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Chapters: People From Glencoe, Illinois, Fred Savage, Laurie Dann, Archibald Macleish, Lili Taylor, Skokie Lagoons, Ravine Bluffs Development, Sheridan Road, Douglas Conant, Kenneth Macleish, Paris Grey. Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 60. Not illustrated. Free updates online. Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: Laurie Dann (née Wasserman) (October 18, 1957May 20, 1988) was an American murderer who shot and killed a boy, and wounded two girls and three boys, in a Winnetka, Illinois, elementary school, then took a family hostage and shot a man before killing herself. Dann was born into a Jewish family in Chicago and grew up in Glencoe, an affluent northern suburb of Chicago. She was the daughter of an accountant, Norman Wasserman, and his wife, Edith. Those who knew Dann described her as shy and withdrawn but attractive. She dated a number of her male peers as a teenager and graduated from New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois, in 1975. Her grades were poor in high school, but she was able to attend Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. When her grades improved, she transferred to the University of Arizona with the goal of becoming a teacher. She began dating a pre-med student, and the relationship soon became serious, but she was becoming possessive and demanding. In 1980, with the relationship failing, Dann moved back to her parents' home. She then transferred to Northwestern University to complete her degree, but she dropped out of all her classes and never graduated. She met and married Russell Dann, an executive in a successful insurance brokering firm in September 1982, but the marriage was quickly in trouble as Russell Dann and her family noted signs of obsessive-compulsive disorder and other strange behavior, including leaving trash around the house. Laurie saw a psychiatrist for a short period, who identif...More: http://booksllc.net/?id=2158718 ... Read more

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Chapters: Fred Savage, Laurie Dann, Archibald Macleish, Lili Taylor, Douglas Conant, Kenneth Macleish, Paris Grey. Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 43. Not illustrated. Free updates online. Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: Laurie Dann (née Wasserman) (October 18, 1957May 20, 1988) was an American murderer who shot and killed a boy, and wounded two girls and three boys, in a Winnetka, Illinois, elementary school, then took a family hostage and shot a man before killing herself. Dann was born into a Jewish family in Chicago and grew up in Glencoe, an affluent northern suburb of Chicago. She was the daughter of an accountant, Norman Wasserman, and his wife, Edith. Those who knew Dann described her as shy and withdrawn but attractive. She dated a number of her male peers as a teenager and graduated from New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois, in 1975. Her grades were poor in high school, but she was able to attend Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. When her grades improved, she transferred to the University of Arizona with the goal of becoming a teacher. She began dating a pre-med student, and the relationship soon became serious, but she was becoming possessive and demanding. In 1980, with the relationship failing, Dann moved back to her parents' home. She then transferred to Northwestern University to complete her degree, but she dropped out of all her classes and never graduated. She met and married Russell Dann, an executive in a successful insurance brokering firm in September 1982, but the marriage was quickly in trouble as Russell Dann and her family noted signs of obsessive-compulsive disorder and other strange behavior, including leaving trash around the house. Laurie saw a psychiatrist for a short period, who identified her childhood and upbringing as a cause of her problems. Laurie and Russell Dann sepa...More: http://booksllc.net/?id=2158718 ... Read more

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BOMB 47, Spring 1994, featuring: Interviews with Djur Djura by David Byrne, Gregory Crane by Simon Lane, Lili Taylor by Nicole Burdette, Paul Beatty by Christian Haye, Edmund White by Alain Kirili, Richard Foreman by Eric Bogosian, Robert Berry, Martha Rosler, and Nancy Spero by Marjorie Welish, Suzan-Lori Parks by Han Ong, St. Clair Cemin by Shirley Kaneda, and Pedro Almodovar by Ela Troyano. Fiction and Poetry by Klauss Kertess, Vivian Heller, Sophie Cabot Black, Mark Solomon, Padgett Powell, and Beverly Lowry. Artwork by Jane Kaplowitz, Christian Schumann, Eva Lundsager, Glenn Ligon, Kim Dingle, and Richard Flexner. ... Read more

