Behind The Pine Curtain

Jacqueline Keys was ostracized from her small hometown of Pine Springs, Texas when she was seventeen, sent away because she was gay. Her family was the largest employer in the county, owning Pine Springs Lumber, and her father was mayor of this small town. Her mother could not accept the fact that her only child was gay, could not tolerate the gossip about her family. So, with a hundred dollars in her pocket and a one-way bus ticket out of town, Jacqueline was told not to come back until she had come to her senses. And that included being prepared to marry the son of a business associate of the family. Fifteen years later—long after she'd hitch-hiked to Los Angeles, long after she'd worked nights to put herself through college, and long after she'd written her first best seller, No Place For Family—Jacqueline is persuaded to go back to the tiny town of Pine Springs after her father's death. The quick trip she'd envisioned for the funeral turns into weeks as she learns her father's business is suddenly hers to manage. And she is also again face-to-face with the woman who, as a teen, had been Jackie's first crush. She and Kay had been inseparable as kids, and later as teens. They find themselves falling back into their old habits, and Jackie is soon fighting the same feelings she'd had when she was seventeen. But living behind the pine curtain, Kay is afraid of her love for Jackie, afraid of what her family will say, afraid of how the town will react. Jackie refuses to hide, refuses to crawl back into the closet, so once again, she leaves Pine Springs...alone.

Beloved, award-winning golf writer James Dodson, author of Final Rounds and American Triumvirate, shares his funny, intimate, nostalgic journey of self and sport in his golfing “bucket list.” Many years ago, when James Dodson was thirteen years old, he wrote a list titled “Things to Do in Golf.” It included the golfing aspirations of a young boy who had no idea where life would take him. A few years ago, now in his sixties and one of the most respected golf writers of all time, Dodson rediscovered the piece of paper in an old trunk. Realizing that he had yet to achieve many of his thirteen-year-old dreams, and pondering the things he’d add to the list if he wrote it today, he expanded the list into a golfing “bucket list” of the people and places he had yet to meet and see in the golf world. In this tribute to the game he loves, Dodson takes readers on a journey around the world and into the lives of characters large and small. From an interesting lunch with Donald Trump to rounds with John Updike and intimate conversations with Arnold Palmer, from scoring a memorable thirteen on a hole at St. Andrews to revealing the real reason The Masters has always been broadcast on CBS, The Range Bucket List is simultaneously an exhilarating armchair adventure and one man’s love letter to a game that has fundamentally shaped him and his life, filled with unforgettable characters, untold history, and lots of heart.

The saga of the lives of Clem and Susannah Brown and their family continues to unfold. The first book in The Fruit of the Spirit Series dealt with Clems childhood and subsequent marriage to Susannah and all the trials and tragedies they experienced through the years. Their children are Thomas, Ruth and Jeff. This book deals with their daughter Ruth from ages four to eighteen. She misbehaves as a child and doesnt show respect and love to her family and feels they dont love her. The prayer life of her family is greatly increased due to her attitude. She wants out of Victory, Texas, and off the farm. She wants big city life and wants to teach school. Her grandparents spoil her by giving her anything she wants. She eventually goes off to college in Houston and graduates top of her class in 1910, but through it all she shows lack of respect and love to her family many, many times with her prideful and haughty attitude. She applies for teaching jobs in four states and wants a big city. The only offer she gets is from a small town in Georgia in a one-room school. Everyone advises her to take it as a first-year teacher. She finally consents, but God has a plan for Ruth. The plan unfolds in a most unusual way to get her attention. Discover what happens to and in Ruth.

Nothing beats a natural swimming hole for cooling off on a scorching summer day in Texas. Cold, clear spring water, big old shade trees, and a quiet stretch of beach or lawn offer the perfect excuse to pack a cooler and head out with family and friends to the nearest natural oasis. Whether you're looking for a quick getaway or an unforgettable summer vacation, let The Swimming Holes of Texas be your guide. Julie Wernersbach and Carolyn Tracy highlight one hundred natural swimming spots across the entire state. The book is organized by geographic regions, so you can quickly find local places to swim--or plan a trip to a more distant spot you'd like to explore. Each swimming hole is illustrated with an inviting color photo and a description of what it's like to swim there, as well as the site's history, ecology, and conservation. The authors include all the pertinent info about admission fees and hours, parking, and on-site amenities such as showers and restrooms. They also offer tips for planning your trips and lists of the swimming holes that are most welcoming to families and pets. So when the temperature tops 100 and there's nothing but traffic in sight, take a detour down the backroads and swim, sunbathe, revel, and relax in the swimming holes of Texas.

From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Barbarian Days, this narrative nonfiction classic documents the rising inequality and cultural alienation that presaged the crises of today. “A status report on the American Dream [that] gets its power [from] the unpredictable, rich specifics of people’s lives.”—Time “[William] Finnegan’s real achievement is to attach identities to the steady stream of faceless statistics that tell us America’s social problems are more serious than we want to believe.”—The Washington Post A fifteen-year-old drug dealer in blighted New Haven, Connecticut; a sleepy Texas town transformed by crack; Mexican American teenagers in Washington State, unable to relate to their immigrant parents and trying to find an identity in gangs; jobless young white supremacists in a downwardly mobile L.A. suburb. William Finnegan spent years embedded with families in four communities across the country to become an intimate observer of the lives he reveals in Cold New World. What emerges from these beautifully rendered portraits is a prescient and compassionate book that never loses sight of its subjects’ humanity. A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK • A LOS ANGELES TIMES BEST NONFICTION SELECTION Praise for Cold New World “Unlike most journalists who drop in for a quick interview and fly back out again, Finnegan spent many weeks with families in each community over a period of several years, enough time to distinguish between the kind of short-term problems that can beset anyone and the longer-term systemic poverty and social disintegration that can pound an entire generation into a groove of despair.”—Los Angeles Times Book Review “The most remarkable of William Finnegan’s many literary gifts is his compassion. Not the fact of it, which we have a right to expect from any personal reporting about the oppressed, but its coolness, its clarity, its ductile strength. . . . Finnegan writes like a dream. His prose is unfailingly lucid, graceful, and specific, his characterization effortless, and the pull of his narrative pure seduction.”—The Village Voice “Four astonishingly intimate and evocative portraits. . . . All of these stories are vividly, honestly and compassionately told. . . . While Cold New World may make us look in new ways at our young people, perhaps its real goal is to make us look at ourselves.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer

Lauren Voss has a nice, quiet, orderly life running her grandmother’s Heron Bay Resort on the Texas coast. Three years removed from a break-up that left her ex—and her life—behind in San Diego, she’s adjusted to the slow pace in Rockport, seeking out neither new friends nor lovers. Vandalism at the resort’s clubhouse—and a cryptic message written in blood—brings Detective Harley Shepherd, with her obnoxious Hawaiian shirts, into her life. A tragedy sent Harley Shepherd running to the sleepy fishing village of Rockport, where violent crime is rare. So different from her life as a homicide detective in a large city, she embraced the quiet and easy-going attitude of the town, determined to put her past behind her. Was it luck or fate that had her catch a case of simple vandalism? The lovely Lauren Voss made no attempt to hide her dislike of both her—she reminded Lauren of her ex—and her Hawaiian shirts. Was the vandalism a prank, as Lauren suspects? When a body is found floating near the resort’s pier, Harley is convinced it’s related. As the formality and animosity between them changes and a friendship forms, the women find themselves growing closer as a killer terrorizes the peaceful town they both now call home.