Marty Frye, a seven-year-old who likes to read poetry and talk in rhymes, solves three separate mysteries for a classmate, a toy store owner, and his younger sister.

Hall's remarkable life in poetry--a career capped by his appointment as U.S. poet laureate in 2006--comes alive in this richly detailed, self-revealing memoir. At 80, Hall is as painstakingly honest about his failures and low points as a poet, writer, lover, and father as he is about his successes, making "Unpacking the Boxes," his first book since being named poet laureate, both revelatory and tremendously poignant.-- Publisher

A Mixteca Indian from Oaxaca, America Soliz, suffers from the poverty and hopelessness of her Chicago ghetto, made more endurable by a desire and determination to be a poet.

"When Robert Frost was a child, his family thought he would grow up to be a baseball player. Instead, he became a poet. His life on a farm in New Hampshire inspired him to write 'poetry that talked,' and today he is famous for his vivid descriptions of the rural life he loved so much. There was a time, though, when Frost had to struggle to get his poetry published. Told from the point of view of Lesley, Robert Frost's oldest daughter, this is the...

"Langston Hughes was born in Joplin, Missouri, and was raised by his grandmother, who told him many stories of the Black American experience and taught him to be proud of his race from a young age. With her guidance, Langston became a talented writer in high school, creating dramatic plays, poetry, and articles for the school paper. His career as a writer would continue to blossom. Langston pioneered jazz poetry and published nearly twenty poetry...

A hilarious and moving memoir--in the spirit of Anne Lamott and Nora Ephron--about a woman who returns home to her close-knit Mennonite family after a personal crisis. In the spirit of Anne Lamott and Nora Ephron comes Janze's hilarious and moving memoir about a woman who returns home to her close-knit Mennonite family after a personal crisis.-- Publisher

What dreams do you carry? Myra Viola Wilds dreamed of opportunity. She left her home in rural Kentucky for the city, learned to read and to write, and became a dressmaker. She hand-stitched gorgeous gowns. She worked so hard she lost her eyesight, and her world went dark. But those well-loved stitches turned into words, and one night Myra woke in the middle of the night and wrote a poem she called "Sunshine." She kept writing. She wrote the lush green,...

Auxilio Lacouture, "madre de todos los mexicanos," uruguaya de nacimiento y residente en México D. F., está abonada a los trabajos humildes y esporádicos durante el día e incansablemente inmersa en la bohemia de la ciudad durante la noche. Todo cambia para ella el 18 de septiembre de 1968, cuando el ejército toma posesión del campus de la Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México y ella queda encerrada en los baños de la facultad de filosofía...

In the far north of Italy lies the valley of the ice-cream makers: about a dozen villages where, for generations, people have specialised in making ice cream. Giuseppe Talamini claims it was actually invented here. Every spring his family sets off for the ice-cream parlour in Rotterdam, returning to the mountains only in winter.Eldest son Giovanni Talamini decides to break with this tradition by pursuing a literary career. But then one day his younger...

This is the story of a woman forging a new life for herself after her marriage has foundered, shutting up her beloved Devonshire house and making a home for her two young children in London, elated at completing the collection of poems she foresees will make her name. It is also the story of a woman struggling to maintain her mental equilibrium, to absorb the pain of her husband's betrayal and to resist her mother's engulfing love. It is the story...