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This digital document is an article from Winnipeg Free Press, published by Thomson Gale on August 11, 2007. The length of the article is 883 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Leading ladies star on cable; Fronting series new for Hunter, Close, Taylor.(Entertainment Wire)
Author: Gale Reference Team
Publication: Winnipeg Free Press (Magazine/Journal)
Date: August 11, 2007
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Page: c10

Distributed by Thomson Gale ... Read more

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FOR USE IN SCHOOLS AND LIBRARIES ONLY. Having entered her Black Period, Ida B. Applewood is facing some challenging times and so must turn to her loyal pets, a dedicated teacher, and the beauty of her favorite apple tree to get through it all, in an entertaining coming of age tale. ... Read more

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For the first time on audio - all six in The Princess Tales series by Newbery Honor winner Gail Carson Levine

Customer Reviews (12)

The Princess Tales: Volume One
The Princess Tales are funny, clever, exciting and easy reads. The first story of volume one wasn't my favorite because I was so use to the classic princess tales where fairies don't mess up. I almost put the book down because I was upset with how the story was going. But the tales were funny and well written with intriguing characters so I felt compelled to keep reading and find out what happens to these princesses.
Not only is it an exciting twist on a classic fairy tales but the stories have great messages in them for all ages. These stories are clever in that it makes you compare the old classic tales with these new ones such as the old Princes and the Pea compares to the new the Princess Test and the old Sleeping Beauty to the new Princess Sonora and the Long Sleep. It makes you think "this is how they must have acted" instead of the old damsel in distress where the heroic prince comes and saves the day. I can't wait to share these new Princess tales with my niece when she is old enough. I'm sure she'll laugh and enjoy them just as much as I did.

Fun retellings of familiar favorites
This first volume of fairytale retellings by the legendary Gail Carson Levine includes 'The Princess and the Pea', 'Sleeping Beauty' and (To be honest, I'm not sure what story 'The Fairy's Mistake' is supposed to be.) All three stories are told in fun and amusing ways though Princess Sonora's "smartness" was really annoying since a lot of conclusions she came to were downright inaccurate. For a grownup stuff like that can be amusing but for a child it can be confusing.

Awesome, Unique Princess Stories to tell your children
These stories are all awesome.They are different, humorous and continually unpredicatble.Ms. Levine does a fabulous job of retelling well known fairy tales in such a way as to surprise and delight everyone and entertain even the most scattered of readers (not that I'm scattered or anything... I'm just saying, if I WAS:)

She has inspired me to write stories, and my children have been inspired to play make believe and make up new and interesting tales.She inspires creativity and thinking outside the box.

Fabulous story!

My daughter loves these stories
There was a time where trying to get my middle daughter to read was like trying to herd cats. Then she brought this book home from the school library. I didn't have to nag her once to finish it, she poured through it from cover to cover. She liked it because it was funny and captured her interest.

Well, I was sold. I bought this book and Volume II and it was the beginning of the turn around. They helped to inspire the love of reading I was hoping for with my daughter, and now she willingly reads a wider variety of books.

2nd Quater Book Project
The Princess Tales Volume One By Gail Carson Levine

Rosella is a princess that was granted with a spell that made jewels come out of her mouth when she talked. No one really appreciated her but they appreciated her jewels.

Lorelei was a girl that lived with her nanny that didnt like her very much at all. Lorelei ends up pretending that she was a princess and it turned out she did eveything a real princess should be able to do.

Sonaro was a princess that was granted with a spell that if she was pricked with needle she would fall asleep for a hundred years and a prince would wake her up with a kiss. Sonaro gets pricked by a needle and she falls asleep for a hundrd years and she wakes up with a prince that was perfect for her.

Three princesses are each fighting hard times with spells and people.

Hundreds of years ago on Snettering-On-Snoakes these three tales take place.

Beauty, bravery, fear, hope, and love all take place in the story making it very detailed and addicting to read.

I liked this story. These tales really made me want to keep reading to find out how these princesses would go on living and why. ... Read more

Product Description
With this stunning novel about a woman and a marriage that begins in passion and becomes violent, the Pulitzer Prize--winning journalist and bestselling author of One True Thing and Object Lessons moves to a new dimension as a writer of superb fiction. "If literature were judged solely by its ability to elicit strong emotions," Kirkus Reviews said about One True Thing, "columnist-cum-novelist Quindlen would win another Pulitzer."  And the same will be said about Black and Blue, a brilliant novel of suspense, substance, and importance.

