Just in time for your holiday wish list, here’s a handful of the latest regional reads:
Adirondack Hard Times: Evolution of a Rich Man’s Paradise (The History Press, 2021), by Andrew Egan, points out inconsistencies in the accepted truths of Adirondack history, turning our attention to the region’s “poignant rural poverty” (160 pages, $21.99, softcover, black-and-white images, www.arcadiapublishing.com).
Local historian Jay O’Hern’s The Adirondacks’ Moose River Plains: Life Around the Indian Clearing (self-published, 2021) spotlights the pioneers of some of the most remote acres in the West Central Adirondacks (700 pages, $39.95, softcover, black-and-white images, adirondackbooksonline.com).
In The Amazing Migration Vacation (self-published, 2021), the latest addition to Justin and Gary Van Riper’s Adirondack Kids series, the gang finds common ground between home and North Carolina’s Outer Banks (84 pages, $9.95, softcover, black-and-white images, adirondackkids.com).
Joan Cofrancesco and illustrator Janine Bartolotti team up for a second time in Billie Bunny goes to Paris (self-published, 2021), as Billie bounds from Blue Mountain Lake to the City of Lights and back again (24 pages, $15, softcover, color illustrations, joannecofrancesco@icloud.com).
Glenn Erick Miller’s Camper Girl (Fitzroy Books, 2020) takes young adult readers on a lively Adirondack scavenger hunt (175 pages, $14.95, softcover, www.regalhousepublishing.com).
Celebrating Their Lives: Turning the Loss of a Loved One into a Legacy for Helping Others (self-published, 2021), by Norah Machia, tells the stories of 14 North Country families who found ways to turn tragedy into meaningful change (133 pages, $16.99, softcover, black-and-white images, www.norahmachia.com).
The Crazy Wisdom: Memoir of a Friendship (self-published, 2021), by former Adirondack Life editor Christopher Shaw, offers a portrait of a gritty Adirondack character (218 pages, $17.95, softcover, www.barnesandnoble.com).
Ruth Rogers Clausen and Gregory D. Tepper provide tips for a nibble-proof garden in Deer-Resistant Native Plants for the Northeast (Timber Press, 2021, 220 pages, $19.95, softcover, color images, www.workman.com)
In Forests Adrift (Yale University Press, 2020), ecologist Charles D. Canham analyzes the past, present and future of our northeastern forests, exploring threats like invasive species and climate change (222 pages, $28, hardcover, black-and-white images, yalebooks.yale.edu).
Erik Schlimmer’s From Northville to Placid: Place Names of New York’s Oldest Long Trail (self-published, 2021) tells the stories behind the sites along the 138-mile Northville–Lake Placid Trail (116 pages, $16, softcover, black-and-white images, beechwoodbks.com).
Former rafting guide Ronald M. Berger’s novel The Gorge (self-published, 2020) follows a guide-turned-criminologist as he tracks down a killer who’s using the spring-swollen Hudson as a weapon (225 pages, $12.99, softcover, www.barnesandnoble.com).
In Iron Sharpens Iron (self-published, 2020), by Herb Terns, a Lake Placid native tries to outrun—and outswim and outbike—his past by winning the Ironman triathlon (378 pages, $16.99, softcover, www.herbterns.com).
A Prison in the Woods (University of Massachusetts Press, 2020), by Clarence Jefferson Hall Jr., explores the connections between the North Country’s carceral economy and the environment (249 pages, $29.95, softcover, black-and-white images, www.umasspress.com).
Tom Tolnay’s Love in the Shadows of the Mountains (self-published, 2021) dips into the earthier side of Adirondack relationships (329 pages, $21.99, softcover, atmospherepress.com).
Learn how to darn a pair of socks or shear a sheep—and just about everything in between—with Storey’s Curious Compendium of Practical and Obscure Skills (Storey Publishing, 2020, 344 pages, $29.95, hardcover, color images, www.storey.com).
Marc Douglass Smith’s Tamarack Summers (self-published, 2021), an adventure for 13 to 18-year-olds, follows the journey of a boy and his rescued turtle (188 pages, $15.99, softcover, atmospherepress.com).
In Valcour: The 1776 Campaign That Saved the Cause of Liberty (St. Martin’s Press, 2021), Jack Kelly vividly details the lead-up, action and aftermath of this pivotal Lake Champlain battle (285 pages, $28.99, hardcover, black-and-white images, us.macmillan.com).
What’s with Those Adirondack Mountain Names? (self-published, 2021), by Robert C. Lawrence, tracks the origins of 100 mountain monikers (152 pages, $19.99, softcover, black-and-white images, www.amazon.com).
Brad Edmondson takes the starch out of Adirondack Park Agency history in A Wild Idea: How the Environmental Movement Tamed the Adirondacks (Cornell University Press, 2021), giving readers an absorbing narrative of its messy birth (304 pages, $29.95, hardcover, black-and-white images, www.cornellpress.cornell.edu).
