Wild Swans

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Janet Frame

"From the first place of liquid darkness, within the second place of air and light, I set down the following record with its mixture of fact and truths and memories of truths and its direction always toward the Third Place, where the starting point is myth." Thus opens this first volume of autobiography by Janet Frame, one of the most highly regarded writers of today. Recounting her childhood in New Zealand in the 1920s and 30s, Janet Frame not only takes us on a remarkable journey through her childhood and adolescence, but also shows us the evolution of a writer. It is a sensitive, endearing narrative, written simply and from the heart; full of the joy and wonderment of a child and the craft of an artist. *To the Is-Land* recalls in vivid detail the worlds which open up to Janet Frame; her initiations, her first encounters with death, the facts of life, and her exploration into the world around her leading to her discovery of the world of poetry. Janet Frame writes, "I remember my overwhelming sense of anticipation and excitement at the world - the world being My Place by the fallen birch log, with the grass, the insects in the grass, the sky, the sheep and cows and rabbits, the wax-eyes and hawks - everything Outside... and the way I was filled with longing for it."

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Richard K. Tucker

In the early 1920s there were about 250,000 members of the Ku Klux Klan in Indiana. Their principal organizer, and the man who profited most from their membership fees, was D.C. Stephenson, a mysterious drifter with a shady background who arrived in Indiana in 1920 with political experience and an acute sense of the showmanship required for political success, but no beliefs. He used his skills to move to the forefront of the Klan boom. But Stephenson's 1925 murder conviction, stemming from a bizarre and inebriated episode of abduction and rape, ended support for the Klan in Indiana, and discredited many of the state's political leaders. These two books, written for a general audience, tell the story of the rise and fall of the Indiana Klan and Stephenson. Tucker's book ventures more theoretical speculation about the Klan in the North, though he doesn't advance any sustained argument other than to stress, correctly, the Klan's anti-Catholicism. But Tucker exaggerates the Klan's hegemony and gives neither a real sense of the climate and the struggles of the time nor a convincing portrait of Stephenson, who remains a shadowy figure. Lutholtz's thorough book, though it has a sharper focus on Stephenson and Indiana, portrays the political struggles more completely. What is most pertinent is the picture that emerges of the quiet force of bigotry rather than overt Klan power. But Lutholtz resists all theory, so any conclusions about the broader relevance of the strange and fascinating story of Stephenson and the Indiana Klan in the 1920s will have to be drawn by the reader. Lutholtz's book is for larger public library collections.

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Lois Gould

Compelling and multilayered, Mommy Dressing recounts the author's bittersweet girlhood as the daughter of one of America's first star designers. Lois Gould now offers a memoir that is at once a personal history of her family and a fascinating portrayal of New York's emergence as the world's fashion and glamour capital. Both stories revolve around the central figure of Jo Copeland, a brilliant artist and working mother whose career spanned four decades, from the birth of New York fashion in the 1920s to the close of her own design studio in the 1960s. The story of Jo Copeland's rise to success - in the company of other such early designers as Hattie Carnegie, Claire McCardell, and Vera Maxwell - is also the story of the headstrong, difficult rise of American fashion. And through the lens of Lois Gould's childhood, an interior world as remote and complex as the mother she strove to understand, readers are given a glimpse of the distant landscape of beautiful exteriors that her mother both created and inspired.

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Merle Hoffman

"As a girl, Merle Hoffman knew she was destined for greatness--she just didn't know which stage she would act upon. Coming of age amidst the cries for reproductive freedom and the rise of modern feminism, Hoffman saw her chance to become a pioneer in an exciting new field: she would run one of the first abortion clinics in New York City. Hoffman went on to become one of the fiercest voices in the pro-choice movement, leading rallies in Bryant Park and marches down Fifth Avenue, debating Jerry Falwell on national television, and hosting a groundbreaking TV series called On the Issues. Throughout her years of campaigning, Hoffman's commitment to creating a place of safety and comfort for the tens of thousands of patients who have relied upon her clinic, CHOICES Women's Medical center, has made her a thorn in the side of the pro-life movement and an inspiration to her fellow feminists. Intimate Wars is the story of a warrior who never hesitated to enter battle and risk her life for the fundamental right for women to govern their own bodies"--