In Black and Blue, Fran Benedetto tells a spellbinding story: how at nineteen she fell in love with Bobby Benedetto, how their passionate marriage became a nightmare, why she stayed, and what happened on the night she finally decided to run away with her ten-year-old son and start a new life under a new name. Living in fear in Florida--yet with increasing confidence, freedom, and hope--Fran unravels the complex threads of family, identity, and desire that shape a woman's life, even as she begins to create a new one. As Fran starts to heal from the pain of the past, she almost believes she has escaped it--that Bobby Benedetto will not find her and again provoke the complex combustion between them of attraction and destruction, lust and love.

Black and Blue is a beautifully written, heart-stopping story in which Anna Quindlen writes with power, wisdom, and humor about the real lives of men and women, the varieties of people and love, the bonds between mother and child, the solace of family and friendship, the inexplicable feelings between people who are passionately connected in ways they don't understand. It is a remarkable work of fiction by the writer whom Alice Hoffman has called "a national treasure."


From the Hardcover edition.Amazon.com Review
Oprah Book Club® Selection, April 1998: "The first time my husband hit me I was nineteen years old," begins Fran Benedetto, the broken heroine of Anna Quindlen's Black and Blue. With one sweeping sentence, the door to an abused and tortured world is swung wide open and the psyche of a crushed and tattered self-imageexposed. "Frannie, Frannie, Fran"--as Bobby Benedetto liked to call her before smashing her into kitchen appliances--was a young, energetic nursing student when she met her husband-to-be at a local Brooklyn bar. She was instantly captivated by his dark, brooding looks and magnetic personality, but her fascination soon solidified into a marital prison sentence of incessant abuse and the destruction of her own identity. After an especially horrific beating and rape, Fran realizes that the next attack could be the last. Fearing her son would be left alone with Bobby, she escapes one morning with her child. Fran'ssalvation comes in the form of Patty Bancroft and Co., a relocation agency for abused women that touts better service than the witness protection program. Armed only with a phone number, a few hundred dollars, and the help of several anonymous volunteers, Fran begins a new life. The agency relocates her to Florida, where she becomes Beth Crenshaw, a recently divorced home-care assistant from Delaware. Fran and her son adapt, meeting challenges with unexpected resilience and resolve until their past returns to haunt them. Quindlen renders the intricacies of spousal abuse with eerie accuracy, taking the reader deep within the realm of dysfunctional human ties. However, her vivid descriptions of abuse, emotional disintegration, and acute loneliness at times numb the reader with their realism. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (475)

A literary profile of the abuser
Many of us who loveLolita have its unforgettable first lines committed to memory: "Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three..."Using exquisite prose, Nabokov sketches in an extremely compelling manner the profile of a pedophile and his victim. Unlike many other psychological novels, he doesn't turn tragedy into redemption and pathology into love. There's nothing redeeming or redeemable about the sociopathic pedophile and his sick love for Lolita.

Anna Quindlen's Black and Blue follows in Lolita`s footsteps as a great work of psychological fiction. Psychological, because the author sketches in such a realistic fashion the profile of the abuser that I'm tempted to say her novel should be available in every domestic violence shelter under the category of "nonfiction." And yet, one can't forget that Black and Blue is above all a work of fiction, masterfully crafted. Its beginning echoes the first lines of Lolita, in fact, the novel which it resembles in style even more than in content:

"The first time my husband hit me I was nineteen years old. One sentence and I'm lost. One sentence and I can hear his voice in my head, that butterscotch-syrup voice that made goose bumps rise on my arms when I was young, that turned all of my skin warm and alive with a sibilant S, the drawling vowels, its shocking fricatives. It always sounded like a whisper, the way he talked, the intimacy of it, the way the words seemed to go into your gutys, your head, your heart." (1)

The message of Black and Blue is similar to that of nonfiction books on dangerous men, which attempt to educate the public and empower the victims. Abusers are often charming. Abusers don't usually begin intimate relationships with overt abuse. Abusers can be entrancing and romantic, at least at first, during the wooing phase. Abuse doesn't get better; it escalates. Abusers push the limits of their victims' tolerance, little by little, until they dominate their targets. Abuse is above all a power game. The abusers are generally narcissistic individuals who lack empathy and want total control. The victims, however, aren't necessarily weak or passive. They can be strong and loving men and women, like Frannie Benedetto. Abuse is a tragedy without a silver lining.

