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Reader's Digest Condensed Books
''Reader's Digest Condensed Books'' was a series of hardcover anthology collections, published by the American general interest monthly family magazine ''Reader's Digest'' and distributed by direct mail. Most volumes contained five (although a considerable minority consisted of three, four, or six) current best-selling novels and nonfiction books which were abridged (or "condensed") specifically for ''Reader's Digest''. The series was published from 1950 until 1997, when it was renamed ''Reader's Digest Select Editions''. The series was popular; a 1987 ''New York Times'' article estimated annual sales of 10 million copies. Despite this popularity, old copies are notoriously difficult to sell. Despite the series' ubiquity, scholarly attention has been sparse. For much of their publication schedule, the volumes were issued four times each year. Each year the company produced a Volume 1 (winter), Volume 2 (spring), Volume 3 (summer), and Volume 4 (autumn). In later years they ad ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Library Books
A library is a collection of materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a physical location or a virtual space, or both. A library's collection can include printed materials and other physical resources in many formats such as DVD, CD and cassette as well as access to information, music or other content held on bibliographic databases. A library, which may vary widely in size, may be organized for use and maintained by a public body such as a government; an institution such as a school or museum; a corporation; or a private individual. In addition to providing materials, libraries also provide the services of librarians who are trained and experts at finding, selecting, circulating and organizing information and at interpreting information needs, navigating and analyzing very large amounts of information with a variety of resources ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cry, The Beloved Country
''Cry, the Beloved Country'' is a 1948 novel by South African writer Alan Paton. Set in the prelude to apartheid in South Africa, it follows a black village priest and a white farmer who must deal with news of a murder. American publisher Bennett Cerf remarked at that year's meeting of the American Booksellers Association that there had been "only three novels published since the first of the year that were worth reading… ''Cry, The Beloved Country'', ''The Ides of March'', and ''The Naked and the Dead''.""Reader's Digest: Gossip, news: J. F. Albright reports on A.B.A. meeting," ''The Dallas Morning News'', 30 May 1948, p. 6. It remains one of the best-known works of South African literature. Two cinema adaptations of the book have been made, the first in 1951 and the second in 1995. The novel was also adapted as a musical called ''Lost in the Stars'' (1949), with a book by the American writer Maxwell Anderson and music composed by the German emigre Kurt Weill. Plot The story ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
MacKinlay Kantor
MacKinlay Kantor (February 4, 1904 – October 11, 1977), born Benjamin McKinlay Kantor, was an American journalist, novelist and screenwriter. He wrote more than 30 novels, several set during the American Civil War, and was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1956 for his 1955 novel, ''Andersonville''. He also wrote the novel ''Gettysburg'', set during the Civil War. Early life and education Kantor was born and grew up in Webster City, Iowa, the second child and only son in his family. He had a sister, Virginia. His mother, Effie (McKinlay) Kantor, worked as the editor of the ''Webster City Daily News'' during part of his childhood. His father, John Martin Kantor, was a native-born Swedish Jew descended from "a long line of rabbis, who posed as a Protestant clergyman". His mother was of English, Irish, Scottish, and Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry. (Later, MacKinlay Kantor wrote an unpublished novel called ''Half Jew''.) republished on ''Mystery File'' Kantor's ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Betty MacDonald
Betty MacDonald (born Anne Elizabeth Campbell Bard; March 26, 1907 – February 7, 1958) was an American author who specialized in humorous autobiographical tales, and is best known for her book ''The Egg and I''. She also wrote the ''Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle'' series of children's books. She is associated with the Pacific Northwest, especially Washington. Life and work MacDonald was born in Boulder, Colorado. Her official birth date is given as March 26, 1908, although federal census returns seem to indicate 1907. Her parents were Harvard-educated mining engineer Darsie Bard and his wife Elsie Sanderson, called Sydney. Betty had three sisters, Mary, Bard, Dorothea Bard and Alison Bard, and one brother, Sydney Cleveland Bard. In adulthood, MacDonald's sister, Mary Bard (Jensen), was also a published author. (Another sister, Sylvia, died in infancy.) Betty Bard spent her childhood in Mexico, Montana and Idaho.AP Staff Writer, “Author Betty MacDonald Is Dead; Cancer,” Cedar Rapids Gaz ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dorothy Baker (writer)
Dorothy Baker (April 21, 1907 – June 17, 1968) was an American novelist who wrote the lesbian pulp novel ''Trio'' (1943), along with widely-successful romance novels. She married poet Howard Baker and together they composed fiction and plays. Early life and education Baker was born Dorothy Alice Dodds on April 21, 1907 in Missoula, Montana to Raymond Branson Dodds and Alice Sowers Grady. Dorothy was raised in California, where her father worked in the oil business. As a child, she played the violin, but became crippled with polio and resigned to write about music instead of playing it. She studied at Occidental College and Whittier College, then transferred to the University of California, Los Angeles, from where she graduated in 1929 with a B.A. in French. She was a member of the sorority Gamma Phi Beta. Upon graduation, she traveled to France where she met her future husband, the poet Howard Baker. The two married on August 22, 1930. The couple moved back to Californi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Young Man With A Horn (novel)
