Our lady of birth control

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Patricia Sullivan

"Virginia Foster Durr was a monumental champion for civil rights. A white southerner who returned to Alabama in 1951 after twenty years in Washington, D.C., she was horrified to revisit the racism of her childhood. In her struggle to understand the South and battle isolation, she wrote hundreds of letters - humorous, sharp, and observant - to her friends up north, among them Eleanor Roosevelt, Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson, Hugo Black, and C. Vann Woodward." "Published on the 100th anniversary of Durr's birth, her letters offer a window onto a society in turmoil, chronicling the events that transformed the South and the nation. Her writing adds a distinctive glimpse into the day-to-day battles for racial justice at a pivotal moment in American history."--Jacket.

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Jean Lacouture

A tour de force narrative history that provides readers with detailed and engrossing biographies of several notable Jesuits. French journalist Lacouture (De Gaulle, 1992, etc.) has crafted an original approach to Jesuit history here. Instead of following a traditional, chronological history of the Society of Jesus, he has chosen to provide a ""multibiography"" that emphasizes the contributions of a few innovators, including the movement's founder, St. Ignatius of Loyola. Lacouture has been quixotic in his sampling, choosing occasionally to highlight some obscure, understudied Jesuit in lieu of a more celebrated priest. But despite the eclectic nature of his foci, Lacouture proves he is no dilettante. The result is a nearly perfect blend of stories from various cultures, and the author, a gifted raconteur, is always passionate about his subject matter. He challenges the widely held stereotype that the Society was driven solely by blind obedience to Rome and instead explores the Jesuits' evolving commitments to syncretism and cultural exchange. As the Society founded missions in diverse cultures, Lacouture maintains, it abandoned much of its absolutism in favor of a Christianity that would adapt to its surroundings and ""be all things to all men."" Lacouture traces the development of Jesuit missions in regions as far-flung as Japan, India, and Paraguay and demonstrates a surprisingly profound knowledge of non-European histories. He also reveals some of the ""forgotten"" history of the Jesuit movement, such as the short-lived attempt to establish a sister order in the 16th century. Lacouture's historical reconstructions are greatly enhanced by his prolific use of diaries, memoirs, and letters. That the book is so well-written is pleasantly surprising, since it has been translated and abridged from the bestselling two-volume French edition. Beautifully told, with an occasional dose of sardonic humor, Lacouture's well-crafted ""multibiography"" is destined to become a classic of Jesuit studies.

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Pat Cary Peek

"Through a blend of personal experience, historical fiction, and natural history of the Big Creek River area, One Winter in the Wilderness describes the humorous, frustrating, and sometimes dangerous daily adventures of a wildlife biologist and his wife in Idaho's remote back country. During the colors of fall, the cold and dark of winter, and the welcome greening of spring, Pat Cary Peek interweaves her experiences with daily events and activities to give readers a taste of life in the wilderness."--BOOK JACKET. "The author's husband, Dr. James Peek, professor of Wildlife Resources at the University of Idaho, studied the habitat of the large mammals that frequent the Big Creek canyon for several years and Pat had gone with him on summer field trips. When she retired from teaching, the two decided it would be an excellent time to spend a winter writing, observing the animals, and acting as ranch caretakers."--BOOK JACKET.

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Erich Leyens, Lotte Andor

This book contains two narratives, each of which offers a clear and moving portrait of how German Jews came to terms with the changes in their lives brought on by the Nazis. Under the Nazi Regime is a powerful study of the destruction of culture and humanity, morality and justice, and the morale of the general population in Hitler's Germany. Erich Leyens, a decorated World War I hero who openly protested the arrival of the Nazis in his hometown, reflects here on his five years of direct experience with the Nazis. Among the questions he explores in his narrative are: How did the pressures of an authoritarian system destroy human relationships and compromise values? How could friends and neighbors, fellow citizens and public officials, undergo such a complete transformation? How could the masses of Germans become disposed to submit unconditionally to the Hitler cult? . In contrast, Lotte Andor's Memoirs of an Unknown Actress focuses on the comical, even absurd side of her experiences as an exile. For Andor, whose promising career as a stage actress was abruptly ended by the Nazis, her emigration from Germany in 1934 brought not only apprehension, pain, and uncertainty, but sometimes unusual joy. Because her commitment to life and humor, Andor was able to make the many very difficult adjustments demanded by emigration, seemingly with ease.