It's one thing to read this familiar message in self-help books and pamphlets and quite another to feel it in a great work of fiction. From the very first lines, Black and Blue gets under your skin. It reveals the mindset of both abuser and abused. It traces the emotional scars of the child or children who have to endure these sad family dynamics. "My son scarcely ever cries. And his smile comes so seldom that it's like bright sunshine on winter snow, blinding and strange." (26)Such beautiful language for such ugly facts... Perhaps this is the best way to bring the abuse to life for others. Above all, Black and Blue puts you in the shoes of all those who have the courage to run away from it without ever looking back.

Claudia Moscovici, Notablewriters.com

A Compelling Story

I loved this book.It was given to me in a box of books (I had never heard of it), and it's one of the first ones that i picked out to read.I am an avid reader, and i think the writing is fantastic (I read it in a day and a half - i couldnt put it down).

I personally did NOT predict the ending, and was soooo saddened by it.I thought the story was really interesting (I dont want to give things away in case someone is trying to decide whether to read it).It does have some descriptiveness about a man beating his wife (it's fiction) - but that is part of the story.A woman leaves her husband - finally - after years of beatings.Her whole abusive marriage has been made harder due to the fact that he's a police officer.Which will also make the fact that she's trying to disappear and change her identity (with the help of mostly anonymous helpers) much harder.She takes her son with her.

So to me it had all the properties of a great book:good story, entertaining, great writing, good character development, and it left me feeling like i had come away with 'something' after reading it.Enjoy!

Great story and quick read
Enjoyed book very much. Hard to put down! Liked the larger print-easier on my eyes.

A well written book
This is a very serious subject and I think the author researched the subject. It has some ups but mostly downs.

Very compelling but emotional
Not only is this a great read, but I think it's an important novel to read, especially for those who don't understand why many women stay in abusive relationships. Told in the first person's view, it really gives you a look inside the mind of an abused wife/mom, and the reader will begin to see why domestic violence so easily continues, and is exactly what it is, a trap and a vicious cycle. However, it also educates us on what a woman has to sacrifice in order to leave it behind. A sad, scary, hopeful, real and wonderful novel. It took me all of two days to read this book, and I'm a slow reader. What I mean is that I couldn't put it down. It made my heart beat faster, filled me with doomed suspense, and I shed many tears. ... Read more

Product Description
Who is Ida B. Applewood?She is a fourth grader like no other, living a life like no other, with a voice like no other, and a family like no other, and her story will resonate long after this audiobook has ended.How does Ida B. cope when outside forces--life, really--attempt to derail her and her family and her future?She enters her Black Period, and it is not pretty.But then, with the help of a patient teacher, a loyal cat and dog, her beloved apple trees, and parents who believe in the same things she does (even if they sometimes act as though they don't), the resilience that is the very essence of Ida B. triumphs . . . and Ida B. Applewood takes the hand that is extended and starts to grow up.

This first novel is both very funny and extraordinarily moving, and it introduces two shining stars, author Katherine Hanningan and Ida B. Applewood. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (82)

Endearing
Ida B. is the ultimate child.She has imaginary friends and many adventures.This book will have you reflecting on childhood left and right.It is touching and completely honest.I fell in love with the little girl who gets herself into trouble and who loves trees.She reminds me much of a character who would fit well in the little rascals.She's spunky and independent.This book is truly one of my favorites.I highly recommend it to people of all ages!

Unique and Beautiful!
Ida B. is a character I will remember long after I have closed the book. Getting into Ida B's head and sharing her thoughts and feelings was a most remarkable experience. Katherine Hannigan is a very gifted writer and I look forward to reading more of her work. Highly recommended!