''Young Man with a Horn'' is a 1938 novel by Dorothy Baker that is loosely based on the real life of jazz cornet player Bix Beiderbecke. The novel was adapted for the movie '' Young Man With a Horn'' (1950) with Kirk Douglas, Doris Day, Lauren Bacall, Juano Hernández, and real-life Bix Beiderbecke friend and collaborator Hoagy Carmichael Preface Dorothy Baker explained that the inspiration for the book was jazz cornetist, pianist, and composer Bix Beiderbecke. In the Preface, she wrote: "The inspiration for the writing of this book has been the music, but not the life, of a great musician, Leon (Bix) Beiderbecke, who died in the year 1931. The characters and events of the story are entirely fictitious and do not refer to real musicians, living or dead, or to actual happenings." Plot introduction It is a fictionalized novel on jazz set in a world of speakeasies and big bands during The Jazz Age of the 1920s. It is loosely based on the life of the great cornet player Bix Be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Gunther
John Gunther (August 30, 1901 – May 29, 1970) was an American journalist and writer. His success came primarily by a series of popular sociopolitical works, known as the "Inside" books (1936–1972), including the best-selling '' Inside U.S.A.'' in 1947. However, he is now best known for his memoir ''Death Be Not Proud'' (1949), on the death of his teenage son, Johnny Gunther, from a brain tumor. Life Gunther was born in 1901 in the Lakeview district of Chicago and grew up on the North Side of the city. He was the first child of a German-American family: his father was Eugene Guenther, a traveling salesman, and his mother was Lizette Schoeninger Guenther. During World War I, the family changed the spelling of its name from Guenther to Gunther to avoid having an obviously-German name. In 1922, he was awarded a Bachelor of Philosophy from the University of Chicago, where he was literary editor of the student paper. He worked briefly in the city as a reporter for t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry Morton Robinson
Henry Morton Robinson (September 7, 1898 – January 13, 1961) was an American novelist, best known for ''A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake'' written with Joseph Campbell and his 1950 novel ''The Cardinal'', which ''Time'' magazine reported was "The year's most popular book, fiction or nonfiction." ''Time'', December 18, 1950 Biography Robinson was born in Boston and graduated from Columbia College in 1923 after serving in the US Navy during the First World War. He was an instructor in English at |
The Way West
''The Way West'' is a 1949 western novel by A. B. Guthrie, Jr. The book won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1950 and became the basis for a film starring Kirk Douglas, Robert Mitchum, and Richard Widmark. The novel is one in the sequence of six by A. B. Guthrie, Jr. dealing with the Oregon Trail and the development of Montana from 1830, the time of the mountain men, to "the cattle empire of the 1880s to the near present". The publication sequence started with ''The Big Sky'', followed by ''The Way West'', ''These Thousand Hills'', ''Arfive'' (1971), ''The Last Valley'' (1975), and '' Fair Land, Fair Land''. (1982) The first three books of the six in chronological story sequence (but not in the sequence of publishing) — ''The Big Sky'', ''The Way West'', and ''Fair Land, Fair ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dick Grace
Richard Virgil Grace (October 1, 1898 – June 25, 1965), known as Dick Grace, was an American stunt pilot who specialized in crashing planes for films. Films that he appeared in include ''Sky Bride'', ''The Lost Squadron'', '' Lilac Time'', and ''Wings''. He served in both world wars, bombing Germany, as a B-17 Flying Fortress co-pilot with the 486th Bombardment Group. After the Second World War, he operated a charter business in South America. He was married to Crystine Francis Malstrom, a stage actress who appeared in ''Abie's Irish Rose''. He was the author of several books, including ''Squadron of Death'', ''Crash Pilot'', ''I am still alive,'' and ''Visibility Unlimited''. Grace was one of the few stunt pilots who died of old age.Lussier, Tim (2004"Daredevils in the Air - Three of the Greats - Wilson, Locklear and Grace", Silents Are Golden Stunt work on films *'' The Flying Fool'' (1925) *''Wings'' (1927) *'' Lilac Time'' (1928) *''Young Eagles'' (1930) *''The Lost Squadron ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cleveland Amory
Cleveland Amory (September 2, 1917 – October 14, 1998) was an American author, reporter, television critic, commentator and animal rights activist. He originally was known for writing a series of popular books poking fun at the pretensions and customs of society, starting with ''The Proper Bostonians'' in 1947. From the 1950s through the 1990s, he had a long career as a reporter and writer for national magazines and as a television and radio commentator. In the late 1980s and 1990s, he was best known for his bestselling books about his adopted cat, Polar Bear, starting with ''The Cat Who Came for Christmas'' (1987). Amory devoted much of his life to promoting animal rights, particularly protection of animals from hunting and vivisection; the executive director of the Humane Society of the United States described Amory as "the founding father of the modern animal protection movement." Early life Amory was born September 2, 1917, into a privileged and established Boston Brahmin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
