California Bear

This "fresh, exciting, and brilliantly unpredictable" thriller (James Patterson) from a "great storyteller" (Michael Connelly) follows four unlikely vigilantes who pit themselves against the villain behind California’s coldest case when they decide to take justice into their own hands. NONE OF YOU ARE SAFE “KILLER”: Jack Queen has been exonerated and freed from prison thanks to retired LAPD officer Cato Hightower. But when guilt gnaws at Jack, he admits: “I actually did it.” To which Hightower responds: “Yeah, no kidding.” You see, the ex-cop has a special job in mind for the ex-con… THE GIRL DETECTIVE: Fifteen-year-old Matilda Finnerty has been handed a potential death sentence in the form of a leukemia diagnosis. But that’s not going to stop her from tackling the most important mystery of her life: Is her father guilty of murder? GENE JEANIE: Jeanie Hightower mends family trees for a living, but the genealogist is unable to repair her own marriage. And her soon-to-be ex may have entangled her in a scheme that has drawn the bloody wrath of… THE BEAR: A prolific serial killer who disappeared forty years ago, who is only now emerging from hibernation when the conditions are just right. And this time, the California Bear is not content to hunt in the shadows… From two-time Edgar nominee Duane Swierczynski, California Bear is clever, moving, and surprising as it takes aim at the true crime industry, Hollywood, justice, and the killers inside us all.

Dale L. Walker, historian and author of Legends and Lies: Great Mysteries of the American West, takes on the conquest of California in this vivid portrait of America's manifest destiny. Bear Flag Rising traces the history of California from the Indians who inhabited the land before the first Europeans saw it through the warfare that would finally leave the province in American hands. The lives of the Californios in tranquil days before the advent of American trappers and the steady decline of the province under Mexico's neglectful rule are brought to life in this epic chronicle. Battles and skirmishes, such as the bitter fight on the San Gabriel River during the march to recapture Los Angeles, are meticulously re-created in all their vicious glory. Above all, Bear Flag Rising is rich with the personalities of the conquest--from John Charles Fremont, the ambitious, enigmatic explorer, to Commodore Robert Field Stockton, a wealthy, imperious, and ruthless naval officer, and Stephen Watts Kearny, who made a 2,000-mile overland march from Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, annexing New Mexico on the way, and arrived in California to face Mexican lancers in battle. Bear Flag Rising reveals, through exacting research and masterful prose, the full story of how Mexico lost California and how this Pacific paradise went on to become "the greatest jewel in the crown of the American Empire." At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

"Unless otherwise noted, all material is from the collection of The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley"--T.p. verso.

The California Bear Flag and the University of California football team the Golden Bears emblemize the great animal that has been extinct in California since the 1920s but once numbered perhaps as many as ten thousand in the state. Forty years after its original publication, University of California Press proudly reissues California Grizzly, still the most comprehensive book on the bear's history in California. The lessons of the book resonate today as the issues of protection of wildlife habitat versus unfettered development of land for human use are debated with increasing urgency.

From National Book Award in Fiction finalist Andrew Krivak comes a gorgeous fable of Earth’s last two human inhabitants, and a girl’s journey home In an Edenic future, a girl and her father live close to the land in the shadow of a lone mountain. They possess a few remnants of civilization: some books, a pane of glass, a set of flint and steel, a comb. The father teaches the girl how to fish and hunt, the secrets of the seasons and the stars. He is preparing her for an adulthood in harmony with nature, for they are the last of humankind. But when the girl finds herself alone in an unknown landscape, it is a bear that will lead her back home through a vast wilderness that offers the greatest lessons of all, if she can only learn to listen. A cautionary tale of human fragility, of love and loss, The Bear is a stunning tribute to the beauty of nature’s dominion. Andrew Krivak is the author of two previous novels: The Signal Flame, a Chautauqua Prize finalist, and The Sojourn, a National Book Award finalist and winner of both the Chautauqua Prize and Dayton Literary Peace Prize. He lives with his wife and three children in Somerville, Massachusetts, and Jaffrey, New Hampshire, in the shadow of Mount Monadnock, which inspired much of the landscape in The Bear.

The black dog is not scratching. He goes back to his sniffing and huffing and then he starts cracking his bone. Stick and I are huddled tight. . . . It is dark and no Daddy or Mommy and after a while I watch the lids of my eyes close down like jaws. Told from the point of view of a six-year-old child, The Bear is the story of Anna and her little brother, Stick--two young children forced to fend for themselves in Algonquin Park after a black bear attacks their parents. A gripping and mesmerizing exploration of the child psyche, this is a survival story unlike any other, one that asks what it takes to survive in the wilderness and what happens when predation comes from within.

From debut children's author Vanessa Bayer and illustrator Rosie Butcher, How Do You Care for a Very Sick Bear? is a sweet picture book with advice for children—and adults—for dealing with a sick friend. You and your friend Bear are an excellent pair. But if your friend gets sick, And can’t do all the things that you two love to do... You may wonder--how do you care for a very sick Bear? When someone dear is dealing with illness, it's difficult to know what to do or say. The actor Vanessa Bayer experienced this firsthand when she was treated for childhood leukemia. In her first children's book, she offers gentle, reassuring advice that people of all ages will appreciate.