Sky Blue Water

From the Dakota people who first inhabited the state to its generations of immigrants and today’s residents, Minnesota has long had a vibrant and unique storytelling tradition. A rich and often under appreciated part of this tradition is youth storytelling—a movement of which Minnesota is a national forerunner. Here, for the first time, two of the state’s beloved independent booksellers collect a wide array of short stories for young readers that pay homage to Minnesota's diverse cultures and stunning landscapes. Sky Blue Water celebrates young adult and intermediate fiction from some of Minnesota’s most beloved and award-winning authors to emerging talents and many more. With each turn of the page, every young reader will find a poignant and relatable story: tales of discovering hidden truths about one’s family, dealing with a difficult bully, and falling for the new kid who dresses like a cowboy, as well as settings from Rainy Lake to Lake Calhoun and time periods from Prohibition to the present day. Featuring primarily never-published stories, this anthology beautifully captures the essence of a Minnesota adolescence in twenty short stories and poems. Sky Blue Water features a Q&A between Minnesota classrooms and the contributing authors as well as curriculum materials for families, teachers, and students. This collection embodies passion for fostering literacy in young readers. A portion of the proceeds from Sky Blue Water will go to the Mid-Continent Oceanographic Institute, a Twin Cities organization offering free tutoring and writing assistance for students ages six to eighteen. Contributors: William Alexander; Swati Avasthi; Kelly Barnhill; Mary Casanova; John Coy; Kirstin Cronn-Mills; Anika Fajardo; Shannon Gibney; Pete Hautman; Lynne Jonell; Kevin Kling; Margi Preus; Marcie Rendon; Kurtis Scaletta; Julie Schumacher; Joyce Sidman; Phuoc Thi Minh Tran; Anne Ursu; Sarah Warren; Stephanie Watson; Kao Kalia Yang.

A vexatious shapeshifter walks among humans. Shadowy beasts skulk at the edges of the woods. A ghostly apparition haunts a lonely stretch of highway. Spirits and legends rise and join together to protect the north. Land-Water-Sky/Ndè-Tı-Yat’a is the debut novel from Dene author Katłıà. Set in Canada’s far north, this layered composite novel traverses space and time, from a community being stalked by a dark presence, a group of teenagers out for a dangerous joyride, to an archeological site on a mysterious island that holds a powerful secret. Riveting, subtle, and unforgettable, Katłıà gives us a unique perspective into what the world might look like today if Indigenous legends walked amongst us, disguised as humans, and ensures that the spiritual significance and teachings behind the stories of Indigenous legends are respected and honored. We acknowledge the support of Arts Nova Scotia.

From the author of the international bestseller Mornings in Jenin comes a powerful, passionate story of a family separated by conflict, and the tragedy they endure 'The story Susan Abulhawa tells in this marvellous novel is hard to bear but impossible to ignore ... precise, courageous, and dazzling' Teju Cole 'Gripping and deeply moving ... Suffering and resilience are difficult things to witness, but this powerful, politically engaged novel does so with a transformative literary grace.' Independent on Sunday It is 1947, and Beit Daras, a rural Palestinian village, is home to the Baraka family – oldest daughter Nazmiyeh, brother Mamdouh, beautiful, dreamy Mariam and their widowed mother. When Israeli forces descend, sending the village up in flames, the family must take the long road to Gaza, in a walk that will test them to their limits. Sixty years later, in America, Mamdouh's granddaughter Nur falls in love with a doctor. Following him to his work in Gaza, she meets Alwan, who will help Nur discover the ties of kinship that transcend distance – and even death. Told with raw humanity, The Blue Between Sky and Water is a lyrical, devastatingly beautiful story of a family's relocation, separation, survival and love.

"These essays are among Scott MacDonald's best. An added bonus among all this new work is one updated vintage essay from 1981—still the very best essay ever written about the uses of pornography. All the essays are intellectually, personally and viscerally vibrant, coupling substantive recent essays with his trademark, probing interviews with key filmmakers. Each interview is beautifully paired with the essays. Scott MacDonald is a monument to thoughtful knowledge of, and pleasure in, avant-garde cinema."—Linda Williams, author of Screening Sex "More than any other critic, Scott MacDonald truly explores contemporary experimental cinema, seeking out new works and new artists, reconsidering classics and broadening out our sense of film history from the images on screen to the social, political and economic contexts and debates surrounding them. And yet if MacDonald surveys a complex landscapes, his books never carry the claustrophobia of the archive or academia. This criticism answers the call of the open road, with conversations and companionship with vivid personalities guiding the way, and the sense of high adventure waiting just around the bend."—Tom Gunning, Chair, Committee on Cinema and Media, University of Chicago

Many associate early western music with the likes of Roy Rogers and Gene Autry, but America’s first western music craze predates these “singing cowboys” by decades. Written by Tin Pan Alley songsters in the era before radio, the first popular cowboy and Indian songs circulated as piano sheet music and as cylinder and disc recordings played on wind-up talking machines. The colorful fantasies of western life depicted in these songs capitalized on popular fascination with the West stoked by Buffalo Bill’s Wild West shows, Owen Wister’s novel The Virginian, and Edwin S. Porter’s film The Great Train Robbery. The talking machine music industry, centered in New York City, used state-of-the-art recording and printing technology to produce and advertise songs about the American West. Talking Machine West brings together for the first time the variety of cowboy, cowgirl, and Indian music recorded and sold for mass consumption between 1902 and 1918. In the book’s introductory chapters, Michael A. Amundson explains how this music reflected the nostalgic passing of the Indian and the frontier while incorporating modern ragtime music and the racial attitudes of Jim Crow America. Hardly Old West ditties, the songs gave voice to changing ideas about Indians and assimilation, cowboys, the frontier, the rise of the New Woman, and ethnic and racial equality. In the book’s second part, a chronological catalogue of fifty-four western recordings provides the full lyrics and history of each song and reproduces in full color the cover art of extant period sheet music. Each entry also describes the song’s composer(s), lyricist(s), and sheet music illustrator and directs readers to online digitized recordings of each song. Gorgeously illustrated throughout, this book is as entertaining as it is informative, offering the first comprehensive account of popular western recorded music in its earliest form.

Colors are all around us, but also within us. We not only have our favorite colous, our auras have their own color. Our chakras have their different colors. Tuning in to our colors rebalances our selves with nature and each other. Finding our right color has implications for the way we dress, how we decorate our homes, even the food we eat. Use the color inset and the exercises in this book to find the right colors for you in different situations. Become color intelligent, and live a glorious life of kaleidoscopic color rather than a monochrome existence.

Bear Lake Valley is located in Bear Lake County, Idaho and Rich County in Utah.

Discover the power of sunrays and how they work wonders in curing various diseases and keeping you fit. "The Healing Powers of Chromotherapy" offers glimpses into the secrets of chromotherapy and gives tips on how to cure ailments. It also gives insights into the principles, techniques and benefits of this alternative therapy so that you can lead a more healthy and fulfilling life. Methods to prepare colour-charged medicines with easily available things like clarified butter (ghee), water, sugar granules, honey and oils have also been discussed. So grab the book and unearth the therapeutic benefits of sunrays and make them work for you.