Not what I first expected, but a great book.
I picked up "Ida B" at the library to read to my kids because it looked like a fun book, perhaps a "Junie B. Jones" character for kids who were just a little bit older. And it did have its moments of humor. My kids did laugh out loud on several occasions. Mostly, though, this book deals with some very big issues. Ida B. is an imaginative young lady, who spends her days talking with trees and the brook and learning at home. After a disastrous first couple weeks in kindergarten, her parents had decided to homeschool her, and she spent four wonderful years that way. As a homeschooling parent, I was very pleased with Hannigan's description of home education. But then, her mother gets cancer and everything goes wrong. Her mother is always tired. Her father has to sell some of their land to pay for medical bills. Worst of all, Ida has to go to public school. Her young life has crashed in a big way and she decides she is not going to take it sitting down. She makes up her mind to hate school, not make friends with anyone, scare off the people building a house on "her" land, and maintain only the minimum of polite conversation with her parents. During the book, readers get to see how these plans turn out for Ida B. It is a book that deals with very real issues of trust and love. Hannigan also includes a very sympathetic 4th grade teacher who never gives up on Ida and in the long run, makes all the difference. Ida learns some important lessons and so will readers. Don't let the cover or the title fool you.

most selfish unlikable character
I'm a 10-year-old home schooler, and I'm offended If people think that home schoolers are like that. Ida is a BRAT!I hated this book!

I love Ida B!
Ida B is a wonderful heroine: intelligent, independent, intropsective.Life throws a curve ball at her and she has trouble adjusting.The story is about her struggle to adjust, to cope with new things, with painful things, and to learn how to overcome them and become a better person because of it. I also love the voice. Ida B has a unique view of the world (though her speech patterns ARE much more southern than Wisconsin):

"Now, some people might stop me right there and say, 'Ida B, you could wait for eternity and a day and you're not going to hear one of those trees talking to you, let alone a brook. Trees don't have mouths, and they don't speak, and you might want to take yourself to the doctor's and get a very thorough check-up real soon.'
And after I took a minute to give my patience and forbearance a chance to recover my mouth from the rudeness that was itching to jump out of it, I would just say this: 'There's more than one way to tell each other things, and there's more than one way to listen, too. And if you've never heard a tree telling you something, then I'd say you don't really know how to listen just yet. But I'd be happy to give you a few pointers sometime.'"

I am eagerly looking forward to Hannigan's next book! ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Great plot by Caldwell
As hostilities flare between Catholic and Huguenot, Cardinal Richelieu relentlessly pursues the favors of Queen Anne. The story tells the saga of two brothers, Arsene de Richepin and Monsieur de Rechepin, personal secretary of Cardinal Richelieu. They represent two opposite worlds which never will meet each other. The author has a similar style as Dumas in telling some historical facts, the pre-revolutionary ideas ofPaul de Vitry and the high price he payed for this, the dramatic siege of La Rochelle by the french and english people.

The Eternal battle of good versus evil
It is a unique experience to read a period piece and feel that when you're finished you have learned things that can easily be applied to your own world. Connecting history like that to the present is very amazing.
Set in pre-revolutionary France in the days of Cardinal Richelieu, Taylor Caldwell brings to life the man the forever changed France in ways surpassed by none other than perhaps Napolean Bonaparte.Each character comes from opposing religions, ideals, and childhood experiences and they influence eachother in very profound ways.
Besides feeling connected to a period so distant from us, this novel explores the possibilities of human interaction and how much a person can change.If you enjoy history as well as exploring our own humanity and relationships we forge, you will not be disappointed by this book.The beginning is very exciting then it staggers a bit, but it picks up right till the end.Truly, a great book.

Taylor Caldwell delivers her customary high quality
Caldwell sets this novel in 17th century France, when the persecutions ofthe French Protestant Huguenots is about to resume after a hiatus oftolerance.She offers her usual vivid portraits of characters, especiallythe wily Cardinal Richelieu, and a vivid depiction of the bitterness of thepoverty of Paris peasants.The novel culminates in the dreadful siege ofRochelle, which led to the Huguenots' mass exodus to the New World, wherethey founded New Rochelle.Caldwell's usual flaws are evident here--why iseverone so "inexorable," so bitter, so alientated, soall-or-nothing in their approach? Still, this novel is a highlyentertaining account of this turbulent period in French history, andCaldwell's many fans won't be disappointed. ... Read more