tells a story of India with the intimacy of one who knows the many facets of a land both modern and ancient, awash in contradictions, permeated by a smoldering mix of ageless traditions and new ideas, beauty and brutality, hope and despair, certainty and mystery. A place where love can sometimes involve the peril of defying convention . . . and ultimately risking everything for what matters most.–Lisa Wingate, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Before We Were Yours

With insight and compassion, Thrity Umrigar writes masterfully about the complexities of hatred and love, estrangement and belonging, oppression and privilege, about holding on and letting go. A powerful, important, unforgettable book.–Cheryl Strayed, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Wild

Honor is a novel of profound depths–cultural, personal, romantic, spiritual. It’s also a story of tremendous grace, both in the understanding it shows its characters and in the ways they navigate a brutal but stunning life.–Rebecca Makkai, Pulitzer Prize finalist for The Great Believers

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Sure, I’ll Be Your Black Friend: Notes from the Other Side of the Fist Bump by Ben Phillippe  

29 Monday Nov 2021

Posted by Weston Public Library Staff in 20th century, anecdotes, Biography, Non-fiction, United States

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African American authors, African American men, American wit and humor, essays, humor, race relations, racism, social conditions, United States

I loved Phillippe’s memoir and description of growing up in Canada and eventually moving the to US.  Biting humor and moving.

“Flat-out funny…This is a great next-book for fans of What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker and We Are Never Meeting in Real Life, but if a reader hasn’t turned to either of those yet, Philippe’s disarming, illuminating, and hilarious chronicle is a great place to start.” — Booklist

“I still mute Ben’s texts, but I inhaled his hilarious book, which is so full of razor-sharp wit and punches to the gut that it almost made me sick. In a good way!” — Samantha Irby, New York Times bestselling author of Wow, No Thank You

“Philippe has created a funny, and at times harrowing, memoir of his experience as a Black man. Fans of similar memoirs, such as Damon Young’s What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker, will enjoy the irreverence and recognize themselves in these pages.” — Library Journal

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The Girl with the Louding Voice by Abi Dare

13 Friday Nov 2020

Posted by Weston Public Library Staff in Fiction

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child marriage, Nigeria, social conditions, teenage girls, women

“A celebration of girls who dare to dream.”—Imbolo Mbue, author of Behold the Dreamers (Oprah’s Book Club pick)
 
Shortlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and recommended by The New York Times, Marie Claire, Vogue, Essence, PopSugar, Daily Mail, Electric Literature, Red, Stylist, Daily Kos, Library Journal, The Everygirl, and Read It Forward!

“Adunni’s brave, fresh voice powerfully articulates a resounding anger toward Africa’s toxic patriarchy. . . . Daré draws the reader in with a vivid character whose dire circumstances are contrasted with her natural creativity (she keeps her spirits up by composing comic songs imagining a fabulous future) and her undying will to survive. . . . Throughout her harrowing coming-of-age journey, told with verve and compassion, Adunni never loses the ‘louding voice’ that makes Daré’s story, and her protagonist, so unforgettable.”—The New York Times Book Review

“A stunning novel—original, beautiful, and powerful. I was utterly captivated by Adunni and her mesmerizing louding voice.”—Rosamund Lupton, New York Times bestselling author of Sister

“The girl with the louding voice is a character for the ages. Adunni is a girl who narrates her own suffering with levity, who paints depth and texture and beauty into her Nigerian homeland, who tenderly cultivates her own humanity even while everything around her seeks to thwart it. She is an ambassador for girls everywhere. She is important, funny, brave, and enduring. Abi Daré has written an unforgettable novel, by the strength of her own louding voice.”—Jeanine Cummins, New York Times bestselling author of American Dirt

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American Fire: Love, Arson, and Life in a Vanishing Land by Monica Hesse

13 Tuesday Nov 2018

Posted by Weston Public Library Staff in Non-fiction

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Accomack County, arson, economic conditions, social conditions, Virginia

This is a fascinating true story that I had never heard of, even though it only happened a few years ago. A series of over 80 fires spread through Accomack County, Virginia, committed by two arsonists. This book tells their story, as well as the story of how the community and its firefighters dealt with these events.

Washington Post reporter Hesse leads readers on an extended tour of a bizarre five-month crime spree in rural Accomack County, Va.: a series of over 80 arsons, of predominantly abandoned buildings, committed by a local couple. . . . A page-turning story of love gone off the rails. — Publishers Weekly

Hesse enters the compelling narrative with restraint in probing, essayistic analyses. She tells the story of the fires and of the Eastern Shore and the people she got to know there with an earned familiarity that, at the same time, speaks of the unknowability of a vast, rapidly changing nation. — Annie Bostrom (Booklist, starred review)

A captivating narrative about arson, persistent law enforcers, an unlikely romantic relationship, and a courtroom drama. . . . Throughout, the author offers a nuanced portrait of a way of life unknown to most who have never resided on or visited the Eastern Shore. A true-crime saga that works in every respect. — Kirkus Reviews, starred review

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Hillbilly Elegy: a Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis by J.D. Vance

22 Wednesday Feb 2017

Posted by Weston Public Library Staff in Biography, Non-fiction

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Appalachian Region, economic conditions, Kentucky, mountain people, social conditions, social mobility, United States, working class whites

9780062300546_p0_v6_s118x184

J.D. Vance grows up very poor in the Ohio rustbelt and after deciding to enlist in the Marine Corps eventually he pursues a law degree at Yale.  It’s a very personal account of the author’s childhood and parts of it felt similar to Jeannette Walls’ “The Glass Castle.” I liked it because while the author conveyed a lot of love and respect for aspects of his culture, he also comments on the contradictions, inconsistencies, and issues.

“[An] understated, engaging debut…An unusually timely and deeply affecting view of a social class whose health and economic problems are making headlines in this election year.” (Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“[Vance’s] description of the culture he grew up in is essential reading for this moment in history.” (David Brooks, New York Times)

“J.D. Vance’s memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy”, offers a starkly honest look at what that shattering of faith feels like for a family who lived through it. You will not read a more important book about America this year.” (The Economist)

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